escasez de efectivo

for the last week it´s been impossible to get cash from atms, or the bank... everyone wants to do their holiday shopping but instead they´re standing in long lines at banks, atms... supposedly, the government sent the order for bills late and all will be resolved by december 28th. where has all the $ gone?

El Quiché

El campo. I was so eager to get out of Guatemala City. I was in the Quiché in 1995, but on the other side, I remember the bus ride down to Nebaj through the mountains, a curvy, dusty dirt road in an old bus. I got sick. The road is paved now, but only to Nebaj. We left half the vehicles in the parish and continued northeast to Chajul, then wound through the Cuchumatanes and twice across the river Suchum on a single lane dirt road. The road is rough, even when dry, and the scree made it hard to climb. One of the baby suvs, a Toyota Rav4, couldn´t make it up the hills and an 80s model toyota pick-up with a bedfull of locals had to tow us. We´d left Guatemala City at 5 a.m. and arrived in Chel (after Juá) at 7:30 p.m. It was dark and we were exhausted.

The next day don Juan came to take Alejos and I to his house in Xaxmoxán. I came as a last-minute addition but the purpose of the trip—as a pilot—was for urban University students to learn what life is like for rural Guatemalans. Alejos is a communications student, from what´s left of the middle class, and it was his first trip to the Quiché. Don Juan took us to his cornfield where we gathered dry corn.

His granddaughters, Marìa and Santa, showed me how to get the corn out of its husk, tapizcarlo. The corn is beautiful—maíz blanco, pinto, negro—and the tortillas and atol are much richer than in the capital.

We stayed with three other families during our time in Xaxmoxán. With don José we cut coffee and don Eduardo took us to his cornfield high on the ridge above the village, an hour hike up the mountain. I was in Chel with Talomé when Alejos went to plant corn in a field even farther from the house.

Alejos is 25 and it was great to share the experience with him. Some things—the latrine, the food, the poverty—really shocked him. I watched him enjoying playing with the kids and learning to pulp coffee. Part of the project included a stipend for the families but he told me that he would have felt guilty eating if we hadn´t helped with the work. Not all of the participants were as open as Alejos, and it reminded me a lot of the project that I used to work with in Toksook Bay taking urban teachers to the Bush. I had a hard time listening to the women (unfortunately it was mostly the women) complain about their time in the villages as if it were some sort of trial that they had survived. They made a special effort to distance themselves from their host families when they described their visits. It made me sad, and also really angry, that they didn´t seem to learn anything from being there, that they were just counting the days until they could go home and get their hair done. It’s hard for me not to judge them, and to trust in the miracle of reflection. Perhaps, in time, they will have other ways to connect with the experience.

I was just happy to be out of the city, to be free to walk around without constantly watching my back. The mountains were beautiful and the families we stayed with were great, and invested in showing us what life is like in their Guatemala.

el derrumbe

this landslide stopped us for a few hours on our way back to the city.

it was a beautiful morning for an unexpected delay.

arrest of my friend GERARDO BONILLA in OAXACA

from a press release:

ARREST OF GERARDO BONILLA IN OAXACA SPARKS PROTEST OF AUSTIN ARTISTS, STUDENTS, AND ACTIVISTS

Gerardo Bonilla, painter and friend of many in the Austin artistic, activist, and student communities, was one of 149 arrested this past Saturday in a federal police sweep of Oaxaca city that is increasingly targeting the impoverished southern states workers, artists, writers, and innocent bystanders. He is an accomplished muralist and regularly facilitates and promotes children art workshops in different communities throughout the state of Oaxaca. (See for a photo of Bonilla with his work).
The Mexican army and police forces have arrested and tortured hundreds of innocent protesters. Gerardo¹s detention symbolizes the Mexicangovernment¹s all-out attack on local democracy,².The current situation has long roots. On May 22, seventy thousand teachers started a camp out in the main square of the city to ask for an increase in their tiny salaries. This camp out follows a nearly yearly ritual, and each year it bore some meagre fruit. But on June 14, governor Ulises Ruiz of the Party of the Institutional Revolution (PRI), who was elected two yearsearlier under disputed circumstances, sent the police in helicopters to put a stop to the teacher¹s protest. Many Oaxacans condemned this action and organized to form a broader civil group known as> APPO (Asamblea Popular de los Pueblos de Oaxaca) Popular Assembly of Oaxacan> Communities. Since then the situation has not been resolved and has turned into an all-out conflict. Last Monday the tension in Oaxaca increased when the Federal police (PFP) announced a ³zero tolerance² policy against APPO members and their sympathizers. Now police are searching and ransacking houses and buildings searching for activists. On Saturday November 25th Bonilla was standing in la Plaza de la Bastida where he often sells his paintings. Like many others on this day he was randomly swept up as the police came through the area arresting everyone in sight. He has been flown to a maximum security prison outside the state of Oaxaca in Tamaulipas where he is being held with out due process or outside access. This event typifies the strategy that is currently takingplace in Oaxaca. Since last Saturday there have been at least threeconfirmed deaths, more than 100 injured people, and 221 arrests - including41 womenThis Thursday, November 30, many Austinites, including Bonilla¹s manyfriends here, will demand freedom for Bonilla aswell as the hundreds ofdetained and disappeared. This is the fourth in a series of consulate>protests against Mexican state violence; the first protest followed the May>attacks on flower vendors in Atenco, near Mexico city. On Friday December 1 the new Mexican president, Felipe Calderon, will be sworn in, despitewidespread political instability.