Independence Day

Independence is celebrated in every city and town in Honduras with a parade, here in La Ceiba it is a five hour show, with a march that includes secondary schools (which are a lot), police, military, public employees etc. It is hard because the sun is really strong these days,and those kids are dressed for other types of climate.

In Central America, at least in the five original countries which seceded from Spain in 1821, the 15th of September is celebrated as independence day. By the five original countries I mean Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua and Costa Rica. Belize and Panama were not considered a part of Central America until the late 20th century as Belize remained a colony of the UK until the 1960's and Panama was a part of Colombia when the other five countries got their independence, and was mostly a US protectorate afterwards because of the canal.

Of course independence is just a word as just as soon as the Central American colonies got their independence they joined the Mexican empire headed by Agustin Iturbide until they quit that in 1823. Then came a period of destabilization were local revolutions, wars among the five countries even invasion by filibusters like William Walker were quite common.

Then US companies started coming, first the mining companies and eventually the banana companies, these companies actually controlled the whole country, but in the case of the banana companies they were the only authority in the zones were they operated, having even their own armies. Today our foreign policies and a lot of laws are actually dictated by the US government and the banana companies still are a powerful force here, even though much reduced as to the power they held 75 years ago.

But we still get to elect our own president even though the one we have right now didn't get the most votes, but there are other countries were the president wins and didn't get the most votes either so I'm cool with that.