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1:59

There's a fire in the women of

2:01

my family. Maybe

2:04

it's because they're born in the land of

2:06

volcanoes. Or maybe it's

2:09

because it's what they have to be to survive.

2:12

But every single one of them is like

2:14

a character from a Garcia Marquez novel. They

2:18

burn hot. And

2:20

no one burns hotter than my

2:22

Tia Vilma. The idea

2:24

of the Tia Vilma is a real, real, real, real, real, real. It's

2:28

all about the truth. Tia

2:31

Vilma describes herself as bratty,

2:33

rebellious, and spirited. Which

2:36

I would say is putting it mildly.

2:39

She's the kind of person who takes shit from no one.

2:43

And I think the best way to understand who she is

2:46

is through a story she told me about

2:49

when she and her sister, My

2:51

Tia Margarita, were young girls.

3:17

Their father came home to find the

3:19

two young girls, dancing on the kitchen

3:21

table to a song on the radio.

3:25

He was an abusive drunk. As

3:28

soon as he saw them, they stopped.

3:32

But he said, Oh, so

3:34

you like dancing? Get

3:36

up and dance for me. Margarita,

3:39

you first. Margarita

3:48

didn't want to. But

3:50

her father warned her, If

3:52

you don't dance for me, I'm going to

3:54

beat you. Margarita

4:00

got up on

4:02

the table and danced. When

4:09

he was satisfied, he told her to get

4:11

down, that it was Vilma's

4:13

turn. Vilma

4:21

refused. Again, he

4:23

demanded, get up and dance. But

4:27

she said, why would I dance for you? He

4:39

beat her bloody with an extension cord. All

4:42

the while, she refused to dance.

4:52

Tough women was Mytia Margarita.

5:03

Vilma and Margarita were only two years

5:06

apart in age, and

5:08

they were basically inseparable. They

5:11

were what we call in Spanish, unia y

5:13

mure, as close as the dirt

5:15

is under a fingernail. And

5:17

talking about Margarita is one

5:20

of the only times that Mytia Vilma's

5:22

voice softens. She

5:36

remembers Mytia Margarita as being softer than

5:38

the rest of my family. Prettier,

5:48

gentler. She was

5:51

named after the Margarita flower. In

5:54

English, we call them daisies. A

5:57

flower so simple and common, you forget

5:59

how to dance. how beautiful it is. The

6:03

story of my Tía Margarita's life

6:05

and death is like

6:07

that. It's

6:10

not an extraordinary story. It's

6:12

common. It's

6:15

the story of so many Salvadoran

6:17

women, then and now.

6:22

It's one of the few stories that I

6:24

knew about my family, that my Tía Margarita

6:26

was killed by a death squad, that

6:29

shortly after my mom said goodbye to her in

6:31

El Salvador, masked men came

6:33

in the night to take her away. I'd

6:37

always assumed that maybe she was

6:40

part of the FMLN, the leftist

6:42

guerillas. The

6:45

truth was

6:47

something so much more complicated.

6:52

Something that gets at the heart of what war

6:54

does to people. I'm

7:04

Jasmine Romero, and this is

7:06

Sacred Scandal, Season 3, Nation

7:08

of Saints. This

7:11

is Episode 6, The Flower.

7:24

We'll be right back. Amazon

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power, transforming courts, securing justice

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for all. If

9:11

you ask anyone in San Miguel about my

9:13

family, they'll probably answer you with one phrase.

9:17

Las chilateres. Chilate

9:20

is a hot, thick drink made

9:22

from corn, ginger, pepper and cinnamon.

9:26

And selling chilate in the Mercado has

9:28

been my family business for generations. The

9:31

women of my family would load baskets

9:33

full of hot chilate on their heads

9:36

and head to the market to sell them. I

9:39

asked my Tiaville mother, show me what it sounds like when

9:42

she sells chilate. The

9:44

chilate comes in plastic baggies.

9:46

I remember drinking it when I was a kid,

9:48

tearing up. the

10:00

corner of the bag with my teeth and sucking

10:02

the chilate out. It's

10:04

kind of sweet, but mostly herby.

10:08

My great-grandma was in charge of making a

10:10

huge batch of chilate at dawn. Once

10:13

it was ready, the women of my

10:15

family would go to her house and load up

10:17

their baskets. And

10:19

there were a lot of chilateres. Remember,

10:23

my mom is one of nine.

10:25

I guess when you have nine

10:27

siblings, it's easy to lose track.

10:42

It's also tough to remember them all because

10:44

in El Salvador, no one really calls you

10:46

by your real name. Almost

10:48

everyone goes by nicknames. Troxana

10:51

becomes chana, Maria de Jesus becomes

10:54

chus. You

11:03

get the picture. Selling

11:06

chilate is how my tías,

11:09

Vilma and Margarita, would spend their days

11:11

in San Miguel. They

11:13

grew from young girls to teenagers carrying

11:16

those heavy baskets on top of their

11:18

heads, going up and down

11:20

the streets of El Mercado, calling

11:22

for customers, selling

11:24

the bags for 20 cents. By

11:30

the summer of 1981, Margarita

11:32

was 19 and she

11:34

had three young kids. They

11:36

grew from young girls to teenagers carrying

11:39

those heavy baskets on top of their

11:41

heads, going up and down

11:43

the streets of El Mercado, calling

11:45

for customers, selling

11:47

the bags for 20 cents. By

11:50

the summer of 1981, Margarita was

11:52

19 and

11:56

she had three young kids. just

12:00

separated from the father of her kids, who

12:02

was an abusive alcoholic. It

12:05

was Vilma who convinced her to leave him.

12:08

At the time, Vilma was 17 and dating

12:11

a guy named El Pajaro, the

12:23

bird. His real name

12:25

was Walter, but everyone just called him El

12:27

Pajaro. I suspected speaking

12:29

two best friends, Vilma

12:31

and El Pajaro, Margarita and

12:34

Charra. The

12:41

girls would spend their days in the Americas place all to

12:43

himself. It was kind

12:45

of a crash pad where friends would party before

12:47

going to dances in town. So

12:50

he told Margarita that she could stay there. Margarita

12:54

moved in and soon she met

12:56

one of El Pajaro's best friends, a

12:58

guy named Charra. The

13:01

two of them headed off and started dating. They

13:04

became like the cast of a sitcom, two

13:07

sisters dating two best friends, Vilma

13:10

and El Pajaro, Margarita and

13:13

Charra. The

13:20

girls would spend their days in the Mercado, but

13:23

at night they danced. And

13:28

then they would come and dance. To

13:32

this day, my Tia Vilma

13:34

loves to dance. She'll

13:37

dance anywhere at any time

13:39

for any reason. And

13:41

I love to watch her dance. That

13:44

fall, one of her favorite singers was

13:46

in town, Maria Chacona. because

14:00

I was the mother of Maria Chacona, the mother of the

14:02

two of them, and I was like, I'm not going to

14:04

be here. Milma

14:07

was eight months pregnant, but

14:09

that wasn't going to stop her from going to the dance.

14:12

I was a mother, but I was not going to be there. I

14:16

was totally pregnant, but I

14:18

was the mother of the mother. And

14:21

I didn't want to be there because

14:23

I had no idea what was going on. By

14:26

the fall of 1981, the

14:28

war had started to trickle down into the streets. Every

14:32

once in a while, there were shootouts in town. But

14:35

for the most part, the combat was happening in

14:38

the hills. And

14:40

what does a 17-year-old care about politics

14:42

and war anyway? My

14:44

Tías just wanted to do what all teenagers want to

14:46

do. Party. They

14:58

would go to El Pajaro's house to pregame

15:00

and drink before heading to the dance. Now,

15:04

I know it's not great that my Tía

15:06

Vilma was drinking while she was eight months

15:08

pregnant. It's easy to judge.

15:11

But I try to have grace for someone who was

15:14

17, had never been to school, and

15:17

didn't really know any better. On

15:21

the night of November 14th, the four

15:23

of them were pre-gaming at El Pajaro's house. But

15:26

pre-gaming turned into just drinking,

15:28

and pretty soon it was late at night.

15:31

And my Tía Vilma wasn't feeling so great. Vilma

15:45

wanted to leave, to spend

15:47

that night at my great-grandma's house. But

15:50

Margarita wanted to stay. She

15:54

wasn't ready for the night to end. They

15:57

argued back and forth for a bit. But

16:00

finally, Vilma gave up and

16:02

left her there. When

16:04

Vilma got to my great grandma's house, my

16:07

grandma asked her, where is

16:09

Margarita? The lady who

16:11

was there, the lady who was

16:13

there, the lady who was there. My

16:16

Tia Vilma just shrugged it off. She

16:18

told her, I tried to bring her, but she

16:21

didn't wanna come. I didn't want to come,

16:23

but I didn't want to come. I was

16:25

there to help her, to help her, to help her. I

16:27

didn't want to come. The

16:29

lady who was there, the lady who was there, she told

16:31

me to come. I

16:34

didn't want to come. My grandma

16:36

was worried that something would happen to Margarita.

16:39

But Vilma just went off to bed. The

16:43

next morning, someone arrived at my

16:45

great grandma's house with a message. I

16:48

was in the house with my mom.

16:52

She said, I want to come. Don't

16:57

wait for Margarita, they said. She's

17:00

at the morgue. We'll

17:04

be right back after the break. Hi,

17:29

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I'm Sarah, Jake Roberts. That's

19:47

my grandma. Abuela Tere. She

19:50

remembers thinking it was strange that my

19:52

Tia Margarita didn't come home that night

19:55

because Margarita was such a hard worker.

19:57

It was a

19:59

Sunday morning. morning, and Sundays were

20:02

always good selling days in the market.

20:08

A man came by and knocked on the big

20:10

wooden gate at the front of the house. She

20:14

thought they were just coming to get mimbros.

20:16

I thought, I'm going to get mimbro, I'm

20:18

going to get mimbro. I

20:21

thought mimbros. I thought, I'm

20:23

going to get mimbro. The house,

20:25

the house, the house, the house. Is it a

20:28

fruit? Yes. Mimbros are

20:30

a fruit, kind of like a star fruit.

20:33

There's a big mimbro tree in the yard

20:35

of my grandma's house, and

20:37

the local drunks would come by sometimes and

20:39

ask my grandma for some free fruit. But

20:43

that's not what they wanted. They

20:46

told her that the

20:48

National Guard had

20:51

rounded up some people last

20:53

night, and

21:01

that Margarita was one of them. My

21:15

grandma didn't believe it. She

21:18

was sure that Margarita would turn up later.

21:21

God willing, she said. She

21:24

had no reason to think that Margarita would

21:26

be taken. To

21:33

understand why my Tía Margarita was killed, we

21:37

have to talk about the death squads, and

21:39

why they existed in the first place. Earlier,

21:42

we talked about how Roberto de Huisson

21:45

was central to the creation of Los

21:47

Escuadrones de la Muerte, the

21:49

death squads in El Salvador. These

21:53

death squads were paramilitary groups that

21:55

were not officially part of the

21:57

government. comprised

22:00

of soldiers, police officers, and national

22:02

guardsmen who were paid on the

22:05

side to carry out operations at

22:07

night. The

22:10

alleged goal of these groups was

22:12

to gather information, to find

22:14

out who was part of the leftist guerrilla

22:17

group that had declared war on the government,

22:19

the FMLN. These

22:21

were the same squads who were targeting

22:23

priests, nuns, and religious workers all over

22:26

the country. But

22:29

their directives kept escalating, and

22:31

their targets became more and more broad.

22:34

First, it was the leftists. Then

22:37

it was anyone who was helping the leftists. Then

22:40

it was anyone sympathetic to the leftists. To

22:43

gather the information they needed, the death

22:46

squads would torture their victims. Once

22:49

the information was extracted, they

22:51

would kill the person with a mercy bullet through

22:53

the temple and dump the

22:55

body in a rural area. It's

22:59

estimated that of the 75,000 people

23:02

killed during the Civil War, 40,000 of them

23:05

were killed

23:07

by death squads. Not

23:10

in combat, but in secret, taken

23:13

from their homes in the dead of the night. This

23:18

is what happened to Maytia Margarita. The

23:23

next morning, she was found on

23:26

the side of the road, along

23:28

with the bodies of Walter El Pajaro,

23:31

her boyfriend Charra, and

23:33

two other men. Maytia

23:46

Vilma went with my grandmother to

23:49

identify Margarita's body at the morgue. Margarita

24:00

had cigarette burns on her arms and belt marks on

24:02

her neck and wrists. Mytia

24:27

Vilma instantly understood where they

24:29

came from. She

24:32

had seen the chair where they tortured people.

24:36

As part of her route selling chilate, she

24:39

would stop by the local police precinct and

24:41

sell to the cops. She'd

24:44

been inside. She

24:58

said the chair looked like a dentist chair,

25:01

but with leather straps hanging off the

25:04

sides. But

25:08

why would they have taken Margarita? She

25:11

wasn't a political activist. She

25:13

wasn't a union organizer. She

25:15

was just a teenage girl. I'd

25:18

always assumed that maybe she was

25:20

secretly a part of the FMLN, or

25:23

maybe her boyfriend, Charra was. But

25:27

the answer came to mytia

25:29

Vilma there, at the morgue, while

25:32

she was identifying her sister's body. Charra's

25:35

mother was there to identify her son. And

25:55

crying over her son's body, she

25:58

cursed Margarita, saying it

26:00

was her fault that her son was killed.

26:03

It wasn't until much later that

26:05

Vilma understood what she meant. This

26:09

thing, the senior I am more than

26:11

a warrior. Chara's mother

26:14

didn't approve of his relationship

26:16

with Margarita. To

26:19

this day, no one's really sure

26:21

why. But

26:23

the story goes, it was

26:26

Chara's mother who sent a tip to the

26:28

National Guard. She

26:44

told them that Margarita was

26:46

hiding FMLN soldiers. Chara's

26:54

mother didn't realize that if

26:56

they came to take Margarita,

26:58

they would take everyone who

27:13

was there, including her

27:15

son. That

27:18

night, the death squad killed

27:20

Margarita, Chara, Walter

27:22

El Pajaro, and two

27:24

witnesses that saw them taking the group. A

27:28

man who was across the street, cleaning a

27:30

schoolyard, and his son. All

27:33

of them received the same fate. For

27:37

my Tia Vilma, it was a bitter

27:39

irony. Margarita was the tough

27:41

one. Vilma

27:44

was the tough one. Vilma

27:49

was the fighter. I

27:51

always carried a knife in my bra, she tells

27:53

me, just in case. My

27:56

sister didn't even carry a needle. My

28:01

grandma, my Tia Vilma, and

28:04

the rest of my family buried Margarita

28:06

in a simple wood box. They

28:11

borrowed money from the other vendors in El Mercado to

28:13

put the funeral together. The

28:16

lady who owned the flower shop that my mom worked at,

28:19

she gave my grandma the rest of the money she needed. My

28:23

grandma went back to work the very next day, selling

28:26

chilate in the market. She

28:29

says she didn't shed a single tear. And

28:33

I didn't want to be

28:35

here because I didn't want to be

28:37

here. I didn't want to be here. As

28:41

long as I was here, I didn't want to be here.

28:44

I didn't want to be here because I didn't want to

28:46

be here. But

28:49

I didn't want to be here. My

28:52

Tia Vilma says my grandmother

28:54

does cry from Margarita. Now.

28:59

In her sleep. She

29:01

was a Catholic

29:23

church. She was a sinner. But

29:27

she was one of Oscar Romero's people. When

29:31

he preached about Nuestro Sufrido Pueblo, our

29:34

suffering people, he meant

29:36

her. Not

29:38

a saint, but a martyr,

29:41

all the same. On

29:49

the next episode, we'll talk about one

29:51

of the most controversial moments from the war,

29:54

one that people are still debating

29:56

today. That's

30:01

next time on Nation of Saints. Sacred

30:11

Scandal Nation of Saints is a production

30:13

of a HA! podcast in partnership with

30:15

iHeart's Mike Altura podcast network and is

30:17

hosted and written by me, Jasmine Romero.

30:21

Produced by Jasmine Romero with help from

30:23

Alvaro Cespéles. Research and

30:25

reporting by Jasmine Romero. Produced

30:28

by Cireque Bado. Nation of Saints was

30:30

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