Drunken Guy and More Police

On the way home tonight, I saw a man lying in the corner of an intersection. I went past at first, but thought better of it and turned around. I stopped my bike near him and asked if he was alright. He was clearly drunk and I could smell the alcohol on him from a few feet away. He kept falling over into the street, and kept pulling himself back up using a guy wire for a utility pole.
After a few minutes, he pulled out a cell phone and called someone, presumably for help. Satisfied, I went to the nearest police box whose location I knew and reported it, then got a couple of numbers to call in the future.

To top it off, they were all impressed with my Japanese (not actually a good sign), seemed to think I was super-cool because I had both a cell phone and a radio, and I got some good info about an electronics shop for my trouble.

I'm still a little worried about the old man on the side of the street, but he looked plenty well off and I imagine the police will stop by there soon if they haven't already. I think most of their job here is dealing with drunks, so...

Cuy and Culebron

I had one of the guys from my Basic Japanese class come by tonight and we watched parts of a couple of movies. Afterwards, he was telling me about something, and ended up looking guinea pigs on Wikipedia.
Me: "You guys have guinea pigs in Peru?"
Kilk: "Yeah! Haven't you ever had one?"
Me: "Yeah, I sure miss him..."
Kilk: "I know! They're so delicious!"
Me: "... Heh?"

Lo and behold, he wasn't kidding. Apparently, guinea pigs are a common food in Peru. On the news of other pets that you eat, they sometimes mix dog meat in with beef. I was able to verify the guinea-pig-eating with a couple of sources online, and Wikipedia comes through once again, though I didn't find that article until I went to find a site I had found previously. Here's a small quote:

"Peruvians consume an estimated 65 million guinea pigs each year, and the animal is so entrenched in the culture that one famous painting of the Last Supper in the main cathedral in Cusco shows Christ and the twelve disciples dining on guinea pig"

What spawned this sudden interest in Peruvian foods was Kilk explaining to me one of his favorite (I guess?) drinks: culebron. Plus or minus an accent mark on the O to make it sound less French.
Culebron is made by taking a live snake and putting it in a bottle, and getting some kind of alcohol, usually 35-50%, from what I've seen online. You then fill the bottle with alcohol and drown the snake. Then... I guess you drink it? I don't know what you do with the snake.

Arashiyama

Hamid leaves fairly soon, and he's one of the few people I've hung out with much while I've been here. Once he leaves, my nearest friend will be about 5 minutes away. Bryen lives next door to me, but he's a popular person and we don't mesh as well. Hamid and I are nearly opposites - he owns a pair of jeans that cost him about $220 and considers this normal - but we've gotten along pretty decently, somehow.
Reminds me, last night the lesson "Don't try to argue with drunk people" was reinforced. Apparently I had forgotten.

Anyway, we're trying to get some people to go up to a swimming area and we're going to try and have a bit of an open barbecue kind of thhing. Should be tasty, if nothing else.