Getting grifted in Potosi

I say grifted because it sounds more romantic. As I said before Sarah and I had been feeling sick and grumpy when we arrived in Potosi, and this was the shortest bus ride we had been on since arriving on this continent (a meagre three hours). The town was brown, brown, brown and grey. The odious and very infamous Cero Rico (the cause of millions and millions of Bolivian deaths over the last 500 hundred years) loomed in the background.




When we got off our bus a greasy, round-faced man with the moustache of a fifteen year old boy and a grey puffer jacket that looked like a throwback from the mid-eighties (the kind of jacket I have always associated with the Hardy Boys, God knows why) greeted us and asked if we wanted a taxi. We said “no” and ignored him as he followed us around the bus. After we had our bags safely secured (they just chucked them off the bus and left them on the ground) the same guy was still asking us if we wanted a taxi. I flagged to Sarah that we should go with this guy and she, not so confidently, agreed to follow.

Once at the taxi Sarah was not feeling so great about the prospect of going with this driver. She asked me to check if there was a proper taxi sign on the front (which I did) but by then I had already given him my bag and was not in any mood to be getting caught up in details. All I wanted to do was get to the hostel. As far as I was concerned this was just like all the other beat-up pieces-of-shit we had travelled in since being in Bolivia. So what difference does it make? This is a developing country after all. As such we cannot go around pushing our white middle-class, eurocentric view onto everything. These are poor people trying to make a living. Give the guy a break.

About ten metres after we departed we suddenly had a new passenger in the taxi with us. A smiling South American man who claimed he wanted to travel with us to a hostel as he too was a backpacker. He grinned away, from ear-to-ear, and did his best to be affable despite the language barrier. He was wearing a blue jacket, round spectacles and looked “clean and respectable.” Truth be told, it was at this stage that Sarah and I both new we were in trouble but our packs were in the boot and there was little we could do. Neither of us said anything to each other or the driver. Just one nervous glance to the effect of “what the fuck.”

Finally another ten metres down the road a man in a Police uniform came out of nowhere, slowed the car down and asked to see the drivers papers. A second later he was in the car going through what can only be described as a well rehearsed routine designed to shake us up and disorientate us. As we drove of the “Police Officer” asserted his authority on us. He checked our passports scrupulously and then proceeded to search us for drugs, checking for chalk marks on our arms and rifling through all our stuff (including the bag of our colleague with a shit-eating-grin). Through this process we were dumbstruck. Our stuff was being taken out of our bags and then being handed back to us (a confidence move by our men if ever there was one). He would then shout “drogas” and a variety of other things before then going back into our bags to search further. Meanwhile the driver, quiet and unassuming the whole time, took us to some quiet back streets (though we had not noticed and had no idea where we were going anyway, having never been to Potosi). Blue jacket, shit-eating-grin guy played along, keeping proceedings calm with his amiable insistance of “tranquilla” (be cool) and his backing up of the “Police Officer” as a bonafide lawman.

By the end of it Sarah was starting to get pretty upset and then suddenly it was over. The driver had stopped and taken our bags from the boot and, very preciously, placed them up on a wall next to the car. We were free to go and the “Police Officer” had given all our stuff back. We were both so relieved to be out of the car.

Once out they were gone in a second, the street was silent and we stood staring at each other before both letting out a series of expletives. What just happened? They did not take anything. Or did they? Somehow all the shouting and disorientation had worked perfectly. We were now missing an Ipod, our camera and 700 Bolivianos. I had even checked the camera was still with in my bag minutes before exiting the taxi, I thought I had it covered. I didn´t.

The classic thing about this whole episode was that just days before we had spent an entire morning talking with a very lovely English couple about various scams and how quickly these things happen. We debated at length the need to be on guard, but not so on guard as to ruin your whole trip with paranoia. The wisdom from that conversation was clearly lost on me very quickly.
It is also ironic given my past line of work: you would not be blamed for thinking that I should have better presence of mind and/or judgement of character. Looks like the jokes on me this time. At least I have now had some of my naivete knocked out of me. In the final analysis neither Sarah nor myself were physically harmed and truth be told we will now be better travellers for this experience. You do have to be cautious, you do have employ strategies to safe guard yourself. Thanks for the wake up call Potosi.