meish dot org: life, unfolding

Back in the nineties, when the web was young…

…most web pages took over a minute to load
…the song of one’s home 14.4kbps modem was more familiar than any novelty ringtone (what’s one of those, then?)
…AOL was a groundbreaking kind of company
…chatrooms were still a non-sleazy novelty
…marquee and blink tags were in common usage
…a web-ring was a social navigational device, not a gang of kiddy-fiddlers
…many web sites had an entire page dedicated to links
…the use of nested tables to layout a website was cutting-edge
…Google, Blogger and Amazon were just a twinkle in the eyes of their founders
…Facebook, YouTube, MySpace and Twitter were just random meaningless utterings
…building a web page was something only total weirdos would do

…dear, (now) departed Geocities was a vibrant and bustling place for play and experimentation, consisting of “neighbourhoods” and suburbs with particular themes or personalities, named after real or imagined geographical locations - SouthBeach, TheTropics, EnchantedForest, Tokyo, MotorCity, PicketFence, Petsburgh, Athens.

And each of these was stuffed with hundreds of citizens, tending hundreds upon thousands of lovingly constructed pages, each brimming with animated gifs, eye-bleeding backgrounds and a never-ending stream of scrolling, blinking, neon, capitalised, centre-justified text and badly-compressed, rasterized photos.

Including me, for a short while.

At the time, one of the most common phrases on the internet was “this page is under construction” - a sort of excuse or explanation, I suppose, often accompanied by a representation or parody of the symbols usually associated with road-works or construction sites in the non-virtual world. Strips of black and yellow tape or triangular red, black and white icons of ‘Men At Work’.

But thinking about it, it was a strange statement to make. At the time, the entire Internet was itself under construction; being built and explored and defined and designed and conquered and claimed by users just like me. By definition, web pages could (and can) continue being constructed, built upon, refined and redesigned forever - there’s no end to the work: even now, a redesign is only ever a temporary thing and its unveiling tends to be just a brief resting status in between periods of intense redevelopment activity.

The point is, the Internet can’t ever be completed, at least in the traditional sense of the word. It’s a living work in progress. The constant ripple of activity keeps it being. When it stops evolving, it stops being relevant. That was the point of web pages versus print and then as now, the idea of publishing flat print-like pages without interactivity or hypertextuality or even contextuality and formatting to the web is quite daft.

The web is alive: as long as there is networking occurring - both social and electronic - the Internet will exist and be continuously re-invented, never quite the same from one second to the next.

Back in the nineties, I used the idea of being under construction as the central focus for my (now horribly outdated and quite shuddersomely facile) MA Thesis: Under Construction: (Re)Defining Culture and Community in Cyberspace.

Don’t read it though. You can garner more knowledge about internet culture and community from five minutes on Twitter these days - and if you do decide to plough through it, remember that in the nineties many, many people (including academics) didn’t know what the internet was, let alone a modem, which is why it’s so full of explanations and definitions of terms.

In fact, back in 1997 when I stated my intention to embark on research in this particular area, I was told by senior members of the Anthropology department that there was no such thing as culture and community in cyberspace, and that I should redirect my attentions to something proper instead.

WHO’S LAUGHING NOW, EH?

Ahem.

The phrase ‘Under Construction’ is interesting for Anthropologists and other social scientists, who sometimes theorise that that culture is itself a construction - made and reinforced by the actions of those who show up and participate. In my thesis, I explained that even perception is not a passive experience.

We are constantly constructing the world (through perception, etc.) as much as the world is constantly constructing (shaping, changing and influencing) us. The idea of a ‘passive media’ such as television takes on a new perspective when it is understood that the process of watching a soap-opera requires the brain to unconsciously perform startling feats of interpretation and imagination just to make sense - images - out of the millions of pixels and lines fired rapidly at the screen, not to mention understanding the plot.

Fascinated back then - and still - by the idea that just by showing up, we are causing the net to come into a new phase of being. Leaning forward makes that link even more tangible. That’s still true, of course. Perhaps moreso than ever?

As a sidenote, I was thinking the other day how long it had been since I used the acronym “IRL” or the expanded phrase “In Real Life.”

It used to be the thing we’d say when we meant “not on the internet”, and I’m glad that it has become gradually obsolete over the years, now that the internet is accepted as part of life.

The internet is real life: I am real, sat at my real computer, engaging with the screen and the world beyond that it unlocks, in real time, via my eyes, ears, keyboard, mouse, attention. Online and offline make much more sense, being descriptive of state rather than reality.

(Likewise, I’m glad that we don’t talk about “virtual communities” anymore - as if spending time with people interacting around common interests and deepening relationships over time was in any way less than real. Now we know it can be, and that gets proved and reproved every day.)

So anyway, today’s unplugging of the Geocities life-support made me think about how we shaped it, and it shaped us.

Geocities slowly became unloved, unused and eventually undermined by wave upon wave of new services which helped us to express ourselves; live out loud, on the screen; learn to create/tinker/experiment; play with our identities; find others; experience the thrill of seeing our words, our work in a public “space”.

But for all its faults, Geocities was, for many long-term residents of the web, the first place they called home(page). And because of that, we mourn its passing.

But its spirit lives on. The creative, tinkering itch still runs thunderous and irrepressible through us. Our web experiences - and we ourselves - are still under construction.

Last night I spoke at a NESTA event called Collaborate to Innovate, which was related to their new Connecting Innovation programme.

The other speaker was Sociologist Ron Burt from the University of Chicago, who gave a fascinating talk on his specialist subject (and the topic of his book), Structural Holes which posits both
a) that creativity is an import/export game (that is, creativity has got more to do with situation than individual) and
b) that people who exist in the intersection of social worlds (i.e. those with many structural holes in their networks) have a greater likelihood of having good ideas.

His theory is outlined in a great New York Times article from May 2004 - Where to Get a Good Idea: Steal It Outisde Your Group, the text of which has been handily republished by Danah Boyd here:

People with cohesive social networks, whether offices, cliques or industries, tend to think and act the same, he explains. In the long run, this homogeneity deadens creativity. As Mr Burt’s research has repeatedly shown, people who reach outside their social network not only are often the first to learn about new and useful information, but they are also able to see how different kinds of groups solve similar problems.

I can certainly see how this works in a business context, because looking beyond your own team, department, organisation or even industry can be a great source of creativity and inspiration. How often, after all, have we heard the same ideas (or the same group type of ideas) come from the same team? Breakthrough ideas tend to be ones which are surprising, or which take a different approach completely - Innovation company ?WhatIf! calls this technique “River Jumping”. Burt argues that that different approach can be greatly enhanced or developed by having a different social perspective, one which has been formed by a greater openness in one’s personal social network.

But for years I’ve felt that the same applies to the digital generation - and specifically, people with blogs or other online community ties. Now, I don’t want to make the assertion that all people with blogs are creative genii, but rather that some of the most creative, inspiring, switched on and engaging people I know are those who have been blogging for years. The key here is not their blogs - or the act of publishing or wibbling about one’s cat or breakfast for years - but instead the way they have been able to successfully and mostly effortlessly straddle and navigate several social contexts, while being able to learn, transfer and apply knowledge from one to another. And usually, the transfer has been from the real world to the professional context, and not the other way around. I’ve rarely heard about someone being a better blogger or photographer or IM chat buddy because they’re a product manager, but I hear the inverse with increasing, pleasing frequency.

Take me, for example: I’ve been working at the same company for eight and a half years, in a variety of roles. At the same time, I’ve been publishing a blog for nearly as long, and engaging in virtual/online communities for much longer. So right away, there have been two sides to my approach - two major inputs into my attitude, knowledge, reference points and behaviour. If you like, there have been two Megs - Meg-at-work and Meg-online. And they say that two Megs are better than one, right? ;)

I know that although the blog-Meg and the work-Meg have been kept very (intentionally) distinct for years, there’s no doubt that engaging passionately in this blog (and blogging and social online contexts in general) have made me more knowledgable about life, online, more interested in emerging technologies and more likely to play and experiment with ideas, technologies and features - like tagging, for example. And all that, in turn and quite coincidentally, has made me more valuable to the company I work for.

But let’s be clear about this - I haven’t been engaging in the online social world as part of an extended research project to benefit my company.

No.

I’ve been doing it because this is what I do. And I’m lucky that I’ve been able to define roles within work which allow me to share and apply knowledge and inklings and hypotheses. And I’m lucky that it’s been well-accepted from my colleagues, and that I’ve been in a position to influence thinking and activity about things that I’m passionate about.

Ron Burt says that “The easiest way to feel creative is to find people who are more ignorant than yourself,” and he’s right. It’s much easier to be dazzling when people around you don’t have the same cultural or social reference points.

Here’s a tip for the wise: pub quizzes in Fulham are full of people who work in the music industry, so the music round is always a clean sweep and thus not very interesting. Their shared specialist knowedge creates a level field, so the real competition has to take place in the other rounds, in which it tends to be a case of “who is the least ignorant”. However, the same people entering a different quiz would ace the music round and blow the competition off their barstools - and likewise, a sport, science, geography or literature specialist could probably clean up in the quiz nights of Fulham, if they really wanted.

This is something I’ve seen people I know with blogs be able to do again and again in their professional lives. They have been able to bring in unthought-of perspectives and bricolage skills and an open approach to social communication and experimentation which most of their colleagues can neither understand nor reproduce. Good. That’s the way our social internet revolution continues, moving offline and starting to influence real things, too. And once the rest of the organisation catches up and catches on, then those people - those digital natives, so comfortable on code-switching between their worlds - start to move on, to other challenges, new pub quizzes. It’s interesting to see it happen.

The last couple of years have been especially interesting and weird for me as the two sides of Meg-ness - personal and professional - have blended together, to the point that I’m now being introduced at events like the one last night with both my job title and my blog URL. It’s weird, but it’s good.

So a special hello to anyone who attended the NESTA event last night and has swung by this URL to see what’s going on. If you’re expecting a lot of posts about social media then you may (or may not) be disappointed.

This blog is a digital record of lots of things which occupy my brain - from travel to technology - which means it’s as multifacted and poly-topical as I tend to be, in life as online. It’s not “about” anything, in the same way that I’m not “about” anything: it is (and I am) a construction of lots of things and influences and ideas and cultural and social reference points, over time. It’s a work in progress, a virtual version of my head, a digital approximation of me. That’s why it’s me(ish).

Hello.

Don’t eat people,
Have you gone clean out of your mind?
I won’t eat people,
What’s the matter with the lad?
Don’t eat people,
He keeps on repeating,
Eating people is bad.

But people have always eaten people,
What else is there to eat?
If the Jou-Jou had meant us not to eat people,
He wouldn’t have made us of meat.

Flanders & Swann, The Reluctant Cannibal from At the Drop of a Hat

There’s been a lot of talk about cannibalism in the media the last couple of days, most of which can be explained by this German man, currently on trial accused of killing, dissecting and eating another man who allegedly volunteered to be killed and eaten by replying to an internet advert.

As you do.

I was interested to see that the accused had previously harboured fantasies about eating school friends. In an earlier version of the BBC story linked above (I wish they wouldn’t randomly change copy at the same URL like that - shame they didn’t change the mis-spelling of this name, though, while they were at it…) there was a tiny extra fragment of detail, which I can’t find anywhere else, unfortunately. A short paragraph explained that, inspired by horror films, Meiwes had wanted to eat his childhood friends in order to inherit some of their qualities.

All of which reminded me some research I did years ago, for my MA, about the cannibalism taboo, and how much of the cannibalism of popular cultural stereotype - the savage, the stranger in the pot - was actual and how much was either symbolic (body of Christ, anyone?), or part of the cultural othering process - if cannibalism is the strongest human taboo then those who are alleged to practice it are somehow less than human - wild, savage, uncultured. In other words, a product of the overactive colonial imagination, a metaphor for the savage.

And even if people actually did consume other human beings (out of cultural ritual rather than necessity - see Alive for the latter), then how much of it was ritual or magic cannibalism (where the participants aspire to absorb some of the spiritual essence or attribute of the deceased) rather than gastric cannibalism (in which human flesh is consumed for taste and/or food value)

Anyway, I had a hunt around and I managed to find one of the papers I wrote on it, specifically about the Tupinamba, who lived in the Atlantic coastal region of Southern Brazil. I’ll post it next here. It’s quite easy-going, really - not academic claptrap at all, even though it’s got all the bibliographical references intact, there isn’t a footnote in sight. It’s mostly an overview of historic accounts of Tupi anthropopaghy and an exploration of the cultural significance of the cannibal taboo.

There’s another paper somewhere about the cultural development of the cannibal taboo in the media, but I fear that one may have been lost forever, abandoned on a floppy disk somewhere at the bottom of a box after a housemove.
Read the rest of this entry »

This sample of interview subjects were selected from 29 individuals who participated in 41 interviews. Obviously, as mentioned previously, some interviews stand alone, and others form part of a series conducted with the same subject. All these interviews were conducted over a period of fourteen months in the deparments of La Paz and Cochabamba, Bolivia. Of these interviews, almost a quarter were recorded on magnetic tape, the remainder being scribed during or after the event. The following three subjects belong to the former group. I have chosen these three women as case studies since they seem to represent a fair cross-section of both the female Bolivian population and the subjects of my interviews, and because each has an interesting contribution to make. They were also selected because I know a little about their lives, and therefore can make better judgements on the objectiveness of their interviews. Furthermore, they come from three very different backgrounds and social settings, which lends depth and perspective to their accounts.

Mari-Luz is a cook in her late fifties, who lives in El Alto (near La Paz), and who is originally from a small town near Lake Titicaca. She moved to La Paz when she was in her early teens, and worked as an empleada for most of her life. She is married, with grown up children, and grandchildren. Her extended family all live in the same area of El Alto. She describes herself as being a ‘Catolica buena [a good Catholic]‘ (Source:Interview 1 1/2/96a), and regularly attends a Catholic church in El Alto with the rest of her family. However, she is also very proud and vocal about being Aymara, speaking Aymara at home, and to the kitchen staff, and wearing full Chola dress at all times.

Cecilia is a student of economics at the Universidad Mayor de San Andres. She works as a waitress at nights. She is in her early twenties, and is originally from La Paz. She lives with her parents and two adult brothers in Alto Sopocachi (a relatively nice area of La Paz). Her mother is a Chola, and has worked as an empleada (maid) and ninera (nanny) for the same family for many years. She is not married, and does not attend church regularly, although her brothers do (I am still unsure as to whether her parents belong to any particular church, as she did not like to discuss them).

Elena is the owner and manager of the family business - a second hand clothes shop in the busy and highly competitive district of similar shops next to La Cancha open-air market in Cochabamba. She is in her early forties, and is originally from Quillacollo, although her husband is from Oruro, and they have also lived there. She now lives with her husband and his mother on the outskirts of Cochabamba, by the lake. She has two children, both of whom are at University (in Oruro and Santa Cruz). She describes her family as being ‘ni ricos, ni pobres.. . tenemos suficiente, no mas [neither rich nor poor... we have enough, and that's all' (Source: Interview 2 9/4/96) She is Catholic, but (as far as I could tell) sceptical, although she attends church on a regular basis. However, all her children are baptised and have had their First Communions, and she observes all the Catholic holidays.

Case Study #1 - Mari-Luz

Mari-Luz, was instrumental in introducing me to a larger group of people (her friends, family and neighbours) after I met and first interviewed her on Martes de Ch'alla (also known as Ch'allaru (Quechua) or Ch'allaku (Aymara)) in February. I had been invited to attend a Ch'alla in a popular La Paz restaurant where she worked as the cook. She told me the order of proceedings on the day, and explained to me the importance of the ritual: 'Es vida, es costumbre [it is life, it is tradition]‘( Source: Inteview 1 1/2/96a) was a phrase she often used to explain the Ch’alla, which was an intensely frustrating response - as any Anthropologist will be aware. It was only after getting to know her better, and observing the importance of the ritual in her daily life, and the lives of those around her, that I was able to understand what she meant by that. She explained that on Martes de Ch’alla in La Paz, it is customary for people to gather in the places that are important to them. This could include your home, workplace or stall, workshop, your land or fields, or the instruments of your work (machinery, tools or vehicles). Then, each person present must be blessed with alcohol, sweet things and confetti placed on their heads. Then follows the most important part of the day. The area (or item) is blessed with alcohol, sweet and/or colourifil items (including handfbls of sugar and spices) bright colours and noise. It is important that each area is blessed properly - every corner of the kitchen including the cupboards and under the sink (this was, of course, an area of great importance for Mari-Luz, as it was her domain, and she ensured that we completed the blessing satisfactorily), all the knives and pans, etc.. In this area, as with the rest of the restaurant, it was necessary to ensure that each corner had been properly ‘covered’ as the corners are places where Pachamama likes to rest, and are easy to miss out. This is also a reason why, in another Andean ceremony, the corners of the foundation of a new house, or the area where a new house is to be built are very important, and are ritually blessed or “fed” with llama foetuses, food and alcohol. The toilets and corridors had been sprinkled with alcohol and sweets as well, and even the storeroom was blessed thoroughly. This, Mari-Luz explained, is because these are places which are easy to forget when considering the livelihood of the restaurant: if Pachamama sees that the toilets have not been blessed, she may bring sickness; if she sees that the storeroom has been ignored, she may become offended, and be angry with those who work there. It is therefore of great importance to remember to bless every corner. It is also of key importance to bless the area from the outside inwards This sentiment was echoed in a number of interviews, and the reason is because if the blessing is performed from inside-out, Pachamama may think you are trying to throw her out, whereas in starting off by sprinkling alcohol in the street, and then on the front step and door, and then moving inside, you are ushering her in, showing her the way.

After everybody present has received the blessing from an elder person in the group (in this case, Mari-Luz herself) of alcohol and sweet things and confetti, a ritual fire (mesa) is assembled, and burnt. This part of the Martes de Ch’alla proceedings will be explained fully within the context of the next interview. While the fire is burning, each person present is poured a drink (usually chicha, or, as in this case, beer) from which they perform their personal ch’alla action, of pouring a little onto the ground. Then everyone’s health is toasted with the drink, and coca leaves are passed around for chewing and offered to Pachamama by scattering on the ground. The group then sit chatting until the fire burns down, which can take a number of hours. This last event may seem to have no ritual significance, but I is, in fact, one of the keys to understanding the Ch’alla. By participating in ritual sociability (through the ritual of the Ch’alla itself), the community is strengthened.

Mari-Luz made a very interesting point when she said that the first thing to do when performing the rituals for Martes de Ch’alla, is to remember to pray to God. I was surprised, although I knew she was a practising Catholic, to hear that the Christian and Andean religions were mixed so freely in specific events, as well as in general day-to-day life. When I asked her about this, she answered simply ‘yo soy catolica, pero eso es costumbre de los abuelos [I am Catholic, but this is a tradition of my ancestors]‘ (Source: Interview I 1/2/96a). She went on to explain that we had to pray to God, to ask His forgiveness for making offerings to Pachamama, a native deity. Apparently, once we had done this, we were free to participate in the rituals, as we had been forgiven by God.

This idea of Christian versus Andean religion, and of forgiveness and offerings in both, is a concept which merits an entire dissertation, as it is extremely complex and needs a great deal of research, and more knowledge of the Catholic Church than I possess and therefore will not be discussed in detail within this dissertation, although it is important to note that this kind of religious syncretism - and hybridisation - is common in Bolivia.

The other interesting point that Mari-Luz was keen to emphasise was that the ch’alla and mesa ritual of Ch’alla Tuesday is a social activity - that is to say that it is inappropriate (and would seldom occur in Bolivia) to perform this ritual by yourself It is very important to have other people present, to help to ‘invita a la Pachamama a su sitio [invite Pachamama into the place]‘ (Source: Interview I I/2/96a), because if you do it alone, she may not feel welcomed. For this reason, it is common for many people to spend the day of Martes de Ch’alla travelling from place to place, in order to celebrate in other situations which are important to them, (e.g. home/work) or with other people close to them (e.g. friends/family/neighbours) On that one day, Mari-Luz expected to attend four celebrations; at her own home; at the restaurant; at her neighbour’s house; at her daughter’s house. This demonstrates the importance of the ch’alla as a community event, a point which will be discussed in a later section.*

* It may also be interesting to add that, since Martes de Ch’alla falls during Carnaval, before Lent, it is the same day as Shrove Tuesday. The restaurant in which Mari-Luz works is owned and run by an English man, and so the celebration was also for Pancake Day. This proved to be both interesting and valuable, as it enabled Mari-Luz and I to talk about the day’s events while I was showing her how to toss pancakes.

The Ch’alla is one of the most common rituals in Andean life. It can be seen in all parts of the Andean region where there is a significant settlement of Quechua or Aymara people, although it is most common in the central Andes (that is to say, the highlands of Peru and Bolivia).

Hans van den Berg gives the Spanish translation of the Aymara word Ch’alla in his Diccionario Religioso Aymara as ‘aspersion [sprinkling]‘ (van den Berg, 1985:48). He goes on to define the term thus:

En muchas oportunidades los aymaras realizan la ceremonia llamada ch’alla. Consiste en derramar un poco de alcohol que se va a tomar sobre el suelo en honor de Ia pachamama; o en asperjar alcohol sobre los implementos que se usa en los ritos o sobre un animal que se va a ser sacrificado. Tambien se realiza la ch’alla de las chacras por motivo de la siembra o en algun momento durante el periodo del crecimiento de las plantas, en el estreno de herramientas de trabajo, cuando se hacen los cimientos de una nueva casa y durante un viaje, cuando se pasa por una cumbre. (van den Berg, 1985:49)

This definition is echoed in many other ethnographies of the cultures of the Andean region. I aim to deal with the phenomenon of the ch’alla in the urban setting, rather than in the rural sphere, about which various works on ritual have already been published.

When in La Paz, Cochabamba, and other large cities in Bolivia, it is easy to see the extent to which the ch’alla is still practised. One need only sit in a bar for a matter of minutes before observing how, before drinking, those present almost absentmindedly tip their glass or bottle to let some liquid spill on the floor, or alternatively dip the tip of their index finger into the glass and then flick the liquid away to the floor. The action is occasionally accompanied by a mumbled prayer to Pachamama, which can be offered on behalf of the group, but this is fairly rare in an informal urban setting, unless the ritual is taking place as part of a larger ‘mesa ritual’.

The word ch’alla has also been ‘hispanized’ to turn it into a verb challar which is used in Bolivia to denote the action of performing ch’alla, and also on occasion, meaning ‘to bless’ (although this usage is used only in relation to Pachamama, and never with reference to the Christian religion).

This simple gesture is the basic element common to all ch’alla rituals; whether performed on a grand scale, or in a home, or indeed, in a bar. The practise is so common and natural for so many urban (or urbanised) Bolivians that many people do not realise that they are performing the action. The arguments for whether rituals are conscious or unconscious actions will follow in a later section. But whether personal or public, innate or learnt, sober or drunk, it is certainly predominently true to say that “Pachamama, Mother Earth, is always toasted before any Andean drinks a beverage” (Bastien, 1978:197).

The pouring of libations (that is, a drink offering to a god) is not an activity which is unique to the Andes. In fact, this ritual activity can be found in most parts of the world, and in diverse religions. There are interesting descriptions of the pouring of libations in other cultures to be found in works by Turner (about the Ndmebu of Zambia) and J. Omosade Awolalu (about the Yoruba of Nigeria).

The other phenomenon to be discussed in this dissertation, is one which is closely linked to that of the ch’alla, in the sense that it is also a ritual performed in honour of Pachamama, and that it is also to ask for her blessing over a person, situation, house or object. The main difference between the mesa ritual (also written as MISA by Hans van den Berg (1985:123)) and the ch’alla is that the mesa ritual is performed only on special occasions (although the action of performing a mesa ritual makes the occasion sacred), and involves some degree of planning and preparation, while the ch’alla, as has already been demonstrated, is a much more spontaneous and less complex activity overall.

In order to avoid any confusion between the Misa Catolica and the Andean Misa to Pachamama, the word Mesa will subsequently be used to signify the offering to be described below, except in quotations, in which case the word should already be in context, and the meaning therefore clear. This confusion is often made, as pointed out by Gabriel Martinez, when he notes that:

“el termino ‘misa’ [es] una de las pronunciaciones alternativas quechuas y aymaras, para la palabra castellana ‘mesa’ como se sabe, aquellas dos lenguas no diferencian fonologicamente nuestras vocales lel e lil y las pronuncian indistintamente, en este realizacion, de un u otra manera” (Martinez, 1987:11)

It should be mentioned that the merging which is occurring in this situation is conceptual as well as linguistic.

The Mesa is a complex offering, made up of many different ingredients and serving many different hinctions. In a subsequent chapter, the ritual of the mesa will be described in full, but at this point it is important to understand how it differs from the ch’alla ritual. Van den Berg defines the Mesa well:

MISA ‘ofrenda’.
Misa es la palabra mas comun para la ofrenda compleja, es decir para la ofrenda con varios o muchos ingredientes. Es una hoja de papel, sobre Ia cual se colocan, segun la intencion de la ofrenda, una cierta cantidad de elementos vegetales, animales, minerales, alimenticios y diversos. Estos ingredientes constituyen dones olfatorios, alimenticios o especiales para los seres sobrenaturales y simbolizan un determinado deseo (proteccion, suerte, amor, maleficio, etc.). Hay ofrendas benevolas y ofrendas malevolas; es decir, ofrendas que tienen la intencion de conseguir un bien o de hacer mal. De la gran variedad de ofrendas podemos enumerar las siguientes: alta misa, apustal misa, chiwchi misa, ch’iara misa, insinshu misa, janq’u misa, kuti misa, llampu misa, muxsa misa, nanqha misa, salud miss, samina misa. (van den Berg, 1985:123)

Each of the different mesas that he offers as examples have a different function (as can be seen by some of the names: e.g. salud mesa - for health), and different ingredients. All of these mesas can be bought ready-made from stalls in the markets of Bolivia, although many of the women who sell them say they prefer to make them up for each person individually. It is also possible to buy each ingredient separately, and this is common practice for those making a complex or large offering.

As should now be clear, the ch’alla and the mesa are radically different rituals; one complex, the other simple; one relatively pre-planned and organised, the other much more spontaneous. But it is important at this point to realise that the ch’alla itself makes up an important part of the mesa ritual. The problem here is with terminology used by informants. In my experiences performing research in Bolivia, I found that the word ch’alla can be used to mean a number of things:

1. the sprinkling of alcohol on the ground as an offering to pachamama (’challar’)
2. the liquid that is poured on the ground in this action (’hacer una ch’alla’)
3. the blessing from pachamama whose petition accompanies the action (’pedir Ia ch’alla’)
4. the gathering of people to ‘bless’ something new (house, car etc.) which will involve the action of (i) (’Hay una ch’alla en la casa suya hoy dia’)
5. an alternative name for the action of burning the mesa ritual, and all the surrounding rituals (’durante la ch’alla, masticaremos la coca’)
   

As can be seen, the problems inherent in the terminology used by Bolivians mean that the true symbolism or meaning of what is happening in a situation involving ch’alla or a mesa ritual can easily become confused by those not used to the cultural context, if all the participants are not agreed on the meaning of the words concerned. However, it is hoped that this text will remain sufficiently clear, with added explanation and annotation of meaning when necessary.

As already noted, the ch’alla is performed in a number of situation, both formal and informal, although the mesa ritual is generally reserved for more important occasions. These occasions can include the ‘dedication’ of a new house, or vehicle, a special day in the year eg. Martes de Ch’alla which falls on the same day as Shrove Tuesday in the Christian religion; or the third day of the festival of Todos Santos) or when an individual wishes to seek a blessing for themselves (for suerte, trabajo or amor) or on behalf of someone else (familia, novia, amiga).

The petitioner can choose to buy the mesa themselves from the market, after consulting with the woman who sells the ingredients as to which are the most appropriate chiwchi or misterios (important ingredients to be explained fully later) to include in the offering. Alternatively, it is quite usual for the stall-holder to choose the misterios or chiwchi on the behalf of the petitioner, after looking at them for a moment or two (’reading’ them). In this case, the petitioner will not know which items have been chosen, and these are ceremonially ‘read’ by the participants of the ritual before the mesa is burnt. It is said that the fortune of the participants can be found in the meaning of the misterios.

A mesa ritual (ie the actual offering made up of various ingredients and presented on a piece of white paper) can cost between five and five hundred Bolivianos (US$1- $100), depending on the complexity and content of the ingredients, as well as the prestige of the woman (witch) who made it. The average mesa costs around seven Bolivianos, and the coca leaves, cigarettes and alcohol also necessary for the ritual are then purchased seperately.

This cost is not seen to be unreasonable, considering that the mesa ritual is only performed occasionally (on average, once every three months). Having said this, it is interesting to note that stall-holders and shop-owners in the La Cancha market area of Cochabamba chose to perform the ritual on the first Friday of every month (providing that this does not coincide with a Christian festival, eg Good Friday), as well as at other important events which occur during the year. This adds considerably to their costs, especially when the fact that the ritual is an eminently social occasion, and therefore requires the purchase of more alcohol (usually alcohol puro for the ritual, and beer and chicha for the participants).

Welcome students of the university of Manitoba, who appear to be studying this site as part of some coursework. Why do I feel like I’m in a petri dish?

That reminds me. Yesterday, on a mailing list, someone mentioned that the GBlogs portal had shut up shop. In the course of his question he said, “Does this signal the end of the ‘community’ project?”

As an academic, supposedly researching blogging and bloggers in the UK for the last two years, I was disappointed to realise that the author had failed to grasp even the simplest concept - it wasn’t a project. It was a way of making it simpler to contact and identify each other. The community - all the conversations, the portals and the gizmos grew organically from the community - not the other way around.

In 2000, the mailing list started because a blogger from the Netherlands was coming over during the summer, and a few personal publishers wanted to organise a drinks thing to meet her. Rather than firing mails all over the shop, thirteen people set up a mailing list, and then met up in a dingy pub in King’s Cross in June. From there, it grew.

The portal was created around the community, rather than the other way around. At no point did anyone sit down and decide to create a community. The community was already there.

Plus the addition of inverted commas to that question makes the whole ‘community’ seem to be a subject of doubt or disdain. Now, I’ll admit that I’m not the fan of jolly blogmeets that I once was (too big now, too hard to organise, too many egos and attitudes in the room at once), but there was definitely a community there at some point, though not a pet project, and not an engineered one. Spontaneous.

When people do something they enjoy (like, say, blogging) which is fundamentally an individual pursuit, when they eventually decide to get together and meet up, that’s community. If I wanted to start up a standing-on-one-leg-in-the-rain community, would you join? Not unless you were already interested in standing on one leg…