Curitiba Pilgrimage 8 (11/23 – An Intense Day Outside and In Cascavel)

Jonas, Eduardo, Roberto, Nancy, and John

After lunch at MLST

After another shortened night’s sleep, Nancy and I were driven over to São Lucas, arriving dutifully within a few minutes of the scheduled time of 8 a.m.  We were among the first ones there. I got into the van and ended up being driven over to another house where two others were staying.  When we returned, Nancy along with Revdo. Marialvo and others had started morning prayer.  We got on the road sometime after 8:30.  For our travels today we were joined by Revdo. Carlos, the pastor of Ascensão, which was the other congregation in Cascavel.  We would be relying on Roberto, sometimes assisted by Michael or Nancy or me, for translation.

After driving for maybe an hour or more, we pulled off the road in the middle of a farming area. Carlos went to the door of a small wooden cabin like structure, which was adjacent to a well-kept garden and obviously was someone’s home.  Were joined by two men, Eduardo, who was probably in his 30’s and extremely well-spoken, and Jonas, who was somewhat older and disheveled in appearance.  Respectively, they represented the Movimento Sem Terra or “MST” (meaning a movement of people without land) and Via Campesino.

We crossed the highway and walked down a dirt road to a series of what from the outside appeared to be small farm buildings.  We walked into one of the buildings, maybe the size of a small parish hall, with a single light bulb hanging from the ceiling, a dirt floor, and several chairs and individual classroom desks.  In the center of the room was a desktop computer standing next to a chair on which a slide-show projector was perched and pointing toward a screen at the back of the room.  A single power cord led away from the computer back toward the entry.  We were later told that the only source of power was a generator and that the building was used as classroom, adding that having only a dirt floor didn’t matter for purposes of teaching.

Eduardo started the slide show that showed various pictures of farm people engaged in collective agriculture and other activities for self-support.  While the slide show cycled through continuously, Eduardo provided a lengthy explanation of MST, translated by Roberto, which I can only summarize briefly here.  The MST is an organization that started in 1984 and consists of persons, or groups of persons, who seek and obtain land from the government; they are able to live on and farm the land but do not own it.  “Sem terra” means without land or landless.  The government will appropriate land from large private landowners for this purpose under three circumstances: (1) if it can be shown that no productive use is being made of the land — I believe he said that the owners are compensated under this circumstance; (2) if the land has been used for criminal activity, which I believe includes using illegal farming methods such as applying banned pesticides to crops; and (3) if the landowner has employed farmworkers under conditions of slavery.  To obtain use of such land, families must have sufficient resources to put it to use and apparently must be associated with a sufficient number of other families to manage the land and support their needs on a collective basis.  Eduardo spoke of needing to accumulate specified amounts of money to obtain certain items or build a house (7,000 reais?).  We probed, but it remained unclear to what extent they act or use resources collectively and how much is individual.  MST is committed to what, for lack of a better term, I will refer to as organic farming and to growing a full variety of items to meet their own needs rather than producing one or two items for sale.  Agribusiness here typically does the latter, the predominant crop in this area being soy beans, and follows conventional but increasingly controversial farming practices including use of pesticides and growing genetically modified crops.  At this farm, having enough water is a significant issue, since it is a long way to the local source of fresh water, and they still lack the resources to develop an adequate alternative by digging wells.

The members of Via Campesino are farmworkers who are still waiting for a land allotment.  In Jonas’ case, it has been several years.  These groups feel that it is essential that they keep pressure on the government to appropriate land under the described circumstances and provide farmworkers with an opportunity for self-support through sustainable agriculture on those lands.

After this meeting we walked back to Eduardo’s house across the highway, and some of our group looked at his family vegetable garden.  I wanted to ask him about his education, since he clearly was well-read and articulate and didn’t have a lot of learning resources in the immediate vicinity; but I asked only how long he had lived there, to which he replied two years.  We requested and he retrieved a CD copy of the slide show that he had shown us.

After this we proceeded up the road and turned in to a very modern facility behind a gate for a bathroom break.  These were the cleanest public rest rooms we had seen anywhere on our travels, and they even had showers.  There were a few workers around the buildings of this facility, but there didn’t seem to be any activity going on.  As we walked back out to the gate, Roberto related the story of this facility.  It belonged to an agency of the State of Paraná and was about to be turned over to Via Campesino.  It had belonged to a private owner or company that was found to be using illegal pesticides and diseased seeds. Farmworkers associated with Via Campesino staged an occupation, and the owner responded by hiring private security to remove them.  The conflict apparently went on for some time, eventually leading to a shootout in which one campesino was killed and five others wounded, and one of the security force also was killed.  The campesinos denied being armed, while the security force clearly were armed, though it was illegal for them to carry arms.  Following an investigation, the security force and ultimately the owner were held responsible for both fatalities.  This resulted in the forfeiture and appropriation of the land, based on its use in criminal activity.  When the facility is turned over to Via Campesino, which will happen shortly, it will be renamed in honor of the campesino who was killed in the incident, and a monument will be installed adjacent to the entryway. (We were shown the foundation for the monument.)

Our next stop was further down the highway at another encampment.  We passed several rustic cabin-like structures in close proximity to each other before we turned into the encampment and parked. (We were told that this particular encampment often is depicted in pictures sent out to publicize the landless movement.)  This was our lunch stop, and perhaps a 100 or more people of all ages gathered to meet us and show us to the makeshift kitchen.  We were served a lunch of rice and chicken, exquisitely prepared, and the cabbage and tomato salad that we’ve seen everywhere. (We later saw what we guessed might be some of the brothers and sisters of the chickens used to feed us.)  After we went through the food line, we were led into a room on the other side of the kitchen to sit down and eat, while the residents just sat down anywhere outside.  The segregation seemed strange but we didn’t think to question it until after the fact.  We were served something like Kool-aid to drink.  We had been told ahead of time that it would be perfectly acceptable to decline and just stick with our own bottled water.  However, a couple of us went ahead and drank the Kool-aid (no broader analogies intended).  I’ve made a few jokes about catching turista as a weight-loss strategy; but it’s been a couple of days now, and I’ve neither developed turista nor lost any weight.

After lunch we gathered in what most would call a good-sized barn that is the Capela Jesus Cristo Libertador.  This is another mission that is served once a month by Revdo. Carlos and where, we are told, Bispo Naudal baptized someone on a recent visit.  We did our usual short introductions, and everyone else around the room introduced themselves, giving their age and how long that had been at the encampment.  Most had been there in the range of 4-5 years and had dealt with periodic tensions with private owners, including one incident in which the encampment was overrun and the chapel demolished — which they then rebuilt using some of the same lumber.  This group was the Movimento de Libertacão dos Sem Terra (MLST), on off-shoot of the MST that regards itself as less rigid and strident than the MST, sort of an “MST Light.” (It sounded just like a comparison of the Episcopal and Roman Catholic churches, although the Anglican church in Curitiba is tiny compared to the Roman church and other evangelical denominations.  However, possibly this may change with the Anglicans’ willingness to promote and support social justice issues — to embrace the “liberation theology” for which the Romans once stood in the forefront but have subsequently withdrawn.)

I heard both before and after these visits that the landless groups are controversial and often portrayed negatively in the media.  Among the accusations are that they resell the land allotments, contrary to the purpose of the program and despite lacking title.  From the church’s standpoint, however, they are a community that desires and needs to be served and therefore a place where the church needs to be.  And from my perspective, they have a lot to teach us about living and being committed to each other as a community.

After the gathering with MLST, we split up and walked around the encampment and out into the fields.  As the daughter of a west-Texas farmer, Amber was interested in looking at how they grew the crops and managed the land.  Later, as we walked back into the living area, I saw a few boys kicking around a football (that’s “soccer” for you Yankees) , and I got into the circle to join them — Nancy and I played when we were younger, and that’s just something we do instinctively because we loved playing and miss it.  Nancy also joined in as did Amber, though she had never played.  Amber later described the experience as a profound one — here we were from radically different places and backgrounds, all just playing together.

After leaving the encampment, we drove back to Cascavel.  We now had the red clay soil all over the bus and ourselves, particularly the jugadores (look it up). We went to a school and were led into a classroom, where we pulled a few chairs together in a semi-circle. As students began to file into the room, we expanded the circle; and we did this repeatedly as more students entered until there were about 35-40 people in the room.  Even though it was hot, we asked someone to turn off the very noisy fan so we could hear better.  However, one of the instructors then opened up all the windows, which allowed the loud shrieks of children playing outside to permeate the room.  The students at this school appeared to be of junior high school age and somewhat reluctant to engage with us as we went through our presentations and then responded to questions about ourselves, the U.S., and California.  Kate led us once again in “Amazing Grace” — that impresses everyone — and then we all decided to teach them the hokey-pokey, just to liven things up (and, of course, because that’s what it’s all about).  We then said our goodbyes to the students individually and headed back to the van.

We waited at the van about 15 minutes until Carlos emerged and we could proceed.  We then asked to stop at a market for water, and everyone dawdled more than usual.  It was 5 o’clock; we had started early; it was hot; and we were exhausted.  We were told that we had one or two more stops prior to whatever “free” time was left before having dinner with the Ascensão congregation at 8.  However, we were spent, and we needed to process and discuss what we had heard and experienced earlier that day.  We asked to put off the next visit — to a rehabilitation center for boys with drug addictions and to a women’s sewing circle that is part of the center — to the next day.  Since we had a light schedule the next day, Carlos and Roberto agreed.  We also decided to stay at Ascensão to meditate and meet prior to the evening reception rather than asking the van driver Moacir ferry us to and from to our individual homes — Nancy and I didn’t even know if Jussieur or Janete were at home or how to reach them.

Carlos let us into the church, and we negotiated an amount of quiet meditation time among ourselves.  Some tried to meditate and others just passed out in the pews.  I finally asked Moacir to open the van so I could get out my computer and do some writing. Amber got up a little later and asked if it had been 20 minutes.  She reminded me that the cheap watch she bought a few days earlier couldn’t tell time.  We gathered ourselves and walked a couple of blocks over to a café and bought a round of cervejas plus one coke for the non-cerveja drinker.  If we had really begun to bond as individuals on our long van rides, this was group bonding as a group.  We griped and laughed and shared our impressions about the day’s events.  At about a quarter to eight, someone from the church found us and said they were ready for us to head back their way. 

At Ascensão we spent time in individual conversation and then went into the temple for a prayer service.  Some of these parishioners were hosting members of our group and thus were already known to them.  We have heard that there is some division between this congregation and São Lucas, but we don’t know what specifically it is.  I found this congregation to be lively and engaging, like the others we have met, with young adults, including a former exchange student (to Dallas) who served as our translator.  We did our presentations but also shared something about what we had seen that day.  We finished late and got home even later after Janete was called to pick us up from another drop-off point.  We then spent time with Jussieur and Janete, whom we had not seen all day, before heading off to bed.  Writing would have to wait until later.