I cannot tell you how happy I am to be in Bolivia. We arrived at the bus station super early Wednesday morning so we could catch the 9:00 bus. And keeping with true South American culture, the bus didn’t actually leave until around 10:30. While we were waiting, I heard a commotion by the door and looked up to see some of our ‘N’ squad men start chasing a guy down the street, he had grabbed 2 charging IPhones off of a squad mates lap. The men returned a few minutes later with the culprit in tow, shortly after a policeman arrived. What a way to start off our adventure! We then boarded a bus to start a 32 hour bus ride to La Paz, Bolivia. When we arrived at the border, we had to get off the bus and go to one customs office to get an exit stamp to leave Peru. Everyone was moving along pretty quickly at first, until it was my turn to approach the counter. Turns out, when we entered Peru, they had stamped my passport along with ½ of the group traveling with us only allowing us 30 days to be in the country. So we all had to pay fines for staying in the country longer than expected. After about 45 mins, when we were finally allowed to leave Peru, we walked across the Bolivian Border and entered their customs office to get our visas. After about another 45 mins we were all good to go and ready to get back on the bus! Some of us were experiencing altitude sickness, I was a little nauseous with a small headache, but some had it some had it much worse.
After arriving in La Paz, 35 hours after beginning our adventure, we immediately bought tickets on the next sleeper bus to Cochabamba. The seats were huge and fully reclining and I was blessed with one of the best seats on the bus, the very front. I have to admit, I was slightly disappointed when there was already someone sitting in the seat beside me, because on the previous bus ride, I had a larger man who had to share ½ of my seat with me and snored all night. This sweet lady beside me was an even bigger blessing than the good seat I got. As I turned over and curled up to go to sleep, snuggling Clarence, my elephant pillow pet, the lady threw ½ of her blanket on me and started tucking it underneath my chin. That gesture was so sweet, I wanted to cry.
We arrived in Cochabamba around 7 am and purchased tickets for a 10 hour bus ride to our final destination, Santa Cruz. This bus was not air conditioned and it sounded like it was going to break at every bump we hit. We went through several police checkpoints but were only stopped at 2. At one point, I had my bag checked and had to empty all of the contents. At the very bottom of my bag, I have 2 vacuum-sealed bags of pads, the policeman was asking me what it was in Spanish and I was answering in English, not understanding, he smelled the bags. The policewoman beside him started busting out laughing! By that time he was red faced and shoving things back into my bag. Finally, around 7pm Friday we arrived at the bus station in Santa Cruz.
Sonia, the director of YWAM, picked us up about an hour later in a taxi and 20 minutes later we made it to our new home! We were greeted with hot pizza, cold showers, bunk beds, and fast internet – thank you Jesus!
So excited, that we will be working at an orphanage with special needs babies!
