"I would like to see you again soon, my son": moving trip to Malvinas from parents of soldiers killed in action

Click, click, click, click. The rosaries strike Darwin's white crosses, caressed by the wind of the islands.

Trap, trap, trap. The steps on the white stones that lead to the cemetery mark the anxiety of these mothers, brothers and children, who hurry to spend this morning under the sun and the cold in the green meadow.

"Yes Yes Yes", exclaims a mother, while she is on her knees, she caresses for the first time the name of her son, now identified, engraved on the black granite plate.

Malvinas has a voice. Each sound tells a different story. The stories they keep since the end of the war, the 230 crosses, each the 649 names written in the big cenotaph of the Argentine cemetery.

Today, 62 parents have come to Darwin to pay tribute to the newly identified soldiers: 112 have regained their names since the launch of the Humanitarian Project Plan. Only 10 people are missing and there will be more Argentinian soldiers known only to God in the Falklands.

Flight of the Andes 682, rented by Argentina 2000 airports, left Ezeiza after four in the morning. Two hours and forty minutes later, the pilots Pablo Linari, Tomás Martin and Federico Serino They landed at Mount Pleasant with 165 pbadengers who without sleep and with emotionsthey felt how the sun's rays welcomed them to Isla Soledad.

"Until the morning it rained"said an attendant who sealed the pbadports in a soft and difficult Spanish language and confirmed that adverse weather conditions in the south of the country had changed to accommodate families of heroes.

The 40-minute bus separating the airport from the cemetery was held in silence. The eyes, nailed in the green and yellow arid lands.

Then it was the sound of the steps on the gravel road. And the rosaries. And the sobs of mothers who have found their children after more than three decades.

Now it's the voices and the tears, the prayers and the cuddles that break the silence in this immense solitude. "His little body is there, I can stay calm"he said almost whispering, his hands clasped, his eyes full of tears, Cristina Lera, the mother of the soldier Luis Sevilla. Cry then Miriam, who fired his only brother as a teenager and, three decades later, still misses him on the first day. And he speaks to the white cross. She tells him that on May 28, the day of her death, they are preparing the locro that she loved so much. "The little letter you sent from the Falklands informing us that it was very cold is in a box at home"he says.

Grief squeezes his throat when he explains that he could not have done his military service because he was the only child to support a single mother. But he asked to leave because the Air Force had touched him and he said that it gave him the opportunity to progress and study. "He told my mother "so that I can buy you a house and we do not walk from here to there without housing". And the poor man gave him home, but he paid for it with his life"he's remembered with anguish.

Kneeling Mabel Godoy kiss the cross of Víctor Rodríguez, the young man who fell in love with her from that moment, they went together to Luján to pray to the virgin when she was barely 17 years old. It was his first and greatest love. But the war has kidnapped him.

Beside her, Nora, who was only four years old when Victor left for the war, pays homage to his older brother, whom he hardly remembers. What images come back to this memory that barely manages to remember the smiling young man who lifted her in his arms and pampered her like a princess of the family?

Wrapped in a plastic bag and in an envelope, Raquel Folch He kept a letter for Hannibal, his younger brother fell on June 14, 1982, while there were only a few hours left for the surrender of General Mario Benjamín Menéndez. "This is the letter that he had asked me to send to the Islands and at that time, I did not write because I thought that Ani would come back"he laments.

It took 37 years before Raquel, who for the first time enters the islands with her sister, will have the courage to write the letter that she has never sent. "I apologize for not having done so before because I was as young as him and, at that time, I did not imagine what a war is … I would never have thought that he would stay here."Cry."I just want to kiss my brother", repeat and wrap the cross adorned with white flowers in cloth and fixed with a seal so that the wind does not take them.

The cry drowns in tears: "Why so much pain, why were you so cold, why did you stay here, little brother?" He lays his forehead on the black granite plate and caresses the name of Anibal Folch.

A row behind, Lila Yolanda Aguirre he says that he does not want to remember his Hector cold as marble resting under the cross. It's hot and it gets closer, he says, and he touches his belly. At 82, he says that in his memory he appears smiling and calls him "Negra". Do not forget that he loved judo and practiced it at night near the cbad. "The madness"Friends told her only son and so she loved her motherly love."Now I'm calmer because I know his body is there"he thinks and presses in his hands with force a few white pebbles he has picked up at the cemetery.

Travel alone and cries hugged at the cross of his brother. Cata Ferrau He speaks to him in front of the grave now identified. "Why did you have to stay in these islands so far, if I begged you to come back anyway? Even injured or disabled, I would have treated you all my life. Why did not you go home where I waited for you all these years?", the woman who came to the islands for the first time is delighted. "They are so far away … when I got on the plane, as I had never done before, I was scared, but if he dared to come, I also had to do it, "closes the sister of the soldier Jose Ramón.

Knock Knock knock, the boots of the Scottish Guard sound on the perimeter of the cemetery of Darwin. Dressed in their uniforms, seven British soldiers raise their weapons and pay homage to the cenotaph.

The long, sad notes of a bagpipe cross tears and prayers before the crosses. Two real bagpipe players interpret the complaint. Then, it will be Omar Tabarez, a corporal of regiment 25 and who has returned for the first time to the islands, which, with his trumpet, will once again ring the story of the war and its heroes.

The time of prayer arrives. The father Ponciano Acosta, member of the family of the fallen gendarme Malvinas Gumersindo Acosta, the answer begins: "You who will resurrect us …". "Lord, have mercy on us," the voices join to pray to the Lord. He is accompanied by the priest of the islands, Father Ambrose, who in a clear Spanish, helps the ceremony.

The Argentine priest speaks of three words that mark the historic day: Thanks (to be here, to know where are our dear ones), Sow ("the seed that falls on the earth is infertile, but below It can bear fruit: that they are seeds of peace "), and of light (" we are going to bless those candles of different colors that express the diversity that exists between us "). The Eucharist marks the profound silence interrupted only by the "amen" of loved ones.

The cross of Mario Cisnero he has on his foot the picture of the brave soldier. Her sister Galdys placed the fabric roses with care and love. For many years, his family refused to identify: "We were afraid to transport his body to the mainland and take it out of the islands," he says.

But today, the "Dog" is one of 112 identified soldiers. "It was to end a duel, to achieve peace," he says, saying that it was only much later in his birth, Catamarca, that he knew that Mario Antonio was a symbol for his men and for the Army.

He has today a small museum of his brother in a room of the house: a mannequin with his uniform, two helmets, the last suitcase that he used with his shirts and his clothes, his beret .. . "I am proud and reading his name on this plaque also allowed me to think that it is right and important that the heroes have their names."he says.

Lorna Márquez fulfilled the promise made to her grandmother: she took the ashes of Elda to accompany her son. "She had asked me to throw her ashes on the islands because my uncle was not identified. Now, I put them between pebbles, so that they are united forever"he is excited.

The 165 people visit the Darwin Cemetery during this second humanitarian trip organized by Eduardo Eurnekian –Argentina 2000 airports– Roberto Curilovic – Director of Business Development AA2000 – UK Ambbadador to Argentina Mark Kent, the government of the islands and the commission of the relatives of the dead in Malvinas. The trip was supported by the Secretary of Human Rights and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

This humanitarian cause has been promoted since 2008 by the veteran Julio Aro, who was moved in front of the 121 crosses that, at that time, indicated that the Argentine soldier was only known to God and began to work to identify his companions. He was accompanied in this task by the British colonel Geoffrey Cardozo – who was entrusted with the difficult task of badembling the battlefield corps to give them an honorable burial – and this journalist Infobae, who with Aro visited nearly 120 families. The cause was concluded in the humanitarian project plan. All three of us stopped in front of the 10 unidentified crosses and we promised the dead: "We will find them again".

The Andes flight turbines 682 are now sounding and in two hours and forty minutes, the pilots will land at Ezeiza International Airport. The ship gets up, leaves Mount Pleasant. The islands are getting small. And a mother cries near the window: "I hope to come back soon to see you my son"