Virginia narrates how she fled from military operations with her children and recounts the day her nine-year-old son died, and she was unable to bury him.
- Chapter:
- Chapter 3: The Years of "Guindas"
- Interviewee:
- Virginia
Transcription
…So I came back to Patamera, which had been taken over by the guerrilla. We stayed in Patamera for a year, then another military operation came and drove us out. Some of the guerrilla leaders were there, and we were driven out in the direction of La Montañona, “the Big Mountain,” we called it, but when those of us in that group tried to pass over to the other side of La Montañona the military cordon was already in place and we couldn’t get through, it was impossible, so we came back here. So at that time I was carrying one of my children, he was the one who I had to leave behind in El Conacaste. I don’t even know if he was buried or not. He was nine years old, and he had been in the hospital, but in Honduras. Because someone from Honduras requested that he be admitted to the hospital as if he was their child, because he fell off a high *door* (?) onto a rock, here, and was gravely injured, so badly that his whole stomach was bruised. When I went to see him there, the guerrilla took him for me because a guerrilla leader said to me, “You can’t keep going with so many kids, can you?” “I can’t,” I said, but I told him, I said, “I would rather give myself up to the soldiers that have them kill me and my children, but I won’t leave him,” I said. So they took him in for me and put him in the guerrilla’s hospital. But by the time they told me I should go see him he was in very bad shape, his whole stomach was bruised from falling on a rock. So I came back to where I was staying, I was near a place that they called “Los López,” near Nombre de Jesús, they kept us there in the forest. Later they sent for me again, they told me to come again about eight days later. I went back. When I entered they had him there, there were some nurses and a bunch of guerrilla, and they said to me, “Look, your son is in very bad shape. Your son—we did what we could, but what else can we do, we’ve called you here to see how bad it is.” I went in to see him, and all he said to me was, “Mama, I’m not going to be with you anymore, I’m not going to see any change in the war. Go, take care of my brothers and sisters, they will see it, and you too, but I’m not going to because I’m in bad shape, I can’t take it, I can’t bear the pain I feel inside.” He was covered with bruises, all swollen. So as I was leaving he said to me, “But don’t cry for me, don’t cry for me. Be careful,” he said. Oh! And I had barely come outside when the guerrilla leader said to me, “Get out of here immediately because the solders are coming and they will catch you here.” “What are you going to do with him?” “We’ll see what to do.” Oh, and by eight that night they were telling me that he had died. And I asked, “Can I go and see what they will do with him” “No,” they said, “It’s been taken over, but I assure you that we’re going to bury him.” At that point I lost communication with them, I don’t know if they buried him or left him there. I don’t know where that boy ended up. He was nine. Yes.