Drowned father and daughter mourned
SAN SALVADOR, EL SALVADOR » A man and his young daughter who drowned trying to cross into Texas were laid to rest Monday, a week after a heartbreaking image of their bodies floating in the Rio Grande circled the globe.
About 200 relatives and friends followed a hearse bearing the bodies of ”scar Martínez and his 23-month-old daughter, Valeria, in La Bermeja municipal cemetery in southern San Salvador. The ceremony was private, and journalists were not allowed access.
Many mourners wore black and wept. They carried flowers and green palms, and some held signs bearing the logo of the Alianza soccer team favored by Martínez, who belonged to a group that supports the club.
“For those who cheer you on from heaven,” one read.
“I knew them. They are good people, and I can’t believe they died this way,” said Berta Padilla, who arrived along with about 30 others on a bus from Altavista, the working-class city the Martínezes called home before they left in April, headed for the U.S.
“We came from Altavista to be with ”scar’s family,” Padilla added. “We are with them in their pain.”
Tania Vanessa Ávalos, their wife and mother, returned to El Salvador on Friday ahead of their remains.
A municipal police officer said their graves were in a section of the cemetery named after Saint ”scar Romero, the San Salvador archbishop who devoted himself to helping the poor and was assassinated in 1980. Romero, who was canonized last year, is buried in the crypt of the city’s cathedral.
After the burial, relatives stayed behind at the gravesite to say a last goodbye, said family friend Reyna Moran.
“This is very painful, most of all because of the baby . ... They went in search of a better future, but everything came to an end in the river,” Moran said.
A collection of floral arrangements adorned the grave, including one from El Salvador’s president and first lady. Interior Minister Mario Durán was among those who attended.
The photographs of Martínez, 25, and Valeria, lying face-down along the riverbank, the tiny girl tucked inside his black shirt and her arm draped over his neck, prompted a global outpouring of emotion. They underscored the perils faced by migrants and asylum-seekers trying to reach the United States.
“We are dismayed, shocked, everyone is in pain,” said Altavista Mayor Victor Manuel Rivera.