On Class

Winter has begun its slow slide into spring here; every once in awhile a little bit of blue will sneak into the sky and things will start to cast shadows. Enticed by the promise of sun, Jeff, Diego, and I joined with the few other people we know to head for Cieneguilla, a resort valley about an hour to the east of Lima. By some fluke of meteorology, Cieneguilla is fog-free year round, making this desert oasis a Palm Springs for Lima's upper class.

Out beyond the city, there is the most horrifying desert imaginable; dead walls of dust and rock roll into hills on either side of the two-lane road east. Nothing can scrape together an existence out there. I thought we were in a mine, like one of those big operations out in Utah where no one cares about the landscape as long as bauxite prices are high. Despite the fog, Lima is the driest major city in the world; goodness, I believe it.

Cieneguilla is really more of a single street than a town, a long straight burn through the valley flanked on either side by lawn clubs and country retreats. We got off our combi at our club, Mesa de Piedra, hidden behind a King-Kong gate. Consisting of a large outdoor restaurant, a pool, and an expanse of lawn, Mesa de Piedra was completely empty; it was 9.30am after all.

I spent the day lounging on the grass, harassing the two llamas near the entrance and otherwise doing nothing. Strangely, every so often a troupe of dancers would come out to the restaurant and do native dancing which, from what I saw, involves skipping a few times, stopping, and yelling, "Yah!' Very strange. Maybe the strangest part was that this wasn't some tourist enclave, this was a place for Limenos to relax in the winter. It's like if you went to the Balboa Bay Club and a bunch of Southerners came out and did a hoedown.

I should note the band, whose four-hour set of traditional Andean music included such traditional favorites as "Hotel California" and "El Condor Pasa." Nothing like late-70s rock on the pan flute.

An hour back to Lima, I took a shower and took a nap. The sun takes a lot out of a man, even in the winter.