Home at last

We’re home! Readjusting to life in the US will take some time, integrating all we have learned. One of the things that we learned already is that we have a google email account! Unbeknownst to us, we have been receiving lovely notes from our wonderful friends and family on this account all year while we are away. Now it is like a journey back in time, reading all your notes: comments on the blog, on the weather, on your activities. Thank you for your emails, and sorry we did not respond to them at the time.

Buenos Aires

Living in Buenos Aires, we seem to have come back full circle to the European start of our year. The city looks like Paris or Madrid: cobblestone streets, cafes, buildings built in the Neapolitan style, and high fashion everywhere. We feel like we need to upgrade our wardrobe from the old sneakers and jackets we wear every day. But the sneakers are needed for walking: miles upon miles of avenues, parks and museums to explore. Unlike New York, there is no overall organizing principle, no numbered streets, no “A” train from top to bottom. Instead there are huge “barrios” to visit, each one taking a full morning to explore. The subway system covers the downtown area, supplemented by a confusing patchwork of buses and commuter rail. We have loved exploring the wide avenues and narrow pedestrian streets, the gorgeous stone buildings with towers, turrets and gargoyles, the modern streetscapes that remind us of Fifth Avenue and 42^nd street in New York.

The weather, too, feels like late fall in Europe, reminding us of our time in Madrid last November. A chill wind blows off the river, scattering the autumn leaves down the sidewalk. The days are sunny and warm, but the evenings (when the city comes alive) and nights are quite cold. In the mornings, fog floats over the city and looks like a sky full of snow. June in Buenos Aires is winter.

It feels odd being in such an opulent city after living in Bolivia. The number of private cars is astounding. There are no street sellers, no young men shining shoes. Professional dog walkers, no stray dogs. Starbucks has made inroads here, vying with local purveyors of fancy tea and coffee. We choose the local alternative, and ordering a simple cup of coffee, we were treated with fine coffee topped by a dollop of ice cream, along with cookies and a glass of mineral water. Though I certainly survived without coffee for two months, it is nice to enjoy a good cup of the stuff.

We happened upon the Salon de Glace, a circular building that was a skating rink, now a modern art exhibit with creative installations of all kinds. In MALBA, the main Buenos Aires art museum, we saw an interesting exhibit on beef by Cristina Piffer. Commenting on the centrality of beef in the Argentine diet, and its connection with colonialism and violence, she works with slabs of meet (generally frozen into plastic) and rectangles of white fat. Marble parquet floors, tombstones, ropes: meat is transposed into creative shapes to tell her stories.

We visited the little museum dedicated to Eva Peron, heroine of Argentine history though she was never elected to public office. There were no facts in the museum, but a telling emotion. The myth of the little angel who sacrificed all for her people (despite her extravagant wardrobe and her pre-marital affair with her husband-to-be, Juan Duarte). Her image lives on even today in the Peronista party.

The themes in the Eva Peron museum were oddly familiar, from our visit to Che Guevara’s childhood home outside Cordoba. The same prettified biography, the same story of a life of sacrifice for country and ideals, and the accompanying strong religious overtones. In both cases, the underlying message seems to head towards beatification. This despite the violence undertaken by Che as a Marxist revolutionary and later, as an enforcer in the Cuban government. Eva ran an orphanage for poor children, but we know that as a powerbroker in her husband’s government, she was party to violence and injustice as well. Her gravestone reads, in part: I am an essential part of your existence. All love and pain I have foreseen. I have accomplished my humble imitation of Christ.

We visited a museum of a different sort in Cordoba’s “Museo de la Memoria”, Museum of Memory. This museum, and another like it in Buenos Aires, is devoted to telling the story of Argentina’s “dirty war”, the many thousands of citizens who were tortured and killed by the government in the 1970s and 1980s. The police bureau used as a detention center is the actual site of the museum. First-hand recollections of survivors echo along the walls which are unchanged since those days, frighteningly recent in memory. The museum itself is a courageous undertaking in a country where perpetrators of those crimes are still alive and well, many of them still in power.

Traveling south from Bolivia

On the bus, heading south to Argentina. We left La Paz for Oruro, then the train overnight to the border town of Villazon, arriving at 7 am. Riding the last train line in Bolivia was an interesting experience, even though the reality did not match the amenities advertised. The seats did recline to varying degrees, but the cold wind emanating from the windows as we traveled through the altiplano prevented us from getting much sleep. As advertised, we were served a choice of hot dinner at our seats by bow-tied waiters, quite a change from the lurching buses we have been traveling on without even a restroom. I was impressed at the cleanliness of the train until I happened to see what happened to the trash swept up at intervals: out on the track it went. Nevertheless, the relaxing rhythmic sound of the train running along the old tracks all night, with a bowl-full of stars above and deserted plains all around us, was something to remember.

After arriving at Villazon, we crossed the border and took the next bus heading south. Traveling all day through northwestern Argentina gave us a chance to see the changing landscape. From the altiplano, we descended 3000 meters or 9000 feet, to a familiar 1100 meters in altitude. The first change I noted as we descended was vegetation: a wide variety: first, cactus in the dry Quebrada mountain range, then hillsides covered with hardwoods of all kinds. Further down, we traveled through fertile river valleys filled with cropland bordered by willows and the ever-present yellow-flowered perennial, rudbeckia, here growing to plants over 10 feet tall.

In La Paz, both the lack of public resources and the climate mitigate against green spaces. The Prado, the main street running through La Paz, has a park down the middle, where palm trees (amazingly prospering at that altitude) and green grass are growing, along with flower beds with hardy autumn flowers: petunias and marigolds. On weekends, Bolivians stretch out luxuriously on the grass and take a snooze, or play cards or chat. These are among the only green areas available in the city. It is quite a change to see hillsides covered with trees and fields of green crops growing.

The general level of prosperity is much higher in northern Argentina than in Bolivia: good paved roads, even highways, many private cars, and well-dressed travelers are everywhere. All the little towns we pass have playgrounds, green parks, well equipped football fields, and much more foreign investment than we are used to seeing. Pedestrian streets with antique streetlights and restaurants appealing to the middle-class traveler are in evidence.

Life in Buenos Aires

Living in Buenos Aires, we seem to have come back full circle to the European start of our year. The city looks like Paris or Madrid: cobblestone streets, cafes, buildings built in the Neapolitan style, and high fashion everywhere. We feel like we need to upgrade our wardrobe from the old sneakers and jackets we wear every day. But the sneakers are needed for walking: miles upon miles of avenues, parks and museums to explore. Unlike New York, there is no overall organizing principle, no numbered streets, no “A” train from top to bottom. Instead there are huge “barrios” to visit, each one taking a full morning to explore. The subway system covers the downtown area, supplemented by a confusing patchwork of buses and commuter rail. We have loved exploring the wide avenues and narrow pedestrian streets, the gorgeous stone buildings with towers, turrets and gargoyles, the modern streetscapes that remind us of Fifth Avenue and 42^nd street in New York.

The weather, too, feels like late fall in Europe, reminding us of our time in Madrid last November. A chill wind blows off the river, scattering the autumn leaves down the sidewalk. The days are sunny and warm, but the evenings (when the city comes alive) and nights are quite cold. In the mornings, fog floats over the city and looks like a sky full of snow. June in Buenos Aires is winter.

It feels odd being in such an opulent city after living in Bolivia. The number of private cars is astounding. There are no street sellers, no young men shining shoes. Professional dog walkers, no stray dogs. Starbucks has made inroads here, vying with local purveyors of fancy tea and coffee. We choose the local restaurant, and ordering a simple cup of coffee, we are treated with fine coffee topped by a dollop of ice cream, along with cookies and a glass of mineral water. Though I certainly survived without coffee for two months, it is nice to enjoy a good cup of the stuff.

We happened upon the Salon de Glace, a circular building that was a skating rink, now a modern art exhibit with creative installations of all kinds. In MALBA, the main Buenos Aires art museum, we saw an interesting exhibit on beef by Cristina Piffer. Commenting on the centrality of beef in the Argentine diet, and its connection with colonialism and violence, she works with slabs of meet (generally frozen into plastic) and rectangles of white fat. Marble parquet floors, tombstones, ropes: meat is transposed into creative shapes to tell her stories.

We visited the little museum dedicated to Eva Peron, heroine of Argentine history though she was never elected to public office. There were no facts in the museum, but a telling emotion. The myth of the little angel who sacrificed all for her people (despite her extravagant wardrobe and her pre-marital affair with her husband-to-be, Juan Duarte). Her image lives on even today in the Peronista party.

The themes in the Eva Peron museum were oddly familiar, from our visit to Che Guevara’s childhood home outside Cordoba. The same prettified biography, the same story of a life of sacrifice for country and ideals, and the accompanying strong religious overtones. In both cases, the underlying message seems to head towards beatification. This despite the violence undertaken by Che as a Marxist revolutionary and later, as an enforcer in the Cuban government. Eva ran an orphanage for poor children, but we know that as a powerbroker in her husband’s government, she was party to violence and injustice as well. Her gravestone reads, in part: I am an essential part of your existence. All love and pain I have foreseen. I have accomplished my humble imitation of Christ.

We visited a museum of a different sort in Cordoba’s “Museo de la Memoria”, Museum of Memory. This museum, and another like it in Buenos Aires, is devoted to telling the story of Argentina’s “dirty war”, the many thousands of citizens who were tortured and killed by the government in the 1970s and 1980s. The police bureau used as a detention center is the actual site of the museum. First-hand recollections of survivors echo along the walls which are unchanged since those days, frighteningly recent in memory. The museum itself is a courageous undertaking in a country where perpetrators of those crimes are still alive and well, many of them still in power.

Environmental Awareness



Rio Choqueyapu



Bolivia has just passed a very encouraging – and groundbreaking – law of protection for Mother Earth, or Pachamama, the earth goddess and creator of all in the indigenous Aymara tradition. Now lawsuits can be brought claiming damages to Pachamama. The awareness is there, but the budget is not sufficient to the task, and enforcement will be hard to obtain. For instance, there are no laws in Bolivia against dumping trash on land or water. Just below our home is a dirty river called Choqueyapu, which is officially dead. Apparently 200,000 gallons of urine are dumped into it annually, along with 160,000 tons of excrement and tons of toxic waste from factories. The stench is overwhelming as we walk to the bus stop beside its foamy chocolate-colored waters. There are no leash laws and dog excrement is a part of sidewalk life, which adds to the runoff. We saw some laughing girls leaving an automotive business with a huge bucket which they dumped into the rushing waters without a care.

There are few private cars in La Paz, but many private minibuses which traverse the city constantly. This reduces smog and traffic though the buses themselves create major traffic jams and their emission controls are minimal. Littering is ubiquitous.



Not Pachamama, but another indigenous masked figure



 

On the other hand, the carbon footprint of most Bolivianos is tiny. Imagine the impact of not using any heat between March and December, of course no air conditioning, no hot tap water and just a little electric heater for shower water. No clothes dryers, hardly any plane travel and few cars. Bolivians are acutely aware of the climate changes that have taken place in recent years, as they have lost 30% of their glaciers in the last 20 years, according to a Quaker environmental conference we attended.



So it appears that in most parts of the world the pollution is right under our feet, whereas in the so- called developed world, we create our pollution miles away from where we live, in our coal mines, our jet streams and our meat factories.







Traveling by bus from Cochabamba to La Paz

Bus travel through Bolivia means mountains. Not just the trip down from the Cordillera to Coroico, the so called “death road”, called the most dangerous road in the world. Every trip in western Bolivia where we are involves climbing impossible roads up through the mountains with breathtaking views. Right now we are on the well-traveled route from Cochabamba to La Paz. We are inching along behind a 16-wheeler. It is an 8-hour trip, and the second driver is sleeping down below in the sleeping berth, awaiting his turn to drive. We are upstairs, on the second story. The higher level adds to the drama and the views. Evan is sitting in the front seat, perched over the front of the bus. We pass tiny villages of sheep farmers, whose mud brick houses with thatched roofs hug the hillsides. Families are out carrying water and watching their herds. Some have put their laundry out to dry on the rocks: enormous pollera skirts making a huge smile, matching petticoats, and handwoven blankets with earth tones and geometric patterns. The mountain ranges stretch out to the horizon in all directions. When we pass a town, little kids offer us soft drinks from their families’ stands. As the sun sinks behind the mountains, the houses blend into the rocks and the doors to the houses are all closed against the cool night air.

Machu Picchu and Potosí

Machu Picchu from above

The fields and Wayna Picchu

 

  



Perfectly aligned door and window (trapezoidal shape most stable)



Recently we’ve taken two tourist tours, and they represent the absolute opposites of human existence. At the heights of Machu Picchu, we saw the architectural, scientific and aesthetic accomplishments of the Inca civilization, in 15^th century Peru. On the very top of the most inaccessible mountains, Incan engineers erected huge stone dwellings, ceremonial spaces, and terraced fields. The city of Machu Picchu was perfectly located so as to maximize the northern sun. Part fortress, part city, access was controlled by the high mountain passes and intruders could be seen from far off. They had to walk the path in the hot sun, where their every movement would be observed by those in the city, and they had to pass through occasional guard houses where many soldiers could hide. The walkway is a good two meters wide, made of flat stones and steps that can be used to this day. Within the city, water channels brought clear running water underground into basins where jars could be filled, with benches for resting and observing the cool water. The channels run clear to this day.



Potosí, the largest mining city of Bolivia, was once the largest city in the Americas, with 800,000 inhabitants in 1574. When New York was still Dutch, the Spanish ruled Potosí and worked the Bolivian miners to death churning out silver, riches which are still on display in churches all over Spain but especially in Toledo and in the Escorial, the palace built by Phillip II as a monument to the Spanish monarchy.

Current day Potosí may be the saddest place I have ever visited. Worse even than the Lakota reservation in South Dakota, with its evil liquor stores just outside the reservation, run by non-Indians. Potosí is garbage-strewn streets, where stray dogs and people work at night in the cold wind to find a few items of value. Potosí is 16^th century Spanish buildings gone derelict with graffiti on their facades, and children of miners hawking pretty stones in the central square.  While the settlers in North America simply killed the indigenous people living there, the Spanish settlers in Bolivia worked them to death mining minerals to bring back to Spain.

Reaching the mouth of the mine, the wagon went off its track

The mine is still the biggest employer in town, and a mine tour is offered to tourists as a way to experience a small part of the horrific conditions that still reign in the mines.  We entered the mountain through a muddy hole no more than five feet tall. As we were led into the depths of the mountain, we brushed against walls furry with asbestos, gleaming with bits of zinc and silver, dripping with brown and yellow liquids. Occasionally we needed to move aside as men came by us pushing wagons filled with stone, one ton each. Three men pushed and hauled each wagon along the track, uphill and down, to reach the mouth of the mine and dump it over the cliff into the slag heap below. No mules or trucks were used inside the mine: men are the beasts of burden. To get through their day, they drink grain alcohol and chew enormous mouthfuls of coca leaves. Having been drilled through for over four centuries, the mountain is in imminent danger of collapse. And yet men choose to enter the mines, in the hopes of gaining a living, and with the dream of finding a large vein and making a fortune.

Potosí was the raw grinding of poverty against idle wealth and oppression. The whole city appeared like a slag heap, with most items of value long since gone, where the citizens continue to work centuries later to find a few crumbs. Over the centuries of the Spanish occupation of Bolivia, it is estimated that nine million Bolivians died in the mines, though no memorial has ever been built. The sadness of the past hangs over the present like a dense fog.