An Incan Trail & The Man From Japan

Me with Tamiji at Casa Sandillani, in Bolivia, 2010

Here is a new featured photo post. This picture was taken in August 2010 in Bolivia, on my 3rd day of walking an Incan trail known as El Choro. The old man in the picture with me is named Tamiji Hanamura. Tamiji came to Bolivia from Japan over 50 years ago and built himself a beautiful Japanese-style garden and home in the mountains near Chairo. All the trekkers on El Choro are expected to meet Tamiji on their way and sign in to his visitors book. Some people also bring postcards from their home countries and cities to Tamiji or send them to him after their return from Bolivia. He's collected all these cards over the years and keeps the collection handy to show his visitors.

Some trekkers also camp at Tamiji's home, known as Casa Sandillani, either on their first day (if they are doing the Choro trek going up from Chairo to La Cumbre) or on their last (for those doing the trek the opposite direction, as I did). I did not stay at Casa Sandillani, though I would have loved to. I had a porter/guide along with me on the trek, and he made the decisions where we camped and stopped along the way. The Choro trek was beautiful but rough--at least for me it was--beginning at La Cumbre at an elevation of about 15,500 feet and descending over 10,000 feet by the time you reach the village of Chairo. The trek takes you from cold, snowy, thin-air terrain to a hot and humid one (Chairo is on the edge of the Bolivian Amazon). At Casa Sandillani there are gorgeous mountain views, an abundance of flowers grown and tended by Tamiji, and plants and trees bearing fruit such as bananas. Since this is National Poetry Month, and since I am sort of attempting the NaPoWriMo challenge of writing a poem a day this month, I wrote a haiku about Tamiji from Japan and his lovely dwellings in the mountains of Bolivia. Here's the haiku:

One banana tree

Makes a good postcard picture--

Greetings, Tamiji.

Banana tree outside Tamiji's house at Casa Sandillani--that's my porter Baladio helpfully arranging the leaves so I could get the best shot of the bananas.