Orito Bajo

Domingo, 06-Julio-2014

Amazonian Tribal Communities

Orito Bajo is one Asháninka native community located about 2 hours away from La Merced near Pichanaki. The Asháninka tribespeople (also called Campa) are the largest indigenous Amazon group in Peru. They are known historically for their fierce resistance to Spanish conquistadors and inhabit many river valleys east of the central highlands. There are at least 15 other tribes in Peru's Amazon but the Asháninka are the most accustomed to the outside world due to their close location. 

The Journey

To get to Orito Bajo, we drove north on a paved road for about 1.25 hrs following the river called Rio Perene.  

At some point we made a u-turn down a gravel path and headed straight for the river. I was a little confused as to where we were going since I hadn't seen a bridge. Turns out there was no bridge, instead we drove onto a wooden raft built over two canoes. This raft would take us across the river!! 

Once on the other side we drove for another 45 minutes on gravel roads up the side of the mountain. These roads were very bumpy and rough. We later found out this is bc the municipality wouldn't fund a road building project so the locals created their own pathway. 

Wellness Check-Ups

Our goal for this trip to Orito Bajo is to get a health baseline for the community and better understand who we are helping. In order to accomplish all of this, we were split into groups: one group would walk around and map out the community, another group went door-to-door to talk with the families and learn about living conditions and daily life, and the third group would work with Dr Franćois and Liz (US med student) to check the kids health. I was part of the last group. 

We used the main school house as the clinic area and were able to see 33 children in 2 hours! I was outside with Casey and Erin getting info from the moms and measuring the kids height and weight. None of us speak particularly good Spanish so it was a little bit of a challenge but we made it happen! Also we asked several people with difficult names to write them for us and it surprised me how literate the entire community was. I guess I assumed that since they don't have proper education they wouldn't know how to write but everyone did!

All of the kids were in excellent health minus dental problems. There were a couple children who stuck out today. One little girl had a bug in her ear and so we used warm water and a syringe to flush it out! 

We did a well baby check up on a 1 month old baby boy. Está muy lindo (He was very cute)!! 

Lastly we made friends with the cutest kid ever! Davíd is 1-2 years old and such a happy toddler!! He loved hanging out around us and we loved having him there. His mom was also with us and we learned that she was 15 years old and had Davíd when she was 14. It literally blows my mind that by the time she's my age, she will have been a mother for almost 10 years! 

Cooking Lunch in the Orchard

Around 2pm we left the community to go make lunch since you can't really eat in front of people who can barely afford soup for dinner. We drove a little further up the mountain until we were in the heart of the orange orchards and then continued on foot to find a good place to cook. 

For lunch we brought spaghetti and sauce to cook over an open flame. Danel and Alex got the fire going while we prepared the ingredients! We brought some veggies to chop up and sauté for the sauce and the Asháninka chief gave us a huge papaya to eat as well. It was delicious!!

Lauren, George, Dustin, and I wandered away while the food was cooking and went looking for ripe oranges. We came across one tree that had lost all it's leaves and it was unbelievable the number of oranges in that one tree! During the harvest season, the Orito Bajo community will have 20,000 kg of oranges trucked out EACH DAY and sent to Lima to be sold as fresh produce. 

Learning More

Danielle is a FIMRC intern who is getting a masters in Public Health from Drexel University. She came down to Peru for two weeks to help gather a baseline for several indigenous communities to see which ones FIMRC can help the most. She is the one who planned everything today and she had intended on us doing a group project with the community after lunch but not enough people showed up. Instead they've rescheduled for next Sunday. Her projects are to have the community create a calendar of annual events (harvesting, cleanup, etc) as well as have them draw a map of their community since no one seems to know which huts belong to Orito Bajo. 

Instead of doing her projects, we listened to people tell stories about Orito Bajo. Turns out that the village used to be on the other side of the river but an outbreak of measles caused everyone to uproot and relocate to their current location. The government finally recognized them as a village in 1982 and gave them a land deed. In the 1980s, there were only 40 families and now there are 250 people (175 are children). These people live off the land and barely make enough money selling oranges to get by. Therefore only 40 of the children actually attend school and the rest are working in the fields. 

After the stories ended, I was able to get a picture of the current chief (the woman) and a past chief who decided to wear a headress type thing. The chiefs are voted at a community meeting so it's a fair system. I love that right now the chief is a woman since it shows that machismo is not as big if an issue as I once thought. 

Water and Latrines

First and foremost, I've never been so terrified to pee in my life. The latrine available for us was a small metal box set back in the woods. I was expecting there to just be a hole in the ground but I didn't expect a family of banana spiders to appear mid-pee. These spiders are TERRIFYING!! They are about 2 in long with yellow and black stripes. They started crawling in all directions and I have never been so scared in my life. Somehow I was able to block it out and finish peeing before running like hell out of there. I was the first and only person to use the latrine. Everyone else decided not peeing was a much better option.

After this terrifying experience, I joined everyone who walked up to the mountain to the water source. The water source was questionable and I'm impressed with how healthy the community is given that this is there main water supply. There was stagnant water with fuzz/scum collecting on top and there was lots of mud and decaying leaves. It was about a 20 min walk further up the mountain which is quite a hike to get "clean" water but the view was amazing!! You can even see the fútbol game going on below in the community center!

Asháninka Language

Orito Bajo prides itself with its Asháninka heritage and therefore many people know the native language. A few people only know the native language and not Spanish which seems crazy to me. I was able to pick up a few words:

- Avito (aah-bee-toe) = hello

- Pasonke (pass-un-key) = thank you

- Hanaká (ha-nak-ah) = bye 

Also their alphabet only has 19 letters to it which is why all the words sound very similar. 

By the end of the say I was very sad to leave and hope to see them again! I plan on keeping up with Danielle and see how her research goes. If all goes well maybe I can return with her once I'm a PA to help out some more!