Bolivia: smells like a llama fetus

So after Sucre, Leah and I headed to Tupiza, but before we could arrive we had a 10 hour bus ride ahead of us. After stopping at every bakery along the way to the bus station, we were fully prepared for this long ride. The bus was a typical South American bus, uncomfortable, and SMELLY. I have noticed that every bus we have ridden in Peru and Boliva has the same distinct, gross smell. When I asked Leah if she noticed, she said, "yes, its the people, and they smell like llama fetuses."

With that in mind, we tried to settle in for the long, probably uncomfortable ride ahead of us. As bad luck would have it, three asshole teenagers behind us proceeded to blast every current emo song from their cellphones for at least 2 hours, until the bus driver got sick of it and turned up the radio. Unfortunately, that music was no better and we had to listen to latin ballads that were so loud and painful that I couldnt hear my ipod over them. But enough of the complaining, we had plenty of baked goods from the bakery (think mini fruit tarts, SO GOOD) and were able to sleep for most of the ride.

Our bus arrived in Tupiza at 3 30 in the morning. We stumbled off into a bus station having no idea where to go, but knew our hostel was close. A women gave us confusing directions, and we were off. The streets were completely empty except for a few drunk people wandering around, due to carnival festivals. We were walking down the middle of the street when this dog on the sidewalk starts to growl at us and chase us. I was ready to swing my suitcase at it, but it backed off once we left its area. Then we realized there were no street signs, so we were pretty lost until a nice man, who kept telling us not to be afraid, took us to our hostel. We were pretty lucky, otherwise we could have been wandering around forever.

We walked into the hostel and realized it was more like a giant complex and it even had a pool. We were expecting to be showed to a normal hostel room, but were taken down a long hallway and shown into a ridiculous and quite frightening room. There were twin beds with scarily colorful bedspreads, weird wall patterns, and a terrifying and quite large picture of Jesus above the beds. The man was talking to Leah, but I was too horrified and fascinated by the room to pay attention. All I got was that we would be leaving the room the next day. When I asked her why, she was like, "Kelly, we are in the owners residence. This room, apparently, belongs to Grandma." What did that mean? Was Grandma sleeping on the floor in some other room? Was she dead? WHO KNEW?! Overall it was a very strange experience, especially when we were woken up the next day by 2 children running into our room, laughing, then running away.

After that we moved to a normal room and decided to explore the town of Tupiza, which to be honest, there was not a lot of. It seemed like every other store was a pizzaria, so we headed into a random one and ended up having a delicious lunch while watching the movie Pay It Forward in spanish. Believe me, its terrible no matter what language. Then we wandered the markets and went to the lookout point, which was obviously up ANOTHER mountain. If I never climb another mountain after this trip, I will be so happy. The lookout was quite beautiful, since the town is surrounded by giant red mountains.

After that we wandered around the square looking for internet. Then Leah got pegged with about 3 water balloons by local children. Its carnival time and in Bolivia, that means give your children water balloons. And for some reason, Leah is always a target. She got hit on the head in Sucre as well, so I blame her red hair. I take it as a compliment because clearly I am blending in with the locals.

For dinner we went to another pizza place and the food was TERRIBLE but the ambiance was amazing. It was all gringos and none of us were talking to each other, but we were all watching the awesome 80s music videos that were on TV. Then Lionel Richies "Hello" came on, and we all started laughing and hollering and some scottish guy knew all the words so of course we made fun of him. Then everyone began talking and we all continued to make fun of the videos. My favorite was when one with George Michael came on and he was kissing a woman. Someone shouted, "yeah right George, you arent fooling anyone!"

Then we decided to go to bed because we had a huge adventure ahead of us, the SALT FLATS, which we will have to tell you about later.

And as a special treat, some Lionel for you!