northeastern chile 1.0: text version

So here goes my post to tell everyone about the absolutely amazing week I had on our excursion east.  I'm going to try to break it down day by day so it's a bit more manageable and I don't start rambling about unimportant things.  Here we go!

Day 1:

• We all loaded into our tour bus (yet again) and left Arica around 9:30am.  Putre technically is only about 60 km away but it's also 12,000 feet above sea level, which makes for a long, winding drive.  We stopped 4 times on the way to take a breather and adjust to the quickly rising altitude.

Almost to Putre - view from the bus

• After an absolutely breathtaking ride, we arrived to Putre in the early afternoon. We checked into our home for the week, Hotel Kukuli, and ate lunch. Almost immediately many of us were feeling the effects of the altitude - shortness of breath, pounding hearts, headaches.  Eh. 

• Lunch concluded and we walked to the town center to a small meeting room where we'd be having our classes for the week.  We met the excursion coordinator, Aldo, who acted as our "guide" of sorts for the week and he gave a presentation on the Indigenous Health System and Putre's context in particular.  I can't say I paid much attention to any of this - I was nauseous, light-headed, and feeling like I couldn't breathe.  One girl got up because she thought she was going to faint (and proceeded to puke outside the door) and I swore I was going to be next, but somehow I made it through the presentation. We were given some coca leaves to chew on or make tea with after an that helped a lot. 

• Later that afternoon we visited the local CESFAM (Centro de Salud Familiar; aka public health center) for a tour and to speak with the staff. The place was very tiny (sometimes they only have 5 or so patients a day!) but had a nurse, dentist, psychologist, and child developmental workers on staff.  There's also a paramedic that lives in the building who can be called 24/7 if an ambulance is needed.  The interesting part is that most of these people aren't actually residents of Putre but of Arica and they spend every other week in Putre.  Working in a small CESFAM like Putre's wouldn't be thought of as a very prestigious job in the Chilean medical field (the majority just enter the field for the money and prosperity instead of the desire to truly help people of all locations and statuses), so it's hard to fill the positions full-time to somebody who's interested in staying long-term. 

• Free time, dinner, bed.  Altitude sickness = no appetite and energy, so it was a bit of a rough night.   On top of that, very very cold!  The temperature dropped to around 30 degrees Fahrenheit around dinner time (and there's no heaters!) so we all piled on all of our warm clothes yet again. Thankfully there were about 5 (heavy) blankets on each bed so it wasn't too bad (minus the already suffocating feeling of not having enough oxygen).  My heart was still racing from chewing on coca leaves all afternoon, but after a while I drifted off to sleep.

Day 2:

• After a long night of strangely vivid dreams (which interestingly, quite a large number of us claimed to have) and waking up multiple times during the night gasping for air, Day 2 was ready to roll!  We ate a delicious breakfast in the hotel - cereal, bread, avocado, fruit, cheese, yogurt, and juice - and walked (still very slowly) to our classroom a few blocks away.

• Meeting with representatives from the Aymara community!  About 90% of the population in Putre (and the surrounding little communities) are of Aymara descent.  This morning about 10 different representatives of this community - doctors, midwives, farmers, etc - came in to talk to us about their role in the community and their health system.  I was grouped with 4 other Americans and two Aymaran women who came all the way from their pueblo that's about 3 hours away by bus.  These women weren't part of the traditional medicine system but were farmers.  They both came from the same village of about 10 families (and I thought Luverne was small) and their primary form of income was raising goats and farming.  They raise the goats as a food source and make fresh cheese to sell in Arica.  In terms of farming they grew all sorts of vegetables but were known for their oregano, which is also sold in Arica (and many other places as well).  One common thing that was heard among all the groups is that all of the children of these community members had moved away from their villages or Putre after school to live in Arica.  There aren't opportunities for higher education in these places and not many opportunities for work, so unless the children want to stay and work the land like their parents did they generally go to Arica.  These is causing an extreme demographic change in the area -- the population is overwhelmingly adultos mayores (older people).  It really makes you wonder what the future of Putre and the surrounding areas are - with a steadily aging population, who will sustain the community? Will Putre turn into another Chilean ghost town 50 years from now?  It's hard to say. 

• Lunch with the community representatives.  I ate salmon for the first official time, and unfortunately for probably the last time too.  Definitely not one of my favorites.

• In the afternoon class was taught by a yatiri (Aymaran doctor or "shaman" that uses mostly herbs to treat illnesses) and a partera or midwife.  The yatiri performed a few ceremonies to release the soul of somebody who recently passed away and also to wish good luck on somebody going on a journey.  The partera showed us different methods used to turn the baby before birth and also how to unwrap the cord.  Listening to their methods was definitely a learning experience -- a learning experience in cultural competency and open-mindedness.  You have to observe, accept, and support even if it doesn't make sense to you.  Overall, it truly was a once in a lifetime experience.

• Debriefing/feedback, dinner, sleep (with a little exploring in between). 

Day 3:

• Breakfast + load the bus to leave for Belén.  Belén is a rural town (with a population of 28 people) about 2 hours away.  The drive there was absolutely incredible - not like anything I'd ever seen before.

• Once in Belén we visited the posta or health center.  What an eye-opening experience that was!  The posta was tiny - about what you'd expect for a population of only 28 people (plus all the people in the surrounding villages).  It is run by one man, a paramedic who spends every other week in Belén and Arica (when another paramedic switches off with him).  When in Belén he does the work of an entire health team - he serves as the doctor, nurse, psychologist, matrona, everything.  Only very basic services are provided here, but they are available 24/7 because the paramedic lives on site.  For emergencies an ambulance is called in from Putre that will come to Belén and then take the individual to Arica.  Additionally, once a month a full medical staff comes to the area for what is call las rondas or "the rounds" essentially.  Las rondas visit all rural areas once a month and is the time when more specialized care can be provided or even basic care can be provided to those who have difficulty accessing the postas and clinics.  It was really impressive to hear all this one man does for the community.  One complaint he did have, however, was the lack of technology that's available to him.  There's no internet in the area and no cell phone services (companies don't want to pay to install towers in these rural areas when they could profit more off of installing them in more populated areas), and only one fixed phone (which only works with the usage of a calling card, which of course are not sold anywhere nearby and are very expensive).  In other words, besides the posta's radio used to call ambulances, communication is practically impossible.  Such a drastic change from the consumeristic life we're all used to living. 

• After our visit to the posta we visited the school in Belén - which currently as 6 students.  It's an intercultural school where the children learn Spanish, English, and Aymara.  They prepared and performed and traditional dance for us and the school "cook" made us a three typical Aymaran foods - goat cheese flavored with oregano, toasted corn, and llama jerky.  As a group we also brought various candies and kids toys to give to them (silly bands, candy flavored chapstick, toy cars, frisbees, bubbles, etc) because in general they really don't have access to that sort of thing.  It was a really, really touching experience and, once again, really made me open my eyes and evaluate my own life. 

• On our final stop of the day we went to Chapiquiña, another very small rural town in the region.  Here we visited centro de adultos mayores, essentially a house for older people who would otherwise live alone, and were served sopaipillas, a fried dough, with goat cheese and a spicy salsa, and guatia, a traditional Aymaran feast typically used for celebrations.  Guatia was quite the experience.  It is lamb, potatoes, and humitas (corn tamales) that are all completely cooked underground.  I took about 10 pictures of them digging it out of the ground because I was so excited about the whole process.  Once it was all recovered from the burning coals we were served absolutely giant portions -- each person got 4 potatoes, 2 humitas, and a giant hunk of lamb.  It was so delicious and soooo filling; I could barely eat half of my plate's worth.  After eating we strolled around the streets a bit.  Chapiquiña is located in the most beautiful of locations, everything was absolutely breathtaking.  But, at the same time, all very eerily quiet.  Besides the centro de adultos mayores, the city is practically abandoned, but all of the houses are buildings are still standing.  My first experience in a Chilean ghost town of sorts, you could say. The most interesting was seeing the old basketball court and playground at the edge of the city, uninhabited and rusty because not a single child lives in the town.

• Another long bus ride back to Putre.  That night we walked around the town a bit and perused though some of the stores for alpaca items (I bought a sweater and a headband) and watched the most beautiful sunset descent over the mountains.  All in all, the most incredible of days. 

Day 4

• Words can't fully describe the beauty I witnessed on Friday, the fourth and final day of our excursion.  We left around 10am and drove to Parque Nacional Lauca, one of the largest nature reserves in Chile, which includes Lagó Chungará (Lake Chungara), the highest-altitude lake in the world. The only complaint about the entire part is that we didnt get very close to any wild alpaca, event though they roam all over the park.  After an hour or so in the park we drove through the small town of Parinacota, a typical town of the altiplano area, and then headed to some termas or hot springs.  All of it absolutely exceeded my expectations.  Anybody can go to a big foreign city, but who can say they got the experience to eat guatia in a small diminishing village and spend time in the outskirts of the Andes talking with Aymara community leaders?  I feel like the luckiest girl, and am trying to soak in all these experiences as much as I possibly can.

I think that about sums up my week!  Next week I head to Peru but I'll try to do another post before then.  Also, I reached my limit on flickr already (frustrating), so I created a new picasso page - my pictures can now be viewed here:  https://picasaweb.google.com/100575919417646923485.

Chao,
Brittany