Sunday, March 02, 2008

seeing things in La Paz ...

After just an evening here in the world's highest capital city of La Paz, Mel has headed off to Peru for a few days.


I've decided to use the time to just hang out here for a few days while I plan my own little excursion to see a bit more of Bolivia. More on that later.




In between watching football and researching new beers in the bar, I've found some fairly unique sights in Laz Paz - from the slightly gruesome dried Llama Feoti (above) readily available from any number of stores to a surprising number of people urinating in the street in broad daylight.

Mostly they don't even bother finding a wall and just do it in the gutter facing the pedestrians walking along the street. Bolivia is a fairly poor country so I guess a significant number of people just can't justify spending the 50 centavos (3p) required to use a public loo. I can't really blame them, I just wish they were a little less open about it.

Perhaps one of the most memorable sights though are the two Zebra's (below) who can be seen directing traffic every afternoon at one of the city's busiest road junctions. Initially I presumed it was some form of advertising stunt, but there isn't a trace of branding to be seen.





I can only guess that someone at the council got the wrong end of the stick when they decided a Zebra Crossing was needed ...