Butterfly

At an altitude of more than 4,000 meters, every step feels different. The air is lighter, the cold is more intense, and the silence seems to have a presence of its own. When night fell, the landscape was completely transformed: the reddish surface of the lagoon began to reflect the lights in the sky, and the vastness of the Milky Way appeared overhead, forming an arch that seemed to connect both horizons; at my feet, the lagoon appeared to have traced the shape of a butterfly on the earth.

In places like this, the sense of isolation is absolute. There are no cities, no noise—nothing to distract the eye from what truly matters. Only the vastness of the Bolivian Altiplano and millions of stars shining with an intensity that’s hard to describe. As I watched that scene, I couldn’t help but think of how privileged we are to be able to reach such remote corners and behold something that has been there for thousands of years.