Mas de nada

Not much to report here. Martijn and I spent a couple hours today making phone calls and visiting various government offices. I think things will shake out, but they will take time. Andres Soliz, the former minister of hydrocarbons, says he would be happy to interview, but is traveling for the next month or so. Carlos Villegas, the current minister, is likewise out of town until Friday. We went to his office, and were told that he would probably interview, but is really busy. If the scheduling doesn't work out, he has two under-secretaries that are easier to schedule with. I called Jorge Quiroga, the head of PODEMOS (the main opposition party in Bolivia), who is - five points if you guessed it - out of town. But supposedly he will call us back on Tuesday. I'm trying to track down a woman named Leonilda Zurita Vargas, the senior senator from Cochabamba and the head of MAS in the Senate. I have three numbers for her now, but I haven't gotten ahold of her yet. I'm hoping she can be a policy maker I can interview, since I can't get Alvaro Garcia. I'm still waiting to hear back from CEDLA about the interview with the hydrocarbons expert (we'll try again tomorrow if we don't hear back). So that's kind of where I'm at. In the "hurry up and wait" seat again.

I started Spanish classes again yesterday. I'm not sure if I like them as much as at my old school, but we'll see I guess. So far though, I feel like the grammar instruction was organized much better at my old school. Plus, here I'm doing my grammar one-on-one with the teacher, and I can't understand her super well, which makes me really shy really fast, which makes me stupid.

Other than that, I made some yummy quinoa/black bean/blue cheese burritos last night (Roquefort is the only decent cheese to be had over here. And don't get me started on the sandwich meat. Meat should not have chunks of what looks like jello and olives in it). And I made some pico de gallo salsa to go in, too. They don't really have what we would call "salsa" here (salsa just means "sauce" - ketchup is a salsa, for example), so I had to make my own, which is better anyways. I actually did try a sample of some imported Tostidos salsa at the supermercado, which isn't the greatest to begin with and also cost like six dollars. So I'm definitely sticking with my home-made stuff.

I don't think I brought it up before, but Windows Vista was on a lot of the computers down here in October - months before it was even released.