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Woman Spinning Wool, Ausangate
photo by Barbara Drake Time for an Andean reality check. Too much Paris Hilton bikini nonsense. I met this woman last month while trekking around Mount Ausangate, in southern Peru. Her name is Vicentina Chuchicari Mamani, and like most people in the area, she spins her wool and makes her own clothes. People have been crafting their textiles in this way for more than a thousand years. Vicentina is 48 years old. She has spent every day of her life sitting in the lap of Ausangate, spinning wool from her herd of llamas and alpacas. She likes to be busy, she says. When I tried to take a photo of her at rest,…