Such a cool little dude

The days are dwindling in Cochabamba (only one full month to go) and with this comes a pang, for sure. But also, there has been time for a new routine to form with Performing Life post-Casa Cuna; run and study an hour a piece before 08:30AM and then off to work.

By far the best part about getting to work is seeing the dudes from the morning performance art class; Wilber, Nelson, Vladimir, Lino and Efrain. Everyday these guys travel from the north-west hills of Cochabamba to Performing Life classes in the city and then back again in the afternoon for school (if you want to be part of Performing Life classes you have to attend school). This is a real commitment. The great thing is that these guys let me practice Spanish and juggling with them before and after their morning class.

At the moment the guy who is working me over the most is Vladimir. He is such a cool little dude. Nine years old. Every morning he wanders into my office with an air of disinterest. He then casually asks if I have my “lados” (his word for my Ben10 Rubik’s cube) that Sarah bought me when we got to the end of the Urkupiña Virgin pilgrimage.

Just like me Vladi has his routine too. Every day he walks in with feet as weightless as a Joe90 marionette and a massive smile. Offhandedly asks if I have the cube then sets to work on putting together the picture of Cuatro Brazos (Four Arms). Quickly losing interest in this he then grabs the juggling balls John has lent me and we battle with new tricks I am trying to learn. Once he is finished kicking my but he asks if there are any games on the computer and then runs out the door to be with the rest of the crew without saying goodbye.

Man, if only my working day back in the real world started like this. It is impossible not to be impressed by the boys in the morning class. It is very hard not to spend the next half hour grinning after Vladimir has paid his morning visit; this guy is my new role model.

Stencils again

Cochabamba and La Paz

While not as acute as before the compulsion to make a record of all the stencils in Cochabamba has continued. I have to say that the overall style of the stencils has not changed to much over six months. Political and idiosyncratic expressions are still the norm.

I should note that when we were in La Paz many months ago the approach to stenciling up there is almost identical. A lot of anti-war/capitalist/animal rights and playful/humorous-type pieces. At least La Paz had the coolest municipal-type stencil I have seen. A friendly cartoon rendition of a Police Officer. Satisfyingly ironic perhaps?

CBBA Artists

What has been nice recently is seeing new artists emerge while others seem to fade completely. I have not seen a piece by ADM for some time (which “ADM” this is, I do not know).

There is one graffiti artist in Cochabamba, Ash, who is very prolific. So prolific that I wonder if
"Ash" is actually a crew (though how can we ever forget North Shore legend "Ratz"). He has done a stencil or two around town but seems to have shifted his focus to throw-ups and unsophisticated, though competent, bombs. I was walking out of my apartment yesterday and the piece below had just appeared overnight.

An artist calling himself Tony turned up the week before last and he has been very busy by all accounts. He has three or so pieces that have turned up in a myriad of places. His designs are not amazing but his application of paint is uncommonly slick for Cochabamba. Who knows, possibly this work is by an extranjero.

At the same time (literally in the same week) as the Tony pieces a series of stencils that were anti-capitalist and idiosyncratic appeared also. Their size and palette is the same as the Tony pieces so it’s possibly the same guy. The only thing is that Tony seems to go for “recognizability” where as these other pieces are anonymous. My favorite from this series is the facsimile of the National Geographic cover Afghan Girl though it fails to take advantage of the intense eyes of the subject; the key detail.

Mata²rte (Mata Arte)

The most original and talented artist working in Cochabamba is Mata²rte. As far as stenciling goes he does a fantastic job integrating an excellent sense of design, scale (all his pieces are about four feet tall), humor and Bolivian imagery. He also gets around. When we were in La Paz last – 234 kilometers away from Cochabamba – there was evidence all around the city of a visit by him.

I was given a lead that he was on Facebook. As such I sent him a message to get some background on his work but frustratingly he has not responded. I have tried Googling for articles on him but nothing-doing.

The only other record of his work that I am aware is on a blog called Where Are Andy and Jenny? We had the chance to get to know Andy and Jenny while they were in Cochabamba and Andy actually went out on with Mata²rte and another colleague to do “some work.” If you follow the link you can actually see photos of these pieces going up. It is a great record.

Yup

On a personal level it is frustrating discovering a new stencil when I do not have my camera. I went for my 06:00AM run on Thursday and found one in a park I had never been through before. At moments like these I am excited and irritated by the burden of having to come back so that my Pokémon like excess is sated. Once I discover a new stencil I always have to go back. Do you know how big a hassle that is?

The lyrical side of this project is of course watching the city change at a quotidian level. The city is always becoming new with fresh stencils and old with stencils from yesterday eroding from the warm, dry conditions of Cochabamba. With this observation I always wonder to myself if I can stop trying to record every stencil.

I live in hope. With some luck this blog entry will cure me.

Stencil Albums

If you want to look at the whole collection check out:

• Here for La Paz
• Here for new stencilis from Cochabamba
• Here for stencils by Marte Arte

Time to get up

It has been pretty exciting starting at Performing Life. Working with John is cool and I feel like I am using my area of expertise by writing grants and updating content on the new website. Contrary to this, as all good stories go, is that my previous schedule is incompatible.

I have exercised my remarkable intellect, yet again, and come to the conclusion that I need to change my schedule. I really want those black “X’s” on my daily checklist. From now on I will get up at 06:00AM and go for a run then study for an hour. Following that I am going to eat porridge have a shower and walk to work for 09:00AM.

I have actually already tried to do this. The truth is sleeping-in has seemed like a whole lot more fun so far. The only way to get this underway is to call-myself-out on my blog (is blog a proper-name and needs a capital?), read some science from Oprahdiluvian type websites, tell Sarah, check something T.S.Eliot said and set my alarm.

Thank you "youth culture of digital narcissism." Because of you I am pretty sure I am going to go for a run in the AM now.

The Saga of Casa Cuna

Part One: the joys of working at Casa Cuna

I have never spent a whole lot of time with children or made plans to have kids myself. Despite this I learnt at Casa Cuna that hanging out with kids was a whole lot of fun. As I developed a relationship with the orphans, or "abandonados de niños" as they are sometimes called, the smell of urine and household cleaner that greeted me when I entered Casa Cuna became the smell of play and laughter.

From my experience the kids were all friends. They got along really well. Yeah they cried but only when they fell over or took each other’s toys (e.g. normal kid stuff). A couple of them were more frangible than others but overall my perception of the children was that they were very happy. And really cute.

Ahhhh Pancho. I will never forget my first day walking upstairs and seeing you with the bathroom - door wide open - and barely balanced on the toilet bowl rim. You had gargantuan, limpid eyes and were making the most astonishing noises. How can someone be so little and create such profoundly violent flatulence? At the time I couldn’t believe it was you!

Part Two: how it functioned

Casa Cuna was founded by Doctor Maria Ferrera but the orphanage was managed fulltime (24 hours) by shifts of two teams of two nurses and during the day with Virginia (the coordinator) and her son Israel and daughters Maria and Ruth. In addition to the people there was Israel’s cat Chulo who was also an orphan found in the street. The nurses worked on rotating 24 hours shifts which would alternate 3 and 4 days per week between the two teams. Virginia worked 09:00-17:00 Monday-Saturday. I describe Virginia as strict but compassionate and the nurses as efficient and well humoured. These things together created a family atmosphere in Casa Cuna.

In terms of funding, up until the end of 2009, Casa Cuna was supported by Millennium. Unfortunately the money dried up in the States and things began to get tough at the orphanage. Amizade (a global NGO that has an office in Cochabamba) made an appeal to get more funds and wrote about it here and here. Despite this set back, while I was there, things looked good. The kids were well looked after and they got good food (they were eating a lot of vegetables, uncommon for a lot of Bolivian children). They also got a lot of attention and structure in their day.

Those of age were bundled into a car and taken to Tiquipaya for school Monday to Friday. The kids were aged one through to seven. I was told that at the age of eight they would be moved to another place, perhaps another orphanage, where they stay until they are about 16 or 17. Frustratingly no one knew where (or wanted to tell me) where this “other place” was or what it was called.

I believe that Casa Cuna got a lot of mileage out of what they had. For example, they washed/scrubbed the dirty old ripped mattresses and hanging them out to try frequently. This shows, in my opinion, their desire for hygiene as well as caring for what they have despite the destitution.

Part Three: what happened next

So what happened?

Well in a nutshell social workers form the government (Sedeges) turned up and inspected the place. The social workers were solemn bunch but everyone from Casa Cuna seemed totally relaxed an unstressed in their presence. I should note that at one point in the day Virginia asked me to not say anything bad about the orphanage. Obviously this struck me as odd. Why would I? Suspicious? Yes.

The assessment was completed and a week later there were no more kids.

I was told initially that they would be back in fifteen days. In the meantime we set about working on the house; painting, gardening, spring cleaning. I felt that it had been implied that the kids had gone on a holiday and that this was all totally normal. Then the fifteen days elapsed, then twenty and then thirty. Still no kids.

On the day I decided to call-it-quits they spilled the beans and told me that the kids had been taken away by the government due to the results of their psychological assessments and signs of abuse to the children. They also told me that they were going through the courts to defend these allegations. I have found this article which I believe is about them. In my opinion the article is "light" and quite ambiguous.

Through information acquired by a friend here in Cochabamba we also found out that an assessment had been completed by the same social workers earlier in the year. Allegedly, they had made recommendations that were not acted on by Casa Cuna and as such the kids were removed. The story of the removal sounded pretty horrible. I am not going to go into here. I will state that I never saw any abusive behaviour in my time at Casa Cuna.

Finally, it has been said that Bolivia no longer wants private orphanages. I have nothing to back this up but it does fit in with Evo’s nationalisation project and perhaps this is part of the explanation.

Part Four: goodbye

So the kids never came back, their cat Chulo died and I said goodbye. Perhaps surprisingly, I got a nice farewell and enjoyed hanging out with Virginia and her family, practicing my Spanish. But what occurred here... I will never fully know. I Emailed Amizade to get there side of the story but nothing has come of it so far.

In the last days, the house still smelling of cleaner and a faint aroma of urine, I played PS1 (NFS and Tekken) with Israel and had some amazing food cooked by Virginia. She also gave me these cool, handmade, chocolates. In spite of this it the farewell that did not quite feel right. I never got to say goodbye to the kids. To have formed a relationship with little-people and then to have them taken away... it is a bitter memory to say the least. This was also compounded by the strange approach by Casa Cuna took to talking to me about “what happened” with the removal. In retrospect it is possible that they were in shock, and angry, and as such did not trust anyone. Maybe they thought I contributed to it. Who knows.

Part Five: final contact?

A week after I left Casa Cuna they asked me to come in for a meeting. Virginia did not tell me what it was about.

As I made my way over I got a text message changing the time of the meeting so I returned home. When I returned to Casa Cuna no one was there. I left my Email address and a note in the door. No Emails have been received as of yet.