Living in Bolivia for un ratito, having Bolivian friends, and knowing those who have stayed with host families has made me familiar with several customs and beliefs shared by many of the people who live here. While most of them have something or other to do with food (and timing!), some are life lessons.
1. It is forbidden to eat sopa de mani (peanut soup) at night. Sopa de mani is one of my favorite Bolivian foods. To make it, you grind up peanuts in the blender until they are basically powder, mix that in with broth and sometimes milk or cream, add some cooked veggies and noodles, and top with tiny french fries and a good sized dollop of llajua (hot sauce). Come lunchtime, you'll see sopa de mani featured in maybe half the set lunches in the city. After lunchtime, not a chance! When I asked why, the answer was that the soup is too heavy and will stick to your insides and give you a stomachache if you eat it at night. I find this confusing because if something doesn't hurt my stomach at one time of the day, it tends not to harm it at a different hour.
2. Similarly, you cannot eat salteñas past midday. And again, as much as I love sopa de mani, salteñas are my one true love. To make a salteña, you basically take an empanada and make it better and harder to eat. It's the same basic idea--pastry shell with a meatish filling, but the filling is more like a stew. A sweet, spicy stew. Add the obligatory olive (plus pit) and tiny hard-boiled egg and you've got a salteña. I've finally mastered the art of eating one without spilling it all over myself but it involves using a bowl or at least a small plastic bag to catch the drip, I'm sad to say. Here's the problem: past midnight, there is little I wouldn't do if someone could just get me a salteña. Impossible. Salteñas are available from 8 am to 1 pm if you're lucky and that's it. I think maybe people get stomachaches if they eat salteñas past this hour because it means they have been sitting out in the sun all day, but someone told me it's really just because the dough is too thick and it will stick to your insides and make your stomach hurt if you eat a salteña in the afternoon.
3. My friend Allison prepared dinner for herself and her boyfriend the other night. She made a really elaborate salad complete with...walnuts. Before they started eating he asked, "are you sure it's okay to eat this salad?" She wasn't sure why it would be a problem, so he voiced his concern once again, "there are walnuts in it. we won't be able to sleep!" She assured him there is no proof that nuts affect your sleep patterns, and while he was slightly incredulous, he ate the salad anyway. She informed me that he slept just fine that night.
4. "Hay que abrigarse! Estamos en invierno!" It's winter, wear a jacket. I don't care if it's 75 degrees outside. You're going to catch a cold if you don't wear your jacket. It's winter.
5. Be on time to your bus. I learned this the hard way. After living here for several months and never seeing a bus leave on time, I foolishly believed all buses left half an hour late. This is not a source of annoyance, it's completely fine. It's expected. It's also awesome to take the 2:00 bus when you show up at the bus station at 2:20 because it feels like you're cheating time. I suppose I grew complacent because while in Santa Cruz we decided to pick up some dinner to-go before boarding our bus back to Cochabamba. I was a bit nervous about the timing but my friend Robyn (who had been living in Latin America for about a year and a half) told me she was always late and had NEVER missed a bus. Our bus was scheduled to leave at 7:30 pm. We got to the bus station, paid our terminal fee, and walked outside to the spot our bus was supposed to be. Not there! It was 7:36 and our bus was LEAVING the terminal! One of the guys from our bus company ran after us and told us he sold our tickets because we were late but he booked us on the next bus out of town. That was fine, but we were baffled as to how this could have happened. Not only was our bus leaving on time but they must have sold our tickets to other customers right at 7:30. I still am not sure what went down, but there had to be something else going on other than our bus simply leaving on time. Since then all my buses have left at least 30 minutes late.
6. My friend Cameron's family decided he was in love. He was not. He wasn't acting like he was in love either, or so I thought. One day, he was getting dressed in his room and while putting on his shirt he hit his hand on one of the blades of the ceiling fan. Being one to share his pain with others, he told his host mom he hit his hand and it hurt. Her reply was less sympathetic and more confusing: "You must be in love." Thinking he must just not have understood something, he left the subject alone. When his host sister came home, he told her his hand hurt because he hit it on the fan. Her response? "Who are you in love with?" Yep.
