Ica

We've been here in Ica for 4 days now. Luckily for us, the hotel we're staying in has wifi. It has essentially saved us, since there is absolutely nothing to do in Ica (aside from looking for informal moneylenders) and the streets are dangerous at night.

The people in the markets here have been much friendlier than they were in Cusco. They actually invited us to a meeting at the market where the merchant association discussed issues they were having in the market. Since then, people appear to be trying to help us talk to moneylenders. We met with one, who turned out to be a HUGE talker, and between two days talked to us for about 4 hours. Of course the information we wanted to get out of him, he wasn't interested in divulging, but he did give us an interesting overview of his business and the type of personality this type of profession requires. He also informed us that most other moneylenders in the area were jealous and guarded people who often used violence to ensure repayment. Because of this, he told us they would either refuse to speak with us, lie to us if we spoke with them, and in general, be semi-dangerous to approach. We're taking that information with a grain of salt (considering they are his competitors) but also proceeding with caution.

We were also suprised yesterday to find out after interviewing the Caja Municipal de Ica, that these quasi-banks actually don't collect repayments daily in Ica. In Cusco, we found that banks (and these cajas) have changed there business model to target the market base that generally goes to informal moneylenders. The banks in Cusco send representatives to collect loans from the people in the market daily, to make it easier for these clients to repay. Here in Ica, however, the Cajas do not do this. We speculate it is because it is more dangerous to collect here. We heard that some moneylenders bring guns when they come to collect, and some banks that tried to collect daily at the markets were robbed shortly thereafter.

After finding out this information, we think that some people in the market are lying to us. Many people told us that they only work with the banks, though clearly if they are repaying daily, that is impossible. We think their lies are a mixture of protecting both themselves and us from the moneylenders here. Yesterday, I was sitting with a lady waiting for her to introduce me to a moneylender. While I was sitting there, a lady came up to her, collected money, signed off a card that said "prestamo" at the top, then moved on. I asked her if that lady was from a bank, she shook her head at me, then proceeded not to explain why I wasn't allowed to talk to her moneylender. About an hour later, she told me the lender we were waiting for must not be coming today, and that I should come back a different day. Clearly, she didn't want me to talk to her lender, though I'm still not sure why.

We're not sure how much longer we need to stay in Ica. We're thinking of moving onto our next coastal city either tomorrow or early next week. We'll probably either go to Pisco or Nasco next.