Peru - 1st impressions

We set off out of the airport to make the journey across part of the city back to my friend Mark's house where i would be spending most of my time in Peru. Seeing our Gringo (white person) faces (especially mine, mark can get away with it a bit more) the first Taxi Driver told us the fare would be 70 soles whixh is about £12 not bad in England for roughly an hour in a taxi but here things are a bit cheaper and catching one just as we were leaving the airport we got it for about 20 only £3, it helps when you meet people with local knowledge. The Drive across the city of around 12 million people, which is over half the population of a country which is 6 times as big as the UK was my first experience of South America. After arriving at Mark's seeing how far on a map we had covered of the city and the different kinds of areas we had been through and traffic we had seen my first impressions were. This is a big, big place, the driving is comical/terrifying, there are people selling stuff everywhere including in the middle of the traffic and that as well as having lots of very poor looking areas there are some really nice bits as well that dont fit the stereotypical westerners view of a developing country in South America, and lastly everywhere is covered in dust.

After arriving without my bag i spent my first afternoon shopping and realised i had lost my bag in the right place as things here were so cheap. Got a few new t-shirts and shorts for now still in the hope my bag would arrive soon.