Kuntisuyu · the Colca canyon and the Nazca pampa
A road of the Kuntisuyu, the south-west quarter: it follows the rim of the Colca canyon, one of the deepest in the world, goes down to the Nazca pampa and comes back to the canyon's rim at the Cruz del Cóndor. Here is my architecture work: the achievements of each stage of my career stored in colcas, and the artifacts I built across companies drawn as geoglyphs. It is a model: the Colca and Nazca are some 300 km apart in reality; here one road joins them.
Arriving
You arrive from Qusqu through a stone punku at the east end of the road, on the canyon's rim, facing west. By the punku, “E · Back to Qusqu” takes you back to the plaza of Qusqu, in front of the Kuntisuyu punku. The traveler is dressed for trekking: a cap with a neck flap, a two-tone zipped windbreaker, cargo trousers with side pockets and hiking boots.
The road and the canyon
The road runs along the canyon's north rim, a few steps from the drop. Under the rim there is a rock face and then andenes, pre-Inca farming terraces stepping down, with green, yellow, golden and bare plots; lower down, rock walls in coloured bands and, at the bottom, far below the road, the river. Layers of mist cross the canyon, thicker in the morning. Across it there are more terraces and, on the southern skyline, the volcanoes Sabancaya (with a faint fumarole), Hualca Hualca and Ampato; behind the village, to the north-east, Mismi. On the puna there is ichu grass, tola shrubs, columnar cacti and stones. Then the road turns north and goes down to the Nazca pampa, of reddish gravel, and later climbs back toward the canyon's rim.
A few steps past the punku, on the right of the road, a saddled mule waits: “E · Ride the mule” and it trots you along the canyon's rim, past the village and the colcas, and down the descent to the pampa; “E · Dismount” or Esc gets you off, and it does not go into the stations' plazas. Where the descent reaches the pampa the mule stops and you get off; a few steps further, by the road, a quad bike waits: “E · Ride the quad bike” and it takes you faster across the pampa, past the Nazca lookout and Cahuachi, and up the climb to the Cruz del Cóndor; its wheels roll and turn into the bends. It does not climb the tower or go into the plazas, and it does not go back up toward the canyon: you get off there. It makes no engine sound.
People come and go along the whole road, each on their own side, there and back; they stop if you stand in their way and turn back at the end of their stretch. Along the canyon's rim: women of the valley in their embroidered dress and the Cabanaconde or Collagua hat (one with her basket), a farmer with his bundle, walkers with packs and caps, and another farmer leading two pack llamas. On the descent and the final climb, walkers and a woman of Cabanaconde. On the Nazca pampa: archaeologists in canvas sun hats, visitors with packs and people from Nasca in felt hats. At night they go home.
Collagua village
North of the road, a village in the style of Yanque or Chivay: a paved plaza with a stone fountain and flowering kantu bushes, houses of whitewashed adobe, bare adobe and stone with thatched, tiled or tin roofs, and on its north side the white colonial-Andean church, with its carved sillar portal, two bell towers with domes and an atrium with an arched gate. A carved sign names the village.
By day, women in the valley's embroidered dress (skirts embroidered with flowers and the white embroidered Cabanaconde hat or the tall white Collagua hat) and men in felt hats walk between the church door, the fountain and the houses, and step out of your way; a few children play tag in the plaza and scamper off a few steps if you come very close. A farmer leads three pack llamas along the road between the village and the colcas, there and back, and waits if you stand in his way. At night people go home and the llamas lie down by the village, the farmer sitting beside them.
Passport stamp: Collagua village · church and plaza
Colcas · the achievements of each stage
Colcas were the stone storehouses of the Tawantinsuyu, and the Colca valley takes its name from them. North of the road, a stepped cliff rises over a small plaza; on its ledges stand 10 colcas, one per stage of my career, the oldest bottom-left and the newest top-right. From each one's window hangs a cord with one knot per achievement, in that stage's colour. On the plaza, “E · Open the colcas” opens a panel with the company, the role, the years and the place, the summary, the achievements and the tools; the arrows move from one colca to the next.
1. Avances Tecnológicos · Technical Leader Mobile
2014–2016 · Lima, Peru
Architecture for Yanbal's consultant apps and the company's first Node.js microservices architecture.
- First hybrid app for Yanbal with Ionic and Angular.
- Winner of the Fincyt contest with the Cuponeo idea for small businesses.
- The company's first Node.js microservices architecture.
With: Ionic, Angular, Node.js
2. Hundred · Associate Consultant
2016 · Lima, Peru
Mobile consulting for Belcorp: sync, updates and modularity.
- 50% · 50% less sync time in the “Gestiona tu Negocio” app.
- First modular pattern implementation in Belcorp's apps.
With: Android, iOS
3. Belcorp · Solutions Architect
2016–2020 · Lima, Peru
From the first mobile DevOps platform to an omnichannel API Gateway on Kong.
- Omnichannel API Gateway on Kong: JWT, API keys and a Lua authorization plugin.
- First DevOps platform for mobile apps with Jenkins and Fastlane.
- Multi-brand design system with Stencil.
- Clean Architecture on Android with Kotlin and Jetpack.
With: Kong, Lua, Kotlin, Jenkins, Stencil, EventBridge
4. Auna · Solutions Architect
2020–2021 · Lima, Peru
The first digital transformation app, serverless end to end.
- Telehealth, appointments and prescriptions on serverless microservices and API Gateway WebSocket.
- Payment Broker and Identity Broker for every digital product.
- Biometric identity validation with Python for digital signatures.
With: AWS Lambda, API Gateway, DynamoDB, Python, Ionic
5. Auna · Principal Architect
2021–2022 · Lima, Peru
Architecture governance for the whole organization: CyberSecurity, Architecture and Platform.
- Multi-brand design system with design tokens, Style Dictionary and web components.
- Technology Radar for the whole organization.
- API Platform on AWS API Gateway and migration off IBM API Connect.
- Analytics framework with Kinesis Stream, Firehose and S3.
With: C4 Model, AWS, Kinesis, Auth0, Sentry, Strapi
6. Auna · Senior Engineering Manager
2022 · Lima, Peru
Six PODs: Common Components, CyberSecurity, Architecture, Platform, Design System and Digital Clinic.
- 99.9% · Kong Gateway for digital health at 99.9% SLA for critical patient systems.
- 6 · Six PODs led.
- Micro frontend templates with React and Webpack, and microservice templates in .NET and Node.js.
With: Kong, React, Webpack, .NET, Node.js
7. Xepelin · Engineering Manager
2022–2024 · Remote
Core Engineering, PaaS, Onboarding and Lending at a fast-scaling fintech.
- 4 · Four teams led.
- Internal, external and public API Platform on AWS API Gateway with a documented Node.js library.
- Event-driven architecture on Kafka with an event catalog and library.
- Core microservices ThirdParty and Documents Manager.
- AI-accelerated development: Claude Code and ChatGPT in the teams' daily work.
- TypeScript toolkit: decorators, domain errors, monads, logger and shared configs.
With: TypeScript, Kafka, Pulumi, AWS, EKS, GitHub Actions, Claude Code, ChatGPT
8. U. Complutense · Master's in Big Data, Data Science & AI
2023–2024 · Madrid, Spain · Education
Data science and artificial intelligence, alongside the work at Xepelin.
- Big Data, Data Science and Artificial Intelligence.
With: Python, ML, Spark
9. TopSort · Infra Lead
2024–2026 · Remote
Cutting the bill without cutting availability, across a multi-region, multi-cloud operation.
- 30–40% · 30–40% lower infrastructure cost with FinOps, Karpenter and KubeCost.
- 100% observability with Grafana, Loki, Tempo and Prometheus.
- Event-driven architecture with Kafka, SQS and EventBridge.
- GitOps with ArgoCD, Helm and Kustomize; IaC with Terraform and Pulumi.
With: Kubernetes, GCP, AWS, Karpenter, ArgoCD, Terraform, Kafka, SQS, EventBridge, Grafana
10. Globant · Tech Manager
2026–now · Remote
Satellites, Integrations and Cloud & DevSecOps for the migration to the new INSIS Core.
- 50+ · INSIS Core integration architecture: 50+ integrations under one shared pattern.
- 3 · Three teams and their Tech Leads: Satellites, Integrations and Cloud & DevSecOps.
- AI-automated delivery cycle with context and quality practices.
- TL Charter: the Technical Lead role versus the Tech Manager role.
With: INSIS, API contracts, GitOps, Observability, AI
Passport stamp: Colcas · the achievements of each stage
Nazca lookout · the artifacts
On the pampa, each artifact I built across companies is drawn as a giant geoglyph, pale lines on the reddish gravel, after the silhouettes of real Nazca figures. By the road stands a steel lookout tower with four flights of wooden stairs and a railed deck; you can climb it. Up there, the figure you face is named on screen and “E · Read the geoglyph” opens its panel; by the road, the board closest to each figure opens it too. A board at the plaza asks you to keep off the lines. The figures face the tower so they read upright from above. North of the tower, away from the road, a lone alpaca grazes the pampa; they say that on some nights something hums in the sky above it: a tourist from very far away who comes to admire the lines the Nazca drew.
Spider · API Gateway & API Platform
Kong · AWS API Gateway · Lua · 4 companies
One central contract for all service-to-service traffic. I built it four times, in four different contexts.
Where I built it:
- Belcorp · Solutions Architect (2016–2020): Omnichannel Kong with a Lua plugin.
- Auna · Principal Architect (2021–2022): AWS API Gateway, migrated off IBM.
- Auna · Senior Engineering Manager (2022): Kong at 99.9% SLA.
- Xepelin · Engineering Manager (2022–2024): Internal, external and public API Platform.
- Globant · Tech Manager (2026–now): API exposure governance into the cluster.
The real figure: About 46 metres, with one long, extended leg on one side.
Hummingbird · Multi-brand Design System
Stencil · Style Dictionary · Web Components · 2 companies
Components shared across brands, driven by design tokens.
Where I built it:
- Belcorp · Solutions Architect (2016–2020): Multi-brand Stencil.
- Auna · Principal Architect (2021–2022): Tokens + web components in a monorepo.
- Auna · Senior Engineering Manager (2022): Design System POD.
The real figure: At Nazca it is about 96 metres long: a long beak, comb-feathered wings and a fanned tail.
Monkey · Event-driven architecture
EventBridge · SQS · Kinesis · Kafka · 4 companies
Events as the contract between domains, with a catalog and shared libraries.
Where I built it:
- Belcorp · Solutions Architect (2016–2020): MCBA + EDA library on EventBridge.
- Auna · Principal Architect (2021–2022): Analytics on Kinesis.
- Xepelin · Engineering Manager (2022–2024): Kafka with an event catalog.
- TopSort · Infra Lead (2024–2026): Kafka, SQS and EventBridge on the multi-region platform.
The real figure: About 93 metres, drawn in a single line: hands with four and five fingers and a spiral tail.
Condor · Platform engineering & DevOps
Jenkins · GitHub Actions · ArgoCD · Terraform · Pulumi · 5 companies
The path from commit to production: from mobile Jenkins to multi-region GitOps.
Where I built it:
- Belcorp · Solutions Architect (2016–2020): Mobile DevOps with Jenkins.
- Auna · Principal Architect (2021–2022): SonarCloud, Nexus, EKS runners.
- Xepelin · Engineering Manager (2022–2024): GitHub Actions and Pulumi as the standard.
- TopSort · Infra Lead (2024–2026): ArgoCD GitOps, 30–40% cheaper.
- Globant · Tech Manager (2026–now): GitOps and observability gap analysis.
The real figure: About 136 metres from end to end, wings spread and tail fanned.
Astronaut · AI in the delivery cycle
Claude Code · ChatGPT · LLM agents · Python · 3 companies
From data analytics to AI-assisted development across every team.
Where I built it:
- Auna · Solutions Architect (2020–2021): Biometrics with Python.
- Xepelin · Engineering Manager (2022–2024): Development accelerated with Claude Code and ChatGPT.
- U. Complutense · Master's in Big Data, Data Science & AI (2023–2024): AI master's degree.
- Globant · Tech Manager (2026–now): AI-automated SDLC.
The real figure: About 32 metres, on a hillside: a round-headed, big-eyed figure waving; it is also called the owl-man.
Passport stamp: Nazca lookout · the artifacts
Cahuachi
West of the pampa, by the road, a small stepped adobe pyramid in tribute to Cahuachi, the great ceremonial centre of the Nazca culture (the real one is a field of adobe mounds by the Nazca river), with broken adobe walls at its foot and a carved sign. Reaching its plaza gives a bonus stamp.
Bonus passport stamp: Cahuachi · adobe pyramid
Cruz del Cóndor
Where the road ends, on the canyon's rim, a stone platform with a parapet over the drop, stone benches and a stone cross on a stepped pedestal, like the real lookout over the Colca. In the mornings, among the condors gliding in front of the lookout, a white one sometimes appears.
By day there are people at the lookout: visitors by the parapet watching the condors (one taking photos of them, another resting on a stone bench), a vendor with folded textiles on a cloth, a woman of Cabanaconde in her embroidered hat and two children playing near the sign. The way from the road to the cross stays clear.
The first time you reach the cross, the place celebrates: the condors rise out of the canyon in a spiral and circle over you, condor feathers and coloured confetti burst from the cross (not if your system asks for reduced motion), a short tune plays (with sound on), you get a stamp and the panel “You made it!” opens with your traveler name if you set one, subtitled “End of the Kuntisuyu”. It shows what you saw on the road:
- 5 artifacts on the pampa
- 34 achievements in the colcas
- 10 career stages
- 7 companies
and buttons to make your postcard, book 60 minutes, download the resume, go back to Qusqu or back to the site. Afterwards, “E · See your reward” by the cross opens it again.
Book 60 min · Download resume · Back to Qusqu · Back to the site
Passport stamp: Cruz del Cóndor · viewpoint
Passport stamp: End of the Kuntisuyu
Wildlife
Animals you can meet on the road. A good look earns bonus stamps.
Andean condor Vultur gryphus
- Where
- Over the canyon, close to the rim and the road: in front of the village, in front of the colcas, where the road leaves the rim and before the Cruz del Cóndor; another circles mid-canyon and one flies deep down, far below the rim. Two sit on a rock on the rim by the colcas and two more on a rock by the Cruz del Cóndor.
- When
- They fly by day. Early in the morning (roughly 6:30 to 10:30) two of them rise in front of the Cruz del Cóndor and pass very close to the lookout. At dusk they go down to roost and they do not fly at night; the ones on the rocks stay there day and night.
- What it does
- They glide in big, slow circles on the rising warm air, wings spread and still with finger-like tips, banked into the turn; they drift slowly up and down, from far below the rim to above it, and now and then give a few deep wingbeats. While you walk along the rim, about once a minute one leaves its circle, glides down and passes over your head before going back to it (not if your system asks for reduced motion). The perched ones sit upright with folded wings and turn their heads; early in the morning one of each pair opens its wings to the sun.
- Stamp
- Andean condor
Vicuña Vicugna vicugna
- Where
- On the puna, in two small herds: north of the road between the village and the colcas, and on the slope where the road climbs back toward the Cruz del Cóndor.
- When
- By day they graze; at night they lie down to rest.
- What it does
- Cinnamon back and white belly. Each one walks about its herd's ground and lowers its head to graze when it stops. Come too close and the whole herd trots away together, staying on its ground, then settles to graze again.
- Stamp
- Vicuña
Viscacha Lagidium peruanum
- Where
- On the boulders at the foot of the colcas cliff and on the rocks beside the Cruz del Cóndor.
- When
- By day, sunning.
- What it does
- They sit up on their rock with the long tail curled and look about in quick turns. Come very close and one hops off its rock and hides; it comes back a while later.
- Stamp
- Viscacha
Giant hummingbird Patagona gigas
- Where
- At the flowering kantu bushes round the village plaza.
- When
- By day.
- What it does
- The largest hummingbird in the world (drawn a little larger than life here so it shows): it hovers at a flower for a few seconds, wings a blur, then darts off to another bush.
- Stamp
- Giant hummingbird
Andean fox Lycalopex culpaeus
- Where
- On the puna north of the road, between the colcas and the way down to the pampa.
- When
- At dusk and at night.
- What it does
- It trots a loop over the puna, nose down. If it sees you nearby it stops and watches you, ears up; come very close and it lopes off along its way.
- Stamp
- Andean fox
The map
The paper map opens with M (or the gamepad's Y button): the canyon with its river below, the road, the stations and the geoglyphs. Fast travel between places opens once you reach the Cruz del Cóndor.
From any world, the “Travel” button at the top (the V key, or the gamepad's LT trigger) opens a small map of the Tawantinsuyu with every world: Qusqu in the centre and each road in its direction. Pick one and, once you confirm you want to leave, you travel straight there; the ones you've visited (any stamp in your passport) carry a ✓ and the world you are in shows as “You are here”.