Day 1: PDA and Mayonnaise

We settled for an expensive taxi to the hostel (S/ 55), and showered. It was glorious. The hostel guys spoke some english, which was useful.

After discovering that our feet stunk to high heaven, we left the hostel to explore Miraflores (a suburb in the south of Lima). We walked to a café for coffee and soda, then headed to a park by the beach called Parque del Amor. PDA central.

The breeze was nice and we ended up talking to guy from la selva (the jungle in the north of Peru) named Amaru. He didn´t emit any creepy vibes, and seemed like a very decent guy. He spoke some English, and with my little bit of Spanish, we were able to communicate rather well. We walked with him for a while, got some restaurant recommendations, and agreed to meet up the following day to see Barranco (a suburb to the southeast of Miraflores). He walked us to an exhibition of nativity scenes made by artisans from around the country. The theme was Andean Nativity Scene, and while a lot of them looked quite alike, some of them were outstanding. No pictures allowed, which was lame, but it was wonderful to see them all--we would not have found the place on our own.

It was getting dark, so we parted ways. We promptly forgot his dinner recommendations after discovering that one of them was more bar than restaurant, and walked down a tourist trap (presumbly) known as pizza st. (The guy at the hostel had suggested sushi--really?) We stopped at one with waitresses who promised us a free drink. We sat down, and were not given free drinks. The meal deteriorated from there.

First of all, we blind ordered two things off the "Peruvian Food" menú that sounded good--yellow mashed potatoes with chicken, and avocado with vegetables. The waitress appeared to have lost her wits somewhere earlier in life and was confused about how many entrees we were ordering. However, she soon figured out that we wanted one of each.

When she brought out the glass bottle of water with metal cap, she took a wine opener and attempted to open the bottle. Being unsuccessful (lack of sufficient pressure, I believe), she retreated to the kitchen to get help. She returned with the open bottle and pour water for each of us. It is unknown whether she noticed our giggles.

A few minutes later, she made a big deal of putting down our napkins and silverware horizontally and very carefully. The whole process took a full minute.
By this point, Carrie quipped, "Well, at least the food can´t be that bad."

The waitress brought out two plates of food on a serving tray, and seemed to be untrained in lifting one off without almost dropping the other. At this point, I must say that we completely regret not photographing our food before eating, because each plate was truly a work of art.

Mayonnaise art. Each plate was decorated with curly-qs of mayonnaise, with paprika sprinkled on top. The mashed potatoes entreé was in the shape of a small round cake, vertical sides and everything. The top was also decorated with lattice decorations of mayonnaise, and there were four sliced black olives atop it. I barely noticed the two half hard-boiled eggs on each side of the cake potatoes.

However, the other was even more epic. They had taken an avocado, sliced it in half, and filled it with chicken salad. Atop the avocado itself was a giant glob of mayonnaise, about the size of the entire avocado itself.

After giving each other the look of impending doom, we dug into the entreés, unsure what we would find. It turned out to be mayonnaise-y chicken salad. I think. Now, Carrie´s not a huge fan of mayonnaise, and I have to admit, I can only eat it in relatively small quantities. Ergo, the entire meal was digusting.

The food had been expensive, but not knowing enough Spanish to complain, we decided to chalk up the meal as "an experience", pay, and leave. We paid S/ 29 for the entire mess and ran.

Right into a really short guy trying to cross the street who started talking to us (in English) as we walked into the park. It was his New Years (still drunk, perhaps?) and he offered to buy us drinks. But "no sex". Though we were "fucking attractive". "Me, I am 31." He looked 51. We shook him off, as you would a tiny yapping dog.

I steered us back to a tiny hole in the wall restaurant, where I got a cheese sandwich and Carrie got a fruit salad (I had to pick out the bananas for her). It was much much better and we laughed about the mayonnaise, which became something of a running joke until we encountered another fantastic inside joke the following day.

Day 0: Victorian England and Turbulence

After an intense day of travel from our respective homes, Carrie and I planned to land at LAX the same day (the 3rd). I arrived at noon and watched American Dad! and Pride and Prejudice, the Keira Knightley version. I want a Mr. Darcy. Carrie arrived at 4pm, walked to my terminal (oh, LAX, how we hate you) and we decided to wait outside for Tedders, who had agreed to pick us up and take our luggage. He was our savior. Two hours later, he arrived, after two calls from Sardimonster, who wanted to meet up with us, and three failed status update inquirys. Anyway, he picked us up, took us to Salvadorean food (huzzah!), took us back to his house to leave our stuff, asked us creepily if we wanted a drink, and even lent me some headphones.

The interesting thing about TACA airlines is that pretty much everyone flying it is going to visit family or head home--thus, it is assumed at the counter that you´ll be able to communicate in Spanish. We did that just fine, but then the woman at the counter stared at our tickets for a good 10 minutes without saying anything, which was terrifying because we´d booked the tickets on a not very well-known website, and thus were concerned that the flight did not exist. Thankfully, it did, and we went through security without a problem.

We lay down in the terminal and made a few observations:

I am always in the way, especially when on the floor.

Only douches play guitar in the airport at midnight.

Even airline workers dislike the tendency for people to line up before boarding because it´s so incredibly inconvenient.

We boarded the flight to San Salvador (first leg) and discovered that turbulence is actually quite terrifying. I totally considered praying when we hit turbulence for the second time and the pilot told us that the seatbelt sign was mandatory and there would be no bathroom use for a good 10 minutes as we flew through it. Then I thought about how good it was that I was wearing real shoes so I could walk through broken glass if we did crash. What I said to Carrie was, "Ah, the Pacific Ocean¨.

The San Salvador airport had a tiny little stand in front of the flight to Miama. The extra security for flights to the U.S. They were checking everything though. What does the U.S. expect from countries without a ton of infrastructure? The flight to Lima took another 5 hours, and I really can´t remember it at all. I think I slept or something. A flight attendant woke us up about an hour before landing with food. Cheese crepes. Yum.

We landed, proceeded to discuss our need for showers, and left the airport in a hurry after going through immigration to find a taxi.