On Pyramids

Some months ago some friends and I went to a Brasilian rodizio here in Bologna. One my friends was quite intrigued about the decoration of the place, which was indeed unusual for the Italian standards: the restaurant itself was huge, with a water fountain in the middle, and a randomly chosen set of huge, excessively colorful paintings. Everything was bigger, brighter, fuller than the average; apart from the disturbing lack of taste, the whole place was clearly a demonstration of excessive, and most likely sudden, wealth.

I could tell that the style of the place caused an impression on my Italian friends, who are certainly not used to this "excess as power" mentality (at least for restaurant decoration). This is a very southamerican attitude, I am afraid, and thus something possibly hard to understand from the European perspective. Here's a quick hypothesis of mine: social progress in countries is such a rare thing that when you finally get something better in your life you tend to show off. So, for instance, it could occur that when someone 'progresses' (say, gets promoted in a job), she or he gets the biggest plasma TV (car, apartment, boob operation) available and invites the whole neighborhood for an (equally excessive) party to 'celebrate' the promotion. Making sure others see your new plasma TV (car, apartment, boob operation) is way more important than the money/loans involved in paying it.

In the Colombian case, the "excess as power" approach is intimately related to the drug trafficking business. Drug money has reached pretty much every single layer and structure of Colombian society; the cultural degeneration it comes with is, in my view, one of the most disturbing effects of drugs. It is often an underestimated consequence too, I think. Here I am referring to a collective mentality that pushes people to get money and power by all means. This is beyond standard capitalism in that the respect of certain "core values" (let alone laws) has been abolished. Under such a mentality, the principle of hard, legal work and education as the basis for social progress is no longer valid. Why would you care about finishing high school when someone you know offers you a job that pays much more money than the allowance your dad gives you? More dramatically, why would you study when your father went from poor and excluded to rich and socially accepted without touching a book or getting a regular job? Why would you pursue a degree on Law when a "powerful friend" can buy you a political career and put you in Congress?

This kind of ethical/moral dilemmas are increasingly common in Colombia. We're a poor country, and given the lack of opportunities, many are tempted to take the easy road. Unfortunately, this is an attitude that won't be easily erased from the collective concious of my country. In fact, if this attitude ever changes, it will take several generations of Colombians.

What would occur in the meantime? Well, things as the events I am about to outline. These days Colombia suffers (yet another) social and political crisis because of a huge financial fraud, in the form of the major pyramid scheme in years. The idea of a 'pyramid' is simple: you 'invest' some money, convince others to do the same, you obtain absurd benefits (say 150% in a month), and make sure many others join as well so to keep the scheme running. Yes, you're stealing money from others, but the trick is to climb up to the top of the pyramid and get enough idiots for the base.

Of course, this is not a sustainable business and sooner or later the scam is discovered. This is not a new thing, and one is surprised to know that people are falling again and again in the old tricks. Very shocking stories arise. The intrguiging thing that makes me wonder is why people are so naive so to join pyramid schemes and similar 'businesses'. The best answer I can come up with is this perverse mentality when it comes to 'easy money' that has been triggered, among others, by the drug dealing culture. Indeed, although many people affected in the pyramids are indeed very poor, a significant amount of people are actually well-educated ones trying to take advantage. They sell their properties and obtain bank loans so to 'feed' the pyramid, with the hope that many others will join and the absurd benefits will eventually appear.

Why would someone educated (say, a university professor with a PhD) join such a scam? Of course he does it in the understanding that the 'pyramid bank' is indeed a scam and that he's actually stealing money from others. He's just trying to get advantage of the situation. In our distorted scale of values, this is the obvious thing to do. That's the real shame: how this 'pyramidal greed' turned out the be the main thing for people, and how it changed the lives of millions for ever. Apart from the obvious financial and personal consequences (say, broken friendships, destroyed families, collective depression and increased rates of suicide attempts) there have been political consequences (the government saw the thing coming and did nothing on time to stop it), as well as social consequences, including riots all over the country and manifestations supporting the pyramid banks initiators (!). This last consequence is not because of the illegal-distorted mentality or love to money, it is simply because people are really, really stupid.

Now, to conclude, a video of a (loosely related) song that I like very much and that conveys a lot joy and happiness; perhaps the same joy and hapiness those affected by the fraud will experiment during this Christmas.

Two suggestions

It's been a while since I don't write about music. Here's a quick post on two terrific albums you should definitely hear. Along with this album, they are among the best of 2008, without a doubt.

The first one is The Verve's Forth. It is simply splendid to see The Verve back again doing great songs. I have found many people who don't know much about them apart from the everlasting Bitter Sweet Symphony. That's a real shame. Forth features ten excellent songs. My favorites are Rather Be (a classic for sure), I See Houses, Columbo, and perhaps the most amazing song I have heard in years: Appalachian Springs. Here's the video:



I tend to create links between albums/songs and the situations I am living. I first discovered Forth while in Denmark, and now that I listen again some of its songs, I can't help thinking in Copenhagen and the great summer that now it's gone. A similar thing occurs to me when listening Elbow's The Seldom Seen Kid, my second suggestion for you. I started listening that album while in Rome's airport, waiting for my flight to Poland. Then during my week in Warsow I listened it a lot and  managed to appreciate it very much. Now it reminds me of my flight back to Bologna, and of a certain nostalgic feeling for Warsow.

I have to admit that I decided to listening Elbow only once they won the Mercury prize. I guess lots of people did the same and were nicely surprised with this record. This is not an easy album: do not wait for catchy songs or conventional melodies. Lyrics are excellent. It takes a while to get used to the music. At the end, in my experience, you'll end up enjoying it. My favorite song (so far) is Mirrorball. Here's the video:

Another rather decent album you'll like to hear is Dig Out Your Soul by Oasis. It is enjoyable but it's definitely not as good as the two above. 

Capsule of Absurdity No. 3

Imagine yourself, lost in the middle of nowhere, with a flight to catch and with an incompetent French bus driver that doesn't know how to take you to the airport.

In this post I offer you une capsule d'absurdité. As I mentioned at the end of this capsule, here I will describe some events related to a strike day in Paris.

Strikes (grèves in French, scioperi in Italian, huelgas in Spanish) seem to be a sign of developed societies. They're one of the expressions of the liberty working classes have to complain and fight for their rights. Unfortunately, unions and associations often misuse such a liberty to annoy the rest of the world. In Colombia there are no strikes, at least not legal ones: when people start to protest and not working, the government declares the strike as illegal. This scares most workers, and pretty much everything goes back to normal. In fact, I don't remember a single legal strike in Colombia. More common are the so-called turtle operations, in which services are offered up to some partial capacity. So, for instance, a turtle operation in a hospital might involve only providing ER attention and/or only practicing a few, randomly chosen, more delicate procedures. Even if technically turtle operations are not strikes, they're as or more annoying than fully-fledged strikes.

Here in Italy transport strikes are becoming increasingly frequent. These are rather gentle strikes: since most of them are announced in advance, they don't cause big problems provided you plan your travel schedule in advance. (Of course, there have been more problematic strikes but those are less frequent.) Indeed, recent strikes seem to be extremely gently when compared with the French transport strikes. During a recent visit to Paris (on which I commented here and here) I had the wonderful experience of a reduced train strike in Paris.

It was indeed a very reduced strike (at least when compared to those that took place when Sarkozy got into office). Paris is served by two train companies: one for the metropolitan part, and another that connects Paris with neighboring towns such as Roissy (north, where the airport is located) and Orsay (south, where I was staying). It was the second company the one that decided to go to strike the Monday in which I was supposed to return to Italy. In practical terms, that meant that instead of having a boring, very long trip from Orsay to CDG, I would have to go from Orsay to some intermediate station in Paris, take some metro line (using the company that wasn't in strike) and reach a certain station in which a train to CDG were available.

For reasons that are irrelevant now, and to keep things short, I will say that I ended up first taking the RER in Orsay until Châtelet – Les Halles; then I took the metro and arrived to the Opera. There, I took the RoissyBus (see the picture below), modern wonder that is the center of this capsule. This is a service intended to connect people in central Paris to the CDG airport. Given the strike circumstances, the RoissyBus seemed the most reasonable option to arrive to CDG in time.



I took the Roissy Bus and it quickly got out of the center of Paris. I had never reached the airport with a car or autobus, so I didn't know what the 'car entrance' to CDG would look like. Soon we were in a huge highway, and all the planes landing and taking off suggested that we were close to the CDG. All of the sudden, the bus left what it seemed to be the 'mainstream' entrances to the airport. I was surprised indeed, and looked at the faces of people around me: nobody looked worried or nervous, apart from the usual tension people in a rush have in these cases.

Soon we were inside the cargo part of the airport. We entered into some closed set of hangars and storehouses, with very narrow roads. Even if everything outside was a little strange, I was quite relaxed as I was certainly confident on the fact that we were taking a special route, carefully designed so to avoid traffic for all those who need reach CDG as soon as possible from the center. I was just behind the driver, who also acted very normal and confident.

Some minutes after, the RoissyBus stopped. The public part of the narrow road had ended: a fence separated us from some private property. The driver suddenly started to look at his GPS like crazy, and to look around. After some minutes, some radio communications between the driver and (I assume) the central control of the RoissyBuses took place. I couldn't understand what they said, but they seemed upset. We the passengers started to look to ourselves, and quickly realized our absurd reality. Our skillful driver had taken us into a very strange place, and we needed to go back to the main road.

So, we were in the middle of nowhere and needed to go back. In principle, this seems easy, but we had two main problems. One, the long, articulated bus needed to go back in an extremely narrow road, and two, we had a nervous, stupid driver. To give you an idea, imagine what is to leave a parking spot with cars in front and behind you: you have to go back and forth patiently, and repeatedly turn back, until getting enough space to turn completely to one side and go out. Our driver did precisely that, but all his effort was in vain. He obviously had never done that in his life, and the "acordeon" between the two parts of the bus was a nightmare for him, and also for us, who had no option but to observe the pathetic scene. We spent around 20 minutes in doing this: soon people inside the bus started to get anxious and to tell unrequested dramatic stories of how bad it would be to miss their flights. Argh.

At some point, the driver started to talk to some security guards nearby the fence. They had seen all the attempts of our driver and laughed. We didn't. The driver then found out that to one side of the road, there were some huge stones instead of some regular fence. That was our key to scape. The security guards stopped laughing and moved some of the stones, thus leaving some extra space for the RoissyBus to get out. It had to be done carefully, because of the 'second part' of the bus and the notorious incompetence of our driver. He did it very, very slowly.

We had been there for around half an hour and people were starting to suggest things, although not very loudly. I interpreted this lack of reaction in critical situations as another sign of developed societies, as strikes are. I was very calmed since, even with the delay, I had plenty of time. In fact, trying to anticipate any problem related to the strike, I had taken the first train from Orsay. Doing so had proven very wise, indeed.

At the end we managed to get out of the narrow road and to turn completely. I saw some unexpected expressions of joy: people were laughing, and when the whole turn back was done, my fellow passengers started to clap unanimously. I think I saw some hugging between complete strangers but I am not sure. Amazing! We went back to the main road, the driver followed the arrows he should never have ignored and we got safely to CDG. The most unlikely of the developments had arrived to a happy ending.

Now a concluding digression. The surprising clapping in the RoissyBus made quite an impression on me: in fact, clapping in public transportation means automatically brings back to me one of the most disturbing Colombian habits. Indeed, when any plane coming from abroad lands in Colombian soil, Colombians in the plane start to clap. Yes, they clap, and sometimes for several minutes! I never understood why is that, and let me tell you, I feel embarrassed when that occurs. Some people say that this is to honor the pilot. Nonsense. Perhaps my fellow Colombians just try to thank God the flight went OK, or they want express their happiness; in any case, I find it pathetic. It seems that things used to be worse in the past: I was told that there was a Colombian airline who played a fragment of the national anthem as soon as the plane landed, just before the clapping ritual.

(It has to be said that landing in Bogotá is a magnificent experience. The city is HUGE and flights from Europe usually arrive in the afternoon, so you can see very well the whole city from a privileged perspective. It is simply marvelous. You can see the landing here, and the see the landing and hear the clapping here.)

Here comes the sun

(Image taken from CNN.com)

The sun is shining today. Both metaphorically and literally. Indeed, after a few Copenhagen-like days, today the sun has returned to Bologna. The day is really splendid. There a few clouds, of course, but the fact that you can see some different perspectives can inspire you, and perhaps make your day. Also metaphorically the sun is shining today, after Barack Husein's clear victory last night. I think this is a so desired day for many people in the world; I would even dare to say that the enthusiasm outside the US is as big as it is today for more than 62 million people in the US.

Of course, just because today there's a shining sun it doesn't mean that there will be no more clouds around. After seeing both speeches last night this is even more certain. The speech by Obama was clear and inspiring, and at the same time, it was a statement of the huge challenges to come. I enjoyed the honesty in his words. But rather than digging on Obama's address, it is perhaps more insightful to pay attention to McCain's speech. I would like to comment on two particular moments.

First, when he opened his intervention mentioning Obama and the fact he had conceded him the presidency, McCain supporters started to boo Obama in several times. They interrupted McCain, who disapproved such a reaction. In my view, the face expression of McCain in that precise moment is priceless: it is a clear, authentic sign of disgust. Perhaps only in that instant, when hearing such an overwhelming negative reaction against the president-elect, John McCain realized the monster he had created by appealing to one of the most aggressive and nasty political campaigns in history.

The second moment that I find remarkable in McCain's speech is when he mentions Sarah Palin as the future driving force of the republican party. That lady certainly attracted a number of people who believe in conservative policies. The reaction to Palin's mention is almost the opposite to Obama's. Unfortunately, this campaign has put Palin in the top places of the political scenario in the US, and I am sure she will be the face behind powerful right-wing sectors interested in a new conservative agenda post-Obama.

Once again appealing to my weather metaphor, it is clearly a relief that the most influential person in the world is someone who not only can express himself properly, but that can bring inspiration to others in times of difficulty. Also, the fact that his vice-president is familiar with foreign policy issues (and that speaks his mind when he feels like doing so) is a killer combination. We should try to enjoy this sun while we can. We should also remember that even in the most splendid of the suns there are those little gray clouds that stand there. There will be always radical people like Sarah Palin that will play hard, not only against people like Barack Obama, but also against any manifestation of common sense. To conclude, let me provide a compelling example of this. According to Palin and her supporters, global warming is not man-made. I am sure that most of them would agree with Tina Fey on the fact that global warming is "just God hugging us closely".