EYES
OF THE ALTIPLANO
by CPT Ted Bowling, Latin American FAO
Assuming the absense of any critical mechanical failure, the train ride from Cuzco,
Peru, to Puno on the western shore of Lake Titikaka takes about nine hours. The train
winds its way across the golden 13,000 foot high Altiplano which flows unimpeded by
the great lake into Bolivia and falls precipitously into the canyons of La Paz. The "curing
touch" of the Fujimori government has yet to reach this enclave of pre-Colombian
culture. The simple adobe igloos and colorfully dressed Native Americans tending their
llamas on the vast free range of the Plano do not betray the year in which they live. The
train stops occasionally in pueblos (small villages), but nobody actually gets on or off.
The train just stops, then slowly begins its journey south again, its antique mustard
colored locomotive belching black smoke and straining to achieve enough momentum to
reach its next mysterious halt. As we roll through this surreal world, children steal a
moments rest from their 7,000 year old chores and glance up at the glass windows of
the great iron wagons and somehow directly into our eyes. In their eyes is infinite time
and space. There are wars 5000 years old, struggles so brutal that the suffering
populations built floating islands of reeds on the great lake, where they could live without
the pain and loss that war has always brought. Through their eyes marches Huayna
Capac escorted by 10,000 guards, aides, and personal servants making his way south
across the Altiplano with us, attending to affairs in his 3,000 mile long Inca Empire. His
children Huascar and Atahualpa at his side; his children who would be so deeply
embroiled in internecine warfare upon the arrival of the men on horses, that their fate
would be sealed and the destiny of a great people changed forever. I see in these
children's eyes the passing gaggle of untrained Spanish cavalry, fresh from the
effortless conquest of precious Cuzco, plodding their way southward. Eventually, they
will reach Potosi where they will discover untold wealth, which in a twist of fortunes
(played out so many times in the history of kings) will seal the fate and fall of Spain as a
world power. Through those eyes I see "the fate," I see El Librador marching south with
his lieutenants. He marches deliberately and without enthusiasm on his long journey to
La Paz where he will reluctantly grant independence to a country that he knows cannot
be governed; a country that will be his namesake for the next two centuries as the
continent struggles to judge him. The train speeds by and the last blur of recognition is
death. The children will return to their chores, only faintly understanding the urgency of
every task in preparation for the great drought which El Nino will soon bring; too young
to remember the last visit, when famine's only competition in the reaper's morbid game
was the illogical slaughter by Sendero Luminoso's butchers.
Some day I will take the trip again. I think what bothers me most is not the fear of what I
may see the next time I look, but rather that I do not know what I want to see.
1997, Foreign Area Officer Association
Springfield,
Virginia
Maintained by LTC Steve
Gotowicki.
http://www.faoa.org