In the bright mid-winter

Culturally, the Bolivian ex-pat lifestyle can be a little confused. On Saturday, we attended a Swedish mid-summer party held by Alina, a Canadian-Pole. It had been mid-summer the day before in the northern hemisphere, so we were only one day and two seasons out.
Given that winter here means dazzling blue skies, it’s not so dissimilar to summer in the UK, except it’s dark by 7pm and there are dazzling blue skies.
Anyway, feeling a little odd because of jet lag and altitude adjustment, a party where our Swedish friends said they would be dancing around an enormous penis was not to be missed.
The party was held in a garden with magnificent views of Illimani, if you stood in the right place. It was good to see Alejandro again—one of the few ice-hockey playing Mexicans in La Paz—we had been to his leaving party the night before.
And there in the pride of place was a tall, decorated cross; which would once have been a fertility-symbol phallus before Christianity ruined the fun.
After delicious Indian samosas and flavoured vodka, it was time to dance. Wearing crowns of flowers, we held hands around the “symbol”. A bottle of lemon vodka was passed around, the girl next to me turned it down pointing out she was pregnant, and the dancing began.
There was a song in Swedish about being a frog with hand-actions for ears and tails, for some reason this ended in falling over. I tripped and panicked about landing on the pregnant lady, while next to me a tall Bolivian lady was toppling too. Don’t land on me, I thought. Then, Oh no. Don’t land on her. Land on me. Land on me.
Happily, she managed to miss us both.

The 10 things we missed about Bolivia

It’s still inexcusably self-indulgent, and I won’t do it again.

The cloudless deep blue skies
The dazzling star-filled night sky
The amazing fruit (and I didn’t think I liked fruit)
Everything being remarkably cheap
Dogs decked out in anoraks, cardies and hoodies
Sonia—our maid
Illimani—our neighborhood 15,000 feet mountain
The view from the lip of El Alto into the La Paz bowl
Indigenous people in their gear
Susi and friends (not that most of them are Bolivian)

Susi's most missed:

Illi Mani—our cats
Illimani—the wopping mountain
The city’s lights at night
Having lots of money
Having a maid
Cholitas
Being taller than everyone else
Lake Titicaca or The Lake as it is known
Speaking Spanish
Having a fuck-off big flat