Jungle Livelihoods

5:30am, the sun hasn’t even risen yet, and I’m on my way to watch a family’s daily routine of making Chankaka, a hardened block of sugar cane juice used for sweetener. They’ve been up since 4am though, and when I arrive they have already ground down half of the sugar cane stalks and three large buckets are filled with the remaining liquid that is taken out.

The simple machine they are using is known in Spanish as a Trapinche, and it is powered by animals, two horses in this case, who walked around in circles attached to a lever that spun the cylinders of the trapinche round and round.

Operating this machine was a family of 6, 2 twin 14 year olds, a male and a female couple of about 40 years old, a 66 year old mother/mother in law, and an 11 month old baby, and all contributed to one of the family’s livelihoods of making chankaka. The horses were powered by one of the 14 year olds who ran behind these graceful beasts, urging them on with the snap of a whip or the click of the tongue. The husband and wife of the home stood on either side of the trapinche, feeding the sugar cane stalks into the cylinders. Another son stood nearby with the 11 month old baby, entertaining her by chasing after the first boy operating the horses. The mother in law helped by carrying away the used sugar cane stalks to feed to the other livestock around the farm, washing out the tank used to boil the sugar cane juice, making breakfast.

When the family finished grinding the sugar cane, the juice still had to be boiled, which is a task that takes 6 hours, and then placed into molds to harden and taken to Lamas to sell. Other tasks for the day included milking cows and harvesting more sugar cane for the next day, going to school, making lunch…

This hard morning of work is crucial to this family’s livelihood and each person plays a crucial role in the process.