The Night Before

It´s shortly after 9.30pm and I should be heading off to bed, with a 4.30 wake-up call for my trek up to Machu Picchu.
Machu Picchu is incidentally, the last item on my vision list which I created during my second year of varsity. I used to joke saying that I could quite happily leave this plant after seeing M.P. – as it always remained no.1 on my bucket list.

However, since I´ve been in Peru, I´ve realised just how much of life there still is to be discovered – not just of the world outside, but of the world inside too. I believe that our existance centres around finding and staying true to ourselves. A simple, yet ever challenging concept. As we explore the essence of who are, we will come closer to realising that we are, infact, God.

That is nothing that seperates God from us, or us from God. I know this may be a shocking concept to most fervent church goers, but it is something that needs to be said, because it is the truth. Our society, upbringing and domestication process has left us disconnected with ourselves, the rest of humanity, and with nature. We have forgotten that we are Divine, that we are Spirit having a human experience.

We spend so much of our time in a self created and self imposed hell – which is commandeered by two personalities – the Judge and the Victim.
The Judge – constantly judging ourselves and in turn, the rest of the world and the Victim – that revels in the ´poor me´ syndrome.
If only one human being could transcend the Judge and Victim, and love themselves unconditionally, then the rest of humanity would be loved unconditionally as well. And that friends, is the biggest challenge – an unconditional love of self. 

The only reason we judge others so harshly is because we judge ourselves so harshly. Without the Judge, we would love and accept everyone else exactly as they are – without expectations and without attachments. It would be a perfect world.

I´ve always underestimated the power of one vibrational frequency on the rest of the world. It is like throwing a stone into water – the ripple effects stretch far and wide. The poison of anger, jealousy, depression and guilt that we hold inside, ripples off far wider and further than we are even capable of imagining.

We are composed of energy and every thought, spoken word and deed has ripple repurcussions that affects the dream of the planet. Each and every one of us has the potential to change the dream of the planet.
We are living in exponential times and change is happening faster than ever. There is a shift in consciousness which I anticipate is going to divide those that are consciously evolving and those that choose to remain behind.
These statements may sound radical and outlandish to some, but it is the truth.

On a lighter note 🙂
I never really wrote about the rest of my trip with my mom in South Peru and left off my last blog entry in Arequippa. The day after we visited the Colca Canyons (the deepest canyons in the world), we saw condors sweeping down into the canyons depths and up again. It was truly magnificent and magestic. We also visited the natural hot water baths in Colca and saw a number of pre Incan archeological sites. Colca Canyon was followed by a bus trip to Puno, where we visited the floating islands of Uros and spent the night with a local family on an island on the Lake of Titicaca – the longest navigational lake in the world.

Spending the night with a rural family, that had so few material posessions was an eye opening experience. Sabastiana, the mother of the family, cooked us up a storm in her kitchen full of old potjie cast iron pots – devoid of electricity and running water. Her husband has to walk up a huge mountain every day (to the next water source), to collect water for the family and then bring it down the mountain again. This process takes the entire day and is repeated every single day.

The following day we visited another island by boat, where we were told the island´s fascinating cultural history and courtship rules. On this island, the normal age for choosing a life partner happens between the ages of 15 to 16. Courtship is initiated by the boy who will throw stones at the girl he likes. If she finds him attractive, she will stop in her tracks and things will develop from there. If she does not find him attractive, she will carry on walking. If you were a clever little boy, you would find a stone big enough to stop the girl dead in her tracks (no pun intended).

After a two week courtship period (no more we were assured), the boy will ask the parents of the girl he fancies whether he may co-habit (i.e. live with her). The couple are then given exactly three years in which to produce a child (or two). After these three years the couple are married in an extravagent ceremony, which lasts three days. The entire island´s villagers will be invited and will in most likelihood, translate into atleast five years of savings.

Should the aforementiond couple not produce a child during their three years of cohabitation, they will be asked to leave the island and will have to seek refuge on the mainland (that is if they wish to remain together). If not, they are permitted to seek other (probably more fertile), partners.
The islanders also have very specific dress which donates whether they are single or married. Single men will wear a white and red hat, worn tilted to the right, with a specific belt and a little man-bag stuffed with coca leaves. Married men on the other hand wear a red hat, tilted to the left, without man-bag.
Both single and married women wear a black head dress (looks more like a big blanket) which hangs down to the back of their knees. At the end of this head dress contraption, are brightly coloured baubles. The single women´s baubles being bigger than the married women´s baubles.
One just hopes that the stone throwing bachelor has good eye sight and is infact able to discern whether the baubles are big or small.

I am just glad that I grew up where I did and did not have to be part of the stone throwing brigade. Or that I had to choose a husband at the age of 15. Blessed are we to be of Western heritage. And there the Judge in me runs rampant again:-D

Best be off to bed. Tomorrow is a very early start and Day 1 of the four day Inca Trek which will take me to the top of Machu Picchu on Thursday. I return back to Cusco late on Thursday night and depart again for Iquitos on Friday morning.
I have been blessed to have found volunteering space at Hummingbird Centre and will spend the next four weeks there. Again out of touch with technology and internet. Will be writing about Machu Picchu before I head off into the Amazon again.

With love from Cusco
xxx