Potosi: The Highest City in the World

After our first night in Potosi, I awoke well rested if still a little sick. Despite this we had booked a tour of the cooperative mines, with a group called Koala Tours. Why Koala Tours you ask? Well Koalas chew eucalyptus leaves all day, whilst Bolivians chew Coca leaves all day. Also Koalas sleep 22 hours a day, whilst miners are awake 22 hours a day. Except for the boss of koala Tours who also sleeps 22 hours a day. Well that´s what our guide told us anyway.
We were lucky to get a very good guide. A miner, who spoke very good English, and was very funny. Our tour consisted of more Australians than we had met on the trip so far. But I guess that´s what you get when you travel with Koala tours.
The first thing we had to do was get into ridiculous mining apparel, then jump on a bus to the markets outside the mines. Upon getting off the bus, we realised how ridiculous our clothes were, no other group looked like us, and the miners certainly didn´t look like us. Upon asking the guide why we were dressed the way we were, he responded, to give the other miners a laugh. And yes upon looking around we were attracting many looks and smiles. I have never felt so much like a tourist. At the markets we were to buy the miners presents. Our guide gathered us around and taught us about the presents we would buy. First of all dynamite. Our guide pulled out a big stick of it and smacked me hard on my helmet with it to mine and everyone elses horror. Then explained it was harmless without a fuse and detonator, I was not entirely convinced, but am glad i still have my head. then our guide pulled out a bottle of alcohol. 96% alcoholic it was, he said we must drink from it if we were to enter the mines. A mouthful put hairs on your chest, anymore would put you under ground. By this stage the entire group´s eyes were watering. Our guide proceeded to tell us to buy a bag of Coca leaves, and soft drink.
We bought these items, and I realised it was the first and most likley the last time I would be holding cocaine and dynamite at the same time... at least legally.
We were then taken to outside of the mines where our guide sat us down and introduced himself as Pedro, not Perro (dog), and if we ever called him Pedo (fart) he said he´d kill us. He got us to introduce ourselves, upon telling him my name he told me I must be mistaken... He was asking us what our names were. Upon reassuring him that my name really was Dylan, ya know like Bob Dylan, he decided just to stick with Bob. He then asked the girls when they started high school, and that became a running joke of the tour, getting the girls to cover their ears when he was to tell us anything remotely crude.
Pedro then pulled out a bag of Coca and asked us all to take a handful, a large handful, he wanted us strong for the mines. He then told us all to put it in our mouths and chew it. So we all stuck large fistfuls of Coca leaves into our mouths and began chewing. It tasted pretty foul, kinda like sticking a hundred tea leaves in your mouthes. As he watched us all struggle on our big mouthfuls of Coca leaves. He laughed and showed us how Bolivians chewed Coca... One leaf at a time. We cursed him between swallowing large amounts of Coca sap.
Finally Pedro took us into the mines. The ceiling was very low, I hardly ever was able to stand up straight, and I was thankful for my helmut as I hit my head often and hard on rocks and beams, but my neck got very sore. It often got so low that we had to crawl on our stomachs.
The Potosi mines are the highest mines in the world. So conditions in them are very hot, up to 45 degrees C, and there is very little oxygen in them, thus conditions for working are poor. The miners work for themselves, and have to sell their mineral themselves to the highest bidder. Thus they have no medical benefits, no protective clothing, and no special equiptment to get their minerals out of the mine. The average life expectancy of a miner after he starts working is 10 to 15 years. That said, Pedro explained that most miners were happy at present as the price of minerals were way up, and a miner could make quite a good living these days, drawing attention to all the miners rocking up in their 4X drives. Still it´s a hard life for a miner.
In the mines there were many sculptures of the devil, sporting a flattering erection, usually holding a bottle of booze, smoking a cigarette, and covered in coca leaves. This is because the miners are predominantly catholic. They believe that their mines must be close to hell and therefore the minerals in them must belong to the devil, so they worship him, reffering to him as Tio (uncle). If they have a good harvest of minerals, they feel they must show their appreciation to Tio by drinking A LOT with him. If they have a bad harvest they believe they have not drunk enough with him to appease him, so they drink A LOT with him. In fact there are many occassions whereby the miners drink a lot.
We crawled our way to the 3rd level of the mine, it was hot, impossible to breathe, and many of our group looked as if they were to pass out at any minute. I couldn´t walk in a straight line. Sarah looked as if she could have collapsed at any moment. One Hawaiian man was really struggling. Pedro explained that we should not worry if we passed out, he had carried two Israeli´s out yesterday.
Pedro continued to tell us of the miner´s bloody history, as we passed other miners giving them presents. As many as five massacres have occurrred in the mines in the past 100 hundred years, whereby the government have come in and just slaughtered them. To protect themselves the miners use dynamite as weapons, and continue to keep the cheaper crappier Peruvian dynamite on hand to kill anyone if need be. Pedro explained this in quite a matter of fact way, it was just their way of life he explained. The mines have claimed over 8 million lives in its entire history.
Upon getting out of the mines and regaining our breath the guides got some of the remaining dynamite, prepared it and lit it, and handed it to me and some other guy and just walked away. We both had a minor freak out, but the guides told us top stay there while people took pictures. Then strolled up to us casually took the dynamite walked 150m away put it down and walked casually back in time to watch it explode. I don´t think such practices would be accepted by OHSW in Aus, but it certainly made for an intersting day!
Catch yáll,
Dylan