Welcome to part two of my Huancayo entry! It took a while, but I got there!

I'm now in Wellington, with fond memories of Huancayo. I left there at the beginning of July, but if feels like forever ago. Let´s see what I can remember...

FOOD

Lots of starch! I coudn´t have done the paleo diet here! (Probably not in the rest of Sth America either for that matter, save Argentina or Brazil maybe, if I ate meat). I had breakfasts and lunches at my homestay and Hilda is a great cook. Delicious food every day, but like the food here, it´s pretty starchy. Pasta, rice, potatoes, beans, sometimes up to three on one plate! But there are also lots of salads and vegetables. The fresh produce here is really lovely, which I wasn´t expecting for some reason. For breakfast I would usually get yoghurt or fresh juice and bread and cheese. Hilda would put the bread and cheese into a toasted sandwich maker - mmmm! I would usually not have time to eat them all (she´d do about four or five), so I would be sent off for the day with a bag of toasted bread and cheese!

There are some good bakeries around too and I made it my mission to try every non-meat item at one particularly good bakery. I never quite made it! In fact, I didn´t make it there for a couple of weeks. I tried to find it on my last day to have one last pig-out, but I forgot where it was and ran out of time to try and it find it.

Peruvians seem to like sweet stuff. The kids at nursery often arrived with bags filled with jelly. They would tear a hole in a corner and suck the jelly out. Their juice was often brought in this way too. It probably wouldn´t surprise you to know that many of them had terrible teeth. One little boy in particular, the one who was a little terror, had rotting teeth. He will be 4 in November. I did wonder if the reason he was so awful at times was because he was in pain due to his teeth.

My favourite foods, apart from the occasional empanada de queso, or cheese empanada, were anything with avocado, papas a la Huancaína (potatoes with a slightly spicy cheese sauce, served cold) and the best ever scorched almonds - the Vizzio brand. I ate waaaay too many of them. They even made it into the goodbye cake Ria and Elin cooked for me and Aidan!

PEOPLE

The people of Huancayo were lovely. Apart from Juliana and my host family, the people I came into the most frequent contact with were the ladies at the nursery, the internet cafe owner and the staff at the local supermercado. The security guard there, Juan, is a lovely old man, missing his front teeth, which made his Spanish even harder for me to understand. He greeted me (and other volunteers) with a smile and a salute, and sometimes a bow too! A couple of times when I was on the other side of the road, he even crossed over to say hi! The staff at the supermarket got used to me as well, I think, and were very patient with me and my bungled attempts at speaking their language. At least I tried!

I only had one issue there and that was with a taxi driver who decided to keep the 50c change I was owed. Here you agree on the price of the ride before you go, and we had agreed on S/. 4.50. A bit steep, but it was getting late and I was tired and just wanted to go home, so I agreed. He took me to a part of Pio Pata (where I was staying) that I hadn´t been to before and I tried to say I wasn´t familiar with the place. He kept talking in Spanish, I kept telling him in Spanish that I didn´t understand him and didn´t speak Spanish well. We ended up driving round in circles until I saw a part I recognised and we eventually ended up outside the house. I should have given him the 4.50 in change, but gave a S/. 5 coin. He rubbed the coin and then put it away and said "completar". WTF?! Ok, I know it´s just 50c, but it´s the principle right? He indicated that he should keep the change because he couldn´t find the place and went round in circles. Not my fault; you´re the taxi driver and should know how to find places (although in his defence, there are hardly any street signs here). So we argued in Spanish, which consisted of me going "No!" several times, and I said some English too. I eventually got out of the car and slammed the door and called him something. I walked to the front door of my homestay rather quickly, and he drove off yelling something very loudly at me. I was quite glad at that particular point in time that I didn't understand what he said, as no doubt it would have offended and/or infuriated me.

DRIVERS

OMG, maniac drivers on a death wish abound in this place! I don't know how many of them actually have a licence, or if they took any driving lessons. It made life interesting, and I never got run over, or saw it happen to anyone else, or any of the many (street savvy) stray dogs around the place. But travelling in taxis could be like being on a thrill ride sometimes, and most of them would let in more than the car was actually meant to take. On our way to Concepcion (the first visit), six of us rode in a car that should only have taken four passengers. In the front seat, one of the girls was sitting on the lap of another girl, and in the back four of us managed to squish in, although one of us was only half sitting on the seat! Seatbelts, if they were even there, were optional. On the second visit there, the two guys sat in the boot of the stationwagon, which meant there was a bit more room for everyone.

The buses in Huancayo were actually minivans that had been modified with seats in the back. Some were nicer and bigger than others. To get to the nursery, I'd have to take a bus there and back as it was too far to walk. Sometimes we would catch something that was more like a bus as we'd know it in NZ, but they weren't flash by any means. And as soon as the last passenger to get on had a toe on the step, the bus would take off as fast as possible, so you had to make sure you had grabbed onto something so you didn't fall. One time I didn't manage to grab onto anything in time and ended up falling chest-first on to a male passenger. He made a noise like he was in pain, but given that his face ended up in my boobs, I doubt he was!

Each bus had a driver and a person who would call out from the side door where each bus was going, such as "Chupaca! Chupaca! Chupaca!", which was a place near Huancayo. I did wonder how many of these people were injured in the course of their work, as it was a dangerous job. The sliding door would often be opened before the fast moving bus had come to a stop, and they would jump back on it when it was in motion too.

They did play some good music on there sometimes, usually Peruvian/Andean, but sometimes stuff that I actually recognised. Sometimes they were decorated as well, for Father's Day for example.

The seats were quite close together, which is fine when you are a short Peruvian, but a bit squished when you are a Westerner, even a 165cm shorty such as me! I quite often had my legs out in the little aisle as it could be a bit uncomfortable otherwise.

That's all I can think of for now. If I remember anything else, I'll update it!