From Iguazu to Corumba

From Iguazu Falls to Corumba and everything in between, I had nothing short of a heavenly time. I met wonderful people from all four corners of the world, visited unforgettable spots and for the first time ever in any trip I ever made, I was left with a feeling I could come back for more.

I keep finding myself thinking about Bariloche all the time. I want to go back and trek again at Chalten, Los Alerces and Bariloche. Maybe at some other time I will go to Torres del Paine after all, as well as San Martin and San Junin de Los Andes.

It is funny how I set out to see the Moreno Glaciar and Torres del Paine, then shoot straight North to Peru. Instead of that I found myself captivated by Argentina and never made it to Torres or Peru.

Argentina was amazing, not one bad thing to say about it. From its spectacular nature to its warm and receptive people, it is a country that is easy to fall for.

Being from Brazil makes it easy for me to go back there, and I can't wait to do so.

As for my next trip, I hope to be off to Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam. It will hopefully happen in 2005, if all goes well.

I end this diary, the story of a recorrido, rejuvenated. Four months or so of road were wonderful to me. My spirit is high and I am fully ready to embark on a new stage of my life. Once again, I feel reassured that traveling is an intrinsic part of me.

I wonder what kinda of places I will have seen when I am finally too old to travel (if I ever get that old). What kind of people I will have met and most importantly, what kind of person will all this traveling turn me into.

La Paz Airplane Station

La Paz airport is so tiny it doesn't really qualify as an airport, it is more like a bus station with planes.

In all fairness, it is like that because the altitude makes it difficult for planes to land there. The air is too thin to support big planes and the largest plane that is able to land there is a 727, which was the one I took.

There had been some problem with some emergency landing and my flight was delayed for over 3 hours. After a stop over in Santa Cruz to switch planes, I made it to Puerto Suarez, on the Brazilian border, at 7pm at nite.

Border towns give the creeps and this one was no different. The hostel here was he most expensive I had stayed in in all of Bolivia. After spending an uneventful night in Puerto Suarez, I crossed the border into Brazil. It was strange to read street signs in Portuguese. I would read them and try to make sense of them, even though I had already understood them.

A twenty hour bus ride separated me from my place. The bus was ride was fine. Not as good as in Argentina but infinitely better than in Bolivia. Border police was the rudest one I encountered in all of my trip. They were very rude to everyone on the bus, specially to Bolivians. Police in Brazil, and in South America in general, is hard to trust or feel comfortable around.

Bumming in La Paz

Having bought my ticket, I had nothing to do for like a week. I figured I would bum around, walk to places and take pictures. Knowing I was very close to making it home made it easy on me. I had been very irritable and impatient but I was no longer. I used my left over time to digest some of La Paz's sights and sounds.

One day I went to the valle de la Luna, a valley with rock formations. It was less impressive than what I expected but it was fun nonetheless. After a few pictures, I headed back to the city.

I had been eating at downtown's comedor publico the entire time. it was actually quite good. For seventy cents you would get a meal soup and another dish (albondigas or pollo dorado: meat balls or golden chicken)

As always, the hostel was packed with Israelis.

After buying gifts for my family. I was ready to take my flight and go home.

Making it Easy on Me

After having found a place to stay, I went to this internet place to check my mail. To my surprise I found a group of Brazilian there, all desperate to get to Peru.

In general, Brazilians are horrible travelers. They never backpack, never share a room or much less a bathroom. If you are not in Miami, Paris or Rome, finding a Brazilian is a real rarity... not that I miss'em.

Anyways, they were desperate because of some supposed strike. Since I couldnt make up mind about either going to Cusco or going home, the people at Llave decided to make that decision on my behalf. Just a little past the Peruvian border, the citizens of Llave built a road block in an attempt to get the mayor out of office.

That meant no one could cross to Puno and make it to Cusco. It was beyond me. I couldnt get there even if I wanted to. Peru was no longer accessible at least for another week or so.

I heard what these Brazilians had to say and went on to check with the Bolivian border patrol. As soon as I heard it was true, I was on the first bus back to La Paz. Two hours after I made it town, I had my ticket back to Brazil.

Home was less than a week away.

The Last Breath I Could Muster

After a week or so of laying low in La Paz, I figured I would give it a shot and crawl my way to Peru. I took a bus to Copacabana, three hours away from La Paz.

The city of La Paz is an interesting one and riding out of it is an experience in itself. La Paz stands on what can be described as a canyon. There is a flat top part, a hilly part and a flat bottom part.

The top part, called el Alto, is the poorest. The day I decided to ride out of la Paz into Copacabana, there was a swap meet going on. You would be amazed at what Bolivians manage to fit in a bus. Bed frames, tvs, rocking chairs, anything they bought at the swap meet will have to go in the bus. It is amazing what they will do to a back pack. They will toss it around, flip'em over, place them upside down, fold them... whatever it takes so they can jam another random thing in the bus.

I was freaking out about my backpack the entire time but we made it to Copacabana in one piece.

Copacabana was really nice, with a big church that was impressive. Multi colored tiles cover its domes, making it look very much like a Turkish mosque, or at least what I have seen on pictures.

Lake Titicaca, a holy place of Aztecs, Incas and Mayas, is not actually that impressive on account. The thing is people can't perceive altitude in front of a lake and therefore the highest navigable lake on earth (which is impressive) becomes just another lake on earth (which is not that impressive)

One thing did catch up with me, the change of country. Whenever you change countries, there is a change in spices, bacteria or whatever it is that you drink in the water or eat in food. Eventually, you stomach catches up to it... big time.

I got really really sick and basically got stuck in the hostel I was at.

It was holy Friday and prices on the hostel were going up from 10 Bolivianos to 20 U$, 2o times the original price.

I figured I would keep my cool and go seat for a new hostel that didnt want to gauge my eyes out but it is hard to keep your cool when your stomach is acting up on your. I eventually found a spot that was willing to charge me the same price all through the holiday. It was dingy,dirty, musty and ugly. I had already paid for one more night at my current hostel so I told the lady I would come back in the morning.

La Paz

There was still the matter of La Paz. I was there so I might as well enjoy it. I actually like La Paz quite a lot. It does have its charms, in avery questionable way. Just like every big city, there is plenty of stuff for one to do, but mainly cosmopolitan stuff, like going shopping or going to the movies...

And that I did. I went to grocery stores and saw two movies I really wanted to see. Mistic River and Some's Gotta Give. I bought a whole bunch of stupid little things at the local markets, I walked around. Mostly, I thought about my family, my unborn nephew Pedro, my new life in Baton Rouge and Capoera.

I was at La Paz and I was in peace. One day I was walking one of La Paz's many market when I looked down my hands and realized I had very beautiful fingers.

In Brazil, a country of many ups and downs, there is a saying that helps people cope with their losses:

"Nessa vida, vao-se os aneis mas ficam os dedos."

In life, we may loose our rings, but we get to keep our fingers.

This saying makes an obvious reference to the loss of wealth and the findings of oneself, represented by what is often hidden by our material possessions.

Sometimes in order to see ourselves for what we really are, we need to strip ourselves of our material possessions and see what we are made of. It is a scary but revealing experience. Do it, and you may find that your bare fingers may actually glitter brighter than your expensive golden rings.

I was walking the markets, contemplating about my shifts in life and my new upcoming challenges. I was about to embark on a new stage, where I will have to live on less than 1000 U$ a month. I will have to work hard, but my ass for five years so that new doors can open for me.

The ride here, from that January 5th, 1995, has been miraculous. Almost 19 years have passed an I am a whole new person. My fingers are bare, my nails are long and dirty, their skin is crackled dry and of many colors. Cold and altitude have taken a huge toll on my cuticles. Nevertheless, my fingers have never looked so beautiful. I am at peace in La Paz.

Time is up

This bus ride did it for me. My time was up and my batteries had died again. There was no fridge that was going to revive them. I wanted to go home.

I was struggling with the idea of not making it to Matchu Pitchu, my initial traveling goal. It is a place I obviously want to visit, but I felt I would spoil my visit by going only because I had to , or because I had made it that far. I wanted to see it with a fresh and invigorated perspective.

Besides, three months after my departure from the Barra Funda bus station in Sao Paulo, a lot had changed. I was officially a graduate student and no longer an applicant. Twenty pounds light, I had discovered camping, trekking and fishing, not to mention I had rekindled my sky watching interests.

This trip had given me much more than whatever I could ever have planned. It was okay not to go to Matchu Pitchu. It was time I headed back.

Enjoy Coca Cola

If I were a Jehovah's witness and I had to convince people to come to my church, I would get a list of people who had travelled in Bolivia, and tell'em if they didn't join our congregation they would be doomed to an eternal hell of riding a Bolivian bus.... from La Paz to Uyuni and back ...forever.

Knowing what the ride is like there is no way they wouldn't join.

Come to think of it, I should rewrite Dante's Divine comedy, reevaluating the various states of hell. Next to the hell of liars and cheaters there would be the hell for backpackers: a never ending Bolivian bus ride, complete with Cholas, chickens, all nite crying babies, backpacks falling off the roof of the bus and no coca-cola what so ever.

Anyways, where was I. Ohhh, Tal and I boarded our bus ride to La Paz.

The bus absolutely stank, it was ten times worst than the worst Laidlaw school bus you ever rode in. I was old, with bald tires and cracked windows. Seats had patched holes or straight out holes on them. There were peole sitting down, people standing up and other just comfortably sleeping on the floor.

I wanted to know what they were on. I'd bottle it, sell it and make a fortune out of it. If there is something you can take that will make you sleep on the floor on this bus, it can make you sleep anywhere.

After riding for seven hours, I was dieing to go to the bathroom for a quick #1. I had waited for the next stop to come, but apparently Bolivians don't concern themselves with such trivial matters like bodily functions. I got up and hopped over three of four people before making it to the driver. My effort was all in vain, as this guy did a better job at ignoring me than Republicans do at ignoring Black voters or Arizona cops ignoring Latino people's rights. For half an hour I begged this guy to pull over so I could ease my pain, but it was wall in vain.

Resolute in my decision to do something, I tried to make it back to my seat without pissing my pants. As I held onto the overhead luggage compartment in an attempt to balance myself, I accidently grabbed on to a coca-cola bottle. A bright light immediately lit inside my head. I was free at last.

I didnt care about whose bottle it was or if it was empty or full. I just grabbed it and rushed to my seat. It was pitch black inside the bus, making for a perfect crime scene.

2 minutes and almost a quart later, I was the happiest most relieved guy on earth. Ohhh man did I enjoy my coca-cola

Never in a million years did the marketing folks at coca-cola could have though that the phrase enjoy coca-cola would be used in this context.

Cheap Bastard !!!!!

I hate prejudices and stereotypes, one of the reasons I spend so much of my time, money and patience traveling around is so I can become more and more aware of how people live. Constantly getting myself out of my comfort zone has forced me to become more receptive and less judgmental.

Some people, however, make it really hard for me not to just go to those long lived stereotypes that are perpetuated generation after generation.

Some lady had offered us a direct bus ticket to La Paz for forty Bolivianos, while all the other companies only charged thirty five. Tal, my jewish traveling companion, went on a mission to bring the price down from 40 to 35.

All I wanted was to buy the darn ticket and go walk around, but paying the entire forty Bolivianos, argued Tal, messed up his game plan to get the price down.

We must remain a united front, he said

You understand you are arguing over fifty cents of a dollar ?

It is the principle that counts, he replied.

Come on dude... it is fifty cents. I was losing it

She is about to crack

I had to sit there for 20 minutes, listening to his broken Spanish attempts to drive down the price

You are a cheap bastard, you know that? I said to him

If you do this every time... he continued ... you end up saving 100 dollars over six months. I've done the math. he gloated.

Yes, I thought. That is true, but you will also end up with absolutely no one willing to travel with you !!!!!

One more minute and she will cave

It was unbelievable. After twenty solid minutes of annoying arguments, the lady finally caved.

You give jews a bad name !!! I poked him a little bit.

I may give'em a bad name, but I did get that discount, didn't I?

When it was time to pay, the lady didn't have change for my fifty bolivianos so I told'er to just keep the change, just to spite him a little bit.

He shook his head in betrayal !!!!