Last night we started to get in the spirit of Christmas amid the summer evening storms which have been assailing our small City of Cochabamba. The tree was put up and the usual sibling fussiness was dealt with. Then the kids were finally put off to bed. We decided to have a night cap as we listened to some music in order to calm our nerves. I would like to say that we had a nice time as we sipped on our glasses but in reality we devoured the bottle, but still a nice time. Then Tammy mentioned something that was interesting. “You know a friend said to me that Cochabamba is much like the mythical fortress of Camelot. In Camelot it would rain all night and be sunshiny during the day” Which is true because as of late it has been hot and sunny during the day and rainy at night. Later that evening I sat out on the bedroom balcony with only a comforter wrapped around my body watching an electrical storm roll in while listening to the rain fall. Occasionally I would turn to look at my wife’s slender figure shrouded buy a white blanket appear and disappear while she slumbered. It truly is a magnificent place this Cochabamba.
To speak more on Bolivia we have our national president and parliament elections this Sunday. I am afraid that the outcome is already known quite well but right now but it is my opinion that the race is to determine how parliament will be divided up. The opposition is trying desperately to gain a foothold here in order to balance power. It will be interesting to see how right fits against left. There has been much mudslinging. Just the other day I saw home video footage on the news of a crew of workers loading up suspicious looking voter boxes into the back of a pickup truck that had no tags but had political party banners all over it. I’m thinking “Could somebody be careful enough to take off the license plates and then leave political banners all over the vehicle while performing such a nefarious activity? Or is it some kind of a set up. But then again I have been wrong before when I have thought ‘Nobody can be that stupid!’” I don’t know.
Also an interesting note about the incumbents (president and vice-president) is that they are both post middle-aged bachelors. For this they have been accused of being homosexuals and many times being direct partners. Then to combat these rumors the spokes people for the president state “This man cannot be a homosexual! Just look at the amount of illegitimate children he has had.” Also in one of the current presidents life movies(as there have been several) it depicts him as a partying bachelor which in several scenes show him whoring in a whore house in the Chapare region with the local cholitas (indigenous women). I guess that is all the proof we should need that the man is straight Not really that I care about the amount of Levitical laws the man violates in his bedroom. Still a far cry from US politics….or is it?
Either way there are real issues that are in the balance. To name a few are as follows. How will Bolivia define its relationship with the US, Chavez, and Cuba? Is Bolivia a pluri-nationalistic nation or not, or what does that even mean? What is to be done with the exploration and exploitation of Bolivia’s natural resources (which there are many gigantic reserves of all sorts almost untouched)? What about national health care? (Sound familiar?) What of Bolivia’s ever deteriorating infrastructure? Etc.
Keep Bolivia in your hearts and thoughts on Sunday.
Coming clean straight from Camelot
FeO2
Three Religiions
Facing the wall
