352 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1957 



sectors of the coast where coconut palms thrive, these trees provide 

 one of the principal crops, but only one with some financial backing 

 can undertake to plant a grove, because his family must somehow 

 live while waiting the 3 or 4 years until the trees begin to bear. In 

 these groves hogs are fattened on the residue of coconut meats after 

 the oil has been extracted; they are kept in pens off the ground so 

 that they cannot run off the fat they accumulate. 



In recent years there has been a steady rise in the high rates of 

 natural increase among this population, inured as it is to extremely 

 unfavorable living conditions, in spite of dire predictions to the 

 contrary. 2 Those who live through infancy are tough — they prove 

 it by their survival. Moreover, interest in improving general health 

 conditions, particularly in the field of infant care, has been aroused on 

 a national scale, with the result that in the Guajira, too, the rate of 

 infant mortality, though still high, has been greatly decreased. Gov- 

 ernment-sponsored public-health measures are being pushed. Even 

 in remote corners of Venezuela houses are regularly sprayed with 

 DDT to eradicate malarial mosquitoes, as well as other household 

 vermin. The drilling of wells and the installation of windmills, 

 in many sectors of the Guajira on both sides of the border, to provide 

 an adequate supply of uncontaminated water for human and animal 

 consumption, has gone a long way toward decreasing the incidence 

 of gastroenteritis, dysentery, typhoid, and other water-borne diseases, 

 which are still among the leading causes of death. 



The per capita consumption of alcohol in the Guajira appears to 

 be exceedingly high. Each little store lost in the immensity of the 

 bush, even when its entire stock is not worth more than a few dollars, 

 has on hand a barrel of firewater. The tired wayfarer or visitor often is 

 proffered an alcoholic drink, or a dozen drinks, rather than food. 

 Tremendous quantities of beer and hard liquors are drunk with no 

 thought of eating anything at all. On one occasion, my chauffeur and 

 his host (the husband of his cousin), while waiting for breakfast, 

 tossed off six cold beers, presumably by way of recovering from the 

 long bout of the night before. As a binge continues on into its sec- 

 ond or third day, or longer, less and less thought will be given to the 

 consumption of solid food. After an Indian has performed a piece of 

 hard manual labor — changing and repairing the tire of a truck, for 

 example — it is customary to give him a shot or more of powerful fire- 

 water, rather than a substantial meal, by way of compensation. To 

 be sure, the reward of a drink has become so common and accepted 

 that it would perhaps come as an unwelcome imiovation if food were 

 offered instead. One cannot but feel, however, that a half-and-half 



Weston, Julian A., The cactus eaters, p. 130. London, 1937. 



