The mad City:

The city is a full paced, non stop, calamity of colours and actions and people and cars and buses and more people and everyone heading in different directions and no-one following any of the non-existed road rules. Somehow an entire city moves past one another without hindrance, most of the buses hurtling, most of the cars honking and most of the people dancing in out of madness, their own lives in grave danger just for living in this town. The Andean folk of Bolivia don't seem to mind. They are generally Indians that have had it rough in a Spanish dominated country. Bolivia itself had its access to the sea stolen by Chile and other areas of economic importance taken by Argentina , Colombia and Brazil ...But she doesn't mind too much. Bolivian people have been serfs to their slave driving colonialists for centuries. The mines provided a vastitude of wealth and the Colonialists weren't to keen on mining so they sent in the small, humble Bolivians, fed them coca leaves originally banned by the Church, then re-instated when their properties proved valuable in keeping the slaves working without food...anyway they have had it tough.. why change?...why not live atop the rugged Andes , why not drive on the edge of reason, why not live in the crater of extremes.

Economics:

If you need a shave in Lapaz just search out the barbers' street. An entire block lined with identical looking barbers ready to shave, cut, buy you lunch, whatever. Then there is the plumber's lane with all things pipes and plumbing, hardware street with metal, cement and all things building, Carpentry corner with all styles and shapes and sizes of wood. There is the tent like corner shops all in a row, the restaurants, tourist hostels, the bars, the mechanics the everything. The commercial system is run on the idea that its best having all the shops that sell the same things next to one other that way anyone wanting to buy that particular product will go to that area and one of the shops will get their business...and hopefully over the weeks the business will be shared equally and everyone is happy.

Lapaz...the centre of Bolivia, in the mighty Andes, close to the mightier Amazon, the heart of Indian and Inca cultures, filled with llama cloth products and multi coloured ponchos made by humble Bolivian women wearing little bob hats and carrying young children on their backs. The flight of the condor whistles out across the city played elegantly on bamboo flutes, accompanied by Alpaca skinned drums and they all sit down to enjoy the feasterly delights of chicken and corn and beans and sometimes guinea pig.