Juan Jose Garcia

Ex-migrants help other survivors of journey north

SAN SALVADOR, El Salvador (AP) — Hiding in the bushes, 17-year-old Marcelo Larin watched in terror as attackers raped a fellow migrant, a Guatemalan woman, near her naked, unconscious and machete-wounded husband.

Larin wasn't the only witness to the violence that day more than five years ago in the southern Mexican state of Chiapas. Other Central American migrants were also quietly waiting out the attack until they could rescue the Guatemalan couple. They finally helped the pair to a nearby highway and loaded them into a passing police car.

Larin is now back in his native El Salvador where he goes by the handle "Marcelo the Migrant" and spreads an urgent message to others thinking of trying their luck in the U.S.: Don't go, at least not without legal permission.

"When I'm in the schools, I talk as a kind of prevention," said Larin, now 22. "It's difficult to find opportunities in El Salvador, but there are some."

He works with the nonprofit Committee for Dead and Missing Migrants of El Salvador, which is the first of its kind in this Central American country, championing the rights of those who have survived and returned from the dangerous journey north.

Despite warnings from government officials and others, millions of Salvadoran migrants have hit the torturous road to the U.S. in search of the American dream. Many end up back home, penniless and debt-ridden.

The center's staff, which includes many ex-migrants, offers legal support and counseling to returnees. It's also investigated 309 cases of alleged human rights violations involving Salvadoran migrants as well as searched for those missing in Guatemala and Mexico.

"Many cases go unreported out of fear of reprisal and because most coyotes know the families of the victims," said committee director Lucia Gonzalez, using a slang term for smugglers hired to guide migrants.

Her office is covered with photographs of missing migrants, many with the question "Where are they?" written across their faces.

Such dangers have only grown in recent months as Mexican drug cartels escalate their war for control of smuggling routes into the U.S., which are often the same paths taken by migrants. Since November, hundreds of migrants, many of them from Central America, have been found dead in mass graves near the U.S.-Mexico border or trapped in stifling cargo trailers driven by smugglers.

Salvadorans were especially shocked by the discovery of 72 slain Central Americans in the northern Mexican state of Tamaulipas. Police suggested they were killed after resisting forced recruitment into the Zetas drug cartel.

Brookside Baby: Juan Jose Cuadra puts up a good fight

Cuadra, retired poet-art critic, who is living the life of a recluse in the hills of Laguna as he struggles with the initial effects of Parkinson’s disease, was known in the past not only for his poems, especially the much-anthologized “Dogstar” and “Dogging Years,” but also his reviews of art exhibitions. There were times when his acerbic pen cut some artists and pseudo-artists down to size. This endeared him to some, but others were not too pleased. About his poems having traces of Jose Garcia Villa’s influence, he said, “I’ve written much poetry, and my language is my own. Villa’s and my poetic sensibilities are worlds apart. One has to read everything a poet has written to make a good judgment. One swallow can’t make a summer. One poem can’t make a poet. I stand on my own as a poet because of the totality of my work.” When he was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease, defined by answers.com as “a progressive nervous disease occurring most often after the age of 50, associated with the destruction of brain cells that produce dopamine and characterized by muscular tremor, slowing of movement, partial facial paralysis, peculiarity of gait and posture, and weakness,” his reaction was near denial. He said, “Naturally, it was a terrible blow to me. I never felt so useless in all of my life. There’s nothing I can do about it, except pray. Only God in his complete love and mercy can heal me. Every day I hope for a miracle. I found out in my situation that only love of God can help. Man, no matter how great he is, is nothing without God’s love. I’ve come to realize that one cannot escape his own karma. Karma is exact when it’s meted out to one. Punishment is exact. One is his own judge and executioner because of karmic debts you accrue for yourself.” On July 22, if he is not bothered by the chronic fatigue that is part of the disease, he’ll journey with de Almeidda for a long-postponed reunion with friends at UP Diliman’s Balay Kalinaw where baritone Andrew Fernando, mezzo soprano Clarissa Ocampo, flutist Christopher Oracion and pianist Mary Anne Espina will gift him with an evening of song and music.

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New statehood bill, Hearings before the subcommittee of the Committee on Territories [Nov. 12-24, 1902] on House bill 12543, to enable the people of Oklahoma, Arizona, and New Mexico, to form constitutions and state governments and be admitted into the Union on an equal footing with the original states