Dreams of change

It happened about two years ago. Autumn 2007, which I started based in Montevideo and finished in Paris, with two big pieces to munch in between: first a UNESCO general conference, the sort of marathon we just finish now, right after stepping down the plane after two months of hard work in Uruguay; then, a long and challenging UN-reform related mission in Cape Verde, which concerned the reform in its “UN Wars” version. From time to time I would wake up in the middle of the night in spells of intercontinental confusion, not knowing whether I was in Paris, in Barcelona, in Kolda, in Montevideo or anywhere else. That night I was in Paris.

I dreamt about home, in Barcelona. I had returned to my parents’ place in East Poblenou, where I grew up. I was walking in amazement down the Diagonal Avenue. I saw my old school in Pallars street, in a section where the road had been asphalted only when I was eighteen years old. Looking East I saw the Princess Hotel and the Forum, where the old Camp de la Bota had been; many people had been summarily executed there by the fascists at the end of the civil war in 1939; later there were slums amongst the latest ones to disappear, in the mid seventies. Looking west I saw the Diagonal up until the Glòries area; now it is a beautiful avenue, at the time there were just bits of it between old factories and new housing. Looking south-east I saw Selva de Mar street on its way to the new Diagonal Mar residential area and the beach; that street was opened only when I was eighteen, after the railroad tracks of what had been Spain’s first line had been removed; after the massive Material y Construcciones SA factory had been closed down and demolished.

I could not stop thinking about all these changes. How the city had changed, and how I had changed, how I left Poblenou and my city and embarked in an adventure that took me to Paris, but also to Africa and to South America. Caught in my reflection and still amazed I sat down on a bench. Within a minute a young boy appeared and sat down with me. Blue cat-like eyes, very blond, sunny smiling, he said hello and engaged in conversation. He wanted to know who I was, where did I come from, what I was doing there. He was nice and pleasant, and asked with an innocent eagerness to know that immediately conquered my heart.

Suddenly I realized that the boy was no other than me; it was me when I was ten years old.

I woke up in the middle of the night, my eyes full of tears.

Worlds apart

Friday morning. I commute to work in a packed carriage of Paris' metro, line 8. As I step off at Ecole Militaire I spot a woman doing the same thing. She carries a baby on her back using a backpack-like device which is actually a real chair. Young Mr. or Mrs. Chairperson is having a peaceful and comfortable nap. I am amazed by the invention, as it looks solid enough to isolate the baby from the dangers inherent to this city’s commuting experience. Especially from a recurring one in the form of the impact of a heavy purse or small briefcase on one’s chest –why bother holding it on your hand? Why depriving people from appreciating it? People spend fortunes in purses! It has to show!-.

The thing is that I immediately think about Africa. The many women, always women, that I have seen doing the same thing but using a much simpler blanket-like big piece of fabric. You can often see women doing so while also carrying in their hands big bags with food or other items, sometimes even carrying something on their heads.

It feels like worlds apart. Thinking just about the devices, one is a world of opulence, where babies are the modus vivendi of a whole industry that involves textiles, plastics –and hence rubber and latex but also, amongst other materials, oil-, as well as transportation, marketing, sales… This means lots of jobs all along the production and distribution chain. Meanwhile there is another world, certainly simpler and rather more modest. Livestock, natural fabrics, little marketing but the markets themselves; light industry even if too often the bulk of the fabrics is imported –from Europe for centuries, from the big Asia more recently. Silk is another story-. Even if these jobs I mentioned might be spread around the globe, I cannot prevent myself from thinking about the different carbon footprints of the ones and the others. I know the question is far from being simple as I suspect that a radical transformation of our lifestyles is unlikely, at least as long as there is still plenty of oil available. Yet I grow increasingly convinced that we need a simpler life.

Suddenly I remember about that funny story about the space race. Apparently while the NASA invested (or simply spent, or wasted, depending on your point of view) a large amount of money developing a pen that could write in a situation of no gravity, the Soviets went to space with pencils. Further proof that life can be simpler, even in space. This is not an apology of real socialism, as Marxism is as production-oriented as capitalism and its models did not factor in production’s impacts on the environment. That was just a funny example.

Several books could be written just by comparing the two examples and analyzing the implications of its various ramifications. For tonight I will only add that to me this is yet another proof that we have much to learn from Africa, despite the poverty, the conflicts and the inequality so real but also so stereotyped in our latitudes. Yet I do not think we are ready to listen. In this part of the world, too often, even if we listen we hardly hear anything but ourselves.

PS: for anyone interested in further information about the whole issue of carrying babies, you may wish to examine this website I found while doing some minimal research to write this piece: it is the French “Association pour la promotion du portage”. Long life to civil society!

A big hug and see you soon, Fernando!

So that was it. While we were immerged in this worldly institutional whirl, you came to remind us that the world keeps going round basically on its own. Moves that come even to our small but yet great unesquian island. The day came, and as scheduled you left for a new stage in your life, to La Habana.

This kind of life we chose to live presents us with opportunities for extraordinary meetings, but it also implies, from time to time, deeply felt farewells. There is no one without the other. With time one gets used to it and develops a sort of shield. Also with time one improves one’s ability to differentiate important people from simple passers-by. Yet no shield can contain what one feels when a true friend leaves, especially when one has a crystal heart. Fernando, thanks for knowing how to listen as good as you know how to talk. Thanks for sharing so many interesting things with me. Thanks for helping me in my effort to see beyond myself. And thanks for sharing your enormous sense of humor, which is no other thing than a supreme form of intelligence. Thanks for being both a gentleman and a wise person. And thanks for allowing me to call you a friend.

I will miss you, compay! But well, we will meet again sooner than later, with a mojito if possible, be it travelling from the Old Europe or from somewhere else. I wish you all the best for the new life you begin, from which I hope to be a distant but yet present part. Or future part. Well, it was understood, wasn’t it?

PS: the most sentimental part I leave it, if you allow me, to someone from Uruguay, Mr. Jaime Roos.

Too much, too early

The 2009 Peace Nobel prize went to the President of the United States of America, Mr. Barack Obama, "for his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples". This came as a big surprise to me, and I must humbly say that I do not think this is appropriate.

I do not have to convince anyone about my high respect for Mr. Obama. In the Catalan edition of this blog I expressed my sympathy, recognition and hope when he was elected; both as the first Afro-American person to become president, with all the symbolism it entails after centuries of segregation, and as a man who won the election with a message of reconciliation and hope.

Barack Obama brought to the international arena a new language and some concrete proposals, notably in the area of nuclear disarmament. He reengaged his country with multilateralism. He also appears to engage in efforts to find a long lasting peaceful solution for the conflict in Palestine/Israel. He has cancelled the anti-missile shield project that must be a long cherished dream of his country’s industrial-military complex. And there are a number of other things. However, I feel we are still at the stage of proposals. We are not yet at the stage of accomplishments. That is why I consider this award unjustified.

I can understand some may want to express strong support for his proposals and compel him to redouble his efforts at a particularly complicated time in his domestic arena, by awarding him this prize somehow in anticipation. Yet I still think this is too much, too early.

Rest in peace, Negra, and many thanks!!!

Many thanks for your company, many thanks for leading us through the darkest times, many thanks for so many things.