things

Saturday June 27

Today, Saturday has been an interesting day as I look back on it with a cat that is inchando on my lap demanding attention; it helps me processes it, and I think, “what really is important?” I realize the simple things of life, those things that don’t seem so complex: what makes you feel comfortable, safe, happy, these things in your personal context, your family, your region, the world. Today I was in the middle of a battle of sorts for those comforts, and as I sit here with this cat on my lap that insists that my hands do not need to be utilized to type these particulars for you, but actually should be used to scratch her ears, I think what if we could be all happy with scratched ears, but at the same time maybe scratched ears is really quite a big deal to this cat. But what do you care about cats and their ears since you really want to know about my day since that is why you looked up this blog. Several months ago I presented a project to the local municipality (this has become normal writing projects and presenting them). The music school has been in existence now some 5 years and it is high time that the municipality help out with a little bit of funding to this point the school has functioned on donations from kind business folks, company’s and grants like the one that I mentioned en a blog post several weeks ago. In the varies meetings that I had with the mayor and his number two (they call it the “major official” here) they assured me that they wanted all the best for the music school out in Santiago (this is the municipality of Robore I’m talking about, the county seat if you will, that manages all the money; Santiago, as a town, manages no budget and has no money at all, only receives money for “projects” and “works” from the higher up municipality to get things done, so if they want a street light put in on the corner they have to got to the local mayors office in Robore with a written up project with a nice letter that has all the stamps from the neighborhood representatives, the mayor of Santiago and then wait till it gets approved by the mayor of Robore) I’m figuring out how this works. Same process goes for a music school. Although I had the idea of presenting a project like the ones in the similar music schools around in the area (albeit that some are a little larger), each other orchestra in Santa Cruz receives a set budget from the municipality to function on during the year, they have to present a new one every year but they have their own, San jose has $30,000 a year to work with (big municipality decent size orchestra, but no choir. San Ignacio has $25,000 a year to work with (another big municipality with nice big program). Concepcion has $10,000 a year closer to the size of Robore but rather small orchestra (but three music teachers). And then there comes Santiago with a annual budget of $0 guaranteed, we have just presented random projects and letters asking for money to pay for transportation so in the last 4 years the municipality has probably invested $1,130 in its orchestra, and has had a history of scoffing at projects presented to them in the past.
With this in mind I made the little project, asking for basic necessities of the orchestra: strings, photocopies, repairs of instruments, small pay for an advanced student to help teach new students, and a minimal salary for a new violin teacher. Totally about $5,600 a year and this was just to be for the next six months, or half that. Again I will mention the enthusiasm that mayor and his major official had about the project when we (two mothers from the parent teachers organization and I presented it) and especially after the scandal that was formed when they (the municipality) had asked as to give them half of our grant that we had received, they assured us that they would consider us in the re-allocations that were schedule for the 27th of June (today).
So the project was delivered with all the stamps from every body that we could find with stamps in Santiago and all the signatures we could muster up as well. And the last two months I was told all you do know is wait for the re-allocations meeting, “which is always interesting” they said.
So this morning I got up super early (at 6:30) and got on the bus into Robore and sat threw the whole ordeal (from 9:00 until 3:00) and it was a super experience on Bolivian culture and politics (along with tons of show and fluff from the mayor who is up for re-election in December and I was surprised to see that he was already starting to try and show himself off by giving the nicest answers to some of the most ridiculous questions). All this I endured, which was great and all fine and good except to find out that nothing was approved… zero, cero, nada, pura blah blah. The worst off it being that in there spiffy little slide show they showed a picture of the choir and orchestra and how they had given us this spiffy banner with our name on it (with money of another Org.) and also had helped us receive the grant from the B.I.D. (which we had sought out and I had written up the project for and they had taken half of and then we got back without there help, or them knowing about). But nothing of our project, the mayor mentioned no worries we promise to help some with the salary of the professor. “But what of the rest of the project” I asked “what of the money for the string and the photocopies for the kids” “well you have money from the B.I.D. for strings” “but thats all fine and good that a international institution is willing to help out the music school but the municipality should put there part as well, you say that you will help with a small salary but what good is the salary if we don’t have money to buy or photocopy music or keep the instruments in good shape.” “Well there isn’t the money” they responded “well how do all the neighboring communities have such large budgets and we have nothing at all?” I demanded. There were no answers and nothing was clarified.
Now that the cat has fallen asleep (along with my arm) on my arms. I see the importance of this comfort (that many of us in the global north have) people make these presentations and project and battles in meetings every day. I’m not saying that their isn’t bureaucratic craziness in the states or that the political system in the U.S. And Canada is perfect. But today I did realize that these people are making these fights for threw these bureaucratic jungles just for decent roads so their burrows can make the trek from one town to the next, so that the shingles that blew off the roof of the school in the neighboring village can be replaced, so that a new system of potable water can be implemented in Santiago (that has been in the project, presentation letter with stamps phase for the last 20 years), so the guy in charge of the hotel can have a play to put the ambulance so that the tires don’t get robbed while it’s waiting for an emergency, so that the national police can be mobilized to remove people that have been purchasing land (sold to them under the table) in the municipal nature preserve. All this and more I saw today, some people were happy some people were frustrated, many people I talked to said they had stopped the fight a long time ago, given up, and expressed their appreciation that I had entered in the fight.
Now I just have to start the draft for the next project (maybe a little bigger so that they can turn down more things and hopefully something will be left that will be approved, if you want a puppy start asking out for an elephant idea). The allocations for next year are set up in November, so with the help of next years SALTer hopefully something will be realized.