According to the Coca Leaves…
10 November 2005 (Thursday) – La Paz, Bolivia
Henry started packing his things as he may or may not leave La Paz today. He would know the answer in 2 hours’ time when Emmanuelle tells him HER travel plans, heh. He was still keen to see the fortune teller Maestro Simon Crespo, as the maestro had come highly recommended by his friend back in Lima, who had lived here in La Paz for a long time. We headed to the maestro‘s place at around noon. Unfortunately, he was not around and his wife told us he would be back by 2pm.
Henry and I agreed to meet back here at that time. Meanwhile, I wandered all over La Paz again. I returned to the Witches’ Market and inquired about the talismans. Gosh, this for health, this to protect the house, this for prosperity, this for love, this for good luck, etc… I need one of everything!
Unfortunately, at 2pm, Maestro Crespo was still not around. Emmanuelle was leaving for Sucre this evening with her family. I wanted to buy a bus ticket for Cochabamba tomorrow and Henry wanted to buy a ticket as well. But to where, he was not sure yet.
Well, his original objective (wow, it sounds so long ago but it was just last Saturday) had been to pass through Bolivia as quickly as possible to get to Buenos Aires. Then, when he saw pictures of Salar de Uyuni, he contemplated on heading to Uyuni, although the cost of the tour would be a problem to his budget. I had asked him how many kidneys he has… it is an option to consider. And well, it is still possible to see Salar de Uyuni with one eye… how much is a cornea worth on the market?
But now, with Emmanuelle in the picture, he was seriously thinking of going to Sucre!
Anyway, we headed to the bus terminal and bought our respective tickets and yep, he bought the one for Sucre.
In the late afternoon, we returned again to Maestro Crespo’s place and this time, he was in, but with a customer. When we explained to Emmanuelle that Maestro Crespo reads the future with coca leaves, Emmanuelle was game to try as well. But as her Spanish was impossible, I had to go in with her to help with interpretation.
Oh no… Maestro Crespo spoke with a thick accent and, as in telling the future, he used a lot of future tense and subjunctive tense which I am terrible at! I mean, half the time, I was talking in past and present tenses. And if I ever speak of the future, I use ‘going to’ – ‘voy a’ / ‘va a’ / ‘vamos a’. As for subjunctive, my Spanish teacher in Singapore had refused to teach us, saying that it was too difficult for us to understand and we would never use it in the markets. But hello… now I need it at the fortune teller! I had self-studied the subjunctive tense, but it was a struggle for me. So, I was trying really hard to understand him. Also, when I tried to ask him to repeat something I did not understand, he did not try to paraphrase, he simply repeated the same words… not even more slowly. It was difficult.
And it did not help that most of what he had to say for Emmanuelle’s future were rather bad news. Emmanuelle looked really shaken as she listened to what I translated and I was really afraid of mistranslating. Maestro Crespo asked if we had been to Isla del Sol or Tiahuanacu. We had been to both. Well, it was a pity, as he said if Emmanuelle could get 2 pieces of rock shaped like triangles from Isla del Sol, she could help rectify her future problems. How about Valle de la Luna? Well, she was leaving La Paz in an hour’s time. So, in the end, he suggested another method for her to do at home back in France.
She really had to go, so I bade her a hurried farewell and she left… looking very sad and shaken. I wanted to have mine read as well, although I was a little afraid of what bad news I would get, having witnessed Emmanuelle’s case.
First, Maestro Crespo asked me to say my name out loud. Then, on the piece of cloth covering the coca leaves, he did some incantations. When he opened the cloth, he placed a few leaves at certain positions and then held a bunch on his right hand and let the leaves fall. Based on where they fell, he proceeded to tell me about my future, my love life, my job, what I should be aware of, about my health (he mentioned that I ought to be careful with my legs as I was always involved in accidents and this was so TRUE!!!). On the whole, everything sounded great, thank goodness. I asked some specific questions about myself, my friends and my family and his answers all sounded very definite. And I must say, I really respected what he had to say as he described certain characters rather accurately.
Well, I paid and left and it was Henry’s turn. He gave me the evil eye, as both of us had taken quite a long time. But, gosh… what was I to do? I did not understand Maestro Crespo so well. Outside were several ladies waiting and I asked them if the maestro was famous and they all agreed he was, saying that he was very accurate. Wow… my head was still reeling from what he had told me.
When Henry was done, we shared a bit of what Maestro Crespo told us. He was totally blown away as well, because the first thing Maestro Crespo said of his health was his busted knees. How true. Then, Henry really had to go. He got his bags ready, hugged me tightly as we had become good friends by now, made promises to catch up in Buenos Aires, and caught a taxi to the bus terminal. And then, there was ONE – me.
Tonight in my hostel, I found my other roommates to be 2 Korean guys and 1 Japanese guy. Well well well, here we are… Little Asia.
Tags: 09) Bolivian Rhapsody, La Paz
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