Bolivian Voices

Original: Otro Sábado Con Voces Bolivianas

The day started with something rather heavy, after a worrying experience last night. One of the many skills that I am very fond of is the sport of basketball. I can rely on my feline-like agility, so every night we decide to play with the guys from the neighborhood. We met some new people, who shared our ball with, and the game started. In one of my many moves, my elbow opened up and struck the faces of one of my new friends. It sounded similar to what one might hear when you crush a potato chip, but only duller. I turned around to see which part of his anatomy had bumped into my elbow, and I found that his right nostril had been hit. I became terribly worried, but I was later calmed. The first thing I did was to find a thin pen in order to correct the damage that I caused. After that, things calmed down, thank God.

Later in the day we had a date with the instructors from Voces Bolivianas, who were a little late, maybe because of access to our zone was damaged and has a lot of speed bumps on the road and make it hard for visitors to arrive. Once we had all gathered at the cyber-café, we gave our blogs one or two final touches, and then the instructors gave us the idea to take picture around our neighborhood. Most of us made the decision that the best place for our photo session would be La Ciudad de la Alegría (City of Joy), which is near the Hombres Nuevos (New Men) community. This community has sporting facilities with a coliseum, 6 multi-functional fields, 3 swimming pools, a football field, recreational and camping areas, and educational facilities with the opening of the San Pablo University – Theater Academy and a kindergarten, and a home for children. Huge, isn’t it?

We decided to walk because no one of us had a car. We were almost there, after a long walk taking pictures and guess what? The sky began to fall. It began to rain, and we looked for shelter so that we wouldn’t catch a cold. But there was no shelter. The natural instinct to run away looking for a safer place would have been useless, we started on our way back with our pictures, and one of the female instructors decided to try the new fashion, Dirty Jeans style after she rolled around and fell in a muddy clearing. It left us smiling.

Translation by Gabriela Garcia Calderon Orbe