A Heart in the Sacred Valley and Confusion at the Salon

We have crossed the border into Bolivia, but wanted to add some final thoughts on Peru:

Hearts Cafe in Ollantaytambo
I only got a ham sandwich and a side of papas fritas at this nondescript little restaurant on the Plaza des Armas in Ollantaytambo, but Meghan and I left with great admiration for one woman and her passion to make a difference. Hungry and dehydrated, we wandered into the little establishment owned by a Sonia Newhouse, a woman from England. We were lucky to run into Sonia during lunch and she told us how she came to create the restaurant where nearly all proceeds go to projects aimed at Andean women and children of the sacred valley. It all started when she was doing some volunteer work in the area several years ago. When she returned to England she was proud to tell people how she built beautiful homes for needy families. But, later she found out those homes were being used by the men of the village to drink and hang out. Angry and upset, Newhouse came back a year or two ago to make things right. On the day we met her, Newhouse had just returned from a trip deep into the Sacred Valley where she received an award from a local village for helping to build a new school. She said she was in need of used cameras and computers for the children. Meghan and I offered to ship our old equipment sitting lifeless in Florida, but she said she doubted it would get to her intact. Instead, she told us to tell our friends about her cafe and if they visit to bring some of those old unused items with them. And so we have. You can read more at www.heartscafe.org.

Israel women are pretty, no?
I am sure this kind of thing happens to everyone learning a new language, but this particular incident happened to me. I stopped into a salon on the Avenue del Sol in Cusco for a haircut. My hair was getting rather unseemly and I needed to get it cut before someone mistook me for some crazy hermit who lives in the sacred mountains. Anyway, using my limited Spanish I somehow convinced my stylist that I was from Israel. I can not tell you exactly how I did this, but once established, she kept talking about the girls in Israel and how pretty they were and if I agreed. By the end, I was too far in the one-sided conversation to try to reverse course. So I played along. Only later, when the owner of the salon asked where I was from did I fess up. My poor stylist was completely confused -- that made two of us.