Peru #4: Volver

On Tuesday (last week), I still hadn't heard anything about my missing suitcase.  I did some searching via the United Airlines website and found out that my suitcase supposedly arrived in Cusco the previous day.  I had a (very friendly) staff member at my school help me make calls to find out for sure.  She first called the United Airlines number at Lima airport, and they stated that my bag arrived in Cusco that day and was sent via LAN Airlines.  (This confused me because I flew Avianca, not LAN, to Cusco, and LAN is not even in the same airline network as United.)  She then called the LAN Airlines phone number at Cusco airport, and they confirmed that my suitcase was there.  Yay!  They also confirmed that I would have to come to the airport to get it, as baggage delivery service was not an option.  Boo!

The rest of my day was too busy to go to the airport, so I planned to go by taxi the following morning.  My host mother was nice enough to offer to ride with me, which completely surprised me but I was very grateful for.  This way, I wouldn't have to worry about being overcharged by the taxi drivers or not being able to communicate at the airport.  Luckily, our residence is not too far from the airport.

We arrived at the airport entrance and walked to the priority counter of LAN.  We were helped quickly, and within 5 minutes I had my bag.  The taxis here are generally very small cars, but my bag was just small enough to fit in the trunk (with a little help smushing it into place.)

It had a crazy journey, but the bag finally made it to my home in Peru.

If there was one bright spot to this pain in the neck experience, it was that it gave me an opportunity to interact with my host mother one-on-one, get to know her better, and see just how kind and generous with her time she is.  We chatted the entire time during the taxi rides, and I learned more about her background, her family, and what she does in her free time.  She is a huge animal lover, and Cusco has tons of stray dogs, so spends a lot of time helping to care for dogs in need.

When we got back home, I opened the suitcase and was surprised to see that everything was exactly as it was when I packed it.  I used to love Dalmatians when I was a kid, and had a huge collection of Dalmatian figurines and stuffed animals.  I brought a few of those stuffed animals to donate to the kids here.  Since Patricia has a Dalmatian, I showed her the stuffed animals and asked her if she wanted one.  She was so excited and thought they were so cute.  She chose the one that was her favorite.  It felt nice to give her something for helping me that day.

Shortly after that, I took the bus to school all by myself.  I was proud that I remembered the route well enough to get off at the right stop.  I joined my friends for lunch when they got out of class.  This time we ate a restaurant very close to school so that I would not run out of time before my class started.

Walking down one of the main city streets to the restaurant.

Unfortunately, this place ended up having very few vegetarian options, so I had to create my own dish out of other dishes.  I ended up really liking it though!

Avocado, cheese, and rice.  Surprisingly good!  Oh, and homework.

The rest of the day was pretty uneventful, as I had a lot of tasks to catch up on (such as my blog!)  Dinner was served very late again, but as usual it tasted very good.  Patricia made pesto (I think) rice with vegetables and apple-pear flan for dessert.

Yes, I am eating rice for the second time today.  A pretty usual occurrence here.

She called it flan, but to me it seemed to be a cake-flan combination.