Thirty-three Years after April 22nd: Memory Is Care

By Nadine Cortés

On April 22, 1992, (https://www.liderempresarial.com/guadalajara-la-ciudad-lider-en-innovacion-y-economia-de-mexico/)“>Guadalajara did not tremble. It burned**. It did so from within, from the depths of its earth, but also from the depths of its history. That morning, in the Analco neighborhood, life went on with the deceptive serenity of the everyday. There were children playing on the sidewalk, mothers preparing breakfast, students waiting for the bus, merchants raising their storefront shutters. No one imagined that beneath their feet not only was gas accumulating, but also negligence**. Warnings ignored, reports that no one wanted to read, voices unheard. And then, at 10:06 in the morning, the earth spoke**. It was not a natural accident: it was an accumulated social explosion**, a tragic consequence of abandonment.

Nine explosions devastated the neighborhood**. More than 200 people died, dozens disappeared, thousands were injured, marked, broken. But what was lost was not only life. In many cases, there were no farewells. There were no rituals. There was no body. There was nowhere to mourn. Homes, dreams were incinerated, but something much more difficult to name was also fractured: the shared identity of a community** that never returned to being the same.

(https://www.liderempresarial.com/veronica-delgadillo-garcia-una-vision-de-alcance-global/ And yet, Guadalajara chose to remember. Not as a symbolic gesture, nor as a calendar routine. Remembering, here, is resisting**. It is caring. The wound was not covered up, not erased, not silenced. The city decided to show it. Not out of morbid curiosity or victimhood, but because there are wounds that must remain visible to prevent them from recurring**. Every April 22nd, memory manifests itself not only in public acts, but in the intimate conscience of a city that knows it is marked by fire, but also by dignity**.

The Analco neighborhood never returned to being the same, but it was reborn**. Not only in bricks, but in bonds. Because when the institutions failed, the community sustained itself**. Solidarity filled the voids left by politics. Memory became a tool, a shelter, a seed. And so, in the midst of pain, Guadalajara built a form of collective care that is not taught in government manuals, but that should inspire all public policy**.

Thirty-three years later, the tragedy remains alive in memory and in responsibility. It is not enough to say “that was before”. Governing also means taking charge of the inherited grief. Not out of guilt, but out of commitment. There are governments that bow their heads to the past, and there are others that extend their arms. Listening is also an act of State. Accompanying is also a form of justice**. Those who today decide from power have the duty to learn from that history, to honor it with deeds, not with speeches, to act before the silence explodes again.

<LinkPreview url=“https://www.liderempresarial.com/guadalajara-la-ciudad-lider-en-innovacion-y-economia-de-mexico/ (https://www.liderempresarial.com/guadalajara-la-ciudad-lider-en-innovacion-y-economia-de-mexico/ Guadalajara teaches. It teaches that memory is not an anchor, but a compass**. That remembering is not looking back, but watching over the present. That the collective is not improvised: it is cared for, cultivated, sustained. While other cities cover their scars with concrete, this one chose to show them. And that choice, deeply human, deeply ethical, is what makes it unforgettable.

When Guadalajara is spoken of, it is not enough to say that a tragedy occurred here. It must also be said that here no one forgot**. That here what was lost was cared for. That here, where the earth spoke, memory chose to stay**. And thanks to that, today it is still possible to imagine a future where it does not happen again.