Bolivia and Beyond : Camping

Me feeding a bunny.

So for the last five days I went……..CAMPING!!!!! Yup, that’s right, I Shobita Suresh went camping. I’m not really a camping-type person, so I am really proud of myself for surviving 5 days and 4 nights in the wild Bolivian jungles. I wasn’t exactly excited when my host sister told me that we were going camping, especially since it was church camp and I was also kind of freaked out that I had to sleep in a tent for 4 nights! Well guess who ended up loving camping....that would be me!

My host sister and I at the campsite.
(We had to wear dresses, because we
had church that morning)

So, to get to the camp we took a bus, and the ride to the camp took about 2 hours. The camp was still in Santa Cruz (I was kind of confused when they told me that the camp was in the Santa Cruz, so I guessing the camp was just in a different part of the city). The ride was really fun because I got to see the countryside of Bolivia and it was really beautiful. It was sooo green and had so many different types of flowers and trees that I’ve never seen before. I also saw the poorer side of Bolivia and it was quite interesting to see how they lived.

The first night, I was very frazzled because I didn’t really know what to expect, but that all changed on the next day. I got to meet a lot of new people (but I did know some people at camp, because they went to my school). The people there were really nice and I got to meet the pastor from my church and he was a really cool and an amazing person. I never thought I could call a pastor “cool.” The pastor and I had a long conversation (he spoke English) about religion and science, and the world in general and I learned a lot from him. The pastor has been to 43 countries!!!! He travels the world to learn about cultures and religions. I want to be like him!

Jersey Day!

I also got to meet a bunch of Brazilians. Apparently the medical schools in Bolivia are really cheap, so a lot of Brazilians go to Bolivia to become doctors. Brazilians are fun group of people and they really do love their country! At camp, we had a soccer day (you had to wear the jersey of your favorite soccer team) and my host mom got me a Brazilian soccer jersey. So while I was wearing my Brazilian jersey, this Brazilian lady came up to me and said, “Oh my gosh, I can’t believe this, a gringa (an American) is wearing a Brazilian jersey, I couldn’t be happier!!” Lol, she was really funny and she gave this big hug because she was so proud that an American was wearing a Brazilian shirt.

My friends (from school) at camp!

The view from the mountain.

Me swinging from a tree!

At camp we had a lot of fun activities. We played a lot of games that I’ve never played before. One game that we played was called receitas (it means “lines” in Spanish). To play the game you have pretend your name is the name of the person sitting right next to you. You have to introduce yourself with that name and say how many lines you have on your forehead and then call on someone else. If you say your wrong name or the wrong number of lines on your forehead you get a black line drawn on your forehead! I ended up with 4 lines on my head and I had to walk around with a bunch of black lines on my forehead for the whole day! Thank god I had a cap to help cover that up. We also played a bunch of dancing games, they’re a bit too complicated to explain…..but they were still sooo much fun! We also did this activity where if you liked someone or wanted to tell someone something, you could write it on a piece of paper and then a person would read all the pieces of paper out loud! It was really cute and I got one for me!!! It was from this guy (he’s really cute) and it said, To Sophie (that’s what most everyone calls me here in Bolivia): “I speak very little English, but I would like to get to know you better and to one day be good friends, From: Andre. Isn’t that adorable????!!!! I was so happy when I got one for me!

At camp we also did camp-like things. We did some hiking and the view was soooo pretty! I even got to go on one of those rope-things that hang from a tree and then you swing from it (I don’t know what it’s called) but it was soooo cool and I’ve never done that before.


My friend, Ben and I eating oranges off an orange tree!

There were a lot fruit trees at camp and I got to eat an orange right off an orange tree!!! The orange tasted so good, it was probably the best orange I’ve ever tasted and I am not exaggerating. It also rained a lot at camp, so we had to sleep inside of the church for 2 nights!!!! That part wasn’t too fun but it was part of the experience. Overall, I had a blast at camp and I met a lot of interesting people. I enjoyed it a lot but I don’t think I will be asking to go camping anytime soon.401