Archive for July, 2008

Keep On Keepin’ On

Friday, July 11th, 2008

 Stay the course.”
- George W. Bush, president of the U.S.
Buenos Aires - One of the things that fascinates me about history is the way it repeats itself. Despite all those colloquial admonitions about “those who forget the lessons of history are doomed to repeat them”, it’s a common failing throughout the world. We’re seeing it [...]

Green Cape

Thursday, July 10th, 2008

 We need to educate our children if we want our continent to prosper, but they can’t learn if they go to school hungry.”
- Cesária Évora, the “Barefoot Diva”, Cape Verdian singer
Buenos Aires - If I were to ask you to tell me a little about Cape Verde, I’m guessing you’d draw a blank. So would [...]

Hitting the Sack

Monday, July 7th, 2008

 Sherry… a sickly compound, the use of which will transform a nation, however bold and warlike by nature, into a race of sketchers, scribblers and punsters, in fact into what Englishmen are at the present day.”
- George Borrow, English Novelist
Buenos Aires - I’m going to give you the one sentence basics of sherry, formerly called [...]

Time for a Change

Thursday, July 3rd, 2008

 As the media theorist Marshall McLuhan pointed out in the 1960s, media are not just passive channels of information. They supply the stuff of thought, but they also shape the process of thought. And what the Net seems to be doing is chipping away my capacity for concentration and contemplation. My mind now expects to [...]

A Novel Dinner

Thursday, July 3rd, 2008

 I speak: Portuguese, German, French, English, Spanish, Italian, Esperanto, some Russian; I read: Swedish, Dutch, Latin and Greek (but with the dictionary right next to me); I understand some German dialects; I studied the grammar of: Hungarian, Arabic, Sanskrit, Lithuanian, Polish, Tupi, Hebrew, Japanese, Czech, Finnish, Danish; I dabbled in others. But all at a [...]

The Little Pearl

Wednesday, July 2nd, 2008

I believe the nicest and sweetest days are not those on which anything very splendid or wonderful or exciting happens, but just those that bring simple little pleasures, following one another softly, like pearls off a string.”
- from Anne of Avonlea by Lucy Maud Montgomery
Buenos Aires - Some days you just want simple comfort food. [...]