Bus Travel

So im here in Potosi still.

I have spent 2 nights in a fantastic hostel named the Koala Den. Its not run by Australians but it has had the best hot showers of any hostel so far. The reason im here in Potosi still is because i missed the morning bus to Tupiza. Not actually knowing the time of the bus and just rocking up at the bus terminal around 8.30am wasn't the best of ideas. I missed it by 30mins....so my judgment wasn't too bad.

Anyways now i have to wait for the 7.30pm bus which arrives at the wonderful time of 4.30am in Tupiza! so i have a lot of time to kill. So to kill some of that time ill explain some things which have happened on my little trip so far:

• I had a bloody awesome time in Sucre (stayed there 4nights in total). On my first night out there i met this really nice Dutch-spanish girl randomly at a place called Joyride cafe. Anyways she had been living in Sucre for 3years and spoke nearly every conceivable language. After i had some dinner, she returned to the cafe and invited me to the opening of a new bar called ´Far West´. Appropiately all the people working there looked like cowboys. The best thing was that it was the opening night and it was invite only/friends of the owner...which meant i was very lucky to go. Being the opening night it was FREE DRINKS, YES FREE DRINKS. So we got quite plastered there before heading to this other place called Locols. The random thing was ....the girl i sat next to on the way to Sucre (Paola) her friends were in the band playing in the pub!! There name is Ra-beat and they´re semi electronic-rock. So i got to meet the band and just generally drink and talk to peoples. That night too, a French guy randomly came up´to me and asked me if i was French...(because like always i was wearing the white-black stripe jumper i have and which rosie got for me). The guy was convinced i was French because he said everyone where he was from wheres similar stuff. After convincing him i wasn´t French and making sure he wasn´t hitting on me, we started to chat and got on really really well. His name is Sylvain, and for the next 3nights we continued to drink rediculas amounts of red wine (like at least 2 bottles per night), eat at good places, explore the nightlife of Sucre and generally have too much fun. The thing was, his gf was in northern Bolivia for a few days so we had heaps of time just to party.
  

• Other interesting things which happened in Sucre, met the vice-president of Bolivia (at Joyride no joke), Sylvain got to shake the hand of the opposition leader (who´s famed to be the next president of Bolivia), met the manager who's really cool of Joyride, Sylvain´s gf got to know the French ambassador of Bolivia and Sylvain also chatted to the very drunk German ambassador of Bolivia. Now you might be saying ...wtf....your such a liar!! But the thing was ....all this really did happen. You see i was in Sucre (unintentionally) for the Independence day.....so all the diplomats and government people were there too. And because we got to know the manager of Joyride...(like the biggest gringo & known place in Sucre) we also got to see-meet these people. All i can say ...Sucre was one long trippy, crazy, fun, drunken, beautiful, dancey place. And i loved every moment of it.
  

Potosi

Damn Potosi does shock. Arriving from the beautiful and world heritage listed city of Sucre, Potosi was quite the little wakeup call. Now Potosi has a wonderfully complex and crazy history which i will explain in 2 sentences.

For 200years was Latin America´s richest city and biggest, due to the huge silver deposits found in Cerro Rico (the mountain here). It underwrote the entire Spanish economy for 200 years as it had one of the worlds largest Mints. Anyway now its listed as one of Bolivia´s poorest cities but is also the worlds highest City. Yes confusing, complex but if you ever visit here there are 2 things you HAVE to do, and most gringos do do them.

1. Visit the Cerro Rico silver mine on tour
   
2. Visit the Case De Monedo museum

The Silver mine tour was breathtaking. In respect to you actually going into the underground mines...not like safe ones like in Australia. I mean climbing through 30cm holes, 100 meters underground in complete pitch black (besides headlamps) and watching Bolivians use primitive tools (hammer and a chisel) to chip away and find nothing. These people die young. No joke. None live past 45ish. They die because they work 12hours at least in these conditions, inhaling toxins and gases, whilst chewing coca leaves continuously. We saw kids as young as 15 working in the mines.......in conditions i could only hack for 2hours. When everyone came out of the mines...no-one wanted to go back in, because it was freezing (-10 and then gets to plus 45 degrees), you cant really breathe, we were exhausted from climbing through holes etc. It was probably the best tour ive been on. Because it should you the REAL conditions of these people. It was like a tourist tour.....these were real workers in real conditions really dying. You have to do this tour, as the photos i have don't justify the experience at all. I could keep going on about this but i wont. Just go do the tour, especially through, Koala Tours .......bad name, great tour. (not for people who suffer from claustrophobia)

The Casa de Monedo, the best museum i have been to in South America bar none. It is in the old Potosi Mint, where they use to make the pure silver coins for Spain. The history of the mint for me was very fascinating and the guides (you cant wonder by urself in the museum) were superb. Explaining everything and answering any question the group had. One ironic thing from the museum is, Bolivia use to create pure silver coins for Spain, but now the money of Bolivia is made in Spain and from much inferior materials.

One thing i have learnt about Bolivia is that it gets SCREWED. I mean it gets screwed from nearly every nation in Latin America and also multinational overseas companies. Hardly anything is made in Bolivia, but Bolivia nearly exports every type of material to other countries where its manufactured and then sold back to Bolivia. It is Latin America´s poorest country and besides having a crappy government, the people inside Bolivia hate each other too. That is, Sucre people hate La Paz people, who hate Santa Cruz, who hate Potosi etc. I didn't realise but i have been alive longer then Bolivia has been a democratic nation. It has only been a democratic nation for 23years ....and randomly has had 5 presidents in 1 day, and thats not a joke.

Bolivia has amazing potential, it just needs to stop the internal hate, corruption, have a smart government and get some infrastructure =), and it will one day.

Anyways thats enough babbling for me. Next is Tupiza where i shall do a tiny bit of trekking and also visit the Solar De Uyuni (the worlds biggest salt flats) where everyone says are amazing and the best attraction in Bolivia. For me....i can say.....everything in Bolivia has been amazing and totally surreal.

Ciao for now

Joely

oh yeah i have been posting pictures of Facebook these days. Here are the links: Peru , Bolivia (some are the same as posted on this blog) If your reading this and your not on Facebook, i recommend joining.....its a surprisingly efficient, effective and easy way to stay in touch!