May 2nd- Lima , last day in Peru

By the time you read this we may already have landed at JFK unless I can post this before our flight takes off. We are at the airport in Lima waiting to board our flight home. Students are frantically working to finish journals and everyone is excited about going home. 

Our last day in Peru has been amazing. Lima is an exciting city and we have had another great guide who had taken us on two tours of the city. We started the morning with a visit to a local market. This was a market with many vendors gathered under one roof selling everything from fruits, vegetables, staples, meat and every animal part imaginable, spices, utensils etc. It reminded me a lot of similar markets in Karachi. In fact Lima seemed in many ways very familiar because it was so similar to Karachi with its clearly marked divisions between the wealthy and poorer areas, the same status symbols in terms of cars, homes and foreign franchises. I actually felt quite at home. For the students it was a real eye opener and such a different experience from anything else we had seen in Peru. 

We spent almost 45 minutes at the market trying a dozen or so different fruits , all native to Peru. We then began a bus tour of the three trendiest neighborhoods in Lima- Miraflores where our hotel was, San Isidro and Barranco. We saw beautiful houses, well maintained neighborhoods and interesting architecture mixing Spanish colonial with other styles. 

We then drove to an area on the outskirts of the city where we could see the vast tracts of shanty towns. Our guide Franz, explained to us the various development stages of the shanty towns and we had a long and interesting discussion about the informal and formal economy in Peru which then turned into a discussion of economic development in Peru over the last few decades. It was another one of those spontaneous moments that turned into a valuable and interesting discussion for the group. We learned that only 7% of Lima's 10 million residents live in the upper-middle class neighborhoods we had seen, with the majority living in much more modest homes and the shanty towns in front of us.

As part of our tour we stopped for lunch at a place that specialised in beef heart kabobs. This was definitely an adventure for us but we all tried them, some liking them more than others.

After lunch we had a few free hours to shop or explore, so we split up into groups and went our separate ways. A few students went down to the beach and dipped their feet in the water so they could sample the Pacific Ocean. 

We then met for our last dinner together at a restaurant called Tanta. This is a restaurant (one of many) that is ownend by one of the most famous up and coming chefs in the world - a Peruvian chef Gaston ( forgotten the last name). We had an incredible last meal, complete with amazing desserts, which was the perfect culmination to a fabulous three weeks. 

But we still had more to see as on the way to the airport we had a night tour of the historical district in the center of Lima which was beautifully lit, including museums, government buildings and the Presidential palace. 

I can't believe what an enriching last day we have had. We are now on the plane ready to take off so I probably won't be able to post this until we land tomorrow morning (Saturday). I'll try and include a picture of us at JFK so all the parents know that we made it in safely. 

Hasta mañana!