Lima – first impressions: It’s noisy, crowded, smelly, dangerous (especially if you want to cross the street), chaotic, and cold! But don’t misunderstand my impressions, Lima is actually a pretty cool place. Some parts have really beautiful architecture. I loved the museums we went to, and the ancient archeological sites we visited that were still being excavated were really awesome as well. But my favorite part of Lima was the people I met, of course. Everyone from our taxi driver, Coco, to the people at the Red Unidos Manos office, to the people at the seminary, to the Barrera family who took care of us, were all so kind and welcoming. Of course there were the stares from people on the streets, and the calls of “Gringita, Gingita” (little white girl), but all that I expected and I’m sure we looked quite strange filing behind Debbie like a strange flock of ducks, all with wide eyes that can’t move fast enough to capture all that’s going on around us.
In the few days I’ve been here I’ve already learned so much about the struggles and triumphs of the Peruvian people. One of the first concepts we learned were the concepts of solidarity and partnership with the Peruvian people. All the YAVs, including myself, are working with organizations that are all connected to a larger network called the Red Unidos Manos or the Joining Hands Network. Joining Hands works with everything from environmental issues to economic and fair trade issues to peace and reconciliation initiatives, and the 13 organizations that are a part of the network all work together for sustainable solutions to some of the problems in Peru. Joining Hands also brings in churches and organizations in the United States as partners in this process. The important thing to remember is that these churches and organizations work in partnership and mutuality rather than just giving hand-out and short-term solutions to the Peruvian organizations.
One of the things I’m learning about, and some of you may already have some experience with, is Fair Trade. The fair trade organization in The Red is called Bridge of Hope and they have artisans all across Peru who make everything from beautiful silver jewelry, to alpaca scarves and hats, to ceramic figures, to bags and stuffed animals. The idea of Fair Trade is to provide an alternative to the old purely capitalist system where the goal is to find a way the cheapest, easiest, and quickest way to make a buck. Fair Trade tries to eliminate much of the middle men and takes into consideration the artisans and workers rights and dignity by giving them a fair and decent price for their products. If you don’t already buy fairly traded products I suggest that you do, they stuff you can find that is fairly traded is often beautifully crafted and of a better quality, so in the end it’s really worth it to spend that extra few dollars on something that is fairly traded.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1SHYdKa1UB0 This is a good video about fair trade artisans in celebrating in Lima.
The other issue, that I hope at least some of you have heard about, is the environmental injustices that are occurring in La Oroya, Peru. I could probably write a blog post alone on La Oroya, but for now I will just give you the basics and encourage you to seek out more information on your own. Basically, an American owned company, Doe Run, has a metal smelting factory in Peru. This metal smelting factory emits 2,000,000 pounds of containminates into the air a day! As a result, La Oroya, a town of about 35,000 people, is experiencing a very serious health crisis. Over 99% of the children have lead poisoning and some are even dying from this invisible killer. It’s a very complicated issue because the town depends on the plant, some 20,000 jobs are connect to Doe Run, and so it’s a very decisive issue for the community. The people have to choose between their families health and putting food on the table, which is a decision no one should have to make. There is so much more to this issue, especially since it is an American company that owns Doe Run Peru, but here are some websites you can explore and look at to learn more: http://www.savelaoroya.com/ and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kpwu8DOmzoU <----- watch this video!!! and look for Fellow Presby and director of World Missions in the PC (USA) Hunter Ferrell.
Ok one last bit of information before I end this post. We’ve also been getting educated on the 20 years of violence that occurred in Peru from 1980-2000, when a couple of insurgent militant groups terrorized the country. The groups were the Sendero Luminoso or the Shining Path and the MRNA. Both killed and kidnapped many people, but what is worse about this war is that many of the murders and dissapperances were perpetrated by the Peruvian government in their attempt to quell the violence. It’s a very long and sad story, but one worth learning about. Here is one story in particular that unfortunately is not the only one of its kind about a town in the provences called Putis: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Putis, http://peruanista.blogspot.com/2008/06/amazing-videos-of-mass-graves-of-putis.html. Since the violence ended so recently the effects from it are still very much present in the Peruvian people, and I’m sure that I as I build relationships with the people here I will begin to see just how the years of violence has effected them.
