RRROMPE Y RRRAJA (Jolly Good Knees Up)

Last weekend I returned to Chimbote (where I had Spanish lessons when I first arrived in Peru) for the 60th birthday party of the father of my family there. Check out my 'dad's' suit below. It's almost as spectacular as the Mexican outfit his brother is wearing. The whole affair was rather flash. My Chimbote family have a third floor in their house designed especially for parties - complete with sound system, toilets and kitchen facilities. They even employed waiters in uniforms for the evening. We made it through about 300 litres of beer and I'm not sure how much pisco sour (I was trying not to be in the same vicinity as the pisco). Everyone was so busy dancing and drinking that they completely forgot the cake (despite plenty of leading questions from me as to when it might be cut) and we had to eat it for breakfast.


Birthday Boy: My Chimbote 'dad', Juan, is on the right and his brother, on the left, (not sure why he's dressed as a Mexican, couldn't work it out) is singing him a song about how he's made it to 60 years.


It was great to see the family again but I've been rather tactlessly telling everyone how glad I am that I don't live in Chimbote cos it's cold and smells of fish. But really, I was quite overwhelmed by the fish smell. It was the off-season when I was there last but now that fishing has started up and the factories are in business there is a constant fog of fishy fumes in the city centre (and sometimes they make it to Nuevo Chimbote where my family lives). It's very potent and it lingers on your clothes and in the cars. It was worth putting up with for a weekend though to hang out with the fabulous people that live in Chimbote. I also got to go to a Grupo Cinco concert. Grupo Cinco are Peru's answer to the Beatles (right down to the suits). There are numerous other groups that perform their songs and you can't walk down the road in any part of Peru without hearing a snatch of one of their hits from someone's stereo.

Grupo 5 (Cinco): Yeah, there are more than 5 of them. There's a whole army of them. There are usually only five guys singing and dancing at the front of the stage at any one time, though, and this may be where the name comes from. The music's very catchy and great to dance to. I've bought the CD/DVD so I can share the experience with New Zealand when I return.