Orientation to Chiapas

Two weeks ago I had an amazing orientation into the situation here in Chiapas. I was presented to a range of different organizations (set up by the organization who organized the internship) in San Cristobal who each gave ma a briefing on their area of expertise (all in Spanish!). I also had the opportunity to visit a Zapatista community, autonomous communities who have very well thought out ideals and political views, with someone who has been working with them for years (Julio) and therefore was able to brief me in detail about their 'lucha' (fight). They have set up an autonomous government completely apart from the Mexican government which is entirely democratic. They are attempting to be sustainable, relying as much as possible from their own communities for everything they need as well as trying to conserve their own cultural practices. But the primary goal is to have control over decisions and issues that affect them. I was able to talk to the ‘good government junta’ on my visit, after being checked by a committee to find out the reasons for my visit. I was greeted with open arms into the government building and was able to chat to the government council for an hour, answering all of my enquiries about the community with eagerness and pride. The community was located in beautiful countryside, up in the mountains in complete serenity from the outside world. This visit was definitely one of the highlights of my trip so far!

Situation in Chiapas
The military presence is extremely high in Chiapas. They're not doing much at the moment but Julio tells me they're increasing their troops and establishing themselves more and more, making their presence known. The most concerning is the para-miliatary gangs which are apparently trained by the army to attack communities.

The overall plans of the government here is to take land away from indigenous communities so as to be able to sell it to mining companies or ‘develop’ it for e.g. future tourists. They are also planning on growing 1 million hectares of bio-fuels in Chiapas by 2012.

The Plan Puebla Panama, a highway that is planned from Mexico to Columbia is already taking place – they have started work on the highway from Chiapas to Palenque (have done approx. 9 km’s) but they have encountered opposition, especially since where they’re planning on building the highway is through some Zapatista communities. They will also be destroying a very rich ecosystem which is used as a haven by migratory birds on their way up or down every year. There’s also another highway planned (under a different name – IIRSA) stretching from Columbia all the way to the South of America. The main reasons for this highway is to create infrastructure for mining companies (mainly coming from Canada) to come and extract resources as well as the opportunity to create new sweatshops, where labour will be cheaper down south and the transportation will be swifter with this new highway.

No need to say that my head hurt at the end of this week from the overload of very interesting but quite confronting information. I was taken to Palenque on the Friday to be presented to the organization I will be working with for the next 3 months. But all the travelling I had been doing ended up catching with me and I fell sick as a dog as soon as I got to Palenque. I had all the symptoms of swine flu, or so it seemed to me! I couldn’t do much more than moan about having a fever in 40 degree heat and try and sweat it out. I did go and visit the ruins in a fit of insanity with my friend Flo who happened to be in Palenque at the same time as me, but quite obviously didn’t appreciate any of the amazing archaeological ruins in my presence.

Next blog issue – my organisation – what will I be doing? Not to be missed!