Back from the Land of the Blue-eyed Alpaca
- I spotted this unusual blue-eyed alpaca on a hillside in Upis
I returned to Lima this past Saturday after a week trekking around
Mount Ausangate, in southern Peru, with my cousin and a Quechua-Spanish translator from Cusco. What an experience.
It was a work trip, rather than a vacation per se; we'd wake up at six each morning, bolt down some oatmeal and then walk to the next pueblo to find people to interview. I was there to talk to people about climate change and how it's impacting their daily rituals and religious celebrations.
A few random observations:
(1) The ice caps are melting rapidly, and extreme weather events are becoming more common: months of no rain, then a deluge, then months of hail. (We got hailed on twice.) People are extremely worried about their crops (which are faltering) and their animals (which aren't reproducing as much as they used to, and which are being hit by lightning a lot).
(2) People there have so little money and so few material resources. It is heartbreaking.
(3) The Ausangate region is largely ignored by the Peruvian government. It receives little to no funding support; the police don't bother coming to many of the towns, and people must fend for themselves. This is not the Sacred Valley!
(4) Evangelists have taken over most of the towns.
(5) Even with their "white ponchos" disappearing into thin air, the mountains are breathtakingly beautiful.
(6) I was never so cold in my life! Arggh! Nights, of course, were the worst. My cousin and I shared a tent, and we slept in all the clothes we owned, plus our down jackets, inside our sleeping bags, and still we felt ike a couple of icicles.
As we made our way from village to village, we passed by many flocks of llamas and alpacas grazing on the hillsides.
I've posted a photo of one rare alpaca we spotted -- a white and gray alpaca with pale blue eyes.
I imagine he's quite a celebrity in his corral.
Tags: Climate Change & Disappearing Glaciers·sacred mountains
10 responses so far ↓
1 nixa // Sep 22, 2008 at 2:07 pm
Such a cute llama. I can’t wait to make it back down to the Andes, it has been way to long. I miss my family, the air, the food and the llamas. Your blog helps.
2 Acai Berries // Sep 22, 2008 at 2:10 pm
I’ve heard some goody things about this blog. cheers!
3 Barb // Sep 23, 2008 at 11:33 am
Nixa — yes, the Andes are magical — even the air, as you say. I hope you make it back soon.
4 Melissa // Sep 23, 2008 at 11:34 am
Wow. I’ve always wanted to do that! Just go to the highlands and not go on tours or stay in hotels but just camp in people’s backyards and hang out with them. I would love joining you next time I’m in Peru!! My husband – American – is in love with Peru, he would be so excited about it!
5 Barb // Sep 24, 2008 at 8:29 am
Melissa — most of the people of the Ausangate region welcome tourism, so if you’re inclined to visit, I say go for it! You will need a guide, though, to arrange with locals to camp out on their sites and to ensure safe passage. If your husband is interested, you and he (or one of you)can join the South American Explorers Club, which is an excellent resource for finding good guides and avoiding bad ones. I am going to make my next trek thru the area with a guide I found via SAE.
6 Peruanista // Sep 26, 2008 at 4:11 am
Nixa: that is not a Llama, it’s an Alpaca.
_______
Barbara,
Your chronicle made me sad in some way, but I am looking forward to hearing about the stories the Ausangate people told you. How exciting!
You know, I can imagine the poverty of those people! I have seeing it growing up in the central Andes region of Peru, where mining workers die at 45 y.o. and families live like slaves.
Oh my goodness, what would it take for Peruvians –especially Indigenous peoples- to wake up and break from this horrible reality?
When will the Peruvians start building a better nation, where not a single Peruvian family should suffer of hunger and extreme misery, where everyone would have access to decent housing, good education, health care, etc.
Seriously, am I the only one who feels this way? Will the Lima government do something about our people? Some things have to happen in Peru to change it.
7 Barb // Sep 28, 2008 at 11:47 am
Peruanista — Thanks for your input, esp. since you can testify to the extent of poverty in the Andes. It is hard for outsiders to imagine the lives of people who live in the remote Andes, or who work in the mines. I have only observed it on trips, but you grew up seeing the suffering of miners for yourself. I imagine it must have roused anger and despair in you.
For readers of this blog who want to know more about the conditions that miners suffer in the Andean mines, I can recommend two sources personally.
One is the collection of drawings and commentary by Guaman Poma (1535-1615), who spent 30 years traveling thru Peru right after the Spanish Conquest. His accounts of the incredible abuses perpetrated on indigenous miners are painful to read but impossible to forget. I think his drawings are even more revealing.
Another resource that I recommend is the amazing documentary film The Devil’s Miner (2006), which follows the real-life experiences of two child miners in the mines of Potosi.
Here’s the link to the website:
http://www.thedevilsminer.com/index_new.html
The film literally takes you into the belly of the beast — the silver mines of Potosi, Bolivia, where countless generations of Andean people have suffered and died digging out veins of silver. It’s a brilliant, deeply affecting movie that is quite surprising on some levels. I highly recommend it to anyone who wants to see a great, real film that has also managed to raise more than 1 million Euros for the child miners of Potosi.
8 Barb // Sep 28, 2008 at 11:55 am
“When will the Peruvians start building a better nation, where not a single Peruvian family should suffer of hunger and extreme misery, where everyone would have access to decent housing, good education, health care, etc”
Good question. The issue of hunger is really pressing. There are some excellent NGOs that have been working hard to get food to the people, but their efforts are dwarfed by the size of the problem.
I keep thinking that Peru should emulate the Incas, who built storehouses throughout the Empire to ensure that people would have food during shortages and droughts. Geographical divisions keep certan populations very isolated, but it isn’t impossible to include these communities within a larger solution, as the Incas demonstrated.
Meanwhile, I keep reminded my friends who visit Peru that people here are hungry. If they’re trekking through the Andes, they can bring along bags of rice and noodles and hand them out to people. I have never had any indigenous person get angry at me for giving them food; they recognize its value and are almost always very thankful.
9 Carolyn // Oct 12, 2008 at 9:33 am
I enjoyed reading your story. I just purchased a blue-eyed alpaca male (he is not deaf, thank goodness). He appears white, but I notice his under-coat is gray. One of the nuns from the White Violet Alpaca farm is coming to ‘evaluate’ him tomorrow.
I’m having fun learning about the wonderful animals. I have never been to Peru – I live in the U.S. and have traveled many times to Jamaica. POOR also!!!
10 Barb // Oct 12, 2008 at 9:59 am
Hi, Carolyn — congratulations on acquiring your own blue-eyed alpaca. Impressive! I don’t know anything about the White Violet Alpaca farm — where is it? I imagine the nuns are quite devoted to their animals, no?
I’d like to hear what the nun’s “evaluation” is.
I was under the impression that blue-eyed alpacas have white coats, too, but when I developed my photos from Ausangate I saw that the blue-eyed animal I photographed had both white and grey fur. Therefore the alpaca isn’t albino, per se, which is what I had thought was associated with the blue eyes.