Rabbi Tarlow was right

8/17/11

The last day feels like it was a week. In Peru everything ends up backwards. My plane from Cusco to Lima was delayed for a long time and Peruvian Airline attendant didn’t know why. I mean, that’s not his job. Why should he know why planes are arriving really late? I finally get to Lima extremely late and Bardo is waiting in the arrival area with a sign with my name misspelled. Why should anyone spell my name correctly? I mean, I have a tough name to spell.  

I get put up in a nice hotel in Lima as I was waiting for the arrival of Rabbi Tarlow. It was really nice. I wasn’t sure why the Huanuco community had put me up there. It doesn’t make sense that a poor struggling Jewish community put up their “chazzan” in a nice hotel, when they struggle to make ends meet.

The Rabbi and I arrive and someone was supposed to take us to awesome Incan ruins, but of course, because things just don’t happen in Latin America, no one came to pick us up. We walked 7 miles to the Museo de la Nacion without a map. The walk was better than the museum.  Lima is an ugly city. You can tell I’m in a great mood. But it gets better.

Tonight we were supposed to take an overnight bus to Huanuco and arrive tomorrow (Thursday) morning. We get to the bus station, only to find out that there has been a huayco, (flash flood caused by torrential rains occurring high in the mountains, especially during the weather known as El Niño.)  What this means is that the road to Huanuco has been closed for G-d knows how long, and that all buses tonight have been cancelled to Huanuco.  We hope that by tomorrow they will have cleared the road so we can take a morning bus, but the likelihood that the road will be passable is about 50%. We may get to the bus company tomorrow only to find out that they’re still not letting any vehicles pass. We may needa fly to Huanuco. But the plane is expensive and not particularly safe. If it’s too cloudy a day, the tiny plane can’t take off.  I’m pretty sure the Huanuco runway is a dirt unpaved runway. That’s another story. Essentially if there’s no way to get back and forth from Huanuco safely, the conversions may have to wait till next time and we may have to do the Bar Mitzvah on Skype on Friday or something.

A huayco (from the Quechua wayqu, meaning "depth, valley") is a Peruvian term that refers to a flash flood caused by torrential rains occurring high in the mountains, especially during the weather known as El Niño. Clearly, they needa clean up the huayco in order to cross.

The only other option is to fly Lima-Huanuco in this tiny LC Busre airplane that won't take off if its too cloudy.

Many months ago, Rabbi Tarlow, my mentor in this Huanuco experience, tried to explain to me how things function or rather don’t function in Peru, and I couldn’t comprehend what he was saying. Everything he said seemed contrary to the way stuff works in New York. And in the last 7 weeks, I’ve realized he’s right. In Peru, everything that can go wrong will go wrong.