Origami, Uyuni, and the Little Things
By: Juliet Anderson
Tags: Bolivia, Travel, Storytelling

Bolivia feels more and more like my home every day. Life has fallen into a delightfully slow rhythm, less cluttered and stressful than my life in Santa Clara or at home in Portland. I look forward to little things, like rides home alone in the trufi with my headphones in as the sun sets, starting a new book, and grabbing a salteña from the little stand close to our house for breakfast. I’m even beginning to feel confident and competent in my Spanish and can get around with (relative) fluency. Onno and I get out in the city to do something fun most nights, whether it’s yoga, rock climbing (I did it once; it’s not my forte), trying out some delicious local Bolivian food, or the weekly Tuesday night Parlana — a language exchange where we’ve met friends from all over the world and had a lot of fun.

Our Khan Academy program finished last Friday, and I was sad to see our chicos go. (NOTE: see Onno’s most recent blog post for all the photos you could ever need and want.) Throughout, they were endlessly cute and sweet and working with them was, while exhausting, encouraging and uplifting. I was especially attached to one group, about 13 girls from a Cochabamba orphanage. Weirdly enough they loved origami and I spent several minutes frantically Googling “origami cat.” Shortly thereafter I revised my search to “easy origami cat,” as my origami skills are novice at best and questionable at worst. I repeated this process with dogs, swans, and hearts, and the girls watched me with laser focus and emulated as I folded endless pieces of paper every which way. I often forgot the reality of these girls’ lives as orphans, and, realizing that even smallest gestures of affection were probably rare in their lives, tried to be extra kind and silly to make them feel welcome. In turn, they were endlessly cute to me, giving me countless origami creations and little cute snuggles. The last day with the girls was a tearful goodbye for me and I wasn’t really expecting to get hit with that magnitude of emotion, but it was a good end to our two-week program. We’re planning on visiting the girls’ orphanage this week so I can cry all over again! Excellent!

In other news — last weekend we traveled to the salt flats in Uyuni. In three words — otherworldly, surreal, and COLD. The Uyuni salt flat is roughly the size of Belgium — 12,000 square kilometers of solid white salt from a prehistoric ocean (long since dried up). It draws tourists from all over the world — I’d been seated on a bench not five minutes when I met a guy from Cyprus, who was impressed that I even knew where that was. We visited an island in the salt flat, peppered with cacti, and caught the stunning sunset and sunrise with the backdrop of the Tunupa Volcano while flamingoes casually snacked on microorganisms in the salty lakes on the periphery of the flat. How’s that for a mental image?

I leave Bolivia next Friday, and I don’t know where the time has gone, but I’m so grateful to have been able to be here and for everything that I’ve learned and everyone I’ve met. More on that in my next sappy “goodbye” blog post.

Isla Incahuasi

Is this Earth? Unsure

Llama crossing