5 November 2011

happy guy fawkes day, my dears! it's fun to see that my favorite movie of all time is becoming everybody else's too. i'll be celebrating, as usual, by watching señor v this evening.

i've a fantastic and very appropriate thing to share today! our houseguest this week told us all about her work with the zapatistas in chiapas, mexico. they're a group of indigenous people who oppose neoliberalism and promote alter-globalization. they would, most of all, like to regain control of their homeland and the freedom to work the land and live on it as they've done for centuries.

they're non-violent, for the most part, and their women have fantastic rights (!!!) . they live in autonomous communities, where drug use, drinking, and weapons are not allowed, and the motto is, "aqui manda el pueblo y el gobierno obedece."

this was the first we'd heard of their struggle, and we were most excited to learn that one of the prominent ways they "rebel" is through painting murals. my favorite of them all was the magic mural:

click to enlarge!

it's absolutely breathtaking, but it was destroyed by the mexican army just days after it was completed.

it always hurts my insides when governments destroy books or art to repress a rebellion... and i guess it hurts many others' insides as well, because the mural has been recreated in various locations across the world, the first of which was in the homeland! sadly, the replica in argentina was also destroyed by the authorities. from hasty google searches, it appears that several other replicas have also been destroyed, but one does remain in san fran.

here's a great explanation of all the different parts of the mural:

and you can go here for a version you can color in yourself... or have your kids do it... whatevs.

our houseguest also showed us an awesome mural of the upside-down world map, which i'm also very fond of, but can't find a picture of. sadface. just watch this west wing clip instead.

anyhoo, hats off to these muralists, whose art helps us remember remember that, "people should not be afraid of their governments. governments should be afraid of their people."

happy 5th!