Where's Grayleen?

If you are worry-wart please stop reading this post right now.   I know you’ll continue anyway, but by doing so you promise not to freak out.  Hey you, you know who you are – I said stop!

The bus ride from Arequipa to Cusco is advertised at 10 hours, which should be just enough time to get in a quick movie dubbed in Spanish, the standard game of Bingo (what better way to practice our numbers in Spanish?), and a solid 7 or 8 hours of rest. Everything proceeded as planned and we awoke early in the morning to stunning views of a high Andean plain with mountains all around us. The odd thing was that the bus wasn’t moving. In fact, we each remarked on how when we’d gone to the bathroom in the middle of the night we’d noticed a lack of movement. Neither of us thought much of it since buses stop a lot to change drivers, pay tolls, etc. But in daylight this just didn’t seem right.

Aileen asked the bus attendant what was up and came back to tell me that best she could interpret with her Spanish skills, there was an accident and the road was closed up ahead. It should be open by 7am and we’d be on our way. Expected arrival time was now 1pm (from 6am) and no, the attendant did not have anything to eat or drink at all. Being the experienced world travelers that we are (after 3 weeks on the road), we decided we’d go with the flow. Aileen went back to sleep and I entertained myself looking out the window. Walking backwards along the road were hundreds of colorfully dressed Andeans of all types. I took this as a sign that they had abandoned their rides doubting the road would open up soon.

After about 30 minutes, the attendant calls something out in Spanish which is repeated and passed forward by many passengers throughout the bus. Everyone rushed to close every single blind on the bus, completely blocking the views. I see locals around me peering through the tiny cracks and I do the same. Walking swiftly in what can only be described as a small swarm around the bus are fifteen to twenty men armed with machine guns, with presumably more outside of my view; this was not a happy sight. I hear four or five gunshots and decide to stop looking through the cracks in the window.

Oddly enough, the locals on the bus don’t seem to be too worried. I think I may have heard someone further up the bus say, “Policia,” or at least that is what I told myself.   The gunmen were gone and we started moving forward.  All of this reassured me greatly. After stop-and-go movement for a while, the attendant came on the loudspeaker again of which I only understand the word “dinero” or money. She then starts collecting money in a bag from the passengers. She gave this money to a checkpoint on the side of the road and, oddly, had the passengers at the front of the second floor of the bus write “Viva el Paro” in toothpaste on the front window. I was totally baffled but we started moving forward unimpeded.

The remainder of the bus ride was stifling hot, full of overflowing toilets, and extremely long. And we were famished. We arrived safely in Cusco at 3pm, 9 hours behind schedule. I can’t imagine being happier to be off of a bus!

Here’s what we learned after the fact:

• A group of 15,000 locals have been protesting outside of Arequipa for just over two weeks. They are protesting a dam that the government wants to build that will redirect their water to the city of Arequipa.
• All reports are that they are completely peaceful. They appear to like to shut down the roads and to collect tribute from those that pass by.
• “Viva el Paro” means simply, “Long live the protest!”

Personally, I’d have appreciated a big heads up from the bus company before leaving. We sent a note of warning to our new friends from New Zealand, Bec, David,and 10 month old Emelia, who were taking the bus a couple of days after us. Luckily they’d already learned about the protests. They’re currently stuck in Arequipa until Monday or Tuesday when the police return to work. This makes complete sense since, as Bec puts it, “obviously they only have crime on weekdays in Peru!”