The LUM

The message universally implicit in missionary blogs is that missionaries never get sick, but spend their days continuously enjoying interesting and faith promoting experiences in perfect health. Fake News. Fact: missionaries get sick.

This last Saturday morning Evie, trying to recover from a sinus infection and the side effects of medications (sleep deprivation), had little interest in venturing out in search of yet more interesting experiences. Instead, she was looking forward to a Saturday morning of simply sleeping (a lot), and when awake, reading.

After confirming that Evie really didn’t want him around interrupting her sleeping and reading, Mike took the opportunity to do something he really wanted to:  a visit to the “Lugar de la memoria, la tolerancia y la inclusión social” in Miraflores.  (Since it is a museum entirely in Spanish, it is not high on Evie’s list of things to do in Lima.) 

Twenty years of the Shining Path

After 12 years of military rule in Peru, free elections were finally held in 1980 and a civilian president and legislature were elected and put in place. That same year, however, the Communist Party of Peru, more commonly known as the “Shining Path,” which had rejected any participation in the election, set about to replace this new “bourgeois democracy” with "New Democracy" through “armed struggle.”  So began a bloody twenty year struggle between the government and terrorists that nearly toppled the democratic government in Peru. The Shining Path attacks began in the small villages in the highlands, but eventually terrorist murders and car bombings came to Lima and to the very center of the government. In the end, the terrorists were defeated, but the brutal tactics of the terrorists and the government's military “death squads" that targeted them resulted in the deaths or “disappearance” of over 69,000 (no one really knows with any certainty).

The story of the Shining Path and the government’s fight against them (and its continuing repercussions in Peruvian politics) is fascinating but best left for another time. This post is about Peru’s way of remembering, and hopefully, for future generations, learning from that tragic period.

   

The Place (not museum) of Memory

The LUM, as it is usually called (as in – Lugar de Memoria),[1] is a record of that time, excellently presented with the tools modern museums now use to explain things in graphic and engaging ways. Despite the intensity of feelings about that era, its continuing role in current politics and the fact that it is government funded, the LUM nevertheless seemed to represent a genuine effort to provide a “balanced” account.  Indeed, one of LUM’s leading premises is that “it is not possible to fit all these memories into a single one, [rather] different ways of seeing and giving meaning to the violence of the past is part of reality.” Its goal is to use “these divergent views to provide the population the tools to critically examine questions of violence and authoritarianism in light of the need to protect human dignity and respect for democratic institutions.”

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[1]Here in Peru they have the useful practice of including vowels in their acronyms in order to have a pronounceable word, not just a series of letters. That way we get “LUM,” a nice sounding word suggestive of light (luz and iluminar), instead of a bureaucratic LMTIS.

This a may be the most affecting part of the museum. Nearly life size, ordinary people, tell their stories. It is problematic since once you start to listen (and even with my rudimentary Spanish I could generally follow them) you want to hear it all, all of them. It is a problem because that takes time and most of us are “drive by browsers” at museums. The woman on the left, who was assaulted by government soldiers, is telling her experiences and the effect on her and a daughter later in life. The man on the right with crutches is telling of a Shining Path car bombing. Another is a man telling of an older brother who joined the Shining Path. 

Germans

In 2008 Heidemarie Wieczorek-Zeul, the German Minister of Economic Cooperation and Development, visited Peru in connection with a European - Latin American conference. While in Peru, she saw a presentation about some Peruvians in the highlands seeking to preserve the memory of those lost in this terrorism. Deeply affected, she suggested a building to commemorate this period of violence and the dignity of the victims. In fact, the German government donated two million euros to Peru for that purpose. That was the beginning of the project.

I was not surprised by the interest and involvement of the German government in this project.  Several years ago, Evie and I visited Dachau (WWII death camp) while we were in Germany.  On the day we were there most of the other visitors were students. High school students in Germany are required to visit a death camp as part of the school curriculum, in an effort to assure that future generations understand and, therefore, do not repeat mistakes of the past.

Unlike Germany, I do not believe high school students in Peru are required to visit the LUM, although it might be a good idea. Nonetheless, while I was there on a Saturday morning there were several other visitors – all mostly young people. I think that is a good thing. In fact, I think it would be a good thing if Americans visited this place. There may be some lessons here for us too.