Take the train. It’ll be a better experience.
So I met this gringa, Danielle Koehler, about 2 days before she left for Bolivia and I left for Kyrgyzstan. Our Mutual friend Jenni Marsh introduced us and we’ve been following our journeys since. She wants to make films about people. Cool. I like films.
Just like a good gringa, she also wants to help people, by building them websites. You should follow her travels.
1. How did you first get interested in Bolivia, Argentina and South America in general? What keeps you in the Western Hemisphere?
I started traveling to Latin America every summer when I was 15. The first three years I went to Casa Bernabe Orphanage in Nicaragua with my church, staying about two weeks each time. I kept going back because I loved the kids, the dirt roads, the farm animals everywhere, just everything about the culture. When I was 18 I went with another organization to the Dominican Republic and painted a mural on the cement wall surrounding a squatter community.
I was a real baby missionary on the loose. Not really, but there was a time when I didn’t really understand what that word meant, and saw it as an excuse to travel and learn about cultures. Sadly, I’ve found out that most missionaries use it as an excuse to travel and tell other cultures how wrong they are about their ways of living, which I do not agree with. So I crossed that off my list a while ago and replaced it with the more anthropological field of documentary producer.
When I decided to study abroad, I knew that I was going to stay in Latin America. I’ve been to Europe, and it was great, but not a place I could call home. I hadn’t been to South America yet, and had always had a fascination with Argentina. Actually that was probably less because of the tango culture and more because of the history of the Dirty War and the desaparecidos. Initially I just wanted to come make a documentary about that, but I didn’t have a fresh angle on it- so instead I decided it would be a good place to study abroad and learn Spanish!
Having two months before Argentina’s Fall semester started (reverse seasons), I knew I couldn’t just sit in the States doing nothing, so I found this organization DELPIA that I really like in Bolivia, thought it was ironically awesome that it was so polar opposite from Argentina, and bought a plane ticket before I really knew where I was staying (although I knew my cousins were here and they’ve ended up being lifesavers).
Sorry, this answer was kind of longer than I intended….
2. What is DELPIA and why are you working for them?
(www.fundacion-delpia.org) The DELPIA Foundation (stands for the Development of Local Amazon-Andes Indigenous Tribes) works mostly with an indigenous community called the Yurakaré. Bolivia has 36 minority cultures and languages. One of the most respected are the Quechua; I see and hear it everywhere. Probably one of the least recognized are the Yurakaré. I was talking to some other Bolivians about them, and they had never heard of them, but after learning they lived in the jungle were pretty quick to start joking that they were cannibals who feasted on white flesh.
Currently I am completely reorganizing their website. Sigh. That’s all I’ll say about that. EVENTUALLY, sometime before I leave, I should get to travel into the jungle to meet the Yurakaré and make short documentarias on their culture and the issues they face, etc.
3. What do you want to do while you’re in South America?
A lot of things! The only thing I don’t want to do is be flamboyantly American. I bought some Bolivian shoes the other day and am about to go get my haircut by a Bolivian woman who lives down the street. I will in fact be taking a tango class in Buenos Aires. Oh, and of course I want to really study Spanish more so I don’t have to say Como? all the time.
4. Which do you like more Bolivia, Argentina or Kyrgyzstan?
Well, I’ve haven’t been to Argentina or Kyrgystan yet, so I’m gonna have to say Kyrgystan.
5. Spanish? Really Spanish? Is that useful? Why are you wasting your time with that language?
Joking aside, in Harrisonburg, VA, I worked at this little southern buffet restaurant called the Village Inn (Jenni actually got me the job). Anyways, I loved it because it was like an inside look at a completely different culture, but at the same time, I really did have to explain to a man once why I was studying Spanish. His response was something like “What a godawful language! …but I guess you need it these days, unfortunately.”
I just love Spanish! I love that I’m learning a mostly third-world language and that I’ll be able to communicate with a majority of immigrants in the States who are ashamed of where they’re from because we’ve taught them to be. Speaking to somebody in their native language is like saying “Hey, I took the time to learn something from your own culture, because I really respect it!”
6. Are the tacos in Bolivia better than Taco Bell tacos?
I haven’t had a taco yet, but I’ve had a veggie burrito and it was pretty dang good.
7. What have you learned about the people in Bolivia?
Oh man, they’re great! I mean, granted, most Bolivians sort of view gringos as either aliens or super models, but those that I’ve spent the most time around or the friends of people I live with are really nice to me. Whenever you greet somebody you always kiss them on the cheek and ask how they’re doing, etc. Guys do this weird sort of semi-man-hug.
Everyone always says Hello and Good Morning, and whenever I’m out exploring alone, they always give me directions when I ask. Most people fall into the lower class. Going out for coffee or an icecream with a friend is not an option for most people, even though prices are ridiculously cheap here. American pop music is pretty big, but so is Bolivian folkloric music. I’ll usually hear both every day. I heard Ace of Base twice yesterday (what?!).
The upper class is a very small percentage of the population, and they don’t like anything that the “common” Bolivians do - like riding the taxi trufis with 15 other people even though it’s a lot cheaper. They spend a lot of money to send their kids to private schools to learn English. While it’s mostly people like this that own all the big businesses and have most of the power, it’s encouraging to know that Evo comes from an indigenous tribe himself and has a more “of-the-people” feel: which of course is why they love him so much here. His name is graffitied everywhere I look.
8. What has been your least favorite part so far?
Definitely my least favorite part would be sitting on my computer working on this website which is all about really amazing experiences that I want to take part in, but instead I’m stuck waiting for it to stop RAINING and looking at literally hundreds of pictures of the Yurakaré taken by other volunteers.
9. What else do you have to say?
Should I buy a cheap plane ticket to Buenos Aires that has a 12 hour overnight layover in Paraguay, or should I take a train to the border, bus to Salta, and then get a domestic flight to Buenos Aires to avoid paying the $131 entrance visa that I ALREADY paid to enter Bolivia???
