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Climate Change & Disappearing Glaciers, Festivals, Sacred Rituals, Religion, Peru's Andes Mountains, Traditions + Rituals, Water
Three-faced Ukuku, Guardian of the Glacier
In Andean culture, ukukus represent mythical bear-men who guard the glaciers at Qoyllur Rit'i pilgrimage and assist in other village rituals. Each year, young men volunteer to serve as their village's ukukus and bring health and prosperity to the community. Jorge photographed this ukuku at the June 2006 Qoyllur Rit'i pilgrimage. They wear masks to protect themselves from the cold, but this ukuku was sporting one with three faces. In his hand, he holds a whip, used to fight the condemned souls who haunt the glacier and to punish pilgrims who drink alcohol at the festival, which is forbidden.
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“All Hail the Glacier Gods”: El Fotografo’s MSNBC Pix of Qoyllur Rit’i
Back in December, msnbc.com published a photo story on Qoyllur Rit’i and global warming, with photos by El Fotógrafo and captions by yours truly. I neglected to provide the link to that slide show, which includes some of EF’s strongest images of the dangerous (and endangered) glacier pilgrimage, so here it is, belatedly: “Peru’s Disappearing Holy Glacier.” This photo, above, of a veteran ukuku is one of my favorites. The guy must be about 40 years old, but exposure to the harsh Andean elements has made his face a craggy moraine field. Most of the ukukus at QR are in their late teens and early 20s; you don’t see a lot of…
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Photo of a Pilgrimage Leader
"The Lord of Qoyllur Rit'i wants us to live together on this earth peacefully," he explained. "We travel to Qoyllur Rit'i in comparsas to learn to share, to stop being egotistical and hypocritical."
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Photo of the Day: Our Campsite at Qoyllur Rit’i
We camped out for three nights (June 6-9) in the valley below receding Qolqepunku Glacier. That dark mountain on the right used to be covered with snow and ice. Once upon a twentieth century… I look at this photo, and what strikes me is how pleasant and cozy the scene appears. Warm sunlight, plenty of space between campsites. That’s anything but the truth. Climbing out of that tent in the frigidly cold morning was torture. I got dizzy bending over in the high altitude and sort of collapsed onto this chair just minutes before El Fotografo snapped this shot. There is an 11-year-old child inside the zippered tent, refusing to come out after a sleepless…
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Climate Change & Disappearing Glaciers, Festivals, Sacred Rituals, Religion, Peru's Andes Mountains, Traditions + Rituals
I End up Doing the Whipping Dance
El Fotografo and I were making friend with our camping neighbors — a comparsa from Cusco — at the Qoyllur Rit’i pilgrimage last weekend, when suddenly one of the young dancers snatched me by the arm. “Come on, dance,” she said. No, I said, several times — No to the satin skirt being pinned around my (enormous) down jacket, No to the elaborate flat hat (montera) being strapped on my head, No to the leather whip being thrust in my gloved hand. No, because this gringa didn’t want to risk having a heart attack by foolishly dancing the “Yawar Mayu” (River of Blood) ritual whipping dance at 15,500 feet above sea level. Not…
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Getting Our Bearings Back after Qoyllur Rit’i
Back in Lima today after four days and three nights at Qoyllur Rit’i. We got great material (interviews, photos, video), and all of us survived, but it was an ordeal. Bitterly cold temperatures (-10 degrees Celcius), sleepless nights accompanied by constant drumming, dynamite being set off helter-skelter. Having to re-set up camp ourselves in the dark due to our arriero‘s incompetence (tents pitched at angles, facing wind). El Fotografo passing out due to exertion at high altitude….I could go on and on. But on the plus side — we met a great comparsa from Cusco-Santiago, who welcomed us into their rituals and let us understand the remarkable faith that drives pilgrims to make this…
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Going up the Mountain Today
It is quarter of nine in the morning, and we’re waiting for the van to pick us up at Hostal Buena Vista, in Cusco, to take us to Mawayni. That’s where pilgrims begin the eight-kilometer climb to the shrine of Qoyllur Rit’i. The hostal is owned by El Fotografo’s cousin Jorge, who’s got a nice thing going here. We’re listening to the Waifs and eating local bread with eggs, cheese, ham — 100 percent energy, as Jorge says. El Hijo likes Cusco this time around. I have no idea how well he will cope at high altitude, surrounded by tens of thousands of dancing, chanting pilgrims. Tonight we’ll find out.…
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In Search of the Vanishing Snow Star
El Fotografo and I are turning the house upside-down this weekend, as we air out camping gear to go to the glacier pilgrimage of Qoyllur Rit’i (“Snow Star” in Quechua) next week. The annual Andean pilgrimage takes place in a remote valley in southern Peru, at the foot of 16,000-foot-high Qolqepunku Glacier. Pilgrims travel from all over central and southern Peru, as well as northern Boliva, to attend this remarkable event, the largest of its kind in the Western Hemisphere. The Catholic Church has its hand in Qoyllur Rit’i, but what really interests me and El Fotografo are the indigenous, ice-worshipping rituals that people perform at Qoyllur Rit’i. That’s why we’re…
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Photo of the Day: Masked Sheep’s Head Dancer, Qoyllur Rit’i Pilgrimage 2006
Masked dancer at Qoyllur Rit’i festival, Peru, 2006 El Fotografo spied this guy at the 2006 pilgrimage. He embodies the fertility cult that underpins the festival’s Catholic traditions, which have been sycretized with older, Andean rituals. I find this image rather terrifying, for some reason. We looked again for the Sheep’s Head Dancer this past May but didn’t see hide nor hair of him, as they say. —Barbara R. Drake
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Largest Indigenous Religious Pilgrimage in Western Hemisphere
Media outlets such as National Geographic speak of Qoyllur Rit’i as “the largest indigenous religious pilgrimage in the Western Hemisphere.” But how big is it, really? The number of pilgrims most frequently cited by writers is 40,000. I’ve also seen estimates at 60,000 and 80,000. Wikipedia lowballs attendance at an incredible 10,000 pilgrims. But these figures seem skewed when you visit the site when the pilgrimage is in full swing. I tend to agree with a volunteer for Peru’s Civil Defense, who puts total number of pilgrims at around 300,000 over the four days of the event.
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Back from Qoyllur Rit’i & Ukuku Madness
El Fotógrafo and I are back from the pilgrimage of Qoyllur Rit’i in the Sinakara Mountain range, 80 miles southeast of Cusco, where for three brutally cold nights (May 16 – 18) we camped out below Qolqepunku glacier, along with tens of thousands of pilgrims from parts of Peru and Bolivia. Our goal? To document, in photos and interviews, the changes that global warming has wrought on this 17,000-foot-high glacier, which is considered sacred by the Andean people, and to find out what pilgrims think about their revered glacier vanishing into the ether. It was a rough stint, but worth it: EF got some wonderful shots, I was able to…
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An American in Lima Goes to Qoyllur Rit’i
We’re in a frenzy here in our house packing to go on an expedition to a glacier near Mount Ausangate, in the southern Andes. Qolquepunku Glacier is the site of the ancient pilgrimage of Qoyllur Rit’i, whose name in Quechua translates “Shining Snow Star.” More than 100,000 pilgrims come from all over Peru and Bolivia to pay tribute to “El Senor de Qoyllur Rit’i,” to climb the sacred glacier and to dance for days and nights at 17,000 feet above sea level. Yikes! The pilgrimage is ostensibly Catholic but has its roots in precolombian rituals that were practiced long before the Incas created their vast empire. The three dancers pictured above (photo courtesy El…
