A Week of Firsts

It’s Wednesday night and it has officially been a week since I have left my Sacramento nest and arrived in Cochabamba. This week was full of firsts, but definitely not lasts.

Flying Between San Salvador and Lima. The sky was magnificent!

I truly enjoy traveling, but I haven’t been to as many places as I would have liked in my 19 years. This is my first time in South America! Views like the one above are incomparable to what we see on the surface of Earth. While the 30 hour airport, airplane trip wasn’t the most ideal, the travel experience made me appreciate sleep, a comfy bed, and amazing travel partners even more.

Hands up for the rising sun; it’s the Aymara New Year!

The not so ideal travel schedule was particularly important in order to make it to the winter solstice festival that happens every year on the 21st of June. The winter solstice festival, also known as the Willkakuti and Aymara New Year, takes place throughout Bolivia, from La Paz to Santa Cruz, to Cochabamba. The group of us who went, woke up at 3:30am to see the sun rise in Quilla Collo, a city just outside of Cochabamba. We put our hands up, as shown in the photo, to welcome the new year and appreciate Pachamama.

Are those flamingos? They are native to Bolivia!

At the AHA Bolivia orientation, at Anna and Carlos’ home, we met Marcelo and Soledad who are the owners of Agroflori, a Bolivian animal sanctuary, and they invited us all to visit their property. It’s amazing how biodiverse Bolivia is, but it was also sad to learn of the terrible things owners have done to their parrots and macaws. Just to name a few of the animals, there were turtles, snakes, parakeets, a fox, an ocelot, and eagles at Agroflori. Erin and I will be working there every morning starting on July 9th, so seeing our future work location made us very excited.

Reading about Bolivia online is so different from actually being here. Hearing from previous Global Fellows how amazing their experience was, didn’t fully “hit” me until I got here. Seeing Anna again and finally meeting Carlos was the cherry on top for my first week here.

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Cochabamba Observations:

• Seatbelts are not a thing here in Cochabamba. There are even seat covers in taxis preventing possibly safer passenger habits.
• In Cochabamba, cars have the right of way and passengers wait, lest they wish for a few toes cut off.
• Dogs are everywhere. 🐕
• The Aymara New Year dish is hot dogs! In Ic Norte (the supermarket) there were free samples of hot dogs to prepare for the national holiday.
• The best places to buy your fruits are from the back of a truck where women are selling papayas, mangos, avocados, mandarins, and so much more.
• One of the most common breads here, called tortilla (it’s not the food you’re probably thinking of right now), is sweet! 🍞

An Aviary Look-a-like? 🤔