Stuck in the world's highest city: a dynamite & diahrrea conspiracy

Potosi was once a city of unbelievable wealth, the richest city in the world, a wealth that was generated by the plundering of the abundant silver present within the big, brown mountain 'Cerro Rico' whose moody presence looms over the city.

The Spaniards, using the slave force of millions of indigenous people and imported African slaves, managed to extract so much silver that it was said to have underwritten the spanish empire for 2 centuries. Up to 8 million people died under the hellish conditions of the mines, where miners are exposed to a variety of noxious chemicals and temperatures can range from between below freezing to 45 degrees celcious. The Spanish took almost all of it, and left Bolivia with nothing, as one of the poorest countries in Latin America.

Sadly, people still search for the few remaining slivers of silver. Thousands of people still work the mines, despite the life-shortening silicosis pneumonia which usually kills after 10 years of labour, and shockingly, up to 6000 children work there. They know that the majority of their quarry is long gone, and they barely make enough money to survive, yet they cling to the dream of one more big find.

We had the opportunity to visit the mine, and I almost went, but in the end the idea of scrambling around in a damp, crack 4km deep amongst exploding dynamite didn't quite draw me enough, and anyhow, we got to see a fascinating film called 'The devil's miners' that more than substituted. It followed the life of this poor 13 yr old who is working the mines with his 9 yr old brother as their dad died, so the need for family income left them with little choice in the matter.
Interestingly, the miners split their worship between their Catholic God, when they are above ground level, and El Tio, the devil, when they enter his domain. Each of the mines has its own devil, and the miners regularily visit him to adorn him with gifts to ask for safety and good fortune. They spend up to 24 hours at a time in the mines, hamster-like cheeks stuffed with coca leaves (which give energy and supress hunger) and may breath in a noxious mixture of gases whilst using basic pick-axes and gas headlamps.
We loved the city. Cerro Rico is so impressive, making an amazing unreal super-imposed backdrop, especially when it's colours morph from shade to shade as the sun make's it's daily descent. The worn splendour of the old streets and buildings tell of better times. One thing that took me a while to notice was the complete lack of chain supermarkets - probably the first city i've been to without them. As we don't use these over-packaging, producer-exploiting, 'corporate take-over of our foodchain' - attempting stores of discontent, we wouldn't usually notice their absence straight away. But as far as we could tell, Potosi was supermarket-free and small independent food stores are thriving. How refreshing. We met up with Chaz again, and decided to go and watch a local derby between Real Potosi and another team from the city. The game was pretty mediocre, and the atmosphere lackadaisical, but it's highlight was pretty amusing. The presence of the military police was explained after the linesman on our side made a dodgy decision, which the crowd didn't take to well. A deluge of fruit and empty plastic bottle flew towards him, and landed around his feet as the game continued. He tried his best to pretend he hadn't noticed, but as the bombardment continued, two military police moved between him and us and held their riot shields up to stop the rogue apple cores from interuppting his game!!!!

We found a great little restaurant called the Llama, which did a nice selection of veggie set meals, and a few llama dishes. Llamas are an animal of huge importance in the Andes, as a source of food and wool. After a bit of research about their rearing, we found they were free-range, and decided to treat ourselves with a rare meat meal. It was lovely, I devoured the pork-like meat like a wolf. The restaurant also doubles up as a book exchange, and I found a selection of speaches by Hugo Chavez, which is pretty interesting.

We had planned to leave, but decided to stay one more day to check out a museum. Little did we know that a 48 hour strike and blockade of the city had been planned. So, we awoke to find that no transport would be entering or leaving the city for the next two days, and that many businesses - including the museum which had been our reason for staying the extra day - were closed in solidarity. The miners had blockaded the main roads, whilst locals closed the inner city roads with plastic tape, banners, and loads of big rocks. And so it was, our first Bolivian blockade! It was actually quite nice - the blockades here are a regular occurance, and often have the vibe of a public holiday. People set up their stalls and children and adults alike played games in the middle of the car-free streets. It all felt a bit like a 'reclaim the streets' protest. I think they were calling for better roads, as the current roads are no more than rough dirt tracks. But then the miners seemed to be behind it, so we weren't quite sure what it was about (I later learned that historically the miners have taken a lead role in many political actions in Bolivia).

On the second day we'd heard that some taxis were taking people out and on to Sucre, if you paid them a bit more, so we decided to join a French and Swiss girl who were going to look for a taxi. As we approached the bus station there was a fair bit of commotion and and there were a big group of miners who seemed to be getting tad rowdy, it looked and sounded like they were brawling, but I couldn't be sure. There were a few massive bangs as they let off sticks of dynamite. It all seemed a bit tense, and a lady selling bus tickets for one of the bus companies was trying to tell us that it was impossible to leave until 7 pm, when the 48 hours was up. We decided to look for a taxi all the same, agreeing that as a bus ticket vendor, she'd obviously be inclined to tell us that. But, as we turned a corner, we realised that it would probably be best we waited after all. One taxi had found an unblocked street, and driven away, much to the annoyance of the miners, who proceeded to run over to block prevent further cars from doing the same. As more dynamite exploded, another car attempted the same route, only to be met by miners who surrounded the car and began letting the tires down and forcing the doors open!!! Other cars that had been heading for the same route began reversing speedily back up the hill, and we decided to follow suite! It was pretty exciting stuff! The people here certainly let thier voices be heard when they want something done. I can't imagine the people of a city in the UK coming together to blockade the city for 48 hours to make demands on the government (though sometimes I wish they bloody well would)!

So, we decided we'd let it run its course, and stay one more night. We bought tickets for early the next morning and checked into a hotel accross the road from the bus station. It was a grade A shit hole, but at least we wouldnt have to worry about getting to the bus station early the next day. Unfortunately, later that night, Colette woke up with a dodgy tummy, and was soon bursting from both ends. This went on throughout the night, and sure enough my stomach began too, and we were soon tag-teaming the loo. There was no way we'd be getting that early morning bus, so I asked if we could pay for half a day, to give us chance to recover before the evening bus. We took the day to recover, and felt well enough to travel on to Sucre in the evening.