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Sick of the Revolution.By Deb Olin Unferth- - - - - - - - Part Six Oh, yes, I said. Sure. Mr. Moral. My boyfriend. With his principles. First he'd told me we wouldn't trade on the black market. If there was one thing tearing apart the revolution, he said, it was corruption—bribes, black market, crime. We would play fair, he said, and in this small way we would be revolutionaries, revolutionaries of the economy. Although there isn't anything so revolutionary about obeying the law. But fine, good, agreed. No black market. So then what was he doing trading dollars on the black market one week into Nicaragua? All right, all right, he said. We can't all be perfect, can we? Had I seen the markup on the cordoba? It's absurd. If they're going to make it impossible for us, what else are we supposed to do? Are we supposed to starve while everybody else eats? So that one thing. Trade dollars, nothing else. So what was he doing buying food on the black market? Stolen military tins and plastic packets of peanut butter? Somebody's going to buy the stuff, it may as well be us because at least at heart we're trying to help the revolution. But somebody stole that from the soldiers. Well, it's stolen already. We're not going to find them and give it back. Besides, the soldiers probably sold it. What did they want with the stuff? And, besides, these plastic packets travel well and who knew the next time we'd see peanut butter or the next time we'd be dropped off on some dusty crossroad with nothing to eat? Fine, buy black-market food, that one other thing, but nothing else. So, what is this, was he actually bribing that clerk? Now look, do you know how much it costs to extend our visas? How are we supposed to help this fine revolution if we have to pay all our money just to stay? We were going to spend the extra money inside the country in any case, so what's the difference? But bribing? What would God have to say about that? That must be the limit, that must be over the limit. But, no, as it turned out, that wasn't the limit. Smuggling, that was the limit. Except that wasn't the limit, either. We could do anything. We could steal, we could look into faces and lie, we could forge documents, we could pull tricks and run. It's fine, it turned out.
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