Bolivia 2008

There was a plane to La Paz today, much later than expected, but it arrived. The airport situation in Sucre is even more delicate than for La Serena in Chile, it´s really a kind of gambling. The flight went somehow chaotic (is it normal that the flight attendents ask you three times to change the seat?) and an employee of the airline, who had nothing to say, got extremely upset because I took a photo of the plane, which seems to be the worst law offense. On the other side, boarding the plane with some rolls of dynamite (freely available for purchase) would have been possible, as there were no security checks neither for luggage nor for passengers.

The second photo of today shows the government palace in La Paz. Since the birth of the State, Bolivia had already about 100 presidents, while those completing a full term could be easily named. Several presidents were only interim, many have resigned before the end of their term, and some were even killed. Evo Morales, currently in his third year as president, is the one with the longest government period since 2001.

Tonight I have seen the James Bond movie, which is showing also Bolivia, but was not filmed there. The theater audience was both amused and disappointed about the way how the movie company presented Bolivia, as it did not match the reality at all.

Tomorrow I will leave into the (semi-)jungle and may not be able to update these pages until Tuesday.