Peru did it first!

As we had a nice day of rest today in Cuzco (including some much needed clothes washing) I thought I´d write a little about one of the odd things we´ve noticed. One phenomenon is apparently common throughout S. America. If people here are unsure of the origin of something, they assume it is from their country. (Sonya has good stories about how Chileans insisted that Doritos chips were from Chile.) Maybe in the US we´re so used to everything around us having been adopted from some other country or culture, we don´t automatically assume stuff is from the US. What´s more surprising, though, is that people here have elaborate stories to back up their assertion of inventing various things or practices. A couple examples just from our Salkantay tour guide...

Our guide, Guido, told us one day about how Obama had gotten his slogan from the Peruvians. He told us how a few years back (2004 or 2005), the Peruvian soccer team went on an amazing run, beating other S. American teams. He said that part way through one of the games, some fans started chanting ¨Si se puede!¨ over and over. He said it caught on and fans chanted it for all the soccer games since then. He pointed out that Obama stole this for his ¨Yes we can¨ slogan, which is a general translation of the phrase. I decided to let it go, but Sonya - with her minor in Latin American Studies - took on the issue. She tried to explain how that phrase had been a major part of a movement started by people like Cesar Chavez many decades ago who fought for Latino farm worker´s rights. Our guide calmly explained that the Mexicans at that time also had stolen "Si se peude" from the Peruvians (apparently retroactively).


Another example: Guido was talking about the Cuzco state flag, which includes a rainbow pattern as shown to the right. He talked about how gay people had seen the Cuzco flag and decided they liked it, so they took it for the gay rights movement. He said it became a problem a few years back when some foreign tourists did not want to stay at hotels flying the flag, because they thought they were gay Peruvian hotels. He told us how it had become such a problem, that Peru´s president at the time flew to the United States to meet with the ¨leader of the gays¨ to try to work out the issue...apparently to no avail. Being from San Francisco, we told Guido that the pride flag is a little bit different - it has fewer and slightly different colors than the Cuzco flag, though it does look very similar. Guido suggested that they must have changed their flag recently, since it was originally identical to the Cuzco flag. Neither Sonya nor I wanted to take on the idea of meeting a ¨leader of the gays¨ though it´s pretty funny imagine a meeting between such a person and the president of Peru!

None of these claims are made maliciously in any way. Guido wasn´t upset that those things had been ¨stolen.¨ He just wanted it to be known how they came about according to his history. Other similar stories could be added to this list, each with an elaborate history to back it up (ex. the giant famous redwood trees in California are actually from S. America). It seems we hear these stories at every turn, and then there´s also of course lots of fighting between Chileans, Peruvians, etc. about who really originated these things that none of them actually originated. It´s just a very different mindset than my own, where I generally assume most of what we have in California and the US owes its roots somewhere else. The S. American viewpoints are quite charming and fun to discuss, though!

I just finished my dinner of fried ¨cuy¨ (guinnea pig), and now we´re off to rest before heading on to Puno and, shortly thereafter, Copacabana Bolivia. BTW, the cuy was pretty tasty!

My Cuy Dinner