5.Narcomar, Puerto Nuevo 2012

Narco mar, Puerto Nuevo 2012

As the trays and pots of food were passed from hand to hand, the health promoters reflected.

The words of the Bible and brought them to the present remembering what they had lived through since those 70 years when the Peasant Organization began.

Máxima listened to them and at the same time remembered what her father told her.

-When the parents arrived from Chile, escaping from Pinochet it was because they believed they were communists-was the first comment. That fired everyone's memory.

- They were believed to be communists, but they were from Liberation Theology, which is different

- What's the difference? - asked Máxima

- Communists want the power the hard way, through violence. The priests of Theology believed that an organized town where the peasants did not work for anyone, not for the rich, or for a government, as in Cuba, was the best option.

- But the parents fought with our promoters, said Angel, one of the oldest promoters, their president.

-The problem was with her father's partner, who came to do her rural in Muisne, while her father worked in Cape San Francisco.

"What was the problem?" Asked Máxima again, as she had a cup of coffee, freshly roasted in the large industrial kitchens that the promoters had at home, and ground in a mill that multiplied the aroma of coffee everywhere.

- Dr. Luis, had been in Nicaragua, helping in the Sandinista Front, he brought his Nicaraguan wife, he had a boy and a girl who also lived with him and he believed in the armed struggle, he told us when we met, that we had to take up arms to make a real revolution.

"This is what bothered the parents," said the oldest of the promoters, Brígida, who was also a famous healer of horror, evil eye, and bad air.

- That is why the military came here, and to our houses, they lay us on the floor, they threatened to kill us if we did not confess where the weapons were, weapons that we never saw or had.

-When was that? -Maxima asked

- Around the year 84, when his father and doctor Luis left, then-President León Febres Cordero came to power - Angel answered - Then, Father Gracia was sent to Quito, where they were being watched, but he created an organization fair trade, Julio was deported to Italy

-What happened to the organization? Is he still alive?

- Two of our leaders were assassinated. The organization's house burned down, there is still the land, the dock, and a house where we have sewing machines that they donated to us, but we never use them, and the farm that is on the other side, they want to distribute it among the last leaders. - Angel commented.

In the faces of those 20 promoters, you could see disappointment, frustration, helplessness. The joy with which the meeting began escaped for a few minutes.

-Good Dra., Come and I will show you the room that we have arranged for you- Brígida said.

That large meeting room with tiles and cement on the floor had leaks in the zinc, the room was in a wooden house, which was the oldest construction, but it was in better condition, the bathrooms did not work, the kitchen with a floor of land had two industrial kitchens, and a sink with drinking water, but the water had to be brought from a well that was outside in a garden, on the banks of the river, with low grass that was the most beautiful thing in the place, but with tiny very wild ants. The room had a built-in wooden bed, and an old mattress, on the ceiling the bats slept during the day.

While the promoters continued their gathering, happy to see each other over the years, remembering the past and commenting on the present, Máxima took out her sheet, bedspread and awning, to rest for a few minutes, since the trip from Quito was exhausting.

At noon the promoters called her to lunch, there was a soccer game between old men and women, where laughter and ridicule abounded. It was a rebirth of life and hope.

Creole chicken and fried fish were the menus. After the feast and recess, Máxima took the lead along with Fernando and Angel to comment on the situation, since the dengue plague had arrived, which already had some deaths.

It was a talk about the life of the mosquito, the symptoms of the disease, the risks, the types of dengue, and how to detect the fearsome dengue hemorrhagic fever.

Each of the promoters, many of them had already gone through the disease, gave their opinions, became capable of being health advisers in their communities. At that, two nurses from the hospital arrived. They gave a talk about tuberculosis, which was the campaign that the Correa government was carrying out, after the AH1N1 pandemic, which arrived in 2008 and revealed that tuberculosis was a large problem in the country.