It feels so much like Peru today.  Sitting in the cafe of this fancy lobby, the airconditioning almost too cold after the sweltering heat outside.  Only this time, I’m not a Peace Corps volunteer, sworn to a life of living at poverty level, and I am a guest in the hotel.  I have a right to be in this place, and buy a drink because I want one, not because I am afraid that without it they will ask me to leave.  But the rum that slides down my throat is still a treat; still an abnormality on a Saturday afternoon.  This stolen weekend is a luxury, a rare chance to relax in bright white sheets that I don’t have to wash, watch a tv full of channels that I don’t have at my houses, and meet with friends rarely seen.  Like Peru, the people watching is supreme, like only it can be in places where you are just one anonymous person among many.  And like Peru, I am an underdressed stranger to the city, trying to pass for a local, pretending I belong.  I take a sip of my drink, close my computer, and for the first time in a long, long time, feel that peace that was so  prevalent during my Peace Corps days.  The extreme comfort of luxury, accompanied by the unhurried satisfaction of having nowhere to be and nothing to do.  With a smile, I open my book and settle in to while away the afternoon.

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