Note to Bolivia

I feel so lucky.  What a time to be living in Cochabamba, Bolivia!  This past week Cochabamba came jam-packed with activities that made me feel alive.

The Water War

Ten years ago Cochabamba took to the streets and fought for their water, literally.  The Guerra del Agua (Water War) was a David and Goliath-style battle where an American company attempted to privatise the water in Cochabamba, doubling prices along the way.  Enter the people of Cochabamba.  And two weeks later the Americans were gone.  The Guerra del Agua is one of those triumphant examples pulled out in first year papers in numerous faculties in universities around the world.  We were here for the ten-year anniversary celebrations.

The water is ours

Ten years on there are still tons of problems with water in Cochabamba.  Of course it’s not drinkable but also many people and communities aren’t connected to the main water company and therefore rely on their community to organise pipes or distribution by trucks, wells, gravity, buckets or other.

It got me thinking about water.  Something we don’t really need to think about too much in NZ because as a friend pointed out the other day, we have an envious supply of fresh water.   People in Bolivia aren’t so lucky.  Here in Bolivia there are already climate change refugees:  people that have had to leave their homes because of the effects of climate change, because there is no longer any water where they and their ancestors have always lived and prospered.  Juxtaposed to these thoughts was this social marketing campaign from the States about our obsession with bottled water and the waste it causes.  The irony hurts.

Ugly Plastic Habit

Ugly Plastic Habit

The World People’s Conference on Climate Change and the rights of Mother Earth

After the failed UN Climate Change conference in Copenhagen, the President of Bolivia Evo Morales called an alternative conference.  He wanted it to be a people’s conference; specifically for the people who were excluded from the UN process, the people who will be most affected by climate change.  He called it in Cochabamba and we were here for it.

I don’t care to enter the politics around Evo, Bolivia’s first indigenous president.  He manages to do and say things that are inspiring, odd and contradictory…all at the same time.  And for me, he got 65% of the vote so there is nothing more to say.

Being at the inauguration was an incredible feeling.  It was actually one of those moments where I had to pinch myself.  I really am here in Cochabamba right now with a whole bunch of inspiring people, how did I get this lucky?  As a good Kiwi will always say, AWESOME!

In Evo’s speech at the inauguration he told everyone not to drink Coca-Cola because it’s good for cleaning toilets, he told people to wear ponchos not plastic raincoats and to eat from clay plates not disposable ones.  As he said, it is the small things that count, go Evo!  But then he said not to eat chicken…because the hormones are causing men to be gay or bald! That’s Evo!

That's Evo!

But I don’t mind, he still called this conference and brought a lot of people together to discuss this vast human rights issue.  As Naomi Klein said at a session on Wednesday, it’s not an environmental issue anymore, it is now the biggest human rights issue the world has seen.  It’s about inequality.  The fact is that the developed world has caused climate change but those that will be most affected (and are already affected) by climate change are the poor.  Be that simply because of where some developing countries are geographically located (clear in the case of Africa, the Pacific Islands and South America) or the fact that poor countries will have to try to develop in a world that will be less conducive to development (enforced emissions reductions, harsher living and growing conditions, an inability to afford new technologies).

Buying a cup of coffee in a disposable cup (as I used to do many mornings in NZ) has no consequences;  it doesn’t appear to be hurting anyone.  Perhaps that’s because it won’t hurt me or anyone in New Zealand for a long time.  For me in New Zealand climate change was this ‘thing’ in the future, I was unable to see or understand the consequences, but here it is already hurting people and changing the way they must live their lives.

Surely from here it is just a marketing exercise.  Sell the right idea to the world?  But how do you make people care that their actions (and inactions) are sinking islands, melting glaciers, drying up Africa and creating waterless regions Bolivia?

After a week of activities, parties, concerts and discussions I was ready for a rest, but just in case Cochabamba hadn’t impressed me enough this week, there was a random parade in our normally quiet area and street.  Man I’m lucky to be here!

NB. Maybe this is a rant but I don’t mind.