Continue reading “The Destroying Angel mushroom”

Hay varias opiniones a favor y en contra de la pastera que costará 1,2 mil millones y que están construyendo en la orilla del río Uruguay en frente de la ciudad argentina de Gualeguaychú.

Ninguna otra planta como ésta, que fue construida por la compañía finlandesa Botnia y será puesta en marcha en estos días, ha dañado tanto las relaciones entre la Argentina y Uruguay. Las relaciones entre Finlandia y la Argentina han sufrido consecuentemente también.

Una fuente cercano al proyecto me contó hace poco que muchos problemas se hubieran evitado si la planta hubiera sido construida más al norte de Gualeguaychú.

La ciudad argentina afectada por la pastera vive del turismo y es bastante visible de la playa del lado argentino.

Si la planta contaminará mucho o poco al río Uruguay es una cosa. Seguramente los finlandeses, que tienen uno de las tecnologías más avanzadas en este ramo, pueden construir una pastera que contamine lo menos posible.

Aunque Botnia tiene la mejor tecnología para este tipo de planta, la empresa ha fracasado miserablemente en asegurar a los argentinos que viven al otro lado del río Uruguay que la planta no causará daños al medio ambiente.

Un cartel de estacionamiento en frente de la embajada de Finlandia en Buenos Aires lleno de carteles protestando la construcción de la pastera. Unos de los carteles lee “Botnia mata.”

(Foto por Enrique Tessieri)

If you want to know where one of the places Argentineans are from, visit the Immigrant Hotel Museum. Here’s a picture of some of the baggages and belongings immigrants brought from Europe to Argentinean shores. In the 1914 census, 2.391 million people, or 30.3% of the total population of 7.885 million, were foreigners. In Buenos Aires the native-to-foreign-born ratio stood at 49.4%.

The faces of hope and anticipation.The Immigrant Hotel housed many new immigrants. Some 3.7 million were registered inside these halls during 1882-1927. Most of the foreigners from Europe that lived in Argentina in 1914 were from Italy (942,000), Spain (841,000), Germany (95,000), France (81,000) and Austria (39,000). I have investigated for the past thirty years Finnish immigration to Argentina.

No bird soars too high if he soars with his own wings.
William Blake (1757-1827)

Of all the seasons that pass over the Nordic region, possibly fall is the most magical. But what makes it stand out from the rest?

Is it the pitch-darkness? Is it the vast universe above and its peppered celestial inhabitants that appear to gaze down upon us longer than usual? Yet again, could it be the sound of rustling leaves and rapid breezes that holds on for a moment to trees before losing steam?

I was certain on a late-Saturday afternoon two years ago that I’d finally succeed at finding where happiness lived.

Deep in the woods, I noticed a lone bird resting on a branch. Poor bird – I thought – it must have escaped from a farmhouse because toucans only live in the tropics.

“If you move fast and long enough you’ll be in different lands,” the bird said to my surprise in half-toucan, half- human. “In a way I envy stones because they know where their home is. They don’t move.”

“Don’t look surprised,” it continues. “There are other creatures from distant lands that inhabit these forests. Aren’t you from faraway as well?”

I followed the black bird with the brightly colored bill deeper in the woods.

The scenery looked familiar but then it started to change. A pine tree I passed had its cones pointing towards the sky and there was a spring that had the following sign: “Drink here and quench your thirst for dreams.”

There was also a modest shack that looked like a country store but only sold by the pound hugs, kisses and warm caresses.

A woman soon appeared before me just when I noticed the bird had vanished. She was blessed with so much beauty that it would take thousands of rainbows arched simultaneously in the sky to match her loveliness. I looked straight in her captivating eyes, which are like breathtaking views from space to Earth.

“So what brings you here?” she asks without malice.

“I’m searching for happiness. Can you help me find it?”

Silence and then an answer that twirls to the soft moist ground as an autumn leaf that parted from a branch.

“It’s useless for you to soar high enough by yourself… But with the help of the autumn woods we’ll show you that contentedness is right here and now.”

There are many arguments for and against a $1.2 billion pulp mill being built on the shores of the Uruguay River right across the Argentinean city of Gualeguaychú.

The plant, which is being build by the Finnish company Botnia and will become operational at the end of August or early September, has done more damage to relations between Argentina and Uruguay than any other investment ever.

Relations between Finland and Argentina have suffered as a result as well.

One source close to the project told me that by building the pulp mill higher up river would have solved a lot of problems. Gualeguaychú lives off tourism and the mill is pretty visible from the beach on the Argentinean side.

How much or little the plant will pollute the Uruguay River is one issue. Certainly the Finns, which have some of the best pulp technology in the world, can build a modern plant and pollute as little as possible.

Even if Botnia has the technology they have failed miserably in assuring Argentineans on the other side of the river that the plant won’t cause them any harm.

Here’s a parking sign in front of the Finnish embassy in Buenos Aires with stickers protesting the construction of the pulp mill. One of the stickers reads “Botnia kills.”

(Photo by Enrique Tessieri)

After four weeks on the road I’m back to where I started the journey to Argentina. Believe it or not, the flight from Buenos Aires, which includes brief stopovers at São Paulo and Frankurt, took about 48 hours to make it to the doorsteps of my home in Finland!

The odyssey started Saturday at 4:30am, when I left with my son for Ezeiza Airport in Buenos Aires. After a brief stay on the line to the Varig Airlines checkin counter, I’m informed that the plane won’t be flying to Argentina from Rio de Janeiro. About eight hours later, we’re put on another flight at 4:45PM to São Paulo.

Since I missed the flight to Rio at 7AM, we lost the flight Sunday from Frankfurt to Finland. I’m assured, however, by Varig staff at Buenos Aires that their Frankfurt office will take care of the matter when we arrive in Germany.

Wishful thinking! I was told that I must buy a new ticket (466 euros!) and Varig washed their hands of the matter.

I’ve sent three emails to Varig since Monday and haven’t received any reply.

I’ve got a good lawyer and the consumer ombudsman to help me resolve the matter. All hell is going to break loose but in the meantime avoid Varig Airlines like the plague.

Time flies and all good things come to an end in Argentina as well. But the ending this country had after it was ruled by the last military regime (1976-83), the presidency of Raúl Alfonsín (1983-89), which ended with hyperinflation, and another character Carlos Menem (1989-1999) leaves a lot to be desired.

Menem privatized almost everything that was state-owned. His economic policy didn’t open up a new era of greatness for the country. On the contrary, his policies impoverished Argentina and forced coruption to rocket due to the sale of state-owned companies.

In Buenos Aires, as elsewhere, defeat is alive and kicking today. Some of my countrymen have been so humbled by events in the past thirty years that they have lost the ability to care for their countrymen.

In a country that exports beef, grains and other agricultural products isn’t it a shame that some Argentines die of malnutrition?

An Argentinean friend who had lived through the country’s most difficult periods asked me if I saw a change in the Argentineans since I last visited the country 10 years ago.

I told her that the poverty that has descended on Argentina is like an ogre that has robbed the people of its innocence. People are nice to you as long as your strong or have money. Without those two things you aren’t worth anything in these parts.

Corruption is one of the biggest challenges facing Argentina and other Latin American countries. It’s tougher than military regimes that once ruled these parts and committed outlandish crimes against their countrymen.

The Transparency International Corruption Perceptions Index is an excellent source to measure corruption. Finland, Iceland and New Zealand are the least corrupt with Haiti being at the bottom of the 2006 list.

Of the Latin American countries, Chile (20th) is at the top followed by Uruguay (28th) and El Salvador (57th).  Argentina placed 93rd on the list of 163 coutnries.

It’s pretty incredible to note that after military regimes in Latin America relinquished power to the civilians from the 1980s, there’s one foe that continues to wreak havoc: corruption. It operates more efficiently than any ruthless dictatorship.

In Argentina, most people would agree with you that corruption is one of the main culprits that has kept it from becoming a developed country with strong economic and political institutions.

“Why don’t you denounce the corrupt politician, mayor or policeman?” I asked recently at a party.

“Because we’d end up being harassed by the authorities,” the person said.

If you think of it, the culture of fear that forces you into inaction is the same but different type of terror that military regimes used to rule the country.

Corruption, however, is like an ogre that has fine manners on the surface and walks around in a suit and knows your price.It does not need to shoot you in the head or torture you to get information.

Mestizo is a term commonly used in Latin America to classify a person that has a Spanish and Amerindian ethnic background. 

There’s been an interesting debate in Bolivia recently that suggests that the country, whose inhabitants are mostly Amerindian, are mainly mestizo. An article published July 1 in La Paz daily La Razón reported that 64% of Bolivians identify themselves as mestizo.

Guatemala is another Latin American country where the majority (about 80%) of its inhabitants are Amerindians.

The debate in Bolivia, whether its population is mostly Amerindian or not, is odd. Are they debating the issue because the “minority” mestizo and European “white” population see themselves threatened by MAS (Movement Towards Socialism) President Evo Morales’ government?

I’ve always been amazed by how Latin Americans classify themselves ethnically.

If anything, the debate in Bolivia shows how underdeveloped the region is. How do you explain that being “white” is a zillion times better than being Ameridian or mestizo? If you don’t believe me, take a fast look at any Latin American soap opera. Normally the dark person is the servant and the white person the master.

This is pretty incredulous considering that the so-called Latin American whites are a minority compared to the mestizos, who are a majority.  

The situation is a bit like South Africa, when it imprisoned the Black majority with the help of apartheid.  In most of Latin America the same thing is happening with the help of lack of education, human rights and endemic poverty.

After tomorrow it’ll be a week since we arrived in Buenos Aires. I’m traveling with my son Martin. The first time Martin traveled to  Buenos Aires was about 15 years ago. He’s 18 now so he doesn’t remember a thing from that trip.

One of the matters that has struck Martin the most about the country is how cheap it is. We went to a store and checked out some neat Christian Dior shirts. The price of a shirt was 50 pesos, or about $17. There were other name brands that were in the same price range.

At the railway station outside Buenos Aires, a kiosk vendor was selling Windows Vista for 20 pesos, about $7.  

I told my son that it’s not possible that what costs many times more in Europe or in the States costs only a fraction here in Argentina.

The Argentineans have a great word for it. Whenever something is fake or an imitation they call it trucho. It must be one of the top-ten nouns used in Argentina.

There was an article in Clarín, the biggest daily in the country, that reported that 70% of all CDs sold in Argentina are pirate, or trucho, copies!

With salaries being much lower than what people make in the so-called developed world, it’s no wonder why the government isn’t doing anything to clamp down on this illicit trade.

Buying a real Christian Dior shirt or Windows Vista progam would not be possible, unless a middle-class Argentinean didn’t eat or pay the rent for a few months.