Smoke probed my eyes for weakness. I wouldn’t let its pestering make me cry. I couldn’t. Not in front of the man reading my future with liquor and coca leaves. He motioned for me to close the door to the shed. I followed his instructions.
Moments earlier I stepped off the La Paz cable car. The single glass pod, large enough for six but filled only with two, swayed as docked into the final station. From its cliff-side perch, I could see the spiraling of buildings circling down the mountain to the city center, like a massive sporting arena around a playing field.
A cloudless blue sky presented the illusion of warmth, but the wind-chapped faces of locals bundled in coats and scarves told a different story. Their dark, brown eyes watched as I walked past. Someone of my complexion was as rare as a warm evening in the winter months.
My guide, a petite local woman, well under five feet tall, wrapped her arm around mine. Not from the cold or fear of slipping, but from the group of leering men standing along a chain fence partitioning cement basketball courts from paved roadways. Her other arm clung close to her purse, protecting her scarf and whatever bolivianos, the local currency, she carried.
Mounds of the day’s trash stand in our path, exchanging aromas for warming sunlight. Stray dogs did their best to thin out the pile. By nightfall, the trashmen would have little to collect.
To our left, an opening of gravel and dust, long ago bleached blonde by the sun. A collection of sheds stood in a line, painted deep blue and accented in bright yellow. Scattered fire pits burned warmth into the outstretched hands of old women and young children. The men, too tough and unwilling to show weakness to the cold, rested against their sheds, proud of the status symbol building ownership brought with it.
Stopping at one shed in the stack of sheds, my guide wrapped knuckles on the metal door, opening it as a muffled response instructed to enter.
Smoke from incense and an extinguished cigarette waved me to my seat. The man, with his dark, intense eyes, shifted a cloth mat on the slender table between us. Dumping a small bag of dried coca leaves onto the fabric, his thick, chorizo-like fingers, tied off at the knuckles, ran over the leaves as they fell, raking in the pattern and arrangement. He spoke words under his breath I did not understand. Grabbing a bottle to his side, he splashed three lines of clear liquid along the wall. A few stray ants, senses perked from the sudden presence of sugary alcohol, moved in to fetch a cool drink for their queen as the man compared the three lines with the pattern of leaves on the table.
Selecting a few choice leaves from the pile, he flicked them across the cloth like stones on a lake, each slicing to a stop at the end of the mat. His eyes studied their final direction intently, his round fingers mapped out the movements as he translated the meaning, all while talking quietly under his breath.
The deepness of his voice started me as the cave of his mouth cracked open and he spoke for all to hear. His form of Spanish I did not understand. The words sounded old. Ancient. Spoken not from the present, but the past. My guide translated.
“You are a traveler,” he said through her lips. Not a difficult assessment. “You create for a living. You share stories with those who are near and far. You are away from your family, yet this does not bother you. But there is something else. One thing that is blocking you from great success. It stands in your way. But it is not physical. Nor is it from the outside. It is from within. Something inside your mind holds you back. You must defeat this blockage from the inside, to achieve your full potential on the outside.”
His voice stilled. The echo of hers fell silent shortly after.
Turning from the leaves, he studied me, his deep, black eyes glistened with moisture. Tears from the smoke? From what he saw? He held out his large, meaty hand and extended it, offering his palm with a few choice words.
“That will be ten Bolivianos,” said my guide.