Contents of GL 51:

• Back to the green mountains of Purace
• Louise goes alone to the FARC demilitarized zone ..
• And a guerrillero sings her one of her first songs…
• A long interview with Alfonso Cano who preaches pacifism!
• Guerrilla jeep blown up that had just offered our lads a lift
• Psychic events abound…

In the church cemetery in the village of Viru-Jaagupi (Estonia) is a brass cross... It eulogizes one Manure-Bag Mats. 'Mats was a man who took pride in cleaning his horse's droppings from the street as they occurred,' explained the church rector. 'He put the manure on to his fields, which then prospered. He thought Manure-Bag was an honourable nickname, and asked that it be put on his grave.'
From National Geographic, April 1983

That somewhat odd opener sets the scene for the last two sad and beautiful months back in my mountain home near the National Park of Purace. Sad because the vibrant aliveness of the Green all around, our lifestyle and work, the plants we cultivate, the songs we sing and the theatre we continue to create, all are imbued with Tristan, my murdered farmer/performer grandson, who never lived to see this latest farm of ours, which we all think is the loveliest yet. To feel joy in living again, after the 7 nightmare months of investigations into our boys' deaths, brings with it the pangs of guilt that they cannot share it with us.

LOUISE LECTURES THE FARC COMMAND

Anne continues to work on the legal side in Bogota, with a small team to help her. And on 15th March, Louise (19) travelled alone the long journey to the 'demilitarized zone' which is the guerrilla headquarters granted by the government, down in Caqueta where we started this campaign. She was granted THREE hours of the busy guerrilla leader's time, one of which was spent singing dozens of songs to the young guerrilleros guarding him while a TV news reporter interrupted Louise's interview to film him: he was Alfonso Cano, the chief FARC 'intellectual'. 'Go in there and sing,' he said, 'I'll still be able to hear you and we must keep on talking afterwards.' A somewhat astonished Louise complied - in the past, Anne has been grateful for 5 minutes of this busy man's time.

A Young Guerrillero Knows One of Lou’s songs from his childhood in El Pato

Lou recounts that in the middle of her sing-song, a young guerrillero started singing for her one of her own songs written when she was about 15, which he had heard at one of our first theatre performances in 'El Pato'! And when Cano recalled her, the guerrilleros were dismayed, as Louise was busy teaching them some of our songs.

Alfonso first wanted to know all about our community, what our aims are, where we have lived and why we were thrown out: this from the Leader of the Army who made us refugees... Lou said she didn't know and we still want to find out! He encouraged her to find the commander of El Pato and ask... Oh crazy country!

The promises emanating from this meeting (which should be taken with a large dose of Colombian salt) are that Alfonso Cano will organize a meeting between us and the murderers of our boys and lots of comandantes in a kind of revolutionary court case. He said several of us should be there with every possible bit of information we can get.

I had sent Louise with a long letter I'd written outlining once again the desperate situation in Hoya Grande and pointing out (again) that the FARC are losing all their basis of support amongst the peasants through the insane tactics of their local militia; we also enclosed photos of Tris and Javier. Lou reports that Alfonso Cano over and again referred to my letter and pored over the photos of our dead boys in disbelief, saying, 'They are so young!'

He was extremely interested in our whole life-style and work and said the FARC are faced with so much environmental work that we should all be working together rather than having to solve these horrible problems... he said when we have resolved this terrible situation, he would like us to do theatre in their zone.

Louise reports:

AC felt like a big daddy, very sensitive, almost... pacifist! He simply couldn't believe that anyone in the FARC would just kill for no reason. I said, 'But what about the hillwalkers murdered in Purace and so many other murders all over Colombia?' He just kept saying, 'Terrible, terrible!' He was having a mini nervous breakdown, he was really uncomfortable and had an extreme nervous reaction every time I told him something horrible, whacking the chair or table. In the whole meeting, it was mainly me who talked, he hardly said anything except to express how horrified he was at everything. At one point I said to him, 'You seem like you don't live in Colombia. Things like our case are happening all the time.'

FARC leader preaches pacifism!

I had told him I would be willing to kill the murderers of my nephew Tristan and he had a fit at this saying that violence only creates more violence and that that isn't the solution to the problem! And he asked us to please be very controlled when the face-to-face meeting happens and behave like in a court case and not scream at the murderers or have all our feelings out there and then, or to play tricks on the FARC and kill the murderers during the meeting! He told me that two weeks before our meeting, he had met Comandante Gonzalo (the brute commander who brought about our displacement and was directly responsible for our boys' deaths) and asked him what the hell was going on with the FARC militia-men and that Gonzalo answered: 'They are not saints, but do a lot of good work.' I burst out incredulously with, 'So they do good work as well as murdering children and women and innocent people?!' Whereupon he sat back in his chair and kind of sighed.

During the whole meeting, I felt great relief that I was finally getting through to him, after 8 months of Anne and Jenny working for this. Jenny's letters were so important to him: he had them in front of him during the whole meeting and kept reading bits of them out loud and getting me to clarify a point. At the end, I asked him innocently did he want me to wait in San Vicente to receive a concrete date and place for the 'court case'. 'No, no, no, no!' he said alarmed, 'Go home and we'll get the message to you some time because I don't know when I can get this organized.' During the meeting, I felt I was talking 'man to man' with him and sometimes I even felt older than him...!

Those are just some of the details of Louise's extraordinary encounter. Since then, intensive work has continued with the Attorney General, the families of other victims, and the more radical residents of the hamlet of Hoya Grande. Most recently, Cristina, a long-term Colombian member of our group, has been down to Icononzo to leaflet the people there, Anne is planning a big demonstration using our bus as a focal point and also she plans to have a memorial stone made with an accusatorial inscription to erect near where the boys were captured.

Katie’s Strange Premonition

In the aftermath of the Purace murders, the guilty guerrillas were hauled up by the FARC high command as promised, and now the Army have come in to our area. One day some of the Colombian boys living with us were travelling to Belen, our nearest market town; they refused a lift in a guerrilla jeep, preferring to go on their bikes. That jeep was blown up an hour later by the Army and the young guerrilleros were all killed. A few days previously, our 6 girls had travelled in it to the nearest town. While they were riding along in the back, Katie (15) was suddenly seized with intense fear and said to the others, "Oh god, what if we're blown up, what will poor Jenny and Ned do, we are the future of the community and they won't have anything to live for." She's a strange girl.

Having recently spent so much time in personal grief, and then sharing the mourning of the families of the young folk murdered in Purace, I felt cold when I first heard of the young guerrilleros dying, whereas I used to care tremendously. But fate was not to allow me to remain hard: the same day, working in the glory of the evening garden, a band of young teenage guerrilleros came through the garden from the forest, shared the news and a fruit juice and went their way. One look at their young, worried faces and I knew: this war isn't between people, it's a machine we're all caught up in.

Louise sees a Ghost

One day soon after returning to the countryside, I was alone with Katie and I said to her: 'What do you think about survival of any kind of energy after death? It doesn't exist, does it?' We both agreed there was nothing. At that moment, Louise came white faced up from our centre cabin and said that she had just walked into the kitchen and no-one was there .. except a Man standing with his back to her in silence. She blinked hard, knowing he was not one of us, and he still remained, motionless. She screamed for the other girls and he disappeared. 'How old do you think he was?' I asked. 'About 30', she said.

It was the first anniversary of the death of the son - executed by the FARC for robbery and murders - of the previous owner of our farm. Louise did not know this. He was 30.

It was after that execution that the man's mother had allowed us to live on her farm as she could no longer bear to. All her family were implicated in at least four murders and countless robberies. Ned was talking one day to our next-door neighbour (here that means the farm across the stream, a vigorous walk away) and he was speaking well of the criminal family. Ned was confused and said, 'But isn't it true they killed people?' 'Oh yes,' said our neighbour dismissively, 'but only one or two people.' I recount this anecdote in an attempt to communicate the mind-eclipsing morality of this country.

But the day to day reality of our lives is not this: it is strenuous, delicious though tiring, physical work on the gardens, afternoons working on our environmental theatre, preparing to take it, along with our therapeutic psychological work to a group of psychology students in the town of Popayan, Cauca, on the other side of the National Park. I was working with them when Tris died and now feel ready to resume my task, something I thought I could never do.

Paramilitary Chainsaw Massacre

The Department of Cauca has been taken over by paramilitaries. They make the FARC look like kittens. Recently at least 100 indigenous people were massacred by them with chainsaws... even the urban Press bleeped. But we want to continue, we want to live here; it is so beautiful, it is... peaceful, healing peace all around us in our valley. We need it, for the never-ending work ahead, a work well described by a favourite writer of mine, Loren Eiseley, in
'The Immense Journey':

The need is not really for more brains, the need is now for a gentler, a more tolerant people than those who won for us against the ice, the tiger and the bear. The hand that hefted the ax, out of some old, blind allegiance to the past, fondles the machine gun as lovingly. It is a habit man will have to break to survive, but the roots go very deep...

Good wishes to you all,
Jenny James

Contents of GL 52:

• First anniversary of our boys’ murders
• Giving Therapy in Popayan
• Smurfit’s Colombia
• Our girls on Radio and singing for the Indians
• Tris and Javier’s remains handed over
• Visit to Regional FARC commander
• British Embassy Aids in Kidnap of my grandson Brendan

'I truly believe that we in this generation must come to terms with nature, and I think we're challenged as mankind has never been challenged before to prove our maturity and mastery, not of nature, but of ourselves.'
Rachel Carson (over 3 decades ago)

Tomorrow is the first anniversary of the murder of Tristan and Javier. Becky, my 38 year old daughter who is Tristan's mother, is here with me at our settlement in Purace. I asked her to write some words, not about Tris, but about her first impressions of this, our 7th farm in Colombia.

'You can't feel the pains and danger of Colombia here. The first thing that really hit me after being in Ireland, then 3 weeks in Bogota, is what I can only describe as a loud Silence. No background noise, just the rivers, trees rustling, birds. The climate is like a warm Irish summer, the surroundings are very, very Green. The life-style on the farm is very organized which gives a feeling of 'time' that my life in Ireland does not have.

‘The day begins at 5 a.m. and everyone is asleep by 9.0 p.m. or earlier. From dawn to midday, everyone works very, very hard to run the kitchen, gardens, to do the washing (all by hand and out of doors of course), to build extensions to the existing wooden house to make room for more people and space for dancing and theatre. In the afternoons, time to practice music. At least four people are learning the violin, others the guitar, flute and piano. Katie endlessly composes her beautiful songs, we sew and mend and write . . .

'Howler monkeys sing in the woodlands opposite. The earth in the garden is dark and rich. Short, dark Indians call with their produce or to ask for any spare old blankets. The garden is one of the largest and most productive the Community has had so far; there are non-stop vegetable dinners, an abundance of cabbages, lettuce, celery, beetroot, carrots, radish, swedes, leeks, onions and so much more, including local fruits with interesting tastes. This is not magic, it is created by plenty of steady hard work, the teenage girls, who on stage look like angels from heaven, are out happily collecting cow and horse manure. 12 sacks from just two girls this morning.

Even in a country at war there are still untouched, beautiful places like this farm in this lovely forested valley ..'

Early to bed, plus afternoon naps,
Will get your crops planted before you collapse.
(Charlotte Waldron, Organic Gardening Mag.)

At the end of May, I was invited to run a 3 day intensive therapeutic experience for a mixed bunch of people in Popayan, a town 7 hours away by milk lorry. I had suggested a new type of group therapy involving brief performances of some of our environmental plays, plus one on the violence in Colombia and this was enthusiastically agreed to. I took all our young girls plus our shiatsu/juggler/compost-carrying friend Andy who has been with us off and on for 8 years.

It was a tremendous experience for everyone involved and is leading to many future invitations including the strange sensation of being asked to run a counselling group for 20 teachers from 'Carton Colombia' schools. Now that enterprise, part of an environment- ravishing multinational headed by one Michael Smurfit of Ireland, is to a Green campaigner what a nuclear submarine is to my peace activist friends in Europe ...

What Irish Smurfit has done to Colombia

I went to talk to the teachers who will be organizing the event. We travelled through a horrible area where as far as the eye could see, natural Colombia had disappeared, to be replaced by a sea of sterile pine trees. The air was still and dead, the ground dried up and depressing; the entire local population dependent on this nightmare monster and its 'do-good' image-enhancing works like the neat little schools .. I felt sick. But I will go and do the group for the teachers in September .. interesting. I have been told that one word of criticism in that vast Empire means instant dismissal, at best, or if you get too insistent, death.

Resistance is the quiet and unremarked daily rejection
of all that degrades and debases.
It is the silent and solemn persistence
in not surrendering to the system.
Resistance is keeping our inner vision
clear and intact.

Brian Quail, Trident Ploughshares.

After the Popayan group, one of the participants rushed off to the local radio station, a very radical one run from a University, to organize for our singing girls to spend hours recording in their studio; they also recorded long interviews with myself and the girls, the interviewer woman at times in tears listening to us talk about Colombia, our recent losses, and our work here.

Theatre in the Gruelling Heat

Then we received a phone call from the Mayor of Argentina, the little country town that is the 'capital' of the rural area we live in. Would we perform on the 'Day of the Peasant-Farmer' .. 9 hours drive by milk lorry and by the mayor's special car .. agonizing as we passed the road leading to our valley, we so much wanted to go home, but no, off to the hideous noise the country-people think is fun, to sing sensitive songs and put on the very sensitive wordless dance-play that Tris used to star in called 'The Four Elements' about what happens when Man tries to bend Nature to his ways.

´Never Again’

The Mayor was drunk, but we did our duty in horrendous conditions, then went 'home' to the cool wooden floor of an old people's home to rest for a moment before an evening performance .. and next morning the requests came flooding in. The young President of the local action committees of the whole area called to ask for a full-scale theatre in July. 'What we most want,' he said, 'is your environmental message.' Out the window flew our freshly spoken ever-repeated curse NEVER AGAIN, which comes like a mantra after every rotten experience of Colombian mis-organization, only to melt like the girls' stage makeup in the hot midday sun at the first sign of a truly sensitive request.

And then, last year's Mayor, for whom Alice and I, a long long time ago before we knew we'd never see Tris and Javier again, had played and sung, invited us in to his simple house to sing an hour's goodbye for his massive family, tears in his eyes as he listened to Katie’s song about Colombia.

Singing for the Indians and the Governor of Cauca

While we were in Popayan, the three youngest girls, Katie, Laura and Julie (15 and 12 years old) went to comply with an invitation from the Guambiano Indians to visit their 'mother settlement' an hour away and sing and perform for them. The rest of us were too busy to go. Travelling home after all these events, Katie suddenly pointed to a faded poster on a lamp-post: 'Oh look! that's the Guambiano man I was talking to for hours.' ‘WHAT?!' I said, the penny dropping as to why they'd been so insistent that I go to the event in person. 'Oh my goodness, that's the Governor of the whole of Cauca (the large troubled southern Department on whose borderlands we live). He's very very famous, a brilliant dedicated man in terrible danger from the paramilitaries.' Floro Tunubala: a great victory for the indigenous peoples to have him elected, but he governs one of the most threatened Departments. The indigenous peoples have already lost so many leaders as both sides, the FARC and the paras, attack them for their attempt to stay independent and outside of the war.

The boys’ remains finally handed over…with a threat

Several days passed since I began this Letter, as on the anniversary of our boys' death, we had the chilling news that the FARC had finally handed over their remains, a bag of bones deposited on a country roadside for a local official to pick up in Cunday, Tolima. With this 'grand gesture' came the threat/warning: we are doing this on condition you make no more protests, give out no more leaflets, do not perform any ceremony for the boys in Hoya Grande, and do not erect a commemorative plaque there for them as it would be BAD FOR THE IMAGE OF THE REGION.

We defy the ban immediately

Have your heart and brain stopped functioning as mine did at this twisted thinking? Anne and Andy went straight down to Icononzo and leafletted all the country buses again immediately with this little notice: 'Today, 9th July 2001, is the first anniversary of the murder of Tristan James and Javier Nova. Neither they nor the Atlantis Community will rest in peace until justice is done.' Then they left a clear message with our contact man there saying: NO DEAL.

I have now received a 90% illegible Fax from Anne saying she had to go to the forensic dept. in Bogota to help identify the bones. It seems the original stories we heard of how they died are wrong. Each boy had four shotwounds in the head. The angle from which they came showed they were forced to kneel down. Every time more details come, they die again for us and we die a little inside,

until outrage once again returns to heal our spirits and our resolve.

The bag of bones contained the remains of several other people as well as parts of Tris and Javier.

Shortly after their deaths a year ago, a clairvoyant had told Anne: it will take 2 years for this matter to be resolved. We're at half time, getting ever more deeply educated in the deep corruption of Colombian institutions of every kind. A public prosecutor assigned to our case tried to bully Anne into giving away the identity of our informants: he was more interested in getting an easy 'catch' amongst helpless civilians than dealing with the real criminals. She resisted him absolutely: speaking straight carries its own strength; then the tricks and threats of the 'authorities' collapse in all their shallow mean-mindedness.

A Visit to a Regional Commander of the FARC

The prelude to the handover of the proof of our boys' final agony was a 14 hour journey along rocky unmade-up roads, meeting only one country bus in all that long day, to meet the head of the Tolima FARC.

He looked more like a poet than a guerrillero and was several thousand per cent more civil and concerned than the British Consul in Colombia. He gave us hours of his time and we felt deeply listened to. He agreed that a new young generation of FARC commanders with more military enthusiasm than political consciousness are causing endless trouble for the movement. He began the meeting by thanking me for the letter I had written him. I was baffled. I had written him no letter. Then little by little he jogged my memory and I was astonished: many years ago in Caqueta when our Green campaign first began, I had seen an issue of 'Resistencia', the underground FARC newsletter for campesinos, which was an excellent 'Green' bulletin: I published most of it in an early Green letter. And then I had written to the Tolima command where it was printed congratulating them on the contents and telling them of our work.

The thin sensitive gentleman in front of me was evidently the author of that Bulletin and he had been very proud to receive my letter, had photocopied it and sent it to all the top leaders of the FARC!

At the meeting, we expressed ourselves fully and clearly and could feel his appreciation. Present were: Anne and myself, Becky, Louise (20) and Laura (15). The two girls sang a few of their very plain- talking and moving songs before we left. The main question we were asked was what exactly we wanted to happen to the murderers and what action we wanted the FARC to take. We will be investigating to see whether the latest: 'shut up and be satisfied' message comes from this man, which is very difficult to believe, or from lower down, which we suspect.

Resistance is public and political,
It confronts the bloody face
of militarism and money.
Defies Moloch
pitiless idol of power and wealth
ever hungry for sacrifice,
for our children's blood.
Brian Quail, Trident Ploughshares

The reason Becky is in Colombia is because the British Embassy saw fit to organize the 'legal' kidnap of her son Brendan, whom Louise and I had rescued - with the help of the Colombian Army - from Hoya Grande where he was living next door to his brother's murderers. The Embassy NEVER intervened when he was in real danger, but waited until he was safely in Bogota with Anne. Then they pounced, at the bidding of his biological father who had not seen him for 13 years (an ex-nuclear weapons scientist). We have never been allowed to see Brendan again. It is as simple, as unbelievable, and as outrageous as that.

Tristan died to keep contact with his brother, taking our beloved Javier with him. Presumably this is part of the British Government's 'Plan Colombia'. They hate us because we oppose them, and their murderous fumigations of the forests (under the hypocritical label of a fictitious 'drug war'). They found a neat revenge. But Brendan is 15. He will return if and when he wants to. Our fight with the British lapdogs of American foreign policy will continue. Along the way, we have also had to witness, aghast, the subservience of Colombian institutions - in this case the 'security police' (DAS) and the illnamed 'Children's Welfare Dept.' - to the British Empire, which is alive and well and functioning smoothly in Colombia, thank you very much. I trust there are no thinking people with illusions as to the nature of Mr. Blair's government.

Resistance is not just then and for heroes,
Resistance is now too;
and it's for me and it's for you.
Brian Quail

With love to you all,
Jenny James,

GREEN LETTER FROM Colombia No 53.
14th September 2001

Julio and Baudelina are dead. You do not know these names, my readers; they are the middle-aged peasant couple who were our neighbours in Hoya Grande, Icononzo; and they were the foster-parents of my grandson Brendan (whom as reported in the last Letter, the British embassy here saw fit to spirit away). They were the people Tristan and Javier visited the night they were murdered. And they were the simple people who constantly helped us in the wake of our boys' deaths. For this they were murdered, by poisoning, the same day several thousand people died in the US as a result of US policies abroad, llth September.

Two of our youngest girls, Julie, 12, and Katie, 16, along with Anne and other members of our community have travelled to Icononzo to their funeral. This will be the subject of yet another visit to the FARC Zone. The revenge killing comes as a result of two of the murderers being captured. Leaving others free was not a good idea. We will be taking action. This has now gone too far.

Don Bolivar is dead, the only Colombian we have known for years to die a natural death, of a heart attack whilst working. Don Bolivar built the roof on the extension of our wooden house. The girls say he was like a father to them when they sang and participated in a recent nationwide peasants' strike. Ned writes of him:
'The Army once held him for a week 15 years ago under suspicion of being a guerrilla. He was kept naked in a cell and they took him out to a field for a mock execution. He was always campaigning and attending meetings in defence of the campesinos. He had an ancient motorbike and often did us favours by bringing big bulky things on it like a box of baby chicks or a sack of brown flour. A keen organic gardener, he was the only local who didn't spray his potatoes. He once came across just 6 potatoes of an old variety resistant to disease which he lovingly planted and harvested for years until this year he was able to give us 50 of them, all of which we have planted and harvested and are about to harvest a second time. He recently asked me for advice about diet because he felt he was starting to get overweight and didn't like it, unlike most Colombians who see having a big stomach as a status symbol. I said 'Give up meat'. Out of all our local friends, he and his wife were the ones who most understood and appreciated what we stand for, although he himself admitted freely, that he had been forced by poverty to cut trees and sell the wood.'

Francisco is dead. Community leader, shot by the guerrilla a few days ago, accused of passing information to the Army. Everyone says he was a good and popular leader. Our 12-year-old Julie was the first to find him on the road as she travelled to visit Don Bolivar's widow, as she frequently does. No-one could bear to run and tell Francisco's wife, they were paralyzed. Julie went. Francisco's teenage daughters were coming laughing and chatting gaily along the road. In a moment they would come upon their father dead surrounded by shocked peasants. No-one moved, till a young girl, a friend of our teenagers, rushed towards them to hold them and tell them. Our lasses now visit another widow, who has 7 children, taking vegetables.

'What can we do? We can rise as a human family and force decision makers to consider life the greatest priority. Let us take our inspiration from dolphins, who defend themselves and their offspring through an instinct to mass together in the face of danger ..and to attack power with wisdom.'

Cousteau.

Louise's Report on her Visit to two of our boys' murderers in Prison, 13th August 2001

My two sisters Alice (18) and Katie (16), myself (20) and Anne went at the request of the prosecuting authorities for an 'accidental' meeting arranged by them with the murderers of our nephew, brought up as our brother, and my brother-in-law. We weren't allowed officially to visit them as they had not yet been charged. When the Army captured them, in their own house in Hoya Grande, they found a Diary listing all the people they had killed. On 9th July 2000 it said, 'Today we executed two Irishmen.' (Javier was a dark-skinned Colombian).

My entire body started shaking with anger when I saw one of the men. The four of us walked straight up to him and said, 'We are Tristan and Javier's family.' He looked at us shocked. He was handcuffed and became more and more uncomfortable by the second. He couldn't decide whether to look at us, his handcuffs or the floor. For a moment he looked scared of us, four tall women standing over him. He had to look up to us, as he is short. He had a bad look to him, but I couldn't imagine him killing someone. He just looked like a normal campesino who probably drinks a lot and gets into machete fights. I suppose I'd need someone to look like a monster to believe they could kill young boys.

'I want to know why you killed them', I said to him. He looked up at me, but before he could say anything, I continued, 'They were so young, so innocent, whatever could they possibly have done to deserve such a brutal death? In your mind there was a reason, and I want to know what it was'.

'I don't know what you are talking about', he mumbled.

'Oh, really', I said, 'And I suppose you have never heard of Silvino either?' (Silvino is another completely innocent person we know for sure he murdered). 'Are you going to deny having killed him , and our friend Don Pedro too?' And then between myself and Anne, we gave a list of people we knew his gang had murdered. Anne would say one name and then I another. And then Anne said, 'And you call that revolution.'

The thing that most got to him and made him most uncomfortable was when I simply asked him, 'How did you become a murderer? Whatever happened in your childhood or your life that made you want to kill? Did your parents treat you violently?'. He didn't answer but just became more and more uncomfortable and suddenly it felt like we were getting something through to him. He started looking at me more in the eyes and then started talking about god, how god is the only one who can judge anyone. He kept trying to say he had nothing to do with the murder of our boys, but he didn't try very hard to convince us. Alice and Katie didn't say a word, they just glared at him the whole time. Then suddenly he was taken away to be questioned. We were never allowed to see the other murderer.

During the hours we had to wait outside the court for this encounter, two women kept following us. Later we saw them inside and were told that one of them was the murderer's wife, the other a sister, so I, Alice and Katie went looking for them to confront them. I walked straight up to them and said, 'So, why were you following us and why do you support the murdering of innocent people?' They told me I should 'have more respect'!! 'Oh really', I said, 'and why should I have respect for people who support the murder of 18 year old boys? Explain to me how that deserves respect.' At which point the prison guards said to me: 'You have to leave or we will have to call the police to take you away'. 'I have a right to say everything I think and feel', I answered. Then me and my sisters stormed out as they were seriously going to protect the murderers against us. The Prosecutor lady who had secretly arranged all this for us afterward congratulated me, though she couldn't risk saying anything at the time.

But the news is bad as local people in lcononzo were of the opinion that the guerrilla would pay any bribe to get the man Louise confronted out of prison as he is one of their local commanders, important to them. And shortly after their capture, seven soldiers and a civilian were killed and eight more soldiers wounded in a confrontation between troops and guerrilla in our area of Tolima. Our prosecutor lady affirms that this attack was in response to the captures. So what is one to do? Nothing, to avoid further deaths? But people will keep getting killed whatever we do. This is our mental torment. And we have to keep going. Destiny has decreed we are part of this war now. How did this happen? we tried to save a few trees and show people some organic gardens we lived from ... Philosophizing at this point would drive us quite mad. We just have to keep going.

'When I dare to be powerful, to use my strength in the service of my vision, then it becomes less and less important whether I am afraid.'
Andre Lourde. ( Sent by my dear friend Meredith in Ecuador )

Since the FARC left the region we are living in near Purace National Park, after they killed 7 hillwalkers and two other people and there was a national outcry, the Army took over. But they never come along the mountain road where we live, and there the wood-lorries have recommenced operations, leaving by night laden with precious massacred forest. We have complained to the Parks Department and to the Army and Anne is complaining in Bogota to the Ministry of the Environment. But the men who cut the trees are our friends and neighbours; they know our position, even respect it, but they say they have no alternative source of income. I wish there was black and white, good and bad, simple lines that I could believe in when I was young, baddies I could hate and good people I could praise. Tell me, what would you do in this situation? We carry on, giving away seed and vegetables and clothes when we can; our gardens are visited and marvelled at nearly every day. We feed people our marvellous vegetarian meals, we even give paid work on occasion to very poor people, though we can hardly afford to ourselves. We build and live and communicate and share. And pray, as only atheists can, with our every act! .

Recently our girls visited a neighbouring family to swap flower cuttings and share seeds. They came back indignant and miserable. The peasant house was full of caged tropical birds, captured from their nests for sale -illegally - in the towns. The same vicious circle as the tree problem: "we have no other income." If I buy the birds to set them free, the woman will catch more. And if I don't, she'll catch more. Then young Julie was asked one day for English classes for the 'bird woman's' daughters. She quipped back quickly, 'Yes, if you let the birds go.' The woman laughed uncomfortably. The friendship -and our perhaps pathetic attempts at indoctrination continue. The other day I sorted out a lot of our old and best theatre clothes and sent the huge bundle with our girls to try a little bribery and corruption. 'No, I can't!' replied the woman most anxiously, 'my sister is coming to take them away, and look, this one and this one are free in the house.' She was absolutely delighted with the clothes and gave us lots of beans for them and promised more food later . The friendship continues. What would you do?!

When Louise went to complain to the Parks Dept. in Popayan (our nearest big city) about the wood cutting and lack of support for the campesinos, she was immediately offered a very posh job working for the head of 5 National Parks as a translator and secretary. She was stunned. She's never even been to school. She's decided to accept the job if they're serious 'to spy on what they really do'. It will be to work. on a project funded by the World Bank.. It will absolutely inevitably be a complete farce, facade and many rude words beside. It always is. No money ever reaches the peasants and all the top 'environmentalists' are businessmen.

Time for a little light relief. One day I was coming home hot and happy from an enforced time away from the farm after one of our theatre tours. I crossed the deserted fields, then a stream, through some bushes and suddenly, my long loose rather wild hair became a bees' nest. They were stinging me and I was screaming, beating them off. Then they got down my blouse. I ripped it off (what would you do?! ) and continued, rushing yelling across the field. At that moment, I saw to my intense relief, my tiny little neighbour man approaching on a horse and I rushed towards him and asked him to beat the bees out of my hair. He complied in most gentlemanly fashion, bid me good day and off he rode, whereupon, the panic over, It slowly dawned on me what an extraordinary sight had greeted him and I chuckled in embarrassment all the way home.

Embarrassment seems to be part of life once I step off the safe limits of my farm. During the days of doing theatre, we had just finished performing at one hot hideously organized venue in the centre of our little market town, Belen, and were back in our loaned schoolroom at the height of our "never again" mantra, when an urgent message arrived: the Bishop wants Jenny to play violin in the church. Now, first, I do not play well, second, I go to pieces in public performances and third, I have avoided churches and never seen a bishop in all my life, being a complete atheist. Well , what would you do? !

I went, much to the enormous disgust and disdain of my youngest, Katie, who plays the violin with me. She could not believe her revolutionary mother was giving in to a Call from the Church. 'I'll explain later, get ready,' I said, and down we trotted with the whole little band of scantily-clad girls (they'd just performed a sexy dance in the square) and were treated with enormous courtesy by congregation and priests. The bishop, to my enormous relief, dressed not in a nightgown as I'd expected, but looked just like my dad on a Sunday afternoon at home. He was delightful man and I managed to be a delightful woman, just for the afternoon. The acoustics were wonderful.

And now it is time to listen to the evening news to see if World War III is upon us. I feel schizophrenic, our lives surrounded by beauty and peace, healthy work, silence and laughter, the sounds of animals and thunder, no intrusion.... and then the tragedies and the news, striking like hammer blows, five thousand grieving families in North America. Families who never thought of the thousands of families grieving weekly in Iraq as their people died of hunger or under bombs. Separate realities, not even united in grief, and more grief to come as Bush satisfies the blood lust aroused to keep his ill-earned job. Too much, too big for anyone to take in. We must each keep going, doing what good we can. We welcome your letters more than ever at this turning point in world history.

To my fellow swimmers:

There is a river flowing now very fast.
It is so great and swift that there are those who will be afraid.
They will try to hold on to the shore: they are being torn apart and will suffer greatly.
Know that the river has its destination.
The elders say we must let go of the shore, push off into the middle of the river, keep our heads above water.
At this time in history, we are to take nothing personally, least of all ourselves.
We are the ones we have been waiting for.
Message from the Hopi, taken from Nexus magazine
With love and gratitude to all our readers,

Jenny James

For Atlantis Ecological Community.
Atlantis, Telecom, Belen, Huila, Colombia, South America.

GREEN LETTER FROM COLOMBIA No. 54
20th November 2001

When the US/UK bombing of Afghanistan began, I could no longer stay working in our Green paradise. I just had to make our voice of protest heard. So I travelled the long way back once again to the city I swear I'll never return to, Bogota, to join Anne and other members of our group there. For five weeks, we organized and joined with others in street protests, I spoke on the radio, painted banners and posters, ran an Internet campaign of letter-protest, painted our old bus with anti-war slogans and designed a leaflet, which we gave out in thousands in Bogota. It showed George Bush in a turban with the words (in Spanish of course) 'Wanted, Global Terrorist No. 1', and on the back a short list of the millions massacred by the US over the past 50 years without a single 'Minute of Silence' being held for them just 50 years' silence.

Response everywhere amongst the popular classes was phenomenal, with about 90% cheering our protest and even declaring Ben Laden to be the 'New Messiah' and G. Bush the 'Anti-Christ'. Well, for those who see only the images of babies and children being mutilated or killed by American bombs, and a simple man in peasant clothes standing up against the US, the complications of Islam fundamentalism are of no concern: the people here know instinctively who is next on the US list of 'terrorists' to attack, namely Colombia. Anne had a conversation with some market women in our little local town down here in the South where it was generally agreed the US were 'practising for their next war' in Colombia'. One woman said she feared for the children and feels sad and scared when new babies are born as they will have no future: 'The older ones will know how to run to the forests and hide,' she said, 'but what of the babies?'

On marches in Bogota, one slogan was 'Afghanistan today, Tomorrow, Colombia.' In many places in Southern Colombia, peasant children are already dying from glyphosate poisoning, sprayed from US aircraft as part of the phoney 'Plan Colombia', which is a prelude to precisely the kind of intervention which caused the Vietnam War. If any of our readers would like to inform themselves further on the general situation in Colombia, the Colombia Solidarity Campaign publish a bulletin available to people without an income at 5 pounds p.a., 10 pounds for those with.

While on the subject of other publications, I would urge anyone who can afford the time and money to subscribe to the excellent "Ecologist" magazine (perhaps not for those already terminally depressed about the state of the Planet!), which along with the bad news always gives suggested courses of action, mainly addresses for directing protest letters. Ten issues per year @ 28 pounds, or 22 for those with low income. Address: The Ecologist,
Freepost LON17102, Sittingbourne, Kent ME9 8YG (no stamp required).

And for those of you who live in the English countryside, I have recently been moved by literature sent to me by an organization I had not previously known of, called the Council for the Protection of Rural England. They send a most generous pack of information if you write to CPRE, Freepost NEA 4878, London E1 8BR, which includes lists of local groups and their many militant, but politely English campaigns for quiet lanes, farmers' markets, village traffic reduction, preservation of rural wild habitats, sensible farming methods, and many other vital issues.

'Compassion .. can only attain its full breadth and depth if it embraces all living creatures and does not limit itself to mankind.'
Albert Schweitzer , 1875-1965.

Mary & Becky, who distribute these Letters from Ireland now have a new address: 60, St. Fachtnas Terrace, Skibbereen, Co. Cork, Eire. Please any of you who have an Email address, do let them know so that astronomical postage costs can be kept as low as possible. Thank you. Also, anyone receiving this Green Letter who really does not want to, please let Mary & Becky know: just one postage stamp and 5 minutes of your time, please as our list of correspondents grows all the time, but our non-existent income does not!

The Schweitzer quote by the way was borrowed from "New Leaves", an excellent little magazine run by English Vegans at: Movement for Compassionate Living c/o Alan & Elaine Garrett, Garden Cottage, Whitecroft, Sandy Lane, Newport, Isle of Wight, PO30 3EA.

Our seed distribution campaign has been going very well, with enormous quantities sent here via the good offices of Heather Strange in Shropshire, plus smaller donations from many people in the States, Belgium, England and Ireland. The Guambiano Indian tribe who are our neighbours are extremely grateful, run large food projects and many communal activities, visit our organic gardens regularly and happily bring food and seed from local crops in exchange for our many gifts, though this is never a condition we make. Our present seed needs are for: swede (which grows fast and well here), beetroot (in great demand), edible amaranth (which flourishes in this climate but strangely is not well known here); also all of herbs we could never have enough, and . . .flowers! We have an excuse for this 'luxury request' in that, as any organic gardener knows, they are a very effective, not to mention gorgeous, method of pest control, as they confuse plagues with a variety of scents and colours, thus acting as 'guards' for vulnerable crops.

'How then, do we come to know the land, to discover what more may be there than merchantable timber, grazeable prairies, recoverable ores, damable water, netable fish? It is by looking upon the land not as its possessor but as a companion. . . We would have to memorize the land, walk it, eat from its soils . . We would have to know its winds, inhale its airs, observe the sequence of its flowers in the spring and the range of its birds .. To be intimate with the land like this is to enclose it in the same moral universe we occupy, to include it in the meaning of the word 'community'.'

Taken from 'Smallholder' magazine, Canada.

I write about folk
I don't even know
Never saw their faces
, touched their hands
, heard their laughter
, shared their sorrows.
Two people of another race
Ripening in their years
Living in a distant land
Half the world away
Good folk who with compassion
Took another's child into their hearts
Opened their door and shared their home.
Dear generous people
Julio and Baudelina both
Cruelly, viciously, wantonly killed
For your kindness and humanity
Your agony reaches us far away
Your suffering and sacrifice deeply lamented.
You are remembered.

'Baudelina's and Julio's murder made us so angry, we were desperate to do something, anything and everything we can. I travelled the three day journey to San Vicente where the head of the FARC operate. I went with Anne. It was my second trip there, she has been there half a dozen times.

We stayed in the main guerrilla centre for three days where we got to talk to several commanders and loads of guerrilla soldiers about our case. We tell them everything in detail and make our position very clear. They were all very shocked and could hardly believe what we were telling them. They always sound very convincing when they say they will do something about it, but at this stage, I don't believe anyone any more.

We wrote a long letter to the FARC and gave copies to everyone. Even Marulanda, the head and founder of the FARC got our letter via Rafael Reyes, their top international speaker. Ivan Reos, one of their main leaders, was very satisfying to talk to. When we told him the horror story of our friends being poisoned by the guerrillas, and said, 'You have to do something', he said, 'No, we don't have to do just something, we have to do a lot'. My body relaxed in relief when he said that, it was so nice to hear it, even if they never do it. The head people in the guerrilla force are really getting to know us, and they like us a lot. We made really good friends with Julien, a commander who is a musician and song-writer. I spent most of my time singing with him. I taught him my political songs, and he taught me his. A lot of his songs were environmental and very beautiful. He had some very funny songs about all the animals joining the guerrilla because they are tired of being poisoned with Glyphosate by the Americans. He had songs against arms which he sang with his machine-gun strapped around him and in full combat gear. And he gave us long speeches about how he was in the guerrilla army because he loves peace, and when he kills it's not out of hatred, but out of love for his people ..' Oh dear.

Is there anything left that could go wrong? There is. We have just heard they are carrying out PETROL EXPLORATIONS in our beautiful valley .. and to think ill wishers used to call us 'escapist' for not living in the City ... more of this next Letter. With gratitude to you all for listening. Thank you.

Jenny James

PS 'If fate throws a knife at you, you can catch it either by the blade or by the handle.'

Old Persian proverb (c/o Smallholder magazine).

GREEN LETTER FROM COLOMBIA No. 55
lst February 2002

Postal Address: Atlantis, Telecom, Belén, Huila, Colombia, S. America

"To cultivate one's garden is the politics of the humble man."
Chinese proverb, printed in Smallholder Magazine, Canada.

Well, I don't think making our farm ever more productive and beautiful helps the tragic people of Afghanistan very much, but I do know that after a month or so of once again returning to the city - this time the Southern town of Popayan - to do our best to counteract the rising tide of sadism, cynicism and hypocrisy emanating from the US & UK governments, not to mention the Irish and .. oh horror of horrors, the German 'GREEN' Party, who support the waging of this terrible and illogical war .. I need to return to 'our' mountains for renewal, else I'll become a victim of the war myself. So many good and thinking voices raised all over the world against the present insanity unleashed in the wake of September llth, but mainly drowned out by the greater chorus of primitive and bloodthirsty warmongering. Some clippings of the British press sent to to me by friends leave me shellshocked by their unabashed racial revanchism, and thank goodness I never see the US press ...

But back home on the farm, Life insisted on living itself ... On 30th November, just after breakfast, Anne quite unexpectedly delivered a baby. No, it wasn't hers! One of our girls came running down to find me in the cabbage patch saying, 'The neighbours have sent message to say could we go quick to carry Rosaura out, as she's in labour!' 'Out' here makes no sense. A woman in labour travelling across field and bog and rickety bridge to a deserted trafficless road leading to nowhere? I knew this was the panic of a woman in pain, been there myself, getting carried off a deserted island by lifeboat (that got stuck on a sandbank) to travel 50 bumpy miles to a horrible hospital ... no, I wasn't going to encourage anyone to make the same mistake. "Anne!" I called. "Please drop what you're doing and go and deliver this baby will you?" "Already on my way", she answered, "I knew you'd ask me." She was busy packing a few necessaries. "Have you seen a baby born before?" I thought to ask. "Well, I saw you have Katie .. and Mary have Laura," she answered breezily. "Oh dear, is that all?" I said. "Ah well, march in exuding confidence and the girl will be alright." When Anne arrived across the fields to the neighbour's shack, the mother-to-be was screaming and trying to climb up the walls, and the rest of the family was sitting glumly outside as if at a funeral, evidently convinced the girl was going to die. Anne bossed everyone around, calmed the woman down. And was home in time to make the dinner. "A huge boy," she said as she returned in an astonishingly short time. "Good lord," I said. Ah well, all in a morning's work.

"If we have to start all over again with another Adam and Eve, I want them to be American."
Senator Richard Russell, 1969

"I can go into my office, pick up the telephone, and in 25 minutes, 70 million people will be dead. "
President Richard Nixon

"My life wouldn't be worth living without dope .. it's really a buzz to be tripping out and know that you're cruising the Arctic with Polaris missiles that could wipe out half of Russia - man, that's a real trip!"
US submariner in interview, 1981

"At the end of the day, if 3 Americans and 2 Russians are left alive - we have won!"
General Curtis LeMay

"My fellow Americans, I am pleased to tell you today that I've signed legislation that outlaws Russia forever. The bombing begins in 5 minutes." President Ronald Reagan making a 'joke' during a radio test broadcast in 1984. This was intercepted by Soviet Intelligence.

Sleep easy, goodnight, love Jenny

P.S. "If my soldiers began to think, not one would stay in the ranks."
Frederick the Great

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