I have so far neglected to give you actual information about life in Peru. So let me now give you some information about transportation here in Lima.
There is no viable public transportation except buses and taxis. What I miss most are trains as I’m an avid train user in Switzerland and have owned a General Abonnoment for several years now.
The buses (called “combi”) are run by individuals. They buy a bus, decide on a price, put on a bus number or a route and drive that. That’s all. To my knowledge there are no bus maps available centrally. So if you want to know if it’s possible to get from point A to B by bus you have to ask a local.
Unfortunately it’s very difficult to use the bus from my apartment to the office. So I have to take a taxi every time. In Lima you fix the price before entering the taxi but in other cities there seem to be different rules. The cheapest fare for anything here I’ve ever gotten was 3 Nuevo Soles. From my apartment to my office (or the other way) I pay between 5 to 7 Nuevo Soles. Depends on the time, the mood of the taxi driver, my mood, the traffic and probably other factors as well. As it often the case in Peru they will often give you a higher price only because you’re a foreigner.
Every week a few taxi drivers hope I’m just a tourist and will tell me the route costs 10 Nuevo Soles. This is probably more common than normal, because I always tell them to drive to Cruz del Sur, the bus company. They then think I want to travel somewhere and so I can only be some stupid tourist. Truth is that I work just opposite the road of Cruz del Sur and that almost every taxi drivers knows where that place is. They probably don’t know the Diego Thomson, though. When a taxi driver tells me that fare is 10 Nuevo Soles I don’t even bother to negotiate and send him (no, I’ve never seen a female taxi driver so far) away. They then always want to negotiate and immediatly drop down to 8 or even less Soles. But I send them away for the principle which is that I don’t want to sit in the taxi of a dishonest driver (who might just as well try to physically rob me later).
I have heard by the way, that in Cusco the procedure is different. There you apparently don’t negotiate but just tell the destination and board the taxi. At the end you give the driver 2 (day price) or 3 (night price) Soles and all is good. Sounds like a better (and cheaper) system to me.
Also one peculiarity is that many times the taxi driver hears where you want to go and immediately declines to the trip. Without even asking how much you’re willing to pay. What exactly is the reason for this I don’t know, but that reminds me that I should ask a taxi driver next time I get an opportunity. This was very common in La Paz where we had a hard time finding a taxi to the bus terminal because so many taxi drivers just flat out declined.
I hope that summarizes the public transportation system in Lima correctly. There is also a Wikipedia article: Public transport in Lima.
Place ny additions or questions in the comment section.