Introduction. Why Peru?
I am in Machu Picchu, one of the most important and momentous citadels built by the Inca empire in South America in the 15th century. I am standing in a room housing the sacred altar, used to sacrifice humans and animals and receive favors from the Gods. It’s the middle of the 16th century. Lately times have been rough. Attacked by disease the crops are not healthy. Food is scarce. Public is agitated and frustrated. Hard times have befallen the Incas, who are struggling to keep intact, one of the largest kingdoms in the world spanning the South American continent and the Andes mountain range. The chief problem is the presence of the illegal aliens who have recently arrived in big ships from foreign lands across the ocean. They are hell bent to decimate the Inca civilization and acquire their wealth and land. They want to collect as much Inca gold and silver as possible. Incas are brave warriors, but the aggressors have advanced weapons of mass destruction, such as guns and cannons that are far superior to the bow and arrows used by the Incas. They are ruthless and brutal. Many massacres of the Inca people have already taken place. No one is spared including women, children, sick or elderly. People are looking up to the Inca royal family to defeat these merciless invaders. The royal family appears to be helpless and unable to solve this immense challenge faced by the empire. Surely a divine intervention is needed. Sacrificing few Llamas or Alpacas will not be sufficient this time. A major divine favor of this magnitude would require to upgrade to the next level of sacrifice. The royal family has decided to sweeten the pot, by bringing a young Inca princess to the proverbial table for the ultimate sacrifice. This will surely please the Gods to unleash their wrath on the Spanish invaders. Dressed in my hiking gear with a back pack I am hiding behind a big rock. The room’s ambiance is somber and tense. Last thing I want is to get caught and become an appetizer to this sacrificial menu. The dimly lit altar room is surrounded by smartly dressed elite Inca warriors with their golden armors and shiny swords. Ominous rhythm is being played on the drums. The Inca warriors carry strong bamboo sticks in their hands that they are hitting on the floor in unison with the beating drums. Four Inca warriors bring a carriage in the room and place it on the floor. Someone steps outside from the other side of the carriage and starts walking towards the altar. It appears to be a female figure with beautiful flowing black hair. She must be the Inca princess willing to meet the Gods to protect her nation. She does not appear to be fearful or hesitant. She is fully committed to do whatever it takes to help her nation. Gently she places her head on top of the altar, where the chief Inca warrior is waiting with a grim expression holding his shining sword. Unable to endure this anymore I shout ‘Stop!’. Suddenly there is drop dead silence in the room. The drummer freezes and everyone in the room turns their heads towards me. For the first time I notice the beautiful trembling face of the princess whose eyes are wide open and she is looking at me in utter disbelief. The warriors surround and inspect me only to conclude that I am a foreign agent sent by the brown skin invaders. The chief warrior decides my fate and announces in the Inca language Quechua, which sounds sinister. I shout ‘No Habla Espanol’ in an effort to distance myself from the Spanish invaders but no one is willing to listen. Their understanding of the Spanish language is worse than my three word vocabulary. Who would want to let go of a free sacrificial offering before the main course. Perhaps my impure blood might tarnish the sacred altar reserved for pure Inca blood only, they take me outside the room at the edge of the mountain. There is a herd of angry Llamas urging the soldiers to punish me. Two warriors hold me from hands and legs and after counting 1, 2 and 3 in Quecha language they hurl me down from the Machu Picchu mountain. I am dropping like a rock, through the ever shifting milky clouds with green hills rapidly passing by. Suddenly I notice an airplane flying towards me. Couple of grey haired females frantically shouting and waving at me through the open door. I try to direct my flight path towards the open door to hold their hands. Showing amazing strength while defying their appearance, they somehow manage to pull me in. One of those angry flight stewardess asks me, ‘How many times I told you not to step out during mid-flight when the ‘Fasten Seat Belt’ sign is lit. She starts tugging at my shoulders. Suddenly I feel my eyes opening. I find myself sitting in my airplane seat and the stewardess is tapping my shoulders asking, ‘Omelet or Bagel’. I feel totally disoriented. My heart is pounding fast like the Inca drum and breath is out of control. ‘Nothing, please don’t disturb’ is my angry response as I quickly close my eyes hoping to connect back to my Inca encounter but to no avail. I try to picture the face of the Inca princess. I notice that the girl on the seat next to me is still sleeping with her face wrapped inside the black blanket. She has been sleeping like this ever since I got into the plane. But wait, there is something eerily familiar about her shiny black hair. ‘Was that a dream or am I dreaming right now? ‘ I wondered. Let me back track a little here and start from the beginning.
One crispy November day, my high school friend Wasim Khan called me to chat and say Hi. Wasim is a global nomad. He is constantly bitten by the travel bug and always making plans for his next trip. Upon inquiring about his next trip, he said that the long Thanksgiving Day weekend was approaching in couple of weeks and he was thinking about doing Machu Picchu in Peru and strike it off his Bucket List. I thought that he had nothing left in his bucket list, but I was wrong. His brother in California, Fawad Khan, would be joining him. We talked a little bit and then hung up, but not before he managed to inevitably wake up that slumbering lunatic in my head. In the classic rock song appropriately titled brain damage, Pink Floyd sang, ‘The lunatic is in my head. The lunatic is in the grass’. I have always felt that there is a lunatic in my head, who constantly causes brain damage, and perpetually wants to be in the grass as in green grass, mountains, lakes, water, glaciers etc. If it were up to this lunatic I would move into a remote mountain cabin in Alaska and disappear into the vast wilderness. The lunatic goes wild upon the mere thought of visiting any place that is remote, natural and less populated. Whenever I am driving, this lunatic causes me to glance upon a grove of trees, creeks, forested areas and natural surroundings. The lunatic gets restless when away from the nature, and often goes in a deep slumber only to wake up on the next mention of a nature trip. The lunatic would not care less that I have to work hard, pay bills, fulfill my responsibilities and obligations to my family and society.
All humans have a wild instinct, that is generally suppressed, until unleashed by some event. In the movie Jurassic Park, the dinosaurs that were custom engineered to be tame and timid, to please the tourists in the theme park, refused to subscribe to that idea. They got out of control, hunting and killing everything they could lay their hands or jaws. One of the scientists said, ‘Can’t just suppress 65 million years, of gut instinct’. Sometimes I let my cat Sherkhan loose in the back yard, it starts to hunt bugs and small wild life. All of its moves and maneuvers are reminiscent of watching a hunting Lion in the wild in a National Geographic documentary. No one has taught it how to do this, but thousands of years of gut instincts cannot be suppressed. Same is the case with us humans. Most days we are kept in a sterile, safe and concrete world where everything is supposed to follow a set of rules, designed to stay confined to our cubicles and churn out papers as demanded by others, earn paychecks and pay our bills. This cycle continues permanently. Only when we die, we are allowed to renew our bond with the mother Earth. But what to do with this darn gut instinct that yearns to be out in the wild, free from all bonds and niceties of the regular world. How to satisfy the lunatic in the head. This instinct resides somewhere in the complexities of our DNA, running in our blood stream and inherent in the very core of our being. After the phone call the lunatic started to hound and pester me round the clock. It demanded that I join Wasim for this trip to one of the 7 wonders of world. The ancient ruins of a grand city from Inca civilization of South America. Perched atop an 8000 feet high mountain with the majestic green background of Huyna Picchu mountain shrouded by ever changing clouds is a sight to behold. Any serious traveler’s photo album cannot be complete without an epic duck-faced selfie standing on a grassy mountain terrace with this awesome background of Machu Picchu. The whole setting is such that even the most challenged photographer can go to Machu Picchu, start clicking in any direction and post competition worthy images that will generate instant jealousy and envy from all social media friends and foes. Unable to endure the constant bickering and pestering from the lunatic, I surrendered in submission and decided that I would go for this trip. Of course, the lunatic started to jump with joy. At the end of the day I have always found myself thankful to the lunatic for planting a seed in my brain and then twisting my arm into submission. Wasim told me that it was not a lunatic but I have the ‘keerha’ (bug), a common term which only makes sense in Urdu language and loses its meaning when tried to be translated. Next couple of weeks were spent in trip planning and selection of the right tour operator and available packages. I started to study the history of Peru and the great Inca civilization whose signs are visible in every facet of today’s Peruvian culture and landscape.
Day 1 Lima – Day 2 Cuzco – Day 3 Ollantaytambo – Day 4,5 Machu Picchu
The Lunatic Travels by Wasif Malik 