The coca leaf is perhaps the most indelible symbol of Bolivia: iconic, recognizable, simple. But within its image lies millennia of history and unknown depths of energy and power. Cultivated in the Andes since at least the period of the Tiwanaku – predating the Inca Empire – the coca plant has been employed for a variety of uses, including as a stimulant, an appetite suppressant and as an anesthetic. It is prepared as a tea, applied to wounds and most famously chewed in the mouths of workers of all walks of life here.
Playing such a key role in many societies over centuries, coca is venerated as a sacred plant, and has purpose beyond its biological and medical uses. Yatiris, or shamen, incorporate coca leaves into their practices in many ways. They are spread around in sacred ceremonies and ch’allas, or blessings. Yatiris ‘read’ coca leaves to tell the fortunes of believers. And the leaf is reduced to its essence to make extracts.
It is no wonder that the coca leaf plays a special role in Bolivia’s spiritual, social and economic spheres. It has driven civilizations to greatness, and has enlivened the spirits of their countless inhabitants, as it does today. At the core of this importance is the leaf’s ability to store and give life to those who engage with it. In Bolivia, the coca leaf is more than a symbol, it is the single most potent giver of enduring vitality.
The spirit of the coca leaf resides in many corners of Bolivian society. Similar energising forces which enliven the spirit and bring people together, can be found in other facets of day-to-day Bolivian life. In this issue of Bolivian Express, we explore vitality through the stories of people filled with power and life, from Aymara cholitas scaling the heights of Bolivia’s highest mountains to dancers taking their improvisational movements to the street. La Paz’s famous zebras show us ways to imbue city streets with positive energy, and Korean immigrants and volunteers tell us how they are becoming part of Bolivian society to do good works. We celebrate big advances made for Bolivia’s transgendered community, we also learn about objects and foods filled with the powers to enliven, including Bolivian spirits and the variety of items, old and new, sold at La Paz’s famous Witches Market. Bolivia is known for a number of ‘superfoods’, and we explore their local origins and uses to provide healthy sustenance to people here and abroad. And we dive into the collective national promotion of Vivir Bien, or ‘Living Well’, an abstract idea turning into a tangible, measurable metric for creating and maintaining balance and wellbeing for all of Bolivia’s citizens.
Bolivia is a place with its own kind of energy, its own vibrance. As is the case with every issue of this magazine, here we offer stories that show this beauty in many different ways. We want to show you, the reader, that the same enduring spirit that inhabits the coca leaf also resides in the people, places and things that call this country home. And we hope that you see Bolivia as a place that can be described as, above all, vital.
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Photo: María Mayböck
A Peek Into the Past Through Milky Eyes
They are almost invisible, unless they are part of our families. But the elderly are still a force to be reckoned with. They are many, they are opinionated. They are a fountain of knowledge, possessing a wealth of experience that can only come with age and time.
‘I think a positive aspect of my age is experience,’ says Celeste Pérez Mercado, 82, sitting in her daughter’s living room. ‘I think not one day passes in life in which one does not learn something new. It may be minimal, but every day teaches us something.’ The lines on her face dance when she laughs or lovingly reprimands the family dog. ‘¡Afuera! ¡A la cocina!’ Celeste shouts at the perro. The tea in front of Celeste grows cold as she reminisces about her childhood, days spent climbing trees and crossing rivers – even escaping death, like when she tested the theory of electricity by submerging her hand in a tub of water that was being heated by an electric device. ‘I believe I have been accompanied by divine help all my life because I have lived through situations in which I should have died,’ she says. ‘But I didn’t!’
Javier Torres is 65. He sits on a bench, white hair sneaking out under his blue hat, his green fleece sweater zipped up to all the way to his chin. But as he starts speaking, his face lights up and a youthful, eager attitude takes hold of him. To Javier, the past is the center of his work and studies. ‘I live in Bolivia. I have my Bolivian identity, but I do not feel Bolivian,’ he says, before launching into an exegesis of his grand theory of Andean genealogy and botany: the indigenous genetic modification of the potato, and a 13,000-year-old human footprint found in Bolivia, which could potentially disprove Darwin’s theory of evolution. ‘I am in love with my ancestor’s work,’ says Javier, as he catches his breath just to introduce yet another theory about those ancestors’ discoveries.
‘I believe I have been accompanied by divine help all my life.’
—Celeste Pérez Mercado, 82
Not all memories are sweet, however, and not everyone can look back nostalgically. With experience, inevitably, comes disappointment, frustration and pain. Julio Sevilla Mencia spends his days in a tent on El Prado, camping out to seek justice and raising awareness of the Bolivian government’s human-rights violations in the 1970s. ‘I used to make shoes,’ he says of his youth. ‘I was left without work, without nothing. I was tortured. They pulled off my fingernails. I was shot in my leg here. Scars here in my shin, my collarbone,’ he says. ‘This is why we are here. Waiting for there to be cooperation … But unfortunately this government does not want to listen.’
‘Are you married or single?’ repeats Arsof Puente Ervas, 99. He is a robust man with a black moustache, strong political opinions and a confident temper. ‘I feel young. I dance, I play the piano … I will make you dance!’ he exclaims. He is sitting in the patio of the ‘San Ramón’ assisted-living home in Achumani. Arsof repeats certain anecdotes and similar questions over and over again, but he is far from a boring conversationalist. Still, will he once forget that his daughter has an almacén in Obrajes, or that his third wife lives in Valle Grande? Memory can be fragile and let us down as age creeps up on us.
Carlos Venturini Sandalio Herrera sits on a bench, slightly slanted to one side, yet he never falls over. ‘Sometimes I feel like a heavy rock, sometimes as light as cotton,’ he says. At 89, his speech is soft and slow; his hair a pure white; his gaze fixed on something in the distance as he searches for the name of his disease, Parkinson’s. When talking about his former job as a carpenter, his hands seem to remember better than his words as he mimics the motion of sanding wood.
‘Sometimes I feel like a heavy rock, sometimes as light as cotton.’
—Carlos Venturini Sandalio, 89
Growing old isn’t always graceful. It requires acceptance: of years gone by, of limited physical ability, of life as it is – and also of death. But there’s also hope, oftentimes in future generations. ‘Happiness came in the form of my children,’ says Arsof. ‘In that moment, I felt like the happiest man alive. Why? Because I was able to give them their profession. And I told them: Now you are this, son; you are that. Now you have your whole life in front of you. Mission accomplished.’
Photo: Alexis Galanis
The Challenges of Measuring Living Well
‘This is the challenge of our generation,’ states Simon Yampara, a leading Aymara sociologist, speaking at the presentation of his new book Suma Qama Qamaña. And yet, as I listen to Yampara and his fellow academics discuss Suma Qama Qamaña and Vivir Bien (Living Well) at the Universidad Mayor de San Andrés (UMSA) in central La Paz, I look around and notice that I, a young Englishman who has spent all but two weeks in Bolivia, am the only person under the age of 30 in the room, aside from Ecuadorian thinker Atawallpa Oviedo’s infant child.
When Javier Medina comes to the podium, he begins by saying that he had prepared a talk to explain the concept to university students, but there are none in the room. It comes as both a surprise and a monumental disappointment to the panel. Plenty of engaged listeners, yes, but an entire generation, the generation who are to take this challenge forward, absent.
‘Living Well’ is the guiding principle and the ultimate goal of the Plurinational State of Bolivia since its symbolic foundation in 2009. The recognition of Bolivia’s plurinational status, of its diverse cultural, linguistic and folkloric traditions, has prompted a rediscovery of a worldview lost under the rubble of five hundred years of colonization. Like the complex mosaic of Bolivian identity, Suma Qama Qamaña is a complex network of Aymara-Quechua thought, translated to Vivir Bien.
That translation, however, is no simple process. Medina, who has been a key figure in the construction of ‘Living Well’, underlines the difficulty of applying this philosophy to State policies. ‘Suma Qama Qamaña is a world view which cannot be expressed in Spanish [...] The West does not have the capacity to express its complex ideas, its semantic networks,’ Medina says.
So in the transition from Suma Qama Qamaña to ‘Living Well’, we are sure to lose something. In its most basic terms, Suma Qama Qamaña is a system of dualities, balance and reciprocity with Pachamama. But what does Pachamama really mean? Pa – two, cha – energy, ma – one, ma - one. Not simply ‘Mother Earth’, but the world conceived as a dual-plane of energies. On one side, Japhalla Siqi, the spiritual plane. On the other, Yänaka Siqi, the material plane. ‘Living well,’ Medina claims, ‘is what results when these energies meet and find balance.’
Colonization, capitalism, globalization and Western thought have unsettled the balance, accentuating the material plane and all but casting aside the spiritual plane. ‘We need to restore the balance between these two energies,’ Medina says. ‘This is the challenge of humanity.’ This is not just about ‘Living Well’. It’s about decolonizing thought on a national scale. ‘Living Well,’ he adds, ‘is not absolute, but changes according to context; it’s relative to each individual.’
Ethereal, abstract and entirely subjective, what does all this mean in concrete terms? Can it mean anything in concrete terms? ‘Living Well’ is defined by the state as ‘a philosophy that values life, seeks a balance with oneself and others, an individual and collective well-being, promoting respect and the harmonious coexistence between mankind and nature’. It is intended to offer an alternative model to economic development, precisely encouraging ‘living well’, as opposed to ‘living better’, the individual pursuit of prosperity and success – the model of capitalism, the model of the ‘American Dream’.
This vision, though firmly entrenched in Andean ideology, is not an entirely novel concept. In the small Eastern state of Bhutan, traditional measures of national development have been rejected in the belief that ‘Gross National Happiness (GNH) is more important than GDP’. This famous quote from Bhutan’s former king, Jigme Singye Wangchuck, has served as the country’s guiding principle since 1972. In 2005, it became a new metric to measure national development.
Conceived as a model to promote Bhutan’s culture and spiritual values, GNH has called into question the very role of the State. What’s more important, moral and ethical guidance or economic development? The broad narrative paints a pretty picture: rejecting traditional economic measures of development and prioritizing environmental, cultural and even spiritual concerns. But is it realistic in practice? Can concepts like human happiness, self-worth and emotional stability truly be measured in any meaningful way?
Concrete statistics from Bhutan only add to our doubts. In a 2012 UN study of global happiness, Bhutan ranked 84th out of 157. Additionally, Bhutan is among the top 20 countries with the highest suicide rates in the world. But does this totally discredit the metrics of happiness, or rather suggest an injudicious application of those metrics in its policies? That’s up for debate.
Fast forward to 2016 in Bolivia. Seven years on from the establishment of the plurinational state, it is clear that the implementation of ‘Living Well’ has yet to be successfully realized. What now then? Follow Bhutan.
The National Institute of Statistics (INE), together with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the World Bank, is in the process of creating indicators to measure ‘Living Well’. It feels like a step in the right direction, from a vague idealist discourse to a metric used to guide policy. But can ‘Living Well’, the balance of the two planes of energy of Pachamama, really be measured? ‘Yes, we think so,’ answers Ana Maria Durán of INE. What about broader ideas of happiness or spirituality? ‘Yes,’ she says.
Durán explains that Bolivia has learned from the Ecuadorian ‘Buen Vivir’, which she deems unconvincing. ‘Their model seems to me to be based largely on an individual’s use of time. I think we are on the right path, we have advanced the idea.’ Rather than just time use, the Bolivian ‘Living Well’ encompasses ‘knowing’, ‘feeling’, ‘being’ and ‘doing’. But isn’t that even harder to measure?
Perhaps sensing my enduring scepticism, she hands me a booklet outlining the process of the construction of the ‘Living Well’ metric. Almost immediately some of my reservations dissipate. Models developed from Aymara-Quechua numerical systems define and categorize – according to dual-energy plane of Pachamama – the nine qualities of ‘Living Well’: being, learning, relationships, nourishment, working, enjoyment and rest, loving and being loved, dreams and aspiration, communicating.
Each of these nine qualities come with a set of ‘demands’, 49 in total. Next February, a nationwide survey will ask questions based on these demands. The results of these questions will create a collective score for each quality, each of which has a relative weight in the aggregate metric of ‘Vivir Bien’. The metric, Durán assures me, will be used to guide social, economic and environmental policies.
While the metric is undoubtedly well-planned, no degree of preparation can ever overcome its restrictions. Since ‘Living Well’ is relative to each individual, its qualities cannot be objectively quantified with accuracy, especially once we recognize its spiritual and intangible elements.
Will the inherent limitations of the metric render it completely useless, or will it be able to provide meaningful results? It is difficult to know at this stage. Regardless, the State’s aims of decolonization and social harmony will not only depend on the metric itself, but also on the engagement of the people, on instilling the principles that underpin this philosophy. The challenge of a generation, of humanity...
‘What legacy do we want to leave our children, our grandchildren?’ asks Yampara, as a final thought at the presentation. At that moment, Atawallpa Oviedo’s son noisily bounds on to the stage with youthful exuberance and goes to sit on his father’s lap. A poignant moment. Tragic or heartening? Only time will tell.
Photo: Toby Clyde
The changing products of the Witches Market
The name, El Mercado de las Brujas or the Witches Market, does little to accurately describe the bustling medicine and ritual trade just off Plaza San Francisco. In reality, the market is constantly changing to meet the demands of modern life and tourism as well honouring ancient practice. Here are a few products that embody this diversity – some new this year, some older than the streets on which they are sold.
Feto de Ilama
If tourists remember anything from their time in La Paz, it is the dessicated and blackened llama fetuses, or feto de llama, whose brooding gaze gives the stalls much of their unearthly aura. An ancient and important offering to Pachamama, these fetuses usually come from accidental miscarriages. But the increased demand, suppliers have been known to use sheep instead, elongating their necks to pass them off as the bona fide product.
Dulces
Brightly coloured sugar tablets called dulces are household offerings that cover just about any need. Older designs meet elemental human demands. The sun opens the way for new projects, so it is often packaged with other sweets. Pachamama doesn’t begrudge specificity, it seems, and new sweets like the dollar reflect how these offerings continue to be an important feature of daily life.
Polvo
In the market, special polvos, or powders (often from Venezuela) come in all sorts of packages promising to do everything from improving your sex life to building muscle. A ‘new and improved formula’, Polvo Del Dominio, guarantees dominion over your lover if applied daily to ‘intimate areas’. Although it is a popular and established product, the shopkeeper confesses to having no idea what the powder actually contains.
Maca
Known as Viagra from the Andes, maca is a root vegetable that is a new addition to the market. Natural, energising and rich in protein, maca is boiled for a useful boost, particularly to the older gentleman. It also reflects the extensive trade circuit throughout Bolivia that keeps urban markets busy with new products and plants.
Stevia
A natural sweetener from the Yungas, stevia has become very popular, not just with locals but often with tourists. It has become a trendy, calorie-free alternative to sugar and together with hojas de coca sells well to the health-conscious visitor.
Hercampuri
The sale of herbs to treat everyday ailments has always been central to the market, and packaged versions are now readily available. Billed as ‘from the age of the Incas’, hercampuri provides a complete body cleanse to treat conditions like diabetes and obesity. It even comes with a number to call in order to satisfy your hercampuri needs.
Thanks to Professor Lynn L. Sikkink at the University of Colorado; Milton Eyzaguirre at the Museo Nacional de Etnografía y Folklore; and Natalia Mamau Castuo, a local shop keeper for their help and expertise.
