For a short time, the row of vibrant wrapped metal roofs in Bolivia’s mountain community of El Alto which have been called locally as “suicide homes” due to the tremendous risk their occupants face distracts from the horrifying scene below. A steep drop just inches from the residences. The thin line of fragile buildings dangles on the edge of an earthen precipice that drops hundreds of feet to the granite slope below. The homes’ nickname comes from the fact that experts and local authorities claim the cliff is crumbling making them even dangerously risky.
Aymara shamans called Yatiris frequently use the unstable houses as places of employment where they offer sacrifices to the Pachamama or Earth Mother. However, the foundations of the buildings are being weakened more and more by intense rains and global warming. But even though the back doors of the dilapidated houses only have a small ledge before the ground falls away entirely.
“We are not going to move from this place, because this is our daily work place,” said yatiri Manuel Mamani, making an offering to the Pachamama with a fire outside his home.
As a result local authorities constructed cable cars to facilitate transportation. Furthermore, climate change has made that terrain increasingly dangerous due to increasingly intense weather patterns.
“The precipice in this valley is 90 degrees.That is precisely why we want them to leave this place, if they do not want to leave we are going to have to use force,” said Gabriel Pari, municipal secretary of water, sanitation, environmental management and risk at El Alto’s mayoral office.
