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Published: March 26th 2006
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March 24 2006
posters put up for the 30th anniversary of the Golpe de Estado I have been sitting here, trying to tidy up the thoughts in my head so that I can present them to all of you in a pretty package filled with meaning, love and clarity. I do not know if I can give you this gift. I have just agreed, with myself, to give you what I have and for the rest of this entry I will give you my jumbeled thoughts, run on sentences, observations, laughter, and tears stained with dirt.
Last weekend I wrote about my confusion with how I was going to deal with the anniversary of the Golpe de Estado (coup). At the time I thought I was going to mark the week by reading about the 7 year Dirty War and I can say that while my thoughts got more and more confused as the week went on I still felt pretty strong about not attending the march that would take place on Friday. My reasoning was that I am not part of this society and I felt that if I went to the demonstration I would be there as a tourist....which I feel is pretty counter productive to what is trying to be accomplished with
March 24 2006
grafitti on Avenida de Mayo saying "the man is a criminal" this demonstration. Unfortunatly at 4pm on Friday, when my housemates boarded a bus to leave for the demonstration, I went as well. No, no, no. I shouldnt say
unfortunetly because in the end I was happy I went. I had the day off because the 24th was turned into a national holiday and I didn't want it to be a day for me to go shopping. At the time of leaving I didnt know why I was doing what I was doing. I did think well enough to bring the copy of my passport, my keys, some spare change, my heart to feel, my eyes to see, my ears to hear, and my feet to dance and carry me along.
The demonstration started at Congreso (the congress building) and moved down Avenida de Mayo (and smaller streets running parralell to it). We crossed the largest Boulevard in the world Nueve de Julio (9th of July) and on down to Plaza de Mayo which was made famous during the Dirty War because of the mothers (Madres de Plaze de Mayo) that would meet every Thurseday with the pictures of their children that had "dissapeared".
...close your eyes and for
March 24 2006
the stencil on the bottom is of a Ford Falcon. The importence of this being that the government purchased 94 Ford Falcons which they used to kidnap people. a minute picture the faces of 30,000 people gone missing in a 7 year period. I also want you to imagine the babies that are part of that 30,000 (they were often kidnapped with the mothers, were stolen at their birth in a detention center, or were taken when their mothers died in detention centers. These babies didn't die but they were illegaly adopted by other families....often families of the military.....the families of the men responsible for killing their mothers....
The demonstration was made up of all different types of Argentinians. University students, young radicals, union workers, old men and women, children carrying drums and dancing.....people wearing pictures of their family memebers that dissapeared 30 years ago....people chanting "nunca mas"
It wasn't until yesterday that I started to see how the demonstration was relative to my life and to being an American.
After walking Avenida de Mayo again, this time retracing my steps, I started thinking about governments and the sneaky little tricks they play. Doing things.......laying down the thin layers of oppresion that we do not seem to notice or dont seem to understand the weight of their meaning. These actions fall like snow.....light and soft....but if
March of 24 2006
regarding the Dirty War.
The police said no evil, the church saw no evil, and the press heard no evil. you are not careful, the government, like snow, will crush everything in it's path....breaking limbs of trees....making us run for cover. If we are not careful though there will be no cover to hide under. Specifically I was thinking about one of the first actions the military government took after seizing the government.....the supression of free press. In the beginning of the coup journalists were not to report on the those who were being kidnapped....when thinking about this I instantly thought of the journalist who got in so much trouble for taking pictures of caskets of killed soldiers in the states.
After walking around for ages yesterday taking pictures of stencil art and thinking about the demonstration and the Dirty War I went over to see a photography exhibit of Frank Capa (he was a famous war photographer who died by stepping on a landmine in Vietnam while taking a picture) These photos were candid, often just quick blinks of people living the horror that was their everyday lives. Pictures of families walking/running to shelters during bombraides. These pictures are oddly peaceful, even the most horrific ones....which makes them even more horrific because these pictures show the normalcy of
54 faces of the disappeared
part of a torn flier i found during the demonstration war.
To end the night I met Jennie and Jenya at a small theater, Elkafka, and we were put on the wait list for the final proformence of RomCom a British improve theater piece. The whole concept of the piece is that two Argentinians, who know English, agree on being in the piece not knowing anything about it, which put them at the same level as the audience. They wore headphones and were given directions and their script through those. For instance they would hear "Turn left and scratch your butt" "say I love you" and the person would do the action and say the line.......They were hearing and doing as we were seeing. The concept was fantastic, the subject matter, a man and womans relationship from beginning to end, wasnt so much.
After the theater we went to Palermo (the trendy part of the city) and after being turned away from Green Bamboo (a very popular Vietnamese restuarant) we stumbled onto a parilla that was softly lit with red lighting and decorated with soccer things and pictures of famous tango singers and musicians. The place was very good and at 12:30 we left for the one hour
bus ride home.
All in all a wonderful day in Buenos Aires
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LINZICA
Lindsay & Jenica
fabuloso.
Lizz, you captured the day and the emotions fabulously. It gave me "escalofrios" (goosebumps) and made me realize quite a few things I maybe missed on friday. Gracias. Great pictures and blog. Felicitaciones, escribes muy, pero muy bien! besos Jenica