A photo from open sources
In Peru, there is the city of La Rinconada, which is located in the mountains, on five thousand meters above sea level. But this is remarkable the town is not this, but the fact that it is the center of the modern golden fever.
At the turn of the century, a gold mine was found in its vicinity, since then gold miners from all over the world come here. Living conditions and work at the mines is simply terrifying: cold, illness, poisoning mercury, insecurity and any civilized life – there is no medicine, police, normal trade. All this leads to the fact that gold miners (and there are more than thirty thousand along with wives and children who help men earn gold) doomed to miserable existence, rapid aging, fast and painful death.
But maybe the game is worth the candle, because gold is? But judging by everything, they only make good money on precious metal owners of gold mines (generally in La Rinconada mined to 10 tons of gold per year, and even then these are just official data that intentionally underestimated), simple hard workers inject practically is free. Thirty days – on the owner, and on the thirty-first by him allowed to work for themselves, that is, to dig up so much ore, how much can you carry. This is a kind of lottery, because it happens, which is lucky – up to 10 thousand dollars comes out earnings, but more often total – so miserable pennies. In addition, all the money earned here quickly go down in brothels and drinking establishments, and gold prospectors robbed anyone who can.
Once upon a time, the Klondike gold rush was wonderfully described in his works Jack London. But that was a different time, in modern Peruvian gold race there is not a single gram of romance – some misery. Here you can’t become a hero like Time-not-waiting, only unhappy disabled person. Probably for this reason, writers do not their eyes are fixed on this ruinous place, and journalists, if appear, then leave here with a heavy heart and only negative materials.
Time Life Peru
