The lights of Lima during the holidays.

I woke up in Lima, Peru on Christmas Eve and knew little more than five Spanish phrases — most of which were incomprehensible because of my shabby pronunciation.

The following morning, however, I became a bit more optimistic. I downloaded a translation application for my iPhone and knew that this would help me become fluent over the next three weeks. My high spirits lasted until I reached the street and realized that traffic in Peru doesn’t stop for pedestrians and the sun was intense enough that by mid-afternoon my skin had burnt to a crisp shade of pink.

On this day consumerism thrived. Mall speakers played Michael Bublé’s new Christmas album, locals brushed past each other as they scoured the department stores for last minute gifts and two blocks away a young girl, maybe seven years old, sold individual sheets of wrapping paper for a few soles a piece. In the plazas stood plastic Christmas trees 10 metres tall. As I settled into bed, fireworks were erupting over the beach.

With the hot, muggy weather, loud crowds and fireworks the atmosphere resembled July 1 as much as it did Christmas Eve. In the morning, as my travel group boarded the bus for Pisco the public had abandoned the streets, seeking refuge in the churches and company of their families. Atheism here is nearly unheard of. The Peruvian population consists primarily of devout Catholics. At the next few destinations we encountered quieter celebrations, many intricate Nativity scenes in churches, restaurants and our hostels. Across Peru, Christmas is still a religious holiday centred around Jesus Christ.

We missed our families and I had never felt so far away from home. On Christmas Peruvians serve a traditional cocktail called an aigarronina made from a fruit of the same name, pisco and cinnamon. It is sweet, sour and frothy. We drank our aigarroninas while our travel group, consisting of six people, were introduced for the first time.

Our charming guide, Freddy, told us about his favorite Christmas song, “Burrito Scenero.” Freddy said the lyrics roughly translated to, “My little donkey on the way to Beleing, say hi to me on my way to Beleing.”

“Since I was little that is the song that makes me think of Christmas,” he said.

Freddy smiled and sang to me a few versus in Spanish. Not once in Lima or Pisco did I hear Jose Feliciano’s “Feliz Navidad,” which I had expected and had stuck in my head for the first few days in Peru.

We spent New Year’s Eve in Puno. Yellow was everywhere. The street was decorated with balloons and streamers. Street-side vendors sold funny yellow hats and ties and glasses. Our group exchanged pairs of yellow underwear that Peruvians wear at midnight to attract prosperity in the upcoming year. Red underwear is worn to attract love.

We ate 12 grapes at midnight, one for every hour, and concentrated on our resolutions. In our back pockets we kept charms, flimsy plastic bags filled with different seeds, which were doubly lucky if they broke while we danced at one of the small crowded nightclubs lining the street. Confetti and foam rained down on us as midnight struck and the crowd erupted in celebration. Fireworks were lit in the street. It was raining as I walked back to the hotel, cold in an intrusive way that seemed to suggest that I would never be warm, or for that matter dry, again. With still a half-hour left until midnight in Saskatoon, I settled in.

The one tradition we had missed was one that I had become most interested in. On the day of New Year’s Eve, before midnight, Freddy told us that you could take a special bath to cleanse your aura. The bath would be filled with herbs, flowers, spices and red wine. Thinking positively, bathers would submerge themselves in chamomile, carnations, rose pedals and lavender oil. The bath is meant to rid the bather of stress from the past year.

I ended the year happily, hugging new, strange and unexpected friends, across the globe from my home, and shouting, “Feliz ano nuevo” without any help from my iPhone.

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Photo: ChimiFotos/Flickr