A man reading the Chipaya New Testament at its launch in Oruro, Bolivia, on July 23, 2005. Photo: UBS/Tito Lahaye (BOL05DJ-3.JPG)

By Dr Bill Mitchell, UBS Americas Area Translation Coordinator

BOLIVIA — It was an unforgettable experience. I arrived in Bolivia at dawn on an overnight flight from Miami to La Paz. It was very cold and overnight there had been snow. The airport is actually in El Alto, a city of about a million people which sits on the high Andean plain immediately west of La Paz.

In May, a month or so earlier, El Alto and La Paz had been the scenes of demonstrations and roadblocks. Mounted in protest over the government’s handling of energy resources, they precipitated events that brought most of the country to a halt. A calm has now descended while people await the presidential elections due in December.

Set off

At La Paz airport I was met by Pastor Carlos Huaynoca, the Bolivian Bible Society’s northern distribution director. After a visit to the local Bible Society office, a meeting with the translation team working on the North Quechua New Testament and a visit to the Bible Society’s bookshop in El Alto, we set off.

Our first stop was Oruro, four hours away and 3,702m (12,150 feet) above sea level in the bleak Altiplano region. On arrival we had a supper of sillpancho, a dish of wafer-thin slices of beef. Since we were due to make a start at 4.00 a.m. the following morning, the next thing to do was to get some sleep.

Winds of change for the Chipayas In contrast with the humid lowlands, Bolivia’s Chipaya territory, on the altiplano 4,000 metres (12,000 ft) above sea level, has a cold, dry climate. It also has hurricane-force winds blowing in from the Andes. The territory covers the land surrounding the salt lake known as Salar de Coipasa. Each year in the rainy season, the snow melts high in the Andes, swelling the River Lauca, and the Salar de Coipasa, which is no more than a salt flat in the dry season, rises and floods the surrounding area, causing damage on a serious scale. In the same way that the old bumpy road from Oruro to the Chilean border is to be replaced by a proper highway, the Chipayas would like to build a dyke alongside the River Lauca to prevent the flooding. Even this forgotten corner of Bolivia is not beyond the reach of modern development. Some aspects of it, like the flood prevention scheme, are much to be desired, while the full impact of the new highway, running just an hour’s drive from the Chipaya territory, has yet to be determined.

Music and embraces

It was 3.15 a.m. when the telephone rang. The bus had arrived carrying colleagues and board members from the Bible Society’s main office in Cochabamba, plus a young people’s drama group who were to provide children’s entertainment. They waited for us to get ready so that we could continue the journey together. We duly left at 4.00 a.m.

For the first 20 kms (12.5 miles) the road was asphalted but for the rest of the journey west it turned dusty and bumpy. This is also currently the road to Chile; a new highway under construction along the same route is due to open some time next year.
Reaching Huachacalla, 50 km (31 miles) from the Bolivia-Chile border, at 7.00 a.m., we stopped to have breakfast: api, a runny maize porridge, and buñuelos, puffy fritters the size of a dinner plate and half-an-inch thick, served with syrup. Huachacalla was also where we turned off to Chipaya.

At 11.00 a.m. we reached our destination. A welcome party was waiting for us with music and embraces. We made our way to the school sports ground where the ceremony was due to take place. Before the presentation of the New Testament there was a colourful procession. There was music and joy set a mood which neither the cold, the wind, dust, sand – nor even a touch of snow! – could stifle.

Greetings and thanks

And at last, the thing that had drawn us to this remote region arrived: the New Testament in Chipaya. The ceremony itself had a touch of everything: church choirs… music groups… lots of greetings… lots of thanks.

Children wrapped up against the cold at the launch of the Chipaya New Testament in Oruro, Bolivia, on July 23, 2005. Photo: UBS/Tito Lahaye (BOL05DJ-7.JPG)

It should be said that the entire cost of the translation, including the cost of production, was met by offerings and donations, about half of which came from Bolivia itself. And something else that fills the people with pride is that the translation, typesetting and printing of the New Testament were all done in Bolivia.

While preparing the New Testament translation, the Bible Society has not overlooked the important matter of literacy, and Chipaya reading primers for children were distributed at the New Testament launch.

The language of the Chipayas The Chipaya people belong to the Uru-Chipaya culture, which dates back to about 2,500 BC and is reckoned to be one of the oldest civilisations in America. The Chipaya language comes from Urukilla which predates both Quechua and Aymara. The people themselves display a very different demographic pattern from West Europe and North America: there are some 2,000 Chipayas living in Bolivia and it is thought that there are as many again in Chile where men who commute across the border work in the cities along the coast. Of those in Bolivia some 600 are children attending primary and secondary school. At the moment, all Chipaya children speak their mother tongue until they go to school. Bolivian law requires that they be taught in their first language for the first three years of primary school, before being introduced to Spanish in year four. But lack of suitable resources and inadequate training of teachers make this difficult in some places – hence the importance of literacy materials in Chipaya.

When the New Testament was presented to the mayor of the community, he held it in his hands and told a story. In the story he described how many social and political groups, among others, had raised funds or run political campaigns based on stories of the plight of this people, the Chipayas.

But when the staff of the Bolivian Bible Society arrived, he said, they did some research, they spoke to the Chipaya people, they set the terms of a project and then they got to work. Now the Chipayas had the New Testament in their own language.

“And so,” he said, “the Bible Society has kept its word!”

The story does not end there, of course. The Chipayas are asking for a translation of the Old Testament – a heavy responsibility for the Bolivian Bible Society if we remember the words of Oruro’s mayor: “We trust in the Bolivian Bible Society to keep its word.” [3 photos] (WR 397/1 - 11.05) This report relates to project BOL013.