Dia ch'aku Uma Rutuchi

Hailey turned two on October 6. My friend Cooper and I went to visit our friends in Bellavista, Cochabamba to celebrate their daughter's birthday and take part in the traditional "first hair cut." We arrived early, helped set up the party, saw the steaming Phampaku (chicken, plantains, and potatoes cooked underground with burning rocks) being unearthed and carried in its enormous metal pots. We had a beer, naively thinking that we would only be drinking a beer or two and returning back to the bustle of the city before dark.

Little did we know the party didn't even start until dusk, Hailey's friends trickling in and sitting down at the mini Coca-Cola tables donated by Wilhe's job at the local Coca-Cola factory in Quillacollo. The parents were offered chicha in hollowed-out pineapples, wine, and papaya liquor (all good separately, chaos-inducing when mixed!).
Hailey was then dressed in her beautifully intricate white dress, her hair separated into little sections to make the hair-cutting a bit more painless.

Cooper, Hailey's mom Teresa, and I sit down next to an offering of fruit and treats, preparing to attend to the growing line of guests waiting to make an offering of money to Hailey and then cut a piece of her hair... she immediately gets into the grapes averting her eyes from the dozens of stares in her direction. As her godparents, Cooper and I do the honors of cutting first. Traditionally if there is still hair to cut and all of the guests have offered, the godparents have to keep offering until she doesn't have any more strands to cut!!!

The night continues with chicha, dancing cuecas, more chicha, cerveza, and more dancing. Cooper and I were now comadres and compadres with Hailey's parents and in the six hours that ensued after the ritual, our glasses were never empty and we rarely had a break from dancing the traditional Bolivian cueca with our handkerchiefs in hand.

These are the kind of parties that you dread because you know you will be there so long dancing and drinking and "compartir"-ing until you want to fall down tutuma in hand...

These are the kind of parties that you cherish because you know you will be there so long dancing and drinking and "compartir"-ing until you wake up finding yourself remembering that you've promised to have another such party soon and experience it all over again ...

Feliz Cumpleaños Hailey, gracias por tu fiesta!

(Don Zenobio, Hailey's grandfather, cutting her hair)

(Nearing the end, but there's still hair to be cut!)

(A very tired Hailey after she finished eating mangos from the offering blanket!)