Wednesday, August 19, 2009

what's happening in Honduras?

I've been getting this question a lot because of the current political crisis. So here goes...

Things in Tegucigalpa (I can't speak for the rest of Honduras) have been mostly normal.
The city is covered in mostly pro Mel graffiti like "fuera golpistas" (get out coupsters) and "urge Mel" (hurry, Mel). (I've also started seeing anti Mel graffiti that says "Mel Narco Ladron" (Mel drug dealing thief).)
There are a lot of protests, but they are mostly peaceful. Sometimes they break windows at the fast food restaurants that are owned by a so-called golpista company. And they always spray paint walls/houses/buildings, etc, etc.
And then there was the exceptionally violent protest last week, where the Zelayistas burned a bus and a Popeye's restaurant. You can see a video of all of that here.
But, like I said, things have been mostly normal....for Honduras. And then today, out of nowhere, there were TWO marches in front of my store. One was around noon, with walking protestors.
The other was around 4:45, and lasted for hours. It was car after car after car full of protestors (and you can't help but laugh when you see all of these latinos fulfilling the stereotype with cars of 10-15 people piled in...haha). They were all laying on their horns and being incredibly annoying.
I saw one guy get out of a vehicle and spray paint the wall of a business across the street.
he is writing "fuera golpista"
At one point, the people in the backs of the trucks turned their yelling towards me, and for the first time since I've been back from the US, I was really scared of them! They saw me, obviously gringa, taking videos with my cell phone from the balcony, and started yelling "golpista, fuera golpista!" I ran inside my store and hid for the rest of the protest. ;)
And I just keep asking myself.... what's the point of all this? All they are doing is creating nuisance and chaos. Is driving through the city in a line of hundreds of cars going to convince the opposition to change their minds? No. I'm pretty sure it's just going to piss them off.

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