Last year I spent 10 weeks living in Peru. It was great! I learned a lot of Spanish and saw amazing ruins left behind by the Inca people. My last week there I went to Lake Titicaca to see the Uros Islands.
If you don't know, the Uros Islands floating islands that are made of reeds. They are constantly decomposing and more reeds are always being added to them just to keep them afloat. Even today, the native people to these islands still live there and keep their ancient culture alive and well.
Back to the story, I arrived by bus at Puno, Peru (city close to these islands) at 5 in morning. Only to find out that I had to wait 4 hours for my boat to depart to these islands.
So what did I do?
I went exploring, alone, at 5 morning. I ended up walking around a remote path along the Lake Titicaca shore.
It was fantastic, the sunrise was beautiful, ducks were flying all over the place, and the smell of wood-burning stoves filled the air. Every so often I would pass the occasional jogger, guy walking his dog, ect...
Eventually I notice something very particular. Some guy ahead of me is doing his morning calisthenics, he is kicking, punching and even jumping in the air. The dude looks like a modern day Bruce Lee. I get closer and realize that he is not wearing a shirt, ( remember, its winter time and its at 13,000 feet altitude, its cold) but he does have bright yellow wrist bands and blue bandana on his head. He grabs a katana (Samurai sword) and starts swinging it and does all this Samurai shit right in front of me. At this point I am maybe 30 feet away. I stop and stare at this guy and what he is doing. Not before long he notices me, and asks me in Spanish, "Where are you from?" At that moment I realize that a wrong answer is NOT an option. My immediate reply was "I don't know."
I turn around and walk away. This guy starts laughing at me like he just won some type of battle.
