Culture

Whose Wall Is It Anyway?

05 Oct, 2015 | Celia Dyson

Public Notice: Rubbish Kills. The Pope Is the Antichrist. Evo 2015. What do these three statements have in common? They are all found written on the walls of La Paz – a city whose graffiti stands out...

MI PLAZA ES TU PLAZA

26 Aug, 2015 | Hannah Mills

Chaos and calm in the most public of placesAs I sat for the first time in Plaza España, reading my book and watching the world go by, I vaguely wondered why so many different people had gathered in th...

Llama Droppings -The World’s Greatest Manure

25 Jul, 2015 | Fergus Morgan

Llama manure is amazing stuff. This outstanding fertilizer comes delivered fresh in handy odorless pellets, often stacked neatly by the obliging llama.  Now, thanks to pioneering work conducted b...

Plotting Spirituality in La Paz

29 Jun, 2015 | Laura chitty

Spirituality comes in many shapes and forms, and that is certainly the case in La Paz. To show off the variety of religious systems found here, we have created a map showing seven of the most intrigui...

Zombie Politics

29 Jun, 2015 | Laura Chitty

Nuclear Power and the PachamamaThe Bolivian government turned heads around the world in 2010 when it introduced a controversial and ground-breaking regulation called the ‘Law of Mother Earth’. It was...

Brain Training

29 Jun, 2015 | Katherine Browning

Vipassana Meditation in Bolivia“Anger is anger. When one becomes agitated as a result of this anger, this agitation is not Christian, or Jewish, or Muslim.” S.N. GoenkaThe first time I heard about Vip...

The Rise of the Past

29 Jun, 2015 | Laura Chitty

Bolivians Between Spiritual WorldsThe largest indigenous groups in Bolivia are the Aymaras and Quechuas. The former are mostly found in the vast plains of the altiplano region on the west of Bolivia,...

The Church of Ayahuasca

28 May, 2015 | Valeria Wilde

ILLUSTRATION: MARCO TOXICOFor Andean and Amazonian indigenous cultures in Bolivia, hallucinogenic plants are synonymous  to medicine, spirituality and even religion. Ever since ancestral times, a...

The Danish Invasion

28 May, 2015 | Sophia Vahdati

PHOTO: JULES TUSSEAUDenmark and Bolivia are worlds apart, both geographically and culturally. Yet a Danish community is emerging in La Paz, made up of more than typical expats who have come to ‘find t...

El Clásico

28 May, 2015 | Sophia Vahdati

PHOTO: MICHAEL DUNN CACERESPapá Bolívar in our hearts and celestial blue passion running through our veins. The age-old rivalry fuels an ever unpredictable outcome. Win or lose, triumph or defeat—we a...

The Many Colours of Carnaval

28 May, 2015 | Sophia Vahdati

PHOTO: SZYMON KOCHANSKIOver 200 years old and officially one of UNESCO’s Masterpieces of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity, the Carnaval de Oruro, a tradition of hedonism and spectacle, rem...

Lolita the Kosher Chef

28 May, 2015 | Sharoll Fernandez

PHOTO: NICK SOMERSEvery morning, Lolita leaves her house at 8 am so she can be on time to make the bread. She has been part of the Chabad Lubavitch for four years, working for the rabbi’s family as a...

Michael Jackson is alive

28 May, 2015 | Rodrigo Barrenechea

PHOTO: IVAN RODRIGUEZ PETKOVICOne of the most striking characteristics of La Paz, emerging from the depths of informal labour, is the artistic display of informal shows that take place in the centre o...

Taxi Trivia

28 May, 2015 | Phoebe Roth

PHOTO: AMARU VILLANUEVA RANCESomewhere amongst the abundance of radio taxis and the rather suspect missing-a-headlight cabs, you can find a driver named Mario Durán, who famously challenges his passen...

La Quinceañera

28 May, 2015 | Phoebe Roth

PHOTO: LINDA MARKLUNDIn Bolivia, fifteen is the age that a girl enters into womanhood, and the quinceañera tradition dictates that an extravagant party is thrown to celebrate this rite of passage. It...