Being a Cochabambina and the adventure into dinosaurland!

After being in Cochabamba for over 2 months, I now consider it my home; I roughly know how to get around the city and which truffi (minibuses which operate around the city) I need to take me to where I need to go. Although I am never prepared for the ever-changing weather,  in a day we can see a verity of all weather types and I never seem to be prepared,  but I think that’s not just me! I have really upped the volunteering so in addition to working at the orphanage I now work with kids who are in hospital, just helping them enjoy themselves, painting, reading, playing games. It is really rewarding but like any NGO in Bolivia very disorganized and so I just have to organize my own time and itinery with the kids. My Spanish has improved which I am very happy about; both my teacher and my host mum commented on the fluency of my speech so shows that something is definitely going right! After spending many weekend just chilling in Cochabamba, doing exciting things like going hiking in the local Parque nacional Tunari which has wonderful rivers to walk up and peaks to climb, as well as exploring local towns, of which we exploited during a national holiday for the Bolivian pluri-cultural state (thank Evo Morales) and found that we were the only people in the town with no way of returning back to the city except by fitting 9 people in a taxi which is always fun!  

I finally to the opportunity to travel with some others to Torro Torro, which is about 150 km from the city but takes 6 hours due to the wonderful roads(yes torro does mean bull in Spanish but it also means dinosaur, or maybe that’s just in Bolivia) so hence the name, torro torro is dinosaurland! We saw many dinosaur footprints, interestingly the carnivores have 3 big toes with a longer middle one and the herbivores have footprints similar to an elephant without defined toes! We also explored an amazing canyon and swam in waterfalls which were seriously beautiful, as well as my first experience of caving in which I had to wiggle my body between crevices that were about as big as I was lying down on my tummy! Serious fun but no good if you’re claustrophobic! After all this fun and adventures we hired a truffi to take us back to the town. The driver assured us that the trufi was in good condition but as we got out tof the torro torro it kept stopping every 5 minutes and the driver was playing around with the gas pedal and had to completely reorganize the engine at one point with no luck.   It got serious when we had to push the van out of the river and climb hills as the van couldn’t go up go up the hills with us in it, when it finally collapsed we ended up sleeping in a potato barn until 2 in the morning when we found a taxi to take us to the city arriving at 4 am, serious adventure!  

After my adventure from last week I have just been relaxing in the city getting ready for carnival which is so exciting, I have also had the opportunity to dance in the carnival in Cocha but after a few practices I’m not sure I will master 13 pasos (dances) in 20 days! But dancing or not it will be super fun!

 (more photos to come I promise)

Christmas and New Year Bolivian Style!

It feels strange that I have now been in Bolivia almost a month now, and I can now roughly get myself around Cochabamba with little difficulty. My Christmas was defiantly different and felt nothing like the normal Christmas at home, this was helped by the wonderful weather here although it is the rainy season. They hate the rain here and don’t go out when it rains, should definitely take a trip to the UK and see how it is always rainy season!. As I am living with a family I wanted to experience the Bolivian traditions, like learning how to make empanadas and cooking the pork that we would eat at midnight all day. We could not eat until midnight so it was almost like a waiting game, which I filled by singing Christmas carols to their amusement, especially the grandma who also sang some Bolivian songs. The meal was delicious; we eat Pork, plantains, potatoes, vegetables, followed by red wine. The grandma insisted that I had to drink the wine to kill the pig otherwise it would run around in my stomach and I would not be able to dance or sleep at night, which I found kind of amusing! I then did go to a Christmas party with the other volunteers, kind of strange going out on Christmas Eve! Christmas day was relaxing, speaking to my family, and then we had an afternoon tea of various Christmas traditions, like eggnog and mulled wine.  I made the mistake of not travelling between Christmas and new year so I was just at home, with my family, taking day tips was fun but I would have like to go somewhere. I then spent New Year’s with some Bolivian friends in this eco house in the mountains which again was different, but with all the normal amounts of drinking and dancing. After New Year I travelled to a wonderful place about 150 Km outside of Cochabamba called Villa Tunari, which was in the jungle, with all the jungle features such as humidity and beautiful landscapes. We swam in rivers, saw waterfalls and went to national parks to see animals, which was a really nice break from the city. I hope all of you had a wonderful Christmas and new year, with all best hopes and wishes for the year ahead! 

Going away with the 5000

When my family invited me to go on holiday with them to Copacabana I really didn’t know what to expect but it was not what it turned out to be. Literally there wad 22 members of the family including cousins, arties, grandparents and then me! We journeyed the 12 hours between cocha and Copacabana in the party bus which the my host dad drives and arrived at 9AM on Friday morning, it is a beautiful place but situated at 4000m I was too worried about my breathing to take in the views, but after some coca leaves which really do help, i felt fine. Then came the realisation that the prime reason for this trip was for religious devotion to the Virgin of Copacabana who is of great importance to many Bolivian families, and there was me thinking we were on a tourist holiday! They were very shocked when I told them that I was not catholic, however out of respect did visit the virgin once. As Copacabana is a very touristy place I did bumped into many a gingo who was just travelling and had dinner or drinks which was a nice, however I was with my family and spend most of the days with them. We climbed a mountain to show your devotion to the virgin, when we reached the summit, there are stalls where you can buy little items such as cars, houses or  even passports which you give to the virgin and hope that she will make these things real in the next year, this a tradition throughout Bolivia, for many families. We spend the afternoon in the neighbouring town of Yongo, in Peru. I was rather excited about getting another stamp in my passport but we just walked straight through to my disappointment, so I must have been an illegal immigrant in Peru for a few hours! The following day without my family, I travelled to Isla del sol, which is the place of the Inca creation myth. This was insanely beautiful, situated in the middle of Lake Titicaca, the highest lake in the world. We visited the Inca ruins, including the sacred rock, which the Inca’s prayed to every day for the rising of the sun. After almost missing my boat back to Copacabana I got back to our hotel exhausted after a full day of walking and being a gringo. After another long bus trip I am now back in Cocha, looking forward to my Bolivian Christmas, If i don’t post again, I wish you all a wonderful Christmas and new year, sending much love and wishes from Bolivia! 

First thoughts of Cochabamba

After a 24 hours  flight which included passing US immigration and a re-route due to two erupting volcanoes, I arrived in Cochabamba early Wednesday morning  My first thoughts were about the wonderful weather, hot, sunny and not a cloud in the sky, very different to the British weather which we are having! I was first taken to my family who seemed really lovely and welcoming. They offered me all the food I could ever want, and were very interested in why I had come half way around the world to help in an orphanage. I then was able to visit where I was going to be volunteering , an orphanage called hogar de sueños, (house of dreams) which offers accommodation and food for children who have been abandoned. Many of them do have parents, however their parents are not financially able to take care of them, or have addiction problems. There are 17 children aged 2-9 who live there. I wanted to try to do some music with the children, so my idea about playing Christmas songs  was abandoned when I got out the recorders I had brought with me and they just loved making the wonderful high pitch squeaking noises that recorders make. I think it might take a while before we have cracked Jingle Bells! On Friday I experienced Bolivian nightlife which was a lot of fun, crazy dancing and good music. Make better by trying to get into my house in the early hours and not being able to, my mum then had to come down and assist me of which she was not very happy with spending the rest of the weekend being the centre of all family jokes about how I was grounded. The market was an experience, apparently the biggest market in South America, which had everything you could possible want, I just found it difficult to keep up without getting lost, let alone look at all the wonderful things there was. After my first weekend I am now back to the orphanage and Spanish lessons which should get rid of my accent which they also find hilarious. The highlight of the city is the 32 meter jesus statue which I climbed as my sunday morning activity to be close to God!