Nobel Peace Prize and President Obama

Does he deserve an award? Yes. Does he deserve this award? Arguably. Does he deserve this award this year? No. Morgan Tsvangirai is surely more deserving. In the face of incredible provocation and violence, he acted heroically. Though sharing power with Mugabe may have been criticised by many, as Gandhi said: “There is no way to peace, peace is the way”. Tsvangirai, who this year lost his wife in what may or may not have been an accident, more obviously embodies this sentiment than does the unproven Obama.

La Senda Verde: Miscellaneous Magic

We walked to La Senda Verde (which we had heard about from a guy called Zac in Samaipata) from Coroico, which took between an hour and a half and two hours, what with me stopping for the odd picture. When we got there we were shown around the pool area where most of the monkeys live by Rob, one of the volunteers, and the bird and other enclosures by Holly and Jessy.

We committed ourselves to two weeks of volunteering and came down 48 hours later. We were taken through the procedure with the birds – macaws, parrots and conures to name the most colourful – and it seemed very straightforward. Of note was a macaw called “Primavera”, who pulled out his own head feathers in some act of rebellion against conventional notions of beauty that he was not able fully to articulate. It was like punk all over again. All of the birds are fed fruit and vegetables for breakfast and dinner, with seed for lunch; dry pasta can be included in each of their meals. Most of them are free to fly anywhere but hang around for the food. Ducks, guinea fowl and a noble cock make a significant floor-dwelling feathered presence.

I spent most of the time after my first day with the monkeys (see previous blog entry) but Jun stayed with the birds and “miscellaneous” for her duration. The latter was everything which was not a monkey or a bird, so she fed the cats, dogs, rabbits, guinea pigs, turtles and tortoises and the bear as part of a team. (The coati – or snookum bears – were left to find their own food.) With the exception of the cats, each of these animals had a living space that needed cleaning daily too. In that way, Jun probably dealt with three to four times as many animals as I did, and all alone once Rob and Sarah, Holly and Jessy had left.

While the other volunteers were still there (they arrived a week before us so left a week earlier) we had a few quiz nights based on information from the QI Animal Ignorance book that I originally borrowed from a Brisbane library and then ordered on Amazon and asked Julie to bring out. Jessy was a big fan but it was Rob who shocked us all by guessing the animal correctly from only this information: “When George Shaw made the first written description of [this animal] in 1799...” Do you know the answer?

As well as caring for such a great variety of animals and playing silly guessing games on a few occasions, the La Senda Verde experience was bolstered by the opportunity to see a few of the local birds and butterflies in their natural settings. Vultures flew overhead but I had already captured them and the crested oropendola on my Nikon (though I only identified the latter in La Senda Verde`s owner`s animal encyclopedia). My holy grail was the very large blue butterly which was quite common to see but hard to photograph as it rarely seemed to settle within sight. I did capture an image on the last day but the animal itself was damaged and the pic not the best. A tiny blip that doesn`t register. Ah, good days.

La Senda Verde: Monkey Magic

If you are one of those nutters who takes the word of the vicious Old Testament literally, you will believe that in the Garden of Eden there was no death. Kentucky`s Creation Musuem shows vegetarian dinosaurs alongside Adam and Eve as a way of fitting real knowledge into a mythical setting but at La Senda Verde, I was reminded of this paradisical state as dogs, cats and birds waited together outside the food preparation room every morning to receive their breakfast.

The other likely visitors were the squirrel monkeys – Jimmy and Elvis - who would launch themselves out of a tree at you in their version of foraging. My main responsibility as a volunteer at the animal refuge was another species, the capuchin monkeys, which were at the other end of the land divided between two rivers (and now bordered on one side by a disastrous gold-mining project that the locals are organising against). At 8 every day I fed them porridge prepared by the owners (Vicki and Marcelo), had my own breakfast at 9, cleaned the capuchin tables and houses at 10, fed them a mostly-fruit lunch at 12 and then a mostly-vegetable dinner at 5. In addition, I usually fed the spectacled bear (Aruma) and cleaned his compound twice a day.

The animals are all rescued, normally from abuse, poaching or orphanship. The young capuchin were untethered and playful though one – Kimbo – tended towards the cry-baby side too. Then there were 8 adult capuchin; Naranja, Luna and Sereza were timid females who tended to avoid eye contact with me, Danny and Martin were males who I could interact with, while Mirka was a one-eyed female who took to me immediately. My favourite is a toss-up between Mirka and shoelace and button undoing Martin, though the best moment was when Luna groomed me. The other 2 adults were Ciruelo, the alpha-male, who escaped early in our stay but returned on more than one occasion and was eventually drugged and re-tethered. He went for me more than once without success yet was friendly enough when it came to feeding time. The other male was Pekos, the only caged monkey, who had escaped once and severed a previous volunteer`s tendon, apparently.

Feeding him consisted in a safety-first process something akin to the part in Silence of the Lambs where Hannibal Lecter goes through a routine supervised by two (later cannibalised) policemen.

There were three other species of monkey. The 5 spider monkeys utilised the whole of the refuge, one rushing into our cabaña while I was still in bed one morning and sitting with me briefly before leaving again. That was Zambo, who is the largest male and somewhat excitable: he frightened young visitors a few times. He habitually sat in great poses though and he was my favourite of this group, though the younger ones were predictably cuter. There were two owl-monkeys which (as the name implies) were nocturnal and therefore we did not have much to do with them. Finally, there were two red howlers, one of which was a baby which arrived just before us and clung on to the other (older but not yet mature female) who tolerated it for a few days and then left, not to return while we were there.

The work was hard after the other volunteers left, though more of it fell on Jun, but there were great rewards in the relationship with the other primates. If you ever find yourself in Bolivia with time to volunteer for a worthy cause, La Senda Verde comes highly recommended by this apeman.

Kimbo

Bolivian Vultures 101

On our first day`s walk in Coroico, we saw tens of what I later found out were turkey vultures and black-headed vultures. Although in their scavenger role they share many traits, I learned that there is some debate as to how similar they (or any of the seven species of New World vultures) are to Old World vultures. The similarities may be more to do with convergent evolution than taxonomy but time will tell whether the birds we saw hopping ungracefully and soaring magestically are more closely related to other vultures or to storks.

Some things that are known are that as well as reguritating to feed their young, they also vomit as a defence mechanism. The half-digested carrion will sting if a potential predator gets close enough. Alternatively, getting rid of a heavy meal will provide the vulture with the lift it requires to make a speedy escape should the need arise. Another charming fact is that these vultures piss or shit on their own legs in order to cool themselves down.

Irrational atheist

I touched on the subject two years ago but after blogging about football for the first time in four months and subsequently (I was tempted to use the word "consequently") seeing the Horns go down to two home defeats in four days, I could not keep the nagging superstitious idea out of my head that somehow my actions had precipitated this downturn in our fortunes. As someone who finds it hard to understand reflective religious belief, I simply shake my head indulgently at my own hypocrisy.

Schadenfraude too

I have been gone too long. After two months of insufflation in La Paz, we have all but completed two weeks of volunteering at animal refuge La Senda Verde near Coroico in Bolivia (the website will be improved in the near future). In the meantime, Watford have sold all their best players (Tommy Smith eventually went to Portsmouth and was followed by a petulant Mike Williamson, Tamas Priskin went to Ipswich, Jobi McAnuff and Grzegorz Rasiak followed Brendan Rogers to Reading). The latter two players combined to put Reading ahead in our Saturday showdown but Danny Graham continued his scoring form (six already in nine matches) to get us a point at the Madjeski. There is great satisfaction at seeing Ipswich and Reading poach from us and now struggle in the bottom four while we sit in a far better-than-expected seventh (Newcastle are threatening to run away with it), which makes us closer in position to bottom-of-the-Premiership Portsmouth than to either of our championship rivals.
We got old-boy Heidar Helguson back and he scored twice in a recent 3-3 "thriller" with Leicester and although now injured, I´d back him to beat Saturday´s red-carded Nathan Ellington in the goals tally even if H didn´t find the net again all year. Coventry at home tonight and if we can send them back pointless to whence they came, we might even nick a play-off position. Okay, okay: it is early days.

Pisco

Distilled from different grapes in the two countries – Peru and Chile – that produce it, the liquor takes its contested name from the Quechua for little bird and the pottery in which it was aged (but more directly from the name of a coastal Peruvian city where it was produced).

It was first created in the sixteenth century as a consequence of protectionist policies by the Spanish King banning wine from the new world. Nearly all the first pisco came from a new grape variety – Quebranta – which is still the main source of “pisco puro” in Peru today. Peru also produces aromatic, mosto verde and acholado (blended) pisco. It is the blended pisco which is normally used for the national cocktail of the neighbouring countries, pisco sour, which contains lemon or lime, egg whites, syrup and regional bitters as well as the liquor.

In Chile, varieties of Muscat are the most common grape and certain additives are permitted in order to achieve particular alcohol levels. Chilean pisco is not allowed into Peru, which calims proprietorship of the term “pisco” on historical grounds.

Cuy

Guinea pig was domesticated in the Andean region about 7000 years ago. Before you say “aah, cute”, this was obviously for food rather than as pets. The cavia porcellus, which was traditionally primarily part of a ceremonial meal, has increased in popularity over a few decades and as well as still seeing them for sale at festivals, specialist restaurants “cuyerias” can be found. About 65 million are eaten per year in Peru alone. As I am vegetarian, I have had to ask what it tastes like. Something between chicken and lamb has been the only response I`ve had so far.

More interestingly, the guinea pig has been described as an “Andean X-Ray”. It is traditionally rubbed over the head and face of the patient and is then inserted under their clothes. Some people sleep with them close to the body too, and the idea is that illness can be transferred to the poor guinea pig. If the rodent dies, it is thought that it has taken away the sickness. If it survives, it is assumed the malaise remains inside the animal.

Soroche

Why altitude sickness occurs is not understood. It is not because there is less oxygen in the air, as many would assume, and it may actually be the low carbon dioxide levels that cause the problem, since this can lead to an increase in the pH value of one`s blood.

Its effects are not consistent and it has little or nothing to do with fitness. I was fine in the highest city in the world, Potosi (4060m above sea level), but had a nosebleed during the middle of the night in Cusco (3450m). I have had minor head pangs and suffered shortness of breath when walking uphill or upstairs (I am currently on the fourth floor of a hotel at 3800m) but pacing myself can generally sort out this problem.

The worst time for me is at night. Once lying flat, I seem to have difficulty catching my breath. I heat up (taking off layers of clothes at -15 degrees in Uyuni at 4300m) and if I do sleep, wake in starts, usually having dreamt of some form of persecution or other. The only way to prevent a recurrence of the nightmare preceding the head-tossing awakening is to sit up for a while (normally with the computer) as I am doing as I write this.

Traveller`s tips for Machu Picchu

A) book the train well in advance (perurail.com)
B) book an afternoon train from Ollantaytambo (it is cheaper than from Cuzco and you can go early and see the town and its own ruins)
C) book an evening return for the following day to Ollantaytambo
D) there are cheap places to stay in Aguas Calientes (Machu Picchu Pueblo)
E) you can`t take a pack over 20 litres into MP with you so pack light – you won`t need layers of clothes
F) get up at 4.15
G) either walk to Machu Picchu (over an hour, with lots of stairs) or
H) get in line early for the 5.30 buses (say 4.30 or before)and sit at the front of the bus you get on
I) when you get off the bus at Machu Picchu, start running
J) run to Huayna Picchu and put your name down (only 400 allowed to climb per day)
K) now relax and walk back to the Hut of the Caretaker of the Funerary Rock
L) take great pics from there before the thousands arrive
M) enjoy...
N) catch a taxi or bus back from Ollantaytambo to Cuzco at a fraction of the rail cost

After Capitalism

World Heritage Baggers

We are not world heritage tourists, the (mythical?) types who travel to places inscribed on the UNESCO list just to notch up the numbers, but... It came to my attention that Monastery de Santa Catalina, which we visited yesterday, was on the World Heritage List (as part of the “historical centre of Arequipa” and as my interest had already been tweaked, I did a little online research and found out that the list incoporates 878 sites (679 cultural 174 natural and 25 mixed), twenty of which we have been to in the 8 months we have been away.

The World Heritage List is supposed to be of places with outstanding universal value, though the system – in which countries nominate their own sites – is open to manipulation. A look at the map shows that Europe dominates and, if I counted right, 368 of the sites are on the smallest continent, not including Russian or Turkish Europe. Anyway, though I claimed not to ne a number-notcher, I am sure it will not be long before I go through the whole list and count where I`ve been... In the meantime, these are the 20 we have been to in the last eight months, and the three more in Peru we will see when our friend Julie arrives in a couple of days.

Argentina

• Los Glaciares
• Iguazu National Park

Australia

• Great Barrier Reef
• Wet Tropics of Queensland
• Greater Blue Mountains Area
• Sydney Opera House

Bolivia

• City of Potosí
• Historic City of Sucre
• Fuerte de Samaipata

Chile

• Churches of Chiloé

China

• Imperial Palaces of the Ming and Qing Dynasties in Beijing and Shenyang (Forbidden City)
• Mausoleum of the First Qin Emperor (Terracotta Army)
• The Great Wall
• Summer Palace, an Imperial Garden in Beijing
• Temple of Heaven: an Imperial Sacrificial Altar in Beijing

Japan

• Himeji-jo
• Historic Monuments of Ancient Nara

New Zealand

• Tongariro National Park

Peru

• Historical Centre of the City of Arequipa

Uruguay

• Historic Quarter of the City of Colonia del Sacramento

Ms. Willis will accompany us to

· City of Cuzco

· Historic Sanctuary of Machu Picchu

· Lines and Geoglyphs of Nasca and Pampas de Jumana

Which will provide a further pretext for me to post lots of pictures...

Divided Peru

The evidence of the depth of political conflict in Peru abounds. As soon as we crossed the border – even before we had got to the first town, Tacna – I was surprised by “Fujimori innocent” slogans and even more by painted “Fujimori 2011” campaign propaganda. I know very little about Peruvian politics but was aware that six weeks previously ex-president Alberto Fujimori had been sentenced to 25 years in prison for being the intellectual author of “dirty war” killings in the early 1990s. This, after all, was a fantastic victory for human rights given the number of Latin American “strong men” who have escaped justice for their crimes. True, the number of dead or disappeared he was accused of being responsible for was tiny in comparison to the military regimes in Argentina or Chile during the 1970s and 1980s, but – after all – murder is murder.

The campaign material turned out to be for the daughter of murderer Fujimori, Keiko. She has vowed to pardon her father if elected in two years and is currently looking likely to be able to do just that. Perhaps surprisingly, it is the rural “have nots” of the divided country that still support “chino” Fujimori. (Despite his surname being obviously Japanese (second-generation Nihonjins exist in relatively large numbers in Brazil and Peru, though there are twenty times as many in the Portugese-speaking nation), the nickname of the ex-president apparently plays on the idea of thrifty, hard-working chinese restaurant chefs.) This may be because the Shining Path guerilla group that Fujimori´s government went after so violently was more of a threat in the countryside.

It is the jungle where the contemporary murder is happening though. Just a few days before I arrived, President Alan Garcia had ordered the violent repression of an indigenous blockade in the north of the country. Between 50 and 150 people had died as a result, including about 25 policemen. There were reports that the bodies of some Amazonians (protesting Law 1090, which allows the exploitation of their traditional lands without adequate compensation) had been burned or carried away by security forces intent on hiding the extent of the massacre. This DOES sound like the continent in the 1970s.

In Arequipa, hand-written posters adorn the gates and fence of the cathedral. They tell of solidarity with the people of La Selva (the lowland Amazonian regions) and the desire for peace. There is also a clear line in references to Garcia as a thief and a murderer. He had Shining Path blood on his hands in his stint as president before Fujimori, and now has that of Amazonian Awajun and Aguarunas too. His prosecution should not be too far off.

As the president blamed outside forces (read Bolivia and Venezuela), nationwide protests were organised and today I went to the rally in the Plaza de Armas in Arequipa. Thousands turned out to show their support, demanding a new constitution, a new president, and the repeal of 1090, which – to allow more dialogue - was suspended by the Congress for 90 days last night. I spoke to a guy who said he worked in construction but sounded well-educated and even broke into English. He expressed the fear that the suspension was just a lull before the storm whilst also seeming positive that real change could occur.

I am left doubting that this divided society is going to be healed anytime soon. Despite the hopes of the protesters today, Garcia seems likely to see out his term and that could mean the death of more indigenous people as well as the beginning of the loss of their land and rights such as clean air and water. Come 2011, it currently looks less probable that Peru will be part of the socialist-indigenous South American bloc, and more probable that it will be re-visiting past fights.

Another planet

The five of us in the 4x4 probably could have done a little better
at finding ways to try to describe the Uyuni Salt Plains: "like Mars", "like the Moon" and "otherworldly" won out.

Say Hello, Wave Goodbye

Just when we may have thought we had a manager with whom we might be going places, he goes to a place without us: the news (a message on my Facebook page - I am adrift 4000 feet above sea level) that Brendan Rogers has taken the Reading managerial vacancy 192 days after joining us is bad for the Horns and I never even got to sing one song with his name in (still, I found something to laugh about later). Early favourite to replace him is Malky Mackay, who I hope does not get the post. Where is Peter Taylor these days? Always liked him...

Iguazu to Santa Cruz

The first of four twenty-hour-plus bus journeys within a fortnight was within Argentina – from Buenos Aires to Puerto Iguazu and the Iguazu Falls there. It rained the Thursday evening we arrived and the skies remained overcast but the additional water only added to the experience: the Devil´s Throat inspired awe. Additionally, we saw a greater variety of wildlife than we have since Australia. Like the Perito Moreno glacier at the other end of this enormous country, photos don´t really do the place justice.

En route to Puerto Iguazu I had realised that its location afforded us the perfect opportunity of a side trip into Brazil before resuming our journey to a mid-June rendezvous with Julie in Peru. So it was that the day after visiting the falls, we embarked on an overnight coach for Rio. Accommodation costs were a nasty shock, so it was a pleasant relief that we were offered a sofa-bed for our (consequently lengthened) stay by Andrea and Eduardo. They also lent us bicycles and we rode to all the Rio sights – though didn´t go up Sugar Loaf as it was being recabled – as well as a few less touristy ones.
Eduardo proved a knowledgeable font of information about the minutiae of our experiences and drove us to a Samba Circle on our first night and a football match on our third. My Brazilian stay was further enhanced by the trying of several cachaças (30 Luas, Seleta, Pitú and Sao Paolo) and a vegetarian version of muqueca (usually made with caçao – young shark – but completed with mandioca instead) by chef Edu. Finally, I added 11 beers (Skol, Brahma, Bohemia and Bohemia Escura, Bavaria and Bavaria non-alcohol, Itaipava, Backer Trigo, Devassa, Antarctica and my favourite Xingu) to the list of those tried.
On Sunday 17th Edu got us to Rodoviaria Novo Rio just in time for the bus back to Foz do Iguaçu (the Brazilian side of the falls), from where we crossed into Cuidad del Este, before getting straight onto another bus for the six hour trip to the capital. The Paraguayan money we swapped our Brazilian Reals for reflected the fact that this is the second poorest country in South America: many notes were held together by sticky tape.
Asuncion is like other urban places we have been to on the continent, wires and flags abound in the streets, and there are a number of attractive colonial buildings. Another similarity was that the country went through a military dictatorship which tortured and murdered many of its own citizens. One pleasant difference was that there was a Plaza for the Disappeared, very close to the Palacio de Gobierno. In Brazil, Edu told us, there is never any mention of the victims of the military dictatorship and history is even being rewritten by some to suggest that the time was not so bad. Paraguay is ahead of its neighbour on that one.
On the third day in Asuncion, we came across a demonstration in front of the parliament. Workers, surrounded by hundreds of policemen, were protesting the planned appropriation of their retirement fund by the government. It afforded a good opportunity to practise our listening skills and take a few photos which were slightly different to the majority I have taken so far. Later, we came across a policeman browsing pirate DVDs, an image I would love to have captured.
We went to Aregua on the same day, just to see something beyond the capital, and that trip helped confirm that we were now in the part of the continent where we would encounter more indigenous peoples. The fact is that in Chile, Argentina and Uruguay, the native population is largely invisible and that it is only now that we begin to see the colours and textures of the pre-Columbian population. Our dusty journey from Asuncion to Santa Cruz, Bolivia, at the end of the week has only reinforced this perception.

Hello Newcastle, goodbye Burnley.

In the course of researching an answer to a comment on one of my Sportingo pieces, I was surprised to see just how much Newcastle spend in comparison with other Premiership teams. They have the fifth highest wage-bill and have spent ridiculous amounts in the transfer market over the past 10 years. It is slightly gratifiying then to see that this has not bought them success. They are relegated with Middlesbrough and West Bromwich Albion from the Premiership and will be visitors at Vicarage Road next season. Thus my prediction that last year´s play-off winners would go straight back down again was proved wrong as Hull lost at home but finished in just-safe 17^th. Wolves and Birmingham won automatic promotion and Burnley won the play-off final against Sheffield United, preventing the latter “righting” that perceived Tevez-related wrong.

Vasco Boy

On Wednesday 13th May our Brazilian friend and host took us to Sao Januario for a Copa Brasil match. His (and my new) team, Vasco Da Gama, named for the Portugese navigator and still, as Edu explained, traditionally the Portugese community´s Rio team (there are four), was playing the first leg of the quarter-final against a team (Vitoria, from Bahia) in the division above. Vasco, who play in black and white, were relegated to the second tier for the first time ever last year and are hoping for an instant return, though this match was irrelevant to that campaign, which has just begun.

The first of Vasco´s goals arose from a careless error in the box by a Vitoria defender, pounced upon and slotted in from eight yards. Second was from a corner and the game was over by half-time. After the break and a non-alcoholic beer, a curling free-kick pretty much ended the tie but it was all wrapped up when a Vitoria defender handled a through ball and saw red for his effort. The resulting free-kick was smashed into the net and Vasco take a 4-0 lead north in a couple of weeks.The Vasco fans were livelier than in any English match, with jigs aplenty, particularly behind the goal. However, the stadium was less than capacity and there were very few opposing fans. I was able to join in with some of the chants and was happy to stand the whole of the second half (we had sat on the terrace for the first, and getting up and down was bothering my knees). The only surprise was the abuse heaped upon one or two of Vasco´s own players when they failed to add to the rout.