Living in Peru : your everyday companion

Text and Photos by Niko Kyriakou

(LIP-nk) -- LivinginPeru.com sat down with three successful Peruvian women to discuss their jobs, their passions, and their professional opinions. Find each of these interviews below, beginning with up and coming poet, Nora De Pollaro, followed by the Cuzqueñan congresswoman Maria Sumire, and ending with Ana Maria Bugosen, general manager of the Limenian café chain, 4-D.

A Poet

"Writing makes me feel better".  Nora de Pollarolo

One of Peru's newest poets, Nora De Pollarolo, came out with her first book of poetry last June.

"Los Duenos De La Orilla" or, "The Owners Of The Shore", is a book of short, minimalist poems, dealing with themes of death and discovery.

"Some poets write books all about divorce or a loved one who has died. I hate those types of books that say goodbye to one person," Pollarolo said.

By contrast, her 57-page book presents "poems of hope, of feeling the happiness of life," she says.

"I describe how I made my way out of depression, which I did with my nails in rocks to get out of the water."

Pollarolo has written since childhood but some ten years ago she began writing as "therapy" during a period of depression following a death in her family.

"Writing made me feel better," she said.

The poet writes her poems straight through and says she never goes back to make corrections. Her book of 28 poems was whittled down from some 300 pieces she's written over the past five years.

Pollarolo takes inspiration from some of Peru's brightest poetry stars, such as Jorge Eduardo Eielson, Cesar Vallejo, Mario Vargas Llosa, and Blanca Varela.

It took Pollarolo "two years to learn to write" poetry, which she did by attending literary workshops run by well-known Peruvian poets such as Anna Maria Gazzolo, and Rosella De Paolo. It was Paolo who originally suggested that Pollarolo try to publish her work.

On the leaflet of "The Owners Of The Shore", Paolo describes Pollarolo's words as "thin and clean, like the trace of a snail across these pages, lighter than air but strong in their desire to separate times of pain from times of grace."

Pollarolo was born in Lima in 1955, studied linguistics and literature at Peru's Catholic University, and is currently a teacher and coordinator at World Communications, a modern language institute in Lima.

Last month, the author and her new book were featured favorably on TV Peru's (channel 4) Vano Oficio, a program dedicated to literature and hosted by Ivan Thais.

Pollarolo says she didn’t publish for fame or prestige but that the book as "anchored" her life.

Although she describes poetry as "music", she permitted LIP to translate two of her untitled poems into English for our readers. The following translations were approved by her:

          ___________

My beloved, I can't wait for you any longer. The evening
invites the night and I must enter the cavern. If you come,
you will find me transformed into a transparent
jellyfish. I know you will be surprised by the grace and lightness
of my movements.
Touch me and you'll feel my body is warm
and sweetly slips and that my veins
are chains of light.

___________

The house bleeds: the walls have been torn, they've left pieces of
injured brick and tiles. I've decided to go to the park, everything
is the same there. The faces of the fawns are kind, their bodies
are bathed by mischievous waters, my gaze is long.
I've been here for a long time, and have let myself be taken away by my dreams.

In the pond, the jumping of the fish wakes me up.

To hear more Peruvian poetry contact La Noche cultural center in Lima's district of Barranco about their Monday night literary events, or, watch the literary program Vano Oficio on channel 4, TV Peru, Wednesdays from 4 to 5pm.


A Politician

A Cuzqueñan congresswoman who made a storm last August when she vowed to use Quechua in Peru's Congress is having difficulties keeping her promise.

Maria Sumire and her colleague, Hilaria Supa, were elected to Congress earlier this year on the Union for Peru party ticket and gave their entrance speeches in the ancient Inca language of Quechua.

The two have said they would continue to use the indigenous language in Congress with the help of interpreters, despite pressure from other representatives that they stick with Spanish.

But laws governing congressional protocol have made Sumire and Supa's promise to speak Quechua in Congress difficult to fulfill.

According to Article 48 of Peru's Constitution: “All Peruvians have the right to use their own language before any authority by means of an interpreter.”

Peruvian Congresswoman Maria Sumire vowed to speak only her in native Quechua language in Parliament.

Laws governing congressional conduct however, which permit representatives four minutes to present their views in legislative debates,  do not allow extra time for translations. This makes using Quechua logistically impractical, Sumire told LivinginPeru.com, as she is forced to cut her presentation time in half.

In addition, Sumire says that when she uses Quechua in Congress, "they do not write what I have spoken in the record."

For these reasons, Sumire infrequently uses the ancient tongue in legislative meetings, despite her pledge to do so.

The congresswoman, who holds a doctorate in law, says the current arrangement is illegal because congressional law is subordinate to constitutional law.

Sumire says she uses Quechua because it is the language of the people who elected her.

"Peru is racist because when I entered to administer an oath in Quechua in the congress, (at first) they did not let me. They said to use Castilian."

"One congressman told me he spoke Quechua, but that out of respect to others, I should not speak it. But I said that I represent the excluded population, they are my people, and to my people I am going to be loyal." Sumire said.

Census figures show some 3.2 million Quechua speakers in Peru, but Sumire says surveyors don't reach remote, mountain areas.

She puts the number at closer to 9 million Quechua speakers, or a third of Peru's population.

Two dialects of Quechua, Waywash and Wanp'una, are spoken in Peru's central highlands, and Quechua is still used all over the Inca's former empire, which stretched across Colombia, Chile, Bolivia, Argentina, and Ecuador until the 15th and 16th centuries.

Spanish and Quechua, as well as Aymara, another indigenous language used in Peru, are all officially recognized.

Like many Peruvians, Sumire grew up with Quechua as her mother tongue.

She learned Spanish "with much effort; with blood, because the professor that I learned from drew blood tugging my ear," she said.

Her difficulties with Spanish persist today.

"I cannot understand some of what is debated in Congress," Sumire says, due to the complex Spanish jargon used by the country's politicos.

"Imagine how it is for the millions of uneducated Peruvians," she said.

Sumire is determined to see Congressional law changed. She says it is important to use Quechua in the halls of power so as to remind the Congress whom they represent.

"I think that Peru has forgotten the owners of Peru. Peru is run by a group who are the created owners of Peru, but who have never thought about these people," she said.

"Peru is all the cultures, including Quechuas, Aymaras, Amazons, which have all been excluded. What we want is that they see us, that we exist, that we are people according to the constitution."

In addition, because of the Quechua language barrier, information about politics doesn't reach many Peruvians, Sumire says.

For example, before arriving to the Congress, she had no idea that the Quechua translation of Peru's constitution she keeps on her desk even existed.

Multi-lingual congresses exist in Switzerland, Canada, and Belgium. The idea is under debate in Scotland.


A General Manager

Ana Maria Bugosen in 4-D on Avenida Salaverry in San Isidro.

Ana Maria Bugosen is the production wiz behind 4-D, one of Lima's best-known coffee and ice cream shops.

Over the past eight years, the general manager has developed the company's signature coffee blend, invented its line of diet ice creams, and launched 4-D's elegant hot chocolate, made from fine European cacaos.

Bugosen, who studied coffee and gelato in Italy, says the secret to her success is an unswerving dedication to quality.

"Success comes when you do what is really in your heart, and I love to give people good things to eat; exclusive, optimal products, not an affordable product, or one that will make the most money at market prices, but quality," the general manager says.

Bugosen, 39, has traveled to places like Brazil and Vietnam to sample coffee in the search of the perfect international blend of "taste, aroma, body, color, etc."

"Every country carries its own distinct quality…a good coffee is not just from one country," she says.

4-D owns a plant where they roast their coffee beans daily. The beans arrive at the shop whole and are fresh ground for every cup.

Bugosen is also the mastermind behind 4-D's popular diet ice cream, "which is something you don’t find anyplace," she says.

"Today we have a variety of ice cream that is for diets because many people want dietary and natural products. In summer, we start a new line of soy products which many people, for health reasons, prefer over cow milk."

4-D specializes in handicraft ice creams that follow traditional Italian recipes and is the only shop that makes fruit ice cream daily from A-1 fruit, Bugosen says.

"If I know that Chirimoya is ready this month, I buy it each day, but when the month is up, I don’t make it anymore," she says.

Bugosen's third big breakthrough for 4-D has been their hot chocolate, which is made from Swiss and Dutch cacao.

"It’s a creation that doesn’t exist (in Lima), a pure thick chocolate in your cup," Bugosen says. 4-D also serves homemade dessert chocolate, ice cream chocolate, and chocolate brownies.

The café has opened three new locations since Bugosen came on board, bumping the total to seven, and has plans to open an eighth location at Lima's international airport.

Bugosen graduated from the University of Lima in Communications, did post-graduate studies in Restaurant Administration at Cordon Bleu Peru, and spent time in Italy studying handicraft ice cream and coffee.

Her first job out of school was for an import-export company in Chile, where she worked for seven years.

Bugosen attributes her success to being goal oriented.

"You always have to have objective goals in life. Since being little, it was always clear what I wanted and where I wanted to go. When a person knows what they want and where they want to go, they have to fight for it, with good means," she said.

- related article -

- 2 Congresswomen insist on speaking Quechua in Parliament (Aug. 10, 2006)

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