Zapatista Ambush and Murder
Apr. 2nd, 2014 09:01 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
stormdogI'm starting to write up my reflection paper for the Mexico trip. There has to be something to earn the three credit hours for it, right?
Then I remembered someone in class yesterday saying they'd seen something about a Zapatista having been killed recently; like in the last week or two. He didn't have details, but I Googled around a bit and found a link to this article.
http://floweroftheword.wordpress.com/2014/03/23/assassination-of-juan-carlos-gomez-silvano-from-the-ejido-san-sebastian-bachajon-adherent-to-the-sixth-decl-aration-of-the-lacandon-jungle-chiapas/
It seems that the murdered man was a regional coordinator for the EZLN (the Zapatista Army of National Liberation). He was killed on the 21st of March, the first full day of our time in Mexico. At that point, we were still in Palenque, six hours away from the site we spent most of our time at.
However, with the waypoint I marked on a handheld GPS, I was able to find the very rural site we were at on Google Earth. I was also able to find the small municipality where Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano was ambushed in his truck and shot 20 times. It was about 16 miles away from where we arrived a few days later to spend a week-plus living with the Zapatistas, painting a mural, and living day-to-day life.
I guess it's a little like the time that my parents talk about when I was little and we had been hiking on a trail in Glacier National Park, and when we got back, we found out that another hiker on the same trail around the same time had been face to face with a bear. Though in that case, the bear was not carrying firearms, and the hiker was uninjured.
I don't know that we were ever in serious danger; but at the same time we were officially in a war zone, and I'm that much gladder to be home.
Then I remembered someone in class yesterday saying they'd seen something about a Zapatista having been killed recently; like in the last week or two. He didn't have details, but I Googled around a bit and found a link to this article.
http://floweroftheword.wordpress.com/2014/03/23/assassination-of-juan-carlos-gomez-silvano-from-the-ejido-san-sebastian-bachajon-adherent-to-the-sixth-decl-aration-of-the-lacandon-jungle-chiapas/
It seems that the murdered man was a regional coordinator for the EZLN (the Zapatista Army of National Liberation). He was killed on the 21st of March, the first full day of our time in Mexico. At that point, we were still in Palenque, six hours away from the site we spent most of our time at.
However, with the waypoint I marked on a handheld GPS, I was able to find the very rural site we were at on Google Earth. I was also able to find the small municipality where Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano was ambushed in his truck and shot 20 times. It was about 16 miles away from where we arrived a few days later to spend a week-plus living with the Zapatistas, painting a mural, and living day-to-day life.
I guess it's a little like the time that my parents talk about when I was little and we had been hiking on a trail in Glacier National Park, and when we got back, we found out that another hiker on the same trail around the same time had been face to face with a bear. Though in that case, the bear was not carrying firearms, and the hiker was uninjured.
I don't know that we were ever in serious danger; but at the same time we were officially in a war zone, and I'm that much gladder to be home.
