Save the planet – a message from another world

Patrick Barkham reports for the Guardian:

Jacinto Zarabata sits in a suburban back garden in north London and unselfconsciously uses a stick to probe the inside of a gourd, which is shaped like a rather phallic mushroom with a bright yellow cap. The first member of the Kogi people of Colombia ever to visit Britain is wearing traditional rough cotton clothes and has a cloth bag slung over each shoulder as he chews toasted coca leaves.

It would be easy to view Jacinto as a noble savage; an exotic being from a pristine indigenous culture still living in impenetrable pockets of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, the highest coastal mountain range in the world. But this small, self-assured spokesman for the Kogi soon subverts that stereotype. As he answers my first question in fluent Spanish, he delves into one bag, extracts a camera and takes a photograph of me.

Jacinto has made the journey to Britain because the Kogi have embarked on an unusual and ambitious mission. They are making a movie about their way of life – but not for themselves, as part of some kind of do-gooding community workshop; it is for us, and it carries an uncompromising message. One of very few indigenous American people to resist the ravages of Spanish conquistadors, Christian missionaries and, now, eco-tourists, militias, drug lords and heavy industry, the Kogi have observed frightening changes to their homeland in recent decades. The glaciers are melting, storms have increased in ferocity, there are landslides and floods, followed by droughts and deforestation. The Kogi, who live by a complex set of spiritual beliefs, are the "elder brother" and guardians of this, the heart of the earth, and they believe we in the west ("little brother") are destroying the planet. They have come to warn us, before it is too late.

Jacinto, who is a spokesperson for the Mamos, the Kogi spiritual leaders who have a unique wisdom forged by an entire childhood spent living in the dark, arrived in London the previous night. He is staying with Alan Ereira, who made a BBC documentary, The Heart of the World, about their life 20 years ago. What are Jacinto's first impressions of our society?

"The first thing that is noticeable to me is that this is still the world," he says. "What's visible is construction, what you have made. This is not something we, the Kogi, are used to seeing. You give precedence to the use of a thing rather than its source. That's the intellectual error. Ultimately, it's all nature." From Jacinto's viewpoint, when we glance at a car we might assess its cost and the status conferred on its driver. We don't recognise it as a clever piece of engineering of resources that once lay inside the earth.

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ALUNA - The Movie


The Kogi proclaim their intention to take us into the world of Aluna in a new film.

Lawsuit Against Liquor Makers Illuminates Drug-War Charade

Occasionally, the U.S. justice system opens a window into the true nature of the drug-war pretense, despite the political rhetoric employed to conceal the hypocrisy.

That is the case with respect to a pending lawsuit that pits the government of Colombia, and its various departments (or states) against two of the world's largest liquor producers, England-based Diageo Plc and France-based Pernod Ricard SA — both of which have major U.S. operations and produce well-known brands such as Smirnoff, Johnnie Walker, Captain Morgan Chivas Regal and Martell.

In the litigation, a civil Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organization (RICO) Act case filed in U.S. District Court in Brooklyn, the government of Colombia accuses the giant liquor companies and their co-conspirators, including distributors based in Aruba (a Caribbean island nation just northeast of Colombia), of having “engaged in and facilitated organized crime by laundering the proceeds of narcotics trafficking,” among other acts, according to the court pleadings.

In what can only be described as a real head-scratcher, the government of Colombia is continuing to wage this legal battle against the liquor makers even while it presses for a free trade agreement (FTA) with the United States that, by the terms of the proposed pact (now awaiting approval from the U.S. Congress), would actually make it easier for liquor makers and distributors to expand their business activities in Colombia.

The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative, which is part of the Executive Office of the President, provides the following description of the proposed FTA, dubbed the U.S.-Colombia Trade Promotion Agreement:

    Under Law 788, Colombia assesses a consumption tax on beverage alcohol based on a system of specific rates per degree (percentage point) of alcohol strength. This tax regime discriminates against imported distilled spirits through arbitrary breakpoints that have the effect of applying a lower tax rate per degree of alcohol to domestically produced spirits. Under the CTPA [U.S.-Colombia Trade Promotion Agreement], Colombia committed to eliminate this discriminatory element of the excise tax for imports of distilled spirits within four years of entry into force of the agreement. Additionally, under the national treatment principle of the CTPA, Colombia committed to eliminate discriminatory practices that have restricted the ability of U.S. distilled spirits companies to conduct business in Colombia. [Emphasis added.]

Simple economics seems to dictate that if sales of foreign liquor products increase in Colombia under the trade pact as proposed, so too would the opportunity to launder money via the sales of those products.

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A Convenient Truth: Urban Solutions from Curitiba, Brazil

Cities should be a solution not a problem for human beings. The city of Curitiba has demonstrated for the past 40 years how to transform problems into cost-effective solutions that can be applied in most cities around the world.

A Convenient Truth: Urban Solutions from Curitiba, Brazil is an informative, inspirational documentary aimed at sharing ideas to provoke environment-friendly and cost-effective changes in cities worldwide. The documentary focuses on innovations in transportation, recycling, social benefits including affordable housing, seasonal parks, and the processes that transformed Curitiba into one of the most livable cities in the world.

The film includes interviews from world renowned Curitiba's mayors Jaime Lerner and Cassio Tanigushi, as well as other brilliant minds who made Curitiba a world class model.

On the Passage of a few People through a Rather Brief Moment in Time: The Situationist International 1956-1972

On the Passage of a few People through a Rather Brief Moment in Time: The Situationist International 1956-1972 from zwischenzug on Vimeo.

A video documentary combining exhibition footage of the Situationist International exhibitions with film footage of the 1968 Paris student uprising, and graffiti and slogans based on the ideas of Guy Debord (one of the foremost spokesmen of the Situationist International movement). Also includes commentary by leading art critics Greil Marcus, Thomas Levine, and artists Malcolm Mac Laren and Jamie Reid. Branka Bogdanov, Director and producer. NTSC-VHS 22 min. 1989

After Thirteen Months in an Iranian Prison, Sarah Shourd Has ‘No Animosity’ Toward Ahmadinejad

Sarah Shourd, the American hiker held in Iran for thirteen months on spying charges who was sent back to the U.S. last week, had a face-to-face meeting with Iranian President Ahmadinejad in New York yesterday. Of their chat, she said in a statement:

I would like to thank President Ahmadinejad for giving me and my mother the opportunity to meet with him today. It was a very gracious gesture and a good meeting. While I was in prison, I pleaded for the chance to speak with President Ahmadinejad in order to clear up any misunderstanding that led to our detention. Our story was completely unexpected and tragic. We did nothing wrong. We meant no harm to the Iranian people. I just think it's a huge misunderstanding - more to do with the problems between the countries than us as individuals. I have no animosity towards [Ahmadinejad ] or the government. I want it to be resolved. I want it to be finished.

Shourd added that, of course, she wants her fellow hikers Shane Bauer and Josh Fattal, still held in Iran, sent back to the U.S. as well. Partly, that's because Bauer proposed to her while they were stuck in an Iranian prison together and thought they'd never see home again. And she still wants to marry him. Love!

~ New York Magazine ~