Just to add something interesting about them. Many of our favorite dances and music in Bolivia have being originated and developed from that zone, like Morenada or Caporales. It is a mix of african and andean sounds, which I think is wonderful. And yes I'm Bolivian :)
Here some Saya I randomly found in YT (https://youtu.be/WbI1ncuyWbk)
The Kingdom of Kongo had a civil war resulting two factions claiming the throne and a lot of victims being enslaved and being sent to South America. The monarchy was only disestablished in 1914. The ancestral story mentioned in the article is quite plausible.
Potosi is well worth the visit, if anybody had ever doubts how brutal slavery could be, look no more. Slaves lasted 6 weeks before dying horribly in some of the jobs they had, mostly in ore processing parts. Or if you want to see why its really not a good idea to be pregnant in >4000m altitude, look at their local church.
Mines themselves are surprisingly still open and locals work there, even if they know very well within 15-20 years most of them will develop aggressive lung cancer. IIRC its from fine silica dust that is all over those mines in form of thick dust (and sometimes even raw crystals form on the walls). The hill in which the mines are is pure emmental, around 5000 entries IIRC from various directions and ages.
Visited them with my wife/fiancée few years ago, local woman whose husband died from what I described above guided us quite deep inside. Never saw actual red sticks of dynamite with the burning string till that day. We offered very strong alcohol and coca leaves to Pachamama, had some leaves with 'activator' ourselves (and then went blabbing for half an hour due to mouth and tongue anesthesia). Those silica in the air are not benign, so there are warnings everywhere (and good modern masks should definitely help, we didn't have those unfortunately this was well before covid).
A powerful experience, as backpacking around whole Bolivia is, to us its the most interesting country in South America to visit for intense adventure and lifelong memories. Yungas death road on a rented bike is another very memorable experience, from snowed plains and glaciers 4700m high into jungle in few hours.
Potosi - "the first global city" [1]
Potosi: The Silver City That Changed the World by Kris Lane[2]
I've encountered Kris's work during the pandemic; He released a book "Pandemic in Potosí: Fear, Loathing, and Public Piety in a Colonial Mining Metropolis" [3] about the pandemic in 1719 which killed third of the city
Potosi as a silver hotspot had a coin mint, and of course it had a fraud[4]
The impression this series gives is that Bolivia can be somewhat dangerous.
For instance, from his Wikipedia article, the ... video about a trip to Patamanta in Bolivia was reported by Gizmodo Español as "more scary than entering Chernobyl". In the video, he informed a local woman that he was a tourist, prompting her to warn him that "they burn people" in the area. Two men later approached Rich, inspected his passport, and gave him 30 minutes to explore and leave the area.
And that video actually is terrifying.
But, given that you backpacked around Bolivia with your fiance, your experience must have been different? Was Bald unfair to Bolivia? Is it relatively safe?
Bolivia was a high point in my trekking around S. America. I felt perfectly safe, and had no negative experiences. Beautiful kind people. In La Paz, I asked directions from a random passerby to their electronics market (I wanted to replace a pair of lost headphones), and the man cautioned me that some sellers might try to take advantage of me. He asked me what I was after, and told me what he would expect to pay. But, I had no issues, the price offered, by the first seller I approached, for a pair of Sony ear buds was less than $4-- the headphones only differed in color from the pair I had lost-- I had paid $16 at Target in the US for them.
I was alone, and, when in urban areas, mostly stayed in the hotels in the spaces above street-level businesses that are not geared toward foreign tourists (Spanish required). Except for La Paz, it was less than $10/night and usually between a few dollars to $5. Food was inexpensive and excellent too.
There were amazing historical sites. And, really interesting "hmmmmmm" contemporary things to encounter, if paying attention-- e.g., there was a tribe near Rurrenabaque that spoke Quechua?! (A language you would expect to encounter in central Peru, not there).
The Bolivian high desert is so high that the low hills are topped in ice (14000ft/4000m at the valley floor) and in the low-lands are tropical jungles and pampas. While trekking in the jungle, I saw Tapirs, sloth, jaguar scat/tracks, caiman (alligator/crocodile type animal), spider monkeys, howler monkeys, so many birds... It was amazing!
You will need some level of proficiency in Spanish, unless sticking to tourist places, but even then Spanish will be helpful though not required.
Highly recommend.
(for those unaccustomed to seeing men with guns, you will encounter men with rifles e.g., outside banks, in large cities like La Paz-- so, yes crime exists, but I didn't ever feel that sketch feeling where you decide it is time to leave a place, or not enter it, in the first place-- Bolivia felt very safe to me)
Rurrenabaque is hundreds of miles north of where that wikipedia article is showing the language being spoken (in Bolivia). Speaking with one of the tribal members, he said that there were no other Quechuan speakers within hundreds of kilometers, which matches with the map in the article you linked.
But, I guess I was more surprised hearing Quechua than I should have been. My surprise led to a conversation with a really interesting person, though-- I learned that their tribe's men were known for their archery skills, they had an aggressive encounter (a few years earlier) with a group from another, distant, tribe that almost led to warfare, etc.
It's definitely not "relatively safe" in what I as a European would consider a safe place - although I was told it got a lot better in the last decade. If you look like a rich tourist than you need to be careful, like pretty much anywhere in S. America. However if you present yourself as a nomad hippie looser with nothing worth the trouble of messing with you, you can go around and probably you'll have no big problems, but still requires a bit of common sense in interaction with people. And speaking at least some Spanish. It's not that people are not friendly, they're just poor, and the line between being friendly and hustling you is very thin.
Yeah, that one confused me too. Visiting Chernobyl was mostly a walk in a park, as no other people around and forrest slowly taking over everything. Honestly, it felt way safer than big cities in Ukraine to me - hell, even safer than big cities in my own country :)
I have not been to Bolivia myself, but this question is always relative.
It depends what you count as save and where do you want to go, but also on your experience.
"for intense adventure and lifelong memories. Yungas death road on a rented bike is another very memorable experience"
Parent seems to have a higher risk tolerance.
Also it matters a lot, if you can speak spanish and can act like a local. But if you look and act like a helpless gringo tourist, then you will likely get robbed or worse on the first day.
But I know people who hitchhiked there without serious trouble as white gringos. So the answer is probably, it depends.
I have more than a year of cumulative backpacking experience all around the world when its just you, guide book ie Lonely planet and a loose plan for maybe next 2-4 days, mostly India but also other places. I don't know if that makes me one with 'higher risk tolerance', definitely higher than 0 to actually experience anything interesting. But I do some more intense sports like climbing or paragliding where some risk is unavoidable and you do your best to minimize your exposure to it, and this mindset then permeates rest of your persona.
As for Bolivia, what parent described sounds like some extreme case of 'I walk randomly into favela with gold chain around the neck and rolex watches and shit happened' kind of foolish beginner behavior. Backpacking gives you some instincts what not to do. Did I feel safe in Bolivia in those few places we've done? Absolutely. Is the whole country completely safe in any situation? Most probably not, or it wasn't in 2018, no idea about current affairs. Btw neither me nor my fiancee/wife speak spanish, you can get by with 20 words if you have to.
I've gone to Iran in cca 2015 (Mont Damavand, a bit of culture), an amazing experience and one of my best. Wouldn't go there currently, not because common people got bad (no, they were amazing and everybody spoke english well) but politics made it unsafe.
"I don't know if that makes me one with 'higher risk tolerance'"
Compared to an average human, I would say yes.
And yes, speaking the local language is not a must, I also got by in poor and potential dangerous places by communicating with hand and feat. Eye contact.
The way one treats the people matters. Do they perceive you as a arrogant, bored rich westener who has come to visit the poor people zoo? That might end bad. But showing genuine interest yields different results.
Death road on a mountain bike isn’t all that dangerous. It got its name because it used to be the only route to and from Brasil. So you would get 2 way traffic of like box trucks on a smallish dirt road with a sheer cliff drop off on one side and a mountain on the other. Lots of them went off the cliff.
Now you can book a tour and they provide nice bikes and follow the group in a minivan. There is still some cars and such but it is mostly locals or tour groups. They built a modern highway so that route isn’t used for trucks anymore.
It is super beautiful and not really dangerous unless you want it to be. Totally worth it.
It only takes one mistake to fall off, it could be mechanical failure, hole in the ground after rain, someone in front of you stopping / looking back which cause them to drift (that what happened to me had to break hard and fell)
I saw a video from helmet go pro of some girl hanging on shrubs on her life
Nevertheless 40 km downhill with beautiful scenery would do it again :)
there are a few places where riding relatively close to the edge is inevitable, although you can probably bring yourself to slow down and concentrate for those moments. Still the cycle tour operators (who operate with considerably better than average equipment and professionalism) have non-zero death tolls, so it's not just drunk drivers trying to pass each other.
Still, I reckon Death Road is probably a fair bit safer than the mines in Potosi, or Potosi/Sucre taxi ride at the speed the locals like to drive at, Andes night buses in the less reliable bus companies or deciding to visit a mountaintype viewpoint by wandering through one of the local districts with a camera (Bolivia definitely didn't feel like the worst part of Latin America for that though...). Roads being blocked by angry protestors is a characteristically Bolivian thing too, although they're not at all interested in tourists so unless you're determined to pass the only real danger is to your schedule.
now the time I actually did ride a bike off a cliff was a nice smooth road in Ecuador (I went a little too close to a drain which wasn't particularly close to the edge, went over the handlebars, landed inelegantly on the road and was a little surprised to find no bike behind me... had fun retrieving it from the tree it was caught in a couple of feet below the edge)
Everywhere has their bad parts. I arrived in La Paz in rough shape, as I hadn't slept on the red eye on the way in. I could have easily been taken advantage of. Instead the taxi driver took me right where I was going, helped me unload and communicate with the front desk of the building where my airbnb was.
The people are really friendly, generous, and happy.
Like with a lot of countries in South America, there are certainly places you shouldn't just wander about in. VRAEM in Peru is another example. But there is a lot of tourism in Bolivia. Most places are perfectly safe. Lonely Planet can be a good place to start if you're unsure.
There are a lot more places worth the visit in Bolivia, apart from the Yungas and Potosí. Salar de Uyuni, Sucre (especially the Indigenous Art and Textiles Museum), National Reserve Torotoro, Pantanal (the Bolivian part is better than the Brasilian part), Tarija, and a lot more.
Bolivia is at least as safe as the USofA. Just stay out of Chapare and keep an eye on your money and passport when traveling with bus (and of course in crowded places, but this is true for near the whole planet).
Also, if you're interested in History and enjoy "off the beaten path" type of tourism, it's 100% worth the ~8 hour ride from Santa Cruz to visit La Higuera, the little pueblo where the Bolivian Government captured and executed Che Guevara. The schoolhouse that they executed him in is now converted into a tiny little museum, and the whole town has art and statues of him, it's a super interesting place.
I’m not sure if you’re suggesting Che Guavara wasn’t assassinated, wasn’t assassinated in La Higuera, or that the museum dedicated to memorializing this historical event is either insincere or simply trading on Guevara’s memory as a cynical cash grab…so tldr; WTF are you on about?
I don't understand what he's on about either. They're hardly even making any money from it. I signed the guest book and there were only like one or two visitors every couple of days (or week). The woman who gives tours of the museum can't read or write, she's probably in her 80s. Only elderly people live in the town nowadays, all of the youth left. It can't be more than 30-50 people living there. I don't even remember paying anything to enter, and if I did, it couldn't have been more than a couple of dollars.
I think they’re suggesting Guevara was a criminal and murderer and we shouldn’t idolize or memorialize him. America has strong and deeply ingrained anti-communist sentiment.
I think that regardless of your political leaning, he is an interesting piece of history.
Cochabamba(Chapare) indeed known for gangs and drugs, and also for the water war against privatization of water company(influenced James bond Quantom of solace)
In 2019 there were protests after alleged election fraud, Evo morales the president fled out of the country
In La Paz was a hotspot for tourists abduction in the early 2000s, there is also a known market of stolen goods
I had a visit from Interpol in a hostel in Sucre couple of years ago
Interpol is an organisation for cooperation between national police organisations. They don't visit ordinary citizens or tourists, nor are they allowed to do any police actions in (other) countries. Are you sure that wasn't part of some (attempted) scam?
No I'm not; I was surprised(for some reason I though Interpol is a european thing) and showed some resistant but they just wanted to check in.
I did look up now and found multiple cases where interpol was involved in bolivia as well as car with the logo, and officers with hats \_o_/
Seeing other countries from the reductionist lens of tourism is the McDonalization of humanity. Now the human condition has been reduced to a list of superficial and trivialized activities on Tripadvisor.
Take a selfie next to a statue, eat at a restaurant, buy some souvenir made in China... now you can check a country in your country list and say "I have been to n+1 countries". What was the cost? burning a massive amount of plane fuel to get you there that is equivalent to you burning your trash for a full year, something that in a planet governed by a rational species would be illegal to do.
The article talks about something much more profound. Long distance tourism is at our current technological level a planet-killing industry and should be outlawed.
Car dependent suburban sprawl necessitating 3 hours a day commutes by car 5 days a week,50 weeks a year is a much heavier load on the planet than an annual plane trip .
This is fascinating. If you're interested in African communities in South America, you might also like to read about San Basilio de Palenque. A community of escaped slaves that managed to fight off the Spanish so effectively the king gave up and granted the city freedom. Many people there speak the only Spanish-based creole language in South America
He is very humble for a king. Many are prone to vulgar and ostentatious displays of wealth. However he has the dignity of a hard worker. Many could learn from his example.
Industrialization is what brought prosperity to the masses.
Colonialism and slavery benefited the reigning elite, but the average person almost didn’t see any benefit.
Unfortunately that won’t stop people from lying that slavery is the foundation of wealthy western democracies.
Brazil had 10x more slaves than the USA [1]. They would have been the richest country in Latin America per capita if slavery was the foundation of rich modern democracies, but that’s far from the case
I say this as a Nigerian whose country was colonized by the British.
Alexis de Tocqueville noted in the 1840s that slave-holding America was much poorer than non-slave-holding America, and why, and it's not the climate because there were cases where simply crossing a river border was crossing from wealth to poverty. Slavery absolutely did not benefit the masters, except in so far as it helped them feel better about themselves. "I'm better than you" is a human instinct that continues unabated to this day -- many absolutely adore that feeling as if it was a mind-altering drug hit.
> Alexis de Tocqueville noted in the 1840s that slave-holding America was much poorer than non-slave-holding America
That's because the north, in particular new england, started industrializing in the late 1700s. While the south, due to a variety reasons, didn't.
> Slavery absolutely did not benefit the masters
If it didn't, the civil war wouldn't have happened. The wealthy elite who owned slaves benefited immensely. Just visit a plantation turned historical museum in the south. Most southerners didn't own slaves.
> "I'm better than you" is a human instinct that continues unabated to this day -- many absolutely adore that feeling as if it was a mind-altering drug hit.
Yup. It's important to note that while slavery was bad economically for the South as a whole, it was certainly good for the tiny minority of rich white elite.
Interestingly enough, a virulent white supremacist at the time [1] pointed this out, and the South banned his book. He hated black people, but at the same time made the economic analysis that slavery was a tool for white elite to oppress not just black people but also poor white people. He wanted to end slavery not to benefit blacks (he wanted to build a railroad to send black people to South America), but to benefit poorer whites.
Fortunately, we learned from this lesson, and we'll never let elites bring in tons of outsiders to push down the price of local labor, to the detriment of everyone but themselves.
> He wanted to end slavery not to benefit blacks (he wanted to build a railroad to send black people to South America), but to benefit poorer whites.
Interesting. Abraham Lincoln also wanted to expel blacks. Lincoln was a member of the American Colonization Society which aimed to send blacks (free or enslaved ) to africa. Also, lincoln was a virulent white supremacist as well. But for some strange reason history doesn't like to dwell on that inconvenient truth.
> That's because the north, in particular new england, started industrializing in the late 1700s. While the south, due to a variety reasons, didn't.
Among those reasons was this: that slavery made the capitalists in the South lazy.
> > Slavery absolutely did not benefit the masters
> If it didn't, the civil war wouldn't have happened. The wealthy elite who owned slaves benefited immensely. Just visit a plantation turned historical museum in the south. Most southerners didn't own slaves.
It's a matter of perception: the masters didn't perceive that industrializing would have benefited them much more than slavery ever could, nor did they perceive that slavery held them back. So of course they saw abolition as a threat to their status.
Industrialization relied heavily upon raw materials generated cheaply with slavery - cotton picked in the American South was exported and was a necessity to fuel the industrialization of textile production in England, for example. There is a reason that industrializing and industrialized countries that relied on slavery and other exploitative economic relationships have achieved greater wealth than more newly industrializing countries have. America's wealth is largely supported by cheap labor and raw materials in other countries, opened up for the use of international corporations by state-sponsored violence - see America's history of interfering in South American politics or Chiquita's recent guilty verdict for sponsoring paramilitary forces in Colombia.
It is not true that "cotton . . . was a necessity to fuel the industrialization of textile production in England".
England produced so much wool that it exported most of it (to other European countries). Flax was also very common.
Factories full of steam-powered machines were going to replace the existing arrangement in which most households on farms and in villages manually spun their own yarn and wove their own cloth with or without access to cheap cotton.
> Industrialization is what brought prosperity to the masses.
workers organization did. Early industries were mostly run like slaveshops and the only reason we didn't end up in that world was that the reigning elite needed someone to manage the colonies and thus needed some people educated a bit more (which then also went into industry too) - which turned out problematic.
> They would have been the richest country in Latin America per capita
Oh, the former slave-owners for sure are. Likely too in Nigeria if you know how to look.
Only a few years ago did I learn through an economic historian, that throughout Dutch colonial rule, the entirety of that activity has been a loss, not a gain, to the Dutch state and thus the Dutch citizen (it is evident it was a loss for those enslaved in the process). All it did was make _some_ people _very_ rich, who in turn managed to convince everyone it was all worth the while.
The real money, also for the state, was made through trade with the Baltic area, during the Dutch Golden Age. Not trade with the Indies.
> Industrialization is what brought prosperity to the masses.
Industrialization brought prosperity to the elites, just like colonialism and slavery did. You act like the poor masses were the biggest beneficiaries of industrialization. Most of the benefits of industrializations has gone to the elites. Just like colonialism and slavery.
> Colonialism and slavery benefited the reigning elite, but the average person almost didn’t see any benefit.
Simply false. Tens of millions of europeans crowded in the smallest continent on earth were able to migrate to other parts of the world and gain land ( which is one of the primary sources of wealth ). And the ability to offload excess population allowed european elite to invest in production rather than waste resources on their excess population. A win-win situation.
> Unfortunately that won’t stop people from lying that slavery is the foundation of wealthy western democracies.
Slavery and colonialism were the foundations of industrialization. Industrializaton requires two things - excess capital and excess resources. How do you think europe was able to procure excess capital and resources?
> Brazil had 10x more slaves than the USA [1]. They would have been the richest country in Latin America per capita if slavery was the foundation of rich modern democracies, but that’s far from the case
And one of the most industrialized nations ( North Korea ) is one of the poorest in the world. What's your point? Brazil ended slavery in the 1800s and industrialized. It still isn't 'one of the richest in Latin America per capita'? Obviously you need something more than industrialization. Like political safety and stability and competent leadership.
You seem to think people are saying you need slavery and colonialism to industrialize. That's not the case. The point is that europe industrialized due to slavery and colonialism.
It remarkable how many here watch silly youtube videos to get their understanding of history and economics.
> Most of the benefits of industrializations has gone to the elites. Just like colonialism and slavery.
The average individual is much better off economically and has a higher quality of life in an industrialized economy than one built on slavery.
I’m not arguing that slavery was good, but that it was orthogonal to industrialization. Virtually all countries practiced slavery at some point, but most didn’t industrialize.
Industrialization began with Britain running out of firewood and switching to coal as an alternative energy source. Steam engines were fine tuned to pump water out of coal mines, and people gradually began using steam engines to power other things, kickstarting the revolution.
My point is that Europe would have industrialized with or without slavery.
Thanks for picking North Korea as an example…a country where 43.5% works in agriculture and only a mere 14% in industry [1], compared to the much richer South Korea where only 5% work in agriculture [2]. It remains obvious that any economy built mainly on manual labor (slavery included) will be as mediocre as North Korea’s.
I understand your point, but not sure I would accuse those that misinterpret these things of lying. Many people are educated enough to know that the massive explosion in human advancement was heavily fueled by exploitation of some kind. They simply don't understand exactly what those exploitations are and the resulting effects they've had.
> Wether we like it or not these are the pillars of the western world
Not sure I understand you correctly, but I strongly disagree that colonialism was a necessary foundation for todays wealthy western democracies.
I would consider it more another symptom-- once the perpetrators realized how outmatched the rest of the world was in military/logistics (especially compared to their direct neighbors).
Older cultures acted exactly the same way, compare e.g. Romans, Huns, Egyptians, Persians (European colonialism just had the naval logistics to make this work on a bigger scale).
> Not sure I understand you correctly, but I strongly disagree that colonialism was a necessary foundation for todays wealthy western democracies.
Then go visit Sevilla and enjoy the output of the mines in the cathedral (no danger at all). And then think a little how amassing enough silver by slavery to make a 60feet high altar 300 years ago didn't give you quite a nice headstart on dominating a world where most other competing cultures valued the same metals as currency.
Not saying this is particularly wrong in the grand scheme or we need to all be in eternal deference to anyone claiming to be a descendant of the people our ancestors exterminated for this. But it should be clear, getting access to these resources and ruthlessly exploiting them made Europe rich and enabled all the other colonialization which followed.
> And then think a little how amassing enough silver by slavery to make a 60feet high altar 300 years ago didn't give you quite a nice headstart on dominating a world where most other competing cultures valued the same metals as currency.
This is where we disagree. My position is that colonialism was a consequence of post-medieval Europe being dominant, instead of the other way around.
I'm not disputing that colonialism profitted the perpetrators, but I think giving it major credit for 20th-century Europes wealth is just a misattribution (if I had to reduce that to one word it would be "industrialization" and not "colonialism", very clearly).
Early ~1900 power dynamics are another strong indicator-- even at the height of colonialism, the nations engaging very heavily in it (British, Spanish, Portugese, Dutch) struggled to keep up with Germany which did not get significant benefit from it at all.
I would also argue that the biggest value of colonies was less in the raw extraction of ressources, but instead in the trade/arbitration (and additional markets) that they enabled (i.e. the big value-add was not so much stealing the silver out of the ground in Argentinia, but instead the act of getting/selling it to China).
> But it should be clear, getting access to these resources and ruthlessly exploiting them made Europe rich and enabled all the other colonialization which followed.
I'm not GP, but the connections you're making between this sentence and the sentences prior to it are the suspicious ones. What you need to do is argue against the claim that it those things that allowed for the accumulation of all this silver that allowed for the success of colonization.
I had a number of cringes moment in spain with my latin american partner when overhearring some spanish people justifying colonization with webroughtthemcivilization bullshit. Also reading plain insults with similar colonization justification bullshit aimed at latin american workers who clean the facilities in the restrooms of a Corte Ingles in Madrid center. Made me want to burn the whole place.
In a way colonization hasn't stopped and should still be talked about and denounced.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8kQZHYbZkLs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xnqXtz3sxjU
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charango https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siku_(instrument)
--
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UNZD5buXlmY
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kongo_Civil_War
I am not sure where Uganda comes in, possibly the king has other relatives from there.
Mines themselves are surprisingly still open and locals work there, even if they know very well within 15-20 years most of them will develop aggressive lung cancer. IIRC its from fine silica dust that is all over those mines in form of thick dust (and sometimes even raw crystals form on the walls). The hill in which the mines are is pure emmental, around 5000 entries IIRC from various directions and ages.
Visited them with my wife/fiancée few years ago, local woman whose husband died from what I described above guided us quite deep inside. Never saw actual red sticks of dynamite with the burning string till that day. We offered very strong alcohol and coca leaves to Pachamama, had some leaves with 'activator' ourselves (and then went blabbing for half an hour due to mouth and tongue anesthesia). Those silica in the air are not benign, so there are warnings everywhere (and good modern masks should definitely help, we didn't have those unfortunately this was well before covid).
A powerful experience, as backpacking around whole Bolivia is, to us its the most interesting country in South America to visit for intense adventure and lifelong memories. Yungas death road on a rented bike is another very memorable experience, from snowed plains and glaciers 4700m high into jungle in few hours.
Potosi - "the first global city" [1] Potosi: The Silver City That Changed the World by Kris Lane[2]
I've encountered Kris's work during the pandemic; He released a book "Pandemic in Potosí: Fear, Loathing, and Public Piety in a Colonial Mining Metropolis" [3] about the pandemic in 1719 which killed third of the city
Potosi as a silver hotspot had a coin mint, and of course it had a fraud[4]
https://liberalarts.tulane.edu/history/people/faculty-staff-... https://aeon.co/essays/potosi-the-mountain-of-silver-that-wa... https://www.amazon.com/Potosi-Changed-California-History-Lib... https://www.psupress.org/books/titles/978-0-271-09198-3.html https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Potos%C3%AD_Mint_Fraud_o...
The impression this series gives is that Bolivia can be somewhat dangerous.
For instance, from his Wikipedia article, the ... video about a trip to Patamanta in Bolivia was reported by Gizmodo Español as "more scary than entering Chernobyl". In the video, he informed a local woman that he was a tourist, prompting her to warn him that "they burn people" in the area. Two men later approached Rich, inspected his passport, and gave him 30 minutes to explore and leave the area.
And that video actually is terrifying.
But, given that you backpacked around Bolivia with your fiance, your experience must have been different? Was Bald unfair to Bolivia? Is it relatively safe?
I was alone, and, when in urban areas, mostly stayed in the hotels in the spaces above street-level businesses that are not geared toward foreign tourists (Spanish required). Except for La Paz, it was less than $10/night and usually between a few dollars to $5. Food was inexpensive and excellent too.
There were amazing historical sites. And, really interesting "hmmmmmm" contemporary things to encounter, if paying attention-- e.g., there was a tribe near Rurrenabaque that spoke Quechua?! (A language you would expect to encounter in central Peru, not there).
The Bolivian high desert is so high that the low hills are topped in ice (14000ft/4000m at the valley floor) and in the low-lands are tropical jungles and pampas. While trekking in the jungle, I saw Tapirs, sloth, jaguar scat/tracks, caiman (alligator/crocodile type animal), spider monkeys, howler monkeys, so many birds... It was amazing!
You will need some level of proficiency in Spanish, unless sticking to tourist places, but even then Spanish will be helpful though not required.
Highly recommend.
(for those unaccustomed to seeing men with guns, you will encounter men with rifles e.g., outside banks, in large cities like La Paz-- so, yes crime exists, but I didn't ever feel that sketch feeling where you decide it is time to leave a place, or not enter it, in the first place-- Bolivia felt very safe to me)
Quechuan languages are quite widespread, including over large areas of Bolivia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quechuan_languages
But, I guess I was more surprised hearing Quechua than I should have been. My surprise led to a conversation with a really interesting person, though-- I learned that their tribe's men were known for their archery skills, they had an aggressive encounter (a few years earlier) with a group from another, distant, tribe that almost led to warfare, etc.
Prior that, you could go to Chernobyl with a tour and it was absolutely safe. Much safer than walking around random US city, actually.
I have not been to Bolivia myself, but this question is always relative.
It depends what you count as save and where do you want to go, but also on your experience.
"for intense adventure and lifelong memories. Yungas death road on a rented bike is another very memorable experience"
Parent seems to have a higher risk tolerance.
Also it matters a lot, if you can speak spanish and can act like a local. But if you look and act like a helpless gringo tourist, then you will likely get robbed or worse on the first day.
But I know people who hitchhiked there without serious trouble as white gringos. So the answer is probably, it depends.
As for Bolivia, what parent described sounds like some extreme case of 'I walk randomly into favela with gold chain around the neck and rolex watches and shit happened' kind of foolish beginner behavior. Backpacking gives you some instincts what not to do. Did I feel safe in Bolivia in those few places we've done? Absolutely. Is the whole country completely safe in any situation? Most probably not, or it wasn't in 2018, no idea about current affairs. Btw neither me nor my fiancee/wife speak spanish, you can get by with 20 words if you have to.
I've gone to Iran in cca 2015 (Mont Damavand, a bit of culture), an amazing experience and one of my best. Wouldn't go there currently, not because common people got bad (no, they were amazing and everybody spoke english well) but politics made it unsafe.
Compared to an average human, I would say yes.
And yes, speaking the local language is not a must, I also got by in poor and potential dangerous places by communicating with hand and feat. Eye contact.
The way one treats the people matters. Do they perceive you as a arrogant, bored rich westener who has come to visit the poor people zoo? That might end bad. But showing genuine interest yields different results.
Now you can book a tour and they provide nice bikes and follow the group in a minivan. There is still some cars and such but it is mostly locals or tour groups. They built a modern highway so that route isn’t used for trucks anymore.
It is super beautiful and not really dangerous unless you want it to be. Totally worth it.
Still, I reckon Death Road is probably a fair bit safer than the mines in Potosi, or Potosi/Sucre taxi ride at the speed the locals like to drive at, Andes night buses in the less reliable bus companies or deciding to visit a mountaintype viewpoint by wandering through one of the local districts with a camera (Bolivia definitely didn't feel like the worst part of Latin America for that though...). Roads being blocked by angry protestors is a characteristically Bolivian thing too, although they're not at all interested in tourists so unless you're determined to pass the only real danger is to your schedule.
now the time I actually did ride a bike off a cliff was a nice smooth road in Ecuador (I went a little too close to a drain which wasn't particularly close to the edge, went over the handlebars, landed inelegantly on the road and was a little surprised to find no bike behind me... had fun retrieving it from the tree it was caught in a couple of feet below the edge)
The people are really friendly, generous, and happy.
I can't wait to go back
Bolivia is at least as safe as the USofA. Just stay out of Chapare and keep an eye on your money and passport when traveling with bus (and of course in crowded places, but this is true for near the whole planet).
I think that regardless of your political leaning, he is an interesting piece of history.
In 2019 there were protests after alleged election fraud, Evo morales the president fled out of the country
In La Paz was a hotspot for tourists abduction in the early 2000s, there is also a known market of stolen goods
I had a visit from Interpol in a hostel in Sucre couple of years ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cochabamba_Water_War https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019_Bolivian_protests
Take a selfie next to a statue, eat at a restaurant, buy some souvenir made in China... now you can check a country in your country list and say "I have been to n+1 countries". What was the cost? burning a massive amount of plane fuel to get you there that is equivalent to you burning your trash for a full year, something that in a planet governed by a rational species would be illegal to do.
The article talks about something much more profound. Long distance tourism is at our current technological level a planet-killing industry and should be outlawed.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Basilio_de_Palenque
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=XkOlzCoNstM
As Spaniard this is disgusting to me and I don’t understand how talking about this still raises anger and some weird historic justifications.
Wether we like it or not these are the pillars of the western world and why today we have privileges over most of the planet.
Colonialism and slavery benefited the reigning elite, but the average person almost didn’t see any benefit.
Unfortunately that won’t stop people from lying that slavery is the foundation of wealthy western democracies.
Brazil had 10x more slaves than the USA [1]. They would have been the richest country in Latin America per capita if slavery was the foundation of rich modern democracies, but that’s far from the case
I say this as a Nigerian whose country was colonized by the British.
1- https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/abs/comparative-histori....
That's because the north, in particular new england, started industrializing in the late 1700s. While the south, due to a variety reasons, didn't.
> Slavery absolutely did not benefit the masters
If it didn't, the civil war wouldn't have happened. The wealthy elite who owned slaves benefited immensely. Just visit a plantation turned historical museum in the south. Most southerners didn't own slaves.
> "I'm better than you" is a human instinct that continues unabated to this day -- many absolutely adore that feeling as if it was a mind-altering drug hit.
Indeed.
Interestingly enough, a virulent white supremacist at the time [1] pointed this out, and the South banned his book. He hated black people, but at the same time made the economic analysis that slavery was a tool for white elite to oppress not just black people but also poor white people. He wanted to end slavery not to benefit blacks (he wanted to build a railroad to send black people to South America), but to benefit poorer whites.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hinton_Rowan_Helper
Interesting. Abraham Lincoln also wanted to expel blacks. Lincoln was a member of the American Colonization Society which aimed to send blacks (free or enslaved ) to africa. Also, lincoln was a virulent white supremacist as well. But for some strange reason history doesn't like to dwell on that inconvenient truth.
Among those reasons was this: that slavery made the capitalists in the South lazy.
> > Slavery absolutely did not benefit the masters
> If it didn't, the civil war wouldn't have happened. The wealthy elite who owned slaves benefited immensely. Just visit a plantation turned historical museum in the south. Most southerners didn't own slaves.
It's a matter of perception: the masters didn't perceive that industrializing would have benefited them much more than slavery ever could, nor did they perceive that slavery held them back. So of course they saw abolition as a threat to their status.
England produced so much wool that it exported most of it (to other European countries). Flax was also very common.
Factories full of steam-powered machines were going to replace the existing arrangement in which most households on farms and in villages manually spun their own yarn and wove their own cloth with or without access to cheap cotton.
workers organization did. Early industries were mostly run like slaveshops and the only reason we didn't end up in that world was that the reigning elite needed someone to manage the colonies and thus needed some people educated a bit more (which then also went into industry too) - which turned out problematic.
> They would have been the richest country in Latin America per capita
Oh, the former slave-owners for sure are. Likely too in Nigeria if you know how to look.
Probably, which supports my case that slavery benefited a tiny set of slaveowners but not the average citizen.
The real money, also for the state, was made through trade with the Baltic area, during the Dutch Golden Age. Not trade with the Indies.
Industrialization brought prosperity to the elites, just like colonialism and slavery did. You act like the poor masses were the biggest beneficiaries of industrialization. Most of the benefits of industrializations has gone to the elites. Just like colonialism and slavery.
> Colonialism and slavery benefited the reigning elite, but the average person almost didn’t see any benefit.
Simply false. Tens of millions of europeans crowded in the smallest continent on earth were able to migrate to other parts of the world and gain land ( which is one of the primary sources of wealth ). And the ability to offload excess population allowed european elite to invest in production rather than waste resources on their excess population. A win-win situation.
> Unfortunately that won’t stop people from lying that slavery is the foundation of wealthy western democracies.
Slavery and colonialism were the foundations of industrialization. Industrializaton requires two things - excess capital and excess resources. How do you think europe was able to procure excess capital and resources?
> Brazil had 10x more slaves than the USA [1]. They would have been the richest country in Latin America per capita if slavery was the foundation of rich modern democracies, but that’s far from the case
And one of the most industrialized nations ( North Korea ) is one of the poorest in the world. What's your point? Brazil ended slavery in the 1800s and industrialized. It still isn't 'one of the richest in Latin America per capita'? Obviously you need something more than industrialization. Like political safety and stability and competent leadership.
You seem to think people are saying you need slavery and colonialism to industrialize. That's not the case. The point is that europe industrialized due to slavery and colonialism.
It remarkable how many here watch silly youtube videos to get their understanding of history and economics.
The average individual is much better off economically and has a higher quality of life in an industrialized economy than one built on slavery.
I’m not arguing that slavery was good, but that it was orthogonal to industrialization. Virtually all countries practiced slavery at some point, but most didn’t industrialize.
Industrialization began with Britain running out of firewood and switching to coal as an alternative energy source. Steam engines were fine tuned to pump water out of coal mines, and people gradually began using steam engines to power other things, kickstarting the revolution.
My point is that Europe would have industrialized with or without slavery.
Thanks for picking North Korea as an example…a country where 43.5% works in agriculture and only a mere 14% in industry [1], compared to the much richer South Korea where only 5% work in agriculture [2]. It remains obvious that any economy built mainly on manual labor (slavery included) will be as mediocre as North Korea’s.
1-https://globaledge.msu.edu/countries/north-korea/economy
2- https://globaledge.msu.edu/countries/south-korea/economy
Not sure I understand you correctly, but I strongly disagree that colonialism was a necessary foundation for todays wealthy western democracies.
I would consider it more another symptom-- once the perpetrators realized how outmatched the rest of the world was in military/logistics (especially compared to their direct neighbors).
Older cultures acted exactly the same way, compare e.g. Romans, Huns, Egyptians, Persians (European colonialism just had the naval logistics to make this work on a bigger scale).
Then go visit Sevilla and enjoy the output of the mines in the cathedral (no danger at all). And then think a little how amassing enough silver by slavery to make a 60feet high altar 300 years ago didn't give you quite a nice headstart on dominating a world where most other competing cultures valued the same metals as currency.
Not saying this is particularly wrong in the grand scheme or we need to all be in eternal deference to anyone claiming to be a descendant of the people our ancestors exterminated for this. But it should be clear, getting access to these resources and ruthlessly exploiting them made Europe rich and enabled all the other colonialization which followed.
This is where we disagree. My position is that colonialism was a consequence of post-medieval Europe being dominant, instead of the other way around.
I'm not disputing that colonialism profitted the perpetrators, but I think giving it major credit for 20th-century Europes wealth is just a misattribution (if I had to reduce that to one word it would be "industrialization" and not "colonialism", very clearly).
Early ~1900 power dynamics are another strong indicator-- even at the height of colonialism, the nations engaging very heavily in it (British, Spanish, Portugese, Dutch) struggled to keep up with Germany which did not get significant benefit from it at all.
I would also argue that the biggest value of colonies was less in the raw extraction of ressources, but instead in the trade/arbitration (and additional markets) that they enabled (i.e. the big value-add was not so much stealing the silver out of the ground in Argentinia, but instead the act of getting/selling it to China).
I'm not GP, but the connections you're making between this sentence and the sentences prior to it are the suspicious ones. What you need to do is argue against the claim that it those things that allowed for the accumulation of all this silver that allowed for the success of colonization.
In a way colonization hasn't stopped and should still be talked about and denounced.