oruro
from there we all traveled to ororo for carnaval. every town and country celebrates it in its own way, and oruro celebrates with a week long celebration of a goddess. the dancers start at one end of the town, and end up in the cathedral, where they get blessed. this dancing, drinking, and pegging people with carnaval foam and water balloons went on for 5 days straight. not kidding. we went to bed a 6 one morning, woke up for breakfast (it was free at our hotel, so ofcourse we set our alarm) at 8, and the dancers were still parading through the streets. daisuke, one of our new friends from japan, also brought an outfit( vegeeta from dragon ball z ) from japan so it was hilarious to see him dancing around…although we were prime targets for water balloons.
getting to the bus station was also tricky because we had all of our bags and could not move as fast, but we made it out alive…
from there we said our goodbyes since i needed to head back south to bs as, and i spent another night back in potosì. well, more like another day in a hostel, since it was carnaval here as well, but there were more kids dumping water off their roof, as well as drive-by super soakers…
salar de uyuni
since rodrigo and i were both heading off to uyuni, we decided to go together, and met up with his friend andy there. the uyuni salt flats are amazing! we were in a 4 x 4 for 4 days with a french couple and a japanese girl, so our conversations were ridiculous. i spoke to rodrigo and andy in spanish, and to izumi in japanese, and then we all kinda spoke english…but it was great to be able to practice japanese before my trip! since it had been raining a bit the first night, the salar looked like we were driving on top of water…we also saw things like flamingos, llamas (they are everywhere) huge cactus’s like 30 foot tall, awesome rock formations, pretty lakes, and geysers.
we decided to go cheap and bargain with all the tour companies, and so of-course the one we went with ended up to be pretty non-catering. our driver was also the cook and tour guide, and our car was shit so he was a mechanic most of the time…haha.
potosi
from there, the guys left for salvador, brazil, and i to potosí, which is a little mining town south of la paz. they have coal mining caves that you can visit, and so rodrigo ( an argentine guy from my hostel) and i decided to do the tour. the tour takes about 4 hours, which i thought would be a long time to spend crawling in a closed dusty place. but it went by fairly fast and i kinda imagined myself like the dwarfs in snow white…
i still can not believe the conditions that these people work in. most of the workers work ten hour shifts, and make less than one dollar a day…and the average age of the workers is 20. we bought coca leaves, cookies, and dynamite to give to the miners, because this is what keeps them going throughout the day. lighting off the dynamite was cool because it was risky but i thought i lost hearing for a bit…
la paz (san pedro prison)
after cusco i ended up spending another week in la paz, and got another chance to visit the san pedro prison. the san pedro prison in la paz is famous because there are different rankings of prisoners, and so some live in shithole cells and some in like hotel suites. tourists used to be able to visit until a few years ago, when there was a riot and it was clear that is was unsafe for foreigners. anyways, i heard of people getting in and the guys i was with really wanted to go in, so we decided to try. it was actually really sketchy, because you have to know someone in the prison, (long lost friend, relative..etc) but ofcourse when you have me and three aussie guys that don´t speak spanish, they guards knew we are lying.
so we waited across the street for some guy to come over and hand us a sheet of paper that had a spanish guy´s name and number to the jail. the number is 2131454 in case you know of anyone that is gonna go…just ask the guard for ernesto. his full name is ernesto sello, and he said he has been in there for the last 3 years and has 10 left. we thought it would be cool to hear his story. so we used the payphone across the street and called for him. the guard put him on the phone, and then ernesto he told us to bring him some coke and cigarettes in a grocery bag, and that we should put our names and some money for him to bribe the popo so that our names would be down on the visitation list.
well…it was kinda intimidating because there are all the prisoners with their arms through the front jail gates and i was the one that had to go in there and hand ernesto the bag. it was also sketchy because the guards were like, yea, YOU can go in. i was like, ¨HELL NO¨ not with out my friends. we then had to call ernesto back from the payphone and arrange a time for us to meet. the guards were watching us the whole time, and i can not imagine what they were thinking. probably something like…weird stupid gringos. anyways, we arranged for a time but then went out with a bunch of the guy´s friends from melbourne that night and missed it the next day. so, all that for nothin. haha.
we didn´t get to go in to the different rooms of the jail, but got to see the courtyard, eating area, gift shop, and talking area from where i gave ernesto our goods. so it was enough for me. and yes, they have a gift shop where the prisoners can sell their crafts…
copacabana y isla del sol
enda, randall, and i left for a little town called copacabana, which is a little port town on lago titicaca a bit later. it was a good place to stop over on the way to peru, because we got to relax and was also there on a sunday, where the town brings their cars in front of the main church to get it blessed. confetti, fireworks, and little trinkets were everywhere, but it was also kinda funny to see people shaking and spraying pepsi all over their cars.
then we made our way to an amazing island on a boat ride that should have taken 15 min but took almost two hours. we were going slower than the speed we have to go in the no wake zone on lake washington….ridiculous. the max. capacity for the boat was about 25 people and we had atleast 40 PLUS backpacks. but it was so worth it and we stayed for two nights on an island called isla del sol on lago ticicaca. it was the coolest island ever. even though there is nothing on the island, there are quite a few hostels, and so as soon as we got off the boat the little kids swarmed us asking if we wanted a place to stay. these little kids are great salesmen, as they are so persistent! everywhere we went, there were kids trying to sell us things…we could not escape.
anyways, the lake is so grand and gorgeous that you would think it was the ocean, and the weather has been great for us as well. and the tricky thing about the island though, is that you have to climb up hill for like 45 min to the hostel with our backpacks. this was one thing that was omitted from anything we read. but i suppose it is not in there for a reason…..with the thin air, my lungs were not having it. the island also had a water problem, because people that ran the hostel/restaurants could only have the donkeys carry up so much water….so that was interesting, to say the least. i am sure we all smelled awesome.
la paz
i then made my way back to buenos aires and am currently in la paz. bolivia is beautiful! i have been here for the last week with in la paz are really dark skinned and indigenous looking, and there are a lot of homeless people. it is completely different from buenos aires and uruguay, where most of the locals were of european decent. the women here wear traditional garb with bright skirts, and this hat that looks like a top hat rested crookedly on the top of the head. it is also so busy here but busy in a different way than a city like buenos aires or tokyo….hard to explain.
there are also a million stands along the road where you can buy everything-clothes, underwear, batteries, knives, phones, cd´s candy, water, tv´s. and all for super-cheap. i have been able to stock up here, and was also able to buy a charger for my phone for only $2! i have also not seen a convenient store yet…
it took me two days to get acclimated to the high altitude ( the highest city in the world!), but i am doing fine now. the city is literally in a bowl, so there is A LOT of walking up and down the street. i swear we walk like 5 miles a day, but i don´t seem to be losing weight. dammit. yesterday we climbed up the city hills and drank beer watching the sunset. it was so so so pretty.
it was also ´”the day of abundance” on the 24th, and the whole country celebrates by buying things like miniature cars, houses, fake money, etc that they wish to have. they then have it blessed and hope that it comes true in the upcoming year. there were like a billion little stands selling the same things but some of it was actually really funny. the funniest has to be a little ceramic guy with an alpaca beanie, with just tons of luxury items around his neck, while smoking a cigarette. it is just ridiculous looking. you can also buy llama fetuses for good luck to put under your house. maybe i will try and smuggle some back home!
there are also a billion police and guard men in uniform, so it is kinda intimidating to walk around. we were at the sand pedro prison yesterday, and took a picture of the guards. we thought we did it stealthily, but i guess not because a guard carrying the biggest gun i have ever seen came over and told us to erase it. there have not been any riots while i have been here, but i am kinda excited for one to happen. i haven´t had anyone hassle me for my passport, documents, etc, but i do walk around with a bitchy face. i have heard some horrible stories of people getting robbed,. but i think it can happen anywhere… but i guess if we get robbed, we get robbed, and there is nothing we can do about it. so we are being careful.