Drag Queens and Guinea Pigs

I have to say, I never thought I would write about drag queens and guinea pigs in the same post, but, when in Cusco…

Friday was the birthday of a teacher and a student from the school I attend and so celebrations were in order. We started off at the school, just hanging out, drinking some beer, and chatting away. We were given the heads up that there would be a surprise at 11pm and sure enough, 11pm rolled around and the surprise arrived!

Drag queens!

They danced for the birthday boys for a while before joining us for drinks. I, of course, had to grab a photo with them. I mean, wouldn’t you?

Later, my friends and I moved onto a couple of dance clubs, starting with Mythology and then Temple.

There is definitely an active nightlife in Cusco with bars fighting for tourist dollars by handing out cards for free admission and free drinks. I kid you not, a person could bar hop all night long and not pay for a single drink, so long as you don’t mind rum and coke.

After a few hours of dancing and a pretty hilarious conversation with some Australians, we all headed to our respective homes with plans to meet up the next day to try some guinea pig. Yay!

Oh, and some llama hats were tried on as well.

Guinea pig is a delicacy throughout the Andes – from Ecuador southward through Peru. I’m not sure about Chile. Courtney’s host mom gave her the name of a good place to go for Cuy (spanish name for guinea pig) located on one of the mountains overlooking Cusco. A quick taxi ride winding our way through the streets of town brought us to our destination and soon we had a couple of guinea pigs sitting on the table in front of us!

The one guinea pig looked like it had been flattened by a truck. It was fried.

The other guinea pig was roasted.

Look – teeth!

Guinea pig claw high-five!

It tasted like chicken to me and there wasn’t a lot of meat on the bones. I probably wouldn’t go out of my way to have it again. On the side was a stuffed pepper, potatoes, and something else we couldn’t identify.

After lunch we made our way back downtown and settled on a balcony for an hour or so before the others had a tour of Cusco.

I also had to say goodbye to Courtney. She left yesterday and I wish she could have stayed longer. Just another reason to visit Boston, where she lives.

The rest of the weekend was low-key; my foot was pretty sore from dancing on Friday so I took it easy. Sat on a park bench and read, did a bit of grocery shopping, and starting to put together some materials for my volunteer placement.

No big plans on the books for this week so far. I’m planning to join a spinning class, starting trying out some Peruvian recipes, and keep practicing Spanish. Oh, and I got screened into the next phase for a job so I have a test to write on Friday – eek!

Hope you all had a safe and fun weekend!