LIFE IN BOLIVIA

Evening Star, Issue 22454, 26 September 1936, Page 2

LIFE IN BOLIVIA

More extracts from letters of a missionary’s wife. January 30. In a multitude of ways wc have been so well .provided for. At this season eggs aro scarce, and for a good while I was without one in the house, and didn’t know where to get one. A Chola girl comes regularly with oranges, and J. always put the sarfte question; “Runtus?” (eggs), but she always shook her head mournfully, while she rattled off a string of words in an unknown tongue. Then two weeks ago a woman came to the door with 30, and the next day she brought 40 more. You can imagine what a help this has been to the head of the house, as he battled with kitchen problems. I fear that we are not very popular over the buying of these eggs. With “new chum” eagerness we pay, sixpence a dozen, and ask fox* more, while the Plaza price is less. But they are not sold in dozens. “ Iscai pata ” (two a penny) says my Indian woman, with a furtive glance. She wonders if I know that at the Plaza, or almost any other door, she -would be given a “ pata ” for three.

One day wo got a good supply of peaches and apples, beautiful peaches and bard, tasteless little apples. These also were brought to the door by a woman who was looking for higher prices. Five peaches for a penny, and six apples for another penny. Could one offer less? Yet L know she went away feeling that she had made a good - sale. , ' • _ You asked about shops, les, we have several dozen of them, but you wouldn’t recognise them as such. One side of the Plaza is devoted to the native church—a dreary adobe building On the other three sides are long single-storied houses, nearly every one of which is a shop as well as a dwelling. The most ambitious shopkeeper doesn’t aspire to more than one room, always with a mud floor, and a bench or two which hold the goods for sale, the principal articles displayed are native beer, sugar, dried red peppers, soap, candles, and matches. On the floor there may be a heap or two of maize and potatoes. Room must be allowed to spread the rugs at night, for the family sleep in the shop. And here neighbours drop in to smoko, chew coca, spit, and drink “ chicha ’’—each little shop a social hall. " Gringos don t patronise these places much; food kept in such storage doesn’t appeal to us, and the wares are so shockingly expensive. Of course, if our Oruro, supply runs out, there is nothing else tor it We are buying candles at 4d each, and 1 am afraid we shall have to get sugar, and pay £2 a bag for it. Ihe Oruro price is £1 2s, plus carnage, but our shopman sells in pennyworths,- making a good profit. , Sometimes I think of Princes street and George street, and I want to see a shop again. . ... A good deal of buying and selling is done in the Plaza, and Sunday is the great market day. I went for a walk one Sunday afternoon, and coming back through the Plaza was surprised to hncl such an animated scene. In the centre the Indian market women squatted on the ground, their wares spread out before them on cloths of woven woolsheep or llama. The quantity of goods displayed by each was very small —little heaps of maize, a few potatoes,, some rock salt, and “chunos.”' At the sides of the Plaza stalls were erected, Chola women doing better business than their Indian neighbours. There was a good demand for leaves of the coca tree, which the men are for ever chewing; also we noticed alcohol and German dyes of brilliant hues to colour the wool yam which they spin and weave into ponchos, belts, hats, rugs—indeed, almost everything. The men strolled or lurched round wearily, chewing coca, occasionally having a drink of chicha, but otherwise making few purchases. The weird notes of the reed pipes were heard above the din of the market place, and the yelp of a dog as an irate woman chased it from her pile of goods. , The “ chunos ” that I mentioned are greatly liked by the Indians and as heartily disliked by the “ Gringos.” They are made from potatoes, perfectly good potatoes, converted into a most unappetising article of diet. The potatoes are laid outside to freeze during the night. In the daytime, after they have thawed, bare feet roll and gradually squeeze out_ the water they contain. This process is repeated many times until the potato becomes a dark shrivelled-up object horrible to behold and worse to eat. Of course, it keeps indefinitely, just as a stone does. The main meal of the day in an Indian home is often this most uninteresting mess of pottage, “ chunos ” floating round in the water they were boiled in. We strolled over to the other side of the Plaza, where an Indian woman, beside a little improvised stone fireplace, was doing a good trade in bowls of this “ lawa.” One “ Gringo ” remarked as we walked away, “It is undoubtedly nourishing, but it looks like soup made from old cork.” “ And has about the same flavour.” said another. Another opinion was, “ I think that ‘ chuno ’ resembles the bagpipes in this .—no one not native born can ever like them. Next week I hope to start jam-mak-ing, and the difficulty will be not to find fruit, but bottles. Making jam seems to bo an art known only to the “ Gringos,” and I notice that when the ladies of the mission house are not able to attend to the fruit as it comes in the men prove quite efficient in dealing with it. Yes, they eat all they can, but some good samples of preserve stand to their credit, too. Peach jam is the commonest, and our poor old despised plum is the rarest, for evidently plums don’t grow in this locality. Gooseberries are unknown, but we get delicious figs, eight for a penny: Fig jam is nicest of all. There is another delicious fruit called “ guayaha,” which looks like passion fruit, but grows on a tree. But there is one fruit that stands out above all others, both with natives and foreigners. In appearance it is something like a stunted green marrow with a bumpy surface. When you cut it you find a delectable ice cream substance studded with large black seeds. “ Chirimoya ” is the native name, and I have been wondering if we have ever heard of this fruit by any other name. Unlike most Bolivian products, it is expensive, sixpence for one about the size of a large orange. The trees don’t grow here, else should we all have our yards lined with them. I asked an Indian girl where they came from. “ From far away, my mother, three days’ journey 7,” she answered. There are no frills about my vocabulary. I point to the fruit and say, “Maimanta?” (where frompf And then, with the aid of useful little Nancy, who speaks Quichua as easily as she speaks English, I get the desirci information.