A man found the footprints of the prophet in the sand and began to follow him.
Further on he met another man coming in the opposite direction:
- What are you doing," he asked him, "Don't you know that the prophet is going this way?"
- "I don't want to follow him", answered the other man, "I want to know where he came from."
Alfredo Mires Ortiz
In: El duende del laberinto
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On how the Ñaupa got its name and the recreation of ancient images:
On many occasions, when I asked in the people in the rural areas who had made the cave paintings, petroglyphs, sanctuaries or ceramics, the older villagers would answer: "That was done by the Ñaupa". In Quechua, the Ñaupa is the ancient one, the oldest, the grandfather of the oldest. That is why I decided to give this name to the character and the graphic recreation I have carried out.
This process of recreation tries to be extremely respectful of the original plastic art. And it aims to highlight the extraordinary heritage that our elders left us, as well as to emphasise the identity of our peoples in their constant struggle to protect nature and to champion their dignity.
Although we published the first iconographic reproductions in 1991, these recreations began to see the light of day in 2011, accompanying the edition of 'The Letter from the Seattle Indian Chief' that we worked on in a version for children. From that experience we saw that it was possible to vivify the symbols that our ancestors had left us in order to bring us together.
Alfredo Mires Ortiz
in: El Ñaupa
On 20 February 2024, Doña Paca Roncal passed away in the city of Trujillo. Doña Paca, wife of Don Miguel Rodríguez, a very close friend of Alfredo, and her son Miguel, coordinator of the Rural Library at the Pingo-Cajabamba Educational Institution, have always been very close to us. The Rodríguez Roncal family is a reference point for culture, books, rock art and a lot of love. Our deep condolences, we accompany them from the heart. We will always miss the kind and affectionate presence of Doña Paca. "Hugs from many arms".
As students and teachers of the Sucse Secondary School in the community of Sucse, district of Sócota, motivated by the generosity of God, our apus, our mamapacha - who sustain us and give us food - we decided to pay a beautiful tribute to water on its day, knowing that Water Day is our day because of the importance it has in our lives.
We gathered in the courtyard of the Institution and made an offering to the earth, with a reading and a brief reflection on the treatment of water, by teachers Heli Tenorio and Abel Vasquez, and, to end the ritual, we toasted with a glass of water and the delivery of books to all students.
From the distant Medellín, in the mountains of Antioquia, I heard the echoes of a network, the Rural Libraries Network of Cajamarca. I heard the voices from Peru, but above all from the rural areas, from the countryside. This path of promoting reading is not built alone, it is necessary to read to others, to read for others, to fall in love with others, to recount to others. As soon as I heard about this work in Cajamarca, I fantasised about finding out more about what it was all about. So far their peasant library has a great variety of numbers; that is, a great variety of voices, because this has been the work of loving and delicate listening so that these threads of voices are not carried away by the wind, but persist and resist on the pages for them to read, so that others can continue to read them.
That place, back in Cajamarca, sounded somewhat mythical, because one of its main figures, the one who carried the baton for a long time, is one of those beings who are hard to find. An all-rounder, a journeyer, a curious person, a man respectful of his land and his knowledge, a listener, a lover. It would be wrong to say that we did not know Alfredo Mires. That is not true. He decided to go to other lands earlier, probably to continue collecting voices, and so he left us a tremendous team and he exists in each one of them. In the house, in this house, in each of the details that inhabit it, he is there, his spirit is there. It is impossible not to mention him from time to time. At breakfast with Karina who tells me about his good humour. At the table with Lola, who tells me of his love for his neighbourhood's pan de agua "Bring me a pancito de agua", Alfredo used to say to her. Of the respect and admiration with which Don Javier speaks when he mentions the memory of Alfredo, and Rita, his partner in crime, who breathes that tranquillity that comes from having shared so much with him. Alfredo is in the meeting room where the assembly is a political act, with affection, where decisions are taken because they listen to each other. What a tremendous gesture, they listen to each other. And I, who try to make people listen, talk, read and write in every experience, find myself with this enormous display of life.
Infinite admiration will continue for this collective of warriors, dreamers, steadfasts, who continue to believe that it is necessary to keep this house standing, this house that exists and is replicated in each of the libraries where the seed was sown and that now germinate, beautiful, small, with a shelf full of colourful books, with people who, between the work on the land, the hard work on the land, feel it necessary to go and meet with the books. They continue to make circles of words, paying tribute to the earth and respecting the memory of all those who have gone before them. Long live the books, love for the land and affection for the words that do not run out, that do not die.
Jaime Roldán
In the Rural Libraries Network, as our dear brother Alfredo Mires said, we avoid bureaucracy as much as possible; thus, the processes we follow are minimal, simple and understandable. A clear example is the procedures for opening new libraries when communities request them: a simple request and the signatures of those who want the library in their community; adults, young people, children and the elderly.
It is therefore difficult to understand why state and private institutions are riddled with cumbersome, incomprehensible procedures and documents. It is hard for them to understand and accept the simplicity with which a volunteer works, even more so if he or she is a community member.
Fortunately, in our wanderings, we always find people and organisations that accompany us and help us to clarify many of these procedures, which are legally indispensable.
Since a few months ago, and starting a new administrative period in Rural Libraries, we have been accompanied by the accounting firm Consulcont, in the persons of Rodolfo Urteaga and Monica Narvaez. We would like to thank them for their perseverance, for the pleasant moments we have shared and for the encouragement they give us with their guidance, which helps to strengthen the administrative aspects of our Network.
These are hot times in the city of Medellín, Colombia with temperatures between 29° and 33° degrees Celsius most of the day; with no hopeful sign of a little rain to give some respite to the bountiful amount of little trees and plants that live in this city.
It was only a few days ago that, while walking through the university, I came across a water fountain that I had never noticed before. When I looked at it more closely I could see that someone had written on it the following sentence: "water will be gold in times of drought".
I couldn't help but be moved and shed a tear, remembering my beloved Cajamarca. Remembering our constant struggle for water, for life, for our people and for justice.
Almost twelve years have passed since the beginning of the series of mass demonstrations against the "Conga" project, which - as it is still "suspended" to this day - intends to destroy 238 hectares of wetlands and lagoons. These lagoons and wetlands not only provide water to thousands of families who live from agriculture and livestock farming in the Cajamarca páramo (wetland ecosystem) and, at the same time, feed the entire city of Cajamarca, but are also invaluable for the sustainability of the ecosystem of the area.
Almost twelve years have passed since, in those protests, I saw my ten-year-old self facing, for the first time in my life, walking through the Plaza de Armas of my birthplace, defending my ideas and those of my people, surrounded by armed police and military, ready to shoot anyone they considered a threat to the "progress and development" of the country.
Today I feel, once again, the streets of my people full of hats and flags, of cries for justice and freedom, of the clamour of the land itself, defending its life through our voices.
And it is no coincidence to hear so many saying "it's too hot", "the weather is not like it used to be", "years ago this weather was rainy weather". It is no coincidence, it is the loud and clear roar of the forests cut down and burned, of the fish left without rivers, of the mountains left without water, of the air that enters our lungs grey and polluted.
But today I also feel hope that it is not true that "only after the last tree is cut down, only after the last river has been poisoned, only after the last fish has been caught, only then will we realise that gold is inedible."
I wish it were sooner, I wish it were today....
Mara Mires Mocker
Alfredo Mires traveled the Apu Qayapuma for several decades, to the point where he knew by heart the location of each painting and the paths to reach them. He walked, went deep into the Apu and spent many nights to investigate in depth the relationship of each drawing with the environment, with the change of light and temperature. He spent entire days there, where our grandparents lived, to observe what happened during the time of rain and drought, because all that influences, he told us, nothing looks the same, everything changes according to the circumstances.
He investigated each space of the "Puma convenor", with the limitations of the Peruvian who dares on his own and whose budget, many times, is only his own spirit. And like this he went also to other places.
When he went to the communities, he would ask the community members who had made the paintings, the sanctuaries, the petroglyphs, the ceramics. The people answered him, he says, that Ñaupa had done all that. For that reason, he also tells that he decided to baptize with the name "Ñaupa", the recurrent character that he found in the callanas, those pieces of ceramics that are found in any sacred place of the Andes, and also in other representations of the Cajamarcan rock art. Based on these investigations, Alfredo completed and recreated El Ñaupa graphically, giving it a social, cultural and political meaning (El Ñaupa T1, p.8).
