This might be something that not too many of you are interested in, but I wanted to give a “brief” sum-up of the political situation here in Bolivia for those of you who may be following the news and hearing about recent deaths or planned demonstrations. I am not sure if these explanations are even relevant or interesting to those of you who have not lived in Bolivia and have not experienced the racial and political tension that have shaped this country, but I hope that this will give a bit of insight into Bolivian politics. At the very end there is a bit of speculation about the impact of the US on Bolivia, so maybe that will be a bit more interesting. Enjoy!
January 2009, will be a historic month in Bolivia. While Americans, with the exception of a few Deep Southerners in denial, have been eagerly awaiting this time as one that symbolizes the (hopefully) positive changes that will come to our country in terms of economic management, government programs, war spending, etc., etc., as we welcome our new president to his position, Bolivianos too are waiting for this historic month to arrive, though with an air more of apprehension and anxiety than excitement, and an undeniable fear of what this change may bring.
On January 25, 2009, Bolivians are voting on their new Constitution. President Evo Morales claims this Constitution will bring about a new Bolivia, a change that all Bolivians deserve, and a change in which, in his words in a recent interview, campesinos (the indigenous, rural, and often landless population of Bolivia) will finally know what it is like to be in the upper-class, and white people (“blancos”) will finally know what it is like to be poor.
Ironically enough, in his new Constitution, Evo guaranteed the inalienable protection from discrimination for all people.
As an extranjera (foreigner) that has been living in Bolivia for the last three months, I am far from an expert in Bolivian politics, and lack the advantage of a lifetime of living with Bolivian politicians, the vast majority of whom have the habit of promising things during their campaigns, following through on very few of these promises, and then stealing a large chunk of the citizens’ tax money and running off to the United States. However, despite this disadvantage, I have been talking politics with many people in the last three months, and will try to give you all an idea of the “coyuntura,” the situation, here in Bolivia, and the implications of that the new Constitution and the current political situations have for Bolivian citizens here.
Bolivia is a starkly divided nation, with five natural resource- and agricultural-rich states forming a lovely half-moon on the east side (calling themselves the medialuna), and four poorer states laying to the west of them. The medialuna, for quite some time now, has insisted on autonomy: that the revenues from the currently nationalized natural resources should be placed in the hands of the regions of these resources; AKA, the medialuna is insisting that Bolivia adopt a commercial system similar to that of the United States, instead of losing a large chunk of their money in paying taxes and supporting areas of Bolivia that are not as economically successful (mostly because they, although nearly as resource-rich as the medialuna, are investing their money in economic activities that are not suitable to their climate nor geography).
Despite this stark division, that causes economic and racial tension that often breaks out in the form of road blockades, violence, and sometimes murder, every region of Bolivia shared a common hope in 2005 when Evo Morales was elected to be the next president – a hope that, eerily enough, mirrors the hope that Americans now have for Barack Obama. Evo was the first indigenous president of Bolivia, representing a long-underrepresented and discriminated population of his country. Like Obama, Evo came into power during a politically turbulent time in his nation, and promised political and economic stability, an end to poverty, protection for the rural poor, and equality for all people. Most importantly, Evo promised something that the people of Bolivia had not seen for a very, very long time: Change.
Here’s a shortlist of what Evo’s presidency of change has accomplished in the last three years:
1. Many threats to take unused land under government control (without payment to owners) to give to campesinos, without any capacitation programs for them. This was tried once before with the agricultural reform in 1954, only to find that, without any capacitation program, the campesinos had no knowledge of how to work their new land, and therefore could not farm it. They also were not provided with any information on the local market, so did not know what crops to produce or where to sell them, resulting in absolutely no drop in poverty despite the intention.
2. Payment to campesinos to create roadblocks to stop traffic, and more importantly, transport of goods such as food, between cities, for various reasons, usually involving a fight for land. These roadblocks usually break out in violence and can result in deaths; a year ago, a roadblock between Santa Cruz and Cochabamba resulted in many people going hungry as food trucks could not make it into the city. Other roadblocks, such as one recently created by foreign used auto importers, result in the death of people on both sides of the block.
3. Eradication of the coca eradication program. Although the coca-cocaine issue is an extremely complicated one, and although I personally think that the US and Europe has a responsibility to focus more on cocaine programs in their respective countries instead of destroying coca fields by the masses down here in Bolivia (many of these coca crops are used locally and never used for cocaine; the coca leaf has many natural, medicinal, and cultural purposes here in Bolivia), I still feel that Evo should be working to destroy cocaine laboratories, as they are, beyond destroying the lives of millions of people worldwide through addiction, are also destroying the rainforests of Bolivia from drug-trafficking corridors that could be used for eco-tourism or other sectors of the economy. In addition, many of Evo’s closest supporters, living close to him in huge mansions of La Paz, are involved in cocaine drug rings, and it has become obvious that Evo has other motives in throwing out the U.S. DEA and the coca eradication program than simply that coca is part of Bolivia’s natural and cultural heritage and should be protected as a natural medicine.
This is just a brief list, obviously. Many of Evo’s “cabinet” has also been involved in drug rings, violence, and murder. To say the least, he has lost the confidence and trust of many of the people that originally voted for him; even campesinos are starting to become skeptical. However, he still has wide popularity, and the hope for change still exists among many of the rural poor of this country, who make up a vast majority of the population. And, come January, Bolivia may be in for permanent change. Here are some elements of this new Constitution. I read it earlier this evening, and believe that my translation was correct, though my interpretation may not be, so if you are a Bolivian, please correct me! (Note: I actually included some good things too):
1. According to Evo, a “promise” of autonomy. This is created as an incentive to the medialuna to support the new Constitution. Unfortunately, the Constitution contains no guarantee of autonomy, despite what he says. It creates the possibility of autonomy, with a two-thirds vote of a region, under the rules and regulations of “The Framework Law of Autonomy and Decentralization,” which has not yet been written (the draft will be ready by the end of December or beginning of January). Then, if autonomy does pass, it becomes nearly irrelevant, because later in the Constitution it firmly states that the most important resources of the nation, those of which the medialuna have been fighting for, such as hydrocarbons, will always be property of the federal government.
2. The granting of autonomy to campesino populations, including judgment of crimes according to their own traditions, within limits of the constitution and federal laws.
3. Equal rights to all Bolivians and foreigners living within Bolivia, with special emphasis on afrobolivianos (ex-slaves), campesinos, and especially campesino women.
4. A limit on the maximum amount of land that a single person can own at one time, the amount of which will be determined on January 20 as well, between 5,000 and 10,000 hectares (1 hectare = 2.5 acres I think). Note that many people in the medialuna own much more land than this, and this is Evo’s plan to be able to take over this land to give it to campesinos (without, I must add again, any programs to teach these campesinos how to manage their land or to provide them information on the market and selling their goods). Also, many commercial farms in Bolivia that provide a large amount of the alimentation for this nation would be unable to make any money on such a small plot of land, and would go bankrupt. One of the feared consequences of this change would be a national food shortage.
Tensions are growing between the people here. It began with “Autonomía, carajo!” (carajo is a pretty strong curse word here) t-shirts, and will most likely grow to violent blockadees. Bolivians and foreigners alike are anxiously waiting to see what January brings.
Meanwhile, we are also waiting to see how January will change the relationship between the U.S. and Bolivia. Evo-supporters have happily put up banners spanning the wide downtown streets saying “Bolivia, Venezuela, and Cuba united against the Empire” while Evo and Bush take turns worsening the relationship between the two nations, both kicking out the other countries’ ambassadors, Evo kicking out the DEA, and Bush putting Bolivia on the nation’s blacklist, cutting off all trade and impoverishing 20,000 more Bolivians, and then, completely illogically, pushing Obama to improve trade relations with Colombia, which has a stronger cocaine trade with the U.S. than Bolivia. Bolivians have already heard rumors of Obama working to improve its relationship with Cuba and Venezuela (some of these rumors I think may be wrong, and have something to do with the fact that socialist leaders of South America and democrats in America both have the labels of “leftist” in their respective countries), and are waiting to see if Obama will hope for the same with Bolivia. Evo has already expressed his pleasure at Obama’s election and his willingness to work with him in the future. However, many Americans living in Bolivia are anxiously waiting to see how Obama will react towards Bolivia; they are wondering if Obama will choose Bolivia as the nation to “rule with a hard fist,” to show his force as a new president.
Personally, I am really excited to be part of such a momentous day both here and in America, and am anxious to see what the day will bring for both countries.
Thursday, December 18, 2008
Sunday, December 7, 2008
Only in Bolivia...
Only in Bolivia...
Unfortunately, no matter how much fun it is to have a very forward not-so-gentlemanly monkey attack you with kisses in the middle of the jungle, my joy was a little bit hampered by the conservation conversation (ooo, wouldn´t that be fun to try to say out loud after three months of talking almost all Spanish) I had shortly after. The way this park is managed, monkeys are more than accustomed to human presence (bet you couldn´t have already gathered that from the photos), and the result is that any sickness that a human has poses a major exposure risk to the monkeys of the park, or, possibly, to a whole species of monkeys in the Chapare. We spent a chunk of conversation debating if the benefits of environmental awareness and protection that came out of such close contact with the rainforest outweighed this risk to the animals...we still don´t have a solid answer.
Well, that´s about it about this last month! In other news, I have pierced my ears for the first time ever in my life because of the gorgeous earrings down here (my family and I went on a family piercing trip). I also discovered about a month ago how much of a sense of humor that my host family and I share, which is pretty much down to a tee, and have now found that I prefer to spend my time at home nearly rolling around on the ground laughing and more or less seeing how much we can lovingly insult each other, instead of going out (wild, I know). Also, I´m feeling really lucky to be coming home to visit my family for Christmas, so if you want to get together, shoot me an email or call my home phone (or my Bolivian cell phone, if you really want to burn the bucks)! And thanks to all of you who are donating!! I´ve gotten some really great emails from some of you, and it has been so inspiring!!
That´s about all! I hope all is well and hopefully I´ll be seeing a good chunk of you all (my, what an image) soon!
Cheers,
Sarah
...can you ignore the fact that you have a blog for a few weeks right after asking for donations.
No, really, I'm sorry I've been slacking on this! I'm going to try to give a quick update on my life and the craziness that has been going on in the last month or so!
No, really, I'm sorry I've been slacking on this! I'm going to try to give a quick update on my life and the craziness that has been going on in the last month or so!
So. Only in Bolivia....
...can a first birthday party take 3 months to prepare for and seem as important as an (American) wedding.
I say American wedding because Bolivians put even more effort into their weddings than their children´s first birthdays. One of my cousins was having her first birthday while I was here, so the family bussed it down to Santa Cruz, the tropical paradise (or for me, inferno) 10 hours away from Cochabamba. Although I didn´t get to see a bit of Santa Cruz while I was there, I did get to experience a full-on Bolivian first birthday celebration, which, it turns out, is a really big deal here. My Aunt Carmen, the grandmother of the baby, spent a full month up until 3, 4, or 5 in the morning every night, and she, along with her daughter and the mother of the baby, made everything from porcelain invitations (for 80 people!) to handmade goodie baskets (for 80 people!) to homemade artwork. To give a bit of a taste for what the party looked like:
My cousin, Andrea, and her now one-year-old baby, Yara, in the middle of a mess of dressed up kids. You´ll notice a Snow White in the middle of the bottom row...this little angel refused to play any of the games the entire party because she ¨was waiting for her dwarfs to arrive,¨and when they never did arrive, she promised us that she would call their cells and see what was wrong. No, really.
This is me, getting all cuddly with the entrance decorations. The balloons here and in the other photo above it were the proud work of a morning of turning purple and passing out.
Please tell me why this evil, pink-bellied monster is an appropriate one-year-old birthday decoration?!?!?!
I got stuck in a clown sandwich by the end of the night. I´m putting this up because I FINALLY have a photo of my other sister, Boria, the 24-year-old, for you all, but, unfortunately, she is a clown. This is the only photo I have of her, but don´t worry, it shows her good side (Just kidding, but for the record, she fortunately doesn´t speak English).
The other part of the festivities included the mini-mountain of food that my family prepared: two gigantic cakes, empanadas, traditional Santa Cruz cheese rolls, enough traditional Bolivian candies to make any kids´teeth fall out, a variety of banana breads, dulce de leche tarts, other sweet breads and muffins, and some chocolate chip cookies that I made to sport my good ol´Uncle Sam pride (chocolate chip cookies are so rare here that I was unable to find chocolate chips...the scandal!!!). I blame all this food on the reason why I was unable to hold my own in limbo with the kids...a near-disaster considering the skirt I was wearing and the 80 people present. Boria, the clown sister holding the limbo stick at the time, later told me that, as I fell to the floor, she didn´t know if she should try to grab my hand or my skirt. Though no worries, nothing happened.
After this weekend of preparation and then a party full of food, clowns, musical chairs, and many, many people (but unfortunately for one little girl, no dwarfs), I was exhausted and ready to go home.
My Aunt Carmen later asked me how I liked Santa Cruz that weekend, because I hadn´t yet been there. I responded by telling her I really liked her house.
Needless to say, I didn´t mention to any Bolivian that their one-year-old has no chance of remembering probably the second-biggest party of their life. But it was fun for the rest of us. :)
Only in Bolivia...
...can a first birthday party take 3 months to prepare for and seem as important as an (American) wedding.
I say American wedding because Bolivians put even more effort into their weddings than their children´s first birthdays. One of my cousins was having her first birthday while I was here, so the family bussed it down to Santa Cruz, the tropical paradise (or for me, inferno) 10 hours away from Cochabamba. Although I didn´t get to see a bit of Santa Cruz while I was there, I did get to experience a full-on Bolivian first birthday celebration, which, it turns out, is a really big deal here. My Aunt Carmen, the grandmother of the baby, spent a full month up until 3, 4, or 5 in the morning every night, and she, along with her daughter and the mother of the baby, made everything from porcelain invitations (for 80 people!) to handmade goodie baskets (for 80 people!) to homemade artwork. To give a bit of a taste for what the party looked like:
My cousin, Andrea, and her now one-year-old baby, Yara, in the middle of a mess of dressed up kids. You´ll notice a Snow White in the middle of the bottom row...this little angel refused to play any of the games the entire party because she ¨was waiting for her dwarfs to arrive,¨and when they never did arrive, she promised us that she would call their cells and see what was wrong. No, really.
This is me, getting all cuddly with the entrance decorations. The balloons here and in the other photo above it were the proud work of a morning of turning purple and passing out.
Please tell me why this evil, pink-bellied monster is an appropriate one-year-old birthday decoration?!?!?!
I got stuck in a clown sandwich by the end of the night. I´m putting this up because I FINALLY have a photo of my other sister, Boria, the 24-year-old, for you all, but, unfortunately, she is a clown. This is the only photo I have of her, but don´t worry, it shows her good side (Just kidding, but for the record, she fortunately doesn´t speak English).The other part of the festivities included the mini-mountain of food that my family prepared: two gigantic cakes, empanadas, traditional Santa Cruz cheese rolls, enough traditional Bolivian candies to make any kids´teeth fall out, a variety of banana breads, dulce de leche tarts, other sweet breads and muffins, and some chocolate chip cookies that I made to sport my good ol´Uncle Sam pride (chocolate chip cookies are so rare here that I was unable to find chocolate chips...the scandal!!!). I blame all this food on the reason why I was unable to hold my own in limbo with the kids...a near-disaster considering the skirt I was wearing and the 80 people present. Boria, the clown sister holding the limbo stick at the time, later told me that, as I fell to the floor, she didn´t know if she should try to grab my hand or my skirt. Though no worries, nothing happened.
After this weekend of preparation and then a party full of food, clowns, musical chairs, and many, many people (but unfortunately for one little girl, no dwarfs), I was exhausted and ready to go home.
My Aunt Carmen later asked me how I liked Santa Cruz that weekend, because I hadn´t yet been there. I responded by telling her I really liked her house.
Needless to say, I didn´t mention to any Bolivian that their one-year-old has no chance of remembering probably the second-biggest party of their life. But it was fun for the rest of us. :)
Only in Bolivia...
...can you be monkey-loved in the middle of a tropical forest.
One weekend, after going to Santa Cruz with my family, I went with the FSD interns and a couple of friends to the Chapare, a tropical rainforest about 4 hours away from high-altitude, desert-y Cochabamba. This place was so beautiful!! One of my friends we went with happened to be an excellent Bolivian frog-ologist (forgot the name in English) that had done pretty extensive research in the area, and the result was that we had connections all over the place. We got to go on a night hike to see a tarantula devouring a cockroach, got to explore bat caves and get within a couple feet of fruit and VAMPIRE bats, got to explore caves with countrywide-famous birds called Guarachos, which, to me, no matter the fact that this is the only place in the world you can see them, are still really ugly; and to camp in National Parks and in university research areas, where we snuggled uncomfortably into our hot and humid tents after being told that, if we slept outside in the fresher air, a bug that enjoyed to crawl up noses and infest brains would happily do just that. Here´s one photo from one of the hikes, plus the vampire bats:
We also "had the privelege" of getting up at 4:45 AM to hike to an area to see wild parrots. Unfortunately due to our lethargy at such an unpleasant hour, our inability to get a taxi willing to drive us to a small village where they were unlikely to be able to find people to drive back, and the donkey-worthy stubbornness of my fellow intern, Evan, to find a river crossing where his delicate feet would not get wet (just kidding, amigo :) ), we didn't get to see too many parrots.
To cross the river without getting wet, Evan spent a good amount of time bushwhacking through the rainforest for 30 yards or so, an impressive feet if you saw how thick this vegetation was (for conservationists out their yelling out in indignation, rainforest vegetation grows back to exactly how it was 10 years later...ooo, impressive!), and was now at a loss as to how too continue (the vegetation was too thick now) and had decided to start hanging from several vines above the river to see if this helped him magically cross the water (I think that is what he was waiting for...there isn't really any other explanation for what he was doing).
Before he did this, however, he had to get rid of the pineapple that we had brought along on the hike and sportingly carried for a few hours, and he felt the only way to do this would be to chuck it across the river to his friends waiting with open arms, no matter how impatient we were getting with his silly shenanigans. He spent a few good minutes wrestling with the foilage, trying to get a good angle on the throw, and chucked it...right into the river. I panicked to see my favorite fruit swept away from us by rushing water, and on the instinct that any pineapple-obsessed person possesses, jumped into the river and rescued it. As I got back out, Evan was still hanging from his vines wondering what he was going to do next, and we heard a macaw call, and looked up, and saw the last of the parrots, a beautiful green and yellow blur of eagle-sized birds, fly above our heads. Evan, to state the obvious, did not get to see them )and a few seconds later, was wet up to his knees as he conceded defeat and jumped into the river to cross it). All in all, we probably only saw 20 parrots or so, and only 2 species of an amazing amount of species that live there. However, at least we got to eat pineapple. ;)
THEN, we went off to what could well be my favorite place in the world, which had LIVE, UNCAGED MONKEYS!! (I don´t know why I had to stress that they were alive just now, but it is a perk.) The place is called Parque Nacional Machia, and for a few hours we hiked around the place while monkeys wrestled at our feet, jumped on our heads, and tried to sneak things out of our pockets. THEN, because we had been walking for several hours in a tropical rain forest and had sweated a pretty amount, one monkey JUMPED on me and began to lick my neck for a solid minute! I feel that a play-by-play in pictures speak louder than words:
To cross the river without getting wet, Evan spent a good amount of time bushwhacking through the rainforest for 30 yards or so, an impressive feet if you saw how thick this vegetation was (for conservationists out their yelling out in indignation, rainforest vegetation grows back to exactly how it was 10 years later...ooo, impressive!), and was now at a loss as to how too continue (the vegetation was too thick now) and had decided to start hanging from several vines above the river to see if this helped him magically cross the water (I think that is what he was waiting for...there isn't really any other explanation for what he was doing).
Before he did this, however, he had to get rid of the pineapple that we had brought along on the hike and sportingly carried for a few hours, and he felt the only way to do this would be to chuck it across the river to his friends waiting with open arms, no matter how impatient we were getting with his silly shenanigans. He spent a few good minutes wrestling with the foilage, trying to get a good angle on the throw, and chucked it...right into the river. I panicked to see my favorite fruit swept away from us by rushing water, and on the instinct that any pineapple-obsessed person possesses, jumped into the river and rescued it. As I got back out, Evan was still hanging from his vines wondering what he was going to do next, and we heard a macaw call, and looked up, and saw the last of the parrots, a beautiful green and yellow blur of eagle-sized birds, fly above our heads. Evan, to state the obvious, did not get to see them )and a few seconds later, was wet up to his knees as he conceded defeat and jumped into the river to cross it). All in all, we probably only saw 20 parrots or so, and only 2 species of an amazing amount of species that live there. However, at least we got to eat pineapple. ;)
THEN, we went off to what could well be my favorite place in the world, which had LIVE, UNCAGED MONKEYS!! (I don´t know why I had to stress that they were alive just now, but it is a perk.) The place is called Parque Nacional Machia, and for a few hours we hiked around the place while monkeys wrestled at our feet, jumped on our heads, and tried to sneak things out of our pockets. THEN, because we had been walking for several hours in a tropical rain forest and had sweated a pretty amount, one monkey JUMPED on me and began to lick my neck for a solid minute! I feel that a play-by-play in pictures speak louder than words:
Unfortunately, no matter how much fun it is to have a very forward not-so-gentlemanly monkey attack you with kisses in the middle of the jungle, my joy was a little bit hampered by the conservation conversation (ooo, wouldn´t that be fun to try to say out loud after three months of talking almost all Spanish) I had shortly after. The way this park is managed, monkeys are more than accustomed to human presence (bet you couldn´t have already gathered that from the photos), and the result is that any sickness that a human has poses a major exposure risk to the monkeys of the park, or, possibly, to a whole species of monkeys in the Chapare. We spent a chunk of conversation debating if the benefits of environmental awareness and protection that came out of such close contact with the rainforest outweighed this risk to the animals...we still don´t have a solid answer.
Well, that´s about it about this last month! In other news, I have pierced my ears for the first time ever in my life because of the gorgeous earrings down here (my family and I went on a family piercing trip). I also discovered about a month ago how much of a sense of humor that my host family and I share, which is pretty much down to a tee, and have now found that I prefer to spend my time at home nearly rolling around on the ground laughing and more or less seeing how much we can lovingly insult each other, instead of going out (wild, I know). Also, I´m feeling really lucky to be coming home to visit my family for Christmas, so if you want to get together, shoot me an email or call my home phone (or my Bolivian cell phone, if you really want to burn the bucks)! And thanks to all of you who are donating!! I´ve gotten some really great emails from some of you, and it has been so inspiring!!
That´s about all! I hope all is well and hopefully I´ll be seeing a good chunk of you all (my, what an image) soon!
Cheers,
Sarah
Thursday, November 27, 2008
Donate, Take Two!!
Hi everyone! So it seems that this Donate button doesn't work for some of you, or all of you, so I'm going to go ahead and post this link as well to the PayPal page: https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=967028
That should work!! If it doesn't, please let me know!
Also, if you have any questions about this project or anything else, my email is Sarah.Machacek@asu.edu. Thanks!!
Peace,
Sarah
That should work!! If it doesn't, please let me know!
Also, if you have any questions about this project or anything else, my email is Sarah.Machacek@asu.edu. Thanks!!
Peace,
Sarah
Wednesday, November 19, 2008
DONATE DONATE DONATE!!!
Hi all!
OK, so the time has come for me to grovel at your feet and kiss the hems of your jeans...in other words, my non-profit here in Bolivia, Fundacion Gaia Pacha, could really use some of your cash, and there is a PayPal donate button at the bottom of this blog post that eagerly awaits your enthusiastic clicking.
OK, so the time has come for me to grovel at your feet and kiss the hems of your jeans...in other words, my non-profit here in Bolivia, Fundacion Gaia Pacha, could really use some of your cash, and there is a PayPal donate button at the bottom of this blog post that eagerly awaits your enthusiastic clicking.
Friday, November 14, 2008
We made up.
OK, quick and happy update about the organization change from yesterday...I talked with my supervisors today, and they have had an amazing project in the back of their heads for quite some time now that involves working with blind children in environmental themes. There is a center here that works on capacitating (ok, it's not a word in English, but it is in Spanish and you get the idea) blind adults and children to read, write, cook, etc. etc., and they have been hoping for a kids environmental education program for a bit. So this is what I will be developing and doing for the next several months, in addition to working on the other education program with the Ecoteca that we have already been developing :)
Basically, I feel extremely lucky to be working with Gaia Pacha and my coworkers, and am super excited. No, seriously, I had to control myself from screaming those really giddy happy screams in the street this morning. It was so good. I love Bolivia.
OK, that is all! I still hope all is well :)
Ciao,
Sarah
Basically, I feel extremely lucky to be working with Gaia Pacha and my coworkers, and am super excited. No, seriously, I had to control myself from screaming those really giddy happy screams in the street this morning. It was so good. I love Bolivia.
OK, that is all! I still hope all is well :)
Ciao,
Sarah
Thursday, November 13, 2008
The Titi part of Lake Titicaca, woohoo!!!
Holas todos!!!
I hope all is well with you all! These last two weeks have been really crazy for me, mostly emotionally, so I will try to relate to you all that has happened.
First of all, I am starting to feel that Cochabamba is my home. Not to be super corny, but I know that I am feeling comfortable in a new place when I go out for a run and everything seems familiar and happy. I definitely miss everyone at home still, family and friends in Idaho and friends in Arizona, and I miss a lot of things I am so familiar with, like backpacking and climbing trips in Arizona and yummy mochas and cooking my own food and playing with my sister's dog, but let's be honest, I wouldn't be able to do all that at once anyways even if I were in the States, so it is A-OK. I just feel like I have made good friends here , both Bolivian and Gringan, and am liking what I am doing, so I am feeling super lucky right now.
Alright, blah blah blah Sarah, enough already.
So I just got back from Lake Titicaca with the organization that I came here with, Foundation for Sustainable Development (FSD), and it was so beautiful and so much fun!!! We started the trip off in Copacabana, where that lovely Barry Manilow song got stuck in my head, even though this Gringo-tourist hotspot is a bit different from the nightclub in Cuba. For some reason, Gringo hippies lined the streets, with dreadlocks and baggy colorful pants, so it was our group of gringos plus a bunch of these young hooligans, as my mom would lovingly describe them :)
This was our mediocre view from Copacabana:
Highlights from the trip include spending a whole day sitting around, chatting and eating. Maybe not the typical tourist activity (ok, well the eating maybe), but seriously, spending a day eating trout that has not been in a warm truck for hours on end, like you would find in Cochabamba, was wonderful, and my fellow FSD-ers . And they have trout of all kinds...grilled ("trout a la iron," as a direct translation...yummy, no?), with garlic, stuffed with ham, fried in butter...I could go on for this for so long, it was so yummy. Probably doesn't sound like much in the US, but in the fish-starved heart of Bolivia where I am currently living, fresh trout that is a cousin of the fresh salmon in America was nothing short of heaven. Mix that with having Argentinian mate (a tea) that I have been missing for the past few months, eating pasankalla (a delicious type of popcorn here that the cover with yummy sweet crunchiness that all Bolivians eat like Americans eat potato chips...go figure that obesity is a bit more prevalent in our good ol' home country), and chatting among good company, it was a really good time.
The second day we spent some time being a bit more touristy, going to the Isla del Sol, which is a sacred Incan island and an extremely interesting place. Here is my favorite photo from the boat ride:
I feel lucky to say that , thanks to this trip to the Isla del Sol, I have now seen the OFFICIAL birthplace of the sun and moon, not to mention civilization, as well as the footprints of the sun itself (which I have dirtied with my own footprints, seen below).
This was such a gorgeous place (made more beautiful by the fresh trout we ate...have I mentioned that yet???)...here is one more photo of the view from the Isla, complete with six extremely good looking people (sorry, I drank my first cup of coffee in a week or so shortly before writing this blog...bad idea):
We spent the next day racing an international bike race to La Paz, where we spent time in the Plaza Principal where President Evo Morales was somewhere nearby (I tried to convince my fellow gringos to hold up "We heart you, Evo!" signs, in hopes of seeing him) and in the Mercado de Brujas, the local witch's market, which looked like this (why yes Virginia, llama fetuses sold as sacrificial offerings for $4.50 a pop do exist):
I end my Lake Titicaca sum-up with a photo of Jeremy, one of my fellow interns, simply because I promised to post this success photo on facebook (he has been trying to find a campesino technicolor hat like this since he's gotten here, and finally managed to), but facebook doesn't let me laptop update photos. So.....enjoy?
The other big news from these last few days is that I am thinking about changing host organizations but really don't want to, so it has kind of been a bit of an emotional roller coaster for me. My current organization has me doing exactly what I would like to be doing for the rest of my life, and is extremely fun for me. Unfortunately, it is so chock-full of projects that my supervisors really only have time to work on mine, the kids education program, during the mornings, and the result is that I'm half-bored in the afternoons (though I have to admit, enough time to work, run, travel, and spend time with friends and family has not been the hardest thing to adjust to). Talking to FSD about this, they felt that the best situation would be to change organizations (the one they had in mind is called the Insitute for Human Development, whose main focus is AIDS, sexual identity, and....the environment??? Not quite sure how my specialty fits in, but I guess it does somewhere). Unfortunately, I am far too attached to my host organization, its mission, and my coworkers, for this to be a happy thing, and today I had to let my supervisors know what was going on so that we could "discuss our options" (sounds dire, no?).
No matter how sad I am about this, I have to laugh a bit (OK, and nearly cry a bit) about how much this possibility of organization change has resulted in me feeling like I broke up with my NGO and my supervisors. I have become really attached to my organization, through the hot and heavy dates to the farm and through our shared love for the environment, spending time with kids, and long walks on the beach. We even spent this really good night out last night as a goodbye party to a few American volunteers, where my supervisors and I really connected, having a fun time discussing environmental issues in Bolivia, and then the morning after (my NGO and I modestly went back to our own beds in our own houses last night) we spent a really fun morning chatting more and doing crosswords in Spanish (ok, they did the crosswords, I watched and repeatedly said, "Que significa esto?" aka, "What the heck does that mean?" while pointing at every clue). And then, perfect timing, I had to drop the bomb, telling them that FSD was thinking about letting me see other NGOs. Such a fun relationship turned sour extremely fast. What followed was a really ugly session of yelling, getting ceramic dishes thrown at my head, and watching photos of me and my NGO being ripped in half. No really, it's me, not you!!
OK, seriously though, I was really sad about telling my supervisors, who have turned into good friends, about this possibility, and am trying very hard to find a way to stay with them. The result is that I am hopefully going to take on my own environmental project through them in the afternoons, such as establishing a similar environmental education program in the Zona Sur, the poorest part of Cochabamba and one where water issues (aka, not having any, or at least not having any that does not have human waste in it), or working with one of the American-based schools here (which happen to have a lot of money, hopefully, that they are willing to throw at NGOs) to establish their own environmental program.
Anyways, that's my last two weeks, the good and the bad!! Hope all is well with you all!!
Cheers,
Sarah
I hope all is well with you all! These last two weeks have been really crazy for me, mostly emotionally, so I will try to relate to you all that has happened.
First of all, I am starting to feel that Cochabamba is my home. Not to be super corny, but I know that I am feeling comfortable in a new place when I go out for a run and everything seems familiar and happy. I definitely miss everyone at home still, family and friends in Idaho and friends in Arizona, and I miss a lot of things I am so familiar with, like backpacking and climbing trips in Arizona and yummy mochas and cooking my own food and playing with my sister's dog, but let's be honest, I wouldn't be able to do all that at once anyways even if I were in the States, so it is A-OK. I just feel like I have made good friends here , both Bolivian and Gringan, and am liking what I am doing, so I am feeling super lucky right now.
Alright, blah blah blah Sarah, enough already.
So I just got back from Lake Titicaca with the organization that I came here with, Foundation for Sustainable Development (FSD), and it was so beautiful and so much fun!!! We started the trip off in Copacabana, where that lovely Barry Manilow song got stuck in my head, even though this Gringo-tourist hotspot is a bit different from the nightclub in Cuba. For some reason, Gringo hippies lined the streets, with dreadlocks and baggy colorful pants, so it was our group of gringos plus a bunch of these young hooligans, as my mom would lovingly describe them :)
This was our mediocre view from Copacabana:
Highlights from the trip include spending a whole day sitting around, chatting and eating. Maybe not the typical tourist activity (ok, well the eating maybe), but seriously, spending a day eating trout that has not been in a warm truck for hours on end, like you would find in Cochabamba, was wonderful, and my fellow FSD-ers . And they have trout of all kinds...grilled ("trout a la iron," as a direct translation...yummy, no?), with garlic, stuffed with ham, fried in butter...I could go on for this for so long, it was so yummy. Probably doesn't sound like much in the US, but in the fish-starved heart of Bolivia where I am currently living, fresh trout that is a cousin of the fresh salmon in America was nothing short of heaven. Mix that with having Argentinian mate (a tea) that I have been missing for the past few months, eating pasankalla (a delicious type of popcorn here that the cover with yummy sweet crunchiness that all Bolivians eat like Americans eat potato chips...go figure that obesity is a bit more prevalent in our good ol' home country), and chatting among good company, it was a really good time.
The second day we spent some time being a bit more touristy, going to the Isla del Sol, which is a sacred Incan island and an extremely interesting place. Here is my favorite photo from the boat ride:
I feel lucky to say that , thanks to this trip to the Isla del Sol, I have now seen the OFFICIAL birthplace of the sun and moon, not to mention civilization, as well as the footprints of the sun itself (which I have dirtied with my own footprints, seen below).
This was such a gorgeous place (made more beautiful by the fresh trout we ate...have I mentioned that yet???)...here is one more photo of the view from the Isla, complete with six extremely good looking people (sorry, I drank my first cup of coffee in a week or so shortly before writing this blog...bad idea):
We spent the next day racing an international bike race to La Paz, where we spent time in the Plaza Principal where President Evo Morales was somewhere nearby (I tried to convince my fellow gringos to hold up "We heart you, Evo!" signs, in hopes of seeing him) and in the Mercado de Brujas, the local witch's market, which looked like this (why yes Virginia, llama fetuses sold as sacrificial offerings for $4.50 a pop do exist):
I end my Lake Titicaca sum-up with a photo of Jeremy, one of my fellow interns, simply because I promised to post this success photo on facebook (he has been trying to find a campesino technicolor hat like this since he's gotten here, and finally managed to), but facebook doesn't let me laptop update photos. So.....enjoy?
The other big news from these last few days is that I am thinking about changing host organizations but really don't want to, so it has kind of been a bit of an emotional roller coaster for me. My current organization has me doing exactly what I would like to be doing for the rest of my life, and is extremely fun for me. Unfortunately, it is so chock-full of projects that my supervisors really only have time to work on mine, the kids education program, during the mornings, and the result is that I'm half-bored in the afternoons (though I have to admit, enough time to work, run, travel, and spend time with friends and family has not been the hardest thing to adjust to). Talking to FSD about this, they felt that the best situation would be to change organizations (the one they had in mind is called the Insitute for Human Development, whose main focus is AIDS, sexual identity, and....the environment??? Not quite sure how my specialty fits in, but I guess it does somewhere). Unfortunately, I am far too attached to my host organization, its mission, and my coworkers, for this to be a happy thing, and today I had to let my supervisors know what was going on so that we could "discuss our options" (sounds dire, no?).
No matter how sad I am about this, I have to laugh a bit (OK, and nearly cry a bit) about how much this possibility of organization change has resulted in me feeling like I broke up with my NGO and my supervisors. I have become really attached to my organization, through the hot and heavy dates to the farm and through our shared love for the environment, spending time with kids, and long walks on the beach. We even spent this really good night out last night as a goodbye party to a few American volunteers, where my supervisors and I really connected, having a fun time discussing environmental issues in Bolivia, and then the morning after (my NGO and I modestly went back to our own beds in our own houses last night) we spent a really fun morning chatting more and doing crosswords in Spanish (ok, they did the crosswords, I watched and repeatedly said, "Que significa esto?" aka, "What the heck does that mean?" while pointing at every clue). And then, perfect timing, I had to drop the bomb, telling them that FSD was thinking about letting me see other NGOs. Such a fun relationship turned sour extremely fast. What followed was a really ugly session of yelling, getting ceramic dishes thrown at my head, and watching photos of me and my NGO being ripped in half. No really, it's me, not you!!
OK, seriously though, I was really sad about telling my supervisors, who have turned into good friends, about this possibility, and am trying very hard to find a way to stay with them. The result is that I am hopefully going to take on my own environmental project through them in the afternoons, such as establishing a similar environmental education program in the Zona Sur, the poorest part of Cochabamba and one where water issues (aka, not having any, or at least not having any that does not have human waste in it), or working with one of the American-based schools here (which happen to have a lot of money, hopefully, that they are willing to throw at NGOs) to establish their own environmental program.
Anyways, that's my last two weeks, the good and the bad!! Hope all is well with you all!!
Cheers,
Sarah
Friday, October 31, 2008
Holas todos!!!!
Well, I am getting close to my two-month anniversary of being out of the country and doing as well as ever!!
The last few weeks have been a bit of a hectic whirlwind as we found out that our modest little farm would be host to almost 650 kids in a week-and-a-half’s time, which oh-so-conveniently coincides perfectly with the time that my supervisors had to leave to perform some research in another part of the country. The result is that the happiness and education of these 650 kids lay in the hands of three gringos with bad Spanish, two Spanish speakers who have never worked with kids before, one Spanish speaker who can only make it to half of the tours with these kids, and one German who doesn’t speak Spanish, kind of speaks English, and arrived a week ago. This was our armada against 650 children.
But, so far, everything has turned out really well. True, we did have a few setbacks - the German girl and I tried to boil eggs today with a special new Bolivian/German technique I had never heard of, and several of them ended up exploding in the pot, and we also found out at the last minute that the “niños” that we were expecting looked like this:
AKA, they were much older than we thought, between the ages of 13 and 18, and all of our games were geared towards 7-11-year-olds. However, it turns out that these kids really liked to race each other to recycle trash and act out climate change as well, and reacted with the same amount of girly screams (both the boys and the girls) when they found out that the soil that they were touching was actually fully composted cow poo, so it turned out to be really fun. Field trips are much more laid back here than in the U.S….for example, it was the norm to have several people talking at the same time as the tour guide, and it was not unusual for some kids to separate from the group and, instead of participating, do this:
The teacher, the entire time, took an active role in the activities and in controlling the group:
She spent the entire time sitting or chatting with her students, or walking away from the group to find some shade. Here is one more photo of the games on the first day:
To say the least, we were really relieved that the first day went so well, and felt super lucky that the second day went just as smoothly, only with a little more respect from the young’uns towards us, their “profes” for the day.
Unfortunately, the third day, our niños were four years old, which, once again, was a little off the radar screen of what age we were expecting, only in the opposite direction. The result was several devastating activities for the kids, including one in which we tried to teach these four-year-olds what greenhouse gases and climate change are. God forbid that that ever has to happen ever again, anywhere in the world.
But I feel like I am making this sound like a bit more of a disaster than it really has been. Really, everything so far has been really wonderful and really rewarding. The kids have taken to giving us little kisses on the cheek as they leave, thanking us profoundly, and saying really cute things, like “Que bonito tus juegos!!” or, literal translation, “What beautiful games!” that have just really made us happy, and it has been really fun to teach the games that my co-volunteers or I have designed and to have them get really into it (and more so, to be able to make them laugh while speaking in another language for other reasons than you saying something super inappropriate and not realizing it). So, in more or less words, I am going to be really sad when the final two groups of kids come tomorrow.
Well, that’s about it for work. In other news, I climbed my first Bolivian peak this weekend, beautiful snow-capped Tunari, one photo of which I have posted below (and only one...sorry, blogger.com is being silly and annoying again). I would say that this 5030 m peak was quite the difficult climb and a huge accomplishment, but the fact that a 68-year-old man was racing the rest of the group to the top tells a different story.
Also, I’ve officially signed the contract to stay here until April 30th, and some next steps include convincing my sister to fly down here afterwards for a bit of Bolivian climbing, and convincing my parents to ship mp3 CD-versions of the contents of my external harddrive, as I don’t think that my meager iTunes library of Billy Joel and Styx and old Science Friday podcasts will really cut it for me over the next six months, no matter how much of a stud Ira Flatow is.
Let me know how things are going in your world, wherever you are!! Peace to all and take care!!
Wednesday, October 8, 2008
Our town
Okay, last blog for at least a day or so (or given my track record, three weeks), I promise.
I took my camera out last Sunday for a little stroll through two of the main plazas, because Sunday is a day here where everyone relaxes outside together and does fun stuff like break dancing and live concerts that obnoxious tourists really like to photograph. So here are my photos of the day, so that you can all get to know my city a little better.
Also, I have a few videos I will try to post soon, a couple of some crazy break dancer guys in the plaza, and another one of a very high quality praise-Jesus band, so those will be on here for your viewing pleasure as soon as I can fit them all onto my tiny little flash drive.
The first photo is the statue right next to my stadium (the stadium has everything by the way, from a futbol field and a track to karate classes, weight machines, and a "climbing gym," aka a couple of rocks cemented onto the stadium wall, whose routes are extremely slippery and difficult thanks to a local cell phone company deciding to paint a large advertisement over the area, but they are really fun routes nonetheless; I am lucky enough to have all of this half a block away from my house!). I am still trying to figure out why this Grecian Olympian is deified in my city; as far as I know, our humble stadium has never played host to any Olympics, yet alone to one that involved nearly-nude young males that are unnaturally covered in muscles.
The second photo is a lovely view from the bridge closest to my home that leads to the downtown area…the gigantic Jesus Christ statue, known as El Cristo here, is the tallest in the world, beating Rio de Janiero’s Jesus by one meter…I wonder who built theirs last? Even better than an over-sized homage to the Catholic religion, this lovely billboard greets me every time I want to go downtown.
The third is a view of The Prado, one of the main streets that lead downtown. Pretty, no? Cochabambinos really know how to care about their city (I left out the pictures of all the trash strewn in the garden nearby, but I will show those tragic photos when I ask for donations from you, no worries J).
I had another really pretty photo of one of the many churches of Cochabamba, but I really wanted to show a bit of the plaza life instead (Blogspot limits me to five photos a post, which explains the outrageous number of blog posts today), so the next two photos are pretty typical of the main plazas around Cochabamba. The first one is a live demo of some spray painting artwork going on…this guy had a crowd of around 30 people watching him, and was raffling off the paintings at the end of it. Another 30 people or so had gathered around the "artwork" in my last photo…political dialogue is extremely popular here, and it is not uncommon to see several pieces like this, usually complemented by billboards of information and a large crowd of debaters. One of the many reasons why I love this city so much! Everyone really cares about what is going on in their country and enjoys discussing their views with people who disagree.
Picture all this going on, with the live music of a homeless man playing quena (a wooden flute) or of some Cholas playing guitar and quena and dancing (and later, that lovely Jesus band), along with a couple young groups of chicos break dancing on the lawn, many families relaxing on the benches, and young kids driving around the plaza in mini electric toy cars - one of the local attractions here and the cause for the sound of laughter coming from the plaza for hours - and you have Cochabamba. I know a lot of you have heard about the violence and the anger here, so this is my side of the town.
Peace my cariños and cariñas! I hope all is well!
Gaia Pacha, my work
Well hello again! I thought that I would make up for my lack of blogs with a barrage of them, so that everyone has a play-by-play of what I have been up to.
I wanted to describe a bit about what I have been doing here as a volunteer in Cochabamba, so that you all don’t think that I am just wandering around koala-less eucalyptus forests (which should never exist, in my opinion…there should have been koalas crawling around like crazy at Pairumani) and climbing aboard the sketchy Dentist-on-a-Bus (which I have seen roaming the city twice more now, looking for innocent, unsuspecting patients).
I work for a foundation called Gaia Pacha (www.gaiapacha.org – as I write this blog, I do not have Internet on my computer, and cannot remember if it is in Spanish or English, so I apologize to all you English-only speakers if it isn’t all that informative) whose focus is on environmental education and community awareness. Gaia Pacha was funded three or so years ago by a group of university students, all in their mid-20s and 30s. One of their projects consists of traveling around all of Bolivia to interview farmers about the impacts of climate change on their crops, which they will turn into both a documentary and a book (right now, only hard data exists about climate change in Bolivia, and Gaia Pachans are hoping to create a socio-economic view of it as well). Another is to travel to a large quinoa cultivation area in Potosí, one of the cities here, and do scientific research on the differences between organic and conventional farming there, to see if one is better than the other, and then to create educational materials based on the research.
A third project of theirs is one that I am helping to develop, and consists of turning a little farm in Cochabamba into an educational facility for elementary-school-aged children here, and hopefully eventually for people of all ages. A couple of Gaia Pachans and volunteers here have already helped to turn this eco-farm, called CPIA, or Center for Environmental Protection (today my supervisor also called it EcoTeca, which honestly I have no idea what he was talking about or why it is called that, but I think that might be the official name now), into the beginnings of an environmental education center. We were lucky enough to have this space donated to us by a refuge center here, called Aldeas Infantilies SOS, and it already consists of an eco-friendly building made of local mud, straw, and plastic bags and designed to capture the most heat possible, several compost heaps, composting dry toilets with a mechanism (aka extra bucket inside the toilet) to capture the liquid waste to water plants on the farm, a water tank to capture shower and kitchen water that also waters these plants, a biodigestor that turns cow waste into methane gas that serves as all the cooking fuel needed for the farm, and more compost (that eventually grows the alfalfa that feeds the cows again – one big cycle, ooo! Please geek out with me on this). We also have a food dehydrator, a local traditional medicine and herb garden, several greenhouses, a guinea pig farm (don’t ask), and now, to our happiness, a room for the kids to learn all about what it means to be environmentally-friendly.
I put a few pictures up of my "office" so you all can know what a difficult life I live here. The first photo is an over-all view and includes our little EcoTeca (whatever that means) house, and the next few photos are what we have developed on the inside so far for the young’uns. For those of you who want to see what this amazing biodigestor looks like (aka Cara and all other cool people), I also put up photos of that. I will be posting another blog soon on all of this, with a little more detail of the educational material we are developing because, to be perfectly honest, we need a lot of money to make this little farm educationally successful, and, more importantly, a sustainable project that will be able to last for years to come (or at least until global warming destroys our planet). So keep your eyes out for a new, shameless, Gaia-Pacha-promoting blog that comes complete with a handy little donation button, and you will know what to do. J
For any of you who know anything about me have probably already guessed that I am crazy about this place. I feel so lucky to be involved with the only farm like this in Cochabamba, and so lucky to be involved with turning it into an educational center for kids! It is like the two things that I am crazy about in life, Camp Sparky and sustainability, have collided into one big happy ball o’ fun in Cochabamba. Plus, the people I work with are silly and great. So this is what I will be doing for the next several months.
On that note, I hope you are all doing well and enjoying yourselves wherever you are! Take care!
What?! Sarah actually posts new stuff after awhile?!
Hi friends and family!
OK, so I’ll be the first to admit that I suck at updating my blog. That said, I am going to try to give a quick update through photos of what my city and life has been like for the last three weeks in Bolivia, because I have finally become the brave gringa and have taken my camera out of the safety of my room. By the way, my FSD supervisors have another phrase for "brave gringa," and although it is in Spanish, it translates to something along the lines of "silly gringa that adopts a false sense of security and ends up getting robbed." They say that this usually happens around three weeks into the program. Whoops.
Annnnyways, my life here. I will start with my family, who I have already described – I finally have a photo of them, which is the topmost one here. This is me, my mama here, Ginez, my aunt, Charo, and my little sister (Ginez’s daughter), Fabiola. We are missing Boria, the 24-year-old niece, in this photo – she had a little too much fun the night before this photo and decided to stay home.
This photo is in Pairumani, one of the rich tin baron’s estates, and the next two photos are also from this area. Basically, earlier in Bolivia’s history there were three barons that took over all of the tin mining resources of Bolivia, resulting in extreme poverty for miners and extreme wealth for these three barons, their families, and whatever country they decided to send their money to (England, Argentina, and Spain I believe? I can tell you that whatever they were, Bolivia was not one of them). This is the ugly part of Bolivian history – all of its resources have been sold away (and some of its land – one Bolivian president sold a large chunk of Bolivian’s land that was rich in natural resources for a beautiful, beautiful white stallion, which was well worth it, I’m sure) and have resulted in the majority of Bolivians suffering economically. The beautiful part of it is that this tin baron’s estate is now Pairumani, a lovely ecological park full of eucalyptus trees (unfortunately, the koalas are down in Santa Cruz and in Peru, not here in Cochabamba) and a canyon. In the photo of the canyon, you can see the wonderful Cochabamba in the background.
The gigantic metal man is one of the many pieces of artwork throughout Cochabamba. Despite being such a poor country, I have to say that Cochabambinos have really taken good care of their city (minus many of the flaws in their understanding of environmentalism, which will be in a blog to come). We were lucky enough to have a Prefect (aka Governor of one of Bolivia’s states, called Departments here) here for several years, named Manfred Reyes Villa, who decided that public works projects should be of top priority instead of causing national governmental upsets. The result was an astonishing amount of beautiful parks, a bicycle path that runs through the entire city similar to Boise’s greenbelt (and Arizona’s…oh, no, we don’t have one of those), a soccer field for nearly every corner, and public artwork all over the place. This is just one example – there were pieces that I liked much better, but my photography skills aren’t that great on this bumpy public bus ride, and this was the best I could come up with. (I might add, unfortunately, that this same mayor, Manfred, suddenly turned on his Department and decided to vote for Cochabamba Department’s autonomy after 63% of Cochabambinos voted against it, resulting in an extremely violent riot, the burning of the Prefecture’s door, two people dead, over a hundred injured, and, needless to say, the end of Manfred’s term shortly thereafter. This all occurred in January of 2007 and was very disastrous for Cochabamba and its people. As for Manfred - whoops, I guess causing national governmental upsets WAS on the agenda.)
Finally, I end my blog with a photo of one of the many legitimate businesses here, a Dentist-on-a-Bus, complete with pictures in every window of what your teeth may be feeling like at this moment. Enjoy.
Ciao and I hope all is well!
Monday, September 22, 2008
Alrighty, so I wrote this blog six days ago, so I really have been here much longer than two days.
Hola amigos y familia!!
I finally made it to Cochabamba two days ago!! After resting up a lot, I found out that my program, due to a lot of cancelled flights because of all of this political unrest, will not be starting for at least another week, so I have plenty of time to relax, explore, and do whatever I please. It’s a little strange to be in a new place and not really be doing anything or knowing anyone, but I’m super excited to be here and seeing new things and only speaking Spanish wherever I go. I am also hoping to find a climbing gym soon, if on exists, so I can hang out with climbing buddies again – Chile and Anne Marie spoiled me so much with the abundant amount of rocks everywhere, and I can’t wait to get climbing again.
My family is really nice – I live with a mother, Ginez, her sister, Charo (which is short for Rosario), Ginez’s 17-year-old daughter, Fabiola, and Ginez and Charo’s niece, and Fabiola’s cousin, Boria. This took me several tries and mistakes to figure out, as Ginez and Charo’s sister, Carmen, the mother of Boria, as well as her daughter (and Boria’s sister), Tatiana, were visiting when I arrived, and Ginez was out of town for the night. I swear, this is the most simple way of explaining their family. And now you know how I feel, and might possibly understand why I assumed the Charo was Ginez, Carmen was Charo, Tatiana was a neighborhood child visiting for the night, etc. etc. I also happened to make the mistake (out loud to the family) that Charo was one of Ginez’s brothers, at which the female Charo quickly pointed to herself to announce that that was her. Aye aye aye.
However, beyond the extremely complicated family structure, this family is extremely nice and has a pretty great sense of humor. They have told me many-a-silly-factoid about Bolivia, so I, in turn, will spread the jolliness:
First, I have heard a bit about ladrones (thieves) since I have been here – my family is very intent on telling me every unsafe part of every aspect of Latin American life (including deaths at World Cup soccer matches, where the fans get a little too fanatic), and today they told me many stories of thieves around Bolivia. As they were sharing these scary stories, and convincing me to never leave my safe haven of their house, Ginez broke in with a story of an Italian who, when robbed, began begging that the thief return certain things in the purse, like her passport, so she could return to Italy, and her keys, so that she could get back into her hostel at night. Apparently (and this is only in Bolivia, my family told me), you can negotiate with the thieves here! Even when held at gunpoint, you can ask that the ladrones return certain items that are of particular importance to you, and then they can leave with the cash. Needless to say, the Italian got her passport back and was able to return to Italy :-)
There is also a group of women here called Cholas, who all dress in the same skirt, blouse, and hat, and who, I get the impression, are a mixed indigenous group of the area. The Cholas have two crazy things about them: 1) their clothes are extremely expensive, and they love to show off their wealth by covering themselves not only with expensive clothing but also with gold jewelry all over the place (Ginez was telling me of a lady she saw in a carnicerìa, or meat shop, who was cutting a huge chunk of beef with gigantic rings on her fingers); and 2) the Cholas love futbol (soccer), and play any and everybody, including men, in their traditional dress. They only take off their shoes and replace them with soccer socks, shinguards, and soccer cleats, but keep the blouse and skirt on (tying up the skirt to allow for running, of course), and play. So silly! And for those of you who are interested, Cholas are only women – their maridos, or husbands, wear the same clothes as any other Bolivian man.
Yesterday was Cochabamba’s birthday (it’s some 400+ years old), and the family took me to a parade to watch the marching bands. Apparently every single group in Cochabamba, from university students to high school gymnasts, from lawyers and doctors to Search and Rescue troops, from Boy Scouts to BMX racers, have a spot in this parade, and most of them, it seems, also have a marching band (not completely sure why). The military especially prides itself in its many marching bands, and there is even a military restaurant a few blocks south of my house (which is really close to the centro – downtown – of Cochabamba, yay!) that had a marching band playing today.
So I am learning these and other fun facts about Bolivia as I spend time here. Another thing I’ve noticed is that politics are a central part of conversation here – Bolivia has yet to have a stable government, nor a president who truly does anything for its people, and Bolivians (or at least my family) discuss this a lot. The recent conflict between the U.S. and Bolivia is just a miniscule part of Bolivian politics, and it is all very interesting, yet sad, to listen to. Bolivian politicians focus much more on campaigning and gaining popular support than ever actually focusing on the people’s needs – for example, the unemployment rate here is around 40%, according to my family, and the government has done absolutely nothing to create jobs here. In addition, many problems, like the cleferos, or young children who have gotten into glue-sniffing (a huge problem here), go ignored. My family has a good sense of humor as they describe different aspects of Bolivia to me, but everyone seems to talk with a sad undertone. I am still figuring this all out, and I am sure that I will have much more to figure out in the near future.
Not wanting to end this blog on a sad note, I have to speak a bit about the daily routine and eating of Bolivians, as it makes me super happy :) Breakfast, as far as I can tell, is taken at leisure at some point in the morning, and consists of something small – bread and butter, or fruit, or yogurt, or something of the sort. Then, several hours later, as my tummy grumbles, around 1 or 2 in the afternoon, the whole family sits down to lunch and eats a GINORMOUS amount, much to my happiness. It usually starts with some sort of soup much like chicken noodle, but with more variety, and then a full lunch that is much like our dinner, like chicken and vegetables, or some pasta dish, or something of the sort. After everyone is super full and happy, everyone must eat more, and tecito or cafecito is served (tea or coffee), along with some sort of after-lunch dish, which so far has been fruit or yogurt mixed with linera, a seed that is good for digestion (which, after that much food, is very necessary). The whole lunch process takes around 2 hours or so, during which everyone talks about their lives, Cholas, futbol, ladrones, and whatever else pleases us. After lunch, everyone continues on with their lives, and sometimes meets again late at night, around 7 or 8 usually, to eat a piece of pan with Dulce de Leche (which is the same as manjar, thank God it still exists here!) and to take more coffee or tea (I’m not completely sure why people like having so much caffeine in their blood right before bed, but whatever works for them). This can last for another hour or so and includes a lot more talking and laughing and again, is very fun.
So all in all, I am having a pretty good time in Bolivia!! I promise that these blogs will get shorter as I get busier, but I have so much time on my hands right now that I just can’t help it. I hope all is well with everyone and that no one has invested too much in Wall Street. Que les vayan bien!!
Hola amigos y familia!!
I finally made it to Cochabamba two days ago!! After resting up a lot, I found out that my program, due to a lot of cancelled flights because of all of this political unrest, will not be starting for at least another week, so I have plenty of time to relax, explore, and do whatever I please. It’s a little strange to be in a new place and not really be doing anything or knowing anyone, but I’m super excited to be here and seeing new things and only speaking Spanish wherever I go. I am also hoping to find a climbing gym soon, if on exists, so I can hang out with climbing buddies again – Chile and Anne Marie spoiled me so much with the abundant amount of rocks everywhere, and I can’t wait to get climbing again.
My family is really nice – I live with a mother, Ginez, her sister, Charo (which is short for Rosario), Ginez’s 17-year-old daughter, Fabiola, and Ginez and Charo’s niece, and Fabiola’s cousin, Boria. This took me several tries and mistakes to figure out, as Ginez and Charo’s sister, Carmen, the mother of Boria, as well as her daughter (and Boria’s sister), Tatiana, were visiting when I arrived, and Ginez was out of town for the night. I swear, this is the most simple way of explaining their family. And now you know how I feel, and might possibly understand why I assumed the Charo was Ginez, Carmen was Charo, Tatiana was a neighborhood child visiting for the night, etc. etc. I also happened to make the mistake (out loud to the family) that Charo was one of Ginez’s brothers, at which the female Charo quickly pointed to herself to announce that that was her. Aye aye aye.
However, beyond the extremely complicated family structure, this family is extremely nice and has a pretty great sense of humor. They have told me many-a-silly-factoid about Bolivia, so I, in turn, will spread the jolliness:
First, I have heard a bit about ladrones (thieves) since I have been here – my family is very intent on telling me every unsafe part of every aspect of Latin American life (including deaths at World Cup soccer matches, where the fans get a little too fanatic), and today they told me many stories of thieves around Bolivia. As they were sharing these scary stories, and convincing me to never leave my safe haven of their house, Ginez broke in with a story of an Italian who, when robbed, began begging that the thief return certain things in the purse, like her passport, so she could return to Italy, and her keys, so that she could get back into her hostel at night. Apparently (and this is only in Bolivia, my family told me), you can negotiate with the thieves here! Even when held at gunpoint, you can ask that the ladrones return certain items that are of particular importance to you, and then they can leave with the cash. Needless to say, the Italian got her passport back and was able to return to Italy :-)
There is also a group of women here called Cholas, who all dress in the same skirt, blouse, and hat, and who, I get the impression, are a mixed indigenous group of the area. The Cholas have two crazy things about them: 1) their clothes are extremely expensive, and they love to show off their wealth by covering themselves not only with expensive clothing but also with gold jewelry all over the place (Ginez was telling me of a lady she saw in a carnicerìa, or meat shop, who was cutting a huge chunk of beef with gigantic rings on her fingers); and 2) the Cholas love futbol (soccer), and play any and everybody, including men, in their traditional dress. They only take off their shoes and replace them with soccer socks, shinguards, and soccer cleats, but keep the blouse and skirt on (tying up the skirt to allow for running, of course), and play. So silly! And for those of you who are interested, Cholas are only women – their maridos, or husbands, wear the same clothes as any other Bolivian man.
Yesterday was Cochabamba’s birthday (it’s some 400+ years old), and the family took me to a parade to watch the marching bands. Apparently every single group in Cochabamba, from university students to high school gymnasts, from lawyers and doctors to Search and Rescue troops, from Boy Scouts to BMX racers, have a spot in this parade, and most of them, it seems, also have a marching band (not completely sure why). The military especially prides itself in its many marching bands, and there is even a military restaurant a few blocks south of my house (which is really close to the centro – downtown – of Cochabamba, yay!) that had a marching band playing today.
So I am learning these and other fun facts about Bolivia as I spend time here. Another thing I’ve noticed is that politics are a central part of conversation here – Bolivia has yet to have a stable government, nor a president who truly does anything for its people, and Bolivians (or at least my family) discuss this a lot. The recent conflict between the U.S. and Bolivia is just a miniscule part of Bolivian politics, and it is all very interesting, yet sad, to listen to. Bolivian politicians focus much more on campaigning and gaining popular support than ever actually focusing on the people’s needs – for example, the unemployment rate here is around 40%, according to my family, and the government has done absolutely nothing to create jobs here. In addition, many problems, like the cleferos, or young children who have gotten into glue-sniffing (a huge problem here), go ignored. My family has a good sense of humor as they describe different aspects of Bolivia to me, but everyone seems to talk with a sad undertone. I am still figuring this all out, and I am sure that I will have much more to figure out in the near future.
Not wanting to end this blog on a sad note, I have to speak a bit about the daily routine and eating of Bolivians, as it makes me super happy :) Breakfast, as far as I can tell, is taken at leisure at some point in the morning, and consists of something small – bread and butter, or fruit, or yogurt, or something of the sort. Then, several hours later, as my tummy grumbles, around 1 or 2 in the afternoon, the whole family sits down to lunch and eats a GINORMOUS amount, much to my happiness. It usually starts with some sort of soup much like chicken noodle, but with more variety, and then a full lunch that is much like our dinner, like chicken and vegetables, or some pasta dish, or something of the sort. After everyone is super full and happy, everyone must eat more, and tecito or cafecito is served (tea or coffee), along with some sort of after-lunch dish, which so far has been fruit or yogurt mixed with linera, a seed that is good for digestion (which, after that much food, is very necessary). The whole lunch process takes around 2 hours or so, during which everyone talks about their lives, Cholas, futbol, ladrones, and whatever else pleases us. After lunch, everyone continues on with their lives, and sometimes meets again late at night, around 7 or 8 usually, to eat a piece of pan with Dulce de Leche (which is the same as manjar, thank God it still exists here!) and to take more coffee or tea (I’m not completely sure why people like having so much caffeine in their blood right before bed, but whatever works for them). This can last for another hour or so and includes a lot more talking and laughing and again, is very fun.
So all in all, I am having a pretty good time in Bolivia!! I promise that these blogs will get shorter as I get busier, but I have so much time on my hands right now that I just can’t help it. I hope all is well with everyone and that no one has invested too much in Wall Street. Que les vayan bien!!
Hi all! Ok, sorry it has taken me so long to update this - you all probably just assumed that I am still stuck in the Argentinian airport, no? So I can FINALLY continue updating the blog with photos and info, so here are some photos from Chile from two weeks ago or so...The picture of the sunset is where Anne Marie and I went bouldering by the ocean (poor us). Also, I wanted to find a picture of Mendoza, Argentina, where we visited our friend, but for some reason we didn´t take too many photos of the actually city. However, I feel that the dog at our hotel really epitomizes the city. And although I miss this dog a lot, I´m lucky enough to have its twin sister as my neighbor here in Cochabamba, so I can get a full dose of dogs with goofy eyebrows and sweater vests whenever I want. The third picture is of the bridge in Argentina where we went climbing. :)
OK, now that my trip to Chile is summed up, I can begin on Bolivia! I don´t have too many photos yet because everyone tells me here that the best way to avoid problems is to leave all valuables at home and to blend in as much with the locals as possible. Unfortunately, this means that I can´t run my blond-haired, blue-eyed self around taking flash-photography photos of people too discreetly. But, I sure will try. :)
Saturday, September 13, 2008
Home, Sweet Airport.
Hi all! Ok, this blog will be a bit of an explanation of things that are going on right now in Bolivia and a wrap-up of my amazing time in Chile!!
First of all, the reason why I am writing/publishing all of these blogs is that I'm stranded in Argentina for a bit. The unrest in Bolivia right now has caused every airline but AeroSur to cancel its flights into Bolivia. The bad news is that I did not have an AeroSur flight, and, waiting out my overnight layover and avoiding robbery by consuming lots of caffeine and sugar throughout the night so that I could stare down every passerby that looks at my luggage the wrong way, I haven't slept in 25 hours and am still waiting for any word on a new flight. The good news is that I have gotten accustomed to my new home in the Buenos Aires airport and have settled in by taking my luggage for a walk in the park outside and by sitting in the women's bathroom for several hours in the middle of the night while my laptop charged in the only outlet that worked in the airport (only to find out later that WiFi does not exist here, and I have to go to an Internet Cafe). The other good news is that now I have at least 8 hours to just blog blog blog my life away! Yay, lucky you!
So basically, since I wrote that last blog, for those of you that do not find it necessary to keep up on South American news, ya crazies, after Evo Morales kicked the U.S. ambassador out of Bolivia, the U.S. thought that the only appropriate response would be to kick the Bolivian ambassador out of the U.S., so that this way, there can be no diplomatic relations whatsoever in between the two countries. Then, just for the heck of it (well, more or less.....), Hugo Chavez decided to let the world know what he thought about this whole ordeal, and chucked the U.S. ambassador out of Venezuela as well. Sheesh. So now, in Bolivia, the large chasm that has been growing between the poorer, coca-growing, anti-American, pro-Morales sector of Bolivia and the richer, more urban, anti-Morales (and more pro-American) sector of bolivia has escalated into a bit of violence. So far this has mostly occured in the form of bus holdups and a few riots, but nine people have died (as of yesterday), so it is unfortunately, pretty serious for the people there.
Luckily, Cochabamba for some odd reason has yet to be very affected by this, and so far the people that I have talked to have told me that the news is definitely making it worse that it seems, and that it is really just a matter of the governments fighting, not the people. I was hoping to have a more accurate idea of what was going on in the country by around 1 PM today, when I could talk to Bolivians about the situation, but hopefully I can do that soon enough and write a blog that tells the absolute truth. Stay tuned.
On that note, I'm going to finish talking about my amazing time in Chile!! So, after we finished climbing in Mendoza, Anne Marie and I took the red-eye back to Chile and got held up by Chilean customs for around an hour or so. Many Chileans were insistent on bringing several bags full of groceries, artesan crafts, and cleaning supplies, which eventually they let through, but for some reason took my onion and a two-inch block of cheese. I think they might pick on gringas.
When we arrived home, we rushed to create a masterpiece dinner for Anne Marie's Chilean family that we had promised to make long before I had even arrived. Chileans have this tendency to eat really bad pizza, so Anne Marie and I decided to make a homemade pizza, complete with garlic crust, homemade sauce, and market-fresh peppers, mushrooms, onions, etc. etc. We also thought that we could make chocolate chip cookies for dessert, which seems to be a delicacy that not too many Chileans have enjoyed in their life. There seems to be a reason for this, because chocolate chips don't really exist there - in the gigantic, Walmart-esque Jumbo supermarket, I ran around the store, asking different workers there for chocolate chips. Unfortunately, I had no idea what the word for 'chips' was, and tried many different varieties - "trozas," or "pieces," got me a chocolate bar, "bombones" got me into the chocolate gift area reminiscent of William Sonoma, and finally "triangulos," or "triangles," got me some chocolate chip-like morsels that, when I asked what they were called in Spanish, the worker just grinned at me and said "chocolate chips." It turned out that pizza and chocolate chip cookies were a bit too ambitious for us (we ended up guessing the amount of every ingredient in the cookies, as well as they temperature at which they were being baked in our family's one-temperature-only oven, which resulted in more than half of them having a lovely, burnt black crust on the bottom) , but our family was extremely patient, and finally, at 10:30 that night, we served pizza to our ravenous family. They were so complimentary and grateful that it definitely made the seven or so hours of cooking worth it (plus we love cooking, and love eating, so it was all good), but that is just how amazing my Chilean family was!
Well, this blog is getting really long once again (have I mentioned that I haven't slept in more than a day? I feel like that is a good enough excuse to justify why I just rambled on about pizza and chocolate chip cookies for a whole paragraph), so I will try to wrap up the last bit. As a grand conclusion to my stay in Chile, Anne Marie took me to the climbing spot that has taken up every weekend so far and is preventing her from seeing anywhere else in Chile, called Las Chilcas, and it is SO BEAUTIFUL!! All of the wildflowers were in bloom (I will post a few blogs of just pictures later to catch everyone up) since Spring is just beginning here, and there was this beautiful little creek that ran through our campsite. Plus, the climbing was amazing, and I felt so grateful to be able to see so many amazing places in Chile these past two weeks by doing one of my favorite activities ever with such a good friend.
Well, that is about it for now I think (whew, if you are even still with me, well done). I hope you are all doing wonderfully, and keep in touch!
Peace and hugs,
Sarah
First of all, the reason why I am writing/publishing all of these blogs is that I'm stranded in Argentina for a bit. The unrest in Bolivia right now has caused every airline but AeroSur to cancel its flights into Bolivia. The bad news is that I did not have an AeroSur flight, and, waiting out my overnight layover and avoiding robbery by consuming lots of caffeine and sugar throughout the night so that I could stare down every passerby that looks at my luggage the wrong way, I haven't slept in 25 hours and am still waiting for any word on a new flight. The good news is that I have gotten accustomed to my new home in the Buenos Aires airport and have settled in by taking my luggage for a walk in the park outside and by sitting in the women's bathroom for several hours in the middle of the night while my laptop charged in the only outlet that worked in the airport (only to find out later that WiFi does not exist here, and I have to go to an Internet Cafe). The other good news is that now I have at least 8 hours to just blog blog blog my life away! Yay, lucky you!
So basically, since I wrote that last blog, for those of you that do not find it necessary to keep up on South American news, ya crazies, after Evo Morales kicked the U.S. ambassador out of Bolivia, the U.S. thought that the only appropriate response would be to kick the Bolivian ambassador out of the U.S., so that this way, there can be no diplomatic relations whatsoever in between the two countries. Then, just for the heck of it (well, more or less.....), Hugo Chavez decided to let the world know what he thought about this whole ordeal, and chucked the U.S. ambassador out of Venezuela as well. Sheesh. So now, in Bolivia, the large chasm that has been growing between the poorer, coca-growing, anti-American, pro-Morales sector of Bolivia and the richer, more urban, anti-Morales (and more pro-American) sector of bolivia has escalated into a bit of violence. So far this has mostly occured in the form of bus holdups and a few riots, but nine people have died (as of yesterday), so it is unfortunately, pretty serious for the people there.
Luckily, Cochabamba for some odd reason has yet to be very affected by this, and so far the people that I have talked to have told me that the news is definitely making it worse that it seems, and that it is really just a matter of the governments fighting, not the people. I was hoping to have a more accurate idea of what was going on in the country by around 1 PM today, when I could talk to Bolivians about the situation, but hopefully I can do that soon enough and write a blog that tells the absolute truth. Stay tuned.
On that note, I'm going to finish talking about my amazing time in Chile!! So, after we finished climbing in Mendoza, Anne Marie and I took the red-eye back to Chile and got held up by Chilean customs for around an hour or so. Many Chileans were insistent on bringing several bags full of groceries, artesan crafts, and cleaning supplies, which eventually they let through, but for some reason took my onion and a two-inch block of cheese. I think they might pick on gringas.
When we arrived home, we rushed to create a masterpiece dinner for Anne Marie's Chilean family that we had promised to make long before I had even arrived. Chileans have this tendency to eat really bad pizza, so Anne Marie and I decided to make a homemade pizza, complete with garlic crust, homemade sauce, and market-fresh peppers, mushrooms, onions, etc. etc. We also thought that we could make chocolate chip cookies for dessert, which seems to be a delicacy that not too many Chileans have enjoyed in their life. There seems to be a reason for this, because chocolate chips don't really exist there - in the gigantic, Walmart-esque Jumbo supermarket, I ran around the store, asking different workers there for chocolate chips. Unfortunately, I had no idea what the word for 'chips' was, and tried many different varieties - "trozas," or "pieces," got me a chocolate bar, "bombones" got me into the chocolate gift area reminiscent of William Sonoma, and finally "triangulos," or "triangles," got me some chocolate chip-like morsels that, when I asked what they were called in Spanish, the worker just grinned at me and said "chocolate chips." It turned out that pizza and chocolate chip cookies were a bit too ambitious for us (we ended up guessing the amount of every ingredient in the cookies, as well as they temperature at which they were being baked in our family's one-temperature-only oven, which resulted in more than half of them having a lovely, burnt black crust on the bottom) , but our family was extremely patient, and finally, at 10:30 that night, we served pizza to our ravenous family. They were so complimentary and grateful that it definitely made the seven or so hours of cooking worth it (plus we love cooking, and love eating, so it was all good), but that is just how amazing my Chilean family was!
Well, this blog is getting really long once again (have I mentioned that I haven't slept in more than a day? I feel like that is a good enough excuse to justify why I just rambled on about pizza and chocolate chip cookies for a whole paragraph), so I will try to wrap up the last bit. As a grand conclusion to my stay in Chile, Anne Marie took me to the climbing spot that has taken up every weekend so far and is preventing her from seeing anywhere else in Chile, called Las Chilcas, and it is SO BEAUTIFUL!! All of the wildflowers were in bloom (I will post a few blogs of just pictures later to catch everyone up) since Spring is just beginning here, and there was this beautiful little creek that ran through our campsite. Plus, the climbing was amazing, and I felt so grateful to be able to see so many amazing places in Chile these past two weeks by doing one of my favorite activities ever with such a good friend.
Well, that is about it for now I think (whew, if you are even still with me, well done). I hope you are all doing wonderfully, and keep in touch!
Peace and hugs,
Sarah
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