Cajamarca with snow

In these weeks it came around to me to travel north to visit children with projectable abilities from the Community Program.

In Cajamarca in these months we have been going through a very hard time, with a lot of drought, fires and an extreme lack of water. Many, many seeds and crops have already been lost and many people no longer know how to fill their pots and stomachs. This is a very worrying situation for all of us.

Although it is now beginning to rain, many now have no seeds or have to buy again, getting into debt and not knowing if they will actually have crops that will allow them to repay this debt.

For my part then, I was prepared to find fields with maize dying, trees burned by frost, animals thin because of lack of water and grass. I had also heard from the people of the Jalca (the high altitude) that hail was falling and it was freezing and I imagined the fields with hail grains or frost ice in the early hours. But what I saw was actually snow.

Having been born and lived in cold German lands, it caused me a confusion of feelings. I felt a lot of nostalgia, but also chills imagining the people here and their animals without warm houses or stables, without clothes that keep you warm, without being able to move to warm up your body - thinking of some of the children of the Community Program -, without sufficient food or firewood to prepare a hot drink. And without a government that provides and supports in these situations.

It will be cause to get together more, to learn more and prepare better ... because no one knows what is coming.

Rita Mocker

Community Program Manager