My Wannabe Hero

This is how the spirit of Joe Thornhill saved my life in Bolivia.
I met met Joe´s Australian double yesterday. He is dark, slightly hairy, has big eyes and long lashes, likes to drink, is quite jovial (unless incised, for example by corrupt police officers, at which point he beings to yell and make large arm motions like an out of control windmill), and he saved me at the Bolivian border checkpoint.
Let me explain. I didn´t have an entrance stamp for Bolivia (the Peruvians failed to give my passport to the Bolivians at the border crossing, resulting in a lack of official stamp). I, however, was unaware of this. About an hour past the border, everyone had to get out of the bus in order to make a ferry crossing. The bus was put on a barge, and everyone had to stand in line getting their passports checked before they too were ferried across the river. This was the point when it became obvious that I had no entrance stamp. I was detained. The border officials told me I had to pay $150 biolivianos to get the stamp. I became angry. Crossing the border is free. This was extortion. I was not giving into this intimidation and corruption. I was a tower of righteous strength. I also did not have any Bolivianos to pay them with, even if I wanted to, and there were no ATMs in this town, rendering me penniless. I argued some more with the police. At this point, I, the tower, started to crumble rapidly as I watched my bus floating down the river, further and further away from me, with my backpack on top of it. I started to become desperate. I pulled out my wallet, opened it up and dumped all my change on the desk. "I have nothing!!" I yelled. The police told me I could leave my passport with them, go to La Paz with my bus and come back the next day to pay and retrieve my passport. I laughed manically at them and told them my passport and I do not separate. At this point the bus had reached the other side of the river. I was ready to start crying.
And then I saw an angry Joeseph Thornhill flailing and yelling in an Australian accent. The same thing had happened to him, and together we took on the Bolivian Border Patrol. He did his windmill flail and yelled in English. I looked small and angry (as I often do) and interpreted everything in my totally kick ass Spanish (which consists of about 40 important nouns and unconjugated verbs). Eventually we gave in to the corruption and he paid my fee, saving me from having my passport confiscated.
Lessons learned?? Dont leave the border without first checking all stamps. Also, get to know Joe Thornhill and make him love you (just buy him a beer, a nice one). It will pay off when you are about to be deported from Bolivia and his spirit appears in an Australian body to save you.