Let me recommend Ampay bus line for all of the above.

We hop onto the afternoon bus bound for Quillabamba and I am impressed. This bus is a Mercedes-Benz with freshly ironed curtains lining the windows. The entire bus has a crisp appearance, every surface has clean edges that don’t seem to be worn down with years, grime and abuse. But the best features are the padded, plastic covered leg rests. Ah, luxury! We recline our seats, kick down the leg rests and breathe deep. I am looking forward to a relaxing, comfortable ride to the jungle town of Quillabamba.

The lady across the aisle from us is the only other rider I have an awareness of. She’s holding a cute little puppy in brightly colored manta. Great! We’re riding in comfort next to a cute little puppy . . . can it get any better? We play with the puppy and his little blanket. The puppy eventually shits on the bus floor. We all laugh and the lady cleans it up and throws the toilet paper out the window.

The journey to Quillabamba is long and arduous. Not many travelers take the trip because it’s an eight or nine hour bus ride and the last few hours are on a bumpy, unpaved road and there aren’t many popular tourist destinations in that direction. Quillabamba sits in the high jungle just on the other side of a range of 14,000’ mountain peaks that overlook the popular tourist town of Ollantaytambo. We want to go to Quillabamba for an experience of the high jungle, locally grown coffee and just to see what it’s like.

The bus twists up and up and up for a couple of hours, on a really nice smooth paved road. Then we hit the clouds and we glide through mist. Every once in awhile, the bus is flagged down by little Peruvian kids wearing traditional Quechua clothing. We stop for just a second, the driver hands the kid some bread and we are off again. I’m so comfortable and I’m thinking about how I need to have an Anna-tude adjustment about riding the busses and just learn to relax and trust that everything will be all right. The clouds are so beautiful, we’re crossing the apex of the mountain peak, the cute little puppy is running around . . .

. . . and all of a sudden, there’s a bit of a commotion. No less than four Peruvian matriarchs, including the one sitting next to us with the puppy, run toward the middle of the bus. “Que paso?” I ask the guy sitting next to us. He makes a rounded-belly motion with his hand. “Nacimiento?” I ask. A birth? He shakes his head an emphatic yes. The bus still twists and turns through the clouds, not slowing down at all. I look up. Sure enough, there are four matronly ladies with concerned looks, swaying and staggering in the ailse as the bus rounds the curves, looking down at a passenger who is reclined in one of the comfy bus seats. All I can see from my seat in the back is that they are pushing on a woman’s belly. I’d like to get a picture, but feel it just wouldn’t be right . . .

They ask me if I want to see. I stand up and make my way, swaying with the bus, toward the woman. She’s reclined and her fists are clenched into the blanket that covers her waist. She’s made not one sound, hasn’t cried out in pain at all. “Has she had the baby?” I ask, thinking that the woman is still in labor. Then I notice the man sitting next to her. He’s holding the cloth that the puppy had been wrapped up in earlier. He pulls the cloth back to reveal a tiny baby so new that it’s still covered in goo.

“Close the windows!” one of the matrons calls out. Another passenger offers a sprig of some kind of plant. The woman holds the sprig over the baby and murmurs a prayer in Quechua. The Andean people revere the surrounding mountains as gods. The fact that this baby was born on the very top of this apu is not lost on these mountain women. This baby is special. That apu wanted it to be born right at that moment.

Sometimes the apus claim lives in horrific bus crashes. It’s a daily fact of life that Peruvians just live with. But this time, a new life is born, innocent and new at 14,000’, in the clouds and mist at the top of the mountain.

Travel Well! And always remember that the world is basically a good place, full of honest and well-meaning people.

The reason I bring this point up today is that last week, Matt and I met a very distraught traveler. I´d been introduced to Sarah a few days earlier by some fellow acquaintences of hers.  The next time I saw her, she was alone and kind of wandering the streets in crisis – her face all teary and she was sort of panicked. The friends of hers that I knew had moved on, leaving her all alone in an unfamiliar place.  Travel often brings up all kinds of issues to deal with – fear, anxiety, isolation and sometimes just a general  funk due to being constantly on the move that I call ´traveler´s blues´.  Sarah was freaked out, alone and needed to be with other travelers.

If this happens to you when you are on the road . . . relax. Take a deep breath. Don´t put any pressure on yourself about having to do anything in particular. If you want to stay cuddled up in bed at the hostel for the entire day . . . then give yourself that luxury, no matter if you are leaving in two days or two months. Always, always, always be kind to yourself. Beautiful things await, great hikes are to be had, and gorgeous pictures to snap, but if too panicked to really enjoy any of it . . . then what´s the use?

And most of all . . . remember that the world and life itself is all in how you process it. If you think the world is shit and full of theives and dishonest people, then truly, you will attract only people who will try to take advantage. It is crucial to remember that while the world does have the occasional unscrupulous cab driver or tour guide, that a very large majority of people are helpful, friendly and kind. Remember that you are safe, and that the world will take care of you. Trust, but keep alert always.

So, Matt and I sat down on the cobblestone street with Sarah and listened to her cry. She was all inside her head, spinning in circles . . . upset about losing her camera, confused about obligations of being taken on ´tours´ that locals offered to her and yammering on and on about how she only had five days left in Peru and on one hand wanted to see ¨everything¨ yet was afraid to leave the hostel. Whoa.

I asked her if  she´d eaten yet that morning. She had not. Eating is important – especially if you are in an emotional and confused state. We fed her. Then we insisted she come with us on our hike. We couldn´t leave her there, crying in the street and completely freaked out. She came with us on our hike, and consequently the beauty of the day got her out of her head. I have not seen her since and most likely never will again.

Remember that if you are feeling down while on the road, there really are plenty of other travelers you can join for a day or two. Ask around at local hostels or join a networking group such as couchsurfing.com. Take a few deep breaths, go on a short hike, or if you need to, just spend the whole day laying around in bed. But mostly, just remember that the world is a good place. Trust in that fact and you will find that your woes will eventually slip away . . .

Is it possible for New Age principles and humor to live in harmony? I´m not sure, but I´m willing to give it a try. Maria, my roommate here in Peru, and I discussed this topic this morning after our morning Andean spiritualist yoga class. We decided that New Age spirituality is a valuble paradigm that we both embrace whole-heartedly, but that many New Age practitioners and spiritualists tend to frown upon the insertion of humor into the mix.

I try my hardest not to take myself or my spiritual practice too seriously. This includes meditation, yoga, prayer or ceremony. I understand that in order to get the most out of any of these things, that I have to have a modicum of sincerity about the experience and practice. But that does not mean that I have to take myself so damned seriously. 

That´s when I remembered the heyoka of the Native American cultures. The heyoka is the sacred clown, the one who shows the folly of humanity through his constant joking and insistence on doing things backwards. The heyoka teaches us not to take ourselves or the details of life too seriously.

One night recently I returned home fairly early from a neighboring hostel´s bonfire party. Javier was already at home and surprised by my early return.

¨What made you come home so early?¨ he asked.

¨Well, when they started drumming for world peace, I knew it was time for me to get outta there,¨I said.

Javier stared at me for a minute and then said, ¨Oh Anna, you´re just not . . . spiritual enough.¨

¨Yeah,¨I replied. ¨It´s true.¨

Then we both erupted in a peal of cackles, like a couple of witches. I suppose we heyokas have to stick together.

I´m b-a-a-ck!

When I got to Peru and went deep inside myself, I realized that I was carrying some major amounts of sadness, negativity, anger and a whole lotta self-loathing and judgements. So, I decided it was time to take a break from the blog-world and to be OK with that – to not be angry at myself for taking a hiatus. So, for the last two months since I´ve been here in Peru, I´ve been relaxing and working through some of this yuckiness and learning to take the responsibility for all that I´ve brought into my life – whether it be the sweetness or the sadness. And in the process, I´ve realized quite alot about myself and subsequently, the world at large.

I felt that a daily log of my healing would be not only too personal to broadcast on the worldwide web, but that it might also diminish the power of the process. It´s been an incredible journey of self-realization and discovery. I will say that I feel as though the path I was headed down was a potential path to disaster of my health and well-being. The new path I´ve carved out for myself is one of positivity and health. I´m happy to be back in the blog-world. I´m happy to be back in the real world too – and focusing upon the things that truly do matter: health, help and happiness.

Within the next few days, I plan to unveil a new direction for this blog, but to be honest, I´m still not sure which direction that I will focus upon. I do plan on back-posting entries from the past couple of months (January and early February) in order to share parts of my simple journey in the wonderful country of Peru.

I am really excited as a US citizen that we are finally acquiring a new administration.

Do I think our problems as a country or as a society or as a . . . ahem . . . global village will be instantaneously eradicated? No.

My outlook on politics is generally fairly dismal. I really do believe that Obama will try as best he can to ‘fix things,’ but his hands are really kind of tied in many ways – first of all, the prior administration did everything possible to make ‘change’ really difficult. Secondly, the bigger problem is that Americans as a whole, I believe, are not truly ready to embrace the kind of change that needs to happen to make any difference anyway. Most of us are just still too comfortable and quite frankly, still very much asleep as far as some gigantic problems are concerned – problems that could very well inhibit our very existence.

Until we wake up and demand true change, status quo will continue it’s relentless march onward, simply re-naming itself on many levels as ‘change.’ We must not forget the power that we have as a people. We showed that power for the first time during the election. In droves, in communities, together as a force, we asked for something different – and we got it with a resounding ‘Yes, we can!’ But it’s imperative that we keep demanding – together – in a determined manner for exactly what we want. Otherwise we will keep allowing those politicians to silently stuff their pockets in the name of change while the planetary conditions continue to deteriorate.

As I said before, in the past, it’s been quite easy for me to fall into the media-made machine of fear and spiral down into realms of hopelessness when I think of things like Monsanto, factory farming, society’s mass acceptance of debt, war and the destruction of our living planet earth, which is the very organism that sustains us. So, I’m not gonna go there and begin harping on all of those depressing things today.

Today, I’m just another human being on this great big planet, walking down a muddy dirt road. I’m surrounded  by mamacitas on the street, selling plates of rice and vegetables for US 0.75 cents to passerby. There’s a guy on a bicycle with a home-made platform attached to the front. The wooden platform is overflowing with grapes and electrical equipment. He’s holding a microphone to his mouth. The loudspeaker blares his words, “Uvas! ‘Migas, uvas! Uvas!” Grapes, friends, grapes!

It may seem as though I’m ignoring this great day in history, but it’s the opposite. I’m acutely aware of the transition that’s happening today in my home country. I’m staying far, far away from media and television and internet new sites today. I’m instead focusing on this beautiful moment unfolding in front of me, because really, that’s all I’ve got. And whether you are awake or still dreaming the defunct American dream, that’s all you’ve really got too.

Be aware. Be not one of the cogs in the purposefully generated machine of fear. Wake up. Start really noticing these moments that are all around. Listen to your little voice that whispers inside. That loud one on the outside is doing nothing but propagating fear – exactly what is not needed.

And slowly, slowly, one by one as we wake from the collective nightmare, we can realize our power. Then and only then can true and lasting change transform this crazy world into a better place. Join me in the NEW dream where corporations don’t own the rights to life itself, where the world monetary system will not burden our children’s children, a place where genocide is dead and a time when our planet, our mother who sustains us, is healthy again.

Yes, we truly can – dream a new collective dream, that is.

Disposing of garbage here in Pisac is a unique experience in observation and an opportunity to learn that refuse doesn’t just magically disappear. There is no faraway, out of sight and out of mind dump. We’re all on our own in this matter as there is no garbage man. To have to deal on my own with every bit of waste that’s generated in our household is a humbling and ultimately, a very mindful, experience.

Surprisingly, it’s really not that difficult, nor time consuming to deal with the trash – it just means cultivating some new habits. First, realize that every single little item that we bring into the house eventually must leave by our own hands in the most efficient and sustainable method possible – that includes dish sponges, plastic bags, containers of all types, kitchen scraps and used toilet paper.

Our trash area, not including the bathrooms, is separated into three small buckets. We don’t have the need to purchase trash bags because we simply use the multitude of plastic bags we acquire from daily living. We do try to carry groceries home in our backpacks and elect to not carry things in bags whenever possible. Most of the time I remember to carry a little Tupperware container when dining out for after dinner scraps and to-go food. We try to be mindful and use as few plastic bottles as possible. Glass bottles are either recyclable or in some cases, you leave a deposit for them at the store and when you  bring the bottle back, the store gives your deposit back and returns the bottle to the factory. That’s how it was when I was a kid in the states, too bad it’s no longer that way.

We separate our waste as it’s generated into a compost bucket, a paper bucket and a tiny trash bin in the kitchen. Leftovers, bones and meat we don’t eat is saved for the dogs. Every bathroom in our house as well as the rest of Peru has another tiny trash bin. The sewer systems here cannot handle paper; you must put all used paper in the trash bin.

The rest is pretty easy. There’s a hole in the backyard for the compost. I know there is an art to composting – that oil, spoiled dairy products and probably some other stuff I’m forgetting about isn’t supposed to go in the compost hole, but we really don’t worry about that out here. Nature takes care of all that – there are numerous dogs who continually visit and clean out much of what goes into the hole. The paper gets burned either as kindling in the fireplace or the outdoor fire pit.

We keep a three liter plastic bottle in the kitchen with a wooden stick next to it. We press small, clean plastic bags into the large bottle with the stick. (We learned through trial and error that dirty plastic bags will turn the bottle into a moldy maggot factory.) Once the bottle is full and solid with compressed bags, we put the cap back on and give it to a local builder who will use it as building material. Anything else that is leftover that cannot be disposed of in any of the aforementioned ways goes in the tiny trash bin. Once a week, along with our ‘doody-paper’ trash, we bundle it all up and take it down to the dump. The dump itself is an eye-opening experience.

The Pisac dump is located on the river and adjacent riverbank, just beyond our line of sight behind the curve of the nearest mountain, only about 1/4 of a kilometer past our house. The free-roaming pigs love it! There are always about ten of them happily rooting around. The wind whips up the scattered trash and carries plastic bags up to the vegetation in the mountain and the surrounding fences, where they get stuck. I was completely disgusted the first time my friend Jeff took me to the dump.

“The plastic bags!” I said, horrified, wanting to cry.

“Ah,” Jeff sighed. “I’ve learned to view them as infinite little prayer flags, whipping around in the wind.”

So, that’s what I do.

The Urubamba River is wide and fast as it runs alongside the dirt road to my house. This river is sacred to the people of Peru. It flows from Cusco, through the village of Pisac, onward past Machu Picchu and eventually to the Amazon and then ultimately to the Atlantic Ocean.

This river is sacred because of it’s life-sustaining power to the people of this region. Glaciers from the surrounding mountains drain into it, feeding it’s swift flow. This is the source of water for Cusco and the entire Sacred Valley. It irrigates the crops and nourishes the people and animals who live here. Quite literally, without this river, there would be no life, no valley and no crops here.

This river over the years has also become the basis for the sanitation system of the area – the place where people go to dump their garbage. It’s shores are lined with plastic bottles, ripped up bags of garbage and Styrofoam. It’s not uncommon to see plastic buckets or soccer balls rushing past at a faster clip than a human’s pace. Depending on the day or the amount of rainfall, the river’s color may be anywhere from light brown to army green.

One day, Javier and I were walking home and I looked sadly at the river and said with disgust, “Hrmpf. The sacred river isn’t so sacred anymore. It’s so polluted.”

“Anna,” Javier replied, “you must not judge the river, either.”

He and I had been talking about the power of letting go of all judgements. At first, I really didn’t understand his comment. Then, I began to realize that while the state of the river may very well be alarming, that my judgement of it is not helpful in any way. Judging something does not make it better, it just condemns, which only adds to the problem.

I´m going to try, I swear,  to be more positive in 2009 on this blog, to show the lighter side of life, the fun side of life and  those little moments that make humanity amazing. I realize that my blog devolved a bit, especially at the end of last year,  into a diatribes against evil corporations and government entities.

And you know what? I´ve decided that that sort of talk is just BORING. It´s so easy to get sucked in to the machine of negativism that surrounds us and bombards us on every billboard, commericial and news story. I get sucked in sometimes and I don´t even own a television. I´ll admit that sometimes I get sucked in and then I get really, really angry and frustrated and feel like life is futile and that nothing I do matters. And I don´t want to live that way anymore, because it´s not true.

In fact, the opposite is true. Every little thing each of us does matters.

I want to be the good news sunshine break. I want to show a crack of sunlight through the clouds of despair. So, my promise to you, dear readers, is that I will try my damndest to be a beacon of hope and a deliverer of something that will attempt to make you smile in wonderment at how sublime life can be – if we choose to construct it in that way.

Remember that I´m no Pollyanna. I realize that our country is going through turbulent times, but I believe those incidents are manufactured, just like the hysteria that´s eeked out every night on the local news, like a steady stream of poison. And I´m tired and bored with it all. Good moments happen - all the time, all around us, every minute of the day.

So many things go right for all of us every single second. It can be easy to forget that and to lose hope. And I believe that all those corporations with all those billboards only feed on our fear and anger. So, I give it up. No more fear, no more anger. Time to try something new, ´cause the old way just ain´t working for me anymore.

I decided to consult a friend who is a chef regarding my trashing the tomatoes rant and his input not only surprised me, but in the end, he offered a brilliant and quite viable solution that would be easy to implement in every home and restaurant.

My friend the chef is passionate about the food he serves; it has to be perfect. He says that his number one concern is giving his customer a meal of gastronomic delight that doesn’t make them sick. In my tomato example he says that as a chef he would never want to spread any disease like Hepatitis, even though the chances of something like this happening in my example are near zero.

“I would eat the tomatoes myself,” he says, “but even if every single person in that hot dog line said, ‘Hey, it’s cool. Go ahead, serve those tomatoes,’ I would not do it. I’d throw them in my compost bin.”

“That’s great!” I roared. And it really is! “But . . . no restaurants have a compost bin.”

It would be the perfect solution. I thought about suggesting composting in that last rant, but really believed it was just wishful thinking. That is, until I spoke to my friend. That’s really the whole point - I don’t care if something gets ‘trashed’ in the compost bin; it’s the mindless waste and filling up our landfills that I have a problem with. Plus, nationwide composting in restaurants would create enough quality mulch to solve alot of our nation’s oil-based fertilizer problem that’s raping the planet of nitrogen reserves.

According to Lester Brown’s book, Plan B (which every single person absolutely should read in my opinion), US agriculture in 2004 produced 11.8 billion bushels of corn and used 10 billion tons of nitrogen-based fertilizer to do it. A bushel is not that big – 35.24 liters - compared to one ton of fertilizer. Incidentally that nitrogen-based fertilizer is made with – that’s right – petroluem products. This is an unsustainable model; composting on a massive scale is not only sustainable, it is viable.

This viability is key. The oil-government powers that be, who incidentally subsidized those same 2004 farmers to the tune of $4.5 billion in taxpayer dollars (to enrich their oil empire), would say that composting on a massive scale is not viable and too complicated and that restaurants would never be able to implement such a system.

My friend the chef says otherwise. He worked for two years at a four star restaurant in Yellowstone Park and they composted every single scrap available. What’s more is that the corporate restaurant he worked for actually made money in the composting business. Lots of money, according to my friend.

So, guess what corporate restaurant America?? Lots of money can be made on trash. And a four star, sustainable and massive composting model is already in operation.

His name is Maleke and he drives a tiny little bus in the suburbs of Columbia, South Carolina.

I´d had a trying day. I was staying with Matt and his family in the suburbs of Columbia, South Carolina. I like to ride busses where I can, whenever possible, even when an alternative is available. Yes, there was an alternative available – Matt´s mom offered us the car. But I just wanted to ride the bus, mostly because I believe in public transportation. I´m along for the ride, for the characters, for the slower pace and for the peace of mind of not having to deal with a car. I also believe that as more people demand public transportation,  that it delivers a message to municipalities to extend services.

I walked out to the bus stop just in time to see the bus come zooming down the street about a block away. I stood at the stop, so happy that the timing was so good. And then . . . and then . . . the bus zoomed right on by, without even a pause. So, I ended up having a nice long two mile walk to the suburban Columbia mall. I needed the exercise anyway and I wasn´t in a hurry.

Finally, after traversing the mall, I found the bus I needed and I hopped on. I was the only white person on the bus, the other patrons were older black men, talking about beer and making jokes with one another and cute older little black women with shopping bags. The driver was nice enough and answered all my questions, including my query regarding the bus that zoomed past me earlier in the morning. ¨He shouldn´t a done that,¨said Maleke, the bus driver. ¨I bet he didn´t even see you. Call this number and tell ´em what happened, they´ll give you a free pass and maybe tell that driver to be more aware,¨ he said as he handed me a flier.

The information was nice of Maleke to give, but that´s not why he´s the best bus driver ever. At one of our stops a guy in a day-glo vest with dark sunglasses and cane got onto the bus. He said, ¨I´m trying to get to the mall.¨ Maleke told him that in order to get to the mall, he´d have to cross the street and get on the bus that was going the other way.

One of the bus patrons who´d been making jokes earlier grabbed the blind man´s hand and got off the bus with him and walked him gently across the street to the opposite stop. Maleke waited patiently for his rider to return, and only then did we all continue into town. That is why Maleke is the best bus driver ever.