“I know. Orange you glad I’m stopping?”
Lemon chewed her apple very loudly, and we had to hurry to keep pace with her.
Aguacaliente is a very small resort town. Basically it’s a collection of hotels and shops that only serves as a resting stop for people to go up the mountain and see Machu Picchu. It reminded me of ski resorts in Colorado, but really, really cheap.
We passed shops and outdoor stalls and some pretty sketchy alleyways in the small, narrow streets that I was thankful Lemon didn’t care to lead us down. A fast-flowing river ran through the center of the town and this washed away the sound of Lemon’s chewing as she guided us to the hostel where we were to spend the night.
Lemon checked us in, still nibbling on her apple core. The workers at the hostel looked at us with the same disdain Lemon did, even though I hadn’t made a single fruit-based joke in their presence.
“Um, Miss Lemon,” Freddy asked after we’d been checked in.
“What?” Lemon asked, repeating her crooked-hipped glare.
“I was told to ask for Jorge as a tour guide for tomorrow?”
“Do you have a stick?”
“Umm.” Freddy began groping about his backpack and his pocket-less shirt, hoping a stick would magically appear.
“Why do we need a stick?” I asked.
“Don’t question it, Joe, just go with it. Probably a local custom.”
“It doesn’t hurt to ask. Why do we need a stick?”
“You want me to call Jorge for you or not?” Lemon asked.
“Yes, yes,” Freddy insisted, “We’ll find a stick.”
Lemon glared at us a moment, then ate the entire remains of her apple core in one bite. “Okay.”
We had similar greetings from the other people working in that town, especially from the little convenience store where we bought our meager dinner and prepared a sack lunch and extra water bottles for the hike the next day. You’d think a town entirely dependent on tourists would be friendlier. But I guess if your parents call you Lemon, you have an excuse to be a little sour.
I told that joke to Freddy and he hit me with the stick he found.
Chapter 7
There are some people who wake up at four o’clock in the morning to hike the trail to Machu Picchu to the accompaniment of the rising sun that splits the hazy clouds rolling across ever-lightening trails of impenetrable green.
Freddy and I are not those people.
We took the bus.
Of course the bus had its own benefits. For one, those ever-lightening trails of impenetrable green tended to be covered in slippery rocks and maybe a thug or two looking to completely ruin an enlightening experience with a knife and desire for what a hiker has in his pockets. I also knew that we’d be hiking a ton so if we could do on a bus in ten minutes what would take an hour hiking, I was game.
Nearly as harrowing as the car ride to Aguacaliente, the bus wound up a steep embankment so narrow it looked like the slightest twitch of the steering wheel would send us hurtling toward CNN.com’s ‘this just in’ section. We would go maybe a hundred feet horizontally before making a ninety degree turn the opposite direction, crisscrossing our way up the summit. The scariest but also most impressive parts were when the full-length bus would cross paths with another full-length bus that was heading down to collect more passengers. This involved centimeters of distance as the two swerved around each other, an exhalation away from sending both off the side. No disaster occurred, however, and we were too distracted by the view to worry.
At each turn we could look down and see the village of Aguacaliente and its rushing river below grow ever smaller, the green mountains ever larger, the clouds ever closer. Seeing the mists rolling over peaks and lofting around valleys as invisible gusts carried up and around us by the full light of the morning sun was only the beginning of the day’s delights.
“Did you bring a stick?” Freddy asked, not paying near enough attention to my adjective-heavy description of the surrounding terrain.
“They let you on the bus with a stick?” I asked.
Freddy opened his little pack that contained his granola bars and water bottles. Beside these was a stout, short stick, the same one he hit me with the night before. “You should have gotten a stick.”
“I’ll find one when we’re up there.”
“You should have brought one. Jorge might not accept a stick from where he could just get one. Why else would he ask you to bring a stick?”
“You’re stating this as if someone requesting people bring sticks to join his tour group is a logical thing.”
“Well did you at least remember your lunch?”
I patted my pockets, showing the granola bars, water bottles, and bag of Brazil nuts I’d purchased. “Chill, Freddy. Worry about the bus falling off the cliff; stop bothering me about sticks and lunch.”
When the bus finally made it safely to the top, Freddy rushed out the door, clutching his stick to his chest. I joined him at a little gathering area in front of the large wooden gates that opened to the Machu Picchu-access trail. Here we got maps and looked at a large drawing of Machu Picchu and the surrounding trails on a large, dated display.
“Where do we find Jorge?” Freddy asked.
“Let’s ask that park ranger,” I said, pointing out a man standing not far from the bustling crowd of tourists.
“How can you tell he’s a park ranger?”
“He’s the only one not moving toward the gate. Plus he’s got a nifty hat.”
Indeed the nifty hat, upon closer inspection, had both a wide brim and a fairly official-looking Peruvian badge on it. Since I guessed he didn’t speak English, I approached him and said, “Jorge?”
“Do you have a stick?” the ranger asked me in perfect English.
“Why do I need a stick?”
“I have one,” Freddy said and showed the stick to the ranger.
“Good stick,” the ranger said.
“What’s with the sticks?” I asked.
“Jorge is the tall one. He’ll be wearing a blue baseball cap.”
“Blue baseball cap?” I asked.
“Yes.”
“Does it have a logo? Or is it a plain blue baseball cap?”
“Just plain blue.”
I exchanged a look with Freddy. “You don’t think it’s…”
“Let’s just get in there,” Freddy insisted, “And go find a stick already.”
I found a stick. It was actually a broken piece of a walking staff, discarded at the entrance from someone who had probably broken it the previous day. It was worn, traveled through, and utterly useless. That’s probably why it was tossed into the woods at the park entrance.
“See?” I told Freddy, showing him the broken walking staff, “Stick.”
We gave our previously-purchased tickets to the angry ladies shoving people through the park gates’ turnstiles and eagerly entered the vast national preserve of Machu Picchu.
Just past the narrow gates, we were told that the guides were waiting at a large plateau up the hill. Steep, coated in grass and wet stones, and going up perhaps a hundred meters, the hill would be the first challenge of the day. “Alright, Freddy, you ready for this?” I asked.
“I’m fine, Joe. Hurry up, we want to get to the plateau before the tour starts,” Freddy said, taking a deep breath and joining me in the ascent.
Up the winding, narrow trail we went, marching beside several hundred other tourists who had woken up early enough for the morning tours. There was one incredibly fat kid with a Peruvian family and he was holding up the entire group. The kid must have been ten years old but he was wide as I was tall. At first I felt bad for desiring to throw him off the mountain for going so slow. But then I realized he’d probably just bounce like a beach ball on his way down.
Seriously, I don’t know if the kid expected there to be escalators or something but he wasn’t exactly having a good time sweating his way up the slope. And this was just the entrance! Word of ad
vice to parents: if your children are obese, don’t take them on physically-taxing vacations over a mile above sea level.
While my thoughts were for the moment focused on wanting to get past the fat kid in front of me, a sudden cresting of a final step onto the grassy plateau afforded me a view that silenced all other thoughts. Machu Picchu, the ancient and untouched city, lay below me on the wide, round top of a green and stone-colored mountain. The empty bones of gray-stone buildings shaped streets and homes, temples and squares in a city that could immediately be seen as a place of importance.
I was reminded of a fantasy as I looked at the city. Machu Picchu was a completely lifeless sight, though it sat amidst a gloriously green area. And the clouds, always the clouds that put a haze over the misty scene of the city below us in a kind of wonder that got the blood pumping with excitement for existence and the mystery of life.
A pair of llamas, bounding around the hill and grass without care for the people or danger of their trek, looked down on us from further up the hill. “Hi llama,” I said, my voice echoing down the hill. The llama did not reply.
Freddy and I walked further onto the plateau. It was more a field than a plateau, wide and grassy and big enough to host a very good game of football. You’d just have to be careful for the out of bounds lines.
From the field, Freddy and I could take a better look at the rest of the plateau that overlooked the city proper. The ruins themselves were below us, on an adjacent plateau. The plateau we stood on was a higher hill that looked to be the city’s agricultural center, since everything was grass and garden and held only a handful of buildings, while the lower was all stone structures and streets. At every side of this higher hill were stair-stepping gardens built into the steep sides of the slope.
I marveled at how these gardens were built jutting out flat, creating a platform for which food could be grown and leading to a ninety degree wall of cut stone that fell to another garden. This transformed what would have been a sustained slope of a hill into a stair-stepped pyramid that could quadruple the farmable land.
Aside from the one building near us in our field, and this looked a recent reproduction, none of the ruins had a roof or any other wooden feature. Only the stones had survived, skeletal remains to what may have once been a grand city.
“It’s beautiful,” I said.
Freddy remained silent, probably a more appropriate descriptor for the city of Machu Picchu.
And then we heard the voice of our tour guide.
“Hello. This is Ivan. Ivan normally make table, is good for health. Ivan want make table, but Ivan can’t make table because not many people buy table from small town middle nowhere. So now, Ivan is tour guide for Maju Piju tour, also good for health. Those who want come on tour, come with and give Ivan stick. Those who not want come on tour, Ivan not care. Ivan go over here now. Bring stick,” Ivan the tour guide said and walked a short distance from the cluster of tourists.
It was Ivan!
“Ivan!” I said, following after the enormous man. His thick arms waved like cannons on a warship and his scraggly black beard looked to be attacking his face rather than decorating it. Though it was quite chilly on the cloud-swept plateau, he wore only a comically-tight, stained white t-shirt and a plain blue baseball cap.
There were other Spanish, French, and even a Japanese-language tour guide. These were all Peruvian locals who spoke a second language. Our tour guide was Ivan.
“Ivan, Ivan!” I said, stepping around those brave English-speakers approaching Ivan with readied sticks and pre-paid tour tickets, “Ivan!”
“Spasiba. Spasiba,” Ivan said as he accepted the sticks and tickets.
“Ivan it’s Joe! Joe and Freddy!”
“Dah, thank you for stick.”
“No, Ivan, it’s Joe Stevens and Freddy Baxter!” I said, presenting Ivan my broken walking stick and ticket, holding the stick back when he tried to take it, “Remember us?”
“Is good stick. Give to Ivan.” Ivan took the stick, examining it a moment, before he actually acknowledged me. “Joe?”
“Yes. Remember us?”
“Dah.”
“What are you doing in Peru?” Freddy accused, holding out his stick when Ivan glared at him.
“Ivan was in Greece,” Ivan said, examining Freddy’s thick stick with an appreciative grin, “Ivan remember yelling at protesters. Ivan say, ‘Protestors. What for all the anger. Is Greece. Nice place what be, so be happy.’ Then Ivan get set on fire, is not good for health.”
“I don’t remember you catching on fire,” I said.
“Protestor set Ivan on fire. So Ivan beat protestor in head with two by four. Even trade.”
“What brought you to Peru?”
“Ivan have leave Russia because…”
“Yes we know that part already, Ivan you told us in Prague and Athens. Why are you here, on Machu Picchu?”
“Ah. Ivan come Maju Piju make table. Is why Ivan go most place. That and Ivan brother Dimitri try put Ivan head into wood chipper.”
“Harsh.”
“Dah. All start Ivan try go back to Russia, learn Ivan brother Dimitri not actually dead. Ivan brother Dimitri say to Ivan, Ivan, I not like you what say I was dead. But what Ivan to do; Ivan see brother Dimitri frozen. Ivan even use brother Dimitri as tool bench for make table, is good for health. So Ivan brother Dimitri come to Ivan shop, try put head in wood chipper.”
“I’m sorry about that, Ivan.”
“It okay. Ivan put brother head in wood.”
“That’s…ironic,” Freddy said.
“No, not iron. In wood. Ivan put Dimitri head in wood, not iron.”
“I mean…never mind.”
“So you hurt your brother and had to run away from prison?” I asked.
“Not this time. This time it Ivan mother. Ivan mother mad at Ivan for put Ivan brother Dimitry head in piece of wood. So we go far away from home as possible. Find Maju Piju. Ivan say, okay, Ivan make table in Maju Piju. Harder than Ivan think, now realize.”
“So I gotta ask, Ivan. What’s with the sticks?”
“Ivan take sticks home, make table. Is good for health.”
“And they call you Jorge why?” Freddy asked.
“Ivan not sure. Ivan name is Ivan, not Jorge. Most people call Ivan Jorge, is good for health. Suppose is not problem. But Ivan prefer called Ivan. Ivan also prefer make table. But world not perfect. So Ivan take world as world give. Called Jorge, give tour. Is good for health.”
At this point a crowd of people had gathered ready for the tour, and were thoroughly confused by our conversation. So Ivan cleared his throat and shouted to everyone in Russian. I think a couple people thought they were in the wrong tour, a feeling that didn’t diminish when Ivan actually spoke English.
“Okay, we start tour now. Welcome city Maju Piju,” Ivan said, waving a football-sized hand toward the city below us as a way of ceremony.
“Don’t you mean Machu Picchu?” one American woman said. She was one of the other twenty or so tourists in our group.
“Is what Ivan say, Maju Piju. Now. Most scholar agree, Maju Piju was pilgrimage, religious place. Very special, is good for health.”
“It’s pronounced Machu Picchu.”
“What wrong with Ivan words? Ivan say Maju Piju, is Maju Piju.”
“But it’s…”
“Ivan giving tour and you not give very good stick.” Ivan was holding the bundle of sticks we’d offered him. With one hand he was somehow able to remove the stick this woman had given him. He used it to point at her, shutting up all complaints.
“Not know why build,” Ivan continued, “Maju Piju is too important to be build for farm. Too middle nowhere for politics. Has to be religion. What most important is Spanish not find. Is why so preserved. Look. Look, is preserve.”
Ivan used his stick to point to the city below. At this point the llamas, who’d been munching on grass at the other end of the field, came bounding over to join us, rubbing against the
fat kid I’d complained about earlier as if he were little more than a very round scratching post.
“Good llama,” I whispered.
“Is good view,” Ivan explained and stepped away from the ledge overlooking the ruins. He walked back toward us, ignoring the crying fat kid and the pair of llamas. “Inca march away from Spanish. As they go, they abandon Maju Piju, go hide from Spanish in jungle. Not work. All die; king, people, dead from Spanish when burn jungle and cities. All but Maju Piju. Not till found in century twenty. It very well preserved. But is only five hundred years old, so not that impressive you ask Ivan.”
“It’s only five hundred years old?” Freddy asked as the llamas grew bored with the fat kid and started walking toward our group. They casually walked around us, sometimes pausing as if they were listening to Ivan’s explanation of the city’s history.
“Ivan skip that part?” Ivan asked.
“You just said that they built it for religion. You didn’t say how old the city was.”
“Ah. Ivan sorry. City is five hundred years old. Ivan told people know this because of dating on rocks and decay. City was not finished. Was supposed to be big deal. Maybe new capital, nobody know because nobody find till Inca all gone.”
The llamas, apparently now bored with Ivan’s explanation, started approaching each other. They were bumping hips as if to shove the other into the crowd. We all started to back away a little. “Hey Freddy?” I asked, “Do llamas spit?”
“No,” Freddy said.
“You sure?”
“Positive.”
“Not find out about city till photographer come in early century twenty. Take picture. Say is old city. Not know what call city, though,” Ivan continued as the llamas walked toward Freddy.
“Neat,” Freddy said and took a picture of the close-up llamas with his digital camera. The llamas, enjoying the spotlight, came closer. Before Freddy could finish a second photo, they had gotten close enough to sandwich him between them. There they stood, llama, Freddy, llama. “Uh, Joe…”
“Hand me your camera,” I said.
“Not know what call city,” Ivan repeated, loud enough for Freddy to stop paying attention to the two beasts standing bored beside him and focus his attention on the enormous history teacher with the stick, “So ask local people living in jungle. Photographer ask, what call city? But people don’t know. They just say, is Maju Piju. Photographer ask, what is Maju Piju mean? People say, it mean Big Hill. Is name of this mountain.”
Joe Stevens Mocks a Llama Page 9