Politics, water buckets, epidemics and "Mamita" -

Last week Tony's sister, Kathy, asked if our "job" was getting monotonous. We told her that yes, sometimes, like all jobs it is pretty routine. However, we have gleaned some interesting information as we turn all those pages and take a digital image of each one (55,738 through today). For example, in the first books we did we noticed that well over half of all the deaths were infants or children under two. We felt so sad for all those parents. As we continued through the years, the infant mortality rate went down considerably--possibly due to better health care and we saw more elderly people listed. 

One day we noticed in the 1940 death records of Huaraz that the cause of death of five men indicated they had been executed by the military. A further note stated that they had been court martialled by the army and sentenced to death. We also noticed that there was a cholera epidemic in the Chimbote area in the early 1940's with many deaths.

For a change of pace, this week we have been doing marriage records of a small town named Pallasca in the northern part of this province. These books are small in size (about like a small bound notebook) and in content, an average of 10 - 20 marriages per year. We did 47 books in two days, which dated from 1938 through 1994 when the government began entering vital statistics on computers.

But for Marilyn, one of the most interesting things we noticed was that in 1918 - 1919 there was a flu epidemic here with hundreds of deaths.  She remembers reading in Grandma Rawlins' history that she and Grandpa had to wear face masks when they applied for their marriage license about that same time in Logan, Utah, because there was flu epidemic there also. Apparently it was a world-wide epidemic. One book we did contained 200 pages with a death entry on each page and covered only two weeks in 1919 where normally 200 pages covers four to six months.

Recently we have been doing the 1940's and 1950's death records for Huaraz. The cause of death for many of these people simply says; "unknown cause, without medical assistance", so we don't know what was happening then. We are curious as to how the 70,000 deaths that occurred in the 1970 earthquake and landslide will be recorded.

One of the other things we have noticed is that the paper is very different from year to year and printer to printer. Most books since 1900 have pre-printed pages and the officials only fill in the individual data for each entry. Some books have had paper as thin as scripture paper and others as thick as butcher paper. One mayor in 1920 actually had a stamp for his signature. I think he is the only one so far so he was pretty much on the cutting edge for his day or lazy, not sure which. The mayor signs every record along with other officials of the municipality where the information was recorded. Some of these records will be easy to index because the handwriting is so clear and others not so much--with poor handwriting, water damage and faded ink.

So, just in case you were also wondering if we were getting bored with this assignment, this is probably more than you wanted to know. But since each book is different and some very challenging to photograph--getting the focus and lighting correct can be tricky-- we really are not bored yet. 

It is exciting to be part of a worldwide effort to record and save the vital records of the human family. We quote from an article entitled "Indexing is Vital" which appeared in the December 2013 Ensign magazine.

"Volunteers worldwide have indexed (digitized) more than one billion records since 2006, but there's a lot more work to do. Billions of additional records are waiting in the Granite Mountain Records Vault in Salt Lake City, Utah. And beyond that are the records found in other archives across the globe, which the Family History Department is photographing at the rate of about 35 million digital images per month."

It is exciting to be able to add our "grain of sand" to the effort.

On another front, not long after we arrived in Huaraz we noticed in the headlines in the newspapers on the newstands that there was an investigation of the president of the Ancash Province related to the murder in the city of Chimbote of a former official from the Ancash administration. The capital of the province is Huaraz and the provincial offices are located here. The archives where we work are part of this administrative complex. Not long after, it was announced on radio (which are always on in all the taxis and colectivos--some with music and some with news) and in the newspapers, that an official investigation had also begun of the finances of the province and that an audit would be done of all the offices.

We learned later that the Peruvian government is charging the provincial president and 15 to 20 of his cronies with murder, theft and fraud in the disappearance of US$ 250 million (that's dollars!) from the provincial accounts over the past seven years of the current administration. Included in the charges are the illegal payoff of contractors, who in addition submitted inflated invoices to the provincial government, the purchase of computers, vehicles, etc. for personal use with government funds, and other related racketeering acts.

Ancash has several large open pit mines which operate 7/24 and royalties and taxes from these mining operations go to the regional/provincial government, the remainder to the federal government in Lima. Thus the province has a steady revenue source from these funds. We had heard from the locals and continue to hear, that there is much corruption in both the provincial and the city governments in Peru. Most were not surprised at the amount of the theft nor the murder accusations, but were encouraged that anybody from the federal government was actually going to investigate it. However, some say that even the investigators and the auditors may be in cahoots with the provincial leaders and doubt that an honest audit and investigation will be undertaken.

Things appeared to get serious about two months ago when federal police showed up in riot gear at the entrance to the complex, which is also the entrance to the archives. They have remained every day since in various numbers from 15 to 20 initially, to 8 - 10 now. In addition, a busload of auditors arrived from Lima and has been at the complex ever since. They inventoried  equipment in our area of the archives about 6 weeks ago. An interim president of the province has been appointed and the previous one was in court last week where formal charges were filed. It will be interesting to see where this leads. The locals thinks he will do jail time, but are not sure that the incoming officials, both the interim and the elected replacements this Fall, will be any more honest. "Maybe for awhile until they learn how to embezzle and not get caught!" is a typical comment we hear.

Four weeks ago, the water was turned off to the entire complex. In addition, all temporary and non contract employees were dismissed at the end of April. Rocío, a young lady in her early twenties, who worked in our section of the archives, was terminated. We miss her. The other five employees in the archives have remained but apprehensive of their job security. We estimate there are about 100 - 150 employees total in this entire provincial government complex. They told us that the water had been cut off because the provincial government did not pay the water bill due to the freezing of all funds during the audit and federal investigation.

So, for three weeks, we, and all the other departments, caught rain water in small buckets which were then brought into the bathrooms to flush the toilets and wash hands. Fortunately, it was still raining about everyday so there was enough water. However, about two week ago as the rainy season subsided, they brought around large barrels full of water and placed them outside of each office area. We then filled our bucket as we passed by on the way to the bathroom.

BYOB - Bring your own bucket.

Last week, the water was turned on and the employees said it was at the direction of the new acting president of the province. We were all quite relieved that we could stop the bucket brigade. There is always something interesting to write about in Huaraz.

We will close with some information on our "vending machine" whom we call "Mamita". She sets up her snacks, fruits and drinks everyday by one of the buildings in the complex. We call her Mamita because she started calling us "Poppi" and "Mommi" not long after we arrived. We greet her almost every day and occasionally purchase a snack from her.

Mamita and her "vending machine"

The two mamitas in their hats.  As you can see, Mamita is not very tall.