Isidora recalls her experience in the Mesa Grande refugee camp in Honduras, describing how activities within the camp were divided up between people living there.
- Chapter:
- Chapter 4: Refugee Experiences
- Interviewee:
- Isidora
Transcription
My family went in the direction of Chalatenago. There they supported the Armed Forces and not the guerrilla. They supported them, but only for some things. But we didn't, we went… from Portillo we left for Honduras. In Honduras, from the border, they took us to Mesa Grande, to Mesa Grande. We were in Mesa Grande for a while. We were well attended because the UNHCR gave us... From the moment they took us in, they had blankets for us, because it was cold. It's cold there. They gave us blankets. They gave us... They held lots of workshops, workshops for everything: carpentry, tailoring. We learned a lot there. They gave us everything from needles to houses. At first there were just tents but later they made us wood houses. There were a lot of us there. But it was still dangerous, because there was a… what do you call it; there was a kind of fence. You could go so far, but any farther and they would kill you. It was marked with white paint. No one even wanted to use the bathroom near the fence. They would go somewhere else. They beat one man nearly to death, but he survived. But those responsible for the UNHCR were supportive. They were already ready if you asked them about anything. But the soldiers killed some people, because there was a gate. They were outside and the people were inside, but some people didn't understand, and they tried to leave and were killed. Some of them were killed; they took another man from of his house and we never knew if he was alive or dead. There was a girl whose children were orphaned. They killed her too—they lost her, even though she was with someone from the UNHCR. They took her because of her name—she had a different ID document and they were looking for someone by that name. That's why they said to her, "You're the one we're looking for."