Peru Trip #7

I skipped a year visiting Peru, but I’m back. Before I leave it always seems like such a hassle, and then the second we land in the jungle and take off in the car from Tarapoto, I feel home. The heat makes sense. The colors and crazy moto taxis - they just feel calm.  Everything is the same…but this time not. Little things, like the Lima airport doesn’t have their game show red light / green light random security system for searching bags. Peurto Mirador Hotel no longer has a switch for hot water you have to turn on 30min before you want to shower. There’s a new beer, Tres Cruces, but it’s still just as cold – colder than anywhere I’ve ever had beer. But the rest is the same, we arrive at the hotel with the group of 8 doctors and are greeted by Luis - hugs and then “Okay, 7min and then we leave for Yantaló .” And we’re off, pack well, because filming starts 10min before you’re ready. Straight to Yantaló for the usual tour of the clinic, and the shock of pulling up and seeing the progress was even more than usual. It’s SO BIG!

I always forget how grateful and impressed and inspired I am by the people who congregate to Yantaló,  instigated by Luis. There are always late night dinners, a table full of over 20 from around the world. It’s 10pm and we’re eating and drinking pisco sours. The doctors wake up at 6am and perform 6-8 surgeries in a day. I think josh and my days are hard, carrying around cameras, they’re cutting people open and saving babies! To us filming is fun, to them surgery is fun. Everyone at the table is brilliant, whether a 25 year old student from Lima, President of a hospital from the US, or top surgeon from France, everyone is laughing, and drinking, and completely happy. 

I’m not 100% sure why we're all here, but pretty much all of us will be back, or have been returning- again and again.