Una Historia mas Rica!

I’m terribly behind on blogs so the next few might omit specific details that I’d usually try to include. On Tuesday, we had class for about an hour and then went to visit El Palacio de Gobierno del Peru in La Plaza Mayor. It was absolutely beautiful there in that part of town. The intricate design of the palace, the yellow walls of the plaza, everything was all so beautiful and busy. Of course, the palace was swarming with tourists so I had to really pay attention to which tourists I belonged to. Anyway, the palace was gorgeous and very well designed, in my opinion. It is also the residence of the President of the Republic of Peru, Alan Garcia Perez. I also learned that President Bush (the son) was the first President of the USA to visit Peru in that very house. He actually joined them for dinner in their elaborate dining room. It was pretty cool to be present during the changing of the guard ceremony. At 12 noon every day, they have a special ceremony that basically allows the morning guards to switch with the afternoon/night guards. Essentially their way of clocking out/clocking in was going through the ceremony of live music with a band, and a cadence that sort of matched Hitler’s army. Fortunately, we were inside the palace and inside the gates watching as other tourists were barred outside and forced to watch through the fence.

Near El Palacio de Gobierno del Peru was the Palacio Municipal de Lima and Plaza de Armas. This was the series of buildings with the bright yellow and white paints. We didn’t necessarily go anywhere specific but below were lots of markets and merchants and people, or more so tourists, bustling around looking for good eats. I believe Karlayne and I went to eat somewhere near there and I got a hamburger and pastry with dulce de leche for about 3 soles, or $1 US. We had a quick lunch and rushed to meet at the plaza for our next stop, El Catedral de Lima and more specifically, El Museo del Convento de San Francisco. 

We weren’t allowed to take pictures because of the fact that it was a sacred place and the artifacts were really old; it seemed that the preservation process included no camera flashes, or cameras altogether. But everything inside the cathedral was extremely interesting. There were rooms dressed in gold and lots of pictures and sculptures depicting the different deaths of saints and martyrs. There was also an extensive collection of real human bones in the basement. The catacambas were laid out in different designs, different pits, and some even in their original form. The bodies in prehispanic times were buried facing the ground with possessions and things for the afterlife. The whole experience was creepy and interesting at the same time. There was, however, a consensus that the stench of dead bodies saturated the air. Our tour guide said that since there were no real cemeteries back then, people would lay dead bodies in the same kind of bit with just a blanket over the corpse. Once the body was completely decomposed, the bones would be thrown into a communal pit. We actually saw the communal pit although the archeologists had arranged them into one giant circle with the school scattered neatly in the middle. Another interesting piece in the museum was the Peruvian version of “The Last Supper.” In it, there is a round table instead of a long table and if you look hard enough, you can see Judas, who betrayed Jesus, pointing at himself with the images of 3 devils in the background. Another detail to make note of is the fact that there are more children in this painting that supposedly represents innocence.

After the museum, we went to Congreso de la Republica del Peru. We were stuck outside the building for quite some time before entering because we were unaware of the fact that shorts were not allowed in the building. A few of us were wearing shorts and as a compromise, those girls had to wrap sweaters around their hips in an attempt to cover their knees. We also had another problem at the door because both Alison and I had our wallets pick pocketed from us in Peru and had no proper identification. Luckily Henry was there with our passport numbers. 

At this point of the day everyone was practically falling asleep because it was such a long day. However, we went on with the tour, almost kind of dragging our feet from room to room. It was interesting to see where Congress operated and the woman informed us that Congress met once a week and once a month for the important issues. On the way out, Monica, Tess, me, and Henry noticed a few men outside hammering away at some video tapes. I pulled out my camera to take a picture but my memory was full. One of the men saw me take a picture and yelled for me to stop. He then proceeded to take a picture of us walking away. So no big deal, we’re probably on Peru’s hit list.