Point 1
Intro – New Indian Plaza de Armas
So many paths crisscross and intersect in a city. The meaning of the network that
these paths taken together form, rests in all of its parts… or perhaps, in none of its
parts.
The main plaza of Cusco is nothing more than the serendipitous site of encounter of
many paths arriving at the same point from all directions. And, above all, this plaza
is the site of new beginnings, of new histories, of new paths that carve out new
trajectories for the soul.
Can you see, with your attentive, thoughtful eye, the many silent layers of the past
that have built up over time in this space? Can you imagine all of the emotions that
have been poured out into this quadrilateral?
Can you feel the heaviness and hesitation as you contemplate the next step you
take? Can you feel the stirrings of the dizzying emotions that will transform you as
you embark on your next journey?
I am a new indian. I am shaped by all the converging paths from the past. I am
shaped by the volume of the mountains that surround us. I am brought to
consciousness by the magnificent vistas seen from the mountain peaks, that are
always… always… always… crowned by the chaska, the wandering star.
I am a new indian. Many bloods have been poured into me, just like the waters that
pour into the earth and make it fertile.
I am a new indian. NOQA RUNA. For me, being human is nothing new.
1. The Ushnu of Huacaypata and the Cathedral
No traces of the Ushnu remain. Nonetheless, that missing sacred stone still hears
what the stone that once stood next to it says.
The Ushnu of the Incas once presided over the plaza from where the cathedral now
sits, but it is no longer. It was once the altar where the four directions and the four
districts, or suyos, of the Incan world were united. The Ushnu was also the starting
point for the Qhapaq Nan, the great highway that reached out into the far corners of
the four suyos and made them one.
From this altar of the Ushnu, the Incan elders give thanks to the Apus, the mountain
gods, for successful crops and marvellous feats. The elders raised exquisite cups of
chicha here at the Ushnu to give thanks to Saramama, goddess of maize. The elders
also spoke from this site with Tayta Inti, our father the sun, and Mama Killa, our
mother the moon. Does the power of their prayers of thanks still flow within me?
What magnificent foundations this altar had, what sturdy stones they were to
endure so much… to endure even today.
The cathedral was built intentionally on top of the Ushnu. It took 93 years to
construct. Saqsayhuaman was dismantled and its magnificent stones moved and
reshaped into what you see now. This construction squeezed the life out of the
natives of Cusco who did the work, crushing them, literally. This building had to
impose itself. It had to expel any and all idolatries. It consumed and sated itself with
the creative powers of the three, even four, generations of indians who built it.
Have the bearded ones, united with the power of the horse, been able to remove all
traces of what went before them from me? Has their endlessly intoned evangelism
not yet reached the point of exhaustion? I remain silent, mooring my being to the
living stone, at the very entrance to what the bearded ones constructed. We all enter
and hail the images in the Cathedral. But in silent reverence, we also see and honour
those other images hidden there by indian hands that speak to us.
I’m just another nobody in this plaza. There are centuries of emotions that pass
through me here. I come here to come to terms with those emotions, to look at the
sky, and to look for your face every evening.