Cochabamba what a wonderful place

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Before I begin my song of the day is.......what a wonderful world.

Now most days my song choice is random: the voice (moody blues), me and my monkey (robbie williams), yellow river (??????). But this one isn´t, Cochabamba is an extremely poor city with apparently a glue sniffing problem....though I haven´t encountered any yet just been warned that they do exist! ever 20 paces or so there is a small child dancing for money, cleaning windscreens, polishing shoes in the squares or just begging. Now I´ve just picked out children but in actual fact beggars here are of all ages shapes and sizes...I wasn´t descriminating!!! With the beggars come the fake policemen, fake tourists, thugs, gangs (containing many thugs) and all of them seem to have one thing in common...they want my money (not Tea bag´s...he doesn´t have any).
Luckily as I haven´t met any yet but I have been told where they live (so I can post them a letter?). Anywho thats the bad, lets talk about the good!!! My hostess is a wonderfully kind woman named Edith Velasco who lives in a small apartment in the north of the city, I have my own bedroom with cupboard space and a bathroom. She leaves breakfast out for me and prepares a huge lunch around midday! The city itself is separated by a river and so for me in the north i have to cross the bridge to get to downtown and all it holds (markets, bars, clubs etc). Cochabamba has an amazing bus or micro system (micros, trufis, taxi trufis) all of these lead to a certain destination along a certain route, but the marvellous thing is....you get on and off where you want! Just stick out your arm for the right one, get on, pay 8p a journey and get off by shouting at the driver! It is a phenominal system, the buses usually have a space where a door used to be or won´t shut and are packed. The markets are like Camden on a busy day....but without all the wierdos (you know who you are) and sell normal things like fresh juice, vegetables, fruit, meat, shampoo, soap etc., wooden spoons, clothes, jewelry.....the list goes on! The squares are amazing with fountains, gardens, gardeners and lots of old men lost in their newspapers. This truly is a remarkable city filled with remarkable smells and sites. I will get onto food at a later date after i´ve sampled more! Well today I went to meet with the staff at teaching and projects abroad...they have offices downtown next to el plaza 14 de septiembre . I met Silvia, Carmen, Carmen, Dani, Xemenov (i think thats how you spell it) and all of them were really nice and helpful. Carmen (1) gave me a tour and a briefing about bolivian lifestyle, Xemenov briefed me about my work which starts TOMORROW and Silvia took me there and back! well I´m off for a walk now but I will let you all Know how my first day goes and me learning spanish!!

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