Study Abroad Peru 2013: May 1: Day 5, Part 2 (Cusco)

For lunch we went down to the soccer stadium. While there we met some kids with a soccer ball and a few of us started a match with them. Even though the kids were about half of our height, they had great ball handling skills and significantly more energy than we did. Because it was a holiday (Labor Day) all of the kids were out of school and our match drew many of them to play and watch.

Just hanging out with our new hairdressers.
Please excuse my blindingly white skin.

Some of the little girls decided to sit right behind us and watch. (Possibly based on their knowledge that we had candy, and would probably hand it over at some point) This eventually turned into a them braiding our hair. Almost all Peruvian women have long beautiful hair worn in one or two long simple braids, so their little girls know how to braid earlier than most American girls. They were very talented and not at all afraid to yank hair exactly where they wanted it to go.

Watching the white kids do something
with shiny metal...

Eventually our lunch was over and we went back to measuring the cookstoves and their emissions during dinner. However, because of the holiday they weren't going to be making dinner, something we didn't learn until we should up at the houses we had arranged to be at earlier that day, until after we had to head down to Cusco (so that we weren't traveling on small mountain roads in the dark). So instead we helped the oven team work on their models (This team was working to build ovens from sheet metal that fit on top of the propane stoves owned by some Peruvians.) and sent Porter (one of our two Spanish speakers) and Hernan (our guide in Lima and Cusco who went along to establish a good reputation) tracting for appointments for the next day. They were successful and soon after they returned we all packed and headed down to Cusco.

Taking a turn...

On our way down we stopped at the Blanco Christo that over looks Cusco and took some pictures. After we got down the hill we had a little extra time so several of us headed to the artisan's market to take a look at the crafts sold by locals. It was a lot of fun to even just look at all of the delicately crafted pieces. They included jewlry, clothes of all varieties, crockery, and other items.

One of the dancers at dinner...

For dinner we joined the rest of the group for a dinner at Don Antonio's. There was an endless buffet of food and desserts. Most of the food was very good. The cuy (hamster) had too much of a salt flavor for my taste, however, the alpaca was very tasty and I might prefer it over a beef steak.

A stop at the
Blanco Cristo statue

Probably the best part of dinner was the show. First we were entertained by a live band playing traditional Incan songs, traditional Peruvian songs, and some more popular Latin tunes. The band was followed by a series of dancers performing a variety of Incan and Latin dances. The dancing culminated with members of the audience including Megan, Porter and Jay dancing on stage. As we walked home all were in high spirits. Porter even decided that we should dance our way home for a couple of blocks, which culminated in some flipping. All in all it was a great day and night.