$$$ 2018 05 03 Thursday, cool, cloudy in Los Angeles

We are going to Lima via Panama City on Copa Airline.

Plane left LAX at 10:30 PM.

$$$ 2018 05 04 Friday, Panama City, hot and humid; Lima, cool, overcast; sunny in later afternoon, 70F.

Arrived Panama City at 4:30 AM after 6 hours. Local time is 6:30 AM. The time zone is like Houston, 2 hours ahead of us.

Left Panama City at 9:30 AM, arriving Lima at 12:30 PM after 3 hours. The hotel sent a van to pick us up.

Lima is a coastal city of ~10 million people in a country (Peru) that has about 30 million people. So Lima is like LA; Peru, California. It is very dry, getting 2-3 inches of rain per year. Most of the water for the cities comes from three nearby rivers, which carry water from snowmelt in the high mountains (the Andes). Lima is known as City of the Kings (Spanish: Ciudad de los Reyes).

J. W. Marriott is a 5-star hotel. Our room is on the 11th floor, overlooking the Pacific Ocean. We took a 2-hr (5 mile) walk on the waterfront and beach. We visited the Park of Love with a gigantic sculpture of two lovers in embrace. There was a kissing contest on Valentine’s Day in this park. A Danish couple won by holding their kiss for 1 hour and 46 minutes. The prize was a free trip to Brazil. Who can hold their breaths for so long? The only mammal is the whale.

Dinner at 7 PM in a fancy restaurant (Huaca Pucllana Restaurante), which is part of a museum. Three course dinner with wine. Tomorrow we will tour the city of Lima.

People are friendly, lively and relaxed. This is Latin America.

$$$ 2018 05 05 Saturday, Lima, Foggy in morning, sunny in afternoon, 70F

I knew nothing about Peru till high school, when I heard of the arrival of the Peru soccer team who beat the Hong Kong team in an exhibition match. Later I learned that South America had (and still has) the world’s finest soccer players.

The next time I learned about Peru was in 2010, when I wrote this paper with my then graduate student Zhiming Kuang (now a Chair Professor at Harvard),

Kuang, Z. M. and Y. L. Yung (2000). "Reflectivity variations off the Peru Coast: Evidence for indirect effects of anthropogenic sulfate aerosols on clouds." Geophysical Research Letters 27: 2501-2504.

Peru is like California in at least 3 ways. 1. It is in the down-welling branch of the Hadley circulation; hence little rain. 2. The ocean current (the Humboldt current) is from the pole, carrying cold water to Peru. This is like our Alaskan current. 3. Extensive low stratus clouds, especially in summer (called June gloom by us).

Silver and copper mining is the #1 industry here, creating an pollution that was seen from satellite data, hence our paper. I later learned that there was an NSF campaign to study these stratus clouds on the coast of Peru a few years after our paper was published.

The # 2 industry is fishing; #3, tourism.

We had less than 3 hours of sleep yesterday and were dead tired after dinner at 10 PM. Slept like a serpent for nine hours.

Breakfast at 8 AM. We had special fruits like cherimoya and tuna fruit in additional to my favorites like banana and papaya.

Tour bus with 36 tourists in our group left for downtown. The first destination was the Monastery of San Francisco built in 1635, not long after the Spanish conquered the Inca Empire. The highlights include a painting of The Last Supper, including Judas (with Satan in the form of a sinister beast behind him), a guinea pig in the plate on a round table, and a dog under the table. It was painted in 1696. Unfortunately, we were not allowed to take pictures in the Mission. The Mission has room for 100 priests. Their remains (the skulls and femurs) were stored in a catacomb under the church. An estimated 2500 monks were buried here.

Presidential Palace, Mayor’s Office, Bishop’s Church, the three powers of Peru all in one square, on three sides of a huge square. The fourth side is a modern hotel, representing the fourth power Capitalism.

Lunch, for nearly 2 hours, French style. I remember while in France for a meeting that it took 5 hours for lunch and dinner everyday. Fast food and fast meals are definitely an American invention. The rest of the world knows how to relax and enjoy life.

After lunch we went to a famous coffee shop. Peru is famous for some of the finest brands of coffee. They served us a cup of black coffee. It was too bitter for us even after pouring in lots of sugar and cream.

The highlight of the day was to visit artist’s residence. 90-year old Victor Delfin is absolutely inspiring, combining the finest of Europe and America. Born into a poor family, he worked his way up the world. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V%C3%ADctor_Delf%C3%ADn

He is best known for his monumental El Beso (the kiss), a large sculpture unveiled in 1993 in the "Love Park" by the Pacific Ocean in the Miraflores district of Lima, which we saw yesterday. Many newlyweds visit the park to pose in front of the sculpture. "It also draws throngs of lovers from all areas of Lima celebrating Valentine's Day each February 14."

Delfín was the youngest child (of eight) in a poor family of a welder in Lobitos, a fishing village, and grew up watching and helping his father grind bits for oil rigs in his workshop. At 14, he won a scholarship to art school in Lima and then eight years later he became eligible for a scholarship abroad but chose instead the Peruvian city of Ayacucho. "There I learned what art is all about," he said. "I saw so-called folk artists, the despised 'primitives,' creating masterpieces."

What impressed me most was his spirit of creativity, passion and innovation, bursting with energy in everything he did over his long life.

Wonderful dinner at CALA, on the ocean coast, overlooking the Pacific Ocean.

$$$ 2018 05 06 Sunday, Lima, Foggy in morning; Cusco, Overcast, altitude 11,000 ft. 60F.

Wakeup call at 4:30 AM; breakfast at 5 AM (restaurant opened early just for us; normal time for breakfast is 6:30 AM); tour bus left for airport at 6 AM for our 9AM flight to Cusco, a mountain town, which is the starting point for our trip to Machu Picchu. We swallowed our Diamox (high altitude pill) with our breakfast, which made us somewhat dizzy in the morning. That is probably not the only cause of my dizziness. I had worked (on a review) and read (a fiction) till 1 AM last night, and so had only three and a half hours of sleep before being waken up by the wake up call.

The airport was packed. There were 4 flights at around 9 AM from Lima to Cusco. If each plane holds 250 people, we are talking about 1,000 people going to Cusco with us. This reminds us for our trip a decade ago to the Yellow Mountain in China: People Mountain People Sea. Poor Cusco is going to sink under the sheer weight of so many people. Later the tour guide told us there were 35 flights to Cusco today. The annual number of visitors to Machu Picchu is 2 million.

Arrived Cusco at 11 AM. It is a city of 500,000 people, surrounded by mountains. It feels like Lhasa in Tibet. I tried to reduce my mobility by a factor of 3. Having lost 50% of oxygen, I could only operate at lower than 50% efficiency, a value I calibrated carefully while in Tibet 2 years ago.

Arrived at noon at an authentic Inca restaurant after an hour’s drive along bumpy mountainous roads. They served us beans, peas, corn, potato, …, and above all a roasted guinea pig (like the one that was offered to Jesus Christ in the painting at the Mission).

After lunch, they took us next door to a cloth-making factory using traditional methods. A couple of women workers showed how to weave shawls. The people are apparently quite talented at creating all kinds of aesthetic patterns using very primitive tools.

After the exhibition, we went to the Sunday market, where people sell all kinds of things from vegetables, fruits, meat, souvenirs to clothing.

After that they drove us to our hotel, a beautiful 5-star hotel (Tambo del Inka Resort and Spa) near a mountain and a river.

Dinner at 630 PM was a sumptuous 3 course typical Peruvian dinner.

Having had three and a half hours of sleep last night I felt dead time and went to bed as soon as I typed these messages.

$$$ 2018 05 07 Monday, Cusco, Foggy in the morning, 50F

Up at 7 AM, having slept 9 hours last night. After breakfast, we are ready for tour of the Sacred Valley today, starting at 9 AM.

For background on Peru, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inca_Empire

The Inca Empire (Quechua: Tawantinsuyu, lit. "The Four Regions"), also known as the Incan Empire and the Inka Empire, was the largest empire in pre-Columbian America, and possibly the largest empire in the world in the early 16th century. Its political and administrative structure "was the most sophisticated found among native peoples" in the Americas. The administrative, political and military center of the empire was located in Cusco in modern-day Peru. The Inca civilization arose from the highlands of Peru sometime in the early 13th century. Its last stronghold was conquered by the Spanish in 1572.

History of the Conquest of Peru by William H. Prescott

In a series of episodes as fantastic as any fiction, a powerful civilization crumbled at the hands of a small band of warriors. Written by one of America's great historians, this gripping chronicle draws upon the firsthand accounts of eminent sixteenth-century captains and statesmen to relate the overthrow of the Inca Empire by the Spanish adventurers under Pizarro's command. Author William H. Prescott's immensely readable narrative crackles with drama as he characterizes both conqueror and conquered. Rich in vivid anecdotes, it recaptures the glories of Inca society before European contact, and it paints fascinating portraits of the conquistadors and their courage, cruelty, and pride. Prescott's reconstructions of the attitudes and motivations behind the tumultuous events of the Spanish conquest offer memorable, insightful views of New World history that have made this book a popular classic.

After lunch we had a meeting with a local shaman, who offered us peace, health and happiness.

$$$ 2018 05 08 Tuesday, Town of Ollantaytambo, slight rain, 65 F

This morning we took a 1.5 hour train to the town of Ollantaytambo.

Visited an ancient archeological site, which has some of the same amazing stone structure as will we see in Machu Picchu tomorrow.

How the Incas could cut stones with such precision that you cannot run a knife blade of steel through the cracks remains a mystery, according to the wonderful book on the discovery of Machu Picchu by Hiram Bingham (a Yale professor) a century ago. My postdoc Stuart Bartlett gave it to me just before I left Los Angeles, and I have been reading it on the way. Today I noticed that the train we took has “Hiram Bingham” painted on its side. Hiram Bingham was lionized by the National Geographic and elected to the Fellows of Royal Geological Society for his discovery, but today he is a controversial figure, and the recently planned centennial celebration of his feat had to cancelled because the wife of the President of Peru accused Yale University of theft for some of the artifacts taken from Machu Picchu. [The local newspaper said Yale had agreed to return ~100 artifacts, but hold on to the broken ones for research.]

Does this sound like a familiar story? A hundred years ago, the once mighty Spanish Empire was completely defeated by the USA, which emerged as the superpower of all Americas. All ancient empires, including the Inca Empire, were fair game for the Yankee professor superstar.

I have been thinking of Hiram Bingham’s mystery for the past week. I remember two things.

1. Freeman Dyson, the legendary Princeton Physics professor (his best sellers include “Disturbing the Universe” and “Infinite in all Directions”). I remember a quote from him (roughly):

If all research were run by the government in the Stone Age, today we would have the best stone knifes. Steel knives would not have been invented.

2. I remember seeing in museums that the American Indians used Obsidian, a naturally occurring black volcanic glass. That is about 500 times sharper than the sharpest steel blade. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obsidian

The Inca government ran the Empire like a tight ship and had the equivalent of the Manhattan Project to invent the best knives to cut the stones. They succeeded and the rest is history!

Tomorrow is the climax of our trip! We are going into the Machu Picchu archeological site!

$$$ 2018 05 09 Wednesday, Machu Picchu, clear in morning, slightly cloudy in the afternoon, 60 F

Today is the big day!

We left the hotel at 8 AM, took a tour bus for most of the hour along a winding road to the gates of Machu Picchu. The entrance fee is 150 Sol (yes for Martians, this is same as the day on Mars, worthy about 1/3 USD). That is to see the ruins in the morning. There is a charge of another 150 Sol for a hike to the Sun Gate in the afternoon. There at least three options for hiking from the ruins: Sun Gate, Mount Machu Picchu, and Waynap Picchu (“Young Mountain”, the iconic mountain behind every poster picture of Machu Picchu). Considering the advanced age of the group of 36, only option one (the least challenging) was offered, and only 2/3 of the group chose to take it.

I roughly estimate the total income to Peru per year is on the order of 20 billion USD. Whatever gold the Spanish conquerors took from the Incas Empire, Machu Picchu got it many times over via tourism, which is the 3rd largest industry after mining (silver + copper) and fishing.

My first impression on this glorious morning is these were the most talented engineers in stone architecture, hydrology and terrace farming. They did all these without modern equipment, indeed, without a written language. They understood Nature and her subtleties, and they exploited them to the extreme.

Machu Picchu is divided into two parts. On the east side are what look like luxury houses for the royal family and the ruling class. On the west side are rows and rows of apartment buildings for the working class, which did all the work like terrace farming, fed by an irrigation system that runs its water from the top of a tall mountain several km away. We can see the water dripping through the aqueducts. The farming terraces were a work of considerable engineering skill, built to ensure good drainage and soil fertility while also protecting the mountain itself from erosion and landslides.

There is a tall tree in the center of the town, trying to balance the interests and conflicts of the people in the town. The place is at 8,000 ft, humid, tropical, blooming flowers, singing birds, darting small animals and crawling snakes.

The Incas are highly conscious of astronomy. There is a Temple of the Sun and an Astronomical Observatory. The window in the Temple of the Sun is placed in such a way that the first ray of light at summer solstice (June 21st) from above the mountain will go through the window (without casting any shadow) and fall on the altar of the temple. The Astronomical Observatory is essentially a sundial to mark time.

This took most of the morning. At noon we had lunch at a mountain top restaurant.

The afternoon hike started at 1 PM. We were to hike up from Machu Picchu to Sun Gate, which is about half way up Mount Machu Picchu. The hike is roughly equal to the Henneger Trail in Altadena: 2 miles plus 2000 ft elevation. I have done it in 2 hours. Here because of the high altitude, it took us 4 hours for the round trip. The view from the higher ground is spectacular, especially in the mellow afternoon glow of the sun. Maybe that is why the Incas built the Sun Gate in the first place.

According to history, Machu Picchu was founded in ~1450 AD by the Inca emperor Pachacuti and abandoned in 1572 AD. It is now one of the New Seven Wonders of the World. Although it was located only about 80 kilometers (50 mi) from the Inca capital in Cusco, the Spanish never found Machu Picchu and so did not plunder or destroy it, as they did many other sites. The conquistadors had notes of a place called Piccho, although no record of a Spanish visit exists. The types of sacred rocks defaced by the conquistadors in other locations are untouched at Machu Picchu. In 1983, UNESCO designated Machu Picchu a World Heritage Site, describing it as "an absolute masterpiece of architecture and a unique testimony to the Inca civilization".

After moving around in Machu Picchu for more than 8 hours, we returned to our hotel at 5:30 PM, dead tired.

$$$ 2018 05 10 Thursday, Leaving Machu Picchu for Cusco, clear day, 70 F.

After such an arduous effort yesterday, we had a relaxing day today.

We took the 10 AM train to Ollantaytambo, arriving there at noon for an Inca lunch that was invented 3,000 years ago. The idea is put together all the food you wish to cook in a hole in the ground. Then put stones that have been heated red-hot and put them into the food and bury them for a few hours. When we arrived they opened the “oven” and served the cooked food. It was delicious. I especially enjoyed the chicken and what looked like banana outside but tasted like yam inside. A musician was there to play traditional music while we ate.

After lunch the tour bus took us to Cusco via a mountainous road. On the way we visited a farm for llama, vicuna and alpaca. We stopped to see a Sky Lodge that was several thousand feet above the road. One has to climb up the cliff to get to the hotel, stay there for ~600 USD/night, and come down by a “zipper”. Finally, we arrived at the hilltop overlooking the city at 6 PM, just after sunset. A welcome party was arranged for us at the hilltop with champagne and pastries. We were late due to the bus’ engine failure. The poor attendant had been there waiting for an hour. I think the original plan must have been for us to see a glorious sunset, but Heaven decided otherwise.

Dinner was on our own. We had a great Chinese dinner at a place called Kion. It means “Ginger”, pronounced as “Jiang” in Mandarin but “Kion” in Cantonese. So the ancestors were Cantonese. They served the legendary Chi Fa well known to every Peruvian, who claimed that their version of Chinese food is the best in the world. I will let people from Canton, Peking and Shanghai reply to this claim. My conjecture is that Chi Fa is just “fried rice” in Cantonese, and Cantonese foods ranks near the top among all kinds of Chinese food. No wonder it is a favorite here. We enjoyed our Chinese dinner.

$$$ 2018 05 11 Friday, Cusco, clear day, 70 F.

At 9 AM the tour bus left for the Cusco market, where all kinds of food from vegetables to slaughtered animals were sold.

Next we went to an archeological site on the mountain overlooking the city of Cusco. This is both an Inca temple and a fortress, commanding a panoramic view of the area below.

Descending from the mountain, we visited the city cathedral.

$$$ 2018 05 12 Saturday, Lake Titikaka, clear day, 70 F, 12,500 ft elevation.

At 11 AM we flew from Cusco to Juliaca, then took an hour’s drive to Puno, which is on the shore of Lake Titikaka, a 170x70 km large lake that is shared half and half by Peru and Bolivia.

Late lunch at Puno and we came to our waterfront hotel about 3 PM.

Tomorrow we will take a boat ride and visit some of the ~100 islands in the lake.

$$$ 2018 05 13 Sunday, Lake Titikaka, clear day, 70 F day, night 40 F.

Lake Titikaka! Titi = puma; kaka = stone. Actually the lake is shaped like a puma chasing a rabbit, interpreted with sufficient imagination. It gets 40 inches of rain in the austral winter season, causing the lake level to rise by 2 meters.

This morning we left at 8:30 to take a boat ride to see the “floating islands”, which are made of the roots of reed in the lake. Currently there are hundreds of these little floating islands, housing about 1500 people.

This is their history. In 1425 AD (before Columbus) the Uros tribe was driven by the Incas from their homeland till they came to this huge lake. The shores of the lakes as well as the islands in the lake were already occupied by other tribes. In desperation, these people took to boats made of reeds, which are abundant in this lake. Eventually, these people learned how to make floating islands on which they live from generation to generation. They make a living by fishing and hunting birds.

When I asked there could not be any more Incas persecutions at present, would they go back to their ancestral land? The tourist guide said the people had this option but chose not to return.

Around noon, we took a boat for 1.5 hrs to the large island of Amantani in the middle of the lake. This island has a population of 4,000 people, who make a living by terrace farming and fishing.

We had fish for lunch. Apparently, the island was not suitable for farming, but 5,000 years ago the Incas brought soil from the mainland and used it for growing food. Did they forget to file a pattern for geoengineering?

$$$ 2018 05 14 Monday, Lake Titikaka going to Lima, clear day, 70 F day.

This is our last day in the highlands. After a morning visit to an Inca burial ground, we will fly to Lima in the afternoon, where we will have our farewell dinner and prepare for return to LA tomorrow (Tuesday).

After breakfast the tour bus went for about an hour to an archeological site that is pre- Inca, although Inca architecture, with perfectly fitted masonry, dominates the landscape. The royal burial tower looks about 200 ft tall, 10 ft diameter, with enough space for ~50 mummies, but only 17 mummies were actually recovered by archeologists. Why only 17? We can only speculate that the Inca Empire was destroyed and the Inca Royal family was put to the sword or in chains by the Spaniards before the royal burial tower had time to fill up. In front of the burial tower is a small burial round for many kids. The speculation is that they were sacrificed at the time of the royal burial. Nearby is an ordinary round tower for the burial of ordinary people. No sacrificed kids.

Mystery 1. The tour guide showed us X-rays of the mummies of the royal family. There was a six-month old baby with an enormous head like ET. It is know that Inca mothers distort the heads using metal frames to distinguish royal from common skulls, but it would be hard to do it to an infant who is so young.

Mystery 2. The tour guide further pointed out that the DNA of the mummies of the Incas royal family had recently been studied by the government of Peru. They are different from other human species. I will believe this when it is independently confirmed. Stay tuned.

Mystery 3. There are large-scale geometric figures and arrows in the ground that make sense only when viewed from far above. Why do the Incas draw them, and for what purposes?

Like other places the Peruvian lakes are drying up due to global warming. There are at least 2 reasons:

1. As a result of the intensification of the tropical ascent, the nearby region has less moisture and therefore less rain

2. The glaciers are melting away due to more warming at the top of mountains

We have heard similar stories on the shrinking glacier and decreasing rainfall in Tibet.

The site represents the front line of the clash of two ancient S. American Empires: The Inca Empire from the North, and the Qolla Empire from the south. The tour guide is an unusually intelligent Peruvian (mixture of Inca and Spanish). He said the Incas practically wiped out all contemporaneous competing tribes at the time. What Spain finally did to the Incas was the revenge of history.

The Incas were invincible, sweeping every competitor into the dustbin of history. Except the Qolla tribe, who inhabited the southerly portion of Lake Titikaka. Here the Qollas fought the Incas to a draw, and they started to get tangled, learning the best of each other on agriculture and building.

The Qolla tribe invented a technique of winter farming not seen anywhere in the world. Corn could not be grown at 13,000 ft in the winter, even with terrace farming, when the temperature is far below freezing. However, the Lake was not frozen in the winter. So they built alternative strips each on the order of 10 ft. In this way the land was kept warm by proximity to the water in the lake, thereby allowing a particularly hardy species of corn to be grown in the winter.

Box lunch on the bus.

We got to the airport around noon for a 2 PM flight to Lima, arriving Lima around 3:30.

Farewell dinner at 7. Some of us had to leave early at 9 PM for the airport from the restaurant. The person sitting next to me at the dinner is an electrician, who works on high-voltage transmission towers. He said the wires are at 350 KV. A mistake means you burn to ashes instantly. His work requires total concentration and peace of mind. He cannot retire because there is nothing in life that is like his work. I suggested Zen Buddhism, which he had tried but could not match what he had in work. The poor guy cannot retire.

We will leave at 9 AM from the hotel for the airport.

$$$ 2018 05 15 Tuesday, Lima to Los Angeles clear day, 70 F day.

There was a demonstration at the airport. The World Soccer Cup just suspended the captain of the Peruvian team for 18 months for drinking coca tea (which is not the same as Coca Cola!). The tourist guide told us soccer is the second national religion. The young people were mad. Security is extra tight this morning. Latin people are passionate and emotional. Eventually we got through and were on our way home to Los Angeles.