A Tense Week

Here´s my journal entry from yesterday that I´d like to share. If it´s confusing and you want to learn more, there´s a link below to an article that explains the facts and reality better than any other that I´ve come across.

“The dogs can even feel the tension in Bolívia today. They´re barking like crazy. I´m up here on the terrace of our building and there are loud sounds coming out of various corners of the city – flares, firecrackers, gunshots – who knows?! The news isn´t even on to inform us from whatever point of view they feel like sharing. I feel unsettled inside, but more out of empathy than for fear of my own safety. I just looked up and there is a big cloud of dark smoke billowing from the southern zone around Laguna Alalay...

Things have heated up in the country over the last 5 days or so. What has been brewing and stewing beneath is starting to bubble to the surface. It´s so confusing to figure out exactly what´s going on when you´re listening in your second language and you don`t have the history of it all down. Basically, my understanding is that it has to do with the increasing disconnection and disagreement between 5 states and the national government over the content of the new constitution that is in process as well as increasing repression of free speech and other factors. I do know that Manfred (the Cocha state governor) is speaking out against Evo (the president) with plenty of threats, there were dogs hung as a threat for what is to come, people killed, prisoners escaping, a police-less city in Sucre, and the roads are blocked here in Cocha today to stand in solidarity with what happend in Sucre/Chicisaqua over the weekend. My co-workers told me that it would be best to stay in my house today just in case, but some lives seem to be moving along as normal. Our office at the Foundación is closed today.

Maybe this is just a tiny bit what it might feel like to live in Palestine or Sri Lanka, or... My host mom wants to stock up on flour, sugar, and water just in case, but she doesn´t have the cash flow to buy in quantity. Maybe the Christmas season will hold us back from a civil war, but any kind of dialogue seems unlikely when people are used to solving conflicts with rocks, tear gas, and direct physical confrontation. If Evo doesn´t stop demonizing the Press and if the Constitutional Assembly doesnt agree to return to session after what happened last weekend in Sucre, who knows what all the frustration and emotion here that you can almost taste will come to?

There´s a tension in my gut in worrying about my Bolivian friends and family, for whom this is their daily reality. They can´t just escape to the US like I´ll be doing in the next couple of weeks, counting this as one of many experiences rather than my day-to-day life. It takes courage, though, to live in such uncertain times whether you´re used to it or not."

Pray for peace. Give thanks. And remember what daily life means for so many around our world.

Three Dead in Capital Conflict – Andean Information Network
http://ain-bolivia.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=107&Itemid=32

PS: As of today, things went over quietly and peacefully in the strike yesterday. Life has returned to normal here in Cochabamba. Solutions were hardly brought to the table, though, and the division here continues….