A day in Bolivia.

I usually don't particularly like writing about a specific day because
it seems to include a lot of 'and then's, but yesterday was such a
warped day that I am going to make an exception.

After exchanging turns in getting ill, Alex and I finally left Salta,
Argentina, by bus Tuesday night, to arrive in La Quiaca by morning.
The buses in Argentina are usually an utter treat, at least the
standard of first class in planes. Seats that recline to almost 180º,
footrests, food (albeit inedible), movies in English with Spanish
subtitles (colonization is far from over), and lots of air
conditioning because it is seen as a luxury. Now the problem
arises when you don't prepare for Arctic conditions, as the one
accessory they fail to provide is thermal sleeping bags with inner
electric-powered heating systems. So this last night on the bus was
spent clutching each other to try and resuscitate any form of pulse in
absence of a blanket.

We got into the border town before the sun rose. As we got off the
bus, we realized that we really had no clue which way the border with
Bolivia was, and nighttime is not the ideal time to wander about as
gringos with a blatant map in hand. We both were dying for the dunny;
in touring the entire town at 8 o'clock in the morning, not
a single establishment was open. We went up to the YPF gas station,
which had a big sign saying opening hours started at 7; I mouthed
'baño' to the man inside working but who had not opened the station, and
got a finger wagged at me. The streets were pretty darn empty, and
sparse at that, leaving us to cross some fields to get between
streets. Once the sun rose, we decided that even Bolivia, a third
world country, must be better serviced than this.

So we followed the trail of gringos leading to the border. We first
had our passports stamped to leave Argentina. The office for this was
before a bridge. Between the Argentina and Bolivia border controls was
no-man's land on the actual bridge. As we chatted to the border
control officer and other gringos lined up behind us, locals walked in
and out of both countries without hassle or questioning, running back and forth as if
the big bad soldiers with some impressive and used-looking guns were
not in front of both offices.

We crossed the bridge with the stray dogs and buggies and gringos, and
lined up for the Bolivian office. Normal entry visas for gringos is
free and for 30 days; Americans pay USD150 just for the heck of it.
The little wooden room we waited in had all angles of pictures of the
President, Evo Morales, who is revered in this country. Not really
sure why. Either way, the room smelled chokingly of diesel (comforting with gun powder and smokers around), and all the immigration laws were on printed pieces of loose
paper hung on the walls with Scotch tape. Alex and I, Australian and
Italian passports, got visas for 90 days, the person next in line with
an Aussie passport got 30. Walk on out into Bolivia.

Now Roxy had warned us of a (quote) STARK difference as soon as you
pass into the country: needless to say, she was right. The roads were
no more, only dirt paths from here on out. Houses were not made in any
organized fashion of laying bricks and paving them with cement and
plaster and painting over that. No no no, here the bricks were enough,
with a window or two included at best. Shops spilled onto the streets,
selling the oddest things, like lots and lots of polyester blankets
with pictures of tacky: tacky puppies, tacky Barbies, tacky rainbows.
Or socks. They REALLY like to sell socks in South America, be it in
shops, on the metro, at your restaurant table.

The people here are a completely different race from in Argentina; there are mixed figures,
claiming anywhere between 60 and 80% of the country is of indigenous
descent. I couldn't see a white person in sight in Villazon, except
your classic gringos. Their much darker skin was leathered from the
rough sun, their cheeks red from the harsh rays at the high altitude,
their hair jet black no matter what age.

The men were dressed normally. But the women. Wow. The women have
proven to me that fashion to an outsider does not make sense. You know
how men sometimes question why women wear belts around their waist if
not to hold anything up? Or why wear leggings under a dress and not
stockings tokeep your feet warm? You can never really understand a fashion until you are
part of the same one. Looking from the outside in to the fashion of
Bolivian women is the most puzzling experience. If you Google Image
Bolivian women, and you get a picture of a woman dressed in
old-fashioned, thin-soled, open-toed leather shoes with socks on, a
big frilly skirt to just below the knee, an apron over a big shirt,
two long black braids with tons of blue, glittery beads on the end, a
bowler hat that is about six sizes too small and hence sits atop
instead of on their head at an angle, and the quintessential Bolivian
patterned scarf tied around their body with a baby hanging in the
back, then you know what the majority of the women look like here, regardless
of age. I don't understand how 60-year-old women just like 20-year-old
women (who do not look all that different) are all carrying babies.
Where are they all coming from? Do they import babies to fill the
scarves? Is it like stuffing a bra? Alex purchased a scarf yesterday
and was properly laughed at when he put it babyless around his neck.
Why do they wear open-toed shoes if it is cold? And what on earth is
the hat for?

So we walked up to the bus station amidst the shops and coca leaf
vendors to the bus station, which although very dark, seemed pretty
established. We went to the desk for Tupiza, and asked for two tickets
on the first bus out. Our ticket was a hand-written note, one for the
both of us, for seats 35 and 36 at 8 o'clock. (Although you are
crossing North-wards, you change time zones. Duh.) At 8 o'clock, an
absolute circus began as twice as many people as assigned mounted the
bus. We sat next to the other man assigned seat 35 on the bus. As the
bus started to go, and the bus company realized that half of the
people had to get off before they left town, they started to kick
people off with their weapon of mass destruction: a girl that I really
want to hire as a bouncer in a London nightclub for her fierce power
of turning people away, having them dismount a moving bus. Eventually,
she got half the people off. My idol.

As we started our journey, a salesman (or salesboy, should I say,
since he looked about 18 and had a tattoo of Yogi bear on his face)
started his pitch. He began to talk to the people about how they were
consuming their coffee and bread and meat, but never getting any
nutrition. To me, this was an issue that had disturbed me throughout
Argentina, so my ears perked to hear someone preach to these people to
stop chewing coke and drinking coffee, and to start eating some darn
fruit. Wrong. He was preaching annual stomach cleansing. Apparently
that is what is wrong with their diet, that the Bolivians do not use
poisonous laxatives sold illegally through salesmen on buses in paper sachets to
erradicate their digestive system once a year. Clearly.

We passed out on the bus, and when I woke up I was sure that we had
been transferred to an amusement park ride, as the bus was in a tunnel
(note: hole in hill) that was a two-way passage, which very very barely
fit our vehicle alone. I have seen some iffy driving conditions in my day,
but this was topping the list by far. Later that day, people we met
were in a car that flipped on the road (no one was injured), which
blocked traffic. Solution? People got out of their cars and gathered
enough muddy dirt to creat a road next to the crash. Resourceful if
nothing else.

And now we are in Tupiza, at 3,000 metres, a very small town where the
Internet is slow, the people are nice, and the babies are worn. There
is currently a baby next to me that has been gurgling suspiciously (when aren't babies up to something suspicious) for the entire time I have been in this Internet cafe, with no one really
paying attention to it. I am considering kidnapping it and putting it in my scarf.