Bus Ride to Rurrenabaque

A Little Reflection on the Road:

The bus ride to Rurrenabaque inspired mixed emotions. The breathtaking natural beauty grasped me as we descend into what seemed to be an infinite wilderness--an intimate and mystifying ride through the jungle. I thought it was an exciting and humorously extreme example of what traveling in Bolivia means, but some of the other passengers found the 18 hour cliff-hugging journey less than pleasant. The prospect of falling off the edge terrified them despite the incredibly low probability and relatively consistent safety record of the buses.


It's a New Species!

The most vexing aspect of my trip had nothing to do with the road, cliffs, or the bus. My company plagued my trip. Luck bestowed upon me a rotating roster of three incredibly overweight, unpleasant smelling, and territorially aggressive men. I would argue that they could be classified as amoebas or gelatinous creatures based on the way they settled into their surroundings. Their shape, first of all, encroaches upon neighboring environments simply by virtue of the size and composition of their bellies. These mountainous rolls of fat also force nearby appendages—as if by erosion—to invade the surrounding lowlands. I, a relative molehill, found myself vying desperately simply to maintain possession of a fraction of my allotted space. I positioned myself strategically in order that the encroaching mass would make first contact with a protruding elbow or knee. Unfortunately, even my palisade of armaments generally failed to hold the ever-flowing masses at bay. How exactly chance placed me in their company, I cannot explain

Gluttony's True Form:

The most disgusting and despicable aspect of this incarnation of gluttony and ego-centrism was encompassed in a single uncharacteristically swift and decisive stroke. He took the plastic wrapping of his fatty Bolivian cornbread loaf and pitched it across my face, out the window, and into the pristine rain forests below. The bag meandered on a slight breeze, fighting its impending descent. The bag, a monstrosity, extracted from nature in order to deliver a bit of its own flesh and blood to a similarly monstrous consumer, wandered down into the basin with disdain. Monica, my guide in Coroico had told me about wealthy Bolivian tourists, and their apathy for the preservation of the local environment. Seeing this for myself filled me with violent anger that was difficult to repress. I simply stared in disgust, and thought of how the refuse of the wealthy constantly plague the poor. The story is the same everywhere.

The Gelatinous Embodiments of Bolivia's Present and Future:

A fleeting glimpse of hope taunted me at our first stop when my blob-like neighbor grabbed his pack and headed out; however another of his kind immediately replaced him, and I once again found myself trapped between the alluring beauty of the scenery and the struggle to avoid consumption by the replacement amoeba. This second turned into a third, and my 18 hour trip was a restless struggle. Ebeneezer Scrooge deserved his torment, what the hell did I do? My only guess is that I wasn't grotesque enough for the bus ride, and it was trying to teach me to embrace the gluttony that was literally surrounding me. My luck with buses hasn't been great... but I'll reflect on that more after my trip. For now, I'm focusing more on the excitement of seeing bananas and cocao in their natural habitats.