Enjoying Bolivia 157San Francisco, California. One looks up into San Francisco
and down into La Paz.
Tearing through the gut of La Paz is the river-turned-sewer,
the Río Choqueyapu. Fed by countless tributary-sewers,
the Choqueyapu carries sludge, chemical waste, animal
carcasses and other glorious products of civilisation from
north to south-west. The Choqueyapu runs roughly parallel
to La Paz’s straightest and longest avenue, whose central
point is El Prado.
On El Prado, one may sit on a boulevard bench without
smelling the Choqueyapu, which has been encased in
the downtown area. A thorough cleanup would require
a ten-year commitment, involving a zealous education
campaign and massive investments in sewage systems and
the recycling of industrial wastes. Repercussions from the
Choqueyapu are felt all the way down where it fl attens out
in the Zona Sur (South Zone). Eventually, past a town called
Mallasa, marshlands attempt to absorb and neutralise the
tainted waters.
I’d never think of using water from the Seine for my
morning coffee in Paris, nor catching my fi sh dinner from a
New York City dock on the Hudson River. But the Seine and
Hudson are still rivers. The Choqueyapu is an ex-river. (In
fairness to the Choqueyapu, La Paz is not the fi rst city to have
encased and partly buried a river-turned-sewer. Consider, for
example, the forgotten Bièvre River that once ran through
Paris and now fl ows under it, emptying out into the Seine.)
Choqueyapus
Wherever you go there are Choqueyapus. The answer to the
Choqueyapu is not to escape but to stay and fi ght. Conservative
estimates say that the river can be cleaned and revived for a little
more than US$ 50 million in fi ve years.La Paz is not a beautiful city—‘imposing’ is a better
adjective. It does have its nooks and crannies of superb
grace and splendour, for sure, especially in the old, preserved
streets of its north-west quadrant.