WEST COAST SOUTH AMERICA SERIES Vol. XVII No. 4 (Bolivia) THE CONCEPT OF LUCK IN INDIGENOUS AND HISPANIC CULTURES by Ricliard W. Patch Bolivian beliefs about luck and destiny are clearly illustrated in the Feria de Alacilas, when people buy in miniature those objects they wish to possess in real- ity. The association of Alacitas with the Ekeko, a stylized dwarf-like figure laden with worldly goods, links present beliefs to precolonial ones. FIELDSTAFF Reports [RWP-2-'7O] WHSTCOASI LATIN AMKKKAS1 KIIS Vol. XVII No. 4 (Bolivia) THE CONCEPT OF LUCK IN INDIGENOUS AND HISPANIC CULTURES Alacitas and the Ekeko by Richard W. Patch March 1970 Do you wish to have an extra $2,083 during There is no such intriguing interpretation of Latin year? You may receive a bill of tender American Catholicism, particularly as it is mixed mised for this amount by the Feria de Alacitas with pre-Columbian beliefs, perhaps because the sending an addressed envelope, stamped with conclusions lead to ideas of predestined and ivian postage (1.40 pesos), to me at Casilla unalterable fate, indifference, and resignation to 50, La Paz, Bolivia. You will receive an Alacitas the will of an unknown. for 50 pesos (cincuenta pesos bolivianos) which I increase a thousand times in value during the Neither concept of destiny exists in pure form r to 50,000 pesos, or $2,083. The bills are apart, perhaps, from beliefs held by some individ- ted according to "the law of January 24." The uals who have become marginal in their own 083 will be yours if you believe in Alacitas and societies. Especially in Bolivia beliefs in destiny are law of January 24. The front of the bills carry uncommonly varied-from the entrepreneur who epiction of a campesino, his head covered with a risks everything to build a thirty-story building in UCHO,1 issuing a stirring call by sounding the La Paz to the UKURUNA (Quechua), the out- TUTU. On the reverse there is a genuine lander, the man who is still an Indian in the remote iroduction of the Tiahuanaco Portal of the Sun, highlands, who will not risk changing the centuries- I the assurance that the bill is indeed "Fifty old style of his clothing. »os of Good Luck." Life as Luck ck and a Dwarf Alacitas is the purest representative in the Andes of the phenomenon of life conceived as The miniature money is a basic part of the Fair luck, a luck which can be manipulated by cautious Alacitas which is held each year for a week selection of miniatures which should become real- ginning January 24 in La Paz. The basic premise ities. It is an attitude toward fate, a fate which can that everything bought in miniature will become be influenced by small plaster objects but not by reality during the year. A model of a house will individual effort. Fate and destiny are beyond the come a real house. A small truck, provided it is reach of the individual and in the hands of the ided with tiny freight, will insure plenty of supernatural, by an association of the Ekeko with erything during the year. But beware of the Alacitas. If the theory of a Bolivian archeologist, :eko.2 The Ekeko is a dwarf with elfin face Carlos Ponce Sanjines, is correct, the Ekeko and lose back is loaded with packages, baskets, a Alacitas predate the arrival of the Spaniards and oom, bales, buckets, and a feather duster. He have a special importance in persisting as an image list be bought but not kept. Given away, he and a celebration which neither Catholicism nor ings luck; kept by the buyer he brings ill luck. any other religion (except perhaps the ancient fear of TUNUPA [Aymara'-god of thunder, storm, and There exists, of course, a multitude of ideas lightning], has been able to affect.)3 iout destiny. Two quite different views are held I United States Protestants and by Latin If Ponce is right, and his argument runs to 288 merican Catholics. Weber and Tawney have given pages plus 149 illustrations, the Ekeko was origi- teresting interpretations of the Protestant ethic. nally an Aymara god of fertility and love, as well as Copyright © 1970, American Universities Field Staff, Inc. RWP-2-'7O -2- typical indigenous and criollo boxes, bales, ant! houshold items. It strikes me that if Ponce can link TUNUPA with the EKAKO, I would be justified in deriving the freighted truck, another feature ot Alacitas, from descendents of the Ekeko. Alacitas There is more, below, on the origins of Alacita^ and the Ekeko. But the reader should have an idc; of the Fenade Alacitas of today and the role lucl plays in life each January 24 in La Paz. The Church has little to do with Alacitas except toilless the trucks, houses, bills, and othc miniatures in a spectacular ceremony in the Metro politan Cathedral of La Paz. There is an attempt t( identify Alacitas with Nuestra Senora de La Pa/ but aside from the single ceremony of January 24 few persons except some older women make an; connection between Alacitas and the Saint of L Paz. The Mayor's office (the Alcaklia) is not happ about Alacitas. It is another opportunity fo drunkenness, sleazy games of chance, and smal makeshift restaurants which serve out heaping bv possibly poisonous servings of such things as cu A modern three inch Ekeko made of plaster (guinea pig), fried with head attached. Furthe; and smoking an outsize cigarette. His load of more, there is no place for Alacitas except on abundance is typical. In the center is a guitar, public thoroughfare, which in the past few yeai although reduced to three strings. Above are has been Avenida Montes, the main artery to enU the usual broom and parasol. Left are a or leave the city. And La Paz has too few tourist suitcase, candy, a house, a silver pitcher, and a especially in this cold season of torrential rail soup bowl. Left is a basket containing a bale of (summer), to make Alacitas into a substanti; coca, a ceramic chato or pitcher, more parasols, economic enterprise. Thus the Fair is made u and tied to the basket a bar of soap. almost exclusively of transactions betwee campesinos and townspeople. luck. I do not have the twelve volumes of The Golden Bough at hand, but I can think of no other The stalls of Alacitas line the Avenida MonU male god of fertility in the world, in history, or in for about a third of a mile. They are four deep i prehistory. The Ekeko is definitely male, with the sense that there are two lines of stalls facit early pre-Columbian figures exhibiting a pro- 4 each other along both lanes of the avenue. Eat. nounced phallus. All figures are of hunchbacked stall is formed by three sides of muslin or old sug; dwarfs, with pathological spinal curvature, a slight sacks suspended from a simple frame, and roofc hump, and hunched shoulders which make a neck with pieces of corrugated iron. impossible. Through time the figures become in- creasingly stylized, with only slight representation .': ' of a phallus, until it finally disappears in colonial The Fair is divided into several sections. Upc times, and the hump is replaced by an enormous entering the Avenida Montes, one first encountt burden of earthly goods. The present Ekeko is a miniature representations of money, and tv plaster dwarf, a few inches high, loaded with recent innovations small checkbooks and litt Left: A modern representation in silver of the pre-Columbian ancestor of the Ekeko. Half an inch high. Modern copies are rare and are sold as "an old god of the Incas." The originals are not only pre-Columbian but pre-Incaic. They demonstrate the primordial fertility function of Ekekos before and after 1781. Bottom Left: The proto-Ekeko showing identi- fying hunchback. Bottom Right: Rear view of the proto-Ekeko. R\M" United Suites. So again I fell victim to the spirit of would be incredible in llie United Stales. Axles Alacitas (which means "buy me" in Aymara), break, brakes fail, and about a (ruck a week t'oes bought a truck and loaded it. This is supposed to over a precipice. Sometimes thirty persons ride be general "good luck," and reflects what is atop the cargo. Nineteen persons were killed this probably the greatest single aspiration of the week, including the pilot, when a truck failed to agricultural campesino to promote his position- to make the hairpin descent into Cochabamba and own and live by driving a loaded truck among the rolled down a precipice of 200 meters. commercial centers of Bolivia: La Paz, Caranavi, Oruro, Cochabamba, Santa Cruz, Sucre, and per- Here religion does become mixed with luck. All haps even Potosf. However, a stranger who buys a trucks have names. Mine has the unusually religious truck without cargo is fated to drive an empty "Apdstol Santiago" painted on the front panel of truck and end in bankruptcy. One has to be careful the overload which extends above the cab. Other in Alacitas. names range from "Superman" to "Flower of the Cloves." Having names, trucks are baptized. The Truck is Luck miniatures are blessed en iriasse in the Cathedral on January 24, but a priest usually gives an individual My truck (S3.00 with load) is a remarkable ceremony for the actual truck which is supposed to miniature of the monsters which grind up and appear during the year. down the mountains. It is made entirely by hand, and does not resemble toys in the United States.