“Why, sometimes I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.”
Waking up on our second morning in Cochabamba, and Sweden feels a
lifetime away. After arriving to La Paz and realising that all flights
to Cochabamba were full (maybe because of semana santa/Easter
celebrations), we took a 9 hr bus ride to our final destination. After
60 hrs of travelling, we reached La Tinkuna, the house belonging to our
partner organisation. At first, I was kind of a culture shock for us to
think that we would live here. We had to climb up concrete steps and
along a roof to get to our room, with solid beds and no pillows. The
toilet facilities were… let’s say basic. But, we were completely knocked
out and fell asleep within an hour.
After a good nights sleep however, this seems like the best place one
could imagine for writing our kind of thesis. We have a view of the
cordillera, mountains, outside our window. We have our own room, with
light, we have a basic kitchen, functioning toilets and a shower
(although none of us have tried it yet). After breakfast at the local
market, we had our first meeting with the Red Tinku Team.
Ramiro, our supervisor, started by asking us what we wanted to
investigate. Then, he and the others started explaining what the
situation is like today in Cochabamba regarding the water management.
The municipal authority SEMAPA basically covers the north side, which is
the rich part of town, and somewhat stretches towards the south, but
nowhere near sufficiently. Therefore, neighbours in the south have
gathered in small cooperatives and themselves financed wells, which they
built together and pay for monthly. But the quality of the water is
very poor, and therefore Darwin told us that in his community, they used
water from SEMAPA to drink and cook, but as it was not enough water,
they used salty water from a well to wash themselves, was clothes et
cetera. So it seems like the further south, the less SEMAPA water. Where
we live now, which is neither really south nor north, water is
available three days a week for a couple of hours in the morning, which
is when the tanks and tins are filled up. Then, what one can do is to
try to use as little as possible and hope that it will last. Now there
are ten people staying here, and I doubt that all of us could have a
shower every day…
According to our informants, since the water war* in 2000, people
have lost engagement and participation is dropping low in the
cooperatives. Oscar Olivera used to be the profile of the resisting
forces during the water war, but no one knows what he is up to now. La
Coordinadora de defensa del agua y la vida* has dissolved, and there is
no coordination of the initiatives to get water, no overall authority.
There is a dam construction ongoing, but Ramiro seemed not to believe
that it would be enough water for all. Much of the problem seemed to
stem from rapid urbanisation, where the city and especially the south
expanded faster than the municipal network could handle. The situation
is not recent however, the SEMAPA network have been complemented by
these local solutions for decades. When we asked about governmental
involvement, they told us about MiAgua, which seems to be a less
complicated way of getting water. We need to look more into that!
So much information, our heads felt like water melons! But wow, there
is so much interesting things to look into, and Ramiro is a great
supervisor who has many contacts we can make use of. This is gonna be
great!
*The Water War of Cochabamba – in 2000, the municipal water system
was privatised, which led to rising rates and cooperatively owned wells
was turned over to the trans-national company Aguas del Tunari. The
inhabitants of the city rioted, barricaded the city for several days and
fought against the police and military until Aguas del Tunari was
forced out of the country.
* La Coordinadora de defensa del agua y la vida – led by Oscar
Olivera, this was the overall organisation behind the water war who
fought for water to be a human right and not owned by foreign investors.
