Dear Friends of Patrimonio Panamá:

The year 1989 was a year marked by dramatic changes and events that marked milestones in human history. Although undoubtedly, countless years in the historical record can be described in the same way, 1989 It was an exceptional year in politics, as cruel and ambiguous.

In 1989, Japanese Emperor Hirohito was succeeded by his son Prince Akihito, as the new Emperor of Japan; Hirohito died the same year. Emperor Hirohito saw the defeat of Japan in the world's only atomic bombing, executed by the United States on the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and was the first emperor to declare to his people that it was not of divine origin, as part of the terms of surrender of Japan in World War II. The postwar period of the Second World War led to the Cold War between the world powers. In 1989, Berlin Wall fell; one of the most recognized symbols of the Cold War, and that divided Germany and children in East Germany, under communist ideology, and West Germany, production under capitalist systems. In 1989, Ayatollah Khomeini decreed a fatwa famous for offending Islam against the writer Salman Rushdie for writing and publishing the book, The Satanic Verses, offering three million who killed him. He came up with the slaughter of the Caracazo in Venezuela; Asteroid Asclepius 300 m diameter, passed near our planet nearly twice that distance from the Earth to the Moon, causing fear for its proximity; in 1989 the revolt in Tiananmen Square occurred, that ended in slaughter and state censorship; States called Eastern Bloc Communist regimes under revolutions that took place were the prelude to the fall of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR); dictatorship fell Paraguayan dictator Alfredo Stroessner, which lasted 35 years old; He ended the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet in Chile with the democratic election of President Patricio Aylwin; fell Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceausescu and his wife was shot; failed military coup against Moses Giroldi Panamanian dictator Manuel Antonio Noriega…

In 1989, the United States invaded Panama. They bombed various parts of the country and the capital city in an illegal invasion which began the 20 December. Extracted dictator Manuel Antonio Noriega, former employee of the CIA and drug trafficking, and took him to their country. They stopped sworn the winner of the last election slate, whose victory Noriega refused to recognize: Guillermo Endara Galimany, president; Guillermo Ford and Ricardo Arias Calderon, Vice. Some mark them as direct or indirect part in the Invasion of Panama.

My country was invaded by the army of the United States 20 December 1989.

The enormity of the preceding sentence should he become paragraph, in assay, Novel and Book, herself. I was a little girl in 1989, Pre Media still in high school, which at that time was called First Cycle. I was born under the military dictatorship, that began in 1968 with the dictator Boris Martínez, predecessor Omar Torrijos and Manuel Antonio Noriega. All my guesses about what democracy question were somewhat gruesome theoretical issues, he had never seen in practice; was used to alleviate the effects of tear gas white vinegar in a towel, to my parents' salary was paid in worthless government bonds, fear of night shootings, the rolling blackouts of the regime and curfew; the missing; al headless corpse of Hugo Spadafora; to “rabiblancos” and his belief in the shopping paradise of Miami and Disneyworld; fear of people talking loudly or express the slightest discontent; repression. I can not say I understood something, because nobody understood anything. According to my parents, education was the only way to float above the absolute poverty and have decent work; not worth the work itself, but run it with dignity, refusing to make up numbers, reject bribes and compromising not accept gifts. Panamanians had enrolled in paramilitary forces called Dignity Battalions, Codepadis, and other unlikely names whose sole function was chasing with steel rods to spank them. Dually, batallonero could be a PRD, the political arm of the regime. “¡Civilista visto, dead civilian!” It's just a phrase, and trauma. There were checkpoints, police and guards whose mere presence was a threat. Civilian was learned to be the opposite of all that, defined and as brutally clear as right and wrong.

While bombs were falling, Whole neighborhoods were burning in the dark night, especially Chorrillo, where was The Model, the darkest prison regime after Isla Coiba Penal (Today Coiba National Park and World Heritage natural reasons, unhistorical), and I remembered Anne Frank. When we read her diary in class, I never thought I was going to have a direct experience of how she felt in her country at war with itself. Nobody knows for sure how many Panamanians had died that Christmas, in 1989. After that came the looting. First for food were; after, no longer. People ran mad, breaking windows and stealing clothes and brand shoes under the contemptuous and unflinching look gringo soldiers; yes, libraries were the safest place in those moments Panama. My parents taught us that this was shameful and dishonest, and I fully agree. During that time, when we ran out of cans and dry food, My father went to look for food and knew the fear of not knowing if he would return; not abstract as above, bell a real fear, almost physical. The neighbors erected a barricade at the entrance of the neighborhood, but for good or evil in it lived a colonel in the Defence Forces (FFDD), and American soldiers took; a tank of Americans patrolling our street twice a day. My mom us away from windows. We were a country invaded, occupied by a foreign army. In the papers that were reactivated, came a front-page photo of a climb on a tank girl to kiss feast with an invading soldier, under the headline, “Where is his mother?”. It was surreal and strange.

Some cheered the invasion and received U.S. troops with open arms and full pan, and who call release. They took Noriega, but parents also bought, mothers, HIJOS E is. The 20 December is a day of mourning. The dictatorship ended, but I'm not happy the method. It was a sad Christmas. Panama did not deserve that.

Today, I have traveled the world, I speak three languages ​​and have friends in several countries, including the United States. There are wounds that heal, but communication is key for us to understand and we understand. Although in those years the OAS gave back, I believe in the power of a world organized for peace and tolerance.

The image that I bring is the work of Manuel Salvador, talented graphic artist. Kindly let me put it here. It is a dream image, Based on these facts so terrible. The line reminds the burning buildings bombed Chorrillo neighborhood, their dead, their night of agony. I can not add more.

Regards,

Katti Osorio

Image source: Manuel Salvador. http://www.behance.net/MANUELSALVADOR, https://www.facebook.com/TheBluePenProjectByManuelSalvador