Earthquakes, keys, and locks

In the few weeks since we arrived in Lima we have already experienced two earthquakes, which makes us feel like Peru is more tectonically active than California! Peru lies at the intersection of the Nazca and the South American plates. Their collision gives rise to the Andes, the second highest mountain range in the world, next only to the Himalayas. The plate collision also results in many faults, which invariably means earthquakes. The first one we felt after being here for only about a week was a sudden strong jolt which shook walls and rattled windows. The second one was completely different. It came slowly and grew with a crescendo. Stephanie asked me if it was an earthquake and I replied that probably a large truck was passing by. But then it grew stronger until we couldn't mistake it for anything else. It was very long, longer than anything I've felt in California, at least 20 seconds, which is very long for an earthquake. Fortunately neither one caused injury or damage from what we know. Peru suffered a devastating earthquake in 1970 that killed some 60,000 people. I hope we're not due for another big one.

Out of concern for things like earthquakes and fires we decided to always keep a spare key in the front door lock. Peruvian locks are made so that in order to lock the door you need to lock yourself in. In other words, you need a key to get out. So, we always left it attached to the inside lock in case we needed to get out in a hurry. The problem with that is that (and no one told us this since every good Peruvian should know it already) if you try to lock the door from the outside with another key in the side of the lock inside the apartment, the two keys may turn in different directions resulting in a stuck key. Needles to say, this happened to us last Saturday as we were heading out for a weekend outing to the zoo. Well, the locksmith had to come and drill open our front door lock and replace it with a new one. The entire ordeal took a couple of hours which Ixchel and Stephanie used to visit the Christmas Store (more on that later) and some friends across town while I waited outside our door as the locksmith struggled to get us back into the apartment. As the say, live (in Peru) and learn.