Some think it’s odd that I keep returning to this impoverished, land-locked Andean country—the first time was with a college semester abroad program, the second time was with the Peace Corps, and now I’m here on a University of Texas graduate school study abroad scholarship. To me, it makes perfect sense that I keep coming back. Bolivia is about as dynamic as it gets. When I was finishing my Peace Corps service in 2003, the president known as “El Gringo” was being overthrown by a popular uprising. This time, one of the architects of the uprising is being sworn in as president. He’s the first indigenous president in a primarily indigenous nation.

I’ve brought my microphone and an intense desire to transmit what’s going on here to the U.S. public radio audience. Bolivia’s reality is relevant to the U.S. due to our heavy hand in the War on Drugs, and the huge amount of aid money we invest here, dependent on Bolivia’s compliance with coca eradication. Bolivia remains the third largest producer of coca and one of the poorest in Latin America. I would venture to say most Americans think, “Bolivia: llamas.”

With the training I received in NPR’s Next Generation Student Radio Project in Fort Worth last summer, my year and a-half in graduate school studying Journalism and Latin American Studies, and my nearly year and a-half of experience working in public radio, I hope this report on Bolivia’s presidential inauguration is the first of many over the course of the semester. Bolivia is too rich for it not to be so.

Listen to Sarah's stories here:
President-elect Evo Morales officially becomes Bolivia's first indigenous president. To mark the event, a symbolic inauguration ceremony was held Saturday at the pre-Incan archaeological site of Tiwanaku, 12,500 feet above sea level. Aymara Indians performed a ritual ceremony and Indians from all over Bolivia celebrated.
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Ten Thousand Villages, founded in 1946, is a handicrafts company with about 160 stores in the United States and Canada. It sells gifts and home decorations from around the world at "fair trade" prices set by the artisans who make the products.
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