June 13. One sunset at Longbeach please. Takeout? No, to see here.

The neighbors let me in and after a few attempts I can reach my host on the phone. She comes quickly and we laugh about the situation.
"Don't worry", I say, "I'm glad I have yet another funny story to write about." (and to learn from it myself, but that I don't mention. Actually, we'd seen the movie "Anger management" with Jack Nickelson and Adam Sandler the other day and I felt great to have the opportunity to put it into practice. So if you would have been in Mexico City that night, near the crossing of Felipe Villanueve and Tetrazzine, you would have heard me singing "I feel pretty" while walking nervously in front of that cold closed metal door. The door was green).
"Don't worry", she says, "everything is alright now and you are going to catch your flight."

That's what I do. Comfortable transportation to the blah and airport terminal blah where I go through the customs and have my temperature measured with some high-tech equipment a man in a wheelchair operated and blah I fill in some customs slips and check in my luggage, have a meal blah before I board flight MEX902 which is about twenty minutes late. I see an older woman in a wheelchair being checked thoroughly. They go through her suitcase with swift gloved fingers, messing up her most private belongings. They cram everything back in and command her to roll on. Such a disgrace. And so pointless! You know what? An old hipster with some latent anti-American thoughts, an unkempt pirate beard, a band on his head to protect his salty sweat from running into his critical eyes, and a computer full of highly explosive material - they let him pass after only a short glance at his bag.

In the air. Typing these lines. What are they worth? Nothing. They cannot be sold and therefor form an ugly proof of our infinite value as human beings. The free Tequila-orange juice they serve here in Mexicana at thirty thousand feet might be the foundation of wackier thoughts. Hold on.

I am almost denied access to the United States because I forgot to fill out the online form to apply for the visa waiver program. The big black guy at the entrance desk tells me this is my first and last warning. Thank you, I say, and wish him a nice day.

My couchsurfing host, Jawn, takes time to show me around even though he has been ill the last couple of days. We drive in his blue mini to see sunset at Longbeach. Wait a minute... are we doing this? It's so unreal. It's phantastic, amazing, awesome, I'm here just seconds after I spend a night behind a curtain in the booth of an appartment guard in Mexico city, enjoying the sunset with a friend. I am so fond of it I might have fallen silent. We have dinner with two more friendly couchsurfers (there is the pleonasm again), Rachel from northern California and Raoul from India in a nice Greek restaurant.

April 23. Lake Titicaca.

The legs are okay again. I can move on today. I want to describe the begging women in the bus station. Her dark skin, how she crouches and moves her hand up and down to indicate what she's after: a few Bolivianos. The colorfully woven pouch on her back, the noises she makes, her small feet with the dirty sandals, the old hat, the expression on her face. Her whole expression, her entire being is an allegory of need. Say she's only playing her role as a beggar and skip the only-part.

A few hours later, the bus arrives in the village Copacabana. We have crossed an arm of the Lake Titicaca by boat. The bus was shipped on a different vessel and it was fun to see it moving slowly on the water in the hot afternoon while we had already crossed the water on a smaller motorboat. At the shore of lake Titicaca I had a good lunch of Trucha from the lake and strawberry gelatine, a popular desert in Bolivia. A man came begging and I sent him away with a few coins.
The afternoon program: a boatride to the Isla del Sol. I talk to an older Dutch guy who travels two months every year and "does" Peru and Bolivia this time. I don't really like the expression. How can you do a country? Like you do a woman? Like you do your job? Never mind, the boat trip was beautiful, and the Isla del Sol is a fine thing too. You can walk up a hill and visit some Inca structures there. I had to go back to Copacabana to take the bus to Puno at the Peruvian side of the lake. In Puno, I missed the famous floating islands, that used to be a retreat for the indigenous while the conquistadores lived the city.

Change the bus in Puno. In the terminal some guys yell "Arequipa Arequipa!" and "Cusco Cusco!" The guy from my bus company had it all organized and provides us with Peruvian tickets. In the bus to Cusco I meet an American guy working on a book with his laptop, which I find interesting. He has a book deal and does some field research. We talk about writing travel blogs or travel literature and he tells me he can't just write freely what he thinks. I give him the address of mine and hope we exchange ideas some day. He continues writing with the computer on his lap which scares me a little. He writes more pages than I do! But that doesn't matter, does it? We all do what we do. That goddamn fear of not being recognized is holding up too many fruitful ideas in too many meek minds.

I can't concentrate on my own work and I can't sleep either.

April 22. La Paz.

La Paz. It is cold indeed and the bus driver halts for me so I can take my jacket out of the luggage compartment. The old orange one that has served in Russia earlier on the road. The arrival in La Paz is spectacular and comfortable. A modern bus terminal right in the center, plenty of affordable accomodation within walking distance. The world's highest capital at some 3500 meters, until Tibet gains independance one day. It's not very cold inside the city because of strong direct sunlight. With a few Argentinian girls I find a hostel and walk around. It's all there: romantic cobblestone streets with bright colored Alpaca ponchos on display; salespersons luring you inside their little tienda saying "no comprometido"; ancient blue Ford buses with elegant protruding hoods crowded with noisy locals; older women carrying their offspring in traditional woollen pouches tied on their backs; a central Plaza with a proud revolutionary élan reminding of Buenos Aires' classicistic avenues; dark-skinned shoe polishers covering their faces with a mask and wordlessly pointing at every pair of rich shoes to offer their service to the owner; a nice national Art Museum with an arched patio and an interesting exposition of Bolivian modernism on the second floor; a cathedral as the heart of a rich Catholic tradition; a crowd of silent protesting people in front of the municipal buildings. And that's enough lonely planet intake for the day, mind you.

I walked around at night and experienced some fine happiness in a small bar in the romantic Calle Jaen. Oh if you visit La Paz, walk that magic Calle Jaen. The spot where I saw the protesters that morning was empty, the people that were populating the streets at the evening hour were all on their way to bars. I didn't come back very late and knocked the door of the Argentinian girls' room. Behind closed doors, they said goodbye, and I went to my room where I tried to sleep. Remember: Calle Jaen.

Tried, but my legs hurt like hell. Cramps. Rolled around in my bed, sweating and tearing off the sheets in a vain attempt to overcome the pain. After a few hours, I got up, scoured my backpack for some pills, and took two tablets of acetylsalicylic acid. The pain went away and I could sleep. I dreamt about what our society must have been like before the invention of aspirin, when people had to cope with unbearable pains every day. And I dreamt that in the world before those little Bayer pills religion must have played a bigger role than it does nowadays. Perhaps, religion is one big conspiracy against complaining.