Tuesday, September 21, 2010

http://www.youtube.com/user/JosephOR?feature=mhum

Wednesday, September 8, 2010

La Paz Bolivia

elev, 3,660m (12,000ft)
avg temp 18c (64f)

Calling La Paz the capital of Bolivia is kind of like calling New York the Capitol of America, it's the richest city of the poorest country in South America, poor but an amazing place none the less. At about three times the height of Kathmandu, it is the highest city in the world with a population of over a million.

This is also an old city, originally occupied by the Aymara people it was taken over by the Spanish in 1548, who were mostly men which consequently led to a mixed population. After taking over and enslaving the native population, the Spanish set out to engineering a modern city, not an easy feet if you think about it, not only because of the height La Paz is at but because it is actually surounded by the altiplano mountain range so that it sits in a kind of a 'bowl'. Because of this the only way for the city to expand is by going up and up and up, making the place look kind of cool with the old city in the centre, the new district skyscrapers around it, and the myriads of houses with a market on every street going as far as you can see.
Obviously that's a bit of a romantisization, La Paz is full of mostly poor people, (on a side note, if you go there you should watch out for scams, one I heard of went like this: guy throws sand on you and a whole bunch of "helpful" people dust your shoulders pants and wallet off, DOH!, another: crazy guy comes and goes crazy, people make him go away and an "official" comes up and makes sure you are alright, you are, until you realize you put down your bag in the process, don't look down, it's not there), but not desolate people they have plenty of water, access to water and natural resourses, not to mention an amazing culture, I also find that people who live at high altitude tend to be happy, don't know why. So check out the rest of my photo's, ran out of time, my next post will be better so see you tomorrow!











See... Happy!






I don't know what this is but I know it's in La Paz, and i'ts cool.


I like these night shots, always look cool.

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