Cara Angry

I lot of things have been running through my mind lately. Let me see if I can get them all to fit in a space small enough so I don´t have to open another web page just to fit them all in. That was a bad joke.

So when I came back from Costa Rica, I felt at ease. As the plane touched down on the dry, golden land of El Salvador, I got the same feeling I get when I land in Boston and in Tampa.

Home again.

After a day, I realized that I was kidding myself for feeling that "homeness" in a way. Something was different - and I discovered this at praxis yesterday. I realized that after being away from El Salvador for almost a week and a half, I had begun to build this bubble... this shelter where I wasn´t going to allow anyone in again to break me. And this "anyone" includes El Salvador. Well this defense shield was shortlived - partially because after I realized this yesterday, I refused to maintain this ridiculous idea. Why should I be defensive? It is better to feel.

I tend to do this "thing" before I leave a place and people I love - I shut myself off. I become short, quiet, and sometimes it can all even turn cruel. I do it defensively, automatically, unstoppably. I do it because I know I have to leave this place of comfort and love and I don´t want to. It happens a lot when I go home to the fam in Florida. Spring break here signified and solidified this idea in my head that this is over when really, it´s not. I still have seven weeks here.

Going to Jayaque Wednesday made me realize how ridiculous I was being in this defense mode. And I don´t want that life or way of thinking anymore. Its better to feel.

I read this book this past week - Confessions of an Economic Hit Man. I strongly recommend you all read it when (and thats not and if) you can. It´s by John Perkins, a man out of New Hampshire who enters into the corporatocracy - those coporations that are privately owned but secretly work for the government which in turn work to expand the global empire. His job, basically, was to go into developing countries, develop inflated economic plans for them to show the governments that they should invest their money (that they would borrow from the US) to hire US engineers to come in and develop their nations´electricity, streets, buildings, etc. This "development plan" comes with the ideal that the soverign would obviously be appreciated by their citizens for working to develop their nations. The coporatocracy leaves out the fact that the countries they "serve" would gain severe debt, leaving no choice but to sacrifice their canals, oil, and UN votes to the states.

So between reading that book, seeing The Last King of Scotland last night, and Jayaque yesterday - I broke my bubble of defense. I just had to sit in the movie theater last night and cry. Breakdown. A few of us from the house went together, including Edith (one of the becarias - and strongest people I know). When the first images of Uganda came on the screen, she said,

"Oh! Looks like Chalete!"

She was referring to Chaletenango, her home and a department in northern El Salvador. The first images of Uganda were simply beautiful. I know the cinematographer did this on purpose to recognize that what seems beautiful on the outside of a situation does not mean corruptness does not lie within the facade. It was a harsh movie, a true image of reality. I was jumping, shaking and afraid while watching, and Edith leaned over to me saying, "Carita, sola es una pelicula." (Its just a movie.)

But we know its not.

Hate on this planet runs so deep. So deep. Sometimes we can not always feel the love we have for another because it is so profound. Well, I feel that is the same for hate. I cannot feel the hate of the world but only sometimes because if I did, I dont think I would be able to breathe.

Now, I´m just left speechless, but I hope we all go there. Get to the point of being speechless for a moment, then act on it. I hope we all push ourselves to take off this bandaid over our world and really look into the wound that lives and breathes underneath.


Just to finish, today in praxis seminar Beth played Tracy Chapman - Telling Stories. There was a lyric that stuck out to me.

Sometimes a lie is better than the truth.

Is it?