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also special thanks to Frank from Sugar&Spice who brought in support and great cookies

Democrats Abroad, Argentina

Democrats Abroad, Argentina

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Instinct / Instinto

The swarm, the torus and the flock, your personal space

The New York Times article

Researchers have studied emergent behaviors of ants and locusts to try to understand our own instincts.
It´s been found that a swarm is formed when individuals both attract and repel but do not try to orient themselves to their neighbors. A torus takes place when they move around an empty circle to try to orient themselves to their closest neighbors. A flock is finally achieved when the individuals move with a strong feeling of group in one direction.
Do you keep an eye on your Internet neighborhood? It seems to me that we write or read in a very similar way, according to our inner swarm. If it happens that we take collective decisions like that too, it´s a great opportunity to form our flock and move towards something more important than attracting-repelling others.
Any ideas?

El enjambre, el toroide y la manada, tu espacio personal

wilderbeest

Los científicos han estudiando el comportamiento emergente de hormigas y langostas para entender nuestros propios instintos.
Han encontrado que un enjambre se forma cuando los individuos se atraen y repelen pero no tratan de orientarse con respecto a sus vecinos. Se forma un toroide alrededor de un centro vacío cuando tratan de orientarse con los vecinos más próximos. Una manada se alcanza finalmente cuando todos los individuos se mueven con una fuerte sensación de grupo en una única dirección.
Estás atento a tu vecindario en Internet? A mí me parece que escribimos y leemos de la misma manera, de acuerdo a nuestro enjambre interior. Si resulta que tomamos decisiones colectivas también de esta manera, es una buena oportunidad de formar una manada que marche hacia algo más importante que sólo atraer/repeler a otros.
Alguna idea?

Fuera Botnia!

NO A LAS PAPELERAS
Uruguay cerró la frontera con Argentina
FUERA BOTNIA!

leé lo ocurrido ayer acá

read what happened yesterday here
BOTNIA GO HOME!

My light

A brillar mi amor, vamos a brillar mi amor...

You can only shine when there´s a light.
I found my personal light in Havana, Cuba a couple of centuries ago. We met half way in the planet and I have to admit that it was a very wise idea from our teethless Angel Amber (I might bother you with her story another day). She was smart because otherwise we would have been walking upside down for the rest of our lives.

Yep, my light came from the other side of the world. An unexpected, impossible, magic encounter at a time in which I was just a sketch. A good old project.

He came to my life floating on a stream of soft music but I didn´t recognize him at first. It took me two or three mojitos and a strange request at the Malecón :
- Buy me a love song...

I´ve never done any of those things before but the night had been weird enough up to that moment so I did. I bought him a bolero. While the singers were playing bésame, bésame mucho, and as I was listening to his stories I realized that I was beginning to glow.
Me and the singers were pale phosphorus green glowing!

He told me he was the first of a bunch in a baby boomer family and that he grew up as a dirty road boy in a black neighborhood. I never knew until then that there was something called Midwest the size of my own country, Argentina. He smiled at my accent when I told him I was very "yurban" but he was kind enough not to laugh out loud when I took Chicago as a sleepy town in the middle of nowhere.

Then when he mimicked the way he used to call for buyers as a popcorn seller at the circus, Northern Lights of an unknown Aurora Borealis slowly bathed every single being around.
I think the singers vanished because they were just scared after that.

He went on softly speaking about his life as a traveler and as a blues band leader. I had to come closer to him because the more I shined the more he lowered his voice. He whispered things about his times as an air force secret language interpreter, as a political sciences researcher, as a director of some big company, as a cats lover.
It was passed midnight when he tried to reach for his sun glasses. He couldn´t find them so he closed his eyes and I had to grab his hand. And he kissed me.

I realized that we needed a shelter when a fluorescent Cuban passing by shouted at us:
- Hey you, get a room!I don´t know if he heard it or not. With his eyes still shut he said:
- Marry me...

I didn´t say yes immediately but I looked up and there were no more stars or moon. Instead, diamonds were hanging on our heads. I took that as a good sign.
And we married.

Time passed and we run many adventures together although much less that the ones awaiting. The stream of brilliant plasma around me never fades away when I´m with him. Well, in fact it happens to everybody near him. What reminds me,

Hey baby, tomorrow is your birthday
so what do you say if we go out and shine out the city my love?
Vamos?

Happy birthday baby!

Sí a la vida

MANIFIESTO PÚBLICO

Ante la situación existente en torno a la inminente puesta en marcha de la pastera finlandesa Botnia, la Asamblea Ciudadana Ambiental de Gualeguaychú expresa:

1. Que le recuerda al Sr. Presidente de la Nación, ante el compromiso contraído públicamente con la lucha del pueblo de Gualeguaychu, en el marco de la Causa Nacional, y en honor de las convicciones por él declamadas, que no asuma ninguna medida que implique avalar o confirmar acuerdos que se aparten del objetivo de la relocalización de Botnia fuera de la Cuenca del Río Uruguay.

2. Qué el fin último consistente en que Botnia se retire de nuestra región es parte de las acciones diplomáticas y jurídicas implementadas por la Cancillería Argentina, razón por la que constituye un camino irrenunciable.

3. Que en procura de lograr esa meta, reiteramos que la ASAMBLEA CIUDADANA AMBIENTAL DE GUALEGUAYCHÚ SE DECLARA EN ESTADO DE ALERTA MÁXIMA, VIGILIA Y MOVILIZACIÓN PERMANENTE, para evitar todo intento de presión o acción que burle la soberana voluntad de nuestro pueblo, de vivir en un ambiente sano.

SÍ A LA VIDA!!

San José de Gualeguaychú, 3 de noviembre de 2007.
Provincia de Entre Ríos.
República Argentina

The clouds and the watermelons

photo by Carl Wozniak

I drive country roads a lot. Here´s a story of a day on which I felt I´d lost my path.

It happened one very warm day when I was driving back to the ranch. I had to stop the truck because I felt lost even with the paved road ahead. It was mostly because of the clouds. Not because they obstructed my vision it was more because of their reflections. And my own reflexions. While stretching my legs I thought that probably at that very moment about half of Earth was covered by clouds.

I remembered reading somewhere that they reflect more sunlight than land and water. I was dressed in my white clothes because it was Summer. Everybody knows that white keeps you cooler. I felt some relief thinking that those clouds by reflecting sunlight were keeping the Earth cooler too. And that was when I got completely lost: I was blinded by the A factor. The Albedo in them and in me.

I grabbed a piece of watermelon.

I had recently found some sites about counteracting global warming effects. Scientists no longer talking about it but rather on how to solve the problem. The civil society is more aware of it although finger pointing is such a common thing we do... Names like "ecowarriors", "alarmists", "climate change deniers", "skeptics", "anti-aviation campaigners", “conspiracy theorists”, "liberal activists", "manipulative ecologists", etc are all over the Internet.
I spitted some black seeds.

- "So now some scientists are talking about 'geoengineering' the planet", I said to myself. "It seems that some are thinking on injecting sulfate particles in the upper atmosphere to increase the albedo. Shooting the clouds with some poison that nobody knows what´s going to feed us back can´t be called a 'escape route' from global warming. So vapor trails left by aircrafts are environmentally friendly and cow farts are not?"
- "Hey, finally somebody advocates for us!", a voice said from behind me.
I looked around and saw nobody. There was only me, the truck, the clouds and a black Angus chewing some grass.

I took another bite of watermelon. Summers are so warm down here in the Pampas...

- "Some want to spray aerosol compounds into the atmosphere by utilizing commercial, military and private aircrafts and calves are condemned for belching? It´s not fair...", I thought and sighed.
- "That´s what I said, thank you", said the voice again.
- "Who´s there? Is bad enough that you don´t show yourself but reading my thoughts is something I won´t allow you"
- "Sorry, sorry I didn´t mean to disturb your thoughts. My name is Negrita and I think that since aerosols cut down sunlight by large amounts, they may be spinning down the hydrological cycle of the planet. That´s pure science distorsion, maddness based on volcanic eruptions, come on!", she said.
- "Well, nice to meet you Negrita, I´m 99", I told the cow.
- "Yeah, I know, I read your blog"
- "Well, thanks. So your opinion is...?"
- "I think that using sea water as a source for hygroscopic nuclei may produce enough cloud cover to provided an offset a year's worth of carbon increase"
- "I don´t understand..."
- "See, it´s about evaporating 50 kilograms of sea water per second. We could even, if we wished, drive the problem backwards. It is also fully controllable: you can switch it off!"
- "You mean it can be better than giant reflecting mirrors in space, or laying reflecting film in deserts, or floating white plastic islands in the ocean mimicking the reflective effect of sea?"
- "Yeah, I think it might work better"
- "So you think it´s all about the clouds?"
- "Yep. Clouds and opacity. Clouds and clouds lifetime. Clouds and albedo. Every thing's albedo is measured by how much they reflect sunlight. Bouncing back the light makes them shine, and the Earth shines like a diamond in the Universe. High thin clouds are better blankets in trapping warmth, while low thick clouds make better coolers. Want some grass?"- "Thanks no, I´m on a diet. How do you manage your weight?", I said as I steered at the sky and thought on how much clouds have changed during my lifetime. High, warming clouds had increased while low clouds had decreased"
- "I sweat. I like being black in Summer. Keeps me in shape"
- "Then again back to the subject. Sunlight heats the ocean, water escapes into the atmosphere and falls out as rain..."
- "... non-polluting, planet-saving mist..." - "Not a bad idea"
- "... or just cut the crap with the oil. It´s gonna rain, gotta go. Bye", and she left.
- "Bye Negrita, glad to meet you. See you around!"

I saved the rest of the watermelon for later and jumped back in the truck. I felt not so lost anymore.
Hot Summer days and watermelons just seem to go perfect together...

buenos aires argentina

Elecciones 2007

EL DIFICIL ARTE DEL ZEN ARGENTINO

CANDIDATOS A PRESIDENTE Y VICEPRESIDENTE
PARTIDO OBRERO: Pitrola-Arroyo
PARTIDO SOCIALISTA AUTENTICO: "Pino" Solanas-Cadelli
MOV. SOC. DE LOS TRABAJADORES: Vilma Ripoll-Bidonde
RECREAR: López Murphy-Bullrich
PARTIDO POP. DE LA RECONSTRUCCION: Obeid-Vergara
CONF.LEALTAD POPULAR: Mussa-Nespral
COALICION CIVICA: Carrió-Giustiniani
MOV. INDEP. DE JUB. Y DESOCUPADOS: Castells-"Nina" Pelozo
ALIANZA CONCERTACION UNA: Lavagna-Morales
FREJULI: Rodríguez Saá-Maya
MODIN, etc : Sobisch-Asís
FTE. AMPLIO LATINOAMERICANO: Ammann-De Leonardi
FTE. DE IZQ. TRABAJADORES SOC.: Montes-Heberling
FRENTE PARA LA VICTORIA: Cristina Fernández-Cobos

Sepan disculpar cualquier olvido o error

Qué laburo esto de ser argentinos...

Porteño/a, siga participando: CANDIDATOS A SENADORES Capital Federal

UCR TIT: 1. Gil Lavedra 2. Iraizoz; SUPL: 1. Marquina 2. Canals
PARTIDO DEMOCRATA CRISTIANO TIT: 1. Rabanaque Caballero 2. Domínguez; SUPL: 1. Traboulsi
PARTIDO DEMOCRATA PROGRESISTA TIT: 1. Alterini 2. Mauri; SUPL: 1. Svartz 2. Almirón
PART. OBRERO TIT: 1. Rieznik 2. Barrionuevo; SUPL: 1. Ferro
UCD TIT: 1. Portas Dalmau 2. Mazzeo; SUPL: 1. Barrio 2. Redruello
UNION POPULAR TIT: 1. Seisdedos 2. Sabato; SUPL: 1. Seeber
PART. AUTONOMISTA TIT: 1. Chaied 2. Jarazo; SUPL: 1. Saba
MOV.POR LA DIGNIDAD Y LA INDEP. TIT: 1. Seisdedos 2. Sabato; SUPL: 1. Seeber
MOV.SOC.DE LOS TRABAJADORES TIT: 1. Bidonde 2. Capano; SUPL: 1. Britos 2. Pacagnini
PART. POP. DE LA RECONSTRUCCION TIT: 1. Videla Sánchez 2. Insua; SUPL: 1. Segret 2. Pueyrredon
MOV. INDEP. DE JUB. Y DESOCUPADOS TIT: 1. Perren 2. Rios; SUPL: 1. Valsecchi 2.Ferreiro
ACCION CIUDADANA TIT: 1. Cruz 2.Gerez; SUPL: 1. Rozenfeld 2. Cuarterola
CONVERGENCIA SOCIALISTA TIT: 1. Tavolaro 2. Belizán; SUPL: 1.Yaggi 2. Grancelli
PART. LIGA SOC. REVOLUCIONARIA TIT: 1. Calcagno 2. Calaresu; SUPL: 1. Sposaro 2. Frascino
EL MOVIMIENTO TIT: 1.Piragini 2. Onna; SUPL: 1. Pollach 2. Caubet
CONVOCAT. INTEGRACION CIUDADANA TIT: 1. Sanchez 2. Batalla; SUPL: 1. Tavanti 2. Leal
CONSENSO PORTEñO TIT: 1. Cruciani 2. Matta; SUPL: 1. Lloveras Videla 2. Alvarez
PART. ASAMBLEAS POPULARES TIT: 1. Melnik 2.Abregó; SUPL: 1. Montenegro 2. Rabih
FUERZA INDEP. DE CENTRO TIT: 1. Seisdedos 2. Sabato; SUPL: 1. Seeber
FRENTE PARA LA VICTORIA TIT: 1. Filmus 2. Marcó Del Pont; SUPL: 1. Santa María 2. Dosch
ALza.FRENTE PTS – MAS IZQUIERDA SOCIALISTA TIT: 1.Zadunaisky 2. Castillo; SUPL: 1. Saab
ALza.PROPUESTA REPUBLICANA TIT: 1. Melconian 2. Agostini; SUPL: 1. Torello 2. Berkowski
ALza.PROYECTO SUR TIT: 1."Pino" Solanas 2. Garcia Tuñon; SUPL: 1. Puricelli Yañez 2. Macaggi
ALza.MOV.PROVINCIAS UNIDAS TIT: 1. Silva Garreton 2. Caldini; SUPL: 1. Bustelo 2. Luquet
ALza. CONCERTACION UNA TIT: 1. Posse 2. Suarez; SUPL: 1. Diaz Ortiz 2. Gene
ALza. COALICION CIVICA TIT: 1. Estenssoro 2. Cabanchik; SUPL: 1. Cingolani 2. Montes
ALza.Fte.JUSTICIA UNION Y LIBERTAD TIT: 1. Lanas 2. Domínguez; SUPL: 1. Franco 2. Ferreyra
ALza.Fte.AMPLIO UNIDAD LATINOAMERICANA TIT:1. Zamorano 2. Guardado; SUPL:1. Guglielmotti 2. Balestra

puf! ... andá a votar!

Día de la madre/Mother´s day

En el día de la madre les dejo como regalo un link para recorrer...

Women´s International League for Peace and Freedom

... y este video sobre el peor presidente posible y cómo muchas mujeres americanas recomendan actuar para detener sus actos y evitar que otros lo imiten.

(cuidado: el contenido es fuerte; ustedes deciden si quieren mostrarselo a sus hijos)

Today is Mother´s day in South America. This link is my gift...

Women´s International League for Peace and Freedom

... and a video on the worst president ever and how many American women are recommending to act to stop his actions and for avoiding any other to imitate him.

(warning: the contents is tough; you decide if you want to show it to your children)

Peace takes courage
On October 27th. stand up for peace,
join the National Mobilization from your city: OCT27.org

Blog Action Day 2007, Environment /Medio Ambiente

The fishes house and the Chaos Theory

I loved my father. My father knew everything because he had swept back and forth across the world many times. He knew stories of winds and creatures like nobody else.

One of our favorite strolls was taking a walk on the riverfront to look around among the fishermen. Some of them greeted us and I always asked their permission to look inside the buckets where the fresh catfishes were still gasping in resignation.
Sometimes my father shared a mate tea with the fishermen. The mate was made with water from the river and even when he was too gringo to like it, he took it anyway because he had learned in this land that you should never refuse one.

While walking and in whispers so as not to bother "the catch" I was asking him things about life that he answered to me in long stories also in a low voice.

I had to relearn some of those lessons later in my life but there´s one that still guides me.

In the middle of the river were some buildings like islands with no land. From my height I always saw three. The Río de La Plata was so wide that I stretched my neck and stood on my tip-toes hoping to see more of them because my dad had explained to me that there were many. I was certain that he could see them all from his 6'6" height.
The buildings were brick cubes with roof, door, windows and even when there always was somebody swimming at the beach side no one was ever seen near them.

- Dad, what are those?
- Those are the fishes homes. The fishes go do their b´ness during the day and then at night they go home to sleep. Just like us.
- Don´t they go at siesta time?
- Fishes don´t have siestas like we do. But sometimes they go durin da day when some folk blows on the other side of the planet.
- What happens when somebody blows on the other side of the planet?
- It happens that the air rolls by and turns into winds. If da blow is strong enough there might even be hurricanes. Did you feel da breezes in the Summer nights? Well, it´s da fluttering of da wings of da butterflies in China, ´cos they are awake and fly, ´cos is daytime there.

Years passed and I became and engineer. I learned that the fishes houses where the intake of the drinking water supply for the city of Buenos Aires. It was hard to digest. More years passed and I gave up engineering and resumed my environmental studies from that very lesson. I understood that the waters of my river travel throughout the planet like the winds and can bring back home stories of other creatures.

My father never knew anything about global warming, toxic spills in the river, dead fishes by contamination, acid rain. The latest technology he enjoyed was the Telex.

But he surely knew about the Chaos Theory, the delicate and unpredictable poetry of the natural relationships and he was a firm believer on word of mouth power. He would have been an active blogger.

He would have written a good post on environment today, on Blog Action Day .

La casa de los pescados y la Teoría del Caos

Amaba a mi papá. Mi papá sabía de todo porque había peinado el mundo para allá y para acá varias veces. Conocía historias de vientos y de bichos como nadie.

Uno de nuestros paseos favoritos era recorrer la costanera y curiosear entre los pescadores. Algunos nos saludaban y yo siempre pedía permiso para mirar adentro de sus baldes donde los bagres recien sacados del río todavía seguían boqueando resignados.

Mi papá a veces compartía un mate con los pescadores. El mate se hacía con agua del río y a pesar de que de puro gringo no le gustaba demasiado, se lo tomaba igual porque en estas tierras había aprendido que un mate nunca se desprecia.

Mientras caminabamos y susurrando para no molestar "el pique", yo le iba preguntando cosas de la vida y él me respondía con largas historias también en voz baja.

Muchas de esas lecciones las he tenido que ir reaprendiendo a lo largo de la vida pero hay una historia que todavía me guía.En el medio del río había unas construcciones como islas sin tierra. Desde mi altura yo veía siempre tres. El Río de La Plata era tan ancho que yo estiraba el cuello y me ponía en puntas de pie esperando poder ver alguna más porque mi padre me había explicado que eran muchas. Yo estaba segura de que él las veía todas con sus dos metros de estatura.

Las construcciones eran cubos de ladrillos con techo, puerta, ventanas y a pesar de que en el balneario casi siempre había gente nadando, nunca se veía a nadie cerca de ellas.

- Papá, qué son?
- Son las casas de los pescados. Los pescados andan por ahí durante el día y a la noche se van a dormir a sus casas, como nosotros.
- Y a la siesta no van?
- Los peces no duermen la siesta como nosotros pero a veces van durante el día cuando alguien sopla del otro lado del mundo.
- Qué pasa cuando alguien sopla del otro lado del mundo?
- Pasa que el aire va rodando y se forman los vientos. Si el soplido es muy fuerte hasta puede haber huracanes. Viste las brisas de las noches de verano? Bueno, son por los aleteos de las mariposas de China, que están despiertas y vuelan porque allá es de día.

Pasaron los años y me hice ingeniera. Supe que las casas de los pescados eran solamente las tomas del sistema de agua potable de la Ciudad de Buenos Aires. Me costó digerirlo. Pasaron más años, largué la ingeniería y retomé mis estudios sobre el medio ambiente justo a partir de aquella lección. Entendí que las aguas de mi río viajan por todo el planeta como los vientos y que pueden volver trayendo historias de otras criaturas.

Mi padre nunca supo del calentamiento global, ni de los vertidos tóxicos al río, ni de los peces muertos por la contaminación, ni de la lluvia ácida. La tecnología más avanzada de la que disfrutó fue el Telex.
Pero sí sabía de teoría del caos, de la delicada e impredecible poesía de las relaciones naturales y creía firmemente en el poder del boca a boca. Hubiera sido un blogger activo.
Seguramente hoy 15 de Octubre hubiera escrito un buen post sobre el medio ambiente.