Letters from Bolivia

March 23, 2005 Birmingham to Bolivia

2007-04-05T21:30:00.000-04:00

March 23, 2005

You deplore the demonstrations taking place in Birmingham. But your statement, I am sorry to say, fails to express a similar concern for the conditions that brought about the demonstrations. I am sure that none of you would want to rest content with the superficial kind of social analysis that deals merely with effects and does not grapple with underlying causes. It is unfortunate that demonstrations are taking place in Birmingham, but it is even more unfortunate that the city’s white power structure left the Negro community with no alternative.

-- Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Letter from a Birmingham Jail

Dear Friends,

La Paz, Bolivia, is a long way away from Birmingham, Alabama, but often I find myself thinking of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

Two weeks ago, Bolivia’s president declared the country ungovernable due to constant protests that have shut down much of the country, barred travel and damaged business. The flash point of many of the blockades was Bolivia’s troublesome gas law, though protesters made demands on a wide range of issues, including their right to reasonably priced clean water, concern about keeping profits from natural resources in the country, and independence from U.S. pressure on issues like eradicating the coca crop.

But at the root of these sometimes disparate protests was the sense of powerlessness felt by Bolivia’s indigenous majority, despite promises that democracy would give them power to chart the country’s future.

Then, on March 6, Bolivia’s ever turbulent political situation took a troubling turn: President Carlos Mesa, who’s served since his successor was forced from office last year, made a calculated play for middle class sympathies and got them. In the process, he opened festering wounds of racism and resentment.

As calculated, Congress rejected Mesa resignation letter—giving him a second chance to govern (but this time with an awakened middle class behind him). And so that night, glowing with victory, a crowd of supporters cheering below, Mesa made a speech calling for an end to the blockades and for people to mobilize against those sectors that have been shutting down the country.

I stood outside the presidential palace while Mesa greeted the thousand or so people who had gathered there to support him. They waved Bolivian flags and white handkerchiefs. They cried out for peace. And they carried signs employing various explicit terms aimed at Bolivia’s indigenous opposition leaders. “Death to the piece of sh** Indian Evo.” Jumping up and down, the crowd chanted “If you don’t jump you’re a blockader,” and “Mano dura, mano dura,” encouraging Mesa to use a “strong hand,” to use force against protesters.

In a strongly worded statement blaming social movement leaders, Mesa had proclaimed the country headed toward disaster. He placed most of the blame with two men: Evo Morales, a congressman and staunch defender of the cocalero (coca growers’) union, and Abel Mamani, leader of the Federation of Neighborhood Associations (FEJUVE) in the city of El Alto. Interestingly, he didn’t focus much criticism on the Comité Pro Santa Cruz or Nación Camba, wealthy, elitist groups in Santa Cruz that also had organized paralyzing blockades and marches.

The day following his announcement, Monday, I sat with a friend’s aunt. “I don’t understand what happened,” she said, her eyes stunned. “In the past, the Indians (indios) were more docile.” The conversation was terrible, but also illustrative of these totally different realities—the lack of comprehension between groups in Bolivia, the daily racism that colors everything. Some Bolivians expressed nostalgia for the tranquility they associate with the historically subjugated position of Bolivia’s indigenous majority.

Tuesday I talked with Jaime about the situation. Jaime is a young, professional, upper-middle-class man. He made an argument I’ve heard before: Bolivia needs a dictatorship. We aren’t mature enough for a democracy. Things are too chaotic, people protest over everything. We need a leader who will shut down congress, step in with a strong hand (mano dura), and take charge. It doesn’t have to last long—and any violence would be a necessary evil to get our country back on track.

Recently, international “experts” also have made this argument about maturity and democracy—especially in light of UN polls that found many South Americans have lost faith in democracy. They ask if people are too poor, too uneducated, too immature to handle democracy (as Jaime argued). They wonder if the inequality exacerbated by capitalism creates too many problems for a nascent democracy to survive—making the poor even poorer while giving them new political power they can wield over the rich, threatening to lead to violence against wealthy racial minorities.

But I see it differently. I believe economically poor, indigenous, working class Bolivians have been sold a phony democracy. They vote, but they have no real power to affect change. Bolivia’s decision makers are notoriously corrupt and self-serving. Yet even they don’t really run the country. External interests continue to dictate Bolivia’s future, its economic and social policy.
Bolivians were sold the idea that democracy meant that they controlled their destiny and could shape it to be more just. Instead, they continue to face racism, classism, joblessness, hunger, and voicelessness, and an inability to develop their own, creative policies that could address these problems. In Bolivia, many rural indigenous and migrants to the city can’t even vote because they lack birth certificates. They don’t exist as citizens. For indigenous Bolivians, this democracy is a joke. In rural indigenous communities, a truer democracy—consensus-based decision-making—stands in stark contrast. They know they’ve gotten a raw deal.

And so they march, blockade, protest—yes, sometimes to a point that it seems irrational to outside eyes. But they are flexing what they perceive as their only muscle to affect change. Just as nonviolent direct action during the civil rights movement sought “to create such a crisis and foster such a tension that a community which has constantly refused to negotiate is forced to confront the issue,” Bolivian social movements seek to force the government to respond.
I have listened to city-dwelling Bolivians and American friends—good people—express confusion at the seemingly irrational push to blockade and strike. When they ask “why can’t people be reasonable and take it slow?” I am reminded of Dr. Martin Luther King’s Letter from a Birmingham Jail. When white Civil Rights supporters and church folk grew uncomfortable with the confrontational and disobedient tactics employed by the movement, King said, “This ‘Wait’ has almost always meant ‘Never.’ We must come to see, with one of our distinguished jurists, that ‘justice too long delayed is justice denied.’”

Peace, with justice.

Susan

If you are interested in reading King’s Letter from a Birmingham Jail, visit: http://coursesa.matrix.msu.edu/~hst306/documents/letter.html or I can send you a copy.
The 2005 Mission Yearbook for Prayer & Study, p. 46

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September 29, 2004 Bolivia Post Referendum

2004-10-21T12:30:00.000-04:00

September 29, 2004

Dear Friends,

In the days leading up to July’s referendum on gas, we seemed to be preparing for the worst. Less than a year into his term, Carlos Mesa would fulfill one of the promises he made on October 17, 2003, when he was sworn-in as President, the same night Bolivia’s then-president, Gonzalo Sanchez the Lozada, fled the country.

During October of 2003, Bolivians rallied to reject Sanchez de Lozada’s plan to export natural gas supplies to Mexico and the United States via Chile. The Bolivian government reacted with violent repression, killing dozens of people and wounding hundreds. In response, protests escalated, calling for the President’s resignation. He had killed too many of his own people to retain any legitimacy as President. While the U.S. government backed Sanchez de Lozada, claiming it was necessary to support him in order to preserve democracy—even as he massacred his own people—it was the Bolivians who were calling for a democratic end to the violence through the constitutional succession of Vice President Carlos Mesa.

In his speech accepting the presidency, Carlos Mesa made a commitment to take seriously the “October Agenda” and the demands of Bolivia’s socially, politically, and economically excluded indigenous and poor peoples. They wanted a true voice in the policies that affect their lives. Mesa responded, agreeing to two mechanisms for greater democratic participation—“little ‘d’ democracy,” not U.S. style representative democracy, but a much more participatory, grassroots democracy. Mesa promised Bolivians that he would hold a referendum on the sale of Bolivia’s natural gas supplies. And he promised a constitutional assembly to re-found Bolivia with the writing of a new constitution.

But as we neared the date for the referendum, national debate again turned volatile. The debate focused on the five official referendum questions that the government presented. Some opposition leaders and political analysts thought the questions were too vague, too open for interpretation, and had been manipulated to elicit “yes” votes. Others denounced that the fact that the referendum would only apply to future gas contracts, not the 78 existing contracts signed in previous years.

They accused the government of giving people the illusion of having a say in the gas issue while denying them real control of natural gas supplies. The question so many people had wanted to see—“Are you in favor of the nationalization of Bolivia’s gas supplies?”—was not on the ballot at all.

Some labor and campesino groups called for a boycott, or for Bolivians to destroy their ballots on election day. They called the referendum a trap that Mesa’s administration would use to legitimize its neoliberal policies. Other opposition leaders questioned the call to boycott, accusing their fellow leftist leaders of colluding with rightist interests to destabilize the government and create conditions favorable for a coup.

International commentators couldn’t understand the seeming illogic of Bolivia’s labor, campesino, and indigenous movements.
They had wanted this referendum, and now many of them were calling for a boycott. “Are these groups capable of anything but criticism and protest?” they asked. How could Bolivians throw away their chance for development and be so persuaded by populist and nationalist rhetoric?

In order to understand why people approached the referendum with such mistrust—and reacted so angrily to what they perceived as manipulative questions—it’s helpful to understand the historical context. Bolivians understand that a country rich in natural resources, in zinc, copper, tin and gold, is not the same as a wealthy country. For centuries, they watched as elites of European descent grew wealthy, enriching other countries and international companies while impoverishing Bolivia. Bolivians wanted to assure that the country’s natural gas supplies would not be squandered. They wanted to see the benefits reach average Bolivians, not just a few elites. And so they approached the referendum cautiously, critically. For several months before the actual vote, Bolivians held hundreds of workshops to analyze the referendum as a democratic process, to debate the five questions, to discuss the merits of voting or boycotting, to challenge the information coming out of the government with more independent research and proposals.

On the weekend of July 18, the government imposed a curfew. Clubs and bars shut down. Businesses closed. Driving was only allowed for emergencies. We prepared ourselves for the possibility of another October, stocking up on produce and canned goods, nervously predicting what might happen. But on July 18, the streets were empty except for strolling families or makeshift soccer games. Throughout the day, people made their way to the polls.

On all five questions, the “yes” vote won. The government quickly claimed victory, saying that the majority of Bolivians had ratified its leadership on the gas issue and had shown general support for the administration.

But there were many Bolivians that day who cast their vote despite their deep doubts about the five questions. As one friend put it, “I don’t support the way the government has worded these questions, but I do support the idea of a referendum. I fear that if we don’t participate now, it will give our critics the ammunition they need to say we had a chance at participatory democracy but we threw it away. And we cannot jeopardize the constitutional assembly.”

Of Bolivia’s 4,458,293 registered voters, only about 60 percent voted, despite governmental threats that participation was mandatory. Some people stayed home, refusing to participate in the flawed referendum. Around 12 percent of votes were annulled, many of them destroyed or invalidated because the word “nationalization” was written across the ballot. Those voters participated in the process, but showed their discontent with the options they were given. Other people left sections of their ballots blank, especially on the fourth and fifth questions where 17 and 16 percent were left blank respectively (indicating confusion over the wording or uncertainty about how to respond).

Finally, interviews following the referendum indicated that those “yes” votes often represented very different interpretations of ambiguous questions. Thus an ardent supporter of nationalization and a capitalist investor in private industries may have voted “yes” on the same question.

In the wake of the July 18 referendum, questions still remain about how Bolivians will receive the Mesa administration’s policies on gas as they become more concrete. I was left with the feeling that the issue had been postponed, that the ambiguity of the five questions will kindle conflict again in the future.

We now turn our attention to the constitutional assembly, another democratic “mechanism” that has the potential to allow historically excluded people the chance to participate in the formulation of a new constitution. It also has the potential to repeat Bolivia’s oppressive history. Many of my colleagues express their concern that the assembly will be controlled by those same interests that have always been able to set the nation’s agenda: the ruling economic and political elite. Wary of that possibility, some grassroots groups argue that the assembly is merely an effort to mollify the demands of excluded Bolivians, that it will not affect real change, but rather legalize and lend a false legitimacy to exclusionary laws and policies. Others believe this is a real opportunity for historically excluded Bolivians to articulate concrete demands and a vision for how they would re-make their country—and to develop the constitutional and legal framework to back that vision.

And so the debate begins over the merits of the constitutional assembly, its ability to deconstruct and possibly reconstruct Bolivia.

Peace,

Susan

February 17, 2004 Carnival

2004-10-21T12:27:00.000-04:00

February 17, 2004

Dear Friends,

It's summer here in La Paz. What does that mean? It means I get to sleep with only three wool blankets and one hot-water bottle instead of five wool blankets and two hot-water bottles. My apartment is unheated, year-around. At 12,500 feet, it can get a bit nippy. When it's 35 degrees outside, it's 35 degrees inside. To keep me warm and happy I've become very English—I drink hot tea all day long.

I may, in fact, be a tea fanatic. In Bolivia, more than tea, we drink "mate" or herbal tea. In my house I have a million mates, all part of the ecologically friendly fair trade campaigns picking up in the country. I've got peach, apple, green, mint, coca, trimate (a blend of coca, chamomile, and anis), chamomile by itself, and then regular-old black tea with milk and honey. I could just about open a tea parlor and sell little crumpets out of my back door. It's very Bolivian to have people over for tea and coffee in the early evening. My cozy little living room is perfect for tea visits.

And for having people over when the city is under siege.

For months now we've wondered if last year's upheaval would return. President Mesa's three-month trial period is up. He has presented an austerity plan in an attempt to reactivate Bolivia's economy, called for a referendum on the sale of Bolivia's gas supplies, and yielded to demands for a Constitutional Assembly. The Assembly will attempt to rewrite Bolivia's constitution to reflect the interests of the Bolivian people, especially those who have been marginalized and excluded.

UMAVIDA, the Bolivian network I facilitate, has assumed the Constitutional Assembly as a major part of its work this year. We want to be a part of this effort to construct an alternative vision for what we want this country to be.

In the next few months, the social conflicts will likely return as the country wrestles with voices that want to be heard and taken seriously. The Constitutional Assembly will be both an important space for giving people real voice, with legal backing, and a lightening rod for demands and mobilization.But the pre-Lenten carnival puts everything on hold. Even the social movements stop blockading roadways for the days leading up to the parades and dances in Oruro. The social movements take a break, but the kids don't.

Being blonde with blue eyes gets me a lot of things here in Bolivia. Attention. Lots of questions. Overly courteous waiters. Power.

But during carnival, what it gets me is soaking wet. The Spanish word for target is "blanco." It's also the word for "white." And during carnival I'm a Big White Target.

In Bolivia, Carnival is all about drenching as many people as possible with water balloons or water guns. Preferably people who look like they are in a hurry or off to a big meeting. I am often one of those people getting drenched and left waving my fist at snickering eighth-graders. But the verbal spankings I dish out to the 14-year-old boys are not necessarily a good strategy. The minute I turn my back, five water balloons hit, and I am left grumbling away.

Every year my friends and I pick a day to go play. We buy dozens of water balloons to lob at preteens who are doing the same. Shaving cream is another favorite. The rest of the week we wait for our busses by crouching behind cars and ducking when someone comes along, armed for a water fight.

You develop a special radar during carnival. I can hear a truckload of screeching, armed teenagers from two blocks away—enough time to take off running or dive into the market stall of some bewildered Aymara woman. More dangerous, however, are my neighbors. They seem to spend their days looking out their second-story windows with buckets of water. This is a real test of my nonviolence. Are my verbal spankings respecting the personhood of that $&%^*@# kid? Yeah, probably not. But those kids are mean!

I have to take my aggression out on the soccer field. Soccer is the great world sport that we North Americans don't seem to get, unless the women's national team is playing. Then we're all frenetic. Even my stepmom threatens to rip off her top like Brandi Chastain in the 1999 World Cup. Actually, fans of U.S. women's soccer may reach levels of hysteria seen in South America.

My years of playing bench for Louisville Collegiate School's field hockey team (the Amazons) has paid off. I am now the unofficial soccer coach and teen angst counselor for the girls team at my church, Light and Truth. Not because I'm qualified, mind you. Though my family would say I qualify for the teen angst part.

We've been working on the basics for about a year now. Stop the ball. Control. Pass. Stop. Control. Pass. Do not yell at your teammate!

Kicking the ball randomly only sends it into the sludgy "river" that runs by the concrete field. Fishing out the ball, you start to wonder what parasites are burrowing into your skin and when they'll hatch. And so we practice: Stop. Control. Pass.

Some Bolivians consider soccer the Source of Life itself. But while the boys are handed soccer balls while still in the crib, the girls are just now getting the opportunity to play. The real killers on the field are Aymara women de pollera, who wear the long, multi-layered skirts that characterize Aymara women's dress. Many Aymara empleadas (domestic workers) play on their Sundays off. They're deadly. We like for Petrona, who plays de pollera, to serve as goalie. If it gets past her hands, she's got a thick skirt to back her up.

Since most soccer fields in La Paz are either concrete or rock-scattered, staying on your feet is key. My first game with Light and Truth I took off with the ball towards the goal. This was it! My moment of glory. Until someone else took the ball from me. And I kept going, soaring into the air and landing daintily on my stomach, where I skidded for a while before coming to a stop at the goalie's feet. Blood everywhere. Horrified Bolivians rushing toward me. Teenage boys straining not to laugh.

Ah yes, the crowds love to see a flying gringa. I actually spend a lot of my time playing soccer feeling mortified. Falling down. See, what they don't tell you during the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)'s orientation program is that much of this work is about your humiliation as entertainment for others.

That, and my Bolivian teammates would be disappointed if I gave any less than my body for the game.

Susan

October 21, 2003

2004-10-21T12:25:00.000-04:00

October 21, 2003
La Paz, Bolivia

Dear Friends,

Last Friday afternoon [October 17], the rumors started. Rumors that Goni—Bolivian president Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada—would resign.

"Turn on your radio, are you listening?" asked a friend. I was. Radio Pachamama was trying to respond to listeners: "We must not repeat rumors. Yes, word is circulating that Goni will resign, but that is not confirmed, we must not say so until it is confirmed."

Presbyterian pastor Luis Perez called from the center of town where he had been marching with Roman Catholic and Protestant church members, demanding an end to the violence. "We're hearing Goni may resign," he shouted into the phone. The marchers set off noisemakers in the background. "People here are already celebrating."

Five hours later, in the evening of Friday, October 17, the Bolivian congress convened for a special session. It took longer than expected to get everyone there—many of the congresspeople had to be picked up and flown in because of the blockades that surrounded La Paz. But now we knew the rumors were true.

Goni had turned in his letter of resignation. And he was leaving the country.

My neighbors and I hunkered in front of their TV, listening to a government official read the letter. Some members of Congress erupted into shouts of "Goni, assassin! Goni, butcher!" One elderly congressman was escorted from the floor, hobbling with a cane and waving his free arm in anger. The moderator called for calm and took a vote. Congress accepted the president's resignation.

Immediately La Paz filled with the snap of fireworks. La Paz is shaped like a bowl, a deep crater. From our apartment building on the mountainside, we watched as white flares glimmered across the city, in poor and middle-class neighborhoods alike. My neighbor, Gabriela, and I rushed to her balcony. She laughed, "You'd think our national soccer team had just won the championship!" Bolivia was celebrating. Some of our neighbors lit a loud string of fireworks in the door of their crumbling adobe home and cheered. Gabriela turned and said, "Of course they are celebrating. This is about their lives." Her 2-year-old grandson covered his ears and shrieked. Gabriela comforted him, "It's nothing bad, it's good!"

We only needed to hear one more thing: that the vice president, Carlos Mesa, would accept his place in the constitutional order and become the new president of the republic. Cameras turned to Mesa's home, where he emerged from the house, waving, and began greeting neighbors. "He's going to accept," cried Gabriela, and giggled.

Mesa took office Friday night around midnight. Since then we have all been speculating on what this will mean for Bolivia. His first decision as president was to immediately demilitarize El Alto and La Paz. That night, gathered around the TV, many of us collapsed into our chairs, breathing deeply for the first time since the conflict exploded a month ago. Gabriela sat silently, lightly clapping her hands and closing her eyes, relieved. For many, Mesa represents just that: relief and hope.
But we also know that the challenges that Bolivia and this administration face are complex, overwhelming.

Mesa has shown he "gets it," that he understands that the demands of Altenos and Bolivians in general represent broad sectors of Bolivian society, not a "conspiracy of sedition by armed groups, 'narco-syndicalist' groups, terrorist groups, and cartels who created a confrontational situation, leaving me no way out but to resign," as Goni recently claimed to the BBC. Goni spoke from Washington D.C., where he fled just as his resignation letter was read to the Bolivian people. Many Bolivians are outraged at how Goni has portrayed recent protests, denigrating Bolivians and dismissing their demands. In his letter he neither took responsibility nor showed remorse for the dead.

Mesa spoke differently. In his acceptance speech on Friday he said of Bolivia's indigenous communities: "We cannot look at Bolivia if we do not look at who, for centuries, has been excluded, and if we do not look at what kind of mechanisms we need to give them an answer to [their] legitimate demands, a legitimate right to be true, first-class citizens in a country of equals. And Bolivia is not yet a country of equals."

But for all of Mesa's understanding, it does not remove the challenges ahead.

Ely Lopez, who works with the Center for Andean Peoples and Cultures, explained, "He's presented a very theoretical analysis of the situation, but now we need to see what that will look like concretely. People look to him with hope, but we must not forget that the political system hasn't changed, just the person heading it. […] Still, he recognizes that the issue of indigenous peoples is vital. You cannot even talk about Bolivia without addressing this issue. It is absolutely fundamental."

One major struggle will be to overcome the deep east-west regional division in Bolivia, divisions that have pitted indigenous farmers in the west against wealthy businessmen in the east. Divisions that have widened in this past month.

Bolivia will also have to decide how it will hold the military and police accountable for the more than 74 dead. Goni has left the country, but people are already talking about how to open a case against him. As Lopez explained, "We must demonstrate that we will not permit impunity. I liked what Mesa said to the armed forces. We are all responsible for saying ‘no’ to death, for refusing to carry out orders if we believe they are unjust. This is an important discussion for all of us as Bolivians."

Bolivia will still face many of the same pressures it has in the past: pressure to adopt policies that the U.S. government, the International Monetary Fund (IMF), and World Bank have pushed for nearly 20 years. External forces have long-dictated Bolivia's destiny, and Bolivians are sick of it. Many of those same policies were the impetus for recent mobilizations. And they are still present.

Leading opposition groups and popular movements have said that they want to give Mesa a chance, want to support him if his talk translates into real action, real change. But they also warn that should this administration repeat the mistakes of the past, they will mobilize again. And this time they know their power.

Felipa, an Aymara leader, reflected on what lies ahead for Bolivia's indigenous movements. She said, "This was a big achievement. I've never seen anything like it before. But it isn't over. The struggle isn't over. Little by little we must construct our own vision, our own project for this country. Our brothers and sisters are now conscious of their power, and the need to keep working. This isn't about Evo or Mallku [two well-known indigenous leaders]. This is about all of us participating. We are seeking autonomy, a day when we ourselves will truly govern. This was a big achievement, getting rid of the butcher. But it isn't over. We must continue in this struggle."

On the Monday after Goni's resignation, a Maryknoll missioner friend of mine, Cati, was riding in a taxi with an Aymara driver. They listened to the radio and a speech someone was delivering in El Alto. The speaker closed his talk, and shouted in Aymara, "Jallalla Tupac Katari," "long live Tupac Katari, he is present with us, in the people." Katari led an indigenous uprising for dignity, autonomy, and an end to Spanish colonial rule in the 18th century.

Unsure, Cati turned to the driver and asked, "Who's speaking?"

He grinned. "The president."

Susan

October 16, 2003

2004-10-21T12:23:00.000-04:00

October 16, 2003

Dear Friends,

“Imagine the mothers. Imagine the widows. So much suffering,” wailed R. (I will be using initials to protect the identities of the people I quote). “They should feel anguish—killing their brothers and sisters. But they feel nothing. Shooting from the helicopters, the snipers, oh!”

The most difficult part of being trapped in your house is listening to friends and feeling powerless. R’s voice shook with rage and sorrow as she repeated “They don’t see us as human. They’re just killing us…”

R. is an Aymara friend, an indigenous person, one of my closest here in Bolivia. On Monday she called, frantic to know if I was all right. That was the day everyone started making calls. Now confined to our homes (if you are not one of the people out marching), the phone is what keeps us connected.

Since most people in El Alto have cell phones instead of home phones, I usually catch people on the street.

On Tuesday I got E. as she hurried through her neighborhood. She breathed heavily into the phone, “I’m here in my neighborhood. We’re trying to help the wounded.” A siren grew loud and then faded in the background. A helicopter hovered somewhere nearby. Everyone I call seems to be in shock, despairing.

Tuesday morning, a group of marchers passed by our apartment, chanting, “Come out, neighbors, join the struggle. Come out, neighbors, you must join the struggle.” Most homes in my neighborhood fly the thick red, yellow and green stripes of the Bolivian flag. Each one has a black plastic bag tied to the top, an expression of solidarity with victims in El Alto. Some homes fly the Wipala, the multicolored flag used by the Bolivian indigenous movement.

That evening, some of us ventured from our homes, enticed by news that some chicken had arrived in nearby butcher shops. We walked down the main avenue of our neighborhood and watched as groups of boys played soccer using stones that had been placed in the road as part of the blockades. At night those stones become goal posts.

As the deaths continue to mount, people’s tone is changing. We sit around sharing what we’ve heard from friends in different neighborhoods, on the radio or TV. One neighbor, who has never shown any sympathy for the campesino or indigenous movements, held a hand to her mouth and winced as her daughter told me of another series of deaths. In the early hours of Wednesday morning, nearly 2,500 miners continued their trek from Potosi towards the capital, where they intended to join mounting protests. In the community of Patacamaya, the miners were confronted by the military as it tried to prevent them from entering La Paz. At least two are dead, and 15 wounded.

The mother broke in to her daughter’s report: “We went to the market when it opened for a few hours this morning. It was so horrible to see the poor women. They bought a carrot or two. An onion. And then we saw the wealthy families who bought dozens of eggs and other food. Soon the poor will start to starve to death. All the prices have doubled [because of the siege].”
Among the 74 deaths reported in these days is at least one soldier. He refused to follow an order to shoot into a crowd of protesters. So his superior officer executed him on the spot with a shot in the head.

That death has become a symbol of mindless violence and, for many, a sign that the administration does not value human life, especially the lives of the poor.

Ever since President Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada, or “Goni,” declared on Tuesday that he would not give in to the growing pressure to step down, people have been trying to predict what will happen next. The U.S. government issued statements that it would stand behind Goni and his bid to remain in power. Both administrations claim this is an effort to preserve Bolivian
democracy, even as the Bolivian government employs undemocratic means to crush dissent.

Two papers, one left-leaning and one right, El Pulso and El Diario, made statements to the effect that the Bolivian people had the right to demand Goni’s resignation. Wednesday morning, government officials began pulling them from the stands. Television stations have already announced that if they go off the air, the public should assume it was forced. Worried listeners have started forming vigilance groups to try to protect the press. Masked men blew up Radio Pio XII’s transmission tower in Oruro. Radio Pachamama in El Alto has received multiple threats to shut down. Only days ago we were frustrated with the lack of coverage the international press was giving events in Bolivia. All that has changed. Pretty soon we may be relying on the international press to know what’s happening here in the country.

I asked R. her opinion. She responded, “[Goni] will eventually have to resign. He just will. That’s how it’s always happened. [Indigenous] people didn’t know how to read, to write. There were so few schools; you had to walk for hours. They had to struggle. The people have always had to struggle. You weren’t allowed to study, but the people fought for their rights. The indigenous were slaves to the masters, that’s all. But now the people are many. They’ve studied, and now they are aware. And one day they will govern. They are preparing themselves.”

Susan

October 13, 2003

2004-10-21T12:21:00.000-04:00

October 13, 2003

Dear Friends,

In my last newsletter, I tried to address some of the reasons behind the current unrest. Right now I wanted to give you a sense of current events—what's happening in El Alto and La Paz.

I know that U.S. news is just beginning to cover events here, and so far I've been pretty dissatisfied with the coverage I've seen. The government is trying to downplay the number of deaths and the severity of the situation (we're hearing there were 26 dead and over 50 wounded yesterday, while international news sources report only 5). People are referring to the "Massacre in the Alto," as more and more people are killed or wounded. Several children have already died.

So let me try to capture some of the events in the past few days. I want to reiterate that the situation is uncertain, so things may continue to escalate, or could deflate in the coming days.

La Paz is encircled, totally cut-off from the outside world. They call it a "cerco," a siege. Yesterday I met with an Aymara Methodist minister who used to work with the World Council of Churches and now is here in La Paz with the Latin American Council of Churches. He said, "I keep thinking of Tupac Katari (the indigenous leader who was drawn and quartered in the 1781 after leading an indigenous rebellion that laid siege on the city). He said, 'You may kill me, but I will come back as millions.' Now look around you, in El Alto, in La Paz. He was right."

On Friday, while meeting in the center, we looked out and saw smoke rising from the wooded area above the highway. We later heard that some person or group had tried to blow-up the gas plant in the El Alto neighborhood of Senkata. When that failed, they attacked one of the gas pipelines that serves the city, leaving the center of town without natural gas.

Petroleum, gas for cars, is now cut-off. In La Paz, a city of one million people, transportation has ceased. Yesterday a few busses and taxis passed through roads filled with people walking. Today, the streets are empty. Most airlines have canceled their flights into and out of La Paz. American. Lloyd Aero Boliviano.

The stores are picked-clean. Canned goods. Bread. Rice. Cheese. Milk. Whole shelves are empty in the few super markets. The open markets where people usually shop are closed under threat of being attacked by people trying to keep the siege intact. Part of the electricity grid was apparently blown-up. We are being told that we may lose water and electricity.

Saturday, the mood was somber, worried. We spent a lot of time reflecting on what's happening. At the time we were concerned about rumors that the government would declare an "estado de sitio," martial law, on Monday. I asked members of the UMAVIDA Coordinating Committee what that would entail. They explained that in addition to suspending rights and imposing curfews, they feared this would be an "estado de sitio al estilo de las dictaduras," martial law in the style of past Bolivian dictatorships. In other words, they’re afraid that the government will begin to detain and disappear movement leaders. Some people have apparently already been warned they are on a list, along with 2,000 other names of leaders who would be targeted.

After making threats for days, the government did finally declare martial law in El Alto on Sunday, earlier than expected.
On Saturday night I listened as Radio Pachamama, a radio station run by one of the groups we work with, took calls from reporters and people living in the Alto. They said that that military helicopters were flying overhead and shooting down into the neighborhoods. As news of new deaths and injuries came in, people called the station pleading with neighbors to let ambulances through the blockades. The DJ said, "If any health center is listening to this broadcast, please send help to…." But the Red Cross couldn't get into the Alto. They have no gasoline.

Altenos called the radio station sobbing, terrified by what is happening, begging the government not to kill more people or begging the mobs not to attack their neighbors. Others spoke with hushed voices, expressing their pain and shock.
Another caller identified himself as a "conscripto," a young soldier fulfilling his mandatory military service. Probably a kid just out of high school. He said, "I am here with others in the ***** Battalion. We are ready to support el pueblo, our people. We are ready to disobey orders. We call on others to join us." For a minute I couldn't believe they had just identified themselves publicly.

In the Alto neighborhood of Villa Adela, where water has been cut for several days, a man just called the radio station to say that people there were forming a mob to seek out the families of police in order to take revenge. The DJ tried to calm him down, pleading with him and others not to confront the military or attack police families. The caller responded, "Mr. Journalist, you have to understand. Our people are dying. We cannot let it continue. We must take a stand. We are ready to die confronting the military if necessary." Callers responded, saying this was wrong. That Altenos had to stop attacking Altenos. The poor couldn't keep hurting the poor.

While some people in the Alto do have weapons, most are armed with stones. The roads are blocked with rocks and burning tires. The government, in the meantime, has continued to fly armed helicopters and fill the streets with tanks and heavily-armed soldiers. Usually at protests in Bolivia, military police are armed with canisters of tear-gas to disperse crowds. Now they are carrying "war arms." Television and radio stations announce, "El Alto has been militarized. La Paz has been militarized." And as the repression grows, more people flood into the streets. Pour down from the neighborhoods of El Alto into the center of Bolivia's capital.

Today the radio station continues to take live calls from angry citizens calling for an uprising, or from despairing mothers begging neighbors to bring a wheelbarrow to try to take their wounded children to the nearest clinic.

Massive marches are making their way through El Alto and mobilizing within La Paz. Just as my colleagues predicted—more repression has only intensified the protests.

Pastor Luis called me this morning to say that his road has been blocked—that the mobilizations have radicalized here in the neighborhoods of La Paz. Mariela Ribera, a student in forestry and a member of UMAVIDA's coordinating committee, is staying with me in my apartment. We took her out of the hostel where she was staying, and it turned out to be a good decision. That road is now filled with tanks. She had planned to stay a few extra days between the Committee meeting and Latin American Water Forum. She's now stuck with me until the roads open and flights resume. We've stocked-up on water and canned food and will wait it out. I'm not leaving my neighborhood for now. So we are safe and cloistered. My neighbors are checking in on us, as is Luis. People are watching out for each other.

The most recent news reports that Carlos Mesa, Bolivia’s vice president, is trying to distance himself from the president. “Goni” (that’s what they call the president) has just made a statement saying he will not resign and that he will "destroy all who oppose democracy," an obvious threat to those who are leading these movements.

As things continue to unfold, I will stay in touch.

Abrazos,
Susan

October 3, 2003

2004-10-21T12:19:00.000-04:00

October 3, 2003

Dear Friends,

After spending several days on the phone, members of the Bolivian Joining Hands for Life network (UMAVIDA) decided it was too risky to hold the workshop. We’d have to cancel.

The UMAVIDA network is part of the Presbyterian Hunger Program's Joining Hands Against Hunger Program, which pairs networks around the world with presbyteries in the United States. For weeks, UMAVIDA members had been anticipating our workshop on spirituality and ethics. This ecumenical group of Bolivian non-governmental organizations, grassroots groups, and churches (Protestant and Catholic) wanted to sit down and discuss our shared values. Much of UMAVIDA's work centers around social and economic justice issues. In the workshop, the group planned to discuss the spiritual and ethical basis for its efforts: addressing the root causes of hunger in Bolivia.

But as we prepared for our round table discussions and guest speakers, more immediate justice issues took precedence: thousands of Bolivians took to the streets.

By the time we decided to postpone the workshop, the national context was looking grim. Approximately 700 people were on a hunger strike at the radio station, San Gabriel, demanding the release of indigenous leaders who are being detained. Twenty-four days after they began, they're still striking. A series of small clashes broke out between troops and protesters in the capital city of La Paz and surrounding rural communities. People were wounded, others picked up by the military. Farmers began blocking the transport of food into La Paz , causing shortages and higher prices in the markets.

And then a week ago, six people, including a child, were killed in clashes between campesinos (farmers) in the town of Warisata and the Bolivian military, which was escorting trapped tourists. The people of Warisata were among thousands of Bolivians protesting the sale of Bolivia's natural gas, as well as several laws that aren't favorable to rural communities. The deaths in Warisata radicalized national protests.

More and more people and organizations have begun to participate in nationwide mobilizations, many of them from Bolivia's impoverished indigenous communities. And while the different groups participating in the protests represent a range of demands, the unifying cry has been against the sale of Bolivia's natural gas reserves.

Bolivia has long based its economy on the export of raw material, an approach that has failed to enrich the country. I am often reminded of Kentucky and the coal mines there. Those mines generated wealth for a small group of mine owners who lived far from Appalachian reality. The miners developed black lung and continued to live in Third-World conditions while the wealth left the region. Eastern Kentucky never developed any other economic base to sustain itself. When the miners would strike for their rights, for health care and better wages, they were often terrorized and killed.

For centuries, Bolivia's economy was also based on mining: tin and silver. Millions of African slaves and indigenous Bolivians died in those mines. And now Bolivian officials have developed a project to export another raw material: Bolivia's natural gas supplies, intended for American and Mexican markets.

Bolivians know that they’re getting a raw deal. Many people carry signs that say, "Don't sell the gas, industrialize it." People understand that an economy based on raw materials will never be sustainable and will only bring in a small percentage of the overall wealth generated by the product once it's refined. They also would like to see their natural resources go to serve the people more directly. As one woman told me, "We want the government to annul the agreements they've signed and start over—with good negotiations that will really favor Bolivia and not intermediaries."

Of course, there are arguments in favor of the sale of gas; many claim it's Bolivia's only option to generate wealth. Bolivia's overwhelming external debt and stagnant economy require that the nation seek policies or ventures that will let it generate income to continue paying off loans.

I tend to see this issue as part of a much larger whole: people angry at a government that is unresponsive to their demands.
I spoke with UMAVIDA's coordinator, a Presbyterian pastor named Luis Perez, to get his perspective. We talked about the generalized anger spreading through many of the "social sectors" of Bolivia (peasant farmers, workers, teachers, etc.). Luis said, "Sometimes I think people are excessive in their demands. Now people are calling for [president Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada] to resign. Will that solve the problem? No. We will still face the same pressures, the same external debt. At the same time, the government makes threats, tries to tie leaders like the Mallku [a well-known indigenous leader] to Shining Path [a terrorist group from Peru]. The government is looking for excuses to associate indigenous leaders with these groups as a pretext for arresting them, detaining them."

Luis went on to explain that many of the groups that are marching, blockading, and protesting are divided. He said, "Nobody is united. If they were really united they might be able to achieve real change. Think how much more powerful it could be! But no. There are many divisions. There is no coordination. Everyone wants to be the hero and march for their cause. One week the teachers declare strike, and the next, the drivers. The campesinos of the altiplano call for blockades, and in Cochabamba they refuse to support them. A month later, Cochabamba is blockading and there's nothing in the Altiplano. Yesterday we had no meat. The meat packers went on strike. Since they were a small group, the government tear-gassed and dispersed them. And that was it."

The only conclusion we could come to was that the situation is incredibly complicated, and there are problems within the different movements that we must recognize. Some divisions stem from personality conflicts between leaders or substantive differences in ideologies. Other divisions are caused when the government deftly plays one group against the other. Others still because groups are so intent on the survival of their own people and interests that they develop tunnel vision.

Now in their third week, the once-scattered protests are growing stronger, more unified. In response, the government has begun to militarize the western region. When I met with a group of North American missioners recently, we reflected on this increasing violence. One friend said, "I don't want to hear about dialogue and signing accords and promises. I'm sick of it. We have to see real, tangible change." We talked about how 50 years ago indigenous people were "given" their rights. They were now recognized as human beings, not animals, not slaves. And yet, 50 years have passed and what substantial change have they seen? I met with a good friend of mine last week, Enriqueta, an Aymara woman. We were talking about the current situation when she began to weep over the dead in Warisata. She said, "We are less than animals. They [European/elite Bolivians] treat their dogs better than they treat us. They don't mourn when we die."

Right now the government is pushing a return to dialogue, calling for peace and tranquility. But there's a difference between peace in the sense of no overt unrest, which masks a broiling undercurrent of anger and desperation below a seemingly calm surface, and peace that is achieved because of just policies that address people's needs and give real voice and power to people who have been marginalized.

As another Aymara friend told me, "The government isn't one of us. They've never lived what we live, suffered what we suffer. How could they ever feel what we feel? The people are tired. Poor people no longer know how they will survive."

Susan

September 2003 Reading the Bible through Bolivian Eyes

2004-10-21T12:17:00.000-04:00

September 2003

Every time I pass abuelita, little grandmother, she is spinning. Her fingers twist, thinning the strands of alpaca or llama wool, holding the wooden rueca or spindle above the floor. Her long, whitened braids hang tied behind her back as she works. Sometimes she chats to me in Aymara, even though she knows I can only catch the occasional word. Someone will translate into Spanish. We joke that the family finds her spinning in her sleep, her hands twisting imaginary thread into tighter and tighter ropes. At 72, the money she makes from her wool helps the family survive.

Not long ago I had a vivid dream where I desperately tried to communicate to some friends how different it is to read the Bible in Bolivia than in the United States. I am still learning how different it is. How different our eyes are.

My experience of church in the United States has always been comfortable: Heated or air conditioned worship halls filled with cushioned pews, soft lighting, delicate religious art, and between-service coffee. People in the congregation have their worries: Putting children through college. Caring for aging parents. Slow U.S. economy. Illness. Grief. But people know they’ll find their next meal. We ride to church in our own cars. We proclaim our faith wearing crosses of silver and gold. The gritty life of the Hebrew and New Testaments is a dim reality. But in Bolivia life isn’t so different from how it was in Biblical times.

Here, abuelita might go to church two or three times a week. Many of the Aymara women I know attend Wednesday night and Sunday morning services. And, their experience is far different than the one I had growing up in a comfortable, upper-middle-class Presbyterian church.

If you are an Aymara woman attending Light and Truth church in La Paz, Bolivia, you likely walk a dusty, unpaved road to the Sunday service. During the rainy season, the roads turn muddy and can suck your shoes off. You have no money for a bus, so you walk. You have no steady job and often your next meal is a hope, not a certainty. You work hard to survive and are constantly tense, uncertain of how you will feed your children. You live with a lot of discomfort: rotten teeth, back and leg problems.

Occasionally, you find work as a laundress or part-time empleada, a maid. If you are lucky, you have a factory job, maybe making shampoo. You may wonder if you are being tested with this constant uncertainty, and, if so, why it is so unceasing. Your neighbors may shun you for being an evangélico, a Protestant.

You have Bible study in the open yard of the pastor’s house where chickens and pigs wander through. During the rainy season you watch the pastor’s house begin to separate from the mountainside, and you worry that it will slide off.
You understand the lives of the people in the Bible. Three-month old Rebecca, whose thin mother nursed her quietly in the front row every Sunday, never grew and finally died of malnutrition. Babies die in your neighborhood all the time. A widow faces a hopeless old age, with no social safety net to help her survive.

You see injustice around you daily, but it is the norm. It’s not shocking, and only once in a while do you get angry—because what good does it do? You are poor. You often feel powerless. But, every once in a while some pastor shakes you a bit—says the church must respond to these needs, must be prophetic in this world because injustice isn’t what God wants.
Sometimes you are the one speaking. You read Jesus’ story and realize he was political— he was calling things unjust and telling stories that were threatening to those in power. Sometimes they were funny. Sometimes they were scary in their implications. It makes sense to you because your life isn’t so different from the lives of those who followed Jesus. Death and pain and oppression surround you. Community is important to you. Survival is difficult.

It makes sense, and Scripture gives you hope because it teaches you that one day all this injustice will be turned on its head. One day the oppression and suffering will end. On Earth. That's what we say. On earth as it is in heaven. And so you read the passages calling for patience in suffering, and you hold on to those because your suffering is pretty constant. But you also hold on to the passages that say God does not want this for God’s people and that God calls on average people like you to lead God’s people towards justice.

Theologian Robert McAffee Brown once said of North Americans, "Where we fit in the Exodus story is among the functionaries in Pharaoh's court rather than among the workers in the slave labor camps."

The Aymara women and men in my church are those building the pyramid. When I ask them to describe the most important message for them in the Bible, they speak of hope—hope and love, responsibility for your neighbor and God’s justice. And when they read the Bible, passages like the Beatitudes and James 5, prophets like Jeremiah and Isaiah, and Jesus’ life. Those passages are not gentle metaphors for spirituality. McAffee Brown challenges us to hear the "unexpected" good news of Biblical passages read through the eyes of people living in the global south (Third World). I’ve found that here in Bolivia, I am beginning to catch glimpses of that unexpected good news.

Susan Ellison

Suggestions for further reading

Brown, Robert McAfee. Unexpected News: Reading the Bible with Third-World Eyes. The Westminster Press, 1984.

Sider, Ronald J. Rich. Christians In An Age Of Hunger. Word Publishing; ISBN: 0849914248; 20th anniv. edition (July 23, 1997).

Sider, Ronald J. Editor. For They Shall be Fed: Scripture Readings and Prayers for a Just World. Word Publishing 1997.

Nelson-Pallmeyer, Jack. Jesus Against Christianity: Reclaiming the Missing Jesus. Trinity Press International, 2001.

April 24, 2003 Earth Day 2003: Water

2004-10-21T12:11:00.000-04:00

April 24, 2003

Dear Friends,

Come to Bolivia. Visit an Altiplano indigenous Aymara community. They will welcome you, offer you the community’s only chair, open a striped ahuayo blanket filled with potatoes meant for all to share. But if they offer you water, you must not say “thank you.” Thanking someone for water among the Aymara is offensive, because it is not theirs to give. Water, after all, belongs to everyone.

I open with that example a little ironically. We North Americans are accustomed to thinking of water in Third World countries as the thing to be avoided at all costs—at least if it’s not boiled. As a constantly sick North American living in Bolivia, I am all too familiar with waterborne diseases (I just got over E. Coli in October). On many occasions I have shared stories with you about children, like Rebecca, dying from easily treatable diseases (like diarrhea), which claim the lives of 30,000 children, daily, worldwide.

The United Nations Environmental Program (UNEP) attributes the deaths of 15 million children under the age of five each year to contaminated water. Many more suffer from stunted intellect and growth as well as parasites and other problems related to polluted water. One fifth of the world’s population lacks access to clean drinking water. That’s over one billion people whose quality of life is greatly diminshed.

In the Aymara vision of the cosmos, water is a common heritage, shared by all. But that vision is not unique to their people. Many indigenous communities around the world consider water vital, a source of life, with profound spiritual meaning and great responsibility. But new values are taking precedence over values like reciprocity and balance, found in indigenous communities worldwide, and in Christian concepts of abundance and concern for the “other.”

Fresh water, what we call in Bolivia “agua dulce” (sweet water), accounts for only 2.6 percent of all water on the planet. It is a source of life for both humans and all other life forms; without it, we die.

And now, the planet earth is facing a global water crisis. This crisis not only puts peoples living in the global South, in economically poor countries like Bolivia, or in water-scarce countries or states like California, in danger. It also threatens communities and countries in the wealthy North, in the United States, Canada, Europe.

Human beings are over-consuming water, diverting water (through dams and other development schemes), and contaminating water at an alarming rate. In many parts of the world, people and industries have turned to precious (and often nonrenewable) groundwater stores.

Industry uses 20-25 percent of the world’s fresh water supplies, and that figure is increasing. Crop production uses another 65-70 percent. Massive agro-businesses are top water consumers, relying on highly inefficient water-delivery systems that lead to salination and deplete water stores.

While peoples living in the global South (Third World) are often blamed for over-consumption, statistics point north, to industrialized nations where water is taken for granted and overused. In fact, businesses looking to privatize La Paz’s water system ran into problems when they discovered that Bolivia’s indigenous communities were too good at conserving water (and therefore would not bring in good revenues for prospective companies). Many of my neighbors collect bath water to wash dishes or water their gardens, are never wasteful, never let the tap drip, and closely monitor their water use.

Multinational corporations—especially those interested in the privatization of natural resources—as well as multilateral economic organizations such as the World Trade Organization (WTO) have declared water to be a “human need.” They are pushing water’s privatization. By declaring water a mere human need, and not a human right, as many urge, proponents of water privation can focus on the principles of profit.

In poor countries and poor communities in the United States, a person’s access to water—something that determines whether we live or die—is increasingly determined by that person’s ability to pay. The debate over “need” or “right” becomes a debate over life and death.

In 1998 the World Bank notified Bolivian officials that a new series of loans would be dependent upon the privatization of Cochabamba city’s water system. Aguas del Tunari, a subsidiary of the U.S.-based Bechtel corporation, won the contract after very little negotiation.

Those shallow negotiatons later proved to serve local politicians more than the general Cochabambino population. Water prices jumped dramatically, and citizens faced having to pay for community wells. Poor people simply could not pay. For some, their water bill devoured one quarter of their monthly income.

The people took to the streets, demanding that the business leave town and that water supplies be turned over to local management, ensuring its availability, regardless of ability to pay. But it has been a difficult road for those who took up the fight for Cochabamba’s water. Bolivia now faces a $25 million suit from Bechtel for lost potential profits—what they might have made if they had stayed.

The ability of a business to sue a national or local government for lost potential profits is part of a trend in multilateral economic accords like the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and the proposed Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA). Clauses in these economic agreements give companies the power to sue democratically elected governments that are trying to protect the rights of their citizens.

For example, many of these economic accords call for the elimination of “non-tariff trade barriers” like environmental protection and labor laws. Doing so means removing any barriers to a company’s profit, such as laws regulating the dumping of toxic chemicals into rivers.

People living in the United States, like their Bolivian brothers and sisters, face a future where they may not be able to regulate industries working in their communities or enforce environmental or health safety laws.

In 2000, the Canadian Corporation Methanex sued the state of California after it planned to ban the toxic chemical MTBE (methyl tertiary butyl ether) from gasoline sold in the state. Studies had found that MTBE was leaking into ground water supplies from boats, cars, and gasoline storage tanks.

Methanex brought the suit under Chapter 11 of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), saying it could lose $970 million in profits if California banned MTBE. The ban was an effort to protect California’s citizens from the carcinogenic chemical. Instead, the case demonstrated the dangers new international economic accords pose to water resources and public safety.

The Bolivian Joining Hands for Life Network, whose acronym UMAVIDA comes from the Aymara word, “uma” for water and Spanish word, “vida” for life, believes that access to plentiful, clean water is a right for all humans and other living creatures. The balance of the earth’s ecosystem, the survival of humans and others species requires that we re-think the value we have placed on water, and the increasing commodification of “the commons,” of resources that must be shared.

As Christians, we believe that Jesus came so that we might have abundant life (John 10:10). And abundant life means both spiritual and physical abundance for all. Ensuring that all humans have access to clean and plentiful water, and that the earth’s ecosystem is protected, requires that we take our role as stewards of the creation seriously. And being good stewards also may require changing our lifestyles and our policies to reflect that commitment.

The Bolivian Joining Hands network has commited itself to tackle these issues. Churches participating in the Joining Hands program in the Presbytery of San Francisco have also made a commitment. Both know that water scarcity, contamination, access, and privatization do not only affect poor countries like Bolivia. These are problems that will affect us all. Bolivian members of UMAVIDA are developing plans to raise awareness in their communities. The network is also discussing how it can get involved in worldwide efforts to protect water resources.

These are complex issues, and the problems related to the world water crisis are far more intricate than I can cover here with any depth. I myself am still learning, in large part because the UMAVIDA network is challenging me. But there are plenty of resources out there that explain these issues with greater scientific evidence and policy analysis.

So what can we do?

Read! Below I will include some good resources on water issues, both secular and faith-based.
Get involved in local efforts to protect water resources.

Learn about the Biblical basis for our stewardship of the Creation, and faith-based efforts to heal and protect the Creation. Visit the Environmental Justice Office of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.): http://www.pcusa.org/environment/ (If you’re not Presbyterian, don’t worry, many of these resources take a broad theological view).

Learn about the danger new economic accords like the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) pose to our ability to legislate water use, safety, quality, and commodification.

Many organizations are seeking just, sustainable, and viable solutions to the world water crisis, addressing individual, industrial, and agricultural use, as well as policy issues. But implementing such policies requires a real public and political will to make changes. And that will requires that we be informed about what options exist. Learn more.

Check out the following resources for more information on water issues, faith-based responses to environmental degradation, and efforts to propose real alternatives:

Barlow, Maude and Clarke, Tony. Blue Gold. The New York Press: New York, 2002.

From the New Yorker, “Leasing the Rain,” by William Finnegan, deals with the “Water Wars” in Cochabamba, Bolivia. If you would like a copy, e-mail me and I will send it along, or visit the New Yorker website.

Hope for a Global Future: Towards Just and Sustainable Human Development PDS# OGA 96-031 (PCUSA).

Daly, Herman E. and John B. Cobb Jr. For the Common Good: Redirecting the Economy Toward Community the Envrionment, and a Sustainable Future. 2nd. ed. updated and expanded. Boston. Beacon Press, 1994.

Presbyterian Eco-Justice Task Force. Keeping and Healing the Creation. Social Witness Policy.

Web sites:
Environmental Justice Office of the Presbyterian Church USA:http://www.pcusa.org/environment/
Presbyterian Earth Day Resources This year focusing on water issues, April 27, 2003. Even if Earth Day has passed, these are good resources for your congregation:http://www.pcusa.org/environment/earthday.htm
Presbyterians for Restoring Creation:http://www.pcusa.org/prc/
Enough for Everyone Program:http://www.pcusa.org/enough/
Presbyterian Washington Office network on Ecology and Environment:http://www.pcusa.org/washington/issuenet/enviro.htm
United Nations Environment Programme: http://www.unep.org/

Peace!
Susan Ellison

February 16, 2003 Febrero Negro

2004-10-21T12:08:00.000-04:00

A letter from Susan Ellison in Bolivia

February 16, 2003

Dear Friends,

I watched as fires spread through downtown La Paz last Wednesday night. Smoke towers rose in three different parts of the city, forming a black haze over La Paz. The clapping pop of tear gas canisters shot by the Bolivian military echoed from neighborhood televisions as the city tried to make sense of what was happening. In my old neighborhood, near the Plaza del Estudiante ("Student's Plaza"), a radio reporter frantically described the scene as some 200 people smashed through a restaurant owned by a local mayor. "The City Cafe has been destroyed," the reporter screamed into the microphone. Mobs broke into stores, looting them, and then turned their anger on ATMs. Shop owners armed themselves and told television crews they were prepared to shoot. Not a single police officer patrolled the La Paz streets or tried to intervene-the police, after all, were the original protesters marching on the presidential palace. It's quiet now, and I, like everyone else, am trying to figure out what it means.

Over the past months, the Bolivian government has been developing a series of policies aimed at satisfying several requirements laid out by the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Bolivia needed to meet those requirements before the IMF would approve any loans or sign any agreements with the struggling country. The signature and support of the IMF was also considered necessary for Bolivia to be able to access loans from other international agencies.

The government imposed a new tax plan that would fall heavily on middle class Bolivians who are struggling to live-one of the major requirements outlined by the IMF.

The combination of Bolivia's crushing external debt and its ongoing economic crisis has left Bolivia in a vulnerable position. One third of Bolivia's budget goes to paying off the interest on its debt-just the interest alone. It needed those loans. It still needs those loans.

On Wednesday, the Bolivian police force marched on the presidential palace demanding an end to the tax increase that the government had announced. The police officers who were protesting make around 800 Bolivianos or just over $100 U.S. per month. That places them among the more fortunate of Bolivians, but the additional taxes would have made mere survival even more difficult. They gathered in Plaza Murillo, home of Bolivia's presidential palace and its Congress.

Local school children soon joined them and began throwing rocks at the palace, breaking windows while the police looked on.

While the Bolivian police are the ones generally trained to intervene in protest situations, this day they were the ones protesting. And so the Bolivian military stationed in the Plaza responded as they had been trained to-by firing. Snipers shot from the rooftops of the Congress, palace and a neighboring cathedral. The police shot back. Young military officers in fatigues crawled on their bellies to find shelter among park benches and propped their guns on a national monument dedicated to the man the plaza was named after.

People caught in the crossfire lay dead or bleeding in a plaza normally filled with families feeding pigeons and buying cotton candy. The shoot-out between military and police filled the plaza with tear gas and bullets.

Some of the people gathered in Plaza Murillo stormed the presidential palace and began destroying nearby government buildings and the headquarters of several leading political parties. Throughout the evening, protesters, now mixed with other individuals who apparently were taking advantage of the chaotic atmosphere, broke into government buildings, set them on fire, while in the market and commerce districts, people began looting local businesses and banks.

On Thursday, in addition to the tension over the new budget announced by the government (policies that were later withdrawn by the president), coca growers and poor farmers threatened to block Bolivia's major highways, demanding the resignation of President Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada (known as "Goni"). Mobs continued looting throughout La Paz and the adjacent city of El Alto, apparently a mixture of raw anger and desperation as well as some people taking advantage of the chaotic environment and lack of a police force. As one man put it "I don't believe it's right, but they [the Bolivian government] have stolen so much from us. It's time for us to steal a little back." In some cities, the crowds attacked symbols of economic globalization, including the Coca Cola factory in El Alto.

On Thursday afternoon, a military sniper shot and killed a nurse as she treated an injured protester. Many of the military involved in the fighting were cadets and young men serving their mandatory military service. Kids. Just out of high school.
In Santa Cruz, Oruro, and Cochabamba, people also took to the streets. Some looted and threw rocks. Other people simply marched carrying white handkerchiefs, calling for peace and an end to the killing. By Thursday evening, the violence and looting in La Paz had waned considerably. The death toll stood at 29, with over 100 injured.

After nearly two days of violence and uncertainty, La Paz's citizens began to venture out, wondering what had happened. My friend Sara and I joined those who walked down the main street, or Prado, seeing for the first time two days worth of destruction. We encountered eerie, empty streets-almost no vehicles. Closer to the city's center, families strolled, gawking, hands at their mouths. Bits of burnt paper settled in the gutters. As Sara noted, "I thought, wow, it smells so nice. Like autumn. Then I realized those aren't burning leaves."

Near my old apartment, looters had smashed windows and cleaned-out shops. Hotels had fortified their windows with mattresses and pulled-down their metal doors. Chunks of glass and old garbage lay in the middle of the street. Owners had boarded-up store after store-many clearly too late, their spaces completely emptied of goods.

In the center we found the first of the seven burned buildings: the Ministry of Sustainable Development. Chunks of charred computer and desks smoldered in piles outside the office. People pried in, trying to get past the gate for a better look. Smoke still wafted from one of the blackened windows.

Near Plaza Murillo, three lines of young men in camouflage fortified each of its four corners, pointing their automatic weapons out toward the passing crowd. Snipers continued to patrol the rooftops. A tank stood at each corner of the plaza, the barrel of its gun aimed down the street's center. Families walked by with strollers, pausing at the sight of tanks and so many military officers.

Closer to the palace, protesters had left building after building burned and empty. Windows broken, glass in the street. People standing around pointing. At Goni's party headquarters, people had overturned a large car, slamming it up against the gutted office building and burning it. A fat power line lay in the street. The mobs had made a bonfire out of papers, furniture, computers, and other belongings, though by then it was extinguished. Neighbors swept up glass and ashes in front of their homes and stores.

I passed one woman I had seen the night before on TV as she wept and described a band of protesters that had arrived at the party headquarters of Jaime Paz Zamora, ransacking the building and then burning it down. On Thursday afternoon she sat quietly with several people on the curb, staring at the decimated offices and describing how the mob had entered.

Although the police and government had reached an agreement in La Paz, police in Cochabamba were refusing to recognize it and protests continued there. Opposition leader Evo Morales and others called for Goni's resignation and announced they were considering nationwide blockades. In television interviews, Bolivians wailed and decried "Goni asesino!" Goni is an assassin. The levels of violence and death were compared to the days of Bolivia's dictatorships.

While La Paz has settled into an uneasy calm and its citizens have returned to work, the conflict is probably not yet over. Many of the people I have spoken with blame the government for not having had the foresight to solve or prevent the violence, and for having been blind to the anger the policies would cause. As my friend Lourdes said, "The government seems like it was surprised by what has happened." For many Bolivians, the violence was terrifying but not surprising. People here are desperately poor. A third live in extreme poverty, or misery, surviving on less than a dollar a day. Another third are considered poor.

Nobody knows what's going to happen now, but most people think that the conflict isn't over because the problems that powered it are still here. The anger, frustration, and desperation have been building in Bolivia for a very long time. I'll keep you posted.

Susan

December 2002 Rebecca

2004-10-21T12:05:00.000-04:00

December 2002

Dear Friends,

Only weeks after arriving in Bolivia's capital, Nuestra Señora de La Paz, Our Lady of Peace, I found the Coffin Street.
Everything in this city is sorted and sold by streets. Bathroom sinks gather grime for blocks. Tiles, buckets of plaster, pipes. Then, electronics, roped wires, bulbs glaring midday.

And coffins. On this particular street, several coffin shops prop white, angular coffins in their storefronts. Most coffins are baby-size. In one shop, they lean against the painted adobe and concrete walls, stacked upright, spilling into the street, where the owner also sells fresh bread out of a woven basket. Several adult-sized coffins sit in the back of the shop, but the majority are built for an infant, maybe a 2 year-old.

Here in Bolivia, they need all those baby coffins. Bolivia's infant mortality rate is 63 in 1,000. That number goes up if you include all children under age five. That's the highest rate in South America, and the second highest in the Western hemisphere (behind Haiti).

But those numbers don't mean much until you know the babies and their families.

Miguel and Patti attend my church, Truth and Light Presbyterian, where Miguel's father, Luis Perez, is pastor. In the weeks before their daughter, Rebecca, was born, Patti and Miguel told me that what mattered most was that she be happy and loved. Patti, with her shy smile, would look down at her feet, a little embarrassed by all the attention focused on her and her growing belly. Both Miguel and Patti hoped for a girl. Maybe the baby would become a doctor, a professional. Luis' wish for her was simpler—he wanted the baby to live. Weeks later, when I ran into him on the street, he was nearly bouncing with excitement. His first grandchild had been born.

Rebecca came a month early, but despite her low birth weight, she and Patti went home the next day. Like most Bolivians, Patti kept Rebecca wrapped tightly, a bundle of soft, pastel blankets, only her tiny face peering out. Miguel often carried the baby against his chest, focusing intently on her face during worship. But Rebecca rarely opened her thin eye lids.

Patti and Miguel took her to the local clinic for regular checkups, waiting in line with those who gather at 4:00 a.m. in the hope of seeing a doctor that day, but she didn't seem to gain weight or grow.

"They never gave us anything, not vitamins, not formula that would help her grow strong. Nothing," her grandmother, Lourdes, told me. "Women and babies are supposed to get good care, but the laws are a joke. We are humble people; we are poor people. They take one look at us and know we cannot pay."

No doctor ever determined why Rebecca didn't thrive. She was three months old when she died. Though we were months away from the rainy season, it poured all day. In the early hours of the morning, a Sunday, her family took her tiny body to the coroner. He pronounced her dead of malnutrition, despite Patti and Miguel's care. He asked "Didn't you take her to the doctor?" Luis' normally gentle voice rose in anger and frustration over the telephone as he talked about the coroner. They had loved that baby so much, the diagnosis seemed like an insult. But no one was surprised by Rebecca's death. Families hope and pray, but no one assumes a baby will survive here. When I spoke with Luis that day his voice was hollow, exhausted. He had just buried his three-month-old granddaughter. "Miguel and Patti are inconsolable. But I told them they must move on. They are young, they can have more children. They have to think of it that way. How else can they continue?" Luis and Lourdes lost three children themselves. And Rebecca became one of the thousands.

Every day in the Two-Thirds World, in countries like Bolivia, over 30,000 children under the age of 5 die from preventable diseases related to hunger and poverty. Every year, 14 million children worldwide die of hunger (Jubilee 2000/USA). Mostly babies die of wholly preventable diseases that do not require expensive treatment or high-tech equipment. The number one cause of infant death in Bolivia is diarrhea.

Understanding the context in which Rebecca died is complicated, messy. During the 1980s and 1990s, under pressure from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank, Third-World countries like Bolivia implemented economic austerity measures that slashed services and subsidies, abruptly liberalizing their economy, and promoting privatization, among other measures. Rather than investing in the welfare of their citizens, many countries were forced to cut spending on services like health and education. The policies that were originally implemented in Bolivia during the 1980s to curb rampant inflation are now criticized for having further concentrated wealth into the hands of a few.

While the Bolivian government is now trying to invest more in health and has reduced the infant mortality rate, it is still astonishingly high. One third of Bolivia's budget goes to paying off the interest on its debt. Not the debt itself, just the interest. Both Bolivia's health and education sectors remain heavily dependent on international aid because the government must devote so much of its budget to paying off debt interest rather than investing in its citizens' needs. In 1995, 88 percent of Bolivia's investment into health came from donations and foreign credit (Instituto del Tercer Mundo).

Bolivia's rampant, institutionalized corruption also prevents money and materials from getting to those who need them most.
Did upper-level corruption or mismanaged funds prevent supplies from reaching Rebecca and others entitled to them? Do people who work in the hospital skim off the top because they, too, are trying to survive as Bolivia's economic crisis worsens? What else contributes to making the health care system so profoundly unjust?

The complexity can make the situation seem hopeless, almost not worth tackling. And yet when I asked Luis' permission to tell Rebecca's story, he didn't respond as I expected. When I offered to change names and details to protect their privacy, Luis said "No, you must tell it truthfully. Why hide our names? People need to know."

Knowing that Rebecca's death was preventable, and that thousands of children like her die daily, is maddening. But she is also a powerful reason to keep working.

Susan

September 2002 Se hace camino al andar

2004-10-21T12:03:00.000-04:00

September 2002

"Caminante, no hay camino. Se hace camino al andar."
"Walker, there is no path. You make the path by walking."
—Antonio Machado

Dear Friends,

Until a few months ago, I didn’t fully understand the depths of many Bolivians mistrust of North Americans. Ely Lopez, a member of the Joining Hands network, and I were eating together. She paused, looked up from her plate of pique macho and confessed, "You know, until I knew you and Hunter Farrell [mission co-worker in Peru] I did not trust Americans. I could not trust Americans. But I’m glad you are here."
In that moment I felt both pleased and minuscule. I had begun, at least, to earn Ely’s trust and maybe to breakdown some barriers. But oh! How much remained!

How much remains.

Then, a few weeks ago, three members of the Presbytery of San Francisco traveled to Bolivia. Brad, Jean, and Del were here to attend a workshop on North-South economic relations, debt, and the Free Trade in the Americas (FTAA) agreement being pushed in the region by the United States (also known as "NAFTA for the Americas"), among other themes. But they were also trying to build a relationship between the Bolivian Joining Hands Network and the solidarity network that is based in the Presbytery of San Francisco.

We knew we were building trust when one person at the workshop said "I apologize for this question, but I really have to ask. We have had so many bad experiences with North Americans. How can we trust this isn’t just another form of colonialism?" Brad, Jean, and Del handled it beautifully. As Jean said later, "I saw the same question spread across everyone’s face. How can we trust when we’ve been hurt again and again before?"

The Aymara man who spoke, Felix, was clearly giving voice to what many people feared to ask. And it wasn’t an attempt to hurt. This is a group of people who are taking a real risk in trusting us North Americans. As Jean noted, they have been hurt again and again. Joining Hands is very much an adventure in building trust. It’s an adventure because we have no way of knowing how it will evolve. But both sides have agreed to take that risk, take that leap of faith. As Jean told the group, "There is nothing we can do to prove to you our intentions. We can only ask that you give us a small amount of trust. Enough to begin."

I feel so privileged—and so inadequate—to be witnessing these nervous steps toward each other, to be the person trying to stand between until both worlds draw close enough together so I can step back and let the relationship move on its own. Yet I am not the perfect bridge, because I am also, by virtue of color and citizenship, one who is not to be fully trusted. And I don’t know in the end if I will have been worthy of Bolivians’ trust. My biggest fear, a huge looming fear that sometimes creeps in and then runs on a massive, never-ending treadmill in my head at night, is that I will fail this group, that I will break their trust, that I will add to the countless lists of Northerners who have violated that trust and only validated why people didn’t trust in the first place.

But I also know I can only do my best, be as open, as genuine, and, as they say here, as "transparent" as I can be. We are just beginning.

In other news, one my closest Aymara friends, Rina, has just graduated from San Andres Mayor University with a degree in agronomy. She was the only cholita in the entire graduating class.

Rina graduated de pollera, that is, wearing traditional dress. The term "cholita" refers to an indigenous Aymara woman who still dresses in the full, layered skirts, bowler hat, long black braids, and shawl worn by indigenous women who have moved to the city from the countryside. And yet many women who enter the university feel a great deal of pressure to leave the pollera behind, adopting Western-style dress and trying to downplay their heritage due to ongoing discrimination of indigenous peoples.

Rina is in her early forties and was the only Aymara woman dressed de pollera in the graduating class. She wore her favorite skirt—deep green and moss-colored stripes. After many, many months of struggle to balance work, school, raising her family, and dealing with the low expectations most hold for indigenous women, Rina walked across the stage to the loudest applause and shouts of " bravo!"

There are few indigenous women who have achieved what she has, and yet she is part of something new and exciting for this country. She, like many other Aymara women, is making the path by walking.

Susan Ellison

August 5, 2002 Electing the Gringo

2004-10-21T12:00:00.000-04:00

August 5, 2002

Dear Friends,

Yesterday, Bolivia's congress elected its new president of the republic: Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada. Also known as "Goni." Also known as "the Gringo."

Congress was choosing Bolivia's newest president because no candidate emerged from June 30th's election with a majority. And so they chose between the top two vote-winners: Evo Morales and Sanchez de Lozada.

For months now, friends here have teased me: "How's your uncle Goni doing?" Or praised me: "You have a better accent than Goni!" As a gringa, as a foreigner living in Bolivia, I am a constant target for Gringo Goni jokes. But behind the jokes is a more serious tone.

Sanchez de Lozada got his nickname from his accent, and from his policies. The one-time Bolivian president (1993-1997) and former mining executive grew up in the U.S., studied there, and returned to Bolivia with a notorious gringo (foreign) accent. These days it's become part of his persona: affable, pudgy, neoliberal, always mixing up his verbs or the gender agreement of adjectives.

But the "Gringo" in Goni's persona has become even more pointed since the last days of June, when the U.S. ambassador to Bolivia made a startling statement to this nation as it prepared to vote. Basically:

Do not vote for Evo Morales, or you will face economic sanctions. We'll cut off all aid to your country.

The U.S. ambassador sent a clear message. He told Bolivians for whom they were and were not allowed to vote.

At the time, Evo Morales, an indigenous Aymaran leader famous for his opposition to U.S. drug policy in Bolivia, was trailing well-behind the two most popular candidates. It seemed there was little chance he or the other indigenous candidate, Felipe "Mallku" Quispe, would pose any threat to the reigning political parties and their entrenched leaders.

But in response to the U.S. ambassador's statement, Evo's popularity soared. The embassy has since tried to downplay the statement's role in boosting Evo's popularity, but it's pretty clear. People were enraged at the U.S.

Evo voiced widespread anger toward U.S. drug policy, misguided alternative development programs, and increasing militarism in Bolivia's eastern region, among other issues. But Morales also represented a threatening prospect for Bolivia's wealthy elite, many of European decent. He represented and represents indigenous people gaining voice and political power in a country that has historically excluded them.

Since I arrived in Bolivia, a number of Bolivians have commented on my presence. "It's so good you are here. You can teach these dirty Indians hygiene. They just smell." It's the kind of racist language I always associated with bussing riots and school integration in the United States.

Newly-elected President Goni will have to contend with growing social unrest and spreading condemnation of neoliberal policies, such as the privatization of natural resources. He also faces many questions regarding his dealings with Enron and Shell Oil in a highly questionable gas pipeline project from his first term.

While Evo did not win the congressional vote, he and the unprecedented number of indigenous people who were elected this year may be reshaping Bolivian politics. But Bolivians say they'll wait to see.

I'm hanging on to one last, troubling image: Yesterday I stood in the Plaza Murillo along with thousands of other Bolivians who were awaiting the election's results. Goni supporters wore the party's bright pink. Pink sweaters, pink hats, pink scarves. They triumphantly waved banners and danced—the outcome of the election had pretty much been decided days earlier through a pact made between Goni and one of his staunchest critics.

Goni's supporters occupied the entire plaza, and a protective wall of police in riot gear surrounded them.
Evo supporters stood outside the plaza looking in, denied entry. The military police, armed with tear gas and automatic weapons, effectively shut them out from the public square.

The crowd was mostly Aymara and Quechua, of indigenous decent. They waved the Wipala flag (a checkered, multi-colored flag that has become an icon of the indigenous movement), wore the blue and black of Evo's party. Small groups huddled together, listening intently to handheld radios as, inside, their congressmen and women made impassioned speeches in favor of Morales.

Gazing into the fenced-off plaza, a group gathered on the steps to chant "El pueblo unido jamás será vencido."The people, united, will never be defeated."

Goni supporters formed a conga line and taunted back at the mostly indigenous crowd of Evo supporters: "Go home and bathe. Go home and bathe."

Bread: July 2002

2004-09-09T20:11:00.000-04:00

July 2002

Bread

Luis kept coming back to bread—the importance of the Eucharist, sitting down to a meal together. These are important symbolic acts, demonstrations of community and our Christian faith. But they should also represent an actual goal, ensuring that all can enjoy the abundant life promised by Jesus Christ.

Pastor Luis Perez was challenging his congregation, about 50 mostly indigenous Aymaran Bolivians gathered in their small, concrete-slab church. He asked, "What if one of our members needed an operation that cost $500?" Someone called-out from the congregation, "We would have to sell what we own to help pay."

Reading from Acts, Luis asked, "What would the world look like if we lived like this passage asks us to live?" He answered his own question: "Nobody would be hungry."

Many in Luis’s audience work as maids or laundresses. Some are bricklayers or carpenters. All are poor, but those with jobs consider themselves lucky for even a limited source of income. Many are indigenous and face a great deal of discrimination. Luis was speaking to people that continually face economic crisis and other hardships. And yet he was challenging them to reflect on how well they are living as a community and how closely they are following the example of the early church.

But he also challenged me. Of all the people in that room, I felt like the one most in need of hearing that message, an upper-middle class woman from the United States, with access to education, good nutrition, and every thing I've needed, as well as what I've wanted. If I am to call myself a Christian, I'd better heed Isaiah's words and recognize that unless I actively work toward achieving God's Kingdom here on earth, my praises and prayers are empty.

The Bible is a challenging text. If we were to live our lives according to the Sermon on the Mount, following the example of the disciples in Acts, our local communities and our world would look very different.

It's pretty scary stuff for someone like me. Taking criticisms from the Old Testament prophets seriously can make one uncomfortable. Acknowledging how the Gospel texts call for economic justice and a commitment by Jesus' followers to live their lives differently is daunting.

But as another pastor once told me, neither our faith nor the church should concern themselves with comfort. They should push us to look at ourselves, our lifestyles, our world with a critical eye. Faith should challenge us personally, in our daily decisions, and collectively, in how we make policy and relate to other nations and peoples.

Where I shop, how much energy I use, how closely I follow local and world events, how I vote, all of these individual decisions have an impact on people around me and those I have never met. It is important to work for social and economic justice and abundant life in our local communities. Our Christian faith demands that. But it is also important for me to recognize that community extends beyond my neighborhood or national boundaries. It extends to people I have never met and worlds I have never known. It requires that I recognize that I do have an impact on others in this world, even if I am unaware of it.

Bolivia and Peru. Cameroon, South Africa, and Lesotho. India, Egypt, and Palestine. Churches, NGOs, and grassroots groups from all of these countries are participating in Joining Hands Against Hunger, and the work of the early church is evident in their efforts. The Bolivian Joining Hands network counts among its goals: "To promote the creation of public discourse that is favorable to the better distribution of wealth." They ask that we North American Christians be up for the challenge—that we take a critical look at ourselves, how we build community and how we interact with the rest of the world.

Luis's wife, Lourdes, remembers that their hardest years as a family were when they couldn't afford milk for their three small children. Today they consider themselves relatively well-off compared to the still-hungry families that surround them. And though their own economic well-being is always in jeopardy, both ask "Are we following the example of the early church?" Luis challenges himself and his congregation. He is also the coordinator for Bolivia's Joining Hands Network, which is looking at the root causes of poverty in Bolivia. And I am learning that some of those root causes have to do with me.

Lourdes runs a soup kitchen, and though often exhausted from her studies at the local seminary, she refuses to give them up. "There are still people who are hungry," she says.

What does Luis's challenge mean for me, mean for all of us who have so much and are uncertain how to respond? All I can do is listen to God's call and try to resolve how my life will be different.

March for Sovereignty, Territory, and Natural Resources: June 21st 2002

2004-09-09T20:09:00.000-04:00

June 21, 2002

Dear Friends,

More than a month after they left their homes, several thousand indigenous marchers arrived in La Paz. Their numbers multiplied along the way, as groups joined in from Sucre, Potosí, Oruro and other regions of the country. They march for many reasons, calling themselves a "March for Popular Sovereignty, Territory, and Natural Resources," but their most common cry is for una asamblea constituyente, a democratic assembly that would finally include the voices of communities that have been marginalized in Bolivia for centuries.

As I arrived in La Paz on Monday after attending a Joining Hands workshop in Santa Cruz, we passed the last group to arrive. Hundreds of people scattered off the road as they approached a nearby school where the group would rest before finishing the trek. Hundreds more stood in line for soup and bread. Our bus slowed behind the marchers, patiently waiting for them to pass, while we passengers stood with our heads poking out of the windows to see the people we had been hearing about for weeks.

"Mallkus," the traditional leaders in Aymaran indigenous communities, wore their black and red ponchos, a heavy rope slung around their shoulders indicating their status. Scruffy teenagers in sweatshirts and sandals hobbled from sore feet. Aymara women "de pollera" made the walk in tiny dress flats, carrying bundles and babies on their backs. A woman in front of me gasped and quickly pulled a bag of bread from the cubby above her head, calling out to a young man "Take this and share." He waved gratefully, as did others. We were all silent on board, in awe of what we were witnessing.

Most of the marchers arrived in La Paz sick, with bloodied feet, underdressed (the folks from Santa Cruz are accustomed to 80 degree weather, not the biting cold of the Altiplano), hungry from days with scarce food. Later, I asked one woman what they had eaten along the way. She and her friend laughed. "Potatoes and potatoes. Oh, bread too."

When I went to visit the marchers yesterday, families had collapsed onto the patio of a local university, settling in for the night. I was reminded of a comment a friend once made: "So much of social movements must be about waiting." A month into the march, participants now settled in to wait. Wait for their leaders to meet with government representatives to see if they can reach an agreement to the marchers’ demands.

Today, that same patio was filled with huddled groups of mallkus and community members, all trying to assess where the process stands, what options remain, discussing the news trickling out of the official "dialogue." The cold and lack of food has begun to wear on the several thousand people involved. Some have turned home. More surely will tonight. A line of 20 people waited for the one outhouse. Every person I spoke with communicated in a nasally whine, stuffed-up and coughing, sick from exposure and close quarters. We joked "everyone is sick in solidarity."
The catalyst for this march was a series of constitutional reforms proposed by a select group of non-elected "experts" pulled from the Inter-American Development Bank, the United Nations Development Bank, and the World Bank. Many of the people involved in generating the proposed constitutional reform had questionable ties to big businesses, including logging and oil companies such as Enron and Shell. Marchers and their supporters fear that the reforms will increase economic inequality while granting concessions to logging and oil companies to the detriment of the environment, especially in indigenous territories. In response, the march has called on a democratic assembly that would include the voices of all sectors of society to evaluate and reform the constitution. They want their voices heard, really, for the first time. I asked one woman why she participated. She said so that her voice might reach Congress. She had been walking for 37 days.

People are tired, and not just from the march. As another network member told me "people say they have nothing to lose. Why not march, what other options do they have?" Bolivia’s majority indigenous population has basically faced social exclusion for the past 500 plus years, and previous efforts have not yielded much substantial change. But the recently offered reforms have proven to be too much, galvanizing communities across Bolivia to action.

We do not know what the result of this march will be, but calling someone an "indio," and Indian, has always been the most scathing affront in Bolivia. As I heard someone say: this march, then, is so that "indian" will never again be an insult.

Abrazos,
Susan

To learn more about the U.S. connection, Enron and Shell in Bolivia, visit http://www.amazonwatch.org/

Edwin, Obed, Ana, Iliana: April 2002

2004-08-30T11:31:00.000-04:00

April 2002
Dear Friends,

There's a man who sits near my corner, waving his former hands—now stubs that reveal the shape of the shattered bone beneath—and calling out silently, his mouth gaping but wordless. Everyday I pass him and glance down at his contorted face. Some accident has pulled his forehead, cheeks, jaw, and left, eyeless socket into one massive, descending scar. Last week, I found out the probable cause. This man is not alone. La Paz is filled with such individuals, scarred and misshapen, handless, eyeless.

And now that I know why, I am troubled, fearful that it will happen to Obed, Edwin, Ana, or some other little kid I've never met.

Last month I wrote about the mines of Oruro, and the presence of U.S.-based mining corporations there. Then, last week, I finally visited Potosi's mine, Cerro Rico, and nervously made my way in with 12-year-old Edwin. Edwin is one of the 6,000 children working inside or around the mine site. He works, for now, as a guide, taking uneasy foreigners like me on tours. He charges about seventy cents. Though he says he never wants to work as a miner, there's a good chance one day he will.

Unlike the multinational-owned mines surrounding Oruro, Cerro Rico is a cooperative, run by the miners themselves. The children, therefore, often provide extra sources of income for their families, going to work alongside their parents. A small child, a 5-, 6-, 7-, or 8-year old, might sift through the piles of rock discarded by the older miners, combing for overlooked minerals. An older child may sell stones to tourists or lead tours. Edwin, at 12, has been leading tours for two years: taking gringos like me, hunched, down the light-less tunnels; calming our nervous questions when we hear the tic-tic-tic of hammers against stone and the rush of gravel moments later. (Landslide! I thought. No, normal, Edwin assured me).

By the time a boy reaches his teens, he is probably already working as a full-fledged miner, spending hours at a time inside. Mining is still largely male-dominated, with girls and women sticking to selling stones, culling for minerals in the debris, or guarding pickaxes and other materials outside the mine's gate. There is no single entrance. Instead, the sides of the mountain are pock-marked with hundreds of entrances, and at each entrance, a small shack where a family lives, guarding the miner's equipment and the entrance itself. None of these homes has electricity or water.

I learned from the Center for Regional Development (CDR), a Bolivian organization working in Potosí and with the Joining Hands network, that a child who begins to work in the mine as a teenager can probably do so for no more than 3 to 5 years. Pretty soon, the health consequences, like pulmonary silicosis, take their toll. The day I visited, we saw a teenager doubled over with the kind of thick, soupy cough I used to hear in my grandfather. Teenagers look wizened, look decades older. Inside the mine, as I watched the particles of dust dance in front of the gas-lit lamp, I instinctively covered my mouth and nose with my T-shirt, wanting to filter it out, knowing what it does to healthy lungs.

I spent three days with CDR, getting to know their work, and getting to know the kids of Cerro Rico. What a silly, wise lot. Most are old beyond their years, with poor formal education but unimaginable life experience. The last day of my visit, I sat in on a workshop put on by the organization to get parents involved in the new projects that CDR is establishing for the children. Over 200 parents packed themselves into a small room to talk about their hopes for their children, to listen to CDR workers talk about their new scholarship program, which will provide the kids with things like paper and pencils they cannot otherwise afford, and to dicuss their goal of organizing the children so that they have some protection as they go about their work. CDR operates under the hope that one day they can phase out child labor and find more sustainable, less dangerous futures for Cerro Rico's children.

The children put on what we call in Bolivia a "socio-drama," a series of skits where the children acted out their lives. It was a bitterly funny experience, with kids like Edwin providing dead-on, deadpan impressions of skittish gringo tourists (like me!), demanding bosses, and the violence of alcoholism. Periodically, while making fun of gringos, they'd stop and have me stand up and wave, gently teasing me. We laughed for hours, but I got the point. These kids are funny, smart, cuddly, observant, entrepreneurial, and wise beyond their years. They are also doing work that destroys their health and provides little future beyond short term necessities, like eating. Today.

In Potosí, it's hard to ask a family to keep their child in school. They may be able to catch a glimmer of the vision—hope that the next generation can make it—but in Bolivia's poorest region, that's a hard vision to maintain. Basic survival often comes first, and so child labor is widely accepted. When people look around and see the reality that there are few employment opportunities beyond the mine, it's hard to expect anything else.

CDR knows it's a hard sell. So it works with the children, helping them find other skills, helping cover some of the costs that would otherwise bar them from school (like school supplies), and also works with the local community to create alternative sources of income. That's the toughest part. In a country with terribly high unemployment, especially in the cities, and where those who can find work may work multiple jobs and still not be able to scrape together enough to feed their families, the solutions are not simple.

We tend to have a very faulty image of the poor, both in the United States and abroad, believing the solution is simply individual responsibility. For example, in the U.S. we often hold baseless views of people on welfare. We've grown so accustomed to the stereotype, we ignore the statistical evidence to the contrary.

Mark Rank, one of my professors at Washington University in St. Louis, has spent his career trying to dispel welfare myths.

What he has discovered is that in the United States, people in poverty are the same as you and me. Actually, it's likely that you and I will spend a year living below the poverty line. The truth is, statistically two-thirds of adults will receive some form of welfare by the time they reach 65. And between the ages of 20 and 75, fifty-eight percent of Americans will spend at least one year living below the poverty line. One of the most important statistics Rank has provided challenges one of the more ingrained (and racist) myths of all—that of the black, inner-city recipient. The truth of the matter is, two-thirds of welfare recipients are white, and many live in rural areas (statistics from Washington University Magazine, Spring 2002 pp.10-13).

Rank's point is this: People in need, poor people, are us. The images we have in are head are often false, and the danger is that we will continue to develop policy that reflects a distorted view of the poor. Along side faulty views of who receives such aid and why are stereotypes that prevent us from asking more important and relevant questions about how to address it.
They also relieve us from the responsibility of looking at the structural causes of poverty because our faulty images often incorrectly blame those in need, blame it on their laziness, on biologically inferior intelligence or abilities, blame it on their lack of will or determination, morals or other personal inadequacies—the problems of the individual.

The same goes for poverty worldwide. We develop incorrect assumptions about why people are poor, and those assumptions often blame the victim, failing to recognize deep structural and historical causes, ignoring causes that are beyond the control of the person in need.
In my nearly eight months here I have gotten to know personally some amazing, hard-working, creative, entrepreneurial, ethical people. Economically poor people.

What has struck me as CDR offered me a glimpse into the lives, the joys, and struggles of the kids of Cerro Rico and their families is how much I needed those faces and those stories to give the statistics meaning. Statistics may tell me how wrong my ideas about the poor are, and challenge me to change them. But nothing teaches me, nobody challenges me, like Edwin, Ana, Obed, and Iliana of the mines, like Veronica and Cristian, the street kids of Cochabamba, like Luis, Enriqueta, and Rina, who are working with the network and with their own organizations to address poverty in their communities and throughout Bolivia.

Peace,
Susan

(For further reading: Living on the Edge: The Realities of Welfare in America by Mark Robert Rank)

Mining and the Exodus: March 2002

2004-08-30T11:29:00.000-04:00

March 2002

The Israelites groaned under their slavery, and cried out. Out of their slavery, their cry rose up to God. God heard their groaning, and God remembered God’s covenant with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. God looked upon the Israelites, and God took notice of them.(Exodus 2:23-25)

Dear Friends,

The God of the Exodus heard the cries of the Israelites and heeded those cries for justice in the face of a powerful and oppressive pharaoh. The same God, the God of the Exodus, must also be listening to the cries from Bolivia.

In Oruro, in Potosí, and in many communities throughout Bolivia, the people have been crying out for centuries.

For 500 years, Bolivia has provided the raw materials that generated wealth in other countries. From the tin and silver-rich mines of Oruro and Potosí, Spain filled its pockets, establishing a pattern that would define Bolivia’s economy, reshape its landscape and marginalize its indigenous peoples for centuries.

Bolivian miners bore deeply into the mineral-rich earth, hauled rock and moved mountains. And that wealth built palaces for pharaohs in Europe, and later, America.

That is Bolivia’s history: Export raw materials, exploit natural resources and human beings. The ecological balance of the high plains has forever been altered by intrusive mining practices and the growing use of toxic chemicals.

As many as eight million slaves and indigenous people died from diseases like pulmonary silicosis during the mines’ most productive three centuries. Six thousand children between the ages of eight and eighteen continue to work in the silver mines of Cerro Rico, Potosí’s "Rich Hill."

Almost none of the wealth generated by such human and environmental destruction has remained in the country or returned to the people. New plans to exploit and export natural gas in the forested eastern region threaten to follow this same pattern.

Last week I spent an intense day listening to testimonies from local indigenous leaders and people from the community of Oruro as they confronted representatives of a gold-mining company with U.S. ties. They were using the only power they had—words.

The Center for Andean Peoples and Ecology (CEPA), a member of the Bolivian Joining Hands for Life Network, planned the public forum. They hoped it would encourage public discussion about the impact of multinational mining companies in Bolivia, including the ongoing use of child labor, toxins in the ground water and lakes, and terrible working conditions.

The company, a subsidiary of a large U.S. mining corporation, gave a sleek, polished, PowerPoint presentation, while members of the community could do little more than testify to what they had experienced.

The poor communities surrounding Oruro had no money to conduct scientific studies to see if the company’s past practices had led to environmental degradation. They had no team of experts, no sophisticated presentation. As I watched the "debate" unfold, I thought of how little we know about the practices of our companies in other countries. But I was also aware of how many Bolivian groups like CEPA are working tirelessly to confront injustices in their communities and speak truth to power.

Just as God heard the cries of the Israelites, that same God hears the cries of Bolivians. And we, too, should hear and heed those cries—after all, we were once slaves in Egypt. Our faith tradition demands that we recognize that we are connected to all peoples, especially those poor and exploited. It also demands that we educate ourselves to discover if we are contributing to that exploitation, through our lifestyles, our public policies, or our company practices.

And just as the Exodus story is one of hope—of pharaohs outsmarted by young girls, of communities lead to freedom by the most unlikely (and least eloquent) of people—there is much to hope for in Bolivia.

The Bolivian Joining Hands for Life Network challenges us to seek a new kind of relationship with the peoples and ecology of Bolivia—one that heals God’s broken creation and restores us to right relationship with one another.

In January, representatives from the nine participating non-governmental organizations, grassroots groups, and churches stated that the network’s mission is: "To promote a North-South and South-South solidarity movement that is an alternative to the current model of injustice, discrimination, and oppression."

But this new relationship requires that we in the North also be open to the challenges ahead, to learning from the South, to the possibility that in the process we will be transformed, and that in being transformed, we will no longer be willing to live as we have.

God calls us to respond. But how? We are all learning what it means to be good disciples in this increasingly interconnected world. This effort is ongoing; the first step is to become better informed.

Push your news media to cover events in Latin America and elsewhere in the world. Keep asking questions. When you hear about protests, violence, or other events in Latin America, ask whether they have any connection to the United States or U.S. policy.

Get involved in the Presbyterian "Enough for Everyone" program to learn more about the impact of U.S. lifestyles on others in this world: http://www.pcusa.org/enough. Topics include our energy consumption, the conditions under which the clothing we wear is made, socially responsible investment, and the new Presbyterian Coffee Project.

Make an appointment with the Presbyterian Washington Office to learn more about our faith tradition’s concern for public affairs: www.pcusa.org/washington or call (202) 543-1126. Subscribe to their electronic updates on the public policy issues that interest you the most.

Learn more about corporate responsibility campaigns. Do large companies in your community work in other countries? What are their environmental and labor practices?
Seek out interfaith organizations in your community dedicated to issues in Latin America or other regions of the world.

Often, the biggest challenge to addressing these issues is our lack of information. When we have that base, we can begin to map out a more concrete response to the injustices around us—and pretty soon, injustices that once seemed overwhelming become more manageable.
This story is a hopeful one. We find strength in knowing that God has been working throughout history to right broken and exploitative relationships. We have a responsibility to be active in this process, seeking out alternative relationships, learning about the practices of our companies and the impact of our policies. There is much to hope for, and to work toward: God’s kingdom here on earth.

Peace,

Susan Ellison

October 2001

2004-08-30T11:26:00.000-04:00

October 4, 2001

Dear Friends,

After two months in Bolivia, I am already convinced that the new Joining Hands Against Hunger Program is an important step for Presbyterians to take. The evidence is everywhere.
This afternoon, while walking through Cochabamba’s massive street market, I ran into Veronica again. She lifted her soiled apron and pointed to a large bandage wrapped around her middle. "I’m looking for money for penicillin," she explained, wincing. I’m sure that the many healed scars that crisscross her face are now mirrored by a huge scar on her belly. The baby she was expecting last week is dead.

I met Veronica two weeks ago while she paced near me in San Antonio park. Her belly was large. She was seven months pregnant. She grimaced as she walked, clutching her back and holding a bottle of heavy-duty shoe glue to her nose. Veronica is one of Bolivia’s thousands of street children, and the baby she lost will add to the grim statistics: an infant mortality rate of 63 in 1,000. The park where Veronica sniffs glue is a minefield of bodies sprawled drunkenly against walls or slumped on benches. Most of the children hold a bottle of glue permanently pressed to their noses and gaze around the park, uninterested, detached. These are Bolivia’s street kids—thousands of abandoned or runaway children in a country where 70 percent of the people work in the "informal sector," selling things like toilet paper and candies in the streets. About 63 percent of Bolivia's population lives below the poverty line, and the economy holds little promise that things will change.

But what brings children like Veronica to the streets and to the comfort of glue fumes? For several decades now, shifts in Bolivia’s economy have been the motor for internal migration. But the industries and agriculture that once sustained millions of Bolivian families are no longer viable. During the 1980s, under pressure from the United States and the International Monetary Fund (IMF), Bolivia adopted a series of stringent economic policies dubbed "structural adjustment programs," privatizing its mining industry and taking several other severe economic measures intended as a kind of "shock therapy." Thousands of miners were laid off and the migrations began. The Bolivian government has continued to shape its economic and social policy according to the dictates of the U.S. and international lending agencies. Bolivians themselves rarely have much say in the policies adopted in their own country. Instead, these stringent policies, rapid changes in the world economy, and Bolivia’s staggering debt, have had a profound impact on many communities in Bolivia and throughout Latin America. And so Bolivians move.

From the mines to the city centers, from the campo (countryside) to the ever-expanding and impoverished peripheries of La Paz, Cochabamba, and El Alto. Once in the city, Bolivia’s current economic crisis hits hard and families begin to disintegrate. No work. Squatter life. Alcohol is a good escape. Kids go to the streets to scavenge for food and money, steal— whatever’s necessary to survive. Veronica’s story is but one piece of this economic puzzle. I could describe another piece of the puzzle—a small farmer debating the pros and cons of planting genetically modified crops, or a child-worker in the mines of Potosi suffering from low attendance in school and pulmonary silicosis, or a woman working 14-hour shifts in a textile factory with no bathroom breaks, or an Aymara family in Oruro, powerless against polluting industries that contaminate their drinking water. This is a puzzle I’m just beginning to try to put together. Bolivians, however, have been working hard at it for years.
Throughout Bolivia, grassroots groups, churches, and non-governmental organizations are struggling to meet the growing needs of the people. In Oruro, local grassroots groups educate the community about the consequences of environmental degradation, especially on people’s health. They investigate the effects of pollution and economic globalization on the fragile ecosystem and people of Oruro. In western Bolivia, church groups work in rural development in an area known for its high levels of poverty, where in some places 94 percent of the population lives below the poverty line (that is, less than $150 yearly).

Some organizations focus on women’s rights, others on sustainable rural development, still others advocate on behalf of the marginalized indigenous majority. Eleven such organizations have joined together to form the "Bolivian Joining Hands for Life Network," which is part of the Presbyterian Hunger Program’s pilot project, Joining Hands Against Hunger (JHAH). Often, these groups are forced by circumstances to focus on Band-Aid solutions—simply meeting overwhelming needs in their communities. JHAH hopes to open up space for reflection on and analysis of the root causes of poverty in Bolivia and in the world. Working together as a network, these very different organizations hope to find ways to strategize and coordinate their efforts. They also hope to teach North Americans a little about the often negative impact that economic globalization has on people in countries like Bolivia, and how we can, as Christians and as North Americans, respond by seeking justice in our own communities and in the world. For the next three years I will be doing my best to learn from the people of Bolivia and the Joining Hands for Life Network.

I invite you to learn along with me.

Susan Ellison