http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/200...
The Real Price of Gold
Photograph by Randy Olson
Like many of his Inca ancestors, Juan Apaza is possessed by gold.
Descending into an icy tunnel 17,000 feet up in the Peruvian Andes, the
44-year-old miner stuffs a wad of coca leaves into his mouth to brace
himself for the inevitable hunger and fatigue. For 30 days each month
Apaza toils, without pay, deep inside this mine dug down under a glacier
above the world's highest town, La Rinconada. For 30 days he faces the
dangers that have killed many of his fellow miners—explosives, toxic
gases, tunnel collapses—to extract the gold that the world demands.
Apaza does all this, without pay, so that he can make it to today, the
31st day, when he and his fellow miners are given a single shift, four
hours or maybe a little more, to haul out and keep as much rock as their
weary shoulders can bear. Under the ancient lottery system that still
prevails in the high Andes, known as the cachorreo, this is what
passes for a paycheck: a sack of rocks that may contain a small fortune
in gold or, far more often, very little at all.