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La la lovely La Paz
Blog: Felicity Sees... - 21 September 2009
I was a bit wary about going to La Paz, despite the white flag the name of this city appeared to be waving at me. It seemed that I was setting myself up for an extra concentrated shot of all the usual Bolivian concerns-food, altitude, theft and dodgy taxi drivers. But it is Bolivia´s capital, and it is a necassary stop-over on the way to Peru, and hence I knew that I couldn´t leave Bolivia without giving it a shot, so one more overnight bus ride later I found myself emerging from my cosy sleeping bag at dawn to a see thousands of lights twinkling up the mountains around me.
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Sweet as Sucre
Blog: Felicity Sees... - 18 September 2009
After Salta and the Salares it was time to sweeten things up a bit and hit Bolivia´s ex-capital city Sucre. Not in fact named after another favourite Bolivian white powder, the city´s name actually honours the revolutionary leader Antonio José de Sucre, and was Bolivia´s capital until the seat of government was moved to La Paz in 1898. Although it doesn´t have many major ¨attractions¨ as such, the city itelf has a lovely setting and its Spanish style white-washed colonial buildings make it an attractive place to wander about and relax.
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Cochabamgringa en el Hospital
Blog: Kiva Stories from the Field - 18 September 2009
By Suzy Marinkovich, KF9 My husband walked in to the CIDRE office this Tuesday around 5pm, smiling big but smelling awful. Everyone crowded around and asked, “Mateo! Como le ha ido?” – “How was your [first] day?” I could tell they were worried all day when they had asked me if I heard from [...]
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The Altiplano, Tupiza to Uyuni
Blog: Felicity Sees... - 15 September 2009
You know that feeling of dread you get before an exam you fear might go horribly wrong? Well that was pretty much how I felt as I signed on to a 4 day jeep tour to the remote altiplano in South West Bolivia: Travelling to freezing altitudes of 5000m into remote desert expanses crammed into a worn looking jeep with six strangers and a Spanish-speaking Bolivian driver with no means of bailing out? This, could go horribly wrong.
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Bienvenidos a Bolivia
Blog: Felicity Sees... - 11 September 2009
Buenas tardes chicos!Sorry for my absence over the past few days, but I have been gallavanting around the Bolivian altiplano sin electricity and so have not had a chance to update the blog!
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Bolivian Sojourn: Potosi, By the Numbers
Blog: AlpacaSuitcase - 7 September 2009
The story of the town of Potosi and its Cerro Rico ("Rich Hill"), the mountain of silver that bankrolled the Spanish Empire for two-and-a-half centuries, is one that can be told with numbers:13,420 = The elevation (in feet) of Potosi, the highest city in the world, almost two and a half miles high.
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Bolivian Sojourn: Amazon Basin
Blog: AlpacaSuitcase - 3 September 2009
Our 45-minute flight from La Paz to Rurenabaque was a short but perception-altering experience. Had we not decided at the last minute to visit Bolivia’s Amazon basin, we would still be associating Bolivia with bowler hats, shortness of breath, llamas, woven alpaca textiles and extreme temperatures swings on the altiplano. Our 19-seat, twin-engine propjet “bumped” down on Rurrenabaque’s dirt runway amid clear jungle skies -- according to Lonely Planet’s web site this was one of Bolivia's 1,068 airports with unpaved landing strips.
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Bolivian Sojourn: Navigating a Coral Reef at 12,000 feet Above Sea Level
Blog: AlpacaSuitcase - 31 August 2009
The area around the Salar de Uyuni, the world’s largest salt flat in southwestern Bolivia, is an other-worldly landscape of hallucinogenic visions and poses some difficult questions. For example: How did 10 billion tons of salt get here? Why is that lake green? Why are there thousands of pink flamingos living more than two miles above sea level? Why am I looking at steaming geysers and bubbling mudpots while freezing my butt off? Why is that lake red?
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Bolivian Sojourn: El Choro Trek
Blog: AlpacaSuitcase - 27 August 2009
Even when you take a year off, you need a vacation; we are currently touring Bolivia and everywhere we go we are impressed by its biodiversity. Bolivia has about 736,000 square miles (roughly the size of the U.S. states of Alaska and Washington combined), one-third of which is Andean altiplano and two-thirds is Amazon basin. Were it not for losing its Pacific War with Chile (1879-1884), it would have a coastline as well. (In fact, from 1825 to 1935, Bolivia lost half of its territory to neighboring Chile, Argentina, Peru, Brazil and Paraguay.)
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Funny linguistic joke falls flat. I'm sure the Bolivians would have liked it.
Blog: Bearshapedsphere - 24 August 2009
Even I, amateur linguist, translator and pun maker extraordinaire can have a joke fall flat. Apropos of nothing, except I was baby wrangling for the sweetest mama and baby pair today, and so I had some time to think when I wasn't swirling from side to side or doing a little dance to make the baby stop crying.
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12: "Dinners with Élo: Part 2"
Blog: Dispatches from the Provinces of Argentina - 14 August 2009
I sent an e-mail to Élo after I got back from my trip north, just before the new semester was starting.I asked if she was staying in Paraná.A few days went by. No word. I told Daniel I thought, maybe, she’d split and gone away with her boyfriend.She wrote back, saying she was still in town, and that her friend was visiting, and that we should go canoeing on the river sometime soon. I said we should make dinner and make plans.
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Salar Uyuni – Has The Most Enterprising Salt Maker in Bolivia
Blog: The Travel Tart - Offbeat Tales From A Travel Addict - 10 August 2009
Salar Uyuni – is a mighty impressive Salt Pan at high altitude in Bolivia. There is a standard trip on the Salar Uyuni that takes around 3-4 days, taking in a ton of amazing sights you won’t see anywhere else.
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10 Fellowship Gems
Blog: Kiva Stories from the Field - 7 August 2009
By Cynthia McMurry, KF8 Ecuador Over the past year, I have learned valuable lessons about life, gotten to know myself better, greatly enriched my understanding of microfinance, observed the workings of the informal economy in Latin America, been touched by many clients’ stories and experiences, and been proud to represent Kiva at four different MFIs in [...]
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The Witches Market in La Paz, Bolivia
Blog: Brilliant Tips Travel Blog - 6 August 2009
The markets in La Paz, Bolivia, like many places, are an essential part of the culture and a vital part of the city. In La Paz, there are a number of markets that stretch across the city where one can buy just about anything. There are several food markets, a flower market, an artisans’ market and even a black market where you can buy bootlegs and Polo shirts for the equivelent of 2USD. However, the most interesting market and one of the more unique sights in La Paz is the ...
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“Say Cheese…I mean, Whiskey!”
Blog: Kiva Stories from the Field - 31 July 2009
By: Nilima Achwal, KF8, Bolivia While taking pictures throughout Bolivia of Kiva clients, colleagues, and friends, I’ve noticed a theme. Most people don’t smile. No matter if it’s a jolly loan officer who loves his job, the cleaning girl that always peers curiously over my shoulder at my laptop and brings me mate de coca, or [...]
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The Poster Child for Poverty
Blog: Kiva Stories from the Field - 15 July 2009
By: Nilima Achwal, KF8 Bolivia I rode on the back of a motorcycle with a loan officer while going to visit Kiva clients on the outskirts of Cochabamba, Bolivia. As my hair blew in the wind, I took in the tranquil green pastures, spotted cows grazing, and women in colorful skirts strolling down the dirt road. When we stopped, I exclaimed, “I love this part of town!” “Really?” the loan officer answered in shock.
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The Unexpected Value of a Painting
Blog: Kiva Stories from the Field - 7 July 2009
By Nilima Achwal, KF8 Bolivia On my second day in La Paz, I braved the high altitude and made my way to Calle Sagarnaga, the main tourist shopping street. As I trudged up the slippery cobbled street, a skinny middle-aged man carrying a folder easily kept pace beside me and urged me to take a look [...]
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The Cows of Cochabamba
Blog: Kiva Stories from the Field - 17 June 2009
By Nick Cain, KF7 Paraguay In Cochabamba, Bolivia, milk is quite literally the ticket to financial services and economic growth. Kiva lenders, meet CIDRE, your newest Field Partner in Bolivia. Last week I traveled from Asunción, Paraguay to Cochabamba, Bolivia to train CIDRE’s staff members on the Kiva platform, help them learn a little about the [...]
