Suomi

Thanks to research I was able to visit to Finland, something particularly difficult in normal circumstances. Yes, sometimes research takes you to places where you wouldn't go otherwise. I spent around five days, first in Turku/Abo (the city in which the workshop was held) and then in Helsinki. Here are a few (unstructured) remarks regarding this very brief trip to Finland.

I learned that what is nowadays known as Finland was first a part of Sweden, then part of Russia, and since 1917 an independent republic. As a result, Swedish is one of the official languages of Finland and there is a certain animosity against Russia. Swedish is used by only around 6% of the population, though. The language talked by most of the population is suomi, a word that denotes both the name "Finland" and the language itself, something I find very cool. I didn't know about this bilingualism in Finland: I discovered it while having problems finding my hotel in Google maps. I would look for, say,"Eriksgatan" (swedish) and Google maps would show me "Eerikinkaku" (suomi). Everything is written in both languages, often there is an English translation. Sometimes there is a Russian translation, too. Russia is very close, just in case you haven't done the effort of placing Finland in your mental world map.  In the central train station in Helsinki, where I bought the ticket for Turku, you can also buy tickets for Moscow and St Petersburg. Russians are the largest immigrant population, but there are also many Chinese. Other nationalities can be detected, pretty much as everywhere in Europe.

It is so wonderful to get to know many different countries, especially when those countries are so different from yours. Not only this enriches your perspective of the world, but somehow it also reaffirms who you are.  You can learn a lot about yourself when you understand how different others are from you. I like to look people's faces, and to try get an idea of what Finns look like. Once you've spent sometime in a country you get to understand this kind of things. By know, I know what Colombians, Italians, French, Portuguese look like... Finns are so different from anything I had seen before. So cool. In comparison to what I had seen in Denmark, in Finland you see way less blond people. This probably applies to other scandinavian countries. Finns have very very dark hair and eyes, and their skin is so pale; the contrast is quite impressive. One thing that I found curious is that the English pronunciation of most Finns is quite hard to follow. Their accent is so strong. I somehow expected a better accent. This is not a generalizable trend, though (and I am not a native speaker, anyway.)

I was told that November is the month of the year with worst weather, and I am still wondering why they decided to organize the workshop in this period. The dates of academic events somehow end up becoming a tradition, and changing traditions is not easy. Not even for Finns. Even if the coldest month of the year is usually March, they say that November is not good because is as cold as December but there is no snow. And snow reflects light, which is quite something in a dark country. I had never thought about this advantage of snow. Winters are dark and days are short. While I was here, the day would begin around 8am and end around 4pm. Often less than 8 hours. Such 8 hours of day is what you would commonly call an "awful, gray day" in Cali or Lisbon. Or pretty much anywhere else in the world. When it is not cloudy, the day would come in a blue version, and you get to see some sort of  blue light, something a bit difficult to explain in words but quite beautiful to see. While coming here in November might sound as a terrible idea, I like to think that it was also useful to see how Finns live and behave in "normal conditions". Let me explain: if you'd come here during the summer, most likely you'll have a great time, and most people would be doing "unordinary things", because most of the year is dark and cold. So in some sense, even if coming here in November can be harsh because of the cold (and the rain, and the snow), it is enlightening to do so, to discover how Finland behaves most of the year.

I spent one and a half days in Helsinki (Helsingfors, in swedish). November is definitely not the right period to visit the city. There are nice things to see, museums to visit, and streets to walk. I would certainly like to return here in a different period, perhaps September. The city is quite large, even if it doesn't seem so. The airport is quite far from the city; it is located in Vantaa, and it takes about 40 minutes to reach the city from there. Inside the city you usually move around using the tram system and buses.  There is also a metro line (the most northern metro system in the world) but it seems to be less useful for touristic purposes. I had heard stories about transport systems in Finland being extremely punctual (because this is really important if it's really cold outside) but it seemed quite normal to me. In Turku there were some small delays. Perhaps this period is still "warm" so as to be extremely punctual. In Turku there were only buses, divided in several private companies, so buses don't look all the same. This was interesting to see, as I had the idea that the fact that public transportation is owned and managed by the State was key to its efficiency. (In Colombia one would claim that transport is a mess partly because the State has little control the private companies that run the services.) Tickets for buses in both Turku and Helsinki are very expensive. Of course, they looked particularly expensive to me, being used already to prices in Portugal, where everything is relatively cheap. So you would pay 2,50€ for a single ticket for two hours. Somewhere I read that single tickets have a high price with the goal of  encouraging people to buy day and monthly tickets. This could be true when you consider that a day ticket costs 6.80€.

In general, Finland is an expensive country. This is already noticeable for eating outside. Indeed, even if you eat at McDonalds, you would pay around 10€. This was the case when I ate at "Hesburger", the McDonalds of baltic countries. I payed a little less eating chicken at SFC, which stands for "Southern Fried Chicken" and not for "Suomi Fried Chicken", which was my first thought and is certainly funnier.

The thing I will remember the most about this trip to Finland is Sibelius. Jean Sibelius is the most famous Finnish composer of all times. His name was actually Johan, but at some point in the past it was cool to make your name sound like a French name. He composed Finlandia, the most remarkable national song.  I visited Sibelius's museum in Turku, a very nice experience. Learned a lot about Sibelius, his life and art. Young Sibelius had a very nice, crazy hair cut; the old Sibelius died bald. He deserves respect also for that. I also visited the Sibelius monument in Helsinki, even if it was a bit away from the city center. Quite nice. Now I am listening to a Sibelius's album of "greatest hits", a souvenir that the lady at the museum convinced me to buy. So far I like the Karelia Suite very much: I warmly recommend it.

The P factor

My friend Ebbsborg has recently coined the term "the B factor" to generically refer to the things from Bolivia (hence the "B") that he finds frustrating/stupid/absurd as a foreigner.  (Well, at least that is the meaning that I infer from reading his blog.) I would like to extend this excellent idea to my case (that is, Portugal). Therefore, as of today, I will adopt the term "the P factor" to refer all the possible frustrating/stupid/absurd things one could complain about and that I find unique to Portugal.

While the Portuguese experience has been overall positive so far, somehow I feel that the patience that comes with "discovering" a new country and "adapting" to a number of new things is finishing. Not that I am unhappy or desperate about life here; I think it is a natural thing: once you've spent enough time in a place, you realize the advantages and disadvantages, what you like and what you don't like. And you put things on perspective. You also learn to identify the things you are not able to understand from the place; this is, in part, what I call "the P factor".

By now I could give several examples of the P factor: from absurdities for doing "simple" administrative stuff at work, the paranoia of my bank (and their obsession about sending things using snail mail), to the very bizarre philosophy for putting signs in public spaces (such as the extremely confusing arrows inside the metro of Lisbon). And I could write posts on all those instances of the P factor. But then this week I have been overexposed to the P factor, not to mention quite intense weeks of work, and so today I won't bother you with my complaints.

Atypical

Today there is a very interesting interview to José Mourinho in El País. At some point of the interview, when discussing his feelings about Portugal he says:

I am a very atypical Portuguese, because the typical Portuguese person misses Portugal and that is not my case. I don't feel saudade, perhaps because I have an amazing family, because I love what I do... I don't feel saudade, but I do have a lot of passion. I am a Portuguese who doesn't want to return; I don't want to work in any Portuguese team. I don't want to live in Portugal, but I am a Portuguese that wishes to make something important with my potential.

I couldn't relate more to Mourinho's words. That's is exactly how I feel about Colombia. Sometimes I think that I am an "atypical Colombian" but it seems like a pretentious thing to say. I don't miss Colombia, at least not in the persistent way most Colombians seem to miss it. There is an undeniable Colombian character --some undefinable form of passion, you could say-- in what I do and in how I behave, I am sure, and I feel most proud of that.

All of a sudden

There are modern countries in the world; I have seen some of them. There are also poor, underdeveloped countries; I was born in one of those. More interestingly, there are countries that for many different reasons attempt to go from underdeveloped to modern in a very short period of time. I have seen a few of those, too. Observing such attempts of sudden development is interesting, as it is often expressed by magnificent constructions, but it is also a bit shocking, as development is not uniform, so it looks unnatural, out of context. As a drop of modernity in a sea of underdevelopment.

I had seen this kind of shocking development in Greece, where the contrast between what is recent and works fine and what doesn't work (or doesn't exist at all) is both evident and overwhelming. Probably the thing that impressed me the most there was the ongoing development (notably, the several bridges and highways under construction), a burst of modernity kindly sponsored by the European Union. (I visited in 2007, things might not be that active nowadays.)

Even more impressive was to see sudden development and modernity in Malaysia. It was simply breathtaking. It looks like a place planned and built by giants. A country placed in the middle of a tropical forest, in which cities and highways are huge and underutilized, everything settled in a seducing combination of asian and muslim culture. Modernity has been recently imposed, but the humid character of the forest remains, though, and soon you realize how excessively big and distant things are. The key word here is overwhelming: the size of things, the magnitude of the contrast, and the tough, humid weather leave you no option but to feel overwhelmed. I suppose that even if one stays at fancy Kuala Lumpur it is possible to appreciate the contrasts: from the luxury of Petronas towers, to the traditional Chinese and Indian markets and neighborhoods, everything connected by rudimentary lines of railways that allow you to see everything in the middle. However, if you have the chance of travelling a bit outside Kuala Lumpur, and observe the unexplored forest outside you, then you might be tempted to think that modernity cannot be imposed, or at least that the price of doing so can be high. Malaysia had/has enough oil to pay that price, it seems, and the right leadership to accomplish the task.

I have seen signs of sudden development here in Portugal, too. As in Greece, this is recent development brought by the noble European spirit. Important events such as the EXPO'98 and the EURO 2004 have been also fundamental for the burst of development. It is quite insightful to take a train from Lisbon to Porto. The trip is nice and relatively short (300km in less than 3 hours). The high speed train, also part of the recent development, is rather efficient, and crosses many beautiful landscapes on its way to Porto. Some of such landscapes seem like postcards from 30 or 40 years ago; a flashback from old Portugal. The flashback breaks when you see a modern bridge, or a crossing highway; the sudden development is precisely in that rupture. Once in Porto, traditional and modern elements combine everywhere. In many ways, Porto is quite different from Lisbon, and yet a rather unique Portuguese character can be perceived. The metro in Porto is probably the main sign of sudden development in the city; oddly enough, the "heart" of the metro is at the stadium: the several lines start in the Stadium and fan out so as to reach the city center and the surrounding cities. This is to remind us that at the heart of sudden development is volatile capitalism: rather than ensuring efficient transport for most people, a metro system ensures that most tourists and visitors can go to the stadium. It could be the case that in the case of Porto both intentions coincide, but the idea of "stadium as the heart of the city" is hardly convincing.

Sterile Debates

The World Cup (WC) is over, and now we have to content ourselves with the local leagues. Yes, it sounds like a terrible agreement but that's the way it is. I was tempted to comment on the only two surprises of the WC (Paul the octopus and Larissa Riquelme, that is) but pretty much everyone else has done so by now, so I will concentrate on two rather curious debates that have arisen after the WC.

The first one is about Spain. It is well known that Spanish people have a surprising ability to create divisions and conflicts among themselves, and for very simple reasons. (Not surprisingly, and sadly, a great deal of that ability was inherited by the former Spanish colonies...) It is also well-known that Spain as a country is actually the delicate union of several small countries, each one with their own culture and character. There is, for instance, a latent tension between the people of Madrid and Barcelona, a tension that goes deep into history and covers different facets of society, including sports. Now it turns out that some Spaniards are debating about the "contribution" of players from Barcelona and Madrid into the recent world championship. It is well known that the national team has several players from Barcelona FC (seven, I think), and this is the reason why some people in Barcelona claim that the WC is mostly theirs. People in Madrid, reply claiming that the "contribution" of coach Vicente Del Bosque and goalkeeper/captain Iker Casillas (as well as some other players from Real Madrid) is equally good. Reasonable people simply celebrate the victory of a whole nation. Granted, this useless debate is not massive, but it can be well identified in Spanish sport media commentators. The political component of this debate---the everlasting "Catalonia is (not) Spain" issue---is of course at the heart of this sterile debate.

The second debate takes place in Argentina. I think that after the WC one can safely conclude that most of us are more prepared than Diego Maradona to lead a football team. He unsuccessfully tried to compensate his lack of preparation with great doses of charisma and arrogance.  This worked more or less OK in the first round (against weak opponents), and he was rather lucky against Mexico. Instead, in the last game against Germany, Maradona failed miserably. When we all were expecting a new, mentally stable coach for the Argentinian squad, we discover that not only he will be offered a four-year contract renewal, but also that the AFA (Argentine Football Association) is almost begging to him to sign! This is unbelievable. Apparently at present there are no better candidates for the position and, more dramatically, with Maradona in the bench AFA gets a lot of money through sponsors and highly payed friendly games. That's one of the reasons why AFA is not willing to get rid of DM (although they intend to change the people working with him). There is also the fact that, for reasons that are not entirely clear to me, the current president of Argentina (Mrs. Kirchner) loves and supports Maradona unconditionally, and so apparently she would be terribly disappointed at AFA if DM is fired. These are sad news for the current generation of Argentinian players and common sense at large.

In greed

I remember attending a ceremony in honor of Ingrid Betancourt in Bologna, in December 2008. She received a number of honorary titles from the city, awful music inspired in her drama was performed, and at the end she gave a very touching speech, in which she made a lot of references to the Virgin Mary, and to her responsibility in preventing kidnapping in the world. She also briefly mentioned a foundation/NGO she planned to create. The whole thing sounded so noble when I heard it, that I thought that Ingrid was indeed a different person after spending 6 years of her life in the Colombian jungle, kidnapped by the terrorist group FARC.

I also remember thinking that being kidnapped is such an outrageous thing that one should not judge people that have suffered that experience, essentially because one has no idea of what they have been through. Hence, one should respect their suffering (and that of their families); such suffering includes any incoherent reactions or behaviors once they return back to freedom. In Ingrid's case, the incoherence was  in becoming somewhat religious after a having a fairly promising political carrer, built upon equal amounts of courage, intelligence, stubbornness, and arrogance.

In fact, Ingrid was a controversial character way before her kidnapping. She was able to carry out brilliant debates in congress, but also was capable of doing stupid things just to attract media attention. At the end one would put up with the stupid/arrogant side of her, because she would aim at the right goals, most likely with the wrong manners. In the corrupt political setting of a third world country such as Colombia, however, that seemed as an acceptable compromise.

Ingrid was then a special politician. She was a special hostage, too. Her French citizenship was a factor that changed everything in the political tensions between the Colombian government and the FARC. Her family tried to exploit both options, the Colombian and the French, in order to put pressure on FARC so as to get her back. It didn't work that well, and soon it was pretty obvious that she would be the last one in coming back. The attempt of playing both sides wasn't appreciated by a large part of the Colombian society, who found it despicable to try to give priority to certain hostages, because it was clear that France was only interested in Ingrid. The liberty, equality, and fraternity didn't apply for the others. C'est la vie.

But at the end Ingrid got her happy ending and she got back her freedom thanks to a special operation of the Colombian army. We all were quite happy about that. We were equally surprised last week when we heard that she intended to obtain a "symbolic amount of money" from the Colombian state so as to compensate the period during which she was kidnapped by FARC. The amount of money were mere five million euro. The plan was to try to get an agreement for such a money, and to sue the government if no agreement was reached.

It is very hard for me to take position in this move by Ingrid. It is well known that she ignored a number of warnings regarding going to dangerous places, and so she is responsible for her own kidnapping. Of course, she's not responsible that she had to wait six years before coming back, but she was the  responsible in first place. It is hard to explain the way she's hated right now in Colombia. People find her lack of gratitude simply unacceptable. They have a hard time understanding why she claims 5 million euro, which is by no means symbolic for a country such as Colombia. Not only: by attempting to sue the state without a good reason, she has created an awful precedent for other kidnapped people who, unlike Ingrid, might deserve a compensation, for whatever reason. (In the case of other politicians who were kidnapped more or less in the same period as Ingrid, a compensation makes a lot of sense, I think.)

She finally took her demands back, most likely after seeing the unanimous reaction against her and her pretensions. She should haven't done that, in my view. Suing the state is a right, even if you have crazy reasons to do so. Her pretensions would have been denied, I am sure: all the warnings to her were public and are well documented. It would have been great to see, after several years, a final verdict from a court stating that Ingrid was irresponsible and stupid, and also arrogant enough so as to blame others for her own stupidity (and to try to get some money in the process).

Bit of a Blur

It has been almost a year now that I am completely absorbed by the music of Blur, the british rock/pop band.  I don't recall being interested in a band in this way and for this long; usually one listens an album a lot, finds some new stuff and moves on, and eventually revisits the old albums. Of course, not that I didn't know Blur:  I had a vague idea of their music, and I was aware of hits such as Song 2, Coffee and TV, and Girls and Boys. Back in 2002, I  had even bought and enjoyed their album Think Tank. However, it was only after watching their Glastonbury gig last year that I really got into Blur's music. I was in Grenoble and many things didn't seem to make sense, or so I thought.

So that concert really triggered something in me. I immediately got all of their albums, and read lots of information about them and the band. By now I have an awesome series of Blur-related memories. I would bike to/from work listening to Blur; that's at least one hour of music everyday. That's a lot of Blur. I remember walking in Paris, after doing visa-related bureaucracy, while singing Tender. I also remember walking around Kuala Lumpur, trying to forget about AH1N1 paranoia while listening The Great Escape over and over, and even singing He Thought of Cars (perhaps my favorite song in that album) in the fast train connecting KL and Putrajaya. During those days I would actually alternate between The Great Escape and Parklife, as I really like Tracy Jacks, London Loves, and most specially, Badhead, which was really amazing in the Glastonbury gig.

I find Blur's music intricately simple, as contradictory as this might sound. Lyrics are good (and sometimes brilliant) and in the music nothing appears as excessive or pretentious. What I probably appreciate the most is the fact that Blur as a band always cared to evolve, to push their creative boundaries, which is something I deeply admire in any music group. I find boring bands that always play the same song. Good examples of this desire of evolution in Blur's discography are 13 and Think Tank, the former aiming at exploring electronic music, and the latter being a good attempt of surviving without guitarist Graham Coxon (who left the band because of his problems with alcohol).

As you might guess, I haven't limited to listening and trying to make a high-level idea of their whole discography. I have tried to understand also the solo efforts by Graham Coxon and singer Damon Albarn. I recommend to everyone Coxon's The Spinning Top, a rather conceptual album that accompanied me during the first weeks in Grenoble (he has other albums, more Blur-like, but I haven't listened those yet). The obvious ramification of this exploratory strand is going through the music of Gorillaz, the amazing virtual band of Albarn and Jamie Hewlett. (Gorillaz deserves its own post, really.) The Good, The Bad, and The Queen, another effort by Albarn is warmly recommended, as I mentioned in this post.

Then it comes as no surprise that I've bought and watched several times No Distance Left To Run, a documentary of Blur's reunion last summer (see the official trailer). It is an extremely cool documentary: the story of the band is explained, including their up and downs, their fights and reconciliations. They appear as a group of friends, and the band reunion appears as a long postponed friends reconciliation. It is very well directed and I like it a lot. The DVD documentary comes with a recording of one of their gigs at Hyde Park; the concert is cool, but I like the Glastonbury gig better.

To conclude, these days I am reading Bit of a Blur, the autobiography of bassist Alex Jones. It is such an enjoyable reading; commuting time from/to my work here at Lisbon just flies reading that book. I am only at the beginning, though. Surprisingly, the book reveals that She's So High, one of my favorite songs from Blur, was the first song they ever wrote, at a time when they'd call themselves Seymour. She's So High is probably the simplest song ever (in fact, the lyrics are a little bit more than "I think of her / Everyday / I think of her / It doesn't help me") and yet it makes a great rock song. In fact, the Hyde park concert that appears in the DVD opens with a superb performance of She's So High. Do watch it here.

The End Is The Beginning Is The End

Some things come to an end without starting, or worse, without even existing. These are things that appear to be only because of our expectations or perceptions; they come to an end as soon as we realize they only make sense as the most enthusiastic of our desires. Then you realize that it was certainly nice while it lasted, especially when certain signals suggested the goal was possible. But once reality slaps you in the face, there is no other option but to accept that it is the end, that we have to move on.

The above is of course related to my disappointment after the recent Colombian presidential elections, which I have discussed before here, then here, and more recently, here. Disappointment comes from many different sources, but here I'd like to discuss only a few of them. As you probably know, elections were supposed to be a close competition between Antanas Mockus (the decent one), and Juan Manuel Santos (the despicable one). My first disappointment as a Mockus supporter was to see that Santos won with a huge difference (47% vs 21%, almost 7 million votes against little more than 3 million votes). While a Santos' victory in the first round was expected, such a difference shocked everyone. Moreover, Santos won in every state of the country but one, and also in the three main cities (Bogotá, Cali, Medellín) where Mockus was supposed to be fairly strong. 

A second source of disappointment was to realize that, once again, youngsters didn't go to vote. As I had mentioned here, people having the chance of voting for the first time would make a difference. There was a lot of hope on these kids, as they were supposed to support Mockus unconditionally. Well, it seems that they were too lazy to go to vote on a Sunday and now, partially because of them, the country will be fucked up for at least four more years. Once again, trusting the judgment of the so-called "new generations" has proven to be an idiotic ideal. 

The third disappointment was Mockus himself reacting to the results. We already knew that he isn't that good at speeches and public appearances. But the acceptance speech that he gave just after the results were revealed was absolutely disastrous, terrible, awful. For one, I couldn't watch it complete: I felt so disappointed to see Mockus unable to cheer up more than three million people who had voted for him. The paused style of Mockus when speaking, and his extremely pedagogic way of understanding public demonstrations, ruined the speech. I remember thinking "Mockus is not Obama", as Obama is quite clever at conveying the right emotional message, even if shallow and ephemeral, always at the right moment. What it was needed after a massive disappointment was a concrete, determined promise of fighting until the end for victory; an urgent call, to every single Colombian (and especially to those who didn't vote for him), to choose decency over traditional corruption. 

Of course, since Santos didn't manage to obtain more than 50% of the votes, there will be a second round elections (aka ballotage). To me it is clear that Mockus holds absolutely no chance in that round, especially because all other candidates but one, explicitly or implicitly, have adhered to Santos' campaign. So Santos will win, most likely with a larger difference. It is expected that less people will go to vote on June 20, either because they consider the elections are already settled (and hence their vote would make no difference) or because they think that the World Cup matches that day will be far more interesting (both Italy and Brasil play that day). From this point of view, it would be already "good" if Mockus manages to obtain the same votes he got in the first round. In fact, I would be extremely surprised if Mockus actually gets more votes. Sigh.

You might ask now, what is next for Colombia? In my view, these elections were about a fundamental question: do we want a shift towards a government based on decency, education, and social responsibility, or do we keep a government aiming at continuing with corruption, sustained war, and inequalities? As John McCain said in his concession speech, "the people have spoken, and they have spoken clearly." It is discouraging to realize that three million of decent people are the minority in Colombia. I hope Mockus' party is able to survive the second round with dignitiy, and that it articulates a proper opposition party right after the elections. Sadly, none of the two can be taken by granted.  

El Dorado

These days there is a controversy in Colombia concerning the name of the main airport of the country. In fact, the controversy arose because of a recent law which decrees that the airport of Bogotá should be called Luis Carlos Galán, in detriment of its current name: El Dorado. So you might wonder, what's with these names?

Let's begin by commenting on El Dorado. The associated wikipedia entry explains it reasonably well:

El Dorado (Spanish for "the golden one") is the name of a Muisca tribal chief who covered himself with gold dust and, as an initiation rite, dived into the lake Guatavita (near present day Bogota, Colombia). Later it became the name of a legendary "Lost City of Gold" that has fascinated - and so far eluded - explorers since the days of the Spanish Conquistadors. Imagined as a place, El Dorado became a kingdom, an empire, the city of this legendary golden king.

Hence, calling the main airport of the country El Dorado represents a way of remembering the Muiscas, one of the most remarkable native cultures that populated what nowadays is known as Colombia. (Notice that rather than having a huge, well-known native cultue ---such as the Aztecs in Mexico, or the Incas in Peru--- Colombia was populated by several smaller cultures. The Muiscas were one of them.) In fact, El Dorado feels like a connection to a glorious, prosperous past, a past that many Colombians ignore, do not completely appreciate, or simply despise. From this perspective, changing the name of the airport would mean losing one of our last connections to a significant part of our history.

But then you may ask, who was Luis Carlos Galán? Galán was a politician who was killed by the mafia in 1989 because of his strong positions against drug lords ---and the politicians representing them in the parliament. (Back then, mafia intended to take over the government through corrupt politicians. In fact, it is well known that it was a rival politician who convinced drug lord Pablo Escobar to order Galán's assassination.) Galán's death not only was a terrible crime in itself: it represented the death of the hope of a whole country who trusted him to clean up politics and shape a better future. As a vague analogy, back in 1989, Galán was able to convey the same hope and optimism as Obama did in the US. Everyone knew that Galán had enough popular support so as to be elected president in 1990. The drug lords knew that a "political infiltration" into a Galán government would not be possible, as he was too decent to allow that. So he was murdered on a Friday night, during a public act near Bogotá; I still remember the collective sadness of the following Saturday. I think it was the first crime I was able to understand---I was 6 back then.

Luis Carlos Galán (1943 - 1989)

[A digression here is in order: The 80s-early 90s were particularly tragic in Colombia's history. Galán was yet another one in the list of promising people killed by the so-called fuerzas oscuras (dark forces), that is, mafia often in collaboration with extreme right organizations. A whole generation of decent, bright Colombians was literally wiped out by the mafia during the 80s: judges, attorneys, police officers, ministers, left-wing leaders, journalists, presidential candidates such as Galán. Their crime was to denounce the truth about the danger of mafias, and/or to fight against their power and their role in the society.]

So we are talking about two very meaningful names in the Colombian culture. One represents our ancestral origins, a mystic link to our past and history. The second name represents the hope that couldn't be and most likely will never be. El Dorado is now such a traditional name for the airport, that changing it sounds so strange to me. I am of the opinion of leaving the name of the airport untouched; of course this doesn't mean that the ideals of Galán should ever die. Perhaps better than naming the airport after Galán, a more useful thing would be bringing his murderers into justice.

Season Summary

It is a good moment to review the 2009/2010 season of our beloved Real Madrid (RM). (After all, soon we will be busy with the World Cup.) The season was characterized by the arrival of a "new" president (Florentino Pérez, "my uncle" in what follows), yet additional evidence that Spanish sport media are disgusting, the lack of trophies at the end of the season, and uncertainty about the future.

My uncle arrived to the presidency of RM aiming at a complete revolution, and signed important names such as Cristiano Ronaldo (ManUtd), Kaká (Milan), Benzema (Olympique Lyon), and Xavi Alonso (Liverpool). Other, less renowned, players such as Albiol, Arbeloa, Granero, and Garay signed as well. The chosen manager was Chilean Manuel Pellegrini, who had done a rather good job in Villareal, during 2004-2009. My uncle's objective was to win again some trophies while playing attractively. The main goal of the season was to play the final of the UCL (UEFA Champions League) at the Santiago Bernabéu Stadium (RM home, in case you are not aware).

The season was a failure if one looks only at the final results: embarrassing performance at the Copa del Rey, a defeat full of impotence against Olympique Lyon in the UCL, and a second place in La Liga (the Spanish championship), just behind our sworn enemy. Beyond these disappointing results, in my opinion the team managed to have an idea of how to play, something that is remarkable in the light of the game shown in previous seasons. Moreover, the team did excellent at home (only one, yet crucial and painful, defeat), and some records were broken. The defense was particularly solid, even if Pepe was not available during many games. This is probably the most notable achievement of Pellegrini's team. Unfortunately, midfield and attack lines weren't that regular: although Xabi Alonso had an acceptable performance during the season, the ones supposed to make the team play (Guti, Granero, and perhaps Gago) were rather disappointing. Substitutes for Xabi Alonso (Lass and Mahamadou Diarra) were quite irregular too. The notable news in the attack is that legendary captain Raúl was officially sent to the bench during most of the season, and thus the strikers of the team were Cristiano Ronaldo and my personal favorite, Gonzalo El Pipita Higuaín. This was an awesome season for Pipita (27 goals in 35 appearances in La Liga), despite of the fact that my uncle doesn't like him very much (he prefers shy and unenthusiastic Benzema instead). Pipita scored important goals, was able to overcome the pressure of a lot of bad press against him, and yet again showed that he is the most reliable striker of the team, with a fantastic future ahead (he's just 22).

My uncle of course wasn't very happy at the end of the season with these results. In spite of his previous promises, he has recently fired Pellegrini. I liked Pellegrini a lot: apart from a questionable line-ups at the beginning of the season, you could tell he had a clear idea of how to make the team play for victory. Also, he's a gentleman: during the season he never gave a controversial press conference, always showing decency and culture. Pellegrini's plans for the team were seriously affected as soon as Robben and Sneijder left the team during the preseason (to Bayern Munich and Inter FC, respectively). This occurred even if Pellegrini publicly declared both players were essential in his plans; my uncle didn't appreciate such declarations, and claimed that their transfers were financially crucial. Robben and Sneijder's performances with their new teams (as well as RM's lack of options in the wings) would prove Pellegrini right, at the end.

Another disappointment of the season was Kaká. He had both adaptation and physical problems; a mysterious injury affected him during a large part of the season. However, in the games in which he supposedly was in good shape, he made no difference in the attack of the team. Luckily, whenever Kaká wasn't available or was playing like crap, there was Van der Vaart to play in his position. Van der Vaart did great in some games, but he also had injury problems towards the end of the season.

The last part of the season was characterized by a disgusting media campaign against Pellegrini. While at some point it was hard to believe my uncle would dare to fire him, thus contradicting the opinion of many followers, the intensity of such a campaign eventually convinced us that Pellegrini was out. What a shame. Decent and modest Pellegrini was then replaced by controversial José Mourinho, who has been very successful in Portugal, England, and more recently Italy. My uncle claimed that a change of coach was necessary in order to bring more leadership into the team.

Mourinho's teams tend to be more effective than attractive; it is unclear how he will adapt to Spanish football. He is certainly a guy who enjoys controversy; he says he does so in order to protect his players from unnecessary pressure. I am afraid that RM will be more hated now that Mourinho is leading the team. Mourinho has said that he wants 3 or 4 defensive players. While this could make some sense (given the current weaknesses in the wing positions) the reliability of the defense during this season makes me doubt about this. RM might need to get rid of good players (such as Garay or Albiol), in favor of people Mourinho knows well, such as Inter's Maicon. Perhaps it is just Mourinho trying to impose his new authority above all. Let's see how it goes.

Cerati

These are sad days for music. Gustavo Cerati, 50, one of the most amazing guitarists and songwriters is in critical condition. He suffered some sort of cerebral stroke, after performing a show in Caracas, Venezuela almost two weeks ago. While latest news on his state are somehow optimistic on a mid/long term recovery, the whole chain of events has been terrible news.

Even if Cerati is not dead, in some sense we all know that things will never be same again. I have to admit that during these days I have felt a bit as I imagine Michael Jackson's fans must have felt after his death. While music is supposed to be universal, I am aware that it is hard to explain with words all the emotions that Cerati's music conveys and, more importantly, the significance of his music in my everyday life. Perhaps I could try mentioning that Soda Stereo (the legendary band that Cerati led for many years) was crucial in my own approximations to music, and perhaps I could point you to great songs such as this and this. Or perhaps I could mention how much I admired Cerati reinventing himself after dissolving Soda Stereo, in a phase of my life in which I was also trying also to understand my own position in the world. And then I would probably tell you about this wonderful song, truly representative of those days. Another choice would be to point you to some of his experiments with classic and electronic music, or to introduce you to one of his recent songs. However, I fear that whatever attempt along these lines might not be convincing enough.

Very often, the consequences of what occurs are way more frightening than the events themselves. Nowadays the lack of imagination pervades everything, and it is actually the rule rather than the exception; the thought of the music scene without Cerati (and with other great artists in a decadent state) makes me sad. The absence appears as pointless as what it is left.

Update on Mockus (II)

Finally, presidential elections in Colombia will take place next Sunday the 30th. I have discussed it here and here. According to polls, two candidates still have options for winning the elections: decent, independent Antanas Mockus and the despicable human being Juan Manuel Santos (you might like to read a profile of all the candidates). Mockus managed to have a considerable advantage in polls, but then Santos "re-engineered" his campaign, a process that included hiring a Venezuelan expert in black propaganda. Also, Mockus made a number of mistakes in public events, making unfortunate/confusing statements about crucial issues. Such mishaps were effectively exploited by Santos campaign, I think.

As a result of both things, Mockus and Santos are now (almost) tied in polls (35% vs. 34%), and the final outcome is quite uncertain, essentially because it is known that polls reflect well the situation in middle/large cities, but not that in small cities and the countryside. In fact, in places away from the cities, the so-called electoral machinery --the network of corruption that is able to buy votes and carry out frauds in final results-- is known to be rather effective. This would benefit Santos and candidates from traditional parties but not Mockus. Another element of uncertainty is given by the very young people who are expected to vote for the first time. (In Colombia you can vote once you're 18; vote is not mandatory.) Most of them would support Mockus, but it cannot be taken for granted that they all will actually go to vote at the end, as this is the most skeptical segment of the population able to vote.

The most probable situation is that Mockus and Santos will go into a second round on 20 June. Polls indicate that while Santos would win the first round, Mockus would win the second one. Let's see how it goes.

Order does matter

The other night, while walking around central Lisbon with a friend, I found by accident the Embassy of Colombia in Portugal. It is located in a historical palace (Palácio Sotto-Mayor). Oddly enough, only one side of the palace seems to correspond to the embassy; also in the palace there is a bank and a hotel. I found it a bit weird, as I would have expected the embassy to have a whole building, even if small and modest, for the offices and the residence of the ambassador. I was intrigued immediately about the seemingly hybrid nature of the palace, and the role of the Colombian embassy. I went for further information to the awful website of the Colombian embassy. Apart from a few pictures, there is nothing regarding the residence itself. However, and as part of my lack of focus when I am online wasting my time, I managed to find a list of "famous Colombians" as part of the website.

The list is certainly insightful, and composed of notable individuals, mostly artists and scientists. All names are fairly reasonable, at least if you think from an average Colombian perspective. However, it was the order of the names in the list what shocked me. While the two names at the top of the list (Gabriel García Márquez and Fernando Botero) admit no discussion, ranked third and fourth were Shakira and Juanes, the two singers. I find this outrageous, especially considering the fifth entry: Dr. Rodolfo Llinás, neuroscientist, who is considered a founding father of modern brain science. As a matter of fact, while Llinás has made notable contributions to the understanding of the nature of the human brain, Shakira and Juanes have ruined thousands of brains with their "songs". I therefore fail to find a reason to explain the fact that Dr. Llinás is ranked only fifth. (Popularity or fame is not a good reason to promote the individuals of a country. If that were the case, the list should include Pablo Escobar, who is known everywhere.)

Independently of the ridiculous ranking in the embassy website, I must confess that Dr. Llinás is probably my favorite Colombian abroad. Educated at Bogotá and Australia, he has developed his career in the United States, and is currently working at NYU. He also collaborates with NASA. Apart from his decisive contributions in science, in interviews Dr. Llinás always finds a way of putting his research in easy-to-grasp terms. By looking at the humor and audacity when he expresses himself, he also seems to have a nice personality. Dr. Llinás is the author of I of the Vortex: From Neurons to Self, a book for a general audience in which his view on brain organization and functioning is presented. To get to know better this Colombian genius, you could take a look to this very interesting interview which is, at the very least, thought-provoking.

Little victories

As I had commented previously, the Portuguese system cares a lot about where you live. So, in one of the steps to formalize my residence in Portugal, the other day I went to register my address (and to obtain an associated certificate) to the Junta de Freguesia of my neighborhood. The Junta is, roughly speaking, the local administrative unit at that each neighborhood. I went there at 9.15, as I had seen online that it opens at 9am. To my surprise, the Junta was closed when I got there. I waited for a few moments, but as bad for waiting indefinitely as I am, I gave up and started walking back home. I had walked away for a few meters when someone else wishing to enter appeared. She worked there, and we were able to enter together.

The building in which the Junta is located is simply beautiful, full of impressive azulejos, and very well preserved overall. Once inside, it was easy to find the office where I should get my certificate. There was a lady, somewhere between 40 and 50, who had just arrived (it was 9.30 already, and the thing is supposed to open at 9am, but anyway). I tried to ask her about the thing I needed, but she replied rudely saying that she needed some time to fix things there before. She certainly took her time, and at the end she put on one of those "waist bags" one usually wears for travelling. The bag was full of keys and two cell phones. She was clearly the one in charge of that office.

Once I got her attention, she was unconvinced about my case, as she needed a proof of residence (yes, exactly the thing I needed from her!) and I only had a leasing contract of my room, in English. She didn't accept the contract, so things were in a dead end for a second. Luckily, I had a document from my bank with my address and that worked just fine. (Indeed, the circularity was broken at the bank, as they had accepted the contract in English.) The problem with the document of the bank is that the gorgeous blond woman there wrote my address incorrectly, so the document had an incorrect address. Stupid blond. Somehow I managed to explain this to the lady at the Junta office, and she didn't complain. Lucky me.

Then it was a matter of the lady making copies of my passport and other documents, and me filling in some form. Easy. The problem is that she received a personal call on one of her two mobiles and so the copies took like 10 minutes. I realized the level of competence of the lady when she asked me about my nationality: she had taken many copies of the passport and yet she was unable to infer my nationality. By then, she was already kind. She checked the form I had filled in, and found the names of my parents very funny to read. I had forgotten to fill the field "marital status". She looked at me in the eyes for some long seconds and replied jokingly "definitely single!". She surely thought I am too young and handsome to be married :)

At the end, she entered the information into some database, confirmed again the names of my parents (I still fail to see what's so peculiar about them), complained about the computer, and printed the certificates. Then, using the set of keys in her waist bag, she opened some closet in which there were some other keys that would allow her to unlock the machine that puts some special stamps on the certificates. She put the stamps and that was it.

Smiling, she charged me 7 euros (!) and I thought immediately about this Portuguese thing of ripping off foreigners. Not so frequent, I must admit. The classic example is taxis, but in a country where a coffee costs 50 cents, I am sure that paying 7 euros for two identical public documents is an abuse. However, I payed without complaining: at the end, I wasn't able to complain anyway, I obtained what I wanted --and immediately in the same day-- using the very limited Portuguese I have. So I was very satisfied. This is what little victories are about.

Letting things go

Several of the people I graduated with in high school are also recent facebook contacts. I am quite curious about what they look and how they think at present, and to discover what they did with their lives during these ten years. Nothing strange about this. However, in some cases I have noticed that some of them react and behave (say, by commenting on pictures) exactly with the same spirit and expressions as they did ten years ago. I find that a bit disturbing. It could appear as if they were appealing to memories of the past to compensate something that's missing now; I hope I am mistaken. It's like they were pretending that time hasn't passed, that we all are still the same. And that's not the case, independently of whether they/we accept it or not.

All of this got me thinking. Granted: it is human nature to be afraid of the uncertain future and to rely on the cozy memories of the past instead. In general, it is very difficult to let things go, to accept that a certain phase of our life has passed and that a new one is upon us. It happens with relationships (of all kinds), friendships, summer holidays, jobs, and many other things. It is certainly not about neglecting or ignoring the past, or denying that it was fun or enriching while it lasted, but about accepting that things change, that sooner or later every phase ends, and that one must move on. Needless to say, to let things go and move on is certainly easier said than done.

The Two Pants

I don't remember why or when the other day I remembered that for a long period of my life I only had at most a pair of jeans. This seemingly irrelevant memory brings back a number of other, hopefully more insightful, memories of my childhood.

Life was way simpler back then. Jeans were part of the uniform during primary and high school. The uniform consisted of: black leather shoes, white socks, (dark) blue jeans, a black or brown belt, a white polo shirt (a specific model that one had to buy at the high-school, at the beginning of the academic year). The uniform was mandatory: every morning, teachers would check that one would wear it correctly. (A "decent hair cut" was also considered as part of the uniform, by the way.)

As I mentioned before, every academic year I only had two pairs of jeans. The first pair was the "old one", which was inherited from the previous year. Hence, it wasn't not that blue, and often was patched around the knees, as I was good at breaking pants while playing football. My mom was always keen to patch broken jeans and socks. One of the joys of beginning a new academic year was the idea of having a new pair of jeans, one that wouldn't have any of the embarrassing marks and defects of the old pair. The two pairs of jeans were to be used alternatively, one week one pair, the following week the other pair. (This would give enough time to wash and iron the jeans.) I remember that my mood was a bit better when using the new pair of the year, as somehow they made me feel more elegant and confident. So cool. Wearing the good, new pair, however, entailed some responsibility, as one had to be careful of not doing things that would break or ruin them too fast. The weeks with the "old pair" were then not that bad, as one could care less about the jeans when playing and getting dirt: in any case, the "old pair" would be history at the following June, when the academic year ended. Some sort of "pant-based" equilibrium, you could say.

While having only two pairs of jeans for going to school was probably a consequence of the financial limitations of my family during part of my school life, I don't keep negative memories of that period. Rather on the contrary, all the memories I have go beyond any negative aspect: together they represent the many efforts that my parents did to make sure that I would receive a decent education. (Not a trivial task when you have four kids.) Now that I have apparently reached the end of my formal education, it seems only fair to acknowledge, once again, all of their efforts.

Lisbon: Medley

Here's a collection of things that I have found curious, remarkable, or funny during my first weeks in Lisbon.

• This might sound stupid to Portuguese readers, but the names of the days confuse me a lot. While in my mind the week starts on Monday (and hence Monday is the first day of the week), the Portuguese language conveys a slightly different idea: indeed, Monday in Portuguese is segunda-feira, which could be literally translated as "second fair". (Segunda is also the word in Spanish for the ordinal second). The names for the other days follow the same idea and so, for instance, Friday (the fifth day of my week) is "sixth fair". This was a mess at the beginning; now I am more used to the idea.
• Portuguese people are unable to pronounce my name properly. No surprise. My name is quite challenging for Portuguese, who have produced new funny approximations. Interestingly, a few people here have managed to pronounce it correctly, which both makes me very happy and represents a shame for those who cannot pronounce it correctly :)
• There are many Spanish people here, which is not a surprise, given that Spain is so close. You see lots of tourists, and I assume that they are the cause that one sees Don Juan Carlos so often. I have discovered that I find Spanish people very irritating sometimes, specially when they are in groups, as they are often noisy and vulgar. I really look forward to meet Spanish people who would help me to change this perception.
• The rice pudding one usually gets as a dessert here is prepared in exactly the same way as they do it in Colombia. (With the cinnamon and everything!) This has brought immense joy to my lunch time.
• The first times I went to the supermarket here I was amazed that the cashier would pack my things for me. Not only: she would do it correctly and carefully. This occurred even with different cashiers. Sadly, soon I discovered that cashiers in Portugal are as in everywhere else in the world.
• Bureaucracy here is as tedious as it is in Italy. I am particularly surprised by the fact that everyone wants to see original documents (they don't trust photocopies) and that the Portuguese state is particularly interested in recording your residence address: every procedure requires a proof of residence, something annoying if you just got here and are living in a temporary place. I find it obsessive this interest in your address (after all, in Colombia you don't have to register your address, and Italy they are not strict about this), but Portuguese people seem to find it quite normal.
• The weather here is extremely nice. People here keep telling me that I shouldn't be so happy about it, as I haven't experienced the rain season. I understood them very well when it rained a bit, on a weekend like two weeks ago. It was quite impressive: I had never seen such a violent way of raining! It is literally nature's anger in the form of water.
• In front of Lisbon there is a river (the Tagus) that some people could confuse with the sea. Crossing the Tagus (that is, going to the south of Lisbon) it's my work, so I should spend significant time commuting. I like it, though. Once at the other side of the river I should take a "surface metro" --I would call it tram-- built by Siemens for the city of Almada. It is extremely slow, essentially because the railway lines were designed with a lot of curves, and the tram practically stops at every curve. I often remember the tram in Grenoble, which was way faster, even with similar curves. I am afraid that Siemens ripped off the good people of Portugal; they should have built an Alstom Citadis instead.
• Coffee is important here. While the machines you see in bars are essentially Italian, beans are a bit different, somehow more toasted. The resulting coffee is of course different, with a stronger taste, and you get more quantity. In fact, a "short coffee" is commonly called "Italian", in reference to the Italian espresso. Coffee is also quite cheap: standard price is 50 cents. I still need to get used to the Portuguese style for coffee.
• Preliminary evidence indicates that Portuguese people think that the average Brasilian person is stupid. Interestingly, Brasilian people think exactly the same of the average Portuguese person. I find this surprising and funny. So far my evidence amounts to jokes in both directions, but I promise to look further into this.

Football and justice

As many other things in life, football obeys a series of dualities: apart from the obvious winning-losing aspect, the most notable duality is that every team, no matter its size or origin, has a rival counterpart, a sworn enemy in the field. As a result, you don't only enjoy when your team wins, but also learn to feel relieved when your main adversary loses. Apart from this indisputable duality, there is the very important fact that the football follows no logic. As such, it defies any predictions or anticipated analysis. Much of the beauty in football can be traced back to that simple principle.

The lack of reasonable explanation in events related to football is closely related to justice. Justice is absent from most aspects of life, let alone football. In spite of this, justice at large is a common ideal that is perceived as a feasible one by most of us. In fact, one often hears frustrated football followers complaining about results not being fair. I could bet many lines have been written with the experiences of great teams that never won, or with the lives of extraordinary players who never saw glory. If "justice" or "logic" were part of football then rich teams would win every cup, and talented players would make no mistakes, injuries wouldn't be such a big deal, and everything would be terribly boring. The lack of logic (and therefore of justice) not only makes the whole sport interesting, it's what inspires "weak" teams to overcome their deficiencies and dream of victory. In some sense, perhaps contradictorily, the lack of logic is what equates the two teams in the field.

All of the above is partially due to Barcelona failing to get to the finals of the UEFA Champions League. As a Real Madrid follower, this makes me happy. A very good friend of mine is a Barcelona follower, and he always appeals to the "justice" argument in discussion. We discuss about football quite often; he's quite an expert and, unlike me, remembers many things. It is easy to imagine him now, saying things like "Don't you think it's unfair Barcelona losing against ultradefensive Inter?" I always reply with the same answer, essentially what I just wrote about football and justice. Most of the times he accepts my argument reluctantly. My friend and I have an agreement of not making fun of the other about the failures of our teams. This agreement has lasted for years now, so I am gonna enjoy silently this moment. He's been extremely noble to make his part, even if he has had plenty of opportunities of making fun of the recent and repeated failures of Real Madrid. This post is dedicated to him; I am confident the post does not break our agreement.

Sunday readings

I devote a substantial portion of my Sundays to read Colombian press: I read the opinion section of the two major newspapers and of the only weekly journal that still exists and is serious. I like to think that I am better informed than most Colombians, but it would be a bit pretentious to claim something like that. Today, two of my favorite columnists dedicated their space to comment on the ash cloud caused by the eruption of Iceland's Eyjafjallajokull glacier. The pieces are available here and here; if you read Spanish please take a look, as they are wonderfully written.

The spirit of both pieces is the same: the apocalyptic effects that recent natural disasters are having in the world. Of course, in addition to the glacier thing this week, one remembers the earthquakes in Haiti, Chile, and China. One of the columnists even argues that the combination of an earthquake with the disruption in air transport in Europe would be enough to cause great chaos---the kind of chaos one would expect from the "end of the world". Despite the ash cloud, one of them remarks, the sky in Europe is as blue and wonderful as in the most amazing spring.

Leaving aside the necessary reflections on modern globalization that the ash cloud thing leaves us (one example being the huge losses in Kenia due to failed flower shipments), the idea of the "end of the world" is quite intriguing to me. Somehow I tend to believe that most people are waiting for a huge, unique event (as in massive atomic bombs, perhaps as a result of a world war). That is quite a romantic view of things, I believe, perhaps influenced by religious ideas. In contrast, I think that the end of the world will come in small doses: one huge earthquake there, a tsunami here, an epidemic crisis later. Such events will be analyzed individually, and forgotten later, as we usually do with catastrophes that don't concern us. My point is that most of us will fail to recognize the combined effect of the several "mini" ends of the world. As a result, humanity will reach its end without realizing it, and perhaps the very end of the world itself will be seen as yet another of those catastrophes that is forgotten the day after.

Update on Mockus

The situation for the forthcoming presidential elections in Colombia is getting more and more interesting. Earlier this week, Antanas Mockus (who, as I discussed here, is the best candidate ever) joined forces with Sergio Fajardo, another independent candidate. Fajardo has agreed to be his vice-presidential candidate. This seems to have given a huge momentum to Mockus' candidacy, as now he is second in the polls, just behind Juan Manuel Santos (37% vs. 24%). Mockus is tremendously successful among young people, intellectuals and academics. Also, he is the leader in social networks such as facebook and twitter. (This is just a good sign; not that every family in Colombia has a computer with Internet access.) Although we are less than two months away from election day and anything could happen, it is clear that the momentum gained by Mockus' candidacy is slowly changing the perception that he has no chances of winning. Let's hope the trend continues.

But that's not all. Just after the positive poll results were revealed, yesterday we all were kinda shocked when Mockus revealed he is in an early stage of Parkinson's disease. Unlike in the US, in Colombia the health condition of politicians is little discussed during elections. While other candidates have respected and admired Mockus' courage in making such a declaration, and most of them have promised not to use it during the campaign, it is still not clear to me how this new turn of events will change things. So far people have assumed the news positively, as it is inspiring to see such an extremely brilliant guy dealing with that condition with dignity and courage.

Airplanes in Lisbon

When I was a kid at Cali, one of the things I missed the most from Bogotá was the fact that in Bogotá there are always airplanes flying over, as the airport is inside the city. (In Cali, in contrast, the airport is rather away from the city. It is in fact in a different town.) Ever since, I have appreciated very much the cities in which one can see airplanes flying over---I find it a privilege. Bologna is also one of such cities. And this is one of the things I really enjoy from being in Lisbon: since the airport is at the north of the city, and relatively close from the center, you see planes descending all the time. You see them approaching, hence flying relatively low. So low that you can distinguish the airlines they belong to. It is a simple thing but I love it.

Also because of the location of the airport, landing in Lisbon can be a wonderful experience. Last week the airplane approached Lisbon by flying over the beach, then it gave a turn over the city and the Tagus, and only then landed. It was fantastic! Today, over lunch, a colleague here was telling me about plans of building a new airport, away from the city (in fact, at the other side of the river). He remarked that it was a safety measure for people living close to the airport, in that most incidents with planes occur at take-off and landing. At first I thought "I hope they don't build it so quickly so I can see the planes everyday". Then, when I realized how slow some things work here, I concluded there is nothing to be worried about: I will be able to see airplanes flying over Lisbon for a long while.

Capsule of Absurdity No. 5

It's been a while since the last "Capsule of Absurdity". I knew that I couldn't leave Italy without a last absurd event. In fact, the last thing I did before coming to Portugal was sending a little box with books to my new department in Lisbon. So I went to the Italian post office, and asked about the expedition fees. The lady who was at the counter looked at her computer and asked me the basic information:

- What is the final destination of the box?

- Portugal, I replied.

Then she asked the absurd question:

- Is Portugal in the European Union?

- Of course!! ---I replied, probably with a very surprised face. (In Italian I said "Ma certo!", I wonder if that has to do with the lady's reaction.)

Then the lady looked at me in a terrible way, really really bad, like for 5 seconds. Then she looked again at the computer, and said to me:

- Non è detto...

which is a bit hard to translate, but in this context it could be interpreted as "you never know" or, better, as "you cannot take it for granted". In either case, I found it so incredibly absurd that an average person is not aware of the countries that are part of the European Union. I would have expected everyone to have some sort of "primitive geographical knowledge" such as "Rome is the capital of Italy", "Milan is north, Naples is south", or stuff like that. And then we are talking about an employee of the Italian post, someone a bit above the average (but not too much), in the sense that has a job that requires a bit of geographical knowledge (after all, you spend your days sending things around).

Finally, there is the thought that, from a very extreme point of view, I was the one who wasn't supposed to know that Portugal is indeed in the European Union (after all, I was the "foreigner"). In fact, a more realistic scenario would have been me asking that question and she replying "Ma certo!". Her terrible look at me would have been more than justified.

London in Music

A very brief post to recommend you, in the strongest possible terms, the British superband The Good, The Bad, and the Queen, and their homonymous only album, released in 2007. It is such an excellent record! It is yet another one that I discover quite late after its release. I won't say much about my impressions: I will limit to describe it as dense, fluid, and very pleasant---all in one album. It might be hard to digest at the beginning, but it is definitely worth trying. You can read some reviews here. My favorite songs at present are Kingdom of Doom and Three Changes.

The Spanish connection

I find it amazing how fast (bad) news fly from Italy from Colombia (and, presumably, to the rest of Southamerica). We are of course talking about the kind of news related to Berlusconi, his scandals, ridiculous statements, and all the things in between. I am sure Italians will be surprised/ashamed to know that the average Colombian knows very well who SB is, is well-acquainted with his doings, and that media here is eager to inform about SB's absurd remarks and corruption scandals.

The obvious question is then: how come Berlusconi manages to receive so much press around here? The short answer is: Spain. For some reason I fail to understand, Spanish press has something against Berlusconi. Why is that? My conjecture is that SB's enemies are unable to attack him in Italy, given his strong influence on Italian media. So, anyone willing to attack SB should appeal to foreign newspapers such as El Pais to do the dirty work for them (i.e. to expose his scandals). El Pais is indeed a very good place to be updated about bad things in Italy. Whenever I don't follow some political event in Italy, I go there: they usually explain very well the historical background of each scandal and manage to put things in context. Hence, there is a strong link between Italy and Spain, in such a way that information about bad news in Italy flows easily to Spain.

The link between Spain and Southamerica is more explicit and easier to explain. In the last years we have witnessed an unfortunate invasion of Spanish media groups in Colombia. The two most important newspapers in Colombia (El Tiempo and El Espectador) either belong to Spanish media groups or have strong informative alliances with Spanish newspapers. As a consequence, in newspapers here it is very easy to find content targeted for Spanish audiences; such a content is reproduced here essentially because no translation is needed and copy-and-paste is cheap and quick. This way, if you read something in El Pais on a Sunday, it is very likely that it will appear in El Espectador (my favorite Colombian newspaper) the week after. Several times it has occurred that SB says something stupid/pseudofunny and that such declarations are not covered by, say, La Repubblica, but appear quickly in El Pais (and hence, in El Espectador).

Research, TV ads, and Unacknowledgements

On Commercials. These days there is some relative controversy among Italian researchers because of a TV commercial. You can watch the commercial here. As it is quite likely that the commercial will be erased in the next few days, here's a rough description.

The advertised product is a bank; the commercial shows Claudio, 33, an Italian researcher at a laboratory in the US. We are told that he has an Italian laurea and an american PhD, and that he decided to remain at Los Angeles after finishing his studies. The commercial suggests that Claudio is very successful at what he does. In fact, he appears doing fancy stuff in a very modern laboratory. It is not clear what exactly Claudio's research is, though. Unfortunately, Claudio is not entirely happy and so, one day at the beach, he decides to return to Italy. Claudio has a girlfriend/coworker called Kate; she doesn't like Claudio's decision.

The next thing we see is Claudio resigning to his position at the American laboratory. Right after that, we see Claudio at what appears to be a very modern laboratory, but in Italy. At the Italian lab ---which is very similar to the American lab we saw before--- a colleague says to Claudio: "it feels as if we were in the US". Claudio replies: "and even better". We are told that it is not known if Claudio will fulfill his dreams. Then we see Kate appearing out of nothing, speaking a crappy Italian. Claudio and Kate get on a motorcycle and take a ride. The commercial closes; it reads: "There is an Italy that fights for its own dreams. We stand next to that Italy."

The commercial is offensive in that it Claudio's history is extremely unrelated to reality. It's almost science fiction. There are many highly skilled Italians doing research abroad. This is a very notorious phenomena nowadays, which can be perceived at basically every area of science and arts. Given the way in which the Italian research system expels its most talented individuals, the story of Claudio ---who willingly returns to Italy, with the same research conditions he had in the US--- appears simply laughable. And then it is not clear to me why a bank would like to produce such a commercial. The Italian system is infamous for the ever decreasing funds assigned to education and research, not to mention the unclear, old-fashion procedures it uses to distribute such funds and hire new young researchers. Sadly, the mere fact that the bank dared to produce such a commercial reveals that the Italian society at large is not aware of the huge problem brain drain represents for the country.

On

Unacknowledgements. As you probably know, it is common to add an "acknowledgments" section at the end of a scientific paper. There you thank people who helped you or gave you ideas for developing it, and/or mention the projects/institutions that funded your research. It is not mandatory to write such a section, of course. Well, today I saw something interesting that might impose a trend. In a very recent paper, the authors ---three researchers from Sapienza University of Rome--- include something else. As usual they have an acknowledgments section:

Acknowledgements

We thank the anonymous referees for their useful suggestions.

The novelty is the mention they added right after that:

Unacknowledgements

This work is ostensibly supported by the the Italian

Ministry of University and Research under the FIRB

program, project RBIN047MH9-000.

The Ministry

however has not paid its dues and it is not known

whether it will ever do.

You can take a look to the paper here. (For those of you in the CS world: the paper was accepted at SODA 2010, the ACM-SIAM symposium on discrete algorithms, a top conference on algorithmics.)

I suspect this indeed will initiate a trend, as I am sure there are many researchers in Italy in the same situation. Whether this is an appropriate way of acting or not is a matter of discussion. I was surprised by the originality of the protest. It is worth observing that generally completing a (good) paper represents a great effort, and hence arriving to a point where you write an acknowledgments section for a work of yours is supposed to be satisfying. Therefore, it is very sad to see people who arrived there and recorded their frustration in such a way. It is a matter of desperation, I suppose.

Acknowledgments for a PhD thesis

The following is the acknowledgments section of my recently finished PhD thesis, entitled "Higher-Order Concurrency: Expressiveness and Decidability Results". For those interested in the actual thesis (and not in the thing below), it should be publicly available later this year, as a technical report of the Department of Computer Science of the University of Bologna. If you cannot wait that long, drop me an email and I will send you the current draft.


My greatest debt is to Davide Sangiorgi. Having him as supervisor has been truly inspiring. His careful supervision has influenced enormously my way of doing (and approaching) research. His continuous support and patience during these three years were fundamental to me. I am still amazed by the fact that Davide had always time for me, not only for scientific discussions but also for sorting out everyday issues. I am most grateful to him for his honest and direct advice, and for the liberty that he gave me during my studies.

I also owe much to Camilo Rueda and Frank D. Valencia. I do not forget that it was Camilo who introduced me to research, thus giving me an opportunity that most people in his position would have refused. Even if my PhD studies were not directly related to his research interests, Camilo was always there, interested in my progresses, encouraging me with his support and friendship. Frank not only introduced me to the concurrency theory; he also gave me constant advise and support during my PhD studies and long before. Frank had a lot to do with me coming to Bologna, and that I will never forget.

There is no way in which I could have completed this dissertation by myself. It has been a pleasure to collaborate with extremely talented people, to whom I am deeply grateful: Cinzia Di Giusto, Ivan Lanese, Alan Schmitt, Gianluigi Zavattaro. Thank you for your kindness, generosity and, above all, for your patience.

Many thanks to Uwe Nestmann and Nobuko Yoshida for having accepted to review this dissertation. Thanks also to the members of my internal committee (commissione), Cosimo Laneve and Claudio Sacerdoti-Coen. I am indebted to Simone Martini, the coordinator of the PhD program, for his constant availability and kindness.

Many people proof-read parts of this dissertation, and provided me with constructive criticisms. I am grateful to all of them for their time and availability: Jesus Aranda, Alberto Delgado, Cinzia Di Giusto, Daniele Gorla, Julian Gutierrez, Hugo A. Lopez, Claudio Mezzina, Margarida Piriquito, Frank D. Valencia. A special thanks goes to Daniele Varacca, who suffered an early draft of the whole document and provided me with insightful remarks. Along these years I have benefited a lot from discussions with/comments from a lot of people. I am most grateful for their positive attitude towards my work: Jesus Aranda, Ahmed Bouajjani, Gerard Boudol, Santiago Cortes, Rocco De Nicola, Daniele Gorla, Matthew Hennessy, Thomas Hildebrandt, Kohei Honda, Roland Meyer, Fabrizio Montesi, Camilo Rueda, Jean-Bernard Stefani, Frank D. Valencia, Daniele Varacca, Nobuko Yoshida.

During 2009 I spent some months visiting Alan Schmitt in the SARDES team at INRIA Grenoble - Rhone-Alpes. The period in Grenoble was very enriching and productive; a substantial part of this dissertation was written there. I am grateful to Alan and to Jean-Bernard Stefani for the opportunity of working with them and for treating me as another member of the team. I would like to thank Diane Courtiol for her patient help with all the administrative issues during my stay, and to Claudio Mezzina (or the “tiny little Italian with a pony tail”, as he requested to be acknowledged) for being such a friendly office mate. I also thank the INRIA Equipe Associee BACON for partially supporting my visit.

I would like to express my appreciation to the University of Bologna - MIUR for supporting my studies through a full scholarship. Thanks also to the administrative staff in the Department of Computer Science, for their help and kindness in everyday issues.

I am most proud to be part of a small group of Colombians doing research abroad. We all share many things: we started in the same research group, have similar backgrounds, and came to Europe more or less at the same time. With most of them I even shared an office for a long time. Many thanks to: Jesus Aranda, for his inherent kindness; Alejandro Arbelaez, for the good times while working in Colombia and his hospitality during trips to Paris; Andres Aristizabal, for the constant support in spite of our favorite football teams; Alberto Delgado, with whom I started doing research back in 2002 and has always been there ever since; Gustavo Gutierrez, for the old, good times when he was my first boss, and for the sincere support during all these years; Julian Gutierrez, for all the discussions on life and research, during our PhDs and even way before; Hugo A. Lopez, for sharing with me the experience of living in Italy, several trips, and a plenty of discussions on concurrency theory and life at large; Carlos Olarte, for all the good times in Paris and hospitality in the great city of Bourg-la-Reine; Luis O. Quesada, for his exceptional kindness and hospitality during a visit to Ireland (despite of the fact that my visit brought historical floodings to the Cork region). Above all, I would like to thank all of them for being my friends.

Perhaps the most significant achievement of my PhD studies is all the people I have meet along the way. A special thanks goes to: Cinzia Di Giusto, for her constant support and friendship, and for being the most enthusiastic partner in research one could imagine; Antonio Vitale, for the several trips and for sharing with me bits of PhD frustration and pizzas of varying quality; Ivan Lanese, the loyal friend, the reasonable flat mate, and the talented co-author. Thanks also to: Stefano Arteconi, for insightful and enjoyable discussions on Italy, movies, and music; Ferdinanda Camporesi, for the many chats and the movies we watched together; Marco Di Felice, for being the most welcoming and friendly office mate in underground and being worse than me in calcetto; Ebbe Elsborg (and family) ---the most loyal reader of my blog--- for his kind hospitality during the most splendid vacation in Denmark I could have imagined, and for plenty of discussions on pretty much every aspect of life; Elena Giachino and Luis Perez, for all the fun we had together at summer schools, and for dinners and parties at Pisa; Zeynep Kiziltan, for the chats over lunch that didn’t deal about work; Flavio S. Mendes, for the many trips we did together around Italy, the constant support and friendship, and the many times I stayed at his place; Margarida Piriquito, for the most unexpected friendship I can remember; Sylvain Pradalier, or the coolest French guy I could have shared an office with; Alan Schmitt (and family), for the several great dinners at his place (in Grenoble, but also in Casalecchio) and the clever games in which I would always lose no matter how hard I would try.

Last but not least, I would like to thank my family for their unconditional, constant support. There are no words to thank my parents, my sisters, my brother, and my grandmother. Their love gave me strength to overcome the difficult times. I would also like to thank Andres Monsalve, who is more like a brother than a friend to me. Thanks also to the rest of my family, the many cousins, uncles, and aunts for their continued support towards me.