In the [small] town of Santiago Lachivia the fed-up residents surrounded and put into prison the military group who had been harassing them and arbitrarily breaking into homes which they then robbed. An elderly woman was allegedly robbed of 5,000 pesos…Two soldiers were jailed and 50 others were surrounded and restrained. Nobody was injured, the townspeople had no weapons.
From The Noticias…Oaxaca newpaper
Extracted from a Washington Post article:
On Dec. 9, 1531, the Virgin of Guadalupe appeared in a vision to an Indian peasant, Juan Diego Cuauhtlatoatzin, on a hill north of the ruined Aztec capital, where the basilica stands today. According to accounts, the apparition spoke to Juan Diego in Nahuatl, an Indian language still used in parts of Mexico. When the Spanish bishop asked for proof of the encounter, Juan Diego gathered roses on the hill. As he presented them to the bishop, the image of the Virgin miraculously appeared on his tilma, a kind of traditional cloak fastened at the shoulder with a knot.
The novelist Carlos Fuentes said, “You cannot truly be considered a Mexican unless you believe in the Virgin of Guadalupe.”
Nobel laureate Octavio Paz wrote that if the macho in Mexican society is represented by the conquistador, then the Virgin “is the consolation of the poor, the shield of the weak, the help of the oppressed.”
At a time when the tremors of global recession are spreading from the United States to Mexico, where workers in assembly plants and farm fields provide auto parts and winter tomatoes for American consumption, many of the 5 million people who stood in line for hours to enter the basilica in Mexico City said they would ask the Virgin of Guadalupe to watch over their wallets and keep them filled with pesos, even these weaker pesos.
There were not nearly as many people who lined up in Oaxaca, but Llano Park, across the street from the Virgin of Guadalupe Church was filled with revelers yesterday waiting their turn to kiss the feet of the statue of the virgin…their little children dressed up like Juan Diego begging for treats from the many stalls and rides at the carnival in the street. Nuns were selling homemade Rompopo, a kind of eggnoggy drink made with eggs and rum that is also popular in Honduras and Guatemala at Christmas time. I am told that locally ground almonds, or almond cream is added here in Oaxaca. Rockets and fireworks have been going off continuously day and night. The Zocalo is lit up with white Christmas lights. This is Mexico.
It is Sunday and quiet as usual except for a rally in Llano Park about a block away. The sound of the speeches bounces off the walls of my courtyard but thankfully it has stopped.
It is dusk now and the park across the street from my apartment is nearly empty except for about a dozen well dressed people gathered for something…maybe a wedding celebration. From my veranda I listen to a band playing. A singer dressed in white and big red Mexican hat sings Viva Mexico; Viva America. A young girl sits by herself nearby. An old man further back. An old lady comes and puts her bags down and listens too. The band plays some more. A lone couple dances by themselves off by the side. Another couple dances on the sidewalk. The old woman leaves. A young boy comes and joins the young girl. Maybe she has been waiting for him. Venus and Jupiter are still conjunct in the clear cool sky overhead.
This is Mexico!
The days of Las Posadas commemorate Mary and Joseph’s long and difficult trek from Nazareth to Bethlehem. Rock bands are playing, marching bands with people carrying lights, dancing calendas with a giant Joseph and Mary carried atop the shoulders of a young guy, fireworks, rockets, church bells. The markets are selling Christmas decorations and all manner of related junk.
Last night a calenda with accompanying band, and local neighborhood people, walked quietly with their lights in the street under my veranda and around the park.
All signifying that Christmas is coming.
I’m in my apartment and Tonee, the previous tenant who is moving into his new house on the road to Huayapam, is moving out slowly. In the meantime I am enjoying his furniture…and his cat!
Last weekend I went to a small jazz venue with a friend to listen to her bf blow the sax with his bassist, drummer and guitarist. About 2/3 of the way through, a short slow moving guy with long hair, dressed in jeans and a tweed jacket, obviously Indio, came in drunk and hugged all the band players…while they were playing. Two different waitresses asked politely for him to leave but he ignored them until the older matriarch of the cafe came in… in which case he left immediately without a word. However, he returned shortly, took off his desert boots and began to play one of them to the delight of the clubbers! We later found out he was a local artist…where else but in Mexico…LOL
But wish someone would have ushered out three young girls, eurotrash, who were carrying on a loud screechy conversation in spite of all the faces we made…never did figure out what language they were speaking…where else but Mexico…well, maybe some other places too.
Tonight, in my apartment at my computer, I heard classical music coming from the park that my apartment looks over. I walked out onto the veranda to find a young guy with two girls and a boom box sitting on a park bench. Always music coming from some direction! Where else but in Mexico. I love it.
Description of an altercation between a communist group (FPR) and the anarchists after the march commemorating the November 25th 2006 repression by police. When I saw that these groups, among many others, were lining up behind the teachers during the strike of 2006, I knew there was going to be trouble because they all have their own agendas.
from an expat on the Oaxaca Study Action Group Internet Forum:
“I get the sense that no one is happy with what happened at the march. The good things were the turnout and return of Dra. Bertha. The bad were the disagreements regarding tactics that led to physical encounters and the FPR vs anarchists nonsense in the zocalo. I firmly believe that based on my experiences here, the vast majority of the libertarian punks are not paid government agents. I think it’s dangerous to propose that they are, given the seriousness of the charge, because: unless they read NarcoNews or OSAG they’re unaware of the charges being leveled against them, and, how does one disprove the claim that they’re a government agent? David Venegas, even after spending a year in jail, is still accused of that. Black blocs, graffiti and property destruction are common features of most mass movements all over the world. Of course the capitalist press and fascist government are going to raise hackles about it, that’s their job.
This is not, however, to say that there weren’t infiltrators yesterday. Yet, they’re easy to spot based on their dress, the fact that no one knows them, their actions (for example, yesterday they were smoking weed during the march and one of them painted “David is my leader”, which no anarchist would write and plays right into the gov’t’s and press’s line). As well, the locations targeted – Comex, PRI offices, state gov’t offices, and Chedraui – are all viable targets if one is an anti-capitalist. Working class people’s homes and business didn’t get messed with.
The scene at [the new] Chedraui Market [during their open house] was particularly disappointing. The teachers’ “protest police” lined up in front of Chedraui, trying to keep it from being damaged. It reminded me of “pacifists” lining up to protect Nike and Starbucks in the US during the WTO protest in Seattle 1999. This led to pushing and shoving between teachers and anarchists, and between anarchist and photographers (who were screaming at the anarkos: “We’re going to find out who you are! We’re going to get you!” One friend was randomly assaulted by a photographer out of nowhere).
As far as I know, the teachers’ leadership and the FPR bilaterally declared there would be no graffiti, masks, or property destruction. How they feel they have the right to state that and undemocratically determine the tactics of a broad movement, and try to undemocratically enforce them (by guarding Chedraui of all places for crissakes!) is beyond me. While Chepi may be better than those before, the teachers still don’t seem to me to be doing much, nor do I put much hope in them. They only come out in force when instructed to, probably mainly because they take attendance at these things. Other teachers not marching with Section 22 got on the sound systems behind Section 22 and denounced them for betraying the movement that arose initially to defend them and for their complacency.
I did not see the fight between the FPR and anarchists in the zocalo. My understanding as related to me (admittedly by only one side on the issue), was the David was being heckled while he spoke, while others were shouting to let him speak. An FPR man hit an libertarian woman on the head with one of the sticks they have their flags on, then punched her in the face. Then libertarians got hold of an FPR flag and lit it on fire. Then mayhem broke out. At least one libertarian had to be taken to the hospital after being hit in the head with a flag stick.
All the media and even Radio Planton, blamed it all on David. At least the teachers, though condemning everything that happened, declined to condemn any particular group. Regardless, as I said, no one is happy with what happened. Well, perhaps the FPR is. I think it shows that the next APPO congress really needs to happen and really needs to be democratic. Many of the speakers in the zocalo at least mentioned the former, though groups such as the FPR and some in the teachers leadership are more interested in excluding VOCAL and other libertarian tendencies in the APPO congress than creating a real movement.”
My three cents from my frustrated, biased perspective,
and “Here’s VOCAL’s communique regarding yesterday. In brief, it states that the disunity has been caused by the FPR – primarily for running Zenen Bravo for congress and their meddling in Section 22. It states they had nothing to do with the property destruction but they understand it. It states that FPR started the fight after David was not permitted to speak and a libertarian woman told an FPR man to be quiet and be respectful. And that Section 22 has the responsibility and duty to convene a democratic assembly to plan for the second APPO congress.”
Well, you never know what life will bring you. I am now looking for an apartment in Oaxaca once again and since the house is rented out it looks like I’ll be here for awhile.
November 21 was Revolution Day which passed quietly with the Governor appearing in an upper window of the Palacio. Rumor has it that there will be a large mega-march on November 25 to commemorate the rout of the teacher strike out of the city by the Riot Control Police in 2007. The city will be covered with police this time too that is for sure.
But on the whole I feel quite safe here. Just have to use common sense as in any other big city.
After living for a year in Oaxaca in 2006-7, I have returned here for a couple months before going on to Central and South America. Now I…
Remember the Alcala, the ancient cobblestone pedestrian street: the way your feet tip on the edges of the stones…almost unbalancing you as you walk.
Remember eating chile relleno tortas while listening to the marimba band at Cafe Jardin in the Zocalo late at night: sometimes an older couple dancing alone…the two of them…giving in to the rhythm.
Remember church bells ringing at 6:30 in the morning: a town spiritual alarm.
Remember Noche de Luz (Night of Light): fireworks, calendas, children playing, the National Band; crowds of young people wait to get into ear deafening clubs till 4am and you don’t sleep.
Remember warm love of friends: Max the aging-before-his-time anarchist over mescal and his housemates Sandy…and her 80 year old husband Budd…the BBC filmmaker who jumped onto the Yeltsin tank and took the picture that went around the world…and my friend Sharon who I met on the plane when we first arrived in Oaxaca. Bardo and Mica and daughter Angelita recovering from foot surgery and her brother Pavel named after some revolutionary Russian.
Remember five peso ice cream: doble please…
Remember familiar Trique vendors in long red dresses with horizontal stipes: Jorge in the Zocalo until 10:30pm when he takes the hour long bus back to his home and family in Mitla.
Remember the familiar beggars: the tiny girl on Alcala plays an accomplished tiny accordian. But avoid the old women with two apartment houses.
Remember colorful angry graffiti on ancient stone walls: the only voice of a repressed people.
Remember the taste of an Amarillo tamale made by an old woman in the market washed down with grey foamy tajate: the Zapotec drink of the gods.
Remember drinking beer with Gerardo: sexy Zapotec hustler here after 10 years on the streets of LA and Las Vegas.
Remember sweet smiles from strangers on the street: hola amiga! Hasta Luego!
Remember hot Mexican chocolate and a free pan dulce on the street at 7am: the little man running from one side of the cart to the other in a hurry to serve his morning customers.
Remember eating in comida corridas: an omelette swimming in red sauce…sweet cafe olla made sheepherder style.
Remember made-up over-dressed Chilangos from Mexico city: slumming it on Sundays in Oaxaca…holding themselves with stuffy privilege…they gawk at the indigenous dark ones and don’t buy much.
Remember friendly courtyard apartment owners: checking up on me…in and out. The younger sister speaking English after 4 years as a nanny in LA while leaving her two children here with her ex husband…saving her money and building a new house in which she rents out the extra bedrooms.
Remember to visit Adelina (the maid in the apartment where I lived in 2006 who works 12 hours a day for practically nothing) and living in a one-room tin-roofed shack which barely holds a double bed for her and her bright daughter Fernanda: surprised to see the six year old at the English Lending Library taking part in story time…seemed so much more grown up now…shiny hair curled and turned under…paying a pittance for her schooling…the little girl I never had.
Remember the long drive to Oaxaca from the Columbia Friendship Crossing near Laredo Texas with my son Greg’s best friend who stayed with me for a month: lingering for hours with friends in the cafes in the Zocalo.
Remember the chapulines (dried grasshoppers): if you eat them here the legend says you will return.
Remember the invitation from a Mexican friend to go to Hautla with him and eat magic mushrooms: you were chicken and never did.
Remember thoughts of moving here…
Oaxaca’s Radio Wars
By Charles Mostoller
Despite assassinations, community radio is spreading throughout southern Mexico. “Some people think that we are too young to be informed, but what they should know is that we are too young to die.”
These were the fateful words of Felicitas Martinez Sanchez and Teresa Bautista Merino, two indigenous Triqui radio broadcasters who were assassinated in southern Oaxaca on April 7th.
The two girls, aged 20 and 24, had worked for the recently inaugurated Radio Triqui, “The Voice that Breaks the Silence”, in the autonomous Triqui municipality of San Juan Copala. Read More
Mexican journalist and author, Gustavo Esteva, in writing recently about the wrenching repression and resistance in Mexico and the world, draws an analogy:
The Pot and the Vapor
In the midst of the daily struggle, an image attempting to express what has happened in Oaxaca is now circulating.
Years of fierce corruption and overflowing authoritarianism converted Oaxaca into a pressure cooker above a slow flame. [Governor]Ulises Ruiz added fuel to the fire until the pressure hurled the lid off on June 14th 2006, with the repression of a teachers sit-in. APPO [Popular Assembly] articulated the discontent brewing inside the pot and converted it into transformative action. The ferocity of the federal forces put a new heavy lid on top of Oaxaca on November 25th, but the fire continues. Small holes, that opened in the lid through people’s initiatives, alleviate the pressure, but they remain insufficient. The pressure continues to accumulate and in any moment will hurl the lid off once more. The experiences accumulated in the last year might provide ways to let the pressure escape in a more organized way, but nobody can foresee what will happen. There are too many forces at odds with each other.
Another metaphor can contribute to an understanding of what is coming. More than 35 years ago, in the final pages of La revolución interrumpida, Adolfo Gilly quoted some phrases from Leon Trotsky: “Without leading organizations, the masses’ energy will dissipate, like vapor not contained by a boiler. But be that as it may, what propels the movement is not the boiler nor the piston, but the vapor.”
What is this “real material, invisible and indefinable” that Trotsky calls “the masses’ energy” and compares with “vapor?” In contrast to this, adds Gilly, that material has “sense, understanding, and reason and because of this does not dissipate, like vapor, but endures transmuted in experience, invisible for those that believe that the movement resides in the piston and the boiler (in other words, in the organizational apparatuses), but existing in unexpected subsequent aspects of daily life.”
Oaxaca is still “at full steam”. Part of what was generated in 2006 has condensed itself into an experience and transformed into a behavior: it is in the daily attitudes of many people, who will never return to the old “normalcy.” Another portion of the “vapor” generated yesterday, or that comes up every day, propels many initiatives. And there is “vapor” that continues to accumulate, that raises the pressure and that perhaps is trying to redefine its course once it succeeds in liberating itself from everything still retaining it—which is not a boiler with a piston, but the oppressive lid of the repression that continues: political and police mechanisms blocking off the popular initiative.
The obsession to ascertain who generates that “vapor” persists, according to the prejudice that people can not take initiative themselves. It’s taken for granted that somebody, a person or a group, would be throwing rocks and hiding the hand: it would have manipulated the docile masses and would want to continue doing so. The media constructed their leaders, presenting as leaders people better adapted to the image they were creating to better prepare public opinion to the violent liquidation of the movement. The authorities did the same to organize co-optation and repression; they seem now to believe that the APPO will be paralyzed or at least disabled while those that supposedly lead the movement remain in prison. Similar attitudes have been observed in the left, inside and outside the movement. Those who think that what has happened would be inconceivable without a leading organization, now see it dissolved or weakened and want to renovate it or reconstruct it. Or else, when the absence of real leaders of the APPO is recognized, everything is transferred to the past: that deficiency would have provoked the evaporation of the spontaneous popular outbreak. The popular energy would have dissipated, like vapor not contained in a boiler.
When the question is not about seizing the State apparatuses, but about changing the social reality, the vapor, which continually condenses in experience, operates in its dissipation, spilling itself onto reality. Occasionally adapting itself in boilers and the pistons generated by the vapor itself and used for certain tasks, the vapor can not be contained in “organized apparatuses” nor be driven by “leading organizations”. For those apparatuses and organizations to be relevant and play a role, they should renounce the pyramidal structure, when a web is needed, and they must learn to lead by obeying. Furthermore, they should operate on an appropriate scale, adapting themselves continually to conditions and styles of the real men and women that are always the vapor, the impulse, and those finally determining course and reach of the whole movement.
Mechanical metaphors always fall short of the richness of real social processes. But the pot and the vapor are useful images to observe the complex present situation, in Oaxaca and greater Mexico, when what is most important seems to be invisible.
Then he has this to say about hope:
More than 30 years ago, Ivan Illich observed that, “The Promethean ethos has now eclipsed hope. Survival of the human race depends on its rediscovery as a social force.” [Deschooling Society, London: Marion Boyars, 1996, 105. (First published in 1972).]
In my view, there is nothing about the Zapatistas more important than their contribution to hope. Given the current situation in Oaxaca, Mexico and the world, we are still hoping for the best but prepared for the worst. In our context, hope is not the conviction that something will happen, but the conviction that something makes sense, whatever happens.
San Pablo Etla, Oaxaca Mexico January 2008
(Italics are mine. If the above reads a bit rough in places it is likely due to the best job that the translator from Spanish could do.)
Laughingnomad 