Almost there - Bolivia Part IV (La Paz, Santa Cruz)

I'm back. The Dear Diary Death Blogs are almost over. Only one more to go after this one...and then pure randomness. As promised, here is the last part on Bolivia...

We drive into La Paz (City of Peace, but discovered in the 1500's for its gold and then later its silver) from El Alto. Incredible. Nestled in a valley over the crest of the mountain is this imaginary city...a Shangri-la...well, maybe not quite, but it was amazing anyway. I couldn't get over how the city had ever come to be...a city of 1.5 million people, 4000 metres above sea level. Think of a cereal bowl...just cereal...no milk. Right.

Ok, so the bus drops me off next to the main bus terminal. Gates are closed because of the strike. Great, where to now?

I start walking. It's almost impossible to get lost in La Paz. I say almost because I am capable of getting lost anywhere. Basically, if you are lost..you walk toward the centre of the city (el Centro)...which is downhill. So I start walking downhill. Run into a cop. Judging by her hair and makeup, she's ready to be on the cover of Cosmo. I ask her where downtown is. She points me in the direction, and tells me to be careful..."La Paz has a problem with fake police". Basically, the real police are dressed in green uniforms and the fake police are not. So, if somebody approaches you and asks for your ID, and is not wearing a grean uniform, run. Right. So after that nice reminder, I jump in a cab and head to my hostal (which I later find out was only a 10 minute walk away). I get jammed 20Bs...or $2.50...I get over it...

Call my Uncle Miguel, who is my mother's eldest brother. He looks more Bolivian/ Arab. My mother looks more Chilean. I first met him when I was 12 or so on my first visit back to Venezuela...he called me "el flaco blanco"...the skinny white kid. Yeah, I loved that. The last time I saw him was in 2002 in Caracas. He had recently moved to La Paz, Bolivia so I thought good time as any to catch up. He tells me to come visit so I jump in another cab. This time it only costs me 12Bs for a 30 minute cab ride. Transportation is plentiful and cheap in La Paz. No subway...but you can take a mini-bus (basically a mini-van), a collectivo (a cab that has a mapped route), or a normal taxi. Make sure you use radio-taxis...the ones that have phone numbers on the side...the non-radio taxis are the ones that mug you. Got it.

My intention was to stay at a hostal in the centre of town, while I went on excursions around and outside the city. Well, those plans changed when I arrived at my Uncle's doorstep in the Zona Sur, which is the affluent suburb of La Paz. The Zona Sur (Southern Zone), is about 400 metres lower than el Centro. Zona Sur and el Centro are like night and day in appearance and bustle. It's also easier to breathe in the Zona Sur and the temperature is slightly warmer. Actually, it only rained a couple of times while I was there and that might have lasted an hour or so. Generally, the weather was cloudy in the morning and sunny by noon. Temperature ranged from 0-5 degrees at night, and 10-20 degrees during the day. The sun was still intense so it was easy to burn if you didn't put on sunscreen.

Back to the story. After traveling for almost two months, it was nice to see some family. My Uncle and I got caught up. I couldn't get over how young my Uncle looked for his age...71 but he looked more like 61. The guy just doesn't age even though he used to smoke two packs a day. South Americans age well. I don't know if it's the altitude or what. Or probably their diet. Who knows. I think I may have counted five bald guys on my entire trip thus far. For all those going bald, forget Hair Club For Men, South America is the answer.

After, I met my Aunt Cecilia, who I had never met and my two cousins, Orieta, 23, and Cecilia, 22. I also met my other Aunt Isabela and my Great Uncle, who had fallen very ill in recent months. The six of them lived on one floor of the house while my other Uncle, Antonio, and his family lived on the level above. The house was massive. Most houses, which is common in South America, are surronded by walls and gates. My family's was no different.

It was cool to finally meet my extended family and learn about my roots in Bolivia. My great grandfather, Miguel Sara Alan, was from Palestine (which would make me 1/8 Arab?...whoa). He moved to Bolivia and had six kids, including my grandfather, Ismael (who was also the eldest). My grandfather, at the age of 21, moved to Santiago, Chile where he met my grandmother. There they had 9 kids (my mother was the middle child). My grandfather later moved to Caracas, Venezuela...where my sister and I were born. My sister now has two children, both born in Canada. Who knows where my kids will be born....not quite there yet. Anyway, all this made me realize that I really have no ties to Venezuela other than having lived and being born there. I feel I have stronger roots to Bolivia and Chile versus Venezuela. Anyway, at the end of the day, I am Canadian and proud of it, eh.

My Aunt and Uncle invited me to stay at their house so I went and got my stuff at the hostal in el Centro...of course I had to pay the hostal 25Bs even though I never stayed there...$3...again, I got over it. Gave my cousin an opportunity to show off her driving skills. If you can drive in La Paz, you can drive anywhere. It's not uncommon to be stuck in traffic on a 40 degree angle hill, flanked by buses inches away, while pedestrians are yelling at you to move or stop. Orieta has been driving since she was 13...she learned from my Aunt Cecilia, who is an even better driver. Anyway, it was an eye-opener but fun. We passed Evo Morales's house/ compound, the president of Bolivia and the famous San Francisco church along the way.

Over the next few days, my family introduced me to some really delicious Bolivian food. Bolivian food staples are basically meat, potatos, and aji (a really spicy salsa). Every meal consists of meat and potatos...more or less. The difference is, is that it has kick. Breakfast (papaya juice...yum) and dinner are light, while lunch is the big meal. Soup is often an accompaniment. Dessert isn't really common...I guess because you are so full by the end of the meal. My Aunts and cousins are amazing cooks (so is my Uncle, when he wants to be) and I can't do them just here. All I can say, is that I packed on more pounds during my stay in La Paz than I have anywhere else. I turned into el gordo.

In total I spent ten days in La Paz. My family took me on a lot of sight seeing adventures. Some of them included: Mercado Rodrigues, which was by far the largest open air market I had ever been to. Cholas from all around were selling their goods, "Hey, caballero, don't you want to buy?...hey, mamita, buy this and take it home". I give Cholas a hard time, I know, but that's because a lot of them have attitude. There are nice ones that get taken advantage of by selfish tourists. But there are also those, that know how to play the game. They know the value of the ol' mighty dollar. Most of them have two or three businesses going at the same time and are driving Land Rovers or Toyota 4runners, which would be considered elite vehicles in Bolivia. These women are considered rich by Bolivian standards, so sometimes it's hard for me to sympathize when they are pumping out cash and not paying any taxes. Anyways, enough generalizations...

I also checked out the Black Market and some other local markets around town. Clothes, electronics, music, movies, housewares...you name it. It's all here. And cheap. I bought a pair of "Gap" jeans that Guy likes to call my Kriss Kross pants, for $15. The made in Peru jeans are still holding up. I bought most of my souvenirs at the Witches Market. Stayed away from the Llama fetuses to bring me good luck (no joke...it was gross). I tried pig ear and Queso Chancho (pig cheese) with my Uncle Miguel. There's nothing like chewing down on a piece of pig cartilidge...not this kid's favourite.

I visited my cousin Cecilia's university. She invited me to see some class presentations (for her Communications class) on the History of Communications in Bolivia. Skits were played out and bands played later on. Yeah, not sure why I really went. At least the class was outside. Met her friends. I was paraded around like a mascot. All in good fun, right?

My Aunt took me to see Valle de la Luna and Mecapaca, a small remote village outside of La Paz. My ears popped as we reached the village, 2800 metres above sea level. The countryside reminded me of Las Vegas and southern California. Sooooo quiet and peaceful. It was a weird senstation. Pretty soon, this countryside will be taken over by the urban sprawl...sad. My Aunt also took me to her coffee factory in Villa Fatima, where her family has been making and exporting Bolivian coffee for over 80 years. Really cool to see how coffee is processed and packaged.

I went to Copacabana. Not Copacabana, Brazil. Definitely not. Copacabana, Bolivia is another little town nestled in the mountains (about 3 hours outside of La Paz) along the coast of Lake Titicaca, where you can eat delicious trout, buy some souvenirs, check out a big church or go to Isla del Sol...which I did. Isla del Sol was an island that was discovered over 10,000 years ago (before Titicaca was a lake) and later used as a sacrificial ground for the Incas. Guess who I met there sipping on a double espresso...you got it...Buddy (see Bolivia Part III for a more detailed description). His name turned out to be Jack and he actually was a pretty cool guy. This was his third round the world trip. His system consists of working for a while and then traveling for a year. He's obviously been everywhere. Made me think...it's actually cheaper to travel than to live in Toronto..if you do it right. He gave me some good pointers anyway.

I traveled down the "World's Most Dangerous Road" via mountain bike, from La Cumbre to Coroico (20 min outside La Paz). It is known as the World's Most Dangerous Road because people and things go flying off of it every year. One guide told me since 1945, 80,000 people have died. I heard it's more like 20,000 (300 people or so * 60 years). Busloads of people have gone off of this mountain. Ex-presidential candidates have been executed and thrown off the mountain. Most recent tour fatalities included a French girl in 2002 looking at some birds in the sky one minute and then next minute, woops, right off the mountain. Or the Israeli girl a couple of years ago who complained about her brakes. The tour company said, don't worry about it..it's all good. Well, it wasn't all good when her brakes gave out and she went flying off. The day before my tour, a girl had gone off the edge because she was freaked out by an oncoming truck. She fell about 3 metres. Had she adavanced 25 feet more, it would have been bye bye. So, I went on a tour with the very reputable Gravity Assisted Mountain Biking. 64km of downhill mountain biking madness and 3600m of vertical descent. It took five hours to get to Coroico. Luckily, we had good weather. My total experience mountain biking ever...once, twice??? Growing up, my mountain bike was for my paper route and driving on pavement, not actually for going down a mountain...AND...I had no clue what all the gears did. Anyways, I got a primer on that and learned quite a bit about the sport that day. It was one of the most intense and exhilerating experiences of my life. Best $60 I had spent thus far. Compton, you would have lerved it.

I actually tried changing my ticket to stay in Bolivia a little longer and extend my time in Buenos Aires. It was a no-go based on the restrictions of my round the world ticket. Unfortunately, for me, getting out of Bolivia was not so easy. American Airlines is the only international carrier that flies into La Paz, like I mentioned before. Although LAB (Bolivian national carrier) and Aerosur (South American carrier) also fly in and out of La Paz, I could not find a flight out of the city from the 11th to the 17th. That would have given me all but one day and one night in Buenos Aires...definitely not enough time. Man, I fecked this up.

Lucky for me, I had an Uncle, Alejandro, who lived in Santa Cruz, Bolivia, and who also happened to be one of the chief pilots for Aerosur. His wife, Marlena, had her own travel agency. Mo-neeeey. With the help of my Aunt Cecilia, they graciously found a ticket for me, out of La Paz to Buenos Aires on the 15th. It cost me US$300 but it was well worth it. I was sad to go. Almost cried but held back. I had grown quite attached to my new extended family. I really enjoyed my time in Boliva and I am definitely going to return, sooner rather than later. Still a lot to see and do.

The next morning, with my Uncle, I grabbed a 5:30am taxi to the airport. "Do You Think I'm Sexy" and "I Ran" by A Flock of Seagulls were some of the song selections that the cabbie chose for me. Of course. What North American does not have that in their cd player right now? Said good-bye and thanks to my Uncle Miguel and grabbed my 8:00am flight to Buenos Aires...the city that never sleeps.