Reuben's big adventures in Latin America and beyond the infinite.
Adventure #2, 25/12/2006 in ?)
Hi All -
This has been an intense Christmas for me so far.
A few days ago - impossible to know exactly how many - I found myself drinking red wine at Yoomee's place
at 2 or 3 in the afternoon.
Since then I've felt almost relentlessly silly, but I'm having a fine time.
In response to a current disagreement with Dan over the internal politics of Palestine, I add this:
I've heavily overdosed on international relations, but I can't stop guzzling the news. We seem to have a tyrant
leading the most powerful nation on the planet and everyone else with it into hell. I have no patience for any
political organization that fails to protest, or that gives any "aid and comfort" to the Bush Administration. That's
part of the reason I'm so pissed at Fatah right now. Undercutting Hamas with force and with powerful
symbolism, Abbas goes to Israel and sips tea with the Olmerts while his men battle those of the elected
government. The average Palestinian no doubt wants both sides to refrain from internecine violence, and is
angry with anyone engaging in it. I'm passionate about non-violence myself, but I insist that Fatah's formal
power was bestowed by a dictator and not by a democratic process, and that that power is illegitimate.
Hamas's power is legitimate by any standard except for those imposed by occupying foreigners, the US, Israel,
and indirectly by allies such as Britain and even Canada. US policy on Palestine is so completely fused with
Israel's that I hesitate only a little before giving the US 'direct occupier' status in the Territories. Just squint
your eyes while watching some of the footage out of Iraq that's on the Net.
It does not hurt me too much to point out the moral error of my own countrymen: Canadians are killing and
being killed in Afghanistan as part of a NATO fighting force, not as UN peacekeepers. Our job is to free up a
few American troops who have more important things to do. We're an auxiliary unit fighting for the US main
force which is stuck in Iraq. I say we get out and refuse to get sucked in again. Morally, politically, and
militarily, the 'War on Terror' is a black hole. Nothing it inhales can survive: a lot of innocent people, a few
guilty people, states, constitutional acts and amendments all get ripped apart. I feel there is a line that has not
yet been crossed by the Americans in spite of their abductions, torture, murder, lies, and war. But they're
close. Can you imagine what would happen in Iraq if the US started bombing Iran, as it is now in a position to
do? It has recently sent an armada to the Persian gulf, the UNSC has just voted unanimously to sanction Iran
because of its "weapons of mass destruction program related activities," to borrow an earlier formula, and the
US has just arrested two senior Iranian military advisers in Iraq. Bush has the firepower in place, he has a
diplomatic fig leaf - which is all the clothing this emperor ever needs - and now a casus belli. But, like a
steak-knife salesman, he has more! He has demonstrated in abundance what is most necessary to commit the
mass murder of war: bloodlust. Bush and the neo-cons are psychotics surrounded by moral weaklings.
Fuck the neo-cons, the Republicans, and their mewing Democratic accomplices. Fuck the Canadian
Conservatives and their "proportionate" violence in Lebanon. Fuck Kadima, fuck Fatah. Fuck the Labour Party.
Tony Blair and John Howard can go fuck themselves. Fuck all war pigs.
Merry Christmas.
r.
(adventure #1, 10/05/2005 in Panamá)...
all hi -
in Panama City i´m unsuccessfully digesting a disgusting lunch. getting from Mexico to Panama was
difficult fun, but culinary trauma may kill me now. i´ve eaten a pile of not-even-reheated bland: bland
rice, bland spaghetti, bland beans, bland chicken, a rotting coconut. even the coconut was bland, except
for the parfum de putride.
after Phil set sail for Mazatlan, i spent another month or so on La Isla de la Piedra, where i continued to
make not enough to live. i had earned fifteen dollars for a week´s work on the coconut plantation,
which experience also explains my snobbery toward coconuts not freshly fallen from the tree, and now i
was earning ten dollars per day at a restaurant, but only for one day. they had me collecting pesos and
distributing toilet-paper at the baños, which i was happy to do until the arrogance of a few ill-bred
Mexicans determined that never again would i serve steward to the assholes of assholes. i never went
hungry though, as the kitchen was open and bountiful, and i never went unhappy, for the ocean and hills
and beaches and people of La Piedra are all one needs, except for the road.
so i took to the road. from Mazatlan i caught a ride with an uber-trucker all the way to Guadalajara,
whence, after a memorable dearth of rides, having out-willed a withering wash of sun and asphalt, i rode
again, this time to Mexico City. but now, being forewarned that in the capital thieves would steal my
socks without removing my shoes, i took a colectivo to pretty Puebla, where i failed to seduce an
honourable waitress who had me physically and fully aroused at my table.
from Puebla i would have hitched again had the chain and my lust not been broken, but, as they had
been, i was weak and took an inter-city bus for the first and last time in Mexico. on the pocked road
south the first movie was a soap-opera in Hebrew. the second was a clumsy call to American arms. but
Chiapas enchanted, slipping by.
i spent three weeks living in a palapa in the forest between the depressed town and manicured ruins of
Palenque. the first week was restful, but subsequent days stretched my sanity; a thick humidity
descended after a rain, and i left too much blood in the bellies of sucking flies.
from Mexico my ruined skin and i hitched to the Panamanian border in six days and three rigs. what i
saw in Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica would not of course interest you.
Carribean Panama puts slop in one´s guts, lust in the eyes. lungs and spirit alike are soon laden with
damp exhaust. it´s cars, jewelry, casinos for coke-barons, and transvestites for tea.
i´ll be a while, if at all.
r.