J. Alejandro Anaya's Blog

When I was 18 years old,
On June 3, 1979, I turned 18 years old. It was the rainy season in El Salvador and I was in the middle of 11th grade. I had started high school late due to my birth date year. My mother had emmigrated to the US when I was nine years old, and my siblings and I were living with my grandmother. The cold war was taking foot in Central America, and the social and political instability was heating up in El Salvador. As a result, I had several life-changing events in 1979 that radically impacted my life. The first impact was my indoctrination into the Marxism Leninism movement; and the brainwashing by communist leaders in the political and social battle between the left and the right. We were young high school students, soft at heart and with brains hungry to learn and eager to get involved in the revolutionary movement. At this age, we were easy targets. I had read Marx, Lenin, Engel, theology of liberation and Socrates philosophy about communism, struggles of the masses, critique to capitalism and the communist manifesto. These readings were our justification to be against the then-establishment, the injustice and the poverty we were living in. It scarred my soul forever, and it made who I am now, and what I believe in politics. Because of my young political beliefs, my mother became concerned for my safety in the dangerous social turmoil El Salvador was becoming. In November of 1979, she took a flight back to El Salvador determined to bring me to the US. I had not seen my mother for ten years, but she was well aware of what was going on in the region. Nicaragua had fallen to communism, and the Carter’s Administration had a propaganda campaign to justify intervention and to provide the support for the military leaders in control of the Salvadorian government. People were being killed, assassinated and massacred every day. By November 1979, I was saying good byes to my comrades and friends who in return either were wishing me good luck or calling me a traitor. The truth was that I was very happy to see my mother, my new sister, and to get the hell out of El Salvador. By February 1980, I was attending the 12th grade at Manual Arts H.S. in South Central, Los Angeles. My first year in high school was tough. I did not know the language, and because I was a senior, my classes were hard. My ESL level was not at its best, and the cultural change was another challenge. Most the students were black, and I had never seen or lived within a different culture. But, the adaptation got better when I got involved in sports. I started running track and cross country and I excelled at it. Manual Arts High School made me a runner and made me believe that I could overcome the challenges ahead of me. By June 3, 1980, I was 19, and ready to move on. Manual Arts let me finish my first and last year of high school, and by the beginning of 1981, I was enrolled in my first community college and ready for a new challenge. All these life-changing events, which happened when I was eighteen, changed me forever

You touch the inner core of my soul.

A volcano erupting magna to transform the past.

The heat is intense, and navigating aids have stopped working.

The energy is vast and it blinds my vision.

Love is forgotten, and a fight is engulfed.

Oh dear love, will the tremors of power end our abysm,

 Or silence and calmness will soon settle,

 Or love will revive and engage onto a new harmony?

Let the sky guides the winds to embrace our souls.

Let the birds bring music along the journey of our lives.

Where is the touch that can transform our souls into sweet core?

You touch the inner core of my soul.