Manana a Sucre!

Well we have had an eventful (almost) week in Santa Cruz.

Quick recap: we had a fiesta for Johanna who turned 13 this week; we explored the city on foot; we completed most of the visa process; we practiced Spanish; we booked our flights for tomorrow for language school in Sucre.

Longer recap:
Wed July 18th:
We had our lunch with Dr. Douglas which ended up being a fiesta for Johanna who was turning 13! We had the most delicious meal with Johanna, her mom, Dr. Douglas and several of their family friends (with the best cooked pork ribs ever and an awesome cake). After the fiesta, Maricella took us on our first Micro ride (a small bus/large van that runs like a bus and will stop to pick you up if you wave at them) to el centro de la ciudad (the center of the city). There she took us to several small art/history museums and to the top of the tower in the cathedral downtown. There happened to be a large rally in the center of the city that day; apparently the government wants to build a "highway" through the country side which will interfere with a river that many people depend on for their day to day survival. Hundreds of indigenous people were in the city center protesting against this, waving flags, setting off firecrackers, and speaking on stage.... Unfortunately we have forgotten to bring our camera anywhere with us this week so we don't have pictures at this time; however, Alice (the 21 year old from France who is also staying at the house) might have a picture from the rally.... Later that evening we met up with Alice who took us to a local bar that some of her friends had shown her. (Mom and Dad maybe don't read this next part....I promise we are being safe). Anyways at first we were very skeptical because basically she took us to literally a big red door on the side of a building; there was no sign above the door or windows that we could see. After ringing to doorbell about 5 times someone eventually came to the door and asked us how we found this place because we sure didn't look like locals...however she let us in and it was awesome. It ended up being a huge courtyard with a firepit; it was run by some young people from France, Czechoslavakia, and maybe Bulgaria. We stayed there most of the evening and met some of Alice's work friends who are local Bolivians; it was awesome talking to them (or trying to talk to them...) And guess what, there is soooo much icecream in Bolivia! Great news.
Thurs and Fri July 19th-20th:
We met with a lawyer set up by Dr. Douglas in order to try to work on our year long visa (which is actually a temporary 1 year residency). It was awesome; she used to be the head of immigration so she knows everyone! What usually takes at least several weeks took us two days to do; we taxied around to several places to get paperwork done and got to skip all the lines :) It was awesome! We also found our new favorite store that sells delicious homemade juices. We went there twice in one day....but it was soo good!
Sat July 21st
Lots of studying...packing for our trip to Sucre...
Sun July 22nd
Well this was quite a day...we woke up early to walk to the bus station to buy an overnight bus ticket to Sucre (around a 14 hour bus ride with apparently no bathroom stops). The bus station was somewhat crazy; intially we didn't know what was going on because there were people everywhere asking about getting to Sucre, either trying to buy or illegally sell tickets. All of the bus companies were sold out of tickets to Sucre at 9:30am, something that never happens! Apparently the buses to Sucre had not been running for 3 days so they were all packed (we have no idea why they were not running so it may be a good thing that we didn't get on the bus as they were likely all going to be packed and possibly there were problems with the roads...) So....after not getting a bus ticket we walked to the airport near our house but they were also sold out of tickets for the next two days. So then our next big adventure...Dave drove the manual car to the other airport, all the way across town! We got there and back with the car in one piece (thanks to Dave) and without getting lost (thanks to me)...So although we had wanted to go to Sucre by Monday morning the only tickets anyone had left were for Tues morning! Needless to say, by the afternoon we were fairly tired after walking at least 5 miles. We ended up trying a restaurant for dinner recommended by the past coordinators, Picolo. The food was pretty good and it was very cheap, always a plus. Again I wish I would have brought a camera; this was an outdoor restaurant with orange and neon green balloons everywhere, a playplace like at McDonalds, a singer and guitar player, and people dressed up like Barney and Baby Bop! After dinner we shared a cerveza with Nico, listening to music and me attempting to speak Spanish....The temperature here has been awesome!