I began weaving lessons yesterday. My teacher, Felicitas, lives high up in the mountain community of Patacancha, above 12,000 ft in altitude. There is one passenger van that goes up the mountainside in the mornings. Its passengers are mostly teachers that teach in the remote villages along the road to Patacancha. My lovely host mother Sonia assured me that I could simply get in on this van and come back down at 1:30, the time that school lets out and the teachers come back down to the valley to have lunch. I didn't fit in the van taking teachers up to Patacancha but I did fit in the van going up to Huilloq, about a one hour walk from my destination. I suspect my sea level accustomed lungs were not factored into this time estimate, and still when the van arrived in Huilloq at 8:00 am, I assumed I had just enough time to walk up the rest of the way.
Andean air brings me to my knees. I have no idea how tourists fly into Cusco at 11,000 ft and then trek to Machu Picchu. I arrived to Patacancha at 9:25am, soaked in rain and with muddied boots, but ready for my first lesson with Felicitas. As soon as I walk into town, I'm greeted by a young man named Santos. I'm not sure if it was a coincidence but he just happened to be Felicitas' husband. I tell him I'm here to meet with her and explain I'm taking weaving lessons with her. I think it's the first he's heard of it but he tells me he will get Felicitas and tell her I'm in town. I go find a hut to sit under, take off my boots and wait. I will be doing a lot of waiting today.
Felicitas shows up and tells me to come to her house. She seems a little surprised I made it but seems okay with it. She walks me to her home, passed her flock of sheep, chicken coop, and hospedaje. My first lesson consisted of me balling the yarn I brought and setting up a simple backstrap loom. Alas, the yarn was not spun properly, or enough, and so my first loom was a bust. Felicitas began respinning the yarn on a drop spindle so that I can set up a loom I could actually work with. She tries to teach me how but I have no idea what she is doing, It kind of looks like she's spinning a top, but somehow, all of the thread accumulates at the bottom of the spindle like magic. Maybe with practice?
My first lesson is over, and after a small snack of reconstituted, freeze dried potatoes and coca tea, I'm heading back to the school to catch the only passenger van out of town. I ask the adult I see if she could show me where the van picks up passengers. She tells me there is no van. There is in fact no van waiting for me. If there was it was not waiting for me. I am a pedestrian.
I begin my ascent in the rain. I'm about 35 minutes into my walk and feel as though someone is following me. I turn around and sure enough a 9 year old boy was walking behind me to the next town. I try some small talk to get a little info about him, and the walk that lies ahead. He is in 5th grade, likes school and assures me that in Huilloq, there will be a car that can drive me the rest of the way. He is much faster than me, but I think that at some point he decides I need his help. He guides me with his shortcuts and makes sure I get into the next town.
There are no cars in Huilloq. It is a 3 hour walk to Ollanta. This is what I am told. I continue to walk down this giant beast of a mountain, I pee on the side of the road, pop in my headphones and make it my mission to survive. At this altitude, a casual pace feels like running a marathon. The blood vessels in your brain expand to pump more blood to it because it is essentially starved for oxygen. Breaths are half as deep though you try to convince yourself this is okay, and that your body is not in fact selecting the most important parts of it to pump blood to and save. Things go numb, thoughts are a little looser, your vision becomes tunneled and intensified. Did I mention I had not eaten but one or two formerly freeze-dried, reconstituted potatoes and a cup of coca tea?
I start thinking of the things that await me at the bottom of the mountain; sleep, comfort, food, oxygen, when I bump into a younger boy, about 5 years old. I see him standing in front of a large expanse, staring at it, seemingly taking it all in. I approached him, he didn't move. He was in awe, that, or he had gone over the edge, maybe I had too, looking at the beauty of the landscape around him. As difficult as this terrain is, it is quite breathtaking. Maybe he was just looking for something in the distance, but it was such a strange sight, this kid was transfixed on something and nothing broke his concentration. Maybe this is what one sees toward the end of life, where oxygen is scarce and movements look and feel like silent, stop-motion animations.
I keep trucking. I'm in survival mode after 4 hours of walking down the mountain. Let me clarify that it is not the time spent hiking that is a problem, it was the constant waiting for a save from a non-existent vehicle going in my direction, the altitude, the lack of food, the cold and wet landscape that made my bones shiver and hands go numb. It was the accumulation of these things and the lack of comfort or hope that made this seem like I was a survivor. This is day one of class.
I make it to the base of the mountain. Walk for another hour and see a town. Surely this is my town, Ollantaytambo. This is familiar right? cows? ruins? homesteads? No, it is not my town. It is one town away and also 2 hours from Ollanta by foot. FUCK!
I keep walking and notice I am at km marker 4. I started at 18. At mile marker 4 the unimaginable happens. A cargo truck with people standing up in the back approaches me and stops. This is the same kind of truck that was just in the news for falling off of a cliff and killing 51 people. Oh hell yes I am getting a ride in this bitch. Someone drops a ladder, I hop on for the ride into town, hold on for dear life as we traverse slick and muddy, cobblestone roads.
I made it into town around 6. So it took 5 hours not the 6.5 my dead brain had calculated. I sat down at my favorite restaurant, destroyed a falafel sandwich and beautifully fried potatoes. Then I walked home, tore off my muddy clothes and slept for 12 hours straight.
I'm going back up tomorrow to stay in Patacancha for 3 days. I expect the visions to be spectacular.
