What I desire most in life is the return of my son. As a father, he’s in my blood and mine in his. This corrupt government doesn’t think and it has no heart and it went ahead and just took them. They took them as if they were some sort of animals. But for us, they’re our family members, they’re humans, our children.

My child is a relaxed, quiet, dedicated and intelligent boy. He really likes the “jaripeo” (equestrian sport), actually he’s a horseback rider. He loves horses and he has a beautiful white horse. Wherever my son is he can be proud of me because I will look for him until I find him, and that he knows that I love him, I really love him. This week he’ll turn 20 years old. And like I welcomed him into this world on his birthday 20 years ago with so much love, with that same love I continue my search for him.

My son is only 19 years old. 19 years! Such a young man! He had just arrived here at Ayotzinapa when they had this awful luck and they were taken away. We’ve been here since the 26th of September awaiting his arrival. My son is such a good kid, a straight shooter, a great worker and when he left home he was so excited to start studying and become a teacher. He is so missed.

My son, he really likes this school. He wants to advance himself and do better than we did financially and this is why he came to this school. He’d only been here for two months in the school and they were preparing for a protest and they were shot at in Iguala on the 26th of September. Since then we know absolutely nothing, except government lies and cover ups. It’ll be ten months! The government tried to tell us they were found in the garbage dump in Cocula, but that’s another lie. We have nothing.

What type of government do we have that doesn’t function for anything? Today is my son’s birthday, August 9. And I’m sending him a thousand hugs and a thousand kisses, as do my daughters and my wife. From here we’re celebrating it and wherever he is, may the wind carry my words to him and may he not forget that we’re waiting for him in our house, with open arms.

Well, he went to study at Ayotzinapa because he simply wanted to go somewhere in life and be a teacher. He wanted to be able to financially help us here as poor farmers. And that’s when the bad luck hit him and this huge problem we now have on our hands. The government refuses to acknowledge or admit that it was the police who took the 43 students away.

The last time I talked with him was the fifteenth of September, when he came home to visit us. I didn’t know about the disappearances until the 29th when my daughter told me that she’d heard about it in her school. Since then, life changed. He is dearly missed, always happy, dancing and joyful. All this has left a huge void and we can’t wait until we see him and hear him and hug him again.

My son wanted to learn Spanish well. He speaks Mixteco. In the town where we’re from everyone speaks Mixteco; there’s very little Spanish. I learned Spanish because I came to Ayutla to work. But I can’t write or read and my son wanted to learn that, in Spanish. He loves to work in the countryside on the farm. He likes to plant and harvest coffee and bananas, he likes to work really everything.
Here in the basketball court of the school every day I await his arrival, the return of my son. I will wait here, until he appears.

The government said that all of our children were dead, calcified, but we think that that’s just not true. There is no scientific proof, and this is why we’re fighting and protesting until we find the 43 students. The movement invites anyone to come join with us in order to put increasing pressure on the Mexican government because it’s currently lying to us and covering up the truth. In order to move past these lies we continue our struggle.

Since the 26th of September our children, our loved ones were forcibly deprived of their liberty by the state. We demand answers from the government. We demand from this government the most basic guarantees of dignity as a human being.

My son, he sings and plays guitar beautifully, we’re here waiting for him to come back. The truth is we’ll keep fighting this until the end. We’re not going home until we find him. He went to Ayotzinapa because we didn’t have the resources to send him somewhere else. We’ve travelled around Europe and the US in this fight and we’ll keep it up. It’s embarrassing as Mexicans that we have to go outside of our country for answers, that our government can’t resolve its own problems.

My son is very young. He’s just a little boy starting his life, innocent and excited to start his life as an adult. First he wanted to work as a mechanic. He talked about this for years; it was his dream. But later, he decided that it would be better to do something with which he could help out his community. All of us are dedicated to this movement and we are not going to rest until we have legitimate answers. The government should understand this. We’re not going to let up on this fight.

We’re from a town close by where my son worked as a barber. People always ask for him. Even the little kids in town still ask for him, ask when he’s coming back.
My goal is to find him, hug him along with my wife and his brothers and sisters. I want him to know that we continue, we’re not going to stop looking for him. Until we find out the truth. If they are dead, like the government says, then show us the bodies.

They’ve told me that my son is the only one whose body was identified. This brings me great sadness that they tell me that he’s dead… this can’t end just like that.

The government has offered us houses, political positions, and even direct money, but I won’t sell my child. He doesn’t have a price.

My son is a happy boy. He loves music, likes to sing and he’s very sociable with everyone. He was very responsible with his little two year old daughter. Our movement of parents is spreading the word about what happened and about all of the problems that México suffers. The government continues to violate the human rights of indigenous peoples, the poor and now even students. When you’re poor you always think at least you have your family. But here in México, if you’re poor, they take that from you too.

My son only wanted to do better for himself and have a life that was better than how he grew up. My son was dedicated to helping his father on the farm. In his free time he loves to play baseball. He wasn’t a delinquent like the government keeps saying. He is only 20 years old with his dreams of being a teacher.

My son is very noble, a great worker and very studious. I remember how impressed I was when he studied so late into the night. We’re from a family with very little resources and these teacher’s colleges are the only form that these young men can get ahead. We really don’t know what we’re going to do if they’re not alive. That would be too much for my family and I to take.

We are all poor campesinos and because of that we’re not appreciated. This is why we have to go to other countries to demand justice. We continue in caravans for the North and the South and even internationally in order to assure that the government gives us some answers and so they turn over our children alive.

My son is all that I have in this life. I pray every day and every night that he comes home…. he’s all that I have. I pray every day and every night that he comes back home. He’s all I have, nothing more.

My son loves to play soccer, and he loves school since he was a little boy. He always went to school with his brother. This is what I want, that the government gives them back to us because we’re desperate. We’re not tired and we won’t give up but we’re desperate, it’s been so long since we’ve laid our eyes on them.

These are young lives we’re talking about here. If anyone thinks that we’re going to stop our fight for justice, they’re wrong. Imagine if the children disappeared were children of the government figures who don’t want to hear from us? They’d be found in two days. But for us and our children, children of poor farmers, almost ten months and all we have from the government is pure lies and no news of what happened to our children.

He wanted to go to that school badly and I didn’t want him to. I had a premonition something bad was going to happen there. But he said he wanted to go to study, how can a mom say no to that? Initially he wanted to study to be a doctor, but for a poor person, how can that ever be possible? So, he decided to be a teacher and now, well we all know about what happened now.

The police and the military were all involved in disappearing our children and taking them away. From that moment forward we know nothing, how they are, where they are, we know nothing. We don’t know if they’re eating well, if they even eat or not. But from here we’re saying to the government that we will never stop searching for them.

Unfortunately in 2014 I was told that I have cancer. And my son was very sad and preoccupied for his mother because with little money its difficult to pay for the trips to Acapulco for my treatments. And we never had enough to pay for his further studies, so that was how he ended up studying at Ayotzinapa. We will not rest or give up an inch in this great fight for justice against the Mexican government.

From the moment we got the phone call with the news, we’ve been fighting for our children, the most fundamental thing we have in this life. People have asked us if we’re scared that we may lose our lives but you lose part of your life when something so ugly, so cruel and so awful happens to your child. I don’t know where this movement will take us or its end, but I do know it’s not going to be easy to accept that I’ve lost my son, and I will keep on fighting for his life because I love him so dearly.

Enrique Peña Nieto says that we need to get over the pain, but that’s ridiculous. There’s no way we’ll get over this until they present to us alive our 43 sons and the government punishes those responsible. We will not rest until then. The whole country and the world is behind us!

The government tells us all sorts of lies and we demand that the government tells us where they are, or where the bodies are, or where they murdered them. The government should give us some evidence and not only lies. That’s what the government is- an excellent liar, this goddamned government.

Well, what can I say. He is dearly missed, by everyone in the family. We want the government to give him back, let him come home. He’s only 20 years old.

My Emiliano spent his whole life in the countryside working on the farm and he decided to study. So, I just want him back, we want the government to turn them over to us. This is what we want. And, they’re not delinquents like the government likes to say.

Its painful when I think about him. I cry every night and day. I want the government to just give him back already. The torture and the desperation that we suffer for our children doesn’t have a name horrible enough to express it.

Where are they? My two sons left telling me “We’re going to study there mom, in this economy there’s not much more we can do.” I’ve now regretted thousands of times for having sent my sons there. The goddamned awful bad government is saying that they were delinquents. My sons were not delinquents.

We give thanks to all of the people that are supporting us, that are in solidarity with us and our movement. They were only young boys, young men that wanted to simply get ahead some in life. And this government grabbed them like they were some sort of prisoners, some sort of criminals.

My son is a poor farmer, just like me. He always came out here with me to the farm to plant seeds and harvest the crops. He came here to plant and work the farm in the fresh air his whole life.
When I come here, since they took him away, I listen to the silence and the wind in the trees, rustling the leaves and I think about him. I can almost feel his presence here with me and I can’t think of anything else… only that he is not here with me. Its a strong feeling of loss that he’s not here and it hurts powerfully.

My son is a great person, very noble, sincere and concerned about the welfare of others. This is why he wanted to study at Ayotzinapa and now we’re in this situation. And, we’re not going to rest, we’re going to continue in this fight, in this battle for justice and at very least, at a minimum until we have some sort of legitimate answers about what happened.

My son decided to leave the community to get ahead in life and at the same time, as a teacher, help out others that could use a little help. In this case he was thinking about the youth of the poorest towns in Guerrerro where the children are marginalized and don’t receive the education they deserve as humans. This is his great interest in life: to do his part to help those that need help.

I’m from Ticuí, in the municipality of Atoyac de Álvarez. My son loves to work on the farm, just like his father does, and he works often as a construction worker and carpenter. If we’d have known this was going to happen to him we wouldn’t have sent him there.

My boy is only 26 years old. He’s a noble and studious young man. He loves to dance in the traditional dances of the region here, especially one that’s called, “The Dance of the Tlacoleros.” He also loved getting dressed up as a Charro (traditional cowboy garb) from this region in Guerrerro. He dedicated lots of time to the virgins, of Christmas and Guadalupe. I want to see him come back home.