Darren in South America

Witches

2007-11-22T18:29:00.001-08:00

The Lonely Planet guide book describes a small section of La Paz as being the Witches Market. Here you can find dried Llama fetuses, potions, and offerings to burn. What the guide book doesn’t tell you is that there is a much larger, far more interesting Witches Market above La Paz in the poor neighborhood of El Alto.

El Also began as the shanty town that grew up outside the city. It has grown very large and is now a suburb of La Paz. It is the poorer part of town, but , being on the rim of the valley that surrounds La Paz, El Alto has a fantastic view of the La Paz.

Being the poorer part of town, it has a host of fun and interesting markets you won’t find downtown. The ‘real’ Witches Market is one of these places. The street is unpaved and lines with shabby little huts. In front of each hut is a little wood burning stove where they place offerings to be burnt. In front of many of the huts is a sign describing the services offered. You can have advice on buying a new car, or love potions made, information on your next travel or how the weather will affect your business.

People here didn’t want to be photographed, but I did manage to sneak a few shots.

More images from this series can be found on my web album.

Condos for the Dead

2007-11-22T18:20:00.000-08:00

All cemeteries have their own personality. The architecture of La Paz cemetery gives it its character. Many of the building look like apartment building designed in the 70s. Some building looks as if sections were added on without any plans or any forethought. Walking thru the streets of this cemetery remind me of walking thru a semi run down section of old town Pomona (a suburb of Los Angeles). Even this village for the dead has its nice parts and its slums.

Families hire the many workmen to close, upgrade, or repair a vault. The workers have their own storage area on the edge of the cemetery. When hired, they would take their wheel barrel, tools, cement and other supplies to the vault where the family would site and watch them work. Many workers were busy adding tiles, replacing broken glass, and plastering the front of a vault.

More images from this series can be found on my web album.

Out of the Blue

2007-11-22T18:19:00.000-08:00

Place yourself half way around the globe in a country you have never been before in a city you have never thought much about. Walk down a random street in this city on a random day at a random time. You look down the street and you see someone you know. What are the chances of this? Very slim. This is what happened yesterday.

In the city of La Paz, in the country of Bolivia, on a random street, I saw a friend of mine from Amsterdam. Neither of us knew the other would be traveling in that country or at that time.
We spent the day together and went drinking in the evening at a discotheque where only locals frequented. We danced with some locals girls who invited us onto the dance floor. We both had too many beers and found ourselves staggering and crawling back to our hostels.
Aside from the hang over in the morning, I had a great day.

Don’t splash!

2007-11-22T18:18:00.000-08:00

Hot water is not something you take for granted in Peru or Bolivia. When you go to a new hotel or hostel, you always ask if they have ‘agua calentie’ (hot water). Even when they say they do, doesn’t mean you will get a hot shower. If they have a hot water tank, you have to be one of the first people to shower.

The most reliable hot water system is the hot water on demand systems that use electricity. The shower head is a melon sized unit with two electrical wires running from it to a power source hidden somewhere in the wall. The system work by heating the water as it passes thru the shower head. If the water runs thru the shower head too quickly, the electric heater cannot heat all the water quick enough. Therefore, low water pressure equals hot water and high water pressure is cold water.

The creepy part of this system is the electrical wires attached to the shower head. What happens if the shower head gets wet? Some people have said they felt a slight jolt when using this system. I felt a jolt once when I tried to adjust the setting on a unit in Puno, Peru (the shower head has high, medium, and low setting you can adjust). Having the wires there is a little unsettling.

In my current hostel in La Paz, Bolivia, the showers use this same system. Here, however, it is a bit creepier. Inside each shower stall, to the left of the shower heads, is a 220 volt switch to turn off the power to the shower head. This switch is not water proof. You can see the wires attached to the bottom.

When I shower, I try not to splash.

Traffic!

2007-11-22T18:17:00.000-08:00

Public transportation in Bolivia and Peru consist of busses. Outside of Lima, the most common busses are the small mini vans that were so popular in the USA before SUVs. These mini vans can hold about up to 23 passengers when they are squeezed in. In addition to the passengers is a person operating the side door. This person’s job is to let people in and out, collect the money, and to yell the names of the destinations. Every one of these guys screams out the name so fast you cannot recognize them. Luckily, in La Paz, they have cards in the windshield with the destinations written on them.

There are so many of these mini vans that if you miss one, you can easily wait 30 seconds for the next one. I figure they must all be independent. The massive number of the vans, mixed in with larger busses, taxies, and private cars, fill the streets completely. If you combine the number of vehicles and the lack of strict traffic laws, you have comic driving conditions.

In La Paz, there are few traffic lights or stop signs. At intersections, drives honk to alert unseen cross traffic of their speedy approach. When there are cars coming from several directions at an intersection, the cars just rush into the intersection and force their way thru. Cars are cutting each other off regularly. They force themselves between other cars and they never pay any attention to pedestrians.

The remarkable thing about this system is how efficient it is. It is loud with everyone honking, but the traffic flows. Amazingly, I have not yet seen an accident. I have a theory why there are so few accidents. Drivers here think and pay attention. They don’t have a concept of ‘right-of-way’. Nobody has priority. Each driver knows that another car can appear at any time from anywhere to compete for space.

This made me think about the system that exists in the USA. In the USA, drivers believe they are entitled to their space on the road. This space cannot be violated. People defend this space. When their space is invaded, road-rage is the result. It can be considered a slightly arrogant system. When you combine the idea of personal space on the road with lawyers, you get a system where people stop thinking for themselves; they drive on auto-pilot and don’t take responsibility for their own actions. Problems are solved by calling a lawyer. I know this is a very critical view of the traffic system in the system in the USA does work very well.

Both systems (USA and South American) work, but are completely different incompatible with each other. Put a driver from one system into the other system and there will be problems. What drivers would you think are better?

Juicy!

2007-11-22T18:14:00.000-08:00

Each morning in La Paz I have gone out for breakfast. I wonder to the market where the fruit sells seem to live. There I find the juice ladies who blend fruit for people. Yesterday, for only 60 cents, I had a large (pitcher size) glass of orange and banana juice. It was delicious. That much juice in your stomach tends to fill you up completely and leaves little room for food. One chicken or beef pastry is enough to fill me up.

Yesterday afternoon I had another, smaller, glass of juice that contained oranges, a banana, and several strawberries. Wonderful!!!!

I think I rate countries by their juices. In Thailand they have wonderful juices you can buy on almost any corner. Their watermelon juice is perfect! In Egypt, they blend juices for a few pennies per glass. Sugar cane juice is also common, and delicious, in Egypt.

In the USA, England, or The Netherlands, fresh juice is usually a do-it-yourself job. There are a few restaurants with an orange juice press, but nothing more than that.

I always miss these little juice stands when they are not around.

Crossing Lake Titicaca

2007-11-19T04:37:00.000-08:00

Instead of building a bridge of steel or stone, they built one out of barges. To make the short crossing of Lake Titcaca on the road from Copacabana to La Paz, at least 30 barges are used. Each one can hold a buss and a large car. They fight for position on the shores and bump into each other as the pull away.

The motors on the barges are simple 50hp outboards motors. On the barge carrying my buss, the motor had to be started manually by removing the cover and winding a rope around the starter. Once the buss was in place, the driver could not see the other end of the barge. He would walk away from the motor, look around the buss, and return to correct his path.

When docking and pulling away from the dock, several people with poles would direct the end of the barge into place. If the barge got stuck in the sand, they would all use the poles to push away from the shore and try again.

While on the water, the busses would rock back and forth with the waves. I noticed that nobody was brave enough to sit or stand next to the busses. Everyone would crown at the end of the boat away from the busses.

More images can be found on my web album.

Monastery of Santa Catalina

2007-11-19T04:30:00.000-08:00

I am highly suspicious of the Catholic Church. I believe they spend more money on themselves then they do on helping other people. However, their corruption has given the world countless treasures in art and architecture. The Monastery of Santa Catalina is one of these treasures.

This monastery had been closed to the public since its creation in the 1500s. Lucky for us God decided it was time the public had a chance to look inside. In 1957, he sent a little earthquake to shake the doors open. They monastery could not afford to repair the damage itself, so it had to turn to the public. In exchange for helping rebuild, the Monastery had to be opened up. Their misfortune is our fortune.

Santa Catalina is a city within the city of Arequipa, Peru. It has several streets, chapels, museums, and cafes. All the building are built with white volcanic stone from the local area. Most of it has been painted bright red, blue or yellow. Most of the kitchens are natural stone covered in black soot. The overall affect is beautiful. You walk back in time when you walk thru these streets and buildings. Only a few locations in Spain rival the beauty of this monastery.

More images can be found in my web album.

Hey Mr. Shoe String

2007-11-19T04:25:00.000-08:00

There have been many times when I needed something simple, like replacement shoe strings, but could not find a store that had what I needed. Amsterdam seems to be city where products are pre-selected for the public. If for some strange reason you want something that has not been pre-selected for you, then you are out of luck.

I was unfortunate enough to have a pair of shoes whose laces were on the un-selected list. The laces could not be found and I eventually gave up. The other day in Arequipa, Peru, I stumbled across a super man of hard-to-find items. This man carried double his body weight in shoe laces. Never before had I seen such a vast selection.

As I have always noticed, you only find someone like this when you don’t need him. I was wearing sandals.

Switch backs

2007-11-14T06:51:00.000-08:00

The over priced train from Cuzco to Machu Picchu climbs out of the Cuzco valley and follows the river to Machu Picchu. The river course is simple and uneventful. Climbing out of the Cuzco valley is the amusing part. Busses can use switch back to climb a steep grade. Trains must have a wide rounded curve to switch directions... so I thought. This train uses switch backs to exit and enter the Cuzco valley. The train would have to completely circle the valley to exit because there is no room for rounded curves on the slopes. I was very impressed with their solution.

When we entered the valley last night at 21:00, we could see the bright lights of the main square below us on the left. Then the train stopped... and reversed. I was sitting in the last car on the train. I turned around to see what we were doing and saw the back door open with one of the conductors in the door way with a flashlight pointed down the track. Eventually the train slowed and stopped a few feet from where the track ended. A post with a reflective marker stood just outside the door. The man then closed the door, spoke into his radio, an the train started in the opposite direction.

On the second to last switch back the train stopped while moving in the reverse direction. The conductor holding the flash light yelled at a man standing next to a car that was blocking the tracks. There was a brief verbal argument and the man finally moved his car and the train continued.

Both sides of the tracks during on the switch backs were lined with residential housing. From the condition of the houses and the area, it was poor housing. Dogs would bark at the train and some would even chase it. The roads crossing the tracks had no guards to stop the traffic. The train would blow its very loud whistle and the cars would skid to a stop before the tracks.
There were 4 switch backs before we reached the train station. When we did pull into the station, the train was parked behind another train. We had to climb down from the train and walk thru the train yard to the platform an thru then thru the station to the hungry taxi drivers who were charging double the normal rated.

Going to Machu Pichu

2007-11-13T09:16:00.000-08:00

I strongly believe that the reason many tourists locations are so expensive is revenge. The money they charge to get to and then into Machu Pichu is nothing more than theft. Yet we sill go there and we give them the ransom.

There are 2 way to reach Machu Picho. One is by hiking over land for 4 days and arrive at the site from above. However, do to this hick, you have you make a reservation day to weeks in advance and pay a lot of money. $200 is what I heard from one group.

The second way is to go to Agua Caliente (named after the hot springs located at the town) by train from Cuzco, and then take a buss to the site from the town. The train costs $80 (return trip). You can fly across Peru for $80. I cannot think of any reason this should be so high. Once you reach the town at the town, you must take a buss to the site. The buss ride is only 15 to 20 minutes and costs $12 for the return trip. I concede that parking a car at a similar location would cost about the same as the buss.

Once you arrive at Machu Pichu, the entrance ticket costs you $40. But this is not all. You have to spend at least 2 days in the area to see the sight because the train times are poor. If you add up all the costs, going to Machu Pichu will cost about $200. About the same as hiking 4 days, but taking half the time.

I don´t mind paying a high price to enter the sight since the money goes to maintain the site and to help restore many parts of it. But the $80 theft for the train ticket is ridiculous.
I had to get that out of my system. Thanks for listening. ;)
All that aside, Machu Pichu is spectacular. You must get there on the first buss and watch the sun rise over the hills behind you and light the city. The fog will melt away before you and the other mountains revealed. You can sit for hours and watch the light and shadows move across the buildings and mountains.

My favorite part of the city was the large tree in the central square. I doubt it was there when the Incas lived there, but it looks as if the city was designed around it.

Machu Pichu easily competes with the Taj Mahal in beauty.

Do tourists damage local cultures?

2007-11-10T20:09:00.000-08:00

When you visit a beautiful place and you see that tourists number in the thousands, you can easily thing the tourists ruin the place and wish they would go away. Yesterday I was talking with a French girl about tourists harming the culture of a society. The community on the island of Amantani, Cuszo, and Amsterdam are three cities that have extreme amounts of tourists.
In Amsterdam, the tourists are there, they spend a lot of money, and the locals ignore them unless they are in the service industry (even there tourists think they are ignored by the locals). We both feel that the tourists in Amsterdam do not affect the Dutch culture adversely. It is certain that the red light district would collapse without the tourists, doesn’t every city have sectors that are tourist oriented?

Cuszo is the oldest continuously inhabited city in South America. Currently, it is said that it depends on the tourist industry to survive and prosper. Cuszo is prospering. The tourists spend lots of money, and the locals ignore them (except for the street sellers, taxi driver, restaurants workers, tour shots, etc.). Walking thru the non tourist parts of town, I witnessed a healthy society with a strong culture. Depending on the tourists does not appear to ruin the lives of the people or weaken their society and culture.

Isla Amantani is very different from both Amsterdam and Cuszo in how it deals with tourists. The island has no tour shops, or restaurants or hotels. When tourists visit the island, they stay in the homes of the local families. The families cook for them as they would cook for their own families. The only thing built for the guests are the rooms the guests sleep in. On this island, the men still farm the fields and the women still care for the family. The addition of the tourists, from what I have seen, has had very little affect on the culture. The tourist’s money is not the main income of the families. Instead, it is a supplement that allows them to do more. I don’t see how this is bad for this island culture.

I feel that the lack of tourists can harm a society more than the addition of them. There are communities that would be damaged by tourists. Some of the rainforest communities are examples. It is nice to know that the Peruvian government limits the number of people who can visit these communities. They actively protect these communities.

My conclusion: I don’t feel guilty traveling the world and being a tourist.

4150 meter summit!

2007-11-08T14:21:00.000-08:00

Picture the clear waters of the Mediterain sea with a hot sun and a cool breeze. Picture a set of islands off the coast of Italy or Croatia. Picture the island brown and dry from a long hot summer. Picture on the main island there are no cars, no night clubs, no resteraunts, and no hotels. Picture the sloaps of the island covered with farms. Pitcture this enteire environment raised from sea level to 3830 meters and set in a lake in Peru. Now you have an accuracte description of this Isla Amantani.

Tourists on this island do not stay in hotels. I stayed with the family of Nicolas, the captian of the boat I took to the island. Jak, his 5 year old son is not the least bit shy and and is extreemly friendly. I tought him a few games I know, he tought me some he knows. He found my toilatetry bag facinating and I used my Spanish/English dictionary to help me describe what each items was.

When I arrive at the port, Nicolas placed each pasanger with a host family. He had Jak lead me to their house while he sorted out the others and the boat. Jak took my hand and let me down the beach and up a small hill to the house.

The highlight of the island is hiking up to the summit. Hiking at 4000 meters is a challange. The island is extreemly beautiful. Every bit of land and every hillside is set up in terraces to allow farming very similar to the rice farming in Indonedia.

The view from the summit is spectacular. Only pictures can describe it. This will be a highlight of trip.

Traveling is all about meeting people.

2007-11-08T14:20:00.000-08:00

Once in a while you get the right combination of music, people, conversation, and location. When the combination is clicks in, the music you hear that evening will pick up the mood and feeling you felt and play it back to you when you hear the music again in the future. Tonight was one of those nights. In the town of Puno, is a bar called Mysti-k. It is a very cozy little place with excellent music, and talkative guests – both local and tourist. I talked with a French lady (who has been traveling in South America for a year now) and the bar tender who is a Student at the local university. The three of us discussed music, movies, and traveling for 3 hours while I played as DJ (I plugged my iPod into the music system).

The previous while at the same place, I met a Dutch girl who lives in Amsterdam and her temporary traveling companion from Switzerland. The three of us went to dinner and talked for hours.

Traveling is all about meeting people.

Drug or Tea?

2007-11-06T08:10:00.001-08:00

Coca tea helps you with altitude sickness. He sooths head aches, relaxes you, and filled with stuff your body needs. I am told this tea is given out free to people in Cusco to help them adjust to the height. The tea has a light and distinct taste that I very much like. To brew this tea, you just put the coca leaves into a glass of boiling water. It will not go bitter, so there is no need to remove the leaves.

Coca leaves can be used to create cocaine, but that is a complicated process that I do not know anything about. Coca leaves themselves are safe and very healthy.

Bolivia is the main grower of coca leaves. The leaves are sold for tea in both Bolivia and Peru, but not outside these two countries.

Colombia is the main producer of cocaine. They have refined the process and produce the highest quality. I do not know if the Colombians also use the leaves for tea.

The United States and Europe are the main consumers of cocaine. The banking industry in the UK is an example of a business sector that is heavily addicted to cocaine. I have talked with people in London who have chosen not to go into banking because they didn't want to become a cocaine user. You many find it hard to believe, but the bankers in the worlds strongest economy use cocaine on a daily/weekly basis.

When I travel thru Bolivia, I hope to photograph a coca farm.

Happy birthday Puno!

2007-11-06T07:53:00.000-08:00

Puno is 339 years old today. The streets are stuffed with dancing people, running children, and street vendors. At least 75% of the city’s youth are dressed up and dancing in one of the parades. There is not just one parade. There are about 8 that I counted, plus a funeral parade departing the church behind the judge’s booth. Unfortunately, the individual parades didn’t coordinate with each other. As one parade marches down a street, another one has to flatten itself against the gathered crowds to let it pass. At one point, a parade of boys on horses clashed with a parade of little children. The heads of each verbally argued until the horses turned around.

As theday progressed, the parades continues. They lasted until well after midnight. In the later hours, the older people of town dressed up and danced in parades.

Escaping the mobs, I stepped into a restaurant that looked promising – only locals inside. The chicken was delicious, and the soup excellent. I easily managed to suppress the urge to chew the meat off of the chicken feet in the soup. They don’t waste anything here.

Puno, and Lake Titicaca is about 15,000 feet above sea level. Everyone says you should relax and take it slow the first day to adjust to the thin air. I could not see how I would be affected, an experienced skier that I am. Well…. I am now confident that the ski resorts I have been to are much lower in elevation that this town. I get light headed just running up stairs or walking quickly up a street. It is a very strange sensation.

More photos from the festival:
http://picasaweb.google.com/darren.sullivan/HappyBirthdayPuno

A bad part of town

2007-11-06T07:40:00.000-08:00

The oldest cemetery in Lima is a massive complex in a very run down and extremely dangerous part of the center. When I would express an interest in going to this cemetery, people would look at me like I was crazy. “You can’t go there. You will get robbed.”

Being the crazy adventurer that I am, I hired a taxi to take me there and then be my body guard while exploring the area. I managed to find a taxi driver that was also a police officer. It turns out that the police are not paid very much and some of them have extra jobs.

The area surrounding the cemetery was very run down. I didn’t see any police and the streets were mostly dug up – as if building projects were abandoned. Inside the cemetery was completely different. It was busy with people visiting family and friends. Workers were sleeping in the shade and sometimes cleaning things.

Picture an open air mausoleum and you will have an idea of what this place was like. Rows upon rows of body filled walls filled the space. There were a few crypts scattered about in the open spaces, but they totaled less than 1 percent of the inhabitants.

As with all cemeteries, many parts of it were run down and crypt doors had been broken open. Not even the previous presidents of Peru were immune to the decay. Trash lined the walls of President and General Remigio Morales Bermudez’s crypt.

More photos of the catacomes and the cemetery:
http://picasaweb.google.com/darren.sullivan/CatacomeAndGraveYeardPeru

Lima - another big city

2007-11-03T18:59:00.000-07:00

With 8 million people, Lima is rather busy and poluted. I see this city in several extreemes. While sitting in a nice modern cafe over looking the ocean, enjoying a delicious ice cream cone, you can look down the coast towards the hill covered in cellular towers and see communities of houses that don´t have running water. This reminds me very much of San Diego. North of the Mexican border you have the nice houses and shopping centers. Just over the boarder are the slums and people living in poverty. Here in Lima, there are no boarder walls seperating the two communities.

Lima is still a nice city. I took a quick tour of the city with my cousin today. The tour included the catacomes that I wanted very much to see. I wanted to add images of catacomes to my series of cemetaries. Towards the end of the tour, the security demanded to see my camera (photographing in the church or the catacomes is strictly forbidden - nobody knows why). Our tour guide very much dislikes the security at this location, so she was more than happy to argue with him and demand he back down. She won the verbal exchange and I still have my images. Ha ha!

I found a group of pantomimes today. They were the typical human statues you see in Dam Square in Amsterdam each day. However, this trio was just beginning. I found the group sitting around a table applying the paint to their skin. I very much like the images I took of them. They didn´t speak a word of English, but they did manage to send them copies of the photos. They gave me their email address. I hope they like the images.