By Florencia Ruiz
Photo taken from lacampora.org
Editor's note: Regarding the fifteenth anniversary of the fateful day that preceded the fall of President Fernando de la Rúa , With a death toll of 38 and a memory that still wounds Argentinians, we have decided to publish this personal note from our friend, the singer-songwriter Florencia Ruiz, who tells us what happened that day.
Well, We all have our own experience and memories of December 20, 2001. My boyfriend, now husband, had gone to the plaza with his mom and dad on the 19th and was well-informed, always very active, a university activist. I, on the other hand, was locked in a room studying like crazy.
Early on the 20th, I left my house with my guitar, wearing a slightly torn Iguazu National Park t-shirt. By chance, the 238 bus passed by and dropped me off a few blocks from the Morón Conservatory. The door It was closed and several students outside were trying to get in. I see my teacher appear and demand: Flor has to go in, it's her final. A few minutes later they opened the door and set up a table with three teachers. I was very nervous and could hear the chains rattling on the shop shutters. My body was trembling. My teacher followed me with his eyes, as always. Teacher Aragón said to me: I know you compose, please play something from your suite. I had studied 1 hour and 30 minutes of music but ended up playing for 7 minutes. I was in tears when they shook my hand.– Congratulations, colleague, "The teacher told me, 'He had prepared a gift for me (a record).'" And he even invited me to the bar across the street to toast with Fanta. The Galician man opened the door for us because he recognized the teacher. He was holed up inside. Right then and there he told me, They're going to hang De la Rua. I didn't want to believe it.
When I got home, I begged Hernán not to go to Plaza de Mayo. The capital is very far away, and I was really scared. In the afternoon, a friend called me and said she saw on TV how a friend of mine was shot in the plaza, but that he wasn't on the list of dead. My friend now lives with a bullet in his head forever. I didn't want to turn on the TV so I wouldn't hear his name, but everyone in my house was in the kitchen watching.
Total sadness that will never be erased from my soul. We must not forget, we must work on our memory. Many things that are happening are a direct passage to 2001: Facing the adjustment, the cut of the 60% in science, the number of people without work and the education that falls day by day. It's all a consequence of not having thought about this day. and so many other things, like the fact that we were paid in patacones, and that they gave me change with a piece of paper that said... «"worth a loaf of bread"». And let's not even talk about what it was like to face the sadness and hunger we experienced every day at the kindergarten in Merlo Gomez. Today, let's look within ourselves for the "one day of remembrance" and not silence our anger or sadness. Instead, let's look for ways to build a better country.