Sucre

After an excruciatingly long train trip from the border to Santa Cruz, followed by a similarly long night bus trip from Santa Cruz, we arrived in Sucre, which - I was surprised to find out - is the official capital of Bolivia. I would bet you that on "Who wants to be a millionaire?" you would get away with saying that it is La Paz and, in fact, almost every governmental entity and business is based there, but Sucre kept the Supreme Court and the National Bank. It is a lovely town, surrounded by mountains that are very similar to the Alps, which is why apparently it is popular with German, Swiss and Dutch people.

It is amazing how different this country is compared with Brazil: it is obviously poorer, more traditional, less European, and the people are very different both in terms of looks and behaviour. Of course, I have only been here two days so I cannot make any semi-legitimate statements on anything, it is just a first impression. But it is quite obvious that they are at an earlier stage of modernization, and even though there are a lot of young people hanging out in western clothing, there are plenty of (mostly older) people in their traditional costumes and (unlike the black women in Salvador, who hang out wearing their costumes only to surround unsuspecting tourists like myself and get photographed for money) it is just the way they dress.

Today we walked around the city and ran into an interesting South-African woman living in Denmark, who is traveling around South America with her two little kids, a 7 year-old and a 9-year-old. We spent some time with the older kid in a cafe, while his mother took the younger one to the hospital to get cured from food poisoning, and I must say that he was one of the coolest kids I have ever met. I have always thought it impossible to travel in this manner with children, but it appears doable and the kids certainly do not seem to be worse off for it, on the contrary.

It is so different to be traveling with a friend again. A lot of fun, especially because we get along really well, usually enjoy similar things and also, we have this amazing common language, Hungarian, which is not only beautiful sounding (according to a lot of people that I have met here at least), but is also so useful for being rude about annoying people or situations amongst ourselves. On the other hand, when you are with someone, it changes the way you perceive things: every impression, every experience is instantaneously reflected through the eyes of the other and all is shared and discussed right away. This is not necessarily for the worse, of course, but you do possibly absorb less of the outside world. I still talk to pretty much everyone though...I have realized since starting this trip that I have turned into my grandmother, Lili, who used to drive me up the wall when I was a kid/teenager with her constant need to speak to complete strangers on the street, in restaurants, everywhere. And now here I am, exactly the same (hopefully not annoying Andrea too much).