Until the year! Dispatch of the souls was made in the streets and premises

Leny Chuquimia / La Paz

This year, the office of the souls left the cemeteries to take over the streets and party venues due to the pandemic, the restrictions and the controls carried out in the necropolises of La Paz during the Todos Santos festival.

Between November 1 and 2, the General Cemetery received 60,000 visits, half of the more than 120,000 attendees it had in 2019, before the coronavirus.

“People are entering, but they visit their souls and they stay for a very short time, about 15 minutes, so there is no capacity nor do we have many people in the Cemetery. That is why it was not necessary to close the doors either. Although many people did not agree, we see that the measure works and is respected, ”said Patricia Endara, director of the Municipal Decentralized Entity of Cemeteries of La Paz.

From the cemetery to the streets

“May the prayer be received,” says one of the few residents who managed to enter the General Cemetery for the dispatch of the souls. This year the presence of prayers is prohibited, as is the setting of tables in the tombs.

Visitors are limited to leaving flowers, cleaning the niches and saying a prayer. The party and tradition remained behind the gates of the Cemetery.

“The control is strict, so we have made the tomb as close as possible. It is his first year of visit, he could not miss it ”, says Celia Quispe, whose husband died last year from the covid.

Surrounded by baskets and pots, on a sidewalk next to the cemetery, she welcomes her relatives and distributes the prepared delicacies to other old people and children who come to pray.

Similar panorama is seen in the rear part of the Cemetery. There the rezadores have found a perfect place to settle and raise their prayers dodging the edile controls.

Near the main gate there are long lines of people, but not to enter the necropolis, but to access the vaccine and tests. Most of the applicants were young people under the age of 18 who were waiting impatiently for their turn.

“They take a long time. We are already waiting for a long time and the line does not advance ”, one of them complains.

“People are accessing the vaccine and the tests are also being taken. We have not had any difficulties and thus all the people who entered the cemetery have their negative test or their vaccination card, ”says Endara. He adds that the population acted in a very responsible way “and that is very plausible.”

First year, they arrive in comparsa

But the tables are not only in the streets surrounding the Cemetery. On República avenue in Villa Victoria, dozens of large altars have been installed in the party venues. The Todos Santos tomb of Mario Vigabriel Moreno is one of them.

Vigabriel, patriarch of a family with Potosí roots, died last January. He is survived by his two daughters, Lizeth and Sandra. As it is the first year of his visit, they have prepared a whole party for him, which ended with an office with an unmissable soul.

“It is his first year. They say that he does not arrive alone, but in a troupe, with all his friends: ‘My first year is, come with me to my reception,’ says the soul to all those it met on the spiritual plane. And for that you have to prepare a good grave with everything they liked so that today (yesterday) they leave well satisfied ”, explains Lizeth.

“In the tomb we have put everything traditional and what he liked: stairs, horses, pork rinds, trout, chicken chanka, chantilly. And we are going to collect all that with the godparents to distribute among the visitors ”, Sandra details, while in the premises the amplification for the music groups is installed.

The party was planned for months. From the food to the offerings that will be delivered to the guests and the preparation of the chicha -which came from Chayanta- with which the ceremony of the “small bull” is celebrated, a kind of game to dissipate the penalties and dismiss the loved one see you next year.

“The ‘small bull’ is a custom where we come from. There are two people dressed in thinku who will make people drink chicha from a vessel in the shape of a bull. You have to decorate that bull and celebrate it. With that we will say ‘until the year’ to our daddy ”, Lizeth details.

Little call without party

“They don’t let things come in. They have told me that I cannot build the grave, ”says Mrs. Eugenia tearfully at the gates of La Llamita cemetery, on Periférica avenue. Distressed, she unloads her huge bundle and asks whoever passes by: “Don’t you want to pray to me for my little soul? My little bread is well done,” while showing a t’antawawa of blue Lluchu and huge eyes.

Unlike the General Cemetery, here the vaccination certificate is not requested nor was a mobile test or inoculation brigade installed. The controls are limited to preventing the entry of food, drink, music and resiris.

And this is one of the clandestine cemeteries in which the tradition of Todos Santos is most deeply rooted. Year after year, in its interior huge altars were built to which relatives, groups of prayers and musical groups of different styles attended, which extended the party until late at night, whether it was raining or hot.

“Now we have gone out onto the sidewalks, but there is not much space. There are also no people at the checkpoints and they are already picking us up from here, ”says Don Ricardo at an armed altar on the outskirts of the cemetery.

The police in charge of the controls affirm that the only thing they seek is to avoid crowds that accelerate the escalation of the fourth wave.

“But inside others have bread and canes. They don’t say anything to them ”, a woman complains as they confiscate her bag.

Unlike the La Paz city, the cemeteries of El Alto were filled with families who attended to say goodbye to their loved ones without any restriction. And is that many of these spaces are clandestine.

Breads, food and fruit were distributed along with drinks and music of all times, genres and styles. Everything, always according to the taste of the deceased. Not even the heavy rain with hail managed to lose the tradition.

The Mercedario cemetery was one of the most visited. The children prayed at the top of their lungs in exchange for the offerings that were piled up on the graves.

There was also a lot of activity in the Ventilla cemetery and the Villa Ingenio cemetery. In both necropolises the party lasted until dusk, at which time the traditional tarkeadas marked the farewell of the souls until the following year.

Towards the center of the country, in Cochabamba, there was no shortage of cacharpayas in which couplets were sung and the traditional wallunka was performed. In this one, the women swing on very high swings to knock down jars full of fruits hanging on the poles with their feet.

This year, in the Llajta cemetery, food was allowed to build the graves, but alcohol consumption was restricted.

A similar measure was taken in Sucre and Potosí, where families returned to the cemeteries, after they remained closed in 2020.

“People visit their souls and stay for a short time, so there is no excessive capacity. It was not necessary to close the doors “

Patricia Endara, GAMLP

“The control is strict, that is why we have made the tomb as close as possible. It’s his first year, he couldn’t miss it ”.

Celia quispe, suffering