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I shouldn't have drunk it
Entry 31 of 49 | show all | print this entry |
escribe algo mas de La Paz, carajo
La Paz is an interesting, marvellous, active and moving city in a valley with the view on snow-covered mountains. Unfortunately it turned out to be a huge disaster for me. While visiting a local family I was offered milk for breakfast, in fact it was something between milk and oatmeal. Since the family was really poor, the milk was probably a kind of the cheapest type. Within one hour after drinking the stuff I started to feel really bad. At first I got cramps in my stomach, then I got fever, was cold and had fever again (do you call it ague in english?) and finally I got nausea. Unfortunately at that time I was on the street walking to my hostal so I couldn't puke (the streets in La Paz are full of people and different stalls), even if I felt it would help me. It's not really pleasant to be ill during your stay in a foreign country, when you're alone, thousands of kilometers from home.. What the hell is happening to me? Do I have a milk-poisoning? Do I have malaria?
I slept about three hours, which helped against the fever a bit and then I used my secret cure - the Czech fernet (a traditional alcohol :-) which helped to pacify my stomach, then I slept other twelve (12!!) hours and woke up better, but with a really bad diarrhea (again!). So I was eating only bread or very plain food during the rest of my Bolivian visit. That's why there's no "About the Bolivian food" story even though I saw so many yummy things on the streets (at least they looked yummy, but could be dangerous to me).
Please don't think of my as of a man of prejudice, but I learnt in Cusco that the Israelis always knew where's the cheapest internet, the cheapest laundry, movies for free or the best (=cheapest) restaurant in the town. Moreover, many of them told me that it's pretty cheap to send a package from Bolivia. Since my backpack became heavy, I decided to send home some of my stuff. Why I am telling you this story - Normally you have to let the post officers to check your packet. So I went to another room with open packet "looking forward" to wait till the officer checks all my spanish lessons which I was sending home. But the procedure turned out to be different. The officer didn't check the content of my packet at all, just took the packet from my hands (saying she'll close the top better than me), gave me a piece of paper where I should write down the address and stuff, used my sealing tape I had to buy in advance and then - asked me to pay 3 Bolivianos for her help and advice... 3 Bolivianos are about 0.45 USD, which isn't much, but it drives me really nuts - from Cusco on I've got the feeling that everybody's trying to rip off the tourists. I wasn't arguing with the officer (she could change her mind and decide to see my packet, then I'd have to buy a new tape for 3 Bolivianos), but I asked her to give me the bill for that. Because she didn't know what to write on the bill, she started to look for another "help and advice" in the receipts-book. Of course she didn't find it..
I don't wanna repeat myself, but the world is really tiny, guess what.. I met Angela again (the Colombian girl who I crossed the Ecuador-Peruvian border with) in my hostal of La Paz!! And other story: the third day in La Paz I met Elizabeth (the Dutch lassie from the Peru-Bolivian border) again.
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