What we take with us, what we leave behind

It is more than exciting to go off to visit a new country for the first time, or to return to a country that one has come to know and love from years of experience. But why do we travel, and what do we hope to find when we get there? Sometimes we hope to "find ourselves" by changing our surroundings, that in a new place, freed from the constraints that define us at home, we can really emerge as our true selves. This is perhaps possible - it is true that by changing our external environment we can sometimes open up new possibilities for changing our internal one as well. On the other hand, "wherever you go, there you are" - wherever you might travel, no matter how the externals might change, you bring your baggage with you. So how to reflect on that baggage, to be fully aware of that baggage and experience it as the reality of the moment, and not just hope (to keep with the metaphor) that the airline loses it along the way?

When I travel, especially lately, I think about both what I might discover and what I am leaving behind. Usually and most significantly this means my family. This year, my older son, Ben (13) will be accompanying me to Bolivia, but my younger son, Eli (9), will be staying at home with mom and Ozzie (more on him later). The excitement of departure is tempered by the difficulty of the leaving. This is something that has gotten easier over time - it used to tear me apart, almost literally, to have to leave. But now I recognize that a necessary part of myself is in that other country, and I have to return, even if it is difficult. Not that my true self lies there, but an essential part of myself nonetheless.

Los Ambulantes

Last post I mentioned the ambulantes, one of the groups with which we work in Bolivia. The ambulantes (or, more properly, the Asociación de Comerciantes Minoristas "Los Angeles") are a group of some 1500 illegal street vendors, who sell on the streets of Cochabamba because it is the only way to support their families. Many of the vendors are women and single mothers, have very little in the way of investments, and make the equivalent of about $2 a day selling juice, fruit, fried meat, shoelaces, or other small items. The government considers them to be illegal because they lack work permits and compete with more established vendors, but the ambulantes claim they have no other option, and deserve to have their right to work respected. In 2008, our students worked with this group to try and establish a daycare center, so mothers would have someplace to leave their children while they are out selling in the streets. Two of our students created a website and video to document the situation; these can be viewed at www.losambulantes.com.

This summer, the ambulantes have expressed a desire for a health clinic, and we are going to try and help them to establish one. They have arranged for some Cuban doctors to staff the clinic (the Cuban government has sent doctors throughout the world to work in poor communities, often free of charge), but they need a space in which to set them up. Finding and creating this space will be one of our students' tasks in Bolivia.

Seasons

This morning in New Jersey is gray and wet, with a low-slung sky overhead. It is deep spring now: the azaleas and rhododendrons are popping out their flowers, the smell of mulch is in the air, and all sorts of tree junk is falling like rain over the porch furniture, coating everything in a pale green dust. Daily now, the temperature creeps steadily upward and soon, suddenly, we will find ourselves in the midst of summer, running the AC and fantasizing about winter. At least, I will.

In the global south, of course, they are just entering the fall and winter months. While we are contem- plating heat and humidity, people in Bolivia are watching the temperatures drop. For those of us traveling there, it means we lose a big chunk of summer, exchanging the Jersey heat for the crisp, cool air of a Bolivian winter. 

In Cochabamba it never gets particularly cold, nor does the weather vary a great deal from one day to the next. But, like people everywhere, Bolivians talk constantly about the weather. Every day people will remark to one another "Que frio!", hugging themselves with a mock shiver to indicate how cold it is. I always laugh, and tease people that they don't know what cold is, having never lived through a winter in the Northeast. It hasn't snowed in Cochabamba in years, but sometimes it does in the mountains that ring the city. On waking in the morning, I throw open the curtains and look toward the north, at the white-crested peaks enclosing the town in their frosty grip.

Getting ready for summer '09

The semester has just ended, and I am preparing to lead a second group of students to Bolivia. It comes as a surprise to me that this blog was read rather widely last summer - the first thing people say to me when I tell them I'm returning with students to Bolivia is, "Will you be doing the blog again?" I am happy to oblige. 

This blog serves as an informal means of communication between myself and the wider world - mostly parents and friends of my students, myself, Rutgers University, and Study Abroad. It provides a window on what goes on in Bolivia during our travels, and helps to spread the word about the many things we are experiencing and learning during our time away. 

What to expect in Bolivia? Some things this summer will be the same as last year. We will still be working with La Fundación Pro Justicia, a Bolivian NGO that works to improve access to justice for marginalized urban peoples. The members of Pro Justicia - Guery, Eric, Ethel, and Ruth - will be our companions and guides, helping us to learn about Bolivia and its various challenges. We will still be doing homestays and language classes run through Bolivia Cultura and Volunteer Bolivia (www.volunteerbolivia.org), where Lee Cridland and Javier Molina do a fantastic job making sure all the details go smoothly. We will still be doing service-learning with the people of Loma Pampa and the ambulantes of the Cancha, the ambulant vendors in Cochabamba's giant outdoor marketplace - but more on them later.

What's new this summer will be our efforts to create a health clinic for the ambulantes group. We will be doing construction work in Loma Pampa, putting the finishing touches on the community center that our students began work on last summer. And we will be working with the children in the local orphanage, helping them in their studies and recreation. There is a lot to look forward to.

Please follow this blog for regular updates, both prior to departure and after we have arrived. Departure date is July 1!

The End

We ended our time in Bolivia tonight with a party with the ambulantes, the market vendors with whom several of our students have been working closely to prepare a website and documentary film. There were a lot of speeches, including several by the students themselves, followed by food and dancing, and lots of hugs and teary eyes. Most of the students head for the airport tomorrow; some are traveling overland to Santa Cruz, while others are taking a bus tonight to La Paz, for a visit to Lake Titicaca before returning home.

This marks my final blog entry of the season. It has been a singular pleasure for me to lead this program, and to work with these students on their various projects. I look forward to doing it again next summer.

Jayaya Bolivia!

Despedidas

Our program is in its final days, which in Bolivia means despedidas. The despedida, or goodbye party, is an institution here, and as an anthropologist who has come and gone many times, I have participated in many of them. For our students, these despedidas are wonderful, heart-wrenching experiences. People here are so grateful for the contributions our students have made to their lives and communities, and our students have established so many close personal relationships in the short time that we have been here, that saying goodbye is very difficult. There have been a lot of tears ("Bring on the waterworks," as Alana puts it), hugs, and, this being Bolivia, food and speeches. Personally, I find it very touching and rewarding to see how deeply attached our students have become to people here, and to see how much they have learned and accomplished during our time in Cochabamba. The students' tears, to me, are not a bad thing at all, but rather an indication of the success of our program, and the depth of their feeling and the intensity of their experience. I doubt any of them will ever forget their time here, and expect that many of them will return and continue to work with the Bolivian people and communities they have come to know.

The RU Computer Lab in Concordia Central

The computer lab is up and running in the barrio where our students are doing service. Twice a week a group of students attends the lab, giving instruction to children and adults in the basics of computer use. Just learning the difference between right-click and left-click has been a challenge, but the people are making good progress, with some of the kids showing signs of being true computer prodigies. The computers, donated by Rutgers University's Office of Undergraduate Education, will remain in the community after we have gone - our students are preparing a plan for the ongoing operation and maintenance of the computer lab, so that residents of the community can continue to enjoy the machines, and future generations of Rutgers students can continue to participate in this form of service-learning.

I am feeling much better, having suffered with shingles for almost two weeks now. I look much less horrible (except for the hideous beard I have been forced to grow, being unable to shave due to the sores on my face), and the pain level is low enough that I have returned to work full force.

There remains very little time in our program here, a fact of which our students are keenly aware. They all have formed deep attachments to the people and the communities in which they are volunteering and doing research, and for many their impending departure is a source of much sadness and deep reflection.