Today marked 30 years since the last military coup in Argentina. That final dictatorship was in charge of the "dirty war," resulting in the kidnapping and deaths of 30,000 people. Emotions still run high.
Public marches and demonstrations are not a rarity here in Argentina. I'm pretty sure I've seen one every day I've been here, mostly directed at banks and financial institutions, spilling out of the economic crisis in 2001. But today's march was special, because it commemorated something that touched every last person in Argentina. The streets were overflowing with people. I went by myself; it was an experience I wanted to have alone, specifically, without other Americans. On the surface this march looked like a peace march in the States, only with images of Che instead of peace signs. But there was one other striking difference: the police presence, or specifically the lack of one. I saw a total of two officers in the three-plus hours I marched.
People were holding signs of their "disappeared" relatives. One woman had a sign that said busco a mis padres ("I am looking for my parents"). Most of the signs had pictures, names and dates of the kidnappings. The tone of the march was overall hopeful, but there were some messages aimed at more current events.
There were a lot of skeletons spray-painted onto walls and people dressed as skeletons. They represented the half of Argentina's population that lives in poverty, dying of hunger.
Even though I still don't feel I have enough historic background on the old regime, I'm just glad to have witnessed such a peaceful march.
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