Reframing Latin America: A Cultural Theory Reading ... - BGSU Blogs

248 reframing latin america
figure 14.4 Granado watches the young Che transform himself into a leader in
The Motorcycle Diaries
The moment in question was Che’s and Granado’s visit to a leper colony
in the Peruvian rain forest. There they fi nd a committed core of doctors
and nuns caring for a few hundred people suffering from leprosy, which in
those days was a serious and incurable disease that necessitated living in
segregated colonies far from the centers of society. The lepers live on one
side of a river and their medical caretakers on the other. Che and Granado
immediately begin challenging this hierarchy and separation by refusing to
wear gloves when they meet the patients and disobeying rules about the
segregation. Although they were at the colony for only three weeks, Che
manages in that time to undermine many aspects of the segregation and
soon has the two sides playing soccer with one another and building a sense
of collective identity.
On his last night at the colony, which also happened to be his birthday,
Che insists, in his most explicit demonstration of his commitment to uniting
the two sides of the river, that he wants to spend the night on the other
side of the river with the lepers. Unable to fi nd a boat to take him across
the river, he decides to ignore his asthma and the strong currents and swim
across the chasm, a feat that supposedly no one had ever accomplished. His
arrival on the other side is greeted with great applause by the lepers, who are
ecstatic to receive him. The next morning, as Che and Granado get ready