Had a bit of a spendy week this week, with many visits to La Cancha to buy presents and warm stuff for when I go travelling. Also got a backpack for travelling (with two different makes on... I think this makes it double the quality personally) so am ready to go now! Planning our circuit this week around Bolivia which I'll start on the 9th July. Really excited!
Officially finished my crap work placement and moved to the new one too. Started on Friday and am at Centro de Sauld Cochabamba which is alot bigger than Sarcobamba and also has a hospital right behind it where I can go to watch operations and births next week. I'm working in the obstetric emergency unit and I can already tell it's going to be so much better. However, Friday was not so fun. I got up at 6.30 to be able to get to work for 8, arrived there, the director took me to where I was meant to work... everything went really well for something that had been organised in a short space of time. When I stood up to do something I promptly lost my hearing, almost fainted and had a repeat of La Paz again (without the vomming in the street... I was more classy this time and managed to hold it in). I called my project supervisor who told me to go buy some sweets and water and the wait for her to come get me.
When she eventually arrived, I felt better (who wouldn't after sweets?) but still wanted to go to the doctors just to be checked out. Got all the general things done; OBS, he checked my tummy and listened to it, they took some blood and diagnosed me with gastroentiritus. It's not nice. Then they shoved me on a drip for two hours. This hurt and I never ever want to have one ever again. I also had to spend a bunch on all my exciting tablets that you can see in the photo. I don't have a parasite though. GET IN! Still had the most boring diet in the world for three days - bread, rice, potatoes, chicken and jelly!
We had a long weekend (Aymara new year on Monday) and I was planning on doing the Che trail to follow the last footsteps of Che Guvara and see where he was laid out once he's been killed but my crappy health situation stopped that. Instead, I had a quiet weekend.
Saturday I went to the Palacio Portales de Simon Patiño. This is a big european style house that Simon Patiño (once the richest man in the world) built but never got to live in because he left Bolivia and died before he could ever return. It's absolutely beautiful and has amazing grounds as well. We had a tour around the house and grounds (unfortunatly not allowed to take photos inside the house) but it was amazing. There was silk all over the walls, really ornate carvings, scultpures, pictures and paintings all over the place and he also had a piano for each of his three daughters in the house (which I got majorly excited about as it was maybe the second piano I'd seen in all of Bolivia). Our tour was also done with some stereotypical Americans - my favourite question they asked was 'did he introduce spanish to Bolivia?' when they found out Simon Patiño was from Spain originally. Will went to La Cancha in the afternoon but I had to go get more results so couldn't :( He did get robbed though so maybe it was best that I didn't! He's the third person to have been robbed since I've been here - one with a gun, another with a knife and Will... he got hit in the face with an orange. Could only have been him! Sunday I had a lie in (until 9... the latest I've ever slept here!) then went to buy stuff from the supermarket for a picnic in the park. I had bread, jelly and was naughty and had crisps too. SHOCKING! Had another La Cancha trip (my third of the week :S) to buy more presents and some jewellery for me.
Monday we decided to go to Tarata, a little town about an hour away from Cochabamba. We'd planned to spend the whole day there but when we got there most stuff was shut (apart from the tourist centre which was open but empty). We managed to see a pretty church and a monastery (both pictures) before coming back to Cochabamba in time to see the Spain V Honduras game. We settled down in Dumbo's, this amazing icecream store with a wide screan where I had cake AND icecream to make up for my three days of dull food. I got bored of the football once I realised that Torres had cut all his hair off (WHY DID HE DO IT!) so after half time we walked into the plaza to sunbathe. We'd been there all of ten minutes when this woman came screaming into the plaza shouting stuff like 'te voy a matar' (I'm going to kill you) and other crazy things. She sat down on a bench near us, still screaming, and just as I thought it couldn't get any stranger, this old man on a crutch came over, they started arguing, and then he smacked her hard on the leg with his crutches. As appealing as watching two seventy pluses have a fight, we left to have a wander, as despite him being old, he had an amazing swing!
That was my week... not done the most exciting things, but hopefully I shall have many stories about my new placement to tell you next time.
A x
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