safe and sound...

PRE-CAUTION:
Alright, so this is what i figured. if you are reading my blog you want to know what is actually going on. I have so many that have told me that I should write a blog so that they can live vicariously through me. So, I am now abiding. I am going to be blunt and its going to be entertaining. :) 

4am start to the morning in Canada. Which if you know me (I'm not a morning person) you would think it would bother me. But I have to admit that sleep wasn't priority on the day. was saying goodbye.
That is another story.

Spent the morning on a plane cramped between two people, got to love it seat 23e. They were tiny people though so i was fortunate in that way. I read the majority of my book Celestine prophecy, which i have to admit i was quite surprised that it had a very good message involved. The book was recommended to me to read before I reached Peru. It involved a lot of coming into ones own, seeing a new perspective on life and evolving into the best person you can be. It didn't say anything new to me, however it did give to me some things that i needed to hear again. I also tried to sleep but kept waking myself up from my own snoring, other people must have loved me. But hey no babies on the flights... score!

I arrived at Houston around noon, what i soon realized in my short stop over in Houston is that they like to charge you for everything. Even the wifi, which is normally free, Hell my cheap hostel has free wifi.

Anyways I decided not to put my credit card through a transaction on the internet to get an account to use wifi at the airport. I was feeling a bit hungry having not eaten yet, the 3 hour flight on United didn't offer any food.

I went into a pub near my gate, I had a couple hours to kill. Ordered a Heineken on tap (the best beer they had) and a chicken wrap with yam fries. The beer was flat and tasted more like the bottom of the barrel of Keiths, Heineken and Coors mixed together. mmmm 25 oz of yum. (the food was alright) ;) Afterwards the manager saw that my drink was empty... yes I drank it, it cost me 10 bucks and said to me "Hi Sir, would you like another tasty malt beverage?" hahaha! who says that? I replied "no."

boarding my flight was effortless, I know how to pack, small pack with a weeks worth of clothes and the essentials (my essentials seem to always have no less than 5 books and 2 journals.) and a small carry on with the fragiles, a good book to read and this trip my computer.

I was sat next to a Peruvian man with intelligent kind eyes and a strong jaw. I asked him how he was and he looked at me said... "uh good..." and that was that.
haha ok he did eventually talk to me 10 minutes later, I had found out that he was from Peru but has lived in Canada for some time as a biologist near in Ontario. Doing some very cool research about the metabolism of animals and trying to transfer the results to humans. A very smart and yet humble person. When he found out that I was traveling alone and the length of my stay... he became... well lets say... over protective. Gave me all kinds of advice on where to go, what to watch out for and in a very humble way... telling me there are some people that will rob you. hahaha "we have some uhh, lets say... funny people there"

I guess I didn't really look like a seasoned traveler at this point, clean looking, leather jacket, new bag.
besides the point. Hector was the mans name, which i didn't learn his name until 6 hours of flight and many conversations later when we finally introduced ourselves (sometimes names come later when you realize that you have a connection with someone and you realize you don't know what to call them). He gave me his information on a business card and told me that if i needed anything or anything happened to please call him. There was something funny though, he kept asking me if i was sure that I had a ride ready for me at the airport. I soon realized why later.

An hour to get through customs, get my bag and go through bag checkage (yes checkage, no its not a Peruvian thing is a Tyler thing) I didn't have a problem getting through customs I seldom do. The reason it took so long was apparently Lima does not have that many runways and everything is done at 1 am. so  4 planes landed in a very short time and everyone bottle necked in line.

I started feeling amazing on the plane, very excited about new avenues that I would come across. When the humidity hit me in the airport I was set. I feel good again.

When I walked out of the terminal with my bag in hands ready to look for a banner with my name on it (yes i know i know but i couldn't resist when the hostel asked me if I wanted it, going to feel very special... but it didn't) my eyes widened a bit... try to picture and yes I'm sorry I had all my luggage with me and didn't have time to get out my camera so try to picture with me now... about 500 people in a room behind a small barrier. screaming and asking if I wanted a taxi. Well i read a bit about the taxis in Lima, pretty much said there is risk of getting mugged if you take the wrong one. Anyways, very loud people shouting all grouped up, some families looking, others shouting if anyone wanted a taxi. I was asked 5 times in a within 2 minutes. what really made me laugh was the amount of signs with peoples names on them, i literally had to walk up to a lot of them and see if one was my name.  You would think that my name would stand out among all the spanish names... but apparently  my name can be spelled with extra letters. "Teylor Keialboack" that for sure made me laugh. I could see how overwhelming the airport experience could be for some people and also why Hector was making sure someone was picking me up.

I have always said Calgary has some of the worst drivers, even though other countries seem to be more erratic. So even amongst the craziness i was pretty calm getting into the cab.
I flash back of of movie I had recently seen came flooding into my head "the Art of Travel" fresh new traveler in a cabbie in South America screaming in terror as the erratic fast driving as he passes through stop signs and red lights without blinking and taking corners at race car speeds.
HOWEVER...
I didn't think too much about it as we almost hit 3 cars out of the parking lot, as he pulled up to the 3rd before the exit gate, I'm not sure if i could have slid my hand in between the two bumpers after he jerked on the breaks. Afterwards signalling was a omitted in his driving as he darted in and out of cars, he did slow down for the massive speed bumps that were randomly placed on any road. Funny thing that happened was he was always put on his hi-beams and tail gate someone that cut him off... Now that doesn't seem funny right now and would kind of remind you of Canadian driving respectfully except for one difference, he wasn't at all angry or perturbed in any way, he did it as if it was the thing to do, if someone cuts you off or you dont like their driving, put on your hi-beams and tailgate them. dont forget to smile. :)
ok, not everyone didn't forget their signal lights, very often we passed a car or motor bike with their right signal on... I figure its meant for people to pass them, but who knows.
you may think wow, too crazy... but, ... it's not over yet...

I'm paying attention to say the least but I'm still at this point not nervous, we have more accidents in Canada in my mind at this point... cough*
speeding faster and continuing to dart in between cars and just missing trucks that decided to merge in our lane at the last second, my cab driver decided to put on  a little music... which i wasn't quite sure what it was going to be like but laughed when he finally picked something he enjoyed... My mind has always thought this type of driving should be accompanied with some fast beat or heavy music to keep up with the pace of traffic and my heart beat haha.
nope! We instead got music that I can only describe as ... Mexican polka in an 80s romantic movie minus the sax.
we came to a slow down when we saw some flashing lights, I thought maybe a "Policia" had pulled someone over...
nope! was fire trucks and emergency crews that were looking at a fresh crash... Shattered glass and a badly dented side of a small red car stood in the middle of an intersection. with random people walking around.
My cabbie slowed down to take a look saying "ohhh... crash..."
So at this point my whole argument in my head that I was safe and this is normal came flooding out of me in a kind of nervous laugh. The cabbie smiled apprehensively at me probably wondering what I found so amusing.
After that I have to go down the check list.

garbage in the streets, check
dark alley ways, check
stray dog, check
almost in an accident, check, check, check
group of young men hidden in dark alleys following with their eyes, check
passing a police car over 30km more an hour, check, and check.

Got into my hostel at around 1 am, no one seemed to be awake, got my bag and everything in my room, wrote on facebook telling everyone that I got here... safely? sure why not ... safely!

My hostel is quite nice, red walls, lots of paintings on the walls, literally on the walls, as well as pictures of other backpackers... not lost or missing or anything, in fun poses smiling, I get a good vibe from this place.
One thing is for certain, I must improve on my Spanish if i was to get by here, which is a nice difference from other places I have traveled. Other people in other countries wanted to improve their english where as here they want me to improve my Spanish, awesome!

alright so... this is the morning of Day One... wish me luck!  ;)