Outside My Southern Comfort Zone: The Struggles

I wanted to open up this post with a few struggles that I have faced while here in La Paz. First of all, we still don’t have internet in the house. I have to load up my computer and everything I need into my back pack and walk down the road to the nearest internet café just to post this blog. It cost 2 bolivianos an hour. That’s roughly 28 cents in American money. Speaking of having to walk, most of you at home know that if you want to go somewhere all you have to do is hop in the car and drive to wherever your heart desires. That’s not typical here. Usually you can grab a minibus that will drop you off fairly close to where you want to go. But you got to pay attention because not every mini bus goes to where you want to go. Sometimes to find the minibus that you need to be on you have to walk a few blocks to where that route is. And if you get lucky there Might be an empty seat on one of them. Some days it seems like everyone in the city wants to go to the exact place you are trying to go. Well, also there are radio taxis. They are more of a convenience and cost a bit more. While minibuses cost between 1.50 and 2.50 bolivianos, a taxi might range from 10 to 30 bolivianos depending on where you are heading. So you just give the taxi company a call and they come and pick you up…. most of the time. Lastnight, they said they were on the way but I guess they were busy because they didn’t show. We had to keeping waving at taxis until we found one that was empty. It only took 20 minutes. So back to my point, walking can be very common here in the city. It’s not so bad unless you live up on the mountain side and have to walk home. They don’t call our neighborhood ALTO Obrajes for nothing.

One form of Public Transportation. You can fit about 30 People on this thing.....

A Picture from where my house is. Notice how far up it is.

Another struggle I have dealt with is the fact that we still don’t have a washing machine in our house. They took it to work on it but It has never returned. So, a few of you may be like, “we use to wash our clothes by hand all the time when we were growing up”, but my question to you is “why don’t you still do it?” So yes, I have had to learn to wash my clothes by hand recently and rinse and then hang them out to dry. Honestly it isn't so bad if you have nothing else to do and need to kill some time…. But I would like to have our washing machine back soon.

Most people in La Paz drink INSTANT COFFEE. It just isn't the same. We have some normal coffee grounds here in the house but guess what, there is no coffee pot to brew it in. So I got a little innovative this morning. I had a cup, a filter, coffee grounds, hot water, and plenty of time. It was more of a trial and error kind of thing because my filters kept breaking and ruining the cup of coffee. It took me about 30 minutes to make a cup. I had to put the grounds in the filter and then into the cup. Then slowly I had to pour the hot water into the cup. Maybe you can figure out why my filters kept hemorrhaging. But finally on my third attempt I had a cup of coffee. And let me tell you, when you put that much effort into a cup of coffee, It is oh so amazing!!! But…., If I find me a decently priced coffee maker there Is no doubt in my mind that I will buy it because if that much effort goes into ONE cup of coffee, what if I want TWO? Speaking of finding things, it is difficult a lot of the times to find what you are looking for. There are a few supermarkets here and there but it’s not like going to Wal-Mart or Food Lion. Every once in a while you get lucky though, but it might take a week or so.

You know how in the winter time you like to have a nice hot shower to knock that morning chill off and get your day started? Well the showers here are a little more tricky to do that. Most people’s showers are not hooked up to a water heater. They have a shower head that is hooked up to a wire in the wall. You turn the faucet on and it heats the water as it comes out. But again, it’s not that simple. You have to turn on the water pressure on far enough for the heat to activate. You can hear it making a noise and know that it’s working. But, if you turn the pressure up to high the water is coming out too fast to heat and it never really gets warm. So as you are taking a shower you constantly have to adjust the pressure. And you know how after you get out of the shower in the winter it is really cold and you try to dry off really fast? Well most houses here don’t have heat, and unless you have windows that face the sun, your house stays pretty cold. So Imagine jumping out the shower and instantly being 40 degrees. Yea….

You may think that I’m miserable after reading this, but actually it’s not so bad. It takes a little adjusting and getting use to, but it’s just a part of everyday life here in Bolivia. It makes me very grateful for all the things that we have in the states and the predictability we have. Life here is at a bit slower pace than back at home. You can notice by how fast the people walk. People are not as rushed (except for the taxi drivers) and people seem to enjoy life and time a bit more. I know at home I was always on GO. From the time I woke up I was rushing and all day I seemed to be pressed for time. When I finally had the chance to lay in bed it seemed like my body had to slow down until I could finally drift off to sleep. And I was lucky to get enough sleep. It seems like that is how most Americans live in the United States. “Always on the go and pressed for time.” It really can stress people out and in my opinion might be why so many Americans suffer from Depression. In my experience so many people are focused on the “American Dream” (Have a big house, nice cars, nice things, clothes, perfect family, big vacations), basically, trying to impress all the people around you and make them want to be you. Yea those things are nice but there is no reason to burn yourself out trying to achieve these things and miss enjoying your life altogether in the process. That’s one thing I am learning here in La Paz.

On the lighter side, Tuesday was Independence Day here in Bolivia. Many people were off work and schools were closed. After my Spanish lesson, I went over to the place where I stayed when I first moved here. I had lunch with Rodrigo, Oswaldo, and there mother Anna Maria. I honestly miss living there with them. They are great people and I consider them my Bolivian family because they just took me in and treated me like I was part of the family. After lunch Rodrigo and I walked down to Ketal (the local grocery store) and bought some ingredients to make Pizza. We made the dough from scratch with yeast and flour and all the other ingredients and then had to let it rise. We made three in all. A lot of the college kids from church came over and we had a pizza party and played games. It was a lot of fun. They all seemed to like my pizza and to my surprise they were pretty tasty. Wednesday, me and the guys went and played soccer again down the street. It must have been right around the time school got out because a group of young teenagers wanted to challenge us. Why not? We ended up whooping them. But we made a few friends in the process. On Wednesdays at the Mega Center (the local mall, yes they have a mall with a food court, stores and a movie theater) movies are 2 for 1 in the cinema. So all the volunteers and I (19 in all) decided to go see a movie. We ended up picking “MI Villano Favorito 2” (Despicable Me 2). Honestly that was the biggest movie theater I have ever been in. It was huge! The move was great even though I didn’t understand all of it. The movie was in Spanish and they didn’t have any subtitles. But all in all it was fun.