(no subject)

[korilian]

I don't know if everyone heard about the mudslides that closed of Machu Picchu from the outside world, stranding thousands. I'm a frankly baffled by the news reports I'm getting. There has been a lot of celebrating today because the last tourists have been evactuated. I hoped this was just an overly Western perspective in my paper, but Peruvian news seems to confirm that it's woman, children, and sickly people first... provided they're tourists... or can't pay a couple of hundred to get bumped up the evac list.

If you've never been there, you might not be aware of this, but underneath Machu Picchu is Aquas Calientes, or Machu Picchu town, It's basically a town whose entire economy is based on catering to the tourists. It's not huge, but there are, you know a couple hundred inhabitants at least. The only way to reach it is either a trail through the mountains (which takes 4 days on foot and isn't safe right now), or the train tracks that have been washed away. The only river isn't passable.

There have been reports that the prizes of food, water and shelter shot through the roof after all those poor tourists got stranded. Maybe the locals realized they would just be an afterthought to their own government...

Comments

[padmez.livejournal.com]

I managed to completely miss this. How awful :(

[(Anonymous)]

I managed to miss it as well at first. It doesn't seem to have made a big splash in our papers. Nothing compared to Haiti, even though an entire village was washed away in a mudslide... :(

Korilian