In my hours queueing at bolivian border control I was sold everything. Firstly in a quasi-anglicised language where each word was entirely indistinguishable and then in a rush of relieved spanish when i let on that i might understand better if (invariably) hespoke an actually recognised language. From doornobs to saltedas - poor cousins of the BsAs empanadas... ´Much better than Bolivian ones´i was earnestly assured by which i presume he meant better than those being touted 15ft further along the bridge. I even saw a girl from a bartop in cusco being sold what appeared to be the contents of her own toiletry bag which was pretty thick considering the grime covered face vending Chelsea best.
The most over saturated market however, appeared to be te bicycle transit service. The Peruvian sideof the border heaved wih bikes pushing decorated trailers. The more upmarket ones had a bench seat built in whilst the shabbier ones encorporated llama feed adverts into the design of their decoration. That they were so ornately decorated might have been symptomatic of of their chronic underemployment, a combination of the need for peacock-like ttraction and too much time. On the otherhand it may have been because they enjoyed the sensation of disorientating pedestrians as streams of colour whirled past. The shabbiest of the bike proprietors approached me as i eventually left peruvian emigration, I could just about make out that he could not have been more than about 12 through the thick film of grime encrusting his features. His bike had broken several years before hand and had been disintegrating ever since but this failed to stop him attempting to solicit my custom. he offered a ride to copacabana (an hours drive over the the border) i couldnt contain myself and had to laugh. I spoke too soon, in copacabana on a pit stop i saw him arrive huffing and puffing, pick up a little girl (maybe he had secured the school transport service contract) and set off back toward th border moments later.
Bicycles have achieved two additional major advantages in South America, on top of the usual arguments - cheap, healthy, green - they are infinitely better equipped for emergencies seeing as the option to abandon ship is ever present and the more cautious biker might as well throw themselves in a ditch in preparation for oncoming traffic at the slightest hint of there being any (spotting is a task made easier on the antiplano especially when the exhaust fumes billow out in plumes for miles around). Secondly, a smoother ride as the agile biker is able to swerve potholes, (even when there appears to be rather more hole than road), swim across rivers, or utilise a moss covered footbridge if fortunate enough to find one.
Back to La Paz for take two I managed to act as tour guide of El Prado, San Francisco, avoid the massage palour and become a hostel expert in la paz, having stayed at Las Brisas, Wild Rover, Adventure Brew AND the the Point as well as seeing friends at Loki. I jumped on an unsuspecting Lizzie and Bells (even more unsuspecting friends of theirs) and dragged them off to a world famous (largely due to Rusty Youngs expose in Marching Powder) incarcaration unit where there are unique rules and regulations inside. Unfortunately, after a couple of false starts and a few messages in bedsheets we had a tantalising glimpse of the inside world before a distinctly unimpressed employee returned unamused from her loo break. party over.
Journeying is a sport in itself here - indeed i might suggest it be named the continental favourite past-time. Certainly bus drivers appear to think that screaming destinations aproximate to their own at passersby will entice them on board, as if they'll think, oh sod work, family and home i came out looking for a squash but what i really need is a 19hour bus journey, perhaps they're right I never asked a local if they'd taken a particularly long detour on their way to market on any of my buses. It is also however, a complete matter of chance if you happen to arrive in the right place at the end. Having arrived at El Alto international (state of the art in an ironic contrast to a hastily constructed city and the ariport of official capital sucre - where the main luxury is that the cleaners unblock the loos at semi-regular intervals) ridiculously early due to everything actually going smoothly i was greeted by the aparition of breakfast (i recommend the cinnamon rolls at Alexanders Coffee) in the form of the girls friend Theo who I'd met the previous night in the bar at Loki. We proceeded to be institutionally ripped off by a US$25 departure tax which constituted my single greatest purchase in Bolivia. At least we weren't forced into an inflated extranjeros rate.
Fog prevented our (exceptionally nice; TACA) plane to Lima from taking off and then 2 hours further before we recieved the all clear to discover we'd "lost an engine." careless behaviour really. Anyway, despite a 12minute window in which to disembark and find the flight to Bogota (helped by luggage handlers running alongside me) I made it. Arrival into Colombia was made considerably earier by a Colombian traveller from the plane who brought me supper (amazingly if you pay above average prices in south america you are rewarded with above average food and Colombian airspace it seemed was no exception), gave me his book (brilliant Mark Mann's The Gringo Trail), whisked me off to the DAS counter practically before the rest of the flight had left their seats. All the while telling me that I should look up Walter Seligman who ran an electronics store in Bogota.
I almost expected to be simultaneously mugged, shot and descended upon by sniffer dogs and banditos due to Colombia's reputation and parental angst. However, time kept passing and none of the aforementioned occured (*i did see the snifferdogs; they were all quite fat golden labs and were snoring, loudly). I left the airport, got a taxi and arrived in my hostel unscathed, i even dared to take a walk and nighttime swim in Cartagenas ocean a block from the hotel. It was an unexpected calm and therefore felt strange to realise that, despite the murder figures, general hysteria and economic dependence on cocaine (despite being a fast developing state, being richly endowed naturally benefitting from climate variation, the worlds largest coffee producer and also blessed(or cursed) with that other black gold oil, Colombian cocaine exports come to a greater value than all other individual endeavours. It was estimated by US homeland security that 60% of cocaine in the US is of Colombian origin) I had arrived in what I was to discover was one of the safest and certainly friendliest countries I had visited in South America. Perhaps these speculations were aided by another free meal ('my friend at the fruiteria').
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