Peru V: Tempus Fugit

If I had to choose a painting that best describes our current life under the great Covid cloud, it would be Dali’s timeless dreamscape “The Persistence of Memory”. We too have a dead tree outside, lots of them in fact, the distant cliffs could be neighboring Paracas and our watches have stopped and melted into the noonday heat. Past memories are the only things keeping us going these days; God knows we’re not making any new ones. The passing of time is marked only by the ever growing belly of Edouard’s wife who sings loudly as she works. Her phone is permanently attached and the silence is broken by both sides of daily conversations with Venezuela from the depths of the fridge, or cupboard, or whatever it is she’s cleaning out. I’m putting money on it that the baby will announce its own arrival from the phone on the end of its umbilical cord. In fact, it’s probably got its own WhatsApp account already.

As far as I know, we and the poor souls of six other states are still stuck in Phase 1 of Peru’s grand reopening plan. In early June the country marched into Phase 2, leaving us behind. The Health Ministry was still working on a 3-part plan of action to contain the virus. The State of Emergency, which temporarily restricts constitutional rights, was extended (again) till June 30 and the Quarantine, which allows the government to impose curfews, was loosened. A third element, the Health (or Sanitary) State of Emergency was extended to September 7 and for one awful moment I thought this was the new lockdown date. The words ‘Sanitary State of Emergency’ had a sinister ring, conjuring-up images of olive-green tiled clinics with thermometer-wielding battle-axes in Soviet-style brogues, but it was nothing so ominous. All it does is allow the Ministry of Health to get goods and services quickly, including police and military support, without having to apply in advance for government approval.

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One of the questions we’d pondered for a good part of our quarantine was: are we now wetbacks? Peru allows tourists to enter for 183 days without a visa and we know some visitors easily get this, usually Europeans. But when I asked at the Tumbes border on January 28, our immigration officer snapped back with a quick ‘No’. This was a month before the virus entered Latin America but most of the staff were masked, probably because it was a big migrant crossing. We didn’t plan on staying more than three months but it’s always good to take as many days as you can get. You never know what will happen, right? I found it hard to talk to just a pair of eyes but hers were good at getting the message across and the whip of the head back towards her computer screen was pretty final. We were given 90 days, and later at customs, Pferdi got the same.

I contacted the US State Department because I couldn’t find any official information for people like us who stayed in the country during the State of Emergency, or what to do if our papers expired during that time. In week 5 of the lockdown, we got a call from the embassy in Lima and were told that once the State of Emergency lifted, we’d have 45 days to leave the country, with no penalties or fines. Unfortunately they hadn’t a clue what to do about the bike permit. When entering and exiting countries, Pferdi’s papers are always more laborious than ours. The process takes longer, hours versus minutes, there’s physical inspections, lots of paperwork, sometimes fees and fumigation and a stop at the insurance desk (or clipboard) before hitting the highway. I never owned a vehicle in Ireland but the identification numbers in the US are long and if there’s even one digit or letter amiss, you can be in deep fertilizer when leaving the country.

There was nothing on the Customs Authority website about a Covid-19 extension, nor what to do if you’re a tourist with a foreign vehicle waiting out the lockdown. I spent quite a lot of time on this, being the administrator I am. It’s not easy navigating these bureaucratic websites. There’s so much legalese I doubt I could understand them in English never mind the warped Spanish translations in Google. A government newspaper that contained many of the announcements I needed was pages long and quite terrifying with its lists of supreme decrees, articles and infractions. Even when I knew exactly what I was looking for, I couldn’t find it. Our permits had expired on April 26 so in early June I contacted the customs office at the border where we entered Peru. I was more than surprised when they responded saying Pferdi’s deadline was extended to June 30. While that was awfully nice of them, I would have liked to have known what would happen on July 1 if our movements were still restricted, which of course they were. So I wrote again and was told all would be revealed at the end of June, which of course it wasn’t. After some back and forth with the message never changing, I backed off. Even I can understand “piss off now” in Spanish customs bureaucrat-speak.

The clocks may have stopped but time is flying by. I pay the ‘rent’ in 10 day blocks and it feels like only 4 days later when I’m due to pay again. Before long we were celebrating both my birthday and our anniversary; thirty glorious years of wedded bliss. Melissa and Enrique, ever the perfect housemates, surprised us with a ‘Covid-19 Survival Kit’ containing all the luxuries that make a Peruvian lockdown bearable: dark chocolate, Cusqueña beer, white flour and the ever elusive yeast. And for the days ahead, face masks, a bottle of alcohol spray and a head of garlic. We celebrated in the dark by the pool with Prosecco and Melissa’s chocolate cake. I can honestly say this lockdown birthday was the most decadent I’ve had since going on the road. My first was in Tulum, Mexico and entirely dry thanks to a government election and last year we were marooned on a Colombian beach with only beans and beer.

On June 30 President Vizcarra extended the State of Emergency to July 31 and we were glad. The Covid-19 case and death numbers were higher than ever and we didn’t want to be forced outside. Our 45 days grace period from immigration begins once our travel restrictions are lifted but since Chile isn’t open yet, there’s nowhere really to go; we’ve already decided to skip Bolivia for now. Meanwhile, Peru entered Phase 3 and quarantine was lifted for most of the country. Shopping malls could open at 50% capacity (for adults only), while restaurants, but not bars, could open at 40%. Large gatherings like church services were still suspended. Again none of this applied to us in Ica.

Many countries seemed to be almost back to normal, at least on the surface. I was getting jealous, and incredulous, seeing people’s holiday pictures popping up on my phone. How could they be visiting the other end of their country when I hadn’t been to the other end of my street since March? I was feeling very sorry for myself and wondered if we were living on the same planet at all? Honestly, a few bistro tables with little olive oil bottles out on the sidewalk does not mean life is back to normal. It just means that the virus is enjoying a nice glass of Barbaresco with his antipasto.

There’s no date yet for international flights to start or borders to open. That’s not expected until the fourth and last phase. Domestic flights and inter-regional bus travel just began in spite of 3,500 or more new cases every day. We’re still only allowed out for the essentials like food and medicine but in the past few weeks Fran’s noticed a considerable relaxation on the streets when out shopping. The checkpoint outside the supermarket has disappeared and there’s a lot more traffic and people about.

In the first week of July our hotel owner (la señora) announced she was going to open to other guests which caused a certain amount of disquiet on our part. We knew it would come eventually but after 16 weeks alone, this place had become home and now it felt like we were being invaded. She assured us it’d be workers only and that she’d let just two, upstairs rooms at a time. Twenty-four hours later two women from Lima arrived with their wheelie suitcases. We weren’t expecting it to happen so fast and had barely enough time to rearrange the chairs by the pool into “us” and “them” camps and fret over what to do if they sat on the swings outside our rooms. It didn’t turn out quite like she said. We’d been given the impression these are essential workers but some arrive on Friday nights and are there all day. It wasn’t logical that those in newly-opened departments could travel freely into ones still under lockdown, and do all the things that that states’ inhabitants are not allowed to do. As it turns out, it isn’t allowed but some people are doing it anyway.

The atmosphere has changed and home is no longer home. After 127 days, we’re longing for a change of scenery but like institutionalized inmates, after gazing for so long “upon that little tent of blue which prisoners call the sky”*, we’re apprehensive at the thought of going outside. Not being sure of where we’re going or when, and how our expired papers will be received after we drive our last Peruvian mile are just a few of the unknowns waiting up ahead. And they’re just the tip of the iceberg, there’s a ton more question marks tangled underneath.

* The Ballad of Reading Gaol (Oscar Wilde).