Thursday, June 24th: Apolobamba Trek Day 2

San Juan left-overs
Leonardo had first suggested we should be ready by 6:30AM, then during the San Juan fiesta we agreed on 8AM. By 8:30 AM he still hasn´t shown, I{m thinking he partied a bit harder than expected. At 8:40 his 16 year old brother shows and says they´ll both guide us today. Our backpack gets loaded onto a donkey (we had hoped for a lama), and after a quick breakfast Leonardo shows. He doesn´t look the fittest, but takes us to the community museum. It´s the only Aymara museum we´ll see, the other communities are Quechua. We set off to Kaluyo, at 4120 metres. The first part of the trail is up and down, so we suffer, but so does Leonardo: he hands the reigns of the donkey to his brother while telling us that we should just continue. He´ll catch up with us within minutes. Poor guy, something tells me his body has had his first encounter with alcohol, and the after-effects aren´t necessarily so pleasant.

We walk through beautiful landscapes, enjoy the sight of pristine lakes, some birds, and take loads of pictures of lamas while the brothers struggle on the downhill part with the donkey. From the initial group of 4, only three make it to Kaluyo. When we ask about Leonardo´s whereabouts 15 minutes before arrival, we find out that Leonardo has left the group and hiked back up. No notice, and if we hadn´t asked we would never have known. “Are there any other sights to see before Kaluyo?” “No”. The family is not blessed with the gift of gab. We give Leonardo´s brother a bag of coca leaves (advised to us by Sam in La Paz) upon arrival, he thanks us and starts hiking back up.

Life in Kaluyo central

Eulogio is our host in Kaluyo. Happy to see us, he sits us down for a lunch. It´s just the two of us in this big unheated room again, Eulogio and the cook have already eaten. While we wait, we notice a bouquet of wilted flowers on the table. That´s the second one, the Qutapampans had done this to us as well. Strange habit, but we don´t want to embarrass anybody, so we don´t ask. The food served is fantastic and copious.

In the afternoon Eulogio takes us for a walk around his hamlet and asks us questions about everything. He seems fascinated with elephants, and we answer as well as we can, telling him there are no elephants in Europe. We take pictures of lamas and condors, as the afternoon shadows grow. The hamlet is rather small, but has a small school, so we are curious about the amount of people that live in Kaluyo. “2”, him and his wife. The kids come from all around to attend school, some even walk several hours.

Dinner is fantastic, candles provide a romantic atmosphere. We tell Eulogio that we want to interact with the locals, that´s the kind of cultural experience we are after, and he promises to come and eat with us. We´re the first tourists ever to have asked about this. He joins us, together with another man in indigenous clothing, chewing coca leaves. It´s the kalawaya, or traveling medicine man whom will perform a good luck ceremony for us tonight. He smiles within a few minutes and even adds to the conversation.

Blessings Kalawaya style

The first part of a kalawaya blessing ceremony involves lama wool (not cotton balls as we thought they were) and an old bottle of port, and glittering things, and an egg, etc. We have our health blessed, as well as our trip, the Kalawaya asks for lots of work in 2010 (little does he know I really need LESS work), and he blesses the health of our parents. Too difficult to explain, this type of ceremony is something we´ve never experienced before. At the end of the ceremony, when we have received all the blessings, the stuff is all carefully wrapped together and we´re invited to go burn it all outside, in the freezing cold. The sneering wind has gotten under my clothes and my teeth clapper uncontrollably. After 15 minutes the egg cracks, a good sign, and we are invited back in for the finale. From the remains of the fire, the Kalawaya picks a hot coal (with his bare hands!) and uses it to create smoke. We wash our faces with this smoke, and are happy to get to our beds after that. Everything possible is blessed, except our sleep: the ceremony has lasted over 3 hours.