The only amnesty I remember supporting occurred in the early 1980s, on a warm spring day. At nine in the morning, all the 6th grade EGB students stayed in the courtyard when the bell rang, we left our backpacks … We leaned against the wall and began to shout with enormous democratic conviction: “Amnesty, freedom, we don’t want to study!” That was the unanimous voice of a people, a happy Diada, the chorus of the ancient student nation raised to its feet.
Unfortunately, our votes were not necessary for the continuity of the school director and on top of that the parents, severe judges heirs of the Franco regime, demanded the forceful application of the current mathematics. The revolution lasted half an hour. Some teacher gave us a 155 without any respect for the popular will, we went up to the classroom stuffed in the trunk of our disappointment and ended the day opening the language book to page 134. Our desire for freedom ended up dissolving in a syntactic analysis.
We would have needed a Puigdemont then, and we were all doing quite well. What we would have given to go into exile to play football! But we were stupid and we cultivated martyrology, a bit like Junqueras, and in the end we ended up locked up at home doing our homework and eating tulip sandwiches with chorizo. No one then thought about reconciliation and brotherly love, but about the stubborn application of the law and the educational program. Those fascisms.
That spring day we learned – now I understand – the wrong lesson. We should have escaped to the billiards!
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