If you spend time on Lake Titicaca, you have the opportunity to experience one of Bolivia’s most serene and beautiful sights. As fisherfolk pull their nets out from the depths of the water, totora boats with their majestic sails and bows adorned with proud animal faces skim across the surface, taking their passengers on adventures across the world’s highest navigable lake. Much activity happens on this water, but below is an ecology all its own, with species of fishes and aquatic animals only found there, swimming in and out of legends of lost cities and civilizations believed to be submersed below the waves.
Our writer Julia McGee-Russell travelled to Huatajata, on the road to Copacabana, to work alongside master builder Máximo Catari, to learn the craft of reed boat building. For centuries, residents here have used these techniques to build vessels of all sizes to traverse the lake, providing opportunities for trade and exploration. These living practices continue to be passed on today, and offer a way to dig deep into the culture and history of the area.
In this issue of Bolivian Express, we are exploring the theme of ‘Surfaces’. We are taking a wide look at initial appearances of this diverse country and examining the details that give it the colour and life it has when viewed from the outside. We are also digging deep to see what is below the surface, to understand the inner workings hidden from first glances – the history, the structures, and the motivations of the people that make everything here move and come to life.
We visit Oruro to experience the Diablada, one of the most popular dances of Carnaval, which gives the opportunity for the devil to come out from his subterranean domain to perform for the masses. We explore Bolivia’s historical heritage through unearthed and recovered artefacts and once-hidden cave paintings that provide a window to the ancient past. Bridging the past with the present, we visit Huanuni, a mining centre on the altiplano recently featured in the award-winning Bolivian film Viejo Calavera, to see for ourselves the place portrayed, and to understand the motivations of those involved in the film – the director as well as the stars and residents of the town itself.
There is much history in Bolivia below the surface, but exciting and deep changes are constantly making the country a new place year after year. We examine the new distances covered by new lines of the teleférico, the cable car system in La Paz and El Alto, that will allow residents of far reaches of the metropolis to reach the city centre in record time. And we look to the future through the vision of restaurateurs who are changing spaces, re-envisioning both physical surfaces and Bolivian cuisine to create new experiences for the gourmands in La Paz. We examine the very present struggle for wildlife conservation, particularly the protection of wild quirquinchos, or Andean hairy armadillos, whose hard shells are prized for their usefulness in making musical instruments and ornaments and for generally bringing good luck.
Initial impressions of Bolivia are astounding enough. Anywhere you go in this country you will see nothing but the amazing. From the jungles of the Beni to the high peaks of Illimani and Sajama, there is so much to explore here. And this includes the boats and their builders on the shores of Lake Titicaca. As you take in all Bolivia has to offer, don’t forget to dig, to look under the surface to see the true inner workings of this wonderful place. The stories you will find can only enlighten your senses and offer you the full Bolivian experience.
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Photo: William Wroblewski
The restaurant that welcomes everyone
‘I used to be a girl scout,’ Gabriela tells me. ‘We did a lot of camps, and I used to love cooking for everyone. I used to cook with my grandma too. . . I just fell more and more in love with it.’
The rustic appearance of the restaurant we are sitting in seems to be a reminder of Gabriela’s camping days, as are the bright yellow flowers on the hand-hewn wooden tables, which were crafted lovingly by the father of a staff member. Such home-made details, alongside large, eye-catching portraits of people enjoying their pasta (including a picture of a man amorously staring at the wheel of cheese clutched in his hands that made me smile) represents the values of Propiedad Pública: all are equal, all are welcome.
Propiedad Pública focuses on simple, delicious Italian dishes and fantastic cocktails. It is the creation of Gabriela Prudencio, a young chef under thirty who has worked in other popular restaurants in La Paz, including Gustu and vegan mainstay Red Monkey. She decided to open her own restaurant whilst working at Red Monkey, but her love of comforting Italian food began while working in an Italian restaurant in the United States. One of her best experiences at university in New York was sharing a meal with a large group of friends from different countries at the same table. It is the environment of sharing a table, of a cosy welcoming restaurant, that Gabriela believes in.
The idea of having a restaurant open to everyone as ‘Public Property’ solidified for Gabriela after seeing a sign on a cordoned-off plot of land in El Alto saying 'do not enter, private property’. ‘We wanted to create something that was the total opposite, somewhere where everyone was welcome, from every social class, from all cities, friends, family etc.,’ Gabriela explains.
Since the staff at Propiedad Pública is so important to Gabriela, she wants them to feel that it is their home. ‘If they weren't here, this whole thing wouldn’t work,’ she says. ‘It’s a job that requires everyone’s involvement.’ Her team works well together, moving around with orchestrated ease to plate up food, only stopping for an occasional joke. This does not diminish the work Gabriela puts in herself. She takes on every role, leading by example. Unbeknownst to me and my companions, Gabriela had served our table during a previous visit. When I returned, she still remembered my cocktail preferences.
‘We wanted to create somewhere where everyone was welcome, from every social class, from all cities.’ – Gabriela Prudencio
Cocktails at Propiedad Pública are sublime, with interestingly unexpected ingredient combinations such as passion fruit and coffee, or twists on the traditional, such as a kale mojito. On the menu you will find a balanced selection of pastas and salads, well-loved favourites and newer concoctions. I would unquestionably recommend the figs stuffed with light mascarpone cream for dessert, dipped in rich chocolate and sprinkled with orange peel.
‘You have to have a lot of passion for what you’re doing because it takes a lot of time, lots of personal time especially’ she says. ‘If I didn’t love it, I wouldn’t be able to do it. Bit by bit it will blossom.’
Although it takes enormous sacrifice and determination to open a restaurant, Gabriela is optimistic about the future of Bolivian gastronomy. ‘Our products and our food are regaining worth. We are seeing lots of restaurants that are rebranding Bolivian food in a very authentic way, so I think the time to start is right now.’
Gabriela prizes individuality in restauranteurs, telling me how she believes everyone should do things their own way, ‘putting their own personality into their work’. From her perspective, Propiedad Pública represents her as a person. ‘It is who I am and what I like,’ she says. Comparing her welcoming and genuine smile to the philosophy of her restaurant, I’d have to agree.
Photos: Nick Somers
A cinematic view of what lies beneath the mining communities of the altiplano
Huanuni is a small town in the altiplano, an hour’s drive from Oruro through the sparse, high-altitude countryside. Its main square is bright and colourful, with families eating ice-cream around a huge miner’s helmet statue in the center. Beyond the square, the entrance to the Huanuni Mine, the largest tin mine in Bolivia, can be seen at the top of the hill. And it is in this seemingly sunny orureño town that Kiro Russo’s new film, Viejo Calavera, is set. Yet in the film, we see no sun, nor colourful plazas. Russo’s modern and artistic film takes place in dark alleyways rife with drug and alcohol abuse, in the dark, cold nights of Huanuni’s rural surroundings and in the mine itself.
‘I feel very proud,’ says Julio César Ticona, who plays the protagonist in the film, looking down at the floor of the radio station in Huanuni. César plays the young and antisocial Elder Mamani, a young man who is forced to leave behind a life of hedonism, drugs, and alcohol to replace his recently deceased father in the mine at the age of 16. ‘I work in construction, and I’d never been so deep into the mine until we made Viejo Calavera,’ he admits. ‘I learned a lot about the miners and their work.’ But it is precisely this nuanced portrayal of Bolivian society and mining communities that has split public opinion over Russo’s new film so much.
‘There was a lot of criticism about why the film shows alcoholism and drug addiction, why not show the lives of miners, how hard they work, how they sacrifice themselves for the work they do,’ explains Narciso Choquecallata, who plays Francisco, Elder’s godfather. ‘The first time I saw it, I didn’t really understand it much. But after the second and third time, I began to understand what it was about, what it meant. It is about us, the miners from Huanuni; it shows some of the realities of living here in Huanuni – alcoholism, drug addiction. The reality is that inside of the mine, there are young people like that. So for me there is an important message in the film, especially for young people.’
The film takes place in Huanuni’s dark alleyways, rife with drug and alcohol abuse.
‘I know myself that the film isn’t particularly conventional, but it was all in the search of trying to find something Bolivian in cinema,’ says the film’s director, Kiro Russo, who won the best Latin American Film for Viejo Calavera at the Rio de Janeiro International Film Festival. In a country that some say doesn’t have a recognisable national cinematic identity, unlike other South American countries such as Argentina or Brazil, this can certainly be seen as an ambitious project.
But it wasn’t the miners that drew Russo to Huanuni, but rather the darkness of the mine. ‘I wanted to film in darkness. And it’s from that point that I began to understand that I had to film something about miners, no matter what,’ he says. ‘In every country, there are national icons, and one of the most important icons in Bolivia are the miners.’ However, perverting this iconic image of the miner and instead portraying grittier, rawer, and human characters, the film has certainly split public opinion here. ‘Bolivia has a lot of folklore, it could even be the country that has the most folklore in all South America, but folklore isn’t culture, and this is what people here fail to recognise,’ says Russo.
The inhabitants of Huanuni themselves, seeing their own town and an uncomfortable depiction of their lives represented on screen, also had problems accepting this very contemporary, expositional and dark film. ‘Many people didn’t understand why I was showing drunk people, why wasn’t I showing people dancing, the main square. And I think it’s because here people are used to understanding culture as folklore, and when you don’t give them folklore, people think it's odd,’ expands Russo.
Understandably, creating such an avant-garde and consciously artistic project whilst living together with its subjects presents its own obstacles. ‘Apart from making the film itself, living alongside these people was incredible, it was the best,’ Russo says, who started conceiving the idea of the film and making regular trips to Huanuni in 2009. Many people in the town distrusted the cameras, permits to grant filming in the mine took over a year to obtain, and good friends made over the years visiting Huanuni had to be cut from the film due to a lack of theatrical talent. Yet, the effort of using amateur actors and legitimate miners from the town gives the film an authenticity that may not have been achieved otherwise.
‘It was the first time I’d ever acted, so at first it was difficult,’ explains César. ‘Getting comfortable in front of the cameras in those first scenes wasn’t easy, but gradually I got used to it.’
Sometimes in the street people shout “Hey calavera!”But I’ll carry on just being me.’
—Narciso Choquecallata
Another huge risk was the set itself, a Bolivian tin mine where accidents and death coexist with the quotidian. Tragedy is so commonplace, in fact, that the title itself – Spanish for ‘Dark Skull’ – refers to death; interestingly, calavera also translates to a hedonist, a clear parallel to the film’s main character and its principal themes. Death and injury feature in the film, the catalyst of the narrative being the death of Elder’s father and Elder himself almost falling victim to a mining accident later on in the film. César explains, ‘The most difficult part was when I have an accident in the mine, I fall and I’m shouting, “Help! Help! Godfather!”’ He also recalls the generally difficult shooting conditions. ‘It was really loud,’ he explains. ‘There was dynamite and machinery, and we had to wear earplugs sometimes. There was a lot of dust, too.’
With such a flagship Bolivian film casting a spotlight on the humble town of Huanuni, it's impossible not to wonder what the impact of such a project might be on its participants. Choquecallata says with a smile, ‘It hasn’t changed my life at all. I’m still the same person, maybe except from the fact that I’m slightly more popular around here. Sometimes in the street people shout, “Hey calavera!” to me, which obviously didn’t happen before. But no, I am who I was and I’ll carry on just being me.’
