Travel Book Review ~ Marching Powder by Rusty Young - A True Story of Friendship, Cocaine and South America's Strangest Jail.

Details: Marching Powder by Rusty Young. First published 2003 by Pan Macmillan Australia, isbn 073291180X. Has been reprinted several times. We usually have a copy of Marching Powder in stock - click here to see if we currently have one available.

As a bookdealer I have more books than I can ever possibly read in a lifetime, so choosing a book to read amongst the thousands in our house is a daunting task. One trick I found is to read the books that are usually in shabby condition when found secondhand. These are the books that have been passed around friends and family, read, re-read and read again until near death. One of those books is Marching Powder by Rusty Young.

Marching Powder tells the story of English drug trafficker Thomas McFadden, inmate and tour guide at San Pedro Prison in Bolivia, South America.  San Pedro is possibly the world's weirdest prison. The book begins with author Rusty Young telling us how he came to meet the central figure of the book, Thomas McFadden while backpacking through South America, most of the book focuses on McFadden's incarceration and fight to survive.

Rather than blab on endlessly about the book I have included some key passages so you can check it out for yourself...

I had heard about Thomas McFadden long before I met him. A group of Israelis I met while trekking in the ancient Incan ruins of Machu Picchu had spoken of him with reverence. An Australian couple had told me about him during an Amazon jungle tour of Rerrenabaque. Indeed, his fame had spread all the way along the South American backpacker circuit affectionately dubbed by travellers 'the gringo trail', which extends from Tierra del Feugo in Argentina up to Santa Marta in Columbia.

The jail in which Thomas was housed was even more famous than he was. I had heard of it as far back as Mexico, even before I'd heard of Thomas.

'When you're in Bolivia, you have to visit the prison,' a blonde Canadian traveller had advised me in all seriousness.

'What for?' I asked.

'It's unbelievable. The inmates have jacuzzis and the Internet, and they grow marijuana on the rooftop.'

When I looked at him quizzically, he added, 'It's listed in all the guidebooks. Look it up.'

As soon as no one was watching, I pulled out my Lonely Planet guidebook from the bottom of my backpack, where it was wrapped in a T-shirt along with my moisturising cream. 'The prison' was el Penal de San Pedros; by all accounts, the world's craziest penitentiary system – where wealthy inmates lived in luxury apartments with their wives and children and ate at restaurants inside the prison. And, as I later learned, Thomas McFadden was it's tour guide.

As I approached the city of La Paz, talk of Thomas and San Pedro intensified. There were flyers on the noticeboards in the Hostel Austraia and Hotel Torino advertising prison tours. The foreign travellers I met talked of almost nothing else. Among their ranks, the best informed was Uri, a German backpacker with an unkempt beard who had made the dilapidated El Carretero hostel his new home.

Uri was an expert on anything to do with South America. His attire was an eclectic assortment of local apparel picked up during his travels: a scarf from Chile, a Peruvian poncho, an imitation Che Geuvara beret and necklaces made from rainforest seeds sold by Brazilian street hippies. He was too tall and skinny for any of it to look right, but somehow he carried it off. The truth was, all these fashion accessories lent him a certain kudos amongst the other travellers.

'The best coke in the world comes from Bolivia' Uri informed me, sitting up on his stained dormitory mattress in order to light his second joint of the morning. He deliberately directed a stream of smoke my way.

'And the best coke in Bolivia comes from inside San Pedro prison. The inmates manufacture it in laboratories inside.'

The fact that convicted drug traffickers could continue their trade from prison would have struck me as ironical in any other country. In Bolivia, it didn't warrant comment.

'So, you know this guy Thomas who does the tours, then?' I asked.

'Of course. He's my main supplier. Why? How much coke to you need?'

I liked the way Uri said need instead of want. 'So, how do I get to the prison?' I asked ignoring his offer, 'And how do I find Thomas?'

'Just catch a taxi,' he answered, making his way towards the door that hung tentatively by its remaining hinge. 'Don't worry about finding Thomas, he'll find you.'

The bulk of the book tells of Thomas McFadden's incarceration and how he manages to survive, and eventually flourish in prison. Here's a passage on his arrival in prison....

When we stopped out outside the prison gates, one of the policemen guarding me in the back seat asked me something in Spanish. I didn't understand so I just stared back at him, confused. He repeated the same phrase ' 'La tarifa' – again and again. He sounded like he wanted something. Then the taxi driver became angry and the two policemen started grabbing at me. I was still handcuffed, but at first I struggled to get away because I didn't know what they were trying to do. One policeman got hold of my arms and kept me still, while the other went through my pockets. Then I worked it out: they wanted me to pay the taxi fare.

It was almost dark when I was escorted through the outer gates of San Pedro prison. I remember thinking that the building we were entering couldn't possibly be a prison, because the plaza in front of it was so beautiful. The last thing that I saw of the outside world was a couple walking hand in hand along the footpath. The girl was pretty, and I thought it would be a long time before I saw a woman again.

The policeman were angry that I hadn't any money to pay for the taxi. They dragged me roughly up the stairs to a big, important looking office. A plaque on the door said that the office was that of a major. When we entered the office, the major didn't look up. My file was open on the desk in front of him and he continued studying it as if I wasn't there, just like the colonel had done at the airport. I sat patiently, watching him and waiting. I noticed that his uniform was perfectly ironed, although he was so fat that the buttons looked like there were about to pop off. I desperately needed food, but I decided it would be best to wait for the major to speak first. Eventually, he lifted his head and just stared at me.

When the major finally did speak, it was to ask me for money. I couldn't understand how much of what he said, but I knew the numbers in Spanish, so I picked up the words 'twenty-five bolivianos'. I automatically assumed he was asking me for a bribe  because I was a foreigner. At the time, one boliviano was worth about twenty US cents, so the amount he wanted was only five dollars. I wouldn't have argued with him, except I didn't have any money.

'I haven't got any money. I'm sorry,' I said, shaking my head, frustrated that I couldn't use my hands to explain. When the major noticed that I was struggling with my handcuffs, he nodded for my police escort to remove them. They had been done up very tightly and my hands stung as soon as the blood started to flow again.

'Gracious, senor' I said respectfully, nodding to him. I wondered whether this was the right time to ask him for some food. However, first I wanted to apologise for not being able to give him any money. I turned my pockets inside out to demonstrate that I actually wanted to pay him but couldn't. I think the major misinterpreted this gesture as a refusal, because he immediately sent for a corporal who could speak English. The first thing the corporal translated was, 'But is true, amigo. Everybody pay the entrance fee. Bolivia prisoners also.'

I still assumed this 'entrance fee' was just the major's polite way of asking for a bribe. But I later learned that all new prisoners were indeed required to pay an entrance fee of twenty-five bolivianos for privilege of being imprisoned at San Pedro. They called this 'el Ingreso' and when you paid you were given a receipt.

'But what if I can't pay?' I asked, when I realised they were serious. I was worried that the major would become angry.

'You must work in the kitchen for a period of six months to pay the money' answered the corporal.

I promised that the British Embassy would pay the fee when they came to visit me. Even though he now knew I had no money, he then told me that I would have to buy a prison cell. When the corporal translated this, I looked at him blankly and said that I didn't understand. The other policeman in the room grinned when they saw the look of confusion on my face.

'Abora tiene que comprar su propia celda,' the major repeated impatiently. When his men heard this the second time, they struggled to contain their laughter.

'Now you must buy your own cell' the corporal translated again. Once more, I suspected that this was simply another way of asking for a bribe because I was a foreigner. 'OK' I nodded, playing along with it. My plan was to stay on the major's good side and promise some money later.

The major then sent one of the policemen out of the room to get something. While we were waiting for him to return, I told the corporal that I was hungry. He put his hand up to silence me.

'Wait. After,' he said, as the policeman came back in carrying a large blue book. The major opened the book upside down so that I could read it from my side of the desk. He motioned for me to come closer. I leaned forward in my chair and followed his finger as he ran it down the page, explaining something in Spanish as he went.

It took me some time to understand what the book was about. The pages were divided into columns that contained dates and names and descriptions. When he sensed I was having difficulty, the corporal explained that this was a list of all the cells currently for sale that I could choose from.

Still not quite believing that any of this was real. I asked the major how much a cell cost, using one of my few Spanish expresssions: 'Cuanto cuesta?'. I thought I knew the numbers, but I must have misheard. Five thousand was too much. I asked the translator to repeat the amount in English. He confirmed that it was five thousand.

'Dollars or bolivianos?'

'Dollars my amigo' he said. 'Cell prices in San Pedro are always in American dollars.

Thomas was thrown into the prison in the dark of night and slept on concrete floor. This is what he awoke to...

The first thing I noticed was a big red sign painted on the wall advertising Coca-Cola. Then I saw a number of women and children. I had expected to find myself in a horrible Bolivian prison, where I was probably going to die. Had it all been a bad dream? I didn't actually know where I was or how I'd gotten there, but it certainly didn't look like a jail. I looked around again and wondered if it was some kind of peasant village or city slum. Surrounding me was deteriorating building complex of small apartments of all shapes and sizes, with their doors painted in various colours. It was three stories high and made mostly of wood. The sun was shining and what seemed like hundreds of families were beginning to stir.

Wooden balconies creaked as the women emerged from their houses and began their daily chores. Some carried fresh market produce – fruits, vegetables and chunks of meat – in sacks slung over their shoulders. Others were setting up small stalls that sold all types of goods, from soft drinks, cigarettes and chocolate bars, to secondhand cutlery and cassette tapes. A group of women, dressed in poor but colourful rags, were scrubbing and rinsing clothes by a washbasin and then placing them out to dry on the concrete. One young woman, who could not have been more than sixteen, was seated on a bench, breastfeeding her baby.

There were children of all ages everywhere. The older ones – dressed in their school uniforms, some wearing backpacks – were enjoying the final moments before they had to leave for class. Two small girls jumped gleefully from square to square on a hopscotch grid they had drawn on a cement playing field. I definitely wasn't in prison. But where was I? I walked out further to investigate.

It was at that moment that I realised my pants were completely saturated and stuck to my legs. There was also a disgusting smell somewhere very close to me. When I squeesed the back of my pants to wring out some of the water, I recognised the horrible stench. My hands were covered in shit.

It all came back to me in a sudden flash – everything that had happened to me since I had gone to the airport two weeks before. It hadn't been a dream. I was in prison. I felt faint. Suddenly my knees folded beneath me and I slid down against the wall to the ground. I coughed violently and saw blood splatter on the cement in front of me before I passed out.

Thomas was rescued by a kindly elder inmate, Ricardo who housed and fed him for some time. Riccardo drives a sad point about Boliva...

There was this question that had been bugging me for days. Every morning when I went to the bathroom, I saw female prisoners walking around. I finally asked Ricardo after breakfast one day, as he was doing his hair.

'Isn't it dangerous to have male and female prisoners mixed in the same prison?'

'The women aren't prisoners. They just live here,' he answered in his usual casual manner, turning his face sideways to study a small patch on his neck that he had missed shaving. 'Shit. Damn razor.'

'What, what for?'

Ricardo kept checking himself in the mirror. 'To be with their husbands.'

'But why?' I couldn't believe that anyone would actually choose to live in a prison.

'There's no other choice. It's the only way the family can stay together.'

'Why can't they live outside and just come in to visit?'

'This is Bolivia, Thomas. There's no jobs on the outside. The economy is dead.' Ricardo put down his brush, applied some shaving cream to the tip of his finger and gently picked away with the razor at the whiskers he'd missed. 

About buying a cell in San Pedro prison.

Although they had tried to rip me off on the price, the police hadn't been lying to me on my first night about having to buy my own prison cell. San Pedro was comprised of eight sections – Posta, Pinos (where Ricardo lived) and Alamos, and the rundown inside sections San Martin, Prefectura, Palmar, Guanay and Cancha. After you paid the entrance fee – el Ingreso – to the police for the privelage of being allowed into the prison, you then paid another fee to become a member of one of these sections. And all that was before you spent more money buying your own cell and then having the cell transferred into your name.

'And you can't just go out and buy anything.' Ricardo warned me. 'You have to know what your're doing. Otherwise, you're going to get completely taken for a ride.'

The system was very complicated and there was a great deal of information to take in. It took a long time for Ricardo to explain everything to me, since I kept interrupting him to express my disbelief or to ask questions. Once Ricardo started talking, it was hard to stop him, especially when it had anything to do with his favourite topics: economics and politics. They way things worked in San Pedro was astounding. Everything was about money. And I mean everything.

There were inmates who acted as freelance real estate agents, scouting around for potential buyers on a commission basis. There were restaurant owners who advertised lists of the various properties that were for sale, charging a small fee to the sellers. The section delegates were allowed advertisements – known as 'propaganda' – to be placed on the section noticeboards, because room sales generated income for the section. Even the police were involved, since they were in the best position to get hold of new arrivals who didn't know how things worked. Luckily, I hadn't had any money with which to buy a cell on the first night, the police usually added fifty percent to the price as their commissions.

The first step was paying the twenty-five bolivianos to the police, for which you received a receipt. Then you paid the section entrance fee. This was non-refundable and the amount varied according to which section you joined. When I found my own place, I paid one hundred and fifty bolivianos, approximately thirty US dollars. In the dangerous sections it was much cheaper. This money was placed in a fund that was used to cover section expenses such as maintenance, administration, cleaning, renovations and the occasional social event such as the Prisoner's Day party every September, when the section delegates cooked a barbecue and hired a band for the inmates.

Admission to a section was rarely refused, provided there was a vacancy and provided you had enough money to pay the entrance fee and buy a room. However in the better sections of the prison the process was a little more selective; you often had to be invited by one of the existing members. They mainly wanted to know that you were a person of good fame and character so they could maintain the high safety and quality of the section. This might sound strange for a prison, but there were lots of politicians and businessmen in San Pedro and many of them were well educated. Occasionally, the section delegate may even ask for personal references, although this obviously made it hard for new inmates, especially foreigners, who didn't know anyone. Luckily, Ricardo was prepared to recommend me.

Once you had decided on a section , the next step was to buy a cell. Ricard explained that the market for prison cells operated just like any normal property market, prices went up and down according to supply and demand, and you had to pay commissions to agents and legal fees for the actual transaction. I could hardly believe it.

I recently gave Marching Powder a second read to find some passages to include in this review, putting post-it notes on each page that I thought had something special. By the time  I finished the top of the book was a yellow hedge of post-it notes, this book is dense with great yarns.

Details: Marching Powder by Rusty Young. First published 2003 by Pan Macmillan Australia, isbn 073291180X. Has been reprinted several times.

We usually have a copy of Marching Powder in stock - click here to see if we currently have one available.