Wedding.
Antigua, Guatemala, March 11, 2001.
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Guatemala City, Guatemala, March 8, 2001--
Everywhere
masked students are collecting money for the Guatemalan version
of Carnival. La Huelga de Dolores--the strike of the aggrieved--is a
day when people parade mocking the government. It is also a day of remembrance
of martyred student leaders and military dictatorships of the very recent
past.
In the Lenten processions of the season Ladino
and Mayan people bear extremely heavy wooden images of the crucified
savior and his suffering mother--the Virgin of Sorrows--on their shoulders.
In Antigua, children spend hours making colorful
"rugs" of flowers, colored rice and fruits in the streets.
The procession of suffering will destroy them in minutes. In a neighboring
village other children dance while sniffing glue and throwing the 18th
Street gang sign.
Even at the wedding I photograph the emotions are mixed. The bride receives
gifts and wipes tears from her eyes often. Someone whispers in my ear
that she looks very pregnant.
Guatemala,
March 18
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