The road to the highest city on earth takes you through a landfill, where waste is collected on both sides of the road. This paved path is the only way to reach the city of about 60,000 people, who have only one reason, gold.
Since the arrival of the Spaniards, to this day, Larenconda in Peru is an ideal destination for gold seekers in the world's highest populated spot where humans can not live at any higher point because of the lower oxygen levels as we rise.
In Larinconda, there is gold and half the amount of oxygen found anywhere else in the world, making breathing difficult at times. Most local people suffer from lung problems, and local people chew cocoa leaves to fill hunger and exhaustion.
The miners live in the hope of becoming rich, but the cold or hard work is not the reasons for the hard work, but the bad smell emanating from the sewage in the streets, and the process of finding gold and then exploration is very difficult and need experience And knowledge of the place, and toxic gases from the mines attack the respiratory system.
Illegal prospectors search for gold and precious metals in rivers in the Andes, and dig mines in and above mountains, dangerously close to glaciers likely to explode at any moment.
The idea of becoming rich because of gold in Larenconda is just a legend, where miners operate according to a system called "Cachorio" for 30 days in a row, without pay, and on the 31st day they are allowed to keep everything they find in the mine, On this day, miners are usually sent to areas where there is nothing to be found. With this promise, the city has attracted thousands, in what NGOs call modern slavery.
Many people also suffer from mercury poisoning that attacks the nervous system, digestive system and immune system, where mercury is used extensively in Larenconda to extract gold from gold ore, and the entire city is reported to be contaminated with high levels of mercury and cyanide.
Peru is the fifth largest producer of gold in the world and has an annual output of 150 to 165 tons, and nearly 6% of its economy depends on, since the time of the Incas and the Spanish Empire early.