Friends and Family;
Have you ever gotten to a place and wanted to leave shortly after arriving? I wish I’d listened to that feeling. (Why I didn’t take the hint during my first three hours in the city, I don’t know. I guess I believe in second chances. And I was tired.)
Despite having said that, the city of Sucre is actually a very beautiful city. It sits nestled in a gentle slope of the Andean hills at roughly 2700 meters above sea level, and most buildings share a common colour scheme of white walls and terra cotta roofs. The pictures from high up are quite nice.
There’s something wrong with it though, almost as if the city is too perfect. La Paz, even though it was dirty, torn up and undevelopped, was honest. The city didn’t aim to please. Despite the fact that the place looked like a piece of cracked, orange tile stuck between two mountains, it was beautiful in its honesty. It didn’t try to capture your attention with colour schemes and fancy restaurants, nor did it cover up its imperfections. If La Paz were a person, it would be the guest of honour at a crowded suite-and-tie function, bursting into the room, butt naked and yelling; “I’m hEEEEEEre!” There’s something beautiful in that, and I miss it.
Today, I went with two people I’d met to an archeological sight on the outskirts of town. This spot is famous because it was a dinosaur activity hotspot, and their tracks have been left for tourists to pay the equivalent of $5 to access and see. The interesting thing about these tracks though, is that millenia of tectonic plate movements have forced the tracks onto an 80 degree slope. Instead of following the tracks through the sand like children, we had to stand at the base of a mountain and damage our necks to look up at the testimony to the immensity of these prehistoric creatures. This was the interesting part of the tour however; the beginning (which is mandatory) is a guided tour through a park of sorts, in which life-sized dinosaurs have been built in plastic and propped in different areas around the park. The guide, bless his heart, spoke to a tour full of 20 and 30 year olds as if he were talking to a kindergarten class. It was quite comical, and all we could do to hold straight faces (“and over here, we have a DINOSAUR… whoaaaa…”).
This didn’t do much to help my mood. Despite the intensity of looking up at a monstrous cliff and seeing different sized footprints lined up at different angles all over the cliff, there did seem to be a haste in which the park and the tour were set up. The guides felt like entertainers more than educators, and could answer none of the questions posed to them, once in English and another time in Spanish. The park, complete with plastic dinosaurs, just seemed a lazy addition to a completely fantastic attraction. It felt like a money grab. I wouldn’t have minded paying the $5, had only seen the tracks.
Tomorrow my melodramatic suffering will hopefully come to an end, and I will travel onwards in my journey. I feel like a pilgrim of sorts on a voyage, with the final destination being Buenos Aires, and the journey completely undetermined. I’m excited for what tomorrow will bring. I’m hoping for the change for my sanity’s sake.
Global Thoroughfare 