So..what were you doing in Peru again?

Riiiight! I haven’t said a word about how my research is going. Maybe that is a sign already, or maybe I just think that it would bore you. Not too much exciting stuff has happened really. So far things took longer than I would have liked them to take, although expecting things to move quicker would probably be unrealistic.

In the first week I merely requested some documents in Villa El Salvador (which were ready the next Monday), and got to review some documents already present at DESCO. The second week was a bit more productive. I had a couple of meetings with people who might be able to help me out in a number of ways. The most important was the meeting with a man who has lots of experience in getting to information stowed away in the archives of municipalities. His services will cost much more than expected, and the time needed to obtain all the documents leaves me with little time to actually process them… but that’s just how life is. In the end he cut his price a bit and estimated an optimum of one month, so we got started this week in pulling all the strings to get documents.

Since my experiences with the municipality of Villa El Salvador were positive (I got most of the information within 4 business days), I decided to ask for the lists of projects per year in the other three districts as well. These lists are obligatory documents drawn at the end of each PP round, and simply list the prioritized projects and the funds assigned to them. Nothing more, nothing less, easy to find. Last Friday I arrived at DESCO at 9.00, but had to wait for an hour and a bit to get my accreditation because of the many meetings going on. After that I took the bus for a 30 minute trip through the desert, to get to Lurín. For the first time in a while, I smelled ‘fresher’ air. I say fresher, because it did still not qualify as fresh air per se. At the responsible agency I handed in my request, explained the situation, and they said it would be ready by next Wednesday. Uncomplicated, not as I expected it, exactly the way I like it.

The next stop was Villa Maria del Triúnfo. To get there I had to go through a little adventure, but that story remains for another time. Positively surprised with Lurín, I wrongfully expected a similar course of events in Villa Maria. I explained the situation, what documents I was looking for, and kind of expected a nod or a smile or something. Instead, this man kept looking at me… Just when he noted I started to feel uncomfortable, he started to complain: “Don’t you know how hard it is to get these documents? How much time I need to spend on you, your requests and those of your friends? I think it is not fair. If I do this, you benefit. DESCO benefits. But what do I get? Do you think that this is fair, señor Kevin?” Riiight. I could have told him that there is this freedom of information act and that it is his job to fulfill this type of requests, and that what he got out of it was his #%@ salary. That is in fact what I told him, in my head. Before I could come up with a diplomatic answer though, he had already continued: “And why are you here, and not the woman who signed this letter? Who is she? Where is she? I think she should come here!” I explained again that the information was for me, but that didn’t help. “Ya.. So I think you, this woman, and your friend (by now I discovered he meant Francesca, who had requested a couple of things too) should come here together, so we can coordinate things. I want to have a signed agreement that DESCO analyses the state of our district in exchange for this information. And not signed by this boss of the urban programme. I want the big chief in Lima.” I couldn’t believe it. This man wanted DESCO to invest thousands of man hours in exchange for 5 documents of no more than 3 or 4 pages each. I actually asked him to repeat it, because I assumed my understanding of Spanish must have failed me somehow. The second time around I understood exactly the same though. Later that night he actually repeated the demands to Francesca, who was at a PP meeting in the district. I explained to him that, as a student, I have no power whatsoever over DESCO’s resources. The only thing I could offer him, I said, were the fruits of my labour. Before I knew it he was trying to attack my research ideas: “You shouldn’t compare the southern districts, because they are shit. I am from the north, from Comas. I am a popular representative there, and there the PP mechanism works perfectly. You should compare the south with the north!” Just what I needed. After an hour of brabbling the man finally realized that I had stolen his lunch time. That was the only satisfaction I got out of it.

After a short walk, bus trip and another short walk I arrived in San Juan de Miraflores’ City Hall, which is for some reason five times the size of all the other city halls together. There is so much space in that building, that some floors are completely empty. To fill the room a bit the office of urban planning had evenly distributed the desks throughout the area, which meant that each employee was about a football field away from the next (ok, exaggerated). After the cold shower of Villa Maria, I was received with warmth, cordiality and great interest. The director first questioned me on my research ideas and democracy in the Netherlands, and then called upon an architect in the department. We continued to talk a bit, and then the architect invited me into a meeting room. There he explained for about an hour and a half about the institutional arrangements of the presupuesto participativo in his district. Unfortunately they were not able to provide me with any documents at that moment, but they were themselves in the process of reviewing all the years of participatory budgeting. It would only be a matter of time before all relevant documents showed up. If that’s true I don’t know, but we exchanged contact information and this Monday I sent him an e-mail to know how we could arrange things. Should I come in and ‘help’ in going through documents? That way I can find what I need, and they would have the information too. Would be a good idea, right?

So that is more or less what I am at. Currently I am ordering projects of Villa El Salvador per district to plan a visiting route. That way I can try to verify in the field if a project was implemented and make some pictures. With a 150 projects, it does get kind of complicated finding a proper route though. I’ll let you know how it turned out!