If this Church could talk

Once, long ago it was probably the center of commercial and social activity in an important village at that time known as Tùcume.  We don’t know when the church was built, but we can make an educated guess. The oldest known Catholic Church in Peru was built in 1534 in Piura; just two years after Pizarro founded the city.  In Lima, founded in 1535 again by Pizarro, churches started taking shape in 1536. In 1536 Juan Roldàn Dàvila (born 1490 in Spain) was entrusted by Pizarro with the administrative control of Tùcume and the surrounding area. Given the pattern of two years between Spanish founding and building it is reasonable to assume that the Tùcume church was constructed around 1538 - 1540. Juan probably did not live to see his church completed…he died in Trujillo in 1538.

Northern coastal Peru lacks the metal mines that drove the Spanish appetite for wealth, but the fertile valleys irrigated with water from the mountains provided a wide variety of marine and agricultural food, as well as cotton and ceramics.  Tùcume would have been the center of food processing, manufacturing, trade and social activities with much of it taking place in the large open area in front of the church; today the site of the village park.

The church was built by Moche Culture descendants of adobe brick and other material.  Its massive four-foot think walls, high ceiling and huge archways could have elicited a feeling of awe upon entering. It still has that same affect if you open up to it. Stand in the archway; touch the walls; use your imagination and the church will talk to you… it will tell you what it has seen over the last 475 years. Of all of its memories, both good and bad one of the most impactful occurred in the year 1622. That’s the year the Milk River (La Leche Rio) driven by an El Niño overflowed its banks and completely flooded the village. There had been other floods, but not like this. With that flood the residents had had enough. The village was relocated 10 miles to the west on higher ground. What remained was a renamed village - Tùcume Viejo (Old Tùcume), a handful of villagers and a once proud 400 year old church.

This is what the church exterior looked like on August 22, 2014. There still remains enough of it to imagine how it might have looked all those years ago.

The interior is silent and peaceful. The only indication of human activity is a handful of graves containing the remains of children placed there by parents who either could not afford a cemetery funeral, or perhaps felt that the church ground was the more appropriate location. The graves have been there for many years and have not been disturbed.

This is how the church exterior appears today. El Niño and floods are once again threatening the village and church. The government has committed about $87,000 USD to protect and to some extant restore the site.

Walls are being reinforced and new brick is being added to fill the gaps. It appears at least at this point that the children’s graves sites are being worked around.

Though Machu Picchu and Lima are still Peru’s biggest tourist attractions, every year more visitors are discovering the attractions in the north. It’s probably for the best to preserve and restore the old church in Tùcume Viejo for future visitors, who hopefully will understand and appreciate what they’re seeing. But there is a degree of artificiality in any restoration/preservation efforts. Tourists won’t have the opportunity to walk through the old church…to touch and feel and listen to it. It may be that the cost of preservation is the loss of its voice.

Things are getting serious in Tumàn

In some recent posts I’ve commented about workers and educators protesting against the sugar cooperative in the Tumàn District, charging corruption, incompetence, and the failure to pay workers and teachers. The protests had been generally peaceful but that has changed abruptly. Late last week protestors barricaded the road to Cajamarca in an attempt to block sugar cane transport, and forcefully confronted police who tried to clear the road. Several police and protestors were injured. Four of the protestors were arrested and taken to the police station in Tumàn.

Yesterday protestors attacked the police station in an unsuccessful attempt to rescue the four individuals. They threw rocks and home-made fire bombs at the station, causing some damage to the station and an adjacent clothing store.  Unable to enter the station, they took out their frustration by burning a police motorcycle (photo: Wilfredo Sandoval/El Comercio newspaper). The crowd dispersed when confronted with a larger police presence.  

This situation has escalated far beyond disrupting the school term.  It may be that similar to the copper mine protests in Tia Maria in the south, we’ll see the military here to restore peace before it’s over.

The unique history of the village of Santos Vera

Disclaimer – The following information regarding the man Santos Vera Sandoval came from various sources. Some of it is fact...some probably legend. I haven't bothered to try to sort it out.

On November 1, 1933 Santos Vera Sandoval was born in the city of Tùcume.  Beginning at around age eight Santos’ grandfather, who was regarded as one of the area’s most powerful bruhos (feel free to substitute warlock, wizard, shaman or sorcerer) took Santos under his wing and began instruction in ‘brujeria’ – witchcraft.  Santos was fascinated with the art; studied hard and before long gained the reputation of a powerful bruho (bruha is the feminine form) in his own right. That reputation was further enhanced when Santos’ grandfather died and bequeathed to him all of his paraphernalia including a staff said to have come from one of the Tùcume pyramids. 

Santos prospered as a bruho. He accepted cash and other considerations for his services, which included divining, healing, exorcism, and counseling in family matters. He sometimes performed his services with the use of the hallucinogenic San Pedro cactus. Natural plant concoctions were normally part of his prescribed cures.

At some point he and his family moved from the city of Tùcume to a large expanse of land just north of the Tùcume pyramid complex and Purgatory Mountain, an area regarded as sacred and spiritual. Santos named the new community Fundo Vera, fundo generally meaning a community owned by one man or family. The community is still referred to as Fundo Vera by some, but officially and to most locals it is Santos Vera. The road through the village doesn’t see much traffic. We walked about a mile to another village to get a mototaxi ride back to Tùcume.

It is well known that bruhos are competitive with and jealous of each other, and it is said that Santos had many battles with other bruhos jealous of his popularity.  Bruhos don’t fight physically…instead it is a mental contest done at a distance. Santos always prevailed. On September 9, 1993 Santos died. His remains were placed in a tomb in the Tùcume cemetery. In early 2004 the tomb of Santos was broken into and his head removed. Bruhos believe that the power of a bruho is resident in the brain, even after death so it is suspected that one or more bruhos desecrated the tomb to gain Santos’ power.

Santos is said to have had thirteen children, one of whom, Orlando Vera continues the practice of witchcraft handed down to him by his father. He describes himself as a master healer and spiritual guide. Orlando has a website, and a residence and small museum in Santos Vera containing the ritual articles used by him and his father.

Orlando isn’t the only Santos descendant active in Santos Vera. A niece is the director of the pronoei "Mi Mundo Fantastico", an attractive and reasonably well maintained school on the northern edge of the village surrounded by fields of corn and cotton.  

Maria Bravo Vera was born in Santos Vera and has been the director at the pronoei for three years. She has 22 students ages 3 to 5. When we entered the school she was reading a book to the kids with the theme of working hard to realize dreams, and used finger puppets to keep the kids focused on the story. 

The school is reasonably well equipped. Parents are able to provide basic school supplies, and using her own money Maria has accumulated some books and playthings. The only issues she has is the lack of storage and not enough tables and chairs. She’s using government supplied gym equipment as storage shelves and would like to free them up for their original purpose. One of the four tables needs to be replaced, and many chairs are on the verge of not being serviceable. She has asked us for two storage shelves, twelve chairs and three tables. That’s a modest request that would cost about $200 including transportation and we’re going to do that. If you’d like to contribute to this project please visit the Promesa Peru webpage. Thank you.

The Village of Calupe

Though located only 4 miles from the city of Tumàn, the village of Calupe seems much further as the collectivo from Tumàn navigates the winding road with uninterrupted fields of sugar cane on each side. And like most desert villages, the transition from nothingness to village is abrupt…suddenly without warning you’re there.

Calupe is larger than many villages we’ve visited in the Tumàn District and actually looks more like a city than village though it occupies an area no more than 500 by 500 meters. The streets are straight and in a grid pattern. It has a large, attractive principal park; a library and even a small police department. There is a modest open-air market offering most food types, and a few tiny general stores. We didn’t see any restaurants. The streets and sidewalks in the central section of the village are wide and well maintained. And even the edges of town that butt up against the fields are clean. It’s a quiet village. Sounds were limited to rosters crowing and an occasional donkey braying. The only vehicle traffic we saw were the collectivos arriving from and departing to Tumàn about every 15 minutes. I can understand why people would live in Calupe.

Calupe has two schools…a primary school for grades one through six, and a kinder. We were in Calupe to visit the kinder. For Maribel and me entering the kinder complex was a real eye opener. It is the largest, cheeriest, best equipped, best organized and best maintained kinder we’re seen in Peru.

Martha Martinez is the kinder’s director, and after only a few minutes of discussion it became apparent that she is the force behind everything we were to see this day. She gave us some background information about the school and community, indicating that there is a strong parent’s association that takes their kids education seriously. At present there are two classes, one with 28 students for kids 3 and 4 years old, and the other with 24 students age 5.

After our discussion we spent the next 30 minutes taking a tour of the complex. I use the word 'complex' because the kinder occupies a large, completely enclosed area containing three classrooms, a kitchen, two well equipped play areas, a shrine, and an attractive elevated stage to hold events and ceremonies. This photo shows the classroom of the five year olds. We’ve been present at many kinders during lunch break, but have never seen anything like this. It looked more like a high school cafeteria in Lima than a kinder in the desert. And the demeanor of these kids was incredible. The respect they showed toward the teachers, staff and other students was impressive.

The kitchen, offices and restrooms were clean and well equipped. Martha was especially proud of the kids play area. Some months ago her kids had won 1,500 soles in a singing contest. The prize money was used to construct a roof to protect the kids from the sun.

While returning to Martha's office we commented that the school seemed to have everything it needed. In response she took us to a vacant classroom and said, “Our problem is we are turning away students. We have the classroom, furniture, school supplies and a waiting list of students. What we don’t have is another teacher.” By law the maximum student-teacher ratio is 26 - 1. With 52 students, Martha and the other teacher are at the maximum. The crux of the problem again rests with the current confusion regarding responsibility for the school between the District of Tumàn and the sugar cane cooperative. It’s basically the same problem the primary school in Conchucos is facing.

But unfortunately the school problems are an aside to a larger issue. Every day in Tumàn and lately in Chiclayo sugar cane workers and educators from the Tumàn District are gathering to stage protests against the sugar cane cooperative, claiming mismanagement, fraud and other charges. Some workers and teachers say they have not been paid in over four months.

We’d like to see this ‘responsibility’ issue get resolved soon. It is causing problems for many schools within the Tumàn District. The kinder in Calupe has the ability and desire to provide an excellent education. It’s a shame that for some students the doors are closed.

A Farewell to Conchucos

Our visit to Conchucos this morning will probably be our last. We’ve been to Conchucos four times since our initial visit on March 14^th, and during that time we’ve furnished tables, chairs, school supplies and complete uniforms to the pronoei. 

To the primary school we donated whiteboards and school supplies, and this morning we completed the things we promised by giving them tee-shirts. Earlier we had donated school supplies for 35 students; the number that Ed has registered but unfortunately the 11 students in Ed’s class…

…and these 9 in Guadalupe’s class are the only kids regularly attending. It could be that the confusion between the sugar cane cooperative and the Tumàn District of Education as to who is responsible for the school is keeping those missing 15 students away, but there are probably other reasons as well.

Though we may not have succeeded in enticing the 15 to return…at least not yet, we do feel good about providing the opportunity for the others to continue their education. On the day we delivered school supplies one of the boys made a short speech on behalf of he and his classmates thanking us for the donations and promising to use the things we’d given them and to attend school regularly. Before leaving today I asked that boy to step forward, and reminded him of what he had said, and asked if he and his classmates would continue to keep that promise. They said they would. We believe they will.

Our thanks to Clifton B, Chris R, Amy B, Graham T, the Alice Cool Foundation and others for making the Conchucos project possible.

The Pronoei at Conchucos is alive and well

We were at Conchucos this morning to deliver the uniforms we had promised to the pronoei director Fanny for her fifteen students. The kids came up with an entertaining ceremony as the clothing was being distributed. They loudly chanted the name of the next child in line to receive their clothing, and cheered when the child was dressed.

The uniforms fit perfectly with a little room for another year or two of wear with care. Two of the fifteen students were absent and will get their uniforms tomorrow. Fanny has three more students we did not have uniforms for because they were not registered when we last visited. We need to order uniforms in minimum quantities of fifteen so we can’t do anything about those three students now, but will remember them if we order uniforms for another school. The good news is that those additional three are there because the school is once again providing a solid learning environment.

Just a few months ago this school had nothing. Nearly everything in this photo...the new chairs, tables, pencils, notebooks, erasers, schoolbags and even the clothing the kids are wearing were supplied by donors to Promesa Peru. Without those donations it is very possible that the school would no longer exist. Chris R, Clifton B, Graham T, Amy B, the Alice Cool Foundation and others, please accept our thanks and the thanks of the people of the village of Conchucos.

We hope to be back in Conchucos next week with the tee-shirts for the primary school. We’re curious to see how many of those thirty-five registered students are attending classes.

A proud day for the family

When I first met Katherine she was a chubby little girl who was just starting her teen years. What a world of difference between that little girl and the mature young woman who displayed confidence and poise yesterday in a pressure situation. Along with her mother, brother and grandfather, Maribel and I had the privilege of attending Katherine’s thesis presentation for her bachelor’s degree in industrial engineering.  This day would be either the culmination of over five years of study while working part-time, or a step back involving six or more months of study and a complete new thesis.

The presentation took place in a university classroom where attendance was limited to a few family members and a three-judge panel comprised of in this case her sponsoring professor, the director of the school of engineering, and a professor who had had no prior exposure to Katherine.

Katherine presented an actual case study she had researched over the past year involving a small business that was interested in improving procedures and methodologies in all aspects of their operation. She began with company background and then using slides outlined areas identified as candidates for improvement, followed by specific recommendations, cost-benefit analysis, and conclusion. During her presentation the male member of the panel, who was her sponsor sat back and listened intently while the two women judges were constantly writing notes in their copies of the thesis.

When Katherine had finished the critique began. Her sponsor started by praising her presentation but then followed with criticisms of some aspects of the study. Probably to be expected the school of engineering director was the most critical of the three judges, questioning Katherine’s support for some of the conclusions she had reached. When there were no more questions or comments we were asked to step outside while the panel deliberated for approximately twenty minutes. While outside we talked about the heat, the recent earthquake, where to go for lunch….everything but the presentation and what those judges might be deciding.

When we reentered the classroom the faces of the judges gave no indication of what they had decided. It wasn’t until the director rose, congratulated Katherine and presented her with the ceremonial stole and engineering medallion that we knew her thesis was accepted…she had earned a bachelor’s degree in industrial engineering.

Katherine is happy with her diploma, but I think she knew she had nailed that thesis and wasn’t worried. She has already talked with her employer about plans to enter a master’s degree program. She is an intelligent, mature and confident young woman who knows exactly what she wants and has the ability and determination to get it.