📸 Photo

the words part Quechua, the Inca language, and part Spanish.

During the gleaming morning hours the peddler women, all wearing the same blue smock and hat, offer api and tohori, delicious beverages made of corn. The steaming drinks are served together with hot rolls or fresh donuts dipped in honey.

Along Sixteenth of July Street, which the locals call the prado (promenade), the high school girls dressed in white smocks linger during recess. They tease every passing gringo, whistling and calling, ‘Te amo [I love you].’

At noontime the old people, leaning against the church in their knitted hats, spit out wads of coca leaves, getting ready for lunch. After they’ve eaten their fill, the pouch comes out, and a pinch of fresh leaves goes into their mouths along with the extracting stones.

In the evenings the prado is packed. Strolling youngsters and adults fill the theatres, cinemas, and restaurants.

Marcus, Dede, and Annick were staying at the Rosario Hotel. Jacques and Jacqueline went back to Peru together, and Michel went on to Brazil. Marcus and Annick were becoming very close; I could see they were falling in love. Dede and I spent a lot of time together, but our relationship was different. She was a nice girl, and I liked her a lot. But love? That was something else altogether.

I had taken a room in the Jewish old-folks’ home.