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Ten days of early mornings,
busy days, late nights, and an altitude of over 4000 metres can
take its toll. Besides the stomach upset and the mild altitude
sickness we had both been experiencing, we were also having a lot
of trouble sleeping at nights. But last night, in a superb hotel
in La Paz, Bolivia, we had the best sleep we’ve enjoyed in weeks.
And the best part was that we had absolutely nothing planned for
today except to relax and prepare for our departure tomorrow on a
big five day tour of the south west of Bolivia.
At around 8:35 I start to
approach consciousness. I’m in the denouement of my dream where I
had fought off a dozen terrorists with a swiss army knife and
saved my woman.
At around 8:40 I am conscious
but have not yet opened my eyes. I’m listening to the sound of La
Paz and to the sound of my wife’s breathing. I can hear a large
truck honking its horn repeatedly, almost in time to the man
shouting, “Uvas! Uvas! Bananas! Bananas!” There is no hurry to
get out of bed so I lay there and listen.
At around 8:45 Ana stirs, says
good morning, and gets up to check the time while I lay in bed
absorbing sounds expelling bad breath. We decide to go for
breakfast, hoping to avoid the stale bread and cold coffee which
are inevitably fed to the late risers. After an unfortunately
predictable breakfast of stale bread and cold coffee we return to
the room to jump back into bed, listen to some music and read for
a while, perfect activities for a lazy morning. After a volley of
Sade and Mario Vargas Llosa, I head for the shower. Left arm,
left pit, left shoulder, upper back, right arm, right pit, right
shoulder, rinse, left leg just reaching the foot when I hear Ana
shouting something.
‘What?’ I holler.
Ana appears in the bathroom
and says, ‘It’s the tourist agency on the phone. Apparently some
of the countryside people are planning a big protest tonight and
might be barricading the road, so she thinks that we better get
the bus to Oruro as soon as we can today in case the road gets
blocked tomorrow and we miss our train connection. What should we
do?’
‘I guess we better go, we
don’t want to take any chances.’
That was the end of our
peaceful day. We quickly packed our bags, checked out, and stored
our things with the hotel while we went out to finish up a couple
things. Our first stop was the tourist agency to pick up train
tickets. Next stop was the music stop to pick up a couple
packages of strings for my brand new charango I had purchased the
day before. On the way back to the hotel, we stopped at one of
the witch vendors in the market to take a photo of the llama
fetuses she was selling. She wanted me to buy one in exchange for
the picture but I wasn’t really hungry at the time; instead I gave
her two Bolivianos and her large toothless grin indicated her
satisfaction with the deal.
We called a taxi from the
hotel and he pulled up in front of the doors in about twenty
seconds. En route to the bus station we passed through a chaotic
market where there were vendors selling mangoes, charangos, soap,
rope, glasses of strange yellow liquid, huge bags of popped corn,
fluorescent lamps, cocoa leaves, charms, yarns, and alpaca
sweaters.
‘Seis bolivianos,’ requested
the taxi driver. I gave him the coins, which was the equivalent
of about one American dollar, then gathered the bags and we went
into the station. It was remarkably peaceful, except for the
sales representatives standing in front of each of the bus company
kiosks, one humorously named Jumbo Aroma Bus Company,
screaming destination names. ‘Oruro!!! Oruro!!! Santa Cruz!!!
Arequipa!!!’ We laid the bags down on the cleanest part of the
floor we could find and Ana walked over to one of the kiosks (not
Jumbo Aroma, that one looked a little risky) and bought
tickets for the Oruro bus at 1:30. We then went through the exit
door and waited beside the bus for someone to load our bags. A
young snotty punk finally appeared and begrudgingly fired our
backpacks into the bowels of the autobus. We asked him about the
problem with the road blockades but he wasn’t inclined to answer.
We then asked the bus driver on board what was happening only to
be told that the bus was not going anywhere since there was
already a blockade just outside La Paz and nobody knew how long it
would take for the police to sort it out.
‘Well, that was nice of them
to sell us tickets,’ I said to Ana, ‘do you want to sit on the bus
for a few minutes until we get some more news?’
‘Okay, we might as well,’ she
replied.
We found our seats and sat
down. After a few minutes the young snotty punk climbed aboard on
the bus and informed us that all services to Oruro were cancelled
due to the roadblock and that we should come back tomorrow and try
again. Strangely enough, we could still hear the shouts of ‘Oruro!!!
Oruro!!!’ coming from within the station. So, off the bus,
collect the bags, back into the station, find clean floor and
bench, and sit down to consider our options. Once again, I
guarded the bags while Ana put on her boxing gloves and went to
get a refund on the tickets. It was surprisingly easy. Once she
returned, she became the watcher of the bags while I went to
several of the other kiosks to see if they had busses to Oruro.
They all said no except one chubby lady who said they may have a
bus at 3:30 and to check back at 2:00 to confirm. That gave us
time to sit and stew over our options.
‘How long can they possibly
block a road for? Wouldn’t the police just go and break it up?’
Ana wondered aloud.
‘Who knows? I talked to one
guy over there who said this sort of thing happens quite
frequently and it can take some time. Why don’t we phone the tour
agency and see what they recommend?’ I said. Ana volunteered for
the job and left to make the call but was back shortly to get some
coins. The call would cost only two bolivianos but, as usual, the
vendor did not have change, even for a ten boliviano note. This
is certainly a common thread through Latin American countries,
they never have change. The most important tip for traveling
around Latin America is to have at least two kilograms of coins in
your pocket at all times.
Ana returned shortly with the
news that the tour company was not answering the phone, which was
hardly surprising. We had the distinct feeling that they had sold
us the tour knowing full well that there was trouble in the
countryside. What was our next move? Go back to the agency and
demand a refund? Return to the hotel and wait until tomorrow?
Sit in the bus station all afternoon waiting for news? Find a bar
and get loaded? It is situations like this that are the best and
the worst part of traveling. You cannot have a real adventure
without surprises, unpredictability and hassles, where you have to
make decisions in a foreign, unusual environment surrounded by
locals who look a lot less stunned than you do. But hey, if you
don’t get your kicks that way, then take a nice Caribbean cruise
where the biggest challenge of the day is waking up in time for
bacon and eggs with the rest of the fatties.
As we sat pondering, a man
wearing dark glasses approached us holding a ticket in his hand.
We recognized him as one of the passengers on the original bus.
He told us that he had found a company that was indeed sending a
bus to Oruro and it was leaving in five minutes. We asked how it
was possible that this company was going when all the rest had
cancelled their services. He explained that this bus would be
taking a back road shortcut to avoid the blockade. Ana and I
looked at each other, telepathically weighed the pros and cons of
embarking on this dodgy sounding journey, then Ana was off running
to the kiosk to buy tickets. Ana elbowed through the little
Bolivian mob and got us the last two tickets on the bus. That’s
my girl, I thought.
We rushed out to the bus, had
our bags loaded, and found our seats. Although this was not the
Jumbo Aroma company it might as well have been. The dank
air was thick with hot, sticky Bolivian body odour. The bus took
off before many people had sat down but after several blocks, all
bums had found seats except for two old Bolivian women standing at
the back of the bus next to us. And they smelled horrible. I
recognized the odour from the stands in the La Paz markets selling
the llama fetuses and charms.
‘They’re witches,’ I whispered
to Ana, ‘don’t piss them off.’.
‘I wasn’t planning on pissing
them off,’ she replied in a hushed voice.
I moved as far to the right as
the seat would permit and nuzzled my face into the safety of Ana’s
perfumed neck. Every once in a while I looked over to make sure
they weren’t casting any spells on me for my insolence. The first
witch lady was chewing something and had a small stream of black
paste leaking out of the sides of her mouth. Neither of them were
paying attention to me but the smell was almost making me retch.
After a little while the bus conductor walked to the back and
asked the ladies where their seats were. They said they didn’t
have seats or a ticket. He asked them where they were going.
They didn’t answer. He asked again, but got no response. Instead
of risking a horrible afternoon hexing, he charged them five
bolivianos each and left them alone.
We passed through the slums of
La Paz with all its stray dogs, stray people, stray litter, and
stray colours and were soon out of the city and into the
countryside. The countryside was desolate and bleak, the barren
altoplano periodically decorated by muddy villages where the only
non-brown colours came from the signs advertising Pacena beer and
Coca Cola. Everything was constructed from mud bricks and rebar,
though most buildings were unfinished. There were very few people
walking around the villages which made them look eerily deserted.
The only bit of action we did see was at village number seven,
where an old Bolivian man was emptying his bowels on the side of
the road. And he had timed his release perfectly with the passing
of our bus. In fact, this was a common occurrence in Bolivia.
From the windows of busses, trains, and taxis we had witnessed
dozens of Bolivians of all ages and sex relieving themselves on
walls, streets and signposts. But once you have experienced the
quality of Bolivian toilets, you too would probably shake free
your inhibitions and let loose in the relative sterility of the
open land.
When we got tired of looking
at the brown out the window we watch the Mexican movie which was
playing on the televisions in the bus. I couldn’t quite figure
out the plot. The main character was a short, chubby Mexican man
with a huge moustache and unbelievably white teeth, and the scenes
alternated between him laying in bed all hairy, singing ballads
and a never-ending poker game where, between raking in chips, he
was telling the rest of the bandito gamblers of his love for this
woman who was married to his sworn enemy. Boredom overcame me and
I fell asleep but was soon awoken by the sound of gunshots. The
chubby Mexican was now wearing a sombrero and had just shot his
enemy in the chest, multiple times. The dead man’s wife looked
sad for a moment, then ran into the hero’s arms, eyes wet with
glee. Next scene, they were in bed together, all hairy, and he
was singing her a love ballad. I felt sorry for her.
At that moment the bus slowed,
stopped, and turned off the engine. Ana opened her window, stuck
her head out, and reported that we were stuck in a huge queue of
traffic. Splendid, I thought, so much for the shortcut around the
roadblock. There was no room to turn around and the cars and
busses continued to arrive behind us. I noticed that the witches
were gone, their uncanny senses must have prompted them to get off
sometime before. The other passengers started to look a little
nervous and some were doing inventory on the amount of food and
water they had brought with them.
‘This looks like it may take a
while,’ I sighed to Ana, ‘what do we have to eat?’
‘Half a bottle of water and a
bag of Peruvian corn nuts,’ she replied.
‘Can I have a corn nut?’ I
asked.
Just then we saw a bus pull
out of the queue ahead of us and drive down a rough dirt path to
the left of the highway. The bus descended down a hill slowly and
we notice there were five or six people chasing after the bus.
They caught up to it, passed it, and ran ahead to a part of the
road that looked as if it was piled high with dirt. They stood in
the middle of the road and blocked the bus from progressing. The
bus sat there for quite some time and it was quite far away so we
couldn’t see exactly what was happening. But there was some
movement of people, perhaps the bus driver negotiating with the
protesters. Then the people moved away and the bus lurched
forward over the dirt pile. I guess it was larger than he
estimated because the nose of bus lifted into the air and the ass
of the bus ground itself into the dirt. The brake lights flashed
and the bus remained there, poised for launch, for several
minutes. It then slowly reversed and resumed its horizontal
position. There was again some movement of bodies, some more
minutes passed, then the bus again lurched forward, this time
faster, and plowed itself over the embankment leaving a large
crowd of people behind it, evidently the passengers. The bus,
having gained momentum, continued along the road and up the
incline with all its passengers running wildly behind trying to
catch up.
‘Yeah!’ somebody on our bus
shouted. I hope that was not the go-ahead for us to attempt a
similar maneuver as the bus had appeared to come very close to
tipping over as it went over the embankment. We were happy when
our bus remained in its place, obviously our driver was not a
psycho.
About an hour had passed.
During that time many of the passengers bladders had reached the
bursting point so they had left the bus and watered the side of
the road, some of them even having the courtesy of pointing their
latiny weenies away from the bus. Ana refused to drink any water
just in case we were stuck here for the night. I was also
starting to have horrible thoughts. It would be very easy for
bandits to come onto the bus and rob us of everything. Or the
protesters could take some shots at the bus for trying to cross
the blockade. Perhaps we should have cancelled our tour and
played it safe in La Paz. I was then overjoyed when I felt the
engine of the bus fire up and the bus moving slowly forward. I
reached over Ana and stuck my head out the window. There were
quite a number of Bolivians walking on the side of the road in
both directions. I could see nothing except the line of vehicles
ahead of us slowly creeping forward together in unison. We
continued at this slow but steady pace for twenty minutes when we
finally reached the source of the problems. There was a huge mob
of perhaps two thousand people, all wearing blue rain ponchos
shouting angry words at the bus. The roadblock, hundreds of
medium sized rocks, had been pushed away and were scattered all
along the side of the road. Nobody knew why they had removed the
roadblock, but I was just glad to get out of there before the mob
got the urge to push our bus over. A Bolivian man who had been
sitting behind us returned to his seat after talking to the
driver. He told us that there had actually been ten thousand
people at the ‘rally’ which was had escaped. We never did find
out what the rally was all about, we were just happy to be on our
way to Oruro.
We passed more brown villages
and more bleak countryside, then a few more brown villages. I
pulled out our guide book to read about Oruro. It said that
Oruro
was one of the main cities in the region and quite a pleasant
place to spend some time. ‘Maybe we can have a nice peaceful day
in Oruro tomorrow, it sounds nice,’ I said to Ana. We were soon
to reconfirm our belief that most guide books are crap.
The bus motored along the
highway and at around 7:30, two hours late, we approached what
appeared to be a huge mud flat, except that there were half built
houses floating in it. The rain was coming down hard and the mud
level seemed to be rising before our eyes. If there was an uglier
suburb in the world, this one must a close second. It had the
same mud brick buildings, same lack of colour, but a whole lot
more mud. Must be because of the rain, I thought, but can you
imagine the dust storms around here when it’s dry?
The suburb turned into
Oruro
proper. And it was a true dump. Muddy, unpaved streets, mud
brick buildings, beer signs, and shady looking characters hanging
around shops selling car parts. I looked over at Ana and she was
not impressed. ‘I can’t believe we left our beautiful twenty
dollar per night hotel room in La Paz for this filthy pueblo,’ she
complained. I couldn’t agree more. But, at the very least, we
were here and we beat the roadblocks. At least we wouldn’t miss
our trip tomorrow.
We continued through the town
and things actually began to improve a little. Not much, but a
little. The dirt streets ended and the paved ones begun. There
were a few more lights around and a lot more people. We reached
the bus station. Well, actually, the bus just stopped in the
middle of the road in front of a decrepit hotel and he told
everyone to get off. We claimed our bags from the luggage hold
and found a taxi. Ana had got the name of a decent local hotel
from the reception lady who worked at the hotel in La Paz so we
gave the driver the name and he drove us to the hotel. I paid him
six bolivianos and we walked into the hotel, which was actually a
very large building, rising into the sky at least ten stories.
Inside the hotel we found two shocked looking girls working behind
the desk and a family of Bolivians from granny right down to kiddy
glued to the television in the receptions watching The Simpsons in
Spanish. ‘Dos cervezas Moe,’ I heard Homer say. Can this really
be the global cultural connection that binds all countries, great
and small, together? I hoped not.
‘Buenas noches,’ we said in
unison. Then we asked if they had a double room available. The
first girl looked doubtfully through the register then said they
did, and it was forty-one dollars. ‘No! Fifty-three!’ blurted
the second girl as she shot the first one a very dirty look.
‘Fifty-three dollars
American??’ I asked astounded. How could that be? I told her
that we had been sent by an agency in in La Paz and that we should
get their discount. She asked which agency it was and Ana showed
her the business card.
‘No,’ she said, ‘we don’t work
with that agency. I can give you a discounted rate of forty-one
dollars but that’s it.’ We were not going to back out into the
rain looking for a better deal so we took it. We asked her if we
could at least have a late check-out since our train didn’t leave
until 7:30 the next evening. ‘Sure,’ she replied, ‘but you have
to pay another twenty-one dollars.’ We told her to forget it.
A young man appeared out of
nowhere and motioned for us to follow him. He summoned the
elevator with a concentrated push of the yellowed button and it
eventually arrived. Ana tripped getting in as the elevator floor
was about six inches higher than the ground. Luckily the elevator
was so small there was no room to fall. The third floor is where
the elevator stopped and as the doors opened we were struck with
an indescribable, horrible smell which was likely the result of
disuse, cheap or perhaps no cleansers, and rotting building
materials. We reached the room and were not immediately pissed
off. It was very old and not particularly attractive, but it was
good enough, and there was a television with lots of channels.
The rumbling of our stomachs reminded us that we should dump our
bags in the room and hunt for some food so we returned downward,
minding the tricky elevator floor, and asked the reception girls
if there was a restaurant nearby. They told us there were two
pizza joints, one around the corner and a block down and the other
on the far side of the plaza the hotel faced. We stepped out into
the rain and jog-walked around the corner and down a block and
found ourselves standing in front of a Juan’s Pizza sign and a
large aluminum door covering the restaurant front.
‘Shit!’ I blurted, ‘How the
hell can those stupid girls not know which places are open or
closed?’ We jog-walked in the rain back to the hotel when Ana
pointed up and said, “Look!’ The entire building was black except
the light coming from our room.
‘We’re the only people in the
hotel?’ asked Ana in disgusted amazement. ‘I can see why it was
such a problem giving us a late check-out,’ she said
sarcastically. We had that familiar feeling of a royal
tourist-screwing.
We continued across the plaza
and actually found the second pizza joint, and it was open. We
found ourselves a table and were soon attended to by the waiter.
We ordered a large pizza to share, a diet Coke for Ana and a nice
beer for me. The drinks arrived and we finally had a chance to
relax and collect our thoughts. Soon, four teenaged girls burst
onto the scene, took seats at the table next to us and all lit up
smokes. The waiter arrived and took their order of one large coke
and one large beer. Several filthy grey clouds of smoke later,
the waiter returned with the bottles and four glasses. He placed
one glass in front of each of the girls then half filled each with
coke. To my horror, he then filled each of the glasses with the
foamy beer. The girls put straws into their glasses, gave a stir,
and started sucking away. This incredible disrespect for lager
and the plumes of smoke convinced us to change tables so we went
to the other side of the restaurant.
The pizza turned out to be
very good and we enjoyed our meal then returned to the hotel, only
to find that there was no hot water for a shower. After three
trips down to reception and some shocking Spanish profanity, we
finally got enough hot water for a quick shower.
I climbed into bed after
scanning for bedbugs and thought, ‘I can’t wait to see what
tomorrow has in store for us.’ I then dropped into sweet
unconsciousness. |
