Potosi--history of a journey to the south of the world by Isabella Lorusso

Author:Isabella Lorusso
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9788827853801
Publisher: Youcanprint
Published: 2018-10-23T00:00:00+00:00

One year after my arrival in South America, in 2003, I was about to live one of the most terrifying experiences of my whole life: I was going to spend one day in the Potosì mine.

I went there by bus from Cuzco and asked a guy to guide me there.

«You don’t need to go down there,» he said «but if you decide to descend, avoid any panic attacks, because in few minutes there will be hundreds of thousands of tonnes of earth above us. This is a journey to the bowels of hell.»

As soon as he uttered these words, I was already losing my nerve, but I decided to continue. I curse my height (5.5 feet), I bent my head but I soon had to bend my knees and use my elbows to drag myself forward.

I was sweating like a horse, then I entered some small recesses that looked like ovens. I tried to take off my scarf and jacket, but I could not move, since the space was too narrow; subsequently, I reached another recess where the temperature was ten degrees lower and the sweat froze on my skin. Everything around me was dark, only a small lantern placed on my helmet lit up the path. Then I started to feel hungry, thirsty, sleepy and tired; my body, squeezed in a camouflage suit, was drawing this to my attention.

My guide noticed that I was blue in the face: «Do you already need to chew coke? Let's go on a few metres and look for a comfortable place to have a rest.»

I looked at my watch and asked: «How long have we been here?»

«Less than half an hour, we must stay here until evening.»

I was relieved by the idea that outside there were the sun, the light and the stars, but panic made me think that I might spend the rest of my life in that hell. «Will we survive?»

He smiled. «The first hours are the hardest, then the body gets used to this environment.»

«Good God,» I thought «Why in God's name did I do this!?Why in God's name did I read Marx when I was just fourteen?»

Obviously, I feared that the mountain might crumble, and we might get locked there forever. Who would descend there to recover our bodies? Would they care about me with so many dead men buried down there?

We reached a sort of room. There were five or six miners with a blank expression, but as soon as they saw a woman, they behaved kindly, as if we had met at an elegant party. They let me sit down, cleaned a bottle with the palm of their hand and gave it to me.

«Drink, it will do you good ...»

It was pure alcohol, eighteen degrees.

«No thanks,» I replied «I don’t drink alcohol.»

«You don’t drink alcohol? Here you can’t bear the heat, you can’t bear the cold, you can’t bear anything except for whiskey and coke. If you take it, you’ll be able to get out of here, otherwise you’ll go crazy.

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