No Hay Paz en La Paz

You can´t be indifferent to politics when it arrives on your doorstep.

First, it was the medics protesting against longer working hours. Then ,the police campaigned for a higher salary; strolling down el prado with black masks and batons while the army took over control of the city. But just when the police managed to negotiate better pay, more chaos ensued as the TIPNIS procession arrived in La Paz. The officers went from protesters to oppressors in a matter of days. Admist such confusion, several people, including the head of police, resigned. The streets are filled with banners, graffitti and occasionally tear gas. The pounding of drums is becoming as normal as the beeping of horns.

The TIPNIS protestors have travelled 620 km to campaign against the government propsal to build a road right through their national park. La Paz received them like heroes with cheers of encouragement and showers of white confetti. They are currently camped out in the plaza San Francisco.

 The government´s response to this outcry has been underwhelming. When I arrived at the protest, a female politician was lecturing the campaigners for their ´disrespect´ for Evo Morales. Within minutes, the cry of

"Evo, cabrón, Evo, cabrón", 

drowned her out and the protestors marched on defiantly.

When I turned on the radio the next morning, most stations were parroting her same propaganda. They claimed that the child protestors who died of pneumonia showed how irresponsible the protestors were for using people as "shields" and went on to be quite racist about the Aymaran´s supposed ignorance and backwardness. This controversy has rightly dented Evo´s popularity. It is hard for him to maintain credibility when despite his plans to bulldoze through TIPNIS, he sees himself as a man of the people who supports indigenous rights.

Whatever story the official media spins, numerous banners and graffitti out on the street tell a different tale. The following banner reads: Everyone is a part of TIPNIS.

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Tihuanaco

Bolivian New Year is a magical affair. Tihuanaco may be a shadow of its former glory-railway workers stole many of the ancient Inca blocks in the 20th century-but its spiritual appeal has not yet wained. It was built as an Andean temple to the sun and on June 21st, it is considered good luck to climb to the summit and witness the first post-solstice rays. With the help of a few drinks (including a lot of sugary coffee) we camped out in Cerro de Llloco-Lloco and waited 11 hours in the bitter cold to gain access to la Puerta del Sol. This llama was staring at us mockingly:

Although we were two hours early, the queues were insane and we had to queue-jump our way into Kalasasaya, where the New Year's ceremony would begin.

The beat of drums and an unknown wind instrument accompanied the drone of an Aymaran priest. We could barely see at first because it was still dark and there was smoke everywhere.

This uncertaintainty hardly added to the mystique; we were freezing, tired and impatient so although ten of us made the Tihuanaco journey, only three of us stayed up to see the show!

Finally, the first rays of sun appeared. Everyone raised their hands to the light and we reached up high to warm our numb fingers.

Meanwhile, the Aymaran priest set some llama foetuses alight whilst chewing coca leaves and chanting. I have no idea what that symbolizes and the thousands of surrounding Bolivians were too inebriated to enlighten me.

There was a bottleneck going out of Kalasasaya and everyone was shouting because a few people were still trying to push their way in; despite the fact they had missed everything.

Going back to the hostel, me and Naomi counted our blessings as we walked into the horizon.

Potosí

Why would someone want to pay to go to a place which has been likened to Hell?
I went to Potosí to find out.


At first, I thought that the guide book was over-exaggerating. I skimmed through the page on health and safety and hoped that the mine wouldn´t collapse, there would be no ill-timed explosions and the noxious gases wouldn´t knock me out.


Thankfully, our guide was kind and upbeat and this allayed my worries for a while. He even made us a silver ring out of silver residue!

Everyone in the mines is very laddish and there is a great team spirit. They all have nicknames such a "burro" (donkey) or "apretado" (the one with tight trousers) and everyone pulls their weight.


Our tourguide decided to go with an English nickname, to the amusement of the tourists. 

We bought some gifts for the miners and observed some of their rituals. It is customary to buy coca leaves for a day´s work to stave off hunger and when they drink, they drink heavily. The alcohol they shot is nameless but the percentage is 96! On the last Friday of each money, they worship el Tio (the devil), who looks like this (see below) and then get absolutely wasted.

However, I felt less confident when I entered the third layer of the mines, which is also the deepest. It went from 0 to 40 degrees in under a metre and our guide made us try to work under these sweltering conditions. I only managed five minutes of shovelling, which is 7 hours and 55 minutes shorter than an average miner´s working day. I don´t know how they survive that long without surfacing for air.

We started off with bandanas over our faces but it soon became obvious that it would be better to breathe in a few bad chemicals than suffocate. By the time we reached the third level, our guide had taken off his T-shirt and invited us to take off our jumpsuits. Since there was sulfur dripping from the ceiling I decided this was a bad idea. I already had toxic dust all over me, which iched like hell.

By the time it was time to leave, I was struggling to stay conscious and kept hitting my head to worsen the dizziness. Milka later told me that people start hallucinating when they´ve been mining for a long time because they are so "metido" (shut off). So it's hard to determine the difference between real and psychological hell in such an inferno.

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Extremes of Temperature

The next morning, we woke up at 5am to see the sunrise. We saw 300˚ geizers in the snow and our tour guide warned us that 3 people had died last year because they didn´t know hot it was. One of the people who died was a fellow tour guide who tried and failed to save a dopey German.  Bearing that in mind, it feels really inappropriate that we are grinning idiotically in this photo and I apologize if including it is bad taste.

A few members of our group decided that it would be a good idea to test out the hot springs when it was -5 degrees outside! 

This is the mountain in the background

This is the hot baths

And here´s the ice heart in the foreground; and steam from the baths in the background.

This place wasn´t only heat-extreme but colour-extreme. The red lake wasn´t as red as usual when we saw it because it´s winter here and a lot of the bacteria die. But come summer, it´s practically bloody.

We got really close to the flamingos, which are the only creatures that can survive the acidity of the lake. There so are no fish and if you bathe in the sulfury bit of the lake, your hair falls out!

By contrast, the next place we stopped was like a desert.

The greenest thing we saw for hours was some bulbous moss

We felt like little kids in a giant playground

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Uyuni

Bolivian etiquette has become second nature to me. I can eat a salteña without dripping its juices. I remember to look people in the eye when I say salud. (Bad sex for seven years if you don´t, says Bolivian superstition). I know how to befriend the market sellers and I always get a free top up of papaya juice.


With all these habits, you might think life is getting a little routine. But you´d be mistaken. This weekend was pretty wild and me and Rose embarked on an impromptu trip to Uyuni.


Saturday afternoon, when you were probably watching the footie, we were out in La Valle de La Luna to try quadbiking for the first time. At two pounds fifty, it was a steal and the voluptuous landscape meant we had plenty of craters to speed down.


When I said our trip to Uyuni was impromptu, I meant disorganized. (Our laundry was still at the lavanderia, we forgot to take out money and had to pay the taxi driver in Argentinian pesos!! and we both forgot our sleeping bags...) This left us unprepared for an uncomfortable journey. The suspension in the bus had been suspect and there was a bitter chill, not helped by the cholita in front of us who insisted on opening the window. So we arrived at Uyuni cold and disgruntled. 


Uyuni 6am
... And barely anything was open. But me and Rose had been fantasizing about steaming coffee for literally hours and we were determined to find it. We eventually stumbled on a rustic market selling coffee, api and buñuelos, which we devoured.

Instead of getting a few hours rest, we powered on and decided to find a tourguide. We ignored them initially because it was impossible to choose between the mob of agents shouting at us when we got out of the bus. But when a woman later passed us in the street and offered to take us to her heated tourist office, how could we refuse?

700Bs was a reasonable price to pay for three days of food, accommodation and touring so we accepted her offer and were happy with the result. Our tourguide, Jose, was a complete babe, even if his playlist was a bit repetitive. I couldn´t get "Yo no quiero alma yo quiero bebida" out of my head for a good few days!

Our first stop, at the train cemetary, was iconic and bizarre. I can´t remember if there was a story behind it but I think the pictures speak for themselves.

We also saw how salt was made and manufactured. Whole families are often involved in the business, which, being nationalized, does not make a lot of money. 50g of salt sells for 14 Bolivianos (just over 1p). The salt is heated then purified and is supposedly better quality than our seasalt. But using this traditional method, you can only make 300g of it at a time.

Considering how many tourists come here, local craftsmen decided that using salt in other ways could be more profitable.

You might have seen some famous Uyuni shots online but we decided to play around with the camera and make our own. Me and Ryan had a headstand-off which was painful but worth it! (Salt looks as soft as snow but it´s HARD)

You can also play around with perspective like so:

This visacha stole my photo idea:

Someone else who tried to copy me is this little girl.

She showed me her school and I taught her how to say hello in English.

She was every bit as adorable as she looks.

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Gran Poder, Feijoada & Footie

Gran Poder lived up to its wild reputation.

We were herded through a narrow entrance to be able to see the procession then directed away from the dancers by police officers who seemed to be more adept at getting in the way than helping people to clear the road.

Red Paceña (beer) signs were scattered everywhere; as were flags, children and street vendors selling hot, cold and lukewarm produce as fast as is humanly possible. One little boy near me was going crazy, brushing each dancer as they went past, jangling the beads on their back and generally being a nuisance.

The noise was astounding and people from every age group were banging drums or tooting on their trumpets. Young boys dressed up as negritos (black people) shook their shaggy hair. Large signs behind them commemorated when slavery was abolished.

Not very PC face-paint

Next came ´los vacunos´ or the livestock, which was played by diminutive old women. These women are the pasteurisers and compensated for their stature in volume. They swung percussion instruments which turned 360 degrees and produced a high-pitched rattle for three beats then shouted "Ole! Ole!"on the fourth.

Twist & Shake

We had to rush the procession a bit because we had a Brazilian lunch engagement; a ´feijoada´ at Franklin´s. We arrived in Bolivian time, not British because we took ages to find the flat. Bolivian people never admit defeat when it comes to directions and we wandered up and down like muppets until Sharoll called and sorted us out.

All too soon, we devoured our delicious feijoada, drank our caiperinhas and ran down to the football pitch where Helena and Rodrigo were waiting impatiently. If Pacena dominated the festival, coca cola was the key product at the football match and there were giant red inflatable bottles all around us.

You could see patches of red where the Chileans sat amongst a sea of green. A huge scoreboard eventually and predictably announced two ´goooooooooooooooools´ for the Chileans which led to anarchy. 

(Yes I know this guy is from Barcelona but you get the idea!!)

The Chileans were shooting red gunpowder everywhere whilst the Bolivians booed and they even had to stop the game for all the commotion.

A rowdy shout ´fuera fuera fuera Chilenos´ could be heard and we left the stadium early to avoid any hastle.

Further down the road, we realized we had lost Toni. Harry and Deschan set out to find her, fearing the worst; whilst everyone else was concerned but not crazy enough to stay.

She was fine, thankfully although the riots had got worse and some Chileans were sentenced to jail for tearing and pìssing on the Bolivian flag.