'Before March I was guiding tourists around Machu Picchu – now I'm selling doughnuts'
The Telegraph’s Unlock Long Haul campaign is calling for the Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) to open up travel to more of the world after lockdown. Here, 51-year-old María Gabriela Valdez Ortiz from Cuzco, Peru, tells Chris Moss how the loss of tourism has changed her life.
I have a degree from the University of Cusco in Tourism Business Administration and am also an Official Tourism Guide. I have been working for 25 years as a guide, mainly in the area around Cuzco. All my tours have Machu Picchu as the highlight of the trip. I am also a representative of the UK firm Pura Aventura, which has an office in Peru; I’ve worked for them since 2005.
I had nothing to complain about in terms of salary till March 2020, when I lost 100% of my income. Like most guides in Peru, I worked freelance; we got paid for the days we worked. Unfortunately, my husband and I both work as guides, and neither of us has had any salary since then. The government doesn’t help us at all.
It all ended in March. From one day to the next I no longer had a job. Some days I feel very scared because I have children. On other days I have lots of hope, thinking that this will be over soon and I can get my life back.
Fortunately I had some savings which is helping us to keep living. Me and my husband had been working very hard over the years, and had the chance to save some money. Our main worry is that we can’t see any sign of receptive tourism coming back any day soon – that stresses us a lot.
As the days passed at the start of lockdown, we saw that this situation was going to last for some time. We started thinking about what we could do to get by. We like to cook and bake, so we decided to bake doughnuts. We created a small company called Madonas. Since May we have been working on that.
Unfortunately, the money we make is not great, but at least we can cover 40% of our expenses every month – and at least it is an income.
My husband had been working for more than 12 years for an American tour company. He was a tour leader. Now he is a doughnut-maker. He does the dough and I make the decoration.
The pandemic has caused the Peruvian economy to collapse. We were one of the most stable countries in South America and now it’s a disaster.
It is so hard to see how things have changed so much. It’s almost unbelievable. Tourism activity is totally paralyzed. Peru is a tourism country: the benefits from it are not only for those who work in the sector. As much as 65% of the population depends indirectly on tourism. Downtown Cusco looks like a ghost city right now. It is so sad to see all this, but at the same time we hope it will be over soon.
All my friends – guides, porters, drivers – are jobless now. They’re really struggling, and working in delivery jobs or just selling things to survive.
I think it’s safe to travel to Peru. Our government is taking all the necessary measures to protect our people and those who decide to visit. Everyone in Cusco is eager to receive people – all of the restaurants, hotels, artisans and guides. We cannot wait to receive a multicultural set of people again in our wonderful and historic city.
Unlock Long Haul
The Telegraph’s Unlock Long Haul campaign is calling for the Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) to open up travel to more of the world after lockdown.
As things stand, only a few dozen ‘travel corridor’ countries can be visited by Britons without a requirement to self-isolate on their return. This list contains no nations in Africa or Latin America, despite all of them having far lower Covid infection rates than the UK. Britons may, after lockdown, still travel to these destinations, but the FCDO’s warning against all but essential travel to such places means insurance is harder to come by and tour operators cannot offer trips. We’re demanding that restrictions are lifted for all countries where the Covid risk is lower than in the UK.
The UK winter is long. A second lockdown means it will feel even longer. Just as exercise and green space were championed as partial cures during the first lockdown, so a sun-blessed foreign holiday could be a boost to people’s mental wellbeing after another one.
The UK government has applauded the idea of a happiness-oriented society. Its own health experts tell us that vitamin D is beneficial to the immune system. We will keep applying pressure on the Government to take urgent action, and our campaign will give travel businesses and tourist boards a platform to support the lifting of restrictions to safe winter sun destinations.
If you represent a travel business or overseas tourist board and wish to lend your support to the campaign, please email travelonline@telegraph.co.uk.
