Potosi Silver Mines

So on our last day in Potosi we decided that we had to take a trip through the Silver mines. The mountain, hill, thing that just towers over the town is the reason the town is there. Potosi was a bigger, richer town than anyone in Europe in the 16 century because of the amount of silver they were pulling out of this mountain. Silver veins were a number of feet wide back then. This history makes Potosi a pretty interesting place to visit and kinda old school and medieval looking. We also visited the old mint where they used to make silver money when the town was booming. Now Bolivia doesn't actually make any of its own money, other countries do that including Canada. Anyway so the silver mines closed after the initial silver ran out and Potosi shrank in size. The mines then became state owned and were worked for a while and then closed again for a number of reasons. Now the state rents the space to about 300 cooperatives that mine the mountain. Although it is mostly tapped, only 15 percent of what they pull from the mountain is actually silver, or zinc or whatever else they mine. So we got up early this morning to make it to the tour guides place by 8:30am although we were late. It was Anna, Kaye (the girl we met on the salt flats tour and are now traveling with) me and this Israeli girl I cant remember her name. The tour agency puts us in to a cab and we go up to their building near the base of the mountain. Here we get suited up. We all get rubber style rain suits, tops and bottom, rubber boots, a plastic backpack, hard hats with miners lights and safety glasses. (also on a funny note the washroom at this building is a tiny room with a toilet and a door that had no upper portion so you are basically just sitting in the courtyard and pissing. After we suit up we set of to the market to buy the miners presents. A necessary step to entering the mines. Anyway so the presents you can buy are Coca leaves (which we do), cigarettes (which we do), drinks (which we do) Booze (no one buys this - but you can buy 90 percent stuff) and dynamite (which we all buy). Now it is pretty crazy just buying dynamite, a first for me, and carrying it around in your backpack, although the actual dynamite is not really that dangerous but the explosive cap is so the guide carries that. A whole set up including the stick of dynamite, fuse, and cap is 10 bolivianos which is about a $ 1.20. It is also kinda crazy that there are all these stores that sell dynamite, and our guide was telling us that the government had to start regulating it more after a German tourist came and bought some and committed suicide in his hostel by blowing it up. So after the market we drive up to the mine. We are going into the ¨Black mine¨ (which is the translations) but there are over 300 different mine entrances. Ours is near the bottom and our guide says that is safer but I am not so sure. So we hang out outside the mine entrance, which by the way looks just like you would expect it, a tiny hole cut in the mountain with cart tracks leading out, very Indiana Jones and the temple of doom. We chat through our guide (because most of the miners speak the native language which none of us know) and they are mostly just hitting on us because we are all girls. Then we get ready to go in. Now remember at this point that I have severely sprained my ankle not a week ago and am still having trouble walking on it and we are more than 4000 meters above sea level which makes any physical activity very hard. We are standing outside the mine entrance and our guide says that we have to go very quickly for the first 300 meter because the tunnel isn't wide enough to step aside if one of the carts loaded with rocks comes by and since they weigh more than a ton when full the miners have a hard time stopping them. And with that wonderful piece of knowledge we set off in a dark tiny tunnel where I have to half run, half walk, doubled over because the roof is not remotely high enough to walk standing up, through almost pitch dark along water covered very uneven rock covered tracks. The perfect thing for a busted ankle I might say. When we finally reach the first place where the tunnel widens I am totally out of breath and terrified for my pour ankle and wondering just what I have gotten myself into. The first stop is this tiny cave off the main tunnel that houses this particular mine´s devil statue that they give offerings to. Since we are underground we are in the devils territory and the miners want to keep the devil happy so they wont get hurt and so they will make money. This devil statue is crazy. I am not sure what he is made out of but he is red with horns and a beard and a huge dick. (which we are later told some of older miners suck to appease the devil but I find that very odd and homoerotic) This statue is also surrounded by booze bottles and has a huge pile of old coca leaves in one hand and an empty bottle in the other. We sit under the gaze of this Devil (who they refer to as Tio which means uncle, you cant say devil underground) for a while as our guide who is a touch crazy rambles on about the history of this place. Then we are off again and the next two hours comprise us running down these tunnels to different tunnels than climbing into different tunnels. We saw all sorts of stuff. These huge shafts that miners blast to follow the silver veins and miners at work and all sorts of things like that. (again great for the pour ankle) We met this one miner who was 19 had been working in the mine for a year and was married and expecting a baby (a very different life from mine). The miners here have a life expectancy of around 50 years because the dust kills their lungs. It was hard to meet them and know this but you could tell that many of them had a lot of pride in what they did because it was so hard. How these mines work is that the coops assign areas to different groups of men (only men work in the mines ) and they just blast away until they find silver or nickle or zinc. We asked the guide if there was any over all plan to all this blasting to make sure that the mountain doesn't cave in and he said no which was a great thing to hear when you are deep within the belly of the beast. I just tried not to think about it. After the tour Kaye said that she met a guy who had read a study on the mountain that said that it was basically Swiss cheese and should have caved in by now, which I am also glad I didn´t know at the time. The last place we went was the craziest. Our guide really wanted us to see what it was like for the miners so he led us down this crazy tunnel that got smaller and smaller, at one terrifying point I had to crawl into the darkness foot first, unable to see how far this tunnel was and wriggle on my back because the tunnel was so small that you could only barely fit your body through it. So I was wriggling lying on my back and the tunnel was barely an inch around me and getting smaller and I had no idea how long I had to do this for because Anna had gone ahead with the guide and since I was slower because of my ankle I couldn't even yell to her in the darkness that extended beyond me. I almost turned back at this point but finally after squeezing through the tunnel opened a bit and we climbed down through another hole and eventually found these two miners who were mining this tiny crack of a cave that they had to keep pumping out because naturally water filled it. I will tell you it is possibly the crazy place I have ever been. Deep within this mountain in this slit of a cave knowing I was going to have to go back the way I came through that two foot round hole and knowing that the huge mountain above me was basically Swiss cheese. Knowing that these miners spend every day down there and set explosives down there and would only live to be 50 was really nuts. At this point our guide got all political and started explaining the cooperative and other things and turned out to be a pretty interesting dude. Finally we squeezed our way out of the tunnel, slightly less scary this time because I knew what I was expecting, and ran for the mine entrance, my ankle very sore by this point and thinking that I am loco for making it do this. At the very end we had to pass by two carts and about six miners who are waiting for us to go back into the mine (one of the miners grabbed Anna's bum as she squeezed by) and then we were out into the blinding sun. After rubbing our eyes for a minute we headed back to drop off our equipment. We were all exceptionally happy that we had done the tour and that we were still alive. Then we headed down to the central market, got some food which tasted amazing, everything was amazing after leaving that tiny hole in what felt like the centre of the earth. I feel so bad for those miners, just thinking about those conditions is overwhelming. Then we caught a cab which was no more expensive than the bus to a town called Sucre from where I am writing this entry. One last note, some sort of acid must have gotten through my rain pants and on to my jeans because on the taxi ride the left side of my jeans on the thigh developed a palm sized hole where there had been no hole before. My jeans just kinda fell apart on touch so I took them off as soon as possible and plan to wash them before I wear them again. In conclusion it was an amazing tour and I am glad I did it and I am glad I am out and I really cant believe that people have to do that every day. It really opens your eyes.