Latin America Diaries Read Online Free PDF Page B

settled and amicable and we were to report the next day to finalize details. Imagine our surprise when the next day we found out Dr. Molina had left to inspect the mines and wouldn’t be back for two or three days. So we presented ourselves then, and still no Molina, although they believed he would be back in another couple of days. It would take too long to recount the times we went looking for him; the fact is that 20 days passed before he returned, and by then we could no longer agree to a month—the lost time would have made it two—so he gave us some introductory letters for the director of a tungsten mine, where we went for two or three days. Very interesting, especially because the mine is in a magnificent location. Overall the trip was worthwhile.
    I should tell you that in La Paz I ignored my diet and all that nonsense, and nevertheless felt wonderful for the month and a half I spent there. We traveled quite a bit into the surrounding area— to Las Yungas, for example, very pretty tropical valleys—but one of the most interesting things we did was to study the intriguing political scene. Bolivia has been a particularly important example for the American continent. We saw exactly where the struggles had taken place, the holes left by bullets and even the remains of a man killed in the revolution and recently discovered in the cornice of a building—the lower part of his body had been blown away by one of those dynamite belts they wear around their waists. In the end, they fought without holding back. The revolutions here are not like those in Buenos Aires—two or three thousand (no one knows for sure how many) were left dead on the battlefield.
    Even now the fighting continues, and almost every night people are wounded by gunfire on one side or the other. But the government is supported by an armed people, and there is no possibility of liquidating an armed movement from outside. It can, however, succumb to internal conflicts.
    The MNR [Nationalist Revolutionary Movement] is a coalition with three more or less clear tendencies: the right, represented by Siles Suazo, vice-president and hero of the revolution; the center, represented by Paz Estenssoro, shiftier and probably as right-wing as the first; and the left, represented by Lechín, the visible head of a serious protest movement, but who himself is an unknown given to partying and chasing women. Power is likely to remain in the hands of Lechín’s group, which counts on the powerful support of the armed miners, but resistance from their colleagues in government may prove serious, particularly as the army is going to be reorganized.
    Well, I’ve told you something about the Bolivian situation. I’ll tell you about Peru later, when I’ve lived here for a little longer, but in general I think that Yankee domination in Peru has not even createdthe fiction of economic well-being that can be seen in Venezuela, for example.
    Of my future life, I know little about where I am headed and even less when. We have been thinking of going to Quito and from there to Bogotá and Caracas, but of the intermediary steps we haven’t got much of an idea. I’ve only recently arrived here in Lima from Cuzco.
    I won’t tire of urging you to visit there if possible, especially Machu-Picchu. I promise you won’t regret it.
    I guess that since I left you must have taken at least five subjects, and I imagine you still go fishing for worms in the muck heap. There’s little or nothing to write you about vocations, but if one day you change your tune and want to see the world,
    remember this friend
    who would risk his skin
    to help you however he can
    when the occasion arises
    A hug. Until it occurs to you, and we’re in the same place when it does,
    Ernesto
    The first leg of the journey got us to Piura without a break, where we arrived at lunchtime. Sick with asthma, I locked myself in my room, and only went out for a