An enounter of the nasty kind

I woke up in the morning to find out that the blockades have finally been lifted. The governor and the peasants had reached a partial accord that allowed life to go back to normal, for the time being. I had spent three days here in Tarija, not doing much, but I was not bored, I had a good book to read, and I had my laptop with me. The book I am reading is the Da Vinci code, I had listened to the audio version in the past, but it was a shortened version of the novel, now I am reading the full book. Besides using my laptop for writing, I also stored some movies to watch (one of them is the Da Vince Code), and last week I also bought a new game from the market in Cochabamba, Oblivion, pirated of course, and it proved to be quite an addictive one. So the three days passed rather quickly.

I went immediately to the bus station, and booked the first bus to Salta. There are no direct buses to Salta; one has to take a transport to the border town of Bermejo, cross the border then pick up another transport to Salta, actually it proved to be more complicated than this. I arrived to Bermejo’s bus terminal, I should have in fact gotten off earlier at the international bridge, but I did not know that. Anyway I took a taxi back there, got my stamp at the Bolivia immigration office, and crossed the bridge. There at the other side the Argentinean customs awaited me, and they thoroughly checked my luggage, taken out every item in my bags, but I was given passage in the end. Now to get to the immigration office, I needed to cross a couple of kilometers, which I preferred not to walk with 30Kg of weight in my backpacks, so I took a Taxi to the migration office. Then I realized my first mistake, I did not have Argentinean pesos with, people at this side of the border seemed reluctant to accept Bolivian money, and neither was there any money exchange anywhere to be seen on the border crossing. Anyway the driver reluctantly agreed to take 10 Bolivianos. I passed migration only to realize that the busses to Salta don’t leave from there, but rather from the town of Oran, 40Km away. The taxi wanted about 12$ to take me there, after a lot of hesitation I decided not take the Taxi and look for something cheaper, I had to pay the Taxi driver for the ride to the little town of Aguas Blancas, but I only had 20 Bolivianos, he gave me back only 2 pesos, too little change, but I was in mood to haggle, and in no position to either; I had no Argentinean money. At Aguas Blancas I found a few people and shared a Taxi with them, for 3$ each.

A few kilometers from the border we were stopped by a policeman at a check point, where everybody apparently had to go through a second customs check. As in the border custom check point, it is generally done outside on a large wooden table. I stood in the line like everybody else, but at some point a police officer spotted me, asked me to leave the line, and to accompany him inside to an empty room in the office building. No please come was me sir, just a dry order to follow him. There I was surrounded by two mean looking guys, who bossed me around. Apparently I did not seem pleased with this, who would, and the officer who brought me in asked me if I was angry. Angry? Maybe, but I was more intimidated and worried. I told him that it seems a bit grave; being taken by two officers to an empty room, but that I was not angry, tranquilo I said. He did not seem pleased with my answer, and went and called his boss, now I was surrounded by three unpleasant officers. The boss was particularly unpleasant; he stared at me and sized me up all the time, in a demeaning and intrusive way. He asked me to hand over my camera, and asked me for a tax declaration for it, and also for my laptop, ipod and ipod speakers. I told them that customs checked everything and that they did not require me to declare anything. That answer did not resonate well with them, the bus asked me to stand against the wall, and he raised my shirt again in a very rude and intrusive way, and checked my stomach, for drug bags I guess. Then took off my waist money pouch, and asked me what it is, haven’t you seen any backpackers before, I thought. I did not like where this was going, I was clearly being intimidated there, but for what reason? Are they trying to get me to pay them a bribe? Well I am not going to play ball.

The boss asked me what I did for working, and when I told him I was a software engineer, he sized me up again, from head to toe with a derisory look, as if telling me yes sure you are. Then he told they would confiscate all the items I did not declare, my laptop, my ipod, my ipod speakers and my camera, more intimidation. I did not budge I told them to go ahead and confiscate it, and that I would be immediately on my way to the police to report this. “What police is that you are going to?” the boss replied. I told him that I would keep looking until I found one that would listen to my complaint. That did not go down well with them, neither did my finger pointing. But never the less they dropped the threat to confiscate my stuff, now I was told I had to go back to customs at the border and declare my stuff, I told them I would do it, I just wanted to get out of that room, even if it meant going back tot the border. We went back to the office, and the buss radioed someone asking him for advice, “I have a guy here with a digital camera who did not declare it, should I let him pass, or send him back to the border” he said on the com device. What was the hell all that about back in the room? Now he is considering letting me pass, and the word confiscation was not mentioned at all now on the radio, clearly all what happened inside was just for the purpose of intimidation, I thought. Anyway the voice on the other side told him to send me back to the border, but not after I heard a little lecture about how I should do things, and when I tried to argue that I did not do anything wrong, I was told to keep quite. Well I let him say what he wanted to say, and as soon as I stepped out of the office I shouted what I wanted to day, “I traveled two years in South America, and I was never treated like this”. “Go now” the young officer who brought me replied in a rude way. “Oh I will go, I will go back to the border, but I am not coming back here ever again, I am staying in Bolivia. This is no way to treat people” I said while walking towards a bus that had just arrived at the check point. Beside the bus stood another officer, and I saw him look back towards the office, I looked back and I saw the boss waving at him, You did it Wael, you got your self in big trouble, You had to say something on the way out, I thought. But the captain apparently waved to him to let me through, what a relief. As I was going to get in the bus the taxi driver followed me he demanded his fee, and the bus driver the bus driver told me the fee was 2.25 pesos, I only had two pesos. I handed the taxi driver a bill of 20 Bolivianos, and told him I had no pesos. He wasn’t satisfied and wanted more, and when the bus driver heard I had no pesos he started to drive away. I am getting on that bus, I am not staying one minute longer here. I told the taxi driver that that is what he is getting, and I told the bus driver I had two pesos on me, and he let me get on the bus.

Back at Aguas Blancas, I had no pesos to pay for a Taxi to the border. An old man with white here, who apparently witnessed me storming off the office at the check point, asked me what had happened. I told him. Hhe was very sympathetic, and offered me advice on what to do; he pointed me to a tax office in the town, so that I don’t need to go back to the border. I told him I was not planning to go back to that check point again, that I decided to head back to Bolivia, and that given up on visiting Salta, I asked him if there was any money exchange around here, he told that they don’t take Bolivianos around here. I walked back to the border, a twenty minute walk. I got to the immigration office, where the boss there asked me what happened, I told him I was mistreated and I decided to go back to Bolivia, I got my exist stamp, and headed for the customs. I remembered that I had a couple of one dollar bills. Maybe that would get me a taxi. I was feeling dizzy, the only thing ate the whole day, was a small bag of Yogurt, and it was almost 6 in the afternoon now. I would rather not walk those two kilometers back to the custom office at the bridge. I found a Taxi, he asked me for 1 peso, I offered him 1 dollar, I was not going to rest until I was back in Tarija that night, what ever it takes.

I stopped at the custom point to complain about what happened; I talked to the guys who checked my luggage earlier, and reproached them for not having me declare my electronic gear. But they were puzzled, they told me that as a foreigner, I was allowed to carry items for personal use, like a camera and a laptop, and that I did not need to declare them, and that they would not even know how to do it; they did not have any such declaration forms for foreigners. That eliminated one possible reason for the earlier ordeal, that correct protocol was not followed at the border, anyway I entered Argentina three times before, and I was never asked to declare my camera at the customs. I asked him if tourists never pass through there, but he told that the day before a couple of Swiss backpackers passed went through. One of the guys asked me if I wanted help, and that maybe they can make me some kind of special declaration, I declined, I told him I had made up my mind not to go back to that check point. I crossed the bridge, and got and entrance stamp at the Bolivian side. I took a Taxi back to Bermejo, the taxi driver was a chatty and friendly guy, who wanted to practice the little English he knew. When I told him I was from Israel, he told me that many Israelis pass by Bermejo, since there is nothing to do in Bermejo, the only reason that Israelis would go there, was to cross the border to Argentina, the driver confirmed that. That eliminated a second possible explanation for the or detainment earlier; that they are not used to dealing with tourists there, just Bolivian workers and Argentinean shoppers, but not only there were tourists recently passing there, many of them were Israelis. The taxi driver told me that there are no more buses to Tarija at this time, but I might be lucky to find a small car. I was lucky and there was a car at the terminal with two passengers already inside, and they were looking for a third. Apparently buses and cars are not allowed to leave to Tarija after five in the afternoon, but a little 10 Boliviano bribe from the Taxi driver, resolved the matter at the immigration office, we were let through at 6:30 in the evening.

At around 9:30 I was back in Tarija, right were I started 10 hours back. I checked into the same hotel, and went to get something to eat, I had not eaten all day, traveling in bus usually kills my appetite. After eliminating a couple of explanations, I was left with only two possible explanations for my mistreatment at the check point. The first is that they were trying to intimidate me, so that I would give them a bribe to let me go through. The other is that they are a bunch of mean and twisted minded persons who take pleasure in molesting people. Anyway I had no more desire anymore to visit Salta, in fact think I should have just taken that flight back to Cochabamba on Friday. The Alchemist by Paolo Coelho talks about the signals. The signals were telling me to forget about Salta and head back to Cochabamba, first was the blockades around Tarija, which prevented me from leaving Tarija for three days. I had decided to get on the plane to Cochabamba on Friday afternoon, only to change my mind when they announced that a key meeting was being held to resolve the matter. But the ordeal at the check point, finally convinced me to give up on visiting Salta; I was not going to keep ignoring the signals.