Day 17: Suchitoto

I took a day off and headed to Suchitoto with my uncle and his family.  Suchitoto is touristy town because the city has preserved its old colonial feel which many tourists seem to enjoy.  I visited the city because I have a cousin who lives there.  Casa de Las Alemdras is a beautiful hotel and restaurant.  It has an old hacienda feel and I would recommend it if you are passing through this.  I also visited the Centro de Paz (Center for Peace), which is a hostel as well as an art gallery.  The art gallery is located next to a building which served as a church and a convent.  If you walk through the old building you have to be careful or you might get hit by one of the bats flying in and out of the building. Creepy.  When we arrived the gallery was closed but the man who takes care of the property was willing to open up the gallery for us to take a quick look.

I then went to see a play called El Enfermo Imaginerio, which is a French play and about a man who is a hyperchondriac and is trying to marry his daughter off to a doctor.  The play is actually pretty funny and the two main actors are hilarious.  The actor who plays the hypochondriac recently received a scholarship to studying acting in another country.

Day 16: Las Dignas

I decided to stay in San Salvador for a few days to try and get in contact with various organizations that work with maquila employees.  I was given a few contacts by one of my professors on my thesis committee.  To my surprise, many of them no longer work with maquila workers.  Their attention has now turned to combating femicide in El Salvador. Femicide has become a huge problem in the region.  I have read about femicide in Guatemala and almost went on a delegation this summer to the country to explore the topic.

Las Dignas was the first organization I contacted.  Las Dignas, which is Asociacion de Mujeres por la Dignidad y la vida (Association of Women for Dignity and Life), is a well known feminist organization in El Salvador and often are seen in the national media fighting for women's rights. In the past, they had organized women maquila workers.  I went to their Centro de Documentacion (Documentation Center) to explore their library.  They had a vast collection of books, videos, and CDs.  The library staff member found various books for me on machismo, including one on masculinity and paternity in El Salvador.  She was also able to find an old Las Dignas published manual on maquila workers.  I was very excited and grateful for her assistance and spent a couple of hours making photocopies and looking through various books.  She also provided me with information on femicide in El Salvador which is something I would like to explore at a later date.

This is art work that I spotted displayed on some of the houses in El Salvador.  It reads: "In this house we want a life free of violence against women"

Day 14: Centro Romero at UCA

Prior to today, I had never been to the Universidad Centroamericana Jose Simeon Canas in El Salvador.  I decided to visit the university in hopes that I would be able to find books on the maquilas in El Salvador that perhaps were not available in the U.S.  The library did not have books on the maquilas in El Salvador but it did have a few thesis on maquilas written by students from the university.

I also visited a museum on campus, known as Centro Romero.  Centro Romero is dedicated to the Archbishop Romero, who has become a symbol for the atrocities Salvadorans faced during the civil war, and to the Jesuit priests and 2 women that were killed on campus.  Archbishop Romero was assassinated as he was giving mass.  He was very outspoken in support for the poor of El Salvador and spoke freely against the heinous crimes the government was committing.  University students, faculty, and members of the Catholic church were suspected of being guerillas and/or guerilla supporters.  In 1989, the military surrounded the UCA campus.  As the story goes, the Jesuit priests on campus were accused of hiding guerillas on campus and the military entered the campus in hopes of finding them.  As it turns out, the military did not find any members of the guerillas, yet massacred 8 Jesuit priests and a woman and her daughter that happened to be spending the night.  The Center has pictures of bodies and as disturbing as they were I found myself looking at them because the thought of how the Salvadoran government killed innocent people is repulsing and I had to see for myself what types of atrocities took place.  The Center is very moving and serves as a reminder of the history El Salvador has faced and the issues it still faces.  Although the war ended in 1992 with the Peace Accords, there are still a number of issues the majority of people face.  Mass poverty, low levels of education, limited economic resources, and feminicide are just some of these issues.  A visit to this Center is a must for those visiting El Salvador.