Palegoldenrod

Today is Blog Action Day around the world and this year’s topic is poverty. As I am currently in Bolivia I thought I’d post a little about the country, some statistics and a little about the current situation.

It is difficult for me, as an outsider who has only been here for a month, to explain Bolivia and its issues relating to poverty, politics (international and internal), economics, employment etc. But hopefully I can provide a few bits and pieces that might help to shed a little light.

I wish I could change the timing of the Blog Action Day and my plans. Next week I start my volunteering at a local orphanage, which would (I expect) make for much more interesting reading than what I am about to provide. But if you return at the end of next week I will hopefully have posted something about the orphanage for you.

First, a little background info. Bolivia is landlocked in the centre of South America and is one of the poorer countries on the continent. It is the 3rd largest producer of coca in the world, after Colombia and Peru.

Last year Evo Morales was elected with a 54% majority (an unusually high figure in Bolivia) and became the first indigenous president of the country.

Evo and Coca Farming

Evo was also a coca farmer which puts him in an interesting position. Where the US had been encouraging (and financially supporting) eradication of the coca crop entirely, Evo’s view is “Coca yes, cocaine no” and so gives full support to legitimate farming of the crop. The farming of coca (for uses such as teas, medicine etc - not exclusively for cocaine production, which is illegal) supports a significant portion of the Bolivian workforce. While I don’t have a solution for the cocaine production issue, I am sure that the sudden and complete halt of coca farming in Bolivia would be disastrous.

Current Situation: Sucession of Provinces

There is a wide gap between upper and lower classes in Bolivia which also seems to be roughly the breakup between people of Spanish descent and those of indigenous descent. The provinces containing the upper classes don’t want to participate in Evo’s plan to restructure and redirect funds to support the poorer provinces. As they prefer to keep their earnings in their own provinces, they are trying to suceed and establish their own government. This has prompted violence in those areas and a long series of negotiations which are taking place on neutral territory here in Cochabamba.

Now, I don’t have an opinion here. But the issue is interesting… when some parts of the nation are incredibly wealthy and others have high levels of poverty, what can be done to help restore the balance? Should anything be done?

Stats: Wealth Distribution and Health

Bolivia has such an imbalance of prosperity internally (a minority hold the majority of the wealth) that the number of people in the lower classes and the issues facing the government relating to investment in infrastructure and social support, mean that overall Bolivia is struggling compared to most other countries.

The UN Human Development Report for this year ranks Bolivia as 117th out of 177 countries - putting it in the “medium human development” category. Lets have a look at a few statistics compared to Australia, my home country, ranked 3rd of 177.

The enormity of the wealth imbalance astounds me still, even though I have read these and similar statistics many times in the last month. And there are countries that are worse off in the world. Scary, no?

As expected, the effects of poverty are visible in health as well.

I have come to appreciate clean and drinkable running water, a flushing toilet and a clean bathroom so much more since having spent time in South America

Emloyment and Income as an Indicator of Improvement

The informal labour market supports a significant part of the Bolivian population, which makes it difficult to really get an idea of the emlpoyment situation of many Bolivians. As Diego Cevallos points out in his article Not Everyone Celebrates Improved Poverty Statistics:

By adding cans to the products she scavenges and sells, Guadalupe raised her average monthly earnings from 70 to 85 dollars. But she feels as hard-pressed as before and finds no reason to celebrate.

An increase in income or even a job in the informal labour market is not necessarily a good indicator of an improvement in situation or of a financial situation at all.

Current Political Situation: Further Impact on Economy

Compounding the impact of the worldwide financial crisis, Bolivia´s political issues (internal relating to sucession of some provinces, external relating to diplomatic relations with the US) are also having an effect on the economy. There are significantly less foreigners in the country, and therefore less money being pumped into the multitude of businesses in the tourism industry, as well as vendors and beggars on the street that usually rely on donations from comparatively wealthy travellers.

In addition, according to local news, some factories for US companies are considering shutting down operations operations in Bolivia and relocating to a country with a better diplomatic relationship. If this happens, it is likely that many Bolivians will be out of work, many businesses that supply these factories may lose their primary client and of course the knock on effect could be dramatic. I imagine that some existing trade or financial aid agreements with many allies of the US may be in jeopardy too.

In Australia when such a significant event occurs the government may be able to offer some support or guarantee to the employees of those companies. Here, where the government doesn’t appear to have enough money to provide well paved roads between many of its major cities, I wonder if those workers will have anything when (if?) those companies leave.

But even with employment there is something I don’t understand. Here in Cochabamba there are people on almost every block asking for money, or busking - including children who seem to be only 2 or 3 years old with no parent in sight. Yet, when I walk down the streets in the centre of town every second store has a “help wanted” sign in the window - almost all of them have been there since I arrived. I’m not sure why these jobs aren’t being filled…. maybe one of you can help me figure that one out.

Resources

Here are a few resources for you:

• Sustainable Bolivia - Non Profit - volunteering support and co-oridinator of sustainability projects in Bolivia
• Volunteer Bolivia
• Kiva - financing entrepreneurship in underdeveloped communities
• UNICEF - Poverty in Bolivia
• Global Call to Action Against Poverty - Bolivia
• WorldBank’s PovertyNet Library - Bolivia
• Freerice - expand your vocab while providing rice to those who need it

Wrap Up

Thanks for reading. I’d like to encourage you to find out more about why I posted this at the Blog Action Day site.

Next week I plan to post about my experiences volunteering at the orphanage. I hope you gained some small insight into Bolivia from this spiel. If you have anything to add or ask, please comment below.

Blog Action Day is an annual nonprofit event that aims to unite the world’s bloggers, podcasters and videocasters, to post about the same issue on the same day. Our aim is to raise awareness and trigger a global discussion.

This year, Blog Action Day is on Wednesday the 15th October and is on the topic of poverty. Get involved: register your blog and write about poverty on the day, contribute to the project in other ways, or be inspired to get out and do something to combat poverty in your part of the world.

As for Palegoldenrod, I hope to write something relating to Bolivia, where I have been for almost a month now. I haven’t quite decided on the exact topic yet, hehe.

Catch you on the 15th!

Blog Action Day website

More junk from the mind of a travel-maddened, exhausted, over-partied, distant chica wandering lost and in a daze through South America. I think I have hit a point where my thinking is becoming seriously affected by this experience and has yet to settle down. Its an odd experience.

Anyway, as usual, an apology and a reminder that this really isn’t here for you. Its here because I can. hugs to all my homies in da big hizzouse of da world

He called out over the noise
“hold on to each other!”
afraid we would lose each other in the press of people.
I was afraid
I would lose myself

“HOLD ON to each other”, I thought.
Profound.
I, who had never really held on to anyone
There, with strangers
Wanting to hold on
to HOLD ON!

“Who are strangers,” I thought
“but friends we haven’t yet met.”
An old saying that made me smile.
One I usually scoff at -
I hate that shite.
But not that night.

I held on
With every part of me.
I asked them to carry me gently to the places where the poets are
so I could stroll once more with Clare and Cohen and Shelley
like I used to when I was young
when things felt more real

I almost found it again
that place where I could see and taste and touch and smell
and love
where I could breathe and know I was alive

Then the crowd was gone
and the stranger-friends dispersed
scattered in the four directions
and I’m on the road again
a long bus ride with time to ponder
the nature of love and friendship

23 hours of uninterrupted road
to hold on to

I was told that travel is an experience. I thought “oh yeah, you get to see stuff, and do stuff, and stuff goes wrong and you have to deal with it and all that”.

But I was not prepared for this feeling, so hard to describe. Maybe its the solo travel that is adding this new aspect for me. I am alone. Now don’t get me wrong - this isn’t the same feeling you get when you are at home and bored and you decide to start calling your friends. That happens, and then you transcend that, and arrive where I am now.

A fundamental understanding of the value of being alone.

Don’t mistake this for being lonely, I’m not. This is an appreciation of the quality of that feeling. Becoming comfortable with that feeling - even in a city of six million. I guess on some level becoming comfortable with oneself, which (I noted last night) was something that I haven’t done very well in the past. Actually it quite probably interfered with my brain in such a fundamental way that I would make poor decisions because of it.

Last night I went to the local Irish pub (yes, in Santiago, Chile, there are Irish pubs). I tried a local beer (Kuntsmann Miel if you are interested) and I sat in a corner seat and watched the football (soccer). Now, if I had been sitting alone in a pub in Australia - even as recently as 3 months ago… well, I wouldn’t have been sitting there. I would need a reason to be there: waiting for someone maybe. And if I were waiting I would fidget. I would get self conscious. I would feel like I needed to be doing something, talk on my phone, read a book, something.

Last night I sat and watched football. I thought. A lot. I felt. Maybe not a lot (not strong feelings), but many different things. I thought about what I wanted, which is (for me) one of two big questions of my life. “What do I want?” and “Who am I?”. (I figured that one defines the other so I just picked the one that seems easier to tackle).

I came to a few conclusions that surprised me. I hadn’t thought that the answers would be so… concrete for me, especially when I am usually such a fence-sitter. Other things arose as a result of those conclusions, and I’ve yet to tackle those, but the feeling I had after this initial realisation was of being grounded. Stable.

Maybe it is Chile (or South America) that is doing this to me. I have a scientific mind. I work with facts, unchanging. I think this approach has caused problems with things like “what do you want?” because the answer is based on feeling (unpredictable) and not fact. This somewhat sterile approach is easy to get by with in Australia. Chileans, however, feel a lot more. They have “the passion”. The feel energy, they are open with their thoughts and feelings, they dance and make music and sing and love and compose poetry and are utterly unselfconscious about it. It is beautiful, and maybe contagious

So after all this thinking and conclusion making my brain produced a few lines of something and I’m not really sure what to do with it. As it is so rare for me to create such things I thought I’d put it up here. Its not like anyone reads this anyway, so I think I am pretty safe, haha.

Its not really very sensible, but hey. Don’t say I never gave you anything.

Love you guys.

I started walking on a long dirt road slowly with you years ago
and only now is the end starting to draw near
The dust is settling
I can tell which way is north
I can tell which way is north even without you.
even at night, sometimes
even though, right now, i don’t know where I am

The many stars still guide my way
but these are further from me.
They don’t blind me like the sun
they are gentle, beautiful
less intense
unreachable

Sometimes on nights like this I pause for a moment
In the silent darkness.
I let the dust swirl slowly to a halt around my ankles.
And I wonder if there is such a thing as middle ground
Or balance
Or perfection.

In those moments I feel like we are forced to choose between extremes:
like beauty untouchable and numerous
or blistering splendor in blinding proximity.
Neither satisfying.

But such a choice is impossible -
Preferences have no meaning here
On this road.
Things are not chosen, cannot be chosen
They just are.
Like you and I
and the dirt caked on my shoes.

Maybe my only hope for perfection is to watch for dawn and dusk
When part of the sun and the stars are obscured, but visible
When the sky itself manifests magnificence, even if only fleetingly.
A testament to the beauty of impermanence.
A twice-daily reminder of mortality.