The balloons were there to symbolize death. Then as a positive image we sang chants and songs in Spanish and English, which celebrated our freedom in a democratic country. We left the action with a very unique feeling. A sense of solidarity with the Chilean community, a trust between the two communities, with the promise of more networking and future actions. Important lessons did emerge for me as a comfortable, first-world, nonviolent activist.
Western activists have much to learn from our third-world sisters and brothers.
Our motivations for change are very different, for the Chileans it is a personal survival mechanism, for me it is a feeling of sadness and despair and anger that these human rights abuses had occurred. I felt that an important link was merged between two very different communities, and that each of the communities had learnt so much from each other. An interesting dynamic that I observed on the day, was the absence of any real open conflict between the Chilean community. There was a real conflict of feelings, emotions and ideologies and yet no open hostility. A member of the Chilean community stated that the reason for this was because everyone knew each other and they did in fact socialise together.