ESTA

The following was originally published in the Spanish-language zine Descuartizadora, which Guerrilla Translation is translating into English as part of our first Lovework Open Call. Individual articles, stories and poems will be translated and posted here one by one until all the content has been completed, at which point an English-language version of the zine will be formatted and made available in its entirety. For this work of Trans-Feminist science fiction, we have preserved the format and intentionally non-standard orthographic conventions used in the original text.

Drop. Dead. Gorgeous. ESTA is like an urban myth or whatever you call it. The thing is, every time ESTA shows up, all of our cell phones get wifi by some act of grace or whatever you call it. I didn’t realize what was happening. I’m so stupid, I thought that the idiots at the phone company made some mistake and connected me for free, but no, it was her, ESTA, who gave us free internet, wifi and calls even as far away as new york. I don’t know how, but ESTA’s body works like an antenna, all thin like that, better than cable or any network grid, like a satellite in human form or whatever. Fuck, next to her you can get online and even make calls for free, I’m telling you, it’s unbelievable, even with no plan or money for a plan, so we’re all slowly starting to become friends with ESTA, good friends, but also fanatics or fans or what’s the word? Doesn’t matter. What happened is that we started to talk about ESTA more and more, affectionately, without saying her real name, y’know, to protect her, and also ‘cos life without her is harder, because thanks to her we didn’t have  to pay for data plans or any entel or wom bullshit any more, or cable tv, because just hanging around her those problems aren’t problems anymore, we could save, pull together some money, buy more drugs, can you imagine? just by being close to her, just a few meters away and you could reach out and talk to your mother, catch up with a client, find an address in santiago on google maps or, most importantly, go on facebook and find out when and where the next trans march would be. Shit, we became friends so easily, when ESTA tells you a story she doesn’t even care if you can follow it ‘cos she’s not even really talking to you, she just gives you connection with her closeness, she hooks you up or whatever. And she doesn’t eat, the petite little thing. And that’s why we started to take care of her and follow her around even though she doesn’t say anything, she never talks about anything, doesn’t try to convince you of anything, she’s like, ‘whatever you say’, as if she doesn’t want to be the leader of anything, she’s not even interested but she gives you connection anyway, y’know? And it seems like she just becomes more and more powerful and more and more people connect for free without paying a cent, because you just have to be on the same block as her, and it’s like revolutionary because even if she’s asleep you can still connect and you can get news from abroad and read about all the political stuff oppressing poor people, for free, without ending up in debt and getting blacklisted, you know? And people say that the telecom executives are gonna become obsolete and start having bigger losses and wonder WHY AND HOW? And nobody is gonna know how to tell them that ESTA was becoming more and more powerful by the day, without even trying, just being cute and chill, and I can connect, little by little, to the entire planet just because she exists, just with the mere presence of her body in the world. (Trans Feminist Science Fiction I)

Produced by Guerrilla Translation under a Peer Production License

– Translated by Timothy McKeon
– Edited by Alex Minshall
– Original Spanish-language story published in Descuartizadora 1
– Image by @deusexmachinatattoo, taken from Descuartizadora 1