As I will be returning to Belgium a bit later than expected, one last article to inform everyone of my last month in Iquitos and my plans before going home. As my time here is starting to run out at a dazzling rate, it seems more and more difficult to have a bit of time to rest. There are a lot of things I still wanted to do in my last weeks here, but unfortunately I’m forced to make choices. But off course it’s nice to always have a lot to do during the weekends, contrary to the time when I just arrived here and was even a bit bored at times.
One of the more remarkable celebrations I went to last month was the birthday party of Karelen, the cousin of a friend I met through CouchSurfing. As often here in Iquitos the party already started at midday with drinking beer in the typical local way, which means we only use one glass and a bottle of beer. You usually fill half of your glass and give the bottle to the next person; after finishing your glass you also give your glass etc. Problem is that in this manner you never really notice how much you’re drinking, but maybe this is one of the secrets why birthday parties always are that much fun here. Also the music is of great importance off course and it never takes much time before the whole of the house is filled with people dancing.
On the 23rd of August the same family also invited me to visit their little piece of land on the route to Nauta, the only place that is connected to Iquitos by road. After a long drive by motorcycle we had a pick nick there and in the afternoon we played volleyball. Despite the fact I didn’t play in a decade I managed to win one nuevo sol, although I have to admit it probably was thanks to my strong team, compromising of Karelen, her sister and her parents. Afterwards we all went to the river nearby to have a nice dive.
One of the more noteworthy events of last week happened Wednesday evening when I went to give a lesson in the artisanal school of Belén for a group of young women studying dressmaking. I was invited by the mother of one of my colleagues as she is teaching the class and is obliged to give one lesson in English, but she doesn’t speak the language herself. So she asked me to give a lesson in which I had to explain terms that are important when making clothes. Never thought I would be a teacher in dressmaking one day, but probably I made my grandmother very proud as I’m finally following her footsteps.
This Saturday we also made a nice trip to the nearby lagoon of Quistococha as a present to the children I help at the house of my colleague Jill. Every Tuesday and Thursday in the evening (usually from 7 until after 12 o’clock) and every Saturday in the afternoon I assist them in their homework and teach them a bit of history, geography or English. This time I went in the morning to finish the work they had for school and with Jill, her baby Jilliams and Sorana (who looks after Jilliams and the household for Jill) and her children (her oldest daughter Samantha is one of my students), we took off to Quistococha. There they have a little park with the typical animals living in the Peruvian rainforest and a bathing place where we spent the rest of the afternoon. In the evening we all had a nice dinner at the house of Jill and we ended the day in another typical Peruvian way, namely watching some television. Remarkably was that we watched a documentary about the Holocaust and even Jill didn’t know about the extent of the horrors of the concentration camps. This also might help explain why I know two people by the name of Hitler in Iquitos.
This Tuesday was a bit less joyful as I had to say goodbye to the children of the children’s house Arco Iris. They gave me a nice goodbye however and all the children of my group had made beautiful cards that I can take with me to Belgium to remind me of all of them. Hopefully I can visit them again in the future to see how they’ll grow and continue studying well in the great environment Arco Iris has created for them.
The end of my stay in Iquitos is coming very close, but there’s no time to take it easy now as another big event is coming. Friday and Saturday our association will organize a two-day forum in Iquitos, together with our partners of Solsticio Perú. During the forum different problems concerning the Peruvian rainforest will be discussed with many invited guests, representing the regional government, petroleum institutions, indigenous organizations, NGO’s, etc. Sunday will be my final goodbye from this wonderful city as I will give a party in Jill’s house and on Monday afternoon I have my flight to Lima.
This isn’t the end of my stay in Peru however as I will still have one week to visit Trujillo and Lima. Upon arriving in the Peruvian capital I’ll try to catch the night bus to Trujillo where I’ll stay three days and will try to visit the historic centre of the Chimú civilization, Chan Chan. Afterwards I have four more days in Lima before I finally return to Europe the 15th of September. I won´t immediately return to Belgium however, as I’ll be landing first in Madrid and will have the honour of being guided through Castile and Léon by Inés for no less than nine days. Most of you can expect a spoken report of my travels after the 25th of September, when I’ll be flying back to Belgium from Valladolid.
Bye and maybe ‘till soon!
Jeroen
Thursday, 3 September 2009
Monday, 3 August 2009
Poco de Nada
It’s only a month and a half more before I’ll be returning to Belgium, so this might well be the last article I will write before seeing everyone back, as I’ll then be able to tell all my Peruvian adventures in person. Most important personal event of last month was the visit of my parents during my two weeks of holiday, which gave me the opportunity to travel a bit through Peru with my family. After a week in a jungle lodge near Iquitos, located on the Tamshiyacu River, another tributary of the Amazon, we went one week to the south of Peru to visit Cuzco, the Sacred Valley of the Incas and off course Machu Picchu. Especially the visit to the ruins of Machu Picchu was a wonderful experience. Not only to admire the great building skills of the inhabitants of the Inca Empire, but also because of the breathtaking environment where the ruins are located. Also Cuzco is very beautiful city, with a very relaxed atmosphere despite the many tourists. The architecture however is greatly Spanish, as the conquistadores destroyed everything that could remind of the great Inca culture. The Catholics also found it necessary to destroy all of the Inca temples and to replace them by Christian churches. Finally all art was destroyed as it was considered idolatry.
Also in Iquitos everything is going great. Besides my parents also a friend of mine who was travelling in Peru made a visit. I arranged for him to stay in the house of a colleague and he seemed to really enjoy his time here as he was planning to be here only a few days but in the end stayed almost two weeks. When my parents arrived he was still in the city, so he, together with a few colleagues, helped me to prepare a ceviche (a typical seafood dish with a lot of lemon juice and onion) for my family and colleagues. We also went all together for a dance at El Pardo where my parents managed to impress the crowd with their salsa skills.
The day after I returned from Cuzco I used my last free day to visit the village of Santa Victoria, a bit downstream the Amazon River, where the mother of Marina is working as a teacher. In the afternoon we went with a few friends to Santo Thomas, a beautiful situated village just outside Iquitos, where we went for a swim in the Nanay River.
It is one week now that I’m working again and most important event on the working front is without any doubt the end of the education of Tomás to become a nurse. This Saturday he had to defend his thesis in front of a jury and after this the formal decision was made to give Tomás his final degrees. Afterwards we went with all the members of vzw Putumayo and the people of the jury to a restaurant to celebrate the successful conclusion of three years of hard work by the first Peruvian Secoya to receive a degree in advanced studies. Finally he’ll be able to return to his village to use his skills for the benefit of his people and to see his wife and three children again who were eagerly awaiting his return.
Chau,
Jeroen
Also in Iquitos everything is going great. Besides my parents also a friend of mine who was travelling in Peru made a visit. I arranged for him to stay in the house of a colleague and he seemed to really enjoy his time here as he was planning to be here only a few days but in the end stayed almost two weeks. When my parents arrived he was still in the city, so he, together with a few colleagues, helped me to prepare a ceviche (a typical seafood dish with a lot of lemon juice and onion) for my family and colleagues. We also went all together for a dance at El Pardo where my parents managed to impress the crowd with their salsa skills.
The day after I returned from Cuzco I used my last free day to visit the village of Santa Victoria, a bit downstream the Amazon River, where the mother of Marina is working as a teacher. In the afternoon we went with a few friends to Santo Thomas, a beautiful situated village just outside Iquitos, where we went for a swim in the Nanay River.
It is one week now that I’m working again and most important event on the working front is without any doubt the end of the education of Tomás to become a nurse. This Saturday he had to defend his thesis in front of a jury and after this the formal decision was made to give Tomás his final degrees. Afterwards we went with all the members of vzw Putumayo and the people of the jury to a restaurant to celebrate the successful conclusion of three years of hard work by the first Peruvian Secoya to receive a degree in advanced studies. Finally he’ll be able to return to his village to use his skills for the benefit of his people and to see his wife and three children again who were eagerly awaiting his return.
Chau,
Jeroen
Tuesday, 23 June 2009
Ki-na! Ki-na!
It’s once more two weeks that I couldn’t write on my blog, as last weekends had been very busy and also during the week it’s ever harder to have an evening on myself. On the 14th of June I took a boat to the frontier with Brazil and Colombia, as I don’t have a visa for Peru and I had to get out of the country before the 15th – during the trip to the Putumayo River we visited some Colombian villages, but there it’s not possible to get your passport stamped. The cheapest way to do this quickly is to take a fast boat that can get you to the border in about 10 hours. At 6 o’clock in the morning the boat left the port in Iquitos to follow the Amazon River to the Peruvian village of Santa Rosa. There you can take a small boat to cross the river to one of the twin villages of Leticia (Colombia) and Tabatinga (Brazil). I spent my two nights in a small hostel in Tabatinga, but you can easily walk from one village to the other without any formalities. Once more it was significant how Santa Rosa, on the Peruvian side, was a small village without cars and hardly any commodities, while Tabatinga and Leticia are very developed, with good roads and lots of cars and motorcycles. Also at the Putumayo River it was very clear that most of the money is to be found on the Colombian side.
In Iquitos the most significant event of last two weeks was the general strike that was held on Thursday the 11th of June in support of the indigenous peoples of the Peruvian Amazon. Strikes in Iquitos are generally started in proper way at midnight with a march through the streets. When it’s a worker’s strike usually the streets look like a war has passed the next day, as people start throwing around all they can find on the streets. This time however the people crossed the streets quietly holding candles to remember the victims of the violent clashes that had occurred in Bagua. Another march was organised during the day in the afternoon and attracted a huge crowd that filled the streets of Iquitos. Unions, universities, secondary schools and indigenous and other social organisations were all present and the march was concluded by speeches of indigenous leaders at Plaza 28 de Julio, the biggest square in the city.
At the office we’ve been mostly working on the legalization of the Board of Directors of OISPE and on the search of new markets to sell the artesanía of the Secoya communities. Also I started giving computer classes to the two new indigenous students that are staying in Iquitos, to prepare them for the moment they will have to make their first papers for university. Unfortunately it’s about three weeks now we’re waiting for the telephone company to come and install the internet connection at our new office, which isn’t making our work much easier.
Last weekend was dominated by festivities in the honour of Father’s Day and my birthday. On Friday afternoon, one of the days I went to help in the children’s house, classes were cancelled and a big barbeque was organized. After this the children were free to play and a tournament in both volleyball and football was organised. On Saturday morning I was invited to go with a small organization, founded by Marina and her friends to help young children in their studies, to visit a centre that’s working to protect the endangered manatees living in the Amazon basin. In the evening I had a first drink to celebrate my birthday and the next day we continued with another barbeque (a Peruvian weekend tradition), an original birthday cake (made from cookies, ice cream and wine) and even a few presents (which solved my ‘shortage of t-shirts’-problem).
Hasta la próxima,
Jeroen
In Iquitos the most significant event of last two weeks was the general strike that was held on Thursday the 11th of June in support of the indigenous peoples of the Peruvian Amazon. Strikes in Iquitos are generally started in proper way at midnight with a march through the streets. When it’s a worker’s strike usually the streets look like a war has passed the next day, as people start throwing around all they can find on the streets. This time however the people crossed the streets quietly holding candles to remember the victims of the violent clashes that had occurred in Bagua. Another march was organised during the day in the afternoon and attracted a huge crowd that filled the streets of Iquitos. Unions, universities, secondary schools and indigenous and other social organisations were all present and the march was concluded by speeches of indigenous leaders at Plaza 28 de Julio, the biggest square in the city.
At the office we’ve been mostly working on the legalization of the Board of Directors of OISPE and on the search of new markets to sell the artesanía of the Secoya communities. Also I started giving computer classes to the two new indigenous students that are staying in Iquitos, to prepare them for the moment they will have to make their first papers for university. Unfortunately it’s about three weeks now we’re waiting for the telephone company to come and install the internet connection at our new office, which isn’t making our work much easier.
Last weekend was dominated by festivities in the honour of Father’s Day and my birthday. On Friday afternoon, one of the days I went to help in the children’s house, classes were cancelled and a big barbeque was organized. After this the children were free to play and a tournament in both volleyball and football was organised. On Saturday morning I was invited to go with a small organization, founded by Marina and her friends to help young children in their studies, to visit a centre that’s working to protect the endangered manatees living in the Amazon basin. In the evening I had a first drink to celebrate my birthday and the next day we continued with another barbeque (a Peruvian weekend tradition), an original birthday cake (made from cookies, ice cream and wine) and even a few presents (which solved my ‘shortage of t-shirts’-problem).
Hasta la próxima,
Jeroen
Monday, 8 June 2009
La selva se desangra
News of the week is without doubt the violent clashes that erupted last Friday in the city of Bagua between Peruvian police and indigenous protesters. Since April the indigenous peoples of the Peruvian Amazon have been protesting against the exploitation of their ancestral territories without their consultation, which is against both Peruvian and international laws. For the first time the protests turned violent as armed police lifted a road blockade near Bagua in the region of Amazonas. During this operation more than 20 indigenous were killed and also 11 policemen lost their lives. For now however it’s impossible to have an accurate view on the number of victims, as there are still a lot of wounded people in the hospitals and the Peruvian government tries to minimize the number of indigenous victims. The biased Peruvian television only talks about the ‘heroic’ policemen that died in the violent clashes.
The great majority in Iquitos however agrees with the struggle of the indigenous peoples in the region to defend their rights. On Friday evening there was a gathering of people carrying candles at Plaza de Armas to remember the victims that died in Bagua and to show their support to the indigenous peoples and leaders. The same evening the arrest was ordered of the leader of the organization of indigenous peoples in the Amazon (AIDESEP) Alberto Pizango. He declared the violence to be a consequence of the aggression of police forces trying to lift the blockade, while the protest had been peaceful for almost two months now. The Peruvian government however views the protest as being manipulated by indigenous leaders, political opposition parties and also elements from other countries that try to destabilize Peru and its economy.
On Saturday about ten more policemen that were captured by the protesters died as forces moved in to try to liberate them. Again we have no news about the indigenous that were killed in this operation. The city of Bagua is now under complete control of the police, but for journalists it’s very difficult to enter the region to make a balance of the violence of those two days. It’s also hard to say how the situation will evolve now as the protests keep continuing and an agreement between indigenous leaders and the government now seems absolutely impossible. The conflict will certainly be of great importance in the speech opposition leader Ollanta Humala will give coming Thursday on Plaza de 28 de Julio. If it is not delayed, because today it was announced that on that day a national strike will be organised in support of the indigenous peoples.
News on the lighter side now, we’ve moved to a new office last week for a second time, as organisation of lawyers Solsticio Perú found a place we could share and were there is also the availability of four sleeping rooms. As we only have to pay half of the rent and now an indigenous student and I are living there instead of renting separate rooms, we can save a lot of money this way. And the place is actually a lot more beautiful and comfortable than where we used to stay, although the place is filled with an awful lot of kitsch.
Last week I also started working in a children’s house on Tuesdays and Thursdays to get out of my office from time to time. It’s very pleasing work to help the children to do their work from school from 3 till 5 in the afternoon and afterwards there’s also an hour to play with the children. As it’s a Dutch organization that is running the place I also had the chance to meet some Dutch volunteers working there. One of them is also a student working here for a few months and as she didn’t knew a lot of people in Iquitos till now, I already took her out a few times with my Peruvian friends. Last Thursday e.g. we went to an evening of Creole dances to celebrate the birthday of the university of Marina, a good friend who’s always prepared to take me somewhere with her motorcycle. One of the most fun parts of an evening out for me stays by the way cruising around in the city on the back of her motorcycle picking up all her friends before arriving at a dancing place or bar. And having her drop me off at my place again afterwards too off course.
Chau,
Jeroen
The great majority in Iquitos however agrees with the struggle of the indigenous peoples in the region to defend their rights. On Friday evening there was a gathering of people carrying candles at Plaza de Armas to remember the victims that died in Bagua and to show their support to the indigenous peoples and leaders. The same evening the arrest was ordered of the leader of the organization of indigenous peoples in the Amazon (AIDESEP) Alberto Pizango. He declared the violence to be a consequence of the aggression of police forces trying to lift the blockade, while the protest had been peaceful for almost two months now. The Peruvian government however views the protest as being manipulated by indigenous leaders, political opposition parties and also elements from other countries that try to destabilize Peru and its economy.
On Saturday about ten more policemen that were captured by the protesters died as forces moved in to try to liberate them. Again we have no news about the indigenous that were killed in this operation. The city of Bagua is now under complete control of the police, but for journalists it’s very difficult to enter the region to make a balance of the violence of those two days. It’s also hard to say how the situation will evolve now as the protests keep continuing and an agreement between indigenous leaders and the government now seems absolutely impossible. The conflict will certainly be of great importance in the speech opposition leader Ollanta Humala will give coming Thursday on Plaza de 28 de Julio. If it is not delayed, because today it was announced that on that day a national strike will be organised in support of the indigenous peoples.
News on the lighter side now, we’ve moved to a new office last week for a second time, as organisation of lawyers Solsticio Perú found a place we could share and were there is also the availability of four sleeping rooms. As we only have to pay half of the rent and now an indigenous student and I are living there instead of renting separate rooms, we can save a lot of money this way. And the place is actually a lot more beautiful and comfortable than where we used to stay, although the place is filled with an awful lot of kitsch.
Last week I also started working in a children’s house on Tuesdays and Thursdays to get out of my office from time to time. It’s very pleasing work to help the children to do their work from school from 3 till 5 in the afternoon and afterwards there’s also an hour to play with the children. As it’s a Dutch organization that is running the place I also had the chance to meet some Dutch volunteers working there. One of them is also a student working here for a few months and as she didn’t knew a lot of people in Iquitos till now, I already took her out a few times with my Peruvian friends. Last Thursday e.g. we went to an evening of Creole dances to celebrate the birthday of the university of Marina, a good friend who’s always prepared to take me somewhere with her motorcycle. One of the most fun parts of an evening out for me stays by the way cruising around in the city on the back of her motorcycle picking up all her friends before arriving at a dancing place or bar. And having her drop me off at my place again afterwards too off course.
Chau,
Jeroen
Thursday, 28 May 2009
Safe as Milk or: My Journey to the Putumayo Region
On the 5th of May I left Iquitos for a trip of three weeks to the Putumayo River, which forms the border between Peru and Colombia. It’s in this border region that the indigenous peoples live that Vzw Putumayo is supporting, so it was an opportunity to see the results and problems of some of the projects from close by. The trip didn’t start very well as I became sick the day before we were leaving. With the necessary quantities of antibiotics however I managed to get well soon and against all odds I didn’t get sick during the whole rest of the journey. This journey would take 22 days for me and my colleague, agricultural engineer Sixto and the first 10 days we would be accompanied by Ellen, president of the Belgian branch of the organization, who would be working to do the final part of her fieldwork for her PhD.
Our first goal was El Estrecho, a city that can be reached relatively easy by plane from Iquitos. The first day there we used to buy some necessary supplies for the trip like drinking water, bread and conserve food. After one night of rest in a local hostel, we took off for our first boat trip. A pequé-pequé, a small motorboat, brought us to the Huitoto community of Puerto Limón, a journey that took us the whole day, of which unfortunately it was raining almost half of the time. In this village I could finally see the rice peeling machine that was installed with the support of Vzw Putumayo for the communal enterprise MOK+A+. During the morning of the 7th of May a meeting was planned with the Board of Directors of this enterprise. More information about what we discussed on the meetings and our work will soon be found on the official Putumayo blog.
The following day was again spent on the water as we had to get to the Alto Putumayo region were the Secoya communities and a great number of Kichwa communities are located. To get there we would normally take a Colombian line boat, as these are the fastest way to travel on the Putumayo River, but for an obscure reason it decided it didn’t want to stop in the Colombian village of Belén where we were waiting. As the line boat makes its trip to the Upper Putumayo only once a week, it was no option to wait for the next one, so the only solution was travelling half a day by pequé-pequé to the Colombian city of El Encanto. There we managed to find some Colombians who were prepared to bring us to our destination for a good price. Good for them that is. In the end two somewhat clumsy Colombian youths brought us to our next goal, the Kichwa community of Nueva Esperanza.
There we stayed in the house of FIKAPIR president Demecio Tangoa, who has a nice house looking over the Putumayo River. On the other side of that river was the little Colombian village of La Colonia, in fact not much more than the shop and bar of Doña Mary and her, quite attractive, daughter-in-law Claudia. Here we went to buy more supplies and the necessary gasoline for the people of the different neighbouring communities that would come for the meeting with the Board of Directors of FIKAPIR and the first workshop, which was organised in Nueva Esperanza. As mentioned in the previous post we were going to reproduce a workshop about petroleum exploitation and indigenous rights, given in Iquitos by a lawyer of Solsticio Perú, in some of the villages in the Upper Putumayo. In Nueva Esperanza this would be given in two languages, Castilian and Kichwa. For the translations to Kichwa we received the help of bilingual teacher Jaime Condé.
Both the meeting with the Board of Directors of the Kichwa federation and the workshop went well and the 10th of May we were once more travelling. This time it was only a short distance to the Secoya village of Bellavista, which is located at the Yubineto River. In Bellavista also we had a meeting with a Board of Directors, this time of the Peruvian Secoya organization OISPE, and a workshop, organized in Castilian and Secoya. For the translations we received the help of three different teachers, each helping on a different part of the workshop. The stay in Bellavista was great as it was located really beautiful and the people were very friendly. A feeling I also had in the other Secoya village where we would stay later on the trip.
First however we were visiting another Kichwa village, namely Nueva Angusilla. Here we organized the workshop only in Castilian as all of the attendees were capable of understanding and speaking this language. The stay in this village will mostly be remembered for the abundant presence of mosquitoes, certainly in the health post where we were sleeping, so when I left my arms and legs where covered with dozens of red spots. And it was also the place where I washed my clothes for the first time in a river.
The most distant village we have visited on the trip was the Secoya community of Mashunta.
The evening of our arrival there was immediately a big party to celebrate the birthday of a two-year old, which appeared to be an excuse for the whole village to get drunk on masato, a beverage made of yucca that is fermented by the local women by chewing it. After they served my colleague and me a dinner we were invited to another house where we had the opportunity to dance on Ecuadorian indigenous music. When this house ran out of solar energy we had to move again to the next one. However this next house had only sufficient energy for the music if they turned out the light. Subsequently they started to break leaves from the roof to make a big fire in the house, which made a nice atmosphere, but probably wouldn’t make the owners very happy when they were sober again. As everyone had to sleep long the next day to recuperate from the party, the workshop started for once in the afternoon and was again given in two languages. The 19th of May we left for Nueva Esperanza from where we would take the line boat back to Puerto Limón. There we had to attend the General Assembly of MOK+A+, where a new Board of Directors was elected.
It was the 24th of May when we finally arrived back in El Estrecho, where we celebrated the end of the big journey by playing pool and visiting one of the local discotheques. The next day we made some final visits in the city and then the next part of our work started with the preparation of the necessary reports. It was in the morning of the 26th of May that a plane took us back to Iquitos, which gave me the curious feeling of coming home again.
So, as my experiences in Iquitos might get a bit dull if I keep writing every week, probably I’ll write a bit less often from now on, but I’ll keep doing my best to keep you all informed.
Bye,
Jero
Our first goal was El Estrecho, a city that can be reached relatively easy by plane from Iquitos. The first day there we used to buy some necessary supplies for the trip like drinking water, bread and conserve food. After one night of rest in a local hostel, we took off for our first boat trip. A pequé-pequé, a small motorboat, brought us to the Huitoto community of Puerto Limón, a journey that took us the whole day, of which unfortunately it was raining almost half of the time. In this village I could finally see the rice peeling machine that was installed with the support of Vzw Putumayo for the communal enterprise MOK+A+. During the morning of the 7th of May a meeting was planned with the Board of Directors of this enterprise. More information about what we discussed on the meetings and our work will soon be found on the official Putumayo blog.
The following day was again spent on the water as we had to get to the Alto Putumayo region were the Secoya communities and a great number of Kichwa communities are located. To get there we would normally take a Colombian line boat, as these are the fastest way to travel on the Putumayo River, but for an obscure reason it decided it didn’t want to stop in the Colombian village of Belén where we were waiting. As the line boat makes its trip to the Upper Putumayo only once a week, it was no option to wait for the next one, so the only solution was travelling half a day by pequé-pequé to the Colombian city of El Encanto. There we managed to find some Colombians who were prepared to bring us to our destination for a good price. Good for them that is. In the end two somewhat clumsy Colombian youths brought us to our next goal, the Kichwa community of Nueva Esperanza.
There we stayed in the house of FIKAPIR president Demecio Tangoa, who has a nice house looking over the Putumayo River. On the other side of that river was the little Colombian village of La Colonia, in fact not much more than the shop and bar of Doña Mary and her, quite attractive, daughter-in-law Claudia. Here we went to buy more supplies and the necessary gasoline for the people of the different neighbouring communities that would come for the meeting with the Board of Directors of FIKAPIR and the first workshop, which was organised in Nueva Esperanza. As mentioned in the previous post we were going to reproduce a workshop about petroleum exploitation and indigenous rights, given in Iquitos by a lawyer of Solsticio Perú, in some of the villages in the Upper Putumayo. In Nueva Esperanza this would be given in two languages, Castilian and Kichwa. For the translations to Kichwa we received the help of bilingual teacher Jaime Condé.
Both the meeting with the Board of Directors of the Kichwa federation and the workshop went well and the 10th of May we were once more travelling. This time it was only a short distance to the Secoya village of Bellavista, which is located at the Yubineto River. In Bellavista also we had a meeting with a Board of Directors, this time of the Peruvian Secoya organization OISPE, and a workshop, organized in Castilian and Secoya. For the translations we received the help of three different teachers, each helping on a different part of the workshop. The stay in Bellavista was great as it was located really beautiful and the people were very friendly. A feeling I also had in the other Secoya village where we would stay later on the trip.
First however we were visiting another Kichwa village, namely Nueva Angusilla. Here we organized the workshop only in Castilian as all of the attendees were capable of understanding and speaking this language. The stay in this village will mostly be remembered for the abundant presence of mosquitoes, certainly in the health post where we were sleeping, so when I left my arms and legs where covered with dozens of red spots. And it was also the place where I washed my clothes for the first time in a river.
The most distant village we have visited on the trip was the Secoya community of Mashunta.
The evening of our arrival there was immediately a big party to celebrate the birthday of a two-year old, which appeared to be an excuse for the whole village to get drunk on masato, a beverage made of yucca that is fermented by the local women by chewing it. After they served my colleague and me a dinner we were invited to another house where we had the opportunity to dance on Ecuadorian indigenous music. When this house ran out of solar energy we had to move again to the next one. However this next house had only sufficient energy for the music if they turned out the light. Subsequently they started to break leaves from the roof to make a big fire in the house, which made a nice atmosphere, but probably wouldn’t make the owners very happy when they were sober again. As everyone had to sleep long the next day to recuperate from the party, the workshop started for once in the afternoon and was again given in two languages. The 19th of May we left for Nueva Esperanza from where we would take the line boat back to Puerto Limón. There we had to attend the General Assembly of MOK+A+, where a new Board of Directors was elected.
It was the 24th of May when we finally arrived back in El Estrecho, where we celebrated the end of the big journey by playing pool and visiting one of the local discotheques. The next day we made some final visits in the city and then the next part of our work started with the preparation of the necessary reports. It was in the morning of the 26th of May that a plane took us back to Iquitos, which gave me the curious feeling of coming home again.
So, as my experiences in Iquitos might get a bit dull if I keep writing every week, probably I’ll write a bit less often from now on, but I’ll keep doing my best to keep you all informed.
Bye,
Jero
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