Inevitable: Chilean Miners Go Telenovela Status!

Perhaps you read my earlier post about the temporarily positive coverage of Latinos in the U.S. media as hope and the tenacity of the human spirit were on the tips of everyone’s tongues.  Well, as predicted, now that the miners are out, it’s back to typecasting!

Of all the things to write about the Chilean mine catastrophe — that the miners’ families are suing the mining company, that miners around the world are constantly put in danger over profits and so many other things — the focus has now landed on the telenovela plot line.

“The scene that greeted the emergence of one of the 33 miners being rescued in Chile has revealed which of two women fighting over him – his wife and his girlfriend – triumphed in his affections.

Yonni Barrios, the 21st miner to be hauled to the surface, stepped out of the escape capsule to be hugged by his mistress, Susana Valenzuela.

Ms Valenzuela and Mr Barrios’s wife of 28 years, Marta Salinas, had come to blows weeks ago, when both claimed to be the woman Mr Barrios was pining for as he sat trapped in the mine in northern Chile.

In the end, Ms Salinas declined Mr Barrios’s invitation to be present alongside Ms Valenzuela when the 50-year-old miner was winched to the surface, Chilean media reported.”

¡Qué escándalo!