As i´ve mentioned several times, my school is super neat. While we do our share of touristy visits to hot springs and hikes around guate-bonita, we also have conferencias sobre child labor and have testimonies from ex-guerillas, too.
this past weekend, the school organized a trip to a silver and gold mine that is currently under fire for human rights violations and destroying the communities surrounding it. while it was impossible to actually visit the mine, we took the journey to visit the closest villages to meet the people who are being affected by the it.
it took 5 hours by microbus to get there even though it was only 60 miles from xela. this was due to the rough conditions of the mountain roads and the fact that we got pulled over by police when we got close-ish to the mining area.
the police said they were protecting us from narco-traffickers in the area but when they found out who we were (gringos) and what we wanted to do (go to the mining area and talk to people), they got very concerned and decided that we could only continue if they accompanied us, for our safety of course, the entire time. Thus, we had police follow us all the way to the community, had police stand around (and take a few siestas) while we spent 6 hours walking the community and talking to folks, and had police follow us ALL the way back to xela.
for a country that has 1 police officer for every 3000 people, we probably had 20 different officers with us throughout the day (they changed each time we crossed a municipality line). a bit fishy, i think.
the mine, owned by an Canadian company, opened 6 years ago, and in that short amount of time has managed to trash the community and the land around it and is continuing to do so through some pretty scary tactics.
according to those we talked to, the mine has completely dried out the 8 wells in the area, leaving the townsfolk completely without water. the terra, as a result, is so dry and there is irrating dust (mostly likely tainted with chemicals from the mine) swirling around constantly. the one river that is still there is so toxic, animals die also immediately. the crops grown in the soil and poisonous and other towns refuse to buy them (although the community is forced to eat them themselves). children are getting skin diseases and community members are falling ill with tremors and tumors.
i experienced the irrating dust myself, saw the dried wells, took photos of the cracks with explosions have caused in houses, and met people whose health has been affected. and we saw the glowing water reservoir near the mine, as well. water should definitely not be that color...
some of the most disturbing stories i heard involved violent tactics of intimidation aimed at keeping disatants quiet. stuff you read about but rarely hear from the mouths of those personally touched by such violence.
all in all, it was a surreal experience and one that i hope will instigate further action for those who participated. i know i went on the trip very ignorant of how mining works, and i still need to learn more. however, the trip did give me a clearer sense of just who can be affected and by what means when you buy precious metals or stones.
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