Quito... (in Vib's eyes)

Take it easy when in Quito.

One week after we arrived in Guayaquil where Francisco was figuring in an Aquaculture conference, we had all these plans for the weekend. We’d get to Quito after a short flight, Francisco would do an offical type meeting with a European Union representative and then we would check out the beautiful old city of Quito and have pizza at night.
We would go to Otavalo the next day and the day after that we would take a bus over the Andes or something adventurous and that’s how we’d get back to Guayaquil.

But we forgot.. that Quito is pretty high (in altitude) and that, when you get to Quito, your body has to get used to coping with less oxygen and that makes you feel.. very…tired. That’s all fair enough and easily explained, but when you’re four and a half years old, when you’re very.. tired.., stuff just doesn’t really run smoothly anymore in your brain and melt downs happen.

When parents are very tired as well, they don’t always realize straight away that four and a half year old brains with low oxygen supply need to be taken very seriously. Do not attempt to visit the Florence of South America with a very tired four and a half year old. (Imagine Stendhal syndrome mixed with altitude sickness) Give it some time to let things adjust.

We cut back on things to do and didn’t take busses over the Andes, we just hung out at the pool of our lovely sixties style hotel (Hotel Quito), had breakfast in it’s restaurant, called El techo del Mundo (the roof of the world)

We saw the smog build every morning over the city, did just a day trip to Otavalo and stayed another night in the old city and went to every single church in Quito Antiguo (Centro Historico – a UNESCO World Heritage Site). We chased pigeons on the 1590’s square of San Francisco and took a ride in a horse carrier. We went out after dark against the advice of the Lonely Planet and had dinner in a restaurant where music was provided by a trio of blind musicians.

Inside one of the countless churches in Quito Viejo, me and the kids watched a family celebrating the 15th birthday of a girl clad in a cloud of pink. They were celebrating her ‘Quince’ and all her girlfriends were dressed in lilac. Ave Maria creaked through the stereo. Behind us a family lined up for another celebration, something for two year old girls dressed in clouds of white. Kika was of course very interested in these little girls. I tried to imagine her dressed up head to toe in white fluff and lace. HAHA that wouldn’t last very long!

Outside the same church we watched this lady getting ready to mount the motorbikes with her baby on her back. Now safety standards in traffic (and anywhere else) are something else in South America, but more about that later. That she’s carrying her baby is traditional however in Ecuador.

In Ecuador we got many many stares and even comments because we carry our children in slings when we need to, in a similar fashion. Actually the most common way I’ve seen women do it is in a longer cloth, rebozo style I think it is, so the baby sits up on the back with the cloth tied criss-cross across the front of your body (will have to find you some pics to illustrate it). But all the women who do wear their babies are indigenous and if you’re anywhere near middle class in Ecuador you’re not supposed to do this anymore (I’ve heard the same in Mozambique). I think it’s seen as ‘country’, or worse because a lot of the street people, asking for money, seem to be babywearers. Not the best social stigma you can have for the product. That foreigners like me would wear their baby (or toddler because Kika is almost two and not small) is a new concept.
In Quito we met a girl with her partner and their 6 month old baby who stood there with sore arms from holding the baby at a dance/music performance (she had a stroller but the baby obviously didn’t want to be there) and he told her: YOU SEE! You shouldn’t be embarrassed! Then Francisco broke the news to them that people pay more than 50 dollars for dulce&zoet slings in New Zealand. Of course that’s just plain hilarious!

You need a four wheel drive at Lagunas de Mojanda!

We went to Otavalo to buy some touristy stuff and see something of the country side. Someone in Guayaquil who Francisco worked with new someone in Quito who sometimes takes tourists in his car for trips. So after some calling around Ricardo showed up in his white car, of which he was very proud. Sorry for complying with any stereotype you might have of girls and cars, but of course I only remember that it was white, and not what type it was.

Francisco makes it a habit not to take the same road twice and had spotted a lake in a guide which would make the perfect detour. Without a map or a sign, after some asking around we found the road up the mountain and climbed all the way to cold laguna de Mojanda.



The road got gradually worse however and then it got bumpy and we got ourselves stuck a few times and it got very dusty and Ricardo became very nervous, but he just kept going.

Then a few more bumps and me and Francisco started wondering if Ricardo really knew what he was doing, or if we really knew what we were doing. In the end Francisco had to climb out of the car and coach a very nervous Ricardo out of a few precarious situations and it took some time for him to recover his nerves. Enough already we said! I didn’t feel like getting stuck next to a desolate Andean lake on an unsignposted road in a country where nobody bothers to put up roadsigns or warnings that say: Four wheel drive only.

That’s why I’m telling you now, if you want to go to Lagunas de Mojanda, take a 4 wheel drive. Oh and a warm top. And something to drink and to eat. We turned around and went all the way down the mountain again.. the same road. Ricardo then made this classic comment: I feel like I’ve been having an affair with a woman on the side but it didn’t work out and now I have to go back to the wife with my tail between my legs. Haha. That’s straying of the beaten path in Ecuador.

We did see a lot of roses along the way! And had bizcochos with dulce de leche. Returning to Quito we got stuck in 6 pm Friday afternoon traffic in Quito in the rain. A very claustrophobic situation, but a great adventure nonetheless.

This is all for now as this blog needs to be published before our trip to South America is over. I haven’t even told you about Halloween in Chile and finding out I’m not even married to Francisco in Argentina. (Is Maxima even married to Willem Alexander in that case?)

Guayaquil... (in Vib's eyes)

Francisco asked me to guest blog about our family sojourn into South America.

He was already in Ecuador finishing a month of work when I got there end of October with Felix (4) and Kika (almost 2). I travelled from Holland via Madrid and Quito to Guayaquil. You have to excuse me that a lot of the time my focus is on travelling with young children because if I can’t keep them happy, everything else stops.. As I understand that this is sometimes a bit tedious for those of you not in that ‘frame of life’, I’m starting a separate blog about travel with young kids, where I can elaborate to my hearts content about the ins and outs and ups and downs of travel with under fives.

In Ecuador, the people you see on the billboards advertising fast food, or on the outside of huge new looking malls do not look at all like the people in the cars driving past them (nor do they look like the people walking on the streets, between the cars selling stuff)

The people on the billboards are blond and have blue eyes. But the people of Ecuador (the actual consumers) look something like this:



Francisco says that apparently many ecuadorians think that they look like Europerans. Only when they come to Europe they realize that they don’t.

For a minute I wondered if this was something like the relatively high proportion of Jamaicans in New Zealand commercials. You’d think by watching tv ads in NZ that a huge part of the population is of African descent and speaks with a Jamaican accent.

Now I think it’s more like what Kiran Desai said in an interview I read in Holland in October, how a very large proportion of the population of this world grow up thinking that the place where they are, is not the place to be and that they should strive to leave.
Somehow that sounds very familiar, isn’t that how we’re all sometimes made to feel? Or is that just me?

Guayaquil
What to do with a waterfront? On our first weekend in Guayaquil we hung out at the Malecon!
(if you live in Auckland this may be interesting
http://publicaddress.net/default,3708.sm#post3708)
(if it can be done in Guayaquil?.....)

Guayaquil is the biggest city in Ecuador and suffice to say that most people in Ecuador do not belong to the worlds lucky eight percent
Still, guayaquilianos realized something.. a good public space can save a city. With the Malecon a space was created that people were proud of and that they actively use in their daily lives.

I have a thing for public spaces because in Auckland they somehow don’t quite seem to work, but I sorely miss the good European ones. A good public space makes you want be there and hang out. I’ve taken trains across continents just to be in famous public spaces. They don’t involve Mac D’s and don’t have cars, that’s one thing I know for sure.

The Malecon 2000 in Guayaquil a strip of public space of 4 kilometers long, meticulously paved, it has gardens, art, fountains parks, playgrounds, exercise areas, restaurants, several open air food courts, monuments and morphs itself past two art galleries, an imax cinema and ends at the Cerra Santa Ana.
The Malecon is constantly positively humming with the people of Guayaquil. Old and young, rich and poor… People come here during their time off with the entire family, with their boyfriend or girlfriend (novio/novia), they come here to see and be seen, to eat icecream, to play and to hang out. I think people need a place to play.

I have to point out that the Malecon is ONLY possible in Ecuador because every ten meters there’s a uniformed and armed presence.



Me with Kika in my sling on the Malecon on a Sunday afternoon..
Note.. the tidal river delta of Guayaquil does obviously NOT have pretty blue water like in Auckland.



Something to do for the kids, for only fifty cents a go.



Some more fun for fifty cents.


Some green, some benches to hang out on. Some iguana’s in trees, some ducks to feed.


Some art to stand between.



What else do you need?
The malecon became one of our favourite places to go in Guayaquil.
You can watch people and let young children run without there being the immediate danger of traffic running over them.
For fifty cents you can make the kids INCREDIBLY happy by giving them a ride in a silly train.
And even at 11 o’clock at night, when I was besides myself with jetlag and passed out, Francisco could take the kids for a run (their bio clock obviously told them it was 8 o’clock in the morning) and a play on the Malecon and it would still be buzzing with friendly life.


The Malecon then ends at the Cerro Santa Ana, which is a little hill covered in tiny houses that seemed to have grown on it, leaning on top of and next to each other like in a Hundertwasser picture. Not so long ago it was apparently a no-go slumzone and now it has all been done up in many freshly painted colours with hundreds and hundreds of steps taking you up and down past people running tiny businesses in their front rooms or just hanging out talking about Dutch football (an ecuadorian player is the current star of PSV Eindhoven). People have been stimulated to start these businesses and it’s now a place safe to go because there are guards and people of the Cerro get paid to help keep the place clean.


Nice one Guayaquil.

Mmhhhh.... Berlusconi or Chavez?

Shite... imagine if that are your choices for the president of your country for the next 4 years... welcome to Ecuador!

The elections here were different from what I expected, based in my Latin-American experience... 13 candidates, and 2 went on... and pretty much at the extremes of the spectrum... and no party/carnival atmosphere as it happens in the rest of the continent.

The stage
Ecuador has just 13m people and a $40 billion economy and the elections went for a new Congress and part of the provincial and municipal legislatures as well as the presidency.

Enter Mr Correa
Here is good line that says a lot: After Mr Chávez compared George Bush to the devil Mr Correa wondered whether the devil would take offence.

He opposes a free-trade agreement with the United States, even though neighboring Colombia and Peru have each signed one, and intends to shut the American military base in Manta. He threatens to follow Argentina's example in defaulting on Ecuador's $10 billion foreign debt, the third such default in little more than 20 years. Mr Correa's victory, many fear, would push Ecuador into the club of Latin American countries that revile the United States and use the oil revenues to defy economic gravity.

He is a “fresh” option because Ecuador's political and economic system has been so thoroughly discredited. Street protests have toppled three presidents in the past decade, most recently in April 2005, when Lucio Gutiérrez was thrown out. Political parties are little more than fronts for the business interests of their leaders. The courts are regarded as creatures of the same oligarchs, who plunder the budget and state-owned companies such as Petroecuador, the country's biggest oil company. “We want total change,” says one of the blokes I work with.

Correa means to deliver it by summoning a constituent assembly “with full powers” to sweep away the “dictatorship of the parties”. He has already made it difficult, should he win, to govern within the traditional political framework. He has fielded no congressional candidates, although the tiny Socialist Party backs him. Congress is thus likely to be dominated by the political parties he intends to destroy. The problem is that if he makes it, how hard will the old order strike back?

No one really know what sort of president he would be, he is quite articulate, I followed is discourse over the time... interesting at the beginning, but totally discredited over the last days...

The guy is smart, he has PhD in economics form some American University, and was last year plucked from obscurity as a professor at a private university to be economy minister under the outgoing president, Alfredo Palacio. As in Venezuela, oil fattens the revenues of Ecuador's government, he became a popular hero by dismantling a fund meant primarily for paying debt in order to boost social spending and was soon forced out (under pressure from Ecuador's foreign creditors, his defenders allege).

He is not really like Chavez, but that is the image that opposition wants to portray, to start he is not (and has never been) a military, he is a devoted catholic (not being catholic here would be political suicide anyway), he worked for a year a s a voluntary in a school in the highland, so he speaks quechua (the main aboriginal language) and that was a killer point for his mountain voters, as well as English and French (did a post grad in Belgium, and is married to one).

He is quite pragmatic as well, while he opposes Ecuador's use of the dollar as its currency, which has brought low inflation, but does not plan to stop it. The constituent assembly, he suggests, will strengthen democratic institutions rather than undermining them. He wants to “depoliticise the courts”, conduct a “deep reform” of the government bureaucracy and have congressmen elected by district rather than by province, making them more accountable to their electorates.

The masses like that, but the problem is that Congress will resist Correa's call to drown itself in his constitutional deluge. The army, still the final arbiter in Ecuadorean affairs, is likely to take its side.

Correa does to appeal to the people, but they will follow only so far, Ecuador's are sustained in part by the middle class. Conditions are wretched. Despite years of oil-fuelled growth, more than half the population lives below the poverty line; a similar proportion is underemployed or jobless. Yet Ecuador's unrest is provoked less by deprivation than by anger at a grasping elite. That has fed Correa's support but may also put limits on it. If elected, he may not last long.

His victory is far from certain. He got far, but some are turned off by his radicalism, and some would be surely go the other way, based in his resentment and full on paranoia after the results of the election... he claims fraud, and that everyone is against him... he may loose not by the merits of the opposition, but against a anti Correa coalition...

Enter Mr Noboa
This guy is soooooo unappealing.... honestelly he has serious problems coordinating his hands movements and his speech... small and fluffy, he looks more like a character that never made it to the tele-tubbies than a president...

His dad was the richest man Ecuador, a self made guy, a banana magnate, with scores of other companies... but this guy does not has the best of brains... he ran for president twice before, and now has run a sickening and flagrantly populist campaign. Proclaiming himself “God's messenger”, (for real!) he distributes T-shirts in poor villages, promises jobs and housing and ministers to the sick with his “Álvaro Noboa Medical Brigade”, get on his knees to pray for the health of old ladies carefully “appearing” on his way... Many suspects that his clearest vision is of the welfare of the banana trade, and fear a banana republic.

From his policy perspective he promotes enterprise, investment and trade, all of which Ecuador’s oil-dependent economy sorely needs, and of course, he embraces big time the free-trade agreement with America. But the big worry is how “Albarito” Noboa would reconcile the presidency with his extensive business interests. Rather than resolve the inevitable conflicts of interest, many Ecuadoreans fear that he intends to follow Italy’s exp president Silvio Berlusconi in using his businesses to promote his political ambitions and vice versa. That mix of private and political gain is exactly what Correa has campaigned against.

So next month Ecuadoreans, (as Peruvians before them) have to chose in between the less of two extremes... or as a taxi driver today told me... is like I have to chose in between cancer and aids....

On Galapagos, Fisheries and DLT

I guess this has been the year of speaking Spanish for me.... I have been to Ecuador 3 times and going for 4th one... quite bizarre... I have not worked in Spanish before and here I’m restructuring the way a country gives their “official guarantees” regarding their fisheries.

The last trips weren’t much fun... the 1st month (May) was writing a huge document in an office... and the 2nd month there (July) I was explaining it and getting consensus on implementation.

Quite challenging and boring actually, at least during July I had the chance to get around factories and boats... but the highlight was a trip to Galapagos.

As you most know, I’m a biologist, and if I wasn’t doing fisheries, I’ll be doing Evolution, Socio-biology and Theoretical Biology... So far I have not seen any biological or cultural system/organism that at its basics do not behaves under the postulates I learn trough biology and which evolution isn’t condition by neo-Darwinism and associated ideas...

This blog is not to discuss the merits of evolutionary biology, (read Dawkins, Wilson, Maynard Smith, and others) but about the place where Mr Darwin, based on its reading of Maltus, Smith, Wallace and so on, kind of condensed those ideas with the realities he witnessed in this very particular place... the Galapagos...

I believe that the sense of remoteness is exacerbated by the topography and biogeography of the place... I been to more remote places (Minerva Reef, or Palmerston and Suvarov in the Cooks)... but they kind of look like other places... but I never seen anything that look like the Galapagos...

Very young and very old at the same time, tropical jungle and volcanic driedness separated by 25 km... a bizarre collection of indigenous animals, the most pristine water with the most diverse and abundant marine life... and I guess a whole lot of problems...
It has his fair share of complexity, is at the same time an National Park, Ecuador’s newest province, home of a similarly bizarre collection of exogenous human inhabitants... from aboriginals from the coast, Spanish sailors to all sorts of outcasts during the pirate and whaling years, to Americans during the war, to Swiss, German, Swedes and Norwegians settlers during the 50’s, Feudal barons in the 1900, Taiwanese tycoons, the openly gay restaurant I have seen in Ecuador, 60’s hippies, ex uber corrupt ministers, ... very weird collection there...

Then the park with a sustainability analysis for handling 40000 tourist a year is actually receiving 120000... and a traditional fisherman culture that is being constricted by the lack of a market exposure, the needs for preservation, the lack of control of foreign fleet, the corruption induced by the rich sport fisherman, and lately the influence of NGOs and “green hero” driven organizations like the SeaSheppard...

So where I start... a fair picture of the wildlife would be that perhaps with the fact that beside surfing the empty white beaches of Isla Isabella, (I took my surfboard with me), with sea lions and manta-rays, I walked out of the water with 1 meter long a marine-vegetarian iguana and a tropical penguin... to later sit on the sand while checking out birds with blue feet, pink flamingos and turtles the size of a quad-bike.

To later get up an almost moon like landscape into the slopes of a volcano that as you get up becomes a dense rain forest (due to cooling of the humid sea air that produces this “belt” of rain), to keep going up into the 2nd biggest crater rim in the world and then into the latest eruption area, a mere 4 years old with no life at all... and then coming back to eat freshly caught goat meat...

The biodiversity related problems are huge, many of them related to the introduction of foreign fauna; goats (hence the cheap meat), donkeys, rats, dogs and cats becoming feral, and as well as a lot of plants, mostly a guava look alike...

And of course the pressure of people, only 10 years ago the government started with immigration and tough land law enforcement...

On the fisheries side, the problem is quite hard... and so are the actors involved on it... there were basically no rules, but then the “fishing effort” (impact of fisheries measured on # of HP, hooks, nets, people or other units, in one place at one time) was little... population grows... so does the effort... but then... there is the vital issue of: “what do you catch, for whom and how does it get there”...

At 120000 tourist a year + local population, you’ll be feeding around 15000 people a month... so the local market has its demands... but to a point...

Next: when you fish commercially you have roughly 2 options, niche (high value species, low volume, normally fresh fish, live lobster, etc transported by plane) or bulk (low value species, big volume, normally frozen and sent in containers), the common issue is the availability of good logistics and transport. Fast cargo turnaround and the possibility to maintain containers frozen while waiting cargo...

The Galapagos are 3 hours by plane and 3-4 days by sea form the mainland... Energy is produced by diesel generators... and the infrastructure quite minimal... so whoever wants to export has a hard time in terms of knowing that their product is gonna make it to destination in good condition... plus selling fish is competitive and requires a good marketing structure... so the outlook for local fisherman is bleak...

On top of that and most importantly... there is no resource assessment (how much fish is there), no capture limits/control, neither ownership of the resource by either individuals or groups.... so nobody really cares about sustainability, because if I don’t catch it, someone else will... for example: even if there was a ban on the capture of lobster, you still find it in all food joints...

And if that wasn’t bad enough... enter shark-fining and dried “beche-de mer” (sea cucumbers)... dried sharkfins and sea cucumbers can be maintained anywhere for any period of time... they don’t need much infrastructure neither legality... the market (mainly China) does not give a shit from where they come... so that makes them “perfect” for places like the Galapagos and the pacific islands (same happens in Fiji, Tonga, Solomons, PNG and so on).

And the shark fining business is big international money, which does not combine well with poor and corruptible control authorities... hence there are internationally flagged boats and local fisherman catching sharks on theoretically protected waters...



What to do? Million dollar question... there are various ways and none is easy... unfortunately most people try the less successful and useful... prohibition... without going in deep on why prohibiting something does not work... just think drugs and in particular pot... don't we have 70 years of worldwide organized, international, multilateral, multi-religious, multimillions spend efforts...

And still there... if it does not work for pot how we expect it to work for fish... (ironically enough prohibition is mostly push by the NGO and political parties that have pot decriminalization as part of their agenda)... most people with a brain agree that prohibition is the wrong way to deal with drugs... same goes for fish in my opinion.

It should be about education, empowering, involvement, co management and giving the fisherman incentives for preservation instead that only for capture...

Who is the bad guy? the guy that catches the shark or the people that buy the fins? if the Galapagos fisher stops catching fish... what does he do... the chinese buyer would keep buying form somewhere else... you don’t fix a problem by cutting the offer, but by educating and diminishing the demand.

There I was, in the fisherman cove in Puerto Ayoras, just before leaving the islands after a week of intense sun and no shaving, talking to the local of how much participation the had on the management of the resources, what alternatives they are for commercialization of high value species, vertical longlining and size selectivity, when a well known conservacionist from the Sea Shepperd organization (famous for sinking und ramming whale boats) came over with the crew of a French TV chanel to use us as a background for an interview, as their focus has moved from whales to shark finning... and while agree and respect his convictions and good intentions, I disagree with his methods (never really like vigilantes)

Anyhow he rightlhy mention the corruption and lack of resources of the local patrol boats, to the foreing vessels activities... but then slammed the local fisher for the lack of understading and care for their enviroment and so on.... so I was translating all this to the fisherman and their weren’t impressed...

so at some stage I just got up and told them that it was only fair to have the opinions as well of implicated, so they should talk to the fishers and listen their version... while efforts and support should be given to the local control operations... big part of his efforts and media attention should be based in China, on diminishing the demand... but then is obvious that being in Galapagos is nicer and fits better the “green hero” cult... beside his surprised, he did not took very well my intromission.

But then the fishers had a go on the interview... and the issue was clear... if I don’t fish, what I do? I’m a fisher and this is the only thing I know how to do... Turism? I don’t speak languages, neither have the education the employers want... what can I do? why shark fins and “beche de mer”, because is what most money brings... simple capitalism... and if I don’t catch some one else will...

Ergo the solution is not easy... but it has to involve diversification, co-management, access to markets, property rights and constant evaluation on the resource, training,... and all those things that I work on... for me the big problem is not “fishing”, it when people stop talking about “fishing”... at the end we all want the same, just by different ways and that is “to have enough fish” for whatever reason moves us...

I remember always the 1st rule of ecotoxiclogy, that says “the risk is on the dose, not the substance”... or as beautifully put by MC DLT many years ago... “too much of anything makes you a sucker”

Loss(t) in Banda Aceh

While sitting in the airport waiting for my flight back home, I’m kind of starting to recapitulate on the last couple of weeks, what I did, what I have seen, the people I meet, the organizations there, the history and the stories of the place...
I haven’t done disaster and emergency relief work before, it has been more development and strengthening (to avoid disaster at least in the fisheries sector?), anyway... point is that I have not been in a disaster area before...

The 1st impression was rough... in various aspects... the initial was the feeling of overkill in terms of assistance... I wasn’t aware that there were soooooo many NGOs, UN agencies, bilateral agencies, and so on... from the World Food Programme, via the red crosses of 20 countries to the “firemen without borders” (yes... for real)... Apparently since the Ethiopia crisis of the 80’s there wasn’t a reaction of this scale in ages...

Why? A few factors I guess... the tsunami was at xmas, it was on TV... people saw the waves coming, people dying... it happened in a predominantly Muslim region in an age of guilt over the “war on terror”, and so on... but overall... perhaps simply because the scale of devastation is just incredible...

Not going to repeat the news... but imagine villages where the rate of mortality was 90%... if you where lucky to survive... then from every 20 people you relate to... only one more still alive... the overall sense of loss must be indescribable... let say you lost you family or your house or both... at least there would be references to help you move... your neighbourhood, your corner, your friends, your music, you café shop... but imagine if where your life was... now there is NOTHING... I really mean that... perhaps only the concrete floors of what was once your world...

All other things and people disappeared in 10 minutes...



An estimated of over 80,000 people died with the first 3-4 waves... another 40,000 in the days after from all possible causes... Big fishing boats on roofs... bridges whose concrete “handrails” where torn off, leaving only the bare steel, trucks been tossed around like toys, a huge merchant barge in the middle of a neighbourhood 1.5 km from the coast... 500 kg rocks in the middle of a classroom... There are thousands of orphans, they were held on a hill outside town were parents would go and look for lost children... many of them waited there for weeks until hope just could not sustain anymore... everyone I meet has lost someone...

A year later there are still people living in tents and trying to rebuild their life with the help of the foreign invasion... Banda Aceh as a city is never going to be the same, apart from the tsunami destruction, the city is literally invaded by aid organizations and westerners...

I guess before I keep blurbing about this, is fair to explain that Aceh is a very particular place, a Muslim stronghold with a very long story of independence and resilience...

Since the thirteenth century AD, if not before, Islam is key to this place, Aceh became a main launching point for Southeast Asian Muslim pilgrims to Mecca, mingling together cultural influences from India, Persia, Arabia, and Malaya, as well as becoming a center for Islamic learning during the Acehnese ‘golden age’ under the rule of Sultan Iskandar Muda (1607-1636).

It remained a fiercely independent Sultanate for almost 500 years, and Dutch colonial control was extended to Aceh only after a miserable war beginning in 1873 and lasting 40 years. The Dutch never actually ‘pacified’ Aceh, fighting almost continuously for 69 years until they withdrew in 1942, claiming a total of at least 40,000 troops (more Dutch soldiers died here then during WW2!); the more than 100,000 Acehnese killed in these colonial wars were considered Holy War martyrs. In the local museum is a picture of a village ransacked by the Dutch and you see a whole pile of bodies and soldiers posturing with a boy they kept alive for some reason...

Then they had the Japanese occupation (1942 to 1945), which was even more brutal and still hinders the work of the Japanese NGOs here, and when Indonesia declared it’s independence on August 17, 1945, Aceh became the first Indonesian region that was independent de facto. But then they kept fighting for political autonomy for a few years more, and General Suharto came to factual power in 1966, and started channeling the local oil and gas revenues to Jakarta.

So enters the Acehnese National Liberation Front (ASNLF), better known as GAM, (whose leader Tengku Hasan M. di Tiro, was formerly a strong supporter of the Indonesian nationalist idea and Indonesian Ambassador to the UN during the 1950s), and the fighting went on between the Indonesian Central Government and GAM. Only until pushed by the disastrous consequences of the tsunami, the Indonesian Government and GAM signed a peace agreement on August 15, 2005. Over the last 20 years to come here you needed a “special permit” which was very complicated to get.

Given this background, when you live and work in Aceh, you’re dealing with a society where war has hardly had any break over the last 6 generations. The fact is, Acehnese people were traumatized long before the Tsunami happened.

With this background... let me give you an example... imagine a non descriptive little provincial capital in your country with a history of independence and relatively isolated ... for NZ let say Whakatane... and imagine that in 2003 the number of Indonesian living there was 60, then there is freak event of nature that wipes out ½ of the city, a year later you have 2000 Indonesians roaming the city in the biggest 4WD and cars you can imagine, paying ridiculous amounts for rentals, covering the city with satellite dishes, wandering around with Islamic gear and all women wearing headscarves...

Hopefully you get the point... the place is completely upside down... and then besides having to deal with trauma, completely “non muslim” strangers... the place still full of surreal images such as this huge barge that floated all the way from the harbour and now is in the middle of a neighbourhood 3 km from its original emplacement (and is no way it would ever come back!)


But in spite of that... I was received with smiles in 90% of the place I went... and that is mostly because the type of people who come and do this type of work... for example: Erica a cool lady I meet has a maintained a blogg about living in Aceh... she has been there since December and has good insights.

There are some people working there that I have absolutely nothing in common with, (as in every environment) but then a serious chunk of them are very courageous and plainly good hearted... their “office” is in Sudan massacres, Pakistani earthquakes, Bolivian landslides, name it... very cool people putting their life aside for what they love doing.... for the few rewards their job gives...

But as well very genuine and lonely people... this job is a relations killer... long absences never helped... and on top of that you are emotionally drained by the constant suffering around you... I never seen such a cool bunch of people... so lonely... is very touching... don't get me wrong, you start conversation on very usual things... but then when you get to the personal parts... they are normally overload... your love (if you have one), your friends are all very far... this job is couple killer... and the situation is most difficult for woman... they are so good at the job, very committed and professional... more than most men in my opinion... but seems that solitude is the price to pay for being and independent and driven woman... very unfair...

And then forming a relationship with other people like you is unfortunately really difficult... they are mobilized to different places constantly... so you found someone who understand you... but then you walk different ways... I felt constantly to give people big hugs... all that makes me value my family and relationship with Vibeke even more... man I love her... she is the best.

What was I doing?... I was asked by a project of the German Development Agency (GTZ) to help with the definition of a strategy and areas of work for the reactivation of the fisheries and aquaculture sector, while trying to avoid former fuckups under a “rebuild better” principle... and when you think that 80% of the fishing fleet was destroyed, 60% of the shrimp farms are useless and worst of all, 50% of the fisherman are dead... there is quite a lot to be done... they liked what I did, which was very rewarding, and they want me back as they would be working there until end 2007.


Anyway... hopefully I did not depress and bored you... and if I did... well sorry... you should not have read it until the end... I may be writing this more for me, in order to digest the last couple of weeks, than for any other reason...
Enjoy what have and keep what you think are your problems in a real perspective...

Splore@40+

Backstage at Splore festival
Originally uploaded by mundo-francisco.

Sunday 6 am... I’m inheriting the last standing people that came out of the DJ area...

Hits my head to see that those girls dancing in front of me are ½ my age at least...

On the other side, I’m sure that they haven’t heard this tune never before... the advantages of travelling (and having money to buy music)... it is a cool feeling to chose what to play and have people enjoying it...

I remember on my 20s seeing “older people” coming to parties and feeling odd... kind of like... shouldn’t you be with people your age?... I’m the older guy now... and I’m very conscious about it...

But then as I was told by young DJ Nick, the people that we see as “ridiculous” are those that are trying to join the ‘Scene” now... you actually never left it... I wish I would be invited to play at parties at your age!

I wanted to hug him... even if he is not right... and just being nice.... it feels good to hear him saying that...

As good as it feels to play in front of a crowd and “sense” that they are having a good time... even if I spend most of the 3 days of the festival enjoying family life with Vibeke and the children and missed a lot of acts I wanted to see... but then... I saw many people I have not seen in ages (it was more than 4 years since Mano Paco played in a festival!).

Kika got to meet the band (Ghost Tones / Sugarlicks) that is responsible for her 2nd name (Irie from “Irie is everything” the song that was playing whe she was born). When they play the song in the main stage, it was dedicated to her, it was a cool moment...

Overall... I’ll enjoyed... and do it again... even if I feel that I should be playing in the 40+ area

Ecuador Crossing

I jumped at the opportunity of working in Ecuador, after having done some awfully boring work in NZ and gone trough the always kind of stressful process of buying a house, moving (mostly taken care by Vibeke), enduring Xmas and having my 1st back pain in over 2 years!

I have not yet worked in my present speciality, in Spanish, which is after all my mother language. I knew that the job would be special, and it is....

Ecuador (Equator in Spanish) is kind of mystical country... (there is no country called Tropic, for instance)... Outstanding coastline with fantastic surf on its west, rugged Andean mountains on the middle and Amazonian rainforest on the east... 9 different ethnic groups from is aboriginal population (from pseudo Polynesian looking people in the west, passing by Inca types and full on painted Amazonians, plus the earliest Chinese immigration in Latin America, Lebanese, Mediterranean, Germans... and so on... but the aboriginal component is socially strong...

Quito (the old part) is time travelling to the Spanish colony time, incredible... the place has been preserved pretty much as it was in the 1600-1700 period... absolutely outstanding... Latin-Americans don not have the best urbanity rules in the world and to see this was refreshing...

Still painfully latinamerican in way to many ways... the mess of the country politics in general and the fisheries sector as a consequence, is a sometimes tough reminder of what it was my reality before I emigrated...

Scientists with ½ their heads trying to do their jobs, and the other ½ trying to navigate the pitiful political storms inside their institutions...

I feel like exploding when I see that the power fight in between the people of the National Directorate of Fisheries for the job that is actually done by the Fisheries National Institute... this is putting in jeopardy the market access of the local fisheries into the EU (over 500 million USD a year and the livelihood of over 1.5 million people).... on top of that there is no resource control neither a real fisheries management strategy...

Ecuador is actually a "big fish" in the fisheries world... i really could not believe the state of the sector...

Outside those issues... it is cool... I like to be here... is great to be aware of all that happens around you... to understand the lyrics of all the songs... and latin American music is very funny... and this is full on Cumbia and Reggaeton land.

The team I’m working is cool, full on efficient woman at the driving seats... (seems to be the constant in the projects that do something useful)... the head of this EU programme (ExpoEcuador) is a surfer, so we are off this weekend on a "work trip".

Then I’m off next Monday, back to Chile... then I’m off to see my dad in Argentina for 5 days (I have seen him only 3 times in 11 years, which is not right). Then back to Auckland just in time for playing at Splore... and to be with my family that I seem to miss more by the day.