Diego

We got to know Diego a little better in the restaurant. Ofer had given him the promised reward of $1500 last January, and now he asked Diego what he had done with the money.
The police had taken $200 from him - not the mountain police, but the regular criminal police. We were outraged, but Diego smiled sweetly and said he'd given it to them willingly.
He'd spent another $500 to send his oldest child, a boy in his late teens, to study cooking in Arequipa. We were very gratified to hear that, because that had been Asher's profession, something Diego couldn't have known. He had spent the remaining $800 on a private operation for his wife, who had a tumor, because if they had waited for an operation through the national health services, it might have been too late to operate at all. She was still sick, he said, and there were going to be more expenses.
Then and there we decided to give him another $500 from the funds that our friends and relatives had contributed in Asher's memory.
Diego, who is in his mid-forties, makes a living, if you could call it that, by gathering cochineal, a red dye made from insects that live on cactuses. He roams through the Colca Canyon looking for cactuses infested with the insects and gathers as many as theee kilograms of the stuff every day - weather permitting.
Diego found Asher because he had been looking for cochineal in an area of the canyon where he usually doesn't go, it was starting to rain, so he took a shortcut home, and on the way caught sight of Asher's hat and backpack.
Ofer asked him how much he's paid for the cochineal (which was selling for between $50 and $80 per kilogram in 2005, according to some Web sites I have recently seen). Diego gets $5 per kilogram for what he gathers. So on a really good day, he makes $15. When it rains, and he can't go out looking, he obviously doesn't earn a penny, and if he's not lucky, he gathers a lot less than three kilograms. The material that he gathers looks like a greyish powder on the surface of the cactus. Gathering three kilograms of it would take a very long time, even if you found it quickly and easily.
Diego's seven-year old daughter, Miriam, was a bright, delightful child, with a charming smile and lots of energy. She had a great time in the restaurant, enjoying her food and the Inca Cola she'd ordered. But she was too bashful to repeat the poem she'd recited at the ceremony in the school yard. Her older brother, who was also with us, was a quiet, twelve-year old, with his father's shyness.
What will happen to them? Their mother's health is poor, and how long can Diego keep roaming up and down the canyon looking for cochineal? The older son, who's learning to be a cook, is the family's main hope.
We were lucky that Diego found Asher at all. The rains started soon after the body was discovered, and if his remains hadn't been found then, they might never have been found. Diego was lucky that he found Asher. The prize money saved his wife's life and gave the family hope for the future.
We were glad that the man who benefitted was such a deserving person.