So where did I leave off... Well I think it was Saturday. Turns out the girls from Northwestern went to Chapare, so we decided not to have the bonfire. Also, I saw rain for the first time in Bolivia, so that kind of prevented the bonfire as well. We still went to Katarin's for dinner though where I helped make about 5 pizzas! They were absolutely delicioso! We also made jello shots (mmmm) for afterward. While we were still in the process of making the pizzas, though, Matias, Katarin's 5 year old son, got a hold of the jello shots and said, "mmm, jello, can I have it while I wait for the pizza???" It was extremely hilarious and we had to pry it out of his hands telling him it was a trago (shot) and not for kids. So after dinner, the jello shot competition began. I hardly knew it would be a competition, but after 15 jello shots, I sure felt ready to head to bed. I was so exhausted from the night before, that I fell asleep at 9PM on Katarin's sofa! I was woken up at 2AM by Karin. And I happened to have a blanket covering my body and a pillow under my head... how deep was I sleeping? Anyways, Karin is a sweetheart and made sure I was comfortable even in my sleep.

Sunday was spent at the Hotel Portales pool again. The sun was out again. No more rain. At night, Natalia, Mansi, and I made quesadillas at their house. I was in charge of the guacamole and salsas. They were absolutely delicious and their entire family ate with us and enjoyed it.

The rest of this week was spent at the office creating the website. On Monday we met with the web page designer. He taught us how to enter our information onto the current website. This week we have basically been working to refine what we already have and enter all the information onto the website. Next week, we will be working with the designer so he can do all the coding since we have no idea how a PHP platform works (although I can know create basic HTML websites... yay me). Well we will be working to have the website be dual language, photo slideshow, mini entrance site for affiliates to upload their information, a search option, and basically making the design more user friendly. To see what we have so far, visit www.cadepia.org. We only have the information now, but you will at least be able to see the changes if you look at it now, and look at it at the end of next week.

Well last night, I went on my first date. If you can even call it that. I would like to think that it was NOT a date. Anyhow, I set up Esteban and Mansi because Mansi likes Esteban's teeth... or dientes. Mansi told me I had to come if she was going to go out with him. Esteban told me if I came I had to bring a date. Well, I wasn't about to bring my 35 year-old Bolivian stalker, Richard (who turns out to actually be un buen gente according to my work friends who know him because he is an affiliate). So instead, I turned to a boy I had met a while ago and who keeps texting me asking me to hang out with him. So all four of us ate at Paprika where I had the best margarita I have tasted in my entire life! After we wanted to go dancing at Tirana, but it was closed! So being my boring self, I went home and went to bed.

Also, I forgot to write about this... yesterday, my mommy made cunapes (which is a yucca bread with cheese pictured below), cheese empanadas (plain and picante), AND rollitos! They were all amazing and I am excited to go home right now and eat some more!

 Cunapes

Rollos

Well, I'm about to leave work to go find some portable speakers (parlantes portatiles... I need to remember that word) since I'm leaving for Santa Cruz tonight with Lucas and Mansi. Then I have to eat, finish packing, and I'm off to the Las Vegas of Bolivia. Pictures and more to come. Miss you all!

Sometimes I do other things that don´t involve parties

Where to even begin...Well Tuesday was interesting because I spent much of the day lying on the bathroom floor with my head over the toilet, but hey, This Is Bolivia, so I have come to expect that. Good new though, I am still not afraid of tomatoes or any other raw vegetables that are placed in front of me. On Wednesday I went back to work, and Yudozca, the woman that works in my office invited Esteban and I to a party for her younger sister who was returning home from Argentina (the sister lives there). I went with my sister, and we talked, I got to hear her sister play the violin amazingly, and we had an interminable pizza (basically a pizza that is the size of a medium-sized circular table about 3.5 feet in diameter).

On Thursday, Esteban and I basically finished up the website we have created for CADEPIA. Then at night it was Festival de La Paz, so of course we had to go out. Mansi and I first met at a pizza restaurant to hang out with this guy we had met the weekend before, but then we didn´t want to see him, so we just left and stood him up. Instead we bought a bottle of wine and made spaghetti at her house. Then we took the bottle of wine to the streets to finish it up and met Lucas at the festival. We had this delicious hot milk drink with cinnamon and Singani.

I have no idea what it is called, but it is muy rico. We stayed out late meaning the next morning I really did not want to get up for work.

When I kiss boys they enjoy it...

When they kiss me, it's torture... I guess I haven't grown out of my disgust of kisses.

Friday seems like it passed in a second. In the morning Esteban and I went to the post office to see about CADEPIA´s current situation since they used to have a P.O. box but hadn´t paid in about 15 years. Turns out they gave our mailbox away and don´t even have a record of us in the system. This is a great thing because that means they have no proof of the debt CADEPIA is really in with them, so we can just go ahead and get a new P.O. Box. We need one because we want to start getting donations and people are going to need an address to send their checks to. Well Friday night, I left work early after I presented the website to my supervisor who was really impressed. I hung out with my sister and niece for a while and then met up with everyone at Mansi´s where they were playing catcho and drinking rum. We then went to Tirana and I was talking with this boy that is half Bolivian but he lives in the U.S. Turns out he was only 18, so we all decided to leave to go to Pimienta. Soon after, everyone wanted to leave and, once again, it was just me and Mansi. We met some Australian boys and we hung out with them the rest of the night. I think I got home around 4AM, so I am a bit tired right now. I did wake up in time, though, to go get fitted for the leather coat I am having made for me.

That´s it for now. Pictures to come, and more stories about the fogata I am going to attend with my family tonight. We are each designing our own pizza. Yummy!

Life in CADEPIA's office

This post is dedicated to the Bolivian culture here in CADEPIA/APIMEC’s office:

(1) Everyone loves to watch the World Cup. Work seems to stop whenever there is a game on. Work definitely stops whenever there is a game on with a South American team. In fact, if I wanted to leave work to watch the game at the closest bar or restaurant, I would likely find someone from CADEPIA there screaming at the T.V. Since the World Cup ended yesterday, everyone seems a little bit down since there are no more distractions to prevent us from working.

(2) Everyone likes to be involved in everyone’s love life. It seems as if I am currently going on several dates with friends of friends and family members of people in the office. I’m sure hoping it's all a joke. Also, I seem to be the target of everyone's jokes since I have a Bolivian stalker named Richard. Richard is an affiliate of CADEPIA, and that is all I knew about him. However, as soon as I told one person in the office about Richard, everyone in the office found out about Richard. Some internal stalking about Richard's personal life then followed, and now I know that Richard is a carpinter, is about 33 years old, and was also very good friends with the volunteer from Spain who came before me. Thanks CADEPIA, maybe now I will take him up on his offer to go to the movies, but really really really, I will not!

(3) If you come into work on time you are early. If you come into work 30 minutes late, you are probably still early. About 45 minutes late is right on time. I think I am supposed to be working about 40 hours a week. I'd say that usually is only about 30-35 hours. I've learned here that the U.S. is obsessed with moving as fast as they possibly can. That creates stress. Stress makes you uncomfortable, fat, and unhealthy. We all need to learn to slow down, maybe not quite as slow as things move here at CADEPIA, but slow enough to build relationships and be healthy.

A new week a new project? Just maybe

Well last week turned out to be extremely fun. Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday nights were all spent in the pool. Hopefully I'll make some more friends at swim practice this week, though. On Wednesday, it was Aliya's birthday who used to live with my host family, so I guess technically she is my sister too. Her brother and sister came down from the U.S. to celebrate with her. We all had a great big birthday lunch in her honor on Wednesday and everyone opened presents. Then on Wednesday night, there were festivities, singing, dancing, instrument playing, and plenty of tragos to go around. Aliya works for a group called Katari, which specializes in helping young students pursue their musical and other artistic talents. Therefore, pretty much EVERYONE was singing and playing an instrument. It was great listening, although I couldn't participate because, unfortunately, my parents did not give me vocal cords that would sound good to anyone.

On Thursday, work was once again tiring and boring, and pretty much nothing got done. However, we did figure out a new project to work on. We are going to update the website and put more information about internships, volunteering, and most importantly, making donations to CADEPIA. Right now, the organization is a little lacking in cash. My favorite person in the entire office, Berinice, is leaving at the end of the month because CADEPIA just doesn't have the funds to pay her, and it's come to a point where she just isn't going to work for free. But Thursday night after work, I went to Mansi's house where she cooked for Natalia, her Spanish tutor, and me. She made delicious vegetarian Indian food. Yummmmm.

Friday was a little better, we finally got revisions back on our submitted project. They all really seemed to like the model that we built in Excel because all you really have to do is enter in some numbers, and BOOM, you've got an interest rate. We do have a few things to edit, however. For example, we need to create a guide for future volunteers to follow when they are conducting follow-ups with borrowers. Also, we need to create a job description and criteria for volunteers. But they pretty much liked everything else, and will be presenting it to the Board of Directors today. After work on Friday, I went to a charla at the FSD office where they talked about emigration from Bolivia. Apparently it is a pretty big problem, because 1 in every 5 Bolivians doesn't actually live in Bolivia. Also, once a Bolivian leaves the country, it is very very unlikely that they will ever return either because they have a stable situation elsewhere or because the cost of returning is just too much.  I also met the students who had just arrived on the Northwestern service learning trip. I helped them avert a disaster as well. I was talking on Skype to my mom when I heard that chatting about meeting up at Mandarina for dancing at 10 or so. I went down and told them, "no no no" discotecas in Bolivia don't open until midnight, so you better find something else to do before then. I told them about the discotecas, the bars, and basically the nightlife... and they seemed pretty thankful that I was there. (I was the only summer intern there because everyone else was in various places either traveling on their own, with their family, or with work.) I decided not to go out on Friday, though, because I was tired from the week at work, and my sister was sick, so I decided to cuddle in bed with her and watch TV.

Saturday was a bit more fun. I got my hair cut in the morning = $5.50. Then in the afternoon, I went to La Cancha with my sister where I got a mini tour (it is impossible to ever get a grand tour unless you actually stay in La Canch for a week!). I also bought a belt since my pants were falling down... real leather belt for $5, WOW! And then I bought the new Shakira CD for Tricia... except its actually a DVD which is kind of cooler! Then at night I was supposed to go out dancing with Karin, but she felt sick again. Luckily, right after she told me she was sick, Mansi texted me and said she was coming home tonight! So I met Mansi at Dumbo's on the Prado, and then we finished an entire bottle of wine between the two of us at Casa de Solar, and then we went dancing at Pimienta. We met two people, and now we have two Bolivian friends that we are going to eat pizza with this week.

Sunday morning was tough. I needed to sleep. Until 12:30 PM. At 2, we at lunch. Then after lunch I met up with Mansi at Hotel Portales where there is a gorgeous pool. I sat by the pool and read while she worked on writing her grant proposal. Also, since the World Cup final was on, I was up and down from my spot where I was basking in the sun to see the score of the game. It was always 0-0! But I kept hearing screams and shouts, so I kept wanting to see the score of the game. FINALLY, Spain scored. All I could hear was: Espana, Espana, Espana!!!!!!! Viva Espana! Then after the game, and after the pool, I showed Mansi the best supermarket in Cochabamba where we got our share of American food to hold us over for the next week. We then headed to the Prado to search for the best chocolate cake in Cochabamba which I had just tried the night before. It is from a placed called Alexander's and my sister told me it was on the Prado, and there were two stores also in the South. We couldn't find the cafe, though, and we kept asking people, and no one had heard of it, and when I called my sister she didn't pick up. Finally, we decided to head to Cine Center to watch a movie. On the way there, Karin called me... and what did I find out? Alexander's actually has the BEST chocolate cake in Bolivia, not Cochabamba. And what ELSE did I find out? Alexander's is only located in La Paz. Well, I guess it turns out I hadn't really been listening too well when Karin had been telling me where it was earlier. We were a little far from La Paz, so I guess no chocolate cake anytime soon.

"Live like you're gonna die forever"

Last week at work we finished our project! Yay! So the model we constructed has seven risk factors and each factor is assigned a value depending on that particular loan or borrower. From there, the value is given a weight and then a final point value. With this final point value, we created a set of interest rates ranging from 15%-28% depending on the risk of the loan. And I have to send a big thanks to Mansi because she basically set the whole model up... but I do think I could create a new one from scratch if I had to.

Esteban and I then wrote a 35 page report compiling all of our information and then created a PowerPoint. Well that was done on Thursday, to be edited and handed back to us so we could finish it up this week, but TIB (This is Bolivia), and I'll probably have to wait a few days. Now just what to do in the mean time.... I will need to pick a new project.

Over the weekend, the entire FSD summer volunteer group went to the Chapare, or the jungle resort 4 hours outside of Cochabamba. Half way there, I started feeling sick, but I thought I was just car sick. Turns out, I had food poisoning. It probably goes without saying, but I wasn't feeling too good when we took this group photo at lunch.

As soon as I got to the hotel, I curled up in the fetal position and slept basically until the next afternoon. And then, miraculously, I was better! I did miss a hike through a national park which was sad though. Instead I was at the hotel alone, and I hiked down to the river, went swimming. Took a little walk across the rocks, and then went up to the hammocks to start my new book, Mountains Beyond Mountains. Yes... I finished Three Cups of Tea, and it was fabulous... definitely recommend. When the rest of the group returned from the the national park, I went down to the river again with them, and then we had a "discussion" about our internships so far.

Then it was a dinner, and a riotous night of Napoleon (a very awesome card game that is extremely frustrating) and Catcho (the Bolivian dice game like poker). An American we had met by the river earlier that day came to hang out with us with his Bolivian girlfriend. Since I decided not to drink any alcohol (due to my earlier stomach incidents), I got to experience the entire night and actually remember it. Here is how it went:

1. Bottle of rum + Coke
2. No more rum... no more coke
3. Instead of breaking into the building with the bar, we should probably ask them to sell us more rum
4. They won't sell us rum
5. Mateo is inside, how did he get inside? Oh... he climbed on the roof of the people's home and jumped into the building on the second floor.
6. Mateo is unlocking the door and carrying out a bottle of rum + coke
7. Problem solved... leave them a note with money inside
8. But wait... we want cigarettes now?
9. Lets go back in and search for the key for the locked cigarette box
10. The glass box breaks... Let's leave.
11. Next morning... the rum's price increased by 150 Bolivianos ($21).
12. Lesson = don't break into a building to steal alcohol... don't break into a building to steal anything... don't break into a building period!

The next morning, I felt great and rested, but everyone else was still a bit groggy. Mateo ate eggs for breakfast. We smelled it all day long. We went to a monkey park and had monkeys scrambling all around us. And then we ate lunch, and then we headed back to Cochabamba. Back in Cocha, I ran home to shower, met two of the Northwestern girls who had just arrived with the Service Learning Group, and then ran to CineCenter to catch Plan B with Mateo and Mansi. It was the funniest movie ever, but not because it was supposed to be funny, but because it was so stupid.

Yesterday at work, I didn't have much to do, so I researched opportunities for after college. I decided that I am going to apply to the PeaceCorps, Teach for America, and a Fulbright Scholarship. Then before lunch I went to the pool to register and pay for the swim classes. They said I couldn't register and I had to come back at 3. I decided I would miss a little work to register. I went back to the pool after lunch at 3. They lady wasn't there. She finally arrived at 4. Then there was a line to register. And then TIB (This is Bolivia), so everyone decided to cut the American who waits patiently in a line. And then finally I registered which took 1 minute, but for some reason everyone in front of me took about 10 minutes each to register. Next I needed to pay, which was at the stadium next door. Finally, I found the place to pay and paid. Now it is 5:15. They tell me I need to get a medical examination before I can swim. So I go to the room next door to get examined. Another line, of course. Around 6PM I finish the examination, and it is pretty much pointless to go to work, so I skipped.... ooops. They will understand. At 8, I went to the swim class, and it was really good and really difficult. I needed it. Now I'm ready for the day ahead and will try to find some work to do.

Now I know what you do at work all day long... watch the World Cup

Works been moving along. We finished all the interviews and we then coded all the data from the responses in an excel spreadsheet. We also created graphs for each question, and it reminded me a bunch of my last marketing project I had to do. Mansi is coming this afternoon to help us build a model to determine interest rate by assigning variables based on risk factors. So far this is what we have: 


Tasa de interés =     – S (Monto)  

                               + T (Plazo)  
                               + U (Garantia) 
                                         0 = Hipotecaria 
                                         1 = Prendaria/ Personal 
                               + V (Tipo de prestamo)  
                                         0 = Capital 
                                         1 = Inversion 
                               + W (Numero de otros prestamos actuales)  
                               – X (Edad de la empresa)
                               – Y (Ganancias del ano en Bs)  
                               + Z (Conducta pasada) 
                                         0 = Nunca falto un pago 
                                         1 = Falto un pago

Sorry it's in Spanish, but I really am not in much of the mood to translate. If you would really like to know exactly what it is saying and cannot figure it out, I recommend WordReference as your translation source. It has basically gotten me through college-level Spanish.

Also a little about my weekend... not much happened. I went out Friday and Saturday nights (obviously).
Friday was more relaxed. We went to a bar called the Salar which is because all of the tables and chairs were made from salt blocks like they are on the salt flats. Below is me tasting the table, and Mateo after he had tasted the table...

Then Saturday my host sister took Becca and Lucas and I to Mandarina Club to dance all night long (or at least until 3AM). Saturday afternoon I watched the US lose in a disappointing game to Ghana, but at least now I can root for Ghana to be the only African team to make it to the semi-finals of the World Cup. And then Sunday afternoon, I made brownies with Laurita and they are delicious!

4 days... just 13 hours of sleep total

I’m sorry for my complete incompetence in posting blogs this week. For that reason, I am going to post the most fabulous blog entry documenting the past week pretty much day by day. I still don’t have pictures though, so those will be coming later (possibly this weekend).

Last Friday was one of the most fun days at work I’ve had. I went with my boss to go buy about 40 saltenas because we were having a press conference at the alcaldia (mayor’s office). The press conference was a little strange, though. I think I was there for decoration to make it look like the room was full because nothing actually ever happened. The people in the audience at their saltenas, and then there might have been something going on in the front of the room. The president of CADEPIA and IDEPRO (another MFI) were there talking into some recorders, but no one in the audience heard any of the questions the press was asking and no one could participate at all. It was a little different—and definitely much less violent—from the mock Hershey’s / Townspeople press conference that my block had just this past semester. Then in the afternoon, Esteban and I walked around Cochabamba in search of affiliates’ businesses so we could distribute a survey to learn more about opinions, sentiments, and feelings toward CADEPIA. Nothing could have been more frustrating! The addresses CADEPIA had on file were all wrong. Some of them didn’t exist. Some of them were not the right business. Put simply, all of them (except 1) could not be found! But it was ok because we got to walk around La Cancha, and we eventually ate some pastel to calm our anger (Pastel is this delicious pastry filled with cheese that is puffy and has confection sugar sprinkled on top… pictured below… yummmm)

After work, I went to the FSD office where I learned about applying for grant money for my project. I really didn't need the talk though since my project doesn't require any grant money, but I was forced to stay through the 2.5 hour long discussion about... I'm not really even sure what. Lately, FSD has been a little bit disorganized, but I guess that's just the Bolivian way. Friday night was spend sleeping on the bus cama on the way to La Paz with Luke and Mansi. It was definitely the most comfortable bus I have ever been on.

Saturday morning- spent in the La Paz bus terminal.

Saturday afternoon- spent on the bus to Copacabana + lunch in Copa + boat ride to Isla del Sol.

On the boat ride, we met a tour guide from La Paz who was on vacation with his girlfriend, but he liked talking to us better. So he told us stories about Lake Titicaca the entire 1.5 hr. boat ride. Then we arrived in Isla del Sol in the town of Yumani and hiked to find our hostel which was at the very top of the hill. I was exhausted and sweaty by the time I reached the hostel, but the hostel was amazing. It definitely had the best views and we had the entire place to ourselves. The rooftop balcony was also great for relaxing and looking at the beautiful snow covered mountains on the other side of the lake. We watched the sunset, ate some dinner, and then went to sleep.

On Sunday morning, we woke up at 6AM to watch the sun rise which was so beautiful. The sun came up directly over the mountains. Then we had home-made crepes and mate de coca before we set off to hike across the island. We spent about 4 hours hiking across the ridge of the mountain with beautiful views on all sides of us.

By the time we reached Challapampa on the other side of the island, we were definitely exhausted and ready to take the boat back to Copacabana. In copa, we bought some pan for the bus ride back, and then we were ready to head back to La Paz. As soon as we reach La Paz, we went to Hostal Wild Rover where we checked into a 16 person dorm room to store our stuff. We showered and then immediately headed out to catch a bus to Tiwanaku where there are famous ruins and a big party every year for the Amayra New Year (or the winter solstice). Midnight to 4AM was spent dancing to live Bolivian music (there were famous bands there... I should probably figure out who they were...) and then we walked to see the spectacle of the sun in La Puerta del Sol. We were given student tickets for 15 Bs each, and then told that we actually had to pay 80 Bs since we were foreigners! We refused and ran away with our tickets that they had already given us. We snuck in through the student entrance by keeping our faces low and pretending to be Bolivian university students. It worked! However, it pretty much went downhill from there. Mansi and I were so cold by 6AM that we just couldn't take it anymore. I think it was the coldest I had been in my life and I was not dressed nearly warmly enough. We left Lucas and told him he could tough it out himself. Good decision, because an hour and a half later we get a frustrated call from Lucas saying, "the sun spectacle didn't even work because there were too many clouds!" But he did get to see Evo Morales speak which is kind of cool. Here is what the spectacle is supposed to look like:

 Wowww!!! Right?

By the time we got back to La Paz, I was so exhausted I could not even think about trying to sleep in a 16 person dorm room or even sight-see through La Paz like we were supposed to do all day Monday and Tuesday (I had asked for Tues. off work). I jumped right on a bus and slept all the way to Cochabamba. When I opened the door, my mom was so happy to see me and so happy that I had decided to come home early. She made me a quick dinner and I went to sleep at 7PM, and slept all the way until 7AM when I had to get up for work. It was much needed sleep.

On Tuesday, I worked. I made some calls to get some surveys answered. I walked through La Cancha a little. And I also researched some more pools. I found one I liked (but I actually went yesterday and it was not that great, it was too hot and you couldn't see anything in front of you), but now I am going to try the Olympic Pool next to the stadium.

Wednesday was Dia de San Juan. I got work off in the afternoon so I could go to a party with mi familia. In the morning at work though, I watched the U.S. beat Algeria 1-0 in the World Cup putting us first in our group and qualifying us for the next round. YAY! After a lunch of hamburgers and home-made papas fritas,  we went to my cousin, Katarin's house where we had a huge bonfire. We roasted hot dogs and had marshmellows dipped in chocolate.

 We had Tequila with fresh lemons off the lemon trees in the yard, sparklers, singani, abejas (bees) that fly and turn green like a firework when lit on fire, rum, bread, vodka, cookies, and whiskey.

 The problem is that in Bolivia, as soon as you take a shot, they fill your glass again, and as soon as you have more alcohol in your shot glass, they expect you to drink it. It is a never-ending cycle which reminds me a little bit of Uncle Rick and his habit of filling everyone's wine glasses as soon as they are near empty. We were all very happy, especially my sister, who was very photo-getic = obsessed with taking photos all night long (they are coming soon).

She did end up getting a little sick at the end of the night, though, so Laurita and I fell asleep in front of the TV in one of the bedrooms until 1:30 AM, when Ronald (Karin's friend/co-worker/boyfriend/I don't really know what) drove us home. This was definitely when of the most fun nights since I got to dance with a cute boy (he was 5 and my cousin and adorable), party with my favorite people in Bolivia, and eat delicious food.

I really did not want to get up Thursday morning, but I pushed myself to do so. Thursday was boring at work. I watched the World Cup. We got some surveys completed. I swam at night, as I said before in that pool I found. It happened to be a pool atemporada (which I think means a hot pool). It was definitely hot... like a bath tub! It was so hot that the water was not clear, so I couldn't really see where I was going. I definitely could not do my flipturns. Oh well, still searching for a pool...