Día de Comadres

Thursday, February 16

Today, we had a field trip to Colectivo Katari.  They are a group who pay tribute to and educate others about the indigenous groups of Bolivia.  The presentation was in a straw longhouse-type building.  There was also a kitty!  

This kitten was so snuggly!!

The presentation included some history, some music, and a video.  The music was really cool and the lyrics were all about the plight of indigenous people.  One of the songs went something like “I’m the owner of everything, but I always have nothing” (but in Spanish).  The video was about street and park names in Cochabamba.  A lot of plazas and streets are named for conquistadors or people who were cruel to the indigenous people.  Kinda sad, yah?

After the field trip, it was 5-ish so we got ready to go out for Día de Comadres!  Comadres is a holiday to celebrate godmothers, from what I understand, but it actually just entails ladies going out with their lady friends and partying a lot.  So to prepare for this big night, we ate some bread we bought on the street!  My house was a taxi ride away, so I stashed my stuff at my friend Sophie’s house and went to the party in my clothes from class (rain boots!).  Two of the girls had (Bolivian host) sisters who came out with us too.  We went to a café-type place and danced!  Getting a taxi back home was a challenge since the streets were so packed—finding one was hard enough, and then there was the traffic.  We crammed 10 people into a mini-van taxi!  No picture could capture that.

Attempting to get everyone in the photo

My "buddy" Ali and me