I expect that the incredulous reader is now wondering why I did it. Didn´t I think about the risks? Didn´t I realise that it was probably all just a scam? Didn´t I realise that if I didn´t end up getting killed I would lose all my money? Didn´t I think that not having any kind of business experience, or understanding of agriculture, engineering or even a reasonable knowledge of Spanish would make thinks very difficult for me? The answer to these questions is that I simply didn´t dwell too much on the obvious risks involved. The idea of going to Peru to do this tapped into my juvenile desire to do something exciting, adventurous and glamourous. The idea that I could possibly make some money from this too was interesting to me also, because if I did it would be a triumph, something nobody else in my position had really done before. Going to Peru to do this was a more enticing option than simply staying back in Britain. Although it obviously sounds crazy I thought that trying to build a successful company in Peru might have been the way to fulfil all my desires. After all my prospects at home seemed pretty poor. I thought that if the project worked out I would have 'cheated the system'. I would have done something different, original and 'outside the box'. I thought it would be a huge acheivement and I also thought that it was one worth pursuing. And if it didn´t work out, I reasoned, well at least I tried! I don´t know if all this sounds at all rational to the reader, but these really were my thoughts a tthe time.

I kept what I was doing a secret from everyone. My family and my friends still no absolutely nothing about it. I told them that I was going travelling in South America with my friends. And that´s what they all think I was doing between February and October of 2005. This is actually the first attempt I have ever made to fully explain what I did and what happened. Roger also has not told his family or his wife (then girlfriend) about what we did. So the whole thing was carried out pretty much in secret from all our family and friends. Although I´m sure some of the volunteers at the children´s centre suspected something, nobody ever asked us any direct questions about it, we were mainly left to our own nefarious devices.