Bait and switch

I arrived in Peru this morning and it´s already been quite a day! My sister (who´s meeting me here tomorrow) told me about some really scary taxi stories, and so I was ready to grill anyone who offered me a cab in the airport. After checking his ID card and fixed-price list, and seeing his nice-looking car, I climbed in. We chatted in Spanish about all sorts of things, including why Chile´s neighbors don´t like it either (see prior post). When I told him how much I love the ocean, he went out of the way to drive along the coast despite the fixed fare. What a nice guy!

After settling into the hostel, I went for a self-guided (i.e. aimless and clueless) tour of Miraflores, a gringo-friendly part of Lima. I was disappointed, if not surprised, to see a lot of foreigners in the streets. Being so far from home and trying so hard to learn Spanish makes me annoyed to hear English on the street. On the upside, Lima has some of the chaos that I miss from Ecuador. The brightly-colored buses (and, here, also vans) are privately owned and compete for passengers. They each have a "recruiter" in addition to a driver. The former´s job is to hang out of the moving vehicle to shout and wave at potential passengers. As in Ecuador, you´re lucky if they come to a complete stop for you to get on.

And there is a noticeable lack of stop lights. Even the main avenues don´t have lights on every corner. As such, every intersection is a precarious, fascinating dance of criss-crossing traffic and death-defying pedestrians. It´s like a game of chicken, only with a lot more inching forward and nudging your way past. So, really, it´s more like chicken-lite.

Now to what I intended to write about when I titled this post: I walked to a park overlooking the ocean (and a mall built into the rock-face cliff) and was approached by a guy selling lottery tickets and a kid juggling tennis balls. I turned both down. As I was leaning against the railing, breathing in the crisp ocean breezes, a guy struck up a conversation with me and I thought he might be the one who tried to sell me lottery tickets, but I wasn´t sure. After talking for a while and him telling me how great my Spanish is, he suggested that we get a drink.

We went to a restaurant in the cliff with a fabulous view of the ocean and a group of paragliders. The waitress told me about the varieties (i.e. prices) of alcohol and I said quality doesn´t matter to me. My companion proceeded to tell her to "bring the best". I raised my eyebrows, but he just winked. When she asked me if I wanted one or two, I said one ... and he didn´t order anything. Curious.

Then when I´m half-way through my drink, he asks me if I can buy one for him, too -- because he doesn´t have any money on him. Yup, definitely the guy trying to pawn lottery tickets. He explains that he plays the trumpet in a street band, and will repay me with a beer later on. I tell him no, but begrudgingly offer him the second half of my drink, which he eagerly swigs.

I´m still bewildered by how I was invited to drinks and ended up spending $7.50 to split my drink with a street performer whose top-half dentures giggled when he laughed. Maybe that´s the going-price of Spanish practice ... or maybe I´m just a patsy.