Ana Teresa Torres de Forero has been preparing chicha, an alcoholic drink made from corn, in the La Perseverancia neighborhood of downtown Bogotá since she was 10 years old. Today, this 82-year-old woman, along with several other women in the neighborhood, has become a symbol of traditional Chichera heritage.
“The chicha feeds itself,” repeats Doña Tere, as those who know her call her. He also assures that, in his personal experience, this ancestral drink of the Muisca indigenous tradition, with variable alcohol content depending on the fermentation process, can relieve anemia and gastritis, among other healing powers. “My grandmother, who lived to be 110, told me that the Indians lived so long because they consumed chicha. And both me and my sisters and my brother grew up with chicha.”
For many years, the sale of chicha in neighborhoods was harassed and criminalized by those who had an interest in people consuming other beverages
Doña Tere’s house, where she lives with her youngest daughter Sandra, is the same one she inherited from her grandmother, who bought it for 150 pesos (three cents at the current exchange rate) in the days of the first settlements in the neighborhood has. . . ). Torres lived there, his grandmother Ana Francisca, his parents (Anastasio and Eloísa), his three sisters and his brother: a total of eight people. It was his mother who brought the chicha recipe to the family. However, Eloísa died very young, at the age of 33. “My mother believed one of those liars who came here to sell medicine and took something that made her sick until she died,” recalls Torres, who was young at the time. His grandmother Ana Francisca was responsible for the further preparation of the drink.
Doña Tere, in her home in the neighborhood of La Perseverancia, in Bogotá, Colombia.Diego Battistessa
A colorful neighborhood with a working-class soul, La Perseverancia is a living reminder of the city that predates the old Bavaria Brewery built in 1890 by Bavaria Kopp’s Deutscher Bierbrauerei in the San Diego neighborhood. As the book Por la calle 32: historia de un barrio (published by the Corporación Bogotá Cultura) has compiled, this neighborhood was founded in 1912 under the name Unión Obrera by the brewery workers who were looking for a stable place to organize with their families, and that was close to the company.
Doña Tere is a descendant of the neighborhood’s first residents and was already born at the time of the assassination of Bogotá’s mayor and presidential candidate Jorge Elicier Gaitán (April 9, 1948) and the ensuing social outburst that has gone down in history as Bogotazo. “This war was huge, the streets were full of dead people and my whole family had to lock themselves in the house because my father was friends with Gaitán and had a lot of photos of him,” he recalls with emotion. “Gaitán often came to visit La Perseverancia and on several occasions he would chat and drink chicha with my father Anastasio in that house,” he explains.
Today the neighborhood is different, the brewery plant has closed its doors and from that period there is a statue of Gaitán and the traditional Chicha, the elaboration of which is now continued by the daughter of the old Chichera. “I have five children, one boy and four girls, and Sandra inherited the Chicha tradition, making her the fourth generation in my family to follow this tradition,” Doña Teresa proudly comments.
In 1947, Bogotá banned fermented and corn-based beverages and attempted to close all chicherías in the city. Today the drink is legal and there is even a celebration of the girl, life and happiness.
There are many awards the veteran Chichera has received: from the Bogotá Mayor’s Office, from the District Institute of Cultural Heritage and from the University of San Mateo for her work in “Protecting Traditional Colombian Cuisine”. But his work has not always been well regarded. For many years, the sale of chicha in neighborhoods was harassed and criminalized by those who had an interest in people consuming other beverages. “Chicha is brutal,” repeated street officials, the same ones who, as Doña Tere recounted, often “went into the neighborhood to spread our chicha on the streets when it was still illegal.”
The archives of the city of Bogotá keep the documents that tell the story of the persecution against the production, consumption and sale of chicha in the city. The first text dates from 1691 and is addressed to the Royal Council of the Indies. It describes the consequences of consuming chicha, made by the indigenous people, as part of the fight against alcoholic beverages. The Bogotá, D.C. Council’s 1947 Convention Paper 52 contains the laws that made fermented and corn-based beverages illegal, thereby attempting to shut down all chicherías in the city.
Today, however, the production and sale of chicha is legal and there are some unexpected ones among Doña Tere’s customers. “People from all over the world and all kinds come here: tourists, students and also many police officers who want chicha for their parties.”
The mayor’s office itself has the task of promoting this tradition within the framework of measures to protect the cultural heritage of the citizens. Every October since 1995, the Festival of Chicha, Life and Happiness is held, an event that focuses on the La Perseverancia neighborhood and where old and new generation chiccheras can offer their drink to an international audience… And a little history of Bogotá.
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