Weird and wonderful La Paz

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Though I'm back in the UK, I have some unfinished business with South America: among other things some unpublished blogs. I can't leave out Bolivia, with La Paz - the world's highest capital or volunteering at a jungle animal sanctuary with a puma. Bolivia is quirky to the max, has strong traditions a crazy government and health and safety hasn't been invented yet so you can get to do all sorts of fun inadvisable things…

So I took a bus from Puno (that's another blog), Peru, stopping at Copacabana, to La Paz. Copacabana is on the shore of the mighty Lake Titicaca, I didn’t stop long but what I did see was an armada of hundreds of giant plastic yellow duck and white swan mobiles that people were taking out for trips round the lake – quite a sight. It’s also the place where people take their new cars to the cathedral to be blessed by the priest, apparently this prevents traffic accidents. Anyway, what our bus did here was unexpected. We were told to leave the bus and take a boat across the lake; then our bus was driven onto its own wooden boat and shipped over alongside us. On the other side we were reunited with our bus and off we went once again. It was no problem, kind of fun really. It's just that people don't tell you details like this in South America, so you just hope things are going as they should be. And noone wants to be the uptight gringo questioning the driver - that's not going to get you any traveller cred; you've just gotta go with it man.

Bolivian immigration was no problem at all – in and out of the little office in 20 minutes. Then we weaved around the edge of the lake until we reached La Paz. The approach to the city is cool; La Paz is in a low plain surrounded by The Andes, once you come to the ridge of the mountains you can see down into the huge city. Down, down, down you go until the centre. I found my hostel Bash and Crash easily as it’s near the station. The only drawback being that it’s at the top of four flights of steep stairs. Not so great when you are carrying a backpack at 3,600 metres, oxygen in reception would be a nice welcome.

So I went out to explore, with my first stop being the Red Hat walking tour. I like a walking tour to get to know a place. Our guides were great – two young guys from the city. They started our gringo group off outside the infamous San Pedro prison. The prison is in the centre of the city and has some quirks of course. Firstly the government doesn’t go inside the jail, the prisoners manage it themselves; it’s just the government guards that guard from the outside managing who goes in and out. The prisoners have to pay rent – I guess to the government. This ranges from small potatoes up to hundreds of thousands of dollars per year (for the penthouses, where ex-politicians and drug lords live). As they pay rent their families are allowed to live with them, and so they can pay their rent some prisoners can leave to work each day as long as they’re back at night. Inside is said to be a microcosm of the outside, with prisoners supplying their own dodgy medical services, entertainment and food etc. Until recently tourists took trips (unofficially) to stay there, but funnily enough they encountered some problems i.e. rapes and muggings, so that’s been stopped. In Bolivia you are held in prison until your trial comes up for two years on average, but for some unlucky guys it’s been up to 15 years and they’ve died before their trial came to court. BTW in South America they say: beware of Chilean women (gold diggers) Peruvian men (also gold diggers!) and Bolivian justice.

Our guides took us to the witches market. Witchcraft, shamanism whatever you want to call it, is big among Bolivians and the market is a tourist favourite too. There are potions, spells and talismans for love, work, family, fertility, study, homes and more. Llamas are sacred animals and dried llama foetuses are hung out on display, they are buried under homes as an offering to Pachamama so that she will protect the household. This is pretty grisly but worse is rumoured – for big construction projects it’s said that a live human, e.g. a homeless person or someone who will not be missed, is buried in the foundations to protect the workers.

It’s the indigenous women, the Amayras, who work in the markets. They dress to impress with little bowler hats covering their long braided hair, embroidered blouses, sparkly cardigans and big layered skirts. Their style is a mix of Spanish colonial influence and their own traditional clothes. The women are well built; apparently when an Amayra lady wants to flirt with an Amayra man she will flash a calf – a sturdy calf is more desirable than a waif like waist or wrinkle free face. These ladies work hard in the markets and farms and have lots of children - they need to be strong. I think they look fabulous.

Another feature of La Paz life is protesting. I was there for four days and there was at least one protest each day, and this is at a time when there’s a popular President. There was a strike by lorry drivers, I think about the price of fuel, a protest about animal rights and another about paying government workers a double bonus at Christmas. This last one was a hot topic, the government it seems is never very popular as it pays itself well and there’s a lot of corruption. Congress people earn $4,000 per month, whereas the average salary is $1,200 per year. Here are some of the government ideas and policies that were pointed out to me: retirement age is 65 (when you can access a tiny pension) but on average women live to 65 and men 60. The Bolivian economy is growing but the President (the first indigenous president) says that it’s not growing fast enough as it’s under populated; the solution – tax women heavily if they are not breeding. He also tells his countrymen and women that if they drink a lot of Coca Cola they’ll go bald and too much chicken will turn them gay. Bolivia’s presidents need to be a bit mad I guess; history shows that there’s quite a good chance of being assassinated.

I spent a lot of time in La Paz’s handicraft markets. They specialise in woollen wares and silver jewellery. The prices are really good and I found an alpaca scarf for $2 and a solid silver necklace for $8. You can haggle a bit, but make sure what you’re buying is from Bolivia. The Chinese are copying the designs, making the stuff in China and then selling it in South America for less!

I also went on a tour of the San Francisco church, the best known in La Paz. The part that remains was built just for the indigenous people, the Spanish part was demolished. It’s decorated with traditional symbols like pumas, grapes and llamas and outside there are gargoyles vomiting. The gargoyles were a message to say: don’t come to church drunk – the Spanish introduced wine but the locals couldn’t handle it. When the Spanish arrived in 1549 and started to build churches the congregations were mixed. However, Catholicism grew quickly among the indigenous and more churches were needed, it was decided to build some just for the locals. Bolivia has the highest percentage of indigenous people of all South American countries (62%) stemming from the fact that the Spanish needed the locals to work in the mines - their African slaves couldn’t bear the altitude. Outside the church is the main plaza, and being close to Christmas there was a Christmas tree made entirely from recycled green plastic bottles, pretty cool!

So back to mining; I went to The Coca Museum which tells the tale of coca production and use. Its use goes back a long way – more than 1,000 years. The indigenous chew leaves to give them endurance at high altitude and this was what kept them going in the Spanish mines. During the height of the mines coca was worth as much as gold, as the workers couldn’t endure their harsh conditions without it. Coca of course makes cocaine, big business in Bolivia today. There’s a display of a small-scale cocaine production plant, explaining the chemistry behind the process and that the people who run the plants funnily enough aren’t qualified chemists. These days in Bolivia it’s legal to grow coca and to use it as an ingredient in many products, but not to make cocaine. I’ve chewed the leaves and drunk the tea to help with the altitude – worked for me, and tastes pretty good too.

I also went on a very touristy open topped tourist bus because I wanted to get a panoramic view of the city. It was fun as the streets are steep and you go up to a mini mountain to look out to the snow covered mountains in the distance. You have to duck under the crazy telephone wires and wait in choc-a-bloc traffic, but the locals will wave at you out of windows while you wait and I was blown a kiss by a gold-toothed cholita J



I’ve heard that the night life is pretty good in La Paz, but I can’t say I sampled too much first hand. I did however go to a free Andean music concert at the Conservatorio that I will never forget. The musicians were some of Bolivia’s best and one in particular, Amado Espinoza, is worth checking out. He can play 40 instruments, including two tarkas (Andean flutes) at one time.

I love La Paz; the people are friendly, fun and a bit nuts. It’s kind of chaotic, and the traffic pollution is nasty but it’s a unique place and worth a visit!

P.S. I’ll tell you about the animal sanctuary next time; and apologies for my rubbish photos, I had more but they were erased during a monkey attack...

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