Moín Port, Limón, Costa Rica

From the earlier Administration, Costa Rica has inherited a series of outrageous cases of corruption that could easily dunk it among the countries with abhorrent levels of corruption. The former president - who got a second term in less-than-legal ways in a country where reelection was prohibited after a couple of brothers, the Tinoco brothers, nearly extinguished all shreds of democracy - pushed his influences up and down forcing the rigging of a referendum to pass the conflictive CAFTA, which - as foreseen by its oppositors - brought nothing but worse labor conditions and none of the rise in employment levels as promised, he signed a permit and a National Interest Decree to allow a Canadian Mining Company to dig an open pit gold mine not 3 km from the border with Nicaragua, delimited by a river - San Juan river - which flows into the Caribbean sea. This even after the prior Administration signed a permanent moratorium to anykind of industrial mining in the country, in order to defend the environment. This after the same Company (Crucitas - Industrias Infinito) had opened another pit near the Pacific Ocean, and had to abandon it due to a rupture in the membrane of pool containing cianide.

This former president - Oscar Arias - and his brother took all sorts of aids and used them to pay their friends and cohorts. When his brother, the then Prime Minister, Rodrigo Arias, was questioned, they twisted arms to get the Attorney General to dismiss the case. Just as an example, a donation from the Government of Taiwan to build 150 social interest houses, was all spent on consultors and advisers, and not a penny was left for the houses.

The building of roads was given in rather rigged procedures to certain companies, that cashed the money and laid a road that doesn't even match up to the current traffic requirements, over crumbling lands, cutting people living there (there's a case of a family that was left without water supply, electricity and phone service, because the company cut pipes and powerlines. The family, depending on the production of milk, has slumped, since there's not a working fridge to keep the milk and cheese they used to produce and live on), and the landslides happening around had already taken the life of a woman. A "highway" that charges about 60 times more than any other paying highway in the country. The reply? "You don't have to travel through it if you don't like it." Is it only me noticing that's not a matter of which road I take, but where is my tax money being spent?

It's certainly interesting how Mr. Arias traveled often before assuming being elected, to China - in secret -  only to continue when elected - bringing on the official trip his whole family, enve those who weren't working in the Government - to end up severing ties with Taiwan, halting the aid recieved from them - aid China didn't pick up, reason for which a bridge fell in a small town, killing many - to then have telecommunication contracts awarded to Huawei (in an interesting move, where all competitors, promoted by Huawei, decided to not participate to declare the licitation void, only to have Huawei present their offer in the last 20 minutes), and put a Free Trade Agreement in motion with this particular nation, for which, in exchange, they built us a new National Stadium, with Chinese workers (including architects and engineers), who then stayed around for all the new buildings privatelly awarded to the Chinese company. I bet that does wonders for the economy, particularly in the construction industry.

Thing is that there was yet another "mine" to squeeze, the Caribbean Port. This port is in the hands of the State, and sadly, it has one of the country's strongest unions, SINJATRAP. As part of a cunning scheme to pass it to private hands, for years the Arias brothers and their posey made sure funds were cut from this port, to the point of leaving it  in really decadent, shameful conditions. To add insult to injury, the Caribbean province has been let slide down, slumped into levels of abandonment no one has seen since Katrina. Most of the province grew thanks to the port, but as things have been left to rot there, people had to go back to the people-exploiting plantations, where the corruption and the types of abuse towards workers and to the whole human and natural environment are proper of a horror story... or China. Knowing the importance of the port, the union has struggled to keep it there, in the hands of the State, and thus keep a place where the Caribbean workers are not exposed to the abhorrent hunger and profit lust that comes from the privately owned companies.

The Arias brothers made an attempt earlier, to bribe the workers of the port, offering to distribute among them a total of US$131 million if they agreed to let the port be given in concession to private companies. The Union stepped up and said that no private concession was needed, but instead of distributing a BRIBE of US$131 million, if they were willing to invest US$80 million in the port, they could pump it up to modern standards and have it working like a clock. As response the Government decided to get rid of the Union's board, and ILEGALLY elected a new board that did its biding. Now, this should not come as a surprise, specially after Mr. Arias promised to the ILO to strenghten unions in Costa Rica and improve labor conditions, but did the entire opposite, or that he condonned several ilegal moves during the referendum campaing about the CAFTA, many of which were included in a memorandum known as "Memorandum del Miedo" (Fear Memorandum). However, Unions don't scare so easily. All unions got together to fight the legal board to be instaurated, and finally, with lots of hardworking and international claims of help, it was instaurated.

A Government promoted campaing to soil the Union was started, accusing them of corruption, claiming they wanted to slum the whole region into poverty, of obstructing progress. The Union continued to say the same: "Save the taxpayers US$51 million, don't spend that money on bribes, spend it in improving the port, and leaving it in the hands of all Costa Ricans". The Arias, furious, refused. It was the bribe or nothing, and made an intense campaing - almost like a coca-cola ad - to sell people the idea that the only way to pull the port and the whole region up was by giving the port to a private concession. 

This people know about private concessions. They know about the United Fruit Co. making them work to death, torturing them if they dared to form a union, refusing to pay them in money, but giving them tickets they could only exchange for goods at their own stores, at absurdly high prices. They finally have a place to work, which is State owned, where they get a good salary, can get organized in a Union, have the right to sick days and sick leave, to vacations, and are not worked to death, and for some coins they are being cooed into going back to the mistreat?

The Union had elections recently, and the old board was reelected again, to which the president, Ms. Laura Chinchilla, portegée of the Arias brothers (well, their puppet, as they have often undermined her authority, by starting political campaings to get Rodrigo elected for president for 2014-2018 the same day she was taking the Presidency from Oscar, and holding political meetings and press conferences to keep their agenda and define politics before Ms. Chinchilla is even asked), claimed her Administration has no Plan B for the case the concession doesn't go through. They put their eggs in the rigged board, and the President herself held press conferences to campaing for that board, claiming the same thing her pupetmasters have: "Limón has no other choice, it's the concession or deeper down in poverty". The Union workers decided by an appalling majority, to save the port, to keep the old board and keep the port in State hands, and the rigged board - elected originally in an ilegal, rigged, secret meeting - claims the elections have been arranged to favor the old board. The President claims her hands are tied and there are no other options available for the port but the concession.

What about the US$80 million to pump it up to shape? Or would that go against the wishes of the campaing donors and other patrons, who would resent not having that strategic port in their hands?

Worth of Words

Well, again, I didn't blog in a while, and some of my "incognito" readers took the chance to shower me with demands. Not complaining, only noticing! However, when your mind is locked on certain things, such as work &/or thesis, you can hardly concentrate on other matters to write, or the matters come quite unsubstantial. What can I say? I've only one brain, and that brain is segmented in to hemispheres, so there's just so much I can do.

There are indeed a few things I would like to write about. I'll stay far this time from the political arena, mainly because I'm still filling my soul and braincells with the concepts of Cicero, but also because the level of corruption seen in this country are starting to blow my mind like never before. Then again, when it comes blatant that incompetence is not necessarily due to lack of knowledge, but simply a mask for all kinds of sickening little political games to fall into place, well, it's heartbreaking. So I'll save myself from that. Instead of it, I'll do some more of the kind of blogging that has to do with people - usually things I see in people around me.

The image of the blogger has taken an interesting hue. A blogger - though it can be basically anyone - seems to be a sort of independent reporter, someone in the shadows, chased by oppresive governments and corrupt companies across the globe. Though certainly there are many who are like that, truth is that a blogger is simply some person with access to internet, a cyber place to blog and time to post. 

It never ceases to amuse me how many people - bloggers and blog readers - often give to bloggers an inflated meaning, and act as if they were the last guardians of the writen word, the last bulwark of freespeech, the last haven for thinkers, and the one way for improving the mind. I guess they haven't witnessed the horror behind the infamous "Next Blog" button. Pretention among the lines of bloggers surfaces here and there, with self-important posts and titles, in some of which you can smell that self glorifying smirt, that "this analysis I do is the best" or "here, I'm throwing you a piece of absolute truth", and let's not talk about "oh, I'm so important and I'm so famous because I've an average of 2 million comments per post", but then again, truth is that this is a mean where the blogger writes against the dark void, and sometimes the dark void replies back.

Bloggers are nothing different than any other person, specially since more and more people have blogs or blog-like things. It does make you wonder if there's a sort of correlation between the number of bloggers and the number of journal/diary keepers, specially judging from some journals. However, the point here is that bloggers basically do what we all do: use words. It's basically expression, whether you blog, publish, communicate, make a video, record a track, talk to a friend, vent at the office, you name it. Communication in all its forms is out there, and those smells we pick on some bloggers, are not the blog-scent, but the given person's scent. The blogger isn't the only self-important, self-glorifying, self-satisfied animal, but anyone can be it, and you can catch that in their words, in their attitude, in their general communication.

A problem that concerns me now - again -  is the case of people who void their words of any strenght. Those who don't keep their words, specially because by losing the strenght of their words, they also lose the strenght of their character.

Often we come around people who promise something, or threaten others with something, but that something never happens. It happens with the parents that threat with a punishment their child, and yet inspite of the kid continuing the undesired behavior, the punishment never comes. Happens with the mate who promises never again to do something the other part don't like - get late, skip classes, leave their part of the job or chores to others, cheat, do some poor job, mess with other people's lives - and yet keep doing it as if nothing ever happened. Those who promise themselves they won't take more of something - no more abuse, no more lies, no more deception, no more extra tasks, no more forgiving and supplying for the shortcomings of others, no more insults, no more bad jokes - and yet comes the next batch of ill and they take it again with only bitter complain, but no action towards effectively terminating the given situation.

Though cases can be different from one another, and the implications of them can be miles appart, the root of all of them is the same: words that are void of meaning, words that lose strenght and take away also the strenght of character. Because you can promise it aloud or silently, you can promise it to yourself or to others, the effect is the same: you lose face when you don't keep it. Yes, there are cases that are hard to push through. How can you let go of a good job just because your boss is a major s.o.b.? How can you end your marriage of Hyne knows how many years just because your husband likes to hump whores? How can you leave your family just because your sibling is a money swallowing inconsiderated monster and your folks remind your that they kept your when you were a kid and now it's your responsability to keep them in return?

"This is the last time."

These are the words of a lost soul. These are often said when they are not meant. This case reminds me of my latest former boss. Working with him was... well, it wasn't Hell, but it was true martyrdom. For nearly 18 months I endured, tried to change things, but there was no awail. I did not promise myself I wouldn't take more, I just didn't take more. It takes strenght, more than saying the words, it takes the strenght of THINKING the words and standing by them. "I won't do it" or "I won't take it" often don't make it, because such words don't contain the way to follow. Threats do, but what's the point of threatening when nothing comes out of it? When the threat is irrational or impossible to keep?

A blogger can post anything they want. A person can think and say anything they want, but what does any of that mean when there's no intention, real, throught-through intention behind it?

When you promise, keep the promise, when you speak, be prepared to stand by your words.

Indifference: In Reply to a Post

As many other times, for many of us, Twitter has been today the way for a guy known as @H3dicho, or carepicha (swearing expression in Spanish) to promote people to read his latest post. Inspite of his colourful handle, this kid writes really well, spinning his words quite properly, with gusto around the topic he develops. Truth to be told, I don't follow his blog, therefore I couldn't tell you what's the normal trend of his blog, though I have read a few of his entries, most of them about daily philosophy, pointing the finger at different cases, all of them very well sustained, and so on. This time he wrote about one topic that seems to occupy the mind of men more often than not, and it has nothing to do with any sort of sport you can follow on ESPN: women.

I saw that, eye rolling. But before the ladies fall into the usual when-will-men-think-of-anything-else-other-than-how-complicated-we-are, let's give him a chance, let's talk about it, shall we?

There's a general misbelieve that women are complicated and nobody can understand them, except other women, and also that men are complicated (or generally stupid, with a mental development of a 5 year-old and an emotional level of a 3 year old) and nobody can get them except other men. That's not true. Neither women are complicated nor men are stupid. Truth is that socially we are conditioned to be attracted to each other, but not to work on the same wavelenght when it comes to relationships, or more personal, intimate matters. Societies such as Latin American ones, and others where the cultural difference between the genders is even more marked, this gap is wider. It's not only about giving dolls to girls on Christmas, and cars to boys, but also the things we daily receive from everywhere. Girls are expected to take interest in fashion, and wishing to get married, have a family and cook and clean for them. Boys are told to be interested in sports and mechanics, seduce as many women as he can and always have a sort of pure angel, a virgin at his side who will faithfully serve him, give him children and sleep only with him. Demurely.

The view society sells about a woman is a young person with big boobs, small waist, long legs, big ass, long hair, skimpy clothes, who was born only for sex and servitude. She must love shoes and dress sexily to attract men, whom she dates looking always for her Prince Charming. She changes her mind constantly and never says what's really in her mind, but speaks so much she drives everybody into boredom.

In most societies men still resent it if his wife or girlfriend makes more money than them, and also resent women who act like them. Women tend to look down on men who make less money than them and dislike men who act like them. It's a good sign, that these are less and less seen in the younger generations, but the seeds of difference are still present.

Generally, also, society tends to infuse in us bits to deconstruct weaken our self esteem and self confidence. For one side, the virtue of being humble is promoted everywhere, and often in a way that suggests you must hide your other virtues and systematically debase yourself, undervalue, underestimate yourself, otherwise you'll be guilty of being too self involved. For instance, you are not allowed socially to say you are beautiful, or smart. You can't reassure yourself of these. The social way for you to reassure yourself of being beautiful or smart is by being considered so by others. In other words, your opinion of yourself has no social value, only the opinion of others, and the only value acceptable is the social one. A person isn't successful if their environment doesn't consider them so.

Also there's another social conditioning regarding relationships of the romantic type: people who say "yes" right away are either desperate or whores. Playing "hard to get" is socially expected. A woman who yields at one to the request of a man loses his respect. Women, naturally, are not allowed socially to make requests at men, but a man who replies at once to her subtle advances is considered a loser who would wag his tail at anything giving him the slightest morsel of attention. Thus everybody's life is made more miserable thanks to expectations. The downfall here is that you are put on a guessing game, trying to find out whether you will actually get to your goal or not, which isn't all that much fun. Also, when you are not interested, how are you supposed to fend off the unrequested attention?

However, yes, socially the pretended party is expected to show indifference to arouse the attention of the pretender. In this game often two types of pretender come to game: the broken, one who can't stand indifference, thus must convert it into attention; and the hunter. In either case - sadly - the pretended using the indifference card, loses their humanity: they are no longer a person with whom the pretender would like to build a healthy, happy relationship, but a challenge, a goal, an object. It's quite interesting how lots of people are actually hoping to become objects, shed their humanity to be a thing.

The broken is often a person seemed as well adapted, normal, and much a product of their society. This kind of pretender often comes up like someone who moves well in society and their behavior is in everyway as expected. In other cases, as the need for acceptance increases, the broken can also come up as a dependant, needy person. This character often seeks specifically people who are not interested in them to seduce them. Those around them who like them are less interesting, less important, as their input of appreciation has already been gotten. Interestingly, in their mind, as they find someone not charmed by them - or a negative input about themselves - the value of those liking them decreases. After all, being the value of the person determinated by others, if one person don't show appreciation is because there's something wrong with them, and all those liking them are mistaken because they can't see that flaw that takes aways someone else's aproval. Thus seducing this person, making this person like them is the only way they can restablish their own worth.

Not getting their approval equals to failure, a rupture on their self image.

For this kind of pretender, getting the liking of this person isn't the end of the story, for they will keep seeking for other people to "convert". If the broken finds another person to seduce and seduces it successfully, their self image remains unharmed. The aproval of the left one leaves no mark, as any disapproval will be written off as dispair due to the break up. However if the pretender is the one leaving them, the broken's self image suffers greatly. Approval was temporal and they have failed to keep it up. The sense of failure in them will be great and they'll probably feel worthless, as if source of their worth is only a mirage. Comfort people like this is a really hard task.

The hunter, on the other hand, is interested only on the game, on the getting the prize and then hunt down the next one. Easy preys are not fun, which is why they only go for those hard to get, or those who have a particular feature that makes them socially valuable. Some hunt for the youngest, the foreigner, the pretiest, the wealthiest, the strongest, the most wanted, the most famous. It's never about the person, or about getting to know the given person, or even get their approval. The game is only about getting it, the whole point is to be able to say "I had X". Another notch on the bedpost, another entry in the black book.

Yes, certainly you can attract some pretenders by playing hard to get, but think about the kind of people such a move will put in your life. People who expect you to play, to pretend, to be something you are not, to conceal yourself, leave honesty outside of the relationship because you can't actually express what you want. If, on the other hand you pretend a person who plays this card, what kind of person will you get? Yes, the woman who played hard to get will be complicated, because she learned the only way she can keep your interest is by making things difficult for you. Yes, the man who played hard to get will be a motherfucker who treats you like shit because he learned you like to suffer and be subject to an emotional swing: beating&chocolates. But what can you do? Keep dreaming about the perfect person who will happen into your life like a dream and make everything perfect?

Men dreaming about women who are beautiful, don't want them for their money, love football, aren't jealous, love them to madness and love to have sex all the time. Women dreaming about kind, gentle men who help them, don't complain about the number of shoes stashed in their closets or the time it takes them to get ready.

Keep dreaming.

Have anyone noticed we are taught to dream about something other than a person? Have anyone noticed that our best relationships are those with our friends because they are loose and free of expectations? You friend people, humans, regardless of their gender, money or looks, and you love them for long, long time. Why can't we look at our romantic relationships the same way? See the person before the social pose, the looks, the money, the shoes, the title, the fashion?

My kind is easier. Simpler I wouldn't say because no person is simple and no person is as uncomplicated as they believe themselves to be. But we talk. If you approach us and we like you, we will smile back, kiss you on the cheek, talk, seek to know you better and then decide. We don't play hard to get. If you arouse us we might even kiss you before even saying hello. We don't need your approval, we don't depend on that, we only want your honest wish to share soemthing with us: time, smile, a trip, a friendship, thoughts, a good talk, sex.

We don't hide our thoughts, and we would like you to do the same, but we don't expect. You give what you want to give, what you feel like giving, and we will take that, nothing more and decide if that's enough for us. A break up can make us sad, because we might lose someone we've got to love deeply, but we will recover, smile and remember the good and greet you gladly if we see you again sometime.

You don't touch our self esteem or our self confidence, or our image: you touch our lives and we will cherish you always. Society doesn't really roll with us. We are accepted, as we have grown many in number, but we are not a "normal" component of societies. We are "variety", "different", "freethinkers", "weirdos", "hippies", "potheads", "treehuggers". Society continues looking at us as exceptions, though we are starting to hardly be so.

Yes, there's people out there who is honest and can't give a flying jump about what society thinks it's proper or not, so it's up to you: continue in the game, strategize to get a prize, play your cards to be the Game of the Year, of let yourself meet people and find those who will say yes at once and concentrate not in the seducing game, but in the building of a happy, uncomplicated relationship. Your choice.

Out with the Old, In with the New

It's that time of the year again, after I come back from my yearly trip to Hungary, when I sit down and start cleaning up my room. Not much real cleaning needs to be done because my folks had the room painted, and my control freak, neat freak Mom took it to herself to clean up everything. Things also got massively rearranged, and though everything looks perfect, I find it difficult to find my things, so this year the need to go over every single scrap of paper was a must in the really short term.

Yearly clean-ups are one of the favorite activities of every single, true control freaks or organization junkies. Personally, I love the feeling of letting go of things. Let go of old papers, let of of old clothes, let go of old shoes, let go of old things. Sometimes it's really difficult, as you hold in your hand that thing a dear friend or beloved relative gave you once, but then you ask yourself: where did I have it stashed? Did I used it everyday? And when you realize it wasn't part of your décor, nor you used it everyday, and maybe there's someone who could make a better use of it, letting it go feels like a rain of feathers. It tickles good. The trick is also to remember that you throw away or give away a thing, not the feeling, the person or the memory. Personally, I'm big of keeping really useless things, such as old plane tickets. But it's the ticket or the memory of the trip? So tickets must go, and what means has already been saved in my memory and my journals.

I don't let go of certain things, like letters - I may have lost some, but for instance I still keep all the letters I've got from my friends when I was in Hungary between 1994 and 1996 - or university papers, but others can be thrown away. Loads and loads of paper, which I intend to send to a selective recollection center for them to be recycled, have already been stocked out of my filer, yet a lot is still to be checked and eliminated, or found a new home.

You can also find from time to time some documentation that though important, or still valid, could be saved in some other, more space efficient way. Scan some old investigations and save them in a digital format, thus liberating more paper, which can be send for recycling and reusing. As you check over all the things you keep around you, at the office, at home, and why not? in your purse, or even your computer, you come across many things that have an inflated sense of importance, that do nothing but clutter your life. Remember, if you haven't used it in a year, you probably won't use it again, but someone else would be happy to.

As a Begining of the Year personal ritual, I cast away the things I won't take with me in the new journey, things I lock in the past, give away for someone else to find them use, and step into the new year with lighter baggage, full of hope and space for all the new each year has to offer. Don't lay down the experiences and the lessons learned, but be wise enough to lay down the tools that have served you, and let others find the lessons that are still inside each of them.

This year, more than in the last ones, I'm preparing for yet another journey, a journey many are waiting for with motivations as different as the people in the planet. Some with joy, some with sorrow, some with envy, some with pety selfishness. Yes, one action provokes many reactions, and these reactions could provoke many feelings inside many people. I'm concentrating on my trip, my journey, my process. My first step is to become light, to shed all excess and find the bare necessities I need to carry over with me, leaving as much room as possible for all the important things that must come with me. Thus I'm shedding, and through this journey I'll continue shedding as much as I can, keeping a critic view to know what must stay, what must go, leave fondless aside. Hopefully it will work out, but if it doesn't work out as well as it should, maybe seasonal cleaning-up will have to be set up, right?

Getting organized isn't something that can happen over night. Perhaps you watch those shows in the TV, where a super messy family or person get's the help of an organizing professional and thus they turn a cluttered "vortex of enthropy" into a neat room you'd love to be in and work in. Do you wonder, just like me, how much time passes before that perfect room, where everything stays in place, remains like that? Well, not for long, I assure you. And it's okay, as long as you are willing to eventually come around and set order before the mess takes over your life.

My advise is simple in this case, though perhaps not very scientifical. First of all accept yourself the way you are. So you are lazy every now and then and don't really feel like putting away your clothes, or washing the dishes. Sure, take a break, but don't take it every day. Second of all, remember that a clean, organized space doesn't put stress on you. Organized places don't hide the things you need from you. An organized place will allow you to find that bill you need to pay, and even remind you you gara pay it. It helps you find the keys, the leash of your dog, the phone, the magazine you were reading, the purse taht goes with those shoes, your other shoe, your watch, the essay you must present, the pendrive with your month's work, a pen that works, your iPod, etc.

Organizing isn't a chore, a duty, a punishment, it's fun. Organizing is the perfect time to check over everything, find long lost item, discover treasures and the perfect excuse to get rid of everything you don't need, or don't really need. Cleaning up, getting organized is the process throug which you get to be free, is the process that prepares you to travel light.

Go on, try it out, travel light.

The Whine

My friend Dragonfly-cr wrote recently a post about her workplace, and expressed a view I can't but absolutely agree and totally share: the annoyance of having a job where you have nothing to do. This is something a lot of people don't get, because they love being paid to do nothing. Some, while love having nothing to do, also love to complain about how they have nothing to do. These cases are spotted quite easily, because the moment you give them something to do, they have an excuse  to avoid doing it, or endorse it to someone else.

At the office there's a lot of people who are not here because they like it, but because they want the money. People with no calling for the job their are doing, or any sort of affinity with the company. They want the status, they want the paycheck but they want nothing else to do with the job. Some people also have dreams of grandeur, dreams outside their regular activities, dreams of movie-like fates, and spend every available and non-available second to tell others about these. Annoyed listening to their ramblings, you wonder either when will they wake up or why don't they go and do exactly that.

There's this guy, Whiner, who fits this type. He has a good job, truth to be told, a good income too. He, however, finds it unsatisfying to be here, and believing himself a genius in the area of business and such, he has some sort of side business I don't quite get. Allegedly he has a car dealing business, though when I wanted to buy a car, he went to the very online site were I also searched at first. Anyway, he has a business. Why at the office, he spends his day doing not much, or eventually dealing with this database, that database, going to meetings, making calculations and so on. But he also manages his business from here. Well, I'm not the boss, so whatever he does or doesn't do isn't really my problem.

Recently he interrupted my most delicious state of absolute concentration - music on, shut of the outer world and it was only the computer and I - to whine about how he isn't meant to work in an office. To explain this a bit more graphically, I was really out of the real world and submerged in my own thoughts revolving about this work I was doing, when he waved his hand before my eyes, so that he could whine. He waited for me to react and extrincate myself from the earphones, so I assumed it would be something important. Go figure.

He passingly mentioned how he envied people who got retired, just to take on the topic as a jumping board, to dig into his favorite topic: he's so awesome, he's such an incredibly gifted manager, has such a nose for business, he has so much money and blah, blah, blah... and he would really like to work on his own, be his own boss, travel around... because "he isn't meant to work in an office". Compared to myself and my natural reaction, I was really polite. I told him that wasn't my case, I loved working in an office, having a stable job, not to mention I was beyond satisfied with my current job. Oh no, no, no, he's so grateful for having this job... Yeah.

So, let me get this: he wants to work for himself and already has a business on the side where he does exactly that -  and he's such a successful business man and all that -  so why in the freaking hell is he interrupting my work&me time to bitch about the job - because I basically qualify that as bitching - when he could take his sorry ass, quite the job and be happy doing the crap he wants to do? I mean, if I have this super-awesome business and I'm doing so freaking good, but I still work at an office... it's because I like it, right? Not in his case. I can't vouch for how he conducts his private business - though based on the interaction with my buying the car, he really can't close a good deal, unless he can find a gullible client - but based on what one can see around him, he's working because he really needs the money.

God has blessed me with no husband and no children, therefore I don't have to endure the hardships and sacrifices that come from supporting a family, thus perhaps it's a priviledge only people like me can enjoy, to work for calling, because we love what we do, and not to bow into servitude into a job, and work for a fee. sure, I have dreams outside the office. I'd like to get published, would like to teach economics, do some consulting in my older years... in topics related with economics and telecommunications.

Yes, I can imagine working for a paycheck to support your family, but when you are settled, shouldn't you look to move towards what you like? Isn't then like whoring out to keep on a job you don't like - though you could do what you like - only to live at an unreasonable level of luxury?

First Day of the YearLooking at the

Looking of for the day, thinking back at the celebration, sometimes we wish to put magical, bigger-scheme-signss to moments here and there, to tell us something about the year to come. We have some public and private rituals about the turn of the year, which we honestly belive will influence the rest of the 365 days to come. Does it? Why does it strike us only once, and never through the other days of the year?

We celebrate and make sure to be with someone, spend the celebration as merrily as possible, almost as if hoping to make some of that party stick through the rest of the year. Let's have a Happy New Year - for the whole year - surrounded with the people we love. In an effort to either make it count, or extend somehow the feeling, we make Promises, which often have more of a feeling of "hopes and wishes". Do we wish or do we promise? People often don't know the difference. I do both, look forward and sit down with my calendar, check my tagged friends and buddies and make major clean-ups. Naturally mine will have to wait until I get home, to Costa Rica, where I'll check all of my clothes, my things and decides what will see with me the rest of 2011 and what must go and find a new home.

New promises, new hopes. Let's work to bring us closer to our dream this year.