The sacrifice was another 24 hour bus ride, and I sat next to the pissiest Chileno I have ever met. It made the trip a little uncomfortable. On the way, The Motorcycle Diaries soundtrack came on my ipod, and I started to think about Che Guevara. In some (small, mind you) ways I was following in his footsteps. Che visited Chuqui during his famous motorcycle trip across South America, and there he met a communist miner that is largely credited with giving birth to Che's political leanings. Che has been a huge inspiration to me since I studied his life and politics in perhaps the best class I took in college, "Revolution in Latin America." It is not Che's revolutionary ideology that inspires me so much, as I do not agree with armed resistance, although I can see how it seemed like a good option. No, it is more the commitment to his ideals that inspires me. He lived a guerrilla life with serious asthma. Every time I start to get pissy because diabetes is getting in my way, I think of Che. I am a hypocite...I have ideals that I completly ignore when the situation suits me. I think overconsumption is a problem, but you should see my closet. In these respects, I am to be more like Che. And in many ways, the romantic notions attached to his cross-continent journey gave me the idea for my own journey. But look how different my situation is from his. I am in (mostly) comfortable, climate-controlled buses, listening to my ipod. When I run out of money, I call my mom. Che and his traveling mate barely scraped by. I could never do that. And for that, too, I admire him.
So anyway, the visit to the copper mine was really important to me. These days, the mining company runs tours (Che would not approve) and they are, sadly, 57% propaganda for the mining industry. For example, we visited the abandoned town, and were told how the mining company provided all the housing for the miners. "They don't have to pay rent!" the tour guide yelled at us. Umm, internal eye roll. Can you please talk about the miners' quality of life, sir? Also, he gave some very interesting reasons for why the town was abandoned. Obviously, it was too close to the mines and was thus polluted, but they don't tell you that on the tour. Instead, they told us it was because they want to expand the mine and the town was in the way. However, when we saw the site of expansion, which will connect the major mine with another minor mine, it was not in the area of the former town. In any event, after being indoctrinated, we were allowed to stare into the mine for about 25 minutes. It looked like the inside of a giant snail, with stacked trails that looked like a maze. You could see where parts had collapsed, and we were warned what to do in case we felt an earthquake. The mine is 5 kilometers wide, 3 kilometers long, and 1 kilometer deep. It was massive, obviously. And so was the mining equipment. The dump trucks were the size of houses, and the biggest ones weigh something like 400 tons. Apparently, China is the biggest importer of copper from this mine; they receive 22% of the exports. They use it in electrical projects in their development-crazed cities. There were other interesting statistics, such as how much earth is moved each day, and it was some crazy, unbelievable number that I have forgotten by now.
Staring into the pit.
The dump trucks were really cool.
Chuqui, you were worth the wait. I'm no Che Guevara, though. 
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