My Near-Demise on Friendship Bridge

Unfortunate name. Quite misleading. Honestly.



Friendship Bridge is just about the craziest and coolest thing I have ever encountered: thousands of people crossing it by bus, van, car, bike...but mainly motorcycle taxi or foot.

This is the border crossing between Foz de Iguazu, Brazil, and Ciudad del Este, Paraguay. Ciudad del Este is considered on the the most dangerous places in South America, so I decided to spend a few days there.

Es una locura. It´s just crazy. More counterfeit goods than you can shake a stick at: cigarettes, electronics, sneakers, etc.







And the bridge really is awesome...and quite dangerous...maybe that´s what the warning is about. However, there are tons of people walking between the cars selling everything up to fake Pringles as the passengers wait on the bridge to be let into Brazil. There are companies of vans with the simple task of transporting the ridiculous amounts of goods that people and businesses buy in Ciudad del Este.





Another odd aspect is the huge asian influence on the area. There are Chinese and Japonese eateries at every turn.

Also, the changes of language and currency are amazing. Portuguese, Spanish, Guarani (the indigenous language of southern Paraguay) and several Asian languages as well. But the most impressive was watching them convert money, because almost anything is accepted here - even Euros and Pounds.

I had some fun with a little kid trying to hawk some socks. I asked him in Guaranies (the Paraguayan money), Reales (Brazilian), Pesos (Argentine), Dollars and Euros. He couldn´t do Euros, but it was fun. And he could almost seemlessly switch pretty accurately between all the other currencies (I had figured it out before asking). I didn´t mind screwing with him because he´d been following me and annoying the living crap out of me for about 6 blocks.



Other than switching some my old shorts for a new pair, I mainly tried to help two British girls (we had met back in Iguazu) not get ripped off as we went from site to site looking at digital cameras. I think the final result was pretty legitimate.