El día de Santa Clara

Last Wednesday, as a break from the Archives, I decided to visit the Museo del Convento de Santa Clara. Much smaller than the Museo de Santa Teresa in Potosí, the local museum has a small but excellent collection of 18th century paintings, sculpture and silverwork. On my way out of my B&B, I mentioned Santa Clara to my landlord, Osvaldo, and he asked me if I was going to pick up some of their famous empanandas (filled meat or cheese pies) which hadn't occurred to me, but...

When I entered, I realized that I would not be allowed to take photographs. The ticket seller/guide (I was the only visitor) indicated I needed to go around the corner to request permission. I expected I would find something like an office where I could plead my case. Instead, off to the side of a small courtyard was a staircase, a large landing and a number of people standing in line to buy empanadas. Not seeing any other possibility, I joined the line. When the nun, behind a small green wooden revolving door asked me how many I wanted. I said none, thank you, but I would like permission to take photographs in the museum. She said a nun would meet me in the museum. I returned to the museum, presented my card and explained why I needed the pictures and that I would not use flash. She agreed but suggested I make a contribution to the museum which I did. At that point, the once officious guide became my gracious assistant.

This morning, I was invited to my friend Darío's Mother's house for the Canseco annual participatory Empanadas de Santa Clara bake. We all helped roll the dough, stuff, finish the edges and bake. When they were fresh from the oven, there were more than 25 of us feasting. The filling consisted of sautéed green onions, hardboiled eggs and olives cured in red wine. Of course they were delicious. I hadn’t realized that Wednesday was Santa Clara's saint’s day and the one day in the year that the Santa Clara nuns offer their famous empanadas to the public.

By the way, as I left the museum, I asked the guide if the nuns ever offered him an empanada. He said no, so I went back to the green rotating door and bought two for each of us.

Silver, Sucre and La Virgen de Guadalupe

One of the advantages of wearing a coat outdoors is that it permits me to carry my digital camera with me at all times. This morning, I was able to get into the Chapel of the Virgin de Guadelupe. The Chapel, adjoining the Cathedral, contains a miraculous image of the Patroness of La Plata (Sucre.) The image itself, Mary and baby Jesus have painted faces which were placed on a gold-plated silver triangle, is encrusted with jewels (pearls, diamonds, emeralds, etc.) and is rumored to be so valuable that, if cashed in could pay off Bolivia's national debt.

In the Plaza, along the side elevation of the Cathedral, a line of cars were being readied for a procession and eventual Mass in the Guadelupe Chapel. The cars were covered with family treasures (weavings, silver bowls and plates, and stuffed animals and dolls.) I missed the procession itself, but I spoke with one of the women sewing silver objects to the weavings. She told me that it was a family celebration. Years ago, in Cochabamba, I saw a similar ceremony. Then, I learned that each year, a family becomes the protector of a religious image for a year. The procession and fiesta occured when the next branch of the family takes guardianship. Perhaps, this was a similar occassion.

My Piece of Bolivia's History

I first came to Bolivia in 1964, when I was 22. As a Peace Corps Volunteer, I taught at the state university in Cochabamba (La Universidad Mayor de San Simón.) Twelve years before, Bolivia experienced the first major social and economic revolution after that of Mexico in 1910. The MNR (National Revolutionary Movement) initiated land reform, the nationalization of the mines, health reform, public education and unversal suffrage. Bolivia's revolution was supported by Washington. It preceded Cuba's revolution by seven years, a revolution definitely not supported by Washington.

This comes to mind after a conversation, last week, with a recent graduate of the local School of Architecture. He is working, part-time, for my best friend here, Arq. Darío Canseco. Mario (his name) is from a village near Zudañez, a small city about 50 miles from Sucre. His father works the land and plants potatoes, wheat and corn. I can't vouch for this, but it very likely the land was once part of a hacienda and was distributed to the peones who worked for the hacendado five days a week to be able to work a small plot of the master's land the other days. Clearly, Marios' family made major sacrifices to enable him to receive a university education. While in architecture school, he worked as a waiter in one of Sucre's tourist restaurants.

What I am trying to say is that the education and land reform MNR revolution has had a major impact on the lives of Bolivians. Evo Morales' presidency is a direct result of the 1952 revolution and the increasing participation of indigenous groups in national politics. On my way back from the Archives, I passed through a group of "originarios" (the latest term for indigenous peoples) from the community of Qhara Qhara. For the past two weeks, the members of the local allyu (traditional tribal group) have been protesting over their political leadership. At present, they are represented by a "sindicato de campesinos" (peasant union.) I haven't figured out whether this has to do with the strength or values of individual leaders or the authenticity of the governing structure. What I do know is that the "sindicatos de campesinos" was the mechanism used by the MNR in the 1950s to organize the new land-holding ex-hacienda peones. The syndicatos were used by the government to channel campesino votes in their favor. Evo Morales is similarly marshalling "originario" votes emphasizing traditional political organizations with the same objective - maintaining political power. In a complex society with conflicting interests and needs, in the end, is the concentration of power productive?

The Other Sucre

I realize that almost all of my photographs show Sucre at its most picturesque. This has alot to do with my fascination with the Colonial Period, with my stay in the historic core and the chaos of unplanned rapid development which surrounds the center. When I first came here, in 1965, Sucre had about 60,000. One hundred years earlier, the population was 18,000. Now, forty plus years after my first visit, Sucre has the current population of New Orleans, 350,000.

When I lived in Cochabamba in the mid-sixties, Bolivia had not experienced the rapid urban migrations that had such an impact in other Latin American countries. Subsequently, the effects of the land reform initiated by the 1952 MNR Revolution and the closing of the tin mines in 1982, enabled by neo-liberalism policies of privatization, brought about this uncoordinated urban growth.

I took these pictures last Friday. My friend, the architect Dar ío Canseco, took me along on a site visit with his clients, a lawyer and pharmacist. They had purchased a property in one of the more stabilized areas around Sucre and had built a protective wall and two temporary buildings which they currently occupy. The site presents some extraordinary design challenges and I wish Darío great good luck in their resolution.

The last two photographs were taken from the property. The second to last shows an automobile dealership in its context. The last, I hope you can discover it, is a house Darío designed for his uncle. They both represent distinct approaches to dealing with the problems of finding an architecture in contemporary Sucre. I’m happy to apply my own creativity to reconstruct the texture of the social and professional relationships which formed the basis for contemporary society.

In the Sala de Investigadores

I don't know what community he came from.(*) I will have to ask today, when I return to the National Archive. I didn't want to stare but he was fairly young, pouring over a document in his traditional clothing, which was immaculate. His was showing the utmost respect to the Archive and to his people's past. He wore sandals, cotton pants which reached his calves, an embroidered shirt and a magnificent poncho - stripes of red, yellow and blue in varying widths and quite asymmetrical - unlike those I had previously seen. He wore a chulo - a knitted cap with ear flaps common in Bolivia and on the heads of hip college students in the States - of cream and dark brown wool. Over the chulo he wore a high crowned natural felt hat - quite common among the indigenous people of this region - but his was brand new.

My photograph of the indigenous scholar in the Sala de Investigadores, sitting at a Danish Modern desk, surrounded by bookshelves and other researchers would have been a prizewinner. Unfortunately, cameras are prohibited in the Archive.

(*) I subsequently learned from a librarian that he was from Tapacarí, in the Cochabamba Province and he was carrying bolas (a weapon made famous by the gauchos in Argentina), indicating that he was a chief. Tapacarí is the mountainous area between the Cochabamba valley and the Altiplano to the West. It is sparsely populated and consists of small interconnected mountain valleys. The main route from Cochabamba to Oruro and La Paz passes through this region.

Returning to Sucre

Sunday, June 28

I arrived in Sucre eleven days ago after an absence of six months. Initially, I reconnected with my closest friends - a very enjoyable process - and returned to the Archivo Nacional and resumed my research – also reconnecting with the frustrating life of a scholar (dead ends and and rare and occasional and a restored optimism.)

Last Wednesday, I attended the inauguration of the 5th Annual Conference of the Bolivian Studies Association . (Some 10 years ago, I helped organize the first conference which took place at Loyola and Tulane.) The conference was held primarily in the Archives. I was very conscientious the first day and selected talks related to my dissertation. The Bolivian and Latin American scholars had a knowledge so extensive and deep that I walked away feeling quite intimidated but also stimulated. My interests were only indirectly addressed. I still believe that my focus on the artisans of La Plata (colonial Sucre) and the way the urban fabric accommodated distinct social groups has largely been overlooked. So, I hope I will be able to make a valuable contribution.

My attendance diminished as the days went by and even though a star in the Bolivian Studies firmament - Tristan Pratt from St. Edwards University in Scotland - presented Saturday morning, I was pretty much used up. I was particularly impressed by several young Bolivian scholars. One, a psychologist and historian, did a brilliant job. I spoke to him after his talk and learned he had studied architecture for 3 years before switching to psychology. I will certainly keep in touch with him. Unfortunately, he lives in La Paz. A young woman presented a talk on pre-independence pasquines (wall newspapers.) She teaches here in Sucre and when she heard my name she asked me if I would meet with a group of her students who are also working on La Plata's artisanos.

Maybe I can work out a collaborative agreement to share sources. My Internet situation is pretty erratic. My landlord, a university professor, seems to be using a university service which allows me access early in the morning (when students are not monopolizing the net.) His children and I are working together to persuade him to switch providers. I'm writing this blog off-line. It will be posted the next time I have access. Meanwhile, I have been popping into Internet cafe's to catch up on email.

I went to a party for the recent graduates of the architecture school. They named my best friend and two of his colleagues as padrinos of their graduation fiesta and expected them to pay for it. That seemed a very bizarre custom to this gringo. I was invited and beer, dinner, beer beer beer and more beer was the evening's program. When five of us were left (mainly the profs.) and the manager of the Collegio de Arquitectos - the professional organization headquarters where the party was held - insisted that we leave, we headed to a great crowded bar, where the students who had left the earlier party had reassembled. All this drinking was too much for me, I left early and got home at 2am after partying from 5-30 in the afternoon.


Monday, June 29

I returned to the Archives this morning with renewed patience and resolve. Today, I reviewed the annotated index of the Correspondencia de la Audiencia de Charcas. Subordinate only to the Viceroy in Lima and later Buenos Aires, the Audiencia governed an enormous region from Lake Titicaca to the North through much of Argentina, all of Paraguay and to the Pacific coast north of present-day Santiago, Chile. Given the distance from either viceregal center, the Audiencia acted with autonomy unless specifically directed. Even then, the principle "yo obedezco pero no cumplo" (I obey but do not comply) was operative. I was looking, unsuccessfully, for any indication of a request for a census. It would be very helpful if I could find out more about the population of La Plata during the 18th century. I would jump out of my skin if I could get a sense of how many artisans there were relative to other occupations. Relative statistics on race and class would be helpful, as well. No such luck. However, I did discover letters written by Alonso Carrío de la Vandera. He was the Viceroy's postal inspector in the late 18th century author of one of the few descriptions of La Plata in this period. That was encouraging.

In the afternoon, I started reviewing another set of documents I had not looked at previously. And, although I still haven't found any reference to a census, I did come across some artisans I had not yet noted: a master watchmaker and a silversmith. The silversmith was requesting that the Cabildo (the city government) name him a master silversmith in recognition of 20 years of activity. I had understood that this was the province of the guild of silversmiths, not the civil authorities. This seems intriguing and, once I go through the entire index, I will examine the original document very carefully. This was even more encouraging.

Some recent photos of Sucre can be found at http://picasaweb.google.com/spjacobs/SucreSWinterLight?feat=email#

Tulane, Taihuichi and T-Shirts



This afternoon, I biked over to the Tulane Library to empty out the carrel I have been using all semester. After getting off the elevator, I noticed a young fellow in the upstairs lobby. He was wearing a yellow Taihuichi t-shirt. I couldn't resist mentioning that I would be in Santa Cruz a week from tomorrow.

Taihuichi is a world famous soccer academy. Many of Bolivia's most famous players (Marco "El Diablo" Etcheverry and Jaime Moreno - both stars on the Bolivian national team and DC United) trained there. It was formed in 1978 to involve youth from impoverished areas of Santa Cruz productively in sport and, through the talent of its staff and head coach Rolando Aguilera Pareja, it formed a team which was extraordinarily successful in Latin American youth competitions. Taihuichi invites young soccer players from abroad to participate in their training program and help support the non-profit academy. http://www.tahuichi.com.bo/

Hal, the Tulane student, spent 6 weeks at Taihuichi two years ago. He said it was the most difficult thing he had ever done in his life. The training was so arduous that he was tempted to fake an injury. When he returned to high school in the states, he was offered a number of athletic scholarships. He eventually transferred to Tulane which doesn't field an inter-collegiate soccer team. However, Hal plays in a Latin-American league in New Orleans. At the moment, he was finishing a semester paper for Prof. Martin Mendoza (a visiting professor of political science from La Paz.)

So, clearly, the real function of a t-shirt is as a conversation starter.

Paleography

Even though my skills at interpreting the handwriting of 18th century scribes is improving, this morning I met my match in one critical document. It was written in 1700 and defines the financial and labor obligations of young Cristobál Dávalos. He was apprenticed, at 13 years of age, to Tomás de Torres, a locksmith and blacksmith. It would seem like a promising career opportunity. I have yet to find another 18th century locksmith and very few ironsmiths. Of course, I am working with legal documents and it is very possible that the others had no occasion to visit an official scribe or their documents have been lost.

I am reading apprenticeship contracts and they seem to vary little over the 18th century. Guardians are sometimes responsible for clothing but virtually all expenses from room and board to healthcare and even burial expenses are incurred by the master craftsmen. In one instance, in case the master watchmaker should die before the completion of the contract, the apprentice was to inherit the master´s tools. None of the documents mention anything related to the eventual acceptance of the apprentice into the respective guilds (gremios) but in one instance, the master guarantees the "graduate" apprentice´s work for five years.

Back to paleography. I'm hoping that a haircut and lunch will give me the patience, concentration and imagination to tackle the rest of the document. Paleography reminds me of the Sunday Times double crostic. Fragments of words, marks on paper which could go one way or another are juxtaposed against my Spanish vocabulary (which, I am happy to report, is pretty good) trying to build the most plausible narrative. It is slow going but reveals so much detail. My initial database, developed from the index summaries of the collection of 18th Century Escrituras Publicas enabled me to identify the documents that called for closer inspection. And that will be my work for the next month.

An Outing with Architecture Students

Five years ago, during my last Tulane sabbatical, I taught in the Architecture School at the Universidad Mayor, Real y Pontificia de San Francisco Xavier de Churquisaca (South America´s second oldest university founded in 1624.) My friendships with both facuty and students have made this time in Sucre most enjoyable. This year, I was named Docente Honorario (Honorary Professor) and, on occassion I have been invited to participate in design reviews and other classes. The school is planning a new building and on Tuesday afternoon, I will join in on discussions of proposed alternatives. The following photographs were taken during a field trip with Arq. Guillermo Layme and his students to a site for a class project, one of the few times I have been able to enjoy the countryside.

It seems that all of the photos in this blog from Sucre seem to be taken on sunny, cloudless days. Indeed, cloudy days are rare. So, here are a group of photos taken in softer light conditions. San Lázaro was Sucre´s first cathedral. It was built on a terrace which served as an outdoor atrium, a space for the conversion of the indigenous population. Santo Domingo was the center of the Dominican Order and the Inquisition.

Santo Domingo



San Lázaro

Calle Oruro - once a street of craftsmen.

Gran Fiesta presented by the School of Finance and Business Administration of the UFXC. Note the menu - stuffed potatoes, piquante noodles, basically spicy meat sauce, and (mmmmmmmm) spicy tiny flavorful potatoes (papa lisa.) All of this plus music and dance for 5bs or 75 cents.

A day in the Life

The House on Abaroa Street

Santa Mónica

Spring, in all its glory, has arrived in Sucre. This morning, rather than going directly to the Archivo Nacionál, I decided to take care of a few errands. But first, I wanted to take advantage of the early sun angle to photograph the facade of a colonial courtyard house on Calle Abaroa that I have been looking at for years. The elaborate portal was decorated in a style which relates to the clearly mestizo facade of Santa Mónica. Half of the palacio has been demolished allowing a revealing sectional view of the typical adobe construction.

While I was clicking away, a charming young woman approached and as she unlocked the carved wooden door, she asked me where I was from. I was able to get myself invited into the remarkable patio and took the photos included in this post. As you can see, it contains a truly remarkable and completely unexpected staircase. The austerity of the patio itself and the baroque exuberance of the stairs suggest that they were a later addition. But they also point out the love of contrast found in most colonial buildings here – direct basic bearing wall construction largely of unadorned walls with a few simple openings combined with rare but with richly sculpted entrance portals.

On my way to the Brazilian Consulate (to enquire about visa requirements – I will be returning via Rio), I joined the Dino gym (Sucre is noted for its dinosaur tracks recently discovered at the outskirts of the city.) It is on the top floor of the MultiCentro Céspedes on the Plaza. The penthouse gym has a terrace with a panoramic view. Unfortunately, their aerobic equipment is meager and in bad repair but it appears to be the best-equipped gym in the city. I should have joined a month ago but, now that my research path is clear and I have completed a body of work, its time to work on my own body.

Fortunately, he Brazilian consul was not in. I will have to return this afternoon. There I was, only a few blocks from the Colonial neighborhood, Los Tres Molles. (A molle is a native tree with clusters of small red berries.) It occurred to me to photograph the remaining examples of colonial architecture in the area. I had just read a document from 1740 certifying the purchase of a lot and house by Nicolás de Herrera, a silversmith (platero) I have been studying. It occurred to me to see if the name “Tres Molles” meant anything to current inhabitants. A shoemaker directed me to a corner store and its elderly (can I use this term) owner. He was quite familiar with the term and described the neighborhoods boundaries. When I told him about Nicolás de Herrera, he said that Calle Destacamento 111 was once known as Calle Herrera. Also, a Doctor Herrera had offices near the corner on property possibly part of the original purchase. I will be speaking with him this afternoon.

Aha!!! I now have a whole new avenue of historic research and a brilliant excuse to change focus and escape from the Library from time to time.

Barrio de los Tres Molles

The Prado Today

It´s an unexpectedly chilly morning in Cochabamba. I´m sitting in Dumbo´s, a clean and pleasant gringofied restaurant on the Prado, not far from the spot, now long gone, where David Erbe and I took pension in the ´60s as Peace Corps volunteers.

In those days, the Prado and Sundays were synonymous. Bolivians would sit at tables along the sidewalk eating salteñas (spicy meat pies), drinking the local beer (Taquiña) from liter bottles and playing “Generala” (poker dice) for beers. All this, while admiring Cochabamba´s golden youth as they promenaded (chaperoned by their parents) up and down the park-like neutral ground (New Orleans for median strip.)

The promenaders would disappear into the church in the Plaza Colón for Mass before repeating the ritual afterward. Meanwhile, the observers made plans for afternoon excursions – bike rides into the countryside or poolside relaxation at the Cortijo, a country-club like spa, now a luxurious private residence.

It could be the weather, more likely cultural changes, but the Sunday morning promenade is a thing of the past. Many of the Prado´s small apartment buildings and fancy houses have been replaced by high-rise hotels and office towers. Ground level restaurants have moved indoors and the Prado has become something else entirely.

In the ‘60’s, Cochabamba was a rather slow-moving city of 100,000 with very few private automobiles. We, along with our students and many Cochabambinos, traveled by bicycle. Today, the same streets are choked with traffic and the metropolitan area has upwards of 800,000. Sucre has its own problems of rapid urbanization but its scale and temperament remind me more of my Cochabamba.

La Ciudad Blanca

I first came to Sucre in 1965, when I was a Peace Corps Volunteer. The city had a population of some 40,000 and barely extended beyond its colonial core. The perspectives framed by one and two story colonial and republican buildings terminated with green hills planted with corn and other crops with blue mountains beyond. Today, the hills closest to Sucre are covered with red brick houses waiting to be stuccoed when more prosperous times arrive.

Five years ago, when I was teaching at the university, I lived near the architecture school, in the first ring of expansion. My private Quechua lessons were on the other side of the Mercado Campesino, part of the next ring of growth toward the north. Sucre expanded in all directions, accommodating both rural-urban migration and the shift in population since the closing of the tin mines, in the 1980s. Streets no longer follow the original grid of the colonial settlement. Houses no longer provide a continuous wall defining the public space of the street from the private domain yet the tendency to assert ownership and control is expressed by high gated walls.

Despite the expansion of urban terrain and population, Sucre remains tightly organized around the same plaza that was laid out during the ceremonial foundation of the city in 1538. Politicians and petitioners congregate in front of the Alcaldia (City Hall) and Prefectura (Departmental Government.) In the mornings, senior citizens - perhaps former government officials sit on sunny benches reading the daily papers. Meanwhile, small armies of school children in uniform troop across the square on their way to colegios. Most of the private and religious schools are scattered around the Plaza in buildings that were once monasteries and convents or large private homes. Their large central patios work well for their new activities.

After school, teenagers congregate on one side of the Plaza flirting just like they did when I was growing up in Forest Hills and the way suburban kids do in malls all across the States. I was talking to the parents of a friend of mine from Sucre, now living in California. In their day, they were only allowed to meet for an hour on Wednesday evenings and again on Sunday. When I visited Sucre in the mid-sixties, colonial courtship traditions were still operative. From the more liberal perspective of Cochabamba's youth, the Sucre's Sunday promenade (young women strolling around the Plaza in a clockwise direction - or was it counterclockwise - and young men in the opposite direction, gradually pairing up under protective and watchful parental gaze in the same kind of flirtatious behavior) seemed ridiculously out-moded.

During the noon-hour, the Plaza often provides the setting for blood drives and public heath exhibits, national unity pagents, and mobile phone promotions. It is the terminus of protest marches, accompained by firecrackers, with dramatic public oratory (further fireworks) directed from the bandstand. Religious processions like last week´s Entrada de la Virgen de Guadalupe also enter and circle the Plaza ending with prayer at the Cathedral's entrance. In the evening, clowns and magicians, along with salesmen of miracle cures, take over, using the monument to Mariscal Sucre as a backdrop. I haven´t been in the Plaza late in the evening but I am told that university students, as they did in Cochabamba so many years ago, pace back and forth under the lamp-posts studying for exams.

In addition to being the first day of spring, the 21st of September is also El Dia del Estudiante. Since Friday, there have been parties in the various Facultades of the University. On Friday, I spent some time in the Museo Colonial and the excited shouts of elementary school children from the adjoining escuela primaria and the decorated hats of schoolchildren crossing the Plaza at lunch were indications of the extent of these celebrations. Sucre is enlivened, as it has been since colonial times, by its role as an educational center. The University, the second oldest in South America, brought together students from beyond the Audiencia de Charcas (Sucre was the major political and religious center in the Southern Andes.) It is still a major center of higher education and students come from all over Bolivia to study at the Universidad Mayor y Pontificia de San Francisco Xavier de Chuquisaca and several private universities.

I am interested in the schematic nature of the colonial city, the way a conceptual framework gets populated by particular human beings and evolves through time. In Sucre, the urban plan called for by the Consejo de Indias, the branch of the Spanish Government that administered the colonies, was laid out on gently undulating topography suggesting, as you move away from the Plaza (which itself slopes), patterns of drainage and possible neighborhood divisions. Sucre, like Rome is surrounded by seven hills, several of these were associated with neighborhoods during the colonial period and may have accommodated different social groups, including artists and artisans. One of my research interests is the geographical distribution of classes and disciplines. My examination of the notarial archives has given me some very preliminary suggestions of this neighborhood structure.

Today, most of the buildings in the colonial core have been rebuilt or substantially renovated. Perhaps some of the original adobe walls are still present under subsequent decorative applications. The original settlers were given large lots, sometimes an entire block, and over many generations, large houses were divided among multiple heirs and had portions sold off during times of economic hardship. It is difficult to reconstruct these larger properties today. My friend Bill Loftstrom and a Bolivian architect are trying to locate and mentally reconstruct the Palacio de la Audiencia from the remaining fragments. At the fringes of the colonial core, a number of one and two story houses, built of adobe, with infrequent and unadorned openings and tiled roofs, strongly suggest the character of early colonial construction. These undecorated adobe bearing walls, wooden lintels and sloping tile roofs, are common throughout Bolivia and much of Latin America. These simple constructions were in their own way, just as abstract and schematic as the gridded colonial city. In Sucre´s colonial core, with very few exceptions, buildings are regularly whitewashed, enhancing this abstract, almost dream-like quality, especially when seen against an intensely blue cloudless sky.

Sucre Beginnings

My first 10 days in Sucre have been very productive on a number of fronts. After a week in the lively Hostal Cruz de Popayán, with its world travelers living out of impressive backpacks, I moved into an upscale version – small, with few guests and no backpackers. My companions, so far, consist of three French-Canadian volunteers (causing me complicated linguistic problems) and a Taiwanese acupuncturist (we had our first conversation this morning and he doesn’t necessarily use needles – more on this theme later.)

My Bolivian friends have been most attentive. I’ve been to a birthday party, had family lunches and have gone out in the evenings with former students. One of my friends from Peace Corps days, Bill Loftstrom, is a noted Latin American historian and has retired to Sucre with his Bolivian wife. Last Friday, he presented a paper before the local historical and geographical society on a group of paintings popular in the 19th century that abound here. I paid a visit to the Architecture School, where I taught 5 years ago and where I have many friends – outings to the Uyuni salt flats and to the tropical reserve at Torotoro are in the works.

Meanwhile, this is the week building up to Sucre’s most important annual festival, La Fiesta de la Virgen de Guadelupe. In recent years, indeed since my Peace Corps days over 40 years ago, these festivals had been considerably scaled down since the colonial period. Indeed, the Carnaval de Oruru was just about it, insofar as spectacular costumes seen by troups of regional dancers was concerned. In the intervening years, every major Bolivian city has revived these elaborate celebrations and Sucre is no exception. So, Sunday evening there was a relatively small entrada (the term for these processions of dancing troops.) My friend Darío dances with a group of Morenadas and was part of the program. Next weekend, the groups will where there most elaborate

outfits. For Sunday, however, costumes were vastly symplefied. Indeed, the male Morenos (ranging in age from 5 years old and up) wore some combination of business suits with ponchos or scarves. Different components of the larger group dressed identically – even the marching band. Surprisingly, my digital camera was able to capture some of the spirit in stills and video clips.

I have begun my works in the Archivo Nacionál de Bolivia. It’s only 3 downhill blocks from my digs. I have started reviewing a detailed index of every notarial document in the collection from the 18th Century, identifying every artist and artisan who was involved in any legal procedure. I have been developing a database of these individuals and their associates. I will identify the most interesting of these documents and the most cited individuals and look at the documents themselves. I have my reservations of this approach and, while I am moving forward, I am looking into complementary investigations. Sitting at a desk in the archives, for hours at a time, is really tough on my back and my eyes. Today, I went to a physical therapist, recommended by Bill, and was manipulated – giving me some relief. He checked my blood pressure and took the ph-factor of my saliva. Apparently, my diet is way off. He recommended the Green Tea from the Chapare region (where the coca comes from) and wants me to drink it several times a day to reduce oxidants and help purge me. OK. I’ll give it a try. I have another session early Monday morning. So, bottoms up!!!

Considering that the kind of historic research I am doing requires a long stretch of time sitting and reading, I am really fortunate to have such a well organized archive with very supportive personnel. Furthermore, that I arrived in Sucre with an already established and quite varied network of friends makes an extended stay here really quite comfortable. (Indeed, I sort of worked backwards and developed my dissertation topic to enable me to work here.) And then there’s Skype and the Internet - I am hardly disconnected from my base of operations in New Orleans and at Tulane. So, please let this be the end of the hurricane season – too much anxiety. We all have better things to be concerned about.

Desde Sucre, La Capital Constitucionál de Bolivia.

Black Arts Festival - 2008


I live directly across the street from the Saint Joan of Arc School. Every spring they stage the Black Arts Festival as a fund-raiser. There are always great musical acts and plenty of delicious New Orleans treats. This year, two Mardi Gras Indians paid a visit and I couldn't resist hauling out my fancy digital camera and snapping away.

Of course there was much else going on at the fair: gospel, blues and rock & roll. Nevertheless, an Indian siting is a rare and special thing, especially on my block so, I'm afraid, I had eyes for little else.


There were only two Indians in the pack, this time. However, they were accompanied by a retinue of rhythm-makers and second-liners.




The bead-work is exquisite. It is said that costumes are worn for only one year. The dancers construct their own. I'll have to find out if the feathers and beads are recycled from one year to the next.