June Newsletter

As I’ve done a few other times this year, our officially suggested prompt for the month is going out the window so that I can talk about what’s really on my mind, and like February, this will not be without political opinion – please be advised, and if you are one of my supporting congregations and are making my updates available to the congregation members, feel free to substitute this one for a funny blog entry with photos of the kids at La Obra.

I have, at least in my blog, mentioned a certain character named Claudio. He’s in his late fifties and one of the two educadores in the Centro de Estudios. If you read the blog, he’s the thin, grey-haired man who looks remarkably like Don Quixote who appears in multiple photos. At the outset of the year, we were told by a lot of former volunteers that we might not be around many other people our age, and that it was pretty common for one’s best friends in one’s host country to be people much older or younger. I figured, after meeting the grupo de jóvenes in my first week in Uruguay that this wouldn’t be the case for me – I have had plenty of contact with other people in their early-to-mid twenties. However, as great as my grup de jóvenes friends have been, my two best friends have indeed been someone notably older (Claudio) and someone younger (Sebastián, who’s a week away from turning 17 and in fairness is a part of the grupo). Seba has been like the younger brother I never had this year, and some of my best memories from Uruguay are of the two of us joking around, acting like complete morons together, and despite ourselves, managing to have serious “man-talk” from time-to-time, too.

Claudio, obviously, hasn’t filled a brotherly role in my Uruguayan community, nor has he been a surrogate parent. He has been, however, the first one of these that I’ve had in a long time – a hero. The only other that I can think of in my life, or at least people I’ve known personally (I could rattle off a list of “heroes” who lived long before my time), was my Uncle Sam, who passed away in 2006. Claudio and Uncle Sam – two men as radically different as they are alike. Both tall, lanky grey-haired men from the country, both smokers, both enormous fans of caffeine-fueled story-telling and conversations, both incredible teachers of how to live and treat other human beings. The differences are as obvious, too – language, work (one stayed in the country, the other didn’t), generation, nationality, personal history. The latter aspect adds an element of irony to their duel position in my mind as heroes – Claudio’s life story has much to do with another, somewhat more globally well-known grey-haired, lanky Uncle Sam…but we’ll come back to that point.

Of course, it probably merits explanation why these two are heroes, whereas the many other amazing people in my life haven’t made it to that sphere yet. For me, it’s the mythologization, the way simple acts have become life-transformingly significant. Uncle Sam didn’t just give me ice cream as a kid: he treated me just like one of his own grandkids when he did it. It wasn’t just a bowl of Rocky Road; it was showing me with a scoop and a bowl how to love other human beings and make everyone feel equal and appreciated. Claudio, too – it wasn’t just teaching me how to serve mate or asking me literal hundreds of questions about life and politics in the United States or always taking the same bus even if it meant a few pesos more for the ticket; it was the openness to a stranger from a strange land, the willingness and ability to find value even in someone from a place that’s caused him so much pain.

I’ve hinted enough at what’s coming. Claudio and the United States have a very special relationship with each other. I’ve mentioned, at least in my blog, that Uruguay was governed by a brutally repressive military government from June 27^th, 1973 to March 1^st, 1985. I’ve mentioned that hundreds of Uruguayans “disappeared” during the dictatorship and are “reappearing” in shallow graves on military bases, that thousands more went into exile, and that thousands went to jail, where they were tortured by the military. I’ve even mentioned that the United States dirtied its hand in the matter, too, funding the military government (we even paid for its “death squad” of executioners, the people responsible for those disappeared and their shallow graves), and through the School of the Americas (as well as military advisors) training the Uruguayan military and national police in torture and interrogation methods. What I haven’t mentioned is why it bothers me so much, other than the very basic fact that it was morally unjustifiable and complete reprehensible.

Claudio was one of those prisoners. Too far left for the military government because he believed that people should have the right to free speech and free assembly, and because he used those freedoms to ask questions about the social inequalities of Uruguay, they put him in jail. They tortured him there, too. Those techniques you read about sometimes, the strapping jumper cables to people’s testicles, the water-boarding, the beatings – they’re not just abstractions. They didn’t end with the Inquisition. They happened in Uruguay in the 1970s and 1980s, and my country helped make it possible because, hey, at least the military government liked big American businesses and wasn’t keen on the Russians.

At the beginning of the month, I went to the Museum of Remembrance dedicated to preserving the story of what happened in the dictatorship. The section on the lead-up to the coup and the initial resistance (the general strike, the demonstrations, and so on) were tough, but I didn’t break. It was the section devoted to prison life that tore me in half. The jumpers – was one of them Claudio’s? The chess set made from bits of wood and broken nails – is this how he passed the time when he wasn’t being beaten? The prohibited book, written on cigarette rolling papers in handwriting so fine a magnifying glass is needed to read it – was this his reading material? I remembered, too, after seeing the book, how he told me once that he always appreciated Fahrenheit 451 because of its ending – the group of people who’d each memorized whole books and plays, and kept themselves entertained and intellectually stimulated by reciting them to one another. They did this in his prison. Claudio did this – memorized poems and books and plays to keep from going insane. I don’t know where he was imprisoned – in one of the smaller ones in the city, or in a makeshift one like the basketball stadium. I somehow imagine that, given his eye for the ironies in life, he was locked up in the largest of the prisons – it was located in a city called Libertad.

I don’t think it’s his personal tragedy that’s made him a hero to me, though. It’s how he responded to it. What easier response is there to torture and imprisonment than lose faith in God and other people and become a bitter, cynical shell of a human being? I don’t blame those who do, either. But that’s not what happened with Claudio. Call it the will of God, the triumph of the irrepressible human spirit, or even the sweetest revenge ever, but Claudio’s still there, working every day to better other people and work for a more just society, and the military government that tried to destroy him is long gone. THAT is heroic – to look the darkest things this universe can conjure up in the eye and say, in words and deeds, that you won’t let it win, not only in your own life, but in those of the people around, too.

After the museum, I went to La Iglesia del Sagrado Corazón de Jesús, an enormous church standing on one of the highest points in Montevideo. I see it every day, towering over some of the poorest neighbors in the entire country. It’s the theology of glory in a world of the cross. Before this year, I might have been able to appreciate it as an item removed from its context – a nice building, a good vista of the city. Now, however, I was struck as much by the poverty around the church and in the neighborhoods from which one can see it as I was by the building itself. I think I can thank my time with Claudio this year a little bit for a bit of new sight.

Beyond new heroes and their life stories, I think the most important lesson I’ve pulled this year from Claudio, or perhaps my faith-driven synthesis of lessons, deals with one detail I noticed at the church. It was locked – no one could come in. They were just too afraid of what might happen if the door wasn’t shut. In a country with incredibly low numbers of church participation, you’d think the priests would’ve been all but begging people to come inside, discover the transforming power of the Gospel for hearts and minds. But no. It was just locked up. And I wonder – are we that church? Do we really care enough about people suffering in this world to do something about it – to work on their behalf, to do something other than feel bad for them, to proclaim the Gospel with our lives and actions and not just flimsy paper tracts passed out on a street corner? Do we shut our doors to the undesirables, preferring the memory of our glory days to the risks of welcoming in people who don’t have nice clothes, who don’t have nice cars, who aren’t our skin color, who don’t speak our language?

Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe I’m just a 23 year old who feels too much and lets the Bible talk to him in ways that might make James Dobson accuse me of dragging biblical interpretation through the mud. Or maybe there’s a huge world out there of people suffering, in physical and spiritual poverty, and it’s our job, our highest calling and biggest responsibility, to work to change that. It’s our job to welcome in the stranger, rich and poor and white and black and brown and every other attribute equally, just like a crazy-looking Uruguayan welcomed this volunteer from his enemy’s camp and didn’t judge him based on where he came from, but recognized him as another child of God.

Coming to a newspaper near you...

Uruguay made BBC World News TWICE today...this is pretty much unheard of. The quiet, tiny country with the name of a river generally makes the international news once a year. So, here are the stories:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7469731.stm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/7475546.stm

Oil/gas discoveries seem to be following me on my international sojourns; Ghana, too, discovered a sizeable offshore oil field not too long after my time there. If YOU are from a small country looking for another exploitable resource and would like me to come visit you as a talisman, let's talk. C'mon, Guinea-Bissau...you know you want me.

But seriously, these two stories are both good in that some much needed money and economic opportunities are entering the picture for Uruguay, and that, hey, we're getting some attention. On the flipside, there is no national economic combination worse than lack of domestic ownership of land plus natural resources of high value and demand...look at what caused the Mexican Revolution, after all. There's always the aspect of corruption and social transformation, too - would Nigeria be so marked bycorruption and violence if it weren't for its enormous oilfields? What, too, about safeguarding the not-perfect-but-improving government services and sense of social equity that is a trademark of Uruguay? Other countries whose economies revolve around agriculture and/or exploitation of high-value natural resources are a mixed bag - one on hand, you have Norway (which pretty much defines "high standard of living and stability with incredible public access to services"), and on the other you have Bolivia (as I read in Las Venas Abiertas de América Latina, "Bolivia had the cow, but everyone else in the world got the milk"). Food for thought.

My kids

This was, minus the captioning, ready to go up last weekend, but I got busy and then went to Resistencia in northern Argentina to hang out with some pretty cool people for our closing retreat - all 6 of us in Argentina and Uruguay are rapidly approaching our leave dates, and this was pretty much the last time all of us could leave our sites before departure.

Rather than dwell on that, however, we've got a HAPPY picture post to caption, this time of 50 or so of the world's coolest inhabitants - the students of Centro de Estudios and the children of Club de Niños!

1. Giselle (left) and Abigail (right). If Abi looks familiar, it's because she was in Club de Niños last year; she's the only one of the 5 who "graduated" from Club de Niños who I've seen on an equally regular basis this second half of the year. These two very often come for English help, with a generous amount of other subjects mixed in, too.

2. Gimena is in her second year of secondary school and has come a long way, at the very least with her English, from last year when we first started working together. I've also gotten to explain Renaissance art and architecture and the Reformation to her - two of my favorite things!

3. Lucila, one of the nicest, calmest students imaginable. She's a great worker.

4. Cecilia is one of the students at the new secondary school in the barrio; from her, I've gotten to hear about the long and difficult process of looking for teachers, managing students new to secondary study, and doing these things in one of the city's poorest neighourhoods from someone who's seen it firsthand. She's a great English and sciences student.

5. The new accreditation class; this is for adolescents and adults who were unable to finish primary school, and upon completion of the class and a basic skills exam, they'll receive credit for the first 6 years of the educational process. There are currently 4 youths (ages 14-17) in the class; here are two of them, along with their teacher, Nellida.

6. The reclusive cook, Ana, captured again in her natural habitat, this time while making sauce for pizza....mmmmm.

7. It was a chilly day, so Emilia brought her earmuffs....she was not the only one to wear them, however. Even Fabiana, one of the teacher's aides, decided to fight the good fight against chilly earlobes.

8. Whip out a camera, and watch how they all react - laughing, smiling, or looking away, they all still want to be in a picture...

9. The day's activities involved the kids being blindfolded and touching various items, then having to guess what they were. This how my scarf ended up wrapped around Iara's head - note Viviana's glam pose (scarf-blinded and all) and Karen's "why are you putting this on film?" look.

10. Not everyone had a scarf or school uniform ribbon, however...fortunately, the kids are nothing if not creative...

11. The items to feel were selected from outside, and involved all kinds of stuff, including a broken broomstick, an empty tank of some sort, and what looked a bit like a toilet lid.

12. Emilia (kneeling) helped some of her friends' dreams take flight...literally. Giuliana wanted to "fly" (balance on one foot on an old stump with her arms out like wings), so Emilia spotted for her while Michaela waited patiently for her turn to fly.

13. The adults (plus a few kids) enjoying a few minutes of break-time peace while the kids play.

14. Monica is not normally a part of my afternoons, but is around every morning as the coordinator for Casa Jóven and Centro de Estudios. She's a big joker, and it took her a while to pick up on my sense of humor and tendency to say absolutely ridiculous things in a serious tone - she even told me once that she never knew if I was joking or not, or if I even caught jokes, just because I was so serious. Please hold the laughter, folks from back home. She figured me out shortly thereafter.

15. Kirsten, Milton, and Fabi hold back a flood of kids excited about having music class with the best Uruguayan/Estadounidense teaching duo EVER. Or at least that's what I tell myself.

16. We did the same activity with the little ones, who were (go figure) calmer...but when you have sweethearts like Sofia (pink scarf) and Leticia (blue ribbon as blindfold), it really isn't any wonder why.

17. They were so calm and sweet that we even got to do the second part of the activity - feel the hand and guess the person! Kimberley did, if I remember right, guess "Ana Karen" on the second try.

18. After snack time, the kids help clean up, even the littlest ones...Ana opted to wipe down the tables.

MonteDVD - It's Uruguay updated for the 21st century!

So, if I haven't said lately that I love Montevideo and that it's easily my favorite place that I've lived, let me reiterate that point. Today, a tribute - a week's worth of shots taken along La Rambla, at the Museo de la Memoria, El Cerrito, and Bulevar José Battle y Ordoñez (aka Bulevar Propios), the street I go down every day on the 145 bus on my way to and from work.

1. Playa Buceo is the closest beach to my house...I normally go to Pocitos when I'm in a beach mood because I like the walk there better, but Buceo's nice, too. It lies along La Rambla, the 26-Km of beach, footpath, and street that run along the Rio de la Plata in Montevideo.

2. Buceo from the other end of the beach - note the faint white dot, a sailboat.

3. Playa Malvin is the next one down from Buceo; they're separated by a rock formation that juts out into the water. Malvin's got really nice sand, and also an island offshore...the island made an appearance in the lyrics of Queso Magro's murga act this past Carnaval!

4. Montevideo has two great scenic outlooks - one faces the harbor and old city, and the other, Punta Gorda, faces La Rambla...and it's a great view.

5. The vista also features a somewhat-odd looking monument to fallen seamen.

6. The other direction - Playa Verde and Carrasco.

7. Montevideo is arguably the best city for architecture in Latin America - this is a stretch of houses at Punta Gorda that I like, if just for their stylistic diversity.

8. El Museo de la Memoria, intentionally/ironically located in the former estate of a military strongman, is dedicated to telling the story of the human rights abuses of the military government of '73-85...the first democratically-elected president after the military government was sworn in 10 days after I was born.

9. In front of the museum, there are pictures on the pavement devoted to the theme of the "desaparecidos" - people who "disappeared" during the dictatorship and are now beginning to "reappear" on shallow graves on military bases. Uruguay, being much smaller than Argentina, had a lower number of desaparecidos (between 200 and 300; in Argentina, there were over 30,000), but the highest percentage of citizens jailed by the government of any of the Latin American dictatorships in the '70s-'80s- at least 7,5000, probably more, in a country with a population of 3.3 million.

10. Read it and weep...I did. Keeping in mind the previous caption, I'll just say that a major point of this paragraph is to combine the phrases "death squads," "supported by," and "government of the United States of America."

11. The theology of glory in a world of the cross - the enormous Church of the Sacred Heart on top of El Cerrito, towering over a fairly poor neighborhood. I can see the church for much of my daily bus ride to and from La Obra.

12. Close-up of the church.

13. The bus stops generally come with ads - this one is a Health Ministry informative ad about condoms..."Do it well, use a condom."

14. One of the main technical schools in the city.

15. The Police Hospital.

16. And THIS is why I've never been tempted to break into any warehouses...you see a LOT of guard dogs in this city.

17. The big milk processing plant...this is an industrial zone of the city.

18. The 145, which I take every day...and yes, the destination is "Colon"...it's Spanish for "Columbus."

19. Leftist political graffiti, which can be seen all over the city...this one is calling for the repeal of the law granting immunity to those involved with the human rights abuses mentioned above.

20. Il Mondo della Pizza, a block from my house - REALLY good pizza and fainá.

21. The fruit stand on the corner where I catch the bus every day.

They came from afar

I am convinced that I have one of the most surreal lives on this planet. Last week’s proof: the visit of the Tahitians.

Yes, that’s right – Tahitians in Uruguay. Ten Tahitian women arrived in Montevideo last Tuesday evening as part of the Women’s Caravan of Peace, an ecumenical movement which began in Africa in 2006 as a way to carry the word of peace to all corners of the world. The move began in Morocco, when two women of one of the Protestant churches in the country went on a mission to Côte d’Ivoire to speak a word of hope and peace to those suffering in the aftermath of the nation’s civil war. From there, it spread, a chain of peacemaking across the world. An international ecumenical group of 35 churches has been paying to send two women from each church to visit their closest geographic neighbor in an east-west movement. The Tahitians recently received a visit from the church in New Caledonia, and the Valdense Church of the Rio de la Plata happened to be next on the list to visit.

So, on Wednesday morning, the normal flow of things at La Obra was interrupted by the arrival of 10 older, fairly tall Polynesian women with crowns of flowers on their heads. None of the group members spoke more than a few words of Spanish; being that their islands are part of French Polynesia, they all spoke French, in addition to their native language, and two of the women spoke English fairly well. I got to explain the Centro de Estudios in what might have been the world’s worst spoken French (they still understood, though), and then proceeded to help with the translating (mostly from English, thank God) of their sit-down with the youth from Casa Jóven. This was all good stuff, but the best of the day was yet to come.

We went out for a walk through the neighborhood. You’d have thought that we (we being Milton, my choir friends Mabel and Mario, and I) were guiding the first delegation of Martians to visit the planet Earth around the barrio based on the reactions of several of the people…especially the kids. We had a gaggle of elementary-age students tailing us for a good ways, imitating the women’s Tahitian language and asking them questions. Adults, too, came out to take pictures and ask them where they were from. But that wasn’t the best, either.

Oh no, that came when we got back and the Tahitians spent time with the escuelitas. We started off with a game – we all held hands in a huge circle and passed two hula hoops around…everyone had to pass through the hoop without letting go of anyone’s hand. If you have never watched a 68 year old Tahitian women with a floral crown try to crawl through a hula hoop while holding the hands of two eight year old Uruguayans, I highly recommend it. We then went inside and sang a few songs for the women, who then in turned did a dance for us and then made us get up and dance, Polynesian-style, with them.

The kids were transfixed. We’re talking complete and total fascination. Kids who have non-existent attention spans and capacities to sit still were entranced, watching the Tahitians in perfect silence and stillness. They danced, too, most of them. After spending half the afternoon with us, the ladies moved on to another get-together, and I met up with them again in the Valdense church for an evening presentation, which involved the world’s funniest French-Spanish dialogue, namely due to our translator’s being an 80-something year old retired female pastor who didn’t quite get the finer points of using a microphone. The other translator arrived shortly, however, and things went a smidge more smoothly and involved more dancing, plenty of singing, and food.

The next day, while I was otherwise detained workwise, les Tahitiennes went to visit with a female senator in Uruguay, as well as with the Liga Femenina Cristiana, and to have lunch at the Mercado del Puerto. The meeting with the senator was perhaps one of the most honest encounters in political history – the Tahitian women told her that their hearts were crying for the extreme poverty they saw in the Barrio Borro (where La Obra is), and for the extreme difference between rich and poor that exists in Uruguay. This dichotomy just doesn’t exist in Tahiti; people aren’t really at one extreme or the other, and it was difficult for them to see it and not be affected. Lunch, however, was more light-hearted, and involved one of the women dancing on a chair in the restaurant while a passing street musician played a milongo (similar to tango) on his accordion.

That evening, the women came to the grupo de jóvenes, again to share about their mission and about the lives of youth in the church, which is enormous compared to any of the Protestant churches here – 100,000 members, or about 40-45% of the total population of French Polynesia. They have youth gatherings, district youth gatherings, with 5,000 participants. The Valdense Church of the Rio de la Plata had about 100 participants in their churchwide youth gathering in January. It was the classic case of two different worlds colliding and being amazed by the lives of the others…and also a fruitful encounter that might result in a youth interchange in a few years between the two. We shall see. Then, we danced, a lot, ate empanadas, a lot, and the Tahitians gave out some gifts – mother of pearl medallions and traditional garb for Wilma and Álvaro, and some more modest (but still very cool) shell and seed necklaces to those of us who helped translate, show them around, and were willing to make fools of ourselves dancing…for me, on multiple occasions. I am now a near-expert on Polynesian male dance moves. Just ask Lucia and Florencia, the sisters from Colonia who got volunteered to dance with me during one of the sessions.

And then Friday, they left. Just like the beautiful, fragrant Tahitian flowers they told us about, they’re here for a while and then move on…but today feels just a little bit sunnier in their wake. Thank God for this being such a small, surreal world.

The Polenta Variations

With the weather now being of a rather more winter timbre in Montevideo and with rice and pasta prices continuing to rise, a new food era has begun. For most of my time here, rice was my go-to food - that white, yummy base that could go with virtually any other food and come out delicious...you can even make it a dessert. Now, though, it's POLENTA TIME.

For those of you who might not be familiar with polenta, it is a northern Italian dish, made from cornmeal, that is most typically eaten as a kind of thick porridge, most often with marinara sauce. but not always. You can, however, take the polenta in porridge-ish form, add whatever else you like to it, and bake or fry it, or you can make it into a dessert by cooking it with milk and sugar instead of water. If you are a Texan, think "grits," and you will have a reasonably good, although not perfect, idea of what polenta is. It is extremely popular in Uruguay during the winter, since...

1. Roughly half of Uruguayans claim Italian descent, and most of those can trace their roots to northern Italy - Piemonte, Lombardia, and Liguria (Genova).
2. It's cheap - all you need is cornmeal, or instant polenta for those times when you want it NOW
3. It's cold and damp, and there's nothing quite like hot polenta to fill you up.

It is so popular, in fact, that there are even kiddie songs involving polenta, and it has worked its way into Uruguayan slang...if you want to tell the kids to sing with gusto, a nice "ay, chicos, por favor - con polenta!" will get your point across.

So, polenta has essentially taken over my life from all possible angles. If the spring and summer were my "1000 things to do with rice" kitchen era, the late fall and winter are looking to be "1000 ways to make polenta." Here are three quick and easy ways to experience the joy that is polenta. I say quick - they're quick and easy if you're using instant polenta. If you're going at it with cornmeal, you'll be stirring the polenta slowly and constantly for about an hour - if you can't find it instant, you might want to invite a friend over to take a turn stirring...just call it bonding time. Oh, and other caveat - if you like Fannie Farmer-esque precise measurements, do not read on - I have not used a measuring cup in about a year and like it that way.

-POLENTA CON TUCO-
The classic. You'll need, to feed two:

2 cups instant polenta or cornmeal
6 cups-ish of boiling water - less water means thicker polenta, more water means thinner. A 2.5-or-3 to 1 ratio is the recommended rule of thumb. I personally go with 2.5.
salt and oil to taste

Bring the water to a boil, add quite a bit of salt and a fairly sizeable drizzle of (preferably olive) oil...the salt is needed for the taste, and oil helps with the consistency. If you're using instant, throw it in, take the water/polenta mix off the heat and stir it until it reaches a smooth consistency. If you're using cornmeal, have fun and try not to get tennis elbow.

Now, the tuco (sauce):
tomato sauce (of the variety that comes in cans or, in Uruguay, boxes and is just tomato in liquid form without anything extra...I'd use 350-500 mL)
1 small-to-medium onion, diced
1 clove of garlic
1 small-to-medium bell pepper, diced
1 can of tomatoes, diced (you can use fresh, too)
if they have these in the US, one Knorr's Flavor Cube (looks like a bouillon cube, but is seasonings rather than soup base)...I'd recommend Provençal, Garlic-Basil, Traditional Marinara...anything like that. If those haven't made it to the US yet, omit it and just add more of the following to compensate
black pepper
salt (only add this if you can't find the Flavor Cube)
rosemary
basil
oregano

Saute the onion, garlic, and bell pepper in a little bit of olive oil. Add flavor cube, cut up into little pieces (if applicable). Let the flavor cube pieces cook into the vegetables for a few minutes; add the liquid tomato. Add the canned tomato and other spices; let simmer for at least 20 minutes to combine all the flavors. Once the polenta is done, pour some sauce on top of it and buen provecho!

-POLENTA CON JAMÓN Y QUESO-

This one's even easier to make...this is definitely a Monday night meal, especially with instant polenta. Follow above directions for cooking the polenta, maybe adding some herbs this time, or substituting the salt for...a Knorr's Flavor Cube (I swear they're not paying me for the product placement). Then add finely diced or shredded cheese (maybe a 40/40/20 mix of Mozzarrella, Gruyere or other Swiss, and Parmesan or Romano), diced ham (cold cuts will work just fine), stir it until the cheese melts, and voila. In Uruguay, you can buy, for about $1.20, a small tray of already diced assorted cheese and lunchmeat in the supermarket - the portioning is about perfect for making this dish.

-POLENTA CON DULCE DE HIGO-

I get to claim this recipe as my own; this one isn't particularly traditional, but it is tasty - a nice cold weather dessert that's not overpoweringly sweet. The amount of polenta stays the same, as does the proportion of liquid, but instead of water, salt, and oil, you'll need:

milk
sugar - at least 1/3 cup; more if you want it really sweet.
2 good dashes of vanilla extract


Cooking method stays the same. Now, the fig part. You'll need:

several ripe figs, chopped
plenty of brown sugar
water - maybe 2/3-3/4 cup
aniseed, to taste
a dash of vanilla extract

Put the chopped figs in a saucepan over medium-low heat. Add the water, brown sugar, aniseed, and vanilla: simmer until the figs are falling apart and the water/sugar have turned into a relatively thick syrup...something like a runny jam. Pour the fig mixture over the polenta and enjoy.

In which he goes there

-PREFACE. THIS IS A POLITICAL OPINION POST. THE VIEWS CONTAINED HEREIN ARE NOT THOSE OF THE EVANGELICAL LUTHERAN CHURCH IN AMERICA, MERELY THOSE OF THIS ENTRY'S AUTHOR. Get steamed if you want to, but get mad at me, not God, Lutheranism, or the church. -

Navy Re-Establishes U.S. Fourth Fleet

Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Gary Roughead announced today the re-establishment of the U.S. Fourth Fleet and assigned Rear Adm. Joseph D. Kernan, currently serving as commander, Naval Special Warfare Command, as its new commander. Fourth Fleet will be responsible for U.S. Navy ships, aircraft and submarines operating in the Caribbean, and Central and South America.

U.S. Fourth Fleet will be dual-hatted with the existing commander, U.S. Naval Forces Southern Command (NAVSO), currently located in Mayport, Fla. U.S. Fourth Fleet has been re-established to address the increased role of maritime forces in the U.S. Southern Command (SOUTHCOM) area of operations, and to demonstrate U.S. commitment to regional partners.

“Re-establishing the Fourth Fleet recognizes the immense importance of maritime security in the southern part of the Western Hemisphere, and signals our support and interest in the civil and military maritime services in Central and South America,” said Roughead. “Our maritime strategy raises the importance of working with international partners as the basis for global maritime security. This change increases our emphasis in the region on employing naval forces to build confidence and trust among nations through collective maritime security efforts that focus on common threats and mutual interests. “

Effective July 1, the command will have operational responsibility for U.S. Navy assets assigned from east and west coast fleets to operate in the SOUTHCOM area. As a result, U.S. Fourth Fleet will not involve an increase in forces assigned in Mayport, Fla. These assets will conduct varying missions including a range of contingency operations, counter narcoterrorism, and theater security cooperation (TSC) activities. TSC includes military-to-military interaction and bilateral training opportunities as well as humanitarian assistance and in-country partnerships.

U.S. Fourth Fleet will retain responsibility as NAVSO, the Navy component command for SOUTHCOM. Its mission is to direct U.S. naval forces operating in the Caribbean, and Central and South American regions and interact with partner nation navies to shape the maritime environment.

Kernan will be the first Navy SEAL to serve as a numbered fleet commander.
Article obtained from http://www.defenselink.mil/releases/release.aspx?releaseid=11862

Note, also, the source of the news - this is the United States Department of Defense itself. This is not a rumor floating around the blogosphere, or something penned by Castro and distributed to scare other Latin American nations. Nope, this is the real deal. The United States has officially decided to return to gunboat diplomacy in Latin America. Words cannot express adequately how simultaneously angry and terrified most of the people I know here are. These are people who've already lived through one brutal, repressive military government installed by the U.S. that did a very successful job of running Uruguay's economy into the ground, and to them, the 4th Fleet represents the very real threat of another round of continent-wide brutal, repressive military government.

There is, and I have yet to confirm its validity, a document circulating which states flat-out that the U.S. government has officially stated its willingness to support military governments in the name of advancing its aims for Latin America. So much for the lofty goals of bringing democracy to the world that we heard all about in the march up to, and immediate aftermath of, the invasion of Iraq.

Of course, every government in South Americam, barring Colombia's, has had a cow over the past week, and the military chiefs of Mercosur (Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Paraguay, and Uruguay) plus Bolivia's had what boils down to a crisis conference in Brasilia to discuss the matter. The U.S. military's response: "It is not an offensive force in any way...The IV Fleet's entire purpose is cooperation, friendship, response to natural disaster, missions of peace and, yes, there will be counter narcotics work, as is traditional." (http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20080515/pl_afp/usmilitarynavylatam_080515224313)

My personal BS-o-meter went off the scale when I read that, barring the part about counter-narcotics. Friendship doesn't come in the form of battleships around here, cooperation generally suggests helping someone in a way that was asked for (ok, maybe Colombia asked for the help), there aren't any major natural disasters going on that a fleet of warships would be able to abate, and one person's "mission of peace" has a way of being another person's "war that obliterated my country" in this day and age.

Now, how about some other possible reasons for the re-deployment?

-Colombia's right-wing, pro-US, heavily US-funded government over 40-year struggle against leftist guerrilla groups. In fairness, the label "narcoterrorist" does fit them to a hefty extent, so a simplified view of them as noble idealists struggling against a foreign-backed oppressive government doesn't work. U.S. naval presence near Colombia facilitates aiding the Uribe government.

-Hugo Chavez. Chavez has done a remarkably good job of infuriating the White House since his near-removal from power by a U.S-backed military coup in 2002. I think Chavez is a corrupt brute and borderline dictator, but one can hardly blame him for not liking the U.S., at least since '02, just based on his personal history and there are a lot of people who find his economic reforms to be admirable, if not his methods of applying them.

-Connected to the above: Venezuela's oil. One of the world's largest oil producers is just across the Caribbean from the U.S., but with Chavez holding back on production and sales to the U.S., its proximity isn't doing much to the help with North American fuel prices.

-The convenient excuse. Colombia is on the brink of war with Venezuela and Ecuador; Colombia has taken to crossing the borders with its neighbors to get at guerrillas hiding there (who are, admittedly, backed by Ecuador and Venezuela), and (not surprisingly) Ecuador and Venezuela aren't thrilled about having Colombian troops and planes enter their countries uninvited. This would be akin to the Mexican military crossing over into Texas, "just for a few isolated, surgical strikes," to take out enemies of the state. Chavez made moves to deploy the military to the Colombian border, an emergency summit was held, both sides agreed to be calm and respectful...and Colombia's still doing it.

-The rest of the region. Since kicking repressive, U.S.-installed-and-backed military governments to the curb in the 1980s and 1990s, South America has been trying to find new ways to do things, especially after the old ways really took a blow in the continent-wide economic crisis of 2001-2002. Argentina and Brazil officially gave the finger to the IMF (which is a tool of US/Western European aims at controlling the world economy to the sole benefit of the US, Canada, and Western Europe), and since 2002, every country, except Colombia, has elected leftist governments on the continent. And...they've made progress. Standards of living are up, economies are growing. It's not all roses yet, but things are improving...but nobody but Colombia is paying court to the U.S., cutting trade deals that benefit U.S. business and no one else. Accordingly, democractically elected leaders, such as Evo Morales in Bolivia and Luiz Lula da Silva in Brazil, have been painted by the U.S. government as villianous, dangerous threats to regional security. What better away to "teach Latin America to elect good men!" (in the words of Woodrow Wilson) than send a fleet down this way to monitor them?

This is going to precipitate, at the very least, a diplomatic crisis, if not a regional war. There is no way that the presence of the 4th Fleet will make the hemisphere safer for anyone, and it is only serving to confirm the convictions of everyone in the Americas who does not have U.S. citizenship that the United States has no interest in friendly relations with anyone, not even its neighbors, if being friendly means not getting its way with everything. This is imperialism. It is the use of force to shove a political agenda down the throat of another continent...and this time, I don't think the U.S. will be able to get away with it. The war in Iraq, beyond its cost in human lives and money, has lost all international respect for the United States - simply put, we don't have many friends. Now, in Latin America, a region that lined up behind the U.S. to support us after 9-11-2001, rather than develop strong, reciprocally beneficial relations with free, democractic governments, we are poised to turn our next-door neighbors into our enemies. Real national security doesn't come from scaring the bejesus out of South America; it comes from being willing to compromise with nations who do not hold ill-will toward you and work for the good of both rather than just your own good, and from that put pressure on the ones who do have it out for you.

Please, if you are from the United States and reading this, even if you think I am a complete liberal, unpatriotic, commie pinko traitor for daring question our national motives, help me get the word on this out. Write to your newspaper. Tell other people. Make this known, so that at the very least we're informed.

Links you should check out:
http://www.fpif.org/papers/latam2003.html http://www.globalpolitician.com/21668-foreign-latin-america