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Leaving the Shadows: Peru Seeks a Sense of National Unity
| Article
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17465 |
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Section : |
CULTURE
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| Issue
Date : |
3 / 1998 |
2,322 Words |
| Author
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Ben Barber
Ben Barber is the State Department correspondent for the
Washington Times. |
Leaving the shadows, we enter a huge square. Sharp, staccato drumming and the slightly off-key blaring of brass instruments fill the air. I have stumbled into the strange mixture of pagan Inca ritual and Spanish Christian festival known as Corpus Christi. Milling crowds await the ecstatic moment when--from the darkness behind the massive wood and iron doors of the cathedral--the first of the huge wooden statues of saints and the Virgin will be brought forth. Borne along by dozens of sturdy villagers, the icons will be carried around to the crowd's noisy cheers and the lively cacophony of the bands that will march behind.
For several days this festival in Cuzco, Peru, has been drawing steadily larger crowds. The people come from villages high in the surrounding mountains and from cities as far away as Lima. Corpus Christi is a perfect expression of the two cultures that define Peruvian society. On the one hand are the Quechua-speaking Indians. Renowned for their colorful, handwoven clothing, they are primarily poor farmers. Increasingly, to escape their rural poverty, many are moving from the mountains to the sprawling urban shantytowns.
The other group are ethnically Spanish, descendants or successors of those who--led by Francisco Pizarro--came as colonial masters in 1532. They remain the economic masters of the country. On this Corpus Christi day, the ninth Thursday after Easter, I have a chance to clearly observe interaction between the two cultural spheres that make up this nation of twenty-six million people.
Easygoing revelry
The festival is
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