Posted 3:33 PM by MelanieandSteve
POTOSI, BOLIVIA, 16-19 APRIL

TOP OF THE MORNING FROM TOP OF THE WORLD

QUE TAL FROM BOLIVIA´S TALL MOUNTAIN TOWN of Potosi where every rubbly road, Mestizo market, and colorfully clad country person deserves to be framed. In town and at Potosi´s nearby mines we learned of a history rich in man power, mining, and money making.

POTOSI:

THIS SKY HIGH SILVER RICH CITY touts many claims to fame. At 4070 m (13,349.6 ft) it is the world´s highest city. In its hey day it produced 50% of the world´s silver, making it then the richest and most populated city of the Americas. Once, solid nuggets of silver surfaced in the mines, but today the still active mines only reveal silver mixed in veins of iron and zink.

ALL THAT SPARKLES IS NOT SILVER: The silver city´s history is Tarnished by slave labor and death. When African slaves could not adjust to Potosi´s cold weather and high altitude, indigenous ``slaves`` were paid a pittence to work, nearly all of which went directly to the Spanish crown in taxes. Oxygen starved mine shafts, explosives, massive machinery, and toxic chemicals, along with few safety precautions resulted in some eight million deaths in Potosi´s four hundred years of mineral pursuits.

HOUSE OF MONEY:

THE CASA DE MONEDA (House of Money), stopped functioning as a mint in 1953 when wealthier countries could produce Bolivia´s coins more efficiently. Now, the museum displays the old machinery and tools: multi-ton gear-wheels once turned by mules, huge hammers for pounding prints, and furnace rooms for forming silver bars. There were minerals on display, but surprisingly none from Potosi. We appreciated some honest perspective from Julio, our funny guide and former mine worker with anger issues.

MOUNTAIN OF MONEY

DAY ON THE MOUNTAIN: We spent a day on Cerro Rico (Rich Hill.) We shopped at miner´s markets, saw mineral refineries, and inside its hollows we watched its workings.

MINER´S MARKETS: Miners, as independent contractors, purchase their own supplies in street-side stands. The burrough of markets was stocked with dynamite, potassium nitrate, detonators, fuses, alcohol, pop, torches, and protective clothing. Best selling item, however, were coca leaves.

COCA LEAVES: Miners suck the juice from thirty grams of leaves a day (about 10 inch baggie).They can not eat in the toxic and dusty caverns and coca helps suppress their appetites. It also lubricates their throats and and filters out dust. Guides also called it an antedote for altitude and encouraged us to try.

MORE LIKE A TEA: Coca leaf is more like a tea than a drug. Its extract only contributes to cocaine in massive concentration (around 300 to 1) when combined with a conglomerate of chemical additives. We sucked on dried leaves of coca and drank it in hot water as tea. The taste was like green tea or mate (hay-like) but the juice barely numbed our tongues and there were no mind altering effects. We found this Bolivian substance of culture, economy, and comfort to be benign.

THE MORE PROBLEMATIC SUBSTANCE for Bolivian miners was alcohol. Hardened miners think beer at 5% alcohol is ´´like water for babies, ladies, and lady-boys´´. So they drink 96% ´´Alcohol Potable´´ (drinkable moonshine-like alcohol). Our former miner guide Effrain surprised us with a demonstration by upturning the bottle and taking in two large gulps of the clear throat burning substance. Many miners have large families and meager salaries, yet they still spend time and money on this sickening substance.

GIFTS: At the markets, we bought gifts for the miners (no alcohol). In Bolivia, anyone can buy explosives, ´´even a ten year old kid´´. We paid for two ´´completos´´ (the fixings for a bomb) and two liters of soda pop in hopes of easing the overhead for some underground, overworked, underpaid men.

MINERAL REFINERY

WE WALKED ALONG WOBBLY WOODEN LADDERS AND SAGGING WIRES in a warehouse too loud for talking and saw in action the machines that make mined rock into concentrated minerals.

HERE, RUBBLE brought from the mines by the ton, was pulvarized in huge grinding machines. Then the minerals were separated from rock through chemical processes using copper sulfide and cyanide. The resulting tri-mineral mix of zinc, iron, and silver was sold and shipped abroad to countries with smeltering technology.

SADDLY, THE CYANIDE and other chemicals were barely cleaned up and much of it would sludge into the river. Because of this, our guide doesn´t eat fish.

CERRO RICO MINES

THESE 14,300 FT HIGH MINES were alive and active. We stumbled through muddy puddles, sidestepped unmarked shafts, and ducked to avoid low ceilings and electric wires. We had to hit the wall when minors heaved and pushed their two-ton ore-trollies by us. Some of them stopped to talk. One man removed the handkerchief from his neck and wrung out nearly a cup of perspiration. We were glad to give him a bottle of soda pop.

POW PREP: Deep in one cavern, we watched a 25 year mining veteran and his sons pound a hole into the wall and stuff it with explosives. Before they lit the fuse, we exited the cavern remembering a disclaimer we had signed acknowledging an inherent risk of cave ins.

SHOVELLING BY THE SHAFT: We helped to shovel six barrel fulls of heavy rock onto an electric winch lift. Even taking turns between barrels the work was back breaking. The minor we spoke to said he shovels 300 barrels a day.

TIGHT SQUEEZES: The caves were uncomfortable, dusty and cramped. At times we could barely squeeze through the narrow channels. Two girls found themselves in tears and begging to get out. We had been warned and actually found the caves less encroaching than we had expected. Still, simple pleasures gained our appreciation, like any opportunity to stand up straight or our freedom to leave after a day, rather than work there for 20 years.

WE HAD A BLAST AND STEVE´S SHIRT SAW ITS LAST

EXPLOSIVE DEMONSTRATION: Outside the mines, Effrain assembled and detonated a stick of dynamite. For the demonstation of force, we placed Steve´s old T-shirt over it. From a distance, we watched the explosion of smoke accompanied by a deep boom. The group was awed as Steve´s shredded shirt shot high above. The resulting tattered threads were a good way to conceptualized the powers and the dangers that the miners handle every day.

PARTYING POTOSI: NOT ALL HARD WORK FOR US

MARKETS: Later, we had fun in Potosi city. We walked the markets, an open air corridor of kiosks stocked high with the sundries of a supermarket, and a tented warehouse of wonderful fruits and vegetables. It was an interesting amalgam of first world supply and third world display (and out-of-this-world low prices).

EVENINGS OUT: We and friends frequented some nice restaurants and cafes. One evening, we shared a live Andean music performance in a coffee shop with an audience of just six people. The personal treatment from the local band felt like a living-room music jam.

PARADES AND FIREWORKS: It was the anniversary of Potosi´s Colegio so twice we saw parades of school marching bands to the backdrop of bottle rocket blasts.

SWEET AND SAVORY:

WE HAD A SWEET TIME in the sweet town of Potosi. NEXT TIME: a more savory excursion -- the Salt Flats of Uyuni, Bolivia.

HAPPY BIRTHDAYS TO: Raul G.R., Kieren C.