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http://www.indymedia.org:8081 Last Night in Buenos Aires Argentina. My Personal Experience (english) Thursday 20 Dec 2001 author: I'd rather be anonymous summary Last nights protest and how they felt, personal report. |
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I was watching television, seeing the lootings and the uprisings in the country interior. Suddenly the president appeared on the screen.. he talked about differentiating between the criminals and the needy. He spoke quietly almost elegantly trying to sound in charge. He said he had announced today the state of siege. I knew that it is uncostitutional in Argentina for the president to declare an state of siege, only the congress can do that. I was disgusted and I turned off the TV. I started hearing a sound.. very quiet sound but growing.. I went to the balcony of my apartment, looked out.. people on every balcony banging pots and caceroles, the sound got louder and louder.. it was a roar.. and it wasn't going to stop. I saw some people on the corner of the street I live.. no more than 10.. I put on a shirt and went down.. It was strange, and exciting, on every corner I could see people were gathering. Small groups. This is a comfortable middle class neighbourhood.. but everybody's been fucked by what's going on... and it's been going on for far too long. On the corner of the next street people had went and started gathering on the middle of the streets. Banging spoons against caceroles, waving flags.. in a few minutes we were something like 150 persons.. we started walking.. nobody seemed to knew were we were going or what was gonna happen.. an hour had gone by since the bangings started and the noise wasn't stopping, coming from every corner of the city. As we walked people where joining us, it was exciting.. almost manic. The feeling of regaining your own power. People from all walks of life where there.. I looked back and suddenly this spontaneus manifestation was a couple of blocks long.. and I could see that we were joing other spontaneus groups coming from other streets. I could see people in suits and people in working uniforms. I could see young girls in nice clothes and senior citizens in old clothes. I could see the small businessman who is suffering from higher and higher taxes and it's about to loss his house from his bank loans and the young man who has been excluded by the system and couldn't get a job for 4 years. Everybody was represented. It was amazing.. People cheered from the balconies.. small pieces of shreded paper falling slowly to the streets.. singing, banging, marching. When I got to the congress a couple of thousand people where allready there.. and I could see people coming in from every corner.. It felt like a party. The Flags waving, the chants, the clapping. A guy on the top of the stairs lighted some sort of smoke light.. pink smoke all over the place.. I looked around, don't know why but I started feeling tense.. people kept on coming and we started marching to the casa rosada. Things didn't feel exciting anymore.. it felt tenser and tenser.. I could see some fire on the street ahead.. A small trashcan on fire.. I kept on walking.. some people where quietly singing and clapping but I saw other small fires.. I had entered a column that come from a tougher neighboorhood than mine. I don't blame them.. they've been fucked way harder than anybody else.. and hunger breeds anger. This young guy was about to bang a stick against a street sign, this thirtiesh guy, skinny and dressed in really old jeans and shirt, holding a young girl on his arms, said something to him.. The young man looked back, he saw the columns of people. I could catch this phrase from the skinny guy "Look at how many we are".. I looked back.. I saw and felt what I felt at the beggining.. everybody was there, everybody was represented.. we were too many. The guy threw away the stick. When I got to Plaza de Mayo. A couple thousands were there.. and they kept and kept on coming.. It was weird.. people started coming in on cars.. as well as marching. Young people, old people, families.. the people.The plaza was half full and the columns kept on coming.. I walked around. Amazed. Still quite surprised of being there. I was on the back thinking that not many days you go to the balcony to check the noises coming from the streets and you end up being a witness to a presidential deposition by social uprising. Suddenly I was pushed in the back by somebody.. when I regained balance I saw people running away.. Somebody was yelling "Sons of bitches" right next to me.. out of instinct I started running with them.. I ran half a block.. stopped and look back.. I saw thousands and thousands of people running.. I kept on running but looked back from time to time. I asked somebody what's going on.. he just runned.. somebody passing me was saying something about the police.. couldn't quite understand.. my nose started itching.. I looked back.. in the plaza, 500 meters back, I could see smoke.. I looked at people's eyes.. they were redenning... my throat hurt.. I ran. I looked back.. people were going off in all directions but away from the plaza.. the smoke got higher and higher I took of my shirt and covered my nose and mouth.. my eyes itched.. I got pretty far.. looked around.. this guy on a Miami Florida t-shirt.. absolutely middle class. said he now understood what the piqueteros felt. I kept on walking.. heading for my home.. I suddenly realized I was crying. I didn't knew if it was from the lacrimogic gases or from impotence and anger. | |