It's been awhile

So where to begin.

I went to Nicaragua. A beautiful confusing wounded wonderful place. My girlfriend was already there.

She is a do-gooder, you see, while I am merely a showbiz phoney. She was guiding some dentists who were travelling by canoe through the bosawas bio-sphere region (brought to you by our friends at the UN) where they did emergency dental work on the indigenous people there, called the Miskito people, unless they are called the Sumi. Dental infections are the 3rd leading cause of death out there, and despite what we say at RFT, laughter is NOT the best medicine. These men and women are heroes, and i suggest you admire them for awhile, instead of 50 cent or whoever. In ten days they pulled 982 teeth in conditions about 40% worse then what you see on the MASH reruns. My girlfriend pulled one too.

We went around to the cities, wounded managua, pretty grenada, youthful and spunky leon. we had a mission to buy some art for funraising auction at Change for Children and as a reslut I saw a lot of latin american art. It rules.

(about here I developed a fantasy that I would become a latin american art dealer, speaking perfect spanish and wearing a jaunty hat. Give me five years. The first step is the hat.)

Here's Nicaragua's big problem. The United States of America. What else is new?

This tiny country has been in one kind of war with invaders from america or another since 1934, when a general marched in with a private army, burnt grenada to the ground and declared himself president. That was the first time nicarauguans had to go to the mattresses and kick out a foreign national, and the first time the US said, OH NO YOU DON'T! The revolutionary in question was a man named san dino, and he is revered as a saint to this day. the country is strewn with large siloettes of the man and his famous hat, and he is a symbol of resistance to the US running their country against their will. Which they still do.

After this first ONYD!, the US installed a dictator called Samoza (much less tasty than the middle eastern snack) and he passed the title around his family through sham elections for the next 46 years).

In 1972 a huge earthquake hit managua. 80% of the building over two stories hit the ground. 80%!!! Billions in foreign aid flowed in, as will happen, and as will happen too, the dictator stole it. He stole it all and then left people to die in the ruins of his capitol city. The people of Nicaragua decided it was time for another revolution. And as this revolution struggled on, Samoza was revealed to be an even bigger asshole than was previously thought.

One example was when the revolutionary force got lucky and killed the main Samoza's brother at an opera house. In retaliation he fire bombed Grenada, he went to Leon and opened fire in a student square!! The US started to get nervous. They wanted to move Samoza out. They chose a journalist from the local CIA run newspaper and named him the new president. When Samoza heard about it, he had the journalist killed. This started to get even the right wingers and middle class to back the revolution.

And then won! 1979 saw the day of victory. The new government was leftist, but not communist. The seized not one single farm or factory or business. All they seized was the massive estates Samoza gave out to his cronies and made them into farms. They gave away 100 000 farms in those days and started a program aimed at 100% literacy for their people. Obviously the US was not going to stand for that.

Every revolution has a counter revolution, usually made up of the people who lost their massive privledge under the assholes formerly in charge. But not every counter revolution has 100 million dollars in US funding, and the back up of a CIA cell with a 300 million dollar budget to destablize the current government. Later when there were elections and the people democratically elected the same government again, this changed the US stance not one fucking bit.

And who was the secretary of defence? A young Dick Cheney. Yeah. Exactly.

Add this to the crippling economic sanctions that really cramp the style of a country that does not produce it's own steel, and you've got yourself a fine mess.

In 1990, the right wing party campaigned under the slogan "A Vote for me is a Vote for Peace!" and it was. As soon as the exhausted Nicaraguans gave up and elected the party the US wanted, the war stopped. The economic sanctions lifted and Coca Cola flooded freely back in to the country.

But they never gave up. Not really. The heart of Nicaragua beats with revolution, even as they embrace peace.

And that is why I propose we dig up Ronald Reagan and burn him in effigy (for he was always a straw model of himself), using Dick Cheney as firewood.

Who's with me?

All that said, I really had a great time. I learned a lot. I rode horses. I chilled on beaches. I saw monkeys in their own tree, and one of them tried to pee on me.

And i saw my girlfriend, who is so cool.