Team Archie

I am currently a long ways from BC, but I have long had an attitude toward papparazzi, one that is not difficult to express.

I hate them.  It is not a term I am happy expressing, for it is a very strong word to put in writing, but they are a loathsome facet of modern life, and the tabloid yellow press that they feed are a steep step below them.  They are not connected to reality, and force the celebs they prey on into extremes to attain a bit of honest privacy.

The tabloids in Britain appear to be the worst on the planet, and they have driven a number of people away from their own country, and have insisted on making the life of various Royals sheer hell.

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I am someone who travels with a camera, and usually have one in easy reach.  The people I do photograph are either friends, at SCA events, or ones who pose for the camera.  I do strive to never post an embarrassing picture of someone, but do try for candid pictures, where the unposed picture captures better than anything staged could.  I do not post pictures of any one who is uncomfortable with a picture I have taken and either delete it or never post it, as they request.

That being said, I will never post a photo of a famous without their tacit consent.  As in, if they are at a public event, they are fair game during the event.  If they have stepped out for a private moment, no.  If they are at a beach on a photo shoot, sure.  If they are at a beach with family, no.

From what I have seen on the press, Prince Harry, Megan Markle and their son have chosen to step away from the limnlight to better raise their son and have some privacy doing so.  I applaud their choice, and will not seek out and way to invade into their lives.  To me, being on Team Archie means leaving them alone to give them the space to raise their child out of the spotlight of celebrity, and hopefully to become a person as admirable as his parents are.

Cochabamba Bolivia

I had a great lunch at a place with a lovely garden setting.  Just uphill was a great viewpoint overlooking Cochabamba.

The restaurant is called El Molino de Pihusi.

And the view from uphill

Bolivia, November 2019

By looking at the news, I would believe that at this time, November 17, 2019 in Bolivia, there would be a lot of protests happening.  There are many articles about the current political upheaval happening, yet here in Santa Cruz, life seems to go on with no real difference.

It is very true that my Spanish fluency is somewhere between bad and horrible, but still, walking around the central part of Santa Cruz, there are no parades, no rallies, and people seem to be going about their business without any concern.  Walking down the streets, it seems to me that there are more vacant business places than last time I was here, two years ago, but not by an incredible amount.

The central park, 24th September Plaza, had quite a few people in it on Saturday, and most were enjoying the day, with the usual gang playing chess at the boards set up around the edges.

And, here are a few of the pictures I took.

Uncle Finn

This post will ramble.


Many things are easy to remember about my Uncle Finn.  Tall, average to slim build.  Strong.  Farmer strong, the kind with endurance to spare.  Mechanically savvy, able to take apart and fix anything he had the tools for.  Woodworker, handyman, etc.  Christian, but not in the thou shalt not way, more in the lead by example way.

He has been in my life as long as I can remember, even though we never lived in the same town, except  for two years in the 80's.  And now every time I see him, he fades.

He still has a playful humour, but is no longer an active person.  He needs help standing up, and really needs to use a walker, but has the idea that a walker will make him dependent on it for mobility, no matter how many people try to tell him it will help his mobility.  Stubborn guy that uncle of mine.

Proud of all his family.  He will complain about his kids and other descendants a bit, but he also brags about them a lot.  His love for his brother and sister is at the core of him and what he thinks family is all about.

He taught me that a tool that can only do one thing is a lousy tool, and that a craftsman who can only use a tool one way is a lousy craftsman.

He taught me that friends are earned, and family means a lot, but friends who are family are the most important people in the world.

Somewhere in side the shell he is, a light comes forth and I am talking to the man I always knew, one who is engaged in the world and loves the people who surround him, but that man is getting harder to find.  He is slowly being replaced by a man sitting in the corner, nodding and smiling but not really engaging.  It has  been years since he could be trusted behind the wheel of a car.  Years, maybe even more than a decade, since he last held a saw and made something new.

But.

He still knows me.

His whole face still lights up whenever a friend or family member drops by for coffee.

He does his best to entertain.

He loves his sister.

He misses his brother even more than I miss my dad.

He still makes me happier to see him than sad about what he used to be.

A tour with me

I keep thinking of doing a guided tour of Peru, or Central America.  Both have a very strong appeal for me, and both would pull me in many directions.

A tour of Peru would cover a lot of ground, and ideally would go from the north to the south (or vice versa).  I could see taking a group from Trujillo to Cusco, and then down to Nazca., or doing Cuzco last.  That would take about 17 days to do decently, and more time would allow for diving into deeper detail in the ruins that are throughout Peru.  My best guess at cost would run about C$4,000/person, including airfare from Vancouver, staying in a mix of hostels and a few hotels, meals, entrance fees and guides, but not including booze.  please note that that is a budget whirlwind of a trip, spending a lot on airfare within Peru to skip the time taking a bus.

The short version for Central America would start in Cancun Mexico, them Tulum, then on to Caye Caulker in Belize, then San Ignacio.  Cross the border into Guatemala and see Tikal, stay in Flores for a day, Antigua, Lake Atitlan, and then off for Nicaragua for a week, with the flight home from Managua.  The problem with that is the current political unrest in Nicaragua.  i would be reluctant to take a trip there, not in terms of personal safety, but in terms of reliability of travel.  Skipping Nicaragua and Costa Rico to go to Panama might make sense, but would up the cost by quite a bit.  A 3 week trip would cost around C$3,500.  Increase the cost to 4,000 if we fly to Panama and do the canal.

Canadian Politics, n stuff

Part 1

Current Canadian politics is embroiled in a controversy on how much power the Prime Minister has.  He has shuffled Jody Wilson-Raybould out of the position of Attorney-General, a decision that is well within his power as PM.  However the optics of doing so while pressuring her to go easy on SNC-Lavalin, followed by asking the new Attorney General to discuss the SNC-L case, and then maintaining that the former AG was not shuffled out because of her stance on SNC-L stinks of corruption.

To most of the world, Canadian politics are seen as corruption free, but that is not true, and this ugly case brings that to the fore.  Justin Trudeau was elected and put in office based on a number of positions that placed him at the forefront of many modern political reforms and changes.  He promised many things that melted away soon after being elected, among them changing electoral laws from first past the post to proportional representation, how open the cabinet meetings would be and how much he would listen to the new opinions of the newly elected in the Liberal Party.  With the exception of legalising marijuana, he has failed on all his major election promises, and even there he has been swayed by large corporations to keep the cultivation limited to large companies, rather than kicking the doors open to all.

Part 2

I have not looked into what is taught in social studies currently, but when I was in high school, {1977-1980), there was a lot taught about what the constitution means, a bit on personal rights and freedoms, and nothing at all on personal political power.  As a member of  a democracy, your personal political power is small, and your voice is weak.  But that does not mean it does not exist, nor does it mean that it cannot be joined to others.  The point that is never brought up is the one of civil disobedience.  At what point are you as a citizen obligated to stand up against the current laws and state THIS IS WRONG

You can protest by carrying a sign, you can protest by writing letters and phone calls, and you can protest by voting.  You can shout your protest by entering as a candidate..  

It is currently wrong how our native population is treated.  What should be done to correct it is not something that I know, nor is there ever going to be an easy solution, but moving towards a solution is something we as a country need to do.

Trudeau promised to move Canada away from oil dependence, and toward a green economy.  Moments after being elected, he hit the money wall that is big oil, and all ideas of green slammed to a halt.  He turned his back on the protesters and supported big oil, then wondered why his popularity took a dive, while smiling at the cameras and showing how picture perfect his family is.

One of the things I am fairly confident of in Canada's politics is the integrity of the ballot box, and between social media and the ballot box, the up coming election looks to be a way to slap the face of those who think last election promises are forgotten as soon as the politicians are sworn in.

Veteran's Day

Also known as armistice day, November 11th.

I have posted about it several times, and I hope that this time it is from a slightly different angle.

My interaction with veterans of either World War were limited, and the one who talked to me the most about it was an American WW II veteran maned Robert Waltz.

When I moved into the Vancouver area, I ended up living in his basement for a while, and got to know him slightly over the six or so months I was there.

He read a lot.

He wrote a lot.  Not much of his writing was published, but the information I have is that he published a few novels shortly after WW II, and then a long break before a last novel in about 1999.

He was a raconteur, and had lived a full life, with many wives, a lot of children and travel at a time when things were both easier and more difficult than now.  The few stories he share about travelling with the Taureg in Morocco in the 1950's made me realise how different things are now, with our ease of getting to Morocco, but at the same time going between counties was much easier then, and for the most part instead of a passport, he used his military ID.

I never figured out a chronology for his life.  I know he grew up somewhere in the states, and volunteered for the army, getting into a armoured unit and becoming a tank driver.

The first dichotomy in talking to him was the complete lack of anger or malice towards the German people as soon as the peace was declared, and the attitude of achievement of running over German soldiers with the tank.  He even made sure that any troops who surrendered to him were taken to a place where their surrender was treated according to conventions rather than turning them over to the locals who were shooting them out of hand.

I have no idea when he went back to the states after his time in Europe, but he said he left a country where there was very little racism, and went back to a country he no longer had a connection with, because of the amount of racism he encountered.

I have a very hard time believing that statement from him, on the one hand, but on the other I think that he changed vastly in his time away, and the things he accepted as part of the culture when he had no foreign experience and the culture shock he felt upon return was strong.

He left the United Sates, and never returned.

He spent more time travelling, eventually ending up in Canada with a French wife and the two children he had with her.

Although he seemed blind to what we call race or colour, he was not blind about background and culture.  He seemed to revel in pointing out cultural differences, not favouring one culture over another, just highlighting the differences.

I do wonder what he would have thought of the current divisive mess that is US politics.  Not to talk about what should be changed, but to talk about the societal pressures that pushed them into the current fight they are in.