So basically, we have missed our bus. I don't know why I handled it the way that I did, but there's something about traveling with someone else that makes me a little more bold and a little more confident than normal. It helps that I feel more experienced and capable of working. When we realized our mistake, I marched immediately to the bus ticketing office and actually had my first real conversation in Spanish with someone who isn't my Spanish teacher. I told them that our ticket said gate 20 at 7:15pm, and we were in front waiting for the bus at that time in that place - but the bus wasn't there and we didn't see it. I had no idea how I even had the coherency to think in Spanish and voice myself - it was quite incredible, really. I was using pretty bad grammar the whole time, but not once did they ask me to repeat myself or look like they didn't know what I was saying. Instead, even when I said something as ridiculous as, "I want to come back the money," they understood and continued the conversation. Eventually, since I wouldn't take their offer of 60 Bs for the 100 that we originally paid, they were willing to give us the last seats on the next bus to Santa Cruz for 80 each - 30 additional to what we had already paid, which made sense because we paid for a less comfortable bus - and I got it down to 50 for the both of us. Looking back, it's kind of an incredible experience. Empowering, at least, to know that I can stand up for myself in Spanish and resolve problems. I was a little riled up after that, bus quickly calmed down. Out of all the mishaps I've had, this is the "best" one. I learned that my Spanish is making real progress - one of my biggest goals in my time here. Yay!
Upon arrival in Santa Cruz, it was actually cold and rainy - ugh. Santa Cruz is known for weather that can be a little bipolar, but this rain made it a sad day to visit the city. More on this later.
We took a taxi to our Couchsurfing host's place, and he was really nice! He has a small one-bedroom place with a living room and made us breakfast, inviting us to use whatever he had in his fridge as his own if we wanted more stuff. He is from Venezuela and offered us a typical Venezuelan food, arepas, for breakfast. It's basically a thick little cornmeal pancake, and tastes a little bland but surprisingly delicious with some cream cheese and fruit juice.
Our itinerary for the day consisted of walking - a lot. We first walked to the main plaza, called Plaza 24 de Septiembre. On the way were tons of puddles and billboards advertising the arrival of Pope Francis next week to the city and statues and the feel of a more modern city that I got in Peru but I had forgotten was lacking in Bolivia. It made me like Santa Cruz instantly - and after today it's my favorite city in Bolivia. I would choose to live here if I had to live in Bolivia.
The plaza itself, about a 30-minute walk away, was beautiful. It was empty (a shame because it must be incredible when bustling with life), but beautiful nonetheless. It was next to a church which was quite nice and was being prepared for tomorrow's sermon.
Nearby, there was a mall that we checked out. It spanned about one block on all four sides and 3 stories up - and featured this genius minion phone case that made me double-take! I've seen a lot of minion-related merchandise here (the movie characters seem to be popular as designs for beanies, sweaters, socks, etc.) but this was a first. I was almost tempted to buy it just for show. Seriously, it's incredible.
There were then four parks that I had read about that I tried to go to. It turns out that TripAdvisor wasn't completely accurate with their location maps or something because I couldn't find all of them, but the ones that we did see were quite nice! I think that's what sets Santa Cruz apart from the other cities I've seen - the sheer amount of green space in the city.
On the way, we found this little place that had a small sign with a link to a Facebook page, and since it was close to a point that had been listed on my TripAdvisor app, we thought it would be worth it to check it out. The building looked like a house, but all the doors were open so we walked in. It turned out that there was no one in the house, but there were two giant freezers in the kitchen area - but they were filled with regular food instead of ice cream or something that could be sold. It was very confusing, and when we turned around we saw a man who acted like it was totally normal to have random tourists in his house. We eventually spoke with him, and he explained that they sold sweets but were out of them at that time. He had the weirdest reaction to seeing random people in his house, though!
Lunch: fried chicken, fries, and rice. Dinner: pique macho with our host, Alejandro! He is from Venezuela and makes me interested in visiting sometime, though the country sounds more dangerous than Peru or Bolivia or Chile. Perhaps in a few more years with more experience in Spanish. He also works as a geophysics engineer (or something of the like) for a Chinese company that is extremely strict with its employees - all the Chinese employees must live in their facilities, can go out only with a company driver, must justify any and all trips that are not in the company requirements, provide bank accounts of their wives for payment rather than getting paid and having freedom to access the money, cannot get involved with locals, etc. or they will be sent back to China. It was the most bizarre thing I had ever heard about a company culture. He wasn't subjected to the same rules because he wasn't a Chinese employee, but I wonder about the effectiveness and cultural implications of such strict rules. Hmm.
Tomorrow I plan to go to a nature/animal sanctuary-type place which has some incredible scenery as a day trip. Hopefully it goes without a hitch!
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