19 November, 2014

patterns of water, patterns of air, patterns of earth

Juliaca city has populated since thousands of years ago, the main Apu (sacred hill) is Huaynarroque, a hill with two peaks that shows the unity in the duality. But there are another secondary apus and places with its own communities. Chacas lagoon has two towns: Kokan and Chacas. They are something similar to satellite towns but they’re more like part of a body of sacred hills and the lagoon that I guess has the status of a cocha (sacred lagoon). Apus and Cochas are like ancestors to us, in our mythology there is no creation but breeding so every community has to care its Apu and Cocha with specific rules.

The first signal that you are near a sacred place in Peru is to see an old catholic temple. To indoctrinate us priest built temples near Apus.

The door of the red star

But well, you know once one church and usually you already know the rest and my goal was to walk in the lagoon where I played when child. I followed the road…

The road

spirit of wayra

Chacas lagoon is at 3829 masl (approximately 12 000 feet) in a weather where usually there is just cold.

a yellow flower in the green field of the blue heaven

a road of sky crossing an earthy way

cover me

smallness

a road in earth, a road in the sky

Near the lagoon I met three kind persons attending the fields of papas. The lord of the fields asked me for some photographs. The Qashwa, a mythological warrior dance with a symbolism of fertility, was nearer so there was a kind spirit.

hard work

The lagoon

I drink to forget

The school used to hire a little bus, but I went walking and the lagoon seemed so far. But I get the shores. Although I took another road from a side I didn’t know, so the place was like go for first time again.