Lima, Peru - Arts, Culture and Food!
November 23-29
Days 24-29
After arriving in Lima at night and took a taxi to the Selina hostel in Miraflores, a nice neighborhood in Lima. I spent my first day exploring the area on my own. For lunch, I went to a little restaurant called Asianica Street Food, a vegetarian restaurant specializing in tacos and burgers made of quinoa. I ordered quinoa tacos.
Journaling and tacos - a great first day
I enjoy being close to sea level. Sunny skies, mostly blue with a scatter of clouds. A strong sea breeze brought cool air through the streets making the air fresh and warm and carrying the scent of food cooking over fire. I drank a blueberry kombucha under the shade of a wooden awning; there has been kombucha almost everywhere. The building has a Mediterranean/Spanish feel to it, which is a popular style in this neighborhood. Acoustic-pop played from small speakers.
Imagine living here!
I liked Lima. It reminded me of Tel Aviv. It was clean and friendly, enriching and satisfying both for the mind mind and the taste buds. Ah, the food. Lima is home to Central, second to NOMA ranked in the best restaurants worldwide. I wanted to go but of course did not have a reservation. After some research, I decided I would show up before opening and hope there was a cancelation.
I waited on an empty street in front of where Google told me the restaurant was, although there was no signage or indication that I was in the right place until other guests arrived, more than 10 minutes after me. First through the door upon opening, the host greeted me and asked if I had a reservation. “No,” I replied. “But I’m hoping to join you for lunch. It’s just me.” She asked me to wait and within 5 minutes I was sitting in a private dining room and asked for my water preference (sparkling, of course). I chose the full tasting menu with the non-alcoholic beverage pairing.
dining at Central!
Virgilio Martinez, founder and executive chef, creates a menu with each course encompassing a different altitude and ecosystem in Peru. He takes you from the sea to the high Andes on a culinary adventure. The staff were professional and became friendly when I started talking with them and asking about working there. They told me that everyone starts in the kitchen and has to know how to prepare each dish before they can work in the front of house. Many people stay and work there for years because it’s such a good job.
The table spread at Central
Three hours later, I finished my meal and began walking 45 minutes back to the hostel. Feeling both food-gasm and food-coma take over, I spent the rest of the day blissed out in bed, grateful to have a private room.
While in Lima, I spent an afternoon at Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Lima (MAC Lima). In this contemporary art museum all the artists were indigenous. In the US, native artists are presented in exhibits made for native artists and the fact they are native is pointed out as a key aspect of their art. Here, the museum was saying these are Peru’s contemporary artists and this is the art they create, they are Indigenous and that’s part of their story and guides their art, but we show them because they are our contemporary artists. Why does it matter if they from Native or Western ancestry? Because it was the first time I’ve been to a museum and seen aesthetics developed form non-Western art concepts. The three rooms of the museum, in which I spent a total of four hours, drew on patterns, materials, concepts, and cosmology other than Western, Christian. Aesthetics developed from Andean, Amazonian, and Incan, worldviews, with nature and community at the center. This was (one) reason why I came here, to South America, to see this kind of art presented in this manner.
While not in museums or restaurants, I spent my time in Lima enjoying the parks that span the cliffs across Miraflores and Barranco, watching surfers, paragliders, families, friends, and lovers enjoying their beautiful city. After seven sunsets, it was time to head back into the Andes. Next stop… Cusco!
