Gloria López Manuel

September 21, 2004, Letter to Christopher Curran

Hi Christopher, how are you? I hope you find yourself well with your parents and friends.

I will write to you the history of my community during the armed conflict through the years 1980, 1981, 1982, and 1983.

It was March 14, a Sunday, when people were busy with different activities. Some were at the market and others were content in the churches, none of them aware of what was going to happen. It was about 10:00 am when a helicopter flew over the community and the people were surprised to see it land. Many of them ran to the landing place to see what was happening, and in the helicopter were 30 well-armed soldiers and a commander who lead them. The people were happy to welcome them. Everyone went to the market, where most of the people of the community were, and in that place the soldiers gathered all the men, young to old. The soldiers told the men, ‘Go out and bring back firewood from the mountain because there will be a big celebration for all of you, we will cook a lot of meat so you’ll be happy.’ The poor peasants obeyed all of the commands, they went to get firewood on the mountain while the soldiers stayed behind to dig a great pit, about 14 meters deep. An hour later the peasants arrived carrying the heavy loads of firewood. They were very tired, and the soldiers ordered them to put the firewood in the pit. The wood was lit on fire and the commander said a word of farewell. One of the peasants asked what the soldiers were going to do to them, and the soldiers, very furious, began to grab them one by one, tying their hands behind their backs and covering their eyes with glue. In that way they started throwing them into the firepit, and that’s how my community began to suffer great pain and tragedies.

Later, four more groups of soldiers arrived and closed off three places in the community where people could enter or leave. At that moment, warplanes flew over the community dropping bombs, while the soldiers on the ground were massacring the rest of the people. They went to the churches and took the people out, and they locked the pregnant women in the mayor’s house where they were then raped. Afterward, the soldiers beat them and cut open their wombs with knives to take out the babies inside and throw them into the fire, and in that way they killed them. The young women were locked into a large meeting room, where they were stripped naked and raped. Then their breasts and ears were cut off, their eyes taken out, and they died that way. The older women were tied under large pieces of canvas for 5 hours, and they were beaten under the canvas with sticks and rocks, and since this didn’t kill them the soldiers took them out and threw them to the fire. The children were locked into the coffee-drying house, where the soldiers entered and took them by their feet to bash them into the walls and corners of the room. The rest of the people were shut into the church, and they then set fire to it and threw bombs inside. That is how the blood flowed in my community, where more than 450 innocent people lost their lives.

While this great tragedy was happening, 35 people were able to escape, among them my father and mother and my brother who had been born ten days earlier. They ran to the mountains, not fearing the thorns, animals, rain, heat, cold, and hunger. They lived through a terrible suffering during eight months hiding and traveling over the mountains, until they arrived in Mexico where they decided to stay for a long time.

They arrived in the state of Chiapas, where they were received by good people who gave them food and places to sleep. Later, Mexican organizations arranged for them to go to the state of Campeche to find land that they could work and live on. Thanks to God, they found a plantation stayed there, camping and working the land of the mountains. Later on they moved again, and the Mexican government provided them with medicine, clothing, and mattresses to sleep on.

At that point they began to feel more calm, but they never forgot the pain that they suffered and the tragedy they survived.

I was 14 when a commission was organized to arrange our return to Guatemala. My parents and brothers and sisters decided to return again to our country of origin, Guatemala, with the goal of cultivating the land and raising domestic animals. We now live in the communities of Cuarto Pueblo, in the municipality of Ixcán Playa Grande in the department of El Quiché.

My father dedicates himself now to growing corn, beans, and rice in order to live with the family.

My name is Gloria Erlinda López Manuel.
I am 20 years old.
I was born on December 21, 1983.

I’m sorry Christopher, I can write only the history of my community now and later I will write more for the scholarship application, I have to go because I don’t have much money for the Internet.

I’ll write you soon.

To contribute Gloria's scholarship, please visit the Support us page.

Go back to the Students page to read more biographies.

 Tax-deductible contributions to Project Victoria may be made to:

Project Victoria Fund
Greater Cedar Rapids Community Foundation
200 1st St. SW
Cedar Rapids IA 52404
319-366-2862