Inti Raymi (Festival of the Sun)

...and what a fiesta it was! 300,000 Peruvians / tourists jammed into a man-made Quechoan built granite-rock theatre. ...and there was even a sacrifice of a live llama! ...but let´s backup and start fromt the beginning.

Inti Raymi was initiated by the 9th ruler of the Inkan empire (I wont even attempt to spell his name, as I´m sure you couldn´t pronunciate it anyways) in order to bring his empire together to give thanks to the Sun on their new year, 6/21 -- their shortest day of the year, for granting them growth and prosperity. The festival begins on the weekend before and continues througout the entire week. The day before, i.e. 6/23, the streets of Cusco, and especially the road around Plaza de Armas, are filled with thousands of dancers / costumes / floats etc. On this day, I rolled out of bed around 9, and watched the parade for about an hour. Similar to the New years Rose parade in the US, I thought the parade would wind up around mid-day. Not so! After attending lunch with a couple of new Peruvian friends, I came back to the Plaza, and to my amazement, the parade was still going on. After watching for another 30 minutes, I then went home to take a nap -- a daily routine in vacation life. After a brief snooze, a quick shower, and dinner, I headed out around 10pm ...and guess what, the parade was still going on! Unbelievable!!!!!! ...and all of these people were ready at 10 the next morning for the real festival. One thing is clear -- we Americans have a long way to go to learn how to throw a REAL festival. The Super Bowl is child´s play

The next morning I awoke early to join a guided tour for the day´s festivities, and the tour was top notch. While most of the pictures will hopefully do the parade justice, I can only comment that Inti Raymi´s billing as the second greatest party in South America (next to Carnaval of course) is extremely well-deserved. The entire day´s festivities culminate with a 3 hour choreographed display on the fields of Sacsayhuaman. While I´m obviously not Quechoan, and not really that spiritual in my analytical, I can honestly say that the Quechoan display was quite inspiring. I was moved by the emotion. The people take a lot of pride in being Quechoan, and their spirit is something to be admired.

I´m off to Lima tomorrow for a brief stint before heading to Colombia for 17 days. The saga continues....

...oh, and btw, I was in an English pub last night and some English bloke mentioned that I look like Alan Shearer. Alan Shearer is now very old, i.e. 40 or so, so I did not take this as a compliment. However, out of nowhere, an attractive black english girl sitting next to me, said the following ..and I quote in my best English accent, "Alan Shearer ..I think not. He looks more like Tiger Woods than anything!" This obviously brought a White Tiger smile to my face. :-) For all you doubters out there, this is just further proof -- HA!