Meeting with faculty and administrators from UMSA
March 29, 2017
Connor Yarnall: My day began with another Spanish lesson; however, we had to cut this one short for a meeting with the chancellor of UMSA. UMSA is a large university in La Paz with eighty thousand students. We went to one of their many campus buildings that hosted the offices of many administrators. The meeting with the chancellor went very well and he was very hospitable. He even came with us to lunch.
Afterwards, I decided to do some shopping and was able to find some good items for my friends back home. But that only lasted a little while as we had another meeting with EIA (Engineers in Action). I was really impressed with the work conducted by EIA, a non-profit organization. They care for many rural communities surrounding La Paz and had more communities to care for then they could supply. It really opened my eyes about what type of work was needed and the problems Bolivia has with their water, infrastructure, and energy.
Traffic zebras help pedestrians cross the streets
Lauren Reynolds: In the afternoon, Connor and I visited the Witches’ Market. We were supposed to be back at the hotel by 6:00. We departed from the witch’s market with 20 minutes until 6:00 thinking that would be plenty of time to get back to the hotel and it would have been if we had not run into the traffic zebras! Bolivia uses traffic zebras to help pedestrians be able to cross the streets safely. We couldn’t continue heading back without a selfie with a zebra!
Anna Meyer: We got back to the hotel and I scrambled to get some homework done. Shortly after returning to the hotel, we left again for the movies. We got there by taxi and teleférico. I was surprised by how easy it was to understand the film despite it being in Spanish. I enjoyed the movie very much, but it was not a happy movie. It was extremely suspenseful. Going to the movies in Bolivia was an interesting experience because I saw a lot of teenagers there. I have not seen that many in the city. I liked seeing the couples all dressed up for their dates.
Jordan Pryor: While the rest of the group went to experience a movie in Spanish, Lauren and I decided to explore the mall. Malls here are quite different from malls in the United States. They are way busier through all hours. For example, as the mall came closer and closer to closing time, the human traffic did not seem to decrease at all. I believe that this is a great example of how different people are socially here in Bolivia and really Latin America as a whole. They are, in general, more social all of the time rather than just on the weekends. You will find that in most Latin American countries, there will be people out and about way later than you will find in the United States. This is especially noticeable during weeknights, and we often found ourselves saying, “Don’t they have work tomorrow?!” It is quite interesting how differently people interact with each other according to the country that they are from.