Hola Bolivia

We said goodbye to salgados, suscos and multipul flavors of tang juice mix (who knew that tang had a guava flavor) and took a public bus to the border of Brazil and Bolivia. We (along with about 10 other tourists) walked over a small bridge and into Bolivia. We got our passports stamped, exchanged money (via the fancy purse carrying lady at the border aka the bank) and got a taxi to the train station. The rule on the train is that anything heavier than 30 kilos has to be put in the luggage compartment and we reluctantly handed over most of our blongings (with a little silent prayer to the luggage god to keep our clothing safe, we had already put our important stuff in a carry-on), and boarded the train.

The train has not been updated since oh..1950. This includes the spings to make sure that the chairs recline all the way, the toilets, and the airconditioning. The tv´s however had been updated, like all things in S. America good tv´s and cell phones are readily available everywhere. The best part about entering Bolivia is that I actually really understand what people are saying (provided that they speak slowly) and I can actually really answer them, this alone has made me feel more comfortable in Bolivia than I was when we first arrived in Brazil.

We settled into the train and for the next 18 hours (really) we watched a variety of 80´s videos, an HBO special on the Tsunami in Thailand (in portuguese with spanish subtitles, my brain just about exploded trying to figure out what was going on), and some sort of kung fu movie spoof. I have been amazed at how the two places we have been in S. America seem to be stuck in some sort of 80´s time warp...in Brazil it was the thumb up to everyone and here in the cool music videos clothing style. We had our first tastes of Bolivian food, everytime the train stopped people (including children) would run along the train and you could purchase food through the window (it was a bit surreal). I slept for about 12 hours (thanks Ted) and woke up with a blanket covering me (we did not bring one), apprently the lady sitting to our right decided that we looked cold and lent us (while we were asleep) one of her blankets. The kindness of strangers never ceases to amaze me.

We finally pulled into Santa Cruz de la Sierra at about 9am, got our bags (thanks luggage god) and got a taxi to our hostel. We are very dirty and desperately need to do laundry (both of which the hostal can help us with). Our plan is to relax for most of today, check out a few tour agencies and figure out what we want to do for the next 14 days until my brother in-law arrives in La Paz on the 25th of July.

I finally have some time to sit down and remove all the splinters and the hitchhiking tic, I got while walking barefoot in the pantanal, maybe that was not such a good idea. (oh yeah and I am sure many of you noticed...I spelled caiman wrong! oops!)