One Tough Day!

So we want to cross an international border. For many people this might be a daily occurrence. For many people of Villazon, on the Bolivian, Argentinian line, it is clearly is. They walk to and fro, carrying goods from one to the other without paying import duties. The government had turned a blind eye to this illegal activity until recently, a new law stating that you could only bring one bag of illegal goods into the country rather than the previous three. This was provocation enough to send the locals into a frenzy. And rather than accept the wisdom and enforcement they had chosen to take to the street. Or the border as the case maybe.

We had chosen this day, of all those available in the calendar, to cross this very same border. Of all the gin bars in all the world, we had to walk into this one!

I don’t know her name and I didn’t want to learn it but she was the ring leader. Sitting, fat assed by the hinge of the border crossing, she barked instructions to her minions to stop anyone from crossing the border from the Bolivian side. Was she empowered by the state to be the guardian of an international border? Had she a mandate written on paper that she quite possibly could not even read saying thus? No. What she did have was the opportunity to subject us to what would become a very challenging 48 hours.

Do I blame her and her disgruntled minions? I want to say ‘no’. I asked her when we might be able to pass. In between a pearl and a knot in her knitting she said December. While her minions laughed I held tight control over my urge to swear badly in a foreign language.

We decided to head to the next border crossing, 300kms over bad roads. With a parting salute recognized the world over, we hit the road east. It was lovely scenery through a deep canyon unknown to many tourists. As the road breached the rim things got tough. To say the wind howled would be to use mild language. To say that the wind was not icy cold and gusting would be a bold lie as I focused now on the twin challenges of forward momentum and gravity on two wheels. And this road just kept going, and going, and going. Through a windswept valley and over yet another pass we ploughed onwards. As we finally spied our destination, Tarija, a city of 50,000, my thoughts were only of one variety and the adjectives cannot be printed. We were still 1.5 vertical kms and countless precipitous curves on a very poorly maintained road from home, warmth and shelter. It was now just a test to get down far enough to not freeze overnight and camp as the sun lit the western clouds for the last time this day.

The next morning started badly. It was a streak of bad luck that would epitomize the day, we didn’t have enough water to have our daily coffee. My caffeine intake, a result of owning a restaurant, was high enough to be an addiction; not getting my morning coffee would subject me to a blistering headache that would last until my craving was satisfied. Today, that would not happen! Score one for the other side!

We headed down the mountain, dodged traffic in the city and continued south towards the border. As we did so we also dropped 2km is altitude and into the jungle of the Bolivian Rainforest. And you don’t have rain forest with out rain. 9 kms from our destination the dark clouds opened forth a torrent of fat drops. With no where to shelter we powered on, albeit now at a greatly reduced 30km/h. as the rain slowed we pulled our soggy behinds off the bike and began the process of checking out of Bolivia. The process was lethargic without being painful, the official behind the counter had clearly been practising his scowl, however he still had remnants of friendliness that he would need to work on.

With a whoop and holler we crossed the bridge into Argentina; unwittingly we would cross this bridge another two more times. The fellow at pest control was friendly to a level of annoyance but being new to the country from one where ‘tolerance’ was the best you could expect, we lapped it up.

3kms later, and while we didn’t know it then, our adventure came to a sudden pause and someone had pressed play on our day from hell. Firstly we walked into the migration office for exiting passengers. Then we joined the correct queue, much longer ,aromatic and unair-conditioned than the former. As we patiently waited in line the bugs began to enjoy my exposed, flabby white flesh. Finally we made our way to the front of the line, but no, their computer was down and they would have to go to some mysterious place to process our very expensive immigration documents.

Meanwhile I handed over my temporary import permit to the Bolivian official, a young lass, harassed by the queue in front of her. Quite unexpectedly she invited me outside. With a serious expression in direct contrast with my own friendly, hopeful countenance, she explained that my documents were out of date and that she would have to confiscate my motorbike. She thought that she might be able to avoid a scene my breaking the news to me in the fresh air. I was ready for this and proceeded to show her that the incoming customs agent had actually written down the wrong date of departure. Bullet dodged.

Back inside and Carlie had received our stamped passports after whatever magic needs to happen with the immigration computer systems. Now it was time to import the bike.

“Do you have insurance?” the first question. In my retarded linguistically way I launched into an elaborate, yet truthful, reason as to why I did not. I had time to practise this speech on the ride south and was rewarded with the chance to say it again to the boss of customs. If this man smiled then I truly believe his face would have cracked into two beaded pieces. I never learnt his name but his eyes looked in two different directions while his personality was certainly one tracked, to make my life difficult. There was no reasoning with the fellow. As my Spanish pleas achieved nothing but to make him serve another in line, Carlie began the waterworks.  This was not a scripted piece of performance but I was happy to let the tears come forth. 

Maybe there could be some value in a crying foreigner in the customs house that I could cash in on. No, I am not going to win ‘Husband Of The Year’ for this. But Mr Beard was unmoved, his demeanour not altering a whisker at my wife’s tears.

The young lass from the Bolivian customs stepped in. Clearly not ready to step on international toes she did however offer her laptop to see if we could buy some insurance on-line. But our bad luck streak was only just beginning. She had no credit on her account. Then I could not find a site from which to buy insurance. I did find a phone number that I could call. With this we thanked the young lass and decided that we would then try our luck in the nearby village. Maybe get online, make a phone call and get some insurance to satisfy our mactachoied menace. However we had no local currency. We could not ride our bike further into the country and the walk was in the light rain. Let me say that at this point here that there are no kind words or light hearted conversations you can have with your spouse of 8 years that can make things better.

The village we arrived in was in the process of shutting down for siesta. New to us, this culturally instituted laziness as we saw it, would thwart any attempt to even make a phone call. The only public phone was in a shop that was closed until 5pm, 4 hours from now. Anyone I asked to use their cellular phone had no credit. I offered to buy some. Sure, they would have to wait until 5pm to buy credit however. How is it that in a continent where anyone over the age of 5 has a phone in their hands has no credit? What the hell are they doing with these little black things?

Food called and we found a small place that would take dollars for a mildly unrude exchange rate. The mamma who served us was incredibly friendly. For the next 10 minutes she told us exactly how to solve our dilemma. Unfortunately she failed to realize that her version of Spanish was completely new to us. Now I am not saying that she didn’t have a comprehensive grasp of the language, but what she didn’t grasp was our lack of it. We thanked her for her help and had the best mashed potatoes this side of my nans kitchen.

We continued our search for a phone but to no avail, by now I knew that my chips were down, that this day was doomed to be a good story but a shitty experience. Our walk back to immigration was more of a trudge, marital harmony shattered, we were now moving into survival mode. We had decided to return to Bolivia. Then, miraculously, I spied a phone box. As tempting as it was, I had no local currency with which to feed the beast. Another visit into the exiting migration office and plight explained they rallied together to give me the change required to make a call. And what should happen but the machine was out of order, this was the day I was having. But then a technician arrived. My hopes began the upswing. 10 minutes later he told me that it was broken, not having a degree in this field I still knew this. What he did inform me was that it was not about to be fixed in the near future. 

The ride back across the bridge to Bolivia may have been disheartening but not nearly as much as seeing a line 50 people deep at immigration. My mood at joining this line, the second time on the same day, was dark. When asked to let in 6 people in front of me because they had been sitting down for the last 20 mins was posed then I can only say that I was not at my diplomatic best with my response. An hour later I handed my completed papers and passports to the clerk, the same unsmiling creature I had mistakenly farewelled for good earlier in the day, I was told that there were irregularities and to wait outside. My patience, not my most endearing feature, was at breaking point. But I know these situations require a smile and pandering, again, not my most readily function. After half an hour I had had enough, shoving my documents at the official I challenged him to tell me what was wrong. I then had to explain to HIM how everything was in order to which he readily agreed to and got the necessary ink flowing. I was beyond caring now, just wanting to hug my wife who had be sitting, guarding the bike for the duration, enduring her own torment of enquiring bystanders wanting to know everything from make, model, origin and foot size.

We headed into the Bolivian border town, any border town is always shabby at best, seedy at worst and this was no different. After a couple of laps we found a place with parking for the bike. Overpriced, underwhelming and with doors that closed with a hopeful twist of the ancient keys. The proprietor, a man with wide girth, a too small belt and helpful nature pointed us towards a place he knew that sold insurance. But our luck was still with us, it was closed. Returning to the hotel we reached out to our online friends. We could only access the internet from the stairwell and of course the computer battery ran out. At this stage we had been reduced to laughing about our predicament. Then a friend emailed a document to us that would work to get us through the border. Then I realised that I had forgotten the password to the email account. Murphy was sitting on my shoulder like an evil spirit.

Finally I managed to get a hold of the document, I would show these Argentinian peons that I had insurance.

With not just the forged insurance certificate but a fictional, printed, email conversation and receipt in hand we made our way to the border yet again.  It was just like old friends on the Bolivian side, “Ah, you again, got your insurance?” was my greeting. Checking out was easy as we made our way towards the Argentinian side. But the cosmic joke that we were unwittingly the butt of saw a new clerk at the desk of the customs office. She cared more about staying inside the air-conditioned office than my intricately crafted story of how I purchased international insurance for my motorbike for her country and we were in.

The score now was in bureaucracy’s favour but with the stamped import permit based on a forgery I felt that I had scored a late equalizer. As I opened the throttle southwards the adventure took proportion, if it was easy, then everyone would be doing it.