The World As-It-Is.

Three days of continuous alterglobalist drip.

In the picture to the left, my boothmate Mary of the Snows from Ecos with Martha Richards, from Sudan.

Martha Richards, the Hero.

Such intravenous therapy in the Independent Republic of Ecositoland has relived in my immune system the necessary mechanisms which identify and kill a wide variety of agents. "Detection is complicated as pathogens adapt and evolve new ways to successfully infect the host organism" ;-P

I am back.

Yesterday, I frolicked in BCSland and found useful uses for the word Charity.

Useful uses such as "up my ass". Charity. Real poetry, that is.

Today I live in the Kindom of Paraphernalia, in the City of Tacit Promises, that very same place where Princes of Charming surname that I loved, geniuses I still admire, infallibly, dogmatically, despondently, told me of late how preoccupying it was that I don't want to discover the world "as it is".

What I do instead is, apparently, "invent my own".

Pppppppppfffffff.

Juas, juas.

It is a truth universally acknowledged that the world which I endure and make perdure MUST be the real world. And if someone dares have a different viewpoint, they're, of course, making it all up. Plain wrong. Who, in their right minds, would try and invent the world differently to how I myself think it is?

What?! Change it?

I give you The World, my Lords. But not just "your" "Real" 0.0001% elite within the Western 20%. Not just the demonstrations in the Plaza.

Today I attended protests against the right-wing Mayor. People in this godforsaken City stand up against whoever governs the Town Hall ONLY when he increases taxes. We are only concerned about not receiving the money we rightly deserve.

Are you ready to see the other 80% exactly "as it is", without an ounce of artistic, literary embellishment?

Enter, Your Highnesses, the real poetic 80% of the World-As-It-Is that you, we, egocentrically, Salmantinianly, Madrilegnianly, Grenadianly, Canadianly, Edinburghianly ignore...


Sentada en el borde de la cama, nos mira, pero no nos ve. Tiene la mirada de los niños autistas. Su cuerpo oculta un espíritu en fuga a otro mundo. La toalla de baño se ha deslizado de los hombros de la niña. Su magra espalda muestra huellas de laceraciones, de golpes de cinturón o de latigazos. Grandes llagas enrojecidas supuran un líquido verdoso. Su pubis está inflamado, marcado con una mancha pardusca circular: una gran quemadura de cigarrillo. Ahora conozco a la perfección esta lesión. Toy vierte té frío en un gran vaso; la niña bebe a sorbitos y hace muecas de dolor. Con precaución examino su boquita. Las paredes bucales están cubiertas de abscesos hasta no formar más que una sola llaga. Una infección corriente entre los niños prostituídos. A causa de la falta de higiene, de las infecciones y de las felaciones repetidas. La niña se ha dormido, y Toy, apoyado en el borde de la ventana, permanece en silencio. Nuestros ojos no se apartan de Sonta. Su cuerpo, envuelto en el tejido blanco de algodón, parece ya haber abandonado la vida.

El precio de un niño
Marie-France Botte y Jean-Paul Mari.
Cuatro años en el infierno de la prostitución infantil en Bangkok
(Courtesy of Makarena, social worker and flatmate).

The other day, on the bus to Salamanca, a group of very young policemen-to-be, probably on their way to the local disco, otherwise known as Going De Putas, were laughing at one of their friends because he couldn't draw a map of Spain and show them where Galicia was. Let's call him Pedro.

After a while, the same to-be policemen said that if he ever has a son who turns out to be gay, he'll stop speaking to him.

Pedro's friend stood up and replied that he considered being homophobic was much worse than not knowing where Galicia was. For a policeman, that is.

Also see Mary of the Snows' coment on the cantautor:

-Menos cantarle al amor, y más altermundismo.

Encyclopaedic knowledge is not an antonym for common sense, values and fair play.

Lovely people, if WE don't change things, no-one else will.

The rest will follow you to the Plaza if you give them reasons and hope.

Dear considered-intelligent people. You have become, inadvertently, or not exactly so, Noam Chomsky's "elites". But you are supposed to be the so-called intellectuals, you have the understanding of the world, the means and power, and the gift of persuasion.

Whether you like it or not, people follow you. People believe what you say and copy what you do.

Whether you like it or not, it is your, my, our, responsibility if Salamanca hasn't changed in centuries. We are not the future anymore. We are almost 30. We change the present.

What we do, our children will inherit. Everything is our own fucking doing, not our parents', the institutions', the governments'. Stop blaming others and do your bit. Quit the whining and keep trying.

Susan George, 73 years old and the perfect example of time well spent told me just a couple of days ago that if she was in her twenties she wouldn't waste a minute of her time with nonsense.

Look beyond your belly-buttons and DO SOMETHING!!!!

Move, you self-centered, Gucci-dressed, oversexed, drug-addicted, overfed journalists, lecturers, professors, writers, artists and PhD students!

Set the example, you fucking bastards!

Move, for the love of what's fair, and right and plain old charitable.

Wake up, find the first, last, whatever piece of the puzzle. Move.

Do your best.

Please.