Fischers in Peru

Hot on the heels of the last ETE (Educación Teológica por Extensión) workshop in Chivay, the weekend of 13-15 October saw us in the village of Paquenta.  Where is this?  Well... it's out the back of Cota Cota, which is out the back of Tisco, which is out the back of Chivay, which is out the back of Arequipa.  You get the drift.  On the way there was a fair bit of wet weather blowing through, and we even copped a bit of snow:

This has to be the most remote location I've been to with René and Roberto: a gathering of houses and huts in a shallow valley.  There are quite a few buildings in the village, but most of them aren't occupied.  Only a few families live there; about 5 of these people are ETE students.

Below: A frosty Saturday morning in Paquenta.  The peaks on the horizon rise to over 5000m.

René got the Saturday workshop up and running with the 5 Paquenta students and another 6 or so joining from Cota Cota and Tisco.  As a group we worked our way through a text from the Gospel of Matthew, helping the students to analyse the text, explore its context, and figure out how you'd prepare a teaching session based on it.

For me it's been a real eye-opener to see how René patiently, clearly, and methodically explains things.  Now this is not because the students are dumb; far from it, there are some very sharp tools in this shed!  But most people in these areas have very little (if any) formal education, and the many benefits schooling can bring.  This means there isn't much you can assume when taking these classes.  So, while you and I might find a given method for analysing a text fairly straight forward, well... can you imagine how you'd go if you'd never done this before?

One thing you can assume, though, is that everyone knows how to play football.  Paquenta FC was quickly formed and the game kicked off:

As you can see not much quarter was given, and Peruvian footy passions were well-stirred.  I was happy to be team photographer and marvel (as usual) at the fitness of these people who can slam a ball around at 4400m for 45 minutes and not really get that puffed.

On the way back to Arequipa I had the usual stimulating conversation with René and Roberto about the challenges of delivering Christian education in the rural backblocks.  It was a strange consolation to realise that, even though Roberto and René have been doing the ETE gig for decades now, and they have all the advantages that come with being a part of the culture they're working in, at the same time they keenly feel the challenges too.  As an outsider with a different perspective, but with the same desire to help train competent and effective teachers of the Bible in these churches, these guys are more than happy to toss stuff around and let this greenhorn join in the action.

As we were stumping our way across the pitch black plaza to our sleeping quarters late on Saturday evening, a couple of the brothers cautioned me not to trip across a huge rock which is still embedded in the plaza surface.  You can see where it's situated, right in front of the flag pole:

I haven't yet asked anyone about this, but it's got me wondering: Why, in an otherwise flat, clear and level plaza, would you leave a rock like this sitting there?  Maybe it was too big to move... but no, moving rocks is one thing the locals are very good at, and access to heavy machinery isn't that far away.

So what is it doing there?  My suspicion is that it's a huaca -- a sort of sacred object in the Quechua scheme of things that is/ was believed to have supernatural properties.  One thing the Spanish were keen to do when they colonised Peru was obliterate all these remnants of Inca religion.  I've read how the Catholic establishment was frustrated by the fact that while many of these sacred objects still existed in plain sight, only the locals knew which rocks were huacas and they weren't about to let the Spaniards in on the secret!

On the way back home, as we chatted about ETE training and the associated issues, the landscape of the altiplano did its usual breathtaking thing...

Above: a couple of tetchy vicuñas.  Below: a llama.  Even though you can be standing quite close to them, they have perfected the art of (seemingly) not paying you any attention while they gaze off into the distance.

Below: a rain storm bringing another dumping of snow and ice somewhere.