D for Disorientation

Primary election results

2009-08-03T11:59:00.002-03:00

A few weird numbers came out of yesterday's election. The main thing was that the opposition represented by the Justicialist Party (that is, the Peronists) won in Rosario, where it usually loses by a wide margin, and the Progressive Front won in Santa Fe City, where it usually doesn't do that well and was vanquished in the latest legislative election. What happened?

You need to remember this was a primary election and, although it was compulsory, many people didn't turn up. It was a local election and in Rosario, also, it was a local election pitching a diverse (some would say promiscuous) opposition party against a fairly monolithic government party whose administration is showing some wear after 14 years in office. People who are more-or-less OK with the Socialist administration didn't vote for it because the main list of candidates was seen as a bunch of yes-people ready to raise their hands on the mayor's command. I myself voted for Nire Roldán, one of the minor, dissident candidates of the Progressive Front, instead of the "loyalist" Clara García (currently a top municipal official), because I don't want a Deliberative Council with an absolute majority of the government's faction.

In any case, the Progressive Front had differences in opinion among its factions, basically regarding the closeness of the candidates to the mayor's power. On the other hand, the Peronists are profoundly divided, and so they went to the primary election: a Kirchnerist faction led by extra-partisan, former Socialist and Menemist sell-out Héctor Cavallero, with the explicit support of the now disgraced Kirchnerist mouthpiece Agustín Rossi; a faction led by one Diego Giuliano, a political unknown who answers to formerly fervent Kirchnerist, now right-wing anti-Kirchnerist Carlos Reutemann; another one led by Osvaldo Miatello, the only one with a current and established legislative career, backed by former governor Jorge Obeid; and an assortment of no-names. These will have to get along somehow — they'll all be together in a single ballot in September.

My analysis is that many people just took the Progressive Front for granted and refused to show extra support for the mayor's faction (that's what I did after all) as a way of letting them know they'll have to work harder to stay in power, while each of the various competing Peronist candidates conducted an aggressive campaign just to make themselves noticed, and their wide differences encouraged their supporters to go out and vote.We'll see what happens with those figures in September. I really can't see a traditional, conservative Peronist voting for a former Socialist with Kirchnerist backing, or viceversa.

The flu

2009-08-03T07:55:00.000-03:00

I haven't written about the influenza A(H1N1) epidemic in Argentina. Everyone else has, though, so I'll leave it at that. For me, it had its good and bad sides. The good side was that children and teenagers cleared the streets, buses, and other public venues for us grownups, leaving us room to enjoy our city without being bumped into, or bombarded with trashy music out of MP3 players. Oh, some people died. Not many, certainly an insignificant number compared to the people who die of other preventable diseases or in traffic accidents caused by drivers' carelessness. Several acquaintances of mine fell with the flu, but it was nothing serious.

The bad side was the hysteria and the paranoia. I'm sure you've seen your share of this. What happens here is that as soon as, let's say, an outbreak of a disease is announced, society divides itself into two main groups: those who panic, go to ridiculous extremes to protect themselves, and generally bother the rest of us, and those who just dismiss it all as an invention of the government, the media, or both to make us forget of the really important matters, and place the rest of us at risk because of their carelessness. You may have noticed there's a third group, what I've called "the rest of us" — make of that what you want.

As the first wave of the flu subsided, many people have started to forget the cautionary measures against contagion. This may or may not be OK. Others continue to be hysterical, in both the usual and the figurative meaning: they remain fearful and paranoid, and they're very funny — tending towards the "pathetic" kind of funny. At work, I've had perfectly healthy people, who usually offered me their cheek to kiss every morning, refuse to come even close to me. During the initial phase of the epidemic, one of my co-workers first became very agitated, then tried to force her daughter's school to shut down, and then basically locked her up at home (this was a few days before the Ministry of Education finally decided to shut down the schools). There's still alcohol gel everywhere, and by the looks of it, some people think it's an all-powerful, virus-proof barrier against the flu.

The cold, and with it the flu, will be gone in less than two months. I can't wait to tell you about the upcoming dengue epidemic...

Just voted

2009-08-02T10:59:00.000-03:00

I've just voted on the (arguably) most boring election ever — a primary to select candidates for the city's Deliberative Council.

Not only did most people not know exactly who the candidates were, what general views (as opposed to nice specific ideas) they had, or even which party they belonged to, but also, as a result of the flu epidemic, the election should have taken place a month ago and didn't. It was postposed, but the legal ban on political advertising wasn't reset, so it's been more than a month since any of the candidates was allowed to appear on TV or be heard on the radio to explain the citizens what they intend to do if they're elected. Now I don't really love politicians broadcasting their promises along with catchy, unsubstantial slogans every ten minutes on the radio, but I do appreciate those things have a purpose.

Some of the major candidates evaded the ban by campaigning through Facebook. I think this is a very nice idea. It was pioneered, I think, by mayor Miguel Lifschitz, and spread quickly to other candidates, who apparently saw that just having a website was useless if nobody noticed it. The digital divide makes this practice a bit problematic, though.

I'll be posting the results here as soon as I have them, but nobody expects a surprise. The real election, with the candidates from each party already selected, will take place on September 27.

Does God exist?

2009-07-31T10:24:00.000-03:00

I don't like translating my own writings, so I won't subject you to a translation of my review of ¿Dios existe?, whose core is a public debate between then-cardinal Joseph Ratzinger and the atheist Italian philosopher Paolo Flores d’Arcais (which, as far as I know, hasn't been published in English). The book in fact doesn't deal a lot with that ancient, ever-present topic, but has more to do with the mode of the affirmation of God by the believers and how it relates to the grounding of moral principles and the law.

Deep stuff, especially for one (like me) who has never studied philosophy. I'm missing most of the references that the author takes for granted... But I think I'm getting it, mostly. This guy Flores d’Arcais has some very clear ideas and he knows how to convey them. This unlike Michel Onfray, who's fascinating but excessively florid and elliptical (I just finished a book by him about the Cynics, by the way), and very, very unlike the one contemporary atheist philosopher I've read within the Anglo-Saxon materialist tradition, Daniel Dennett. Popular English-language atheistic thought is, understandably, almost completely devoted to refuting Protestant fundamentalism and creationism, on one hand, and denouncing the dangers of Islamic fundamentalism on the other — and it all seems a bit shallow and pointless after a while. I've been overexposed to that lately (I'm still trying to finish Dennett's Darwin's Dangerous Idea, which has very engaging ideas on the origin of design). So for me Onfray and Flores d’Arcais are a door into a different world of thought.

I'll leave you with something to get an idea of what Flores d’Arcais thinks about religion in the public sphere, his Eleven Theses Against Habermas. The condition he sets for a pluralistic democracy are echoed in the arguments he presents in the book — namely, that all of us, believers of all faiths and nonbelievers alike, must renounce to claim that we have reasonable, unassailably objective grounds for our principles, because such a thing does not and cannot exist.

Amado Boudou

2009-07-28T12:36:00.000-03:00

I'm being asked to come back and write something. So instead of apologizing (again) for doing something else instead of writing, I thought I'd share short snippets of my thoughts that might interest my readership. Here comes one: did you know (or notice) that phonetically, the name of our latest Minister of Economy, Amado Boudou, means Beloved Voodoo?

Voodoo seems an appropriate subject to relate to the minister. Our economy, with its ups and downs, is faring surprisingly well given the crisis, but since Néstor Kirchner decided to get rid of Roberto Lavagna, the office of the Minister of Economy is like a periodically revived zombie. When someone alive steps into the post, or she or he's promptly bludgeoned into an undead state by the Kirchners' requirements of absolute loyalty. Felisa Miceli was an undead from the start, as was Miguel Peirano; his successor, Martín Lousteau, like him a promising, independent young minister, made the grave mistake of proposing Resolution 125 and the fatal one of disturbing the government's inflation denialism, and lasted very little after that; Carlos Fernández was barely seen or heard, an undead without even the redeeming features of romanticism or tragedy, and passed without a sigh.

Argentine governments tend to burn economy ministers fairly quickly. Boudou has just started and he's half wasted already, having had several members of his work team vetoed or hand-picked by Néstor Kirchner on the basis of personal loyalty. Want to bet how long he'll last?

In a pause

2009-07-02T08:16:00.000-03:00

I'm having trouble connecting to the internet at home, due to a chronically failing telephone line, so I'm writing from the office and I'll have to keep it short. I'm working at the very place where the statistics of the influenza A epidemic for the south of Santa Fe are reported and analyzed, so you'll understand.

I really have no idea what's going on, except what everybody knows: the schools are closed for July, though other public places are so far deemed OK, and it seems the government might postpone the provincial primary election to be held next Sunday (July 5) for a month. Pregnant women will be given a couple of weeks off (with pay) until the peak of the flu epidemic passes. And there's a lot of paranoia around. It's tiring sometimes.

I haven't even caught a cold this winter (knock on wood), so I'll be back soon, I hope!

After the elections

2009-06-30T21:51:00.001-03:00

The legislative elections are over, and if you're following the news, you'll be surely aware of the big picture: Néstor Kirchner has lost, the government's power in Congress has been cut down, and several presidenciables (that is, likely presidential candidates) are already lining up (or have been lined up by the media) for the 2011 election.

So I'll just concentrate on the small things and the analysis. First, let's get Kirchner out of the way... Néstor Kirchner lost to Francisco de Narváez by a handful of votes, a lot of votes actually, but only about two-and-a-half percent of the Buenos Aires Province vote. Of course, what happened is that the list of candidates headed by NK got a few votes less than that led by FDN; in formal terms it was a tie, but Kirchner's insistence on the paramount importance of this election worked like a self-fulfilled prophecy: almost everyone assumed positions as if it were the one and final battle of a war, and the election turned into an opportunity to bash the government. And bashed it was: Kirchner, who had achieved record levels of popularity during his term, lost to a group of the strangest bedfellows politics has inflicted on us as of late, led by a right-wing Colombian-born multimillionaire with an image constructed hastily by the media in a matter of months. Many of the so-called "barons" of Greater Buenos Aires, who rule the poorest and most densely populated parts of Argentina as virtual feudal lords and are keen observers of reality, betrayed their alliance with Kirchner, unnanounced.

In any case, after what must have been a very long night and a terrible day, Kirchner dutifully resigned from the presidency of the Justicialist Party. He released a short video accepting the defeat and I swear he looked mildly drugged.

Yesterday in the afternoon, Cristina Fernández de Kirchner gave a press conference. First she started out by reciting highly optimistic figures for the composition of the new Congress, and feigned not to have the exact numbers of her husband's defeat on hand (while, as everyone knows, she probably had the figures down to the least significant digit painfully etched in her short-term memory). Then she tried to turn the whole thing on its head, pointing out how an awful lot of people had still voted for the government's party. When a journalist pointed out that she'd gotten 45% of the vote when she was elected and now her husband got only 31%, she was upset and accused the media of having a double standard because they hadn't gone and asked that to Mauricio Macri and his candidate Gabriela Michetti (in the City of Buenos Aires, Michetti got 30% of the vote, only half of what Macri and her had gotten two years ago). She also resented the petitio principii of a journalist who asked about the manipulation of INDEC's figures of inflation — which did beg the question, of course, because the government has never admitted to that manipulation, although everyone, including some of the president's favorite economists, is certain of it.

At that point, approximately, I stopped watching the press conference. It was pointless. Either Cristina has learned nothing or she needs a few days to let it sink in, but based on previous experience, the latter is unlikely. We're left with the hope that she won't attempt something funny before December, when the new Congressmen will take their seats.

I have voted

2009-06-28T11:10:00.000-03:00

I've just come back from my old primary school, where I voted. My DNI (Documento Nacional de Identidad) now has one more stamped-and-signed square near its back. Now to wait until evening...

Before the elections (III)

2009-06-27T07:17:00.001-03:00

This is probably a breach of electoral law, but what the heck, these are littering the streets everywhere... This is my vote for tomorrow:

As you see, the ballot has two parts; on the left is the vote for the senators of the Progressive Front (whose major force is the Socialist Party, which rules Santa Fe Province since 2007 and Rosario since 1989), and on the right, the vote for the deputies (diputados, or what Americans would call Representatives). I'm mainly supporting Rubén Giustiniani for senator, and against the ghastly Carlos Reutemann. I don't care much about the deputies — on that department my vote is for the coalition rather than the candidates.

If I wanted to, I could vote for different parties, by manually cutting the ballots along the vertical dotted line; senators and deputies are formally separate elections after all. Or I could just vote for senator Giustiniani and leave the deputies' place blank (i.e. not placing any vote for deputies in the envelope I'll be given), but I feel it's important to strengthen the opposition in the Lower House.

I'll be voting at my old primary school, about four blocks from my house, probably just before noon as usual. Then we'll all have to wait until eight or nine in the evening to get the preliminary results. I'll blog about that as soon as I can.

Before the elections (II)

2009-06-26T07:26:00.069-03:00

I left out some details in my previous post about the upcoming legislative election, just to keep it short and avoid digression. I think I need to clarify some things, for those who don't live in Argentina and have no idea what's the voting system is like. Some general information can be found in the Wikipedia articles Elections in Argentina and Argentine legislative election, 2009, but here I'm interested in the little things that make fraud and deceitful tactics easy (or easier).

There are two kinds of problems with this election (and many past ones): what I'd call ethical problems, and systemic problems. The latter are technical details; the former are often allowed (or encouraged) by the latter. Let me explain.

The main systemic problem in legislative elections is the fact that, for Deputies (the members of the Lower House), we use proportional representation, whereby you vote for party-approved lists of candidates, rather than single candidates. The more votes a list receives, the more candidates the party gets elected. This in itself is not bad, but in a very uninformed society like Argentina's, it means most people don't know who they're voting for, beyond the first candidate in the list, who's usually chosen to be as charismatic and well-known a character as possible. Most of our current representatives never have to do any campaigning besides standing next to the "poster guy", and get elected merely because they've secured (by whatever means) a place in the list.

Compounding this, there's another problem with the system: we use paper ballots as a universal means of vote, and each party or coalition is in charge of printing and supplying the public with their ballots. When you go to vote, you're let into a cuarto oscuro (literally, a "dark room", though of course it's not dark) where you face dozens of piles of ballots, each with different logos, party symbols, colors, etc. The ballots for each party have the party name and the first candidate in the list printed in large type; the second and maybe the third and fourth candidates in the list are printed somewhat smaller, and the rest are in normal type. There's nothing to stop the sensible, concerned citizen from reading and assessing the whole list, but as I said, Argentina's political culture is very primitive, so most people only know the first candidate and will vote for him or her without paying attention to the rest of the bandwagon, or simply look for the party name among the ballots and put that into the envelope.

The different ballots thing also enables a whole host of fraudulent activities. For example, pseudo-parties created with the sole purpose of having an extra ballot in the "dark room" and confuse the voters, either by closely mimicking the name and typography chosen by another party, or by suggesting there are alternatives where there aren't (in this case the pseudo-party might be a "mirror" of another party — different name, same candidates). There are (in)famous cases of parties registered only to have a first candidate with a last name very similar to a major candidate of another party.

The state must pay for the ballots so each party has an opportunity to participate even if it doesn't have a lot of contributors. In every election, many little parties pop into existence, ask the state for money to print their ballots, and vanish. Control is absent.

If the ballots for a party run out, they have to be replenished by the delegates of the party present in the election table. If the party couldn't provide a delegate, the ballots won't be replenished and some people might have to go without voting for the party they had in mind. So it's a very common practice in some areas for voters to be sent into the voting rooms to steal or ruin other party's ballots. People can be also sent in to plant fake ballots for a competing party, differring from the real ones by minor details that won't be noticed by the voters, but will be cause for voiding them afterwards, during the count.

It's quite clear these problems exist and could be easily solved by printing a single standard ballot, with the names of all the candidates in it, and having the voters mark them with a pen, as is done in other countries. It's also very clear why this hasn't been done — the party that most benefits from these tactics is the one in power, and wishes to remain so.

Some other problems with the system derive from the fact that the laws regulating the elections are lax, and moreover, nobody respects them, and the judges are unable or unwilling to do anything about it. But mostly the remaining problem is one of ethics. There's no law forbidding a person from running as candidate to a post he or she will never accept once elected (or will accept only to resign immediately), but in a normal society such dishonest behavior would be punished by public opinion; in Argentina, however, we have "testimonial candidates" at the top of the public's preferences.

The main offender in the ethics field is, no doubt, the Front for Victory, i.e. Kirchnerism. As is regrettably usual in Argentine politics, but taken to the extreme by the ruling couple and their allies, there's a confusion and merging of the conceptual limits of state, government and party. One sees Néstor Kirchner campaigning and can almost forget he's only a candidate in a given district — the full structure of the national government has been put at his disposal (funds, transportation, official coverage, the Cabinet, the President herself), even though it's illegal (and even more so because it's just before an election). We have no president, we have a ruling cabal presided by Néstor Kirchner, and Congress is virtually non-existent.

There are many who still passionately support the Kirchners because of their past achievements regarding human rights, the renewel of the Supreme Court, and the economic recovery, as well as the idea (unfounded in my opinion) that their ethical "rough edges" will be polished in time. Despite the fact that wealth inequality hasn't decreased and that the Kirchners show no sign of changing their friends' capitalism for socialism, many in the left still believe "the model" is an ongoing revolution towards a better country. Others don't have that faith, but refuse to position themselves against the Kirchners because they know the opposition is worse.

Despite all the problems with our system, I still hope we can all change this state of affairs. Right now the battle between Kirchnerism and opposition is a zero-sum game. Maybe after next Sunday, or next year (once the candidates have taken office) the politicians who haven't done anything but fight each other will find a way to discuss and, if necessary, compromise, so we can move on.

Before the elections

2009-06-25T07:32:00.000-03:00

It's only a few days to the legislative election, so this is a brief "state of the campaign" post. I'll refrain from emphasizing the appallingly low level of today's politics, if only because the post would turn into in a long, bitter rant if I tried to convey that.

First, my home district, Santa Fe. Here the senatorial race is the major one, because we have two great contenders: former two-time governor Carlos Reutemann, and Rubén Giustiniani, backed by current governor and former two-time mayor of Rosario Hermes Binner. Both candidates are already senators and both are sure to be reelected; the real issue is, first, who will win (even by one vote), and in a distant second place, which party will get the third senator.

Reutemann is a well-known, wealthy, conservative Peronist who for some reason (certainly not his charisma or his performance when in office) has consistently captured over a third of the vote in every election. Giustiniani is your typically neat low-profile militant of the very moderate (almost European-like) Socialist Party who ran (big mistake!) as candidate for the vice-presidency next to Elisa Carrió in 2007. Reutemann is playing the anti-Kirchnerist card, an attribute he earned by positioning himself against the ruling couple on the issue of Resolution 125, even though he barely did anything but raise his hand on command on all other issues. Since half the population of the province barely knows Giustiniani, until a few months ago Reutemann took his triumph for granted, but since governor Binner stepped into the campaign, Giustiniani has come close to his opponent, to the point that the predicted result is very close to a tie.

The leading candidates for the Chamber of Deputies are almost completely unknown; they're only getting votes because they'll be on the same paper ballot as their respective senators. Ironically, the only candidate everyone knows is the one heading for the distant third place: Agustín Rossi, by now politically disgraced in his own home turf due to his complete, unwavering submission to Néstor Kirchner.

In the Province of Buenos Aires, well... you have a contest of unscrupulous millionaires, a huge, impoverished clientele, well-oiled political machines with their filthy cogs obscenely in view and no-one doing anything about it, the government doing campaign for its party with state funds, the opposition wipping up the visceral hate for the Kirchners of the mostly right-wing citizenry, and no government proposals whatsoever except for "it's us or chaos". It's sleazy. So you'll forgive me if I refuse to take one more step into that crap.

Several problems with this election and with the system in general: first, the ballots printed by each party with their own candidates (instead of a universal ballot where you have to select what you want), which leaves ample space for fraud and many borderline illegal practices; second, the use of (linear) proportional representation in a country like Argentina, with a ridiculously skewered population distribution, which makes it possible for a party to win an election just by concentrating their efforts on a few hundred square kilometers crammed full with very poor, very influentiable people; third, the lack of political awareness of most of the citizens, understandably tired of anything to do with politics, which makes it easy for opportunists to flourish and for the unscrupulous to "disappear in the crowd".

I feel fortunate that I inhabit a district where, at least, the choices are clear-cut and the fight has not turned dirty beyond words. I won't vote for Reutemann, the love child of Carlos Menem and completely deprived of ideas besides his own plans to maintain influence; I won't vote for Rossi, a mouthpiece of the Executive Branch who would bring its own province to its knees to further the Kirchnerist agenda of centralized control; I'll vote for Giustiniani, who has some ideas I like and belongs to a structured political project that's going in the (general) right direction.

Finally back from vacations

2009-06-21T22:22:00.000-03:00

First of all, I'm very sorry! I haven't found the time to update this blog for more than month, including the week I was away on vacation. Secondly, I promise I'll try to post at least once a week, even if it's only a very short post.

I took a lot of pictures (and many many notes) on my trip to and from the Iguassu Falls. For the travel chronicle I posted on Sin calma, I just transcribed the notes, and added some pictures, but even so, it was a lot of work. You'll forgive me I don't translate it all into English here.

It was a packaged tour, unlike all our previous trips: everything (almost) was arranged and paid for in advance. Although both Marisa and I prefer the flexibility of self-made tours and hostel accomodation, for this particular destination, and with these particular time constraints (one week off work and not a single day more), a package was both inexpensive and comfortable.

Of six days, we spent two on the road, with frequent stops. We visited San Ignacio Miní (which I visited a couple of years ago) and the semiprecious stone mines of Wanda (a tourist trap if I ever saw one). Then we crossed into Brazil, where we lodged at a hotel in the city of Foz do Iguaçu. From there we were taken on succesive days to the Argentine and Brazilian sides of the Iguassu River (Iguazú in Argentina, Iguaçu in Brazil) to see the falls from different angles. It wasn't difficult to see why the Iguassu Falls are considered a natural wonder of the world.

Regarding the pictures, for the time being, I'll leave you with a slideshow of the ones I uploaded to Flickr. There are a few of each place we visited. Of course none of the photos of the falls do any justice to their majesty. You just have to be there to appreciate them, and even there it's difficult to take it all in.

Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.

Vacations

2009-05-17T11:55:00.000-03:00

I'm going on vacation to the Iguazú Falls today. Marisa and I will be lodging on the Brazilian city of Foz do Iguaçu, from where we'll the falls from both sides of the border. I'll share the experience when I come back, next Saturday. See you!

Marijuana March 2009 in Rosario

2009-05-04T20:20:00.000-03:00

Last Saturday it was the tenth edition of the Global Marijuana March, and Rosario wouldn't be left out of it, so an event for the legalization of the private use of cannabis was scheduled. Yours truly hasn't even had a tobacco cigarette in his life, but I do support the right of people to smoke whatever they want provided they don't hurt anyone else, so I attended just to see what it was all about.

The meeting place was the spot beside the Planetarium, within the Parque Urquiza, and the time was 3 PM. Marisa and I had a very late lunch, and we couldn't make it until after 4 PM. I had my doubts, because it was supposedly a march, i.e. people would not stay there just waiting for us to come. But there was no march, only fairly scattered groups sitting in the park. Some activists had mounted stands and were giving out pamphlets explaining what marijuana is, the kind of care you must take if you're going to smoke it or eat it, etc.; others asked for the legalization of cultivation for private use and for government-sponsored strategies of damage reduction. A guy walked around disguised as the cannabis plant, in a green foam rubber suit, and people took pictures of themselves with him.

It was sunny and warm, a typical day for this weird autumn. Like ourselves, many had brought thermos and mate, while of course more than a few others were smoking joints. It was all rather calm, with people coming and leaving all the time, while joggers ran and elderly couples strolled by the site, probably curious but not seemingly alarmed. We stayed until our mate ran out, then left for a walk down the coast.

Anything to do with cannabis is illegal in Argentina, which seems rather stupid. As in many other places, the victims are the consumers: if they're caught, they're subject to all-too-frequent police abuse, and if they become addicted, they get treated like criminals. Lots of people sell, buy and smoke marijuana in bars and discos, and the law against it only serves to set up a bribe system benefitting the police and the authorities. Of course, the ones who make money selling bad-quality drugs to the poor are elsewhere.

Banning the possession of marijuana for private use has been deemed unconstitutional several times (per Article 19 of the Constitution, such things are "exempt from the authority of magistrates"). The Supreme Court is currently withholding its position, but it seems the majority wants the repressive law to be repealed.

Testimonial candidates, or, lying for Kirchner

2009-04-29T10:47:00.009-03:00

In the past, people voted for parties. But the candidates were important. They were expected to support the party platform, but also to do things independently, since a party's legislative bloc is not a committee. Otherwise it would be simpler to choose one representative per party and give each a certain number of beans to represent their voting power.

When Resolution 125 was killed in the Senate, the Kirchners realized that legislators were not beans they could count and hold in their hands. But Cristina and Néstor still need their beans. Now they're dangerously close to losing the majority, they'll do anything to retain it, including the latest fad: "testimonial" candidates.

Testimonial candidates are the quintessential beans. They're not even expected to get elected and then vote as the party leader tells them: their only function is to bring in votes. They're expected to resign without even taking office and leave their place to their stand-ins and to the next ones in the list. This is so because testimonial candidates must perforce be highly visible characters with political influence, and these are already taken up, mostly at executive positions, so they're not to be "wasted" as mere beans.

A few weeks ago, Néstor Kirchner told a number of loyal governors and mayors of the Buenos Aires metropolitan area to run for legislative posts, with the understanding that they'd have to campaign and let their valuable names be placed in big bold letters at the top of ballots, but nothing else. They are to (unofficially) take a couple of months off from their government obligations and just get elected. Most of the mayors accepted to run for the post of city council member. Some said they wouldn't, but offered to put their spouses or children on the lists instead (that's advertising by association for you); after all it's not as if beans must know what to do once elected, except raise their hands at the appropriate moments. The governors weren't so obedient, but Daniel Scioli, the governor of Buenos Aires, the largest and wealthiest province of Argentina, complied. He's now the best known of testimonial candidates.

Why "testimonial"? Well, the Kirchners believe (or want us to believe — it's not clear) that they're leading a movement based on a certain "model". El modelo is said to stand for a lot of very nice things, like wealth redistribution and social justice. It's like Christian salvation. Like religious believers, the governors and mayors are being told to testify. Their contribution to "the model" is to be where the leader tells them to, defending the bean count (i.e. the legislative majority). There's no need for them to take office; once the beans are in place, it doesn't matter who they are; in fact, it's better if they're not well-known, politically experienced people, as these tend to become ambitious on their own. The testimonial candidates just stand there saying "I support this model".

Whether this insulting farce will work or not, we'll see after June 28.

Interviewed!

2009-04-26T13:21:00.000-03:00

Last Saturday I was interviewed by Vicky Baker, a British journalist currently residing in Buenos Aires and working on a tourist book. She's been in Argentina for several months now, and this is her fourth or fifth time in the country, but she'd never been to Rosario, so she wanted to meet me and have a chat about the city's "gems" as she called them — from restaurants and bars to nightlife to interesting local tales.

We arranged to meet at the famed El Cairo, the bar where Roberto Fontanorrosa used to gather with his friends for years. I'd been to my first Mate&Blogs meeting with Marisa, so after we finished there, we headed for the bar with a bunch of bloggers on our tail. When Vicky arrived Marisa and I found an extra chair for her and talked for an hour and a half; then we walked with her down to the river and along the Parque España, and finally let her go. I hope what we told her will be useful for her research; she has to fill 400 pages of Argentina!

Uruguay 2009, part 16: This is the end, my friends

2009-04-06T19:03:00.001-03:00

Available in Spanish: Final final

This is the last post about my Uruguay vacations. I'll make it short because it's been a month and a half since I got back and other things are happening in real life.

As I explained before, there were no Paysandú-Colón-Rosario bus combinations at convenient times. Surprisingly for neighbouring frontier towns (one of which is the second city in its country), there aren't frequent bus routes; maybe the people who move between them are few and/or they do it by car.

That being not our case, we had to get up early and take a stroll with our backpacks up to the Paysandú bus terminal. The bus departed on time, but when we reached the international bridge we had to wait more than half an hour for some guy to take a few glances at each of us as he counted our heads, and for the migrations and customs officers to check our identity papers.

Drawing up a comparison with the more finicky but also much more efficient bureaucracy between Buenos Aires and Colonia, I couldn't help but conclude that it all comes down to money: if you travel on the Buquebús, you're served by shirt-and-tie, smiling employees who try to make things easy for you so nobody gets delayed; if you travel by bus, your time is worthless and the customs staff will waste it as they see fit.

We finally got to Colón and, of course, the bus for Rosario had gone twenty minutes ago. It was 9:30 and we'd have to wait for the next one... departing some time after 2 PM. The ghost of Valle Edén's nightmare reared its head, but in the end it wasn't such a big deal: Colón's bus terminal was relatively cool, there were toilets, a bar, and benches. In a languid state we let the hours go by, and weren't totally fed up by the time our transportation arrived.

We crossed Entre Ríos from east to west — a geographical ode to boredom — until we reached Victoria. Then a leap of six hundred metres over the Paraná, and we were in Rosario, some five hours after leaving Colón, and almost ten after departing from Paysandú. It was still day. My mother and my brother had come to welcome us back. As if trying to forget that this was the end of our vacations, we said goodbye quickly, quickly, and went away, each of us following their own path.

And thus is finished the story of our travels in Uruguay.

Uruguay 2009, part 15: Paysandú

2009-04-04T11:00:00.000-03:00

Available in Spanish: Paysandú

Paysandú's basilica

After the evening deluge, Tacuarembó felt much cooler, but we didn't have the chance to take a last look at it, since our bus to Paysandú was scheduled very early. While it was still dark, we phoned a taxi from the hotel, and twenty minutes later we were already on our way west — and asleep.

Three hours later we woke up in Paysandú, Uruguay's second city, department capital, port on the Uruguay River, and border town. It was a sunny, windy, nice morning. It took us almost no effort to locate the address of our lodging place, a big single-story house turned hotel, opposite the main square and not far from the bus terminal. If as the beach rhythm grew farther away and our "big city people" habits returned, this was a step in the right direction — we had a room where five people would've fit, a large bathroom, and even a little patio.

I'd been to Paysandú, briefly, years ago (on an afternoon escapade) but I didn't remember much of it, so we'll have to go over it. In order to do that, however, we were first in need of breakfast, which we'd been unable to have before leaving Tacuarembó. We found a bar (it was called "El Bar") and we asked for white coffee and medialunas. Now I saw that the menu listed both medialunas and croissants, and the latter were much cheaper; the waiter gave us a weird look when we ordered medialunas "with nothing" (he checked), and my suspicions were confirmed when he brought us two huge crescent-shaped pieces of pastry, of the same kind (but double the size) of what's known in Argentina as medialuna — they were the kind we'd seen used for sandwiches in supermarkets throughout Uruguay. Nobody asks for "croissants" in Argentina; we just have medialunas.

After such copious breakfast (which, I'll hasten to add, didn't prompt any protests on our part) we went on a tour of the nearby touristic spots: the basilica church, rather modest from the outside but quite nice inside, and with a large bronze bell dated 1689 exhibited near the front door; the small museum honouring Leandro Gómez, the brave (and suicidal) defender of Paysandú during the siege of eighteen-twentysomething, at the main square; and the municipal history museum, with a diorama showing the area of the ancient battle where Gómez fell before my supposed far-removed relative, General Venancio Flores, with the help of Brazilians, on his way to conquer Montevideo.

We had some light thing for lunch in the hotel, and took a nap. Then we went to the bus terminal to buy our tickets in advance. I had the slightest hope that we might be able to get a direct ticket to Rosario, or an acceptable combination, but there was no such thing. The bus leaving Paysandú for Colón (Entre Ríos) reaches its destination, provided there are no delays, at exactly the same time as another bus leaves Colón for Rosario. And of course, there are always delays.

We still had the afternoon. Since the weather was fine, we decided to walk: map in hand, we went from one square to the next, we passed by the old train station, and we reached the river. We wandered along the coast. The port, which I had known in a state of abandon and open to the curious visitor, had been reactivated and now rejected us with fences and guards. The spot indicated in the map as a prime place to watch the river was also closed. We went on until we found a small beach, and there we sat down to rest, looking at a few children who played in the water, against the light of the sun near the horizon. We felt the weight of accumulated fatigue and didn't want to go back.

Marisa wanted to phone home to let her parents know about our return time, but we couldn't find a single public phone available at that time. The evening had arrived suddenly and Paysandú had shut off. My legs were wobbling from tiredness. At that moment Marisa realized she'd kept a whole lot of Uruguayan pesos... It was pointless, of course, to look for an exchange. So we made an opportunity out of it, and decided to spend that money on dinner as we hadn't had during the whole trip, a copious, hot, well-made restaurant dinner.

And that's how we said goodbye to Paysandú.

To be continued...

Uruguay 2009, part 14: Valle Edén

2009-04-02T11:17:00.000-03:00

Available in Spanish: Valle Edén

On the day after our arrival, Tacuarembó continued to feel asphyxiatingly hot and humid. We woke up deliciously later that many other days, with no appointments for the morning, and once in the street we walked with resignation following the shaded parts of the sidewalk.

There are two museums in Tacuarembó: the Historical and the Geoscience Museum. None of them is notable, but they were OK for a brief visit. None had air conditioning. The lady who sat (in supreme boredom) at the reception of the Geoscience Museum made a note out of that, while she guided us around a room where labels made her explanations wholly unnecessary.

Near noon we headed for the bus terminal to wait for the bus that would take us to Valle Edén, 23 km from Tacuarembó, a recommended touristic spot which promised lots of green, water and cool, besides being the seat of the Carlos Gardel Museum. Said museum showcases abundant proofs that Gardel, the most famous of all tango singers, was born in Tacuarembó, the bastard son of a promiscuous military man, and not in France... although those proofs are only considered clearly true by the people of Tacuarembó.

The bus came on time, and after about 40 minutes it left us at the entrance to Valle Edén, under a sky pouring sunlight on us. First mistake: the museum is one kilometre from the entrance; if we'd asked for it the bus would've taken us closer. The walk we had to endure was the first step of the realization of what would become painfully obvious later: that Valle Edén was not a summer paradise, unless you have a fast means of transportation (and with A/C).

The museum was an oasis of coolness, a house with lots of pictures and copies of historical documents about Carlos Gardel, and tango in the background. We tarried there, on my part without any interest in the hellish outside. Once the tour was over, we sat down to have lunch beside the museum, under some trees. We visited what's left of the Valle Edén train station, where a couple of locomotives are abandoned, giving the visitor a false sense of security (a train came by at full speed a while later). Then, map in hand, I went and inquired about the paths to take in order to reach the curiously named places noted as attractions.

There's nothing, nothing in Valle Edén that is close to anything else. The nearest touristic spot was about 7 km from us, maybe feasible for people in better shape or in more moderate temperatures, but not for us two. We didn't recoil from the challenge, though. Following the directions given to me by a local guide, we started walking toward the Gruta de los Chivos (Goats' Cave), but soon we realized that either the map or the guide's tips, or most likely both, bore no relationship to reality. We went back to the starting point, beside a rocky stream, shallow and full of green mud (described in the touristic brochure as having "crystal-clear waters") and near a suspended bridge (which we dared not climb).

By then it was clear the one good idea I had when we decided to try Valle Edén was insisting that we take two litres of cold water with us, despite its weight and the fact that it meant forfeiting our afternoon mate. There's no need, I guess, to note that anyway drinking hot mate at 40 °C was not a priority. We were sweating just by sitting down. And sitting we would have to stay, because the only bus back to Tacuarembó would come after 7 PM. And it was 2.

Faced with the prospect of a five-hour wait in that open-air sauna (which was mercifully getting cloudy), we exhausted all conversation topics, including how the hell we'd gotten there and why the guy at Tourist Info didn't explicitly tell us not to go. It was truly very very hot (I can't help repeating that) and we had to be careful with our water.

For a good while we considered going up to the road and hitchhike. But we hadn't seen any hitchhiking in Uruguay, least of all in Tacuarembó. Maybe it wasn't customary, maybe here in the deep interior of the country nobody had that custom. The road didn't look very crowded to us. And beside the road there wouldn't be a lot of convenient waiting places in the shade. We decided against hitchhiking. What to do then?

I'd brought a book, mostly because I had a lot of room in my backpack, thinking maybe we'd lie down in the cool grass in that paradise which Valle Edén had promised to be. I took the book out and started reading, but right away I realized that Marisa, who hadn't brought her own book, would get even more bored watching me read. So I asked her if she wanted me to read aloud. And that was, I think, the second good idea I had in Tacuarembó. The book was Desert Memories, by Ariel Dorfman, an Argentine-born Chilean exilee settled in the United States, and it was about his trip in the north of Chile for a close-up investigation of the history of the towns that sprang up in the late 19th century and early 20th beside the saltpeter mines. Not only was it entertaining and moving, but ideal for travelers like us, ideal to forget the heavy heat, to spend the hours, to stop after a couple of paragraphs and chat and discuss.

At one point when the time to return was still far away and not even the book or the conversations it prompted were enough anymore to keep us calm, we rose and went towards the road. We'd escaped from the dead hours and from our own tempers and we even had some water left, which we now took in little sips. The weather was better as well: the sky was gray and gusts of promising cool wind blew. I started to fear a storm would fall upon us.

At about 6:30 the bus came by, headed for Tambores, the end of its route, from where it would have to return and fetch us. From that moment on the wait became easier. One hour later we saw the same bus come towards us, we signaled it, got in and sat down, so happy.

With almost chronometric precision, it started to rain as soon as we neared Tacuarembó. We had no food for the night, and I had to phone a woman in Paysandú to confirm our reservation for the next day. We ran along the streets; sweating from the day and wet from the rain we went to a supermarket to buy some stuff, and managed to find a public phone. The whole night was a deluge, and thus the coolness we'd wished for the whole day finally came.

To be continued...

Uruguay 2009, part 13: Tacuarembó

2009-04-01T08:29:00.001-03:00

Available in Spanish: Conociendo Tacuarembó

Church of St. Fructuoso, Tacuarembó

How did it cross our minds to go to Tacuarembó, in the depths of Uruguay, closer to the south of Brazil than to the Atlantic coast? It was a purely geographical matter: the goal was not to stay all the time in the coast, and not to return the same way we had come. Tacuarembó isn't a place of international tourist attractions, unless you're a true fan of Carlos Gardel (I'll explain that in due time).

Anyway, Uruguay suffers from the same type of macrocephalic disorder as Argentina, only even more pronounced; if Buenos Aires and its metropolitan area hold between one third and one fourth of the Argentine population, half of the Uruguayan population (which is only one tenth of that of Argentina) is concentrated on the Montevideo Department. That is to say that all roads lead to Montevideo. Or, to make a long story short, there's no direct route from Rocha to Tacuarembó. The traveller who wants to reach the gaucho heart of the country has no other recourse but to go first west-southwest to Montevideo and then wait for another bus to take him north-northeast to Tacuarembó. You go to a place 365 km away (as the crow flies) but you have to travel some 560 km, including a few tens of kilometres going on the opposite direction as the one desired.

So despite our intentions we did go back on our steps, although our stay in Montevideo was much shorter; by a fortunate coincidence, the bus that took us away from a cool night in La Pedrera at 6:30 left us in Tres Cruces, Montevideo, four hours later, and less than an hour before the departure of the bus to Tacuarembó.

The trip was rather long: about five hours (that's long for Uruguayan standards). Half asleep, we entered a flat, green country of scattered cows and sheep. Map in hand, but with no real knowledge of actual geography, I tried to guess at and remember the names of towns and cities we were passing by. I knew we were going to cross several department capitals and a great river... We got to Durazno (what a beautiful name, I thought¹) and then, much later, when I'd started to lose hope of seeing running water ever again, I saw a bridge, a watery expanse, and bam, in a matter of seconds we'd crossed over a blue river, its banks lined with trees, and there waving at us was a huge yellow sign with the black silhouette of a bull, the mark of the most famous of tonic waters in both our countries (when I was little I believed "tonic water" was just a non-commercial way of saying Paso de los Toros).² Of course, of said tonic water only the brand is left, acquired by a multinational consortium which surely claims to be making it "with the same coolness as ever", or something like that.

¹ Durazno means "peach".
² Paso de los Toros is the second city of Tacuarembó Department. Its name means "bulls' crossing", referring to the ford on the Río Negro beside which the city is located. It's also the brand name of a soft drink originally made there and still sold widely in Uruguay and Argentina.

Coming to Tacuarembó and getting off the bus was literally a thermal shock. From the marine coolness and the Montevidean air conditioning we had emerged directly into the subtropical weather of a land-locked city. And it was 4 PM, and in the Tacuarembó bus terminal there was no A/C. We went to the tourist office, where we were informed that touristic spots in Tacuarembó are located outside the city and in no way made easily accessible to visitors by bus.

Unraveled and sticky, we marched, backpacks over our shoulders, into the city center and towards our hotel, which turned out to be a curious but eventually satisfactory mix between disarray and amplitude. After the almost forgotten days in the confusing barracks that was the hostel of La Paloma, and the couple of days in the cozy but too little room in La Pedrera, with its doorless bathroom, this was paradise. We had a shower and, braving the awful heat outside, we went out for a walk.

Laguna de las Lavanderas (Lavenders' Lagoon)

Multicolour bridge

Tacuarembó is a village — a village of fifty-odd thousand, scattered, but a little town anyway, with summer afternoons empty until sunset, lots of young guys in motorbikes, a big square in the middle, a main street on each side of the square and a church just over there. If even walking in the shade hadn't been exhausting, I'm sure we could've enjoyed it more. As things went, there wasn't much to see, so we took the road towards the only tourist attraction we could reach on foot, the Lavenders' Lagoon (Laguna de las Lavanderas).

Even if a picture is worth a thousand words, one has to note that those words can be lies. The postcard images of the Lavenders' Lagoon showed a beautiful watery mirror surrounded by greenery and shade; only by coming close you would notice that the calm water was in fact stagnant. There was indeed much life and green stuff there, but it felt yucky just thinking of touching the water with the tip of a toe.

We fled, therefore, and back in the city, after crossing a bridge painted in bright, desaturated colours (the multicolour logo of the Municipality of Tacuarembó), we got into a cybercafé, and after that we went looking for a place to eat. We shared a huge sandwich and a beer in a bar, sitting next to two young foreign tourists of Anglo-Saxon speech habits and backpacker looks, who for some strange reason (such is the way of globalization) had ended up in this same little corner of the planet as us.

We were in front of the main square, which was filling up, and beside the main street, buzzing with little motorbikes and scooters. I'm emphasizing the bikes because it seems to be a common feature of middle-sized towns where public transport is scarce or nonexistent; in Chilecito, La Rioja, we'd observed that each and every youth seemed to have a motorbike, small or big, old or new, but always a means of transportation for their own use, relatively small and inexpensive, so as to be free from the alternative of a long, slow walk vs. an expensive taxi.

In Tacuarembó, of course, the boys came in motorbikes or bicycles carrying their thermos and mate, showing a kind of manual dexterity I couldn't hope to imitate; they parked at the square, turned on their music, chatted and drank mate. None or almost none of beer or wine or alcoholic drinks, which in Argentina and in squares and in every public place where young people gather tend to mix and turn inevitably into insolence and violence. It was still early, sure, but these guys seemed to be ready to stay, and neither boys nor girls looked any less happy or entertained than their Argentine counterparts, who (rather sadly) claim or assume they need some alcohol blood content to have fun.

These observations having been made, and with a few good, cold glasses of beer in our bloodstream, we wrapped up dinner and went back to the hotel to have some rest.

To be continued...

Uruguay 2009, part 12: Cabo Polonio

2009-03-29T18:56:00.000-03:00

Available in Spanish: Cabo Polonio

Cabo Polonio is a projection of land that enters the sea, surrounded and almost completely covered by huge dunes. A few years ago it was rather difficult to reach. Today you still have to get off your bus or car, get into a large off-road vehicle, and shake around at low speed for half an hour along a sandy path. The difference is that before (I'm told) there was only one big four-wheel drive truck which departed from the middle of nowhere and came to what was then a fishermen's village without drinking water or electric power, occasionally inhabited by hippies and other adventurous types; while now there's a whole fleet, a small emporium of vehicles, on an open space with ticket vending booths and public restrooms, and at the end of the road the little village has turned into a still picturesque and rustic but also populous place, with decent lodgings and even a seafood restaurant.

The day was splendid, threatening none of those clouds or those cold winds that had been visited upon us on previous occasions. We took the bus headed for Barra de Valizas and left it a few kilometers before that; there we boarded our 4x4 truck, named El Mamut (the Mammoth), together with a couple dozens of people, and slightly compressed atop its bulge we went down the sandy, wavy road, until we were able to see, far off in the distance, some dunes and a beach of uniform colour, some scattered houses, a turquoise-blue sea. The Mammoth drove along the shoreline for a while, turned left, and let us go in a place no different from any other.

We daubbed ourselves on sunblock (which in the long run would turn out insufficient) and a few steps from there we sat down to eat our sandwich lunch. Even without much wind, the sea looked fabulous; in the distance I thought I saw some surfers. Off the beach you could see some islets with little dark spots on the bare, glittering, surf-beaten rocks: seawolves, aparently gathering just to be together and bask in the sun all day. Beyond, on our side of the coast, there were more rocks and a lighthouse. We headed for it to try and down our meal.

On our way we found a corner where the rocky floor went down up to the sea, and a fenced-out area. A few metres away, some twenty sea lions,* black and brown, glistening with salty waterdrops, were dozing off. You couldn't really say they were active animals in any sense. One that looked like a maned male emitted faint bellows while it lifted itself on its forefins, and somewhat apart a pup scratched itself, oblivious to the rest of the world.

* I don't know if this is the proper terminology. In Spanish these are lobos marinos ("sea wolves") rather than leones marinos ("sea lions"), but the names are often mixed up in actual usage. In any case the ones in Cabo Polonio must be South American Sea Lions, Otaria flavescens.

We retraced our steps up the rocks and went to the lighthouse. The climb left us breathless (120 steps!) but the effort was rewarded: from up there our eyes could span not only the ocean and the two islands full of sea lions, but the whole cape, with beaches on both sides and the immense, saffron-yellow dunes in the distance. (I assembled a panoramic picture there which soon, I expect, will be hanging in my room's wall in its full 5-foot-wide glory.)

The sea was inviting. We'd had enough of walking and climbing stairs. We rushed into the beach, towards a place with fewer people around, and went into the water. (As in other occasions, I stayed there much longer than Marisa and went back several times. It was by far the best beach we'd experienced during the whole trip.)

Sunset was upon us. The distant beach was becoming empty and promised peace and a glorious view for meditation. We set ourselves into motion again, the sun burning us from the side, and soon reached the point where the dunes come a few steps close to the sea and there are just lonely beachgoers looking for silence stay. I climbed a dune and looked around. It would've been easy to go down the other slope and climb again and get lost in this fine, hot sand, but I had to hurry back to the beach, where Marisa was waiting, taking those typical I'm-at-the-top-of-the-world tourist-waving-from-afar pictures.

We'd gone towards an end of the cape, which looked far away but not impossibly so, and we hadn't even gotten half-way there, and the lighthouse and the village houses were barely visible already. It wasn't too late, but it wasn't a good idea to wait. When, half an hour later, we rode back on one of the Mammoth's companions and then had to wait for our bus 45 minutes beside the road, we resented not having used up to our last minute in Cabo Polonio; but such is the cruel fate of the tourist who depends on his feet and on other people's means of transportation.

Exhausted on our return, we somehow dragged ourselves to a supermarket and bought mosquito repellent and a quick dinner before falling into deep sleep. There were to be no more beaches for us. Our tired eyes tired and our deep-tanned skins were saying goodbye to the coasts of Uruguay; the next day, before the sun was out, we'd be on our way to Montevideo.

To be continued...

Uruguay 2009, part 11: La Pedrera

2009-03-26T12:12:00.008-03:00

The day we arrived in La Pedrera marked one week of our journey, and like many other times before and after, it felt incredible to me that so much could have happened in such a short time.

We had already called Janneo, the owner of our hostel in La Pedrera, to reassure him and promise, swear that we wouldn't fail him. Even then he hadn't felt extremely sure, and when we came into his front yard, almost at noon, he greeted us with genuine joy and noticeable relief, and proceeded to make us comfortable in our room at once. It was good to finally have a place for ourselves, with a private bathroom where you didn't have to wait on a queue to take a shower or pray for hot water to come out, and without other people's luggage scattered on the floor.

The room itself was little (the bed took up most of it), but well-lit, painted white, with an immaculately clean bathroom (separated from the rest only by a translucent curtain). Its sliding window was also its entrance.

Breakfast wasn't provided, and there was no kitchen available either, which somehow stretched the definition of a hostel and made the price less acceptable; but after three days of living in a tight space, it was paradise. We went out, therefore, to look for lunch, and since we were in good spirits, we splashed out: we sat at the table of a nice little restaurant, beside the main street (filled with sun and sand) and had a good meal with a cold beer.

If La Paloma can be termed a city, La Pedrera is definitely what you'd call a little town. The only paved street is the main one, which leads straight to the sea, which anyway isn't far from anywhere, in one direction or another.

Marisa had a vague reminiscence of the place from a visit long ago. It had changed only a bit; many luxurious homes had sprouted near the coast, there were certain facilities on the previously empty beach, and the visitors weren't all adventurous youth but also elderly people and families, including a good proportion of Argentinians. On both sides of the main street, populated by trucks and full of beach-goers, there were bars, restaurants, bakeries and takeaway food stores, besides a couple of little supermarkets and a few artisans' spots.

After downing our food as best we could, we went down to the sea. Again we had to endure wind and clouds. My secret hope of witnessing a storm over the sea, however, wasn't fulfilled.

We stayed for a long while, until it started getting uncomfortably cool. We returned to the hostel, had a hot shower to rid ourselves of the cold, the sand and the tiredness, and went out again to fetch dinner. We had empanadas. Marisa, evidently not in her highest moment regarding food, almost couldn't sleep. I didn't do that well either, since (as in Montevideo) mosquitoes attacked.

While we were in La Paloma he'd been unable to arrange a trip to Cabo Polonio, and here in La Pedrera we were all set to go the next day. Nice trip, I thought — me without sleep, and Marisa with her stomach turned into a knot... But finally our tiredness got the best of us both, and when we woke up, with the whole town still drowned in the silence and coolness of morning, we managed to get started with the help of coffee and tea, served in a baker's shop which was evidently used to early birds.

We only had one more beach day ahead...

To be continued...

Uruguay 2009, part 10: The Fortress and National Park of Santa Teresa

2009-03-24T07:52:00.000-03:00

Available in Spanish: Fortaleza y parque de Santa Teresa

The Fortress of Santa Teresa is near the coast of the Atlantic. Its construction began in 1762, by the Portuguese. The Spaniards came, took over it, and finished it. After undergoing wars and conflicts of all kinds, it was abandoned and got deteriorated seriously. In 1928 an archaelogist took upon himself the task of rebuilding it, and that's why it's still there in our time. Today it's a museum and it marks the entrance of the Santa Teresa National Park.

That day, at mid-morning, we left the La Paloma bus terminal without a clear idea of what the place was like that we were about to visit, and thinking maybe we could step by nearby Punta del Diablo on our way back. The bus we were on finished its route in Chuy, on the frontier with Brazil, and entered each and every city and town in the way, so the trip took twice the time it should have.

As soon as we saw the Fortress we (hastily) got off the bus. Right away we realized it hadn't been a good idea, as the bus went on its way toward the interior of the National Park, leaving us under the sun falling vertically on us. There was none of the sea breeze that had been with us on other occasions, and to top it off, the stone walls of the Fortress showed no opening, or at least an overhang. So that we could postpone a walk that promised to be extremely hot, and also to avoid food poisoning later, we took out our ham-and-cheese sandwiches and ate, sitting on a rock carefully chosen so that the nearest wall provided shade (not much of it).

It turned out, when we went around the Fortress, that the entrance gate was on the other side. Once inside we found shade and cool in the great stone halls that were used, long ago, to house soldiers and officers, to prepare their meals, to pray and hear Mass, to repair weapons, to shoe horses, and to store ammunition. There were, as is usual, ancient and modern weapons in heterogeneous sets, cannonballs, ordinary objects rescued from the past, old flags and banners, uniforms, a chapel with a tearful Virgin Mary, and even a latrine room.

The contrast between the inside of these dark chambers, with walls one metre thick, and the sweltering outside, was terrible. From the Fortress's watchtowers you could feel some breeze, but that was all. As my mood was getting rather nasty (this I believed I noticed myself, and Marisa confirmed it), we wrapped up our visit and went down to the beach, across the park's camping site; on our way we bought return bus tickets, so we'd be sure to have seats.

As soon as I saw the sea my fastidiousness disappeared. The heat didn't matter anymore. In fact, it was a blessing, encouraging me to get right into the water and enjoy it. The problem was the wind... again the wind. At one point the fine, almost colourless sand, started flying around and stinging our legs. Our things (clothes, towel, camera...) were being covered in sand. A few steps from us, the wind grabbed an umbrella and sent it tumbling away to an amazing distance, followed closely by its owner.

But the waves were fabulous, the beach was wide and quiet, and in the water the wind and the sand didn't exist.

I had to concede in the end. We took the sand off our stuff and retreated. On a bend in the road we had some late mate (which had been impossible before, with so much sand flying around), and then we went into the heart of the park.

The park is quite large... not huge, but rather large for a casual walk. There were a lot of tall palm trees, those stereotypical palm trees with smallish leaves all bunched up at the top, but also leafy trees and lots of flowers and bushes. Where one would've expected park rangers or guides there were five individuals who, on seeing our approach, seemed to wage a short silent battle of mutual glances to decide which one of them would move and speak to us. We were given a map and at the same time the advice not to pay attention to it. We walked on, therefore, following verbal directions, among gigantic trees with a smooth, hard, plastic-looking, lustrous bark, and accompanied by the squeaks and cries of an immense crowd of parakeets.

Thus we came to the Pajarera. Despite its name, suggesting a bird cage, it had not only birds (of various species, from chickens to a tucan) but also monkeys and rabbits, along with a couple of cats which apparently were part of the staff; they let visitors call and pet them, and from time to time they sat down and looked intently (as if in a trance) into the cages of the smaller birds.

Nearby there was a small lagoon, with palm trees on one side and a kind of wooden balcony or pier on the other. In the lagoon there were ducks, and under the balcony, hidden among the grass and the mud of the shore, an otter. A group of kids, delighted at the sight of such a rare animal, debated whether it was a giant rat, a kind of hamster or a carpincho.

The time to go back was nearing, so we had to forfeit the chance of watching the sunset in the park. Clearly we should've gone there first, into the green and the shade, and then to the Fortress, but that's how it went, and it was a good day. It was the third in La Paloma, and the last night of our stay there. Next stop: La Pedrera.

To be continued...

Uruguay 2009, part 9: Bird watching in La Paloma

2009-03-22T13:49:00.001-03:00

Available in Spanish: Avistamiento de aves en La Paloma

Our second day in La Paloma began early. Having gone to bed so tired the night before, sleep came so fast and overwhelming that despite the crowded room and the thin mattress, when I woke up I found out I hadn't moved from my original position, nor had I dreamed (that I could remember), and I hadn't even woken up once and taken a look in the darkness as I often do.

Green-barred Woodpecker

Campo Flicker

White heron

American Oystercatcher

The morning air felt fresh and stimulating, and there was quite a lot of light. I took a peek and found out Marisa wasn't there. It was no more than 7:30, and though I tend to wake up early because of my work, she most definitely doesn't; maybe she'd gone to the bathroom? I got out, trying not to step on anything or anybody. Marisa was on the hammock, reading under the vine, in the almost completely silent patio (the water of the fountain in the other patio could be heard).

The hostel was evidently not a place for early risers, and breakfast was served at nine o'clock, so we decided to kill time walking around. It felt like an autumn morning, but it was green and bright and without a trace of the mist and the grayness we associate with that season. We came back to the hostel in time to sit down by an outside table, with white coffee and a pile of toast and biscuits with jam.

After this copious feeding, with our faithful map in hand, we headed for the port zone and its breakwater, so we could be surrounded by sea. On our way there we passed by a naval base, around which lots of birds were doing their things: our familiar teros (Southern Lapwings), and others I didn't recognize. I chased them, zoom maxed out, while Marisa waited patiently. In the end I managed to take one acceptable picture of (what I later found out to be) a Green-barred Woodpecker and a Campo Flicker. I honestly thought that woodpeckers were all little birds with a red crest that lived all the time clutching a tree trunk and drilling holes in it, but as it turned out, these ones prefer the grass.

The breakwater was narrow and long. On the side of the port (a haven, actually) a large group of sea birds took to the air as we got 200 meters from them. On the calm water there were some birds with a little crest and a long reddish neck. Unknown to me at the time, they turned out to be Great Grebes with breeding plumage. On the side of the sea, right on a group of nearby rocks, there were the ever-present biguás (Neotropic Cormorants) by the dozens, as usual happily taking in the sun, along with a few little white herons, a couple of oystercatchers (small, with long, flaming red-orange beaks), and Kelp Gulls (white, with yellow bill and legs, and black wings with a white border).

This ornithological feast didn't keep the sun from going up and up. We left the coast and went to see the old train station on our way back. There we noticed there's a tremendous difference between a sunny midday in the cool breeze from the sea and the same time of day with no wind or shade even among the trees. I don't remember what we had for lunch, but I know after the long walk in the sun I wanted to take a nap. Marisa declared she had no intention to sleep, and went away with her book to read in the hammock; as expected, when I went to the patio to fetch her, one and a half hour later, she was sound asleep.

The afternoon sky was starting to get cloudy. We'd planned to go to the other beach, the one we hadn't visited before, called La Aguada, crossing a little woods (there's a camping site inside), and then have some mate beside the sea, as the weather it was noticeably getting cooler. After just a moment there we realized we wouldn't be able to pour even one mate, since the wind was blowing so strong that sand was flying, prickling our faces, and we were barely able to keep our eyes open. We retreated into the woods. Even among the tall trees it took us a while to find a calm spot for our picnic.

I'd been concerned about getting lodging in La Pedrera (especially after I saw the conditions of our accommodation in La Paloma), and I'd located a place that seemed OK. So when we got back, we went to a public phone and I called. The owner of this place, the only one we could conceivably get a room at, would not settle the deal: yes, he had room, a double room, and he would have room for us two days from now, but as for assuring us of it, he'd rather not, he couldn't, but if I insisted, well, I should go and see and he would see if he had that room... and so on. This indecission was all the more worrying because La Pedrera isn't exactly full of cheap lodgings, least of all available on high tourist season. I promised the man I'd call him back the next day to assure him (once again) that we'd be there.

We grabbed some warm clothes (it was a bit cold already), and we went (for the second time) to the artisans' fair in front of the hostel. If in Argentina good crafts tend to be a little expensive for the casual passer-by, they were very expensive here, so we only got ourselves a couple of carved mate gourds.

The next day we had already planned a tour outside La Paloma, to the famous (but only vaguely portrayed in the brochures) Fortress of Santa Teresa.

To be continued...

Uruguay 2009, part 8: Arrival in La Paloma

2009-03-04T07:45:00.000-02:00

Disponible en español: Llegada a La Paloma

On the morning of February 4 we said goodbye to the Montevidean hostel that had given us lodging for three nights, to the streets of the Old Town and to the expansive capital metropolis. The trip that followed lasted too much and, to my disappointment, we barely got to see the sea at any point. First the suburbs of Punta del Este passed by; then almost two hours later we entered Rocha, the capital of the Rocha Departament, and a while later we got off the bus at the luminous terminal of La Paloma.

As is already automatic for us, we asked for a map and inquired about our hostel, where we headed on foot. Due to reasons of availability, first, and then also of price, in La Paloma we'd had no other recourse but to book places in a shared bedroom. My hostelling experience in that regard was more or less varied, but it hadn't prepared me for this: a mixed room with five twin bunk beds, low and not really firm-looking, with the thinnest mattresses ever seen, and some tiny lockers, all of which filled up with people in a very short time. People who choose to sleep in mixed, low-price shared bedrooms tend to come along with lots of luggage and make room for it liberally (that is to say, there were huge backpacks thrown around the middle of the room, all the time).

The place had a reduced staff, not to say two people (in all shifts, not always simultaneously), and it was reduced also in two very, very major aspects: the bathrooms and the kitchen. The latter was so small that two people couldn't get in it at the same time, and the equipment was scarce, though fortunately it worked OK. As for the bathrooms, they were few and logically they weren't (always) clean, since among that many people there's always one or two that are dirty and careless. For my first shower I got cold water; for the second one, I was cautious enough to get up early, before the hot water ran out.

We men at last have the advantage of being quick; some of the women managed to hog the shower for themselves for half an hour or more, which led to the formation of queues (ask Marisa about that). Naturally they then emerged from the bathroom as if just come from the beauty parlour, which confirms to me that we men are sometimes too lazy to take our time, although in cases like these being negligent actually helps. (My self-portraits of those days are unpublishable, showing how I completely let fo of the routine of combing my hair, shaving and choosing the right clothes, as soon as I left Montevideo.)

I don't want to trash the hostel completely, though, since there were some good things about it. Firstly, it was cheap and the location was very convenient. Secondly, thin as they were, the mattresses were sleepable. Breakfast wasn't just abundant but varied: coffee (black or white) and croissants or biscuits with jam, or juice and slices of fresh watermelon, all of it freely available on a covered pool table for unlimited servings. Outside there were chairs so you could have breakfast facing the streets, and inside, a great patio shaded by a dense vine (a haven for the sunny hours) and a hammock.

I'm speaking ahead of the facts, though. The first day, as I said, we arrived after a long trip, so we quickly dropped our stuff and went to eat lunch at the closest place we'd spotted: a little bar across from the bus terminal, where we were served a sandwich of something that was a beef milanesa in name, though not in looks or texture, and which came to us addled in sticky, antique oil. My chronic digestive troubles made no appearance, which is a clear sign that work not only isn't healthy but should be actively advised against by medical professionals.

After prudently waiting for the meal to go down, we went to the beach. It was our first encounter with the sea proper here in Uruguay (as I've said, in Montevideo the river is practically a sea, but not technically), and off I went, according to Marisa "just like a kid", which is perfectly understandable if you ask me. She likes the sea but basically to look at and listen to it; I have to get inside the water and if possible be beaten, dragged, rudely rocked by it in order to feel it.

My little secret, here, is that it was the first time I went to the sea. As a kid my family never went on vacation (as so many Argentine families) to Mar del Plata or any of the all-too-popular beach resorts in the coast of Buenos Aires; as a teenager we had no vacations at all; when, as a grown-up, I had my own job and the ability to make use of my own money, it never occurred to me to look toward the ocean, but rather I turned to the dense forest or the mountain or the desert. So there I was, 32 years old and for the first time treading on the soaked-up sand, feeling the foam come and go over my feet, the cool shock and the rude welcome of the waves, the salt in my mouth. If I ever get used to it, I'll stop being a kid before the sea and I'll be just one more guy in the beach... but that won't happen soon.

The wind blows all the time in the shore, and it wasn't easy staying in the beach waiting for the sun to dry you off. We went back to town, wandered here and there, bought some food, went to the hostel, grabbed some warm clothes. Then we went down to the beach again to watch the sunset and stayed there, two lovers looking at the sun and the surf, exactly like countless couples on countless sunsets must have done since the world began.

To be continued...

Uruguay 2009, part 7: El Prado

2009-03-02T16:31:00.002-02:00

Disponible en español: El barrio del Prado

Church of the Carmelites

We spent our last day in Montevideo visiting the neighbourhood of El Prado, a residential area, very quiet and very old, full of trees, with houses from days of long-past splendour.

The night before, after having a big time eating shellfish and fried calamari, walking several kilometers and skirting disaster on our return by bus after midnight, we were left exhausted. Some of all that must have had an effect on Marisa, because she woke up early with a major stomach pain, feeling very weak and certainly in no shape to go out for a walking tour. Fortunately it turned out not to be (as she feared) a gastroenteritis. Nothing could be done except to get her to rest, something for the pain, lots of liquid and nothing to eat.

The plan of touring some more of Montevideo in the morning was discarded, and I started to fear that we would have to call a doctor, but Marisa would have none of that. So I left her where she was and took a bus to Tres Cruces to get our tickets for La Paloma. The day was cloudy and just a little too warm. I went and returned in an hour and a half, tops, and I saw Marisa was much better. She had something light to eat and we decided we'd try to go to El Prado in the afternoon.

It took us almost 40 minutes to get there, on a bus going first towards the city center, and then north; we traversed unknown neighbourhoods and completely lost our bearings, but somehow managed to get off the bus just one block from where we should. Our informant had given us an exact location to begin (the intersection of Agraciada and 19 de Abril), and a detailed route to follow as well. Probably not in that order, we saw the old houses and tall plane trees of Avenida 19 de Abril, the Church of the Carmelites (one of the few truly large churches I saw in Montevideo), the weird storehouses of the Rural Society, the Miguelete Stream, a great park with a huge pergola and a rose garden (without roses), the Hotel del Prado, the Botanical Garden, the presidential residence, a museum, and thrown in with all that, little houses of archaic style and mansions that went from the austerely severe to the Disneylandish.

We ended up in a bar called Los Yuyos, which must be famous, and which owes its name to the traditional herbs that are added to the caña and the grappa served there. We had no occasion to try such stuff, of course; just a glass of orange juice and a hot sandwich (to the list of things I missed in Uruguay, which started with icecream, let's add carlitos and ketchup).

Marisa at "Los Yuyos"

We had walked about three hours and the tour had taken us to the far end of the neighbourhood, a long way from Avenida Agraciada, the only street that we knew for sure could get us back to our hostel. The idea of crossing the whole barrio again wasn't something we were looking forward to. We were so lucky, though, that only a couple of blocks from Los Yuyos there was a bus stop and the bus took us to the Old Town.

Evening came and my one concern was finding a bed to crash, but Marisa (who had obviously recovered and wasn't sleepy) found Hannibal (i.e. the sequel of The Silence of the Lambs) on cable and decided to watch it whole, so my half-sleep was punctuated by screams, bullet shots and a variety of scenes with guts and brains flying around.

And that's how we said goodbye to Montevideo. Next stop: the beaches of La Paloma.

To be continued...

Uruguay 2009, part 6: The feast of Iemanjá

2009-02-26T19:23:00.000-02:00

Disponible en español: La fiesta de Iemanjá

On the evening of our second day in Montevideo, we set up our stuff to go to the beach (for the first time in Uruguay) and to watch what promised to be somewhat of a novelty for us: an umbanda ceremony honouring Iemanjá, the orisha of the sea.

For those unaware of it, the umbanda religion is one of many cults which, after coming to the Americas with the African slaves, underwent a process of adaptation, growth and merging with the dominant Catholic religion. Among the multiple variants of voodoo (Haitian and Louisianan), the Cuban santería and the Uruguayan candoblé, the umbanda religion (which comes from Brazil, with its center in Bahia) is one of many with a pantheon of minor gods and goddesses, known here as orishas (written orixas in Portuguese), and which incorporated and assimilated the characters of Catholic saints and others. This fusion of diverse religious traditions is known as sincretism.

The names of orishas come from the Yoruba language (whose dialects are spoken by some 22 million people in Africa). Iemanjá is what people in Uruguay call Yemayá, the orisha who governs the sea. On February 2 she is honoured with dances, singing and offerings of flowers and fruit on the beaches of Montevideo, where her devotees come along with thousands of curious people.

We'd been advised to go to the beach known as Playa del Buceo because the place, although it attracts fewer people than others, also attracts fewer choripán salesmen and peddlers of the sort, who (kind of) take away some colour off the ceremony. The ceremony should begin after sundown, we were told, but we went a lot earlier to check out the sea/river and try the sand and the water. Buceo is the neighbourhood's name; the beach with that name is next (going west) to the well-known and extremely posh beach of Pocitos.

Playa del Buceo

We got on a bus that left us a couple of blocks from the beach. Through this, incidentally, we found out something weird about Montevideo... By asking the hostel staff how to get to Buceo's beach, we wanted to be pointed towards a bus that wouldn't pass very far away from it, one that would leave us on the general vicinity; when one travels for half an hour in a big city it's no big deal to get off and walk five or ten minutes. But the hostel guys seemed intent on giving us a bus that would almost literally dump us on the sand of the beach, and even more so, on some specific point of it, and they would refuse to understand our lack of precission. Later, when we asked the driver about the best place to leave the bus in order to go to the beach, he was very concerned and disturbed, as if we'd taken a bus that took us on the opposite direction and he had no way to tell us the bad news. This happened to us again. It seems that the people of Montevideo tend to be that precise when giving directions; maybe they're used to there being buses that take you from all places to every other place without need to walk much.

But I digress. We got off the bus, walked a couple of blocks, and there was the sea (technically it's still the Río de la Plata, but it's so blue, so full of waves, so salty, that calling it a river is pedantic). The beach wasn't crowded at all; we dumped our stuff on the sand and, first one and then the other (with our Argentine fear of insecurity still in our heads) we took a splash. Then we dried off in the sun and sat down to wait.

And they came. Several women, fewer men, no more than eight or nine, all dressed in white, the men with a cylindrical cap, the women with great kerchiefs like turbans, except for a guy who brought a percussion instrument (a hand drum, maybe an atabaque) and a woman dressed differently from the rest, with a long light blue dress and semi-transparent cloth of the same colour. The dark, wrinkled man with the drum started beating on it with a contagious rhythm; the woman in the sky-blue dress seemed to direct the ceremony. They brought a little wooden boat to the sand, set up candles on it and a great bundle of white carnations inside it, and then all the people dressed in white danced: first only revolutions around the boat, then rotations on themselves, with light steps, barefoot. A chant rose, and then another. Some turned and spinned with their eyes towards the ground, others waved their hands in precise, strong ritual gestures. Every now and then one of the women fell to the ground, prostrated and kissed the sand, then got up and went on with her danced and sung prayer.

The gathered public looked on calmly, in a circle, no more than two or three dozen people. The dance finished. The woman in blue gave some instructions, and the little boat was lifted and carried by the devotees to the shore. They entered the water and one of the men went on, pushing the boat through the waves that splashed up to his chest, until it sank or was lost to sea. Iemanjá had accepted the offer.

Later, when we were leaving to walk along the beach, we ran across another group of devotees. These were different: they wore colourful dresses and they carried flower and fruit (watermelon) offers, and some coloured cloth standards with figures we couldn't make out. They came walking and singing along the seaside road, and they were headed for Buceo beach. We didn't follow them, except with our eyes. The sun was setting.

Finally we arrived in Pocitos, where we decided that so much sun and walking were enough, and sat down on a little restaurant. We ordered a beer and had shellfish empanadas and rabas (fried calamari). Marisa was very tired, and I as well, but I persuaded her to get back to Buceo to check if something else had happened, since our Montevidean insider had told us the real show happened by night. We retraced our steps. Upon nearing Buceo beach again, we saw in the half-darkness a motion of people, plus some mysterious dots of lights in the sand.

As it turned out, countless makeshift altars had been erected, ornamented with veils and garlands and Christmas lights, statuettes and figurines and coloured candles; many groups of umbanda devotees were there, singing and dancing or laying hands on people. In the sand there were many holes, dug by hand, each containing one or several lit candles, protected from the wind, and many families were still coming, bringing their thermos and mate, and starting new holes. There was definitely a good vibe on that evening, cool and full the murmurs of the sea.

The time to return came and then we discovered we didn't know how. We'd lost our reference points. We went to wait for a bus at the closest stop we saw, but it never came. We were nervous and tired. We looked and walked around until we found the place we'd come from in the afternoon. Bingo! It was (apparently) the right place. The bus came, and it broke ten minutes later in the middle of nowhere... Ten minutes after that another bus came — not the same line, but it was close enough (again we had to explain the driver that yes, we did want to go to the Old Town, but no, it was no problem for us if he left us three blocks from there). We got off near the Citadel's Gate, I think. Five blocks of coolness and dark, and finally rest in our hostel.

To be continued...

Uruguay 2009, part 5: The Port's Market and the Breakwater

2009-02-21T15:27:00.001-02:00

Disponible en español: El Mercado del Puerto y la Escollera

Second day in Montevideo. We had a plan to explore the coast and the atractions of the Old Town (the Ciudad Vieja), where we were staying. First we walked up to Rambla 25 de Agosto, where we were greeted by some imposing buildings but mostly containers and other not-so-touristic sights.

A typical bar in the Port's Market

Following that way we arrived in the Port's Market (Mercado del Puerto), an immense old storehouse full of little bars and restaurants, dark but not gloomy and pleasantly cool, with huge skylights to let the sun in.

It was fascinating, if a bit expensive (in Uruguay everything's expensive for Argentinians, even more so if it's about having a good meal of fish or shellfish, or an asado). We didn't stop there for long. The Market is surrounded by shops offering art and crafts, very picturesque yet more city-like (and in agreement to my taste) than in small-town Colonia.

We kept walking. Sunlight was pouring on us, but wind blew some of it away. We ventured onto the Escollera Sarandí, a breakwater that emerges like a massive spine or narwhal's horn from the end of the peninsula where the original Montevideo was founded, into the river-sea. There were some port employees and others there, most of them fishing, sitting or standing on the big blocks placed on both sides. We'd been told, for safety, to go to the Escollera at a reasonable time of day and to avoid displaying our nice cameras around too much, but I didn't have any reasons for alarm (our Uruguayan correspondent might not have known that we live in an insecure, big city, and that through bitter experience we've acquired a certain sense of danger and opportunity). Montevideo, I must say, isn't quite a wonderful view from the Escollera, especially at noon, as the skyline of the Old Town and beyond isn't very impressive (I'm not saying it has to be either).

We spotted some birds, some bugs scuttling among the ever-wet rocks, and a few muddy little crabs. The fishermen seemed to be carrying on with their task more for fun than anything else, judging by the scarce, diminutive catches I saw.

It was a stimulating stroll to start checking out Montevideo, but the heat was overwhelming, so we came back and shut ourselves inside the hostel. The afternoon and the evening awaited us with the promise of witnessing a religious ceremony outside all of our previous experience: the festivities for Iemanjá.

To be continued...

Uruguay 2009, part 4: Carnival in Montevideo

2009-02-19T10:52:00.001-02:00

Disponible en español: El Carnaval de Montevideo

Palacio Salvo

Our first day in Montevideo was better than expected, without taking into account the easy and safe arrival, the cleanliness and everything else. It was the first day of February and, contrary to our fears, the weather was ideal. A nap was required, yes, but after that we were able to go out to the sunny afternoon and wander around the Old Town, here and there taking pictures of the typical icons: the Artigas mausoleum, the Palacio Salvo, the architecture surrounding the main square.

The really good stuff, however, was a change of schedule due to a rain we didn't witness. As it turned out, the opening ceremony of the 2009 Carnival season had been put off because of bad weather a few days ago, so that day we'd have the chance to see it. The hostel staff proposed that we go together, at 5:30 PM, and get a good place somewhere along Avenida 18 de Julio, which was already closed to traffic and where you could see long rows of wooden chairs and palcos that looked like gigantic baby playpens (all of which could be rented at reasonable prices).

Marisa and I followed the group but then, deciding we'd found a good spot already, we left them. We stayed at the corner of 18 de Julio and Rio Branco St. (I remember that detail not because I'm some sort of memory freak but because we stood there beside the sign with the street name for two hours).

It's unusual, as I understand, for the first Carnival parade to start during the daytime. That also was good for us. First, of course, we had to wait for the police and the organizers to free up the avenue, for the comparsas and the murgas to line up correctly, for the peddlers of canned foam and cotton candy and confetti to leave (they never left completely). After that there came a couple of buses rolling side-to-side to make room, and then they began coming, one, two, ten, fifty carnival groups, each with their own outfits or banners, on foot or atop carriages with varied ornamentation, dancing or singing or doing choral parody.

I've never been too fond of Brazilian-style carnival or the modest copy of it that is en vogue in several parts of Argentina, with gigantic carrozas and a predominance busty women covered in artificial feathers. I acknowledge their effort but I'm not interested in it, except technically. The Montevidean carnival is different, since in Uruguay murga and parody troupes, which represent the true spirit of carnival (transgression, role inversion) are featured more prominently. You also get to more of, let's say, real people. I saw almost nothing of sweaty, muscled male dancers or hot brunettes displaying their natural gifts for the public; there were "queens" waving from their vehicles, but most of the participants were just people, young and old, fat ladies, middle-aged gentlemen singing, guys dressed as ladies, everyone with their own colours, with elaborate costumes, lots of face-painting, whirls of brilliance and sequins, and always a smile for the kids that clapped on the sides. This carnival had more mocking and parody, and yet more innocence, than what you see in the corsódromos.

If we had arrived one day later, we would've missed it. If we had come to see it on the scheduled date, days before, we would've missed it as well.

One after another came cabezudos, cumbia singers with flamboyant hairdos, a huge flag of Peñarol and a huge Argentine flag, a group of guys clad in gold with boxes, bottles, cages, umbrellas and a whole assembly of props on top of them; a smiling bishop, a king of spades, groups marching at the rhythm of a batucada, a parody of firemen on a mini-firetruck that sprayed Seltz water over us, ladies with curlers... Two hours went by, and necks were already hurting from looking west, and faces burned from receiving the sun on the same side all the time.

It was dusk. With the last lights we went walking, going up the river of colours towards its source and beyond, after the Citadel's Gate, where we found thousands of people, hundreds of troupes waiting for their turn to join the parade. The printed schedule of the carnaval listed (if I recall correctly) some 250 groups; we'd only watched about fifty. So we only saw one-fifth of the first day of the 2009 Carnival of Montevideo. That was enough to call it a day. We left to find something to eat, and then to rest.

To be continued...

Uruguay 2009, part 3: Montevideo, the first impression

2009-02-17T22:51:00.000-02:00

We arrived in Montevideo after noon. The city seemed to me big, expansive, with suburbs slow to appear. There are no huge highways or stacked road bridges. Montevideo (with its metropolitan area) has a population of 1.8 million, half the whole of Uruguay, almost twice that of Rosario and two thirds that of Buenos Aires, but it didn't look dense or complicated to me.

After a good while rolling down avenues and more avenues, the bus came to a brick-wall building, made a couple of turns and got inside. Terminal Tres Cruces ("Three Crosses Terminus") is relatively small. After the rather disordered Mariano Moreno bus terminal of Rosario and especially after the horribly filthy Retiro, Tres Cruces impressed me as surprisingly simple, clean and easy to navigate. There wasn't a single piece of paper or a plastic bag on the floor, or even one motor oil stain on the platforms. Neither were there people asking for coins to take your luggage from the bus, and I'd almost bet that the taxis waiting beside the exit weren't all members of a taxi mafia (as in Rosario). In fact, Tres Cruces is also a shopping mall, and as such the shop owners have an interest in making the potential client feel comfortable.

We crossed a street, asked around, and finally got on a bus that took us to the neighbourhood known as Ciudad Vieja (the Old Town), where, with the help of a map we'd gotten at the Tourist Office, we made our way quite easily to our hostel.

What I saw of Montevideo during the three and a half days I was there is almost enough to forgive Uruguayans for their inability to make decent icecream. Some might protest that I only saw the city center and the most touristic parts of the city, but at some point one has to acknowledge that's an excuse. Montevideo is infinitely cleaner than Rosario or Buenos Aires. During my whole stay, which I spent walking around the Old Town, the Center, the port zone, the neighbourhood of El Prado and a couple of beaches, I didn't spot one single pile of dog shit on a sidewalk, or a single garbage dump, or one overflowing trash container. I also didn't see people littering the floor, or pedigree dogs defecating on the public space before their masters.

The traffic also deserves a mention. To begin with, Montevideo car drivers don't look like madmen behind the wheel. They don't show the typical Argentine histeria to be the first to arrive anywhere. In Argentina, when you cross the street, you need to be fully aware you're risking your life. In Uruguay drivers seem to realize that between a walking person and a car it's the former who'll get the most damage if they have a violent encounter, and they slow down to let you pass, or at least they don't show a clear intent to run over you. In Argentina, you can often perceive that the driver is choosing between murder and jail and only refrains from the former to avoid the latter.

Public transport is another thing. Montevideo's buses are such that you get in, pay to a guarda (who sits apart from the driver) and that's it for the rest of the trip. The bus is clean, the guy who sells you the ticket always has change, and no-one ever fires up his or her MP3-enabled cellphone with trashy cumbia or reggaeton. Above all, one doesn't get the distinct feeling that one's about to be insulted or mobbed by another passenger any second, or that the driver is ready to kill if someone honks the horn.

I can't speak about taxis because they truly were unnecessary to us. We went around and around by bus, and only once, late at night, we thought of taking a taxi. It turned out we were just waiting on the wrong spot, for the wrong bus. Besides, in Montevideo you don't get the official fiction that buses work during the evening. After midnight it's almost impossible to catch one, and everyone acknowledges it.

You need some time outside the big city, in Argentina or wherever, to notice the awful load of barely-repressed aggressive instinct we carry around here, and which I didn't see in Uruguay. I repeat that this is my personal experience, and it's partial and limited, but the contrast was so stark and shocking I can't but note it. And I'm talking about Uruguay, which is almost an estranged Argentine province. They're not Swiss or Japanese or come from another planet where people are "better"; it's evidently us Argentinians who're doing something wrong.

On the other hand, and this must have lots to do, in Uruguay I didn't see the terrible amount of poverty or the obscene show of wealth you see every day side-to-side in Argentina. Some child asked me for a coin, and I saw many poor-looking people walking in Montevideo's downtown. Surely there are poor people in Uruguay, and surely someone will tell me they prefer insolently visible poor as in Argentina rather than invisible poor, or poor rendered invisible by society, as supposedly there would be in Uruguay. What I know is that you can't hide all poverty, and that in Montevideo I didn't feel sick witnessing armies of dirty children abandoned on the streets by the parents, asking passers-by for small change or washing the windshields of brand-new luxurious SUVs, and I also didn't see mothers with malnourished babies on every available space in the city center, begging before shops filled of imported goods or overpriced clothes.

All of the above might sound rather unpleasant on my part, and the truth is it is unpleasant, and probably more than one Argentinian with less-than-average IQ is thinking, if I like Uruguay so much, why don't I move there; and the answer is, I wouldn't mind doing it, and it would probably be better for my mental health, but practical and sentimental reasons keep me from it.

And because this post was unpleasant but necessary to me, I've poured all these impressions into it, until the last drop. One can't get to know a country or a city in a couple of weeks on vacation, but if truly the first impression is what counts, then I can't say almost anything bad about Montevideo or Uruguay in general. The comparison inevitably puts Argentina under a bad light. Whatcha gonna do...

I initially intended to write about Montevideo's Carnival, one of the first bright experiences of this voyage, but I had to let go of all the above. The next post, I promise, will be more cheerful.

To be continued...

Uruguay 2009, part 2: Colonia

2009-02-15T15:04:00.000-02:00

A Colonia street

Another street in Colonia

Little boats on Colonia's port

A wooden sculpture by Ricardo Pascale

We arrived in Colonia del Sacramento on the sun-filled noon of Friday, January 31. They made us disembark through a long tube with many turns; we were led to the customs office, and there, mysteriously, all the forms we'd had to fill in to become temporary immigrants into Uruguay were rendered unnecessary by a simple gesture and the words "keep going, keep going" from the guy who checked the luggage. So we took our bags and entered the country just like that, though we were still looking over our shoulders in case some official was coming after us.

The hostel we would be lodged in was a few blocks from the port and on an upward slope, but we managed to get there with our heavy stuff (Marisa was carrying a long backpacker's backpack; I'd taken a wide military-type backpack with a steel frame; both also carried extra bags). The hostel was an old house with lots of tile floors, flowers and shade and quiet.

We had only booked one night in Colonia, so that afternoon we spent touring the older part of the city, wandering along cobbled streets, visiting the port, the small beach of the Old Town, the remains of the ancient wall of the fort, and lighthouse, which we climbed right before sunset. We watched a kart race on General Flores Ave., which was closed to other traffic and full of people: a noisy and at first sight very dangerous event that seemed to us rather alien to its context.

Colonia is, no doubt, but also sells itself as, a picturesque place, away from noise and modern urban decadence, and beautifully preserved. The tourists, mostly high-class porteños and middle-aged foreigners with delicate skins, are after that. Young backpackers and traveling artisans you will find, too, as everywhere else, but these belong to a different kind. We young Argentinians from the inner country, on a budget and without any chance to take away anything (not leather, not carved wood, anything but photographed memories) were also a little alien there.

Here, on our first day in Uruguay, we found out that ice cream is not the forte of this country. What was served to us on a corner of Colonia was a half-melted mass of cream with little flavour and too much colouring, which cost us twice what a larger, much tastier ice cream would have cost us in Rosario. (Rosario, in case you didn't know, is the National Capital of Artisan's Ice Cream. The title sounds pretentious, if I may say so as a native, only until you taste the ice cream that is made in other places.)

The next day we only had time for a brief final tour, on a cool morning, along the coast of the river-sea. We were ready and set for the two-hour trip to the capital, Montevideo.

To be continued...

Uruguay 2009, part 1: Rosario-Buenos Aires-Colonia

2009-02-13T19:06:00.000-02:00

People waiting to board, Buquebús terminal in Puerto Madero, Buenos Aires

A boat of the Buquebús fleet, similar to ours

Marisa before the immensity of the Río de la Plata

The lighthouse of Colonia del Sacramento, as we came close

I begin my travel chronicle with the well-known disclaimer for whoever has had a different experience or thinks I'm overgeneralizing. These vacations were mine and Marisa's, and the experiences and impressions I'll recount are undoubtedly very personal and very partial. One can't get to know a country in two weeks, or even a city. Therefore, anything I say about Uruguay must be read as if preceded by "As far as I saw it...".

That said, I begin my tale, and I have to go back a little. My original idea was going to Uruguay via the most direct route for us, by land through Entre Ríos and from there to Paysandú or Fray Bentos. I would've liked to check out Gualeguaychú, which I saw years ago for a few hours, and Fray Bentos, with its (in)famous pulp mill. Fray Bentos is also where Borges chose to locate the story of Ireneo Funes, "the Memorious". But the news about road and bridge blocks by the Gualeguaychú Environmental Assembly were disquieting. It wasn't in our plan to begin our vacations stuck in the frontier.

Marisa then came up with the idea, which I seconded immediately, of going the other way, which was longer and more expensive but nicer and safer. We researched it a bit and finally booked passages on the Eladia Isabel, a boat of the Buquebús company, to go from Buenos Aires to Colonia del Sacramento across the Río de la Plata.

The trip to Retiro Station (BA) took us about four hours. We arrived at the hypertrophic capital of our country about three hours after leaving Rosario, and from Greater Buenos Aires to Retiro we spent some 45 minutes. Then we had to wait half and hour to enter the huge bus terminal, located wall-to-wall to a huge villa miseria, full of peddlers of dubious merchandise, its tarmac cracked or lost to negligence and time. How a capital which prizes itself on being the Paris of the South has a bus terminal that is so unnecessarily complicated to get into or out of, so ill-placed within its urban environment, and so filthy, escapes my comprehension.

We got off the bus, grabbed our stuff to guard it against unseen thieves, hailed a taxi, and were left on the Buquebús terminal in Puerto Madero, suddenly transported to another world, similar to a squeaky clean and very congested airport. We went through the embarkment paperwork, had coffee, and then boarded. The boat moved away from the coast slowly, and as we went far into the Río de la Plata I could see why Juan Díaz de Solís, the first European who found it and surveyed it, called it "Mar Dulce", that is, the Sweet Sea. It was an infinite expanse of earthen-brown water, with a few boats at the limit of one's vision looking like a gray cardboard figurine. Thus three hours passed, until we saw a few green islets and finally the white lighthouse of old Colonia.

To be continued...

I'm back!

2009-02-13T11:08:00.000-02:00

Just a short note to let you know that I came back to Rosario from my vacations in Uruguay yesterday afternoon, and I'll be delivering my usual travel chronicle through this blog as soon as possible. For the moment you can see the pictures I'm uploading to Flickr at the set Vacaciones Uruguay 2009. It's good to be back!

Mid-vacation

2009-02-05T13:39:00.009-02:00

Folks, this is just a brief note to remind you that I'm still on vacation in Uruguay. We've been to Colonia and Montevideo and now we're in La Paloma, on the Atlantic southern coast of Uruguay, enjoying the beach and the sound of the sea. We've spent some very nice days in all of these places. Colonia was picturesque, if full of Argentinians. Montevideo surprised us with beaches that we hadn't seen advertised anywhere, and with its cleanliness. La Paloma is simply beautiful. If everything goes OK, we should be in La Pedrera in a couple of days.

Bye-bye for now, from the other side of my pond.

Vacations

2009-01-31T09:46:00.000-02:00

If all goes well, as you read this I should be crossing the Río de la Plata on a boat headed for Colonia del Sacramento, Uruguay. I'm going to spend two weeks in this country — a few days in Montevideo, some relaxing time on the beaches of the Atlantic coast, and some more on the return trip through the interior. Don't miss me!

Up it goes

2009-01-27T09:23:00.000-02:00

Everything goes up and stays there these days, especially taxes and the heat.

The municipality is about to implement a new traffic scheme in the microcentro — there will be less room to park your car, it will be much more expensive to park it where allowed, and the penalties for violating the parking regulations will be much stiffer. Good for the mayor, but doing it at the same time people are receiving their new municipal tax bills with increases ranging from 30 to 1,500% with respect to the previous month doesn't show a lot of political savvy. And this in turn comes after the failure of the provincial government to pass a new tax law, and just before they try to introduce a new one.

The national government also recently authorized some impressive utility fee hikes for Buenos Aires and its metropolitan area, as public transport went up as well and subsidies were cut. Everybody behind a government desk is trying to squeeze money out of taxpayers to keep things going, at the same time trying not to be too brutal about it because it's an election year y el horno no está para bollos.

With the worldwide economic crunch, the campo crisis still looming, the drought, the prices of exportable commodities plunging to depths unheard of, and the general perception that Cristina K is deaf, blind and clueless, anybody with half a mind can see that 2009 won't be nice. At least the global recession should keep inflation at bay, but even that may fail — Argentina has a way to crash economic models...

An expat writes from Rosario!

2009-01-20T09:59:00.000-02:00

Mark is a retired US citizen who has been living in Rosario for four and a half years now, and seems unlikely to leave any time soon. He writes An Expat's View of Rosario, a blog which I'm sure you'll find interesting.

Mark actually asked me what I thought about another expat blog and I said I'd love to see it, since it would be (that I know) the only one of its kind written from Rosario. It's brand-new, and so far it contains the typical starting posts of expats' blogs: what's so good and bad about Argentina, the troubles of moving to a different country, the bureaucracy, the dirt, the landscapes, the people. Do pay a visit, leave comments and suggestions, and ask questions. You now have another English-speaking insider in Rosario — take advantage of that. (I can't be everywhere all the time, you know.)

Seven point two

2009-01-15T08:43:00.000-02:00

7.2%

According to the official datum of inflation ("it is no longer correct to call it a measurement, since it is not measured", as La Nación reads today), during 2008 the Consumer Price Index rose by 7.2%, the smallest rate in four years. The Basic Food Basket, which enters the calculation of the poverty line, rose by less than a half of a percentage point (less than 2 pesos). So last year was a bargain. How come we didn't notice?

One strongly feels that this is about it — it's just not possible to lie any more than this and still pretend to be in contact with reality. The government first denied there was inflation, then accused a vaguely defined ensemble of foes of fueling price increases, all the while letting the thuggish Secretary of Trade, Guillermo Moreno, mangle the figures produced by INDEC. Last year the mangling became unnecessary: you don't have to tweak the figures when you've intimidated all the figure-checking personnel into silence or replaced them by your own employees.

Although the real inflation rate, as measured by several independent sources, is about three times the one reported by INDEC, it doesn't really matter to anyone (except the holders of inflation-pegged bonds, for whom this represents a fraud for $5.5 billion). People in the streets have turned from anger to indifference. As in many other respects, this once promising-looking government has abandoned us. We know they're lying, they know we know, and we know they know we know. How they plan to stay on top for three more years like this is a mystery to me. We can only hope they will die with a whimper and not with a bang.

Hot and dry

2009-01-13T07:18:00.002-02:00

We're suffering a drought, as is most of the country, especially the agricultural productive areas. It rained last night, and might rain again today a bit, but it was an isolated phenomenon. Right here in Rosario it's still not as bad as it was last year, when grass everywhere was reduced to brittle, desiccated brown fragments and finely-powdered dirt was blowing from exposed patches everywhere, but there are serious problems in the north.

The Paraná's water level is so low you can see the pipes that drain the rain into the river, lying on the sand in the beaches of the northern city. People still go and bathe there, but the usable area has shrunk; five or six meters from the current shoreline, the river starts to get deep and dangerous.

Upstream, in the dry north of Santa Fe, the situation is dramatic. Neither people nor cattle have enough water for themselves, and the crops are dying. Ironically, northern Santa Fe used to be an area of wetlands and forests, but already in the late 19th century logging companies felled a lot of trees (quebracho, mostly) and then the wetlands were drained by canals to avoid floods. After 2002, when soybean became the star crop, agriculture expanded to the area, and cattle were also moved there from the south. But when you remove a forest, you leave the terrain subject to erosion, and without major watercourses you're tied to rainfall.

The drought will reduce the production of most crops. Maize and soybean were planted late because of this, and coupled with a lower yield, that means Argentina will produce a lot less of both (making things worse, the government continues to place administrative obstacles on crop exports, and the international price of agricultural commodities has decreased dramatically). Wheat production has plummeted to about half of the 2007–2008 harvest. Cattle farming is also suffering; the animals languish and die of starvation or thirst, and often farmers prefer to slaughter cows and sell them for what they might be worth. This year there will be one million less calves.

Hmm... still no rain over here.

Exit 2008...

2008-12-31T13:54:00.000-02:00

'Tis the last day of 2008. One can't easily escape the temptation of the traditional year's end balance, so here it goes...

Overall, this has been a very good year. First of all, of course, love. I met Marisa in the last days of 2007, and a month later, when I went away on vacation with a couple of friends, I discovered I'd already grown used to her, and even as I had lots of fun and traveled through wonderful landscapes I couldn't help missing her. Nearly one year after that, I still feel her absense when we stay apart even for a few days. And so my quest for a place to live on my own also turned into a better kind of expectation — rather than getting away, getting together with the one I love.

It was also a good year on the work side. I didn't get a raise or a higher post or anything like that — if everything, I'm doing extra work for the same pay. But the new administration does things quite differently. Back then I was doing boring repetitive work, and almost completely pointless as well (the signing of tireless forms for the archives of dust, as Borges would say), while now I'm doing more of what I like, meeting new people, and being consulted on what I know. I was quite prepared to leave my safely stable, futile job last year; now I'm willing to wait until I get the monetary recognition I need.

This was a year for travel, too. I spent two-and-a-half weeks touring what I consider the most beautiful part of Argentina (so far), the desertic part of Mendoza and the forests and lake of southern Neuquén. Then I had my first try with Marisa (a week together, visiting Córdoba), in late March. In September we went to La Rioja for another week. And then, despite our conflicting schedules, we somehow managed to squeeze in an escapade to Victoria and another to Tigre. Now we're planning a trip to Uruguay on the first half of February. Always tight on cash, but ready to take any opportunity.

What else? So much! I was stranded in Villa María and survived. My office was moved and I actually got my own little space as "the computer guy". I had some of my photos of Rosario chosen for an exhibition. I sold a piece of software for good money. I resumed jogging and then stopped again. I sold a few pictures. I got scared shitless because of my liver's misbehaving and got well. I started a personal blog and a blog on religion and actually got some people to read them. I left Japanese class and regretted it a bit. From Marisa I learned not to set the alarm clock when I have no reason to wake up at a fixed time. I picked up some cooking from Marisa and her mother. I read a lot of books in English. I joined an atheist group and got my picture on a newspaper. I got some of my long-neglected teeth fixed. I bought gifts for a lot of people, and got many gifts myself. I acquired a few more white hairs. I kept my beard and my 5-year-old cell phone. I learned to let go of some cherished personal myths and hobbies.

Not much will change tonight at midnight, but even as we're all "work in progress", it's a special night. So everybody, have a nice year's end and a happy beginning for 2009!

Christmas at home

2008-12-24T11:30:00.001-02:00

It's been a while since I last wrote, and I feel bad about that, given how often I used to post in earlier times. But such is the way of things.

The last year or so has been busy for me, mostly in the good sense (new girlfriend, new job routine, new places traveled to), but not spectacularly good for news (about the city, or the country or the world as a whole, for that matter). I seem to remember apologizing for a seemingly endless string of depressing political posts. I don't want to do that again.

Christmas season is about to end, thank Jeebus, and truth be told it doesn't seem like "the crisis" has hit that hard. Judging from the sheer volume of the throngs that squeezed along every inch of the downtown commercial streets last Monday (that's when I went gift-shopping myself), there's still lots of spare change in people's pockets for one last spending binge. The soft credits promised by the government have still failed to materialize (and seriously, nobody thinks they will, or at least it's highly doubtful they get past the nicest parts of Greater Buenos Aires) but retired people have got their extra 200 pesos, there'll be a similar supplement for minimum-wage workers and welfare benefits, and it seems the tendency to pay the aguinaldo before the holidays, instead of in January, has caught on.

As for me, I spent an unexpected amount buying little gifts for everyone in the family, which now includes Marisa's parents and her brother's family of three. Back in 2000, when I first got a stable job, and for more than a couple of years after that, I didn't earn enough for such luxuries as gifts, so now I love having the chance, although the act of going around and choosing the actual gifts is still stressful, being such a detail freak.

Since Marisa and I will each have dinner with our own families, and both driving yourself or getting a cab are virtually impossible on Christmas, we exchanged gifts days ago. I promised not to peep, so as to keep the surprise until tonight. There's no-one left at home that believes in Papá Noel (Santa Claus), and of course I don't believe anybody of divine origin was born on December 25, but one comes to appreciate the symbolic importance of waiting until midnight, as is the custom in Argentina, to open the shiny, bow-topped packages and peer inside to see what our loved ones thought we'd find nice or useful.

These days are exhausting, what with the summer heat and the crowded shopping malls and the explosion of red-and-green kitsch everywhere, and it's true that more people than usual feel depressed or lonely at this time of the year. In this sense I loathe Christmas. But maybe we should have more of it. It wouldn't be so special, but maybe one week as each season turns into the next, with less of a focus in overdoing (overspending, overeating, overdrinking) and more of simple expectation and celebration of our continued friendship. Our ancestors (no matter who they were exactly) had a developed awareness of seasonal change; why couldn't we? Imagine four short holiday seasons instead of a protracted one — better for the economy, for our digestive system, and for our inner peace.

Here's to a happy and peaceful Christmas, to all my readers. I'll see you again sooner than expected, I hope.

Big Tobacco strikes back

2008-12-16T19:58:00.001-02:00

The tobacco company Nobleza Piccardo (part of British American Tobacco) is suing Santa Fe Province before the Supreme Court because of the provincial anti-tobacco law, they claim, has made them lose a lot of money. Specifically, they feel the articles that ban cigarette advertising go beyond the provincial state's attributions to care for public health and infringe on free expression.

The fight against smoking has a been a frequent subject in this blog. I think we're all pretty surprised at our own reception of anti-tobacco regulations in this country; besides a minority of doomsday sayers, soon reduced to nothingness, most Argentinians have accepted that it's just rude to smoke indoors in a public place, and got on with our lives. I guess that's as far as product loyalty goes — the tobacco companies must have been very disappointed to witness none of the addicts they created mobilized against the rules that forbid them from pushing their poison on teenagers and children.

The suit (a claim of unconstitutionality) was brought to the Supreme Court two months ago but we know about it now because the state attorney Jorge Barraguirre appears on the press denying the charges. Nobleza Piccardo tried to get in an amparo (sort of an injunction, to stop the law from being applied while the matter is decided) but the Court rejected it, so we must wait and see what comes out of it.

Expensive, those principles (by Martín Caparrós)

2008-12-03T08:22:00.001-02:00

What follows is a translation of an article by Martín Caparrós on today's Crítica Digital (Caros, los principios) about the sweeping tax and capital smuggling amnesty proposed by Kirchner's government and currently being discussed in Congress. In dire need of fresh funds, Cristina is basically offering criminals a free pass to launder their money in Argentina, and inviting all those Argentinians who illegally sent their undeclared foreign currency abroad to take them back without paying taxes, dropping any legal investigations under way. [For some more background, see the American Task Force coverage.] Caparrós, once a leftist militant, again voices his disappointment with this supposedly progressive government, whose true leader (Néstor Kirchner) famously said he would never agree to check his principles at the door of the Casa Rosada.

The good thing is that we now at least know how much they're worth. Or rather how much they believe they're worth. (It may be, if anything, as in the classical sudaca joke about the best business deal: buy an Argentinian for what he's worth, sell him for what he thinks he's worth.) We now know, I was saying, the price. They're not cheap: they must believe their principles are better than they look — and they're charging a lot for them. The savings repatriation and tax moratorium proposal, which Congress began discussing yesterday, is that: a price label. They were supposed to have some principles: equality before the law, opposition to financial capitalism, a "new tax culture", a push towards some [wealth] redistribution by the State, an insistence on justice being made despite [purposeful] oversights. All of which crumbles when the government tells those who took away the money, those who evaded taxes, that there's no problem, that everything's forgotten. For a handful of dollars: various economists reckon that, on the best scenario, five percent of the Argentine capital that escaped might come back — that is, some six billion. That, if anyone believes them and brings in the bucks, which isn't a safe bet at all. With luck, the State could recover 10% of that 5%, some 600 million, and at the same time, of course, take advantage of the modicum of reactivation that money could bring to our economy.

That's what their principles are worth. Or rather the price of shitting on them: if you laundered money, if you evaded taxes, if you forged your bills to take home your "10% commission", don't worry, we'll fix it; and if you were in jail, you can now go home. If you stole 10 kilos of beef from the butcher's on the corner, or 80 pesos from some boy on a dark street, then no, this deal doesn't include you. Evading taxes is not stealing from one person — it's stealing from all of them, from the State which should spend that money on schools and hospitals for everyone, or at least for those who don't have them. Tax evasion is robbery worse than any other robbery: it's robbing those who have the least. These are the crooks this law wants to spare: the big crooks, the shirt-and-tie ones, the friends.

That's why this law is a full stop: a point of no return. If they pass it as it is, they won't ever again be able to speak of their principles: they will have sold them, under the excuse of a crisis that didn't exist days ago. A bit expensive, it's true: as in that bad joke.

The translation is free; the links are mine. Caparrós employs a few local references that may not be obvious unless you live in Argentina: the use of sudaca as a self-effacing slur; the soundbite por una nueva cultura tributaria ("for a new tax culture") which the Federal Tax Administration uses to advertise its fight for citizens' fiscal responsibility (which this moratorium turns into a mockery); the diego or "10% commission" — an euphemism for bribery; the expression punto final, which compares this obscene pardon for the wealthy to the law that halted investigations of the dictatorship's crimes. It just came out and I felt I had to share.

Our illegitimate debt

2008-11-21T08:40:00.002-02:00

The government of Ecuador is considering defaulting on 40% of its debt because it's "illegitimate, corrupt and illegal" (as per the words of president Rafael Correa). An ad hoc international committee studied 32 years of indebtedness, with a focus on the dictatorial period of 1976–1980, and produced a 30,000-page document detailing how and why a large part of the buildup of Ecuador's US$13-billion debt involved questionable or outright criminal maneuvers by governments, creditors, negotiators and other middlemen.

The committee included President Correa's advisor, Argentine historian Alejandro Olmos Gaona. You might remember I mentioned the possibility of Argentine collaboration with Ecuador in a post of February 2007.

Crítica de la Argentina titles this, quite appropriately, Ecuador hizo el Nunca Más de la deuda — a reference to Argentina's Nunca Más ("Never Again") document about forced disappearances. To my knowledge, this is the first time a Latin American country revises its history of debt in this manner. Most of if not all Latin American countries have had long periods of right-wing dictatorship in the late 1970s and early 1980s and neoliberal governments during the 1990s, and a common tendency for these has been to get the country indebted with the IMF, the World Bank and other financial vultures, then divert funds for corrupt purposes and finally trash the economy, leaving the next administration with no seeming choice but to ask for more money and repeat the cycle... each time squeezing the economy a bit more.

Not only did the Argentine military abduct, torture and murder thousands, but they also increased our debt and stole whatever they could. A creditor that lends money to a corrupt, illegal government shouldn't expect to be paid, least of all if the negotiators and overseers of the loans were well aware of that corruption. Moreover, anything done under the pretense of legality during a dictatorship shouldn't be, in principle, considered legally binding. (Laws and other regulations passed by a dictatorial government should be voided ipso facto, though this hasn't been done for practical reasons.)

In 2000, Judge Jorge Ballesteros ruled that the part of Argentina's external debt contracted during the 1976–1982 dictatorship was fraudulent, due to more than 470 irregular operations detected in the loans' proceedings. The debt went from 7 to 45 billion dollars, including formerly private debt that was nationalized by then-minister Domingo Cavallo (a specialist in this matter, judging by his career). Ballesteros left it in the hands of Congress to take action. Nothing happened.

Argentina has much to learn, even from Ecuador — most people don't even question the legality of the debt, but only complain about the politicians who took the money. Would it be impossible to repeal the illegal debt and take the responsible people to court? Even in those cases where 30 years have passed, an argument could be made that Argentina's indebtedness has caused more misery and death than all our dictators. Of course, the reason is political: most of those who benefited from bankrupting the state repeatedly are still Senators, Deputies, ministers, government secretaries, prominent lawyers, presidents of corporations, respected bankers, or family or relatives thereof. In politics and big money, these dynasties and mafia-like networks, essentially the country's owners and managers, haven't changed in decades.

PS: More reading material: Committee for the Abolition of Third World Debt.

No more trams for Rosario

2008-11-07T07:36:00.000-02:00

I was going to write about Obama's victory (and I will eventually), but I just spotted a bit of bad news over here on Rosario3.com. On February 2007 I was happy to report that the mayor's trip to San Francisco had resulted in a conversation with that city's Rosario-born Secretary of Transport and an agreement to mediate in the donation of a fleet of old trolleybuses from Vancouver, Canada (negotiations for which had started before).

Unfortunately, although the trams were almost free (a symbolic amount, as I understand), we had to pay for the shipping. Bringing 80 buses from the opposite end of the planet costs a lot. The national government promised to help us with 2.5 million pesos, but the money never arrived, and the municipality of Rosario is really strapped for cash. So the trams are going to the city of Mendoza, which could afford them (being a provincial capital has its advantages, I guess). They left Vancouver by boat on November 4 and are now headed for the port of Valparaíso, Chile.

I'm beginning to sound like a broken record, but I must say this: it's a shame how local governments are always poor, how provincial administrations have lost control of their own financial resources, and how the national government takes more and more money from us without our representatives doing anything about it. I'm not advocating for the kind of independence from the federal administration seen in the United States; that would be impossible because some provinces, left alone, would simply be inviable. And some things (such as large public works) might be better left to the federal state. But for a city of 1 million to be unable to disburse some US$7 million to take advantage of such a fantastic opportunity is terrible.

I suppose I must be happy for Mendoza, a beautiful city and one I love... but I'm just very frustrated.

Nationalizing pension funds: more money for the Kirchners?

2008-11-03T07:00:00.000-02:00

It's time again for a depressing anti-government post! This time, about the nationalization of AFJPs (private retirement funds). I strongly feel it's a good idea, and as strongly as that I also feel we must keep it from happening as intended by president Néstor Kirchner. (If you think Cristina's the one in charge, you must be living inside a jar, as we say over here. For months she's been devoting her time exclusively to cutting ribbons to [unfinished] public works and, lately, to writing newspaper articles in praise of her husband's ideas. Néstor is de facto big guy.)

Now you mustn't believe I do this because I like destructive criticism. I'm absolutely for "big government" as Americans call it, and I believe important stuff should never be left fully in the hands of private corporate interests whose creed is "make money fast whatever way you can". Kirchner's government has taken us far in this sense, and that's OK.

The problem with the Kirchner administration is that they always, somehow, manage to turn good theory into bad practice, and for a long while now (and not because the media or the far right are trying to make it look so, as C&K passionately believe) everything they've proposed has been born tainted by association. Or, as in this case, destined to fail before (a good part of) public opinion because common sense and the typical Argentine paranoia will kick in, and all alarms will go off, as soon as the state gets close to our pockets.

About 15 years ago, the law that allowed the creation of the AFJP system was drafted and passed, accompanied with a heartfelt defense of private capital accumulation (the so-called "capitalization scheme") by many who now profess to be old-time fans of the old-fashioned state-regulated collective saving scheme, including many faithful Kirchnerists (flip-flopping is another word for pragmatism — the only thing that can be truly called "Peronist doctrine"). Gobs of money were transferred to private capitalization accounts from the state's coffers, and the AFJPs (Administradoras de Fondos de Jubilaciones y Pensiones) started recruiting associates. The law said if you didn't choose where your retirement funds should go, then it would be automatically assigned to an AFJP; thus millions of distracted workers were signed up for a massive speculative operation. The AFJPs invested money in assets of various kinds and for a while they actually increased their clients' funds, although they charged huge commissions.

Pensions were frozen for ten years, as the economy entered into a low-growth phase, unemployment rose steadily, and finally recession entered the picture. After president Carlos Menem (cursed be his name) got away with murder, president Fernando de la Rúa found the dying economy and, instead of trying to resuscitate it, he finished it off with such nice measures as cutting 13% of pension payments. We all know what happened then... so fast forward to 2003.

Néstor Kirchner passed a series of decrees increasing both salaries and pensions, which were well-received, even as employers complained. The economy took off and pensions did as well. There was a small problem, though: the private pension funds couldn't keep up. They started losing money. The law said that the state must guarantee pension payments, if necessary by compensating (subsidizing) the private funds. So the state poured money into the AFJPs, whose risky investments had proven disastrous (does that sound familiar?), and when the companies began accumulating too much debt, the government forced them to buy national debt bonds. Yes, that's right: the government forced the guarantors of retirement funds for millions of Argentinians to accept what amounted to wet paper in order to rid itself of them (the only other feasible destination for those bonds was Hugo Chávez).

In January 2008, after the scarce enthusiasm that followed Cristina's election had faded, someone near her came up with the idea of "letting people choose" where to place their retirement savings. The Kirchnerists hastily passed a law opening up the choice for everyone: 180 days to take your money away from the private box to the state's bag (or the other way round). And the law also established that, if newcomers to the labor market didn't explicitly choose which way, their funds would go to the state system, not some AFJP. The AFJPs understandably lost a lot of clients, but in all fairness they deserved to, and the law didn't force anyone to accept anything against their interest. It had some other very good points as well, so good in fact that, "better late than never" aside, some of us wondered why it hadn't been passed before. Like four years before.

The answer came easily. Why indeed? Because it was only now that the economy had begun slowing down, while debt payments were looming closer and the whole economic structure was showing the strain. High inflation, high interest rates, no way to get fresh funding for things like the bullet train, and the need to pump more and more money into subsidies for electric power, drinking water, fuel, natural gas and everything else. Néstor Kirchner had always ruled with a big wallet of state money freely available to him, but Cristina's future was uncertain. The fresh funds from the AFJPs, of course, should have never been used to fund the state in any respect other than pension payments, but the new law didn't say anything about that. Already in 2007, his last year, Kirchner had signed a decree allowing the government to divert funds from ANSeS (the social security agency) to expenses such as public works.

After the fiasco of Resolution 125 (another, more desperate attempt to get money for the state) came the worldwide financial crisis. After being deprived of juicy taxes on exports of soybean, both exporters and the government have seen the prices of soybean plummet to half the levels of the first quarter: less and less money! Subsidies on buses, natural gas and power were reduced, but that's not enough; with a world recession looming, and the economy visibly decelerating, it would be economic suicide to raise the prices of basic services. On top of that, 2009 is an electoral year, and that means a lot of wills and votes must be bought. Back then, Néstor and Cristina could campaign all year round, visiting one town after another in provinces with "loyal" governors, handing out multimillion checks without any real oversight, and making sure crowds of bussed-in "supporters" would be ready to applaud their presence; but all that costs money.

The national state keeps about 70% of what the provinces contribute, and what it shares, it does so rather unfairly. Most provincial governments are strapped for cash right now, and more than a few are absolutely dependent, on a short-term basis, on presidential whims when it comes to distribution.

Kirchner's desperation is now becoming noticeable. Initially he ordered the bill that nationalizes AFJPs to be approved and turned into law at once, without any changes. His parliamentary bulldog, deputy Agustín Rossi, first attempted this, then saw it was impossible, and timidly conceded that the government's bloc would accept discussion of the finer points.

Now, the bill seeks to overturn a 15-year-old system with millions of associates, in a context of financial turbulence, and to do so in a matter of weeks, so that all the money from the private pensions can be transferred to the state's social security before the end of the year. Not only does this negate the choice of millions of people who decided to stay in the private companies earlier this year, but it also looks rather suspicious.

Why the hurry? True, the assets of the AFJPs are taking heavy hits from the world's financial meltdown. But those things come and go. It's also true that the AFJPs haven't given their associates what they promised, and that they've engaged in some dubious practices. That's something to be settled with general audits. If you have a critical system that doesn't seem to work as intended, you don't decide to break it. You fix it and keep it going while you prepare the transition. The president can count on ample powers, a Congress controlled by overwhelming margins, and a social consensus that private pension funds aren't a good idea for most of us. I repeat, why the hurry? Cristina still has three years to go.

This administration has frustrated me time after time. I'm really tired of seeing great ideas given such bad names by the Kirchnerist gang. I'm fed up with having to agree with certain people... being forced to be on the same side as some who hold principles completely opposite from mine.

Yet I have no alternative. It's just plain common sense that the Kirchners want the private pensions' money to continue their incessant campaigning for their own permanence. They have no new ideas, no plan, no policies, nothing but a hunger for power that sometimes translates into seemingly brilliant developments, soon marred by corruption and negligence. Are we as a nation doomed to go from one rotten set of politicians to another?

25 years of democracy

2008-10-30T17:28:00.001-02:00

Today it's been 25 years since the formal return of democracy in Argentina. On October 20, 1983 a democratically elected president, Raúl Alfonsín, took office after more than seven years of dictatorship and over half a century of erratic shifts between legal presidents and military usurpers.

My personal reckoning is that, although I was born exactly six months after the coup d'état, I have so far spent four fifths of my life under democratic rule. During that time I've voted quite a few times: three times for president (1999, 2003, 2007), four for governor (1995, 1999, 2003, 2007) and many more, at least once every two years to elect national and provincial legislators, and once every four years to elect city mayors and councilmembers, plus a couple of primaries. My generation is possibly the one that has voted the most times during the entire history of this country.

On the national level I've always either voted for the loser... or later regretted not voting for him. During all this time, this thing that gets called "the democratic process" hasn't offered me much satisfaction. But I don't want to despair. Never has Argentina experienced so many years (a quarter of a century!) of uninterrupted free elections on all the levels of government. We move on and crises hit us and sometimes we'd rather have everything blow apart, but in our heart of hearts we know and wish it will go on no matter what.

I have my reservations and my protests in store and readily available, but today I want to end this on a positive note. For 25 years now we've refused, as a people, to be deprived of our right to choose, and even when all our options look bad, we always have one more chance ahead of us. And that counts.

(El texto original de este post, en castellano, está disponible en Sin calma: 25 años de democracia.)

Image gallery

2008-10-25T20:44:00.002-02:00

I've been busy revamping my website these days, which is why I haven't blogged here at all for a week. It's in Spanish, so that's also why I haven't blogged about it here. Anyway, I'm unveiling an image gallery in order to showcase my photos in a different way from that which Flickr offers. The system is not the best to be found, but I can control it some more. The idea is, I will continue sharing pictures of everything that strikes my fancy on Flickr, but I'll keep the more artistic photos for my gallery. I can't (so far) make a trade out of my photos, but this would be a first step towards establishing an online presence as a photographer with a portfolio.

The gallery can be accesed directly at pedeefe.com.ar/gallery2, or embedded into the website at pedeefe.com.ar/site/?q=gallery; the interface is practically the same. Go check it out and leave comments, critiques, or whatever.

Time displacement

2008-10-14T16:07:00.001-03:00

By decree of Our Most Reflective Leader, President Cristina of the Unwrinkled Face, and based on the success of last year's Daylight Saving Time scheme, we'll be advancing our clocks and watches by one hour next Sunday, October 19, at midnight (which will thus become 1 AM). Except of course there was no measurable difference in power usage last year, and all we got from DST was a surge in sleep disorders (and, admittedly, beautiful sunsets at 11 PM beyond the 40°S parallel — almost midnight sun without the expense and inconveniences of a trip to Antarctica).

As usual, it's up to the provincial states to adhere or reject this measure. Four provinces (San Luis, San Juan, La Rioja and Catamarca) are almost sure they won't change the time, while Mendoza has already announced it won't — that is, the whole Cuyo region plus the neighbouring Catamarca will stay behind.

Here in Rosario, as well as in Santa Fe City, business owners are complaining as well, and plan to file a formal request to governor Hermes Binner. Most likely that won't change the decision. It would be rather problematic if Santa Fe stayed behind while all of its neighbours don't.

Argentina's economy: what now?

2008-10-08T08:10:00.001-03:00

Everybody's talking about the financial crisis, so I thought I could chip in with my two cents..., especially seeing how our own Argentine government continues to deny we'll face serious trouble. In fact, President Cristina Kirchner has devoted a lot of time to deride, with barely concealed glee, the proponents of globalized laissez-faire capitalism (we must acknowledge that "kicking them while they're down" never felt better) and to defend the Kirchnerist achievement of decoupling Argentina from international market shocks, which would be terrific — if it were true.

First of all, not to despair: we are, as Cristina says, better prepared than ever in recent history for the shock. The problem started outside our borders (we have different problems) and we'll just have to slow down and wait, hoping that they don't spill into our own economy. For example: we need money to pay our foreign debt next year (and it's a lot of money — more than we owed before Néstor Kirchner renegotiated it, because we actually exchanged debt for more debt), and it'll be difficult to get money from abroad or to refinance the debt once again, with interest rates being so high and everybody clutching desperately to their remaining assets; but we still have a fiscal surplus and a trade surplus.

The peso-dollar rate jumped a bit, too, and that will help the trade surplus. There's just one problem — we're dependent on imports of all kinds, so a higher exchange rate means inflation. And one more problem: the Brazilian real has devalued as well, only much more brutally, so Brazil will be able to sell cheaper stuff to us, they won't be able to buy as much from us, and they'll be much more competitive with respect to third parties. Brazil has a long-standing state policy of industrialization; we don't. Brazil can cope with lower or higher exchange rates; we can't.

Yet more problems: our trade surplus feeds our fiscal surplus, via retenciones (export taxes), especially on soybean products. The price of soybeans (as with other commodities) has taken a deep dive, so that means less revenue from exports. China buys most of our soybeans, but China, like all countries around the globe, will start buying less of everything. Less revenue from exports means less available money to (for example) cover the costs of subsidizing inefficient public services and utilities, and funding public works. The national government has already left the inner country to its own devices, delaying or altogether abandoning plans to build homes, schools and such (Minister De Vido lies, as usual); now it's Buenos Aires's turn. Natural gas, drinking water, domestic power, buses, trains, the subway — they'll go up and up, while construction (the engine of Argentina's economic recovery since 2002) will come to a halt. Tourism and foreign investment will suffer as well; people in the US and Europe simply won't have money to spend on Third World countries like Argentina.

There's a political problem as well, because 2009 is a legislative election year, and the Kirchners doubtless had plans to pour money into cheap, quickly-unveiled public works all over the country, as Peronists are fond of doing; that just won't be possible in this scenario. Least of all if the opposition gets to revise the budget, which contains certain provisions deserving a "best fiction" award, plus the infamous "superpowers" that let the Chief of Cabinet move around huge chapters of the budget under the excuse of an economic emergency that supposedly ended years ago.

All in all, it looks like the next months will bring a "plateau" in Argentina's so far swift growth, and the Kirchnerist government will have to deal, for the first time ever, with a tight budget. It's easy to play when you have cards, as we say over here. The feeling of opportunities for true growth, for industrialization, for true redistribution of wealth, wasted and lost and now unlikely to return for a few years, is almost unbearable.

Vacations in pictures

2008-10-03T08:33:00.000-03:00

Here's a two-volume compilation, totalling 72 pictures, of our trip to Chilecito and La Rioja last month. Click on the mosaics below and, once in the Flickr picture page, click on the individual pictures' titles.

Ship parade against the fires

2008-09-29T11:10:00.000-03:00

Last Saturday, September 27, there was a "ship parade" to protest the fires on the islands of the Paraná river's delta, opposite Rosario. The municipality organized it, and called all the people without a boat to participate by staying beside the river and waving.

Since I've written about the island fires before, I won't explain it all over again in detail. In short: farmer needs place for cattle; government of Entre Ríos Province lets farmer buy island; farmer cheaply clears island scrub by setting fire to it; drought makes fire worse; smoke blows away, blocks traffic, irritates people's eyes and noses; ash rains on Rosario; wetland ecosystem is destroyed; Entre Ríos government does nothing; neighbouring Santa Fe government gets angry; Rosario sues.

The ship parade was the last move of Rosario's municipal government, one week after a gathering and a declaration against the unchecked burning on the islands and for the creation of a natural reserve.

You wouldn't believe the kind of bullshit we've been getting from the government of Entre Ríos and the municipality of Victoria, under whose jurisdiction the nearby islands are. This has worked against them, as more and more facts are uncovered. Entre Ríos, we learned, gets some good money from leasing fiscal land plots on the islands to cattle farmers. And the mayor of Victoria, Entre Ríos, approved the establishment of a meat processing plant there as well, even after the town council rejected it because of the highly suspect credentials of its owner.

It's clear these guys have some business going on on the islands. The governor of Entre Ríos was livid when he learned that Santa Fe's senators were requesting the creation of a protected area. Right now, Entre Ríos and Victoria can say they are unable to stop the fires, with what the drought and their lack of economic resources, and that anyway it's private land; but a protected area under federal jurisdiction would force the national government to preserve the ecosystem from such destruction.

The fact that Cristina Kirchner's government has done almost nothing to stop the fires, except when the smoke reached Buenos Aires, and that Environment Secretary Romina Picolotti might as well be a wooden lamppost for all the effort she's put into this issue, is also a cause for more anger here in Rosario. We've always taken this sort of local pride on being a "self-made city", so if Entre Ríos can't or won't solve it and Cristina doesn't feel like it, let them hand the islands over to us, and we'll surely do a better job keeping one of South America's largest wetlands and most fragile ecosystems from being burned to the ground for short-term profit.

If you read Spanish, keep up with the news and activism reading my blog Sin calma: No a la quema.

Vacation report: La Rioja City

2008-09-22T18:17:00.003-03:00

Joaquín V. González's house

Well, after Talampaya Canyon little of importance could happen to us. The next day, mid-morning, we got on the bus that would take us to the city of La Rioja, and arrived there about three hours later.

La Rioja is a relatively small provincial capital, and I don't have much to say about it, although I do want to be fair and emphasize that we visited it in a hurry and because we had to, since the return bus to Rosario departed from there rather than from Chilecito. La Rioja is cute, but it has no major remarkable touristic spots, with the exception of a huge palaentology museum and some historical churches. The cathedral is also beautiful, but at this stage of our vacations we were no longer terribly impressed about this sort of things.

There's a house resembling a castle where the famous Joaquín V. González lived (the one who built Samay Huasi in Chilecito as a house of rest), and a fair amount of ample, well cared-for public squares, but no big parks within the urban downtown area.

Parque Yacampis, the public park where the zoo is located, lies almost outside of town, and either because of the drought or sheer carelessness it looks rather decrepit. The zoo itself is surprisingly large and comprehensive for such a small city, and we spent a couple of hours going from one cage and enclosure to another. Among the primates there are caí monkeys (capuchins), a spider monkey, and baboons; also many birds, including a miserable condor which seemed to have too little space to exercise its vast wingspan; llamas and guanacos, too, and less curious animals such as goats and pigs.

The "problem" (note the scare quotes) with La Rioja is that, touristic or not, it's a "deep country" city with a small town mentality, and siesta time is sacred, so even the finest restaurant on the best parts of downtown shoo off customers during the afternoon. The traveller that arrives from Chilecito, for instance, checks in at the hotel and goes looking for late lunch, is in for a bad surprise and will be forced to a hungry pilgrimage around the city before he or she can find a table and a waiter.

We stayed in La Rioja all Friday afternoon and Saturday until sunset, when our bus departed. Again we had the unforgettable experience of an interrupted return trip. In March, you'll remember, we were stopped en route by a picket of farmers near Villa María, Córdoba; now it was a bit earlier, when the engine failed and started losing diesel. Marisa, doubtless because of the fuel vapours, felt sick all night; she couldn't force herself to eat so much as a mouthful of dinner, and the nausea lasted even a couple of days after our return. Fortunately we weren't delayed a lot: we stopped in La Falda, north of Córdoba, and we waited an hour or so until a replacement bus was sent from nearby Capilla del Monte. So in the end we got to Rosario two hours after schedule.

And that's the end of my vacation report.

Vacation report: Talampaya Canyon

2008-09-19T09:10:00.001-03:00

Two days after our first, failed attempt, we finally got to see the Talampaya National Park. This was what we'd come to La Rioja for, so we were exhilarating.

The weather had changed. It was cloudy and rather cool, and the tour guide warned us about being so happy, since there was a possibility, if remote, that it could rain. I made the mistake of not taking along more warm clothes than I had already on...

The canyon's walls (there are earthquakes here)

Marisa, frozen, just like me

The trip felt shorter than before. The Cuesta de Miranda wasn't full of splendour under the sun like the previous Tuesday, but dark, with deep colours toned down by the cloud cover. We got to the park's entrance, registered, and then the van kept on going for 12 km. The Talampaya National Park is huge (2,150 km²), but the touristic part, the one you can actually visit, is just the canyon formed by the Talampaya river (which is a dry bed of dust most of the time), with rocky walls chiseled by wind erosion.

We got to the canyon and got off the van to do our trekking. It was bitterly cold and the wind didn't help it, but luckily it hit us from the back. I immediately realized I should've brought at least two more layers of protective warm clothing, plus a scarf, gloves and a wool cap. Marisa was a bit better protected than me and she had a hood over her head; the tips of my ears painfully froze in a matter of minutes.

All this notwithstanding, when you walk for a while at a good pace you forget the cold, even more so when you have such a great spectacle before your eyes. At this point I must let the pictures speak for themselves, because I don't have proper words to describe the immensity of the view. All I was left with was impressions — the clearest one being one the guide made us notice, our inability to grasp the sheer height of the canyon's walls. I don't know how much they were apart; for us, walking along the midline of the utterly dry riverbed, they seemed close enough, but when we tried to get closer we noticed we were never there, it took us a minute or so to get to where your hand could actually touch the reddish rock wall, and then you looked up and it was impossible to see the end of it. The Talampaya Canyon's walls are up to 180 metres high, equivalent to a 60-storey building (there are none so high in Argentina, by the way).

The "chimney"

Our other impression was that of geological age. The wind we felt was dragging and blowing sand and dust; that we could see. But it was hard to relate that to the worn-down, polished, modelled walls. How many millions of years of wind and sand there were on those rocks, I don't know.

The guide showed us petroglyphs, symbols and human and animal characters carved on the surface of the rocks by the ancient natives of the place, who didn't live there but sent their shamans to perform occult ceremonies there (some pictures of petroglyphs can be viewed on my other blog). It's easy to understand how they came to believe the canyon was appropriate for the supernatural; I myself, who don't believe in it, had a perception of concreteness, of such overwhelming solidity that it felt more than sheer material stuff. (Even now my regret is not having touched those rocks with my bare hands a little more. It sounds incredible, but I hardly touched them.)

In a couple of spots, the shape of the rocks and the canyon multiplies the echoes. A cry uttered there rebounds so that you can hear entire sentences repeat themselves four or five times, clearly, all along the walls, at a great distance.

In another spot, a fortuitous combination of factors make the scarce humidity of the place gather and create a natural "garden", with several typical desert tree species. Besides trees and bushes there are maras (wrongly called Patagonian hares — they're cousins of Guinea pigs).

The climax of our experience was looking up and seeing two black shapes gliding among the red peaks, perching on a rock for a while, then flying again. They were condors. There was no way to estimate their size, but we knew a condor can have a wingspan of three metres and these were at high altitude.

A van full of tourists went by and came back after a while. The passengers glared at us, confused. What were we doing outside in this freezing weather, walking miles along the canyon? And just what were looking at so eagerly, up in the sky? Our guide explained that many tourists, instead of hiring the full tour, come by themselves to the park. As they arrive, the management offers them to ride on their vans (it's how they do business). The tour on the van is much cheaper than doing the trip from Chilecito, getting off and hike for two and a half hours with a guide on your side, but it's much more partial. The whole show is reduced to what you can see from the van's windows. Of course you can't see the condors. I don't know what those poor tourists are told, but based on what the guide said, many tourists who came to see the canyon realize only later than they've been sold a very small part of it.

As we walked into the "garden", a shower of tiny, cold things floated down from the sky. It was (barely) snowing. I was happy as a child. Where I live it hasn't snowed since before I was born. Once in my life had I touched snow, when I was 17, in Bariloche.

We took the way back. The wind now blew into our faces. I felt my nose freezing over. Marisa had lost all the healthy colour she'd acquired during the previous days outdoors. Our hands were livid, devoid of blood. It couldn't be much above zero degrees, and there was no shelter. After what seemed like eternity, we came back to the parked van. It took us a while to stop shivering.

In the Cuesta de Miranda, 2,000 metres above sea level, it was snowing with minuscule snowflakes of a white so white it looked fake, like a rain of fine-grained expanded polystyrene; the clouds veiled the peaks. Coming down from those heights, we saw again the already familiar hills of the Famatina, the highest of them subtly covered with snow. It wasn't much, but I hope it helped. In Chilecito, when there's no snow in the winter, there's no water in the summer.

Vacation report: My God, it's full of cacti!

2008-09-16T10:18:00.003-03:00

Entrance to Chirau Mita

You'll remember we had to retreat from Talampaya chased by the zonda wind. Well, after that and two and a half hours, we got back to Chilecito and were told the tour was re-booked for two days later, or else we'd get our money back (minus the cost of fuel).

Since we'd made no other plans, we tried to fit something in the rest of the day, a sunless Tuesday afternoon full of suspended dirt, so we visited Chirau Mita, a cactus garden on the Paimán hill beside Chilecito. You enter from the street and climb terraces planted with many species of cacti plus some non-cactus, mostly agaves (the source of tequila).

The guide told us everything we wanted to know about cacti but were afraid to ask, a bit too quickly for my taste, since I'd rather stop beside each plant and take pictures from several angles, while she continued to climb the stairs and speak of other cacti. You can see some of the best cactus pictures on a special photo-only post of my other blog.

We learned that cacti are succulent plants, which reduce the loss of water through the surface of leaves by turning leaves into spines, which has the added advantage of protecting the plant. The trunk itself turns green and takes over photosynthesis. We saw huge spherical cacti ("mother-in-law's cushions"), tiny cacti with infinitesimal flowers, tall straight cacti, cacti with helicoidally twisted trunks, and hairy cacti, with white doll-like manes that protect them from freezing (you know what happens when water contained in a barely flexible container freezes?). We also learned that cacti are exclusive of the American continent.

We returned to the hostel and saw the people mopping the sidewalks in front of shops to remove the fine reddish dirt, before opening to the public. (It was rather late in the afternoon, but siesta time is kept almost as a sacred tradition.) And that was the rest of Tuesday afternoon.

Vacation report: Zonda Tuesday

2008-09-15T11:41:00.003-03:00

Tuesday, September 2, the sun rose gloriously above Chilecito. We got up at 6 AM and had a half-conscious breakfast. The tour guide came to fetch us on his van at 7, to go to Talampaya and Ischigualasto (Valle de la Luna). These are natural preserves with unique geological formations, and the main reason why we thought of Chilecito for our vacations. (You can also go to Villa Unión, which is much closer to Talampaya, but there's nothing else to do there. The same goes for Valle Fértil, which is opposite Valle de la Luna in San Juan. Both are OK if you have your own vehicle and don't mind changing from one hotel to another.)

Carrying our mate gear, some warm clothing, and the compulsory cap and sunblock, we exited Chilecito, passed by Nonogasta, and then the Cuesta de Miranda, between the mountains (I'm not going to refer to this beautiful place right now). Then we took a dirt road, asphalted road, dirt again, a couple of sleepy villages, and finally we came up to the entrance gate of the Talampaya National Park. A strong wind was blowing, and dust flew around.

The guide got off the van to record our entry and came back after a while. "People, the park is closed", he said calmly. For two whole second I stared at him, waiting for some laughter to emerge after what was indoubtedly a joke told to every tourist — una jodita, as we say in Argentina. It wasn't. It was the truth.

Only then we realized the wind was blowing stronger and stronger. It was the zonda, a dry wind that comes down from the mountains and is felt by the Cuyo provinces of central and central-northern Argentina at the foot of the Andes. This zonda brought reddish dust and sand in incredible amounts and at a terrible speed. It was just starting and the horizon was already vanishing, blurred out of sight by a brown mass of the color of Talampaya's iron-laden sand. Not only sightseeing or taking pictures would be impossible, but anything could fly away, or come flying with, such a wind.

We stayed there for a while to inquire about the park rangers' opinion. The zonda was going to last for a few hours at least, and even after that there would be too much suspended dust. It was entirely likely that the wind wouldn't stop during the whole day.

Dispirited, we took the road back to Chilecito. The zonda's entry way among the mountains could be seen clearly at a distance of a few kilometres: a uniform opaque brownish jet that ran and expanded after us. To my surprise, I noticed I was resigned, even content. The trip to the park and view on the way had been fabulous. I had no right to complain because an unforeseeable weather incident had ruined the main tour. We would have a new chance two days later.

We got back to Chilecito after midday. The zonda had arrived as well. The sky and the tops of the hills had disappeared, swallowed by the enveloping brown cloud. It was cooler than the day before, so off we went to see cacti... which I'll come to later.

Vacation report: Santa Florentina

2008-09-12T11:00:00.000-03:00

Monday, September 1, we kept on braving the heat climbing hills under the sun at noon. This time we resumed our exploration of the famous cablerail that climbs from Chilecito to the Famatina.

You take a bus and it takes you, in twenty minutes or so, to a nearby village called Santa Florentina, a few miles closer to the Famatina range and therefore a few meters above downtown Chilecito's level. SF's main touristic asset is supposedly a plaza museo, that is, an outdoors "museum square", the only one of its kind in the country, with mining-related objects on display from the time when there was mining.

The "museum square" was a complete disappointment, but across the street you can walk up a broad path that leads you along the hillside, first past a deserted camping site and then reaching (after 40 minutes of ascension) to Station No. 2 of the Cablerail, at about 1,600 m amsl.

The station is well-preserved, the buildings and machinery taken care of as if people still lived and worked there every day. When we got there, obviously, we were mostly interested in getting some rest in the shade, but then we took lots of pictures. The view is fabulous: on one side, the slope down the hills, with a line of towers supporting the cablerail, red-ochre, disappearing on a gracious curve towards Chilecito; on the other side, hills crowded with cacti fusing into a gray-blue mass that climbs and climbs until fine snowy threads appear, and finally the eternally white summits of the Nevados del Famatina, no less than 25 or 30 km away and over 4,500 m above sea level. Below, in the valley, a little river flows, with swift, slightly turbid waters, their colour between gold and copper, laden with minerals.

After much admiring the landscape, having some mate, and catching our breath, we went down the path and stayed beside the "museum square" waiting for the bus, which was only half and hour late.

The next day was scheduled for the tour we came to La Rioja for: the visit to the Talampaya Canyon and the Valle de la Luna (Ischigualasto). It began at 7 AM and was going to last 13 hours, so we went to bed early...

Vacation report: Samay Huasi

2008-09-11T07:27:00.004-03:00

On Sunday, August 31, we decided to visit Samay Huasi (that's Quechua for "house of rest"), a large country residence that belonged to Joaquín V. González. The guy's name was vaguely familiar to me before, but in La Rioja he was everywhere. He was born in Nonogasta, near Chilecito, and he was a deputy, senator, governor, educator, historian, philosopher and writer, besides (rumour has it) an atheist and/or a freemason, and an obsessive gambler — a truly fascinating character.

Samay Huasi is minutes away from Chilecito's city center by taxi. There's a small historical museum, rooms with preserved stuff from Joaquín's time, and plenty of space outdoors for the visitor to wander freely, once the AR$1 admittance fee is paid to the guide.

So we walked around, listening to the noisy wild parrots, among galleries, withered vines, and seemingly decorative olive and almond trees. The heat increased as the morning turned into noon. We came by a big statue of Joaquín in a meditative pose, at the foot of a hill. We took a path up the hill and climbed and climbed until we got tired (which was not that close to the summit, I'm embarrassed to admit). I took some pictures, and then we went down a bit, sought the shade of a boulder, took out our sandwiches, and ate lunch.

Coming down the hill wasn't as easy as we'd guessed, but finally, sweating and panting, we returned to the main residence and sat comfortably on a bench in the shade, drank mate and ate cookies and generally attempted to waste as much of our time as possible. The guide had disappeared around siesta time, so nobody looked for us to check what we might be doing. I guess we could've camped somewhere in the fields and stayed for a couple of days.

We had spent a quiet and well-rounded day. We took a deep breath and walked back to Chilecito, 3 or 4 km along the road.

And that was the morning and afternoon of the second day.

Vacation report: First day in Chilecito

2008-09-10T07:36:00.002-03:00

We arrived at Chilecito on Saturday, August 30, mid-morning. The trip from Rosario lasts about 14 hours, not the least because it goes out of the straight path to reach Córdoba City and stops in two dozen little towns on the way. Although the punctuality was exceptional and the travel was fortunately uneventful, I'd like to vent my carefully preserved rancour at the General Urquiza bus company, which gave us no on-board dinner and no breakfast — a major crime if you ask me.

You get to Chilecito and the bus leaves you on the road by the new terminal station. It's not far from the city center but unless you're a backpacker you don't want to drag your stuff ten long blocks, so we took a taxi. We found our hostel quickly enough, left our bags there, went for breakfast, then back to the hostel for a bath, and then to the Cablerail Museum.

The Famatina range west of Chilecito is full of valuable mineral ores, so back in the early 20th century a German company built a system of aerial cables to transport rocks from the mine up in the mountains (at some 4,600 m ASL) to the processing facilities in Chilecito (at 1,100 m ASL). The rails and the supporting towers are still in place and, according to the guide, it might still work if the parts that have been stolen were replaced (and maybe oiled a bit). The Museum is Station No. 1 of the Cablerail, its terminus, and it harbours a heterogeneous collection of tools, blueprints in German, a payroll, parts of the mineral wagons, and rust.

We learned that the Famatina is being open for exploitation of its gold ore by the provincial governor, one of whose campaign promises was that he'd never allow exploitation of the Famatina. Gold extraction requires cyanide, and the snow on top of the Famatina is Chilecito's almost single source of water. Environmentalists don't know if the cyanide process is safe and they're up in arms against the government.

After the museum, we took a nap and then went out again, wandering, taking in the ochre-pink of walls, the blossoming lapachos, the stillness of siesta time. Carrying a thermos for mate, we went to see a white statue of a Christ on a hill and took pictures of ourselves beside a couple of tall cacti, exactly as tourist couples are supposed to do.

And those were the morning and the afternoon of the first day.

Back from vacations

2008-09-09T10:35:00.002-03:00

I'm back from my vacation! I'm trying to summarize all the information and to review all the pictures I took, so it'll take me some time to recount my 1-week experience in Chilecito and La Rioja... but I'll get to it.

Repeating what I wrote on Sin calma, it was a week full of variations — especially weather-wise. First it was sunny spring, which in dry, northern Chilecito means cool nights and blazing-hot days under the sun. Then came the zonda, which is a föhn wind that comes down from the mountains carrying tons of dust and is usually very hot, though this time it was atypically cool. And then there was rain (more like a drizzle, but still extraordinary in this arid land), and then a cold wave hit the whole country and it even snowed a little on the mountaintops. So we got to wear almost all the clothing we'd brought with us, which was nice in a way — because I always pack things just in case which are returned home unused.

The trip to Chilecito lacked any surprises, except the fact that the bus departed and arrived on time. The return trip was a bit bumpy, which makes three of that kind for me since January, and two for Marisa and I as a couple (the first one, you'll remember, took place while the farmers were blocking the roads). If I believed in such nonsense, I'd believe I'm under a jinx of some kind.

I reckon we travelled about 3,000 km total by bus and on a van, plus a few more kilometres on foot, including a few hundred on the vertical axis. I took in a considerable amount of sunlight and sweet honey paste, I ruined an almost brand-new tripod, I submitted to wearing a Mets cap Marisa gave me to prevent sunstroke, I snapped about 1,100 pictures, and I saw llamas, guanacos, maras (Patagonian hares), and condors (three of them for sure, one of them in a zoo cage).

I'm writing a travel chronicle in a more literary, un-blog-like format, in Spanish, which I'll post somewhere else when finished, in case you can read it (and want to try). In the meantime, I'll post my travel stories here. Be patient!

In case you were wondering, I'm having Internet access problems both at home and at work, so the reports may not come smoothly...

Musketeers of redistribution: Guillermo Moreno

2008-09-03T07:45:00.000-03:00

This is the third and last installment of my translation of the Crítica Digital article titled Los mosqueteros de la redistribución ("The Musketeers of Redistribution"), which shows how the Kirchner administration has failed to redistribute income, which they claim as their main economic goal. This time it's about the worst offender in many respects, Secretary of Commerce Guillermo Moreno. This is what the article says about him:

In theory, his mission was to keep inflation from diluting the purchasing power of fixed-wage workers and retired citizens. The price agreements that he signed with companies at the beginning ceased being complied with long ago, except for [the statistics bureau] INDEC, where Moreno draws the lines of his private world.

Of course I've already written about INDEC and its ridiculous, obscenely faked figures of inflation, which the government continues to defend as true. Moreno is de facto leader of INDEC, which used to be a purely technical organization, fairly independent from the national government and thus trustable, until Néstor Kirchner decided he didn't like reality and let Moreno appoint his minions in places of power there. And that's not all.

[The manipulation of INDEC's figures] is a well-known story. Less known are [Moreno's] practices to favour concentrated companies, consolidating monopolic or oligopolic markets. For Moreno, competition is [a subject] for textbooks. He has always chosen commanding phone calls and verbal agreements with the major actors in each economic sector (cereal producers, mills, supermarkets, dairy companies, food companies, etc.) over transparent regulations that might discourage [the formation of] concentrated structures and encourage competition.

The removal of José Sbatella from the leadership of the National Commission for the Defense of Competition, key to the enforcement of anti-monopoly laws, is the culmination of that process. Sbatella, a professional with a long career, ruled against the Cablevisión-Multicanal merge, which two of Moreno's deputies in the Commission approved on the last day of Néstor Kirchner's term; Sbatella also set conditions for other multi-million [company] purchases in the food sector, which were not taken into account.

Guillermo Moreno is the kind of official that any sane administration would get rid of as quickly as possible, preferrably offering him (as compensation) a trip to some faraway land. Cristina Kirchner's unspoken excuse for keeping him is that everybody in the opposition and the major media is asking for Moreno's head, so firing the guy would be interpreted as a sign of weakness. I can understand that, but it also shows quite plainly that Cristina cares more for an appearance of overwhelming power and firm determination than for doing her job well despite her personal pride.

Moreno is a wrench in the most sensitive part of the economic machinery; the more he stays, the more difficult it will be to restore the credibility of the government regarding inflation and their goal of reducing poverty. Right now we don't know how many poor people there are in Argentina, but we know for sure they're many, many more than Cristina Kirchner and Guillermo Moreno would admit.

Musketeers of redistribution: Ricardo Jaime

2008-08-31T08:00:00.000-03:00

Continuing with the translation of the Crítica Digital article titled Los mosqueteros de la redistribución ("The Musketeers of Redistribution"), about the subsidies granted by the Kirchner administration.

The second musketeer of redistribution is the Secretary of Transport, Ricardo Jaime. During the first semester of the year, subsidies to transportation (urban buses, trains and subways) reached AR$2.66bn, up by 71% compared to the same period last year.

Néstor and Cristina Kirchner (for all practical purposes, it's all one open-ended presidential term) have channeled billions into subsidies for public and private companies, with almost complete freedom to alter the budget and without oversight, so these figures are important. They usually say they need freedom to redistribute the income collected by the state so that it reaches the poor, but in fact all that money and all that freedom gives a few people a huge amount of power. Unsurprisingly, they've been using it to benefit the companies.

Subsidizing public passenger transportation is not an Argentine invention. And there's a consensus that such subsidious mostly benefit the lower-income rung of society. However, here we have doubtful criteria for assignment of subsidies, [which are granted,] in the case of bus companies, on the basis of sworn statements without control over cost structures, and in the case of trains and subways, over cost structures that are inflated by companies linked [to the main ones] as suppliers.

If you've travelled by train in Buenos Aires, it should be obvious to you that the companies that provide the service aren't pouring money into it. I mean, people have set fire to train stations out of anger, due to how bad the services are. By giving money to private companies and not overseeing their investments or forcing them to give a reasonably good service, the government is an accomplice of fraud. If the Secretary of Transportation can't make sure that people aren't treated like cattle in buses and trains that he (using our money) is paying for, then he should resign.

Aerolíneas Argentinas is a completely different matter. The poor do not generally travel by plane. The decission of re-nationalizing is debatable, but valid if weight is conceded to arguments such as regional integration or economic development. What is not trivial from the point of view of redistribution is who will take on the cost. Jaime said that, if it were up to him, he would pay nothing to the Spaniards of [the Marsans group]. And he says they gutted the company, while he looked the other way for five years…

This is especially relevant now that Aerolíneas is being really nationalized. It certainly looks as if we'll be buying back a company laden with debt and with a dismal record of service, and we'll be taking care of fixing it.

There is not a successful precedent of redistribution, either, in the case of LAFSA, the state company that in 2003 took care of the employees of former companies LAPA and DINAR. LAFSA never flied and today it is in the process of dissolving itself. But in the budget there are still funds set aside to pay the salaries of 99 employees, about 10 of them with wages above AR$10,000 per month.

Empty shells masquerading as actual companies for accounting purposes are so common in Argentine history that this surprises no-one. "Enterprise ethics" is an oxymoron in Argentina. This case is also interesting because the state invokes the welfare of the workers to justify the intervention in the finances of failed companies. We're hearing this kind of thing in the debate about Aerolíneas Argentinas as well. At the risk of being accused of insensitivity, I think the state should decide whether it wants a serious company that works and can sustain itself as a flagship airline, or a mockery of an airline whose main purpose is to produce money for its workers, some of who have never done any actual work besides showing up at union meetings.

I'll be posting the last installment of this series in a few days.

Vacations!

2008-08-29T08:00:00.001-03:00

I'm going on vacation! Tonight I'm boarding a bus with my girlfriend Marisa and heading for the province of La Rioja, in the northwest of Argentina. We're staying for a week in Chilecito, a town of about 30,000 in an artificial oasis near the center of the province, between two mountain ranges. Although it certainly looks like a lovely place and we'll tour the surroundings, checking out its vineyards and its abandoned mines high up in the sierras, our main goal is to see the marvelous geological formations of Talampaya and Ischigualasto, located south of Chilecito.

Talampaya is a national park; Ischigualasto, better known as Valle de la Luna (Moon Valley), is a provincial park and lies in the territory of the neighbouring San Juan Province. Both places are part of a UNESCO World Heritage Site. They feature some weird geological patterns caused by erosion; Ischigualasto is also renowned for the presence of many, well-preserved ancient dinosaur fossils.

I may have time to leave a few scheduled posts ready for publication, but other than that, I don't think I'll be able to check this blog. I'm leaving comments open without moderation for registered users, in case you absolutely need to express yourself while I'm away. I'll be back, hopefully with good stories and many pictures, on Sunday, September 7.

Musketeers of redistribution: Julio De Vido

2008-08-24T15:52:00.002-03:00

Long time no write, sorry. I resume the translation of the Crítica Digital article titled Los mosqueteros de la redistribución ("The Musketeers of Redistribution"), which shows how the Kirchner administration isn't Robin Hood taking from the rich to give to the poor, as they arrogantly assert all the time.

… [T]he residential natural gas fee in Buenos Aires amounts to 30 cents per cubic metre. However, four million low-income households which have no access to the natural gas supply network are forced to buy [pressurized natural gas] containers at a cost of AR$1.70/m³, that is, almost six times more. Since the devaluation [of the peso, in early 2002] the residential gas fees have been frozen; but the price of the 10-kg gas container has climbed 275%, to an average of AR$30…. [Minister of Federal Planning Julio] De Vido authorized the deregulation of the gas container market, in which [the private company] Repsol YPF is dominant, and in exchange offered the so-called "social container", which is impossible to find at the price of AR$18 suggested by the State. Even if you could get that, the price (AR$1.20/m³) would be four times that of the network gas….

That is, the government forces the natural gas companies to sell their product at ridiculously low prices to a mostly middle-class public (and gives those companies a good excuse not to invest on surveying and expanding their network to less privileged areas) and allows Repsol YPF to charge six times more to the poor who aren't reached by the network, or who can't pay for a connection to it. (Until a few years ago my neighbourhood itself wasn't connected to the NG network — when it was our turn, we had to pay something in the order of AR$700 to get the pipes into our home; the equivalent price today must be three or four times as much.)

With more concern for fiscal health… in the last weeks Cristina's government started giving signs that it will unfreeze the utility fees. The astronomical growth of subsidies would threaten the fiscal balance if tax revenue were to falter in the future. … During the first semester [of 2008] the energy subsidies alone amounted to AR$8.2 billion, 295% than the same period [in 2007]. The announcement of hikes in the power fees will be followed by the slow thawing of residential natural gas fees.

The interesting thing is that the increases follow a segmented criterion: more [percent] increase for those who consume more. According to data provided by the power distribution companies, 7% of the high-income households account for 25% of the consumption. In the case of natural gas the concentration is similar.

If progressive [as in gradual?] adjustments had been applied two or three years ago, the State would have avoided a huge transference of wealth to the pockets of the less needy. Why wasn't it done before? De Vido used to explain it was not easy to identify the bills of the higher-income households, something acknowledged as possible only now.

More about this coming soon...

Income redistribution?

2008-08-11T21:30:00.001-03:00

An example of why I don't consider Cristina Kirchner's to be a progressive government, and why the Kirchnerist mantra about their income redistribution goal is a big lie, and why I think it's OK if the middle- and upper-class heavier consumers are charged more for utilities: an article on Crítica Digital, titled Los mosqueteros de la redistribución ("The Musketeers of Redistribution" — Minister of Federal Planning and Infrastucture Julio De Vido, Secretary of Transportation Ricardo Jaime, and Secretary of Domestic Commerce Guillermo Moreno). I translate freely:

"This year, one million families with incomes in excess of AR$6,000 per month will receive a state subsidy of AR$750/month in the form of cheap power, domestic natural gas and fuel. This is the equivalent of five social plans [welfare payments] of AR$150/month, which are still received by little less than one million household heads under the extreme poverty line."

The minimum wage has been recently raised to AR$1,200, from an earlier figure of AR$980 established in July 2007.

"We have already written about the sales boom of natural gas-powered heaters for swimming pools, of the rage in 1,000-watt searchlights for the gardens of the most exclusive closed neighbourhoods, or the growth of the market of high-end diesel cars. Since nothing is free in economics, these subsidized prices are paid by the state, which this year will give away nearly AR$20 billion to compensate energy companies."

For comparison, the federal state collected taxes for about 17 billion in March and 24 billion in July, so this is like giving away a whole month of taxpayers' money. You could argue the subsidies go to the taxpayers, only they're not the same taxpayers. Most of those billions come from the IVA (our VAT), which is 21% over most goods and services (including food), so the poor pay a disproportionate amount of it, because everybody needs food, and most of what the poor buy is food. A smaller amount comes from a profit tax that leaves ample room for evasion, and that the government doesn't even try to collect. In fact, the government is about to exempt individuals with monthly wages over AR$3,300 (single) or AR$4,500 (married with children) from the profit tax, detracting from the total collection.

The government actually benefits from the "inflation tax". Every month it proudly exhibits huge and increasing tax collection figures, which is easy when your main source of revenue is tied to the prices of consumer goods. Coupled with INDEC's low inflation rates pulled from Guillermo Moreno's ass, it lets them believe or pretend that the country is growing fast, although that plainly happens only in nominal terms.

"From the total subsidies to the energy sector, the generous Argentine State will provide this year AR$9bn to subsidize the consumption of that higher-income social group. Incredibly, there are still well-off middle-class people who complain that the State "gives away" Jefes de Hogar welfare plans, which today are received by extremely poor households mostly headed by women. The 2008 budget for the Unemployed Heads of Household programme is only AR$1.8 billion."

Yes, many in the middle class are really angry that the poor "don't work, don't pay taxes and get money from the government", while "decent hard-working citizens" have to struggle to go on vacations or change the car every few years. I've heard borderline middle-class citizens demand that the government "sends those lazy bums to work", disregarding the fact that most of them are single women with small children, or young men who have no qualifications at all. This is the state's fault, but taking away their welfare payments is not a viable remedy.

"So as to dispell all doubt regarding the magnitude of the redistribution exercised by [Julio De Vido's] Ministry of Federal Planning: the nine billion pesos devoted to subsidize the consumption of well-off citizens are well above this year's budget for the Ministry of Social Development (AR$7.6bn); they're on par with the annual budget of the Ministry of Education (AR$9.3bn); and they represent 2.5 times the budget of the Ministry of Health (AR$3.5bn)."

This was just the first part of the article devoted to the "Musketeers of Redistribution", who (as you see) wield huge power over the lives and fortunes of Argentinians, and who are accountable only to the office of the President. If and when I have the time, I'll translate another part.

Rosario sues over the smoke

2008-08-08T08:07:00.003-03:00

The municipality of Rosario is taking the case of the smoke coming from the islands to the Supreme Court. As I've reported on several occasions, people who own fields on the islands on the Paraná river's floodplain have been setting the scrub on fire, a traditional and cheap way to clear the land that has gotten out of control. The reason why the fires are so widespread is that farmers are moving all their cattle to the islands and keeping their good fields elsewhere for much more profittable soybean, wheat and sunflower.

Not only is the environmental damage considerable, but the smoke raising from the burning islands decreases the visibility on major road corridors (the Buenos Aires–Rosario Highway and the Rosario–Victoria Bridge), and the falling ashes create health problems.

The islands opposite Rosario are under the jurisdiction of the municipality of Victoria, Entre Ríos. Further south, the delta comes under the jurisdiction of Buenos Aires Province.

After years of putting up with the smoke and seeing how nobody does anything to stop it (except the feverish but insufficient joint operation mounted by the national government through the Environment Secretariat a few months ago when the smoke reached the Center of the Universe, i. e. the City of Buenos Aires), mayor Miguel Lifschitz decided to sue the provinces of Entre Ríos and Buenos Aires, not asking for monetary reparation but to get the authorities to stop the burning, monitor the area, and control its development.

I think this is good idea, seeing how all the friendly talks and meetings have failed.

Shadows of the dictatorship

2008-08-07T07:27:00.003-03:00

Argentina's last dictatorship ended in 1983, but for several reasons the criminals that took part in it were not punished appropriately. Now that the trials have been resumed, some cases have been re-opened, and new horrible deeds are unearthed every time. It's no wonder that the criminals resist.

Yesterday the guilty sentence was passed for four of five military defendants on a trial for crimes against humanity held in Corrientes. Cecilia Pando, an activist that defends the tactics of state terrorism employed by the dictatorship, was there with a group of supporters; as the sentence was read, she snapped and started yelling insults and threats all around, accusing Human Rights Secretary Luis Eduardo Duhalde of being a "terrorist", sliding her index finger across her neck (the throat-slitting gesture) and shouting "I'm going to kill you with my own hands".

Pando is the wife of a retired major, Rafael Mercado, and her group calls itself the "Association of Friends and Relatives of Political Prisoners of Argentina". They believe the military defended the country against terrorism and the prospect of a leftist dictatorship, and now they're treated as dirt because the current government is made up of former terrorists and their allies. This claim was echoed by the professional torturer and murderer Luciano Benjamín Menéndez — "the terrorists of the '70s are in power" — after his sentence (a life term) was dictated, last July.

There's a small but well-connected group of people who are convinced of the justice of the military cause — who believe the desaparecidos were only a few, that most of them actually fled to Europe and let their families play the victim, that everyone who has testified about the kidnappings, the gruesome torture sessions, the summary executions is lying or deluded or paid by the government that "persecutes" the country's "heroes".

They don't state this out loud all the time, of course. More often, they admit that crimes ("excesses") were committed fighting the terrorists, but justify it by saying "it was a war". They always speak of national reconciliation, unification and peace, which for them means forgetting the past and forgiving the criminals even as they unrepentantly walk down our streets — not incidentally, the usual line of the Catholic Church.

Another usual complaint is that of unfairness — placing themselves on one side of the "theory of the two demons" and claiming that, if the military must be punished, then so must the "subversives". In reality, of course, many who were tortured or killed by the dictatorship were just activists, and the actual terrorist organizations were never even close to subvert (i.e. overthrow) the government. They were used as a convenient argument for the military to seize power and "restore the order", and then as a scapegoat for the dictatorship's own failed policies.

Why am I giving so many details? Well, part of the public opinion has become more receptive of some of these claims because they don't like the Kirchners' idea of human rights. You know I don't like the Kirchners at all, and I don't believe they have the marvelous "human rights policy" they often congratulate themselves of. What they have is a desire for revenge. They were leftist militants in the 1970s; Néstor Kirchner has a background of closeness to the leftist-Catholic-Peronist terrorists of Montoneros, though he wasn't in the organization himself; there's plenty of evidence he views the world as a battleground, with him on the "good" side; his words when he speaks of the past show his deep (and broad, and therefore often misguided) resentment and intolerance against those who are not of his own ideological flavour. One can understand and sympathize with that up to a certain point, but a president or the leader of an influential majority should be above that, for the good of the people.

Kirchner's desire for revenge turned out to be a catalyzer for better things: by fighting the conservative Supreme Court he was stuck with at the beginning of his term, he allowed for an independent Court to be assembled; by fighting the laws and pardons that kept the dictatorship's criminals from being investigated, he let justice work as it should. That removal of obstacles was about the extent of Néstor Kirchner's policy on human rights, and if he had stepped down as soon as his work was done (about three years into his term), he would've been remembered as a great president by most Argentinians, including myself. But because he showed his true colours, he gave the dictatorship's sympathizers a measure of credibility. Ah, I suppose it's too much to ask for a human being in such a high place to be OK on all accounts.

Power fees going up in Buenos Aires

2008-07-31T09:13:00.006-03:00

The national government is giving the power companies a raise, through an increase in the power fees, that will fall on those who consume more than 650 kWh every two months. The increase will range from 10% to about 30% and, while Minister Julio De Vido says it'll only affect 24% of the population, others claim the middle class will be hit hard. And it seems a further raise is due next February.

The above is the news as reported everywhere in Argentina, and many people are genuinely concerned or outraged for the wrong reasons. Why? Well, despite the big headlines and the alarming newsflashes broadcast by the media, the raise is only for Buenos Aires, its metropolitan area and the city of La Plata only. Granted, that's 40% of the consumer base and Buenos Aires is the center of the universe for the porteño and for the "national" media, but you'd think they should at least qualify their statements.

I didn't say we hinterlanders* shouldn't be concerned or outraged. We have reason to be concerned since the same inflation and the companies' lack of investments that prompted the national government to grant the raise for the Buenos Aires area utility companies is having serious effects on those that supply the provinces; many had adjusted their fees up or were considering raises before this, and now it's only a matter of time before they align themselves with the capital's companies. Our own EPE (the Santa Fe Provincial Power Company) is checking its numbers right now.

* "El interior del país" ("the interior of the country") is what they call everything but Buenos Aires. That's how Argentina was structured to begin with: a colony with a big port to interface with the world, plus a broad expanse of land ripe for primary exploitation. It's customary and it doesn't sound alright. In fact, it reminds me of the ridiculous conception of Bender's robot apartment in Futurama — Bender sleeps standing up in a 1×1-metre room with no furniture, and the place where he lets Fry live is a huge room in itself... which Bender calls "the closet".

The reason for the outrage is, partly, the outrage of the porteños at this raise, because they've been enjoying ridiculously low prices for power, natural gas and public transportation at our expense since... well, ever. Time and time again I've written about the subsidized fuel for buses. As Rosario's city council is about to take the bus ticket to AR$1.60, a bus or subway ticket in Buenos Aires still costs about AR$1.

Well, as it turns out, the average residential power fee in Buenos Aires is vastly lower than the average in the rest of the country. No wonder the system has problems — you can't expect that the power grid won't collapse when you charge the lowest fee in the place with the largest and densest population, the highest per-capita income, and the highest concentration of installed top-notch air conditioners and refrigerators. According to the article in Crítica Digital, in the capital area a home that consumes 1,700 kWh will get a bill for about 88 pesos. Checking EPE's website and doing a quick calculation, we learn that the same amount of power, in Santa Fe, will punish the wasteful ways of the unfortunate consumer with a bill for 194 pesos. (The guy who writes the Crítica article obviously has math issues. He reports that fees in Buenos Aires are "194% cheaper" than in Santa Fe. Things can't be more than 100% less anything, unless you allow for negative values. Back in 2002 journalists noted that the dollar-peso parity had gone from 1 to a rate of almost 4 pesos per dollar, and reported that the peso had therefore "devalued by 400%". I recall only one news source giving the correct figure of 75%.)

Why did the porteños get this lucky all this time? Well, first of all, no-one likes being charged more, and when you have a metropolitan area with 12 million people surrounding the government seat, you don't want to make them angry. Especially when outside the capital proper you have several huge concentric rings of increasingly impoverished areas. If you control the money, you can use it to favour those near you, while the rest of the country gets indebted. Second, if you measure inflation only in the metropolitan area, it's in your best interest (image-wise and in the short term, i.e. the Argentine way) to concentrate your anti-inflation tactics there and leave "the interior" to its own devices. When the system starts to buckle under pressure (because you subsidize the demand but do not force the companies to invest and increase the offer), you deny it for as long as you can. And then you do something. You can imagine how close to the brink we've come if you consider the government is taking this step now, after the president's image has plunged and with a cooling economy on the horizon.

So, porteños and platenses, welcome to the rest of the country. Don't complain; you're still getting lucky.

March of the penguins, part 2: Two down and counting

2008-07-23T18:20:00.003-03:00

Things are moving in the government of Cristina Fernández de Kirchner. Although the Scourge of Statisticians Guillermo Moreno hasn't been removed (yet?), Secretary of Agriculture Javier de Urquiza had to go, and today the unthinkable happened: Chief of Cabinet Alberto Fernández has resigned. De Urquiza was replaced by Carlos Cheppi, formerly head of INTA (the National Agricultural Technology Institute). Fernández's place will be filled by Sergio Massa, up to now mayor of Tigre, Buenos Aires, who led ANSES (the National Social Security Administration) back in 2002. On inquiry, Massa said he'll be there to serve as "the President's spare tire". What personality.

Alberto Fernández, the man I once called "quite possibly the most aggressively ignorant and intolerant minister Argentina has ever had" and "that filthy rat", has been with us for a long time; when Cristina Kirchner was elected he was one of the many things left over from Néstor's government she should've thrown away as quickly as possible, and didn't. As both presidents' mouthpiece (the official spokesman for the Presidency was merely decorative), Alberto was in charge of implementing the policy of constant derision of the opposition and the media that made Néstor Kirchner well-known as a "strong and confrontational leader" — which he was, until he became simply a bully. But Fernández started to fade together with the Kirchners' popularity ratings, and he just wasn't himself since the long farm tax crisis began, during which he conducted unsuccessful meetings with the farming leaders. Rumours of his resignation had popped up every now and then since April or May.

This government defends its own members more than it cares for its own sustainability, its image, or its results. Fernández should've been expelled when he was the most aggressive and the most unpleasant in the eyes of public opinion; most people would've liked his shrill voice to be silenced, and the government would've scored points; now his resignation won't serve any real purpose. But hey, one less Fernández can't be a bad thing altogether.

Some recent pearls of wisdom from Alberto Fernández:

In May 2007, as inflation grew beyond the obfuscation powers of Guillermo Moreno's INDEC: "The opposition candidates are dealing irresponsibly with the issue of inflation… They're trying to create inflationary expectations in order to ruin Argentinians' lives."
In August: "[After Néstor Kirchner's four year term] we are standing at the gates of paradise."
In September: "There's no inflation in Argentina."
After the 2007 presidential election, which Cristina won in the countryside (!) and lost in the big cities (Buenos Aires, Córdoba, Rosario): "I ask porteños to stop voting and thinking as if they were an island."

They say Alberto is ill and with high fever right now, possibly because of stress. We don't want that. Get well, Alberto! And then get away. Buh-bye!

March of the penguins

2008-07-22T06:00:00.003-03:00

It seems the first casualty of the Kirchners' defeat in the Senate won't be a senator but one of the most revolting elements in the government, Secretary of Domestic Commerce Guillermo Moreno. So say some people. But the news channels disagree: was it just a rumour, or will Moreno leave after all?

Does he stay or does he go? Same place, almost the same time.

Moreno is a thug. Just as Néstor Kirchner is the de facto president despite Cristina's formal title, Moreno de facto handles microeconomic policies (or what passes for that) as if the Minister of Economy, Carlos Fernández, did not exist. (I've only seen or heard this Fernández guy speak twice or three times on TV.) He deals with "price fixing agreements" (Kirchnerspeak for price controls) and, through his mafioso acquaintances, manages INDEC, the census bureau that protects us from the harsh reality of inflation by fudging the rates every month.

Moreno was one of the leaders of the mob that drove a cacerolazo away from the presidential residence last month. On Monday afternoon, a couple of hours before the press conference where Cristina Kirchner announced the nationalization of Aerolíneas Argentinas (and its massive debt), his mob at INDEC attacked the office of the opposition union ATE, whose members (also INDEC employees) have been protesting the Kirchnerist tampering of the inflation rate since it began. They threatened the employees and, after they escaped, trashed the office. The authorities did nothing. The police arrived late.

Moreno is just an extreme example of the characters that populate Kirchner's camarilla, and of his way of doing things. Most of his (and Cristina's) top officials are criminals in some way or another — they simply don't make it so clear.

Roberto Fontanarrosa, one year later

2008-07-21T18:22:00.003-03:00

Last Saturday was the first anniversary of the death of Roberto Fontanarrosa, writer, cartoonist and an icon of Rosario. There was a series of homages around last weekend, including an exhibition of drawings and cartoons by several well-known artists, such as Caloi, Quino and Sábat. The grand opening was Saturday at 7:30 PM on the underground floor of Pasaje Pam, a quaint gallery that goes through a whole block in the downtown. I had no idea there was so much room down there; I'd only been to the ground floor and above.

Fontanarrosa was a superb storyteller and cartoonist, or so they say; I was never a fan of his work. But like everyone in Rosario, I knew Fontanarrosa was more than a celebrity. He was someone you could meet down the same streets you walk every day. He had lots of friends here, which is why he rejected the main temptation of fame for an Argentinian of the "interior" provinces — leaving for the blazing lights of Buenos Aires. Most of our artists, writers, composers and singers tend to do that (our football players do it too, and then proceed to Europe). Fontanarrosa stayed with us and remained a simple guy, making it a point to gather with his friends, until he became too ill for that.

You can read a slightly different and longer version of this article (in Spanish) on Sin calma: Homenaje a Roberto Fontanarrosa.

Julio Cobos hits Kirchner with a piece of sanity

2008-07-18T08:49:00.002-03:00

Yesterday at about 4:15 AM I got out of bed, went to the bathroom, and went to the kitchen grab a glass of water. I'd gone to bed early, as usual, the latest news reporting that the government's export tax bill had accumulated 37 votes as announced by the senators themselves, with 35 votes for the opposition. So it was with masochistic intent that I turned on the TV, expecting to see hordes of Kirchnerists beating drums and waving banners in celebration of the victory of their leader's will.

What I saw instead was Vice President Julio Cobos, presiding the Senate, slowly taking the microphone, and at the bottom of the TV screen there was a huge announcement: "URGENT - THERE IS A TIE AT THE SENATE - COBOS HAS TO BREAK IT". The vote tally (as announced) was 36–36. A senator had done a major flip-flop at the last minute. Cobos wanted to put off the vote and continue the debate later to reach a consensus, but the leader of the majority had rejected it outright with a biblical quote: "What you must do, do quickly" — Jesus' admonition to Judas. Cobos took a while. First he ordered the vote. It was a tie. In this case and only in this case, the president of the Senate gets a vote to add to the 72 senators.

Cobos then took the mike (and here I was, half naked and suddenly very awake before the screen in the dark kitchen) and with a croaky voice and many pauses, he explained that he had to follow his inner convictions, that he thought the bill as it was was less than useless, that he hoped he would be forgiven if he made a mistake, and finally (by the time the leader of the majority looked like he was about to explode) that he could not vote yes.

The session ended in a mess. Canal 7, the state channel, immediately cut the transmission and went back to some old documentary. The rest of the news channels switched to hurried analyses of the vote and to the triumphal speech by Eduardo Buzzi, president of the Argentine Agrarian Federation, in the farmers' encampment in Palermo. I went back to bed, but I couldn't sleep. I got up again at 5:30 to go to work.

The papers closed late to catch the news. The papers from Buenos Aires must have arrived in Rosario at about 10 AM, and then they disappeared from the stands. Everybody was speaking about Cobos and the Kirchners. The vibe I caught (I don't presume to speak for the whole of public opinion) was cheerful and hopeful. Like when you're watching a movie and the bad guy is beaten for the first time and the happy ending is not there yet, but you can see it coming. The only concern was for the Kirchners' ability to process the opposition, accept it, and work to fix what's wrong — an ability to accept they might not be absolutely and automatically right every time — an ability they have so far shown not to possess in the slightest.

Yesterday afternoon Cristina went to one of those stupid inaugurations she likes so much, and gave a calm speech where she spoke of "defection" and of "those who haven't yet understood what our project is, but eventually will", avoiding names. Two hours ago she'd had to call a few people to notify them she wouldn't resign, a rumour that had been floated by her own close ones, and which was apparently was what Néstor Kirchner wanted.

I wrote about this in a slightly different mood on Sin calma. If you read Spanish, check out Es para Kirchner que lo mira por tevé. I still have lots of things to say in both places.

To be continued

Rallies in Buenos Aires

2008-07-15T08:34:00.003-03:00

Today the Senate is going to start discussing the export tax bill, which, as you will remember, were approved by the Chamber of Deputies by a difference of only seven votes. Although the Peronist majority in the Senate is even greater than in the lower house, senators are much more committed to their local constituencies. A significant number of Peronist senators are voting no to the government-sponsored bill. Only one or two votes decided at the last minute might make all the difference, and it's entirely possible that there's a tie — in which case the president of the Senate, Vice-president Julio Cobos, will have to break it.

Both Kirchners (the formal president, Cristina, and the de facto one, Néstor) and their high-profile ministers have been wooing the senators, pressuring them, threatening them, to get votes. The end result we'll only see later today, or tomorrow.

The farmers' organizations and the national government are organizing parallel rallies for today in Buenos Aires. The farmers want to (but probably won't) repeat the numeric performance of the May 25 meeting in Rosario, and the government wants to do better than the farmers. Néstor Kirchner has the mob-like truck drivers' union on his side, plus the Peronist Youth and a few other useful idiot clubs, to provide him with a lot of screaming fans, and the farmers have received the support of a true Prince of Sleaze, the leader of the Gastronómicos (the bar and restaurant workers' union).

It's all pretty stupid if you ask me. And divisive, and dangerous. The rallies are basically a bragging competition and won't serve any purpose. Néstor Kirchner is simply unable to stay quiet and hope for the best, and his hateful insolence is contagious. And the farmers must know that this is it, that they're not going to change anybody's mind now, because this has long ago ceased to be about taxes. It's all about ideology and people's conceptions of what government must handle power.

I believe that Kirchnerism is fascism, just as old-time Peronism was — corporatist, demagogical, perversely fusing patriotism with partisan loyalty, corrupt to its very dark core by its own nature. It must be brought down, by legitimate means, because it's wrecking the economy and destroying our dignity.

I don't believe for one second that this is the worst government we might have had at this time. Neither do I believe that the wealthy farmers would choose a better government (better for us) if they had the opportunity.

But the thing I believe the least is that we must somehow choose either populism or oligarchy, and violently reject the possibility of alternatives, the possibility of dialogue and compromise. I'd rather have no rival rallies hurling abuse at each other, no passionate masses in the public squares, no more demonstrations. Not for a while, at least. We'll have to do a lot of cleaning up, as a people, after this.

My pictures of Rosario

2008-07-14T10:00:00.000-03:00

Eight months ago (in November 2007) I had the good luck to sign up for a photography workshop organized by the Firma & Odilo Estévez Decorative Art Museum (I mentioned it in passing back then). The goal was twofold: to observe and discuss pictures of old-time downtown Rosario, and to do guided photo tours and take pictures of our own. Then you had the option of submitting pictures for selection, to be part of a joint exhibition. It was planned for April. It was delayed, of course, but the guys at the museum let us all know that they were working on it, and a few days ago I received an e-mail announcing that the exhibition will be held in August at the Center Municipal District Center (the name looks like a joke, but it's the District Center building for the Center District). My pictures are the ones above (click to enlarge).

That workshop and those pictures hold a special meaning to me. It's not just the first time somebody else selects some my pictures to be displayed somewhere. It's that, while on this workshop and while walking down those streets, I met Marisa and talked to her for the first time. Three of her own pictures will share the exhibition room with mine. And to think that we didn't know each other at all when we took them...

It's a frackin' cracker! (from Pharyngula)

2008-07-11T11:41:00.005-03:00

I'm an avid reader of PZ Myers' blog Pharyngula since I discovered it. I don't know how he manages to produce so much content. I'm often lost on his explanations of the complexities of the evolutionary development of weird microscopic organisms and such, but I usually learn something from them. When he makes fun of religion, he makes me laugh. And when he unleashes his wrath — he's actually contagious.

After reading his report of the latest episode of senseless religious intolerance and unadultered religious stupidity (IT'S A FRACKIN' CRACKER!) I felt briefly overwhelmed by the certainty that humanity will never get rid of faith. But then I thought, the only way to deal with these things is make fun of the fanatics and expose their inanity. Well, English is spoken by many people around the world, but Spanish is also strong, and it's spoken in most of the countries where the hateful cult denounced by PZ is the majority belief. So I went to Alerta Religión and wrote Amenazas de muerte por una galletita ("Death threats over a cookie").

English and Spanish are down. Now we need it in Mandarin and Hindi, I guess...

New blog in Spanish: Sin calma

2008-07-10T10:15:00.004-03:00

I'm starting a yet another blog, mostly because I want to write in my own language, and there are a lot of things I'd like to write about which don't fit into D for Disorientation. So you should expect to see less personal and local content here. Sin calma (which translates as Restless) will get most of it, because I'll be writing for friends, acquaintances, people from Rosario, from Argentina, from the Spanish-speaking world, who'll be surely more familiar with the topics I'm writing about, and with my lexicon.

I still want to advertise what happens here to the whole world, but from now on I'll concentrate on major events (such as the development of the government-vs.-farmers crisis). Doubtless you've been seeing this trend lately.

If you read Spanish, go and read Sin calma. I'll be posting pictures more freely over there, too, so even if you don't understand the language, you'll still have eye candy. You're free to leave comments in English over there, or simply ask what it's all about, if you're curious.

More complicated than seven votes

2008-07-06T18:11:00.005-03:00

Last Saturday evening the mobile tax exports bill was approved by the Chamber of Deputies. Now it will go to the Senate, and if approved there it will become law.

Each politician and political pundit in Argentina has a slightly different view of the legislative debate and its result. The Kirchnerists are publicly exhilarated, though of course we don't know what they actually believe. For the hardcore K-people, it was a show of power and a triumph of loyalty. For the less sophisticated (the usefully idiotic palaeo-leftists, the Peronist Youth, and all the scum between those extremes), it was victory against the "oligarchy". For more than a few legislators, however, it was simply well-deserved relief from the strain of being pulled in several different directions — by the de facto President Néstor Kirchner, by the farmers, by the governors of agricultural provinces, by the urban middle class threatening with more cacelorazos, by our vulture-like media.

For the ones who lost, it was either the first step towards the unification of the opposition or merely one battle in a war that won't end soon. And they got a precious victory of principles: Cristina Kirchner had to subject to the will of Congress.

Mathematically, the result was simple enough: 129 to 122. The Front for Victory had to call on all of its allies for help, and some of their own defected. If three of the Río Negro deputies hadn't been offered a tax exemption that benefits the apple and pear producers of their province, the difference would've been reduced to one vote. If a certain deputy hadn't chosen to abstain at the last moment, instead of voting for the first minority, it would've been a tie. A year ago, even six months ago, Kirchnerism could've passed any law; yesterday it could've lost by a few votes, if only certain deputies hadn't been bought beforehand. That didn't happen, so the Kirchnerists won.

Néstor Kirchner won — the deputies explicitly ratified the authority of the President to set and modify export tariffs. This is so unconstitutional even a ten-year-old could take this matter as far as the Supreme Court, as it will most surely happen, but Kirchner has never been bothered by the law. The rest of the bill was changed almost beyond recognition — first it establishes a new tax and then it returns the money to 85% of the taxed. But the core of the problem, the one thing that matters to Néstor Kirchner, and which we citizens should never stop protesting — the short line that says that the President is entitled to do as she pleases with tariffs, is still there. So Kirchner can count this as a victory.

However, in a sense, it may be said he lost, too, and he's taking her wife and her party down with himself. Cristina Kirchner's approval rate has plummeted, most people don't believe she exercises power in more than symbolic fashion, the party is divided even at its core, and its alliances are coming apart. Right after Felipe Solá announced his vote against the export taxes, fellow Peronist deputy Carlos Kunkel called him "you traitor son of a bitch" so that everybody could hear. Vice-president Julio Cobos was told to "shut up" by an anonymous phone caller, echoing a previous, slightly more polite suggestion by minister Alberto Fernández. Cobos, who will be presiding the Senate next week, calmly replied he won't resign ("How could I resign, when so many people voted for me?"). Many of Kirchner's former allies, who are aligned with Cobos, will vote no to the taxes.

It's been almost four months since this all began, and everything has turned to the worse — consumer spending is down, credit rates are up to ridiculous levels, capital flight has accelerated, the high dollar-peso rate that made industrial exports competitive has had to be decreased to avoid a run on the dollar, and estimates of GDP growth have been taken down a couple of notches already. The export taxes that should've brought billions into the government's coffers are nowhere to be found, since the farmers refuse to sell, and the government is paying tens of billions per year to subsidize utilities and public services, and somehow has to honour a few additional billions of debt payments. Kirchner hates the idea of "cooling the economy", so public spending continues to rise. How will this end? One ugly word — stagflation.

English coverage:

Al Jazeera: Argentina parliament backs tax hike
Yahoo!News: Argentina grain tax bill clears lower house
BBC News: Argentine MPs approve farm taxes

Congress making history — for good or bad

2008-07-04T08:41:00.003-03:00

Another round in the government-vs.-farmers fight: last night the relevant committee in the lower house of Congress wrapped up a package of two different proposals to be debated by the whole Chamber of Deputies. One of them is a joint proposal of the opposition, which, after miraculously reaching an agreement, narrowed it down to "Let's suspend the President's bill for a while and see what we can do." This one was the most predictable, of course. It's in the minority, but it's quite a large minority.

There's a proposal championed by dissident Peronist, and former Buenos Aires Province governor, Felipe Solá, plus some other like him and many of the so-called Radicales K, i.e. former members of the Radical Civic Union. It's a compromise solution that maintains the mobile tax exports but decreases the amounts. If I got it correctly, this proposal doesn't count — the committee will only issue two, one for the minority and one for the majority.

The majority proposal is that of the Kirchnerists. What it basically says is "OK, we'll give you greedy farmers more subsidies, and if you ask for it using complicated forms we'll give you back some of the money we'll be unlawfully extracting from you in the first place." And then it explicitly says: "The President still has the right to do as she pleases with export taxes, no matter what the Constitution says, so all of the above is a joke."

The Kirchnerists say they have the votes it takes to pass the law — there's still some room for doubt, but wills can be bought, and they will. Needless to say, as soon as the law is passed the farmers will go back to the roads.

In the meantime, seeing how his own party turned to internal discussion (some legislators were actually thinking for themselves!), Néstor Kirchner has escalated his denunciations and threats. I won't be quoting him anymore, since it's sickening and pointless. The guy is clearly paranoid and very dangerous; in any normal country his own party would be shunning him (if only for political convenience), but Argentina being what it is, we'll have to wait until next year's elections to get rid of his influence.

This is all coming undone fast. Vice-president Julio Cobos hasn't spoken to Cristina in two weeks, since he started showing the common sense that seems to genetically absent in the Kirchners, and now even the ministers and senators tell him to shut up, which he says he won't. Cristina Kirchner seems unable to stop doing inflammatory speeches, but she can no longer get out of the safety zone. Kirchnerist shock troop commander Luis D'Elía went a bit far on his violent rants and was told to shut up and go abroad to preach his hypocritical "Revenge of the Poor" sermon, but the rest of the Kirchnerist mob is mobilized and waiting. Hebe de Bonafini was accused for inciting the take of official broadcasting media and asking for the farmers to be removed "with tear gas and sticks". Some politicians we saw as sensible, more-or-less honest representatives of the people have shown themselves as idiots and cowards at the very least, or simply as well-paid handmaids of the Kirchners.

It's painful process we're going through these days. The country is divided, and some of the worst elements in our society are working hard to widen the rifts. We've always had inept politicians, corrupt governments, economic uncertainty, but it's been long time since we had such violent popular leaders, such senseless verbal rage being poured on us without restraint. I'm optimistic, only in the sense I think it will all work out in the end. But how much time can we afford to lose?

We have smog

2008-06-29T19:24:00.003-03:00

Smog isn't a common word in Spanish. We're familiar with it but nobody really uses it. Our large cities naturally have some, always, but it tends not to be that visible. Buenos Aires and Rosario are on a plain beside large bodies of water and with no natural obstacles to keep airborne pollution in its place. I don't know how Córdoba manages that, but I've never heard of it having smog despite being inside a big hole.

When the owners of vast tracts of land in the Paraná Delta's islands started burning the scrubland to prepare those lands for cultivation or pasture, we got to know smog. This is etymologically correct smog I'm talking about — it's smoke plus fog, the latter being caused by cool weather and high humidity.

Now some early morning fog makes for great pictures, but smoke and ashes aren't that healthy, especially at the beginning of winter, when people's respiratory systems are already oversensitive. I didn't feel anything funny myself while taking the photo above, but then most of the blurry stuff was true fog. The lamppost you see near the center of the picture (above the guy's head) was only one block away. When you turned round, the view was much clearer, but a faint greenish-gray screen was readily apparent.

Besides that, I swear I'd never heard of so many plane delays due to smog. These are bad times for road trips too — the road blockages set up by farmers and truck drivers have stopped for the moment, but in this region (say from Rosario to Buenos Aires and around) there's so much fog and smoke that roads are totally or partially closed to traffic every day, until the sun dissolves some of the stuff. And traffic accidents are so common that the radio broadcasts the body count next to the weather forecast.

(I object to calling these "accidents", since in most cases they're caused simply by disrespect for the law, overconfidence and disregard of basic safety measures, for which Argentinians are infamously known. If you find yourself inside an airborne gray soup, the right thing to do is flash your lights appropriately and stop beside the road, no matter if you're late for work or the start of your vacations. And if you see someone stopping beside the road ahead of you, you should consider doing the same. The Argentinian's typical reaction, however, is to trust his good stars, disregard a few near misses, curse the weather, and finally crash into someone and blame the state for not forcing him to stop.)

The fires on the islands are obviously not being monitored by anyone. On any given day it's easy to spot two or more columns of smoke rising from different places along the floodplain of the Paraná, opposite the coast of Rosario.

The fires are intentional or derived from intentional ones. Though the weather might be humid, it hasn't rained a respectable amount for months (in fact the north of Santa Fe has been declared an emergency area because of the drought), so all that withered grass and plants and trees are prone to ignite at the very lightest touch of flame. The wind usually carries the smoke away toward the south (to Buenos Aires), but part of it always remains here and affects the coastal areas of the city. If I can see where it comes from, then the authorities (governors, mayors, police, judges, prosecutors, ecological management offices) can see it as well. Why does nothing happen?

The export tax: debate and circus

2008-06-27T11:17:00.000-03:00

There are a lot of things to report about the the government vs. the farmers and the legislative handling of that infamous Resolución 125 (Bill No. 125 of the Executive Branch) that imposed mobile export taxes on soybeans. So many things, in fact, that I've been unable to summarize it these days. You simply can't stay on top of it all.

In short — No. 125 is being debated at the Chamber of Deputies (the lower house), although so far it's been more like a disordered assembly than a true discussion among lawmakers. Clearly as a dilatory measure, Kirchnerism staged an open meeting, where everyone who wished to do so could get in and listen. Insignificant organizations representing minuscule groups of interest demanded to be heard one after another, and the audience applauded or booed. In the meantime, different groups of politicians were lobbied or pressured in different directions, Néstor Kirchner tried to re-inforce his hateful black-and-white view of the issue, the president spoke here and there, the vice-president was rebuked and praised for his meeting with several opposition governors, and finally came... the tents.

First the farmer leader Alfredo De Angeli announced they were setting up a "green tent" on the square before Congress to mark their position. The Kirchnerists reacted quickly and set up several tents of their own. The government of Buenos Aires City ordered them to be taken down, but the Kirchnerist mob insulted the official in charge and refused to acknowledge the authority of the city government or its laws. The Federal Police was asked to intervene, but since it responds to orders of the national government, nothing happened. Yes, you got that right — the City of Buenos Aires has no police force of its own, and the police it's got simply won't enforce the law if the perpetrators are Kirchnerist militants. The government of Buenos Aires filed an accusation (the tents have no security measures and are invading public space without a permit) but a judge, prompted by a Kirchnerist deputy, granted them immunity, the reasoning being that once the tents are installed, the police would have to force the people out and that would be worse than letting them stay. Glory be to fait accompli!

There are now six Kirchnerist tents before Congress, with wooden floors, electric power and heating, plus pamphlets and plasma TV sets. The farmers finally set up their own, and the MAS (a socialist group) brought another one, favouring neither the government nor the farmers. The farmers also hired a giant inflatable bull, which was promptly named "Alfredito", while the Kirchnerists erected an inflatable penguin called "Néstor" (symbol of their leader) and supplied several of their pamphlet-handling militants with egg-shaped costumes. They're considering to bring in a mechanical bull as well. This sounds like a circus, and in a sense it is. Once the entertainment is over, however, no-one knows what might happen.

The government party would have enough legislators on both Houses to turn the presidential bill into law, but only if they were to align with the partisan line dictated by Néstor Kirchner. That won't happen. Most Deputies have had to accept that the bill won't pass unchanged, that they're going to have to concede some things. At least 30 and possibly even 40 Peronist Deputies are going to vote partially or totally against the bill, either because they know it's wrong as it is, or because their constituencies won't forgive them if they submit to Néstor K's wishes. (In fact, unless a miracle erases people's memories or typical Argentine political short-sightedness prevails, it's likely that Kirchnerism will suffer a terrible blow in the legislative elections next year. Some formerly popular politicians are already unable to walk the streets of their home towns without bodyguards.)

Many non-Peronist allies of K are unsure what to do or have already turned their backs on Kirchner, disturbed by his violent discourse and his wild accusations of widespread conspiracy against his wife the nominal president. The opposition is, as always, scattered, but they're converging on a couple of projects regarding the export taxes.

The farmers say that if Congress turns the bill into law without fundamental changes, they'll go back to the strike and take the roads again. Kirchner has told his fellow party members to raise their hands and pass the law exactly as it is. The need to find some middle ground and some compromise settlement is obvious and should be (for savvy politicians) a simple matter of time. But this is Argentina after all...

Flag Day 2008 (no pictures this year)

2008-06-20T14:14:00.001-03:00

Flag Day 2007

It's Flag Day in Rosario! Exactly 188 years ago today, June 20, a lawyer called Manuel Belgrano (forced by circumstances and convictions to act as politician and as a military man) died at the age of 50, poor and forgotten, only eight and a half years after creating and flying the Argentine flag on two artillery batteries on opposite banks of the Paraná River, one in Rosario (then just a village) and the other on the islands of the Paraná's floodplain facing it.

For reasons unknown to me, Argentina commemorates great men and their deeds at the date of their deaths rather than their births or the actual events that made those men great. So this death anniversary is Flag Day. I wrote about it last year (Flag Day 2007), which was a big deal because it was also the 50th anniversary of the construction of the Monumento a la Bandera (Flag Memorial).

This time, however, I refrained from attending the ceremony and the parade. Besides the awful weather (cold, windy, cloudy, and threatening to rain) plus my own concern for my health (I'm still recovering from the cold I caught last weekend), there was too much going on for it to be just a festive meeting of the citizenry.

Until a few days ago, nobody knew whether Cristina Kirchner would preside over the official celebrations in Rosario, as protocol dictates. The "man in the street" view was that she would either (a) employ any excuse to avoid coming to Rosario, where she'd meet harsh popular opposition, or (b) come here bringing along a couple tens of thousands of "supporters". The latter hypothesis was likely, given that the shock troop leader in the service of the Kirchners, Luis D'Elía, had vowed to come to Rosario today to cheer for the President, "defend democracy" and "vindicate the flag", defiled by the May 25 meeting. However, D'Elía went overboard with his call to "take up arms" against those who wanted to "destabilize the government", and the Kirchners backed away from him.

Then the President went and presided over a partisan rally, two days ago. It was organized and paid for by the Presidency, i.e. our taxes, but it was undoubtedly a Peronist rally. The CGT union even decreed a national strike (it was effective only in Buenos Aires) to allow workers to go see Cristina. This rally was seen as both a provocation and a confirmation that Cristina would only address her selected supporters from now on. The idea that she might have thousands mobilized again, to Rosario, 300 km away from her only real center of political power, and along a national road that is blocked in a hundred places by people hostile to her policies, was beginning to sound ridiculous.

May 25 meeting

Moreover, when Rosario was designated as the center of the agricultural protest, about 200,000 people gathered here on May 25. The call to attend the last pro-Kirchner meeting was refused by the local unions, who said it was divisive and inappropriate, so Cristina could expect no help from them on Flag Day. And the common public doesn't like patriotic dates turned into political meetings, and doesn't like Cristina's speech style.

The middle class, in fact, hates Cristina with a passion. Even the local leftist movements are against her in her fight with the agricultural sector. The governor of Santa Fe, Hermes Binner, is a Socialist who supports the legislative debate of the export taxes that Cristina would've chosen to impose. The mayor of Rosario, Miguel Lifschitz, is also a Socialist. Cristina, like her husband, is used to have local authorities on her side wherever she goes — authorities that can be counted on to fill the spaces at rallies with cheering people.

So she chose not to come. The excuse was "bad weather" — plausible, but nevertheless just an excuse. Two days ago, when "bad weather" couldn't be assured, the national officials in charge of protocol and presidential security were already conspicuously absent, when usually they should be planning and coordinating with local police and municipal officials here in Rosario. Then it was announced that Cristina would be instead in Quilmes, near Buenos Aires, in the afternoon. And finally, she moved once again and decided she would do some other minor stuff in Hurlingham, because it's going to rain and there's a roofed stadium in Hurlingham. (La Nación says the Flag Day celebration was moved to Hurlingham. That, as someone pointed out, is incorrect. What moved was Cristina and the presidential political machine, not the official seat of this patriotic celebration, which is duly held in Rosario, as has always been the case.)

It's a pity that the President misses the true celebration. I for one would've considered going if she came, though mainly to boo her. Some of my fellow citizens would, I think, as well. Others were understandably afraid that the Kirchnerist mob would hijack the celebration and disallow the expression of dissent. And yet others were planning to boycott the President's coming to Rosario by hanging black flags on the balconies, instead of sky-blue-and-white Argentine flags, or by simply leaving when she began her speech. She's spared us from choosing among those sad alternatives.

Yesterday I was thinking that Rosario has traditionally been a progressive city, with critical citizens, who never receives attention except on Flag Day, when protocol compels the chief of state to be here for a couple of hours. In ten years Carlos Menem came three times, and the last one he was basically ignored (the weather was awful, like today). Fernando de la Rúa never came, since he couldn't have gotten out alive. Néstor Kirchner came twice, and only the first time he was greeted with enthusiasm; the second time he had to bring his occupation troops with him. Cristina backed away already.

I was writing to someone who lives abroad about this, and I said I felt this feeling of refreshing insolence against the government. Not the bitter anger of people who don't know what the government will do to them, but a healthy mixture of disrespect and rebelliousness. Indeed, if one isn't free to insult one's own authorities for fear of being accused of subversion, what's left? Cristina is afraid of coming here to Rosario, where she'd receive the public punishment she deserves. And I'm proud of that.

One step forward, two steps back

2008-06-18T18:37:00.003-03:00

After almost 100 days of doing nothing but fueling the rage of the farmers and a good part of the general public (including many of her voters), President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner took note of the cacerolazo and reluctantly sent her mobile tax exports bill to Congress.

Never one to aspire to perfection, though, she let her husband go on with today's rally at Plaza de Mayo, which was transmitted on Cadena Nacional (i.e. forcefully overriding the regular schedule of all air TV channels to broadcast her speech). The rally was formally an occasion for all Argentinians to hear the President speak live on the current issues of prime importance for the country, but as expected, and as usual, it was merely a distasteful partisan meeting — thousands of public employees and unionized workers forced to attend, plus thousands of "social movements" who herded their militants to applaud Cristina.

Once before the crowd, la Presidenta took again on her Evita voice (which failed her a couple of times) and proceeded to insult the leaders of the agricultural organizations and to accuse those who protested against her government of being undemocratic and disrespectful of the popular majority. Her thesis (we've heard several times recently) is that democracy consists of voting every four years and then either quietly tolerating the decision of the majority, or form a new political party and compete when time is due. That is, all channels of feedback and criticism between the people and their government (except the ballot box) are to be suppressed: public opinion shouldn't be allowed to express itself through the media or through demonstrations and protests. Criticism on TV or the papers means big media corporations trying to destabilize the government. Banging pots and pans in the streets means inciting a coup. The spectacle of thousands of people who despair at the lack of action of their supposed representatives, taking to the streets on a freezing night with their kids to make some noise, to try to reach the consciousness of the ruler, doesn't mean anything but a threat to democracy.

That's the Kirchners' message, the subtext of most of their speeches. Every time Néstor and Cristina have taken one discursive step forward to speak of free speech or freedom of the press, they've proceeded to immediately take two steps back, treating their critics as enemies. So far it's been the media groups and some specific individuals and organizations. Today, it was the people as a whole.

Yesterday, when I heard Cristina's vow to let Congress discuss the tax bill that caused this whole mess in the first place, I was briefly glad about it. But again she'd taken those two steps back. The bill, they explained, deals with a matter of export tariffs and is under the jurisdiction of the Executive, i.e. it's not really a tax. As such, what Cristina sent to Congress was a closed package that can't be opened. It can only be approved or rejected as a whole. If approved, the conflict will be renewed. If rejected, we must assume, Cristina can ignore it, and given her record, it's quite possible that she would. The political costs might be extremely high for her and for everyone in her party. But the Kirchners have already shown us that they care for nothing. They're like blind bulls racing through a china store.

Cacerolazo, and then?

2008-06-17T13:07:00.011-03:00

I had a tiring, satisfactory long weekend. Friday night, Marisa and I went to see a series of five episodes filmed by a local producer. On Saturday, I attended the unveiling of Che Guevara's statue (Marisa stayed home because she wasn't feeling well). Sunday was Father's Day, so we went to my place to have lunch with my parents, then we left for a recital that served as the closing for Guevara's 80th birthday celebrations, and after that, we marched on to Marisa's folks' home to have dinner with her parents and the families of her brother and one of her cousins. Monday morning, we woke up early to do an architectonic photo tour downtown; right after noon I left for a friend's house to have an asado.

I was still there when, at 5:30 PM, I received a mass SMS calling people to turn off the lights for 15 minutes at 8 PM and then start a cacerolazo against the government. I didn't pay attention to it. I was too tired to think of protesting anything, I was stuffed full and it was cold. Besides, I didn't think anybody would attend. I got back home at around 7 PM, and one hour later I was proven terribly wrong.

I was exhilarated. On edge. Finally! I only wished I could've been there. People were banging pots and pans or honking their horns or simply out on the streets singing or waving flags, disorganized but not incoherent. Thousands (some say 10,000, some say 40,000 or more) in Rosario around the Flag Memorial, many thousands also in several parts of Córdoba City, thousands in Buenos Aires near the Obelisk and also in Olivos, in front of the presidential residence, where the previous night a small group of demonstrators had been forced to leave by a group of government-paid thugs. And in La Plata, Posadas, Catamarca, Santa Cruz, San Rafael and Mendoza City, Chaco, in the larger cities and the towns of the deep countryside and even the places dominated by Kirchnerist administrations. Some were asking for the President to leave; most demanded that she act — do what must be done to put the country back on track, and send the First Gentleman back to where he belongs.

The hardcore Kirchnerists are in the latest stages of paranoia and denial, seeing coups and destabilization and conspiracies everywhere. Luis D'Elía even called people to take up arms in defence of the government. But the rest of the K people are cautiously stepping back from the mad leader.

Yesterday, vice-president Julio Cobos asked for Congress to intervene and discuss, exactly what should've been done to begin with, and just the kind of consensus-based, non-coercive process Néstor K abhors. Several loyal governors suddenly announced they wouldn't attend the government rally planned for Wednesday at Plaza de Mayo in Buenos Aires. Many long-time Peronists showed their disgust for D'Elía's manners. The K Radicals supported their leader, the vice-president. Here in Santa Fe, governor Hermes Binner put it succintly: "This way of governing is coming to an end."

Today the President broadcast one more of her venom-filled speeches, comparing the downfall of Perón in 1955 to what is supposedly being done to her..., and then, she said that, just to please the ungrateful and the ever-discontent and show her respect for the law, she would submit the export taxes to the approval of Congress. It took her 45 minutes of badly doctored speech to acknowledge that she'd been forced to take a step back.

Now Kirchnerism has an automatic majority in Congress. But it's not the monolithic front it used to be. Even if the retenciones pass the legislative filter, it will cost (we hope) several politicians their post in the near future. You'll have to think for yourself and decide, ladies and gentlemen — and then face the consequences when you go back home to your constituencies asking for their vote.

80 years of Che Guevara

2008-06-16T21:15:00.004-03:00

Too tired to write it all down now, but here are the pictures I took during the celebrations for the 80th anniversary of the birth of Ernesto Che Guevara, quite possibly the most famous citizen of Rosario. It's an embedded Flickr slideshow. If that doesn't work, try 80che: 80 years of Che Guevara. New pictures may be added tomorrow.

Claudio Lozano on Cristina's "political naiveté"

2008-06-12T18:04:00.003-03:00

This is a translation of an op-ed by Claudio Lozano on Crítica Digital about Cristina Fernández de Kirchner's speech. Lozano is a left-wing economist associated with the CTA labour union, former Kirchner supporter, and now a national deputy for Proyecto Sur. He speaks of Cristina's acknowledgment that the government's only mistake when implementing the mobile tax exports was the "political naiveté" of thinking that people who earn a lot of money would tolerate the state's demanding of some of that money to give to the poor. The emphasis is mine.

I wish it were the first speech. I wish the argument of political naiveté were believable. I wish we were discussing a serious income redistribution programme while taking responsibility for the fact that in Argentina, since 2007, the economy and hunger are growing in parallel. I wish the debate of a more egalitarian relation between the Nation and the provinces were seriously undertaken. I wish we were in the presence of a government whose goal were capturing extraordinary profits to realize the proclaimed goal of "paying off the Argentinians' deficitary social account". It's a pity that it's not the case. Can it be true that they want to solve the social situation, when INDEC is under intervention and millions of poor people are deliberately hidden from view? What's the reason why the Government speaks of transferring income, and yet its social programme includes no concrete mechanism of transference of resources to families? Does the Government not know that, by just implementing a universal assignment of 100 pesos for every child, extreme poverty (hunger) would be practically eliminated among underage citizens? Does the Government know that simply by setting aside 1% of the annual GDP the issue of hunger would be solved, and with 5% of the GDP poverty would be eliminated altogether? Isn't the Fund created today a bit scarce, when we know that foreign trade taxes will bring in, this year, more than 50 billion pesos? Considering that in the last five years there's been no advance on tax reform, no advance on seizing the profits of oil, mining and fishing, and that in the case of agricultural profits this was done in a small proportion, and granting benefits that favoured the concentration of this economic sector, is today's presidential speech believable? I wish it were true. I wish it weren't just one more speech. But why do we explain what we're going to do with the tax collection above 35%? Weren't export taxes intended to redistribute income?

During five years we've heard the Kirchners and their supporters incessantly congratulate themselves on their progressivism. But nothing has been done to make this country more egalitarian. Kirchnerism has an automatic majority on both Chambers of Congress, a Congress that never refuses a command, and yet all they seem capable of doing is extracting money from one sector of the economy using the bluntest tools at their disposal. Even one of Página/12's commentators, one month after the beginning of the farmers' strike, had to acknowledge that the Kirchners' government is not reformist or progressive at all. Poverty and social inequality are much worse than they were 25 years ago, right after 6 years of a corrupt military dictatorship and a disastrous war. A huge gap still lies between the poor and rich in Argentina: the wealthiest 10% earns 30 times more than the poorest 10%, worse than during the neoliberal rule of the Menem administration. The tax system is horribly regressive: 47% of the total tax revenue corresponds to the IVA (our VAT), a tax on consumption, while you pay no taxes of any kind if you win a million through speculation or when you sell your company's stocks.

And on top of this, the president explains that the leftovers from an exceptionally high tax, imposed by the Executive branch without congressional approval, will be used to redistribute income. I mean, wasn't redistribution the main reason why they needed so much money? And if so, where's the rest of it? Because we sure can't see it anywhere.