Lento Pero Seguro

(events from June 2011)

Typically when people from the town of Rivadavia ask me how work is going in La Misión, it's somewhat of a trick question. Since most of them have the preconception that the Wichí are, at best, unresponsive—at worst, lazy—the response they are expecting from me is one of frustration and impotence. Seeing as this was indeed my general attitude for at least part of almost every day on the job, tweaking the truth was a necessary but subtle art. My typical response was that work was slow, but that there were a significant number of people that were truly committed to the project. I never exactly specified how many people justified my use of the word “significant”, and, conveniently, they never asked. Unfortunately, the number wasn't actually that significant at all, but if the people in the town started doubting us, that would add to the already existing doubt of the community—and indeed the ADRA team itself—which would probably have made work nearly impossible. In order to get through such conversations and still feel like I was being at least mostly genuine, I adopted a local phrase to explain the situation: “lento pero seguro” (slowly but surely).

The truth is that I really did believe in that phrase, not just out of necessity but because of a heartfelt notion that something, or someone, would at some point serve as a trigger to “wake up” the community from its' dormancy with relation to our project, and indeed their development in general. It was just a matter of finding out what it was and/or when it would happen.

The outlook on Monday appeared to be about the same as the week prior. Few hands, lots of work. I was certainly frustrated, especially since Beatriz had left again, but despite the general lack of participation, the first phase of the work—clearing the outer limits of the future garden in order to measure them—was going relatively well. I was also getting much better with the machete and ax.

Then there was Tuesday. I'm not sure how it happened. I don't know what I said, or what I did, or if it was even because of me, but eight people came. Davíd had arrived earliest, and both Demetrio and Luís had brought along some youth, which I felt was a very positive sign. Interestingly, there were also two older women amongst the group: Otilia and her best friend Rosa, Demetrio's mother. I scrambled to hand out tools and decide where to start, trying to hide my surprise and delight. Everyone seemed to be enjoying the work, myself included, but I was also busy observing their social interactions, hoping to discover some clues as to how to maintain, or even surpass, the size of the group that had come that day. After about an hour of slashing at reeds and raking them into piles, I found that almost everyone was working alone, and not talking much either. Since the Cocina Comunidad project not only focuses on but depends upon community involvement and participation (hence comunidad), this seemed to be a disappointing fact. If people were willing to work, but not work together, the project would never move forward.

When it seemed like it was about time to go home for lunch, I told Demetrio I wanted him to get everyone together so we could talk. He said a few words in Wichí, but they all just kept working as if he hadn't said a thing. I was stunned. Was this their community leader? Surely they could not be so engaged in their work that they hadn't heard. Least responsive of all was his own mother, who kept diligently hacking away with Otilia. Eventually, after about five minutes, a sort-of-circle had formed and I told them about how happy I was that they had come and how important it was for their families and their community at large. I also announced that from tomorrow on I would be bringing a small breakfast for them, an incentive we hoped would at least retain existing participants, if not attract more as well. I gave Demetrio a chance to say a few words, but he declined.

Nobody else seemed to have anything to say, so I brought the “meeting” to a close and said I looked forward to seeing them tomorrow. To my surprise, Otilia and Rosa asked me if they could borrow the machetes to keep on working on into the afternoon. Although I hesitated to encourage such long hours—especially for women—I didn't want to discourage their passion for the work either, so I reluctantly said that it was OK...

At last we were seeing some of the results of all of our community outreach of the previous month, the first signs of interest and commitment to what we were proposing. I still knew that it would be an uphill battle, but at least now it seemed “winnable”. A small number of community members were willing to believe, at least on some level, that we were honest and serious about working together to achieve food security, from the ground up—literally.