|
In
placing our trip within the framework of current events, it is necessary
to point out that I run about three or four weeks behind in making web
pages. For example, although I am working on this page for events that
took place on the 16th & 17th of May, it is actually the 8th of June.
When we entered Peru back on the 2nd of May we began to see banners posted
by the teachers union calling for a national strike for mid-May. Teachers
in Peru earn about $160 US per month. When we returned from the jungle
that strike was moving into full swing. In fact the day we arrived we had
to walk a few blocks to our hotel because the bus couldn't get through.
We spent the next two days visiting museums in Cusco before heading towards
Nasca on the coast. Although there were demonstrations daily, everything
seemed to go according to a predefined schedule and appeared to be rather
orderly. The situation since then has become more tense, with the Peru's
President Toledo declaring the strike to be illegal and instituting a state
of emergency. He has suspended civil liberties making it possible for police
to enter private homes without a warrant. Sometime between our departure
from Cusco and our arrival in Nasca the situation had taken a turn for
the worse. Doctors and health care workers joined striking teachers in
Cusco, and at least one rally turned violent when police fired tear-gas
canisters into the crowd. While on the southern coast, demonstrations continued
both in Cusco and Lima. By the time we left Lima and headed north, farmers
had joined the strike. As we headed north, we began to see regular military
patrols guarding the sugar cane fields. We turned inland about 200 kilometers
north of Lima heading for the Callejón de Huaylas. While there,
we learned from some other travelers that the following day it was impossible
to by a bus ticket. Apparently, about 100 miles north of where we left
the Pan American highway, demonstrating farmers had blocked that road with
boulders and burning tires. Troops were sent in and in the ensuing confrontation
one demonstrator was killed. Toledo gave striking teachers 5 days to return
to classes, and from where we are now it seems as if that deadline has
been met. In Trujillo, where we are in real time, we saw the first children
in school uniforms that we have seen in a month. All of this said,
we have so far experienced nothing in the way of fallout. If anything,
the Peruvian's distrust for their own president have made them more sympathetic
of our position on what everyone in South America refers to as La Guerra
de Bush.
|