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Goshen College

Dancing and ancient treasures

February 6, 2017

Tuesday and Wednesday, January 31 and February 1

The high kicks had the guys in a full sweat, but their tongues weren’t hanging out yet.

What is more exhausting than playing futbol?  Answer: doing traditional Peruvian dances with Pedro Farias.   The dance instructor divided the students into men and women and then taught each group traditional dance moves from the 3 regions of Peru: the coast, the mountains, and the jungle.  Successive dance steps got more and more demanding, until everyone was completely worn out and laughing.

The following day we went to the Larco museum to learn about the indigenous cultures that lived in Peru before the Spanish arrived.  Although the Incas are by far the most famous, they were only an empire during the last 100 of 4,500 years of various indigenous civilizations that lived in what is now Peru.  The earliest civilization, which began 5,000 years ago, was in Caral, a location north of Lima that we would visit on Friday and Saturday.

 

Pedro started out with some easy steps.
It began to get more strenous when it got to incorporating squats.
The high kicks had the guys in a full sweat, but their tongues weren’t hanging out yet.
Now we started to see some tongues.
Crossing the street on our way to lunch at El Enano. We forgot our rope today.
Some of the pre-Inca pottery at the Larco museum.
1500 years ago the Moche civilization was making highly detailed ceramic faces.
Miguel Angel, at left, has been the guide for all the GC groups.
Miguel Angel explains enduring characteristics of ancient civilizations in southern and northern Peru.
Inside the glass case is a mummy under several layers of blankets.
The group with a futbol trophy the museum wanted to give us.