Silencio es Oro (Or: Why I’m Staying in Bolivia)

I woke to a peculiar silence.

No grind of construction.

No hum of cars.

Not a single one.

I extended my horizontal hours, dragging my pillows and books outside.  I threw my "pullo" (poo-yo) under the shade of the banana tree, and made myself a second bed -- not for sleeping, for morning reading.  Today was a special holiday.

Except for the occasional outburst of Bolivian dogs (though even they seemed to note the uniqueness of the day), I have never heard such an urban silence.  Like gold.  The most shocking aural presence was a helipcoter of some sort --loud and buzzing and-- oh, no, wait...only wings of a hummingbird.  

Our holidays are often marked sensually:  smell of turkey or apple pie, sight and sound of fireworks or candlelight, the taste of eggnog and holiday jello.  But when is the day marked by silence?  Like a child waking to unique sights and smells in the house not yet understood, I awoke to something new.  Yet my very human intuition told me:  today is not like any other day.  And the silence continued to sing.      

Making brunch for my roommate Luciana's family,

And yet it is just like every other day.  The sun came up.  The dogs and birds and bugs and I awoke.  I made breakfast and tea.   I greeted my roommate.  We breathed and ate and pooped and cleaned and communicated -- the work and life that has gone on for centuries.  It wasn't even (really) a holiday.  No presents, no fancy meal, no grand gathering of families and friends -- how could we when we weren't even allowed to leave the house?  National Census Day in Bolivia, so the whole world was under 24 hour house-arrest. Everyone at home.  No shops open.  No trufis or micros or taxis.  Nothing. Except the few young census-takers meandering house-to-house on foot or bicycle.  

I cannot stress enough the distinctness of such a day.  As if God herself had silenced the world with an enormous, gentle divine blanket simply for the gift of change, the gift of a new lense, in hopes that we would see--or hear--our lives differently.  An invitation to let the gift of today's new perspective, new tone, new silence--carry into normal life.  

And that, I guess, is why I'm staying in Bolivia.  

Everybody dances in Bolivia

The census only lasted one day (though judging by the crowds at the markets the day before and the tons of food purchased, you'd think it was a month-long census. How much meat can one family eat in a 24 hour period, really?!).  Disappointingly the census itself seemed to be a joke.  Sloppy counting, questions were skipped, our census-taker filled the form in pencil--allowing whomever to possibly change our answers to suit their political agenda.  Not all my friends had the same experience, but I've weak faith in the quality of the census (a great loss, really).  But lost quality-censusing-opportunity aside, I hope Bolivia recieved the uniqueness of the day when cars and work and motion did not exist.  Hearing only the birds and wind and the sound of families being together, because there was no place else to go.  

Making fresh pasta with the new Italian roommate

In the evening I risked arrest with a friend, unable to resist the incredible tranquility of the day.  We took to the streets and ran and ran and ran, from city to campo to city again, running freely in the streets without fear of machines.  We passed street soccer games, grandmothers resting in the sunset, and lovers kissing in quiet parks.   For these precious hours we stopped our frantic lives, almost as if some disaster had stripped away the mechanism of the daily grind. In the moments after the storm we found again our humanity -- walking at dusk, chasing a ball, holding the child's hand.   This was invitation to imagine a new way of life.

I came to Bolivia in February 2012, inspired initially by a promise I made to myself at 22 at college gradution: that I would take sabbatical years throughout my life.  

I admired the sabbatical practice in the acadmic world, but perhaps more so in the Jewish tradition where the marking differently of time--for the earth and for our spirits--was not merely rest, but rest that redefined and blessed the routine on either side.  Let the Sabbath inform the working days and working years.  Let what is different help you reimagine regular life.

Imagine if you will a daily life without cars and noise.  Imagine the forced time in your home with your roommate or your children or your spouse, blessed by the freedom to not leave.  To linger at the table and ask just one more question.  To listen more intently--to the birds, to your loved ones, to yourself--because you have the time.

Daily life in Bolivia is not that peaceful.  Tomorrow the banging and speeding and regular life returns (even though it's American Thanksgiving).  I will return to my everyday life, as I now know it to be.  But I remain in a sabbatical season.  Bolivia breaks the routine of life as I knew it for 29 years.  It is my new lense.  

I'm lingering in my "Bolivian sabbatical" until at least 2013, hoping it will continue to shape and form me and the years to come, and that meanwhile I can also give something back to the community I've found and am making here.

The Nuts and Bolts

New Home. (The most important room, anyway)

Why am I staying in Bolivia?  

Or, why not stay in Bolivia?

The reasons to "come home" are obvious:  friends, family, cold weather, and a long list that could follow.  I miss you all (So very much).  I miss the rain and the cold and the snow.  I miss feeling at home.  I miss my culture.

But the reasons to stay:

• I felt drawn to stay initially (back in July) at some gut level: "Don't go yet.  You're not done here."  I'm not done with Bolivia, and she's not done with me.  For whatever it's worth, my gut--shaped by personality, prayer, counsel, emotions and who knows what else--said linger a little longer.
• My second impulse to stay came from a job offer from the Archdioses of Cochabamba: a completely unique project led by a team of two theologians, an agronomist, a lawyer, a pyschologist...and they'd been seeking...an artist.  This diverse team will do formation workshops among social leaders (teachers, pastors, counselors, politians) in the communities in and around Cochabamba.  I found it hard to pass up the opportunity to work on such a diverse team, learning (and arguing for certain) together -- as well as within the various (nine) communities where the workshops will take place.
• The funds for our full-time work on this project (we've already started some preliminary work) which were to begin in January 2013 were suspended until June 2013.  Which meant, without income security in January, suddenly meant I was broke.  I was already teaching a few voice (singing) students. By word-of-mouth I developed a little studio.  Now, the word-of-mouth urgently required a microphone.  Canto Cocha is my "new" voice studio, with a growing number of private (and group) students.   http://www.facebook.com/JulieKurtzCantoCocha



Another reason I'm staying in Bolivia:  I looooove the markets
(But stay away from the cheese man's stand...very dangerous)

• "Reciprocity" is a big word when talking about gringos working or volunteering in Bolivia.  Typically we gain more from the experience than Bolivians do, but the question pushes the point:  the volunteering, work, ministry or research that you're doing within a community--how is it benefitting the community?  Is there a recipricol exchange?  There aren't many singing teachers in Bolivia.  And reviews from my students of their past experiences in singing classes are not generally positive.  So, I'm serving a role.  I take singing for granted, but a musical instrument within your own body is a glorious thing.  When I kick myself because I'm not fighting world injustice as a lawyer or doctor or a hardcore environmental activist, I pause for a moment to consider power of making art with our own bodies.  I want to live in a world where we respect the limits of of planet, where we hold large corporations accountable for their exploitation, where journalism is brave and shapes the world for better.  I also want to live in a world that sings.  

Performing in Novecento with my Jazz Trio "Otoño Eterno"
(With my roommate Gaia noticeably in the foreground)

I don't disconnect the seemingly "larger" global goals from the joy of every person in this world making music.  Lenin, afterall walked out of a concert, saying "If I keep listening to Beethoven's Appassionata, I won't be able to finish the revolution.  

My hope is that music's beauty will captivate us a little longer--and shape our revolutions.   So until June 2013, I am a musician.  Full liberty to claim that title. Profesora de Canto (Singing) and a performing musician around the city of Cochabamba.  Freedom to invest and delight and work in music.

• I've felt vocationally lost for some time, and Bolivia seems as good a place as any to work out some of my confusion, my curiosity (I'm exploring a few strange paths that have teased me for a long time, as well as some closer to home), my insecurity, and search my soul.
• Still sorting out a broken heart. Bolivia = avoidance/processing/healing time and space.
• Spanish.  Yeah, I totally speak Spanish.  But it could be better.  It will be better.  By the time I leave I might even understand mouth-full-of-bread-Spanish.   Some I'm sticking around to get myself more fluent.
• I feel like I'm just starting to know what questions to ask.  And perhaps now am developing the stability to be able ask them.  The first months are such a shell shock that one can barely absorb, let alone ask thoughtful questions about this place, its culture and values.  Six months (my initial projection of my time here) is a long visit.  I'd like to know Bolivia better than that. 



Making pasta together

• I'm also asking questions of myself.  There was an obvious touch of "spiritual quest" in my launch to Bolivia:  Who am I?  How much of my core identity really has to do with my spiritual roots--my "identity in my Creator" and what in actuality is defined by my culture, my economic class, my wants and cravings, or even my community of friends?  There's no doubt that the stresses and challenges of (especially the last several months) have exposed me.  Nothing like stripping away all you've known for 29 years to rock the boat and throw your roots into question.  I'm incredibly grateful that the worst of the storming has (seemingly) passed.  My prayer is that I can grow in the aftermath.  Search my soul, find my Loving Creator there, and work toward living that identity more honestly, more bravely, more compassionately.   In reality Bolivia's spiritual pressure has had a lot to do with exposing my limits.  A few weeks ago I was pumped to attend a large concert, including performances by some of my (high school) students as well as friends.  But at 8:30pm on this particular Saturday night I wasn't sure I could maintain myself upright.  There was nothing I could do but take myself to bed.  Hard to know how much was physical, how much pyschological or spritual, but no matter. My body insisted on behald of the rest of me:  Easy, Julie.  Rest, Julie.  Slow down, dear one.  Your eyes are bigger than your soul.

"Crashing" is more vociferous here.  Instead of the false mask of "managing" the stresss, my body sends me to bed at 8:00pm or I start weeping while biking to the supermarket.  Self care exacts attention, and I learn to say:  I'm not going to be able to pull that off.  I must say no.  I need processing and prayer time tonight, nothing else.  That is beyond my limits.  

I'm no master yet, but the little gem in it all is less hating of my limits.  So I can't. So what. My energy is lacking or my spanish isn't sufficient or I'm not an accomplished guitarist or I crave some gringo conversation and culture or I'm not saving the world and I don't know how to live as simply as others and I'm not a perfect environmentalist or Christian or non-racist or culturally-open-gringo or justice-minded artist or human-being.

Street of Tarata, on a Festival Day.  Note the Drawings of what's being served.

This recent season in Cochabamba has been intensely personally focused.  A dear mentor observed recently that "aspiring Julie" and "pain Julie" have merged.  Perhaps so.  My blog writings have notably taken on that tone as well.  The evolution from visitor to resident chaffed down to my bones.   I'm looking forward to letting my focus drift more outwardly after months of staring at my guts.  (Which means you can expect upcoming photos of dancing drunk cholitas and rants about Evo's environmental policies and sexism.)

As we breathe the holiday season I miss you all (and cold weather) more than ever.  I celebrated a lovely Thanksgiving here, but that doesn't mean I didn't cry while making the cornbread stuffing.  It was a definite gift to share some turkey, pumpkin (well, ok, zapallo) pie and stuffing with Bolivans and gringos -- and in particular share sadness with a few other gringos missing home, missing friends, imaging what their families were doing every hour of the special day.

I've never before been so far away from so many people I love so much.  I treasure you.  Tomorrow I head to Colombia to see my parents, the Caribbean Coast (water!! Now I understand why Bolivians are so pissed about losing their coastline), and meander slowly back to Bolivia via land and boat (including days on the Amazon River and the Peruvian Andes).  I'm pumped about my upcoming adventure, sure.  Frankly, I'm dying to get out of Bolivia for a couple weeks and experience another aspect of South America. 

Api y Pastel, typical Bolivian Christmas Eve fare
(Well, ok, any night of the year--it's delicious)

But it pains me not to be coming home.  My community of friends and family is the sweetness of my life.  I am going about the work of making life and community here--and it is beautiful.  But each individual is uniquely beautiful.  No one here can replace you and none of you will ever replace my growing family of friends here.  I respect and admire and am inspired and delight in and love you dearly.  I'm incredibly fortunate to count you as beloved friends and collegues and partners in the Gospel and in our faulty yet earnest attempts to cultivate the goodness of this world.  Maybe absence makes the heart grow fonder, but moreso, it makes mine grow grateful.  How rich am I to know you and count you as part of the fabric of my life.  The Merriest of Christmases to you all, amidst the mess and beauty of this world.  And a new year full of gratitude.

Los quiero mucho,

Julie

Drive-by Slapping (Or, What I Hate About Bolivia)

La Paz, at the feet of the the 21,200ft Illimani

Amidst the moments of cultural awe, the exotic charm of laughing Cholitas, the triumphs in language, there is so much crap.  One ought to tread lightly around the word hate, but (let's be honest) I apply in under my breath here; I curse in my thoughts.  Far to often the not-so-beautiful in Bolivia (or simply the different) brings out the not-so-beautiful in me.
  

The peace corps gives its volunteers a enculturation timeline, projecting their adjustment into a new culture -- much like as University Resident Assistants we projected the enculturation process of new college freshman: when the honeymoon with roommates would end, when the heartache for home would spark, when they'd break-up with their high-school sweethearts.   A friend who began his five years in Thailand with the Peace Corps shared his surprise at how accurate the Peace Corps projections were.  Month-by-month his love, fascination, bordom, or hate of his new surrounding culture was prophesied. 

I'm not sure this morning's episode fits on the chart.  I hate machismo culture as I did 8 months ago, though I'm trying to be more understanding.  I still encounter men who lack the guts to say to my face "yeah, that was me who whistled at you" (like all oppressors, Bolivian men fear women) but sometimes I encounter a soccer field of men who, after my explanation that I feel like an object, like an animal, like garbage, alter the expressions on their faces, geniunely seeming to care about my human feelings and ask my pardon, "va a discuplar."  I've learned that my aggresive anger doesn't help them, nor me.  A little empathy and sincerity does.  

Still not finding my empathy for the man who drove (at significant speed) inches from my body this morning so that he could drive-by slap my ass.  Beyond the sexual harrassment and degredation, getting slapped by a moving object--hurts.   I yelled at him (words I won't repeat), but by the time I realized what had happen, his car wasn't in earshot.  So (oh so logically) I took out my anger on two men in the park "WHAT KIND OF A PERSON WOULD DO THAT?!  WHY ARE THE MEN IN BOLIVIA SUCH ANIMALS!?!"  (That poor chico who was just trying to read and listen to his music.)  

I am no Saint Martin Luther King.  My response was far from forgiveness and non-violence.

Thank God for my (new) roommate.  I was four blocks from home (a fast four blocks, unconciously sprinting in fury), so she heard the heat of my venting with her fueled compassion.  I yelled to her.  Then furiously cleaned the stove.  Both which helped tremendously.

Getting sexually slapped is at least concrete.  With a child's grasp of morality, I can articulate that what that man did was bad, which is why I now feel bad.  The emotional fragility stemming from constant transition in the recent year of my life is more vague, more profoundly confusing and therefore more painful than a one-time drive by.  Being in a different world, it's hard to know what to "blame" on my new country, and sometimes it's painfully easy to make this country the scapegoat, piling on the frustration, discomfort, loneliness, insecurity and anger. 

The last few months have been rough.  They've been marked by intense transition which now (Thank God) is slowing and stabilizing.  If transition sucks in "regular life" it's even less fun in a world and culture that isn't one's one.  Sure, it's in part because this is a "developing country" (I really am tired of walking past the array of cow body parts in order to buy myself some affordable furniture).  But more significantly it's not my country; it's not my culture.  I am so very tired of Bolivian dogs.  Of Bolivian men.  Of Bolivian piles of garbage. Of Bolivians smoking and throwing their cigarette butts on my yard.   Of not understanding what is going on because the culture bewilders me.     

Yeah, even this charms me.  

My Bolivian Resident gringo friends assure me that returning visits to the USA--despite all the sweet delights--are what assures them they want to live in Bolivia.  My memories and longings highlight all the good things I dearly miss.  I've not had the luxury of returning to the USA, immersing myself in all the offensiveness of American Culture to balance my perspective on the charms and foulness of Bolivia.  (When I'm charmed by Bolivia I take photos like all the ones you see here.)

The centuries-long exploited "Cerro Rico" in Postosi, and a parade through town.

When I'm charmed by Bolivia, the Cancha is an enormous, exotic market, brimming with Bolivan energy, creativity and urban-campo diversity.  When I'm not, the Cancha is the most overstimulating, filthy, filled-with-garbage-on-the-streets-and-for-sale--lousy with theives and dogs and bacteria from decomposing animals parts.  When I'm charmed by Bolivia, a "paro" (of all public transit in the country) or blockade is a beautiful chance to enjoy a tranquil morning run through the center of town, pausing to watch the 7am soccer game of Trufi Drivers who've blocked the surrounding streets with fifty "103 Line" trufi vans.  When I'm not charmed, I curse the 103 trufis for honking at me for being a pedestrian .  ["Días del Peatón" (Pedestrian Days) are a lovely idea in theory.  But for the remaining 362 days of the year, the pedestrians can bow low to the loud, crowding, contaminating machines.]                

View from my old house (one of them) up the hill in Frutillar

In seasons of fragility we look to (and are disappointed by) the little comforts of life which--I'm realizing--can bigger than we think.  If only the bike seat on my (generously lent) bike didn't feel like a rock against my crouch on the less-than-smooth streets of Cochabamba, then I could be happy.  If Cochabamba could only adopt a law (like sensible California) strictly limiting the quantity of fumes allowed to any funcioning automobile (though in 2005 I cursed that $60 California emissions test) so that the micros would quit spouting foul exhaust in my face as I athletically puff and peddle to work -- then I could be happy!  If only the men would stop whistling and the dogs would stop barking, and our landlord's dog would quit peeing in our house, and if they'd only serve a few vegetables instead of disgusting mounds of meat, and they'd quit throwing the remains of a cow head in the street I must pass to buy a table for our kitchen which has counters made for midgets, and if they'd stop talking to me like I'm dumb when really my perspective is just different, and if meetings wouldn't be cancelled 5 minutes before and if it weren't 90 degrees and forcefully sunny every single day, and if they'd only stop drinking Coca-Cola which uses contaminates 7 liters of water to produce every 1 liter of product in a country whose population is suffering tremendously from global warming and water shortage, then  --obviously-- I would be happy!

"In another land, I would be your pet."

How we cope with the regular trials, inconveniences and disappointments of life is rather a huge part of living.  Learning to view oneself and the surrounding world with grace, with patient acceptance, with forgiveness-- is quintessential for doing life well.  Nearly all spiritual traditions invite these trials into the process of spiritual growth.  And, crucially, we're invited into gratitude.  We're invited to walk around to the other side and intently observe the gifts.  Which is hard for this perfectionistic white middle class american.  It's hard to calm the grumbling in my heart even as I note the the filling nutricious dinner sitting in right front of me. Or to be thankful for all the wonderful kitchen and household items rolling in from generous friends, colleagues, and my roommate's grandma, while I constantly stress about all the items we still don't have in our empty new house.  But, starting the morning with hot water for tea and yogurt (kept in a fridge in your very own home so that it doesn't go sour! amazing!) is in fact, a gift. So as I leave behind the tumult of transition and the nastier parts of myself it stirred to the surface, I hope to live with more awareness of the gifts: an orderly furnished kitchen, a hot shower, pretty plates and a new "casita" I can bike home to even at 11:00pm.  Even while I am suspicious of our dependency on such things as a grasping replacement for internal joy, I hope to be better at every day acknowleging them for the gifts that they are.  

My friend "Chocolate" dancing with the Saya dancers in a
local parade of traditional music.

The gifts include the people behind them.  The (chef) friend who lent us her knives(!) while she's out of the country (and I do love knives).  The friends lending all their storage items, and even the sofa-bed from their guestroom.  The friend who sold me pillows and a comforter and breadpan for $8, and gifted us a beautiful vase.  My roommate's boss who's lending us quality pots, pans and silverware.  And the friends who've accompanied me on my numerous Cancha runs to by chairs, wastebaskets, a drying rack, utensils, tablecloth, nails, glasses -- who've carried the weight of tables and clay bowls and 25 bananas with me, as well as the emotional weight of wandering the crazy Cancha in the way-too-close-to-the-Equator-and-far-from-sea-level heat of day.  I look around the house, and realize it's a home made by the help of many people -- even though I often felt so tired and alone in the transition.  So Lord, even though my gratitude was lined with so much tired complaining for months, hear my thanks.  As I sit down to morning coffee on the table Jorge helped me carry, with hot water from the fixed-up stove from Luciana's parents and from the coffee pot Thomas and Nathalie lent us, in the clay mug Christiam helped me pick out at the Señora's home in Tarata, with bread baked in the gift from Guerillo and toasted in the gift from Leon -- hear my many thanks.

Transition Weighed in Kilos (or The Cholita Who Laughs)

I live on a hill now.  Temporarily.  I don't really live anywhere.  I have a suitcase here and I've even put some of my books on the shelves.  I shoved my clothes into the spare inches of the cupboard so that the suitcase on the floor could be a happily disorganized container: my headlamp, my computer chord, the clothes from last night I ripped off in an exhausted blur.   But it's not really my home.  I don't have one of those.

About 4 hours in on the long summit up Mt Tunari, highest peak in
Central Bolivia, which overlooks Cochabamba.  
6 hours and several thousand feet to go.
(All subsequent photos are from the climb).

The majority of my material belongings are in a basement in North Minneapolis.  My frugally-minded friend tells me that before heading to the store to buy a new household item, she and her sister go "shopping" down below.

Some of my items are in a casita in Cala Cala (North Cochabamba, but fewer black people than North Minneapolis), where my friends Thomas and Nathalie live.  I housesat there in July and knowing I would be moving soon, decided it wasn't worth lugging two bags across town--up the hill--to Frutillar.  So my keyboard, some books, a backpack are there, as well as the food I left--which helps me justify every time I make dinner at their house and help myself to their fridge.  

A man I loved used to cheekily tell people that he lived in Minneapolis, his books were in New York, and he left his heart...in San Francisco.  

Other members of my new local hiking group
"Sendas Libres" trekking in the morning light

I'm not sure my articulated division is so clear (or so poetically satisfying), but I am undoubtedly in many places.

This morning I led a physical/vocal warm-up in Minenapolis (by speaker phone) for the dearest colleagues in the world.  It's Upstream Arts' annual training week, so I called the office just as I knew they'd be finishing up coffee, yogurt and pastries before the long-day of participatory training.  Voices I have dearly missed greeted me.  I noted, in particular, the beauty of those voices together.

Tomorrow I will teach a workshop for Mosoj Yan -- a Cochabamba home for adolescent girls that are victims of sexual violence-- where I am now committed to teaching Tuesday and Thursday mornings.  I will probably use at least one activity I learned from Upstream Arts.  I will undoubtedly use the spirit of teaching I learned from Upstream Arts -- which translates in to sound, shapes, movements, and even Spanish.  Go Upstream Arts Bolivia.

Despite the strange peace I feel about staying here in Cochabamba for months (or years?) to come, I am so very tired of transition.  I love adventure, travel, new things, sure, whatever, but I want a place that looks and feels like home.  I want a routine of meaningful work and relationships.  I want to hang my clothes and plant my fresh herbs, and set the table to invite over guests.  To welcome them into my home--in our home, our world.  Because home and community (and fresh herbs) are often too similar to separate.

   Passing other hikers

The apartment in Frutillar (Northeast Cochabamba) where I and my one suitcase currently reside is up the northern foothills.  At 9000ft we overlook Cochabamba's downtown, with an excellent view of the Cerro del Christo as well as the line of smog roofing the city--particularly in the dry season.  Some mornings curiousity or andrenaline or anxiety takes me up up up the hill to the tiny Pueblito where I hover above everything and the mountains feel so close.  I descend on dirt trails, winding through the wild catcus thriving at nearly 10,000ft.

My host Katie Stewart (who has generously taken me in during these weeks of uncertain housing) is the only gringo in the neighborhood.  After living here for nearly five years, she's well known.   "Katie's sister!" people shout, greeting me me as I run the rocky neighborhood roads.  Either I'm Katie or her sister (after all, how many running gringas can there be in one indigenous neighborhood?).  As my friend Christena says, "White people all look the same to me."

One morning I rounded the corner greeted by the most delighted laughter.  A cholita sat on the ground surrounded by bags of papas (potatoes) from her family's land up the hill, selling to faithful customers in this remote Cochabamba neighborhood.  She looked up at me from beneath her cholita sombrero and laughed and laughed and laughed.  "You're running!" from within her giggles.   What fool would run on these rocky steep streets?  Why would one run at all?  Never have I been so glad to be laughed at--the morning of the cholita laughing, selling papas--overflowing with delight.

The summit.  Kate had just arrived to visit--a reunion trip
with me and Bolivia (where she worked 5 years ago).  With only
5 days to adjust to the altitude climbing to 17,000ft nearly killed her.
But look at that smile.

This Land is(n’t) Your Land, This Land is My Land

Pondering what to buy at the weekly market in Punata.

It's easy to be stay focused on issues most seemingly pertinent to life in the United States, and frankly there's a lot going on up there.  But US politics are constantly on the move in South America, and generally it's in the "best interest" of the US federal government and the thousands of US businesses that operate in Latin America to keep its actions quiet to American citizens.   

Perhaps you heard last month that Paraguay impeached its sitting president, former priest and Liberation Theologian Fernando Lugo.  The impeachment (or coup) occurred after a group of police officers were sent to evict peasants peacefully occupying a parcel of land near the Brazilian border.  Upon the arrival of the officers, another group of police snipers ambused the officers and peasants, killing seventeen people: 6 officers and 11 peasants.  What's the connection?  President Fernando Lugo had long been accused by Paraguay's land-holding elite of instigating peasant occupations of land parcels. Like many South American countries trying to reduce the harm of land displacement of indigenous people, President Fernando Lugo had instigated land reform policy in efforts to balance the inequality in Paraguay where 85% of its land is owned by the wealthiest 2% of the population.  

Friends Jason, Emily and Thomas overlooking the Koa "ingredients."
Bolivians make regular offerings to the Pachamama in the Koa ritual, and
especially practice the ritual every first monthly friday.
Walk the streets on a first friday...the entire city smells of the Koa.

Land inequity is a huge deal in South America.  Much like the United States, lands were stolen or "bought" from indigenous peoples, stripping them of their self-sufficiency and relegating them to poverty and dependence on wealthy land owners.  Most landowners in Paraguay use their land almost exclusively for industrial agriculture (where US companies Cargill and Monsanto have huge stakes).  Furthermore, landowners (many of whom are foreign) pay little or no taxes (property taxes account for 0.04% of the tax burden), despite the fact that agribusiness makes up 30% of Paraguay's GDP.  It's no shock then that the wealthy landowners and trans-national businesses like Cargill and Monsanto welcomed President Lugo's impeachment.  Several South American countries have denounced the impeachment.  The US and Brazil (both countries have substancial numbers of citizens/companies that own Paraguay land) have said they look to and trust in Paraguay's peaceful process of democracy, therefore "refraining" from any judgment.  But how shall we define peaceful process of democracy?  In a country like Paraguay, dominated by a population in poverty, are last month's events indeed democracy?  Who pulled the strings?  The people--the democracy--of Paraguay?  Shall we still call it democracy when the wealthy few percent and trans-businesses are calling the shots?

Perhaps my silent (blog) tongue these past few weeks can partially be attributed to my new and painful appreciation of who pulls the strings in Latin America.  It's not that I was completely blind before to "First World" meddling, but I was negligent, apathetic.  Now I smell the West's exploitation of Latin America every time I leave the house.  The sweet frankenstein of capitalism we've created in the West--on which our prosperity rests--is, at its worst, a monster terrorizing the world.  How shall we control this powerful invention?

Vendors packing up their goods for the journey home.

I've made friends with a couple organizations here in Cocha that have done tremendous work communicating with "the North" about the reality on the ground in Bolivia.  The Andean Information Network and The Democracy Center have shared Bolivia's stories in seasons of confusion and manipulation, but even more so have given a human face to the effects of US policies and trans-national businesses in the lives of Bolivian people.  The Democracy Center published a yummy book in 2008 called Dignity and Defiance (or Desafiando la Globalización in Castellano) that I highly recommend.  Using stories of Bolivia, it does a tremendous job exploring the effects of globalization upon the majority or "developing" world.  The stories are fascinating, infuriating, illuminating, and human. You'll find it a touch more gentle than swallowing Open Veins of Latin America, but written with no less heart.  If you're shy on buying the book, co-editor/author Jim Shultz and co-author Leny Olivera presented the book at the University of Washington in 2009, and you can watch their presentation here. You will be entertained (Jim and Leny are charming).  And inspired too ascertain the often hidden reality of American influence throughout the world, to let it connect to your heart, and to speak--out of our implicit moral obligation--helping our country be less oblivious to the harm we so casually commit daily.  There is an immediate connection between my country and its institutions, and the suffering of this world.  We cannot be blind or silent.

Emily and a Coca Vendor.  Both looking regal.

Image Note: photos in this post are from a recent daytrip with friends to Punata, a small pueblo about an hour outside of Cochabamba.  I'm frankly not good about bringing my camera with me these days -- in part because this is simply my everyday life, and in part because it's generally rude to take photos.  But I nonetheless do want to share the images of my world.  Therefore, you're seeing the "subtly snapped" shots from our afternoon wandering the market.  As we walked, despite the obvious busyness of the market, we continually remarked on how relaxing and calm it was.  In comparison with the intensity of Cochabamba's Cancha market, this was a tranquil stroll in the park.  

On the bus ride back to Cocha we sat near two indigenous women, vendors, returning from the market.  Neither of them were young.  It's honestly hard to tell how old.  They could have been 50.  They could have been 75.  But whatever their age it didn't hinder them from hauling their large bags of remaining unsold goods or--as in the case of one--an enormous bag of maíz, which she'd traded for chuña (a Bolivian freeze-dried potato cultivated for centuries in the high Bolivian altiplano. Chuña, in many respects, makes survival in the altiplano possible.)  The woman from Cochabamba had a hat business.  The woman who sold chuña was from high, cold Oruro--a good 5 hours past Cochabamba.  Despite her advanced age, she travels to markets all around Bolivia every single week.  

The woman from Cochabamba (who's spanish was considerably better than the Aymara woman from Oruro) told us of her three children who all live in Italy, and who have brought her out to visit twice.  We of course asked her how she likes Italy, anticipating some response about the museums, the art.  "The corn there is very yellow.  They have hills too. Many beautiful hills." We skipped asking if she'd seen The David.  "'Muca' means 'vaca' (cow) in Italian," she recalled.  We asked if she likes the incredible Italian food.  "Eh.  I'm getting used to it."  

Because goats need to snuggle on the bus ride home too.

She spoke of how far away Italy is.  Twenty-five hour en "avión."  When you consider the financial distance she is from her children, it must seem like the moon.  Translating into Quechua for her friend from Oruro, she told her that it costs $1500 to fly there.  "$1500!!" the Aymara woman switched to spanish and snapped her head toward our friend Thomas sitting at her side, "Is that true!?!"   
Who could possibly have that kind of money?

Oddly, we never thought to ask the women's names. We simply helped them unload their heavy bags off the bus.  I wondered how the old Aymara woman was going to manage her heavy loads for the next many hours, until her arrival home in Oruro.  But she obviously had lifetime of practice.