An Unfortunate Week

This weekend our SALT team was supposed to be traveling to Moro Moro to visit one of the MCC locations. However our travel plans have been postponed due to the current situation. It is a rather interesting time to be living in Santa Cruz, especially this past week. Road blocks are scattered throughout the country inhibiting travel in and out of the Santa Cruz, unrest between classes because of attempts to redistribute land and money, and the city of Santa Cruz is facing uprisings and much vandalism. Many places, such as the national phone company Entel, the immigration office, the bus station, land distribution offices and more have been victim to mobs within the past few days. The whole situation here is escalating rather quickly and many Bolivians have commented that things are the worst they have seen. Also, if you have been following the news lately you will have read that the United States ambassador was kicked out of Bolivia and recently the same has happened in Venezuela. The United States has answered by removing the Bolivian and Venezuelan ambassadors from the United States. I have also been told Evo Morales has sent the military to Santa Cruz today to "help" sort things out given there is much vandalism and deaths have started to occur. Obviously there is much to be sorted out.

I am still learning more about the history of why events have unfolded in this manner and why there is so much tension and unrest. I would love to be able to provide a detailed response to why the problems exist, but I feel rather inept at the moment because I am still figuring out a lot for myself. However, one of the other SALTers serving here in Bolivia has a wealth of knowledge in the history of Bolivia and being fluent in Spanish, has been able to dialogue with many of the locals. I have enjoyed talking with him about the present situation and have learned much. However there is no use in me writing about the topic when he has already done such a nice job. If you have interest in finding out more about the present situation and why there is so much tension within Bolivia, I encourage you to check out his blog at http://wiggipe.wordpress.com/. He has three posts which are quite interesting and worth your time.

I will do my best in the future to keep persons updated on the situation at hand. I do not feel threatened and the other the volunteers have commented they feel very safe as well. It is just sad to witness the recent events and to see, what are normally very peaceful people, resort to such behavior. Blessings.