well... it all boiled down to what i learned the last time.
Doesn't it always?
I thought i'd met such creative people, a new source of inspiration and activity... i put my heart and soul into the campaign... all i wanted was to be part of the movement... the movement that was carrying us all into the new realization that we are all part of the same machinery...
and responsible as such.
http://actionguatemala.blogspot.com/
we ARE responsible... but i think we don't ever really see what it is we are really responsible for. We pretend to do one thing... we think we are sincerely doing it... sometimes we convince many people of it... we are in company, a crowd of sincerely intentioned people... sheep in the corral...
it is election year here ... it's fascinating how many people get so enthusiastic about it... it's extremely personal... and yet, it's beautiful that there are so many opinions and that the freedom we gringos associate with a democratic election is more alive here in the land of tricks and bribes than in is in the north where we vote the lesser of evils to protect us from media driven terrorists...
believe it. nuthin but gangsters, murderers and thieves down here, but they care. The youth is in it... they bring their music, their futbol, their beer drinking ... all of it is in the mix. Not a dull moment in sight.
Meanwhile, the guys i fell in love with last year because they did so many nice projects: street theatre, and the festival of artists who came to promote clean water at the lake... are not in it. They claim to be the voice of 'culture' ... well i finally figured out what they mean by that... when the CCEG... the Centro Cultural de España en Guatemala... says culture, what they mean is Old Spain. the spanish language and the preservation of a perspective coming from that culture, the education that comes with the complication of the use of the tricky old spanish language to preserve exclusivity.
It has changed face... for centuries it´s been used to document business... land deeds that indigenous people sign to get loans and stuff like that... you know what i´m saying about that... major exploitation... major patronization.
now there´s a new language that the kids speak in the cities... it happens worldwide... the ´mara´, the gang, the insiders... they know what yr sayin... i sure don´t. i do, because it´s the same thing i´ve heard in so many languages that i really don´t need to words to figure it out... but it is being used to make sure i know i am not in. I am out.
Racism comes with it. All the ´buena onda´ in the world is just the butter to shmear it all over the top so it looks friendly, so people like me will jump in and give it my time and my money.
i get it one more time why the latin american socialist revolution fell flat in the Maya Highlands.
it´s not the same set of values. It is not the same culture
so when MC TZUTU is rapping with the kids in San Marcos, they are singing a different tune... i am still interested in hearing that tune... i wonder what they think, what their hearts tell them...
i know they are children of parents who didn´t learn to read and write... in spanish or any other language...
i know that i am part of the reason they read and write in spanish... the language of the colonizer...
i believe that the potential for Critical Thought comes from objectivity that comes with tools like written language, and cameras ... that´s my work and i have my moments both ways... i am a huge revolutionary with huge misgivings about the whole dam thing... i am not a missionary who knows i would be doing good if a give a poor kid a nickel.... no not me.
i´m a theorist - a methodologist - a Historian -
if nothing else, i am a critical thinker...
that´s why i write these little essays... not to answer questions but to ask them...
my question today is... now what should i do?
i have resources and i even have a following... i know people of all sides, though... i piss them all off regularly and then i make jokes and usually they forgive me... but it´s not easy to be loyal to individuals of all beliefs...
people get stuck on their beliefs, they stand up for their ignorance - quite often. I guess i must do the same...
how do we get along if we disagree so...? maybe that´s my question?
it's disagreeable to hang out too much with people one disagrees with...
i´m loyal to my journey, because that is where my passion lies... that´s why i live here at the Lake, because i am allowed to be this ´crazy´, and i know i am in stimulating company... or do i mean similar company.... lol
do i sound confused?
write me back friends and enemies alike... give your ideas, your feedback... your dreams and insanities... anything is something right now...
i am growing
have i found life´s purpose? i just can´t get it to sit still...
