📸 Photo

‘He’s supposed to be back about now. He went to the Yungas for two days,’ I answered, and hurried down the street.

‘Are you American?’ he asked, quickening his pace to keep up with me.

For some reason every foreigner on this continent, especially if he happens to be tall and blond, is assumed to be an American. The problem with that is that many of the locals aren’t particularly fond of Americans.

‘Israeli,’ I answered abruptly.

‘I’m Karl Ruchprecter. I’m Austrian, but I’ve been living in Bolivia for ten years now.’

‘Yossi Ghinsberg,’ I said, and shook his big, firm hand.

‘I’m a geologist and work mostly in the jungle. We look for gold, uranium, antiquities.’

‘That’s certainly an unusual way to make a living.’ He had aroused my curiosity.

‘Oh, yes, sure It’s very interesting. I have some photographs here of my last expedition, if you’d like to see them.’

‘Yes, I would.’

We marched up Comercio Street until we came to Plaza Murillo. Some of the old people there leafed through the afternoon papers in boredom or sat warming themselves in the sun. Others tossed kernels of corn to the fat pigeons. Their grandchildren ran about trying unsuccessfully to catch the birds. An ice-cream vendor made a racket hawking his Popsicles. We chose a wooden