Wednesday, October 4, 2017

Ghosts from the History Books Haunting Argentina

In the block I live there is a Latin American immigrants club, where one can take Spanish books and not return them. I took a high school history text that looked familiar - the same I used in the Colegio Nacional Mariano Moreno in Buenos Aires. It neatly describes the "Conquista del Desierto" - the conquest of the pampas in the eighteen sixties - that exterminated the natives and opened up the land. The tribes were ghosts, never existed except as obstacles to progress. I never heard or saw  living Indians in the Province of Buenos Aires.

But they have survived and multiplied and now are claiming the land. The map shows a number of organized Indian groups that are legally claiming lands in the Gran Buenos Aires, in densely populated urban areas of the Capital. Fortunately, no one seems to claim the Barrio Norte where we used to live, but the Tupi Guarani Cuarahji Vera want Ciudadela and the Yecthakay, a qom community, claim the wealthy suburb of Tigre where my cousins still live.

I know about the Tupi Guarani because they ate Solis (the Founder of Buenos Aires). Actually, they were Charrua, but my history book shows barefooted Guarani persecuting nandues, the native ostrich, with boleadores, in what later became the City of Buenos Aires. But who the hell are the qom? Where have been all this time? Are they real or invented? Even google has never heard of them.

I blame the Americans for all the trouble these resuscitated Indians are causing. They started recognizing the tribes as Nations, the legitimate owners of the land. The example is spreading like fire. Here the Hebronites want back the burial cave they sold to our Patriarch Abraham. If the Neanderthals are resuscitated from their DNA, may they have a case to the Carmel hills where they lived? Could they claim Europe?

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