There's no place like home if you have one! My Landlords are Sellin' the Farm! The Espinozas are about the nicest people you could ever meet. They're also the owners of the apartment I live in (here in Santa Cruz). Don Jorge and Señora Martha live on a pretty 4-hectare quinta (country property) near La Guardia, a small town just 20 minutes from the city along the Doble Vía a La Guardia, which is the 4-lane highway that you would take if you were to drive to Samaipata. They've decided to sell their beautiful quinta, retire and move into town so I've set up a page that describes it for anyone who might be interested. It's got a splendid house and a great guesthouse and tons of other stuff. See a full description and photos here. Oops! Since they'll be moving into the apartment I now occupy - guess who's currently doing some major house hunting! 
These discussions are taking place in our forums right now. Got any answers or opinions to share? I'm a little worried people will get bored of hearing ONLY mine! LOL.
 Americans need a visa - but which one? One of the most confusing issues for tourists and expats to Bolivia is the question of visas. There's an interesting discussion going on in our travel forum at this time, initiated by Kenny from Florida - should he get a tourist visa or a residency visa if he plans to tour and possibly stay as a resident afterward? It's tricky when you're not sure what you really want to do or how long you want to stay in Bolivia. Take a look and join in. VisaHQ.com is located right on Embassy Row in Washington D.C. They can help you choose and process the correct visa for your type of travel. What is the cost of living in Bolivia? Someone wrote in requesting information on the cost of living in Santa Cruz. It's really REALLY hard to gauge because in a country like Bolivia where there is no zoning, and there are such serious differences in economic levels, you can find something very expensive or very cheap - but there are very few options in between. Here's the discussion going on so far. It would be nice if this person got other opinions so join in! Is Bolivia safe for Americans any more? This question has shown up in our forums several times now and I get lots of the same through our TELL BELL contact form. It's always more interesting when our site visitors get responses from others and not just me, so take a look at this thread and add your opinions: Is Bolivia still safe for Americans?
Looking into working overseas? If you're looking for jobs abroad, check out Careerjet.com. This job search engine taps into over 70,000 job listing websites with a single click and throws back all the jobs listed in whatever country you choose to search. Looking for jobs in Bolivia? Check out our Work in Bolivia section for information and resources on finding jobs, investing in Bolivia, and starting your own business in Bolivia. Or hop on over to Bella's expat website and read through some of these important articles in our Work Abroad Reading Room. Also read this interesting article: Are expats and freelancing a good match? Emergency Earthquake Relief for Haiti Through BoliviaBella.com and our sister site GoSouthExpat.com we encourage you to help others improve their living conditions in Latin America. Click here to see 40 projects available in South America. Click here if you would like to consider helping provide Emergency Earthquake Relief for Haiti through GlobalGiving.com
The Message Board is where I post messages about things I think you might be interested in throughtout the month. Anything goes as long as it’s useful! Check it out daily – things change here quickly. You can also sign up to my RSS feed to get updates each and every time I add or modify a page. It’s the best way to stay informed between issues of this Ezine! You'll find interesting news, great flight deals, reviews of new books about Bolivia, highlighted articles, and anything else that's useful to Bolivia tourists and expats.
Coming up soon
Alasitas is a huge fair in La Paz, coming up on the 24th of January. At this handcrafts and food fair, you can learn a lot about Bolivian culture like why Bolivians celebrate Alasitas, who is the Ekkekko, and why everything at this fair is a miniature! Carnaval in Bolivia is coming up soon. Most people think of Carnaval in Oruro and the famous devil dancers, but on this page you’ll learn more about the history of Carnaval, where it originated, why its celebrated around the world, what the word “carnival” means, and how it’s celebrated in completely different ways in Oruro and Santa Cruz. Carnaval begins on February 12th so read up!  Tax Time Again! (Uh-oh!) Expats can't put tax filing off until the last minute. NCH Wealth Advisors (ExpatCFO.com) can help you get everything in order between now and April (hopefully you won't wait until the last minute). I own a business in Bolivia - can you imagine filing taxes every month here AND at year's end AND in the US?? Ugh. I think I'll go hide under a rock. Meanwhile, here's hoping things will be much simpler for you! 18 New Shops at Bella Store! Bella Store has been totally revamped for 2010. Shop for alpaca sweaters, Andean handicrafts, leather, ceramics, arts, souvenirs and more.
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Grab a link to BoliviaBella.com and link your website or blog to BoliviaBella to access this site easily and see when I make changes or add new pages and sections. (You can also click on the orange RSS button in the top left corner of EVERY page on this site to add BoliviaBella to your RSS feeder, or click on any of the SHARE buttons on the BOTTOM of every page so you can add BoliviaBella to your personal page in Facebook, Technorati, MyYahoo, Google, and many others). To grab a link, click here:
We had a lot of new BELLA NEWS subscribers this month - welcome to the BoliviaBella online community. For those of you who don't yet know, "Bella" is actually an American living in Bolivia. She works as a professional translator and interpreter and also spends countless hours designing this site just for you! Find out
who is Bella really??
As you can see, we've been very busy working super hard to grow and improve BoliviaBella.com and make it the number one English site on Bolivia. Parts of the site are also being translated into Spanish due to the large number of visitors we have from Spanish-speaking countries. We're always looking to improve - this site is FOR YOU so be sure to let us know what you want to see included on BoliviaBella.com - we're not on our way to NUMERO UNO for nothing - we're working very hard to get there!! Please direct your comments to webmaster "Bella". Tell Bella what you want!
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