Putis, 26 Year Later

In December of 1984 a military detachment or ejercito entered the high Andean pueblo of Putis. The military unit came under the guise that they were going to work with the villagers of Putis to contruct a ¨piscigranja¨or fish (trout) breeding pool as an act of conciliation and development. The military was actully there becasue they suspected some of the villagers to be involved with the revolutionary movement Sendero Luminoso or the Shining Path. On a hillside near the local school the military and the locals set to work digging a shallow (about a foot and half deep) squared off hole. When the locals had reached the desired depth, the military detachment opened fire on the men, women, and children of Putis who had innocently worked to dig the poso or well for the pool. They (123 people) lay dead in the shallow pool (to become grave) they had dug themselves. The soldiers had removed the ¨simpatica¨(beautiful) women to a nearby building and violated them before they to were killed. The military then filled in the poso to cover the act and the evidence.

In anti-terrorism maneuvers all over the Andean Mountains the military acted in this way. Dec of 1984 was a busy month for them. The military was unsure of who was SL or Sendero Luminoso or not (because the SL did not wear uniforms) so they wiped out whole villages of people, just to be sure and with out fact, only hearsay and suspicion. Suscpicion which they typically communicated in castellano (spanish) to people who only spoke Quechua. Two of every three people killed were Quechua speaking.

For 25 years the bodies lay beneath the soil in Putis, and the story of what happened in Putis in December of 1984 was silenced. There were witnesses, but they lived in fear of military and government retalliation so the facts of that day were buried just like a majority of the population of this Andean pueblo. About two years ago they testified under anonymity as part of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, and in 2009 government forensic scientists (like CSI Peru), Paz Y Esperanza lawyers, development specialists, and mental health professionals traveled to Putis and began the arduous task of accompanying those who were left in Putis in the exhummation process. Upon arrival the forensic specialists realized that remains were protruding up from beneath the earth. They unearthed 92 bodies even though there were said to have been 123 victims.

Putis is one of the most prolific and at the same time most devestating examples of the tragic ¨dirty war¨used by the Republic to combat the counter insurgency the Sendero Luminoso had created to unite the campesinoes and destory the Republic of Peru. Abimel Guzman (a Ayacuchano univ professor of philosophy) or "President Gonzolo" as his followers called him sought to replace with a revolutionary socialist- Maoist-communist regime bent on turning Peru upside down (destroying the form of government and replacing it with their own. The SL was not just interested in bringing Peru to its knees like other revolutionary movements (i.e. - MRTA).

The Sendero Luminoso sought to combat the violence of poverty and lack of access gripping the Andean countryside with a unifying revolution by taking out government leaders one by one. When a majority of the local people refused to cooperate or follow the revolution the Path turned violent, and the consequence for being uncooperative was typically death usually involving a public display of torture to threaten others. When the military entered the armed conflict it became a wave of threefold violence. I have learned that combating violence with violence doesn´t seem to be effective, especially for the innocent people involved or the bystanders who seem to become collateral damage. Here in Peru, and from my experience in Guatemala the citizenry were no longer people, but objects to be dealt with along the way. Objects that were dispensable. In violence and war human rights seem to be the first thing that goes out the window or suffers. Peru, is only an example with Putis as a shining star.

After the exhummations, the Paz Y Esperanza team worked to secure recognition of what happened in Dec. 1984 with a ¨Dignified Internment.¨ They held three separate public funerals in which the 92 conffins traveled the department of Ayacucho to the Plaza de Armas in Ayacucho Proper, the Parque Central of Huanta, and then onto Rodeo (the population center of Putis) where a cemetery was constructed to interr the bodies, appropriately this time.

Putis was and still remains an agricultural area of subsitance farmers (potatoes, sheep, and cattle) lacking electricity and potable water, but it is not lacking in a lively, colorful, and spiritual people who long for basic necessities (like water, a health clinic, and electricity), but also seek to maintain the foundations of their intriguing Andean way of life. Today approximately 6 or so families still remain in Putis. More have moved away and others have settled up the road (about 30 miunutes) in Rodeo, Putis.

On Sunday December 12, 2010 Felimon, Omar, Roxanna, and I traveled the long, winding, dirt, and sometimes ¨harry¨road (or path) to Putis in the ever trusty gray 4x4 toyota truck. We went through Huanta, then two and a half hours more to Santillana through rock formations that would blow your mind and scenic valley that take your breath away. We were literally driving in

the clouds at some points.

Then another hour and half to Putis with no rest areas along the way, only mother nature. On Sunday afternoon we hosted games with the children of Putis and Rodeo, as well as a chocolatada or festivus of hot chocolate made with clove, cream, and cinnamon, and panteton (fruit bread). It is a traditional Peruvian Christmas celebration. We broke bread and drank from a common cup, literally as the styrofoam hot/cold cups began to run out. Felimon makes the perfect clown, it seems natural. We wore clown noses and hats to make game time extra special. They call games here dynamicas. The kids (big and small), as well as Omar, Roxanna, Felimon, and I had a great time. It was extremely cold for us and the kids. After the games and before the chocolatada we got soaking wet by a freak shower that came up. Cold + Wet = not fun on the one andd half hour trip back to Santillana. Each time my traveling companions laughed and sneered at me for bringing a bag on an overnight trip I gently reminided them of who was wearing dry clothes and who was shivering, hmmm?

I did catch onto a bit of tension when we drove through Rodeo Sunday and stopped to chat and then onto Putis, proper where we met Fidel the President and the mayor of the region. Felimon wanted us to see the poso and former burial site, and to meet some of the people that we would meet again the next day (Monday) at some of the remeberances. Fidel was welcoming and jovial, as was the regional mayor, but that regional mayor was on a mission and had some things to say. That is where I noticed the tension. He wanted to know why ALL of the activities were not taking place right here in Putis. "This is where it happened!" he said. "This is where it happened, but the graves are up there? You are playing games and having a chocolatada with the kids up there (he pointed). What about our kids, the ones here? They are out there in the fields with their parents tending animals and cultivating potatoes. It is their life. They do not know there is paneton and chocolate here. What about them?" He was clearly upset, and Felimon made space for him to air his grievences. Obviously there was some miscomunication or someone missed some of the phonecalls and messages. Unfortunately Felimon did not really offer much in terms of a respsonse except that any of the kids and parents who were here and wanted to go "up there" to Rodeo were welcome to get in the back of the truck and ride with us, and we would bring them home afterward. That was somewhat appeasing as the youth and several kids gladly piled into the back of the truck. I was not a part of the planning of these two days of remembrances so I am not sure who dropped the ball or was allowing personal feelings to get in the way. I do know that over the course of two days we met 3 to maybe 5 mayors and presidents from Rodeo, Putis, and Huanta. All men of course. That seems to me to be a whole lot of leadership for a very small place. I think it might help them to sit down with each other when it comes to events like this if they didn't already. The tension is still there though and I have a feeling it will come up again.

On Monday, a caravan of political leaders and the rest of the Paz y Esperanza folks came to Putis. A team from Apollyo de Paz also came. Martin from Germany lead their delegation. Father Chamberlain, a Catholic priest from Lima (a gringo) who had accompanied the people of Putis during the exhumation process also came, and offered prayers at the poso site as well as at the cemetery. That is what Monday was. It was two brief services of rememberance, and a reminder that justice for those now interred at Rodeo's new cemetery had not yet been served.

Before we went to Putis my host family said here take some bread becasue there is nothing to eat in Putis. Felimon said the same thing as we ate breakfast and lunch within ten minutes of each other in Santillana. Strikingly enough, on Monday I felt like all I did was eat when we got to Putis. I was offered Mondongo (a local Andean pork skin soup with beans and corn like hominy)twice, and after that a big bowl of roasted sheep ribs and potatoes that were prepared in a panchamanca. The eating thing has now become a running joke with Felimon and I.

I can tell that alot of delicate work has been done over the past several years in Putis, but also that alot more community awareness and building needs to take place. The question is who will do that? Political leaders, doubt it. The church...I think the Christians in Putis are a majority Catholic. Paz y Esperanza or other NGO's who work in the area, who knows. It is a region that continues to cry out for justice, access, and healing...26 years later.