So here’s a picture of (what I think is) a typical Bolivian shower.  Notice there’s a few things missing….like a curtain.   I’m not sure why they don’t have shower curtains here, but they don’t.  Instead you have to try to keep the water in the basin (watch out for streams that come off your elbows), and any water that gets out needs to be squeegeed up when your done…I think a curtain is much easier.  Also notice, there is only one knob to control the volume of water, that’s because there is no hot water in the house.  Fear not though, we haven’t been taking (totally) cold showers!  If you look at that over-sized shower head, that actually contains an electric heating element that heats the water as it goes through, but its not very strong.  So, you control the temperature by controlling how much water is coming out. The less water that comes out, the hotter it will get.  This works great, just too bad for people who like strong/hot showers

Shaving is a whole ‘nother issue.  As I mentioned before, there’s no hot water in the house, so shaving at the sink doesn’t work because the totally cold water makes the skin pucker up.  That leaves two options (plus the super-combination option): boil water and put it in a basin for shaving, or shave in the shower under the warm water.  Its kinda annoying to go to the stove and heat water just to shave, and I tried taking a little mirror into the shower and shaving with that…but I missed a few spots.  Instead, I’m going for the super-combined option…filling up a basin when I get done with the shower (and its coming out warm), and using that in front of the real mirror.

All in all the bathroom experience in bolivia isn’t that bad (I didn’t mention that you can’t flush toilet paper though…maybe another day on that subject), just a couple things that are oddly different from what I’m used to