As High As High Gets: Potosí
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8:17a 6/5/07
Greetings from the highest city in the world! Higher than La Paz (also in Bolivia) and Tibet (not in Bolivia). After a week in Salta aptly named “Salta la Linda” or Salta the beautiful, and getting in some good Northern Argentine cuisine and a couple rejuvenating hikes in the nearby mountains I took an overnight bus to La Quiaca. We arrived at six a.m., frozen over and walked several blocks where you cross a bridge and are officially in Bolivia, in the border town of Villazón. I snapped a couple pics of the persimmons ox-blood colored sunset. Un-doctored. Un-believable. I bought a ticket to Potosí some nine hours away by bumpy dirt roads. To shake off the chill I found a makeshift coffeehouse and sipped piping hot cafés con leche with two Austrians as company. I wrote a poem the other night which I´ll post soon, Commonalities, You and I which basically talks about all these amazing people I meet, and under different circumstances, we could be great friends but we may only have time to have a coffee to share and then we´re off to separate places.
10:19a
I think I got ripped off ten Bolivianos ($1.25) on my seat! This very dark, indigenous, small leather-skinned woman next to me payed ten less. Gringo factor. No bathrooms on the bus! And it´s bumpy. But I´m told we stop every two hours or so. My fingers are cracked dry and my mouth is filled with grit from the dust that´s kicking into the bus. We stopped here in Tupiza, jewel of Bolivia the sign says. The road so far has been breathtaking. From rocky flats, to pebbly cliffs, unconvincing rivers and dynamic cactus plains where mules and donkey freely graze to a backdrop of red rock mountain gorges. How have I been in South America so long and not come here yet? We´re driving bumpy hairpin turns over steep cliffs and the smell of coca leaves permeates the air. Cocaine is produced from a base of coca leaves, here people chew it to ease hunger, for altitude sickness or mild pain, or as a commonplace stimulant. About six hours to the highest city in the world!
11:17a
Dry riverbeds and cascading rock formations and I swear the tire below me has been teetering off the ground at least twice now! Scribbling in my notebook my writing looks like hieroglyphics. I´ve taken a hundred pictures of the landscapes and gone over them three times and can´t get myself to delete even a single one. ´Bout five hours til the highest city in the world, where I´m told I´ll encounter a bone-chilling cold I´ve yet to feel. One brown hoody, check. The bus has stopped. I think a woman wants to come aboard to offer food for sale, trays of meat and potatoes and eggs. She´s speaking to the driver, in a language not Spanish. Quechua? This short dark man with scaly iguana-skin just boarded but he´s wearing a White Sox hat. Rob a wayward Chicagoan? I must look like a large feathery mongoose to these people.
11:32a
Just passed a farm with a dirt roof with a pig and chickens running wild. Oh and I´m officially the last person on the bus without a fat wad of coca leaves in my mouth. Even this baby is doing the coca. That or he/she has large poofy baby cheeks (50/50).
11:34a
Three men are hovering over me watching as I write this. They´re either threatened by my writing, curious, or they´ve clearly never seen a large brown feathery mongoose.
11:50a
Wheel teetering thing again. The good news is I´m starting to regain feeling in my toes, which has been absent since sometime yesterday. I either have poor circulation (newly discovered), or living in Southern California does a poor job of exposing brutishly-cold weather maladies.
11:53a
Lots of shrubs n´stuff. How cool is it that this woman sitting next to me is so indigenous looking!? I´m tempted to snap a pic while she´s sleeping. We´d make a great variety act the world over!
11:56a
Shrubs and despondent cactus sightings. The three wise indigenous men have taken to laughing at the difficulty the large elongated brown feathery mongoose is having writing as his pen is slashing all over the page. Later, if I´m famous I plan to sell these papers as vague impressionist sketches (subjects interpretational).
12:02p
Noises coming from below. I think someone stored chickens as cargo (30/70). Amazingly poofy-cheeked baby not crying on alarmingly bumpy road. Definitely on the coca.
12:32p
We just stopped for lunch. Immediately I ran to a bathroom, and basically paid fifty-centsB to pee in a hole. Luckily I didn´t have to waste time washing my hands as there was neither soap nor running water. Everyone was eating at various street stalls. I opted for a potato (black potatoes and dark brown, and regular old potatoes) and rice soup with a cube of meat and fresh cut parsley. Only when the girl wanted to pour the soup there were no more bowls and she took one from a person who just finished, chucked the last potato, took a cloth and wiped the bowl. Er. Soup was delish. Might (purely speculation) need that travel diarrea medicine I packed. Also had fresh squeezed orange juice from another stall. Lunch cost 50cents. One woman told me “cuidate mucho en Potosí, hay muchos ladrones, te matan por diez Bolivianos”. Be very careful in Potosí, there are a lot of thieves and they´ll kill you for ten Bolivianos ($1.25). Comforting. Very comforting. Four hours to Potosí.
4:15p
I´ve made cordial relations with a small sociable fly. Fly, as I like to call it, understands me. It also understands that it likes the ridge of my nose. Fly may not exist soon. Great Siesta! I chatted up one of the three wise indigenous men, on the pre-tense of asking what his tattoo on his hand meant. I´ve seen a few like it already. Military service, one year obligatory, the tat´s not, but we get it, you know? We spent two hours laughing and joking as he switched seats with awesomely indigenous little dark-leatherette. Again, I couldn´t help but thinking, you´re not so different, you and I. Very close to Potosí now. I can see Cerro Rico, a hill that´s been mined for centuries and in it´s heyday made Potosí the richest city in the new world, with a population that exceeded Madrid. It also was responsible for approximately nine million slaves dying over the centuries, working the mines. As high as high gets, feel slightly winded, but otherwise fine.
.
8:17a 6/5/07
Greetings from the highest city in the world! Higher than La Paz (also in Bolivia) and Tibet (not in Bolivia). After a week in Salta aptly named “Salta la Linda” or Salta the beautiful, and getting in some good Northern Argentine cuisine and a couple rejuvenating hikes in the nearby mountains I took an overnight bus to La Quiaca. We arrived at six a.m., frozen over and walked several blocks where you cross a bridge and are officially in Bolivia, in the border town of Villazón. I snapped a couple pics of the persimmons ox-blood colored sunset. Un-doctored. Un-believable. I bought a ticket to Potosí some nine hours away by bumpy dirt roads. To shake off the chill I found a makeshift coffeehouse and sipped piping hot cafés con leche with two Austrians as company. I wrote a poem the other night which I´ll post soon, Commonalities, You and I which basically talks about all these amazing people I meet, and under different circumstances, we could be great friends but we may only have time to have a coffee to share and then we´re off to separate places.
10:19a
I think I got ripped off ten Bolivianos ($1.25) on my seat! This very dark, indigenous, small leather-skinned woman next to me payed ten less. Gringo factor. No bathrooms on the bus! And it´s bumpy. But I´m told we stop every two hours or so. My fingers are cracked dry and my mouth is filled with grit from the dust that´s kicking into the bus. We stopped here in Tupiza, jewel of Bolivia the sign says. The road so far has been breathtaking. From rocky flats, to pebbly cliffs, unconvincing rivers and dynamic cactus plains where mules and donkey freely graze to a backdrop of red rock mountain gorges. How have I been in South America so long and not come here yet? We´re driving bumpy hairpin turns over steep cliffs and the smell of coca leaves permeates the air. Cocaine is produced from a base of coca leaves, here people chew it to ease hunger, for altitude sickness or mild pain, or as a commonplace stimulant. About six hours to the highest city in the world!
11:17a
Dry riverbeds and cascading rock formations and I swear the tire below me has been teetering off the ground at least twice now! Scribbling in my notebook my writing looks like hieroglyphics. I´ve taken a hundred pictures of the landscapes and gone over them three times and can´t get myself to delete even a single one. ´Bout five hours til the highest city in the world, where I´m told I´ll encounter a bone-chilling cold I´ve yet to feel. One brown hoody, check. The bus has stopped. I think a woman wants to come aboard to offer food for sale, trays of meat and potatoes and eggs. She´s speaking to the driver, in a language not Spanish. Quechua? This short dark man with scaly iguana-skin just boarded but he´s wearing a White Sox hat. Rob a wayward Chicagoan? I must look like a large feathery mongoose to these people.
11:32a
Just passed a farm with a dirt roof with a pig and chickens running wild. Oh and I´m officially the last person on the bus without a fat wad of coca leaves in my mouth. Even this baby is doing the coca. That or he/she has large poofy baby cheeks (50/50).
11:34a
Three men are hovering over me watching as I write this. They´re either threatened by my writing, curious, or they´ve clearly never seen a large brown feathery mongoose.
11:50a
Wheel teetering thing again. The good news is I´m starting to regain feeling in my toes, which has been absent since sometime yesterday. I either have poor circulation (newly discovered), or living in Southern California does a poor job of exposing brutishly-cold weather maladies.
11:53a
Lots of shrubs n´stuff. How cool is it that this woman sitting next to me is so indigenous looking!? I´m tempted to snap a pic while she´s sleeping. We´d make a great variety act the world over!
11:56a
Shrubs and despondent cactus sightings. The three wise indigenous men have taken to laughing at the difficulty the large elongated brown feathery mongoose is having writing as his pen is slashing all over the page. Later, if I´m famous I plan to sell these papers as vague impressionist sketches (subjects interpretational).
12:02p
Noises coming from below. I think someone stored chickens as cargo (30/70). Amazingly poofy-cheeked baby not crying on alarmingly bumpy road. Definitely on the coca.
12:32p
We just stopped for lunch. Immediately I ran to a bathroom, and basically paid fifty-centsB to pee in a hole. Luckily I didn´t have to waste time washing my hands as there was neither soap nor running water. Everyone was eating at various street stalls. I opted for a potato (black potatoes and dark brown, and regular old potatoes) and rice soup with a cube of meat and fresh cut parsley. Only when the girl wanted to pour the soup there were no more bowls and she took one from a person who just finished, chucked the last potato, took a cloth and wiped the bowl. Er. Soup was delish. Might (purely speculation) need that travel diarrea medicine I packed. Also had fresh squeezed orange juice from another stall. Lunch cost 50cents. One woman told me “cuidate mucho en Potosí, hay muchos ladrones, te matan por diez Bolivianos”. Be very careful in Potosí, there are a lot of thieves and they´ll kill you for ten Bolivianos ($1.25). Comforting. Very comforting. Four hours to Potosí.
4:15p
I´ve made cordial relations with a small sociable fly. Fly, as I like to call it, understands me. It also understands that it likes the ridge of my nose. Fly may not exist soon. Great Siesta! I chatted up one of the three wise indigenous men, on the pre-tense of asking what his tattoo on his hand meant. I´ve seen a few like it already. Military service, one year obligatory, the tat´s not, but we get it, you know? We spent two hours laughing and joking as he switched seats with awesomely indigenous little dark-leatherette. Again, I couldn´t help but thinking, you´re not so different, you and I. Very close to Potosí now. I can see Cerro Rico, a hill that´s been mined for centuries and in it´s heyday made Potosí the richest city in the new world, with a population that exceeded Madrid. It also was responsible for approximately nine million slaves dying over the centuries, working the mines. As high as high gets, feel slightly winded, but otherwise fine.
.
posted by Matt In The Hat | 8:02 PM
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