Saint Che Guevara from Bolivia
Posted on October 22, 2006
Filed Under Reportage |
Santa Cruz, Bolivia, 21st July 2000
Yesterday I arrived in Santa Cruz, with this motorbike held together by iron wire, from Higuera, place of execution of Ernesto Guevara. Two heavy dinners, accomplices to my subconscious, produced dreams about him. I read his diary when I was there, I spoke about him with the people, his icon on the walls of the dwellings has accompanied me from Vallegrande (the last real village on the road) till Pucara and then La Higuera. Something like a mystic experience, good for a teenager, not so much for the destination as for the journey itself.
I decided to take the road through the mountains, the same he must have taken more than twenty years ago, with my mythical Honda 125 country, 5 gallons of additional fuel on the seat and a survival kit, adequate for a child who just read Stevenson.
On a rainy afternoon I arrived at Samaipata. The next morning, I drove the motorbike on a terrible horse-path through Vallegrande. On the motorbike with the engine at full power, using no more than the first three gears, for six hours, plus one hour mounting back the chain, which suddenly had desappeard with all the screws. I was almost crying at the idea that I had a dehydrated pasta but only half a liter of water. Then I was able to use the screws of the plate and I began to appreciate the landscape again –these high, dry hills and the absence of signs of humanity.
Once arrived in Pucara, covered in dust, I stopped in the main square, and a bunch of boys surronded me, more amused by my funny outfit (aviator sun-glasses and stormtrooper soldier helmet) than curious about seeing one more yankee pilgrim. One of them took out a thorn from the tire: it deflated. Fixing the motorbike was a big show for the children, something new to see.
After dinner I spoke with the lady who hosted me. I rolled up a cigarette in her store and we had a chat. She suffered from gastritis and tried to cure it with coffee. In the only country where coca leaves are legal she was using instant coffee. I recommended an infusion of coca leaves and gave her some big American pills I had with me. Then I saw a sack of fertilizer with the label “Present of the Japanese Government to the Bolivian Department for Development”.
“What do you use it for?” I asked. Fertilizing potatoes, of course. “And the dung of the cows?” They throw it into the river, of course. “And… the suet of the cows?” Also into the river, of course. Culture as passage of information from one generation to the other does not exist if your granfather was Indio and you are civilized. Any Italian shepherd knows how to produce manure, soap and cheese. Here they sell milk and meat and buy everything. Japanese fertilizer and Argentinian soap, miracles of the market.
Finally the day after I went to La Higuera: I was not the only tourist finding a horse (but I was one of the few –three SUV overpass me) and set off, accompanied by a loquacious Sancho Panza riding a donkey, who told me about the changes of the weather, the difficulty nowadays to cultivate anything –except potatoes, of course.
La Higuera was touching: after the hill it appeared immersed in the sunset, everywhere portraits of Che Guevara. My idée fixe was that I was only one of the many tourists who passed by. I sat down, spoke with the survivors, fifteen, of the village. They were in a bad condition, albeit living in a pilgrimage place. A huge boy told me he could find no shoes to fitt his feet. They appeared apathetic, depressed. Seeing how inapt they are to the society which was imposed on them is disconcerting. How unsuited they are to become true social agents: they survive selling some Coca Cola per day, nothing more.
But the most moving thing was meeting a girl who sold fruit-shakes in Vallerande. This girl told me, the third time I was at her kiosk, that her father hosted Che Guevara. Could be false, everybody there proudly speaks about some relationship with him. But she inspired trust. Listening to the people one would not think that Che Guevara died because of lack of popular support. The Bolivian People were absolutely not at fault, nor did he ever accuse them. Nevertheless he was not received as the savior. Guevara nowadays is seen as a saint who immolated himself. The picture of Guevara –open eyed, dead, which reminds us the Christ of Mantegna– for them is one of the possible Christs. The girl, and not only she, told me about the apparent miracles of Che Guevara. About many boys whose name is Ernesto as sign of gratitude.
The day after I brought her the diary of Guevara with the map of all the locations in the guerrilla warfare, in order to deduce the date of the meeting and read the corresponding day. It came out that probably Guevara never passed by… I felt so miserable. She told me that her father was paying a Mass every year in honour the revolutionary (poor atheist!), how kind he was. I tried to save the situation by formulating the hypothesis that her father hosted Guevara before the actual campaign –incidentaly, if the father did not lie completely he could have hosted the other troop, under the order of Joaquim, whose displacements are sometimes unknown. She then took the book and began reading it, slowly, spelling each word, with her finger following the story. She was not beautiful, but her hands were fine, delicate. She was going through the page like a child, stopping on the pictures, reading the captions, saying “That is part of our history, next time in Santa Cruz I will buy it.”. And so I gave it to her as a present. I wrote my name with the date. She began caressing the cover, telling the daughter “I’m sure you’ll soon read it– and after to me –she reads a lot, everything: stories, comics, books: now she’ll be busy for a while with that!”.
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