salt.
hipstermania.
I was trying to watch the Portlandia skit about putting birds on things, but since it can´t be viewed in my country, I ended up watching mock hipsters instead. It´s funny how hipsters are a big deal in the US. Here, they just are plentyful.
"a hipster who ironically mocks a stereotypical hipster posing as a fake hipster.hipsterception?"
and this one, which isn´t very funny. Til I read the comment someone made under it.
"a hipster who ironically mocks a stereotypical hipster posing as a fake hipster.hipsterception?"
I wanna be a part of it, New York, New York
in like three hours we'll be on our way to the airport. The wierdest sensation. No more South American inefficiency or crazy and wonderful people. I will be understanding what people say and no one will ask us about taking our pictures at random times. No more random food and forever long bus rides. No more of the wonderful vibe of this continent.
back to buses on time, food I know, less friendly and interesting people (no hard feelings towards Swedes and Americans, but you've got more personal space than Latin Americans), the cold outside and the warm water in the shower. I'll be understanding what people say. I'll be seeing friends and family.
very mixed feelings, indeed.
update from far away land.
my camera is dead. For real. True story.
we're in Cali at the moment. Colombia seems like the best place in the world, and we don't have time to experience it. They have the best veggie hamburger EVER. True story.
what have we been up to for the past few weeks? After our decadence in Mancora, we went to Ecuador. First we visited Guayaquil, a nice city with an undeserved bad reputation. We saw whatever the new Twilight film is called, and I actually kinda liked it. It was me, Johanna and a thousand of fifteen year old Ecuadorian girls. A lot of screaming going on there. Then we went to Montañita, which was a less nice Mancora. Then Baños, which was fun! We did canyoning in waterfalls, and it was awesome. Then Quito, and then super-mega-long and boring bus ride to here. It's been a great couple of weeks, we've met a lot of great people, but we're getting tired. After Mancora, we just never got going again. We are really looking forward to the US, though.
one thing I really love about South America is that everybody always are out and about. During our stay in Quito, they started to celebrate the Quito days, which is really in December but they always start like a month in advance. Anyhow, during these celebrations all people of all ages are out on the streets, mainly just strolling and hanging out. And during the days people are taking walks in the city and just chill together, in a way that we don't do in Schwedenland. It's lovely.
less then three weeks til we drop down in the cold of Scandinavia. Can't make sense of what my feelings about that are. Just going with it.
pictures and words and you know the rest.
thoughts on Peruvians and old faith.
tonight we met the funniest Peruvian ever. He said that on Saturdays, he wears high heels, because he, like most Peruvian guys, is so short. He and his friends also talked Swedish with us, out of the blue. Funny.
Liza was wondering when we get back to Schweden. The plan is like this: now we're going to Mancora. In a few days, we're continuing to Ecuador, where we'll spend a couple of weeks. After that, we're going a short while to Colombia, where we're flying out of Bogota to NY on the 5th of December. There we'll play with Patrick and Addie and Rachel and anyone else who wants to play with us. The 19th we'll fly back to Sweden-land, and I'll drop down in Stockholm, and Johanna in Gothenburg on the 20th of December. Voilà, ze plan.
also, a small thought on religion. Today, we visited the coolest temple. They built one tempel, and then they waited a 100 years, then they built a bigger temple that completely covered the first temple. And then they did the same thing 4 times more. This means that the bottom layers are extremely well preserved, both the structures and the colors. Amazing. Huaca de Luna, it's called, eventhough it has nothing whatsoever to do with the moon. Check it out. Anyhow, this place made me think about old religions. Isn't it facinating how all these really old religions in many ways are really similar? They worship the same things, such as water and the sun and the moon, and they all had similar structures with similar types of gods. This in spite of the fact that they excisted in totally different parts of the world. I find it curious, and interesting, the way the human mind works.
Liza was wondering when we get back to Schweden. The plan is like this: now we're going to Mancora. In a few days, we're continuing to Ecuador, where we'll spend a couple of weeks. After that, we're going a short while to Colombia, where we're flying out of Bogota to NY on the 5th of December. There we'll play with Patrick and Addie and Rachel and anyone else who wants to play with us. The 19th we'll fly back to Sweden-land, and I'll drop down in Stockholm, and Johanna in Gothenburg on the 20th of December. Voilà, ze plan.
also, a small thought on religion. Today, we visited the coolest temple. They built one tempel, and then they waited a 100 years, then they built a bigger temple that completely covered the first temple. And then they did the same thing 4 times more. This means that the bottom layers are extremely well preserved, both the structures and the colors. Amazing. Huaca de Luna, it's called, eventhough it has nothing whatsoever to do with the moon. Check it out. Anyhow, this place made me think about old religions. Isn't it facinating how all these really old religions in many ways are really similar? They worship the same things, such as water and the sun and the moon, and they all had similar structures with similar types of gods. This in spite of the fact that they excisted in totally different parts of the world. I find it curious, and interesting, the way the human mind works.
"If this was Canada, there would be a safety rail here"
this is going to be a post about trekking. Since I haven't yet written about the Inka trail and we got back from yet another absolutely stunning trek yesterday, it feels suitable. However, don't expect me to do them justice.
what we can conclude is that Johanna is a fast walker. Really fast. I can't keep up with her, but it doesn't really matter. This far we've only done treks with guides and big groups, so we can walk at our own speed. Another thing is that long treks are disgusting. You are sweaty and smelly and you can't do shit about it. Kinda nice, actually. The Inka trail was worse than the Santa Cruz-trek yesterday, though, since we carried our own big packs. Most people have a porter carry their packs, but we are slightly more kickass.
another thing are the rough climbs. Try take on a hill which starts at 3700 meters above sea level and finishes at 4750. It's a killer. The difference between Santa Cruz and the Inka trail, though, is that the view at the Inka trail was pretty much fog, while the view at the first one was amazing. Probably the most beautiful I've seen in my life. On the other hand, the Inka trail had some pretty gorgeous ruins. Like Machu Picchu. Imagine walking in at one of the wonders of the world, early as hell, waching it coming out of the clouds and with a feeling of being just a little bit cooler meeting the clean and good-smelling day tourists.
there are also really cool locals working as porters/donkey drivers. They usually speak more quechua than spanish, but you can understand eachother enough to have small conversations during the walks, and they are really funny, down to earth people. I mean, they run the same distance as we walk, on the same altitude, with about 20 kilos, the least, on their backs. In sandals, because they don't like shoes. Gotta admire and love them.
our guide at the Inka trail was also an amazing person, telling little stories about life and telling us about the Inka culture, from the perspective of a local, both the historical facts and the myths of the Inkas, and the influence they've had on the world.
last but not the least, the nature, the surroundings, the mountains. Peru is fucking gorgeous.
what we can conclude is that Johanna is a fast walker. Really fast. I can't keep up with her, but it doesn't really matter. This far we've only done treks with guides and big groups, so we can walk at our own speed. Another thing is that long treks are disgusting. You are sweaty and smelly and you can't do shit about it. Kinda nice, actually. The Inka trail was worse than the Santa Cruz-trek yesterday, though, since we carried our own big packs. Most people have a porter carry their packs, but we are slightly more kickass.
another thing are the rough climbs. Try take on a hill which starts at 3700 meters above sea level and finishes at 4750. It's a killer. The difference between Santa Cruz and the Inka trail, though, is that the view at the Inka trail was pretty much fog, while the view at the first one was amazing. Probably the most beautiful I've seen in my life. On the other hand, the Inka trail had some pretty gorgeous ruins. Like Machu Picchu. Imagine walking in at one of the wonders of the world, early as hell, waching it coming out of the clouds and with a feeling of being just a little bit cooler meeting the clean and good-smelling day tourists.
there are also really cool locals working as porters/donkey drivers. They usually speak more quechua than spanish, but you can understand eachother enough to have small conversations during the walks, and they are really funny, down to earth people. I mean, they run the same distance as we walk, on the same altitude, with about 20 kilos, the least, on their backs. In sandals, because they don't like shoes. Gotta admire and love them.
our guide at the Inka trail was also an amazing person, telling little stories about life and telling us about the Inka culture, from the perspective of a local, both the historical facts and the myths of the Inkas, and the influence they've had on the world.
last but not the least, the nature, the surroundings, the mountains. Peru is fucking gorgeous.
in the Switzerland of Peru: Huaraz
an update on the state of things. We're right now in the small town of Huaraz. In the lonely planet, they call it the Switzerland of Peru, due to the national park nearby, which has plenty of snowcaps, hidden blue lagoons and the highest mountain of Peru (which is something like 6700 meters). Tomorrow we're going on a three day trek in the park, sadly we're not doing any peaks, but it's supposed to be gorgeous if the weather is allright.
since Cusco, we've been to Ica (not the food store, the city) where we sandboarded and went on winetour and played in sand dunes. Then we went to Lima to stay with the family of Johanna's father's girlfrien's family. For me, as a gringo with no experience of latin american families whatsoever, this was something of a shock, an experience and something I will always remember. There were people everywhere, who fed you all the time, and sometimes spoke to me in spanish like I was fluent and sometimes didn't speak to me at all since they remembered that I only speak gringo/tourist/baby spanish. We've seen all the shopping districts of Lima, had tons of ice cream and just spent a lot of time with the grandma of the family. She and Johanna had a lot of interesting discussions about religion and politic and culture, and I spent most of the time trying to get the core concepts of the discussion. But I think my spanish has improved at least a little, which is good. And we're also now quite familiar with preuvian cuisine, which is quite nice. I had no idea about this. The eat a lot of potatoes, corn and raw fish.
our hostel in Huaraz is something of an interesting experience as well. We spend most of our time tiptoing, cause we've only been here for one day, and we've allready had an argument with the owner. About a book. Silly.
anyways. After the trek, we're heading straight to the coast. Beach! Whopee!
loads of love!
in Cusco.
I should probably be writing about the Inka trail, cause that's mainly what we've been doing in Cusco. But it' kind of a long story, and I need to figure out a way to tell it without getting too much "first we did this, then we did that". Cause that shit is bauring.
so for now I'm just gonna go for telling that we're alive, I've been tourist sick, but am feeling better, the Inkas (which were the kings, the people were called Quecha, or something like that) were kickass at building things, but they had a kinda nasty habit of getting young girls high and then sacrifice them. Or bury kids alive. Such things that today aren't really socially accepted. Cusco is cute, but full of tourists. And not just the backbacking kind, but real tourists as well. It's slightly strange, haven't seen much of them here until now. We both feel kinda done with Cusco, so today we're heading out for Ica. Their main attraction is sand. It's gonna be fun.
we've also realized that we're getting close to being halfway through our trip. Like everyone who travels says - feels like it's been forever, but yet I can't grip how fast time passes by. Our next solid and decided stop after Ica is Lima, and then we're in the very blurry and undecided part of our trip, the part when we "go north". And then, eventually it's back to real life at home, and I have no clue whatsoever what I'm going to do this spring. Suggestions? (No mother, I'm not worrying. Just thinking.)
Loads of love and such.
Peru, part one.
update from Arequipa, Peru.
we are in civilization, and I'm in shock. It's clean, people look like people at home, but peruvian, there are proper lanes and people drive almost normal. There are supermarkets. It's everything La Paz is not, which is both nice and slightly boring. We've looked at a convent, and Johanna has expressed a desire to live in one. I don't know what to think.
another factor which made the shock worse is that the last place we visited in Bolivia was Isla del Sol. An island with a giant puma made out of rock, which the Inkas fed with girls in the same age as my confirmands. And the sun was born there. And the moon. Nothing special. Anyhow, it's the most basic form of civilisation. They text at the same time as they are walking their donkeys. The entire place is full of hostels and resturants, but they look at you with mild suprise if you ask for a room or something to eat. There's like one street light in the entire village in the southern part of the island, and no heat. But it was absolutely lovely.
here they try to sell you things. It's gonna be a while before I get used to it.
tomorrow we're going hiking in a canyon. There's going to be condors there. Kinda cool.
we've also discovered that Johanna is as amused by my facination for high mountains as I am for her facination for cute animals and babies. Marten, beware. Johanna will be coming home with a baby llama, a baby sheep, a baby donkey and probably a baby child as well. Just so you know. I won't bring a mountain home. They are too big.
Lots of love.
to fly in Bolivia.
some advise on flying in Bolivia.
- never ever count on being in time. Ask the massivly annoying Israeli girl on our flight who HAD to be on time for something. Rookie.
- be prepared on Ryanair 2.0. You pay 750 bolivianos for roundtrip, then it's 10 bs for airport tax, 7 bs for national tax, 7 bs for tourist tax, 8 bs for the shuttle. No one take big notes (20 and upwards) so keep a good storage of change handy.
- the cheapest alternative is military flights. It's all a bit dodgy, no safety instructions, barely seatbelts, the interiour is just a tad shakey on takeoff and landing, and Rurrenabaque has no airport, just a massive field. But you get a snack.
- they've never heard of regulations on liquids when flying, they just give you funny looks when asking. Just don't bring any sharp objects.
we've been in the Amazon basin of Bolivia, in a tiny town called Rurrenabaque, in northen Bolivia. Despite of the town being like five blocks, we managed to get lost. We've peted a baby alligator, fished pirayas, been woken up by monkeys running on the roof, gone anaconda hunting (no luck) and seen all kinds of funny animals. Johannas favourite was the worlds largest animal of the same family of rats, rabbits and squirrels. It looked like the beavers of Narnia, only bigger and without the funny tail. The babies were cute as hell and looked like rabbits. We had the most adorable guide, Rossario, who thought we were extremely funny when scared of things one's supposed to be scared of, like the alligator who swam close to us when we were swimming. And for the record, we were swimming with dolphins. Or rather, Johanna was swimming with dolphins. I got in, saw the alligator, got bitten by a sardine, and decided that the boat was a better alternative.
tomorrow I'm gonna bike what they call the death road. Wish me luck.
peace and love.
- never ever count on being in time. Ask the massivly annoying Israeli girl on our flight who HAD to be on time for something. Rookie.
- be prepared on Ryanair 2.0. You pay 750 bolivianos for roundtrip, then it's 10 bs for airport tax, 7 bs for national tax, 7 bs for tourist tax, 8 bs for the shuttle. No one take big notes (20 and upwards) so keep a good storage of change handy.
- the cheapest alternative is military flights. It's all a bit dodgy, no safety instructions, barely seatbelts, the interiour is just a tad shakey on takeoff and landing, and Rurrenabaque has no airport, just a massive field. But you get a snack.
- they've never heard of regulations on liquids when flying, they just give you funny looks when asking. Just don't bring any sharp objects.
we've been in the Amazon basin of Bolivia, in a tiny town called Rurrenabaque, in northen Bolivia. Despite of the town being like five blocks, we managed to get lost. We've peted a baby alligator, fished pirayas, been woken up by monkeys running on the roof, gone anaconda hunting (no luck) and seen all kinds of funny animals. Johannas favourite was the worlds largest animal of the same family of rats, rabbits and squirrels. It looked like the beavers of Narnia, only bigger and without the funny tail. The babies were cute as hell and looked like rabbits. We had the most adorable guide, Rossario, who thought we were extremely funny when scared of things one's supposed to be scared of, like the alligator who swam close to us when we were swimming. And for the record, we were swimming with dolphins. Or rather, Johanna was swimming with dolphins. I got in, saw the alligator, got bitten by a sardine, and decided that the boat was a better alternative.
tomorrow I'm gonna bike what they call the death road. Wish me luck.
peace and love.
Bolivia; the salty version.
still in Bolivia. Has kinda happend alot since last time, though. Johanna is well again, though tired. So am I, since we got up at 5 am yesterday, and went on a night bus back to La Paz from Uyuni in southern Bolivia last night. The road kept bolivian standard. So did the bus. Enough said.
the reason for being in Uyuni was Salar de Uyuni, a massive salt flat with surrounding deserts, volcanoes and just plainly awesome nature. Pictures will come, sometime, but for long, picture google Salar the Uyuni to get a hint of what we've been up to. We've been jeep cruising for three days with an adorable Australian retired couple and a couple of Swedish boys, and our driver Alejandro.
right now we're just chillin, eating cheap to make our budget work, and doing laundry, sending e-mails and all kinds of practical things. We've also booked a trip to Rurrenabaque, a village in the Bolivian Amazon basin. Taking off early Monday morning. It's going to be a to the wsome.
also, the Bolivian favourite this far. The first couple of days, I tried to figure out where the Bolivians got their food from, cause there is one supermarket in the entire downtown La Paz. Like, three days after we got here, I found the market. It's a MASSIVE labyrinth of streets and houses and alleys where they sell everything one might ever need, from food to hygiene products and material for building a house. And there are people everywhere, and they are all friends and eating together from massive pots of food which some of the older women cook on the street. I can get lost there forever and ever.
something like this. It's all salt and it just never ends and totes fucks up ones sense of perspektive. No wonder people gets hallucinations in deserts.
guess that's that for now. So take care, friends, and I'll get back after our jungle adventure.
tata.
the reason for being in Uyuni was Salar de Uyuni, a massive salt flat with surrounding deserts, volcanoes and just plainly awesome nature. Pictures will come, sometime, but for long, picture google Salar the Uyuni to get a hint of what we've been up to. We've been jeep cruising for three days with an adorable Australian retired couple and a couple of Swedish boys, and our driver Alejandro.
right now we're just chillin, eating cheap to make our budget work, and doing laundry, sending e-mails and all kinds of practical things. We've also booked a trip to Rurrenabaque, a village in the Bolivian Amazon basin. Taking off early Monday morning. It's going to be a to the wsome.
also, the Bolivian favourite this far. The first couple of days, I tried to figure out where the Bolivians got their food from, cause there is one supermarket in the entire downtown La Paz. Like, three days after we got here, I found the market. It's a MASSIVE labyrinth of streets and houses and alleys where they sell everything one might ever need, from food to hygiene products and material for building a house. And there are people everywhere, and they are all friends and eating together from massive pots of food which some of the older women cook on the street. I can get lost there forever and ever.
something like this. It's all salt and it just never ends and totes fucks up ones sense of perspektive. No wonder people gets hallucinations in deserts.
guess that's that for now. So take care, friends, and I'll get back after our jungle adventure.
tata.
Bolivia so far.
first impressions of Bolivia. Dirty, crowded, cold as hell at night and kinda wonderful. But this is only La Paz, and conclusions drawn from one day of solo walking around without a clue on anything. Johanna is completely down with some kind of cold/flu/height illness, so I' m kinda on my own til she gets better. Which I hope will happen fairly soon, cause it's boring being on my own and I really don't want her to be this miserable.
plans when she gets better are probably involving the salt desert in the southern Bolivia, it's supposed to be kinda cool. I'm fine, but hungry. Hanging out with someone who's constantly puking is not helping my appetite.
plans when she gets better are probably involving the salt desert in the southern Bolivia, it's supposed to be kinda cool. I'm fine, but hungry. Hanging out with someone who's constantly puking is not helping my appetite.
äre lugnt om jag kallarej baby? Eh, nej?
just to make one thing clear..
I. do. not get. Newkid.
for the few foreigners who occationally reads this blog, hes like a teenage boy who´s hyped by the music hipsters in Sweden. And he makes h o r r i b l e music with a lot of audiotuning and crappy lyrics like " I only cry in the rain" and "is it cool if I call you baby", but with a bratty accent. Can someone please explain the thing about him for me?
cause we are living in a material world.
useful things when backpacking,
and something that I hopefully will have a reason to buy this winter. Keep fingers crossed.
and something that I hopefully will have a reason to buy this winter. Keep fingers crossed.
