Not Angry

I´ve been told that I am sounding angry recently in my blog. And I just wanted to make clear that I am not angry... at all. Yes, there are times when I get annoyed and frustrated and I´ve written about those. This is a pretty crazy experience and there bound to be plenty of those moments. But all in all, I have to say that I´m pretty content. Any angry feeling that may come out of my writing is probably just misconstrued sarcasm. I feel that most people who really know me would get that... that it´s pretty rare for me to be really angry, but you never know. That´s the danger with text. It´s up to the reader to put any spin on it they want. I feel, regrettably, that this blog is already super censored... for fear of offending anyone about anything!

Bolivian Oblivian

Now I consider myself to be a pretty mellow, laid back sort of person. Not much really gets me too upset or bothered. I have even been called oblivious on several occasions (with the nick name Oblivia) to things that are going on around me. But Bolivians take it to a whole other level. Whether it´s the dogs barking and tearing each other apart in the middle of the night, children screaming and fighting, obnoxious drivers with their horns, water overflowing from the tank on top of the house for an entire day, a drunk passed out in the middle of the sidewalk... Bolivians just don´t seem to notice or get annoyed by these things.

Dogs can bark for hours at nothing and nobody will yell at them to shut up...ever! I have never heard anyone at my house yell at the dogs to be quite. And a spooked chicken can be running around going bizurk for an hour and nobody seems to mind. Where I´m about ready to kill the chicken myself. And I don´t want to say that Bolivian parents ignore their kids or anything, but jezz... their kids can be screaming or otherwise doing very obnoxious things like fighting with other kids or destroying something five feet away from their parents or teachers and they don´t yell at them to knock it off. And if they do yell at them it´s like half an hour later than you would expect it. One of the first experiences I had with my host family was one such instance. We were sitting around the table drinking tea and making small talk while Paulo my ten year old host brother is sawing a pen in half with a dinner knife. It was pretty distracting I kept looking from Paulo to Ana and back to Paulo waiting for her to tell him to quit it, but it never happened. This went on for like twenty minutes. Well... maybe Doña Ana is more oblivious than most, but I´ve witnessed plenty of other scenes like this. At the Internet place where I´m writing this the woman who works here often brings her little daughter and half the time the girl is pounding on the keyboards or drawing on the walls. And the mom does nothing. Even in the class rooms while the teacher is there the kids are wailing on each other and finally after ten minutes the teacher will tell them to cut it out. And as a side note, I´ve noticed that the kids are kind of aggressive here. I don´t really have that much experience with kids so I don´t really know how much rough housing is ¨normal¨, but it seems like the kids (the girls too) are always hitting or knocking each other down if not in an all out battle. It´s kind of disturbing.

Then there´s the drunks... while alcoholism is a families´s dirty little secret in the states, it´s very public here. It is not unusual at all to find someone passed out in the middle of the day using the sidewalk for a pillow. I have seen men laying awkwardly face down with their limbs twisted in weird positions, like they´ve just suffered from a narcoleptic attack while walking down the street. I have even seen a man passed out on a little bridge with the bike he was riding still between his legs and his pants pulled down to his knees. And you wouldn´t believe how many drunks I´ve seen walking around with wet pants. And when people pass them you don´t even seem to get the head shaking and finger pointing you would expect. They just simply walk over or around them. And when people get really smashed at parties there is no one telling the drunk guy to slow down, stop being an idiot or even to go home. ¨Oh he´s just drunk.¨

Then there´s the all the little things. Like the ridiculous use of the horn here. A cab driver looking for a passenger will honk at every person walking down the street. To those obviously not looking for a cab. Then when someone stops in front of someones house to pick them up they will honk obnoxiously until the person comes out. Not one or two soft honks but loud, long, repeated honks. There is a garbage truck that passes through the neighborhood at about six in the morning a few times a week. And the truck blasts it´s horn seriously every thirty seconds. And it is loud! You would think that one soft honk every block or so would do it seeing as it´s so damn early in the morning there is little other sound or movement going on. But no... every thirty seconds. And then there´s the sound of water splashing down the side of the house for an entire day, or a door banging in the wind...am I really the only one hearing these things?

I sometimes wonder if I´m getting more uptight over here or it´s just that I was less exposed to situations that seem so obviously annoying the states. Or maybe when I get back nothing will bother me at all! I guess I won´t really know until I go home.

**The whole point I was trying to get at here but didn´t have time to elaborate (I only had so many B´s on me) was that Bolivians have a much higher tolerance for behaviors or situations that, in my opinion, would annoy most Americans. They simply just don´t get worked up about things the way we would. In some respects I think this is a good thing. It´s true that we do spend too much time sweating the small stuff. But for others... especially the alcohol issue, I think it´s a really bad idea to be so indifferent. This is just something I´ve been thinking about lately. It is a generalization about one of the differences between Bolivians and Americans that I´ve observed and, with all generalizations, there are exceptions.

Summer time

This is my abode windowless house. Haha... just kidding! My room is actually pretty sweet by PC standards. I don't want to put any pictures up cause I don't want people getting jealous..heehee. This is actually the view from outside my door into the backyard where we have several stunning Lapacho in bloom. There are three varieties- yellow, purple and white. My personal favorite is the yellow. The drive from Bermejo to Tarija is particularly gorgeous these days with all the yellow, purple and white splashed on the mountains. While the blooming of the Lapacho is beautiful it is also sort of bitter sweet because it flowers for such a short period of time... about two weeks.

The Lapacho is in bloom and just like that summer is upon us. It seems just like last week I was I was telling myself ¨All right... I´m ready for summer. Bring it on. No more of this freezing my ass off in the shower anymore.¨ Oh wait... that was just last week. Well for better or worse I got what I wanted. Out of nowhere the heat and humidity crept up on us last Monday. I just looked up Bermejo on the weather channel (that´s right... it´s got it´s own page http://espanol.weather.com/weather/local/BLXX0030?letter=B so when the weather is especially nasty wherever you are you can look up Bermejo and tell yourself ¨Well..at least I´m not there!¨) and it is currently 36C (97 F) with humidity of 28%. And this is just the beginning! I´ve been told in doesn´t cool down until Feb! I see a lot of sitting directly in front of the fan in my future. Well maybe the heat will make make sweat off a few of those extra pounds (which actually is more like 10!).

Home sweet home...

Not gonna lie. Most of Bermejo is pretty grungy...but here are some of it´s prettier parts.

This is the plaza in the center of the ¨main strip¨. I live about a ten minute walk away. There´s a nice fountain (with no water) and some benches to relax. The big trees in the back ground are recovering from being recently pruned. A process in which it basically gets it´s head chopped off. They literally just saw off the top part of the tree at the trunk. This is one of those Bolivian things that is just maddening. WHY DO YOU DO THIS!?! There are these big beautiful trees everywhere in the city that are pruned down to nothing but the trunk.

The lovely Rio Bermejo. The boats are called ¨chalanas¨ and carry people and goods back and forth between Aguas Blancas, Arg. and Bermejo, Boivia. There is a bridge crossing about 3km upstream. The river is pretty low right now, but we have lots of tubing trips planed for the summer when it warms up and we get some rain.

More pictures soon!

¡Donde hay trabajo!

A class of second graders with their coloring book "Juan Bota Todo" read more below.

A class of seventh graders after a charla on "El Efecto Invernadero y Cambio Climatico" (The Green House Effect and Climate Change)... ya pretty heavy stuff considering my spanish, but it went alright. By the way... I did not try to talk about chlorofluorocarbons (which is written on the corner of the board). That was the profe's two cents. I tried to keep it a little simpler than that.

A class of second graders with their coloring book "Juan Bota Todo" about a mean old man who throws all of his garbage into the street and stream. The kids were actually pretty excited to get their own books. We read the book out loud together and talked about what you should and shouldn't do with the trash. I'm going to check back with the kids next week to check their coloring.

Yay...I am finally working! I feel like the biggest slacker saying I´m just getting started working now. But it isn´t entirely my fault it took me so long to get started. First off, PC tells us that we are´nt really expected to do much but settle in and integrate the first three months in site. And my boss, the program director of Natural Resources/Environmental Ed., had told me to hold off going into the schools and having charlas and whatnot until winter vacation was over. Winter vacations ended late July then I had Project Meeting and IST and was away from my site for nearly two weeks. But during my first three months I did have plenty of meetings with directors and teachers trying to plan future activities. Man... that was a trying experience! I have already explained some of my frustrations with that process previously. Since then I have learned that I need to bring in actual materials to show the teachers. Talking generally about what I would like to do, being really flexible and hoping the teachers would have suggestions or ideas of their own doesn´t work. Even explaining that I have this really lindo story ¨El Lorax¨ and I want to read it to the kids and do some activities and talk about the environmental theme doesn´t really get them too excited, but as soon as I brought in a cheap photocopy of the story they´re like ohhh....ahhh.... all the kids should have a copy of this! It sounds pretty simple and now I´m like duh... why didn´t I just do that in the first place, but hey no one told me these things!

A few of my housemates are teachers and they were telling me that the school district provides virtually no materials for the schools. The kids have to pay for their textbooks to be photocopied. The school district provides chalk... nada mas. They were asking me what the schools we´re like in the states and I almost felt guilty explaining that all textbooks are provided by the school district and there´s usually plenty of other materials available. I didn´t mention anything about computer labs, chemistry equipment... and everything else we have. I tried to ¨justify¨ having all these things buy saying ¨ We´ll...we pay a lot of taxes¨ like that´s a valid reason why we have all this stuff and they don´t. It always makes me sort of uncomfortable when people start to ask how things are in the states... especially when they are clearly a lot better. I always downplay everything because well... it´s hard to explain...there´s always the guilt thing and I guess I don´t want everyone to think that all Americans are spoiled brats... even though generally speaking we are. Anyways, I told them I felt really bad about the lack of materials available in the schools and now I´m going to try and make getting more educational materials one of my top priorities.

¨Salta la Linda¨

¨El Coronado¨ umm...I think that´s what it´s called. A neat old colonial builing that has a cute museum inside.

¨El Catedral¨a very gawdy, but very striking cathedral off the main plaza.

The very pretty main plaza surrounded by trendy restaurants, coffee shops and beautiful arquitecture.

Soo cute! A mini pony and an alpaca... just hanging out on the streets of Salta. I love minature animals!

I have just returned from my first vacation in Salta, Argentina. All the volunteers in Tarija rave about Salta, but at the same time joke about how you know you´ve been in Bolivia too long if Salta becomes an exotic destination. And I guess I have been in Bolivia too long because yes... I thought it was pretty sweet.

The vacation didn´t go exactly as planed. First off, the two girls I was supposed to go with bailed on me last minute leaving me no time to find anyone else to travel with. I decided to go anyways because one, after six months of not being allowed to travel I really felt like I just needed to get out and finally take advantage of this amazing opportunity to explore. And two, I was planning to meet up with an Argentinean ¨aquantance¨ I had meet at a music festival a month or so earlier that was going to show me all around the city and the country side. We barely had the chance to hang out when he got a call for a last minute show in northern Argentina, five hours away. So that was kind of a bummer. We were planning on checking out his home town which is supposed to be a cute colonial village and the vineyards of La Cafayate. So instead I spent the day wandering around the city, had a nice dinner by myself and called it a night.

I tried to get in contact with him the next morning hoping to squeeze in a quick trip to the country side, but I couldn´t get a hold of him. I think his phone was screwed up or didn´t have any credit or whatever. So I sent an email hoping he´d think to check it. All told, I wasted practically the whole day waiting in vain at the hostel, hoping he would show up. He never showed and I haven´t heard from him since!! I really couldn´t believe it because the night before he was confesing his love for me. These latin men are so passionate!! You really can´t take them too seriously. Me and my gringo friends have come to the conclusion that ¨I am in love with you¨ in latin america is really the equivalent of ¨I am sort of attracted to you¨ in the states. So it´s a mystery what happened to him. But it really wasn´t so tragic after all because it wasn´t much of a love connection anyways.

But things started to turn around... I meet three very attractive southern argentineans and made dinner with them at the hostel. Their accent was so different from what I´m used to in Bolivia. Even though I could barely understand them I loved it! It made me really want to visit southern argentina and learn how to speak like that... and maybe meet some more blue eyed, dark haired, educated, good looking men. Anyways, by that point I was hoping that the other guy didn´t show up because I was having such a good time with my new friends. We ended up going out later that night. At like two o´clock in the morning! Argentineans like to party late. And had a good time.. so at least it ended on a high note. It was really nice to have a capuchino in a trendy coffee shop on the plaza and imagine the people next to you are having some intelectual discussion on politics or what have you. And the variety of restaurants and night life blows away anything in Tarija. And I hear that there´s a mall with a McDonald´s that I missed!! For some reason now that it´s not available... McDonald´s sounds incredible! Next time...

It´s name was Tunari

Natural Resources and Environmental Education Project Meeting. We got to spend the night in a super lujo (lux) hotel.

View from the summit. The mountains of La Paz in the distance!!

A cristal clear lake at ~15,00 ft.

Yeeesss!!! The summit!!

Remember the expression ¨kickin´ ass and takin´ names¨? We´ll...it´s name was Tunari. A bunch of us from B-44 took the free weekend between project meeting and IST to climb Mt. Tunari, the highest mountain in central Bolivia. At 16,600 ft. it was definitely the highest I have ever been in my life and probably the most difficult hike (endurance wise) I have ever done. The hike itself is not really that technical, but the elevation makes puting two feet infront of you difficult enough. We took a truffi up as far as it could go and began the hike at about 14,500 ft. at 8:00 in the morning. We stumbled back to the truffi at about 5:00 in the evening.

As soon as you start to climb you immediately feel the effects of the elevation. For the very last strech to the summit I literally could not take five steps without having to rest and catch my breath again. I was very surprised I was able to make it at all, coming from 400 m in Bermejo. The only problem I had was with my damn contacts. Sunscreen and sweat along with plenty of dust got into my eyes. And I think the contacts only helped to trap them all in. Making my eyes water and burn for about half of the day. So it was a slow go to the top, but totally worth it! It was an absolutely gorgeous day with very few clouds in the sky. We could see the snow capped mountain range surrounding La Paz in the distance! We were all worried about the cold since it is the middle of winter, but it turned out to be a lovely day. It was kind of a bummer that all the llamas were lower down on the mountain and we didn´t get to hike with them. They´re really the coolest creatures. Very inquisitve and calm with there big pretty eyes and narly dreadlocks. I really want to bond with a llama to complete my Tunari experience ...haha... next time...