As half past midnight curls around us, the tv generously shares its three channels it can pick up here in the Sacred Valley: one is a sort of local sports channel, one shows psuedo-cultural muck, and the last shows dubious dubbed horror movies. Tonight's special feature is 'Bloodrayne: The Third Reich'. If you get the chance, don't. Just don't.
Yesterday was a bit of a write-off, with one very notable email. We awoke to Sarah wishing she was dead. My diagnostic technique is good, but I couldn't narrow it down from soroche (altitude sickness, and unlikely given that we had descended 500m since Cusco, although Sarah swore she had read the illness could kick in afterwards), a recurrence of the stomach bug from Lima (once again unlikely, given that she has been on nothing but bottled water for a couple of weeks now, not even enjoying tea or coffee), or possibly some sort of funky foreign flu bug (who knows?). Whatever it was, it looked miserable.
No chance of breakfast for her. I settled myself down with tablet and keyboard, having had enough with the UK Passport Office and being messed around. Another 72 hours had passed, no one had contacted us. No surprises there. It is now more than four weeks since our applications were received at Peterborough. I tried to call the office yet again, but the phone lines are down in Ollantaytambo, so I resort to writing a comprehensive report on how we have been let down by all involved. When the UK Passport Office's General Enquiry Form refuses to send with my tirade, enough is enough. Back to the locutoria, onto the phone, make my way through to the Belfast office yet again. This time I talk to Scott. I apologise for him knowing nothing about our case, then bombard him with our story.
To cut that miserable story short, yet another 'escalation form' has been sent off to the 'escalation team' who, judging by the amount of escalating that has happened so far, have pressed the big red STOP button on the side of the escalator and stood there waiting for a security guard to come over and restart it. THERE IS NO SECURITY GUARD, ESCALATION TEAM.
Scott gives me the (incorrect) email address for the Complaints Department in Newport. I google it before sending the email. I have been doing this long enough to know when a conspiracy is taking place. I also forward the email to Rev William McCrea MP who has kindly been assisting with our inquiries. Something tells me there will be some sore heads on Tuesday when people read this. I am rather proud of my work.
All done with Friday's passport business, I took watch over Sarah with the tablet, and whilst the poor dear writhed in discomfort I considered our future plans. We put off heading to Aguas Calientes until Monday, booking ourselves into Hospedaje Inti Killa for another three days, to give her a chance to recover. I then settled down and played a few games on the tablet as she slept: I have rediscovered my love of puzzle games. After a childhood spent moving blocks around to match them up, Tetris, Puzznic, Spindizzy, Columns, a whole host more, I have found a whole bunch of very simple games on Android for free. Particularly addictive is Red Stone, a tile-sliding game that has so far consumed about 6 hours of my time. Seriously, download it and begin to hate yourself.
Sarah doesn't look any better with more sleep. She didn't get much from about 3 am, when a full scale riot seemed to be happening outside our window. Turns out some young chap and his girlfriend were having a domestic and an awful lot of other people were getting involved. Then someone got knocked out. Then the police turned up. It was nice and quite for a couple of hours. At 6am, the Germans in the room beside us got up. One of them seems to have TB. The rest seem to be deaf. Otherwise how could you explain the snorting, hawking, choking, coughing, shouting, guldering, wailing and general effing racket they made. Unfortunately we share a partition between our bathrooms and can hear every single breath like it was our own. Sarah, whose tolerance for people with sinus problems is incredibly limited at the best of times, battered the walls, shrieked at them to shut up, banged some more walls, and eventually some sort of peace descended upon our room. On this occasion she was entirely right, it was bloody horrid. Why do other nations find it so acceptable to suck up their nasal waste products so noisily? To spit in the street? Why are the British the only ones with handkerchiefs? Why do we blow our noses? I have advised Sarah to turn her disgust into an article for the Beeb and begin her journalistic career.
By 2pm I was starting to get worried by the discomfort of the wee princess, especially when the source of her misery was obscured to me. I tried, with the aid of Dante the hostal owner, to get a doctor, but none was forthcoming. Instead we tried very, very very strong pain killers. Sarah took one, passed out for three hours, and woke up virtually pain-free. A bloody miracle. Too many strange antibiotics and pills and whatnot for her system recently, not to mention all these altitudinal changes and water-borne diseases. As much as we love Peru, there are definite downsides to visiting this country, especially for those with sensitive or weakened immune systems.
We venture out for a quick walk about 9.30pm for fresh air and dinner. It's Friday night. The town is virtually deserted. After spending the guts of the holiday getting used to South American dining times stretching far into the evening, Peru drops us right back into British meal times. Breakfast is around 8am, lunch between 11.30am and 2.30pm, and dinner is concluded by 9.30pm. After that you really ought to be having a drink in a bar or in bed. Peru starts early and sleeps early too.
So we pick up take-away burger and chips from Cafe Corazon, but what we think is a delicious chicken burger and chips turns out to be a veggie burger with caramelised onions on it, chips on the side accompanied by a fairly sizable salad. Not bad for less than a fiver!
So we retire to our room, hoping against hope for a decent movie in English on tv. Not a chance of that, but we do manage to catch two spectaculars; Stitches, a black-comedy Irish horror movie that's better than it sounds, and The Haunting Of Molly Hartley, which somehow translated into Spanish as La Profecia del Diablo, or the Prophecy of the Devil, and which was derided on IMDB.com as being 'terrible, but at least everyone in it is good-looking', which really doesn't do justice to how awful a movie this is, nor how well styled everyone's hair is in it.
Saturday morning is typically warm, bright, clear and friendly, before clouding over, much like every other day. Sarah is much improved and manages a bap with scrambled eggs on it and even a glass of fruit juice, diabetes be damned (albeit briefly). I eagerly read the BBC football updates, knowing that there are two people in Old Trafford, one of whom will be delighted whichever way the game goes. No surprises, Utd are dire. Killer may be buying the pints this evening. Sarah is going mad as our snorting Germans next door have been replaced with a Spaniard who absolutely has a chest infection that will kill him in the next five minutes. And lung cancer. And TB. What a combination. No wonder his girlfriend looks so grave.
A band passes carrying little podiums bearing saints. Today is San Isidro day, and the town is celebrating, walking to and from places and churches and beating out some tunes. Its a little like the Twelfth, only less uniforms and more like Mardi Gras. Rockets and fireworks having been going off for two days now, scaring the street dogs and Sarah alike. They ignite on one side of the town then the sound ricochets off the mountains and back in on us, so everything happens in slightly delayed stereo. Its a cheap way to get twice the effect. We thought the previous day was the Peruvian national celebration of the Battle of Callao, when they fought off the returning Spanish who were trying to invade South America again (maybe) (you should read how both sides thought they had one, a very curious tale), but it seems it was also a saints day of some sort.
We also have a rooster outside our window who crows about 6am. Sarah is his biggest fan.
We wander to the market at the foot of the ruins and buy some pruck at bargain prices. We have a nice cup of coffee and a brownie. We return to the hostel and I unpack my entire rucksack and employ a new plan: put all my presents and pruck in the rucksack, put all my clothes that I have left into my little red Peruvian carry-on bag, and all books and food can go into my remaining black shoulder bag. It seems like a brilliant idea. I take out my two bags of paperwork from this trip, all my receipts and maps, bus tickets, ATM slips, guides, and meaningless notes, and try to dispose of as much of it as possible. Four hours later, I've ditched about a dozen illegible receipts and the instructions to my Acer tablet. At least its all in order now though. I should have sent our police reports home with our passport applications in March, that would have made far more sense. I also gave all duplicate bus tickets and whatnot to Sarah, after she generously gave me some a few weeks back. All square now!
With memories of last night floating in our heads, we step out at 7.30pm for dinner, starving, and end up in Papacho's on the corner of the Plaza de Armas, and a full thirty seconds walk from our bedroom door. There, several large parties are causing the two waitresses a great deal of stress, but fortunately we aren't about to chew our own hands off, too busy laughing at other people. We both agree a bowl of quinoa soup and a big dirty cheeseburger and chips is the way to go, though we are forced to work our way through a bottle of CYT Frontera Cab Sauv, which can now safely be described as 'burger wine', as I'm not sure I'd pair it with anything more sophisticated. Still, all that for PNS$107 between us was acceptable.
And so our evening evapourated into stuffing things into my rucksack, preparing estimates of the cost of the next week or two, and watching boxing highlights and crap horror. Nothing to be proud of there. As I finish typing this, it looks a lot like the local TV signal repeater gets turned off in the early hours of the morning. No more bad vampires movies tonight...
Yesterday was a bit of a write-off, with one very notable email. We awoke to Sarah wishing she was dead. My diagnostic technique is good, but I couldn't narrow it down from soroche (altitude sickness, and unlikely given that we had descended 500m since Cusco, although Sarah swore she had read the illness could kick in afterwards), a recurrence of the stomach bug from Lima (once again unlikely, given that she has been on nothing but bottled water for a couple of weeks now, not even enjoying tea or coffee), or possibly some sort of funky foreign flu bug (who knows?). Whatever it was, it looked miserable.
No chance of breakfast for her. I settled myself down with tablet and keyboard, having had enough with the UK Passport Office and being messed around. Another 72 hours had passed, no one had contacted us. No surprises there. It is now more than four weeks since our applications were received at Peterborough. I tried to call the office yet again, but the phone lines are down in Ollantaytambo, so I resort to writing a comprehensive report on how we have been let down by all involved. When the UK Passport Office's General Enquiry Form refuses to send with my tirade, enough is enough. Back to the locutoria, onto the phone, make my way through to the Belfast office yet again. This time I talk to Scott. I apologise for him knowing nothing about our case, then bombard him with our story.
To cut that miserable story short, yet another 'escalation form' has been sent off to the 'escalation team' who, judging by the amount of escalating that has happened so far, have pressed the big red STOP button on the side of the escalator and stood there waiting for a security guard to come over and restart it. THERE IS NO SECURITY GUARD, ESCALATION TEAM.
Scott gives me the (incorrect) email address for the Complaints Department in Newport. I google it before sending the email. I have been doing this long enough to know when a conspiracy is taking place. I also forward the email to Rev William McCrea MP who has kindly been assisting with our inquiries. Something tells me there will be some sore heads on Tuesday when people read this. I am rather proud of my work.
All done with Friday's passport business, I took watch over Sarah with the tablet, and whilst the poor dear writhed in discomfort I considered our future plans. We put off heading to Aguas Calientes until Monday, booking ourselves into Hospedaje Inti Killa for another three days, to give her a chance to recover. I then settled down and played a few games on the tablet as she slept: I have rediscovered my love of puzzle games. After a childhood spent moving blocks around to match them up, Tetris, Puzznic, Spindizzy, Columns, a whole host more, I have found a whole bunch of very simple games on Android for free. Particularly addictive is Red Stone, a tile-sliding game that has so far consumed about 6 hours of my time. Seriously, download it and begin to hate yourself.
Sarah doesn't look any better with more sleep. She didn't get much from about 3 am, when a full scale riot seemed to be happening outside our window. Turns out some young chap and his girlfriend were having a domestic and an awful lot of other people were getting involved. Then someone got knocked out. Then the police turned up. It was nice and quite for a couple of hours. At 6am, the Germans in the room beside us got up. One of them seems to have TB. The rest seem to be deaf. Otherwise how could you explain the snorting, hawking, choking, coughing, shouting, guldering, wailing and general effing racket they made. Unfortunately we share a partition between our bathrooms and can hear every single breath like it was our own. Sarah, whose tolerance for people with sinus problems is incredibly limited at the best of times, battered the walls, shrieked at them to shut up, banged some more walls, and eventually some sort of peace descended upon our room. On this occasion she was entirely right, it was bloody horrid. Why do other nations find it so acceptable to suck up their nasal waste products so noisily? To spit in the street? Why are the British the only ones with handkerchiefs? Why do we blow our noses? I have advised Sarah to turn her disgust into an article for the Beeb and begin her journalistic career.
By 2pm I was starting to get worried by the discomfort of the wee princess, especially when the source of her misery was obscured to me. I tried, with the aid of Dante the hostal owner, to get a doctor, but none was forthcoming. Instead we tried very, very very strong pain killers. Sarah took one, passed out for three hours, and woke up virtually pain-free. A bloody miracle. Too many strange antibiotics and pills and whatnot for her system recently, not to mention all these altitudinal changes and water-borne diseases. As much as we love Peru, there are definite downsides to visiting this country, especially for those with sensitive or weakened immune systems.
We venture out for a quick walk about 9.30pm for fresh air and dinner. It's Friday night. The town is virtually deserted. After spending the guts of the holiday getting used to South American dining times stretching far into the evening, Peru drops us right back into British meal times. Breakfast is around 8am, lunch between 11.30am and 2.30pm, and dinner is concluded by 9.30pm. After that you really ought to be having a drink in a bar or in bed. Peru starts early and sleeps early too.
So we pick up take-away burger and chips from Cafe Corazon, but what we think is a delicious chicken burger and chips turns out to be a veggie burger with caramelised onions on it, chips on the side accompanied by a fairly sizable salad. Not bad for less than a fiver!
So we retire to our room, hoping against hope for a decent movie in English on tv. Not a chance of that, but we do manage to catch two spectaculars; Stitches, a black-comedy Irish horror movie that's better than it sounds, and The Haunting Of Molly Hartley, which somehow translated into Spanish as La Profecia del Diablo, or the Prophecy of the Devil, and which was derided on IMDB.com as being 'terrible, but at least everyone in it is good-looking', which really doesn't do justice to how awful a movie this is, nor how well styled everyone's hair is in it.
Saturday morning is typically warm, bright, clear and friendly, before clouding over, much like every other day. Sarah is much improved and manages a bap with scrambled eggs on it and even a glass of fruit juice, diabetes be damned (albeit briefly). I eagerly read the BBC football updates, knowing that there are two people in Old Trafford, one of whom will be delighted whichever way the game goes. No surprises, Utd are dire. Killer may be buying the pints this evening. Sarah is going mad as our snorting Germans next door have been replaced with a Spaniard who absolutely has a chest infection that will kill him in the next five minutes. And lung cancer. And TB. What a combination. No wonder his girlfriend looks so grave.
A band passes carrying little podiums bearing saints. Today is San Isidro day, and the town is celebrating, walking to and from places and churches and beating out some tunes. Its a little like the Twelfth, only less uniforms and more like Mardi Gras. Rockets and fireworks having been going off for two days now, scaring the street dogs and Sarah alike. They ignite on one side of the town then the sound ricochets off the mountains and back in on us, so everything happens in slightly delayed stereo. Its a cheap way to get twice the effect. We thought the previous day was the Peruvian national celebration of the Battle of Callao, when they fought off the returning Spanish who were trying to invade South America again (maybe) (you should read how both sides thought they had one, a very curious tale), but it seems it was also a saints day of some sort.
We also have a rooster outside our window who crows about 6am. Sarah is his biggest fan.
We wander to the market at the foot of the ruins and buy some pruck at bargain prices. We have a nice cup of coffee and a brownie. We return to the hostel and I unpack my entire rucksack and employ a new plan: put all my presents and pruck in the rucksack, put all my clothes that I have left into my little red Peruvian carry-on bag, and all books and food can go into my remaining black shoulder bag. It seems like a brilliant idea. I take out my two bags of paperwork from this trip, all my receipts and maps, bus tickets, ATM slips, guides, and meaningless notes, and try to dispose of as much of it as possible. Four hours later, I've ditched about a dozen illegible receipts and the instructions to my Acer tablet. At least its all in order now though. I should have sent our police reports home with our passport applications in March, that would have made far more sense. I also gave all duplicate bus tickets and whatnot to Sarah, after she generously gave me some a few weeks back. All square now!
With memories of last night floating in our heads, we step out at 7.30pm for dinner, starving, and end up in Papacho's on the corner of the Plaza de Armas, and a full thirty seconds walk from our bedroom door. There, several large parties are causing the two waitresses a great deal of stress, but fortunately we aren't about to chew our own hands off, too busy laughing at other people. We both agree a bowl of quinoa soup and a big dirty cheeseburger and chips is the way to go, though we are forced to work our way through a bottle of CYT Frontera Cab Sauv, which can now safely be described as 'burger wine', as I'm not sure I'd pair it with anything more sophisticated. Still, all that for PNS$107 between us was acceptable.
And so our evening evapourated into stuffing things into my rucksack, preparing estimates of the cost of the next week or two, and watching boxing highlights and crap horror. Nothing to be proud of there. As I finish typing this, it looks a lot like the local TV signal repeater gets turned off in the early hours of the morning. No more bad vampires movies tonight...
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