Carnival!

"To my mind, the greatest reward and luxury of travel is to be able to experience everyday things as if for the first time, to be in a position in which almost nothing is so familiar it is taken for granted."


War, that's what carnival is, war. The week before carnival was crazy as well. Everywhere you went you were sprayed by fake snow and water, sometimes with up to six or seven people getting you at the same time (granted, being a light haired "gringa" really doesn't help things). There were also a few huge parades, one of which lasted all day and night, and the other was to bring all the people from the countryside into the city for carnival. Both of which involved traditional dancing, music, lots of drinking, and of course, water fights. By this time I had met up with three awesome Canadians, and we spent the days before hand wandering around spraying people, eating all the street food we saw, and playing cards. Then it started. 

Carnival itself is huge parades, all day and night, with crazy costumes. There were hundreds of thousands of people in Oruro, and just getting through the city took hours (literally). Everyone, and I mean everyone, had a water gun and spray can, and seeing as we were four tourists (the boys were all over 6ft, something that really stands out here) we were quite the target. Though, we also made quite the team. Every time someone got us, we all attacked and the person always walked (well ran really) away completely soaked and full of foam. We spent the days watching the parades, getting sprayed, and just hanging out. Though it was cool to see, it is very intense, and after a few days is quite enough.

After that, I came here to Sucre (of course, for some unknown reason there were no buses here so I had to take a bus somewhere else before finding a car that would take me the rest of the way, good old Bolivia) to escape the water and foam. Not. Because from the second I arrived, I was pegged with water balloons. For the two days following carnival, everyone was still drunk and apparently the huge fight hadn't ceased at all. Sick of being wet all the time, I spent the two days in a nice little French cafe. Now I am taking Spanish classes again, and plan on volunteering for the next week in an orphanage.

P.S. There are not very many pictures from carnival as it was not safe at all to have my camera out, and I haven't been able to put them on my site yet because even when I find wifi it's too slow.