IN STEREO

Last year I was injured – because of that I have not worked. I like to work; even now I want to work, I do. But since the doctor has forbidden me, now I can’t. I have to be resting for four years. I fell while putting up a wooden beam when I was climbing. I fell almost three metres, it would be. That hurt my back and that is why I have been forbidden by the doctor to work and do heavy lifting. It is a joy to work. I would like to go to the mountain with my companions, laughing out loud. We all get nicknames: "No way, ‘Fucker’,” "This thing is for you, ‘Dick’,” then we laugh. One comes up here to the mine all depressed, but chewing coca with our partner, we are laughing; it is a joy. We have already lost everything that we have complained about, we are not thinking.

Outside, when we are coming down to our houses, the thought comes back: "What am I going to do; how am I going to feed my children?” We think like that. At the age of 19, I was already widowed, so I had my three kids to take care of. I have had to work: how am I going to eat? I see the mountain [and] I feel sorry… But also, it gives us a disease. It’s a pity that we, the miners, get sick. My mom died of that. Always with mine sickness. She suffered for two years after getting sick. There is gas too; you are risking your life going in. Now I am going to enter and by the afternoon I [could] be dead. That’s how it is. You do not feel anything in the mine. – Doña Julia