60 Going On 16

A little too much like déja vu

I recently wrote a piece elsewhere on a journey I'd made in Peru in 1988, when I was on an extended assignment in Latin America and had travelled by train from the town of Pisac to Aguas Calientes, the end of the line and the place where visitors could catch one of the boneshaker buses that snaked upwards around the mountainside to Macchu Picchu.

These were challenging times for Peruvians and visitors alike; there was widepread civil unrest and Sendero Luminoso (Shining Path) guerillas were locked in combat with the police and the military for the hearts and minds of the populace; thousands of innocent people were killed, entire villages decimated. It made travelling around the country hazardous; impromptu road blocks in the form of boulders would appear overnight, transport was unpredictable - if you managed to reach your destination on an outward journey, there was no guarantee when or if you would get back again.  (An impending rail strike meant that I was lucky to get the last scheduled train from Aguas Calientes to Cuzco later that day; no-one knew when the train would run again.) There was galloping inflation and there were strikes and long queues for basic foodstuffs like bread and sugar. 

I couldn't tell you why I chose to write about this particular journey; after all, it had taken place almost a quarter of a century ago so it wasn't fresh in my memory. I'd kept a travel journal at the time but have no photographic record of my stay in Peru as my Olympus cameras, films, a video camera and sound recording equipment were subsequently stolen by baggage handlers at Lima's Jorge Chávez International Airport, after I checked in for a flight to Colombia. The baggage handlers succeeded where muggers in Cuzco had not a few days beforehand. I'm not sure if this sort of thing still happens in Peru but then it was commonplace. (I should add that all the above notwithstanding, I fell in love with Peru, met and worked with some inspirational people, and would go back in an instant, if I could.)

Although Sendero Luminoso became notorious for its cruelty and ruthlessness, the police and the military were little better - they embarked on their own killing sprees, sanctioned by the government, to  wipe out the guerilla movement. In 1992, Sendero Luminoso's leader, Abimael Guzmán, was captured, put on trial and sentenced to life imprisonment. A retrial in 2004 resulted in the same verdict and he remains in prison in Callao, where he is kept in a subterranean cell. Sendero Luminoso, meanwhile, is still active in Peru.

Writing the piece brought it all back to me and I've found myself thinking about Peru and those perilous times a good deal in the past month.

So you will understand how amazed I was to read in the Independent last week that that my nearest market town - just seven miles down the Exe Valley Way - had unwittingly provided shelter to someone from the other side of the conflict: Rodrigo Grande, a former Peruvian policeman who is wanted for crimes against humanity. The Independent report didn't name him but our local newspaper, whose pages are normally filled with stories of town hall profligacy, community group activities, cheque handovers, and the like (think Framley Examiner) certainly did.

'We track down the man arrested over allegations of crimes against humanity' it roared in a front-page 'EXCLUSIVE' under the headline 'CONFRONTED'. The paper's reporter (and photographer) had come face to face with Señor Grande on the doorstep of his brother's Italian restaurant in the town centre and, no, I am not making this up. He's been here for 18 months apparently. Goodness; who knew?  The funny thing is, a small Mid-Devon town (am tempted to call it 'sleepy' but don't want to ruffle the feathers of the good burghers of said town) is probably the last place you would imagine finding a Peruvian accused of crimes against humanity, which therefore makes it an almost perfect location in which to disappear. Almost but not quite. And, besides, Sr Grande hadn't actually disappeared; he worked openly at the restaurant, never taking a day off, according to the landlord.

Anyway, Sr Grande was hauled off by Metropolitan Police officers at 7.00 am last Tuesday, interviewed at Exeter police station and released on bail until 20 July. Will he be returning to Mid-Devon, I wonder? (Next week's headline: 'Local people seek assurances about Peru's most wanted . . . ') 

Meanwhile - and this has absolutely nothing to do with déja vu - the organisers of Mid-Devon's forthcoming agricultural show, which is held in the same town, also find themselves in a bit of a stew over a story linked to human rights abuses in another part of the world. Its newly elected president, who would normally be expected to open the show, is the sister of the King of Bahrain. Yes that Bahrain, where people are being gunned down in the streets and that King, the one who had the British tabloids fuming about the fact that he had been invited to the forthcoming royal nuptials. (But it's OK because he's not coming.) The king's sister owns a local dairy farm and spends the summer here, which explains - apparently - how she came to be elected president. And where else would you spend your summers when you're the sister of one of the wealthiest and most powerful men in the Middle East? 

I mention all this because the AA is issuing dire warnings that the price of petrol is escalating so steeply that we rural types will all soon be trapped in our villages for ever, unable to afford to drive anywhere. But, as you may be wondering, do we actually need to go anywhere with all this international incident stuff happening under our very noses? Forget roses round the cottage door, forget Cath Kidston cuteness; these days country living is cutting edge.

Apologies and why I turn to Yeats

I realise that I have let far too many days lapse since I last wrote a blogpost. I started several and discarded them as it seemed pointless to be writing about the minutiae of one woman's life in these turbulent and dangerous times, with North Africa and the Middle East in turmoil, and the forces of nature in wild tumult on the other side of the world.

So I missed the opportunity of telling you about the pleasure of being involved in World Book Night and giving away 48 copies of the wondrous Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie to young and adult students at my local further education college.

And I missed the opportunity to  tell you that Christmas Holly made an almost instant and seemingly complete recovery from her stroke. I too am recovering, slowly and gradually, albeit at not quite such a remarkable rate but then I'm not a dog.

And I also missed the opportunity to tell you what a joy Griff Rhys Jones's television programme on the history of Indian textiles was. Celebrity presenters can often be intensely irritating but Hidden Treasures of Indian Art - one of a series on tribal art - was exquisitely shot and thoughtfully presented by someone with due respect for the subject. UK viewers can still catch this and other programmes in the series on BBC iPlayer - although not for long. If textiles, especially embroidery, are your thing, you will be salivating.

But these, inevitably, were small oases in weeks dominated by coverage of the cataclysmic events happening in New Zealand and Japan, especially Japan. As a representative of Save the Children in Sendai reflected, nothing in the aid organisation's previous experience of working in disaster zones could have prepared staff for dealing with an earthquake, followed by a tsunami, rising radiation levels and a potential nuclear meltdown.

So, we have watched these ghastly events with growing disbelief, finding compassion in our hearts but wondering what, sensibly and practically, to do with it. And while all this has been happening half a world away, people close to me have been going through hard and painful times. My dear friend, the Only Other Blonde in the Village, lost her much-loved mum last week; her mother had a long life, had lived for her family, and died peacefully in her sleep, aged 100. But a mum is a mum and irreplaceable; their passing leaves a deep wound.

Today someone I love very dearly rang me with sad and distressing news and I have been wandering around in that place of ice and lead where shock dwells. The Only Other Blonde and I had to do much mutual comforting on this morning's dog walk; thank goodness for the balm of friendship. 

As is so often the case in times of disaster and enormous upheaval, poets can express individual and collective feelings far better than most of us, as we grapple to find a word, a phrase, a sentence that doesn't smack of mawkishness or cliché. It must be more than 40 years since I first read The Second Coming by W B Yeats but it has stayed with me ever since.  Other bloggers have quoted these lines in recent days but they bear repetition:

Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;

Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,

The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere

The ceremony of innocence is drowned . . .

I was thinking about these words when an email arrived from my Friend in New Zealand following her most recent visit to Christchurch, where she holds a monthly homeopathic clinic. She described the scenes of devastation and the experience of aftershocks, which were continuing, and sent thoughful, sensitive photos. This was one of them:

Opawa, Christchurch Photo: © Jane Parkin

One of those random acts of kindness that reminds us of what it is to be human.