Carnaval de Oruro

We were lucky enough for a trip to Oruro to all be sorted out for us by our fellow students at Me Gusta. For a great price, we were taken to Oruro, given a guided tour, seats for the carnaval and breakfast included. We had a great group of people, and had a spectacular time. The city of Oruro is pretty desolate, although it still manages to rival Rio Carnaval with the amount of tourists it attracts. We were told the city is in constant competition with Rio, and had only revealed a month before our visit a giant statue of the Virgin Mary, which now takes the title of the biggest religious statue on the continent.

For the Carnaval we all donned costumes - masks, wigs, glitter - and of course ponchos to tone down the annoyance of waterballoons. Actually we found out that in Oruro water balloons are not the done thing - it was cans of spray foam which were king there, and the battles throughout the day were brutal and merciless. One of the girls on our tour was actually allergic to the foam, so in her case perhaps it was!

 

 

 

 

The Carnaval itself was indescribable. The costumes, the dances, the vibe and the atmosphere was so warm and bright, and it went on long in to the evening where the costumes became lit with fire, the music so loud you could feel it thumping through you.  Unfortunately our camera fell from the rafters on the afternoon of the first day, so we have no photographs of the evening time or of the Sunday.

 

 

Staying in Sucre

After working for Mauricio in Tarija, we headed to the beautiful city of Sucre where we took Spanish lessons. We started with a school called Me Gusta, which was a relaxed and friendly atmosphere, 4 hours lessons a day and homework each evening. We got extremely lucky with our teacher, Coco, who was so warm and friendly, and we hit it off immediately. So much so that when he told us he was leaving the school to start out on his own - we also left the school and started private lessons with him. He was a great teacher, stopping our lessons to take us to the market and throw us in the deep end, giving us his favourite Bolivian recipes for us to cook in the evening - and the best part, when our camera was destroyed at carnival, he took us shopping for a new one, so we weren´t charged with tourist tax.

 

 

 

Sucre is a beautiful city, and a place where it is so easy to lose track of time. Everyone we met there had been there for 3+ weeks, and every traveller we´ve met since then has spoken of losing time in Sucre. The market sold the most delicious fruit smoothies and salads, the freshly baked bread enticed everyone that walked past with the smells, and it was one of the busiest and vibrant places we´ve seen so far. We spent a wonderful three weeks in the city, learning Spanish, meeting some very cool people, and celebrating some Bolivian festivals - the build up to Carnaval, and the celebration of Pachamama, Mother Earth.

 

 

 

 

 

 

While we were in Sucre it was the build up to Carnaval, which means that everywhere you go you are likely to get bombarded by children with water guns and water balloons, from every angle imaginable. We hastily wised up and had fun every time we left the house, ducking behind cars and old Bolivian women to avoid getting soaked. The school had a roof balcony which overlooked the street, and needless to say we spent many hours getting our own back and soaking passers by, who looked outraged to be revenged by gringos. We were told that Oruro was the biggest and best place to celebrate Carnaval in Bolivia, so that´s where our next stop was...