 |
Chilean
miner Victor Zamora gives the thumbs up upon surfacing, on October 13,
2010,
following a 10-week ordeal in the collapsed San Jose mine (AFP Photo/
Rodrigo
Arangua)
|
Santiago
(AFP) - The Chilean miners who became celebrities after months trapped
underground are now immortalized in a Hollywood film starring Antonio Banderas
-- but for some, real life has had no happy ending.
Five years
on, with movie "The 33" hitting screens across the United States on
Friday, men who lived through the ordeal and their families are struggling on
with lives of little glamour.
"We
have felt abandoned from the start," said Jessica Cortes, wife of one of
the miners, Victor Zamora.
"I
have lived through these anxious years with him day after day, seeing how he
gets depressed at not finding a job and at feeling cheated," she told AFP.
The miners'
tale of survival warmed hearts worldwide. For the media, it was a tale of
friendship and triumph in adversity.
 |
Chilean
miner Mario Gomez arrives for
the premiere of 'The 33' during AFI FEST
2015 at
TCL Chinese Theatre in Hollywood,
California (AFP Photo/Mark Ralston)
|
Some went
on to build successful lives, including Luis Urzua, the foreman of the group
working in the San Jose copper mine when it collapsed.
Urzua says
he and some of his companions have managed to get work with big mining groups
and are better off now than before the accident.
But others
struggle to find work and say they have been cheated out of the Hollywood
dollars being made from their story.
"They
have been seriously affected as workers," said Alberto Iturra, a
psychologist who treated the miners.
"They
think that at any moment they are going to be laid off and stop working, or worse,
that they will be unable to cope with the stress."
Mixed
fortunes
With two
children aged four and nine, Zamora is as poor now as he was before the mining
accident. He lives in social housing off odd jobs and a state allowance of $450
a month, awarded to the eldest of the 33 miners.
In March a
fresh disaster hit his family: a storm destroyed their home and left them in
the street.
In
"The 33," Banderas stars as the charismatic Mario Sepulveda, who
acted as one of the leaders of the group, helping to keep their spirits up
until they were rescued in October 2010.
Sepulveda
is among those who have prospered since climbing out of the mine: he has
launched a construction business and a charitable foundation.
But others
in the group have not benefited from the fame their ordeal brought them, and
are bitter at the way they have been treated.
"Each
of them has his own story. Each had his own experience," said Sepulveda.
Legal squabble
Disputes
have broken out, in particular, about contracts for managing the rights to
their story.
Urzua was among several miners who attended a premiere of "The 33" in Hollywood this week, ahead of its general US release on November 13. The movie has been rolled out across Latin America since August, and heads to Asia and Europe over the coming months.
 |
Chilean
miner William Ordenes attends a 2013 ceremony to inaugurate a
monument to the
incident with his daughter (AFP Photo/Ariel Marinkovic)
|
Urzua was among several miners who attended a premiere of "The 33" in Hollywood this week, ahead of its general US release on November 13. The movie has been rolled out across Latin America since August, and heads to Asia and Europe over the coming months.
The
ex-foreman has also led a group of nine miners who sued their lawyers this
month, accusing them of cheating them out of money from the rights to their
story, including earnings from the film.
Sepulveda
took issue with his comrades' lawsuit, saying they were being "led astray
by people who haven't read the contracts properly."
But Victor
Zamora insisted: "The division we have within the group is because of what
the lawyers have done to us."
After
emerging from the mine before the cameras of the world's media, the miners
traveled around the world telling their story.
Each of
them received a gift of $7,000 from Leonardo Farkas, an eccentric Chilean
mining entrepreneur.
One of them
even found love waiting for him in the light at the top of the mineshaft.
A German
woman watching the drama on television fell in love with miner Daniel Herrera
and contacted him online. They are now married and living together in
Chile.
 |
| Miners from "the 33", (L-R) Victor Zamora, Jorge Galleguillos, Luis Urzua and Mario Gomez arrive at the courthouse in Santiago, on November 2, 2015 (AFP Photo/Martin Bernetti) |
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The BBC’s James Read says the number 33 has taken on a special significance for the miners, who are known to be superstitious: there are 33 miners, it took 33 days for the drill to complete the rescue shaft and Roman Catholic Chileans believe Jesus Christ was 33 when he died. Even President Sebastian Pinera mentioned the “magic number” in his triumphant speech after the first miner emerged from the shaft. The date of the rescue 13/10/10, adds up to - you guessed it - 33.
"Atacama Desert, Chile 33-Miners" – Nov 5, 2013 (Kryon channeled by Lee Carroll) + Video
"The 33 Miners" – Oct 24, 2012 (Kryon channeled by Lee Carroll)
"Atacama Desert, Chile 33-Miners" – Nov 5, 2013 (Kryon channeled by Lee Carroll) + Video
"The 33 Miners" – Oct 24, 2012 (Kryon channeled by Lee Carroll)
"The Human Design" – Oct 18, 2010 (Kryon channeled by Lee Carroll) - (Text version)
"... So finally, I give you an answer to a question that has not been asked, but is still on the minds of many. What happened last week in Chile was not an accident [the saving of 33 miners]. Everyone was amazed at how smooth it could be. So, look at the numerology around it! Even the mainstream media noticed - 33, 33, 33. But the media did not tell you the meaning of it, because they didn't know. To them, it was just coincidental, so many 33s!
Let me tell you what it means. Let us take a look at the numerology attributes of 33 from the ancients to modern day. The number 33 is called a master number. It is not to be broken apart numerologically, but you could still look at the attributes of the three alone if you wish. The three in numerological terms is a catalyst energy. A catalytic energy changes things around it. When you put two threes together, they represent one of the highest energies on the planet. It's so high that it's the last master number that is definable by humanity.
In numerology, 44 has no definition. Even those in Tibet who helped originate the numerological system said that 44 was multidimensional and had no paradigm of definition. Neither did 55 or 66 or 77. Thus, 33 was the highest of all defined master numbers and remains so to this day.
Now, don't misunderstand what I'm going to tell you, for this definition is not about the Human Being; it's about an attribute. Thirty-three is defined as the passion of the Christ. Not the man, but the attribute [the noun, compassionate redeemer], the passion of the Christ. Is there anything higher than this? The number 33 is the highest compassion number of them all, and here it was right in Chile, where the heart center moves to. This compassion for the miners was a metaphor filled with energy and things to look at, but nothing will ever be the same here. And how does it make you feel? ...."
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