2 days ago, on Monday 3 women with 14 children were going to a wedding in Northern Mexico and ran into an ambush.
All 3 of the women, 4 children and 2 infants were murdered by a Mexican drug cartel, some of them burned alive.
Usually i dont like talking about these kinds of news but it hits home in this case because from 1998 to 2000 i lived among Mormons and went to school in Utah.
A state that is mostly of Mormon faith.
All my friends in school were Mormons, all my parents friends were Mormons and during the years ive had a number of them visit Croatia and stay with us.
They are a special kind of people unlike any ive ever met before or after. Their faith determines their behavior to such a degree that almost all of them are universally kind and accepting.
Such homogeneity of human decency in one group of people i have yet to encounter anywhere else.
That is why this saddens me even more because the victims in this massacre are the same kinds of people ive lived with, where i learned their values and was a part of their community. The years i spent there had a great impact on my life and who i am as a person.
The Mormons this happened to live in Mexico and there is around 3000 of them in their community. There is a documentary on VICE about their life and their struggles with the drug cartels.
I really recommend you give it a watch.
When i was watching it, probably a year ago, i somehow feared that something like this might happen.
What will always surprise me is the inability of the Mexican government to deal with the crime that plagues the nation. For a while now ive been watching these things transpire in South America and i was blown away with how poorly the nations there deal with these cartels.
The example of Pablo Escobar baffles me to this day. People praising him as a folk hero yet he was one of the worst murderers in the recent history.. Numerous of these Cartel bosses being seen more as celebrities then the criminals they are.
I cannot pretend to understand what it is like to live in Mexico or know their culture, all i can judge is what i do see.... but what i do know is that there is something seriously rotten in that part of the world.
Anyways... Stay safe.