TheExpatJournals.com

I begin this second week thinking about how the wonders of the world famous Geisha coffee are lost on me. Now my son aspires to snobbery in all things consumable, but me? I just love what I love and right now, I’m thrilling on Lojano coffee at $2 a pound. When I left NYC, I was concerned about the loss of great dark roast coffee, great parmesan cheese and access to Yankee Stadium to see games in person.

Without the internet and without tv, just last night I learned the Yankees were beat out of the Division Series. Ouch. Guess that’s gonna be it for Joe Torre, but what a run for someone who had never made the Series in decades…a has been when hired. My theory stands. Steinbrenner f**ked up when he tried to buy the team after that brief dynasty of the late 90’s. Once he traded Tino Martinez for Jason Giambi, he broke up what made them win…synergy. He kept on bringing in the big guns for big bucks..A Rod, Clemens, etc, and remaining on this roll only enabled the Red Sox to win their first Series since 1918. The Yankees haven’t won the Series since he broke up the team and replaced it with guys who get their fat paychecks from the same source. And that doesn’t make a team. It was that synergy. I am so glad I was so involved during that era because I seriously doubt another one like it will ever exist. There was magic in all those ‘has beens’. There was an energy, a chemistry between Joe Torre, Jeter the rookie, Darrell Strawberry, Mariano beginning his closer career, Louis Sosa’s unlikely presence onfield providing a continuity of spirit off field, Doc Gooden’s final no hitter, David Wells after being publicly scorned for his lack pitching that perfect game and the next year, the nearly 40 year old David Cone pitching a perfect game. Joe Torre’s brother’s long awaited transplant coming during the Series, Aaron Boone’s unlikely homer, Scott Broscious Series MVP, the many unlikely post season heroes who’s names are most likely now forgotten and finally, Paul O’Neil playing in the Series in spite of his father dying that morning and breaking down at the end of the game once he could let go only to have the team huddle him off the field to protect his privacy against the invasive press trying to capture the moment…No, I don’t think that kind of chemistry is possible any more. Baseball is about buying the best, not building the best.

I would say the record industry and the game of baseball both went by the commercial wayside about the same time. Do they really think people are inspired by dollars? Owners sold the soul of the game in exchange for the almighty revenue. Baseball is growing more and more soulless as a result and that is NOT what inspires people. Who cares if a player earning more per contract than the operating budgets of some countries swings the bat well? Instead, there’s a resentment against those big contracts if they don’t perform at that level all the time and it’s taken for granted if they do as God knows they should when making that kind of money. No room for heart, no room for the stories that inspire. Now, it’s about a paid performance. Period. How long will it last? As long as corporate box seats are available no doubt.

Someone should put together the All Negro League again and discriminate against Latinos and Caucasians, but then again, they’ve lost that market to basketball and football. I remember reading long ago articles about the greying of baseball as they don’t get the younger fans like they used to. Kids find the game too slow, too boring. It has never been presented for what it is, only ’sold’ for what they want to present. No one has focused on the heart nor managed to reach the minds of youth with a challenge to rise to the level of intelligence required in the game. It’s kind of like the chess of sports, but no one even realizes it. MLB has dropped the ball, pun intended, by allowing the sport to become simply another corporate business.

Record companies are the same. It’s about the next hit, not albums. It’s about huge singles not long careers. It’s about manufacturing what sells, not nurturing what’s great.

Se la vie. That’s America for you. Aim for what will provide you with the deepest corporate pockets by selling lies to the public and pretending your offering something worthwhile for their good. And yes, the old cliche is true…it starts at the top. If there’s anyone left who thinks the war in Iraq was about anything other than deep pockets of the best connected, well, they’re either stupid or in denial. Bucks, ratings, bucks, ratings…same thing. And that is what the US is all about in spite of baseball, apple pie and Chevrolet illusions.

I have said I wanted to go back in time, to another era where life is still about more than just the level of offensive expensive everything grew to be in the US. In that quest, I left for Panama and for awhile oh how great it was to be alive again. I learned a lot about a lot of things in a way that was more of an adventure than a challenge. I continually felt like I was given, not just a second childhood, but perhaps a shot at a childhood I never really had. I don’t think it was simply that the honeymoon period ended. I think that was induced by the almighty gringo culture turning Panama into yet another ugly, petty, mean, culture of bucks, ratings, bucks, ratings…deja vu. I joked that Panama has become the 52nd state, with Puerto Rico being the 51st, of course. The grifts, the shafts, the blatant lies, the rising prices of everything because the market will bear it and this time, instead of Americans, it’s the nationals being left behind or worse, being forced into a level of poverty unknown before the new colonialism because now, things were relative. And now, they had to compete with the haves for basics whereas before, since they were the market, basics were something they could afford. American culture in foreign lands is like a cancer. It might take a few years, but it will replace the healthy parts with sickness before too long. In this context, I refer to sickness of spirit, not body. There’s a reason fire bombs, open anti gringo sentiment, etc are surfacing in Panama and it’s because of fear. Locals who can no longer afford to feed or house their families are afraid. And the only thing that could possibly be fueling the reasons, the exorbitant rise in the price of everything is the overwhelming number of immigrants. Even if someone is living on a retirement income of $600 a month, that’s more than they can ever hope to earn in a month. Unlike the US, Latin America is not the land of opportunity where one can rise. It’s a land of a number of families controlling the wealth, retaining the power and allowing the locals enough to live, but not enough to be a threat. The larger income opportunities just do not exist. So what you have is what you have and when the market rises to accommodate those will forever want more profits, well then you create a gulf, not a gap. And that is bound to create problems of a social nature that will threaten the very basis of the new colonialism. So exactly how does one create sustainable immigration?

Well, first of all, it requires a long term vision, not the typical ‘get what you can while you can any way you can’ stereotype I believe to be the very basis of Latin American thinking. I hope Rafael Correa ends up with the support to see through his agenda because I don’t see much other real hope out there. He is the perfect blend of leadership and passion. I’m not entirely sure his motives are so pure, but what does motivation matter if one’s goals are the same? I see him as incredibly ambitious, but thank God someone ambitious has such noble aims. I see his passion as what might just make this possible, but also what causes such mistakes along the way. When one can believe in one’s goals to the degree that I believe he does, it’s hard not to take attacks personally and it’s hard not to react personally. I think that comes from having that depth of passion which equals heart to me. And I think that the modern world removes that from the equation where the world stage is concerned. One is judged by how they are stoic, use their heads not their hearts; by how removed and cold they can be, by how they play by the numbers sans humanity on the report cards of leaders the journalists in today’s world mete out. A heart has no place in leadership today. Passion is for art, not politics. Politics is about lies, manipulation and a perspective without soul, by the numbers. When did leadership cease to be about leading constituents to where they need to go rather than playing the role of door mat for those more powerful? I might conjecture when a certain regime began to strong arm the perceived less powerful into playing nice or being trampled, but in realty, that has always been the case. It’s just that now, there’s finally some resistance and some hope for a better way.

It’s been interesting to read the little in English about Correa. The shallow reports simply lump him into a Chavez camp. Any in-depth thoughtful analysis by ‘real journalists’ with serious credibility say quite the opposite. And this is a blatant pattern to anyone who seeks out reports dealing with his Presidency. For this and what I guess I can only chalk up to instinct, I for one, choose to wholeheartedly believe in Rafael Correa and wish him God Speed. He’s no Chavez. He’s ambitious, but not to that degree. He’s too smart to allow his ego to overrule that beautiful balance of intelligence and passion. He may be a dreamer, but to quote a musical legend of yore, “He’s not the only one.”

And now, I am off to my lawyer’s office to conclude the paperwork I need for my Ecuador resident Visa because I believe, because I hope, because I trust what lead me here and what here is in the process of becoming. Because I have found that here, I can still go back in time and live a life that is not about bucks, ratings, bucks, ratings…but about more than that. Opportunities here are boundless across the board. Imagine knowing what you know now and beginning life over in the 60’s? There you have it and what’s to doubt about that?