Souvenir Shopping at the Metro in Lima

Now that I have sight seeing out of the way, I'm into hard-core souvenir shopping.

I went to the Metro at lunch. It is the local mega market. As I was wandering around lost, looking for the treats I'd decided on yesterday, a sweet, tiny little woman came up to me and starting talking to me. After a most valiant effort to make herself understood, I began to understand she was a beggar. I think she was from Cuzco, was looking for a job, or noticed that I had a job - I'm not sure which. After she patiently repeated herself 3 or 4 times (the most patience any local has shown in a conversation with me, outside of the office) I realized she was asking for money, S/.20 or S/.30. I don't normally give money to beggars, but she was clean and polite & very patient, so I gave her a few sole coins. Then I patiently, firmly, repeatedly told her goodbye.

At the cash register I asked for change for S/.100 (I wish the ATMs dispensed 20s instead of 100s.) I'm hoping to do some more shopping before I leave, and don't want to repeat my KFC experience. When the cashier handed me a S/.50, I tried to ask her for smaller bills. Well, I guess pequeña was the wrong word, because she firmly handed me the S/.50 and the local equivalent of a roll of quarters and made it clear the transaction was complete.

Lima - City of Three Contrasts

On my first taxi ride through Lima, what struck me most was the contrasts.

For example, near my office, the walls of the freeway are beautifully landscaped. Instead of bill boards, companies plant flowers in the shape of the corporate icon. Yet on the way from the airport, we passed an abandoned toll plaza on the road. My Bay Area and East Coast turnpike friends: Can you image a toll plaza being abandoned and left to rot?











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Another contrast is the bright glitz of gambling parlors sied-by-side with high brick walls, electric fences, and razor wire adorning small businesses and private residences.




And the third contrast that struck me was the very large number of buildings that looked like burned out hulks right next to modern office and apartment buildings. It gave the city overtones of random destuction and made me think of 1940's photos of Dresden.