You know you´ve become a local dignitary when...

A couple of weeks ago I was asked to judge a children´s talent show. It was the night before "dia del estudiante" and the school in the town where I have been staying was having a talent show and competition to find the "Ñusta 2012" (something like the princess of the school for that year). I went along just to watch out of a general sense of curiosity, but sitting towards the back of the hall where the event was about to take place, I kept hearing one of the teachers call out plaintively for the town´s judge to make an appearance. However, his absence continued to be pronounced, and when a couple of teachers started to look in my direction and mutter to each other, I had a feeling what might be coming next. I was asked to join the two secondary school teachers who were already sat on the judging panel, and the show was ready to begin.

Now I don´t know if you´ve ever had to judge a ñusta competition in a Bolivian primary school but it´s trickier than you might think. The girls trot out one by one dressed very nicely in a costume traditional in one of Bolivia´s nine departments, and dancing a dance typical of the region. You have to score the girls in such categories as their personality, their costume, and their dancing. The fact that you have to compare girls aged between about 5 and 11 makes it rather taxing comparing the merits of each girl, because of course a girl aged 5 cannot possibly be expected to dance as well as one twice her age. In fact it was hardly surprising that she barely looked like she know what was expected of her.

For the record, we chose a girl aged about 9 who was dressed in the costume typical of Chuquisaca and was dancing pujllay. I think we made a wise choice. Surprisingly, I thought, none of the rest of the girls seemed to be too upset about losing out.

After the competition there was dancing from individual students and groups. The strangest act of the night was a girl doing Indian style dancing, complete with full comstume (she was quite good), but certainly the most innappropriate was a girl of about 9 years old dancing reggaeton.

At the end all the teachers came on to do an act based on the Mexican TV programme "El Chavo del 8". Though many of the adults probably enjoyed it (i did), the kids merely seemed rather bemused.