article from January 13, 2012
By Jamie Douglas
Dakar Rally
This year’s Dakar Rally Raid is taking its toll on
competitors and spectators both. Day one alone saw three fatalities, one being
the Argentinean motorcycle rider Jorge Martinez Boero, who passed away while
being transported by helicopter to a hospital after a severe crash. That same
day, a father and his 12-year-old son were killed when the ultra-light plane
they were using to observe the race crashed onto the highway in Orense.
There have also been several other spectacular accidents
with serious injuries. The Czech crew of Aleš Loprais, driving a specially
modified Tatra Jamal truck, had great luck, though suffering a very serious
multi-rollover accident after the mechanic who was driving, Petr Almáši, fell
asleep at the wheel, ran off the tarmac and lost control of the machine,
totaling the Total-sponsored vehicle. Two of the three occupants suffered moderate-to-severe
but not life-threatening injuries. As Michal Ernst, the team’s navigator explained
to the media, “It happened very fast. We were all very tired and probably did
not pay enough attention to driving. The truck suddenly went off the road. As we
were driving quite fast at the time, at around 100 km/h, the truck plunged
headlong into the sand and rolled over twice. The impact was severe, it was
nothing pleasant!”
Thursday’s stage ended in Arequipa, Peru, the first time
that nation has been visited by the Dakar Rally, which will end in Lima on
Sunday, Jan 15, after completing well-over 5,000 miles in each of the four
vehicle divisions: bikes, quads, cars and trucks.
The government v the
poor hippies
Those who know the Buenos Aires Microcenter’s Florida
pedestrian mall are no doubt aware of a number of street peddlers setting up
there to sell their merchandise from mid-afternoon until late night. Lately,
probably because the pie is getting smaller, this conflagration of “unsightliness” has become a source of friction
between the rent-paying merchants and the mate-sucking
anarchists of the street. Enter the megalopolis’ Public Space Minister Diego
Santilli, and you have an instant confrontation between the federal riot police
and undesirables.
After several dozen un-deodorized Peruvians, Ecuadoreans,
Brazilians and Bolivians held a protest at the Corrientes crossing, blocking
traffic in the time-honored porteño fashion,
the public space minister asked for the support of the federales in making sure that these vagrants would not reestablish
their clearly illegal selling of goods in public.
IMF v Argentina, round
13
It appears that the Kirchnerist
approach to the International Monetary Fund’s silly demands that Argentina make
arrangements to repay their loans and stop the disingenuousness with which the
nation manufactures its statistics on inflation and unemployment are bearing
fruit.
At a press conference on Thursday, Jan 12, in Washington DC,
the IMF’s Acting Director of External Relations Gerry Rice reiterated that the
organization’s board of directors will meet within a few weeks time to
determine what progress, if any, Argentina has made in respect to the Fund’s
request of a little bit more transparency and less shuffling of the figures submitted
by the Southern Cone nation’s government. He pretty much conceded that whatever
decisions the board would come up with, sanctions against Argentina would not
be included. I guess that concludes that series of discussions before they
start.
Jamie Douglas
San Rafael, Mendoza
I encourage you to write me at cruzansailor [at] gmail [dot] com with
any questions or suggestions you may have. Disclaimer: I am not in any
travel-related business. My advice is based on my own experiences and is free
of charge (Donations welcome). It is always my pleasure to act as a beneficial
counselor to those who are seekers of the next adventure.
