DPOR Touching El Salvador

Touching El Salvador

by Margaret Knapke, July 2001

Last month I met up with friends from Albuquerque, NM (including one of my SOA-10 co-defendant friends), in order to provide a modicum of "trauma reduction" in some of the rural communities hit hard by the earthquakes early this year. (They continue to experience tremors.) Since Judy Bierbaum and I were having our first opportunity to share our prison experiences of 2000 in any detail -- and we often did, I was continually reminded that the healing work we were doing was the hands-on counterpart to the political advocacy work which we call "prison witness."

Even though we were tending to damages seemingly wrought by "natural forces," those damages minimally were exacerbated by environmentally irresponsible development practices, and truly the crunch of economic globalization could be felt everywhere. So in a very real way, the handprint of the SOA was still very visible in El Salvador's ongoing, grinding inequity! But this was the backdrop; in the foreground, every day, was an irrepressible and generous spirit. I felt humbled by it, much as I did by the compassion of the women at Federal Prison Camp Lexington Atwood in 2000.

We were a crew of six: 2 teachers, 2 psychotherapists (including Judy), and 2 body-workers (including me). Judy and her husband Keith had gone down 3 or 4 weeks earlier, and had worked in many communities alongside the staff of APRODEHNI (http://www.APRODEHNI.org/). That acronym stands for The Association for the Promotion of Human Rights for the Children of El Salvador, and the staff are wonderful social workers committed to the very communities ignored by the ARENA government. By the time the rest of us got there on July 8, Judy, Keith and the Salvadorans had identified 4 communities that they considered most in need of our services. So from Monday thru Thursday we went to a different community each day -- all quite poor (materially), three deep in the countryside, and one about an hour from San Salvador.

Each community greeted us warmly in whatever passed for a town center -- sometimes an open space under a thatched roof and other times class rooms. After introductions, we would work in teams providing psychodrama, EMDR (eye movement desensitization and re-processing), and various types of bodywork. Whenever possible we would do some training in basic techniques (for instance, an EMDR technique adapted for children to use themselves to diminish their fears and sadness, as well as basic massage and polarity techniques). Then we would do individual work with adults and children with special needs -- in many cases these weren't necessarily the ones with the greatest needs, but those who were willing to ask for help!

Keep in mind that most of the country over the age of 10 years has some degree of PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder) from the war, and the younger ones were experiencing great fear from the earthquakes. In some cases the trauma from the earthquakes triggered buried memories from the war or other types of abuse. Needless to say, what we were able to offer was a small drop in the proverbial bucket, but our hope is that -- with the basic training that was offered -- it will ramify further.

That training was conducted most significantly on Friday, when about a dozen communities sent leaders to a meeting in San Salvador. There they shared information about their community's losses and needs, and then received training from us in a more sustained manner than we were able to do in the communities. On this particular day I was struck by the recurring phrase -- even in the midst of cataloguing their losses ! -- "Gracias a Dios," "pero gracias a Dios," "y gracias a Dios." Rather than succumbing to bitterness from this seemingly natural (but undoubtedly economically influenced) catastrophe, these amazing people were identifying their community's strengths and gifts! And thanking God.

What a lesson to First (to the table) World activists! If these Salvadorans can avoid "burn out" and sustain themselves and their communities by continually reminding themselves of their deeper resources, even under such grindingly difficult conditions, surely we can do so on our end of the struggle! Once again, my attempt to offer a small gift to the Salvadoran people who have endured so much, became an occasion for receiving an even greater gift from them.