Study-Service Term

The music of the Andes is distinct for its use of native wind instruments — including quenas (flutes) and sikus (pan flutes).  Early versions have been found in archaeological sites dating back thousands of years.   Charangos (lutes that resemble a small guitar) and other stringed instruments are relative newcomers, part of the Spanish influence that began in the 16th century.  Today, wind and string instruments are combined with percussion to make beautiful music.

Mauro Claros Chatas and Americo (Amaru) Mejia Suñiga are prominent in the Cusco music scene.  Mauro is originally from Lake Titicaca, where he grew up playing a flute while tending his family’s sheep.  Amaru is from Cusco, a talented flautist and drummer who studied music after finishing high school.  We spent two memorable hours with Mauro and Amaru, learning about traditional Andean music and discussing changes brought about by European and North American influences.

Our guests played a variety of pieces for us, including a song featuring Aymara lyrics, the native language spoken around Lake Titicaca and the highland areas of Bolivia.  Then someone asked about huaynos, a popular genre in this region that is rooted in traditional Andean folk tunes.  Mauro admitted his distaste for modern huaynos and offered to play us an original huayno instead.  Hearing the tune, our program assistant, Alicia, stepped into the circle and began inviting people to dance — she couldn’t help moving her feet to the rhythm.  So we did too.

How many trees can a group of SST students plant in two days?   246.

We ventured up to the town of Acopia to meet our host, Luis Delgado, founder of Yachay Wasi (House of Learning).   Yachay Wasi is part of an international movement to plant a billion trees in deforested regions all over the world.  Luis has committed his organization to planting a million trees in the four lakes region of Peru.  We did our part to move him a bit closer to his goal, using funds donated from friends back in Goshen to pay for native qeuna seedlings.

Most of the trees were planted our first afternoon near the town of Acopia using chakitaqllas (Andean foot plows) and shovels.  We hope that someday they will form handsome hedgerows to the fields they border.  On our second day we carried 37 more seedlings up to a 4,300 meter (over 14,000 feet) mountain overlooking a vicuna reserve.  Vicunas are a native camelid, related to the llama and alpaca, and are fairly rare in these parts.  We got a view of them in the distance before turning to our work at hand, getting several dozen trees planted in what we hope will one day become the beginning of a new forest.

During our visit we had a chance to learn about global environmental issues from Luis as well as local customs from his neighbor, Feliciano Fputturi.  Each month members of the community gather for a town-hall type meeting and participate in regular feinas (work parties) to repair cobblestone roads, clean out irrigation ditches or construct community buildings.   We also ate a variety of traditional Andean cuisine — soups and main courses consisting of quinua (a high-protein grain), potatoes, herbs and, a rare treat, Alpaca meat.

Quechua is the language of the Incas.  It is the second-most common language in Peru.  We asked one of our Spanish language instructors, Luz Atapaucar, to give us a lecture on Quechua.  Luz, a native of Cusco province, grew up speaking Quechua to her grandmother and other family members.  She explained that Quechua is spoken by 8 million Peruvians, as well as Andean inhabitants of Ecuador, Bolivia, Colombia, Brasil, Chile and Argentina.  After centuries of suppression under Spanish rule, it finally became an official language in Peru in 1975.  The language is still spoken extensively in rural areas and among older people.  Though many younger people would prefer to learn English, the native language is experiencing a resurgence in universities and among noted poets and authors.

Quechua uses onomatopoeia:  words imitate or suggest the source of the sound that they describe.  For example, the word for car is “titititiamoshacarro” — the “titititi” suggests the sound of an approaching vehicle.  The language builds words through aggregation of suffixes, such as adding “kuna” to a word to make it plural or “y” to make it possessive.  Quechua words and phrases are very common here and many students live with host families where Quechua is spoken by some or all of its members.  We appreciated the chance to learn more about the origin, history and structure of this language as we develop a better sense of place.

Moray is an Inca ruin unlike any other.  Our guide, Oswaldo Palomino, described how prominent archaeologists from the United States, Egypt, Mexico and other nations have visited this site and marveled at its design.  Moray consists of twelve concentric circular terraces, each one lower than the one above, that penetrate deep into the side of a mountain.  Each terrace has a different micro-climate, with lower terraces simulating the growing conditions at lower elevations in the Andes.  Scholars theorize that the Incas developed and tested varieties of corn, potatoes and other crops here.  They would have planted a particular variety on several different terraces to observe at which elevation it grew best.

The English word “jerky,” as in beef jerky, originated from the Quechua word Ch’arki.  The Incas and the cultures that preceded it preserved llama and alpaca meat by salting and drying it.  Where did all this salt come from?  We visited the salt works at Maras to find out.  A spring emerges from the earth here, providing a small stream of saline water that is carefully channeled into a series of 2,000 ponds.  Each pond produces about 100 kilos (220 pounds) of salt per month and is owned and managed by a particular family in the nearby town.

Peru is famous for its fine textiles.  We visited the Andean Weaving Center, a workshop where women use looms to produce mantas (blankets used to transport anything from babies to corn on one’s back), table runners and clothing.  We learned from our host, Rene Huaman Callanaupa, that these traditional weaving techniques were almost lost during the colonial period as Andeans were forced to work in the mines and haciendas (estate farms) for their Spanish masters.  In the last several decades arts like these have been revived by the influx of tourism.  The techniques are labor intensive — it takes several weeks to make a table-runner — and foreign tourists have sufficient income and interest in these pieces to support the artisans through their purchases.

We began our first full week in Peru with a presentation on Peru’s economy.  The average Peruvian earns only a fifth as much as the average US resident, but incomes are increasing quickly and the poverty rate is falling.  Mining and tourism are helping to drive the country’s economic growth.  These industries are also bringing profound changes as people move from the countryside in search of income and opportunity.

Next we heard from a curandero, or traditional healer.  Senor Santos Ramirez Zuniga demonstrated a ritual that has been practiced for centuries in the Andes.  One by one, he methodically placed a variety of items representing hopes or desires in a pile.  He soon had a small assortment of leaves, flowers, candy, corn and plastic trinkets which he wrapped up into a bundle and would later burn and bury as an offering for Pachamama (Mother Earth).  He then described an ancient coca leaf ceremony and showed us his technique for healing illnesses with flower water and an egg.  The contrasts between what we witnessed there and the Christian ceremonies and modern medicine practiced in the States were fascinating.

Living with host families and understanding the culture requires a working knowledge of Spanish.  The students’ mastery of Spanish varies widely — from basic to fluent.  We are fortunate to have two experienced and capable instructors to teach during our time here in the Andes:  Luz Arapaucar and Viviana Pujada.  Their goal is to help everyone learn how to communicate in this oral culture, learning the Peruvian version of the second-most-spoken language on earth.

There are many ways to learn, of course, and some of the best opportunities happen outside the classroom.  We spent a morning in the village of Huacarpay helping two families recover from the flooding of 2010.  At one home a group of students moved a large pile of earth to raise the ground level behind the front gate.  At the other a second group helped build a retaining wall to protect the house.  The two families, members of the Mennonite Church, have been displaced for two years and it was satisfying to know that, in some small way, we were helping them put their lives back together.

After our service project, we traveled to the village of Lucre and dined on fresh fish at a trout farm operated by Pastor Eloy and his family.  Most pastors in Peru have another profession to support their families.  We enjoyed the chance to sit among the fruit trees in their yard and satisfy our hunger with local trout, potatoes, corn and salad.

We ended the day with a visit to one of the oldest churches in Peru.  The construction of St. Peter’s Cathedral in nearby Andahuaylillas began in 1572, forty years after the arrival of Francisco Pizarro and his Spanish soldiers.  The church is sometimes referred to as the Sistine Chapel of Peru.  The walls are covered with vivid frescoes depicting the life of the Apostle Peter.  Near the entrance is an engaging mural, The Way to Heaven and the Way to Hell.  Like many churches in the New World, the artwork was intended to teach without the use of words — the Incas and their predecessors operated without a written language and Quechua words were first put onto paper less than a century ago.

We enjoyed two gorgeous days in the Andes, where the rains have returned and the hills are green.  We spent the first day beginning the process of acclimation, taking it easy as our bodies slowly adjust to life at 3,399 meters –  11,152 feet.  It’s not often that we head for bed as soon as dinner is finished.

On our second day we introduced our theme:  A Changing World — A Changing Peru.  Living in small towns and villages in the mountains will give each student a chance to learn the customs, sample the food and experience life in a rural setting where many trace their ancestry and traditions to the Inca culture that ruled here 500 years ago.

Our formal learning will take place in lectures, workshops, Spanish classes and on tours of Inca ruins and traditional markets.  Our informal learning will happen inside the homes of families in San Jeronimo, Angostura, Huacarpay and Lucre, all members of local Mennonite congregations.

After our orientation, we loaded our bags into (and onto) a van and we headed for Promesa school on foot, a half-hour walk through the old section of San Jeronimo.  As we entered the school grounds the families were just beginning to arrive.  Pastor Roberto helped us make the introductions.  Then students headed off, in ones and twos, with their host mothers, fathers, sisters and brothers.