Hi everyone! As you may already know, our Bolivia trip has come to an end, and we are actually back in the states now. But since we stopped updating the blog about half way through our trip, I still wanted to put up the rest of our pictures, and describe each city we visited.
During the times that we were not working on our project, we lived in La Paz, the capitol city of Bolivia. We decided not to interview people in La Paz, because it is not a rural setting like the other regions our study included, and people from all over Bolivia come to live there, so it wouldn't be a very representative sample. This meant that we had some free time to enjoy ourselves in the city, and of course do plenty of shopping. Views of the beautiful Mount Illimani can be seen from all over the city.
There is an interesting story behind the famous hats that the women of La Paz are always seen wearing. As told to us by Oscar, there was once an Italian businessman who originally imported a large shipment of these tall black hats to La Paz with hopes of selling them to the Bolivian men. Unfortunately, the hats turned out to be too small and did not suit the tastes of the Bolivian men, and his plan backfired on him. So in an attempt to find a new market for his hats, the Italian businessman invented a story about the hats, saying that if women wore the hat, they would have increased fertility. And the cholitas in La Paz have been wearing the hats ever since.
The streets of La Paz have very steep slopes, and with the city being at an altitude of 13,000 feet, we got quite the work out just walking around the city every day. Upon our arrival, Sara and I both had very low oxygen levels, around 85%, and our pulses were racing, 135 at rest. Our bodies adjusted over time, but it was still torture to walk up Aspiazu, our favorite uphill climb for 6 blocks at a 45 degree angle from the grocery store to Sue's apartment.
The principal plaza of La Paz, where most of the government buildings are located, is called Plaza Murillo. It is like the Trafalgar Square of La Paz, and people are constantly feeding the pigeons. Sara of course liked scaring them by running at them and making them fly all over the place instead.
Pictured here is a very old street in La Paz, left over from Colonial times. La Paz just celebrated its Bicentenario, the 200th anniversary of its liberty, so this street is over 200 years old. It is made of cobblestone, because horses used to travel along this road. Many museums are located in this area, including the Museo Etnografico, which I highly recommend. It is free for the public, and has some excellent exhibits on photography, textiles, and masks from traditional folk dances. Also on this street is Cafe Soho, a very cozy cafe where we tried a traditional Aymaran drink called Zucumbe (Sara and I were not fans).
We stayed in La Paz with our dear friend Rosi. We had heard of Rosi from three different groups of people while in Hershey, because Rosi had spent a year working as an au pair there. Ironically, we never met her while she was in the states, but are very glad to have met her in Bolivia.
On our first weekend in La Paz, we went to a concert by the famous folkoric band - Kala Marka, meaning stone village in Aymara. The concert that was supposed to start at 8:00 PM of course started at 11:00 PM (Bolivian time), and we spent the next four hours jumping up and down to this great music.
Our favorite place in La Paz was El Prado, a long street full of restaurants and shopping. It is at the heart of the city, and most of the minibuses connect there, at the Plaza de los Estudiantes. One very amusing feature is the the zebra crossing guards that they have on the streets in this area.
Because La Paz is shaped like a bowl, with the city center at the bottom and surrounded by valleys, it was beautiful to see the mountainside lit up every night. This is the view from our friend Reszy's apartment.
During the times that we were not working on our project, we lived in La Paz, the capitol city of Bolivia. We decided not to interview people in La Paz, because it is not a rural setting like the other regions our study included, and people from all over Bolivia come to live there, so it wouldn't be a very representative sample. This meant that we had some free time to enjoy ourselves in the city, and of course do plenty of shopping. Views of the beautiful Mount Illimani can be seen from all over the city.
There is an interesting story behind the famous hats that the women of La Paz are always seen wearing. As told to us by Oscar, there was once an Italian businessman who originally imported a large shipment of these tall black hats to La Paz with hopes of selling them to the Bolivian men. Unfortunately, the hats turned out to be too small and did not suit the tastes of the Bolivian men, and his plan backfired on him. So in an attempt to find a new market for his hats, the Italian businessman invented a story about the hats, saying that if women wore the hat, they would have increased fertility. And the cholitas in La Paz have been wearing the hats ever since.
The streets of La Paz have very steep slopes, and with the city being at an altitude of 13,000 feet, we got quite the work out just walking around the city every day. Upon our arrival, Sara and I both had very low oxygen levels, around 85%, and our pulses were racing, 135 at rest. Our bodies adjusted over time, but it was still torture to walk up Aspiazu, our favorite uphill climb for 6 blocks at a 45 degree angle from the grocery store to Sue's apartment.
The principal plaza of La Paz, where most of the government buildings are located, is called Plaza Murillo. It is like the Trafalgar Square of La Paz, and people are constantly feeding the pigeons. Sara of course liked scaring them by running at them and making them fly all over the place instead.
Pictured here is a very old street in La Paz, left over from Colonial times. La Paz just celebrated its Bicentenario, the 200th anniversary of its liberty, so this street is over 200 years old. It is made of cobblestone, because horses used to travel along this road. Many museums are located in this area, including the Museo Etnografico, which I highly recommend. It is free for the public, and has some excellent exhibits on photography, textiles, and masks from traditional folk dances. Also on this street is Cafe Soho, a very cozy cafe where we tried a traditional Aymaran drink called Zucumbe (Sara and I were not fans).
We stayed in La Paz with our dear friend Rosi. We had heard of Rosi from three different groups of people while in Hershey, because Rosi had spent a year working as an au pair there. Ironically, we never met her while she was in the states, but are very glad to have met her in Bolivia.
On our first weekend in La Paz, we went to a concert by the famous folkoric band - Kala Marka, meaning stone village in Aymara. The concert that was supposed to start at 8:00 PM of course started at 11:00 PM (Bolivian time), and we spent the next four hours jumping up and down to this great music.
Our favorite place in La Paz was El Prado, a long street full of restaurants and shopping. It is at the heart of the city, and most of the minibuses connect there, at the Plaza de los Estudiantes. One very amusing feature is the the zebra crossing guards that they have on the streets in this area.
Because La Paz is shaped like a bowl, with the city center at the bottom and surrounded by valleys, it was beautiful to see the mountainside lit up every night. This is the view from our friend Reszy's apartment.
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