Sweet child carries many names

By Nanna Kirstine Hansen

A good old Danish expression. I myself are being called Nons, Nanse, Nanc, Nanita, Little Mouse, Scallop and Piglet, which might be due to my slightly pink colour and my tendency to snob nose. But in this I am not thinking about myself. In stead I will write about everybody’s darling, our little statue.

It has been fun to watch, how the statue gradually connects more and more personally to us, who often is around her. I feel that every time I see her, I just have to go over to her and touch her round tummy. Besides that she has gradually gotten some pet names: The Little Jesusfine (La Jesu Crista), The Virgin (La Virgen), The Little Virgin (La Virgencita), My Little Girl (Mi Niña), Gigantic Stomach (La Panzona), and the most used; The Little Doll (La Muñequita).

But it is not only us, who often are around her, who get’s a close relation to her. It is like, everybody who in some are in the campaign, either because they participant in it or because they participant in those workshops the women groups hold, gets a relation to her. I was out on a workshop, which was hold by the women group from Masaya, which also are a part of the women’s movement in a small society called Palenque.

The main subject was medical abortion, but under this they got to talk about machismo, violence and that suppression that many, especially the poor women experience, not only from the society’s site, but also in their families, often through their husbands. In the end of the workshop they asked the women to look properly at the statue, and then tell about those thoughts and feelings she put in their heads.

Many of the women went up to the statue and stood closely to her and many of them touched her, touched her stomach, and touched her breasts and her body. As she hangs there on her cross, she seems very vulnerable and even though she hasn’t got any eyes in the hollow of the eyes, you get that impression that she has a sad and melancholic look in her eyes.

One of the women noticed that she looked underfed and that she should have some goat milk. But many of them took her close. It is like they see themselves in her or maybe their daughter or grandchildren. She is for certain and definitely a lady that makes many impressions.

Translated by Matilde Christiansen.