Toque de Queda: Day 3

The city was on lockdown for 42 hours but they've given us a short reprieve. From 10 to 4, the curfew is being lifted so that folks can go out and do their business. Our friends just came by in their SUV and picked Elisa up to make a run to the groceria. So, that was some much-needed good news. But the skeptic in me interprets that as meaning that another long haul is on the way: stock up because this could last a while...

The standoff at the Brazilian Embassy goes on. Mel and 100 of his staff, friends and family are holed up inside. President Michelletti has 'recommended' that Brazil either grant Zelaya full political refuge and fly him the heck out of the country, or they hand him over to Honduras to be tried for his crimes. Zelaya continues to wax poetic insisting that he has come back to receive 'homeland, restitution or death' and that the election in November must be 'for all the people.' Well, Mel, it is for all the people. All the people except for you...

The world media continues to botch their read on the situation. By and large, Mel has managed to cast himself as a martyr and a 'man of the people'. Of course, the democratic West eats that stuff up. I guess everyone has forgotten that power fiends from Stalin to Chavez have wielded the 'populist champion' mythology with great facility. Not many Hondurans are buying it anymore. With very few exceptions, they want to be rid of Mel like the NFL wants to be rid of Bret Favre.

To be fair, there were around 2,500 protestors out on the boulevard yesterday. Hardly, the 'thousands' that are being reported around the world by our media outlets, unfailing paragons of truth that they are. Another side of the story that isn't being told is that most of those folks know or care very little about the machinations of international realpolitik. They just know that they're poor and they're pissed off about it. Many of the stores and fast food places along the city's main arteries have been completely gutted by these Zelayistas. Their activities have very little to do with political passion. This has just become another opportunity to clean out the grocery store.

Maybe, I'm sounding cynical to you. I don't know. Maybe a bit of cabin fever is setting in. But I can tell you that Mel Zelaya's return is about one thing: Mel Zelaya. It's not about sovereignty or liberty or the populist will or the democratic process. It's all about Mel. And millions of people are getting sick of it.

It is, at once, an eerie and peaceful sensation to listen and look out over a silent city of almost 2 million people. We're ready to go back to the noisy pollution of a busy day. Today is the tenth unscheduled day of school that we've missed. But, we're getting ready to hunker down some more and see if we can outlast Zelaya in this game of chicken.

In the meantime, we'll try to get in a game of ultimate frisbee on the school soccer field...if we can by 4 o'clock.