Man´s Best Amigo

Luck! Today, a project manager at Rainforest Expeditions suggested a photo studio on Velarde Street that might be able to help me get the photos off my (Dave´s) camera. I couldn´t actually ask anyone there about the possibility at 3:30 pm when I went by as it was not opening (again for the afternoon) until 4:00 pm. But he and his parakeet were a big help. While he adroitly inserted the card from the camera into a drive that looked like it was made for 3.5" floppies, his bird nibbled annoyingly at a button on his shirt. Never mind the distraction -- I walked away 10 soles poorer and CD in hand. Check out the past two entries for new photos also.

Yesterday afternoon I was minding my own business when a parade came flooding down the divided main street, with contingents of drummers, banner-holders, VIPs in sedans, school children, and ... what´s coming down the street in (very) high heels, a miniskirt, and flowers adorning her breasts and crotch? It is probably not a frequent occurence that a brave drag queen struts her stuff right here in Puerto Maldonado! The observer standing next to me on the sidewalk seemed unbelieving when I mentioned that ¨she¨ might be a ¨he.¨


Jerome asked me this morning if, since I am ¨so big¨, I could help him with his camera while shooting a scene for his biodiversity documentary in the Puerto Maldonado airport parking lot. (So there, Mom, my legs are NOT skinnier than yours!) Apparently I was taking the place of a young woman who would not appear very threatening to would-be thiefs of camera equipment. Our first trip being a wash out (the 9:00 am flight was canceled on Dec. 1 due to seasonal slow tourism), we returned in the sweltering midday heat to shoot, and reshoot, and reshoot Jerome exiting the arrivals terminal on his way to the deepest darkest. He promised I would get a credit!

So, though my permit is not ready (the requisite bribes have not been handed over) to travel all the way upriver to the Tambopata Research Center (TRC), I will be able to tag along with a tourist group to Posada Amazonas tomorrow to begin my schooling in the native avifauna. Then if I ever do get to TRC, I will have had a head start.