The Boss's Birthday

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Or Why I'm a Shit Boyfriend

We waited for our 9:00PM bus in Uyuni at a bar called “Extreme Fun Pub” which, surprisingly, was not Japanese. Our main motivation for eating and drinking there was because the Lonely Planet said that they had a book exchange and, thanks to the boring as shit salt flats, I’d finished mine. Turns out the Lonely Planet was wrong. Again. But it was an ok evening - the food was basic (a menu consisting solely of burgers and nuggets) but tasty, the staff were friendly and the drink selection was a bit of a laugh. They had a shot called “Llama semen” which featured a secret ingredient and a series of drinking challenges which gave the place its motto of “not for chickens”. The ultimate challenge was 10 drinks - a variety of seriously strong shots and mixed drink schooners - costing B$200. However if you made the top five it was half price and if you set a new record it was free (FYI: the record at time of publication was around 36 seconds!)
I ducked away from the pub for ten minutes in search of a book exchange and soon found a hostel with one. They claimed to do the standard South American “two-for-one”, which was bullshit unless they’d started their exchange the day before, because they only had four books and two of them were guide books. Anyway they ended up allowing me to trade my book and B$10 for another and I had a choice of a fantasy novel or a true crime. I went with the true crime and was damned glad I did. “The Stranger Beside Me” by Ann Rule is about a woman (Rule) who worked on a suicide hotline and became close friends with American serial killer Ted Bundy. She was commissioned to write the book about his murders before he had been charged with them, so it’s written from a fairly unique perspective. His ability to seem like a completely normal person, incapable of the sadistic torture and murder he committed, had me cheering for him when he escaped police custody. A few pages later I was less impressed when, in a single night, he murders two girls and beat the hell out of two others in a sorority house and then beat another so badly her sense of balance was put off for the rest of her life in a house a few blocks away.
Our 9PM bus out of Uyuni was destined for the town of Oruro, where we awoke at a little after 4:30AM. We were determined to make the town of Cochabamba that day - we had heard good things about it and it was the Boss’s birthday, so we wanted to spend it somewhere fun. We went in to the bus terminal and luckily there was a bus for Cochabamba at 5AM for only B$25. Again sleeping almost the whole way, we awoke a little after 9AM in a town with an enormous statue of Jesus on a hill overlooking us. We caught a taxi from the station (where there are stacks of hostels but apparently it’s quite dangerous) to the plaza a few blocks away. From there we walked until finding ourselves at the Hostal Colonial. For B$70 a night we got a twin room with cable TV, wifi access and, though it wasn’t an ensuite, the bathroom and shower were next door. Although when I say bathroom and shower, I mean bathroom and shower - the toilet and shower weren’t separated by so much as a curtain, so when you showered the toilet got soaking wet!
We ate breakfast at a Cafe Paris near the plaza. A menu consisting almost exclusively of crepes, the ham, cheese and egg crepe I had was perhaps the best breakfast I’d had in South America. Their coffee was pretty good too. From there we went for a wander around town to get our bearings. There was another plaza a few blocks north where the main bar strip ran off and, ten minutes from there, was a cinema complex. Sufficiently pleased with our orientation, we spent the rest of the afternoon taking it easy in the hostel room.
We had decided to go out for dinner at a Brazilian restaurant that was all you can eat for B$40. The Boss said it was “near the roundabout”, which was close to the cinema complex. But upon reaching the roundabout, we couldn’t find the Brazilian place. At this point the Boss came clean about not actually knowing exactly where near the roundabout this joint was, nor even the name of the place. However since she had received the gift of Sweet FA from me on this, her 21st birthday, I was in no position to say anything remotely sarcastic or angry. We ended up, the better part of an hour later, on Calle Espana near our hostel at a bar called Picasso’s which also had a menu of Mexican food. We ordered some drinks, perused the menu and tried to stay polite whilst a queue of people came in from the street to try to sell us flowers, chocolates, cigarettes or just beg for money. Our drinks arrived, we each ordered a burrito and quietly enjoyed our beverages. However after about 15 minutes, we were approached by a waitress who pointed to the menu and started saying something about “queso” (cheese). I figured she was asking us if we wanted it on our burritos but after telling her “ci, queso is bueno,” or something to that affect, she kept at us. Eventually we worked out what she was telling us - there was only cheese left in the kitchen. We were offered a choice of cheese burritos or a cheese pizza. We paid for our drinks and left.
We ended up at a restaurant on the main bar strip where the Boss got a steak and I had a variety of sushi. I wish I could say at that point I pulled a beautiful piece of jewellery out of my pocket in a grand birthday gesture but unfortunately we just paid the bill and went back to the hostel. I’m a terrible boyfriend.
Happy birthday love. I’m sorry.

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