Lima

Well, I spent 3 days in Lima. After being told it was a shithole I was pleasantly suprised. I was staying in the ultra trendy and rich Miraflores, which is complete with huge American style shopping malls, department stores, restaurants and bars. Quite a contrast to some of the slum type towns high on the hills. However it was good to be in a nice big city as I needed to stock up on supplies which were hard to come by in Cuba. It was nice just to chill out for a while. I was staying in a pretty cool hostel, and met some very interesting people. Including Eric a 40 Brit who spend 3 weeks of hell in Venezuela and was chilling out in Lima, however in the 3 days that I was there I managed to watch him go from a normal person to a wreck after a solid 3 day bender of drinking (I am talking from 10am to 4-5am), cocaine from random taxi drivers, and hanging out with peruvian hookers. Then there was Sean who actually was very interesting. He works for the US state department as a lawyer and has spent the last 9 months in Iraq (Baghdad and Kabul). Needless to say he had some very interesting stories to tell and he has worked in some pretty amazing places (at times for the UN). Sean and I spent an afternoon downtown visiting the Plaza de Armas and some museums. But 3 days in the city is enough, I am ready to hit the real Peru.