Travel Vignette - Cultural "Experiences"

Peru -- 2011

(Note: This story incorporates Dave Fox's final edit from the Globejotting class.)

I groan at the packing list:  "Optional Gear: small gift for home-hosted visit."  It's not the gift.  I'm happy to offer a token of my appreciation.  I'm peeved, however, about a created cultural experience.  The best moments are spontaneous, not scripted.  Nevertheless, I shop for presents.  Coloring books and crayons for the children are easy to pack.  For the adults, a Traveler's Forum suggests, "crank or solar flashlights are good since there's no electricity in the villages."

Two weeks later, however, as we float down the Amazon on our five-day journey, lunch with a local family sounds appealing.  We've watched fishermen checking their lines, women and young children squatting on decrepit docks washing clothes in the silty water.  A chance to ask about their lives is something I'm looking forward to.

We arrive in the village for our home-hosted meal.  Our gifts in brightly colored bags add to our festive mood.  Edwin and Amelia smile and shake our hands.  Their three young girls giggle and hop around.  Our 'placemats,' long palm leaves, are laid end to end on the front porch.  Amelia shows off her kitchen, containing a plastic wash basin and small fire pit.  We help her carry out the food and plastic jugs of fresh mango juice.  The family treats us to a sumptuous lunch of fish, roasted bananas and vegetables, rice, and juice.

Conversation flows freely through our interpreter, Neil.

"I get up early, going down the river to get the fish caught in lines I put out the day before," Edwin tells us.

"After fixing breakfast I take the girls down to the river to do laundry," Amelia says.  We joke about laundry being a never-ending task.

"Do your children go to school?"  Barbara asks.

"Yes, but not now," Edwin says.  He does most of the talking.  Neil explains that school's not in session now, but a young man in the village teaches the children to read and write.  Most will only get a grade school education.  Beyond that, parents must send their children to live with relatives in Nauta, a town of about 18,000, three days further down the Amazon.

"Where are your husbands?"  One of the girls asks.  We chuckle.  Most Peruvians grow up seeing a standard family structure of early marriage followed by children.

"My husband died several years ago," Barbara says.

"I'm divorced, " says Edie.

"I'm too independent to be married," I say.  Everyone laughs.

"It's time for the gifts," Neil says.  I give Amelia the crayons and coloring books.  Then I hand Edwin a solar lantern.  He takes it without a word. I start to feel unsure about my choice.

Pleasant memories of our afternoon turn into earlier fears about scripted experiences.  Now, our afternoon is feeling superficial and condescending.  Rich folks bestowing gifts on the peasants.

The family with their gifts.  Neil, our translator, on the right.

Nervously, I start explaining the lantern.  "You slide the on-off switch like this and here's a clip so you can hang it on a nail or a branch.  It takes about six hours to charge but I already charged it at home so it has power now."  My shoulders tense and I twist my hands, anxious for Edwin's response.

'It's like a dream come true,"  he finally says, tightening his grip on the lantern.  Edwin's gratitude is clear before Neil finishes translating.  "I saw one like this in Nauta but too much, too much."

Neil tells us they sell for about seventy soles ($25), way beyond Edwin's means as a fisherman.  Teary-eyed, Edwin smiles.  His grip is so tight his fingernails are white around the edges.  I relax my shoulders and smile back.  Even scripted experiences can be a chance for communion.