¡Jíbara!

Juanita got off the crowded bus in Río Piedras. She looked across the street at the ornate gateposts, the green lawn and the heavily decorated campanile of the university. Her heart was beating fast with fear and excitement. She crossed the street and joined a stream of young students walking quickly towards what she assumed was the administration building.
“Por favor, where do we register for classes?” she asked a bespectacled young man in a white, short-sleeved shirt.
“I’m new here too. I hope there are going to be signs. But we can ask someone. What’s your name?” he asked.
“Juanita. And you?”
“Ernesto. I’m from Ciales. I went to High School in Río Piedras but I’m still not used to this place; it’s too crowded for me. I don’t think I will ever get used to this town. Where do you live?”
“I live with my mother in ... Santurce. But, you know, I came from Utuado originally. I’m from the mountains too.”
He reached out his hand. “I’m a jíbaro too.”
Juanita felt, reassured knowing that this stranger was somewhat of an ally in this new and unknown world.
As they poured into the colonnaded exterior corridor surrounding the building they were stopped by a mass of students trying to push their way into a room with a big sign that read: REGISTRATION. There was no line.
As more students arrived behind them, the mass of people swelled and it became very hot. Some students became angry and began to call out impatiently, asking how long they were going to have to wait. Juanita was sweating and her feet were beginning to get tired after they had waited for about an hour. The mass of students had not moved at all.
All of a sudden, a student, who appeared to be near the door of the office, shouted that there was not going to be any registration until further notice. He said the students had gone on strike because two independentista teachers, followers of the pro-independence party, had been fired and the secretarial staff had joined the students in protest. A wave of anger passed through the crowd. Curses and threats followed. Juanita felt instantly unsafe and began to push her way towards what she felt would be the nearest open space. She had never been in such close physical contact with so many strangers. The meetings of the students at her high school, after the Ponce Massacre, had been outdoors and not well attended. There had also been a protest in response to the dismissal of a teacher, Miss Mendoza, who took a stand against using English for general instruction in the schools. But, here at the university the mood was a great deal tenser. She was frightened but kept moving slowly in the direction she had set herself to go. She tried to ignore the pinching and rubbing, the groping and whispering along the way.
When she finally reached the edge of the crowd, she leaned against a large flowerpot and breathed in relief. She looked in her purse for a handkerchief to wipe the sweat off her face. She had been afraid of losing her purse with the small amount of money she had and with her new pen, a special present from Cisa. She had clutched her purse to her chest and locked her arms around it.
She was wondering what to do next when she saw Ernesto coming towards her. She noticed his pale skin and his light brown eyes behind horn-rimmed glasses. He was not much taller than her.
“You escaped!” he said smiling.
“For a while I didn’t think I was going to make it ... What happens next? I’m not sure exactly what to do, except go home.”
“I was asking myself the same thing.”
“Someone must have information about when we will be able to register, but I’m not going back in there,” Juanita said.
“I don’t blame you,” Ernesto nodded.
Just then they began to hear the sound of a loudspeaker. They could not make out the words. Without thinking, they began walking fast towards the direction of the voice. A large crowd had gathered near a black car with a loudspeaker. Young men in black shirts and white pants stood around the car. Juanita and Ernesto stood at a distance from the crowd on the front lawn of the campus.
“¡El imperialista yanqui, el monstruo Winship que mató a diésiocho hijos de la República, tiene que morir! ¡La masacre de Ponce tiene que ser vengada! ¡Tiene que morir Winship! ¡Independencia! ”
The anti-American hate pouring out of the loudspeaker, calling for the death of Governor Winship, in revenge for the killing of eighteen Nationalists at the Ponce Massacre, was mesmerizing music to many of the students and to sympathizers who had joined the crowd. Juanita felt a confusing mix of: fear of violence, sympathy for the innocent, anger at injustice and pain for her own and her mother’s poverty. Next to her, Ernesto’s body stiffened.
“Let’s get out of here,” he said.
* * * *
Clara looked at the newspaper headline:
“UNIVERSITY SHUT DOWN BY STRIKING STUDENTS! Students make demands of the administration to take a position on the status of the island. Pro-independence teachers fired. Nationalists inciting students to violence. Fear of another massacre grows among both students and administration as Governor Winship threatens to call in the National Guard. Police are on alert.”
Clara overheard conversations between Arturo and Bernardo, Mercedes husband, about the current political situation. The strikes were getting more frequent and more widespread, not just at the University but throughout the island. Farm workers and laborers claimed they were being starved by the sugar interests, by general unemployment and an inefficient and self-serving government.
The two men were still talking about the Tydings Bill, proposed the prior year in the U.S. Congress that aimed to give independence to the island.