'22 Peru, chapter five
Travel Journal, 120
I recently spent some time in the Peruvian jungle. I worked with a medical team, bringing healthcare and the Gospel to a people who need both. Here’s a few tales.
Think back over the last two years and try to pin down the biggest frustration of the pandemic. I’m not talking about anything serious, like illness or death. What I’m talking about is the minor inconveniences that threw a wrench into everyday living—I give you the Great Toilet Paper Shortage of 2020 as an example. Or how about giving your name, phone number, age, social security, underwear size, mother’s maiden name, childhood fears, and last tarot card reading just to get a table at one of the few open restaurants—that is, of course, after the waiter (yes, the non-medically-trained-18-year-old-waiter) checked your temperature and asked you about your past medical history.
*sigh*
Good times…
But we all know the biggest frustration with the pandemic was (is?) wearing a mask.
This line of thinking pumped through my brain-space as I sat on a plane in the jungle town of Puerto Maldonado. I peered out the small plastic window of the 737 to see old and new growth jungle—a monotonous spread of never-ending green. When I flew here, the jungle below me lay like a carpeted room from the ‘70s. The shag rug of trees and vines and plants could hide anything, like a plane or a community of needy people. A plane goes down here and the jungle simply lifts its branches, and accepts the offering. Nobody’s the wiser. Gone forever. So much of the world is like this, we just don’t see it often, or go there. The jungle begs you to try. “Come on,” it sneers, “come inside and see what’s in here.” But the only thing in there is more jungle.
Tree, plant, vine, bush, plant, vine, tree, twig, river, flies, mosquitoes, tree, plant, and on it goes for farther than you can go.
But we did go. Our boat took us up the river to bring the gospel and healthcare to a people in need. We held multiple clinics in multiple villages. Our jungle boat took us to the vast nothingness that holds communities of Peruvians who live there without a second thought. They harvest Brazil nuts and log the jungle. We went there and we will go again. All for the love of God and the care of man. These things stewed in my mind on the runway at Padre Aldamiz International Airport in Puerto Maldonado, Peru.
But I was interrupted in my reverie by screaming passengers and flight attendants. That most annoying thing about a pandemic reared its ugly head. Just before the pilot hit the juice to lift us off the ground, he backed off and brought us to a stop. A passenger on the plane refused to wear her mask appropriately. At the time, in Peru, all travelers were required to wear two masks over their mouth and nose. After repeated requests, this passenger refused to wear her mask over her nose. That’s when it all went downhill.
Other passengers yelled at her.
“I’m going to miss my next flight in Lima!”
“Why can’t you just follow the rules!?”
And others…
“Just leave her alone!”
“We’re going back to the gate for this?!”
“Who cares about her nose?!”
It was clear that the other passengers were furious, not only about the lady refusing to comply with airline policy, but because we were now rolling back to the gate to kick this lady off the flight. Nearly everybody on the plane was going to miss their connection, all because of one nose.
Jump ahead two months.
My wife and I stood at the gate flying from Detroit to Minneapolis. After a short visit with family, we were on our way home. There did seem to be a bustle of activity around the gate. One agent whispered to another. Then she picked up the phone. They ran off; came back. And then—the announcement.
“Lady’s and gentlemen, Delta airlines has just been informed that a judge has overruled all federal mask requirements for travel. Delta airlines is now no longer requiring passengers wear a mask on their flights. Feel free to remove your mask should you wish to do so. Also, Detroit airport no longer mandates masks in the airport.”
I looked at my wife. We hesitated for a moment. But all around us, masks started falling away from faces, like leave off a tree. Most people laughed and cheered. A few kept their masks on their face.
I took off my mask, but it felt strange—like I had decided to take off my pants in the airport. Was this right? Am I going to get in trouble? It felt like I was revealing a secret or accidently showed my cards. Just two months ago, I sat on a plane and watched as a hoard of angry people shouted at a lady for not covering her nose. I counted over 20 passengers filming her with their cell phones (if I knew how to get on TikTok I could probably find the video). But in 60 days, we went from frightened rage over one uncovered nose, to elation and herds of free faces, ready to roam wildly once more.
And perhaps that was the frustration with mask usage. Policies and requirements varied country to country, state to state, company to company, person to person. We longed for consistency. We longed for light in a jungle of unknowns. The trees and vines had grown over what we considered normal, and there were no answers to the questions we didn’t even know to ask.
Looking back in a (hopefully) post-pandemic world, I still don’t know what it was we went though. The last two years are a jungle to me. But we’ve since taken off and that dark and unknown jungle is behind us, fading into the distance.
And I am so happy that I don’t have to wear a mask on a plane.
-anthony forrest-
Check out the other stories in this series:
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