IN STEREO

What more can I say about my dear Potosí that is desolated, completely desolated? Here downtown, in the centre, in the old town, there hasn’t been improvement. On the contrary, it has deteriorated. Everything is gone. The colonial has remained [only] in the narrow streets. That is the only thing left of our colonial Potosí, nothing more than that. If you look at the old town, it is abandoned. There is no care. There has been progress, there has – but in the outskirts of the city. The old town is abandoned: our sidewalks are poorly maintained, the lighting… Everything is abandoned. I wish the governments would pay attention to the city centre and take a little more care. Do you think this attracts tourism? That is what I ask you.

This will not attract tourism. Potosí has been named [World Heritage] but this does not attract tourism. In the centre, there is cement ‘tile’ that should not be like that. The sidewalk was [proper] tile, not with cement as it is now. If we want to preserve colonial Potosí, why not make it paved like before? It would attract more tourists. But they put cement ‘tile’, which is not old. And that is not touristic. It is no longer colonial. Cement doesn’t attract tourists! There is no heritage; there is no handicraft. This is made by any factory. “That is no longer craftwork,” I say to myself. Why not do it as it used to be, to try to visualise the past? The regal Potosí that we had no longer exists. – Don Freddy