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Today was the real business of coming to Potosi. The Cerro Rico.
First up, a shameless plug for the tour company I went with - Big Deal Tours. They are amazing. Our guide Wilson, whilst a tad transphobic (kept on calling the president a ladyboy), was brilliant. An ex-miner himself, having mined for 17 years starting at age 8, he knew many of miners himself and knew the network of tunnels beneath the mountain surface like the back of his hand.
First up, we headed up into the slums on the outskirts of Potosi, to make a visit to the miners market. Amongst the labyrinth of stray dogs and chicken feet, we found coca leaves and beer to give to the miners. We also found dynamite. Which Wilson happily put in his mouth.
It was then time to get kitted out, into mining overalls, helmet and head torch. Following that we visited a refinery. The refineries are ran by private companies, seperate from the mining cooperatives to unearth the minerals themselves. It was fascinating walking amongst the refinery plant, and how unadvanced and medieval it all felt as we trampled on wooden planks past bubbling, scorching hot, liquid metal.
Finally, it was time to ascend the Cerro Rico. The combination of dusty and thin air (we were at 4500m altitude) made it hard to breath. But that wasn't all that took your breath away. Women aren't allowed to enter the mine because the miners believe it will cause them bad luck. This hails from superstitions that Pachamama (God of the Earth) will get jealous if the miner's bring their wives with them. So instead, the wives and, most often, kids, toil on the outsides of the mines through the waste trying to strike lucky. In colonial times, when the mines were first opened, they were looking for silver, but since the silver has largely ran out, zinc and tin are the main minerals being scoured for.
Then, we entered the mines.
Their crampt, claustrophobic and dangerous.
Our first stop was to meet El Tio, uncle. It is only called uncle, because the local indigenous people could not pronounce the Spanish word for god - Dios. It, is either what the Spanish wanted their indigenous slaves to believe was the god of mines, or the devil, whom the miners are taking the minerals from.
After being thoroughly impressed by how well represented his fertility was (he has a, massive, paper mache dick) and creeped out by how weird he looks, we said goodbye to El Tio and descended further into the mines. Occasionally we had to scramble to the edge of the pathway as a coca chewing miner barrelled towards us with a wheelbarrow full of rubble.
Every now and then we found another miner, and Wilson explained to us the various techniques being used by these desperate people to strike rich. The poorest, strike with hammers and pick-axes on mineral streams, some may use manual winches to try erode the rock, but most use dynamite.
We found one miner who was trying to extract a duff dynamite stick from a mineral stream so that he could put a working one in. Luckily for him, we brought a dynamite stick to give as a present to a miner. Unfortunately for us, whilst the miners usually blast away in the afternoons, as friday afternoon is usually reserved for getting drunk, today they were dynamiting early. Hence, we had to scramble rather quickly past a rivine and down a precarious ladder so that we could be sheltered from the dynamite-caused rock falls.
As we were leaving there were more and more dynamites going off, which was ever so slightly disconcerting given how regular cave-ins and collapses are, but luckily the dynamite was going off quite far away. There are thousands of tunnels in the Cerro Rico.
We finally left the mine, utterly exhausted and bewildered. The mine is a tortuous place. Its crampt, dark, and the miners usually live to just about 50 years old. This is partly due to malnutrition. Most of them chew coca leaves all day, and even use the juice of coca leaves to tell the time. Because of the coca, they don't feel hungry and feel less tired, meaning they can work for longer. The average working time is two four hour shifts a day, but the miners we meet were planning on working sixteen hours, having started at 2am.
I imagine many of the miners die of alcohol poisoning two. Because odd numbers are extremely unlucky in the mines, one group of miners offered each of us two shots of 96% alcohol (for which it would of been immensely rude for us to reject). In fact, a bottle of 96% alcohol costs 20 Bolivianos (£2), less than a standard litre bottle of beer!
But most miners die of silicosis, where their lungs become full of dust. Most of them refuse to wear face masks, as it makes them tire quicker as the masks make it even more difficult to breath.
Interestingly, the miners loathe the socialist president Evo Morales. Like (according to Wilson) 90% of Potosinas. This is because all of Bolivia's mineral wealth flows out of the country, unrefined to its neigbours Chile, Peru and Argentina. The bueracracy and socialist policies of the government have killed industry and discouraged foreign investment meaning Bolivians are not making anything like as much money as they should be from their mineral wealth.
Finally, this mine is not a case of some private multinational exploiting poor locals. This mine is a cooperative, ran by locals, for locals. Miners will have access to their own 'stream' and any new miner must work for an established miner for about three years, each year gradually getting a greater % of the earnings from his work. If the cooperative like his work, he will get his own mineral stream to ply by the end of three years. Women (usually widows) guard the entrance of mines for each cooperative to ensure no-one comes and steals minerals.
The mines in Potosi are literally breathtaking, and simply an absolute must-see in Bolivia. They're definitely not for 'woosies' but it should be added this isn't pure voyeurism (enjoying other's suffering). The miners see tourism as a way of publicising their plight, and given all guides are ex-miners, its a handy source of income for them.
So there we are! Thankfully, going down a perilous mine on Friday the 13th, didn't cause any enormous bad luck e.g. death.
On to La Paz!
Vamos!
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