Summer nights, a peaceful life, and what now

My dreams abruptly ended as I awoke to the intense urge to hack snot from my still sleepy lungs. Loud gurgling horrid lung crushing coughs broke the tranquil silence of the tepid summer night. I forced myself to my feet, my throat burning from the violent hacking. "Fucking allergies" I mumbled as I groggily wobbled toward the heavy wooden door at the end of my small rectangular room. I carefully opened the door, slipping out into the hallway, and gingerly pulled it closed behind me. If my hacking allergic cough had not woken the Russian family with whom I was staying, I did not want the click of the door handle to. I made my way down the small staircase and into the kitchen. I pulled a coffee mug from the drying rack next to the sink and flipped on the tap. Cool water rushed out and filled the mug. I touched it my lips, the water sliding toward my throat. I stood there for a moment staring into the darkness, the cold slate tile floor refrigerating my feet. Another summer in Pucon,Chile, another brutal allergy season, another day of work tomorrow.

I finished my mug of water and found my way back up the stairs, to my room, no longer groggy, now almost half awake. I walked toward my small bed in the corner by a decent sized window. I looked out at the superb mountain top vista. In the daytime the valley below a carpet of green, at night a sea of black. I looked toward Pucon. A small cluster of dim warm orange lights huddled near the edge of the lake. How small it looked from up here. How peaceful. I knew better however. I knew what vices lay below. I could picture it now, the blaring of electronic soulless music of the discos, the groups of perfectly painted hardly clothed out of town girls as they moved from bar to bar, the clusters of very drunk young men hoping to find some excitement in the sauna like disco. 

My first year in Chile I lived for those nights. I could not wait to leave work, change clothes, and head into the chaos and heat of the discos. To have my ears destroyed by bland repetitive reggaetone. To drunkenly find a girl to fight with my tongue. When I think back towards these nights I only remember the sweat, the smell of tequila, and the taste of ash tray lips. 

I continued to look toward the lights, waiting to feel the urge to go to town, waiting to feel as though I was missing something by being here, and not there. It was only three in the morning, if I left now I could make it for the last few hours the discos were open. I could party till the sun revealed the day. However, the longer I stared out at the lights the less desire I had to head toward the city. I did not want to disappear into the blackness of intoxication with fake, superficial, emotionally curbed people crammed around me on the dance floor. I did however want to drink. To forget about this cough. To disappear into sleep free from dreaming.

I waited a while longer, the lights losing their focus in my eyes. They melted together into ribbons of fire. "What now?" I thought. I finally had been able to pay my visa. I had finally found a peaceful place to stay on top of a mountain with a wonderful Russian family. I had finally found my rhythm as a kayak instructor, the work rewarding and plentiful. I had finally put my life in order.

 A peaceful life. The life I had been searching for. However there was something missing.

I awoke to the rhythmic repetitive ear jarring alarm of my old beaten hardly charged cell phone. I forced my eyes to open and great the bright morning sun. They threatened to fall back closed, but I sat up quickly, my bones clicking into place with almost audible pops. I looked out my window. Now in the morning light. My eyes drank in the mountains to the east in large wide eyed gulps. My nostrils became high from the smell of the dry morning mountain air. I massaged my right wrist, the dull deep pain of overuse starting to become an issue, and tried to forget my dreams from the night before, and enjoy the hopeful nature of the morning.

I left the window and once again descended the stairs and headed into the kitchen. I picked up my mug from where I had left it the night before and once again filled it with water. I opened the microwave, slid the mug inside, and carelessly spun the dial to the right. A whoosh of radioactive rays exploded to life. I waited, watching through the frosted glass microwave window, the mug spinning round and round. After a minute or two I prematurely spun the dial back to the left, the imitation ding of a bell signifying that the water was probably a tongue burning temperature. I pulled the mug from the microwave and slid it across the plain white tile counter top. I pulled a small can of instant coffee from a speckled wooden drawer and scooped two spoonfuls of brown powder into the steaming liquid. With a small spoon I swirled the powder round and round the mug until it melted into a slightly appeasing chocolate colored cup of coffee. How mundane this morning ritual. Waiting for the caffeine to wake me up. Waiting to start the day. Waiting for to answer the question, "What now?"

The mug finally stopped steaming. I gulped the coffee down. Almost finished, I dumped the last of it down the drain before throwing my backpack on and heading outside. I found my bike where I had left it the day before, sitting by itself,lonely, against the white cement walls of the house. I pushed it up the gravel driveway, opened the gate, jumped onto the hard seat, and started my descent to work. Hands off the breaks, I sped down the dirt, dust filled, barb wired fence outlined, tree covered road. My tires threatened to slip out from under me as they met the loose gravel floor. I shifted my weight forward, the sudden rush of adrenaline serving to wake me better than the instant coffee. A few more out of control curves later I had descended the mountain another day with out crashing. My legs pumping furiously I started the commute to work.

The sun burned my still mirror like white body as it shoved its way past the dancing leafs of the overhanging grass colored oak tree. I lay on top of a half deflated old pink raft, the hissing of escaping air filling my head. Sand still stuck to the raft scratched my shirtless back. My head slowly lowered as the air found freedom escaping from the open valves. I looked through the leaves and branches above me, blue sky hiding behind them. Wind mixed with the roar of the rapid around the bend as it rushed past me, headed downstream. I breathed deeply now. I breathed naturally. Work was almost over. I had taught the intern at our company how to row, a skill my dad had taught me years ago. I waited once again listening for the rumble of the old van, as it came to collect me from this beach and take me back to the concrete of the city. I thought about staying in the city that night. Drinking till dawn. Allowing the blackness to take me into a peaceful sleep. My relative sobriety had led to nights full of long convoluted dreams, yet I was now more able to enjoy the day, the mornings. I thought about staying, dealing with the question, "What now?" by drowning it in Pisco. I thought for a while. I always think for awhile. Soon my thoughts wandered back to the house atop the mountain, the family awaiting me, and my peaceful life. A peaceful life, a live well lived. The dreams and allergies seemed now in the daylight a small price to for peace. The discos and girls would have to wait another day as my thoughts would keep me atop the mountain.

"Don't leave the Bus"

The sun hung in the sky, sucking the energy from my body. My skin was now like a well fried potato. My hair a greasy tangle wildy bursting from underneath my tattered and soiled trucker’s cap. I sat outside, my back cooking against the hot metal of the bus. My black Patagonia pants now a strange tan color, overwhelmed by dust. I stared out into the the desert sky, my swollen tongue uncomfortably resting behind, cracked and seared lips. It seemed sad that such a beautiful sky could accompany such an ugly horizon. My kayak shoes were soaked in stench from my dirty salty feet. Glassy beads of sweat carved coffee bean colored lines of dirt as they crept down my cheeks. I refused to look down the road. I chose instead to stare into the emptiness, away from this place. Away from this place.

I was stuck. For two days now I had not moved. Our bus, like the line of hundreds behind it, waited impatiently behind large piles of bricks, wood, and tires. Sharpened stick wielding, hard hat wearing, Peruvian miners stood like a lackluster centurions atop the makeshift barriers only a few hundred metres away.  The small city of Atica lay just past the barriers, the desperate miners having overrun it the day before. There was no way around it. My bus had been one of the first to reach the barrier. The line of buses had created somewhat of a community, with people milling about and in hushed tones speculating on what might happen next. I had gone to Chile six months earlier to pursue my lifelong passion for whitewater kayaking. I had spent the last few months, working, kayaking, and enjoying my first year away from home. My Spanish had come along nicely, albeit with a thick Chilean accent.The now overflowing pipe like toilet in the back of the bus, left an inescapable stench of piss and shit which hung the stagnant air and overwhelmed my senses.

It had taken me over 30 hours of non stop buses to get me to this point, and I was still some six hours south of Ica, Peru, and my latest idea of spending the next week sandboarding on the world’s largest sand dunes. The little water I had, I gave to the family behind me in the bus the night before. The route from Arequipa to Ica, a normally safe one, usually takes about fifteen hours. I had not thought to bring extra water with me. I had had no way of knowing that I would be stuck for any length of time, let alone two days.  

“If I ever make it out of this, I will return to chasing my dream of becoming a professional kayaker. I will return to Chile” I promised myself. A promise I did not think would make it past the vast expanse of the desert. This dream had faded in the last couple months of my time in Chile as my money ran thin, and the weather dry. I started to think about returning to a more normal view of life. A view which was filled with a comfortable house, a decent job, and weekends lost in the mountains, rivers, and hidden places of America.

The Pan-American highway had become my prison, the bus my cell, the people around me suspicious and foreboding. I had finished John Steinbeck's  “Travels with Charlie” only a couple hours earlier, ending the only escape I had from this hell. Two days ago they had said we would be here only a few hours, but no one could have predicted this. Where were the police? Where was the help?

My hands fell to my sides, fingers feeling the hot sand of the desert, reminding me of the absence of water. The only relative shade now a thin ever changing shadow cast from the metallic giant.  My stomach ached, the last of its fuel an ice cream bar thirty hours digested. My tongue seemed to be stuck to the roof of my mouth. It had been my own naivete that had led me here. Peru was not the same as Chile. I had spent the last year in a friendly first world country living in a tourist town hundreds of miles to the South of the nearest big city. To assume that traveling alone in a third world country would be as easy as traveling in a first world country was borderline absurd. It was the cheap plane tickets out of Lima, Peru that had drawn me here. My own actions, and the hope of saving money for my return to the United States had now thrown me into what was quickly becoming a fight for survival.

I had read that the average human could go two weeks without food, but only three days without water. With the nearly one hundred degree temperatures and lack of shade, I felt now as though these numbers were grossly over exaggerated. I tried to stand. Black circles formed around the edges of my eyes, a strange almost drunkenness overcame my body and I slouched back down against the bus. I wanted to cry. I wanted to let go. I was nothing but scared. I was the nothing but an unwilling participant in what was rapidly deteriorating situation.

I had my whole life shoved into a small backpack. Four hundred dollars, a computer, toothbrush kit, and my passport always stayed strapped tightly to my shoulders, my heavier luggage safely stowed in the belly of the bus. Four hundred dollars was more than what most of these people made in two months, and I saw showing any signs that I had money as an open invitation to trouble. I had tried to buy food and water from the flock of enterprising nearby townspeople who had come to profit off of the current state of our desperation. I found however, that I, alone and very much vulnerable, could not make it close to the vendors before desperate Peruvians would start taking a special interest on my carefully guarded backpack.

“Don’t leave the bus” the driver had told me, “You will not be safe out there...you will not come back” he had told me the day earlier. He knew better than I of what desperation, hunger, and thirst could force a man to do, and my only chance at help would be the escaping to the locking bus door. I could not sleep at night, every shuffling of feet outside the window, every thud of the closing of the metal bus door would send fear swirling into the forefront of my eyes, and my hand shooting toward the small river knife I had attached to my belt. The uncertainty of the future was the worst. I did not want to die in the desert. I did not want to become the next face demonstrated on my hometown’s local news, explaining the tragedy of one “local Oregon family’s son.” The thought sickened me. I had left the bus a few times, the mid afternoon heat unbearable inside, the driver’s words always in the back of my head. A few other old ladies also residing within the confines of the bus had also warned me of the dangers of the outside. I had never felt so alone. Hopefully I would outlast the sun, the dire situation, and my own mind.

I tried to stand again, this time I was able walk back toward the door. I made my way up the couple steps into the security of the bus. Suddenly the blackness, fueled by the furnace like interior of the bus, overtook my vision. I stumbled, tried to catch myself, then fell to my hands and knees, my eyes wide, trying to maintain consciousness. I fought through it and  clambered back to my feet.

“Careful Gringo, you don’t look so good.” , An old Peruvian woman said, I felt worse than before. I fell back into my seat, and allowed the blackness to return.

I awoke to screams outside, the sudden rumble of the bus, and the terrible pop of tear gas.

The police had arrived.

Everything became one hectic explosion of motion. The busses swung into a strange circle pattern, leaving the road, narrowly missing the scattering passengers who had been caught outside the security of the buses.

The driver yelled for us to get down. A rock contacted the window to my right, a spider web fracture exploding out in all directions. The tear gas seared my senses. I hit the floor, and pulled my shirt over my face. I bounced violently as the bus continued its wild off road maneuver.

More tear gas popped. The screaming was replaced by coughing, crying, and sniffling of submission. I squeezed my eyes tightly shut and shook as I began to attempt to sob. No tears came, the sun had effectively juiced me.

Just as violently as it began it stopped. Our bus slowed, then froze. There was an eerie silence as the engine died. For a few moments no one moved. Finally and old man struggled to his feet and walked toward the front of the bus. Others followed him outside. I could hear the excited chatter of the passengers outside. I followed them out with some hesitation. The buses had moved to form a defensive perimeter parking barely a hip’s distance from each other.   Large black plumes of smoke rose from the tire atop the roadblock which were now ablaze obscuring the occupied city in the distance. Behind stood the phalanx of Peruvian miners, in front stood hundreds of Peruvian police, riot shields, and clubs clutched tightly in their black gloved hands.  The police made no move. It was as if they were waiting for the cover of night to act.

The fiery orange sun disappeared behind the flaming roadblock, and I disappeared back into the bus for another sleepless night of fear. The stifling urine soaked seats of the bus, suffocated my lungs, but I did not notice. I instead listened for the slightest sound of impending police action. Every so often a scream from outside would pierce the low coughs, and squirming passengers, and bring my eyes back to a wide aware state.

At dawn the bus came to life.

“Close the blinds and keep your heads down” called the driver. The orange curtains which hung from the windows were pulled tightly shut, and the bus began a slow crawl forward toward Atica. The police must have cleared the city. Soon shouting, the occasional thud of a rock hitting the side of the bus, and the speculations of what had happened during the night overtook my ears.

I pulled the curtain slightly open and peered out into the streets. We had entered the city of Atica, Peru. A wall of riot shield wielding police held back the hateful looks of the oppressed miners. They stretched as far as I could see down the road to town. They had cleared a path to salvation. Some of the miners shouted, and jabbed past the police with their sticks, but most just stared dejectedly at the procession of defeat. The occasional explosion of tear gas could be seen in the distance, but nothing stopped us from exiting the city and continuing down the open road.

As the bus reached a normal speed for the first time in three days, I sat back in my seat and took a deep breath. “It was over” was all I could think. I could feel a sense of urgency in the speed the bus took, a sense that it was a race to finish line. A race to normality. I fell into a deep sleep as the minutes passed by. A smile slowly creeping across my face as a few hours passed in silence and peace.

The brakes screeched.

I shot upright. “No, no no!” was all I muttered as we slowed, the view outside my window nothing but the desert and the ocean, no salvation in sight. The groans of the other passengers filled the air. I rushed to the front of the bus and leapt out the door as soon as we came to a halt. We had stopped on a large trash covered hill leading into a small dirt covered city, black smoke billowing from the city center, the line of buses in front of ours motionless, stretching to nearly the edge of the main street. It appeared that miners had occupied this city as well, refusing to let us pass.

My eyes burned. “Fuck! I can’t do this! I can’t do this!” I collapsed to the ground. I would not make it to Ica anytime soon, let alone Lima. Any vague romantic notions I had entertained earlier in my trip about my solo journey to Peru were long gone. Any dreams about sandboarding in Ica, or learning to surf in Lima now seemed like something a child might dream of. I felt ashamed of my own ignorant bliss.

A few hours passed, more and more passengers entered the city, drawn toward the possibility of food and water. I started to feel the itch to go as well. To leave the bus. It had become a symbol of my frustrations. It had become a prison I could not escape. With black smoke still rising steadily into the air from the city center, I walked toward the outskirts, motivated by my thirst, disregarding the countless disgruntled miners who lay inside the city.

My footsteps echoed in the dust suffocated streets. For how many people I had seen enter the city, it was strangely empty. I exited a narrow street and came into a large square, a dry cracked plaster white fountain firmly situated in the center. To the left A stationary lone truck sat in front of a small official looking building, a large machine gun mounted in the bed. Outside the door a couple of heavily armed policemen stood scanning the square I had just stumbled upon. I walked toward them and approached the most senior looking of the two.

“Where can I get food?” I asked. He had a line of stars pinned to his collar.

He gave me a confused look then answered, “Across the square in that building.” He  gestured toward a faded white building, “you can find bread, and maybe some juice or something.” I thanked him and started to walk toward the building. “Hurry” he added, “This place, it is not safe for you.”

I quickened my pace to a trot and came to the building. I entered, a tired looking young man in a blue t-shirt greeted me. It seemed he was even more tired than I was of this ordeal. “What can I get you?” he asked.

“Water and bread”  I said.

“We have no water, but you could get a Powerade Zero” he offered, producing a warm looking bottle. The familiar powerade logo assuring me than unlike most of the water in the area, this would be definitely potable.

“How much?” It felt like a stupid question. I would have given all of my four hundred dollars just to have half of the drink.

“2 soles” he answered, less than one US dollar.

I paid him and quickly left the store and started walking back toward the buses. Something felt wrong. It felt as though I had overstayed my welcome. I was abusing the thin line of credit that was my luck. My pace shifted from a slow slog back, to a slight jog.

I could see the buses now, I was in the last block of the city streets.  I glanced back. The streets were no longer empty but instead filled with an impromptu exodus of fleeing passengers. With a soul crushing pop, I heard the can explode. I glanced behind me. The fog of tear gas consumed the area from where I just came.

I started to run. More firecracker like explosions filled the air. I made it to the buses still parked high up on the hill leading toward the city, a wave of coughing, snot covered unlucky passengers arriving shortly after me. I took my seat inside the bus and unscrewed the lid to my powerade. With shaking greedy hands I brought the bottle to my cracked lips. The warm artificial liquid soaked my mouth and soothed my throat. I sucked the bottle down in a matter of seconds, but the relief was short lived. The sudden introduction of rapid hydration to my body cause my empty stomach to howl in protest. I needed to eat. I needed fuel.

A small shack, no more than woven reeds and sticks, sat a few hundred yards from our bus. I could see steam rising from the open hole in the roof. Maybe, there was food. I walked over and stood outside. An old lady emerged, a large pot of pasta held carefully in her weathered and shaking hands. She placed the pot on a small table then returned inside. She appeared once again with a stack of neat porcelain plates. The plates seemed out of place among the severe poverty she seemed to endure. Another man appeared outside the house. He was younger, probably related to her in some way.

“Are you hungry?” he asked, as if he already knew my response.

“Yes.”

“5 soles, and you can have one plate.” He  extended his hand, awaiting payment.

I shoved my hand into my pocket and searched until I found a few small coins. I paid him, and the old lady heaped a pile of slimy fishy smelling pasta onto one of the porcelain plates. I descended upon the food, shoveling down large spoonfuls of the pasta. I rapidly cleaned the plate, then handed it back. I thanked them profusely before heading back to the buses.

The afternoon had grown long, the sun unbearable. I found refuge laying underneath the belly of the buss, a few other Peruvians following suit. I laid in the closest thing to shade I had, and talked with the others next to me. They all said the same thing,  “Don’t leave the bus.” It was as if they knew what was about to happen to me, and they just wanted to prolong the inevitable.

The roar of a helicopter awoke me. I slid out from under the bus and scanned the sky. A large soviet looking military helicopter came circling over head. With careful precision, it maneuvered toward the edge of the city bordering the coast. In a cloud of sand, it disappeared onto the beach for a few minutes before once again rising into the sky and vanishing into the horizon. I returned to my refuge under the bus and continued to wait. There was nothing more I could do.

The sun began to fall quickly, another night out here seemed inevitable. I once again slid out from the bus and stared at the horizon. The black smoke was gone, only the faint rumble of large detonations could be heard.

Our bus came to life. “We are going!” yelled the driver.

Chaos ensued as passengers fled to their buses, hope of escape reaching their hearts. I took my seat and we closed the curtains. A few minutes passed, then we moved. I refused to allow the hope of escape to consume me. I feared that if we stopped once more it would crush any will to live I had left.

We entered the city, Chala, Peru, and the screams and shouts of the miners reverberated throughout the streets. Horns met their shouts, the bus drivers venting the frustrations of us all in loud rhythmic blasts of their horns. I peeked out the window. Miners sat dejectedly staring at yet another wall of riot police. Loose bricks, smoldering tires, and beaten miners were the only signs that there had been a riot. Some of the miners shouted, a few threw some rocks, but they knew as well as I did, that the police had prevailed. They would no longer keep us from reaching our destination. Our salvation.

As we left the city, and climbed into the mountains, I smiled, but I had learned that the best emotion was one of defeat. To proclaim a victory would be to lie. Peru had taken everything from me. Our bus moved to a death defying pace as we fled the city and wound our way along the tight curves leading us away from the narrow coastal road and toward freedom. Suddenly we slowed, I could not figure out why.

“ Un cuerpo!” came the gasps of my fellow passengers.

“A body?” I thought. I must not be hearing this right. I moved to the right side of the bus and looked out the window.

All I could see was his foot, a sandal still attached, flames obscuring the rest of his body. He was on his stomach, the last of his life sizzling from him. The bus came to a stop and the door popped open. The bus driver slowly walked out. To this day I don’t know why but I followed. I was greeted by the sickening smell of burning hair and flesh. It stung my eyes and I gagged. I covered my nose with my elbow and froze. No sounds exiting his mouth, just the slow sound of cooking flesh.

“Dios” was all the driver said. The shock froze me, I could not move. Suddenly my feet turned and I quickly raced back inside the bus and rushed to my seat. I wished to God I had not seen him, but reality overcame me.

My eyes creaked open as I heard someone encouraging me to wake up. “You wanted to go to Ica?”

“Yeah, are we close?” was all I could say.

“We are here” he replied.

The other passengers started shouting at the driver to stop. He quickly slammed the bus to a stop and looked at me. “You want off?” he asked, his tone one of a man who would soon no longer be a bus driver.

“Is this Ica?” I asked.

“You're in the center of it.” he replied, awaiting my decision.

“Ok let me get my stuff from underneath and I’ll go.”

I got off the bus followed by the driver. We had stopped in the middle of what seemed like a six lane highway, taxis, cars, and Tuk Tuks racing past us. He opened the belly of the bus and extracted my guitar and large blue dry bag.

“Good luck.” He disappeared back into the bus and drove off.

I stood watching the cars race dangerously close past me, completely unsure of my next move, my bags straddled between my legs. Suddenly a taxi screeched to a stop inches in front of me. A small black haired man stuck his face out of the window, a large grin consuming his expression, and in a high pitched voice asked, “Need a ride?”

He dropped me at a hostel, and I got a room. I fell onto my bed, ripped off all my clothes, and passed out in seconds. The next morning I sat up with a groan. I opened my eyes and looked at the other empty bunk beds that filled the large cement dorm room. I needed to leave this country. The problem was my plane flight was not for another two weeks. I had planned to spend a week here drinking, partying, and sandboarding before heading to Lima to see about taking surf lessons. Those plans as far as I was concerned were now void. I wanted to return to Chile, my home of the last few months. There had been no riots, intense heat, or burning bodies in Chile. There had been instead amazing kayaking, beautiful women, and plentiful bars. It had been the best six months of my life, but now felt as though I had dreamt it all. I had never felt so safe, a stark contrast with my now painful impression of Peru.  With little money and now fatigued, that was not an option. All I could do was wait for my flight.

I found a computer cafe nearby and opened my email. Four unread messages from my parents greeted me, the last they had heard I was on a bus to Ica, estimated arrival time, four days ago.

“Jon just wondering if you made it” read one.

“Hopefully all is well” read the other.”

“Haven’t heard from you in a while” read the third.

“Where are you?” read the final.

I responded with, “Got stuck on a bus for a few days. Please change my plane ticket, I will pay you back in full as soon as I get back, just get me out of here.”

I spent the next week suddenly taking up chain smoking, excessive drinking, and blankly staring into the distance at the hostel. All I wanted to do was leave. My parents changed the ticket, and I left after a week of self destruction.

When I came back to the states, it felt surreal. The fear I had felt was now gone. I found myself in a wholly safe existence. My time in Peru felt as though it were a nightmare, and I had now awoken, still haunted by what I had seen.

I spent the next year waking to the smell of burning flesh, covered in sweat, feeling as though I was there. I would close my eyes and see it all, like one horrible flashback, before bolting upright, sweat sliding down my face. There was something clearly inside me I needed to deal with, but I instead drowned it in a flood of beer and vodka.

No matter what I did I saw it. Worse than seeing it was the inability to talk about it. No one could understand it. Many times it almost seemed like people thought it was a joke. A well told exaggeration. I learned that what I was willing to tell was not enough for people to understand what I was feeling. I could not describe the fear. I could not describe the fire. I learned it was best to just say, “I don’t like to talk about it.” I also learned that I could not talk about it without feeling the intense urge to cry.

A year past. I found myself back in Chile. I found myself in countless adventures. I found myself once again in the cycle of crazy work hours, and even crazier drinking habits. I witnessed two volcanic eruptions and hitchhiked 1300 km in Argentina with only 80 US dollars to my name. But could not escape Peru. It lingered in my mind every night, and not a day passed I did not think about it. A year after Peru, it was just as real as the present I was living.

I had started working again in America, saving money for the my third trip to Chile. One stifling summer night I was watching “Captain Phillips” a movie about the capture of a cargo ship by Somali pirates. Toward the end of the movie, something triggered my memory. I suddenly found myself outside the bus, staring at the flames, smelling the stench. I broke down into gut wrenching sobs, and slid to the floor curling up into the fetal position. The emotions were overwhelming, the pain that had stayed inside for over a year came flooding out. “I’m sorry” was all that came out of my mouth between long moans and a flood of tears. “I am so sorry I couldn’t help you” I sobbed. “I am so sorry...please forgive me.” I had been given a chance at life which that man never had been given. He now lay dead because I wanted to go down the road. Because I wanted an adventure. He lay dead, along with who knows how many others because the roads needed to be cleared, and because the plight of the Peruvian miner could not be heard. Hours passed before sleep overtook the tears.

It has taken me a year and a half to finally be able to write anything close to the truth about Peru without feeling the welling of tears in my eyes. There is not a day that passes without a sudden panic consuming my body and the sense of entrapment freezing me to my cot, couch, or bed. I don’t know how to end this, maybe because it is still not over. I survived three days of Peruvian hell. They never get to leave. They are not able to escape. I am forever grateful that I was born with the opportunity to escape. To waste and opportunity such as this would be to forget everything I went through. I now am finding peace in returning to pursuing my dream of kayaking. A dream which hopefully, combined with time, will allow me to give someone else the opportunities I have received.