My cape is longer than yours: Caraval 2009 en Oruro

Talk about Spring Break '97, this last weekend was surely on par. I take back any bad thing I have said about Bolivia (all internet comments remain). Not only did I get to watch 8 straight hours of amazing dancing, crazy costumes, and drunk people falling but I also got to enjoy a nice water balloon fight, equip with ponchos of course.

The weekend (Fri-Tues) was true non-stop entertainment. Friday night started with one big party. The main plaza was filled with people plus vendors selling booze and food. The music went on till about 5am and then it was time to return to our "Hotel". I would hardly call it anything really, except maybe a construction site off the side of a house. There were three (?) stories of empty office type rooms where we stuffed in 10 people with sleeping bags. Sleep at 5 wake-up at 7:30 (mostly cuz of the cold).

Parade started at 8 and it was time to start drinking. The whole crowd knew every word to the songs played and would chant when music wasn't playing. The greatest thing about the festival though was that, unlike other events where the entertainers have to be serious and point on, these dancers and musicians were completely allowed to take a mini break, go over to the crowd and grab a beer. In fact many of the marching band members had beer in their pockets or in beer helmets. So great when everyone can enjoy together.


If a parade sounds boring to you then maybe you would enjoy a good water fight. Carnaval is notorious for water balloons. Ponchos were not optional. My friend, poor Alvaro, got socked so many times as he was attempting to put on the poncho. No mercy. But the weather was great and so no complaints. The two sides of the bleachers, instead, would yell "AGUA, AGUA" just to taunt the other side.

Good, good fun. Then of course no work on Monday or Tuesday. The big day seemed to be on Saturday but I guess two days off is never a bad thing.

Wonder what these do

Unfortunately, my knowledge of Spanish doesn't extend to the medical industry. The pharmacy attendant went behind her little counter and pulled out these puppies. She asked me how many I wanted, put them in this blank bag and said 3 times a day.

Caraval Prep bigger than event itself

So it seems that the whole city is getting ready for Caraval. You, of course, can't stay in the city during the event because anybody who is anybody is going to Oruro (a city outside of La Paz). Oruro is supposedly the second biggest Caraval in South America, although I have only heard this from La Pazians (likely story). I'll have to see for myself.

BUT the prep. The preparation is crazy. Where is our balcony? Where are we staying? Who is staying with us? Can we fit that many people? Come on La Paz. If you are saying that this is the second biggest Caraval in South America shouldn't these questions be irrelevant? But I guess I shouldn't judge pre-maturely. Maybe it is the extensive pre-planning that makes these events stand out in the world more than say our 4th of July.

So I guess I will just have to wait and see if early costume-wearing-celebrators are actually the true party starters (with worn in costumes in time for the event) or if these water-balloon-throwing-cheap-shot hooligans will actually be ready with the best aim.

The Real Grapes of Wrath

So yes there are many spoils of living in the United States, fast internet for one. No, I will not stop talking about how slow the internet is in Bolivia. If I stopped talking about the slow internet it would lose the emphasis, therefore I continue. But this post is not about that.

This post is about losing the satisfaction of an entire fruit because of being spoiled in the US. Grapes. Everyone likes grapes right. Small, easy to grab and go, two different types (maybe more?), the list goes on. I don't think grapes are anyone's favorite fruit, by any means, but they are always there for you when you need a good fruit salad. Well no more.

I have been exposed to the real world, people. The world where grapes still have seeds and you actually have to chomp each grape and find a way to get out the seeds without looking like a fool and without ruining the actually satisfaction of eating the grape. Well this morning and then again at lunch I attempted these two things without success. Although it is easy enough to put in the extra effort of taking the seeds out of your mouth (even when the number of seeds fluctuates greatly) it is the actual satisfaction that is truly robbed. My grape days are over. Thanks USofA

Afro-Boliviano "Style" Wedding

When I first got invited to an Afro-Boliviano Wedding I was super stoked but also giggled to myself as I realized I would definitely be the absolute whitest person there. Weirdly enough I was dead wrong.


After a 3 hour bus/van ride to Tomaño, Bo (in the Nor-Yungas region) I saw that I was actually about to enter an awesome hippie gathering of sorts. As soon as we turned onto the dirt road of our final destination we had to stop 4 times. Were we lost? No. We just had to get out and greet the fellow hippies, hanging out on hammocks or just chillin' with their drums. It actually felt the most like home since I have been in Bolivia. If I hadn't heard them speak I would swear I was in Humboldt Country, just visiting my Aunt and Uncle.
The wedding itself was amazing but a little strange. There was a young group of Afro-Bolivianos dressed in traditional clothes playing drums as los novios walked down to the altar (which was actually just a little tent at the end of a basketball court of a school). At the altar there was a really old Afro-Bolivian woman who places bead over the brides head. After the bride passed out coca leaves and the groom started painting stripes on his friends foreheads with some plant. Then it was over. The whole ceremony was about 10 minutes. From that point on we just danced the nice away (me take a nap in between). It was actually pretty perfect. The couple was obviously happy as ever and in general the vibes were great all night.

Later the band changed into their street clothes and danced with the high school gringa of their choice. It was pretty hilarious watching the hippie girls try to keep up with the band's far superior dance moves.

All in all, a great weekend. I guess I was still the most Gringa there but I did get a little tan.

Bailes!

So after a long 13 hours bus ride over night to La Paz I got back. I was starving, tired and a complete mess. Mi Familia picked me up and we started heading to El Sur for lunch. It was apparently really far but I was hungry and didn't care. When we got there it was this awesome little outdoor restaurant with tons of people dancing and singing. They had people in traditional dress, doing traditional dances and local Andean music playing in between. It was so fun. And the dancers seemed to love mi familia and their friends because they kept grabbing them to come up and dance.

To eat I got Llama. My first llama experience. It was kind of sad but I really want to try everything once so I bit the bullet. And apparently because Llama wool is such a profitable industry they don't kill them for meat until they are old. Which makes the meat tough and kind of like beef jerky, in my opinion. It was good but I'm definitely not running out for seconds anytime soon.

The rest of the Inca Trail

So the last 3 days went a lot easier than the first. My legs became weaker and weaker each day and by the end I was limping. Each stair I climbed I had to lift my right leg. The left was okay but the right was basically dead weight.

On the last day we woke up at 3:45am. At soon as our eyes were open we were all on a mission. What they don't tell you about the Inca Trail and Machu Picchu is that it is very competitive. The reason isn't because of pride or even Machu Picchu itself. The reason is because of Wiñay Picchu, the huge mountain next to M. Picchu, that you can climb... if you're lucky. It is a really steep and dangerous climb and only 400 people can go up a day. 200 at 7am and 200 people who get a 10am ticket to go up. On our particular day it was cloudy in the morning and so the 10am tickets were the ones to gets. So back to the beginning we wake up, eat breakfast and get ready for our sprint.

They don't allow the Inca trailers to pass the first checkpoint until 5:30. So we got there at 4:30, 3rd in line, and waited. A little before 5:30 they let us go. We began sprinting towards the Sun Gate where, if you are lucky, you can get your first glimpse of Machu Picchu. We were not lucky. The clouds were completely covering it. From there we realized that our guide was waiting for one of the other people in our group. We were super bummed out because she had our tickets to get into MP where we had to drop off our bags before climbing Wañay. Basically she ruined our chance at the 10 am tickets, we just hoped we would still be able to climb it at all.

So we marched on with two people waiting behind to give her a talking and to make her haul ass with our tickets. Finally after about 90 minutes we made it MP dropped all our stuff and started running towards the Mountain. We got there and there was a huge line but they were still letting people in so we were confident that we could climb. While waiting we realized that we had just run full speed through Machu Picchu without even noticing.

15 minutes later we were climbing the mountain. 10 minutes later we were wanting for a Spaniard to get pull up from the side of the mountain. He had fallen off the edge. I basically crawled the rest of the time. The whole climb was absolutely fascinating. The clouds came in and made it seem mystical or something. After an hour my poor little legs made it to the top. We could see nothing. It was quite laughable. But the climb alone was worth it. And at one point someone yelled, "Machu Picchu!". The clouds had cleared and for 30 seconds we saw it!

After we got a tour of the ruins and returns to a town near there called Aguas Calientes (Hot Springs). We went to the Hot Springs to help our poor little legs. They felt amazing, although not that hot. But at that point we had not a care in the world.

What a journey.