A Culture of Cheating

Having grown up playing soccer, and admiring such professionals as Christiano Ronaldo, I have thought nothing of it when he ´dives´, falling intentionally to draw a call from the referees. Until recently. South America, on the whole, is less of a law driven culture than the United States, and life is not divided between things that you can and cannot do, rather, between what you can get away with, and what you cannot.

This became evident to me in Bolivia, where the majority of the taxi drivers dont have licenses, and the police are ready to accept bribes as opposed to arrest perpetrators. One of my spanish teachers, Oscar, has another business in which he brings cars which have been imported from Japan through Chile to be legally sold in Bolivia and further east in Paraguay and Brasil. He doesn´t have a drivers license, but still drives his cars across Bolivia on weekeds. He has told me that getting a drivers license is not about ability, but rather about money. You must pay to take the test, and then pay off the test taker so that he will pass you. Driving skill is never part of the equation. Once on the streets, these taxi and combi drivers will view stoplights, streetsigns, and even pedestrians as optional yeilding points. Very frequently, drivers will even speed up to intimidate the pedestrian traffic to move aside, and late at night, taxi drivers will not even slow down before running red lights at major intersections. Oscar has been pulled over numerous times, but he says that a bribe of 75 to 100 bolivianos will usually suffice, at which point the officer will drive away, waiting until he needs more pocket cash to pull someone else over.

Here in Peru, the problem has manifested itself in a different form (for me), perhaps more serious and worrying. Working in a day camp program, I have had the opportunity to interact with almost 100 kids from the surrounding neighborhoods, organizing crafts and outdoor games for them to play. Some recent favorites have been American Football, Dodgeball, and Kickball, mixed with the perennial favorites of soccer and volleyball. The problem lies not in the energy of the kids, but in the way that they play the games. Playing soccer on the streets has taught them that anything goes, that winning is the goal and the rules are flexible. When they come to play here, they bend the rules and will sometimes blatantly not listen to them. Granted, kids will be kids, and playing by the rules is something that is learned, and not innate, but the culture here cultivates the idea of winning at all costs, while most families in the states look to teach their children the value of playing fair.

As I mentioned in an earlier post, I have managed to play soccer on a 8 versus 8 field about twice a week, and my Peruvian family constantly finds it funny when I get pushed off the ball by larger (beer bellied) players because of my size. The keep telling me I need to kick back, be tougher and stronger. The soccer here is different from the states, again, because of the culture. A foul in the states would be recognized by people on both teams, and the game stopped, the situation resolved. Here, only the dirtiest fouls are called, to prevent fights from breaking out, and the elbows that I recieve are shown little attention, other than catcalls from the bystanders.

To make broad statements would be unfair, as I´m sure that there are Peruvians who know the value of good sportsmanship and Gringos who do not, but it seems that the culture values are different. Cheating in the states will usually lose you friends and respect, while here it is shrugged off as a part of the competition. If you ask my Peruvian brother, he would tell you, ¨jugamos sucio. No es como los estados unidos, pero es como se juega aqui¨

Como Trabajo

After more than a week here, I thought it fit to give you all some insight into what the conditions are like here, in addition to what I am doing. Chimbote is a very poor city, its economy centered around the fish cleaning factories which are now only open three or four months out of the year due to overfishing. Because of this, there is never much activity in the city, and people sit and stand on the sidewalks drinking Cusqueña (the local beer), and yelling ¨hola gringo¨as you pass by. The school that I work at, Mi Segundo Hogar, is in vacation right now, but with the help of the program Peru 109, they have opened their doors to all of the kids who would be otherwise in the streets, or at home watching television, to come and do arts and crafts or play in the schoolyard. The school is private, and the parents are paying to send their kids to a school where the small classrooms will seat 20 kids, as opposed to the overfilled public schools, which lack space, adequate supplies, and qualified teachers, and can have up to 50 kids in a classroom. The kids here are well off, which is to say, they have a house and parents and daily food.

I have also gone to a shelter for abandoned women, El Hogar de La Paz, which is extremely different. There, many of the women have mental issues, or are forced to wear straight jackets for fear that they might harm themselves or others. Many of them can´t speak, and the more able ones are learning how to write. More than anything, they crave attention, considering that they spend the whole day sitting inside. There are over 70 women there at this moment, and they have three bedrooms. Each is lined with over 20 cots. Upstairs, the nuns who live there attend to the more needy children, many of whom are unable to eat by themselves or wash themselves. Some lay in their beds, staring at the ceiling while flies land on them. One woman was able to talk, and was content with telling me the same story about her family over and over. It is difficult for me to believe that conditions like this existed before I went there.