April kicked off with Holy Week and my departure from the
CdP. As most people in Latin America will tell you, Semana Santa is not the
week to travel. As if to rub it in, Semana Santa brought on airport closures
and inclement weather to prevent my south-bound travels. I took off early in
the morning for the airport in Apartado, only to sit there all day and then
return, again, all the way to La Union. I arrived, laughing at the rising full moon,
which seemed to be somehow conspiring with me, and thinking about how I was
supposed to explain this return to everyone to whom I’d already said goodbye. I
teased my neighbors who had cried that morning and told them all of the angels
in heaven were crying in solidarity with them, and thus my plane could not fly.
And so it was that I came to spend a few more days in La
Union. So it was that I came to see a neighbor walk by with freshly butchered
pig meat wrapped in banana leaves.
And see the early risers off to work with their horses and mules. This
is how I saw the roof of the library fall in and, later in the night, I saw stars through it. How I said goodbye to everyone who tried not to have to
say goodbye to me. And watch my neighbors carry wood on their shoulders and
sharpen their machetes and chop wood for their stoves like they do. This is how
I heard salsa and vallenato and heard a child sing me a romantic ranchero at
her grandmother’s house. I got to talk again with my neighbors, hold my
favorite babies, and sing songs with the kids. I had a few more days to say
goodbye to bunuelos by eating them in excess, and say goodbye to the magical,
mystical cacautera and the relaxing breeze at the kiosks by simply being in them. I had a few more days
to collect avocados and unripe mangos to stuff in my bag headed for the
capital. I had time for a neighbor to tell me I stuck more to this town than
gum to her shoe. (This was, of course, the second time that my initial travel
date away from LU didn’t work out; in November I came back after there were
landslides on the highway.) And this is how I came to repeat tearfull goodbyes.
I know that there are so many beautiful places and people in the
world; I know there are so many places to go and people to meet. I know this,
but it doesn’t matter. In those last few days, sitting at the kiosk, it is only
the cana and the sound of the
machetes hidden inside the fields. At the tank it is only the blast furnace
breeze through the cacao and the perfectly shaped green mangoes hanging from a
tree. It is only the sound of the rain approaching the plateau, and the wind in
the palms imitating that rain. In the end, breathing the air in La Union, it is
hard to believe there is air anywhere else. It is hard to believe there is
anywhere else that one is supposed to go.
And so it was that on my (second) last walk down to town, it is
pissing rain and the river is waist deep and the current strong. A jungle whose
life is everywhere in the deep greens and bright colors growing out and
reaching for the two women at the side of the river, and then one starts her
way across. Wet to the waist with a now wet bag on my back and my legs shaking
from trying sooo hard to fight the current, I make it to the sand bar. I look
back at my friend, who is under a blue pancho, crying in the downpouring rain
because I am leaving and she is too scared to cross with the rushing water and
her yelling at the top of her lungs DONT YOU DARE FUCKING DROWN and me barely
hearing her over the rushing water and my legs trying so hard not to fall. And
then all the way across, waiving back at her and then walking away through the
sheets of rain and intense greens, alone, craddled by the life of
the jungle.
And so it was that I arrived to Bogota to letters and candies from
friends in far away places. And so it was that during my first week in Bogota,
I marinated in this Rumi poem, honoring the love I left with the CdP:
Tender words we spoke
to one another
are sealed in the secret vaults
of heaven.
One day like rain,
they will fall to earth
and grow green
all over the world
I arrived to Bogota just in time to do some
serious retreat preparations and then take off to Medellin for a week of
full-team intensive planning for the next six months. It was exhausting, but
overall we felt we got a lot done. It looks like I will be extending my time
with FOR for a while yet.
Aside from my movement, April had some events
worth mentioning:
The Summit of the Americas was held in Cartagena,
Colombia this month. I guess most of the international news covered the secret
service and armed forces cavorting with prostitutes, rather than the diplomatic
Summit announcements like, for example, the passing of the Free Trade Agreement
with Colombia (despite serious questions to the Obama administration about how exactly
Colombia meets the Human Rights requirements) that is set to officially being
May 15th. Or the
People’s Summit where, alternative to the diplomatic summit, civilian groups got
together to try and organize a people’s agenda. Emily and Susana represented
FOR in Cartagena at this alternative summit. Here is a video where participants
in the People’s Summit responded to the question, “What would you like to see
come out of U.S.-Colombia policy?” Emily and the Bogota Witness for Team rocked
out the taping and editing of this video over the weekend of the Summit:
http://forusa.org/multimedia/fifth-peoples-summit
If you are interested, take the time to read the declaration
from the people’s summit, which I posted far below.
Most of you probably paid taxes this month.
Did you know 53% of your tax dollars go to U.S. military spending? With some
quick math, you can figure out exactly how many dollars that was. Gross.
Colombian President Santos made it onto the
cover of Time magazine this month. I haven’t read the article yet, but the
continued US-Colombia administration collaboration and acceptance by the international
media/ mutual back-patting has me more than slightly uneasy.
Now I have been in Bogota for two weeks. I
have been climbing Monseratte to get some air and see some trees, I have been
dancing salsa, listening to music and using the oven. We said goodbye to Jon, joined a food co-op,
started recycling, and were a part of setting the Guiness Book of World Records
for the most people dancing cumbia in one place (highlight of my life!). I am
listening to the new Baker London album online and skyping my family and
friends. I am enjoying being reconnected to my bigger world of Gina pastpresentfuture, and I am missing being
connected to LU.
A package from Monica and Chris just
arrived and I filled my office with bubbles! Dad comes in town tonight! I live
in Bogota now. Write me letters. Send me e-mails. Alert me when you have
purchased your tickets to come visit. Hurrah!
Time and thought and space and tender words
and blaring transitions and world politics and the life of the jungle and the life of the city and gentle movements and big plans and bigger improvisations
and spiraling whirlwinds, all pumped with the sound of salvation… and somehow I
have made it to the merry merry month of May.
Declaration from the People’s Summit in
Cartagena:
Declaration of the People’s
Summit
Cartagena, 2012
The
social and people’s organizations of the continent, gathered in the V People’s
Summit – The True Voice of the Americas – from April 12-14 in Cartagena de
Indias at the same time as the VI Summit of the
Americas, declare:
We vigorously reject the insistence of the United States government to impose its agenda and decide the direction of these summits. Proof of this can be seen in its veto of Cuba’s participation in the Summit of the Americas as well as its strategy of militarization (for which it uses as a pretext the failed war on drugs, attention to natural disasters, and immigration control) as a way to maintain US hegemony. A fundamental component of this strategy is the criminalization of social movements.
The imperialist policies of the United States can be seen in its support of the coup d’ètat in Honduras and US backing of the illegitimate regime of Porfirio Lobo, its efforts to destabilize Haiti, its ongoing economic blockade of Cuba and the continued presence of the Guantanamo military base, as well as its opposition to the sovereignty of Argentina in the Falkland Islands.
It has been evident, following the Summit of Trinidad and Tobago [June 2009], that the government of President Obama has not fulfilled its offer to construct a new type of relationship with Latin America. In spite of the failure of th Free Trade Area of the Americas proposal, the United States government, in order to dodge the acute economic crisis that it has faced since 2007, insists on promoting free trade agreements and the entire neoliberal agenda which are an obstacle for regional integration and have mired the majority of the countries of the continent in backwardness and misery.
We vigorously reject the insistence of the United States government to impose its agenda and decide the direction of these summits. Proof of this can be seen in its veto of Cuba’s participation in the Summit of the Americas as well as its strategy of militarization (for which it uses as a pretext the failed war on drugs, attention to natural disasters, and immigration control) as a way to maintain US hegemony. A fundamental component of this strategy is the criminalization of social movements.
The imperialist policies of the United States can be seen in its support of the coup d’ètat in Honduras and US backing of the illegitimate regime of Porfirio Lobo, its efforts to destabilize Haiti, its ongoing economic blockade of Cuba and the continued presence of the Guantanamo military base, as well as its opposition to the sovereignty of Argentina in the Falkland Islands.
It has been evident, following the Summit of Trinidad and Tobago [June 2009], that the government of President Obama has not fulfilled its offer to construct a new type of relationship with Latin America. In spite of the failure of th Free Trade Area of the Americas proposal, the United States government, in order to dodge the acute economic crisis that it has faced since 2007, insists on promoting free trade agreements and the entire neoliberal agenda which are an obstacle for regional integration and have mired the majority of the countries of the continent in backwardness and misery.
For
its part, the Canadian government has declared a politics of free trade
agreements, mega-industrial mining, and natural resource extraction in all of
Latin America. Its industries are causing irreversible damages to the
environment and to biodiversity, violating the rights of the people to their
land. Social and environmental conflicts are multiplying as a result of this
predatory model.
We recognize the advances in efforts at autonomous regional integration such as those established in the Bolivarian Alliance for the Americas (ALBA), the Union of South American Nations (UNASUR), and the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC). However, the construction and financing of democratic, progressive, and leftist governments must move toward overcoming a model based on extraction, agricultural monocultures for export, and the hoarding of land. Such practices damage essential rights such as free and informed prior consent and impede the full deployment of social movements as forces capable of deepening change.
The confluence of these governmental streams and those of social and political movements can be preserved to the degree that the people deepen their unity, their social and political mobilization, and do not renounce their autonomy and their ability to guarantee their rights. We note with satisfaction the sustained, non-violent, popular struggles against the neoliberal model.
At this V People’s Summit – The True Voice of the Americas, thousands of fighters from organizations of women, unions, students, farmers, indigenous people, African-descended people, small businesses, and ecumenical religious persons gathered from throughout the hemisphere. We deliberated on the problems that we consider truly fundamental for our countries and we moved forward in the construction of proposals and so, among other petitions, we demand:
- The elimination of foreign military bases, the end of colonialism, the cancellation of joint military and police exercises and training, the closing of the School of the Americas and the elimination of the Inter-American Defense System, and the end of the deployment of the IV fleet in our waters.
- The end of militarization under the pretext of the war on drugs and its replacement by a comprehensive, multilateral policy with emphasis on public health measures.
- The end of the militarization of civil functions such as humanitarian assistance, disaster response, and immigration control.
- The end of the criminalization of social movements, and to the use of indigenous, afro, and campesino [small farmer] lands as battlefields. No to forced recruitment, to the use of women as spoils of war, and to forced displacement. In the case of Colombia, in which an armed, internal conflict persists, militarization has put these people on the brink of extinction.
- The elimination of free trade agreements and investments that deepen poverty, social exclusion, and inequality and which particularly affect women.
- The end of indiscriminate promotion of foreign investment, looking instead for relationships of cooperation and mutual benefit and the strengthening of autonomous processes of integration. The rights of investors cannot be above the rights of the people and of the environment. We condemn transnational companies as the primary actors in this model.
- We call for a new regional financial architecture that incorporates: South Bank, the Latin American Reserve Fund, and puts and end to the impoverishing politics of debt.
- Real solutions to the environmental and climate crisis directed toward its structural causes through rebuilding the financial architecture and thereby changing the development model. We defend life and common goods in the face of the commodification of nature driven by multilateral financial institutions and the countries of the North.
- Respect for the right of the people to decide their agriculture policies and assure their food sovereignty, to conserve and consume their native products, all of which are threatened by monocultures, biofuels, genetically modified organisms, and big mining.
- The creation of decent work for all, the guarantee of freedom of association and collective bargaining, and the end to violence against rural and urban workers of the continent to be made a priority.
- Effective changes in the education systems that assure full access to education with democratic participation in the education establishment and against the privatization and commodification of education. In defense of the right to education, we support the demand of the student movement of the continent for their education to be free and universal.
- Reestablish the right of Cuba to pertain to the multilateral system. Demand the United States cease the blockade of Cuba and cease its hostility toward governments that do not follow its dictates.
- The deepening of autonomous integration processes without the interference of the government of the United States, and the construction of broad processes of integration from the grassroots with respect, recognition, and incorporation of input from the communities for a society based in cooperation, good quality of life for all, and the construction of a culture of peace. Sister nations of the continent join with Colombia in the search for a negotiated and peaceful solution to the armed conflict.
We lament that the beautiful city of Cartagena is at the same time an example of inequality and poverty, and today of militarization with the occasion of the official summit of the presidents. We call upon all social sectors of the American continent so that we might undertake unanimously the struggles for the principles and aspirations described in this declaration, inviting them to accompany the peaceful mass civilian mobilization to achieve the proposed ends.
Finally, we consider that the Summit of the Americas cannot continue being an exclusive stage, subordinated to the empire, a simulation of false harmonies. This is our voice, the true voice of the people of the Americas and thus we proclaim it before the world.
We recognize the advances in efforts at autonomous regional integration such as those established in the Bolivarian Alliance for the Americas (ALBA), the Union of South American Nations (UNASUR), and the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC). However, the construction and financing of democratic, progressive, and leftist governments must move toward overcoming a model based on extraction, agricultural monocultures for export, and the hoarding of land. Such practices damage essential rights such as free and informed prior consent and impede the full deployment of social movements as forces capable of deepening change.
The confluence of these governmental streams and those of social and political movements can be preserved to the degree that the people deepen their unity, their social and political mobilization, and do not renounce their autonomy and their ability to guarantee their rights. We note with satisfaction the sustained, non-violent, popular struggles against the neoliberal model.
At this V People’s Summit – The True Voice of the Americas, thousands of fighters from organizations of women, unions, students, farmers, indigenous people, African-descended people, small businesses, and ecumenical religious persons gathered from throughout the hemisphere. We deliberated on the problems that we consider truly fundamental for our countries and we moved forward in the construction of proposals and so, among other petitions, we demand:
- The elimination of foreign military bases, the end of colonialism, the cancellation of joint military and police exercises and training, the closing of the School of the Americas and the elimination of the Inter-American Defense System, and the end of the deployment of the IV fleet in our waters.
- The end of militarization under the pretext of the war on drugs and its replacement by a comprehensive, multilateral policy with emphasis on public health measures.
- The end of the militarization of civil functions such as humanitarian assistance, disaster response, and immigration control.
- The end of the criminalization of social movements, and to the use of indigenous, afro, and campesino [small farmer] lands as battlefields. No to forced recruitment, to the use of women as spoils of war, and to forced displacement. In the case of Colombia, in which an armed, internal conflict persists, militarization has put these people on the brink of extinction.
- The elimination of free trade agreements and investments that deepen poverty, social exclusion, and inequality and which particularly affect women.
- The end of indiscriminate promotion of foreign investment, looking instead for relationships of cooperation and mutual benefit and the strengthening of autonomous processes of integration. The rights of investors cannot be above the rights of the people and of the environment. We condemn transnational companies as the primary actors in this model.
- We call for a new regional financial architecture that incorporates: South Bank, the Latin American Reserve Fund, and puts and end to the impoverishing politics of debt.
- Real solutions to the environmental and climate crisis directed toward its structural causes through rebuilding the financial architecture and thereby changing the development model. We defend life and common goods in the face of the commodification of nature driven by multilateral financial institutions and the countries of the North.
- Respect for the right of the people to decide their agriculture policies and assure their food sovereignty, to conserve and consume their native products, all of which are threatened by monocultures, biofuels, genetically modified organisms, and big mining.
- The creation of decent work for all, the guarantee of freedom of association and collective bargaining, and the end to violence against rural and urban workers of the continent to be made a priority.
- Effective changes in the education systems that assure full access to education with democratic participation in the education establishment and against the privatization and commodification of education. In defense of the right to education, we support the demand of the student movement of the continent for their education to be free and universal.
- Reestablish the right of Cuba to pertain to the multilateral system. Demand the United States cease the blockade of Cuba and cease its hostility toward governments that do not follow its dictates.
- The deepening of autonomous integration processes without the interference of the government of the United States, and the construction of broad processes of integration from the grassroots with respect, recognition, and incorporation of input from the communities for a society based in cooperation, good quality of life for all, and the construction of a culture of peace. Sister nations of the continent join with Colombia in the search for a negotiated and peaceful solution to the armed conflict.
We lament that the beautiful city of Cartagena is at the same time an example of inequality and poverty, and today of militarization with the occasion of the official summit of the presidents. We call upon all social sectors of the American continent so that we might undertake unanimously the struggles for the principles and aspirations described in this declaration, inviting them to accompany the peaceful mass civilian mobilization to achieve the proposed ends.
Finally, we consider that the Summit of the Americas cannot continue being an exclusive stage, subordinated to the empire, a simulation of false harmonies. This is our voice, the true voice of the people of the Americas and thus we proclaim it before the world.
