There is an old Aymara folktale about two thieves, a Fox and a Monkey. Throughout their adventures, the Fox falls prey to the Monkey’s many ruses, often leading him close to death. One night a very angry Fox, fed up with his partner’s tricks, finds the Monkey on a riverbank, under the moonlight, eating cheese. The Monkey gives the Fox the rest of his cheese, which he quickly eats. When asked where he stole the cheese from, the Monkey points to the moon’s reflection in the water and says, ‘There's the rest of the cheese, brother.’ And the Fox, always taking the Monkey at his word and always hungry for more (SPOILER ALERT!) dives into the river and drowns.
Light is a funny thing. It is often associated with the security and safety of what is known. An illuminated environment is one we can understand, while a lack of light can be menacing – just ask any miner working in the mountains of Oruro and Potosí. But light is also playful, as anyone who has traversed the Salar de Uyuni can attest, particularly when there is a smooth sheen of water covering the white expanse with glitter and glare.
A common use for the word or idea of ‘light’ is to bring forth something. Perhaps the most prevalent use is in the expression ‘to shine a light on’, or to reveal details or the truth.And in a much more intimate way, ‘dar a luz’ is the common way to say ‘to give birth’ in Spanish.
As in the case of the Fox and the Monkey, light can play tricks. It can provide false truth, it can fool the eye. In our folktale, the Fox believed the moon reflected on the riverbed was not what it was, but that it was a desirable piece of cheese. Disastrous as this was for the Fox, these deceptions are what can make light fun. It is a complex force we both use and contend with, and we know the world would not be possible without it.
In this issue of Bolivian Express, we look at ‘light’ in a variety of ways, from the literal to the metaphorical. Our journalists took to the streets, cameras in hand, to capture the ways in which light dances with the landscape to create everyday visual spectacles. After all, photography is light, as many photographers told us. The same goes for cinema, whether delivered in a theatre on film or streamed to a laptop – light is the key component in the creation and dissemination of images. We looked at artists who are playing with light to create intense sensory experiences. And we learned from the miners and fishermen who spend unusual amounts of time doing their work in the cover of darkness.
As a metaphor, light is useful in the formation of phrases and the development of ideas (think: ‘see the light’). We wrote about various methods of enlightenment, both intellectual and spiritual, and also how convicts in Bolivian prisons are preparing for their lives ‘in the light of day’.
In his article In the Arms of the Moon Goddess, writer Nikolaus Cox outlines the importance the moon has on both the residents and visitors to Isla de la Luna, on Lake Titicaca. This is a place where different cultures for millennia have been finding solace, strength and meaning under the canopy of the moonlight. This island holds on its shores a history of light that is as profound as it is ancient.
Too bad for our friend the Fox that he did not see the moon for what it truly is.
But again, that is what makes light so interesting. In its role to clarify and reveal, sometimes it can only confound, confuse and amaze.
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A world without light: terrifying for all, unimaginable for most, a daily reality for the miners of Potosí. Inside the bocamina, there exists a darkness beyond the lack of sunlight. Workers face the threat of deadly stumbles, accidental explosions, and falling rocks. Lung-shrinking carbon monoxide and temperatures that range from boiling hot to freezing cold punish their bodies as they work for hours without rest or food.
Light and dark, night and day, life and death. Reality in the mines is ruled by extreme juxtapositions. Inside the mountain live two deities: Pachamama, or Mother Earth; and Tio, her “husband-to-be.” Tio knows many forms, and many faces. According to Antonio, our miner-turned-tour-guide, in every mine there can be ""three, four, five, more,’ statuettes that embody this figure. Once the miners descend into the dark, these dualistic deities determine their fate.
As we approach the mouth of the mine, Gustavo, the younger of our tour guides, explains that every job involving the boca mina has its dangers and its consequences. The miners take from the mines, just as the mine takes from them. ‘That's why we ask permission,’ he explains, as he drips 98% pure alcohol from a tiny bottle onto the ground at the entrance. This act, known as a Ch'alla, is a request to enter the mine and exit alive. Once for Pachamama, once for Tio, and once for the god above.
Slowly, boot by boot, we climb down long wooden ladders into the dark, following Antonio and Gustavo. Upon our descent, the world outside – its skies, its clouds, its sunshine – disappears. The low, rocky ceiling of the mine quickly consumes all light besides that of our headlamps. Our lungs writhe in the dusty, stale air. Blades of light catch the craggy, enormous rocks below. There is no way of telling how far we would fall, or if we would ever walk again.
Gustavo describes the mine as a house of ants, ‘una casa de hormigas.’ As we scurry behind him through twisting paths, down the narrow holes and up the rickety ladders, the metaphor surrounds us further. An ant is small and vulnerable. Inside the mine, so are we. In profound darkness, in extreme proximity to the rocks, we journey through endless tunnels, feeling like specks of dust in an impossible maze deep within the earth.
‘It’s time to reenact the movie, to be like Spider-Man’, Gustavo says, as he leads us in one direction, while Antonio leads the rest of the group in another. Immediately, we are nearly horizontal, scrambling higher towards another nivel of the mine, just like the superhero. As we struggle to keep hold on the rocks, Gustavo brings us to a gaping hole in the ground, a haunting abyss into which past miners have fallen. We peer down the hole, five or six levels into the mine, and light fades into darkness.
We tread on. High ceiling, low ceiling; squeeze past this and that. We arrive to the first Tio. The statuette smokes two cigarettes at once. He has bleach-white marbles for eyes, and a nose blackened from decades of chain-smoking. Littered around him are neon streamers, empty bottles of soda and beer, more coca leaves than one can count. We add more leaves to the pile and an offering of alcohol on top. Gustavo explains the reason for this: ‘No one can go into the mine, or take from it – even photos – without asking Tio for permission.’
On a normal day, one would see the mine, like an ant colony, crawling with miners. But today is Halloween, and there are few of them. We encounter one miner, who is just a boy. He smiles big, his mouth full of coca, when we hand him a two-litre bottle of cola. After visiting two other Tios and enduring the back-breaking boot-dance through tiny tunnels, we reached the largest, meanest Tio in the mine: Tio Jorge.
Red skin, curved horns, a massive erect penis. While the Tio resembles a stereotypically evil demon, for the miners, Tio Jorge is more than that. He allows them to remove the ore and grants a safe passage home. Tio is seen as benevolent. In fact, words such as diablo, ouija, and brujeria are strictly forbidden inside the mine. A figure of ‘dos caras,’ this dualistic spirit is both fatal and salvific for the miners, whose lives he determines.
The next time we see our guides, it is in quite a different environment. Ditching their overalls for sweaters and jeans, Antonio and Gustavo talk to us a world away from the depths they guided us through hours before. In this light, everything is more visible: gaunt faces, tired eyes, human emotions.
‘Every day, you think you are going to die,’ Antonio says, in brutal honesty. His father, a miner, never forced him or his brother to work in the mine. Yet, as is the reality for many youths of Potosí, necessity prevailed. ‘Mining, from my point of view, is a necessary evil.’
‘My brother told me, “you can work in the mines, if you’re ready to feel pain,”’ Gustavo remembers, who is also the son of a miner. He earned a grant to study in Potosí, but the high cost of university forced him underground. At the beginning, Gustavo worked long hours in brutal conditions; returning home in the evening to shower, eat three plates of food, and then go to university.
As tour guides, Antonio and Gustavo lament the psychological and physical impacts of their work. Though the miners may leave the mine, the mine will never leave them. 'I am partially happy, and partially sad,’ Antonio reflects. ‘Sad for my family members and companions in the mine. And sad for my lungs,' he says, in reference to silicosis: the pulmonary disease that miners contract through the inhalation of toxic particles below ground.
For miners, silicosis is the inevitable mal de mina that often shortens their life to no more than 35 or 40 years. 'We eat a lot, we drink a lot and still we can't put on weight,’ Gustavo explains. Before gauntness took to his face, it was much fleshier. More youthful.
'We have a human vision of tourism, not an economic one,’Antonio asserts. The goal is to tell the story of the mines through the lives of the people who work in them. 'The miner's hope,’ Gustavo adds, ‘is to leave the mine alive and be with his family.’ For the miners of Potosí, entering the darkness is the best way to bring light to their communities and families. Their work demands faith, endurance, and a willingness to die young. That is the measure of their sacrifice.
Photos Credits: Anna Grace & J.Q. Cooley
Lake Titicaca’s Millennia-Old Fishing Grounds
The sun has just risen, the sky is covered with a thin layer of clouds and Demetrio Maite Ramos is motioning for me to join him in his small rowing boat for the day’s fishing. Having emptied the boat of last night’s rainwater and cut back the totora reeds with a long knife-tipped stick in order to clear the way, we are ready to begin. Observing from the shore, my taxista is waiting patiently as we enter the lake.
The fisherfolk of Lake Titicaca are up before the sun, on the lake while the sky is still dark. For Ramos and his neighbours in the community of Sahuiña, a village near Copacabana, the workday begins around 5am, in order to provide the markets with a fresh supply of fish.
Each afternoon nets are put out, attached to floating plastic bottles. A day or two later the fishermen return and pull them out from the dark depths of the lake, revealing small fish such as ispi trapped in the net. Different nets have different-sized holes, each designed to catch a certain type of fish.
However, the most reliable source of income comes from trout, which are farmed in small netted enclosures, covered to protect them from greedy seagulls and wild storms which would otherwise release the trout into the lake. The netting has to be replaced approximately each month, as algae can build up and starve the fish of oxygen. Many of the small fish are fed to the trout after being blended with maize and flour.
Ramos has always been a fisherman, and tells me about the changes he has seen. ‘There aren’t many fish in the lake anymore’, he says, explaining that overfishing and climate change are partly responsible. Over the years the lake’s water has slightly warmed up due to climate change. As a result the water cannot hold as much dissolved oxygen, resulting in a decreased fish population. Both Bolivia and Peru have regulations to prevent overfishing, but they are not always respected.
‘It’s a loss for us,’ Ramos adds. He says that trout farms are now a more reliable source of income than free fishing. It means a shorter workday, leaving time to work on the land as well. For Ramos, afternoons are spent farming, and each of the 20 families in the village has a plot of land to grow potatoes, broad beans, maize and quinoa.
Pollution, which also affects Lake Titicaca’s fish population, is a complex problem with a variety of causes. These include industrial waste flowing in from the rivers, use of harmful pesticides and large quantities of mercury entering the lake, which originate from mining operations. Francisco Osorio, from the Institute of Ecology at the Universidad Mayor de San Andrés, explains that the pollution causes certain species of plant by the shore to grow much faster than others, reducing available light for other plants such as the totora reeds. These reeds provide an essential reproduction site for all the species of fish in the lake apart from trout which breed in rivers. ‘The natural coastal plants die, and so the reproductive habitat is lost’, Osorio explains. Recovering the lake, he says, is a long process which could take 30 years.
Litter is also a growing problem on the lake, much of it left by tourists and spread by the wind. This problem, however, is easier to tackle at a local level. Indeed, the community of Sahuiña cleans up the area each month, and all the village’s children are taught about the importance of not throwing litter on the ground.
For the community, the health of the lake is very important, and the people have a great respect for Pachamama, who keeps the balance of nature. Before the villagers begin to sow or fish, they always ask Pachamama for permission and make offerings of sweets and coca leaves.
As we row back towards the shore, the sun peeps out from behind the clouds, illuminating the beautiful fishing scene I have just experienced. I hope that in years to come this sun will light a healthy, non-polluted lake.
‘It’s a really beautiful lake’, Osorio says fondly, and as I look out over the shimmering waters, I would find it hard to disagree.
Thank you to our taxista Señor Javier Quispe Yavi, who took us to Sahuiña, and is available to provide minibus transport around Copacabana: 76251212 - 73550472
Photo Credit: William Wroblewski
Spiritual Enlightenment in Bolivia Can Take Many Different Paths
For centuries, people have sought spiritual enlightenment, yet finding a single definition of the term is difficult: finding a powerful light in life, becoming aware of a greater truth, or freeing oneself from an egocentric view of the world. Here in La Paz I have investigated three very different schools of thought and how they may – or may not – be paths to this holy grail.
Falun Dafa
Truthfulness, compassion and forbearance – these qualities are the foundation of the practice of Falun Dafa.
Also known as Falun Gong, Falun Dafa was first taught publicly in China in 1992 by Li Hongzhi. It combines ideas from Buddhist and Daoist beliefs with slow body movements, moderated breathing and meditation. Originally promoted simply as a set of exercises with no religious connotations so as not to provoke the Chinese authorities, the movement soon gained widespread popularity as people realised the power it had to change them as a person.
‘From the moment I started to practise, I had lots of energy’, recalls Glora Amparo Ambia Rebatta. ‘I could wash clothes until 12, one or two in the morning, willingly.’ Ambia began the practice 10 years ago, and now runs the only group Falun Dafa sessions in Bolivia, at the vegetarian restaurant Armonía in Sopocachi, which attracts around eight people each week. Ambia is convinced that it is possible to achieve spiritual enlightenment through the practice of Falun Dafa, and believes that there would be a tremendous tranquility and peace in society if everyone took it up.
The Chinese government would beg to differ. Threatened by the immense number of followers, it outlawed Falun Dafa in 1999. Since then, Ambia tells me that practitioners have been arrested and even tortured and murdered for their organs to be sold, though Chinese officials have denied the latter.
Yet Ambia remains undeterred in her practice, and is keen to leave Bolivian Express readers with a parting piece of advice: to observe ourselves truthfully and sincerely and not ignore our defects.
Seventh Day Adventist Church
When the first Adventist missionaries arrived in Bolivia from the United States in 1897, they were few and far between. Pioneers in teaching literacy and health to indigenous communities, the newly arrived Adventists were determined to live their lives in a way that would please Jesus who, they believe, did everything possible for our salvation.
Yet through these benevolent works, Adventists do not aspire to achieve spiritual enlightenment.
‘We believe that the only enlightenment is in the Bible’, explains Giovanny Izquierdo, president of the West Bolivia Mission, which covers the departments of La Paz and Pando. He goes on to tell me that only through faith, rather than the works we perform, can we achieve salvation.
From its humble beginnings in the 19th century, the Adventist Church in Bolivia became official around 1922, and since then has expanded across the country, now with 191 churches in the western section of the country and 97 in the cities of La Paz and El Alto alone.
The church has six doctrines separated into 28 beliefs. These cover the fundamental Adventist ideas, such as the belief in the imminent return of Christ, as well as encouraging Adventists to live healthy and wholesome lives, abstaining from alcohol and drugs. Each belief is backed by copious references to the Bible passages in which the ideas are expressed.
‘I’ve never drunk, never smoked’, Izquierdo tells me, ‘because my body belongs to God, so I care for my body.’ He explains that because of his healthy lifestyle he has only been ill twice in his life.
When asked what advice he would give to Bolivian Express readers, Izquierdo gives three: to believe in the Bible, to accept Jesus as our saviour and to live the lifestyle promoted by the Bible.
Philosophy
‘It changes your whole perspective of the world’, explains Dayme Paymal, a philosophy teacher at the Nueva Acrópolis Institute in Sopocachi. ‘It changes your perspective of your priorities, of who you are.’ She tells me that once you start asking questions and looking for answers, you change, because you can no longer ignore the things you used to ignore.
Nueva Acrópolis is a cultural, philosophical and social organisation founded in Argentina in 1957 that now hosts philosophy classes in over 50 different countries worldwide. It was introduced in Bolivia in 1981, with sites in La Paz and Santa Cruz, and offers philosophy courses at both beginners’ and advanced levels. Nueva Acrópolis is based on three principals: fraternity, knowledge and development.
Paymal believes that through philosophy we can reach spiritual enlightenment, though not in a religious sense. Philosophy allows us to find our spirit, which is timeless, unmovable and transcendent.
Each year, on the third Thursday of November, World Philosophy Day is observed, celebrating what Paymal describes as a human necessity, something that people will always search for. Whilst led by UNESCO, it belongs to anyone with an interest in philosophy. Paymal believes that if everyone in society learned philosophy, people would be happier and society much more efficient, as people would question traditions and practices.
Sincerely and with no elaboration, Paymal gives her one piece of advice for readers: to discover philosophy.
