Friday, April 28, 2006

The Conquest





Things went along swimmingly for the Incas for a few generations until the current Inca and the heir apparent died in a plague that swept through the empire (probably European Smallpox that had been introduced in North America and worked its way South). With no clear leader, the empire dissolved into a civil war that drained the resources and energies of the empire until the northern faction, under the Inca Atawallpa, emerged victorious. It was at this time that Francisco Pizzaro and his decisively un-merry band of unlettered soldiers and mercenaries showed up on the scene. The timing was propitious for Pizarro and his men. He found exactly what he had been looking for: a culture rich in gold and silver that was ripe for exploitation. Pizarro landed near the city of Cajamarca in 1533 as Atawallpa, the Inca who had recently emerged victorious from a devastating civil war, happened to be passing through the area on his way back to Cusco. Atawallpa was curious about the strangers so he invited them to visit his court. He was not worried about any threat presented by the Spaniards as he had several tens of thousands of troops with him and Pizarro was accompanied by only 40 cavalry and 150 foot soldiers. However, Pizarro saw his opportunity and, in a devious but brilliant military maneuver, had his men lay in wait while he asked for a peaceful audience with the Inca under a pledge of truce. When Atawallpa arrived with his retinue, Pizarro´s troops lept out of hiding and captured the Inca. Without direction from their leader, the Incas were left in a state of confusion while the Spaniards pressed their advantage. Even though Pizarro´s men were dreadfully outnumbered, the stone weapons and slingshots of the Incas proved no match for the Spaniards on horseback who slaughtered literally thousands of Inca troops without a single Spanish loss. Atawallpa promised a ransom of a storehouse filled once with gold and twice more with silver if he were released. The Spanish eagerly agreed but once the ransom was paid, they decided that Atawallpa would be too dangerous if released so they killed him.

Other than the virulent germs carried by the Spanish, the most decisive weapon of the conquest was the horse, the tank of the Conquest. One mounted Spaniard was virtually untouchable by attackers on foot while he could kill them almost at will. While the Spanish had muskets, guns would not become a major factor until the invention of the repeating rifle. Time and time again, the Spanish cavalry would win battles in which they were almost always outnumbered. The hierarchically-structured administrative system that was so central to the Inca’s success was now a key component to their defeat and subjugation. Without their leader at the top of the chain of command, the Incas found it difficult to organize a concerted defense or counter-attack and, once in control, the Spanish simply inserted their rulers into the existing top of the chain of command.

The first Spanish on the scene in Cusco were solely concerned with looting and pillaging. Any precious metals that could be grabbed were melted down and carted away; all of the treasures of the Qoricancha ended up in the crucible. But, then, two years later, Pizarro´s puppet Inca, Manco II, escaped and returned with an army of between 100,000 and 200,000 and captured the fortress of Sacsaywaman, laying a six-month siege to the city of Cusco below. All was almost lost for the Spanish until they engaged in a last-ditch flanking maneuver and were able to recapture Sacsaywaman. Manco II retreated to his mountain hideout of Vilcabamba where he was succeeded in his rebellion by Inca Tupac Amaru but, for all intents and purposes, the uprising was over. In 1780, Tupac Amaru II led another surprise rebellion that shocked the Spanish throne. He came close to succeeding but was eventually captured and returned to the main square of Cusco where he was put to death, but only after he was forced to watch his family be killed first.

Once in power, the Spanish destroyed the cooperative Ayllu system in favor of the encomienda system where large pieces of land were granted to Spanish encomienderos who, ignoring knowledge gained by the Incas, introduced European grazing and agricultural practices with disastrous results. The European grazing animals destroyed fragile Andean topsoil and the planting of cash crops such as coffee both eliminated the natives ability to grow food for themselves and destroyed the land in the process by not rotating crops or allowing land to lay fallow. The natives themselves were literally worked to death by the encomienderos whose responsibility to the natives ended with the teaching of Christianity.

Interestingly, it wasn’t the debt-ridden Spanish Crown that primarily benefited from the colonization of the new world but the bankers of England and Northern Europe. The colonization of the new world was also the turning point for the ascendancy of Europe at large as the pre-eminent world power. Prior to 1492, Europe was a global backwater. It was just coming out of the Dark Ages and had been enfeebled by the Black Death that had killed one out of every three people. Sewage flowed freely through the streets of large cities, the dead were unceremoniously dumped in large “dead holes,” and many women were forced to turn to prostitution. In comparison, the new world seemed idyllic to many of the early explorers. In terms of global power, Europe was insignificant compared to the Moslem empire which stretched from Northern Africa all the way around the known world to Indonesia or to the powerful Asian empires of China, Japan, and India. However, in just a few short years, the ranks of Christians in the world swelled from a few million Europeans to the largest religion in the world and the raw materials and cheap labor of the Americas fueled both European industrialization and continued colonial imperialism throughout the globe.

Even with independence the situation of European domination of the indigenous peoples of the Americas has changed but little. Except for a small percentage of white-skinned Peruvians of primarily European descent, the rest of the population are either full-blooded or nearly full-blooded Indians or mestizos whose familial lineage includes some mix of Indian and European blood. Although most people consider themselves to be “mestizo,” this is not to say that the color of one’s skin is not without consequence. The reigns of political and economic power are still primarily held by those with primarily white faces while those of darker complexion find themselves at the bottom of the economic ladder. Even among the poor there is a demarcation based on skin color. We were recently eating dinner with some friends and Zak´s thirteen-year-old friend reminded Zak and I to take off our hats before we eat because "only Incas wear hats when they eat." When I asked what he meant he said that the campesino indians always wear their hats when they eat implying that (light-skinned) social graces prohibited such behavior.

As Cusco is the second largest city in Peru, I had the opportunity to see many election rallies prior to the recent elections and I was shocked to see that the faces of most candidates were much more similar to my own than to the voters whose favor they hoped to curry. The entourage of most of the candidates actually included a group of dark-skinned mestizos or indians in indigenous dress to stress the candidate’s sensitivity to the needs of the “common” man in a way that did not threaten the power elite of primarily European descent.

In Peru, most of the Indians or darker-skinned mestizos speak Quechua or other indigenous languages; they generally live in the countryside (the campo) and are thus referred to as campesinos (literally peasants). Some have moved to the cities in order to find an education for their children or in hopes of finding better economic opportunities. Indicative of this group is my friend Jaime. He has a taxi and I have hired him a number of times to take us on daily excusions to areas of interest around the city. Most tourists simply hire bus tours but I usually have some other out of the way place I want to go in addition to the major tourist stops and I like the flexibility of being able to set my own itinerary. Jaime grew up in the altiplano, the highland campo to the Southeast of Cusco. Much of this area is above the tree line and, as it gets quite cold, houses are small and often adjoin the livestock stables to conserve warmth. The primary fuel for cooking and heating is dried llama and sheep (what’s brown and sounds like a bell?) dung. Jaime was one of eight children (what else is there to do when it gets cold and you don’t have a television?). When his oldest sister was born, his mother did not produce any milk, possibly from malnutrition, so the baby was given away to an orphanage run by nuns and no one knows what has become of her or even if she is dead or alive. When Jaime was young, there was not enough food to go around, particularly in the months before harvest (February, March, and April). Although it sounds almost too stereotypical to be true, a friend who is a graduate student in Anthropology and has done field work in the campos, has found that alcoholism is rampant among adult males and that it is often the mothers who end up doing most of the work and feeding the family. This was true of Jaime’s family as well. As there were too many mouths to feed at home, Jaime left when he was ten years old and went to Cusco where he hoped to find work. He did work, very hard, and eventually reached the point where he was able to buy a used Toyota corolla and start a taxi service. His girlfriend is now pregnant and he seems very happy with his life (it is quite common to start a family after a period of courtship and only get married some years down the line if at all). His parents died in their mid 40s as a result of alcohol abuse and just harsh living.

As most of the countries in South America, including Peru, are considered to be fairly strong democracies, you may wonder why the impoverished majority don’t simply elect one of their own to lead the country and respond to their very dramatic needs? The answer lies in both the historic underpinnings of power (both religious and economic) in South America and in the very real threat of violence both from the domestic powers that be and from external forces such as the United States. Much has it has done since the conquest, violence still underpins power in much of the Americas, elections or not. For its part, the U.S. has been voicing extremely threatening rhetoric toward the recently-elected presidents of Venezuela, Brazil, Bolivia, and one of the two candidates (Ollantay) who will be running in the Peruvian run-off election next month. All of these officials received wide-popular support and are, consequently, viewed by Washington as threatening to the minority of the economic elite who grow richer as foreign economic imperialists, including those from the U.S., extract wealth from South America. Such an attitude is entirely understandable as long as one refrains from any consideration of justice or fairness, after all, how dare the people of South America believe that their resources belong to themselves? For example, in my travels, I’ve noticed that it isn’t easy to find a good cup in Costa Rica, Peru, or Bolivia even though these countries grow some of the best coffee in the world. The reason for this is that most of this coffee is grown for export. Most of the wealth generated by the raw materials exported from the Americas – oil, coffee, sugar, even cocaine – is not seen by the locals but by the exporters, processors, distributors, and retailers, all mainly foreigners. For the locals in Peru and elsewhere in South America, the recently signed free trade agreement is simple an agreement to pay for the continued acquisition of wealth by others.

Peruvians



Here is a poor campesina with her sheep and Alan Garcia, one of the two candidates who won a spot in the run-off election for the Peruvian presidency next month. There is a wide gulf between the haves and the have-nots in Peru.

Tuesday, April 25, 2006

Chacan and Nustapacana




The top picture is of Zak with our two ¨guides,¨ Jonathon and Edgar at the Balcony of the Devil in Chacan, North of Cusco. The second picture is from inside the tunnel through which the stream passes below the Balcony of the Devil. The last photo is of Nustapacana situated at the head of a beautiful valley. All of the farming in this valley is done by the extended family of Jonathon and Edgar on the same Inca terraces that have been in use for hundreds of years.

Monday, April 24, 2006

This post may have a very unhappy ending

This post may have a very unhappy ending. If you don´t want to hear about the possibility of misery and suffering, you should close this browser right now and pick up some of the lesser known Dr. Seuss classics: “Pop Goes the Hamster (and Other Great Microwave Games)” “Curious George and the Electric fence,” and “Daddy Drinks Because You Cry.” This is not one of those posts that ends with ¨happily ever after¨ and if that is what you are looking for, you are in the wrong place. Besides, this posting is long, almost interminable. You have been warned.

The bad news is that I may, in fact, may be dead by the time you read this post. Of course it is also possible that you may be dead by the time you read this post although that is highly unlikely as, although one’s fingernails and hair continue to grow for some time after one’s demise, one’s email correspondence tends to taper off rather dramatically. Even though we Americans generally to ignore it, at our own peril, death is an eventuality for us all and if we keep that in mind, we are more likely to live life while we have the time rather than simply going through lives of quiet desperation. So, since we’re not quite dead yet, we´ve still got the opportunity to get some living in at least before before we get to part of the blog that speculates on the rate of my impending demise.

Zak didn´t have any school on Thursday of Easter week (Semana Santa) so Mary and I decided to Zak on a trek along another of the fabled Braunwarth Inca Trails. Maya stayed at home with Miriam, the woman who meets the kids after school during the week because, unfortunately, she just wouldn´t be able to keep up. We started the hike near the ruins of Sacsaywaman above Cusco and headed North toward a place called Chacán (Bridge-Place) on the river Tica Tica. The name of the river changes to the name Saphi closer to town. It is quite common here for different sections of the same river to have different names and why not?; after all, we have all heard that you can never step in the same river twice. Near Chacán, we made the acquaintance of two local children, David and Jonathon, who eagerly accompanied us on our trek. Chacán consists of a large rock formation which straddles the river gorge while the river flows through a tunnel in the formation 100´ below. The rock formation features many carvings and, near the top, the Incas expanded a natural fissure to create a small cave with a balcony (the ¨Balcony of the Devil¨) that looks out over the river as it flows through the rock below. The tunnel through which the river flows is large enough to stand up in so I suggested that we indulge our inner children and walk through. Even though the river was not deep, it was fed by snow melt from the mountains above and was quite cold. Zak hopped in with his shoes on but Mary decided to indulge her inner adult and wait for us on dry land. Personally, I´m not sure how anyone could pass up the opportunity to wade through cold water in a long, cold, dark tunnel but, oh well, her loss. Anyway, after Zak and I completed our little slosh (it was actually a fascinating and novel experience), we headed upstream (further away from town) for about a kilometer or so, passing Inca terraces and rock work, until we came upon the small but beautiful ruins of Nustapacana. To get to the ruins we had to scramble down a slope through some pretty thick brush. By this time, Mary´s inner child had fled for the day as, perhaps not un-coincidentally, it began to rain. I was still pretty excited by the ruins and looked forward to visiting a couple of other carved rock ruins downstream on the way home. As we headed back, the rain let up and, even though it was not exactly clear what path we should take, we managed to find the Incan “waca” of Quispe Wara. Quispe Wara translates to Crystal Loincloth, the significance of which should be clear to you all. Zak and I scrambled around on the big carved rock in the river while Mary waited onshore. I was carrying the raincoats in my pack and it is possibly only another coincidence that two things occurred simultaneously. One, this was the only point during the day at which I was more than a few minutes away from Mary and two, it began to rain… again… much harder than it had before. By the time I got to Mary and we got our jackets on, sentiments were clearly in favor of heading back. Rather than taking the route over the hill as per my directions, we decided to head back along the leftward-curving river on the advice of some locals we met at the waca who warned us about large and vicious dogs that waited up hill. Hearing about vicious dogs did little to improve Mary´s opinion of this particular Braunwarth Inca trail but, as there was no helicopter coming to pick us up, we forged onward. We passed one campo (a small subsistence farm) which sported a brace of vicious looking barking dogs. Mary was unwilling to cross their paths with Zachary so I went on ahead and then returned to escort them through. Even though the dogs graciously stayed on their side of the property line and we stayed on ours, Mary complained that I took far too many risks. We continued on, with increasing trepidation on Mary’s part. At this point we found ourselves on a path leading slightly away from the river to the left but as the river was curving around in that direction, it looked as thought the path would cut the corner to town and when I saw the roofs of some buildings ahead I assumed that we were already on the outskirts of the city. However, from the direction of these buildings came the sound of barking dogs and, sure enough, one appeared from around the corner of what must have been some type of adobe mud brick shed and charged toward us. This dog was followed by two others and Mary and I picked up rocks and stood our ground which is normally more than enough to stem the enthusiasm of any local canine. Indeed simply bending over and pretending to pick up a rock is enough to send almost any dog cowering. I’ve actually wondered if this fear, reinforced over many generations, could, at some point, become ingrained. Well, not with these dogs. They kept coming until Mary threw her rock at which point the first dog, some kind of collie mix, whirled and headed back. I thought that was the end of the encounter but the dog immediately on the tail of the first, a massive rotweiller, had other ideas. He failed to follow the lead of his more sensible companion and kept coming. All I saw was a mass of smooth rippling muscles and looked like a cross between a Saint Bernard and a bear; he was on me so quick I didn’t even have time to throw my rock. I always thought that I would easily be able to defend myself from a dog attack but the next thing I knew I was looking at the sky and then at a considerable mouthful of teeth (canines?) clamped on my left knee. By this time the adrenaline had kicked in and I was able to disengage the dog from my leg and send him packing for home but not before he left with me with a pretty good puncture wound and some other lacerations. The owner of the dog ran up and was able to corral his charges and direct us toward the correct path to town. I asked if the dog was healthy but between the obvious concern on the part of my family and the campesino trying to control a pack of brutish beasts, I was unable to fully assuage my concerns. The dog certainly looked healthy, if that dog was infirm, I can’t imagine what kind of power if might have when it was in the pink.

In retrospect, the foreshadowing seemed so obvious. Mary was obviously attuned to the weird tension that had developed over the day. I could certainly feel it but I was also excited about the wonderful things that we had seen that day and my concerns were limited to wondering how I could put Mary more at ease but, she obviously had just cause for her concerns. Were all of events of the day merely coincidence? Mary getting pushed beyond her limits (it never happens); the warnings about the dogs; the dogs we had to pass; Mary’s comment about me taking too many risks; veering on the wrong path; etc. Were these little things prophetic or merely invested with significance because our minds strive to impose order on a world of coincidences? Probably the latter. But, perhaps all events are interconnected at some level that exists below our level of consciousness and these presentiments can only be recognized by those who are attuned to the nature of the world around them, while those who have fully bought into the world of the enlightenment suppress those ephemeral and mysterious sentiments that cannot be explained by our rational minds. Some people and many animals can supposedly sense earthquakes before they occur. Aboriginal people in Australia and the Arctic seem to communicate in a way that Western minds are unable to explain. Similar occurrences may have even happened to you.

I had no concern that the dog might have been rabid. In addition to the means, he had the motivation to attack. We were walking toward his house and he was protecting his turf. But, just to be sure, when we got back to town I googled rabies symptoms and found that the incubation period for rabies can be anywhere from a few days to a year and then once the symptoms appear, it’s too late. There is no cure. You will die and, apparently, it’s a pretty uncomfortable way to go. Unlike many Americans I have never denied the eventuality of death. Rather, I have tried to make a friend with death and remember that it is always with me and, if I look quickly over my left shoulder, I can often catch a glimpse of it. This is no morbid fascination with death but a means of maintaining the presence of my fascination with life. Would you have done the things you did today if this day was your last? Even though I’ve no regrets about which turnstiles I’ve gone through in this amusement park we call life and I would visit the same attractions again, that doesn’t mean that I want the rides to end now; I still have mountains to climb, grandchildren to spoil, and love to give.

I did what I could about the bite, I cleaned the wound well with an antibacterial wipe in the field and then with soap and water when I got back home and I was feeling very confident about my chances of survival from this particular experience. But… then I got sick. I was feeling a little queasy at dinner that night and, directly after reading about rabies on the internet, I just made it into the bathroom of the internet café before projectile vomiting into the toilet. The ensuing series of gut wrenching spasms throughout the night that gave me plenty of sleepless hours to contemplate my continued confidence that I would not, in the imminent future, die of seizures while my throat convulses at the mere sight of water. In the morning I solicited the opinions of four different authority sources: my wife (actually that opinion was unsolicited), a local teacher and friend, the police, and my neighbor the doctor. All agreed that while the dog probably was not rabid, I should get the anti-rabies injections as a precaution in order to minimize the maximum regret. Our subsequent visit to the best hospital in the area is a story in itself (think peeling purple paint and junked ambulances out back). The doctors thought that my stomach ailment was the result of something I ate and its timing was merely coincidental. They agreed that I should have the shots and went ahead and administered the first one. However, there is one very serious and major negative side effect to the treatment… while the shots are not as painful as I had heard they might be, I have to avoid alcohol for 24 hours after each of the three injections. Oh the prices we pay to give our spouses a little peace of mind.

Wednesday, April 19, 2006

The Road Less Traveled




If you’ve been reading these blogs, you’ve probable picked up on the idea that I’ve been very impressed with the Incan architecture, much of which survives to this day. We have, of course, visited many major Incan ruins in the area including Pisac, Ollantaytambo, Machu Pichu, and Tipon. However, numerous other small ruins remain scattered about the countryside. These ruins are not on roads and do not appear on tourist brochures or maps and, consequently, they are almost entirely overlooked by the average tourist who has neither the time nor the inclination to go tramping about the countryside. I, however, think that tramping through the countryside is a far more pleasant way to spend the day than shuffling along with the masses to the next big sight. This is not to say I eschew major attractions, if you go to Paris, you need to see the Mona Lisa and if you go to Peru you need to see Machu Pichu. I have seen them both and I’m happy I have. However, unlike many people, I seem to have some sort of innate attraction to those sites that are off the beaten path. In addition, although I am one, I seem to have something of an allergy to other tourists; when I first arrived in town, I had it largely to myself and I still can’t help feeling a little unjustified resentment to my fellow travelers who have filled up the place in recent weeks. Consequently, we didn’t hike the Inca Trail (it would have been too difficult with the kids and part of it was washed out anyway), we hiked Braunwarth Inca Trails, as my friend Jeff Lehman coined the term after following one of my routes.

One day, after visiting the tourist ruins of Tambomachay and Puca Pucara, I had the brilliant idea of heading out across country to some rumored Incan sites I had heard about from an old Indian who shared the information with me in a vision quest, or something like that. Not wanting to leave civilization on an empty stomach, I fortified myself with some soup and chicha an old lady was selling out of her house along the road. The was prepared in a mud brick kitchen on a mud brick stove under the watchful eyes of little cuys who were scurrying about the kitchen floor happy to not be that day’s main course. Between the cuys in the kitchen and the chickens in the dining room, I don’t think the establishment would have received the “Carol Braunwarth Sanitary Seal of Approval” but the soup was one of the best I ever had and I just chose to ignore the dark flecks in the Chicha. From there, using little more than a hand written map and a rusty sextant, we headed across country to the rumored site of Salumpunka heretofore, I believe, unseen by the eyes of White men. The weather was great, the countryside was beautiful, and we found the site with little trouble. These weren’t exactly ruins but an example of a waca or shrine that had been carved into a large rock outcropping. An Intiwata, or hitching post of the sun, and carved into the top of the rock next to a sort of carved rock balcony. We also found pumas, snakes, and condors carved, in bas relief, into the rock. But the best parts of the site were a couple of caves that had been worked by the Incas. One of the caves featured an altar over which a small fissure opened up to the sky. I’ve been told the altar is bathed in moonlight on the full moon closest to the June Solstice. There is a small channel carved into the altar for the drainage whatever “fluids” one might need to drain off of an altar (I prefer to use my imagination rather than having it spelled out for me). The outer and inner entrances to this cave were carved in the shape of llama heads. The other cave was also extensively worked. We found other smaller rock croppings in the area on which seats and steps had been carved by the Incas and Zak, inspired by a book we were reading as a family which noted how wolves mark territory as their own, laid claim to as many of the Incan sites as he could. From there we walked across country to the site of Qenqo which also featured fine examples of how the Incans carved the living rock in situ. We climbed up stairs and through tunnels, marveled at altars that were once covered in gold, tried out mummy niches for size, peered along the site lines of pillars which were used for astronomical observations, and marveled at enigmatic zig-zag channels through which ritual chicha or blood was poured for purposes of devination.




The first image is of the cuys on the floor of the kitchen of the house at which I stopped to eat before hiking to Salumpunka. The second is of Zak in front of the ruin that he just finished claiming as his own. In the third image you can see Mary Walsh standing at the entrance to a cave at Qenqo. The altar you can see behind her was completely covered in gold at one time as was the wall behind the alter (where you can see the light) in order to better reflect the sunlight into this chamber.

K’usillochayuj



Recently, my Mary and Mary Walsh and I decided to take advantage of a sunny morning by walking over to some Inca Terraces that could easily be seen on the other side of a small river that flows behind our house. We weren’t going to be gone long so we didn’t take water or our backpacks but once we were on the terraces, which were very interesting, we ran into someone who told us about even better ruins about a kilometer up the river. We (read I) of course couldn’t miss out on this opportunity for further exploration so off we went. We did find the ruins (K’usillochayuj) and they were more impressive than the ones from which we started but the only problem was the trail petered out at the river 100’ or so below the ruins. Displaying behavior that I’ve been informed is not untypical for me, I solved the problem by climbing up the steep slope (the rock band at which the Mary’s turned back at was easy 5th class, honest), while the girls engaged in behavior not untypical of them and retraced their steps until they found an excellent and well-worn path to the top. The ruins themselves were very interesting with many carved rocks and retaining walls nearby as well as a short tunnel that had been worked by the Incans. We followed another more direct path to the city and passed some excellent Inca terraces which were still being used for agriculture. On the way out, as we passed a couple of Colonial Era brick kilns, we met Tim from Whistler, BC who spends a number of months mountain-biking on the many excellent trails around Cusco. I always admire people like Tim who can drop out of the rat race for shorter or longer periods of time. I don´t mean that we should simply be lazy and mooch off of others but many people seem to forget that time and not just money are valuable. After all, if we are going to talk about wasting time, is it wasted by not working at an unfulfilling job so one can buy bigger cars and stereos or is that, in fact, how time is wasted?

The Feast of 12 Plates



Friday, rather than Easter, is the big feast day here. Rather than being content with ham, potatoes, corn, and pie, the meal here is known as the feast of 12 plates and one is expected to serve 12 different dishes. We were graciously invited to the house of some friends for the event. We had a wonderful meal and a wonderful time. The house consisted of a couple of rooms around a small courtyard which had been muddied by the recent rains. The meal was prepared in a small dirt-floor kitchen on some metal burners which were hooked up to an adjacent propane tank. Other than a small table, on which food was prepared, there was no other furnishings and pots and pans which were not in use were stacked on the floor. We ate in the adjoining main room which, unlike the kitchen, had a cement floor and the adobe mud bricks were covered with blue plastic. The room was furnished with a table and chairs and a hutch for dishes. A few snapshots, a poster of the local soccer team, and some pictures from old calendars rounded out the décor. The bathroom was the only other room we visited and was decorated in what perceived to be a functional shambolic style. A water spigot over a cement basin in the courtyard provided water for the household. Houses like this are not uncommon in Cusco and Latin America in general. While I actually prefer adobe brick construction to the harsh sterility of cement, I do admire the hope for future prosperity in the form of rebar sticking out of the roof of almost all the cement brick house. When one walks about the barrios of the city one often sees these long bundles of rebar waving in the air like long skinny arms beseeching the heavens to drop down a second story on top of the first.

We were told that only rich people actually have 12 different dishes in spite of the name of the feast but we were served at least half that many and I would wager that they were twice as good as anything served in the more upscale part of town. In spite of their obvious lack of material wealth, I was not allowed to contribute any food or money to the repast. The family was interested in our Easter traditions so I tried to explain that the Easter Bunny would be coming on Sunday and delivering eggs and candy to the children.
“Eggs?” they laughed, “rabbits don’t bring eggs.” They were probably thinking that I was having some problem translating my thoughts into English. Earlier we had been discussing the relative virtues of guinea pigs as pets or meat and there may have also been some confusion created by the fact that the word for guinea pigs and rabbits is the same in Peruvian Spanish (Conejos). Any reasonable person would have quit at this point but, although I may have many traits, reasonable is not always high among them. Besides, I had carefully looked up the words before we arrived so that I could share our traditions so I doggedly persisted explaining that while yes, these were chicken eggs, they were not ordinary chicken eggs, oh no, these were multi-colored eggs. I went on to describe said Easter bunny who hopped all over the world bringing kids baskets of eggs and candy nestled on imitation grass. By this time they were laughing quite hard and clearly thought that either I or Americans in general were crazy and as I reviewed the conversation in my head, I can’t say I disagree. After dinner, a TV was brought in from the room of the son and daughter-in-law (because of the lack of economic opportunities here it is very common for children to live at home with their parents until, or even after, they are married) and we were treated to a DVD of local folk music. The performance was, I am somewhat embarrassed to say, pretty “cheesy” by U.S. standards but the family was enthralled and obviously proud to share the music and dancing with us.

Señor de Los Tremblores



It is our good fortune to be visiting Peru during Easter Week. Most cities in Peru, and throughout Latin America, have a number of parades and processions during Semana Santa, the week preceding Easter and Cusco is no exception. Indeed, almost every Sunday the morning, the streets around the main plaza are blocked off, a tent is set up in front of the cathedral for local dignitaries, and various groups, including the military, parade around the plaza. Almost any event will do for a parade. One week it was the anniversary of a local girls´ school, another week it was the beginning of lent. On Tuesday, the merchants at the Molino Central Commercial Market participated in a parade celebrating the anniversary of the market. The market consists of a huge collection of small stallholders who sell everything from coca leaves to light bulbs. Given the presumably meager sales of each of the individual stallholders, I was very impressed with extravagant costumes.

While Easter is the reason for the season, the big event in Cusco occurs on the Monday before Easter for the procession of Señor de Los Tremblores. This has been going on since the great earthquake of 1650 when many of the Spanish Colonial structures collapsed. Attributing the disruption to Divine intervention, the locals paraded a large 10’ crucifix throughout the city and, miraculously, the earthquake stopped (but don’t they all eventually?) I wonder if someone wasn’t wearing a T-shirt emblazoned with the words, “Stop Plate Tectonics!” Anyway, since 1650, the Señor de Los Tremblores is trotted out for a little fresh air and a jaunt around town on the Monday before Easter. You can see the picture below. They take their fiestas seriously in Cusco and this is a big affair. The event is televised live and it’s not just the cable public access crowd tuning in; of all of the televisions I saw that afternoon, both of them were tuned into live coverage of the procession of the Señor. By that evening, when Señor de Los Tremblores was marched back through the main square before being put back in his gilded cage for another year, the plaza was jam packed with people. I’m not too good at estimating the size of crowds but no portion of any sidewalk, street, or walkway was visible through the throng; there must have been several thousand people. While we may have missed some of the excitement of being packed in like sardines with complete strangers on a cold evening in favor of viewind the event with some pisco sours next to a roaring fire in a nice restaurant (Kusikuy) nearby, we have really been enjoying all of the processions and parades in Cusco.

Luckily, the Easter Bunny did indeed find us down here in Cusco, thanks to some planning by Mary. It was, of course, very difficult to sleep in with candy hidden about the house so, after an early morning repast by M&M Mars, we headed into town for Easter service at the cathedral. In an effort to stamp out Incan pagan worship and convert the natives to Christianity, the Spanish often built churches on top of Incan holy places and the cathedral of Cusco is no exception; it was built on top of an Incan palace with stones pilfered from the nearby Incan ruin of Sacsaywaman. Construction on the cathedral began in 1550 and went on for almost 100 years. It was no surprise to see the cathedral full on Easter morning, there were even a couple of dogs resting peacefully near the confessional booth, but we were able to find a good place to stand near one of the side altars. After the service, we wandered about the church with others who were praying to particular side altars. We stopped to admire the Señor de Los Tremblores who was back in his usual altar on the right side. The Señor, like many figures in various churches was attired in a beautifully embroidered piece of clothing. This particular garment consisted of a bright blue wrap around his waist with brilliant silver and gold accents. I looked at the crucifix for some minutes, praying, before I noted the words canal (channel) 41 in gold embroidery on the vestment. Once I picked that out, I saw that the silver web embroidered in the lower right corner was actually a satellite dish with the letters M, T, and V in gold bouncing off of the dish (see below). One of the things I really like about Cusco is the lack of corporate commercialization. There are no McDonalds or other fast-food restaurants and the big box retailers have not yet come to town. And, while I do think that the commodification and commercialization of virtually all aspects of contemporary society is a far more dangerous corruption than sex or violence, I had to admire the pluck of this particular sponsorship opportunity; perhaps this is something Mary´s hospital is going to want to get onto quickly.

Señor de Los Tremblores



Here you can see the Señor de Los Tremblores, as he leaved the church and after his return. You can just make out the silver satellite dish on the lower-right corner of the robe in the second picture. He sits upon 26 kilos of gold and a constellation of precious gems. Some attribute the dark skin of the Christ statue as a reflection of Andean self-image, others to the natural darkening of the wood; I prefer the former.

Monday, April 10, 2006

The Braunwarths in South America



I saw the folks off at the airport yesterday morning. I can’t speak for them but I think they had a wonderful trip. Before they arrived there was some concern that three weeks in a third world country might be a bit long but they really adapted well and had a wonderful time. My mother grew up on a farm where the dirt from the fields was omnipresent; it drifted in through cracks in the doors no matter how hard one tried to keep it out. As stoic Midwesterners her family refused to capitulate and they battled the forces of nature relentlessly; for her family cleanliness was next to godliness. I grew up in a house that was always spotlessly clean and the washing machine was always in use. So I was a bit concerned that she might have some trouble with dirt streets and mud brick houses but my concerns were unfounded. Mom loved the place. Admittedly, she did stick to the more touristy venues and, luckily, Cusco sport a number of excellent restaurants with beautiful views. However, she was the one that suggested the locals-only restaurant in Bolivia where the set price menu was 7 bolivianos ($1) but we ended up paying almost $2 per person because we drank beer and ordered off of the menu. When I succumbed to the temptation for some more adventuresome eating and drinking she exercised her discretion and, although she seemed to take some vicarious pleasure in my gastronomical gregariousness, abstained from joining in. Mom was, of course, the one most concerned about the sanitary status of any consumables but, as dictated by the god Irony, she was the one who, unfortunately, got the worst case of food poisoning of the group. This, of course, occurred on the occasion of the all-day bus trip to Lake Titicaca. But even then, and much to her credit, she didn’t complain even though the average man would have been whimpering for his mother and both Mom and Dad were game for the 12 hour bus trip (with no bathroom) from La Paz to Cusco when we found that no flights were available. My Dad was also not afraid wrap his lips around warm chicha or sink his teeth into a little roast cuy (see the picture above). He was also, as always, there to provide the proper amount of levity to any situation. Those of you who know my father will not be surprised to find that he was able to find a little refuge from Mom’s shopping excursion at Norton Rat’s Tavern on the main plaza. By the end of the trip he was on a first name basis with the staff, all of whom were sorry to see him return to the States. I don’t mean to imply that my father is a barfly. He’s not; far from it. He rarely has more than one or two, he just occasionally, like any guy, needs his own space and, as with any good German boy who grew up among the surrounding towns of Cologne, Gotha, New Ulm, etc., a friendly bar with a convivial atmosphere provides an excellent cure for the common shopping binge. In my opinion, an important ingredient for any marriage is a clubhouse for the boys.

The folks were also able to spend a lot of time with the kids and both groups benefited from the cross-pollination of different generations. Dad especially was able to plug into Zak’s perceptions on the new surroundings and both parents benefited from the perspective offered by fresh young minds still largely unburdened with the baggage of adulthood. Not to say that my kids are blank slates, even if Zak´s most popular expression is a blank gaze. Even though we don’t have a TV (I wanted a vacation from that even though it would probably aid in language acquisition), one of Zak’s favorite topics of conversation is to recount, ad nauseum, previously-viewed plots of Sponge Bob Square Pants and the Simpsons. You can apparently take the boy out of the media but you can’t take the media out of the boy. But, just when I was beginning to think Zak might not be picking up much of anything from the trip, he was able to direct the taxi home for Grandpa and Grandma on their last night in town because he could speak the language while the grandparents still couldn’t pronounce the name of our street after three weeks in town. For their part, Zak and Maya loved having the grandparents around. One day, when the rest of us were preparing to go to a local soccer game, Maya was struck with a sudden onset of some kind of illness. Dad was ready for a break so he took her home only to find her recovered by the time the two of them were back at the house. Maya seems to have the easiest time flying through any type of gastro-intestinal turbulence. Could it be, perhaps, because she still has a simplified digestive system, like a dog’s? At any rate, the Granddaughter turned Grandpa’s planned respite into an opportunity to transform the living room into an amusement park in which each piece of furniture stood in for a ride. By the time we returned from the soccer match, Grandpa looked as though he had take one to many spins on the Tilt-a-Whirl but he was still pleased as punch to have been able to spend a little one-on-one with Maya.

The folks were, of course, impressed with the Inca ruins of Machu Pichu, Ollantaytambo, and Pisac, after all, it would have to take a pretty jaded soul to not be impressed with these ancient masterpieces which remain as testaments to the ability of man to both manipulate nature to their end while retaining a harmonious relationship to it. I also think they appreciated having me there to play tour guide and organize transportation. However I’m not really sure about that because the morning I picked up Mary Walsh at the airport, I sent them out on their own, with Zak as guide, to four nearby ruins. However, they only made it to one before abandoning the expedition and heading back to town for a crepes and cervezas. I’m not sure if this was a result of lack of leadership or different priorities. However, I can say, with a high degree of confidence, that what my parents really enjoyed was the surrounding countryside through which we passed while getting to our various destinations. Although we are from the plains of the Midwest where a 2000’ foot mountain is the highest in the state, they, like I, are no strangers to mountains. They have traveled in the Rockies and other places but there is something different about the mountains here. It’s not just that there are impressive glacier-mantled crags in the distance, there are; it’s that there is a whole population of people who are living and working and farming on and around these Andean peaks and valleys. Although we have been spending all of our time between 9000’ and 14,500’ feet in elevation, these aren’t simply cold and forbidding heights. Rather, due to our proximity to the tropics, the landscape is evocative of a cross between the Tyrolean Alps in the summer and the English countryside of Watership Down except one is more likely to run across grazing llamas and old wrinkled Quechuan women wearing bowler hats with brightly-colored bundles on their back than anthropomorphized rabbits and old white men in lederhosen.

Thanks Mom and Dad for a great visit!

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Tuesday, April 04, 2006

The Witch´s Market in La Paz


A typical vendor at the ¨Witch´s Market¨in La Paz, Bolivia. Note the ocelot(?), dried llama fetuses, armadillos, and talismans for sale in the background. I bought a talisman promising love, prosperity, protection, and longevity for the family and, guess what? It works great!

Lake Titicaca and La Paz




We just returned from our one trip outside of the Cusco region. This trip within a trip brought us to Lake Titicaca and La Paz, Bolivia. I’ve always been one of those people who wants to see all of the new and interesting things there are to see whenever I go somewhere. I’ve always been fascinated by the largest, the oldest, the highest, the whatever. My wife tells me that I am a wealth of useless information and Lake Titicaca is a lake that embodies all manner of memorable trivia. My mother kept saying “I learned that Lake Titicaca was the highest navigable lake in the world in Junior High geography, and I never thought I would actually get here” and, to the extent that it was almost creepy, I heard basically the same sentiment expressed by a number of other tourists. The lake is big in the sense that Queen Latifa’s butt is big; it’s downright massive. It’s the largest lake in South America and it’s the largest lake in the world over 6000’ in elevation. And it is high. It’s not just over 6000’, it’s at about 12,000’ which is way up there. The only lakes we have in the U.S. at that altitude are the little emerald gems below the high passes and cols in the Sierra Nevadas and the Rockies. But Lake Titicaca is much more than just a collection of trivia. At this elevation, the air is incredibly clear and the sky is the shade of clear blue of my wife’s eyes. The sunshine is not just more intense, it’s more luminescent and it sizzles like a 4th of July sparkler as it reflects off the lake. The lake is speckled with islands and peninsulas and bays so the horizon is never the blue on blue one finds at the ocean, rather one is treated to views of the snow-capped peaks of Bolivia’s Cordillea Real and other mountains.

But one can’t just see the lake and tick it off of one’s lifetime “to see” list. The people of the area are also an important part of the whole sense of the place. Now that I’ve had the opportunity to travel beyond the Cusco area, I’ve really been struck by how relatively small pockets of people cling to their traditional cultures and dress in different small locales. We based our Titicaca operations out of the small town of Puno on the South shore of the lake. Mary Walsh, Mom and Dad, myself and the two kids had arrived by a tourist bus from Cusco which made stops at various points of historical interest and, of course, at various artisan centers where we were given the opportunity to purchase the local wares. Mom was fighting a pretty bad case of food poisoning but she was a trooper and didn’t complain a bit. Zak almost sprained his ankle running back to the table from what he has decided is his favorite meal – buffet and Maya was so engrossed in feeding a baby alpaca from a bottle that when Mommy alpaca walked up behind her and nuzzled her neck she nearly jumped out of her skin, as you can see in the picture above. But, we made it, and we were delighted by the destination. The women of Puno all wear the traditional long black braids, skirts, and brightly colored wraps but instead of the tall white stovepipe hats favored by the women in rural Cusco, the women of Puno favor teeny tiny bowler hats which left them looking like so many two-legged pepper pots moving about the streets. A variation on this theme was favored by the women of La Paz who wore elaborately-embroidered skirts over layers of petticoats which were designed to emphasize the size of the wearers hips, a distinctly different ideal of female beauty than that favored by the emaciated models in U.S. fashion magazines. The ensemble was topped by a sweater and a bowler hat which, apparently, became popular in the 1930s. If the women were selling items on the street, and many of the ones I encountered were doing just that, they also sported large aprons with multitudinous pockets from which they would pull wallets, change, goods, etc. One of the most interesting aspects of La Paz was the active street life and the variety of goods for sale at very reasonable prices.

On lake Titicaca, we first visited the floating Uros islands. The original settlers moved to these islands to escape the Incas and other stronger neighbors and found that they could eke out a living on the lake. However, the idea of living on one of these floating carpets of swamp reeds simply because one can eke out a living really strikes home the desperate nature of the lives of so many people in the world. In the picture above, Zak is eating one of the reeds that supplies hearth, home, and food staple. You may note in the background, one of the huts in which one of the inhabitants of these islands live. The sun was setting as we were returning to Puno in the late afternoon and, as a result, the temperature was dropping and I couldn´t help but think about the floating islanders with no permanent address and a life that amounted to little more than camping in a swamp…forever. Think about that the next time you are snuggled up under your warm comforter.

The men of Isla Taquile, only a few miles offshore from Puno, wear homespun white shirts, black pants, wide intricately woven belts, and knit their own hats, as can be seen in the picture above. The color of the hats indicates both their marital status and position in the community. There are only about 2400 islanders on the island and I talked to a couple, both of whom had lived in the island their whole life. Both indicated that very rarely did anyone leave the island and it was even rarer for a mainlander to marry into the community. The island was beautiful although the people did work hard tilling small plots with a sort of makeshift shovel that consisted of little more than a blade on the end of a forked stick. When I think of some of the travails of the modern world I guess I can see why some might be reluctant to leave but that sure makes for a shallow gene pool.

It is fascinating how these little pockets of traditional clothing and culture remain in the contemporary world. The women in the city of Puno favor colorful skirts, sweaters, and little tiny bowler hats that leave them looking like a whole bunch of little pepper pots scurrying about the streets while the women of La Paz wear elaborately embroidered skirts over many layers of petticoats, leaving them almost as wide as they are tall as an expression of a very distinct form of feminine beauty. The women in the countryside surrounding Cusco can be found sporting tall white stovepipe hats, bowler hats, or some elaborately embroidered flat black hats that kind of resemble a fringed-felt frisbee on their head. How long can these distinct cultural expressions remain in a world of MTV and Disney? The young people I´ve met in the city are not following these traditions and I´ve heard more Donna Summer and Rod Stewart than traditional quechuan music blaring from speakers around town. Maybe I´m just being jaded but I hope we don´t all become largely indistinguishable; variety is the spice of life!

Crop Circles and Walking Haystacks


While visiting Moray and Salineras in the beautiful countryside to the Northwest of Cusco, we saw both walking haystacks and crop circles. Which sounds more farfetched? OK, we didn’t really see walking haystacks, we saw walking bundles of grass. Still not buying? I can’t say I blame you. What if I were to say the bundles of grass walked on four hoofed legs and, as our taxi came up behind four of these mobile mounds of mower mulch, we were treated to a view of burro butt right in the middle of each of these walking haystacks. Now we’re getting somewhere. It’s currently toward the end of the rainy season and most of the crops here are approaching maturity and will be harvested soon, before the dry season turns most of these fields brown for the next half of a year. This means that the countryside is carpeted with small plots of variously colored grains undulating in the breeze like one of Grandma Bea’s patchwork quilts covering a couple of newlyweds. In the background we were treated to views of the stark black rock of the Cordillera Villcabamba and Urubumba mountains which were softened by mantles of puffy white clouds that would occasionally part to reveal glimpses of massive glaciers and stark hanging valleys. The agricultural plots are small because the farming in this area is done by hand, largely without the use of mechanized devices. This necessitates both planting crops in small fields that can be reasonably harvested by human and animal in a reasonable period of time and planting a diversity of crops so that they do not all come to maturity at the same time. Now, I’ve nothing against those Midwestern vistas of corn tassels tasseling as far as the eye can see and a horizon full of colorful sunflowers craning their necks toward the sun as it passes over like so many yellow-collared, brown-faced tennis spectators watching a match in extreme slow-motion. Such sights can, and do, inspire awe. And, if truth be told, I do think that a field of blue tipped flax waving in the wind looks much like the waves of a sea and, unlike some contemporary band making a buck covering Motown classics, the flax suffers little in comparison to the real thing. But these scenes are only made possible by the huge economies of scale required of the highly capitalized mechanized farming of the great plains of the Midwest United States. And while one might marvel at a massive two-story tractor that costs more than the average house in the U.S., such machinery is not intrinsically beautiful in itself. When these economies of scale are applied to the production of animals, the resulting barrack rows of five chickens to a small cage and the unappealing un-naturalness of high-density feed lots inspire in me less a sense of awe than of revulsion; which brings us back to the grain-framed burro butts. Almost all of the farming work here is done by humans and animals. We saw oxen hitched to plows and dozens of children and women shepherding flocks of sheep, pigs, and cattle. I’m not saying that these farmers have it better than those in the U.S., they almost certainly don’t in terms of required manual labor and the monetary fruits of that labor but I am saying that such scenes of pastoral splendor are certainly much more aesthetically pleasing to the visitor and, I would have to assume, to the residents themselves. That said, I bet there wasn’t a one of these farmers who wouldn’t trade their farm for the one my mother grew up on in South Dakota faster than you could say walking haystacks. Pastoral splendor doesn’t pay for your kids’ dental work or soothe a back that’s aches from plowing a field by hand. The productivity of U.S. style capital-intensive agriculture leads to incredible productivity and I would warrant that my mother’s childhood farm produces more grain than half of the state of Cusco, but this is, without doubt, a beautiful and fascinating place.

The farms to which I refer are located in the Andean highlands between roughly 10,000 and 12,000 feet of elevation. Not what we typically think of as prime farming land in the U.S. How did farming, and thus civilization, in particular the Inca civilization, adapt crops like corn to these high-altitude conditions? The answer lies in the afore-mentioned crop circles. These are not the result of oil dripping from a leaky oilpan gasket on Han Solo´s Millenian Falcon; these are the simultaneously ancient and innovative crop-laboratories of Moray. The Incas, or possibly an earlier civilization, discovered a fascinating phenomenon that occurs in four natural depressions on the plains Northwest of Cusco. Apparently, because of their location relative to both the larger Andes and to the hills and plains immediately surrounding the depressions, distinct microclimates can be found and different depths of the bowls. In order to take advantage of this discovery, the Incas carved various layers of concentric circles into these depressions and terraced them with the incredible stone masonry work which they utilized at other sites. The result is a series of what are essentially natural greenhouses that the Incas could use to develop strains of crops that could survive in the cultivable terrain available. While I typically don’t get much more excited about crop laboratories than I do about farm machinery, the very age and essence of these bowls are awe inspiring and not just because of their historical significance but because of the intrinsic aesthetic beauty of the melding of form and function.

As we climbed down from the top to the bottom of the biggest depression, we could notice a distinct elevation in temperature. According to one scientist, the difference in temperature from the top layer to the bottom is often a full 15 degrees celsius which is the difference in the average mean temperature between London and Bombay. As one descends, the temperature increase makes one feel as though they are descending into a terrarium, an experience that is heightened by the progression from smaller to smaller circles. I found myself looking up hoping that the makers of more fanciful crop circles weren´t in the process of screwing on the lid and, if they were, that they remembered to punch holes in the top this time. As you can guess by the publication of this missive, there was no lid and we are still out exploring all that this region has to offer.

Moray and Salineras



The first picture is of Zak standing next to the largest depression at Moray. A series of concentric circular terraces drop away on the otherside of the horseshoe-shaped area next to where he stands.

The second picture is of salt evaporating ponds near the Moray ampitheaters. A saline-laden warm spring is diverted into the ponds, the water is allowed to evaporate and then the salt is extracted by hand. The Incas harvested salt here the same way over 500 years ago and used the valuable commodity to trade with other groups. We had our taxi drop us off here and we walked down the ravine to the Urubumba River Valley where we met up with the cab. The walk was great both because it was fun to get off the beaten path but also because of the incredible diversity of ecosystems we were able to see. The ravine resembled one of the red-walled canyons of the desert southwest, complete with a cotillion of cactuses while just on the other side of the valley we were treated to views of towering peaks with massive glaciers. The Andes in the tropics are truly a fascinating place.