Back from Guatemala!
Hola! Stephanie and I safely made it back to El Salvador on Thursday. We had a nice time. On Monday we went to a nature reserve where there were supposed to be spider monkeys, but we didn't see any. We also went to see the lake, which was gorgeous. On Tuesday we went on a boat to visit three towns around the lake. We also did some shopping for pretty Guatemalan stuff. On Wednesday we had been planning to do a hike through a cloud forest, but we discovered that the place our Lonely Planet book said to go to arrange a guide no longer exists, and when we talked to someone else, they said it isn't safe where we wanted to go. We decided to just relax on Wednesday, and we sat by the lake and read for a good part of the day. It was fun. I got to watch TV for the first time in two months, and was able to take hot showers for the second time in two months. It was a nice little vacation. At first I was really enjoying being a tourist, but then it disturbed me a bit how I was just one of those Americans who came to Guatemala to see some pretty sites and buy pretty fabrics. My role was to spend money, which I did. I wasn't doing anything but seeing pretty sites and buying pretty things, and I understood that and intended to do that. I guess the fact that I know I was not seeing Guatemalan reality makes it a lot better than it could be. Also, I'd rather be giving my money to Guatemalan textile makers than to some corporation in the U.S. And guess what? I uploaded pictures!
Everybody should read Confessions of an Economic Hitman by John Perkins. It's highly disturbing and educational and very good.
One of the major continuing news stories here has been a bunch of loans that the ARENA party (the primary conservative party, in power currently) wants and which the FMLN (the primary liberal party) opposes. ARENA is presenting it as the FMLN is against poor people and doesn't want to help education and the health care system, etc. I don't really know the specific reasons the FMLN is opposing the loans because the papers are pretty biased and I haven't seen their side represented (that could also be because I'm too lazy to read very many articles in Spanish). They just voted on $197 million of loans, which the country will not get because of the FMLN's opposition. I was talking about this a bit with Teresita, one of the Salvadoran students who lives in my house, and when I said that loans to poor countries aren't always a good thing, she asked why. I was kind of taken aback. I forgot that just because someone suffers from the poverty that these loans often create doesn't mean that they know about it. Being poor doesn't mean that you're super educated, and is more likely to mean that you're not educated. It reminded me of Pedagogy of the Oppressed by Paulo Freire (another book you should read, but a whole lot harder than Confessions of an Economic Hitman) and the need to raise consciousness in order to make change. I explained to Teresita that the loans often just put poor countries into more debt which makes them dependent on the loaning countries or institutions, and allows the rich people to exploit the poor countries and requires the poor countries to institute programs that benefit the rich countries (e.g. we'll give you this money if you grow this crop). When I explained it, she completely understood. Even if she hasn't been taught this stuff in school, she will always have a different and deeper understanding of what all that stuff means than I ever will.
Okay, I said forever ago that I was going to post my reflection on Voces Inocentes and my liberation theology paper. Here they are: Liberation Theology, Voces Inocentes.
Everybody should read Confessions of an Economic Hitman by John Perkins. It's highly disturbing and educational and very good.
One of the major continuing news stories here has been a bunch of loans that the ARENA party (the primary conservative party, in power currently) wants and which the FMLN (the primary liberal party) opposes. ARENA is presenting it as the FMLN is against poor people and doesn't want to help education and the health care system, etc. I don't really know the specific reasons the FMLN is opposing the loans because the papers are pretty biased and I haven't seen their side represented (that could also be because I'm too lazy to read very many articles in Spanish). They just voted on $197 million of loans, which the country will not get because of the FMLN's opposition. I was talking about this a bit with Teresita, one of the Salvadoran students who lives in my house, and when I said that loans to poor countries aren't always a good thing, she asked why. I was kind of taken aback. I forgot that just because someone suffers from the poverty that these loans often create doesn't mean that they know about it. Being poor doesn't mean that you're super educated, and is more likely to mean that you're not educated. It reminded me of Pedagogy of the Oppressed by Paulo Freire (another book you should read, but a whole lot harder than Confessions of an Economic Hitman) and the need to raise consciousness in order to make change. I explained to Teresita that the loans often just put poor countries into more debt which makes them dependent on the loaning countries or institutions, and allows the rich people to exploit the poor countries and requires the poor countries to institute programs that benefit the rich countries (e.g. we'll give you this money if you grow this crop). When I explained it, she completely understood. Even if she hasn't been taught this stuff in school, she will always have a different and deeper understanding of what all that stuff means than I ever will.
Okay, I said forever ago that I was going to post my reflection on Voces Inocentes and my liberation theology paper. Here they are: Liberation Theology, Voces Inocentes.
posted by Amber at 4:16 PM
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Voces Inocentes is available through eBay.
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