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Our stay in Tarija was truly enjoyable. I was so happy that Rachael enjoyed my favorite Bolivian town as much as I did. Tarija is commonly regarded by Bolivian nationals and tourists alike as the Bolivian Andalucia. The Guadalquivir River that borders the city was named after the Spanish river that passes through Córdoba and Seville. During the rainy season (January to March) the whole valley transforms into a luscious green ripe with juicy grapes on vines. It truly becomes “Tarija la Linda”. By May most of the vines are gone but it’s still a pleasant little town.
Unfortunately, our stay was also too short. Before we left, we did manage to eat at my favorite P-day lunch spot, Gattopardos; the Spaghetti Mafiosa was just as good as I remembered!
Our flight to Cochabamba was supposed to be for 10am the next morning, of course it was delayed the inevitable hour because well, that's the way things work in Bolivia. One thing I failed to mention was our family home evening we had on the night before we left. The whole family was involved, I was asked to give the lesson five minutes before everything started and I got in touch with one of my first baptisms, Saul Duchén. We have been communicating off and on for the last couple of years and I learned that he served a mission, got married in the temple and is now 3 months from being a dad. Needless to say, it was great to see him after eight long years. It was certainly a cool thing to go back to my first area and look at the mission photos of my first baptism. Anyway, at the airport Saul came unannounced to see us off for the last time; definitely a cool thing for me.
We got into Coch (mission slang for Cochabamba) and the family that our good friend Dustin knew during his mission was there to pick us up and offer their house as a base for our daily excursions. The Salazar family was great and so nice to offer a room of their house to people they've never met and barely heard of; however, they esteem Dustin on the same level as a god and so if he says we were good people then that was the infallible truth. After hearing a brief recounting of our trouble in La Paz, René, the father, insisted that we have at least one member of the family with us at all times in the city. That promise held true for the first day, but I was able to convince him that it would be alright and we've traveled this far by ourselves without much trouble. Reluctantly, he let us out of the house without an accompaniment. The first day, we took the gondola up to the Cristo de la Concordia to get a good look at the whole city. This statute is not much unlike the one in Rio de Janeiro, except this one is a few inches taller (I have a picture of the stats to prove it), and has peep holes drilled in all over the body.
Day two in Coch we decided to go to "la Cancha", the big open market in the center of town that has just about everything you could ever want or need and lots more of what you'll never want or need. Specifically, we hit up the artisan rows to scope out what souvenirs we would be bringing home. Unfortunately, we only had travelers’ checks to cash and none of the money exchangers could do that. We were directed to the center of town where once again we were told to go somewhere else. During our wild goose chase for the elusive travelers’ check money exchanger, I learned that during my six year absence from the country the mission office had moved to a different unknown part of town, Burger King had taken the place of McDonald's as the only fast-food restaurant, and lunchtime had drastically increased in length from two to three hours!
We waited for a few hours, once again entertained only by the pigeons, only this time their excrement became more of a problem (we'll just leave it at that). After finally cashing our checks we hopped onto a small little bus, trufi, and headed out to one of my favorite areas in Coch.
I was a little worried that I wouldn't remember where to get off, but in the prior week I learned to just trust my instincts. The highway out to Quillacollo (the Blanco Galindo) had changed quite a bit but somehow I remembered the kilometer mark and told the driver to stop. I got out and I soon found my way around. I decided that I would try to find some of the great families that I had met and Rachael and I trotted off in the general direction where I thought they lived. Fortunately, I did find the house where the Ayala family lived but of course they had moved.
I learned a secret years ago about finding people and figuring out what happened to them: ask the lady in the tienda. I went across the street and tapped a coin on the metal bars to the store; soon the doña came and directed me to the general area where they had moved. Luckily, she told me they hadn't moved far from there. We did an about-face and went in search of the next tienda that could lead us to the promised land. Of course, the only one at the next tienda was no more than 10 years old and couldn't help us out. Discouraged only a little, I set out to find other people that I knew. This time with ease, I found where I once laid my head to rest at night and descendants of that family still lived there (the grandparents who I knew are now living in Salt Lake City!). I described members of the Ayalas and the 15 year old grandson walked us to their front door.
Lizeth, now a 21 year old young lady, answered the door. I called her by name, I took off my sunglasses, then my baseball cap; still a perplexed look affixed to her face. "Elder Lippmann?", I said; still, nothing. Ultimately, I had to play the "go get your mother" card. Finally, the mother came and I was immediately recognized and welcomed! The family told me of some hard times that they were having and I promised to keep in touch and help in any way I could.
Sufficiently exhausted and a little sicker, we staggered back to the Salazar’s and we failed to even notice the rock hard mattress we had to sleep on. Day three meant a trip back to la Cancha to purchase all of the necessary souvenirs as proof of our journey to the center of South America. I really enjoyed the process of haggling and lowering prices by nominal amounts and then deciding we really didn’t want the item anyway. We spent quite a few hours and eventually came away with an impressive loot that covered both of our families’ Christmas presents all for a very reasonable low price. We made our way to the bus terminal and purchased our passage for our final destination.
Once again we were off to La Paz. We had the names of a few good hotels to stay at and decided on the one that a taxi driver pointed out to us. There was really nothing special but it had hot water straight from the sink faucet (a first in our trip) and it was relatively clean. For our last two days in Bolivia we weren't really motivated to go out and see a bunch of stuff, but I tried to complete the Bolivian experience for Rachael.
Early the next morning (our last day and Rachael’s birthday) I was directed to a little shack where they served salteñas. Salteñas are savory pastries filled with beef, pork or chicken mixed in a sweet, slightly spicy or very spicy sauce, and sometimes also containing peas, potatoes and other ingredients – something I loved during my mission. Rachael didn’t like how they tasted so I got a hearty breakfast.
Later we went up “gringo alley” and looked for anything that was so fabulous we wouldn’t be able to resist…we didn’t find anything. The prices were about the same as in Coch, there was a little more selection but basically it was the same ol’ stuff.
We then continued up the main street and entered into a little fruit and pastry market. I was looking for a special hot drink called api. Wikipedia (source of all knowledge) describes it thusly: api, a.k.a. chicha morada, is usually made of ears of purple maize (choclo morado) which are boiled with pineapple rind, cinnamon, and clove. This gives a strong purple-colored liquid which is then mixed with sugar and lemon. This beverage is generally drunk as an accompaniment to empanadas. I decided on the cleanest stand I could find and downed my api with an empanada with powdered sugar sprinkled over it. Again, Rachael wasn’t much impressed with the Bolivian cuisine and I suggested she get a milk shake across the way. This is where things got bad for her. Throughout the entire trip we had successfully avoided any food or drink that could make us sick; unfortunately, I did not see the doña put ice into the blender – Rachael saw it but didn’t think much of it. Apparently the bacterial infection she endured after the trip reared its ugly head exactly 2 weeks (time to incubate) after she partook of the fruity drink. Ironically enough, it was one of the only Bolivian treats she enjoyed. That night we tried and failed to find an Argentine beef place to eat and settled on the upscale “Dumbos” which is famous for its ice cream but also provides a pu-pu platter of other stuff. I just wanted ice cream and nothing else on the menu appeared palatable, but Rachael wanted more on her b-day. Unfortunately her selection (chili con carne) was too spicy and sour cream doesn’t exist in Bolivia. After sending it back and waiting 30 minutes for it to come back in its same original spicy form we headed back to the hotel.
Early the next morning we tried to get a taxi and every single one was charging the outlandish amount of $7! Mind you, up to this point I had not paid more than $1 for a taxi ride and $7 could buy passage for two halfway across Bolivia. But at 4 a.m. on a Sunday morning, surprisingly, our options were limited. We got to the airport on time thinking that it would be a direct flight to Miami, since that is what was on my ticket and what I had arranged with my travel agent, but of course in Bolivia things are up for interpretation as what a direct flight means.
We had to fly to Santa Cruz and stay on the plane while 20% of the flight debarked and we waited another 50 minutes while a airplane security agent took off every seat cushion and patted down the fabric with bare hands. As luck would have it, he did not find any bomb and we were finally off to a land where we could drink straight from the tap and not worry about flushing used toilet paper.
There are few times in life that we experience a completely different world, few times we see how fortunate we are to live in the United States, few times to see and really understand that the next vacation will be an all inclusive package.
Unfortunately, our stay was also too short. Before we left, we did manage to eat at my favorite P-day lunch spot, Gattopardos; the Spaghetti Mafiosa was just as good as I remembered!
Our flight to Cochabamba was supposed to be for 10am the next morning, of course it was delayed the inevitable hour because well, that's the way things work in Bolivia. One thing I failed to mention was our family home evening we had on the night before we left. The whole family was involved, I was asked to give the lesson five minutes before everything started and I got in touch with one of my first baptisms, Saul Duchén. We have been communicating off and on for the last couple of years and I learned that he served a mission, got married in the temple and is now 3 months from being a dad. Needless to say, it was great to see him after eight long years. It was certainly a cool thing to go back to my first area and look at the mission photos of my first baptism. Anyway, at the airport Saul came unannounced to see us off for the last time; definitely a cool thing for me.
We got into Coch (mission slang for Cochabamba) and the family that our good friend Dustin knew during his mission was there to pick us up and offer their house as a base for our daily excursions. The Salazar family was great and so nice to offer a room of their house to people they've never met and barely heard of; however, they esteem Dustin on the same level as a god and so if he says we were good people then that was the infallible truth. After hearing a brief recounting of our trouble in La Paz, René, the father, insisted that we have at least one member of the family with us at all times in the city. That promise held true for the first day, but I was able to convince him that it would be alright and we've traveled this far by ourselves without much trouble. Reluctantly, he let us out of the house without an accompaniment. The first day, we took the gondola up to the Cristo de la Concordia to get a good look at the whole city. This statute is not much unlike the one in Rio de Janeiro, except this one is a few inches taller (I have a picture of the stats to prove it), and has peep holes drilled in all over the body.Day two in Coch we decided to go to "la Cancha", the big open market in the center of town that has just about everything you could ever want or need and lots more of what you'll never want or need. Specifically, we hit up the artisan rows to scope out what souvenirs we would be bringing home. Unfortunately, we only had travelers’ checks to cash and none of the money exchangers could do that. We were directed to the center of town where once again we were told to go somewhere else. During our wild goose chase for the elusive travelers’ check money exchanger, I learned that during my six year absence from the country the mission office had moved to a different unknown part of town, Burger King had taken the place of McDonald's as the only fast-food restaurant, and lunchtime had drastically increased in length from two to three hours!
We waited for a few hours, once again entertained only by the pigeons, only this time their excrement became more of a problem (we'll just leave it at that). After finally cashing our checks we hopped onto a small little bus, trufi, and headed out to one of my favorite areas in Coch.
I was a little worried that I wouldn't remember where to get off, but in the prior week I learned to just trust my instincts. The highway out to Quillacollo (the Blanco Galindo) had changed quite a bit but somehow I remembered the kilometer mark and told the driver to stop. I got out and I soon found my way around. I decided that I would try to find some of the great families that I had met and Rachael and I trotted off in the general direction where I thought they lived. Fortunately, I did find the house where the Ayala family lived but of course they had moved.
I learned a secret years ago about finding people and figuring out what happened to them: ask the lady in the tienda. I went across the street and tapped a coin on the metal bars to the store; soon the doña came and directed me to the general area where they had moved. Luckily, she told me they hadn't moved far from there. We did an about-face and went in search of the next tienda that could lead us to the promised land. Of course, the only one at the next tienda was no more than 10 years old and couldn't help us out. Discouraged only a little, I set out to find other people that I knew. This time with ease, I found where I once laid my head to rest at night and descendants of that family still lived there (the grandparents who I knew are now living in Salt Lake City!). I described members of the Ayalas and the 15 year old grandson walked us to their front door.
Lizeth, now a 21 year old young lady, answered the door. I called her by name, I took off my sunglasses, then my baseball cap; still a perplexed look affixed to her face. "Elder Lippmann?", I said; still, nothing. Ultimately, I had to play the "go get your mother" card. Finally, the mother came and I was immediately recognized and welcomed! The family told me of some hard times that they were having and I promised to keep in touch and help in any way I could.
Sufficiently exhausted and a little sicker, we staggered back to the Salazar’s and we failed to even notice the rock hard mattress we had to sleep on. Day three meant a trip back to la Cancha to purchase all of the necessary souvenirs as proof of our journey to the center of South America. I really enjoyed the process of haggling and lowering prices by nominal amounts and then deciding we really didn’t want the item anyway. We spent quite a few hours and eventually came away with an impressive loot that covered both of our families’ Christmas presents all for a very reasonable low price. We made our way to the bus terminal and purchased our passage for our final destination.
Once again we were off to La Paz. We had the names of a few good hotels to stay at and decided on the one that a taxi driver pointed out to us. There was really nothing special but it had hot water straight from the sink faucet (a first in our trip) and it was relatively clean. For our last two days in Bolivia we weren't really motivated to go out and see a bunch of stuff, but I tried to complete the Bolivian experience for Rachael.
Early the next morning (our last day and Rachael’s birthday) I was directed to a little shack where they served salteñas. Salteñas are savory pastries filled with beef, pork or chicken mixed in a sweet, slightly spicy or very spicy sauce, and sometimes also containing peas, potatoes and other ingredients – something I loved during my mission. Rachael didn’t like how they tasted so I got a hearty breakfast.
Later we went up “gringo alley” and looked for anything that was so fabulous we wouldn’t be able to resist…we didn’t find anything. The prices were about the same as in Coch, there was a little more selection but basically it was the same ol’ stuff.
We then continued up the main street and entered into a little fruit and pastry market. I was looking for a special hot drink called api. Wikipedia (source of all knowledge) describes it thusly: api, a.k.a. chicha morada, is usually made of ears of purple maize (choclo morado) which are boiled with pineapple rind, cinnamon, and clove. This gives a strong purple-colored liquid which is then mixed with sugar and lemon. This beverage is generally drunk as an accompaniment to empanadas. I decided on the cleanest stand I could find and downed my api with an empanada with powdered sugar sprinkled over it. Again, Rachael wasn’t much impressed with the Bolivian cuisine and I suggested she get a milk shake across the way. This is where things got bad for her. Throughout the entire trip we had successfully avoided any food or drink that could make us sick; unfortunately, I did not see the doña put ice into the blender – Rachael saw it but didn’t think much of it. Apparently the bacterial infection she endured after the trip reared its ugly head exactly 2 weeks (time to incubate) after she partook of the fruity drink. Ironically enough, it was one of the only Bolivian treats she enjoyed. That night we tried and failed to find an Argentine beef place to eat and settled on the upscale “Dumbos” which is famous for its ice cream but also provides a pu-pu platter of other stuff. I just wanted ice cream and nothing else on the menu appeared palatable, but Rachael wanted more on her b-day. Unfortunately her selection (chili con carne) was too spicy and sour cream doesn’t exist in Bolivia. After sending it back and waiting 30 minutes for it to come back in its same original spicy form we headed back to the hotel.Early the next morning we tried to get a taxi and every single one was charging the outlandish amount of $7! Mind you, up to this point I had not paid more than $1 for a taxi ride and $7 could buy passage for two halfway across Bolivia. But at 4 a.m. on a Sunday morning, surprisingly, our options were limited. We got to the airport on time thinking that it would be a direct flight to Miami, since that is what was on my ticket and what I had arranged with my travel agent, but of course in Bolivia things are up for interpretation as what a direct flight means.
We had to fly to Santa Cruz and stay on the plane while 20% of the flight debarked and we waited another 50 minutes while a airplane security agent took off every seat cushion and patted down the fabric with bare hands. As luck would have it, he did not find any bomb and we were finally off to a land where we could drink straight from the tap and not worry about flushing used toilet paper.
There are few times in life that we experience a completely different world, few times we see how fortunate we are to live in the United States, few times to see and really understand that the next vacation will be an all inclusive package.
