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	September 2003				Marching Powder by Rusty Young, Macmillan Australia, 2003. RRP $30
		Marching Powder reviewed by Philip Blake
			The prison gate which leads onto the San Pedro Plaza in Bolivia's capital city La Paz gives little indication of what happens on the other side of the entrance. Inside is a microcosm of all that is most vile and corrupt in the external world! It is a place of desperation, violence, drugs and degradation. It is a community where money can buy almost anything and where the special interests of corrupt police and judiciary are implemented. It is a penal institution where real estate in the form of cells ranges between squalor and luxury. It is a gaol where shops ply for trade, cafés supply food, and where within its own special facility, cocaine is manufactured! This is a true story about Thomas McFadden - black English drug smuggler, Rusty Young an Australian backpacker lawyer, and a great variety of other people who appear both inside and outside the San Pedro Prison. The economy of the institution was based on money and drugs. Bribery was a vital fact of life and a means of living. Money could buy limited leave, the entry of visitors for short or long periods, and under the expertise of McFadden - tours of the gaol! Rusty Young heard about these tours and fascinated by the person of the Englishman, managed to share a cell with him for three months. Much money passed hands in order to make this possible. The result was the book Marching Powder, with Rusty as writer. It is not a story for the faint-hearted reader. At times it is peppered with expletives and yet it is an important contribution to our understanding of the world in which we live, and particularly the South American world. In the midst of the violence and corruption there is a real measure of mateship and as in all prisons, an anticipated code of behaviour. Many people marched in and out of the prison and these included Sylvia Venables, the wife of the Anglican Bishop of Bolivia, and her visits meant a lot to Thomas. He called her his 'Angel of the Anglican Church' and he describes her as having 'a wicked sense of humour.' It is a long story, but eventually McFadden was released. He resolved to quit his drug addiction and dealing. We do not know whether he fulfilled his prayer and resolve, but we do know that out of his ill-treatment of every kind and his descent into the Hades of the Bolivian experience, some good did emerge. Read the book!