11.03.08 My first Bolivian hangover

Over the years I would say I’ve run the gamut of hangovers: the sucker punch that you thought you’d got away with; the guilt-laden, teary, soul-sapper; the nauseating, painful, sickener; the dreamy, floaty giggler; the detached, untouchable, isolator; the ratty, grumpy bastard… but nothing like this. Everything was in super-sharp relief, colours and sounds were acute, extraordinarily acute. And the area in and above my left eye, pain. Oh lord, pain!

10.03.08 A humbling experience

Susi’s birthday and I was a hopeless boyfriend: no card, no presents. Pathetic. She was wonderfully sympathetic, which was a relief. While I knew what I wanted to buy, I’ve been hamstrung by illness, not knowing where to get them, or what they’re called. Infuriating. In the end, I managed to acquire a card (technically, a postcard), some flowers (a huge, beautiful array) and a plastic jug to put them in. Not a complete success, but I did take her out for dinner as well. While this was not all I had planned, it still felt like an achievement and she was a happy lady. I am a very lucky chap.

I went to interview Juan Mauricio Choque Apaza. It was very different experience to last week: he was now in his 14th day of hunger strike and weak, his room was stripped of all its anti-Morales posters and bright flags, and he was completely on his own. A few days earlier, there had been five hunger strikers, when government officials arrived with the police. They knew to expect trouble and ran, leaving their visitors to take everything they could steal. Juan Mauricio Choque Apaza was told they were going to kill him, but he escaped. Despite the intimidation, he has vowed to carry on for another couple of days. Lying there now he looks incredibly vulnerable, he’s utterly defenceless. His bravery is in the name of democracy and it struck me how we in the UK treat our liberties with such disregard.

9.03.08 If it’s good enough for the Queen…

What a strange night: I woke when it was still very dark with my stomach making peculiar noises. It reminded me of being a small boy waking scared in my aunt’s ancient house in Herefordshire. In my Superman jimjams in the darkness (as a boy, not now), I was captivated by the unexplained sounds of creaking, banging, stuttering and gurgling. Now my own body was reproducing the unsettling noises and effect of the timber and pipes at The Old Forge. Something is definitely not right.

The local cure for my ailment is coca, in fact, it seems to be the local cure for everything. It might work, so we have bought coca tea bags from the local supermarket. I could not resist the Windsor brand—I like to think of the royal family tucking in for a revitalising cup illegally imported in the diplomatic bag. Cheers, maam.

Feeling stronger in the morning, Susi and I went out to look for somewhere to live for the rest of our time in Bolivia. On our way home a police bike went past, riding pillion was a man dressed in a police-dog outfit waving to children. What with this and the zebra, it is easy to see why drivers treat the rules of the road with such disrespect.

8.03.08 All hands to the pumps

I’ve been very inactive for the last couple of days, apart from the area between my ribs and hips, which is furiously busy. Whether I have poisoned myself or not (I’m blaming bad, yet delicious, gambas from a restaurant), I do not feel good.

Being ill and not eating leaves me in a very peculiar state, I am simultaneously hungry and repulsed by food. This is particularly acute as I walk back from Spanish. The Bolivians love a road-side treat: the air is thick with rotisserie chicken, fat chorizo and other salchichas (sausages) being griddled, wafer-thin slices of sizzling llama steak, and empanadas (delish Bolivian pasties) winking enticingly. I love and hate these meaty treats equally; when I am well, I am going to EAT!

The short walk to Spanish or a café for its internet connection have been my entire time outside. On route, I’ve been surprised by the various types of entertainment at traffic lights: jugglers, singers, guitarists and people doing that spinning a plastic thing on string, they’re all out plying their trade. It’s like a visiting a rubbish circus every time the lights are against you. And once I saw a man in a zebra outfit directing the traffic.

6.03.08 Shoe-shine fear

This was a very quiet day following a night of very little sleep and an unsettled stomach. Thinking about the possible causes produced a prodigious list of potential culprits. Worryingly, Sanna has gastro enteritis; surely, I haven’t poisoned us?
I gingerly walked to my Spanish class through the Plaza Eduardo. It’s a lovely square, which is a hot bed of smoochers, slackers and shoe-shine boys. These lads represent the militant arm of a humble, inoffensive job. The boys cover their faces with balaclavas and adopt the proactive approach of chuggers, only without the false smiles or good intentions.

5.03.08 Love is in the air

Susi lunches with her colleagues and today they ate a locals’ place. It was a small unsophisticated restaurant with a powerful stereo. In an alchemic piece of cross-culturalism, it played very loud pan pipes renditions of classics, such as the timeless Lady in Red, Celine Dion’s unforgettable theme to Titanic and a compulsory Everything I Do (I Do It For You). And where was I, like a fool, during this cultural feast? In the Bolivian answer to Starbucks listening to James Blunt, without a pan pipe in ear shot. Surely, You’re Beautiful is crying out for the Andean treatment?
La Paz is a very romantic city. In every park, street corner and bench, there are teenagers and people old enough to know better canoodling and snogging. While this is going on everywhere, it appears somehow chaste and innocent, and rather charming.

4.03.08 Not what I am used to

I had my first Spanish lesson since leaving London with a kindly teacher at the inaccurately titled Instituto Exclusivo (well, they took me)—and it appears I have not improved. As luck would have it, there is plenty of opportunity for me to practice.
In the afternoon, I returned to the Iglesia de San Francisco to interview Juan Mauricio Choque Apaza, who is on hunger strike. A charming, vibrant man in bright, traditional clothes, he enthusiastically described how Evo Morales’ government was only good for socialists. Interestingly, he also drew comparisons with Nazi Germany and apartheid. In his room lined with posters denouncing the government and explaining his strike, he was solely sustaining himself on coca leaves and cigarettes. I found his demands impossibly and possibly suicidally woolly—for the government to move to social democratic principles—but I was impressed by his bravery. Only last week, supporters of the Morales’ Movement Towards Democracy knocked him unconscious at a demonstration.
As my first piece of work since leaving ILN, the contrast between the conviction of this man to starve himself for his principles and subbing the fluff I was used to in London could not have been greater. In fact, I took myself off for a beer to muse further.