When tradition and customs wreak havoc

The general Lucio V. Mansilla he was a rare blend of combat soldier, rugged desert warrior, and exquisite writer. He was also a tireless traveler. Lover of good taste, shapes and style, a waste-free dandy.

In this Buenos Aires of mud and wind, he walked neat and graceful in the dusty streets. For him, cleanliness and presence were essential virtues that could not be lacking in human beings. In this gray village, with dark hues, he was encouraged by duckling yellow and proudly displayed this color on his inner vest.

He was son of General Mansilla the brave warrior who fiercely fought the English and French forces, in the Vuelta de Obligado. This general did not get along with his first wife, she was shaggy, dirty and untidy, so he went to see his parents-in-law and said to them: I have come to give you back your daughter. He separated. Soon after, he fell madly in love with Augustine Roses, sister of the dictator. Agustina was said to be the prettiest girl in Buenos Aires. He was fifteen and Mansilla forty-one. It wasn’t very reciprocal, but things went well. From this union was born Lucio, our man, so he was also nephew of Brigadier General Juan Manuel de Rosas another meticulous porteño and attentive to personal hygiene. The reader will understand why I insist on this.

Lucio Mansilla (m) marched 1870 To ranqueline awnings (these indigenous peoples were from Araucanian) to discuss with the cacique Mariano Rosas the conditions of peace that the national government offered to the Indians. Meetings, crowds, parties, binge eating, drunkenness, violence, outbursts, dirt, chaos and lack of control, everything is described in his magnificent book: Excursion to the Ranqueles Indians. Mansilla’s family habits did not prevent him from fulfilling his obligations, but they reveal the rejection of certain indigenous customs.

I take randomly and with intention, some of his notes. After a gargantuan lunch “the aperitif tour began. This chapter is serious. The Indians drink like everyone else, by mouth. But they don’t drink while eating. Drinking is a separate act. There is nothing more pleasant for them. While they have something to drink, they drink; they drink for an hour, a day, two days, two months. They are able to spend it on drinking until they burst. The Indians begin by saying yapai, filling the glass well, which is usually a small horn. The Indians were already warming up, emptying the bottles, drinking without method. !Came! Came! They asked to auction, as they say. Some fell down and some got up, and some screamed and some fell silent, and some laughed and some cried and some came to hug me and kiss me and some threatened me in their language.”

Scenes like this are repeated several times in his book, although it is fair to say that Mansilla was benevolent towards the savages, especially if one reads his description of the Indians, José Hernández in Martin Fierro.

The English traveler who traveled through Patagonia between 1869 and 1870, George Mustershe left written in his book, Life among the Patagoniansan invaluable contribution to the knowledge of our indigenous indigenous tribes: the Tehuelches. Also Araucanians, with whom he did not sympathize, because of their warlike, moral and criminal customs. While discussing with his Tehuelche friends: “A messenger arrived unexpectedly, splattered with blood and showing on his face the effects of drink or furious excitement. Everyone crowded around him to hear the news, and the newcomer told us briefly that the group that had gone out the day before to look for apples had found another group of Indians, Araucanians, with water- of life. An orgy followed this, then a fight in which one person died, but they continued to drink, leaving the corpse outside, which the dogs had devoured. In short, the book is very detailed and meticulous in the stories and justification of the cacique Casimiro, Tehuelche, who ruled his parliaments with the Argentine flag in the center.

Francisco Pascasio Moreno, geographer, scientist, traveler and nature lover, worthy representative of the generation of the 80s, left us, in addition to the first peace agreements with Chile, beautiful descriptions of Patagonia as well as of life and sociability natives. in his book Journey to Southern Patagonia 1876-1877 Impossible to quote because of the flowery and extensive descriptions, there are several narrations of intense color. Drunkenness is part of the daily life of the savages and here Moreno includes women in these rural orgies. On one occasion, he had to deal with a machi trying to bring a totally drunk Indian woman to her senses, aggravating the clinical picture. There is much more but that is not the purpose of the article.

If that is said, everything is said and in the three books the authors of yesteryear wonder about certain indigenous behaviors that speak to us of societies whose values ​​are unfortunately violated under the influence of alcohol. And it was every day. Customs that remain engraved in the fire if a people, a civilization or an individual does not consider this past of vices and violence as an error.

We then understand the situation of personal abandonment, drunk and ill-advised, in which he found himself. huala jones at the time of his arrest. The uncompromising claim of a civilization corroded by alcohol and violence causes those who assume their representation to fall into the same miseries. In such a case, the problem is not Jones Huala, at this point a misfit and a lumpen cruelly sponsored by the current government. Jones Huala does not represent the heirs of the Araucanian people, integrated into Argentina thanks to school, work, health. If even the usurper of Mascardi, who was pregnant, did not go to the mountains to give birth, she went to a health center in Bariloche.

It is time for national and provincial governments to stop interfering and helping this marginalized minority. It was known that Huala was in the country, the author of this note had made it public the previous year indicating that he had stolen plums with a cane in the La Cristalina hut, owned by Diego Frutos. Frutos himself denounced him a few days later. Chance put Huala in the hands of the police, we will see what justice and politics will do.

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