The Guy at the Street Fair.

Heading back from our excursion to the San Pedro jail and lunch downtown, we discovered a small street festival.  By small street festival, I mean there was a stage, a bar, a few tables, and fewer tents.  There were plenty of Bolivians, and most of them had been drinking for quite some time.


There were four of us: Stacy (basically fluent), Ken (Irish...very little Spanish), TK (wanting to be fluent), and myself (pretending to want to be fluent).


We found a table and quickly ordered a round of Grande Paceňas.  That'll be 40 Bs (i.e.: 1.50 each).  Sweet.


Of course, it was day number two of the trip; and I was still suffering from altitude sickness.  So I started on my beer, but sadly didn't finish.


While we sat, drank, and watched the Bolivian street festival; a band began to form on stage.  Soon there were several people up there, and a few began to play.  The odd part was there seemed to be a family: mother and small children/baby on the stage.  We weren't quite sure why they were sitting up there since they weren't participating in the band.


Once the band introduced themselves and started playing, some of the Bolivians left their seats, formed a link, and started dancing.  It was an interesting dance.  Something like what I think of as a deconstructed quadrille.  Imagine if you will Jane Austen's description of dancing in any of her English stories on romance and families of status.  They form a link, each person has a partner, and they basically walk in circles to the music occasionally holding hands as they switch places.


That's sort of what this was like.


Didn't matter which side the man or woman stood on, but it was clear they were dancing opposite each other (i.e.: together).  They would do something of a v-step with turn (if you're familiar with step-aerobics) loosely to the beat, and every once in awhile hold their hand out to their partner, take it, switch places, and then resume the v-step with turn.


Soon after the first round of beers, I was approached by a Bolivian man to join the dancing.  I deferred to TK, who damned me to hell for sending her out to the 'dance floor'.  While out there, she turned to me, raised a hand, and then her middle finger.  I snapped her picture.  Might have been the greatest Facebook profile picture of all time.  We'll never know.  That camera and its memory card were stolen later that day.


When she returned to us, she said, "You're going to hell."  Yeah, I thought she might say something like that.


Later, a second man came to invite us to dance.  Based on TK's feelings that the women didn't want us out there, we all politely declined.


More beer means friendly Bolivians.  Yet another man came to our table, poured a glass of beer, and handed it to me.  I tried to explain I was only drinking water, but he would have none of it.  So, I drank.  


Then, I tossed the rest on the ground.  


Apparently, this is what you're supposed to do.  In some way this honors your ancestors.  I'm not quite sure what the overall meaning is, but that's what they do.  He did the same for TK, Ken, and Stacy.  Stacy drank all her beer and had very little to throw on the ground.  I hope that isn't bad news...


After some unintelligible pleasantries, he left for the next table.  Gracias, seňor!
Finally, the last man approached our table.  This is the man around whom the whole story centers.  He had clearly been enjoying his cerveza.  So had our table, but not yet to the same extent.  He took and kissed my hand.  Uhm.  Great.  Thanks.


Someone offered him the beer I was no longer drinking.  Happily he took it.  He was a talker!  Man did he have a lot to say, and apparently he had a lot of things to say that were funny!


Unfortunately for us, we didn't understand 99.9% of what he had to say.  Including Stacy!  We kept looking to her for help, but she was as confused as we were.


At some point she figured out he thought I had beautiful eyes.  Gracias, seňor!  Then she said he liked my backside.  Uhm?    Gracias, seňor!  Then he wanted to marry one or the both of us.  Uh?   Gracias, seňor!  He left and came back with two beers.    Gracias, seňor!


He was standing between Stacy and myself, so we were clearly getting the brunt of the attention.  Ken tried to assert his dominance by saying that we were all with him, lucky bastard.  And we all tried to agree.  The guy didn't take the hint.


So, Ken did what any man in his situation would do, he got up and went to el baňo.  Seriously.


I think it took us about 30 minutes to wrest our way out of the situation, which really meant getting up and leaving what had been a loud, but pleasant, afternoon.


Lesson: Stay for the street festival, dance one dance, share some beer, and leave.

Bolivia

Before I start reminiscing about other trips I've loved and sharing those photos and stories, I'll tell you about my most recent adventure - BOLIVIA!

It was my first trip to South America, and my first trip south of the Equator.  Honestly, I've been waiting for that forever it feels like.  And it's true, the toilets really do flush in the opposite direction!  They did.  Yay!

I flew down overnight on Friday the 16th.  The flight started out a little crazy, since the flight lost all but emergency power while loading the luggage.  Confidence, that's American Airlines.

The arrival, the visa, and getting a cab to the hotel where I was meeting my friend was all fine.  The visa is 135 USD upon arrival, and you should have two passport photos ready to be used.  The cab was 50 Bs (that's Bolivianos), which at the time was approximately 7 USD.

Wondering where the photographs from our arrival and first few days are?  Me too.  My camera bag complete with dslr, point and shoot, bank card, and cell phone were stolen.  So any photos I took between Saturday morning and Sunday evening are gone; including the best T.K. Facebook profile picture of all time.  Sorry, T.K.!

I suffered from altitude sickness for most of the trip.  In case you aren't aware, Bolivia is the highest country in S. America.  In fact, when the planes take off, they take a lot longer to get off the ground because the air is so thin.  Makes sense when you think about it, but I wouldn't have thought about it.  Good thing someone mentioned it.

Saturday we checked into the Hotel Alem on Calle Sagárnaga and spent the rest of our day sort of getting our bearings.  We tried mate de coca (coca leaves in hot water; it's not tea, though) and ate Italian for dinner.  Yup, Italian.

Sunday we walked over to the prison that has capture Stacy's imagination, San Pedro.  There's a crazy history for this prison.  If you Google it, you'll come up with all sorts of stories related to prisoners, tours, and so on.  Stacy had been told to go to the park across from the jail and approach the prostitute for a tour.  Honest.  So, we went to the park, but we didn't see anyone who fit the description; after about twenty minutes we were hungry.  So we left to find the lunchtime treat of saltenas.

Leaving the park we ran into Stacy's backpacking friend Ken.  Once he joined the group, we had some direction regarding food and more mate de coca.

We ate lunch at a little restaurant where the servers wore masks, which turns out to be rather common there.  After lunch it looked like rain, so we ducked into a higher end establishment whose outdoor seating had not only a cover by sides that had been put down, too.  So we could be outside and dry simultaneously.  Nice!

Walking back to "our part of town" we found a street party, which was a lot of fun.  I'll have to write about it another time.  It was after this party, we stopped for one last beer, grabbed our belongings, and headed off to the bus station to head to Uyuni and the salt flats.

At the bus station, Stacy was watching all our things.  Too many items for one person.  Shouldn't have put her in that position, but hindsight is 20/20.  One man tapped her shoulder, the other grabbed the bag. My bag.  My camera bag.

And so here we are, starting our story without pictures.  Next post will have pictures, promise.  Oh, wait.  Next post will probably be about the street festival.  Ok, how about within the next five posts, I'll start having pictures!?

Welcome!

Hey there!  My father always said I was the child who was always packed and ready for any trip.  Over the years, the itch to get up and go has only grown.  Now, I'd like to share some of the places I've seen, the photographs I've taken, and the experiences I've shared with you.

A few weeks back I decided to rearrange the photographs in my bedroom.  Now, I live in New York City's East Village, so my bedroom isn't that big.  But, there is space for four new frames, which means I need four more pictures.  Gee, I thought, what should go in them?

Continents!  Yes, I've been to four continents, and, happily, I've been to each one at least once with my high school friend Stacy (happilylost).  Therefore, each picture will be representative of our visits around the world.  This year alone we have met in Asia and South America!  What will come next?