"El Receloso, El Extranjero" The Distrustful, the Outsider

Today in my Aymara class, I learned a very interesting word: kharisiri which roughly translates from Spanish to "the one who cuts the throat of an animal or person."

My question which instigated the presentation of this term and the subsequent myth was "how are foreign investigators seen by rural Aymara communities?"

Well...

There is a myth that explains how outsiders (or more appropriately, white people) are considered kharisiri...those who that cut out the cebo o grasa (fat) of the local people. According to the legend, if a local sees an white outsider who has no connection, no reason for being in the community it is likely that they have come to take the cebo, or some kind of the person's essence. If this is to happen, the individual can become very sick and die. When this happens and the local witnesses a strange presence they do not completely understand or even remember happening. Sometimes the outsider appears and suddenly transforms into an animal (dog, donkey, bird). Often the experience occurs, as if in a dream, and the local awakes abruptly in another location feeling disoriented and troubled.

Once the local starts becoming sick, the symptoms are presented with intensive sweating, fever, headache, indigestion, etc. Normally, the local has forgotten what caused the event to occur and they turn to the community's curado (relative to what we in the U.S. would understand as a witch doctor). The curado uses guinea pig or coca leaves to understand why the person is suffering.

The rural communities are certain that sick individual will not be saved in hospitals because the doctors do not understand how to cure this illness. Generally, the cure to the illness imposed by the kharisiri foreigner is to help the sick person gain weight. They are fed black lamb and different types of herbal teas.

My Aymara tutor explained that the myth came primarily from the suspicion of priests and other missionaries who would come into the communities to convert the populace to Christianity. He mentioned that if I am to work within the community, I must to so through trusted contacts. For sure, he noted, I will not be able to tape record my focus group discussions. It is also highly unlikely I will be able to take pictures of the local participants.

As I listened, I sat rather awestruck by the implications of the myth. Now, I am extremely glad that I chose to take the slower, more prudent route of putting my foot in the door here in the city of Puno. Through the next months the challenge will be to develop these trusted contacts that extend into the rural communities.