In December of 2014, I made
a voyage of discovery to Peru, going up and down the coast in search of images
to complete one documentary and create another.
Both films are about Afro-Peruvians;
one focuses on the dance, history, and music with its connection to
Latin jazz. The other is a celebration
of three great percussionists: Lalo
Izquierdo, Juan Medrano Cotito, and Huevito Lobatón.
I’ve talked about the films
elsewhere, and you can view their trailers on their web sites (www.AZestforLifeMovie.com and www.MastersofRhythm-Movie.com), so here
I’ll give you a travel resumé.
Before going any further, I
should explain that I speak Spanish. My
trip would have been very different if that were not the case. If you don’t already know it, it’s a good
language to learn.
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| Mosaics in the Parque del Amor; it's hazy but you can still just make out the ocean. |
In the week before I left
California to board the airplane for Lima, several people advised me to be
careful and watch out for thieves.
Frankly, they made me feel a bit nervous about going. My worries increased when, as planned, I was
met at the airport by a taxi driver promised as reliable, and he told me to
lock the cab’s doors and keep the windows rolled up. He then regaled me with a couple of sobering
stories of tourists being kidnapped.
After I’d spent a couple of
days in Lima, however, I decided that it was unnecessary to be fearful. Yes, you want to be sure to use a licensed
cab driver (and its easy to find one).
And of course you don’t want to walk down the street with your video
camera, worth thousands of dollars, in a fancy camera bag that kind of says
“steal me.”
But beyond these and other
common sense tips, it’s not a place to be afraid of.
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| Street in Miraflores with old-style buildings. |
All in all, I spent a little
under a month in Peru, about two weeks of which were in Lima where I’d rented a
room in an apartment in the Miraflores district. Miraflores, as I soon discovered, is a
district on the shore of the Pacific with a lot of tourists, students, and
upper middle class housing.
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| Rather more modern buildings across from the lovely Parque Kennedy. |
The room I rented was in an
apartment in a large housing block whose entrance had a guard/concierge at the
door. There was also a dog…an elderly
dog who mostly lay in the sun and enjoyed being petted. A nice dog.
Many people in the apartment
block had green and healthy plants in front of their doors. It was delightful. And since it was December, not only was the
weather very mild (December is summer in Peru) but several of the balconies on
the upper stories had been hung with Christmas lights.
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| Front of one of the apartments with very healthy plants. That's me, in front. |
The apartment was only a few
blocks from the ocean, and the coastline is lined with beautiful parks. I took full advantage of them to go for some
very nice walks. The coast reminds me a
little of the coast in the San Francisco Bay Area because it’s frequently
foggy. There is also a high bluff next
to the ocean. I was on top of the bluff
and never made it down to the beaches.
After all, I was there to work.
_________________
Eve A. Ma is the producer-director
of two documentaries about Afro-Peruvians:
A Zest for Life and Masters of Rhythm. Find out about these and her other work at www.PalominoPro-signup.com.
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