Representatives of the Peace Community in Germany

Alexandra Huck, volunteer from Germany (2000)

The Peace Community of San José de Apartadó receives the Aachen Peace Award (Germany) in 2007.

We were in a large old hall in Aachen, Germany. All of the seats were filled. In a solemn act, the Aachen peace award was presented to the Peace Community of San José de Apartadó. At the podium, people took turns to honour the Peace Community’s courage and commitment. From my seat in the audience, I could see Gildardo and Nohelia go up to receive the award.

How strange and wonderful to see them there! I recalled Gildardo in rubber boots and with a machete. I remembered San José de Apartadó: simple wooden houses, the smell of cacao beans drying in the sun, the surrounding green mountains, pigs walking around the streets of the community, and the farmers returning from the fields.

In this medieval hall in Aachen, the speeches from the podium –as well as the gaze from the audience- expressed the deepest respect for this peace project. It is such a contrast with the memories of San José de Apartadó: the days of feeling anguish with these people that was so intense I thought could almost touch it.

At last in Aachen, Gildardo and Nohelia were in the environment they deserved: recognition, with no danger or hostilities. I also recalled other visits from the Community. One time I was sitting with Wilson and Brígida on a sofa at the Ministry of the Exterior. They had a difficult time helping the official understand why it would go against international humanitarian law for the Community to improve the road hand in hand with the army engineer battalion. When the two visitors had a moment of relaxation, they discovered the Berlin underground, the ticket machines and the escalators.