Bolivia: La Paz. City of contrasts.

It´s been over two weeks since I arrived to La Paz and, by now, I am feeling like I am settling in this city. The first thing that caught my attention when arriving here at night was the myriads of city lights spread accross the upper and lower part of the city as if the stars had a reflection on this massive human creation. The image was really amazing. It somehow reminded me of Cusco but at way more immense level. I didn´t know what to expect, but I knew I would probably find many similarities with some of the Peruvian cities I had already seen.

The first thing that catches a traveller attention once here, together with the impressive nocturnal landscape, is the bus station built by Gustave Eiffel, world wide famous for something that doesn´t need to be mentioned. If arriving during daytime, it will probably be the omnipresent Illimani snowed peaks, dominating the landscape from the horizon.

La Paz, like many other capitals, is a city of contrasts. From the skyscrapers of the city centre to the big mass of unfinished houses of the suburbs of the city, La Paz can be a confusing place. Reminiscences of a city like Madrid in some of the colonial buildings in the centre, several steep streets built all the way up to the area known as El Alto due to its height (4000 above the sea level), dark slums spreading for kilometers outside the city, residential areas with green areas, ... La Paz (and Bolivia) is not as open to tourism as Perú might be, and this is translated into the locals being more reserved than their Andean neighbours. It is not that they are cold, but they definitely lack the warmth I found in the beginning of my trip. Differences aside, they share many common aspects, like the crazy traffic, the chaotic organisation and their deep political conscience.

Watching on TV vulgar criminals being beaten up as an act of street justice or social unrest encouraging people to block roads and set barricades doesn´t give the most pleasant feeling about the country. This all can be really far from the other reality of the country: white models and presenters on TV, the importance of football and an interest to portrait the economy as a flourishing one. But there is poverty, inequality and corruption here ("everything has a price" is a true statement here). I won´t get into ethical questions like who´s responsible for this or what is the international community doing about it (or what can they do, in general). However, it makes me sad that a country with such natural resources and some of the most incredible landscapes on Earth falls that low and gets stuck in this situation. In one of my nights hanging out with locals I even got to hear an opinion as dramatic as "the indigenous people are the cause of the non-development of the country". Again, the two Bolivias.

Apart from the political and economical situation, the city is a vibrant one. There are plenty of possibilities here: dinning at some really interesting restaurants, going to concerts or the cinema, visiting the witches market (where you can buy a llama fetus to bury in the foundations of your new house and be granted luck), visiting the coca museum and understanding why Western countries unfairly "demonise" a plant that has been used many centuries before we even had any sort of civilization, dropping by the National Art Museum and seeing a national art influenced by colonial religion, indigenous aspects and social protest or simply sitting down at the Plaza Murillo contemplating some of the most impressive buildings of the city, like the presidential palace.

Due to my volunteer work with children, I will be staying in this city until the end of this month, where I expect to reach a better understanding of the city that, somehow, remains a mystery to me in some aspects. Right now I am starting to feel that I might have preferred to use my time as a volunteer in a rural area, working with farming communities and street children, and far from the misleading images I get in the capital. I also wish I could have stayed with some local family to escape a bit from the gringo land place that my hostel is, where any hint of latin culture or Spanish speaking is far from reach (apart from the kitchen, that is). I must admit, on the other hand, that the bar of the hostel makes a good place to socialise and to avoid the solitude of the lonely traveller.

Other than that, I am really glad I can get lost in the capital of Bolivia and that I can contribute, even if done at a really small scale, to change the life of these little orphan kids who otherwise would have a hard life on the streets and an even harder future at the tough prisons of La Paz in most cases.