Colombia Gets Chance to Start Anew

Sixty-two-year-old Gustavo Petro (left), who once spent time in jail for his political beliefs and who promised profound social and economic change, has won Colombia’s presidency, beating the populist business tycoon Rodolfo Hernandez. 

He is the first ever leftist president of the deeply unequal country that has been ruled since independence by conservative elites and plagued for decades by political violence. He began his political career in the ranks of a Colombian guerrilla army, has survived assassination attempts and served as senator and mayor of Bogotá. When he appears before throngs of supporters in squares across the country, he does so flanked by bodyguards with bulletproof shields. 

And on Sunday, he won 50.5 percent of the vote to Hernandez’s 47.3 percent, with a margin of more than 700,000 votes. The two had been technically tied in polling ahead of the vote. 

Petro’s running mate Francia Márquez (right), a single mother, former housekeeper and activist, will be the country’s first Afro-Colombian female vice president. 

Certainly, Colombians are hoping their country can now start anew! 

But I am not so sure. And that's because it has been claimed that Petro is really a faux leftie who embraces woke ideology. Moreover, his veep is a former USAID worker, meaning, she's CIA-linked. 

In fact, Jackson Hinkle ("The Dive") had tweeted that when Venezuela's Maduro, Bolivia's Morales and Nicaragua's Ortega were elected/re-elected President, the New York Times claimed the elections were fraudulent and the results were illegitimate. When Petro and Chile's Boric were elected President, the NYT celebrated their victories as "leftist success stories". 

Time will tell whether Petro is a genuine reformer or a charlatan. Despite my misgivings, I'm keeping my fingers crossed he'll turn out to be the former. 

For Colombians' sake, I pray their hopes won't be misplaced!

A Smartphone App for Football Matches

Japan’s coronavirus-hit J-League is anticipated to resume either June 27 or July 04 behind closed doors. 

And a remote cheering app could mean football action won’t unfold in atmosphere-sapping silence. 

The Remote Cheerer system developed by Japanese firm Yamaha allows fans following the match on TV, the radio or online to encourage – or berate – players via their smartphones, their voices reverberating around the stadium in realtime via loudspeakers. 

In one field test, users in multiple remote locations chose from a range of on-screen options that sent their applause, chants, cheers and boos into the 50,000-seat Shizuoka Stadium ECOPA in Fukuroi City, Shizuoka Prefecture via 58 speakers set up among the empty seats. 

That’s a lot better than Germany’s cardboard cut-outs (my blog post dated May 16) and/or South Korea’s sex dolls (my blog post dated May 21)! 

Now, if only UK’s EPL will procure this app – that’ll be really cool! 

The Americas, said WHO, have emerged as the center of the coronavirus pandemic.

Indeed, cases have spiked, registering more than 2.4 million cases and more than 143,000 deaths. 

Countries like Brazil, Chile, El Salvador, Guatemala, Nicaragua and Peru have been singled out for special mention. 

Already yesterday, Carissa Etienne (right), WHO director for the Americas and head of the Pan American Health Organization had issued a warning: “Now is not the time for countries to ease restrictions”.

I don't think the twin terrors Donald Trump and Jai Bolsonaro will give a damn to the advice!

FYI, the Top 7 countries in the Americas combined account for 44.6% of coronavirus cases worldwide:

More Slut Walks

Taman Indrahana Toastmasters Club had their meeting yesterday, and thirty people came. As usual, it was an evening of riotous fun and I particularly enjoyed listening to feedback from Alice Ong, who as the Table Topics Evaluator, infused it with much humor. Her one-liners had me struggling to keep a straight face because she was so hilarious! When Alice speaks, you don’t need to have a Humor Master anymore since she is good at keeping her audience in stitches! Assignment speeches and evaluations were generally stimulating as well as stirring. And yes, I was again voted the Best Evaluator. I evaluated Ho Fong Ming’s CC speech # 8: Get Comfortable with Visual Aids. But honestly, folks, I would happily surrender all the ribbons and certificates I have received if I can win just once at the division (I don’t care whether it is Divisions B, C, G or P) and/or district level Evaluation contest. Sigh!

Anyway, I enjoyed the meeting and I would give it a score of 8 over 10! It’s a Taman Indrahana meeting after all.

About two hundred people turned up for the Slut Walk in Sydney, Australia on Monday, shunning lingerie due to cold weather but nonetheless hammering home their message with banners reading 'Proud and happy slut' and 'Blame rapists not boobs'. As one organizer told marchers: “We're here today to declare that slut-shaming and victim-blaming have to stop".

Image credit: http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/gallery/gallery-e6frewxi-1226074432890?page=2

Image credit: http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/gallery/gallery-e6frewxi-1226074432890?page=11

And on Sunday, demonstrators in Mexico City, Mexico, who organized largely over social media, said they were protesting a pervasive macho culture that too often faults women for aggressions against them. This, in a country where the mayor of a small west coast town had proposed banning miniskirts to prevent teen pregnancy, and in a city where hit-and-run spankings of women are not uncommon.

Image credit: http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/world/9630759/slutwalk-happens-in-mexico-city/

The "Slut Walk" to protest violence and harassment against women also took place in other Latin American cities, including Matagalpa, Nicaragua, and Tegucigalpa (below photo), Honduras on Saturday.

Image credit: http://www.straitstimes.com/BreakingNews/Lifestyle/Story/STIStory_679370.html

We can expect to see more Slut Walks worldwide on a regular basis.