Bolivia Journal #4 – July 18, 2010
So much has happened since the last time I had time to write for this blog. My first three days of classes have gone well. We are starting from the beginning so a lot of the material is review for Carolyn and myself. We are moving through it pretty quickly and I expect to get to material I don’t know as well or at all within a week of two. It can be a little frustrating at times to go over material I really already know, but I think the professors need to know we have the basics down before we move on to more advanced material. Thankfully they seem happy to move quickly when it is apparent that we already have the material down.
I like all of my first set of professors. We only have this set for two weeks before we rotate to a new set and possibly a new time for class. The school wants us to be exposed constantly to new accents and different ways of speaking. Our first set of professors is Senorita Ana Lucy, Senora Liliana, Senor Oscar, and Senora Judith. They all have their own different style of teaching and so we get a slightly different approach to learning. Liliana is the most energetic and effervescent and tends to throw in a few English words during the lesson. Ana Lucy and Oscar are the most formal and we tend to be very task oriented during class. Judith reminds me a little of a favorite grandmother (abuela en espanol). She also has the most difficult accent for me to understand and I have to listen the hardest to follow exactly what she is saying most of the time. She is also the final professor of the day which probably effects my comprehension. It can be very tiring to work in a language you don’t know well all the time and after several hours it can be very tiring to maintain one’s concentration. I usually go to mass at the end of the day and find that I have the same problem.
My class schedule works well. Right now Carolyn and I are in the first set, or shift, of classes. We start at 8am and finish at ll:30am. This means that I usually have enough time to make it home in time for lunch at 12:15. Each class lasts about forty-five minutes and after the second class we have a twenty minute coffee break. During the break there are almost always people selling arts and crafts in the courtyard outside the school building. On Friday I bought what the man selling it described as both a belt and a camera strap. Basically it is a narrow piece of woven cloth in red and black with ties on both ends so it can be attached to something.
On Wednesday afternoon there was a presentation of an Aymara ritual at the Maryknoll Center. The Aymara are one of the major native ethnic groups here in Bolivia. They are concentrated in what is known as the Altiplano (the high plain) where La Paz is located. The man who performed the ceremony is an ordained Catholic deacon from the diocese of El Alto (the Altiplano, including La Paz) and comes from a family of Aymara priests. He is well versed in both traditions and specializes in adapting Aymara rituals for use in the Catholic Church. The ceremony he performed for us was a prayer to Christ and the Virgen Mary for the good of the Center and for those of us beginning the language program. I have pictures which I will post when I have time to find the cord I need to connect my camera to my computer ( I seem to have left the one I had in the U.S.).
Thursday was an interesting day. It was the feast of St. Bonaventure, a major feast day for Franciscans, and we had wine with lunch and ice cream for desert. Both of these things are reserved here for special days. Dessert most days is fruit and we have water and fruit juice to drink with meals. In the evening I went to play volleyball at the Maryknoll center with the other students and Professor Oscar. We played for about two hours and I found out that I am a tad rusty. I am also a little more out of shape than I thought, although this could also be the lingering effects of adjusting to the altitude (so I hope). Whatever the cause, my knees were sore for two days afterwards. I should be sufficiently recovered to play futbol tomorrow evening (that’s soccer for the rest of the gringos out there). It looks like I could have the opportunity to play sports four times a week. They students here at the house plays sports twice a week starting next week, although they play at 9pm, after dinner. I don’t know if I will be up to four nights a week immediately, but it should be good exercise if I can manage it. We shall see. I also need to spend some time every day studying so I don’t want to tire myself out too much each day.
Thursday evening was also the beginning of the feast of the Virgen of Carmen, the patron saint of Bolivia and La Paz. The celebrations were bigger in La Paz than in Cochabamba, but there were still marching bands in the street and people setting off fireworks in the area near the friary. We are relatively close to the Carmelite Church here in the city, which was the center of the celebrations Thursday night and into Friday. The Church was packed on Friday night when I went to mass. After mass there was a large crowd of people who came to the sacristy to have statues of the Virgen and bottles of the water blessed. Other than that Friday was relatively uneventful.
On Saturday I went on a tour of the city with most of the rest of the students in the program. I went on the same tour two years ago and loved it. This time was the same. The strangest thing about the day was the fact that it rained. It almost never rains in Cochabamba this time of year. I had actually seen a weather forecast predicting rain, but didn’t bring a raincoat with me because I convinced myself that it couldn’t possible be true. Sure enough, however, it rained, if only lightly and intermittently. The day went well despite the inclement weather and I think all had a good time, myself included. The hotel and restaurant where we had lunch had a nice set of grounds and we had some time to play volleyball before lunch and use the swings and see-saws (there is video of Carolyn and myself on the see-saw, it’s coming, I promise). It’s amazing how much one’s inner child comes out around playground equipment.
So, that’s what I’ve been doing for the last few days. I also realize I have gotten away from writing about the social justice stuff, mostly because I haven’t had time to keep up as much as I’d like to between the demands of the program I am in and the intermittent nature of my contact with the internet. I hope to be able to write about the social justice issues that are important locally when I get a little more settled. One of the friars who lives next door to my friary, Ignacio Harding, is heavily involved in the local justice and peace movement. I had a nice conversation with him about volunteering with the local Franciscan justice and peace office when my Spanish gets a little bit better. Hopefully in a month or so I can get started.
Until next time, peace and all good.
The Bolivia Journal #4 – July 18, 2010 by Stephen DeWitt, OFM, unless otherwise expressly stated, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 Unported License.
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