Masacre de Santiago Atilan

Dos de diciembre de 1,990
Trece personas dsesinadas por el ejercit
Don Juam Sacaxoy (perdio´ familiares)
Communidad maya tzutuhil

This story begins with American priests coming to this area in the mid 1960´s. In the 70´s these priests began to teach liberation theology to the local people. They taught people how to read and write and how to take better care of themselves. Around 1978 Padre Francisco, de Oklahoma, came to Guatemala. He came as a missionary to spread the word of God, to help the poor, the orphans and widows. Padre gathered a group of people to become catechist and they set about doing God´s work. In 1980 the army began to have a presence in this pueblo and began terrorizing the indigenous people. Padre also bought a small farm so that the people could began to have a better life. He taught they how to farm so that their crops were plentiful and he helped them learn better methods for sanitation.

When the army arrive they began ¨discussions¨with Padre Francisco. They wanted to buy his farm and accused him of being a communist and for gathering people and spreading communism en Guatemala. He tried to explain what he was doing and they killed him. This was sometime around 27 julio de 1982. The army began killing the catechist and this is when Don Juan Sacaxoy fled to the mountain with so of the other compañeros. The army violated many men and women and children and killed many of the indigenous people. The repression went on for 10 more years before the peace accords were officially signed.

One day the army was going to execute a man in front of the church. He started screaming and all of a sudden all the church bells started ringing and everyone began hitting their pots and pans. What was so unusual about this was that the bells ringing and the clattering of pots and pans meant their was a lunar eclipse. All the towns people began to come out into the streets and said ¨we have had enough.¨ It was estimated that about 5,000 had gathered and they marched toward the army encampment. Until this time the towns people had not really fought back. But this particular day enough was enough. The army slaughtered hundreds of men and women this day. When the battle was over the townspeople would not leave the bodies for the army to claim. They remained with their people for 3 days before the international human rights people could get there. It was then verified that it truly was a slaughter and that the army was in violation of the indigenous peoples human rights.

As the men and women were fighting together Don Juan Sacaxoy told us that they were all equals. The people from the country were being taught how to read and write by their compañeros who were from the city. Many of the city men and women were univeristy professors and they were taught how to survive in the mountains by the country men and women. In order to survive they shared resources, they helped when someone was wounded, each person had weapons-they were all equal.

The U.S. government had been providing financial resources for the army to ¨fight the hundreds of thousands of guerrillas¨. As it turned out the army had thousands of solders and the guerrillas number less than 500 at any given time. The U.S.A. was considered to be a terroist country by local Guatemalans because they helped the army continue the repression for so many years.

Santiago Atitlan was the first city to sign a peace accord between the army and the guerrillas, and the United Nations officially expelled the army from this pueblo.

Third week of Español

When I wake up in the mornings I am speaking beautiful Español, in my head. But I have to admit that when I actually start speaking the language I feel like a fool and for whatever reason now I can hear my accent. Before learning to speak Español I never realized that I had a southern accent. Did ya´know that I spoke southern? I do understand a whole lot more than I speak. Our classes are totally in Español--no English--and I find myself saying ¨Si¨ a whole lot and then I sit back and think did I really understand what was just said or was ¨si¨an automatic response.

Anyway, I did start yoga this week and attended classes regularly for three days before getting the Guatemalan bug. Yep, I finally got real sick, but immediately went to a lab and verified that I had gotten ever parasite known to the Quetzalteco´s. The school, PLQ, recommended a clinic close by so I went there. Not to gross you out...well I won´t even go there then. But needless to say I got the bugs. The clinic said my results would not be available until 2 p.m. so I went back home. Fausto, the man whose family I live with said ¨no¨. So Fausto and I go back to the clinic, he talks with them, they give me back my ¨sample¨ and he and I go to another lab. This lab is also owned by the doctor who also owns the pharmacy. And within 30 minutes I am on my way to mi casa having paid a total of 57 Quetzales for the lab, the doctor, and medication. This is approximately $7.50. I think that Central America must be the one place Americans CAN afford to get sick. After 1 day of strong medication I am already much better.

This week I am doing yoga in the mornings and Español en la tarde, 2 - 7 p.m. Since there are fewer students in the evening classes our school day trips are much easier to manage. Nothing as exciting this week as last week though so I only went on one trip which was to Almolonga. This is a small pueblo about 30 minutes out of Xela. Oh yea, and I took my first Chicken Bus ride that day. Almolonga is known for its famous vegetable market. At the market I bought a whole lot of produce for the house and spent less than $10.

Last night at la escuela we had the international cena. We had so much comida. I love potlucks. There is a woman from New Orleans, here at PLQ, and she made jambalaya. It was good and even though I had been sick earlier that day I ate two helpings of it and then a lot of other foods. A man from Japan made great rice rolls, and we had a lot of other great foods as well.

Today I have been walking around Xela for a couple of hours. At Pargque Central there are huge demonstrations going on. The upcoming presidential election is only weeks away and the young Guatemala´s for social justice and change are having a great day. Not understanding the language and all of the history of injustice that has been done to these people, I find it difficult to stay for any length of time.

At PLQ we had several conferences this week. One was on the presidential election and the other one was about a mining project that displaced and entire pueblo. These indigenous people were forcible removed from their land by the government who leased their prosperous property to a Canadian mining company. In all of the conferences the United States government has been one of Guatemala´s worse culprits to violate the local people and their economy. The US involvement goes way back many many years with the CIA and J. Edgar Hoover. There is much to learn here. It seems the US government finances a lot of the corruption. This way they can continue to have a strong hold on Central America.

Well another week of school has ended and my first month in Guatemala. My prayer is that I learn Español and that all of you have peace in your life too.

Third week of espaañol

This is the beginning of my third week of Spanish immersion class. How many weeks does it take before I will feel like I can form a sentence, I ask you? Possibly I know more this week than the previous week, but I cannot tell, yet. And when the teacher continually says bueno then how can I measure any progress. I keep you updated though.

And yesterday I started yoga classes at 6:50 in the morning and I arranged for my language classes to be in the afternoon. The workout yesterday was very good, but when the instructor came over and pushed on both of my knees to make them go closer to the floor I thought I was going to rip wide open. Today was better, but I was ready for him today. When he started ¨gently¨ pushing on my knees I just gave him the thumbs up and he laughed, but he stopped. I can already tell that it will be similar to my Spanish progress, practico, practico, practico. I paid for the month rather than by individual class so now I am obligated to go, right? That´s how my brain works.

This weeks the school has arranged many activities so look later in the week for more entries.

Cena nacional

In an early posting I mentioned that there was going to be a dinner on Friday evening. Seis maestra/o sang español songs and served us lots of local good food. I really enjoyed the evening and I think everyone else did as well. Six or seven students who were graduating/leaving talked a bit about their experiences here at PLQ. One woman, Andrea who was only at the school for one week became proficient at making tortillas (not really). But she wrote a poem to her maestra about the tortilla making process. It was funny. This school is a great fit for me and I recommend it to anyone who is thinking of comging to Guatemala to study Español. If you have not checked the school out please do so by clicking on the link provided below and pass this info on to. http://www.hermandad.com/projects_spanish.html At the dinner we had lots of music, singing, food, dancing and great conversation en ambo ingles y español.

On Saturday 7 of us hired Oscar, the man who drives students to many of the school activities around Xela, to take us to Lago Atitlan. To get more information than I could possibly share with you please click on http://santiagoatitlan.com/. The lake is surrounded by several active volcanoes and the area is so lush and green and absolutely beautiful. We left the school around 6:45 a.m. and returned around 7 p.m. the same evening. It was a great trip and a very good way of getting better acquainted with other students. On this particular trip we were all Americans. Many thanks to Andrea and Lisa for arranging a great outing. For some reason all of the women selling their wares approached me and were very insistent upon me buying stuff from them. It was very funny. I must have said ¨no¨ a thousand times yesterday. Finally I gave in and bought a beautiful woven piece of material.

After returning to Xela, Jennifer, from the Bywater in New Orleans, and I when to the local India restaurant for a delicious dinner. There are many good places to eat here in Xela. I have eaten at a Cuban cafe that I really like, a somewhat OK Thai place, and two restaurants that serve Indian food, plus a good cheap taco chain. So far I have been able to restrain myself from eating at any of the food stalls. I just don´t want to get sick. The family I live with repeatedly reminds me that the food stalls are not sanitary. The smells are delicious but I refrain. I do have to admit that I have been off BEANS for cuatro dias. Too much hablo español (if you get my drift)!

Today I went to church with Fautos, el senior en mi casa. Even though I know the rituals of the catolico ingelsia I was lost quite a bit. After mass Fausto and I walked around Xela almost 2 hours. Once we got back to mi casa and sat down for lunch we were both starved. Glaydis, his wife always serves me too much food, but today it was just enough.

adios amgios

The second week of language school is over

Well folks I completed yet another full week of Español immersion. I heard you ask if I could habla español. Si, hablo español unpiqueto. Es poco, poco, poco. Remember that I am not as young as I used to be so I am allowing myself the luxury of not stressing (too much) over my progress/lack of. But as we all know it is one day at a time, and especially here in Guatemala. Today I acknowledged to mi maestro that I was hestitante to speak español, but I realized also that I could understand a lot more each day. So I have to practico, practico, practico.

Yesterday I went on a field trip with 14 other students to Zunil. It is a farming community about 30 minutes from Xela. http://www.thresholds.net/zunil/index.html We walked around the pueblo and visit a catholic church, a cooperative run by local indigenous women, and then we went to visit San Simon. (The following is copied) San Simón is housed in a squat, large, one-room dwelling that sits with another building and a wooden shack in a dirt yard surrounded by a four-foot stone wall. This compound is at the edge of the farms across the valley floor from the main part of town. San Simón is a life-sized doll who sits in a hand-carved, wooden throne-like chair against the wall away from the door of this building. He was dressed (they change his clothes like they do the saints in the churches) in black cowboy boots, slacks, red vest, black gloves, white shirt with black tie, rainbow-tinted, reflective, aviator sunglasses and a fedora. His face is a painted wooden mask. There is another mask sitting on a side table. Directly in front of him are many votive candles and candlesticks in white, blue, purple, red, green, yellow, and black without holders. The candlesticks are stuck to the cement floor with melted wax. On either side of this glowing pond are large vases of flowers. Crudely made, low benches line the side walls and the close ceiling is hung with strings of plastic banners of Pepsi signs and tissue paper cut outs. There are no windows in this room and no interior lighting except the candles. The dusty, butterscotch afternoon sun came through the wide, low doorway, a sea of floating particles of earth and incense. You have to see this so please go to the following link. http://www.visitguatemala.com/nuevo/ver_servicio.asp?id=3572

This week has been filled with language classes and afternoon and evening events. The movie we were to see earlier this week was changed because we could not get the English subtitles to work on the film. So instead we watched a Michael Douglas film Traffic which was OK. It is a story about drug smuggling between Mexico and the United States. The funny thing about this movie was that as we listen to it in English it had English subtitles, but when they were speaking Spanish there were no subtitles. But as we all know actions speak louder than words. Afterwards I walked home alone at 10 p.m. In order to get to where I live I have to walk through a barrio where once I used the winos as landmarks. But at night the winos are different men than the daytime drunks. It was kind of scary when they started yelling ¨gringo¨. Later I learned that it was not to threaten me but only to ask me for money. But being an experienced city walker I just walked faster as you all can imagine.

Tonight is graduation night for students who are leaving. Faculty and staff are providing dinner and students bring drinks. So I have to get going so that I can buy something for myself and others to enjoy.

Great experiences

Well is has been a few days since my last posting. I could give you plenty of reasons why I have not written more, but they would probably be boring to you all. As I have mentioned before Internet access is available but not always reliable. Just yesterday while in school we were without electricity for about an hour. It seems that this is a common occurrence throughout Guatemala. No electricity also meant no water and not bathroom. So you can imagine at 8:30 in the morning after everyone has had breakfast and coffee...

I started my second week in Español immersion. This school, PLQ, as mentioned in my previous entry, really seems committed to social justice and progress for women and men. Some of the things that set them apart from other schools is that they offer paid vacation, sick time, and their teachers have contracts which means that they are not waiting for the telefono to ring on martes to let them know if they have work for the week. This school feels like a good fit for me so today I paid through the first week of septiembre. I will stay at the school until after 15 septiembre which will be a huge celebration of Guatemala achieving independence from Spain. After that I plan on a short trip to Mexico for three or four few days so that I can get my passport stamped. One can stay for 90 days on a stamp so I figure that after about 7 or 8 weeks of the immersion experience I will be ready for a vacation. And then I can stay until my return date of 8 diciembre.

Yesterday the school held a conference for students. Remember now that this school has a very strong stance on social justice issues. A young man who is now 39 years old who had fought as a guerrilla against the army came and told of his experiences during the years of the conflict. It has only been since the very late 1990´s that the peace accords were signed. His told of how his entire family had to leave Guatemala for Mexico before being slaughtered and then how some of them returned to fight. He trained in the mountains with only a few others. I was amazing to hear his stories. He talked about how the CIA financially supported the armies, he told stories of how the army killed, raped, and tortured entire pueblos. There were only hundreds of brave women and men serving as guerrillas who fought thousands of men trained by US military counterintelligence. It was breathtaking.

Today about 15 students went to Los Vahos, a natural sauna. It was a great afternoon and a very good way to get to know other students. The sauna is heated from the volcanoes and then getting into the cold shower afterwards was very refreshing. Tonight I will be attending a film at the school which will have a strong message about Guatemalan history that I will be able to tell you about later.

As the days go by I am beginning to have more español under my belt, but I still have many months to practice so that I will be able to at least order from a Mexican menu.

Adios Amigos

A trip to the mall

Well I ventured out via a "shuttle bus". Not only was it jammed pack with people but at one point we totaled 20 personas. Si vienta personas. It was not quite the experience I have heard of about riding the Chicken Bus but it must be similar on a much smaller scale. If you went to xelapages.com then maybe you read the story of the Chicken Bus driver who was fired because he was not driving fast enough and he was not under the influence of alcohol. When the authorities began to investigate his record before they fired him it was determined that he had already had several infractions on his driving record. Further exploration revealed that he did not have a drivers license to revoke because he was only 13 years old. The authorities said that the reason it all came to their attention was because he refused to pick up more passengers when the bus was full. The superintendent of the Chicken Bus company said company policy was that it was their business to make more room for passengers when there was none available.

Well anyway, my experience was not quite as involved as on the Chicken Bus, but it was an adventure. Fumes, the loud radio, people crammed into one another definitely made for an interesting ride out to the mall. And I hate to say it but it was to Wal-Mart, Central America. It was the place recommended to buy my yoga mat which is another story for later.

It seems that all I do now is eat. I don't think I have experienced one hunger pain since arriving in Guatemala. The day consist of breakfast, a mid-morning snack, lunch, mid-afternoon snack and then dinner. The stories reported of gringos not getting enough food is beyond me. They must be living on an extremely tight budget. Food is so affordable and everywhere that one could not possibly get skinny while here. Food is such an important part of the culture here, even more so than in Mississippi or Louisiana where I know that it is important.

Diploma para los debidos

Ha aprobado satisfactiriamente el Curo del Idioma Español que comprende: gramatica, composicion, estructuraction, redaccion, participacion en actividades culturales, actividades de proyeccion social y vivir con una familia guatemaltecca.

Well, don´t believe a word of what I just said. Simple put I received my first certificate of completion. Yep, already I completed mi primeria semana in español. If you could hear me speak Spanish you would not have awarded me this certificate I am sure. However, I.C.A. did recognize that I was there in attendance for a full week.

http://www.xelapages.com is the small magazine that caters to the gringos here in Xela. If you go to this site and click on ICA you will see the school that I have been attending all week. It really is not a bad school, as far as I can tell, however, next week I am moving to Proyecto Linguistico Quetzaleteco de Español (PLQ). At this website you will be able to read about it as well. Right now I have reserved a space for 4 weeks at the school in Xela and then the following 2 weeks in the Mountain School.

I still promise there are some pictures that will be appearing soon. As most of you know I am not a techie and so I have to get this thing figured out. Each time I go into my blog I have to remember how to get it to the English page so I can understand it, but before long you all may just be getting Spanish, who knows.

Dale has made it through his first week

Well it is has a while since my last correspondence and there is lots to mention. I spent my first week in Xela (shay-la) in the Casa Dona Mercedes hostel walking around and getting familiar with the city, and eating often it seemed. The hostel was a very nice mid-range priced hotel only 2 blocks from Parque Central and I would recommend it to any of you when you decide to travel to Guatemala. The park is where all the activities such as banco´s, mercado´s, and people watching take place. Already you can see that I am getting command of my new language, huh.

On Sunday I moved into the home of a local family. They have two lovely teenage daughters and a 10 years old girl. The girls all laugh at my Spanish accent (cannot imagine why though). The accommodations are very good. I am on the 3rd floor of their home with a very large private room and a private bathroom. I arrived at their home at 9 a.m. knowing they were going to church and I wanted to go with them. I made the assumption they would be catholic, not true. So my first experience of attending a religious service in español was in a very vibrant and loud Pentecostal church; I did not understand any other than the clapping.

On Monday I started language classes at ICA, a school established in 1979. There are probably 15 students in the morning and 15 in the evening. We each have an individual instructor 5 hours a day. But on my first day only after only 3 hours I asked if we could go for a walk and get some coffee. That part of school was fun. Each evening I have homework before going to bed but it has not seemed to make a difference yet. The school has various activities through the week each afternoon/evening. I did attend a great documentary on the Club Social de Buena Vista, a famous Cuban salsa band. They are in concert in Xela tonight.

Today is 4 dia en español and it was so much better than yesterday. The total immersion experience is amazing. My instructor speaks very little English and she understands even less so the only way we communicate is in Spanish. Poco poco poco she reminds me. So if I can be quiet long enough then I will be able to hablo español in a few dias o semanas, si?

Yesterday I went with the doctor from the school, a few staff members and a couple of other students to a local school. The doctor talked about good dental hygiene and then we passed out toothbrushes and toothpaste to the niños. It was fun watching them brush their teeth out in the courtyard and all of them gathered around a drainhole where they were spitting. I was able to take some pictures and will soon be posting them. My picture taking has been limited because of the danger foreigners have experienced when taking pictures of the local people.

Please continue to follow my journey and I will attempt to post more often. It is sometimes so difficult sitting here at the school or at an Internet cafe waiting for a connection or after writing an email for it to be sent.