not in Kansas anymore

I dont really know where to find the words for this one... The last day has been pretty crazy, mostly in a good way... a day to never forget.
I find myself in a different world today than I ever knew existed. My flight from Lima was hands down the most amazing flying experience of my life, taking off over the Atacama desert, flat and vast, just expansive dry brown nothingness, then a very short while later, the development of the foothills of the Andes, then a little later, the ANDES! Seriously, what a view! The plane seemed nearly ready to clip the tops off some of the peaks (which, luckily, it did not). There were parts completely covered with snow, just incredibly beautiful. There´s almost no civilization to be seen anywhere, no roads, no anything besides mountains and more mountains. Then, seemingly out of nowhere, is Cuzco, resting on a long, low valley between numerous peaks. I was thinking to myself how completely tenacious the people who originally inhabited this city must have been to take such a remote location and make a city out of it. It seems as though situations like this one would be a challange to pilots, but ours seemed like he had done it a thousand times, and we set down easy. I didn´t even get off the plane, but when they opened the door, I could feel the cool mountain air rush in. I´ll be spending a week or two in Cuzco in conjunction to my trip to Macchu Picchu in May. I think that cool air will be a shock to the system by then. So, less than half an hour later, we were back in the air, again, soaring over the beautiful mountains. Then, quite abruptly, the mountains end, and there´s nothing but a thick, grey mat of clouds. Eventually the captain comes on the loudspeaker asking the attendants to prepare for landing, and I know what´s beneath those clouds. We drop elevation, sink beneath the grey, and whammo! there´s the Amazon spreading out as far as the eye can see in every direction nothing but green! Tears flooded my eyes instantly, as this moment is something I have drempt of for as long as I can remember. I have often heard the Amazon referred to as the ¨lungs of the Earth¨and as I looked out on that landscape, I couldn´t help but feel I was looking my creator in the eye... The only interruptions to the green were twisting, twining rivers.... and then there´s Puerto Maldonado... This ¨city¨, if you can call it a city, is a very foreign land to my eyes. It´s more intense than I expected it to be for sure. (Just now a parade of women protesting for childrens rights are marching by this hole in the wall internet cafe). We landed at the single strip airport and the terminal itself is a single big room with open air grated walls and a thatched roof covered with a layer of corrugated tin (the building material of choice down here). The air is hot. Really steamy, and sweet, but not unbearable. I´m glad to have been in the tropics for over a month now, because I´m feeling decently acclimated to the temperature. I found my luggage and then found a group of German tourists who were going to the same place as me and got in on their private bus to the office of the tourist company who collaborates with the people running the study I´ll be working on. I sat to the side as they checked in all the tourists and delt with all their arrangements, and after that was all done, I was shown my room, which has two bunk beds, with mattresses only on the bottom half. The top half is used as a canopy to hang a mosquito net from. I was then invited to lunch with all the guides, all Peruvians, who were extremely friendly. I was SO grateful for my Spanish classes, without which I would have been completely lost in the conversation. As it was, I still only got about 60%, but was able to follow for the most part, and understood all the questions they asked me about myself, and was then able to answer. I have a feeling that this whole experience is going to be good practice as far as Spanish speaking goes. After lunch one of the girls was going into the town and asked if I wanted to come along. Since I needed to purchase some rubber boots I decided to go, and we walked down the little dirt road to the bigger dirt road and waited for what she referred to as the ¨bus¨. Along comes a dilapadated old mini van with it´s slider door torn off, and it slows down and we hop on, joining 8 or so people who are already on, all Peruvian. They all stare at me. We pay 60 cents (about 10 cents American) and ride for about 20 minutes, picking up others on the way, and when we get to the market place, the girl I was with tells me that I´m there, and I hop off alone. The market is THRONGING with people and activity. There are vendors of everything imaginable, and some things unimaginable, from rice, to chickens, to candy, to unidentifyable herbs, to all kinds of strange looking fish... you name it, it´s there. The smell is atrocious, dominated by the stench of unrefridgerated meat. I eventually find a few people selling rubber boots and I ask around for a good price and eventually settle on $6, although I´m sure it would be considterably less if I were a local and spoke better Spanish. $6 is not too bad, though, and I´m sure the woman I gave it to is happy to make some decent money. I took a look around town, not really daring to walk into the areas away from the center... I get the impression that people are (financially) really really poor here and it´s something I´ve never experienced before. Not to this level. Houses are barely standing, clothes are dirty and torn, some of the children are barefoot, faces look weathered and show signs of a life of struggle. At the same time, the unifying factors of joy and laughter are here as well. Parents playing with their children, people enjoying conversation and the good things in life... I just cant imagine this place being reality for an entire lifetime. I´m really grateful, however, to let it be my reality for a few days. It´s enlightening indeed to see how life goes in a place like this.
I eventually returned to the lodge and spent the night writing in my journal and reading (very slowly with my dictionary at my side) a book in Spanish, and then just laying under my mosquito net, listening to the night sounds of the jungle, and feeling incredibly lucky. Seriously lucky. I remind myself constantly.
The boat schedule is a bit confused here and I´m going to be in Puerto Maldonado until the 9th, then I´m going half way up river to a lodge called ¨Posadas Amazonas¨ for four days, and then on the 13th I´ll finally be on my way to Tambopata. I´m excited to get waaayy out there and be away from all the motorcycles and barking dogs that are in this city... to really get down to buisness...