Visa para un sueño
From 2007 a large number of countries will require Bolivians to have a visa before arriving. Gone are the days of easy traveling. Only eleven countries in the world will not ask me for a visa. Sigh.
Why is this happening? Easy, because of migration. Many people in Bolivia pack up and away they go to make some "tourism". Only in Spain it is said that 200 incoming Bolivians are detected per day. They come from several regions of Bolivia, such as La Paz, Cochabamba, Santa Cruz, Ecuador, Peru and China.
What!?
Ecuador, Peru and China!?
Yup. That's what you read. Right until the end of this year it is going to be popular to be Bolivian, because by having a fake passport you can enter Spain somewhat unmolested. So, from those 200 that enter per day, sixty per cent are in fact non-Bolivians.
Update: Sergio's comment just made me realize that I quoted the La Razon article wrong. The sixty percent number for non-Bolivian people with a Bolivian passport is more like eighty percent!
Oh, and in the case you didn't notice it, I named this post after the famous song by Juan Luis Guerra.
posted by Alexey @ 3:01 PM
5 Comments:
Thats really interesting about the 60%.. where did you read that? I heard about Bangladeshi and Peruvians in Bolivia illegally.. but didn't know it was to that extent!
sergio
I am sorry. That sixty percent figure is wrong.
Actually it is more like eighty percent!!
I got it from the La Razon article I linked to.
The relevant paragraph roughly translates as follows:
David Choquehuanca, Bolivia's foreign minister, has acknowledged that migratory controls, especially Spanish ones, detect 200 Bolivian citizens daily, of which 40 are actually natives, while the rest are Ecuatorians, Peruvians and Chinese.
Some time ago there were not enough passports to satisfy the demand back in Bolivia. This could reflect a large demand for them but also it could point to corruption: maybe the passports were sold to allow the entry of non-bolivian citizens into European countries.
I guess Leo Spitzer's Book "Hotel Bolivia" is still being repeated today. Thanks for the update.
sergio
I mean the book's general message of using Bolivia as a temporary "hotel" in order to ultimately enter other countries..
Hola Sergio, thanks for the book reference. I found it in amazon and tried to buy a used copy but they wouldn't ship it to the Netherlands. Maybe another time.
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