Hueca, Huaca, Huaraz

so i've realized that my natural inclination is not toward blogging, but my mama has objected to my hiatus, so here's what i've got for now:

we've been traveling at a really quick pace since we left quito, staying 2 nights or less in each place. it's been chaotic but really fun. now we're in huaraz (mountain city), and we'll be between huaraz and chavin (small town 2 hours from huaraz where we'll meet up with Stanford professor/archeologist John Rick) for the next... month maybe. this place feels good, very good vibes. clean air, people selling fruit and veggies on the street, and CRAZY tall hats with wide rims and colorful patterned shawls. I'm going to take a million pictures--luckily i found some cheap film in Trujillo, which is a cool but strangely cursed town.... we were only there for one day but we had quite an adventure. first we met this strange girl who seemed really really out of it and was supposedly going to help us find a restaurant but ended up just taking us around the same blocks over and over, and when we were talking to her about the ruins Huaca de la Luna and Huaca del Sol, I accidentally said Hueca and she stopped and said, "hueca? are you talking about me because i can't find a place to eat?" and explained that hueca meant someone who has a hole in their head and so their thoughts just escape right out. after she said that, ana and i could not stop thinking of her that way. there was something very odd about her. after ana and i got back from the huaca de la luna (ruins of the ceremonial place of the moche civilization where they used to perform human sacrifices--we think this might have something to do with the curse) we started feeling like we couldn't get a hold of our thoughts and that we were turning into huecas. luckily we chugged some water and snapped out of it in time to plunge into the marketplace. we bought some latin american poetry, tools to work with metal wire for our new artisan careers... doesn't really matter what we bought, it was just really exciting to be in the midst of so many people. it felt like we had broken through the tourist bubble. anyway, another night bus later and we've arrived in Huaraz and i'll leave it at that for now because we're going to go enjoy our new city :)

Much love, and i'll try to write more.