Welcome to Cusco!

Cusco is a wonderful city full of honking and sun, colorful Cholitas, small food carts, black smoke clouds from buses emitting exhaust fumes, traffic police with whistles (I still don't understand the traffic light system: complicatedly, the traffic light usually shows the number of seconds until it turns green again, but in reality you can usually walk when it's red because fewer cars pass by...), Cumbia music in the buses (how lifeless must German traffic appear to a Peruvian!??), tasty Pisco Sour, fresh mangoes, passion fruits, bananas (offered at the market in Cusco among never-before-seen varieties of potatoes and corn, stuffed baby llamas, and alpaca sweaters), small buildings (earthquakes..!!) and small people (without exaggeration, Peruvians have barely surpassed my 1.80 height). The city of Cusco, which is also on the verge of regional elections, is pulsating these days: a variety of caricatures of current politicians displayed in the main square and a large demonstration against corruption allowed us to experience this up close. Cusco has a university, many artists live here and at the same time it is a tourist center of Peru. Here you can dive into cultures dating back thousands of years. Massive stone walls, which were cut to fit without mortar with extreme precision over 1000 years ago, have survived every earthquake so far. Unlike our planned first Airbnb accommodation, which suffered a big crack during an earthquake about a week ago and is now at risk of collapse. So we spontaneously moved and now live with Aaron - the son of our hostess - in a (also rented through Airbnb) spacious apartment with hot water, Netflix, and automatic room spray that sprays you if you pass by at the wrong moment. The only thing missing is a refrigerator! As we had to realize after a huge market shopping...

In addition to these impressions, I am completely surprised by the warmth and shyness of many people we encounter here. Of course, we had to pay a little more on our first taxi ride and sometimes we tourists are also persistently invited to buy jewelry and take photos with a baby llama. But these 'worlds' that may differentiate us start to merge when we sit in a tienda (basically a small neighborhood shop) drinking a soda and smiling at a girl with her baby brother, just as they smile at us when Sinja sits on my lap in this tienda. Or when Sinja becomes interested in a self-knitted headband, suddenly starts discussing stitches with the saleswoman, and finally happily warms her ears with a custom-made piece.

Once you get into it, you don't want to stop writing. Actually, this was supposed to be a short entry...

Now it's time for bed, good night and sweet dreams, friends!