TANGY! Or is it Tango-ey? Whatever it is, it's Buenos Aires. Capital Federal, La Reina del Plata, the town of unknown population. It's great. Cars stop at the line at red lights! Water can be drunk from the tap without dying! There are pedestrian buttons, and drivers respect the little green man! There's a little green man!!!
Of course, the taxis have a meter, which gets my goat. They point at the meter as if I'm stupid when I lean in and say "[insert direction here] - ¿cuanto cuesta?"
It's European, cosmopolitan, full of the Argentinian street-jewellery sellers that you see all over Bolivia, and they have every reason to crow about their Tango. I'M sweating when a couple in the street, at a show, in the bar finish their dance!
AND it's just that much closer to home. I'm doing all I can to enjoy these last smatterings of holiday fun with Fiona before the crash of responsibility comes... um, crashing down and I'm home again with my family and friends. I really have learned what it means to be Australian, to belong to a place, have my heart where I was born no matter where I am. I also have the tingling feeling of future hugs, "salud"s and chuckles of long-time knowings with those I love.
Oh, and Iguazu Falls. Look it up, find footage, ask your well-travelled friends, but you'll never ever understand the falls without having been there. The enormity of the spectacle - not just the sheer volume, which is mesmerisingly seductive and heady, but the beauty of its hundreds of both tiny and massive squirts just blew my synapses. Really, it's something! AND something else! It's great, but the fellow at the counter says "Get your ass outa here" in his indecipherable Argentinian Spanish. So chau.
Love, Michael.
Sunday, July 29, 2007
Monday, July 16, 2007
Thought I'd better include one of Fiona for all youse Fiona fans out there. This is second day Amboro too. Pretty as a picture, or photograph as the case may be.
And this is last day Amboro, near the end of the trek and our guide waiting patiently (and amusedly we hope) again for us as we get the perfect photo.
What a nong, I lost my thong, better than Disney, these kids love frisbee, far from the city I found this kitty.
Well, finally here are some shots that we took on our holiday, starting near and in Amboro National Park (the photos, not the trip itself - that started with a bus trip to Santa Cruz).
Buena Vista is one of my favourite places. It was really friendly, not very gringo, and evn though it's the gateway to Amboro there's not alot of tourist industry. People get on with the daily job of living with milk vats coming in from close to town at 5am, and minibuses (trufis) honking around the pretty plaza all day to pick up locals and us to Santa Cruz and towns inbetween. Of course all that isn't going to be documented in these photos, but the big scary jaguar (with his own mobile phone!) that nearly devoured me whole, will be.
On our way through to Amboro on the first day our guide stopped us at the school of the villiage where he grew up. We had lunch there and when the kids came out of school they were shyly keen to chat, and when we showed them the never-before-seen frisbee they took to it like leaf-cutter ants to... well, leaves.
The famous incident (it's known from Guarayamarin to Potosi) of the lost left sandal during our second day in the Park is depicted here with me at the beginning stages of the search. The deceptively peaceful riverbed takes a nasty slope near that rock on the right (of course Fiona followed the guide much to the left where I thought "Gee, that looks much shallower there..." I couldn't keep my foot in my sandal when I started to go down because I was carrying over my backpack, with camera and hearing aid and so forth and so on, so... I ended up shivering for about half an hour sifting the sand near and far. As I've written before, I found a right-footed size six thong, which lasted the rest of the trip. Fiona was impressed at my stoicism. Geez I'm good.
Wednesday, July 11, 2007
Pass the port, I've lost my sport, at least I'm not going to court, but I've been maligned more than I ought.
O.k. My luck was changing but now it's ... still changing.
How much energy can somebody put into positive thinking before it leads you to psychotic tendencies?
I was delighted to see my passport again, like a lost friend... in Guantanamo Bay, at the Migration Center here in ... Cochabamba! Why do I highlight that my passport is in Cbba? Well, I was just making absolutely, without a doubt, no question about it sure that La Paz immigration hadn't sent my passport here on some whim of efficiency or some unsurprising stuffup before I head there to plead and yell and state my case as angrily as possible - the only way to succeed as highly prescribed by Migration Cbba.
Well, was it efficiency or a stuffup when it was in fact here when I went with my long suffering friend and ex-student Celia, who has done much visa-related calling and visiting on my behalf?
It was a bit of both. Immigration's legal team in La Paz hold on like death to their decision that my visa application was submitted with expired documents regardless of the unprovable fact that Cbba Immigration had forgotten that they had my completed application for 4 months before they realised and thought "how are we going to get out of this one?". Luckily for them those helping me way back then (last year) didn' t bother to ask for proof that they were handing over my passport and all my documents for submission. So now when I sigh "but you HAD all this beFORE my documents expired!!" they smug away with "prove it." So they sent it back for me to "fix" before they hand over a visa.
So, this brilliant rotund fellow at Immigration the other day (when I sighted my passport going mouldy in the ever dilapidating compulsory migration folder (which of course costs money)) has been zipping me around to Interpol, the police station and the hospital the last couple mornings after I approached him in between admiring but panicked visa-appliers (this lawyer's happy clients) and said "Yo necesito su ayuda. Ellos tienen me pasaporte para un año ahora y yo quiero salir esta pais finalamente!!" Not quite proper Español but he got it, and I don't.
I'm pretty sure that the costs of the new docs and whatever this fellow is going to charge (he keeps telling me how much the docs will cost when I ask him what his fee will be...) will be substancially less than a bribe at the border, and safer because I like how he kisses the female Interpol officer and slips her my $100B all at once withOUT getting arrested.
Anyway, I was hoping beyond hope that I'd not have to actually go to La Paz and scream my proverbials orf and that has at this point come to pass. The lawyer man told me I'd have my visa by this afternoon (Friday) and will be able to leave the country at will (the plan was Sunday after my desperdido (farewell party) on Saturday. Well, to thrill youse even more with the incredibly interesting details, one of the medical certificates won't be ready till Monday morning because it takes 24 hours and the offices are shut on the weekend - which surprises me!! *and he hates to make the "not" joke but has to because the context of Bolivia isn't immediately apparent to everyone in the world* NOT!!!
So. Lawyer man could be the recipient of a nice bottle of Fernet if he plays his efficiency cards right. I'm confident (a dangerous state) because of the happiness of his fretful clients during the time I've been with him.
Well, Fiona won't be happy when I tell her that it's at least Monday now before I see some sort of visa - which (and this is where my positive energy falls short and the psychotic episodes begin) could turn into Tuesday, or Wednesday, or August for all I bloody know!
On a happy note, I can't wait for my party at Tirana on Saturday (where Mauro works). Not sure what the ratio of Bolivianos to Gringos will be and it will be a telling viewpoint of my experience to see. I better get presents.
Anyway, in a stark change of topic I highly recommend you all look at the "Oz in 30 seconds" competition (http://www.ozin30seconds.org/vote/videos) and vote for Rupert or the one you like the most.
See you in 2009 when my visa is... yep. You get the exxageration jibe.
How much energy can somebody put into positive thinking before it leads you to psychotic tendencies?
I was delighted to see my passport again, like a lost friend... in Guantanamo Bay, at the Migration Center here in ... Cochabamba! Why do I highlight that my passport is in Cbba? Well, I was just making absolutely, without a doubt, no question about it sure that La Paz immigration hadn't sent my passport here on some whim of efficiency or some unsurprising stuffup before I head there to plead and yell and state my case as angrily as possible - the only way to succeed as highly prescribed by Migration Cbba.
Well, was it efficiency or a stuffup when it was in fact here when I went with my long suffering friend and ex-student Celia, who has done much visa-related calling and visiting on my behalf?
It was a bit of both. Immigration's legal team in La Paz hold on like death to their decision that my visa application was submitted with expired documents regardless of the unprovable fact that Cbba Immigration had forgotten that they had my completed application for 4 months before they realised and thought "how are we going to get out of this one?". Luckily for them those helping me way back then (last year) didn' t bother to ask for proof that they were handing over my passport and all my documents for submission. So now when I sigh "but you HAD all this beFORE my documents expired!!" they smug away with "prove it." So they sent it back for me to "fix" before they hand over a visa.
So, this brilliant rotund fellow at Immigration the other day (when I sighted my passport going mouldy in the ever dilapidating compulsory migration folder (which of course costs money)) has been zipping me around to Interpol, the police station and the hospital the last couple mornings after I approached him in between admiring but panicked visa-appliers (this lawyer's happy clients) and said "Yo necesito su ayuda. Ellos tienen me pasaporte para un año ahora y yo quiero salir esta pais finalamente!!" Not quite proper Español but he got it, and I don't.
I'm pretty sure that the costs of the new docs and whatever this fellow is going to charge (he keeps telling me how much the docs will cost when I ask him what his fee will be...) will be substancially less than a bribe at the border, and safer because I like how he kisses the female Interpol officer and slips her my $100B all at once withOUT getting arrested.
Anyway, I was hoping beyond hope that I'd not have to actually go to La Paz and scream my proverbials orf and that has at this point come to pass. The lawyer man told me I'd have my visa by this afternoon (Friday) and will be able to leave the country at will (the plan was Sunday after my desperdido (farewell party) on Saturday. Well, to thrill youse even more with the incredibly interesting details, one of the medical certificates won't be ready till Monday morning because it takes 24 hours and the offices are shut on the weekend - which surprises me!! *and he hates to make the "not" joke but has to because the context of Bolivia isn't immediately apparent to everyone in the world* NOT!!!
So. Lawyer man could be the recipient of a nice bottle of Fernet if he plays his efficiency cards right. I'm confident (a dangerous state) because of the happiness of his fretful clients during the time I've been with him.
Well, Fiona won't be happy when I tell her that it's at least Monday now before I see some sort of visa - which (and this is where my positive energy falls short and the psychotic episodes begin) could turn into Tuesday, or Wednesday, or August for all I bloody know!
On a happy note, I can't wait for my party at Tirana on Saturday (where Mauro works). Not sure what the ratio of Bolivianos to Gringos will be and it will be a telling viewpoint of my experience to see. I better get presents.
Anyway, in a stark change of topic I highly recommend you all look at the "Oz in 30 seconds" competition (http://www.ozin30seconds.org/vote/videos) and vote for Rupert or the one you like the most.
See you in 2009 when my visa is... yep. You get the exxageration jibe.
Monday, July 09, 2007
Fiona and I are back in Cochabamba.
Our trip around Bolivia was wonderful. And the anticipation of being back home in Australia on Friday is fantastic. But that's the thing with anticipation - it's usually unrealistic. So, as there are no actual plans to be back in Australia by Friday, we'll be looking sometime around September.
Yah, photos. I gotta DO that!
Our trip around Bolivia was wonderful. And the anticipation of being back home in Australia on Friday is fantastic. But that's the thing with anticipation - it's usually unrealistic. So, as there are no actual plans to be back in Australia by Friday, we'll be looking sometime around September.
Yah, photos. I gotta DO that!
Saturday, June 30, 2007
I feel Bolivian but then again, nup.
Some thoughts I got excited about yesterday:
a) Although here in Sucre there was a very large protest going on in the plaza: firecrackers (LOTS of them), very VERY loud and clear speakers and music, and marching all over the shop, when Fiona and I ran into Sarah, a friend of mine from Cochas on a balcony of a bar overlooking said plaza we didn't even mention the mayhem in the street. That's an exciting concept - being such a part of a country that you don't acknowledge things that wouldn't happen in your own countries. (Of course, how much a part of which part of the country is up for question as I sit somewhat languidly sipping beer in a fancy bar on the balcony *starts talking in a toffee English colonialist accent* overlooking the masses)
b) Having been invited to have drinks later that evening with said friend it didn't occur to us to specify a time. This is very Bolivian, given that Bolivian timekeeping is famous for it's non-existence. I feel at home with this concept now. Nice one.
c) I forget the third one. But an exciting thing today is that our tea and coffee con leche, along with two cheese pastels cost only B6.50. And the smile on the girl serving us was worth at least two more B. The Sucre marketplace is actually quite clean, as noted in The Book, adding it to the suggestion that Sucre is a very clean city. "The Book" seems to have played a joke on everyone reading its Sucre pages with mistakes that outnumber all the others in the entire edition (tall order) but it rings true here.
Potosi tomorrow to witness the horrid conditions of thousands in the mines (a national tourist attraction!! Whee!) kept in motion by the powers that need the poor to feed the rich.
And photos soon, I promise!
a) Although here in Sucre there was a very large protest going on in the plaza: firecrackers (LOTS of them), very VERY loud and clear speakers and music, and marching all over the shop, when Fiona and I ran into Sarah, a friend of mine from Cochas on a balcony of a bar overlooking said plaza we didn't even mention the mayhem in the street. That's an exciting concept - being such a part of a country that you don't acknowledge things that wouldn't happen in your own countries. (Of course, how much a part of which part of the country is up for question as I sit somewhat languidly sipping beer in a fancy bar on the balcony *starts talking in a toffee English colonialist accent* overlooking the masses)
b) Having been invited to have drinks later that evening with said friend it didn't occur to us to specify a time. This is very Bolivian, given that Bolivian timekeeping is famous for it's non-existence. I feel at home with this concept now. Nice one.
c) I forget the third one. But an exciting thing today is that our tea and coffee con leche, along with two cheese pastels cost only B6.50. And the smile on the girl serving us was worth at least two more B. The Sucre marketplace is actually quite clean, as noted in The Book, adding it to the suggestion that Sucre is a very clean city. "The Book" seems to have played a joke on everyone reading its Sucre pages with mistakes that outnumber all the others in the entire edition (tall order) but it rings true here.
Potosi tomorrow to witness the horrid conditions of thousands in the mines (a national tourist attraction!! Whee!) kept in motion by the powers that need the poor to feed the rich.
And photos soon, I promise!
Friday, June 29, 2007
Thursday, June 28, 2007
White, after wet after wild after white.
Sucre, the Athens of America, the City of Four Names, the Cradle of Liberty, the White City of the Americas, Sucre. Boy howdy, it sure is white! And the prettiness that everyone rattles on about is due, surely to this whitewashed city. The streets are fairly spotless, the gardens are exquisite and there's a lot of interesting achichechure to google at (see, I can use that word without any reference to the one with a capital "G" even though I just referenced it...)
I wonder however how much of this "whitewash", a typical phrase for nastiness swept under the carpet, is facading the reality. Afterall, T.I.B. (This Is Bolivia) and it's poverty can't just be non-existent just because the buildings are coloured white. In fact, poverty there is: our new amigos, Julio and Rodriegez - two cute little chewing gum sellers - wolfed down their meals we bought them yesterday, chicken bones sucked as white as Sucre, almost licking their plates while they chatted gaily and interestedly about Australia, their homes in the university grounds, our favourite Bolivian soccer teams, Pirates of the Carribean 3. And racism and classism runs clear and true here as in anywhere in Bolivia and indeed anywhere in the world - poor little 8 year old Rodregez couldn't eat his meal today because he was too scared of the very well-dressed arsehole who roared at them to get out of the dining room (an open market-style food court) when they were clearly sitting with us, and having a fine old conversation. We told him the boys were our friends and were here to dine with us, but I wish I had the Spanish to have been able to challenge HIS right to be there more than our friends. Makes me want to swear... *takes deep breath and it passes* Rod wolfed down when we got it out of him from Julio (12) why he was trying to surrepticiously hide under the table, and assured him that we could "take that jerk" and not to worry. Talking about the dinosaurs cheered them up somewhat.
And so Sucre - we've been here since Tuesday morning and its tranquilo pace (strange, since we're back in the Occident, where although we feel more at home is supposed to be much more stressfully busy and unfriendly) is giving us reason to stay a few more days, then visit Potosi's stark contrast, and then hotfoot it to Cbba for Luke's wedding.
Before landing in Whiteland, Fiona and I spent a specki 5 days cruising up the river, the Mamore River to be exact, from Trinidad to Guayaramarin. A variety of animals and the tranquility of the neverending scenery was only slightly interrupted by the nagging knowledge that we were towing tonnes of petrolium on our little tugboat. Oh well, nobody's perfect. Trinidad upwards we found an incredible habit of the younger portions of the population to ride interminably around and around the plaza on their motos (motorcycles). Fiona thought it was more amusing than I did, me being a killjoy and vilifying their disgusting waste of fossil fuels. They'd be much more comphy on a bicycle...
Guayaramerin (in the north of Bolivia just below the Pando region (I must take a horse to the Pando just for the sake of being in "The Pando!")) was hot, of course, being close to the Equator, low in the altitude and the jungle just across the river, as is Brazil. We could see Brazil from the water's edge and most of the day yesterday as we meandered down the border river watching Pink River Dolphins (by the hundreds!), monkeys, a plethora of beautiful birds and just the serenity and diversity of both countries' jungle edge.
Bloody glad on the other hand to be able to walk 10 steps in a straight line and have a beer and some ice cream and some fruit and some water and some chocolate and some more beer. Dry land with shops have a lot going for it.
Yesterday we went to the site of the largest collection of fossilised dinosour footprints in the world. Over 5000 tracks set in the wall (as it is now - techtonic plate movement giving the lake bed a nudge upward) of a concrete company's mining site. The tour operator told us that it was lucky they found magnesium in the rocks otherwise they'd have just blown up that wall as well. Anyhow, the place was incredibly high quality tourist development by Bolivian standards, and again, photos will ensue when we get back to Cochas and my camera photo transfer cable.
Oh, and the jesuit missionary circuit was a boon and a bore at various times. More about that another day.
I wonder however how much of this "whitewash", a typical phrase for nastiness swept under the carpet, is facading the reality. Afterall, T.I.B. (This Is Bolivia) and it's poverty can't just be non-existent just because the buildings are coloured white. In fact, poverty there is: our new amigos, Julio and Rodriegez - two cute little chewing gum sellers - wolfed down their meals we bought them yesterday, chicken bones sucked as white as Sucre, almost licking their plates while they chatted gaily and interestedly about Australia, their homes in the university grounds, our favourite Bolivian soccer teams, Pirates of the Carribean 3. And racism and classism runs clear and true here as in anywhere in Bolivia and indeed anywhere in the world - poor little 8 year old Rodregez couldn't eat his meal today because he was too scared of the very well-dressed arsehole who roared at them to get out of the dining room (an open market-style food court) when they were clearly sitting with us, and having a fine old conversation. We told him the boys were our friends and were here to dine with us, but I wish I had the Spanish to have been able to challenge HIS right to be there more than our friends. Makes me want to swear... *takes deep breath and it passes* Rod wolfed down when we got it out of him from Julio (12) why he was trying to surrepticiously hide under the table, and assured him that we could "take that jerk" and not to worry. Talking about the dinosaurs cheered them up somewhat.
And so Sucre - we've been here since Tuesday morning and its tranquilo pace (strange, since we're back in the Occident, where although we feel more at home is supposed to be much more stressfully busy and unfriendly) is giving us reason to stay a few more days, then visit Potosi's stark contrast, and then hotfoot it to Cbba for Luke's wedding.
Before landing in Whiteland, Fiona and I spent a specki 5 days cruising up the river, the Mamore River to be exact, from Trinidad to Guayaramarin. A variety of animals and the tranquility of the neverending scenery was only slightly interrupted by the nagging knowledge that we were towing tonnes of petrolium on our little tugboat. Oh well, nobody's perfect. Trinidad upwards we found an incredible habit of the younger portions of the population to ride interminably around and around the plaza on their motos (motorcycles). Fiona thought it was more amusing than I did, me being a killjoy and vilifying their disgusting waste of fossil fuels. They'd be much more comphy on a bicycle...
Guayaramerin (in the north of Bolivia just below the Pando region (I must take a horse to the Pando just for the sake of being in "The Pando!")) was hot, of course, being close to the Equator, low in the altitude and the jungle just across the river, as is Brazil. We could see Brazil from the water's edge and most of the day yesterday as we meandered down the border river watching Pink River Dolphins (by the hundreds!), monkeys, a plethora of beautiful birds and just the serenity and diversity of both countries' jungle edge.
Bloody glad on the other hand to be able to walk 10 steps in a straight line and have a beer and some ice cream and some fruit and some water and some chocolate and some more beer. Dry land with shops have a lot going for it.
Yesterday we went to the site of the largest collection of fossilised dinosour footprints in the world. Over 5000 tracks set in the wall (as it is now - techtonic plate movement giving the lake bed a nudge upward) of a concrete company's mining site. The tour operator told us that it was lucky they found magnesium in the rocks otherwise they'd have just blown up that wall as well. Anyhow, the place was incredibly high quality tourist development by Bolivian standards, and again, photos will ensue when we get back to Cochas and my camera photo transfer cable.
Oh, and the jesuit missionary circuit was a boon and a bore at various times. More about that another day.
Monday, June 04, 2007
A quiet ride back to town from the schoolhouse...
Is it fate? Is it stupidity? No se. Pero Fiona and I found ourselves (after 2 hours in a taxi along the most wonderfully scenic countryside and remote mountains) outside the schoolhouse in the middle of nowhere, where Che Guevara and two comrades were summarily executed. As many of you may already know, I was not going to view, or even venture near the places that were most morbid and too sad for me, including the laundry of the local hospital here in Vallegrande, where his body was brought and put on show like a big fish, the trail of his final push including the river crossing where many of his right hand men and woman (Tania Bunke) met their end and he was captured, and the schoolhouse where he was jailed and shot. I looked at the schoolhouse as I stood outside it, now a information centre of the whole affair, and knew it was where it all happened (even though we had thought it was some miles from the town we'd just arrived in, La Higuera). In fact I read it on the wall -something like "This is the schoolhouse where Che Guevara was held and later executed". Not sure how I missed my resolve to not experience this period of his life, and not sure why I crossed the threshold. Inside was the picture of Che that perhaps I feel worse about than his many depressing photographs as a dead man being propped up by Bolivian military for show and tell - it is a photo of his bent and apparently defeated self, head bowed, being led in shackles before being shot. I had been under the impression that he and his comrades had been killed outside the schoolhouse but when I walked inside I had the destinct impression that it smelled like death. I think I was still under the nearing delusional impression that I wasn't at his site of death. When Fiona read on the wall that he was in fact killed IN the room in which we were standing and clarified that with the curator of the building, I finally came to and said "NO! No puedo quedar aqui (No, I can't stay here)" and made a beeline for the door bursting into the sunlight, with the very emotional knowledge that Che couldn't do that. And perhaps - and I hope this is true for many revolutionary comrades - my being able to leave that place was a sign that it is we who can continue his dream of a free world, a fair world, a fight for justice and peace.
"Patria o muerta!" (Which to me translates to "A fair and equal planet or death!")
Then had dinner in a restaurant tonight that, while not unlike all the other outlets in this town in displaying Che and exploiting his image, including one's of him dead, had giant artistic paintings depicting his dead body on the walls, copies of the classic photos you might find in books and things... I found this particularly disturbing and distasteful and tried to express my views to the owner, who was receptive but appeared surprised. I don't think she gets too many complaints...
Just working out where to go next. We both agree that it should be far, far from this little depressing neck of the woods.
And due to popular demand no puedo... I can't download photos, I just realised now, because my cable is in Cochabamba. Perhaps this nice woman who runs this internet place (not the fodden extorcionista in Samaipata!!! Be warned!) will have one.
"Patria o muerta!" (Which to me translates to "A fair and equal planet or death!")
Then had dinner in a restaurant tonight that, while not unlike all the other outlets in this town in displaying Che and exploiting his image, including one's of him dead, had giant artistic paintings depicting his dead body on the walls, copies of the classic photos you might find in books and things... I found this particularly disturbing and distasteful and tried to express my views to the owner, who was receptive but appeared surprised. I don't think she gets too many complaints...
Just working out where to go next. We both agree that it should be far, far from this little depressing neck of the woods.
And due to popular demand no puedo... I can't download photos, I just realised now, because my cable is in Cochabamba. Perhaps this nice woman who runs this internet place (not the fodden extorcionista in Samaipata!!! Be warned!) will have one.
Sunday, June 03, 2007
Weather reflecting my mood so close to Che's demise.
Yeah. So we're freezing our proverbials orf in Vallegrande. Know where that is? It's the main town in the region of Señor Ernesto Che Guevara's last stand. I didn't want to come here initially due to the whole finality of his living years being so starkly commemorated around these parts, and certainly can't see myself going to the school he was shot outside of, the hospital where he was taken after they cut off his hands to avoid identification, or the airstrip under which he was buried but there is a very large (taller than the whole of me!) bust of Che, a monument in the little town where the hospital and school are so I want to see that at least.
We're staying, luckily, at a hotel for 15B each with a big private balcony looking over the pretty pretty plaza. Yay.
As noted, Fiona and I ventured into the Amboro National Park for some wildlife viewing and it was bloody cold there too. Janice and all will be happy to know I'm keeping up the tradition of doing stupid things around water... we had to wade waist deep (just passing the low of my jocks for me) through a river to continue our hike on day two of the three day trek - not a blue spot in the sky to be seen - and I predictably found a spot in the riverbed that sloped down, down, down... and I lost my fodden left sandal. This was one half of a pair I'd bought just days before leaving Cochabamba, a rubber tyre-made pair popular among the poorer Bolivians and specially made for me (size 46). I had to take off the top half of my clothing as well to wade deep, deep, deep in the less than warm (read: c-c-c-cold) waters sifting through the sand to rescue it. I didn't, but I found a complete set of kitchen knifes down there - not really but I couldn't believe I found another thong, a girly right-footed one about half my size that I finished the slippery rockhopping hike with. Bloody. Then on our way back, at the river after the water had settled and we could see the bottom again, did I see my sandal at the bottom? No, I saw the other half of the girly pair. Bugger! So at least I had the left size 6 girly sandal to wear on my left foot. Photos to follow.
It was sunny today but yesterday's weather was shithouse. However the drives to the prettiest towns ever are very pleasant and viewsome and everyone is very friendly around these parts.
After this we might find ourselves on a riverboat tour to Trinidad. Vamos a ver.
Chau, busting to go to the baño!!
Love yas, Michael.
We're staying, luckily, at a hotel for 15B each with a big private balcony looking over the pretty pretty plaza. Yay.
As noted, Fiona and I ventured into the Amboro National Park for some wildlife viewing and it was bloody cold there too. Janice and all will be happy to know I'm keeping up the tradition of doing stupid things around water... we had to wade waist deep (just passing the low of my jocks for me) through a river to continue our hike on day two of the three day trek - not a blue spot in the sky to be seen - and I predictably found a spot in the riverbed that sloped down, down, down... and I lost my fodden left sandal. This was one half of a pair I'd bought just days before leaving Cochabamba, a rubber tyre-made pair popular among the poorer Bolivians and specially made for me (size 46). I had to take off the top half of my clothing as well to wade deep, deep, deep in the less than warm (read: c-c-c-cold) waters sifting through the sand to rescue it. I didn't, but I found a complete set of kitchen knifes down there - not really but I couldn't believe I found another thong, a girly right-footed one about half my size that I finished the slippery rockhopping hike with. Bloody. Then on our way back, at the river after the water had settled and we could see the bottom again, did I see my sandal at the bottom? No, I saw the other half of the girly pair. Bugger! So at least I had the left size 6 girly sandal to wear on my left foot. Photos to follow.
It was sunny today but yesterday's weather was shithouse. However the drives to the prettiest towns ever are very pleasant and viewsome and everyone is very friendly around these parts.
After this we might find ourselves on a riverboat tour to Trinidad. Vamos a ver.
Chau, busting to go to the baño!!
Love yas, Michael.
Wednesday, May 30, 2007
Spider moneys get angry at you if you look at 'em! Image issues...
Goodness me! I just got back from our jaguar hunt in Amboro National Park and I'm not sure who is thinking "bugger Noel Kempff for a joke!" more - Fiona or yo...
We trekked for less than three days, and lets face it, we aren't getting any younger, and we haven't quite been doing triathlons to prepare for the event and so, while Fiona is in bed (at 9.26pm) and I'm trying not to pass out at the computer nextdoor, sitting waiting for my leg bones to go solid again, Noel Kempff Mercado National Park is getting a little bit more distant everyday (not that 700ks from ANYwhere is spitting distance away). Anyway, we saw the most brilliant kingfishers flying down the gorges, saw spider monkeys, and two other kinds of monkeys that I don't have my little reference notebook here to elaborate on, a dead honeybear..., the tracks of an endangered deer, tapir tracks (these are incredibly dificult to catch up with in person) and lo and behold - a jaguar footprint! This was a boon really. Our guide (you must have one to get into the park) has only seen one before in his life in the park - he came around a bend in the track to be faced with it 50 metres away and was scared poo-less he admitted. It roared at him and he stood frozen solid, then backed away. I think the print was fun enough to take photos of. Oh, and the butterflies did indeed blow our socks orf!
We're back in Buenavista now, tossing up our thoughts on a six day river boat cruise to Trinidad with our salads (they only have monkey food on the barges up the river).
Bueno, nos vemos, or as they say in this part of the country - no vemo.
Michael.
We trekked for less than three days, and lets face it, we aren't getting any younger, and we haven't quite been doing triathlons to prepare for the event and so, while Fiona is in bed (at 9.26pm) and I'm trying not to pass out at the computer nextdoor, sitting waiting for my leg bones to go solid again, Noel Kempff Mercado National Park is getting a little bit more distant everyday (not that 700ks from ANYwhere is spitting distance away). Anyway, we saw the most brilliant kingfishers flying down the gorges, saw spider monkeys, and two other kinds of monkeys that I don't have my little reference notebook here to elaborate on, a dead honeybear..., the tracks of an endangered deer, tapir tracks (these are incredibly dificult to catch up with in person) and lo and behold - a jaguar footprint! This was a boon really. Our guide (you must have one to get into the park) has only seen one before in his life in the park - he came around a bend in the track to be faced with it 50 metres away and was scared poo-less he admitted. It roared at him and he stood frozen solid, then backed away. I think the print was fun enough to take photos of. Oh, and the butterflies did indeed blow our socks orf!
We're back in Buenavista now, tossing up our thoughts on a six day river boat cruise to Trinidad with our salads (they only have monkey food on the barges up the river).
Bueno, nos vemos, or as they say in this part of the country - no vemo.
Michael.
Friday, May 25, 2007
Nothing doing...
Well, you wouldn't believe it! Fiona and I arrived in bloody Santa Cruz and lo and behold, every godarned information and tourist agency in the land told us that if we tried to get to Noel Kempff Mercado National Park, on our own or even on a tour, we'd be wasting our time while our notion of "adventure" would become a notion of hell on earth. We'd certainly have something to write home about but it would probably be just one of us writing, including the inside story of how we killed the other in a non-jaguar devouring massacre after a waterless, foodless, energyless arguement. The rain has made the reconstruction of every road and path into the park impassable. Well travelled Kempffers looked at us without trying to laugh telling us it's stupid to try it. So, there goes plan number 42 of trying to be utterly romantic in Fiona's life. Foder.
Yep. We're out of Santa bloody Cruz and in Buena Vista now, with more wildlife rich incredibility at it's doorstep and an Irish Pub in the middle of the square. It's nothing like an Irish pub except for the name (and I surmised, it's ownership in Santa Cruz). Amboro National Park is just across the river from here, where tapirs, jaguars, howler monkeys and butterflies that'll blow your socks off (always wanted to say that about butterflies) are available for viewing if you're lucky.
I called Amboro AmborING after not being able to go to the Kempff, the motherlode of all national parks. But perhaps we'll be able to access the park in a couple of weeks when we get back from the Jesuit missionary circuit - a lovely historical experience of local meets the conquistadors. It's supposed to be fun, beautiful and informative.
Right, godlovingly slow and expensive here. Chau,
Michael.
Yep. We're out of Santa bloody Cruz and in Buena Vista now, with more wildlife rich incredibility at it's doorstep and an Irish Pub in the middle of the square. It's nothing like an Irish pub except for the name (and I surmised, it's ownership in Santa Cruz). Amboro National Park is just across the river from here, where tapirs, jaguars, howler monkeys and butterflies that'll blow your socks off (always wanted to say that about butterflies) are available for viewing if you're lucky.
I called Amboro AmborING after not being able to go to the Kempff, the motherlode of all national parks. But perhaps we'll be able to access the park in a couple of weeks when we get back from the Jesuit missionary circuit - a lovely historical experience of local meets the conquistadors. It's supposed to be fun, beautiful and informative.
Right, godlovingly slow and expensive here. Chau,
Michael.
Tuesday, May 22, 2007
Goin' on a jaguar hunt, but I'M not afraid!
O.k. this is the last email from my days living in Cochabamba.
It's a little bit of an anticlimax, the whole feeling, because of the fact that Fiona and I were supposed to be leaving last Wednesday, then Saturday, then Monday night, then this morning, and now it definitely looks like tonight for an overnight bus to Santa Cruz.
The few delays we've had have also given me the chance to have a catch-up with friends I possibly wouldn't have organised before leaving, and has shown me how close we are and how much I'm going to miss everyone and I suppose vice versa.
Cochabamba will of course, always hold that special place in my heart and I wish I could detail a few items of greatest influence while I still hold it in my hands, but I'll do that, hopefully, on our return here for Luke an Anny's wedding. We'll be here for around a week before heading on the home stretch jaunt.
I told Fiona, after she joined me spontaneously this morning in the excitement of a possible jaguar sighting (we're going to Parque Nacional Noel Kempf Mercado - look it up), that they're probably really dangerous, when she replied that they're more scared of us than we are them. I explained that no, that's spiders and snakes and that jaguars are usually more hungry for us than we are them and referred her to National Geographic docos where the whispering lion hunters are suddenly faced with their photographic prey and we see that ever terrifying camera shot of them running like, well, running slabs of lamb chops back to the safety of the truck. I've got her worried. I giggle, but then, I have no fodden idea what I'm talking about.
It's a little bit of an anticlimax, the whole feeling, because of the fact that Fiona and I were supposed to be leaving last Wednesday, then Saturday, then Monday night, then this morning, and now it definitely looks like tonight for an overnight bus to Santa Cruz.
The few delays we've had have also given me the chance to have a catch-up with friends I possibly wouldn't have organised before leaving, and has shown me how close we are and how much I'm going to miss everyone and I suppose vice versa.
Cochabamba will of course, always hold that special place in my heart and I wish I could detail a few items of greatest influence while I still hold it in my hands, but I'll do that, hopefully, on our return here for Luke an Anny's wedding. We'll be here for around a week before heading on the home stretch jaunt.
I told Fiona, after she joined me spontaneously this morning in the excitement of a possible jaguar sighting (we're going to Parque Nacional Noel Kempf Mercado - look it up), that they're probably really dangerous, when she replied that they're more scared of us than we are them. I explained that no, that's spiders and snakes and that jaguars are usually more hungry for us than we are them and referred her to National Geographic docos where the whispering lion hunters are suddenly faced with their photographic prey and we see that ever terrifying camera shot of them running like, well, running slabs of lamb chops back to the safety of the truck. I've got her worried. I giggle, but then, I have no fodden idea what I'm talking about.
Wednesday, May 09, 2007
I was waiting for it... He's started reading at last.
Sheesh! 'Bout time I got some 'spect from important people on this blog site (see comments under "But Then" Wed. May 2, 2007.)
Saturday, May 05, 2007
Bit callous, but you know... wake up!
One day you’re gonna wake up, America.By David Michael Green
05/04/07 "ICH" -- - And, like every other one since last you can remember, it’s gonna be an ugly morning.
One day you’re gonna wake up and go to your lousy job with its lousy salary and non-existent benefits. You might even remember the good job you once had. Or that the government you once supported gave tax breaks to companies like the one that exported that good job of yours to the ThirdWorld (which is what they’re now starting to call your country). Or that that same government undermined the labor unions which fought to get you your good wages and benefits.
One day you’re gonna wake up and be furious at the monstrous tax burden you are carrying, a tab which accounts for fifty of the seventy hours you must work each week just to eke by. You might even figure out why your tax bill is so high. You might remember that the government you once supported shifted the tax burden from the rich onto people like you, and from the taxpayers of the time onto those of today. And that they borrowed money in astonishing quantities to fund their sleight-of-hand, so that you work thirty hours a week just to pay the interest on a mountain of money borrowed decades ago.
One day you’re gonna wake up in anger at the absurdly poor education your children are receiving. You’re gonna remember that it wasn’t always that way, that even after the military’s voracious appetite was temporarily sated, your country still managed to find a few bucks to at least educate a workforce. No more. And you’re gonna remember how you applauded when your educational system was twisted in to a test taking industry that is careful, above all, not to teach children how to think.
One day you’re gonna wake up literally sick and tired. You’re gonna want treatment for your maladies but you won’t be able to touch the cost. You’re gonna wonder what you were thinking when believed your country had the best healthcare system in the world, even though it was the only advanced democracy in the world that didn’t provide universal care, even though it devoted fifty percent more of its economy than those other countries to pay for a system that left fifty million people uninsured, and even though there were massive layers of unnecessary and harmful private sector bureaucracy skimming hundreds of billions of dollars of profits out of the system in the name of free enterprise.
One day you’re gonna wake up too tired to go to work anymore. You’re gonna want to retire in dignity but will be left instead to laugh bitterly at the cruelty of that joke. And you’re gonna wonder what in the world you had been thinking voting for a president who’s primary goal was to allow Wall Street to raid Social Security, destroying what had once been considered the most successful domestic program in human history.
One day you’re gonna wake up and wish that it wasn’t so bloody hot, and that there weren’t so many diseases and species eradications and violent storms lashing the planet. And maybe you’ll even remember that you once supported a government that lied about the very existence of global warming – back when it might have been curtailed – a government that scuttled the barest remedy for the problem in order to protect oil company profits.
One day you’re gonna wake up and wish you had a government that could simply and competently do the basic things it was designed for. A government that could protect you from foreign attack, that could come to your rescue after a devastating hurricane, that could properly manage a new program or other people’s security. An administration that didn’t pervert the purpose of every agency within the government to its opposite, using civil rights lawyers to fight civil rights, for example, or the EPA to protect polluters.
One day you’re gonna wake up and cry out for simple justice, blindly applied without bias. And perhaps you’ll remember when that principle died. When your country stood by and watched the politicization of its judicial system for purposes of partisanship, and said nothing. When it stood by and watched its highest law enforcement officials in the land lie about their failing memory of events and pretended to believe that was acceptable.
One day you’re gonna wake up and wish that you weren’t being drafted to go fight wars you don’t believe in. You’ll remember how soldiers were sent to their deaths for lies. You’ll remember how badly they were treated when they came home maimed and twisted. You’ll remember how real, patriotic, former soldiers were mocked and humiliated by dress-up, unpatriotic, former non-soldiers. And suddenly you’ll understand why no one would volunteer for the military anymore, and why people like you had to be drafted.
One day you’re gonna wake up and want very badly to run outside and scream in anger about a government that long ago stopped serving your interests in favor of the narrow interests of a tiny oligarchy. But instead you’ll stay inside and keep your scream tucked safely in your belly. Because you’ll know that in your country dissent has long since been outlawed, on pain of torture and death. You’ll remember concepts like due process, limitations on government search, seizure and wiretapping, habeas corpus, trial by peers, legal representation and prohibitions against cruel and unusual punishment as historical artifacts no longer even taught in schools.
One day you’re gonna wake up and want so badly to change governments. You’re gonna treasure the concept of democracy like no Soviet dissident ever did. You’re gonna crave the opportunity to own your own government, to make your own societal choices, to make a change of direction never before so desperately necessary. And you’re gonna wonder why you didn’t speak up as you watched first-hand the dismantling of the democracy you had been handed by previous generations of patriots. You’re gonna wish you had been patriotic enough yourself to demand, above all else, free and fair elections, and you’re gonna shake your head in puzzlement at how you stood by watching in silence those that patently were not.
One day you’re gonna wake up and want to get the hell out of your rotting, repressive country. You’re gonna remember a time when that wasn’t true. But, oddly enough, you’ll find that other countries remember too. They’ll remember your country’s arrogance, its unilateralism, its walls, its racism, and its politicized abuse of immigrants. And they’ll remember how your government undermined and violently replaced theirs whenever corporations from your country had their profits threatened. You’re gonna want to leave, but there will be nowhere you’ll be welcome. You’re gonna find out that walls can face both directions.
One day you’re gonna wake up in a hostile world where your country no longer has any friends. There will be governments of other countries – former long-standing allies – that cannot afford to have anything to do with you, lest their publics angrily remove them from office for collaborating with a country as hated as yours. Nor will those governments trust yours anyway. They will perhaps possess intelligence that could save your life, but they will not share it. They will possess forces that could help you survive real security threats, but they will not provide them. Your country will have become an international pariah, the South Africa of the twenty-first century.
And because no one will assist you, one day you’re gonna wake up fearing for your life as your country is brutally attacked by angry militants deploying weapons of mass destruction against your cities. Long dormant connections in your brain will resurface, and you will dimly understand why. On this day – perhaps March 20,2023 – you might be assisted in your comprehension by the message of one of the attackers, someone whose family your country callously destroyed in its mission accomplished in Iraq, and who spent the next twenty years plotting this day’s revenge. And you will wonder again why you stood by as your country attacked Iraq on a completely bogus pretext. You’ll remember applauding when this mailed fist was long ago sent. And, just as it comes hurling back in your direction at a lethal velocity, stamped “Return to Sender”, you’ll wonder what you were thinking. And you’ll realize just how much you weren’t.
One day you’re gonna wake up, America, and you’re gonna find out what was happening while you were sprawled on the couch watching endless mind-numbing loops of CSI, Desperate Housewives or Dancing with the Stars.
One day you’re gonna wake up and realize that catching all the action during week seven of the 2011 NFL season really wasn’t so critical in the greater scheme of things after all.
One day you’re gonna wake up and wished you’d invested a little more energy into monitoring and choosing the people who made monumental decisions on your behalf.
One day, with a flash of remorse greater than you thought it possible that one human vessel could contain, you’ll remember the ignored warning shots across your bow. Moments later, you’ll discover the human capacity for searing remorse is actually even greater still, as you contemplate your inattention even to the shots that were fired right through the bow. With a fury you would yesterday have thought yourself incapable of, you’ll hurriedly attempt to affix Band-Aids to the tattered splinters remaining from your country’s once sturdy hull. But you’ll learn quickly the toll of those years spent wasted in a civic coma. You’ll find that no amount of patchwork can any longer save this sinking ship from its appointment with the dustbin of history.
In shame, you’ll regret the callous arrogance with which you laughingly dismissed those who sounded the early clarion call. “We are destroying ourselves”, they tried to tell you. But even on the rare occasion when you roused yourself from your stupor long enough to learn the slightest bit about the very threats that jeopardized your life and that of your species, still you found it more reassuring to follow the blustering worst amongst us, with their patently absurd pretended confidence, and their ever constant resort to the cheapest of false solutions, and the rudest of demeanors.
One day, you’ll desperately search for hope of any sort, but none will remain. Nothing will be left to save you.
One day you’ll realize that once there were solutions, but that that day is now long past. You’ll see that human technological capacity ran its evolutionary race with wisdom, and the latter came in second. You’ll sadly realize that you stood by while your country led the once great tool-making species to its own destruction.
One day you’re gonna wake up, America, and realize how far it’s all gone. But if that day isn’t very soon, it won’t matter.
Because one day you’re gonna wake up, and it will be far, far too late.
David Michael Green is a professor of political science at Hofstra University in New York. He is delighted to receive readers' reactions to his articles (dmg@regressiveantidote.net ), but regrets that time constraints do not always allow him to respond. More of his work can be found at his website, www.regressiveantidote.net.
05/04/07 "ICH" -- - And, like every other one since last you can remember, it’s gonna be an ugly morning.
One day you’re gonna wake up and go to your lousy job with its lousy salary and non-existent benefits. You might even remember the good job you once had. Or that the government you once supported gave tax breaks to companies like the one that exported that good job of yours to the ThirdWorld (which is what they’re now starting to call your country). Or that that same government undermined the labor unions which fought to get you your good wages and benefits.
One day you’re gonna wake up and be furious at the monstrous tax burden you are carrying, a tab which accounts for fifty of the seventy hours you must work each week just to eke by. You might even figure out why your tax bill is so high. You might remember that the government you once supported shifted the tax burden from the rich onto people like you, and from the taxpayers of the time onto those of today. And that they borrowed money in astonishing quantities to fund their sleight-of-hand, so that you work thirty hours a week just to pay the interest on a mountain of money borrowed decades ago.
One day you’re gonna wake up in anger at the absurdly poor education your children are receiving. You’re gonna remember that it wasn’t always that way, that even after the military’s voracious appetite was temporarily sated, your country still managed to find a few bucks to at least educate a workforce. No more. And you’re gonna remember how you applauded when your educational system was twisted in to a test taking industry that is careful, above all, not to teach children how to think.
One day you’re gonna wake up literally sick and tired. You’re gonna want treatment for your maladies but you won’t be able to touch the cost. You’re gonna wonder what you were thinking when believed your country had the best healthcare system in the world, even though it was the only advanced democracy in the world that didn’t provide universal care, even though it devoted fifty percent more of its economy than those other countries to pay for a system that left fifty million people uninsured, and even though there were massive layers of unnecessary and harmful private sector bureaucracy skimming hundreds of billions of dollars of profits out of the system in the name of free enterprise.
One day you’re gonna wake up too tired to go to work anymore. You’re gonna want to retire in dignity but will be left instead to laugh bitterly at the cruelty of that joke. And you’re gonna wonder what in the world you had been thinking voting for a president who’s primary goal was to allow Wall Street to raid Social Security, destroying what had once been considered the most successful domestic program in human history.
One day you’re gonna wake up and wish that it wasn’t so bloody hot, and that there weren’t so many diseases and species eradications and violent storms lashing the planet. And maybe you’ll even remember that you once supported a government that lied about the very existence of global warming – back when it might have been curtailed – a government that scuttled the barest remedy for the problem in order to protect oil company profits.
One day you’re gonna wake up and wish you had a government that could simply and competently do the basic things it was designed for. A government that could protect you from foreign attack, that could come to your rescue after a devastating hurricane, that could properly manage a new program or other people’s security. An administration that didn’t pervert the purpose of every agency within the government to its opposite, using civil rights lawyers to fight civil rights, for example, or the EPA to protect polluters.
One day you’re gonna wake up and cry out for simple justice, blindly applied without bias. And perhaps you’ll remember when that principle died. When your country stood by and watched the politicization of its judicial system for purposes of partisanship, and said nothing. When it stood by and watched its highest law enforcement officials in the land lie about their failing memory of events and pretended to believe that was acceptable.
One day you’re gonna wake up and wish that you weren’t being drafted to go fight wars you don’t believe in. You’ll remember how soldiers were sent to their deaths for lies. You’ll remember how badly they were treated when they came home maimed and twisted. You’ll remember how real, patriotic, former soldiers were mocked and humiliated by dress-up, unpatriotic, former non-soldiers. And suddenly you’ll understand why no one would volunteer for the military anymore, and why people like you had to be drafted.
One day you’re gonna wake up and want very badly to run outside and scream in anger about a government that long ago stopped serving your interests in favor of the narrow interests of a tiny oligarchy. But instead you’ll stay inside and keep your scream tucked safely in your belly. Because you’ll know that in your country dissent has long since been outlawed, on pain of torture and death. You’ll remember concepts like due process, limitations on government search, seizure and wiretapping, habeas corpus, trial by peers, legal representation and prohibitions against cruel and unusual punishment as historical artifacts no longer even taught in schools.
One day you’re gonna wake up and want so badly to change governments. You’re gonna treasure the concept of democracy like no Soviet dissident ever did. You’re gonna crave the opportunity to own your own government, to make your own societal choices, to make a change of direction never before so desperately necessary. And you’re gonna wonder why you didn’t speak up as you watched first-hand the dismantling of the democracy you had been handed by previous generations of patriots. You’re gonna wish you had been patriotic enough yourself to demand, above all else, free and fair elections, and you’re gonna shake your head in puzzlement at how you stood by watching in silence those that patently were not.
One day you’re gonna wake up and want to get the hell out of your rotting, repressive country. You’re gonna remember a time when that wasn’t true. But, oddly enough, you’ll find that other countries remember too. They’ll remember your country’s arrogance, its unilateralism, its walls, its racism, and its politicized abuse of immigrants. And they’ll remember how your government undermined and violently replaced theirs whenever corporations from your country had their profits threatened. You’re gonna want to leave, but there will be nowhere you’ll be welcome. You’re gonna find out that walls can face both directions.
One day you’re gonna wake up in a hostile world where your country no longer has any friends. There will be governments of other countries – former long-standing allies – that cannot afford to have anything to do with you, lest their publics angrily remove them from office for collaborating with a country as hated as yours. Nor will those governments trust yours anyway. They will perhaps possess intelligence that could save your life, but they will not share it. They will possess forces that could help you survive real security threats, but they will not provide them. Your country will have become an international pariah, the South Africa of the twenty-first century.
And because no one will assist you, one day you’re gonna wake up fearing for your life as your country is brutally attacked by angry militants deploying weapons of mass destruction against your cities. Long dormant connections in your brain will resurface, and you will dimly understand why. On this day – perhaps March 20,2023 – you might be assisted in your comprehension by the message of one of the attackers, someone whose family your country callously destroyed in its mission accomplished in Iraq, and who spent the next twenty years plotting this day’s revenge. And you will wonder again why you stood by as your country attacked Iraq on a completely bogus pretext. You’ll remember applauding when this mailed fist was long ago sent. And, just as it comes hurling back in your direction at a lethal velocity, stamped “Return to Sender”, you’ll wonder what you were thinking. And you’ll realize just how much you weren’t.
One day you’re gonna wake up, America, and you’re gonna find out what was happening while you were sprawled on the couch watching endless mind-numbing loops of CSI, Desperate Housewives or Dancing with the Stars.
One day you’re gonna wake up and realize that catching all the action during week seven of the 2011 NFL season really wasn’t so critical in the greater scheme of things after all.
One day you’re gonna wake up and wished you’d invested a little more energy into monitoring and choosing the people who made monumental decisions on your behalf.
One day, with a flash of remorse greater than you thought it possible that one human vessel could contain, you’ll remember the ignored warning shots across your bow. Moments later, you’ll discover the human capacity for searing remorse is actually even greater still, as you contemplate your inattention even to the shots that were fired right through the bow. With a fury you would yesterday have thought yourself incapable of, you’ll hurriedly attempt to affix Band-Aids to the tattered splinters remaining from your country’s once sturdy hull. But you’ll learn quickly the toll of those years spent wasted in a civic coma. You’ll find that no amount of patchwork can any longer save this sinking ship from its appointment with the dustbin of history.
In shame, you’ll regret the callous arrogance with which you laughingly dismissed those who sounded the early clarion call. “We are destroying ourselves”, they tried to tell you. But even on the rare occasion when you roused yourself from your stupor long enough to learn the slightest bit about the very threats that jeopardized your life and that of your species, still you found it more reassuring to follow the blustering worst amongst us, with their patently absurd pretended confidence, and their ever constant resort to the cheapest of false solutions, and the rudest of demeanors.
One day, you’ll desperately search for hope of any sort, but none will remain. Nothing will be left to save you.
One day you’ll realize that once there were solutions, but that that day is now long past. You’ll see that human technological capacity ran its evolutionary race with wisdom, and the latter came in second. You’ll sadly realize that you stood by while your country led the once great tool-making species to its own destruction.
One day you’re gonna wake up, America, and realize how far it’s all gone. But if that day isn’t very soon, it won’t matter.
Because one day you’re gonna wake up, and it will be far, far too late.
David Michael Green is a professor of political science at Hofstra University in New York. He is delighted to receive readers' reactions to his articles (dmg@regressiveantidote.net ), but regrets that time constraints do not always allow him to respond. More of his work can be found at his website, www.regressiveantidote.net.
Friday, May 04, 2007
A scary article. As usual, Bush and the military are involved...
The Crusaders
“The Christian Taliban is Running the Department of Defense”By Robert Koehler
05/03/07 "ICH" -- -- Sixteen words may be all that stand right now between the apparatus of government and the Founding Fathers’ worst nightmare. And those words are starting to give.
“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof . . .”
When George Bush, in the wake of 9/11, puffed himself into Richard the Lionheart and declared he would lead the country in a “crusade” against terrorism - you know, crusade, as in slaughter of Muslim infidels - turns out . . . oh, how awkward (if you’re on White House spin duty) . . . he may have been speaking literally.
What’s certain, in any case, is that a lot of people in high and low places within the Bush administration - and in particular, the military - heard him literally, and regard the war on terror as a religious war:
“The enemy has got a face. He’s called Satan. He lives in Fallujah. And we’re going to destroy him,” a lieutenant colonel, according to a BBC reporter, said to his troops on the eve of the destruction of that undefended city in post-election 2004.
“I knew my God was bigger than his. I knew that my God was a real God and his was an idol,” Deputy Undersecretary of Defense Jerry Boykin notoriously boasted a few years back, speaking of a Muslim warlord in Somalia. And by the way, George Bush is “in the White House because God put him there.”
And, of course, just the other day, Lt. Col. Ralph Kauzlarich, who conducted the first official investigation into Pat Tillman’s death, opined that Tillman’s family is only pestering the Army for the, ahem, truth about how he died because their loved one, a non-believer with no heavenly reward to reap, is now “worm dirt.”
Until I read the newly published “With God on Their Side” (St. Martin’s Press), Michael Weinstein’s disturbing account of anti-Semitism at the U.S. Air Force Academy, I shrugged off each of these remarks, and so much more, as isolated, almost comically intolerant noises out of True Believer Land. Forgive them, Lord, for they know not what they do . . .
Now my blood runs cold. Weinstein, a 1977 graduate of the Academy and former assistant general counsel in the Reagan administration, and a lifelong Republican, has devoted the last several years of his life to battling what he has come to regard as a fundamentalist takeover of the Academy, turning it, in effect, into a taxpayer-supported Evangelical institution. He charges that the separation of church and state is rapidly vanishing at the school, which routinely promotes sectarian religious events, tolerates the proselytizing of uniquely vulnerable new recruits and, basically, conflates evangelical interests and the national interest.
If you think this is just a fight over some abstract principle, with ramifications only for atheist, Jewish, Buddhist and other cadets who may be “offended” by fundamentalist God talk, I urge you to check out Weinstein’s book or website. He documents a chilling phenomenon: The whole U.S. military, up and down the chain of command, is coming to be dominated by members of a small, characteristically intolerant sliver of Christianity who truly regard themselves as Christian soldiers, on a God-appointed mission to harvest souls and battle evil.
Weinstein, whose family tradition of national service is pretty impressive, does not do battle lightly with those who now run his alma mater. One of his sons is a recent graduate of the Air Force Academy and the other is still a cadet there. The fact that both of them endured anti-Semitic harassment initially spurred him to take action. But this goes deeper than disrespect for other faiths. The attitude he has encountered in his attempt to hold the institution, and the rest of the military, accountable smacks of a coup: “The Christian Taliban is running the Department of Defense,” he told me. “It inundates everything.”
Can you imagine a contingent of religious zealots, with their contempt for secular values (and such manifestations of secular order as the U.S. Constitution) - and with their zest for holy war - in control of the most potent fighting force and weaponry in human history? Is this possible?
Well, said Weinstein, consider the 523rd Fighter Squadron, based at Cannon Air Force Base, N.M., which calls itself The Crusaders, and whose emblem consists of a sword, four crosses and a medieval knight’s helmet. Check ‘em out at globalsecurity.org, which reports that the payload on the F-16s they fly consists of “a wide variety of conventional, precision guided and nuclear weapons.”
And listen once again to Commander-in-Chief Bush, speaking in 2003 to Palestinian Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas, according to the Israeli newspaper Haaretz: “God told me to strike at al-Qaida and I struck them, and then he instructed me to strike at Saddam, which I did, and now I am determined to solve the problem in the Middle East.”
If this is a religious war - a “clash of civilizations,” waged by competing agents of God’s will - victory may be indistinguishable from Armageddon. God help the human race.
Robert Koehler, an award-winning, Chicago-based journalist, is an editor at Tribune Media Services and nationally syndicated writer. You can respond to this column at bkoehler@tribune.com.
“The Christian Taliban is Running the Department of Defense”By Robert Koehler
05/03/07 "ICH" -- -- Sixteen words may be all that stand right now between the apparatus of government and the Founding Fathers’ worst nightmare. And those words are starting to give.
“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof . . .”
When George Bush, in the wake of 9/11, puffed himself into Richard the Lionheart and declared he would lead the country in a “crusade” against terrorism - you know, crusade, as in slaughter of Muslim infidels - turns out . . . oh, how awkward (if you’re on White House spin duty) . . . he may have been speaking literally.
What’s certain, in any case, is that a lot of people in high and low places within the Bush administration - and in particular, the military - heard him literally, and regard the war on terror as a religious war:
“The enemy has got a face. He’s called Satan. He lives in Fallujah. And we’re going to destroy him,” a lieutenant colonel, according to a BBC reporter, said to his troops on the eve of the destruction of that undefended city in post-election 2004.
“I knew my God was bigger than his. I knew that my God was a real God and his was an idol,” Deputy Undersecretary of Defense Jerry Boykin notoriously boasted a few years back, speaking of a Muslim warlord in Somalia. And by the way, George Bush is “in the White House because God put him there.”
And, of course, just the other day, Lt. Col. Ralph Kauzlarich, who conducted the first official investigation into Pat Tillman’s death, opined that Tillman’s family is only pestering the Army for the, ahem, truth about how he died because their loved one, a non-believer with no heavenly reward to reap, is now “worm dirt.”
Until I read the newly published “With God on Their Side” (St. Martin’s Press), Michael Weinstein’s disturbing account of anti-Semitism at the U.S. Air Force Academy, I shrugged off each of these remarks, and so much more, as isolated, almost comically intolerant noises out of True Believer Land. Forgive them, Lord, for they know not what they do . . .
Now my blood runs cold. Weinstein, a 1977 graduate of the Academy and former assistant general counsel in the Reagan administration, and a lifelong Republican, has devoted the last several years of his life to battling what he has come to regard as a fundamentalist takeover of the Academy, turning it, in effect, into a taxpayer-supported Evangelical institution. He charges that the separation of church and state is rapidly vanishing at the school, which routinely promotes sectarian religious events, tolerates the proselytizing of uniquely vulnerable new recruits and, basically, conflates evangelical interests and the national interest.
If you think this is just a fight over some abstract principle, with ramifications only for atheist, Jewish, Buddhist and other cadets who may be “offended” by fundamentalist God talk, I urge you to check out Weinstein’s book or website. He documents a chilling phenomenon: The whole U.S. military, up and down the chain of command, is coming to be dominated by members of a small, characteristically intolerant sliver of Christianity who truly regard themselves as Christian soldiers, on a God-appointed mission to harvest souls and battle evil.
Weinstein, whose family tradition of national service is pretty impressive, does not do battle lightly with those who now run his alma mater. One of his sons is a recent graduate of the Air Force Academy and the other is still a cadet there. The fact that both of them endured anti-Semitic harassment initially spurred him to take action. But this goes deeper than disrespect for other faiths. The attitude he has encountered in his attempt to hold the institution, and the rest of the military, accountable smacks of a coup: “The Christian Taliban is running the Department of Defense,” he told me. “It inundates everything.”
Can you imagine a contingent of religious zealots, with their contempt for secular values (and such manifestations of secular order as the U.S. Constitution) - and with their zest for holy war - in control of the most potent fighting force and weaponry in human history? Is this possible?
Well, said Weinstein, consider the 523rd Fighter Squadron, based at Cannon Air Force Base, N.M., which calls itself The Crusaders, and whose emblem consists of a sword, four crosses and a medieval knight’s helmet. Check ‘em out at globalsecurity.org, which reports that the payload on the F-16s they fly consists of “a wide variety of conventional, precision guided and nuclear weapons.”
And listen once again to Commander-in-Chief Bush, speaking in 2003 to Palestinian Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas, according to the Israeli newspaper Haaretz: “God told me to strike at al-Qaida and I struck them, and then he instructed me to strike at Saddam, which I did, and now I am determined to solve the problem in the Middle East.”
If this is a religious war - a “clash of civilizations,” waged by competing agents of God’s will - victory may be indistinguishable from Armageddon. God help the human race.
Robert Koehler, an award-winning, Chicago-based journalist, is an editor at Tribune Media Services and nationally syndicated writer. You can respond to this column at bkoehler@tribune.com.
Wednesday, May 02, 2007
But then...
Of course much of the placating nature of Fiona's description of Cuba came directly from the added compensation of gifts! (Note the revolutionary's hat, that with the long hair bears me a strikingly uncanny resemblance to Che - surely you can note! and of course that's a Havana cigar. Note - don't inhale!)
She's baa-aaack!
Well, Fiona has certainly changed much of my life since her arrival (again) in Cochabamba last week, but in contrasting ways. She has softened my passion to experience Cuba firsthand, given that her description and analysis has been pretty satisfying to date and I give her judgement on these matters quite some weight. On the other hand she's inspired me to keep Cuba in my sights, even if a visit from me does have to occur after the fact (that fact being Fidel's demise). Cuba will continue to change politically as it has since 1959 (and obviously before), and perhaps more sharply come the new leader of the Republic, and maybe it will be one of those historic epochs one could regret missing, like pre-industrial society but then, any new era will give us the opporunity to continue the fight for a better world. It's all the same.
Given all that, I still hope to feel some of the emotion and conflicting interests that govern the Cuban culture that Fiona felt. These photos give some idea of that:
Fiona in the very impressive Che tribute square- a large square with an imposing figure of Che atop this block of his (I'm sure very inspiring) text.
This fellow (below) shows off one of the abundance of well-kept cars of the 50s - a necessity given the complete shut-down of trade from countries that could have helped Cuba's industrial growth (trade barriers an indicator of fear, and Cuba the most feared example of fair and equal development in the world).
Che (above), again and again and again, being flaunted there in Cuba as the martyr of the revolution much to Fidel's joy and luck (or WAS it?). And the music of Cuba being flaunted joyously and deservedly in a member of the famous Buena Vista Social Club, who Fiona met in a bar and who signed the CD she bought. The Buena Vista Social Club was a Havana club where musicians met and played in the 40s and were subsequently made an international success with recordings on an album of the same name from this fellow and others in the 90s.
Fiona being back in Cochabamba contrasts my emotions more personally as well (as opposed to my personal/political). We commented yesterday, as we spent the Feria holiday afternoon walking around the botanical gardens, having ice-cream, talking of our future and our kids in the hideously American CineCenter, playing air-hockey and basketball in the pin-ball parlour, and booking tickets for tomorrow's premier of the only movie I'd ever consider buying advance tickets for (gee, can you guess what it is?!), ... um, yes, we commented that we felt very much at home, or that we didn't miss home at all as heinously when we had each other here (or anywhere), and even seriously put forward the incredibly corny notion that we indeed were home to one another. How sweet (and corny). Contrasting however, because the more we talk about not missing home (my family, friends, streets, cafes, pubs, parks, family, friends), well, der brain, I get homesick!
Given all that, I still hope to feel some of the emotion and conflicting interests that govern the Cuban culture that Fiona felt. These photos give some idea of that:
Fiona in the very impressive Che tribute square- a large square with an imposing figure of Che atop this block of his (I'm sure very inspiring) text.
This fellow (below) shows off one of the abundance of well-kept cars of the 50s - a necessity given the complete shut-down of trade from countries that could have helped Cuba's industrial growth (trade barriers an indicator of fear, and Cuba the most feared example of fair and equal development in the world).
Che (above), again and again and again, being flaunted there in Cuba as the martyr of the revolution much to Fidel's joy and luck (or WAS it?). And the music of Cuba being flaunted joyously and deservedly in a member of the famous Buena Vista Social Club, who Fiona met in a bar and who signed the CD she bought. The Buena Vista Social Club was a Havana club where musicians met and played in the 40s and were subsequently made an international success with recordings on an album of the same name from this fellow and others in the 90s.
Fiona being back in Cochabamba contrasts my emotions more personally as well (as opposed to my personal/political). We commented yesterday, as we spent the Feria holiday afternoon walking around the botanical gardens, having ice-cream, talking of our future and our kids in the hideously American CineCenter, playing air-hockey and basketball in the pin-ball parlour, and booking tickets for tomorrow's premier of the only movie I'd ever consider buying advance tickets for (gee, can you guess what it is?!), ... um, yes, we commented that we felt very much at home, or that we didn't miss home at all as heinously when we had each other here (or anywhere), and even seriously put forward the incredibly corny notion that we indeed were home to one another. How sweet (and corny). Contrasting however, because the more we talk about not missing home (my family, friends, streets, cafes, pubs, parks, family, friends), well, der brain, I get homesick!
Monday, April 30, 2007
In a culture like ours, one sometimes forgets the power of a poet's words...
Here is an open letter from the poet Sharon Olds to Laura Bush declining the invitation to read and speak at the National Book Critics Circle Award in Washington, DC. Feel free to forward it along if you feel more people may want to read it. Sharon Olds is one of most widely read and critically acclaimed poets living in America today. Read to the end of eloquence.
> Laura Bush
>First Lady, The White House
>
> Dear Mrs. Bush,
>
> I am writing to let you know why I am not able to
> accept your kind invitation to give a presentation
> at the National Book Festival on September 24, or
> to attend your dinner at the Library of Congress or
> the breakfast at the White House.
>
> In one way, it's a very appealing invitation. The
> idea of speaking at a festival attended by 85,000
> people is inspiring! The possibility of finding new
> readers is exciting for a poet in personal terms,
> and in terms of the desire that poetry serve its
> constituents--all of us who need the pleasure, and
> the inner and outer news, it delivers.
>
> And the concept of a community of readers and
> writers has long been dear to my heart. As a
> professor of creative writing in the graduate school
> of a major university, I have had the chance to be a
> part of some magnificent outreach writing workshops
> in which our students have become teachers. Over the
> years, they have taught in a variety of settings: a
> women's prison, several New York City public high
> schools, an oncology ward for children.
>
> Our initial program, at a 900-bed state hospital for
> the severely physically challenged, has been running
> now for twenty years, creating along the way lasting
> friendships between young MFA candidates and their
> students--long-term residents at the hospital who,
> in their humor, courage and wisdom, become our
> teachers.
>
> When you have witnessed someone nonspeaking and
> almost nonmoving spell out, with a toe, on a big
> plastic alphabet chart, letter by letter, his new
> poem, you have experienced, close up, the passion
> and essentialness of writing.
>
> When you have held up a small cardboard alphabet
> card for a writer who is completely nonspeaking and
> nonmoving (except for the eyes), and pointed first
> to the A, then the B, then C, then D, until you get
> to the first letter of the first word of the first
> line of the poem she has been composing in her head
> all week, and she lifts her eyes when that letter is
> touched to say yes, you feel with a fresh immediacy
> the human drive for creation, self-expression,
> accuracy, honesty and wit--and the importance of
> writing, which celebrates the value of each person's
> unique story and song.
>
> So the prospect of a festival of books seemed
> wonderful to me. I thought of the opportunity to
> talk about how to start up an outreach program. I
> thought of the chance to sell some books, sign some
> books and meet some of the citizens of Washington,
> DC. I thought that I could try to find a way, even
> as your guest, with respect, to speak about my deep
> feeling that we should not have invaded Iraq, and to
> declare my belief that the wish to invade another
> culture and another country--with the resultant loss
> of life and limb for our brave soldiers, and for the
> noncombatants in their home terrain--did not come
> out of our democracy but was instead a decision made
> "at the top" and forced on the people by distorted
> language, and by untruths. I hoped to express the
> fear that we have begun to live in the shadows of
> tyranny and religious chauvinism--the opposites of
> the liberty, tolerance and diversity our nation
> aspires to.
>
> I tried to see my way clear to attend the festival
> in order to bear witness--as an American who loves
> her country and its principles and its
> writing--against this undeclared and devastating
> war.
>
> But I could not face the idea of breaking bread with
> you. I knew that if I sat down to eat with you, it
> would feel to me as if I were condoning what I see
> to be the wild, highhanded actions of the Bush
> Administration.
>
> What kept coming to the fore of my mind was that I
> would be taking food from the hand of the First Lady
> who represents the Administration that unleashed
> this war and that wills its continuation, even to
> the extent of permitting "extraordinary rendition":
> flying people to other countries where they will be
> tortured for us.
>
> So many Americans who had felt pride in our country
> now feel anguish and shame, for the current regime
> of blood, wounds and fire. I thought of the clean
> linens at your table, the shining knives and the
> flames of the candles, and I could not stomach it.
>
> Sincerely,
>
> SHARON OLDS
Here is an open letter from the poet Sharon Olds to Laura Bush declining the invitation to read and speak at the National Book Critics Circle Award in Washington, DC. Feel free to forward it along if you feel more people may want to read it. Sharon Olds is one of most widely read and critically acclaimed poets living in America today. Read to the end of eloquence.
> Laura Bush
>First Lady, The White House
>
> Dear Mrs. Bush,
>
> I am writing to let you know why I am not able to
> accept your kind invitation to give a presentation
> at the National Book Festival on September 24, or
> to attend your dinner at the Library of Congress or
> the breakfast at the White House.
>
> In one way, it's a very appealing invitation. The
> idea of speaking at a festival attended by 85,000
> people is inspiring! The possibility of finding new
> readers is exciting for a poet in personal terms,
> and in terms of the desire that poetry serve its
> constituents--all of us who need the pleasure, and
> the inner and outer news, it delivers.
>
> And the concept of a community of readers and
> writers has long been dear to my heart. As a
> professor of creative writing in the graduate school
> of a major university, I have had the chance to be a
> part of some magnificent outreach writing workshops
> in which our students have become teachers. Over the
> years, they have taught in a variety of settings: a
> women's prison, several New York City public high
> schools, an oncology ward for children.
>
> Our initial program, at a 900-bed state hospital for
> the severely physically challenged, has been running
> now for twenty years, creating along the way lasting
> friendships between young MFA candidates and their
> students--long-term residents at the hospital who,
> in their humor, courage and wisdom, become our
> teachers.
>
> When you have witnessed someone nonspeaking and
> almost nonmoving spell out, with a toe, on a big
> plastic alphabet chart, letter by letter, his new
> poem, you have experienced, close up, the passion
> and essentialness of writing.
>
> When you have held up a small cardboard alphabet
> card for a writer who is completely nonspeaking and
> nonmoving (except for the eyes), and pointed first
> to the A, then the B, then C, then D, until you get
> to the first letter of the first word of the first
> line of the poem she has been composing in her head
> all week, and she lifts her eyes when that letter is
> touched to say yes, you feel with a fresh immediacy
> the human drive for creation, self-expression,
> accuracy, honesty and wit--and the importance of
> writing, which celebrates the value of each person's
> unique story and song.
>
> So the prospect of a festival of books seemed
> wonderful to me. I thought of the opportunity to
> talk about how to start up an outreach program. I
> thought of the chance to sell some books, sign some
> books and meet some of the citizens of Washington,
> DC. I thought that I could try to find a way, even
> as your guest, with respect, to speak about my deep
> feeling that we should not have invaded Iraq, and to
> declare my belief that the wish to invade another
> culture and another country--with the resultant loss
> of life and limb for our brave soldiers, and for the
> noncombatants in their home terrain--did not come
> out of our democracy but was instead a decision made
> "at the top" and forced on the people by distorted
> language, and by untruths. I hoped to express the
> fear that we have begun to live in the shadows of
> tyranny and religious chauvinism--the opposites of
> the liberty, tolerance and diversity our nation
> aspires to.
>
> I tried to see my way clear to attend the festival
> in order to bear witness--as an American who loves
> her country and its principles and its
> writing--against this undeclared and devastating
> war.
>
> But I could not face the idea of breaking bread with
> you. I knew that if I sat down to eat with you, it
> would feel to me as if I were condoning what I see
> to be the wild, highhanded actions of the Bush
> Administration.
>
> What kept coming to the fore of my mind was that I
> would be taking food from the hand of the First Lady
> who represents the Administration that unleashed
> this war and that wills its continuation, even to
> the extent of permitting "extraordinary rendition":
> flying people to other countries where they will be
> tortured for us.
>
> So many Americans who had felt pride in our country
> now feel anguish and shame, for the current regime
> of blood, wounds and fire. I thought of the clean
> linens at your table, the shining knives and the
> flames of the candles, and I could not stomach it.
>
> Sincerely,
>
> SHARON OLDS
Thursday, April 26, 2007
The goods.
"Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it's time to pause and reflect."
Mark Twain
Mark Twain
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
