My First 1st Birthday Party in Peru
Arturo’s a crazy dude, always joking. He’s fun to drink with. He invited me to his niece’s first birthday party at the hostel on Saturday. It started at 2pm and he told me to show up around 3. True to Latin culture, I arrived around 5:30.
I didn’t think about what to expect, but I did expect a lot of people. Family parties in Latin America draw all the family members in a 100-mile radius plus whatever friends they’re hanging out with at the time. There were at least two dozen people in the garden of the hostel when I arrived. Arturo had cleared out the entire living room of the building for a dance floor. On the table were various snacks, cake, and an arch of over fifty balloons – orange, pink, and green. A server (in white shirt and black tie) made rounds with various appetizers including causa balls, a kebab of spicy chicken and onion, and mini chicken salad sandwiches. The party was well-stocked with Cusqueña beer and Johnny Walker Red. Twenty bottles of scotch.
While I expected a lot of people, I didn’t expect them to be drinking scotch at 5:30. I started with beer, as I hadn’t yet showered and didn’t want to commit the whole night to this party. I schmoozed with his family and guests. I met this Swiss guy who’s lived in Arequipa for four years. He married a local and they have a kid. He’s a manager at Forum – one of the main dance clubs downtown. I called Nicolas and told him to come meet his countryman.
I talked to these three girls I’d met last week on my first night back drinking. One is tall and an absolute brichera. After my low tolerance sent me home from Deja Vu early that first night drinking again, she reportedly tried to make out with Mike. Ten minutes after he told her he had a girlfriend, she was making out with an Australian guy. Arturo says she isn’t really that easy, she was just drunk. But he does say that she is a brichera and that all her ex-boyfriends are gringos.
After five or six beers, I went home to shower. When I came back, all the kids and most of the elderly had left. The crowd was down to a dozen or so, and drunk. I switched to scotch and caught up. The conversations got louder with more laughing and then, when inebriation had almost peaked, Arturo called somebody out to sing. The crowd would join in the chant, “Que cante Maria, que cante Maria,” or whoever.
Nicolas arrived just before they started singing. Maria sang. One difference between Latin culture and gringo culture is that the average Latino can sing. The average gringo cannot. One night I was dragged to a karaoke bar in Peru (after much resistance and protesting). I was surprised that the singers didn’t suck. In fact, they were good! I have heard that if you suck and try to sing, they’ll boo you.
The wife of the Swiss guy sings really well. Everybody clapped afterward. Some other guy sang well too. The guys sang a song in unison – I didn’t know the words. They called me out to sing and I firmly set them straight (canto feo).
After singing, Arturo asked if anybody wanted to tell a joke. He volunteered to go first and told a joke using me as a character. For this joke, he could’ve used anybody who is big. The joke is that I went to Mass drunk. The priest saw that, given my size, I would need more than a wafer for a sufficient communion and gave me an eraser. I stumbled around with it in my mouth and somebody told me I’d taken the body of Christ. I replied that the priest gave me his dick.
I didn’t find any of the jokes funny. They were more like standup routines than quick jokes. Each of the jokes took at least five minutes to tell. The punch line wasn’t as emphasized so much as the whole story. The comics went for laughs with funny faces and impersonations of the different characters. For example, Arturo stumbled around like a drunk and exaggerated my English accent while telling his joke.
I wanted the jokes to end because I was kind of bored. Plus, drinking scotch while just sitting down isn’t a good idea for an old man like me. To kill my boredom, I was turning the bottle of scotch upside down over my face and chasing it with scotch and water. The girls went home to clean up before we all went out for the night. Nicolas I went home because I was too drunk, tired, and old to go out.
Just outside the windows in our hallway and in my room, there are these two dogs in the enclosed patio one floor down from our apartments. They always bark and annoy us when we open the windows. They annoyed the shit out of me this night so I peed on them. They stopped barking the moment the urine stream hit the ground. I imagine it was quite degrading for them.
I felt a vague hint of regret the next morning. What if the neighbors downstairs knew? What would I say? In this case, you just have to come clean. Yes, I did it. Sorry. I was really drunk. It won’t happen again. Sorry.
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The Forum manager is Martin, a lanky, balding guy. I’ve been told Forum is the place to be. Haven’t been there yet, will probably go next year when I’m back visiting Arequipa. By the way, I think I caught sight of your friend Nicolas last Friday night around 11:30 at Frogs with a group of expats and a couple of locals, my girlfriend saw him and said he looked familiar from pics you’ve posted on your blog. I wasn’t so sure, but I wouldn’t be surprised if it was him.
Martin is an OK dude, but Forum is the biggest piece of shit place in AQP. I fucking hate it and never had a good time for even a second in that amateur spot.