Intersting stuff

So I´ve got free internet here at this hostal in La Paz, so I´ll be damned if I don´t take advantage. Had a day walking around the city today, on a little walking tour we found in the ever handy Lonely Planet. Stuff noted:

Child labor is not against the law here. When we were in Uyuni, we were waited on by a ten year old kid, who was tending to his toddler daughter most of the time(quality of food not affected, twas delicious). It was a strange experiance. And in La Paz, children are a sadder sight. They are a lot of them begging, I was walking across a bridge here and there were two of them, probably no more than seven years old trying to play small guitars for money. And about every half hour a kid will follow us asking for money. I'm not really sure what to do in this situations, and I´ll spare you the phisophical discussion that goes on in my head while dealing with these poor children.

So they have little street shops for everything. really, everything. They´re are artesanias next to toliet bowl stands next to car parts stands next to food stands. Its crazy. And kinda cool. There aren´t any large supermarkets(thought there are large markets) or department stores. I can understand the appeal to a large ¨buy everything in one place¨ type of store a lot better now.

A friend here told us about a good India restuarant in town, and was quite correct. I am proud to say I´ve now eaten Llama Tikka Masala. And boy, it was tasty. There was none left at the end. Because I ate it.

Whilst hanging out with the frenchies on the tour in the salt flats, we communicated in only spanish. It was kinda neat if you don´t mind me sayin- they spoke french for mostly the entire time. But! When the switched into spanish, it was all clear all the sudden, i could finally figure out what they were saying and whatnot. Long story short, it was pretty similar to when i first came to chile with spanish and english. Though, of course, spanish is always a work in progress.

Oh also, at one of these street side vendors, I saw a stand for tatoos. Naturally, I thought, hey, they must have those henna tatoos things here. Quite the contrary! Upon closer inspection, there was a guy, tatooing the ankle of some girl, on the side of the busiest road in La Paz. Incredible. So that was a bit of a shock. I do not have any tatoos.

Whelp, i´m off to sleep, have a good one.

-Brian