ALASITAS

Thursday January 24 marked the first day of the 2008 Alasitas festivities, a three-week period leading up to Carnaval in which hundreds (thousands, seemingly!) of vendors sell miniature wares representing everything from dollars and euros (and bolivianos) to cars, kitchens, and even pirated DVDs. The stalls are spread around the city and we were able to soak in the flavor at our local plaza right away, witnessing the mayhem of buyers rushing to get their goods blessed by noon in a special ceremony involving fragrant incense.

Delayed by a Friday night thunderstorm we preferred watching from indoors, we finally made it to the main attraction on Saturday, where we witnessed the transformation of a normally busy (and trafficked!) street into a festive fairground, with sellers of miniatures as well as plants of every imaginable variety, candies, cakes and pastries, ice cream, churros and all sorts of goodies and of course toys and games of all kinds. We bought some long-sought after wooden spoons and a wicker napkin holder and bread basket, and walked for seemingly miles in the noon-day sun to take in all the action. Ferris wheels and other huge attractions for kids were interwoven with the ramshackle stalls, and I couldn’t figure out how it all survived the serious downpour the night before.

I managed to get a serious sunburn on my shoulders (fooled by the cloud cover into thinking I was safe putting 30 on just my face) but overall enjoyed the outing so much it was all I could talk about for the rest of the weekend, which we spent between making blueberry pancakes at home and eating fried buñuelos and empanadas accompanied by my new favorite hot beverage, api, in Achumani. Ah, here’s to more weekends (and weekdays) dedicated to such simple pleasures!!