Okay folks. Do what you know.... I know the media and that's what I'm gonna use.
If you are not interested in my views on the appalling Brent Borthwick and his Wind Word ministries turn off your sets now...
I simply cannot let Brent's manipulation go unchallenged....don't be duped by this transparent ploy, don't let him get away with claiming your support.
Be warned!
Sunday, 4 November 2007
Musings...
This morning we awoke to news of what looks like a fatal accident on the Rio. Two lancha's laden with tourists collided and a number of people went in to the water near the bridge at Fronteras. One was lost and is presumed drowned, a French man on holiday with his family. We feel very sorry for them as the search continues for his body.
It's Election day in Guatemala as the people vote for a new President. I have been reading about politics here and the struggles for democracy that this country has experienced particularly in the last 50 years. When they were well on their way to a more settled future everything was thrown over when, in 1954, the US, in one of the first documented covert operations by the CIA, orchestrated an invasion from Honduras that forced President Jacobo Arbenz to step down and ensured that agrarian reform that threatened the interests of the US United Fruit Company never took place . For most of the next 50 years violence became a staple of political life. Let's hope todays elections will be more peaceful and productive for the ordinary people of Guatemala
As cruisers we are in an extremely privileged position from which to 'take the pulse' of the countries that we visit. Not really tourists and yet not residents, we often experience a much closer sense of mood within our host nations. We get a feel for how actions taken by our native political leaders impact the impression that other countries now form of us.
The American cruisers have found it difficult to accept that Venezuela is no longer very welcoming, that is until they think about the relationship between Hugo Chavez (the Venezuelan president) and George W.
When we sailed to Morocco in North Africa we didn't fly our British Ensign, and were pleased we didn't as every other fishing boat in the harbour at Tangier was named Osama Bin Laden!
US and UK cruisers coming through the Red Sea tend to take in their ensigns in deference to the current situation in the middle east and so on...
Ecuador has been a popular destination of cruisers in recent years. Cheap and welcoming it was a great place to leave the boat as you traveled inland to explore the delights of South America. But that has all changed. Cruisers report a turn around by the current government and a strong anti-cruiser feeling. Stringent new regulations fror cruisers are reported on the noonsite.
Rules affecting use of agents, buying fuel , length of visas granted have all changed. Now why is this?
We have just read a book 'Confessions of an Economic Hit Man' by John Perkins. In it he explains how, in his career for an international consulting firm, he convinced developing countries to accept enormous loans and to funnel that money to US corporations.
He writes,
Because of EHM (Economic Hit Man) projects, Ecuador is awash in foreign debt and must devote an inordinate share of it's national budget to paying this off, instead of using its capital to help the millions of its citizens officially classified as dangerously impoverished. The only way Ecuador can buy down its foreign obligations is by selling its rain forests to the oil companies. Indeed, one of the reasons the EHM's set their sights on Ecuador in the first place was because the sea of oil beneath its Amazon region is believed to rival the oilfields of the Middle East. The global empire demands its pound of flesh in the form of oil concessions.
These demands became especially urgent after September 11, 2001, when Washington feared that Middle Eastern supplies might cease. On top of that,Venezuela, our third -largest oil supplier, had recently elected a populous president, Hugo Chavez, who took a strong stand against what he referred to as U.S. Imperialism; he threatened to cut off oil sales to the United States. The EHM's had failed in Iraq and Venezuela, but we had succeeded in Ecuador; now we would milk it for all it is worth.
Ecuador is typical of countries around the world that EHM's have brought into the economic-political fold. For every $100 of crude taken out of the Ecuadorian rain forest, the oil companies receive $75. Of the remaining $25, 3/4 must go to paying off the foreign debt. Most of the remainder covers military and other government expenses - which leaves about $2.50 for health, education, and programmes aimed at helping the poor. Thus, out of every $100 worth of oil torn from the Amazon, less than $3 goes to the people who need the money most, those whose lives have been so adversely impacted by the dams, the drilling, and the pipelines, and who are dying from lack of edible food and potable water.
All of those people - millions in Ecuador, billions around the planet - are potential terrorists. Not because they believe in communism or anarchism or are intrinsically evil, but simply because they are desperate.
So it really is no surprise that these countries see us as the 'enemy', is it? And no surprise that we are no longer welcomed with open arms. Cruisers usually arrive by the back door, dealing directly with officials and bureaucrats who reveal far more of their country's attitudes than the package tourist is ever going to see.
It's Election day in Guatemala as the people vote for a new President. I have been reading about politics here and the struggles for democracy that this country has experienced particularly in the last 50 years. When they were well on their way to a more settled future everything was thrown over when, in 1954, the US, in one of the first documented covert operations by the CIA, orchestrated an invasion from Honduras that forced President Jacobo Arbenz to step down and ensured that agrarian reform that threatened the interests of the US United Fruit Company never took place . For most of the next 50 years violence became a staple of political life. Let's hope todays elections will be more peaceful and productive for the ordinary people of Guatemala
As cruisers we are in an extremely privileged position from which to 'take the pulse' of the countries that we visit. Not really tourists and yet not residents, we often experience a much closer sense of mood within our host nations. We get a feel for how actions taken by our native political leaders impact the impression that other countries now form of us.
The American cruisers have found it difficult to accept that Venezuela is no longer very welcoming, that is until they think about the relationship between Hugo Chavez (the Venezuelan president) and George W.
When we sailed to Morocco in North Africa we didn't fly our British Ensign, and were pleased we didn't as every other fishing boat in the harbour at Tangier was named Osama Bin Laden!
US and UK cruisers coming through the Red Sea tend to take in their ensigns in deference to the current situation in the middle east and so on...
Ecuador has been a popular destination of cruisers in recent years. Cheap and welcoming it was a great place to leave the boat as you traveled inland to explore the delights of South America. But that has all changed. Cruisers report a turn around by the current government and a strong anti-cruiser feeling. Stringent new regulations fror cruisers are reported on the noonsite.
Rules affecting use of agents, buying fuel , length of visas granted have all changed. Now why is this?
We have just read a book 'Confessions of an Economic Hit Man' by John Perkins. In it he explains how, in his career for an international consulting firm, he convinced developing countries to accept enormous loans and to funnel that money to US corporations.
He writes,
Because of EHM (Economic Hit Man) projects, Ecuador is awash in foreign debt and must devote an inordinate share of it's national budget to paying this off, instead of using its capital to help the millions of its citizens officially classified as dangerously impoverished. The only way Ecuador can buy down its foreign obligations is by selling its rain forests to the oil companies. Indeed, one of the reasons the EHM's set their sights on Ecuador in the first place was because the sea of oil beneath its Amazon region is believed to rival the oilfields of the Middle East. The global empire demands its pound of flesh in the form of oil concessions.
These demands became especially urgent after September 11, 2001, when Washington feared that Middle Eastern supplies might cease. On top of that,Venezuela, our third -largest oil supplier, had recently elected a populous president, Hugo Chavez, who took a strong stand against what he referred to as U.S. Imperialism; he threatened to cut off oil sales to the United States. The EHM's had failed in Iraq and Venezuela, but we had succeeded in Ecuador; now we would milk it for all it is worth.
Ecuador is typical of countries around the world that EHM's have brought into the economic-political fold. For every $100 of crude taken out of the Ecuadorian rain forest, the oil companies receive $75. Of the remaining $25, 3/4 must go to paying off the foreign debt. Most of the remainder covers military and other government expenses - which leaves about $2.50 for health, education, and programmes aimed at helping the poor. Thus, out of every $100 worth of oil torn from the Amazon, less than $3 goes to the people who need the money most, those whose lives have been so adversely impacted by the dams, the drilling, and the pipelines, and who are dying from lack of edible food and potable water.
All of those people - millions in Ecuador, billions around the planet - are potential terrorists. Not because they believe in communism or anarchism or are intrinsically evil, but simply because they are desperate.
So it really is no surprise that these countries see us as the 'enemy', is it? And no surprise that we are no longer welcomed with open arms. Cruisers usually arrive by the back door, dealing directly with officials and bureaucrats who reveal far more of their country's attitudes than the package tourist is ever going to see.
Saturday, 3 November 2007
What's so bad about Brent?
Today’s headlines: one hundred feared dead in the Dominican Republic, 43 dead in Haiti, three hundred thousand made homeless by floods in Mexico, Red Cross appealing for relief supplies… and the Guatemalan navy have caught two thieves trying to steal a dinghy (Brent’s basking in reflected glory, although it looks as though the thieves might be released for "lack of evidence").
Retouched photos of angels, Brent you must be joking.
Let’s start with the question of why people fall for it. Well… in a room full of frothing believers, even the most skeptical begin to doubt their critical faculties. Technically, it is achieved through a mix of “socially-constructed reality” and “abreactive trance”, sorry about the psycho-babble.
The famous demonstration of socially-constructed reality, cited in lots of places (such as “A note on the drawing power of crowds of different sizes” in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 13, 79-82, Milgram, S., Bickman, L., & Berkowitz, O) and repeated many times, goes like this:
Place one person on a busy street corner looking up at an imaginary object. People will walk by, look up, see nothing, and consider him daft. Place two people on that corner looking up, and the same result. Place three people on the corner looking up, and passers by will stop and look up much more carefully before walking on. At some point, as you continue to add people looking up, the passer by will change from thinking “what's wrong with you” to “what's wrong with me that I can't see anything”. Reality becomes socially defined regardless of what's “really” out there.
Now change from a busy street corner to a room full of people, of any denomination, filled with the “Holy Spirit”. The longer a skeptic stays in the room, the more they begin to doubt... “Maybe there is something going on here”. Now change the skeptic for someone who wants to believe. The shift occurs much more rapidly.
That's half the story. Here is the other half.
Most hypnotists sooner or later run into a phenomenon known as abreaction. It seems to occur when the entranced client lets go of some emotion he or she had been repressing. Abreaction manifests itself as anything from crying, to limb shaking, to other unusual behavior. In hypnotherapy, it’s usually regarded as counterproductive, so the therapist just suggests it away. However, in a room where weirdness and flailing about is a sign of the Holy Spirit, and such behavior is not only allowed, but desperately sought, one can expect a significantly higher instance of “on demand” abreaction. Once someone sets the context and expectation by starting the process (often a stooge), the rest of the adherents can honestly and sincerely begin to flop about like beached fish.
Brent ministers with Fresh Fire Ministries (FFM), he boasts about it on his own website. Here is Brent’s sidekick Todd Walker from FFM pulling the old falling down stunt.
Strip away the superstition and you are left with cheap fraudsters taking money from deluded people through false pretenses.
The answer is that these criminals target the weak and desperate. Here, if you can bear to watch it, is a cock-a-whoop Todd Walker exploiting the misery of a child with muscular dystrophy (of course at that age he must be desperate for someone to wave a magic wand to make him better, to make him not different, to make him fit in like other kids). And then this creep goes on to promise to cure cancer, heal abused women and the rest. There are lots of Todd's videos on YouTube. He's obviously very pleased with himself. And so he should be. FFM are making millions from it, according to their Revenue Canada filings. I wonder what's Brent's slice of that action?
I don't object to people having religious beliefs, what I do object to is those who use these beliefs as a cover to prey on the weak and the desperate. What’s so vile about vermin like Brent and his mates is that they are attracted to countries like
Brent may not be able to write and spell but don't be deceived; the measured tones, the wholesome image (always pictured with his family), he is a skilled manipulator. There is real human tragedy here in Guatemala. Yes Brent, people with problems even more dire than the possibility that their credit card debt might not be cleared at the end of each month. And you are the last thing they need.
Retouched angels and pleas for maintenance costs aren’t funny, they’re sick. I can hardly find the words to express my utter disgust at such wickedness. These “mega-yacht missionaries” should go far, the further the better.
Hot tips for ailing laptops
Gerry has permitted me an entry in her blog.
We don’t use our laptops for navigation, but we are increasingly dependent on them for email, Skype, radiofax, watching DVDs, storing photographs, music and so on. And meanwhile, of course, Microsoft is busily writing ever more bloated software to make our present equipment obsolete.
So here are three tips for recovering ailing hard drives:
1) If your hard drive has crashed, take it out of the machine, place it in the palm of your left hand and clap your right hand briskly down on it. This will un-jam the heads, temporarily, about sixty percent of the time.
2) Then copy the whole drive using Western Digital Data Lifeguard Tools, downloadable for free from here.
3) When you’ve loaded your operating system and files into a new hard drive, follow Mike Binn’s advice, available here, to keep your old computer running smoothly.
If I had known this sooner, it would have saved me buying my last laptop.
Friday, 2 November 2007
Brent and the angel's wings!
Taken from this site (you need to keep scrolling, it's near the bottom of the page) is the strange photograph of our old friend Brent Borthwick of Jireh showing off his angel's wings...
Gosh if I give you the wool can you knit a pair for me please?
In a recent outreach to Mexico with Todd Bentley, Brent Borthwick the founder of Wind Word took numerous photos of "angels" that appeared in their meetings.
Which were available for purchase on a CD for ten dollars. It may be difficult to see but behind Brent Borthwick's shoulder are angels according to him.
But in case you can't discern it Brent has enhanced the photo for us.
Oh come off it Brent, at least buy a decent edition of 'Photoshop' if you are going to try and make this one stick.
Still I am certain that Jireh must already be on its way to either Mexico (300,000 homeless in the floods) or Dominican Republic (with 90 dead in the latest hurricane). Sorry- nobody seen the boat going down river yet? Now why am I not surprised? Guess he doesn't want to miss selling those cookies at Mario's tomorrow.
Gosh if I give you the wool can you knit a pair for me please?
In a recent outreach to Mexico with Todd Bentley, Brent Borthwick the founder of Wind Word took numerous photos of "angels" that appeared in their meetings.Which were available for purchase on a CD for ten dollars. It may be difficult to see but behind Brent Borthwick's shoulder are angels according to him.
But in case you can't discern it Brent has enhanced the photo for us.
Oh come off it Brent, at least buy a decent edition of 'Photoshop' if you are going to try and make this one stick.
Still I am certain that Jireh must already be on its way to either Mexico (300,000 homeless in the floods) or Dominican Republic (with 90 dead in the latest hurricane). Sorry- nobody seen the boat going down river yet? Now why am I not surprised? Guess he doesn't want to miss selling those cookies at Mario's tomorrow.
Barcelona World Race.
Another big race is about to start,11th November, in Barcelona and we just received this email from our friends Pete and Anne Thomson, father and step-mum to Alex the current great white hope of British sailing.
Hi We're currently "parked" in our van next to the Hugo Boss container and only about 10 yards from all the open 60 yachts. It's very exciting here and we're thoroughly enjoying the city of Barcelona. The race starts on the 11th and Nosille (ex sailing friends) are coming along on the spectator boat for the start. the other great thing is having wifi so can skype and email to our hearts content. Pete and I are also busy preparing the lunches each day for the shore team of about 20 people!!! You can follow the race on Alex's website or the DailySail is quite good. Gotta go. Love Anne and Pete xx
We met Pete and Anne in St Maarten's. We had just crossed the Atlantic and they were repairing their boat after Hurricane Ivan.It's a small world as we later realized that our daughter, Lucy, knew Alex.....we all decided that it was probably better not to investigate just how 'well' they knew each other!
So we follow Alexs' career with great interest. We spent some nail biting days during the Velux 5 oceans race when he had to abandon his boat mid-ocean and be rescued by Mike Golding , Ecover, only for them to both need rescuing shortly after when Ecover lost it's mast.....
Alex only has one speed, foot hard down, so his races are always worth watching. TBH also likes to fantasize about the razzamatazz and dancing girls that accompany Alexs' departures. He is sponsored by Hugo Boss and they certainly know how to appeal to the testosterone ridden groupies of ocean racing!
You can follow the exploits of Alex and his co-skipper Andrew Cape from Australia on Alexs' site and the whole race on the race site.
Good luck and fair winds guys!
We will be thinking about the traumas that parents go through as their kids set about conquering the world. Doesn't matter how old they are they're always somebodies baby!
Alex is on the left, Andrew on the right.
Thursday, 1 November 2007
Halloween at Mario's.
Being the biggest night in the Pagan calender it would have been difficult not to join in with the party here in the marina last night.
Dressing up or costume parties always cause complete panic on board our boat. Neither of us could possibly be called 'creative' on the odd bit of fabric and a few baubles front! I remember, when the kids were small, that my heart would plummet when they arrived home from school clutching an invite to a themed party in their hot grubby little hand. That was until I discovered that a friend worked for the biggest theatrical Costumiers in the world and life suddenly got a whole lot easier. Sadly there is no such back up here in Guatemala, bother!
Have you noticed how very artistic a lot of boaters are? Running up canvas work, painting pictures, making jewelery. It's a pity that we have none of those skills here...
Well all things come to those who wait(or ask in the case of Jireh!) and on Tuesday dear Bob and Trisha took us off to the big city of Puerto Barrios to shop and eat McDonald's. It was wonderful! We drove (fast!), shopped(hard) and ate (lots). The best bit was we got to buy proper manufactured plastic props for Halloween. Oh joy! No scrabbling around attempting to make a mummy out of tissue paper for us.
TBH (pirate) and me (water witch) toddled to the end of our dock to join in with the festivities.
Now those of you who have followed the blog for a while may have just got the teeniest hint that I am a bit of a cynical bastard. I know, I try and keep it hidden but there it is creeping out across the page determined to have it's say. And I can be pretty rude at times about stuff I don't like, but there you go, thats me folks!
Marina 'activities' have always scared me. I think it's the premonition that this is what life may become as I slide disgracefully into old age and the 'dribbly farm' that the kids threaten me with from time to time. But its fine 'cos here you can get involved if you want but nobody bugs you if, like me, you are an anti-social old biddy and don't want to play!
Decorating of the 'Cayuco Club' (bar) had taken all afternoon, lancha(boat) taxi organized to collect partygoers from the other marinas around the Rio and the party was on..
It was really good fun. Got to give it to these guys they sure know how to enjoy themselves. The staff and kids looked a bit bemused from time to time at this bunch of weird old Gringo's wearing the strangest assortment of hats, eye patches, witches hats and worse cavorted on the dance floor to a strange mix of pop, jazz and island music. Probably just confirmed their view that we are all barking mad!
Coconuts were decorated, big lack of pumpkins in these parts. Excellent food was laid on, hot and spicy as appropriate for the Night! Costume's judged, fireworks lit.
A truly great night was had by all. Another memory to add to the stash of cruising moments of note!
Hope you enjoy the video that we put together of some of the nights images.
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