Tarija at last

Our first impression of Tarija was that it is remarkably similar to Bali or Thailand. There are obvious differences, one being of course the language, but overall very, very similar. The back streets have footpaths in varying degrees of disrepair, but the closer you get to the central plazas, the tidier everything gets.
   Much more on the actual city in future posts. We arrived here Friday, just got settled in our house, and Saturday morning we were off to our first convention! Well actually a special assembly day. It was really nice to meet many of our brothers and sisters, some of whom are to become good friends. An extra special treat for us was seeing and meeting several people from the "Necesidad en Bolivia" DVD which we watched over and over again prior to coming here. Two photos follow regarding this:

 

 

 

We didn't get as much out of the actual program as we would have liked, and it was so frustrating wanting to talk to everyone but not being able to properly, but we felt at home in the hands of our new brothers and sisters. The brother who narrated the DVD (on the left in the second photo) who is from the Bolivia Bethel, actually thanked during his talk, those who came over from New Zealand to help here. That was very humbling. All in all an unbelievably special first complete day in Tarija. Follow this link to see a short video clip of the Assembly just prior to the start of the session.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Imrz18KABF0&feature=youtu.be

Next post I will discuss the vibrant Camposino market

Vaccinations

When we decided to come to Bolivia we were aware that we would need to get vaccinations of some description, but were not sure of the actual requirements or obligations. We had the luxury of having Jonathon McPherson in our congregation who happens to be a GP. He put us on to a site which was very helpful - typing CDC into Google will get you there, the centre for disease control in the US. It is an awesome site because all you have to do is select the section dealing with travellers, then select your destination country, and it gives you requirements and recommendations for various parts of your destination country.
   Coming from NZ, the only actual requirement for vaccinations, is yellow fever. Without it NZ is not that keen to let you back in the country! All the rest are really optional, although some are strongly recommended, such as typhoid and hepatitis B. anyone thinking of moving or even travelling overseas could do worse than read the recommendations on this site. It has the added feature of being able to choose to read as a layperson or as a clinician, an interesting insight into recommendations to doctors. Jehovah's Witnesses would do well to research the rabbis vaccine thoroughly.
   It actually costs quite a bit to get the vaccines that are recommended. It costs close to $1000 for the whole deal ( per couple) the yellow fever vaccine costs $160 per person, and be prepared, they will tell you, you can die if you accept it! When we got ours we had our granddaughter with us, and the doctor said " by the way you realise  1 in 10000 people die from taking this vaccine? You will need to sit here for 30 mins so we can observe you." You should have seen the look on Lois' face! She said if I had known that, I would have had a coffee before I came here! The mark of a true coffee addict. The doctor continued "if you react to the vaccine there is a small chance we can save you!" Great, let' s do it!
   We actually did need it so we went ahead. Only designates travel doctors can administer the vaccine  and he checks to make sure you haven't recently had another live vaccine. The injection was honestly completely painless. Then we sat there being "observed" waiting to drop dead and leave our granddaughter to her own devices. It turns out we didn't die, so we thought what the heck, and went berserk getting all the vaccines we thought we needed, and went home feeling like pincushions. Our granddaughter bailey was starting to get quite well informed medically after our initial blood tests to check for hepatitis immunity, vaccines and further blood tests due to a mix up at the lab. Anyway, now we were raring to go!
   Next post we go back to Tarija and the start of the real adventure.

Crossing the border

Well it came time to leave Salta and finally enter Bolivia. This turned into the most stressful part of the whole journey actually. We were very grateful to Martin Rattray who booked our transport and subsequently got us out of a hole when things turned a bit awry. The first problem was finding the office of the transport company "Dragon Rojo". It was a small office which we finally found, and of course they didn't speak English. Up until now we had been able to get by with marginal Spanish, but here we faced a problem with our booking which we didn't have the language skills to cope with.
   Apparently the company normally has taxis ferry you to the border, a four hour drive, and then over the border you transfer to a bus. As there were 8 of us from NZ all with truckloads of luggage, the company agreed to bring the bus right to Salta. The problem was that when we went to verify our booking the day before, they conveniently knew nothing about the bus coming to Salta! Enter Martin on a galloping white horse! We ended up having to book 2 extra taxis which cost us more, but at least we were on our way again. If not for Martin we would have been stuck trying to get 8 people and 24 suitcases into 2 taxis!
   The trip happens at night, so here we were waiting outside our hotel in the dark with all our luggage for the taxis to turn up. Nevada and his group were doing the same at their hotel across town. We had just about given up hope of them turning up, when 35 mins late they trundle around the corner. Syntyche and Drew managed to pile there luggage in, but we had a taxi with an LPG tank in the boot. After about 10 mins of karate kicking suitcases we managed to slam the boot, and ensconce ourselves in the back seat with half our luggage. Now I am not a fussy person at all really, and I have had some horrendous trips in my life, but this can only be described as the trip from hell. It was extremely hot, probably well over 30 degrees, we were jammed in the back like sardines hardly able to move our feet let alone get comfortable to sleep, and both our windows and door handles were broken. Not only that but we had not a clue how far we were going, so couldn't even psyche ourselves up for it. Then the driver stopped to but coca leaves and cigarettes, oh joy! As the trip progressed the drivers cheeks bulged more and more until we couldn't see how he could get any more coca leaves in, we felt like banging his cheeks together to see what would happen.
   About an hour into the trip we came across a group of people walking along the road in the complete darkness. Keep in mind that we are miles from anywhere, and it is dark. Well for the next hour and a half there were masses of people walking along in the pitch dark with kids in tow holding flowers. Most of the way the taxi driver was driving on the wrong side of the road to avoid hitting them. This too was part of the celebration of the day of the dead, where they walk through the night to place flowers at cemeteries, a wee bit odd I thought.
   Finally we arrive at an immigration office where the taxi driver herds us in to get our passports stamped. No dramas getting that done, but we come outside and he is gone! After a while we notice his car up ahead several hundred meters. We had been warned that this was the only place to use the toilets before getting to Tarija 3 hours later, so we went off to find them. For the life of me I couldn't find a men's toilet, so I gave up and waited for Lois. She came out rather shell shocked, indicating that the toilet hadn't been flushed in rather a while, and she had to walk over piles of used paper thrown on the floor. Oh well better than nothing I guess.
   Off we go to load our luggage back in to the taxi, squeeze ourselves in and set off again - for 100 meters. Then out we get and all our luggage gets taken out for inspection by officials. Meanwhile we see the taxi driver roaring off into the wild blue yonder back to Salta. An old man loads our luggage onto a trolley and takes off down the road. we weren't sure whether it was being stolen, or we were supposed to follow or what, so we ran after him. He crossed a bridge, went a 100meters or so further and we came to another office where apparently we had to fill in some documents. This office, and the officials put you in mind of some tin pot border control in the middle of nowhere where tourists go missing regularly and are never heard from again. Here is a flattering photograph of the outside of the office:

After being manhandled, ordered around, confused and abused, we finally got to fill in an application for an entry visa and were on our way. By the way the mosquitos here are in plague proportions, and fly around in huge swarms. Fortunately I don't ever seem to get bitten and they didn't bother me. Lois had insect repellent with her, but before leaving NZ she started taking vitamin B1 tablets as they are supposed to stop insects biting. It must work because she didn't get bitten either even without insect repellent.
   We met one young man here who we gave our first witness to. Lois gave him a tract and we asked him to study. He said he had in the past and would love to again.
   The rest of the trip went without too many dramas, we got on the bus which had a TV at the front. The three stooges was playing in Spanish on DVD. After 20 minutes it finished, and we had to endure the one minute preview over and over for two and a half hours. At least I got to see my first toucan fly past the bus! The scenery was nice but not dramatic. Here is a link to a short video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H_oSATeLqqA
   Well we get almost to Tarija, and the bus runs out of diesel! About 45 mins later we get going again, and to cut a long story short we arrive at Martin and Louise Rattray's house. What a relief to be able to converse properly again. Louise had an awesome breakfast prepared for us and we could finally savour the thought that we had arrived at our destination.
Next post I will talk about first impressions of Tarija, and also a little about vaccinations!
Until then...

Salta

When we were planning our trip to South America we decided that as we were going through Salta, we may as well stay for a couple of days and have a look around. By all accounts it purported to be a beautiful city. As we were getting close to Salta in the plane the terrain started getting pretty barren and desert like. The airport was quite small, and we caught a couple of taxis to our hotel without too many dramas. The city seemed quite third world to me as we drove to the Hotel, but we checked in with our best Spanglish and got settled. The rooms were quaint and quite comfortable, the only unusual thing in our room was that the shower and toilet were in the same room, with the shower facing the toilet. As the shower didn't have any walls or curtains, the toilet got wet every time the shower was used. You do get used to wet wipes however! We have noticed this plan is quite common in this part of the world, go figure.
   The free internet at the Hotel while slow, was a lifesaver as we had been incognito for a while, and were able to catch up with family and friends.
   We decided to head into town and have a meal, catching one of the gazillion taxis that take you anywhere for peanuts. Salta is famous for succulent Argentine steak, so we ended up at a restaurant specialising in Steak. In most places in the world I have found when you order steak rare, they think you mean very well done minus two seconds cooking time, so I was delighted to receive a large perfectly cooked delicious fillet which they call here Bif chorizo. I was half expecting a steak dressed with spicy sausage, but no it was exactly what I wanted. The wine list was excellent as well, and the meal was very reasonably priced.
   After the meal we walked out into the main plaza. It seems in the parts of South America we have been to so far that the towns are very far below the western world in standard, but then you come to these plazas here and there which are like oases from the starkness of the suburbs. The plazas are without exception beautiful, and the people seem to congregate in these plazas which are generally filled with eating establishments, monuments, and park benches surrounding well kept grass and gardens. I took a video clip of the plaza, follow this link to see it:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o9RXLq5AYCY
   We came back here the second night and met up with the Soames' and Keatings for a meal (fellow travellers from NZ). We tried another steak establishment and this time my rare steak was extra well done. Oh well you can't win them all, but I know which restaurant I will return to when we go back through Salta. Anyway like in Buenos Aires the town comes alive late a night, and we were heading to the restaurant through the plaza quite late and suddenly all sorts of celebrations randomly start. First some gentlemen (gauchos) ride around the plaza on horses finally hitching them up outside our restaurant, then this band starts blaring its way around as well. I have videos of this at these links:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=98qrbwxnkLk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k89S2l9xUO4
And here is a photograph:

The horses were right beside our restaurant, and the streams of urine and piles of dung really added to the ambiance as I chewed my rubbery steak! Actually coming from Murupara NZ, it's not like we aren't used to horses, and it really was a memorable evening. In fact take a look at this photograph of some horses we were given when witnessing in Ruatahuna NZ, two weeks before flying out. I kid you not, we were honestly given these horses!!

   Back in Salta it turns out we were here during the annual celebration called "the day of the dead" Not sure what part horses and bands play in that, but hey this is South America.
   All in all we enjoyed Salta and were glad we stayed a couple of days, next post I will talk about our dramas getting from here to Tarija across the border of Argentina and Bolivia. So until tomorrow...

Buenos Aires

Before I get into more details about our trip from Buenos Aires to Tarija, I would like to mention something that happened before we left New Zealand which was very very special. I wanted to start the blog with this but it took me longer than expected to sort out the accompanying video.
   Prior to leaving we were treated by our friends in the Rotorua congregations to a farewell. The whole evening was overwhelming for us but it was especially humbling to find out that many had been practicing for weeks to put on a performance for us including Maori poi and action songs. I didn't get to video the whole thing but follow this link to see some of it anyway. A very special thanks to our friends for making us feel so special.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4-fXTmJDVzU

Getting back to South America now, our flight got into Buenos Aires, and I was amazed by the sheer size of the city. It sprawls out for miles and looks quite impressive. The taxi drivers were very disappointed with us for staying only night, and they tried to get us to go straight into the city to make the most of the night life. They say it is like New York and never sleeps. Of course we weren't interested in the night life they were talking about, but it was true the place seemed to be just coming to life at 10p.m. A word about the taxi drivers here by the way, they won't hesitate to rip you off if you are not alert to prices and currencies. At present the NZ dollar buys you about 8 Argentine pesos, and make sure to have some on hand before you arrive if possible. When you come out of the airport guys will grab your bags and load them into their friends taxis and expect to be tipped. This is unavoidable, but they turn their noses up at US coins which they can't exchange, and expect $US5 minimum which amounts to a pretty healthy $50Arg tip! If you have pesos it is the better option I think! We had to take two taxis due to the volume of luggage. When we arrived at the hotel the drivers basically invited us to give whatever we thought for the ride! I am sure if we had underpaid them they would have spat the dummy, I guess being gringos they thought we may give them wads of cash and been none the wiser, but fortunately we had an idea of the cost so we gave that and asked them to return in the morning to pick us up for the airport. (By the way we paid them 25 pesos for a ride of around 10-15 mins)
   My daughter Syntyche booked our hotel from NZ and it turned out to be good value with an excellent breakfast as well. Once we booked in and ferried our truckload of luggage up to our rooms in the tiny lift, we went exploring. The outskirts of the city were a bit more third world than I expected, but we intend to go back for a decent look at the city later in the year, as I know we didn't see the best of it. We found a restaurant and as Drew and I had been doing all the speaking in Spanish we insisted the girls have a turn. They promptly pointed to a special pasted on the wall and said "dos, por favor" - cheats. Having said that it turned out OK as it was a large pizza and a litre of beer, awesome! Quite inexpensive too.
   After our meal, a good nights sleep and the hotel's brilliant breakfast, we hauled our mountain of luggage out onto the road to await our taxi. No show, great! At least it showed we weren't a soft touch. Fortunately taxis are everywhere in South America and so we hailed two and made our way to the airports domestic terminal. Make sure to book in early if you fly out from here, the queues to check in were horrendously long and slow. Any way we made our flight and sat back to enjoy the two and half hour flight to Salta. I have to say that I was stunned by the immensity of flat fertile arable land in Argentina. Both of our flights across country were over mile after mile of perfectly flat intensively farmed countryside, somewhat like the mid-west in the states. I expected more rugged terrain as we headed North. Bolivia made up for Argentina's lack of ruggedness and altitude believe me, but more on that in coming days.
My next post will be about Salta which is quite an interesting city. Tune in tomorrow for this, including a few videos.
Hasta luego

Flying out

One good thing about flying to South America [from New Zealand anyway] is that the baggage allowance is very generous. Each person is allowed two cases of a maximum of 23 kgs, and carry on of 8 kgs. Very helpful indeed if you are planning to be away for a year. It does have a downside though, what a fiasco getting through airports and using taxis! My daughter and her husband decided to accompany us on our adventure, so with four of us we had 8 large suitcases and 4 small. Hugely daunting when arriving in Buenos Aires and not being really sure where our hotel was, and having to take separate taxis. Some people told us not to be concerned about learning Spanish in NZ, being fully immersed in the language would ensure we picked it up in no time. Not really a help in Buenos Aires before arriving in Bolivia however! Fortunately we did try our best for 6 months to learn the language, and I can honestly say the more you can learn before leaving home the better. Even being able to have small conversations with our brothers and sisters here has been like gold! I would have hated not knowing any Spanish at all. Anyway I digress, more on that later.
   I imagined the easiest way to get to Bolivia from NZ would be through the United States, but it turns out the best way for us was to fly either direct from Auckland to La Paz or to fly to either Santiago Chile, or Buenos Aires Argentina, then take a domestic flight up to Salta Argentina, where we could bus across the border to Tarija Bolivia which was our final destination. We were advised that flying in to La Paz while sometimes a cheaper option, could pose problems as it is at a very high altitude (almost 4000 meters) which causes major problems for some until your body adjusts. Apparently there is no way of knowing if you will cope or not, and if you react badly, you simply need to get to a lower altitude ASAP. It appears some people have even died! Considering we were  living not much above sea level in NZ it was probably a good choice to take the Southern route which we did. Actually it just happened that a good special on a flight came up flying into Santiago, then on to Buenos Aires, then on to Salta which we purchased. We were not even aware of how risky it was flying to La Paz. Anyway it was awesome to see other countries on the way.
   We were supposed to have a 7 hour stopover in Chile, but our flight was delayed, and we turned up in Santiago just in time to walk on to the next flight to Buenos Aires. We stayed a night here then flew on to Salta.
   In my next post I will give our impressions of these cities and post some photographs. I only have one poor photograph of our flight into Buenos Aires to post now (sorry about the quality) I was trying to get an impression of the size of the city but it wasn't a great shot. Hasta manana

Starting out

New Zealand is a long way from everywhere, except possibly Australia and the Pacific Islands, so deciding to leave the country for a year was a big deal. In leading up to that decision we tried to read as much as we could about our chosen destination, but found very little has been written about Bolivia. Perhaps because it is the poorest country in South America, and not your usual holiday destination? Whatever the reason, we were fortunate to have some friends living in Bolivia who filled us in on some of the pitfalls and problems to expect. Nevertheless having never been to South America before and not having any mental pictures to go by, we found ourselves flying out over the Pacific into the relatively unknown.
   Why Bolivia, you may be asking? Well as Jehovah's Witnesses we wanted to help people to learn about the Bible, and Bolivia is a place where there is a need for just that. While that was our reason for coming here, this blog is not for the purpose of discussing religion. Why we are writing is to help fill a gap for anyone else intending to visit or move here, who like us cannot find much in print about everyday life in Bolivia. We will hopefully be posting lots of photographs, facts and anecdotes about our year here.
   We have been here just on two weeks, and in our next few posts we will update you on the problems we faced coming into the country, along with some photos, then we will post regularly on life as it happens for us over the next year - a warts and all account of life in Bolivia, by Paul and Lois Clark! we look forward to sharing it with you. To finish our first post, here are SOME things we will really miss while we are away - Photograph 1 - Our son Aaron, our daughter in law Michelle, the ocean, and most of all our granddaughter Bailey! Photograph 2 - Our daughter Carmelita, and our friends the Smiths. Photograph 3 - Gemma Lee. Sorry Kelsens, Lees and Todds I didn't have a photo with me to post!