KEY POINTS:
Plaza 2 de Mayo in Lima feels like the sort of place that the guidebooks warn you about.
It is the sort of place where you immediately weave your arm through your handbag strap and pray that if the worst happens your arm is not dragged off with the thief.
The plaza is a huge roundabout with six roads off it and it is surrounded by once-glorious filthy blue Spanish buildings, three storeys high. With a huge flow of traffic and very few ordinary shops, it is more of a thoroughfare than a meeting point.
Except on Saturday. It was the venue of a protest against George W. Bush's visit for the Apec meeting - but only 1000 people turned up. That was a long way short of the estimated crowd of 35,000 people who protested in nearby Chile at Apec in 2004.
President Bush has only two months to go, and President-elect Barack Obama has become a beacon of hope for the left.
The giant Uncle Sam banner remained draped down one of the building fronts, with a large headline reading "FYueself!," and a footnote - "Obama Save USA."
The plaza was rumoured to be the venue for another protest yesterday, the reason some of the nervous reporters covering Apec ended up there. It turned out not to be. Rather, that protest was outside the home of the United States ambassador, AFP reported, and there were only 300 students. The plaza is posted with signs - to the non-Spanish reader it first looked like a sign to move on prostitutes: "Se necesita personal para ambos sexos." But a later translation put it more like, "We are looking to hire - either gender."
The reassuring feature of the plaza is that it is home to at least 20 music shops. And the distinct sound of someone testing the clarinet with Abba's Chiquitita cut the fear with a knife and made a mugging seem ridiculous.
Along from the clarinet shop was a harp shop, and then a guitar shop where a musician called Juani, who teaches guitar and plays in a band, was shopping.
He has good English because he lived abroad when his father worked for the United Nations.
He might not be your average Peru worker but he says yes, he is worried about his future income when the impact of the financial crisis hits home.
Juani is buying a new guitar. He will pay about US$250 ($467) for the one he is looking at. It's a Chinese copy of a famous model that would normally cost US$1050, he says. The real effects of globalisation in Plaza 2 de Mayo.
