Song of the Water Saints by Nelly Rosario

Author:Nelly Rosario
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction
ISBN: 9780307427892
Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Published: 2007-12-18T00:00:00+00:00

EVACUATION (PURE AND SIMPLE) • 1924

It had taken four years of national and international protest to coerce the American troops to pull up camp and leave the country. For eight years they had stationed themselves in the Dominican Republic, collecting regular payments on the nation’s debt to the United States—and any other Dominican loot that was there for the taking. During their stay they built roads and improved sanitation and education, further compounding the national debt. Anti-yanqui sentiment had grown among the general population. Censorship, curfews, courts of military justice, and the torture of dissidents had stirred popular outrage. Intellectuals launched a campaign for a “pure and simple disoccupation.” Even as the wealthy enjoyed the spoils of the occupation, protests came from many sides.

In the wake of the Americans’ departure remained a corps of locals well trained in the tactics of repression. The troops left behind a certain appetite for American goods. In some sugar towns, like San Pedro de Macorís, there grew an affinity for baseball, which, with time, would replace cockfighting as the national sport. The troops also left a trail of deaths and births: mourning mothers and mothers with fair-haired children.

When the Americans left the Dominican Republic, the masses danced merengue with more vehemence than ever.

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