on political woodrows

last night a friend who works for a particularly lefty (read: good) news site mentioned a delegation of zapatista leaders was scheduled to be in town today to launch the next phase of their campaign.

ok, great. so today i was walking downtown and saw a big van with EZLN painted on the side and a red bandana hanging from the radio antenna. it was parked outside this courtyard restaurant called tierradentro, but the door was shut. i decided to play dumb and shoulder my way in. the place was standing-room only; there must have been 400 people present, all of them listening intently to a panel of 17 zapatistas dressed in full garb. other zapatistas could be seen sprinkled around the room, often standing under 5-feet tall, all of them wearing bandanas and the requisite black ski masks.

needless to say, i was awe-struck. having focused my thesis on the zapatistas, i’ll admit i’m somewhat enamored with them, as are thousands of other sympathizers around the world. regardless, i finally got to see subcommandante marcos and the rest of the zapatista leaders/spokespeople in person. true to form, marcos was smoking his pipe and ripping off jokes that brought the house down, despite the otherwise serious tone of the gathering.

here’s a press release detailing the next phase of La Otra, or “the other campaign.” note the first declaration. this is a direct response to the recent paramilitary activities being carried out by pedro chulin and the OPPDIC, up near ocosingo. it sounds like the zaps prepared to fight back if this keeps up.

woot!