THREE WOMEN Laura Santiago grew up in the village of San Pedro, near Guazapa Volcano in El Salvador. Her campesino parents leased a small plot of land for growing beans and vegetables. They paid for this land with their labor. From November until January, Laura, her seven brothers, two sisters, mother and father harvested coffee for the patron. After they had picked enough coffee beans to pay for the land, they earned only $400 dollars. This money was used to buy clothing, medicine, perhaps a few chickens and some small niceties for their one-room home. In 1980, when Laura was 17 years old, her family fled Guazapa and sought refuge in the capital of San Salvador. The incident that forced this exodus left an indelible scar on Laura’s soul. Her parents were members of the Union of Salvadoran Cam- pesinos. In October, 1980, the union asked the patron for a raise in pay. The union leaders explained that because of rising prices, workers could no longer afford basic necessities for their families. The patron listened patiently and then explained that wages depended on international prices. At least for that year, he said, there could be no raise. The union leaders responded that if the campesinos did not receive their wage increase, the union would strike. That night, the Salvadoran National Guard visited San Pedro. They led Laura’s father and nine other men to a ditch next to the patron's house. They killed these men, castrated them, and stuffed their severed genitals into their mouths. The people found the corpses the next morning. Terrified, they buried their dead, packed their few belongings, and began the long trek down the highway to the capital of San Salvador. Tc h o e r p p s e e o s p t l h e e f o n u e n x d t the morning. Terrified, they buried their dead, packed their few belongings, and began the long trek down the highway to the capital of San Salvador. Laura met Juan Gonzalez while on this exodus. They became friends and eventually lovers. They found refuge in the camp established by the Catholic Church in the basement of the Catholic seminary in San Salvador. Their child, Oscar Gonzalez y Santiago, was born a year later. Oscar spent his first two years in that seminary’s basement. He saw the first light of day on July 13, 1983, when Laura and Juan returned to Guazapa with 30 other families. The families who re-settled near Guazapa carved latrine trenches out of the earth. They laid out the roads, and, with Church assistance, secured a loan to purchase bricks, cement, wood and metal roofing. Men, women and children all worked together building their houses. When all thirty- one homes were completed, they held a Mass of thanksgiving, where each family was assigned a home by lottery. Once, when Oscar had fallen ill with dysentery in the refugee camp, Laura had gone to the camp infirmary for medicine. There, she learned about a course for community health workers. After making some inquiries, she enrolled. Over the next year, she completed two steps in the four-part program. When Laura returned to Guazapa, she formed a community health committee. This committee taught people about microbes that infect water and cause dysentery, how to prepare water for drinking, and how to re-hydrate babies suffering from dysentery and diarrhea. Laura assumed responsibility for the clinic’s small pharmacy and began a level-one course for her own committee. Once a month, she took the bus into the capital to continue her own schooling. As Laura’s reputation as a medic spread to the other cantons on Guazapa, the small clinic became overburdened with patients. Laura asked women who came from these villages to volunteer some time to the clinic. She began a training program and soon had teams of health workers visiting the outlying cantons to teach preventative health. El Salvador is a mountainous country. From May until August it rains every night, and not at all during the rest of the year. In the countryside, drinking water comes from wells. The health workers told people that their wells must be deepened and, in some cases, moved a safe distance uphill from latrines. They explained that animals must be kept penned, because animal feces pollute the drinking water and animals that eat human feces become sick and infect humans. People were told that clean water was the only solution to the horrible dysentery killing so many children. Many villages refused to listen. It takes a great deal of effort to dig a new well. Some villages agreed, and when the effects of these efforts became evident, other villages undertook moving their wells. The community health workers spend as much time developing decision-making strategies in the villages as talking about health. If but one family continues to dispose of waste uphill from the well, the effort is wasted. As Laura explained to her coworkers, “It is easier to prevent dysentery than to cure it.” Laura’s husband, Juan, found work as a laborer in the capital. He became a brick carrier earning three dollars a day. After deducting the cost of daily bus fare, Juan earned barely enough to buy food and clothes for his family. On May 1,1985, Juan joined thousands of Salvadoran workers in a demonstration in San Salvador. While returning home, Juan and two companions were arrested by the National Police. They were sent to a political prison and detained without trial. When Laura learned of her husband’s detention, she attempted to secure his release. But Laura was told that she had been mis-informed. There was no Juan Gonzalez in custody and no record of his arrest. In El Salvador, it is said that Juan “had been disappeared.” Laura returned home in despair. She continued training community health workers. Offered a small salary by the Church, she enrolled Oscar in a Church- sponsored day care. Laura’s hope that Juan would return to her grew fainter. She poured herself into het work. By 1986, Laura had completed the training course and was supervising seven teams of health workers north of the capital. Laura admits that at times she fun- neled medicines to the guerrillas on Guazapa. “That is my work,” she says, “to get medicines to those who need them. The muchachos— guerrillas— also have sick and wounded.” Laura never actually visited the guerrillas’ camps. She passed the medicines to a young woman who came to the clinic twice a month. There were times when Laura could not spare supplies. “I had to decide,” she said, “and La sh u e ra w w a a s s r a a r p r e e d st e a d n ; d forced to eat her meals like a dog—refried beans served on a plate of human feces. sometimes I judged that the needs of the people in the villages were greater than those of the muchachos." But something went wrong. The National Guard detected the courier route supplying Guazapa and Laura’s contact was arrested. Under torture, she implicated Laura. Laura was arrested; she was raped and forced to eat her meals like a dog—refried beans served on a plate of human feces. Even under torture Laura could not implicate others. She only knew the one courier. The police tried to get Laura to identify priests and nuns working in the Archdiocese’s social secretariat as “terrorists.” But she refused to do this. Five days after she had been arrested, quite unexpectedly, Laura was released. She returned home, anxious to find her little boy. He was safe in the custody of the day-care teacher. Laura nearly smothered Oscar in her hugs and kisses. She says that Oscar was like a wiry monkey. He clung to her neck and wrapped his legs around Laura’s waist, refusing to let go until that night, when he fell asleep in his mother’s arms. At dawn, the morning after her release, Laura was awakened by a troop of National Guardsmen. They questioned her about the “terrorists” posing as health promoters in the Guazapa region. Laura denied knowing anything about this. One of the soldiers slammed his rifle butt into Laura’s face. She fell back onto her bed and that is when the soldiers discovered little Oscar. Two soldiers took Oscar from his mother’s bed and tugged at his arms and legs, as if to draw and quarter him. The captain continued questioning Laura, who continued to deny any knowledge of the guerrillas’ movements around Guazapa. The soldiers took Oscar outside. Laura heard one of them say “the fence,” and she screamed. By the time the soldiers escorted Laura outside, Oscar’s two captors 38 Clinton St.—Spring 1990
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