4-Star Hotel, Gringo AC

I’ve been bouncing around Peru for 75 days. I’m wiped. I’m in Lima, the capital city, waiting a few more days for my flight to get the hell out of here. It’s 86 and humid with no AC at the cheap places I’ve been staying.

I just arrived at a four-star hotel. Finally. It has air conditioning, a garden, high ceilings, and a rooftop bar and restaurant. The staff looks amazing, and they speak English, praise the lord. 

It was $115 per night. I could have afforded to stay here for a week. But instead, I bounced from one shitty Airbnb to the next. Multiple times I booked Airbnb’s for $15/night and showed up with high expectations. Tonight, I’m triple booked because the unacceptable Airbnbs were nonrefundable.

The truth is, I grew up with air conditioning. I grew up with gardens on every side of my house. I grew up going on vacations around the country and the world. Every other summer, my grandparents would rent a mansion somewhere and everyone in my family would fly and meet there. My grandfather would pick up $500 checks at our go-to French restaurant in the DC suburbs.

I’m not cut out for tiny apartments with no air conditioning in the middle of the South American summer. 

For seven years I lived in a four-bedroom house with one other person. I grew up in the woods. There was no honking. Not one honk. 

Here, the honking is a shitty song in the background, all day and all night. The Airbnb room was on the 15th floor. I could hear half the honks and car alarms in Lima. And heat rises, so the window has to stay open.

It was a shared apartment. A muttering man in a wifebeater ate my eggs. He ate my eggs and admitted it.

I’m now in a four-star air-conditioned hotel looking out the window into the garden where a photographer is photographing a bride. They just brought a lemonade to my room. I like this. When I’m all alone in a foreign developing country, these are the conditions I’m cut out for. 

Good fucking wifi, air conditioning, 4.8-star cafes up and down the street, a good desk to work at, and a king-sized bed that is wider than it is long.

I grew up occasionally flying to Kentucky to ride horses. I bought my first Tesla when I was 21. My $110 sandals were imported from Germany. You already know. I’ve tried to avoid lifestyle creep, but I started pretty high to begin with.

Here’s the deal. There just ain’t no going from AC to no AC. Not with today’s temps. I’m a white boy from the Connecticut suburbs whose biggest challenge is emotions. It ain’t money. And that is why I’m a fish out of water in Lima, Peru. A gringo out of AC. 

My hotel, Casa Republica, has soap that smells better than my farmer's market soap. The rooftop bar is calling my name.

Una limonada, por favor. 

Silence.

I can hear the clicking of the keyboard keys and the hum of the AC. It’s awesome. It’s like home.

It’s 70 degrees in my room. For me, temperature makes all the difference. I’m borderline euphoric. I can breathe. I love the staff. The presence of good-looking English speakers is not to be discounted.

I’m pumping my fists. I nailed it. I fucking nailed it. Now I know where to go when we feel like visiting Peru. I don’t know who “we” refers to, but there will be a we. More Peru stories coming soon.

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I’ve chatted with people from all around the world via curiosity calls on Zoom. Schedule one here.

I post videos and podcasts on YouTube.

The main ways people discover my stories are through word of mouth and readers sharing online.