I won’t be posting anything here until Tuesday. Jill A., Mike F., and I are leaving tonight for an Amazon jungle expedition. We’ve got Monday off school, so we’re getting out of dodge.
We’re heading to Tena, a town notheast of here, in the rainforest. And from there we’ll book passage into the heart of darkness–possibly […]
(Preliminary note to my mom: don’t worry. I’m fine.)
Typhoid fever–yes, Typhoid Fever–has hit Cuenca.
A Spanish teacher at my school came down with it a few days ago. She was hospitalized briefly and she’s recovering now. And two people who’d had close contact with her also tested positive. They’re being treated with antibiotics as a […]
Aaron Tassano, a friend I know through my New York pals Nick M. and Russell W. and Reeves H., is teaching English in Busan, Korea. And he’s blogging up a storm. An especially hilarious posting from a few days ago:
Cats are only in Busan because they eat rats. The cats here are wild and can […]
This should be of practical interest to approximately .001% of newley.com’s readership. Nevertheless, if you’re looking to buy a vacation home, check out my adopted hometown, Beaufort, South Carolina.
MSN Money says it’s one of the top 10 American towns for “second-home investments”:
You know Beaufort, even if you’ve never been there. You’ve seen it […]
I’m not writing about Bolivia very much these days, as events there have slowed down; Indigenous protesters are giving Carlos Mesa, the new president, a grace period to see how his new policies shape up.
But Randy Paul and John Smith are keeping tabs on what’s happening in La Paz. I recommend checking out what they […]
A brief anecdote: Last Saturday night, I attended an unbelievable party at my girlfriend Jill A. and my buddy Mike F.’s apartment. It was perhaps the best soiree I’ve been to here at latitude zero.
Jill and Mike live with an Ecuadorian woman; she’s friends with a great number of gay men from Cuenca. The party […]
Opposition leader Evo Morales, who narrowly lost Bolivia’s last presidential election, received a $50,000 peace prize from Muammar Gadhafi last year.
Morales might be anti-Semitic; he’s certainly anti-”foreigners.” “Bolivia’s Jews,” meanwhile, uncertain whether new president Carlos Mesa will survive for long, “are keeping a low profile.”
Turning to the drug issue, Al Giordano reports on Morales’s […]
If you’ve never seen this, feast your eyes on Japanese Cat Costumes. (Scroll down for photos.) Simply unbelievable.
Last May, I met an American woman who lives in Riobamba. She said rumor had it that a munitions plant explosion there this time last year was no accident: lots of people think it was orchestrated by the military in order to hide evidence that the army had sold small arms to Colombia’s FARK rebel […]
A couple interesting items from another poor Andean nation: Ecuador. Home sweet home.
First, the AP’s Gonzalo Solano brings us up to speed on the ChevronTexaco trial. The American gas company is being sued by an Ecuadorian Indigenous group for polluting the rainforest.
And second, a story that’s too good to be true–mainly because, well, it’s fake. […]
The stories from Bolivia this Friday afternoon have one common theme: coca.
Writing in the Atlanta Journal Constitution, Daisy Pareja, a journalist who grew up in Bolivia, reflects on her home country’s future. She concludes that coca is–and will continue to be–the major issue:
…the (coca) farmers are said to be growing many times the amount of […]
In my old job as a Web strategist in DC, I had the pleasure to work with the really smart and friendly (and prolific) folks at the Pew Internet Project.
They publish, with amazing regularity, top-notch research on how people use the Web. Their latest article, which I’m happy to see is getting a lot […]
Evan, from the interesting Anarchogeek Weblog, asks whether or not there’s an RSS feed for Newley.com. The answer: No. But I’d like to have one installed in the coming months. (Here’s some technical info on RSS, an emerging Web communications channel. A more basic overview is here.)
I took yesterday off from covering the happenings in Bolivia; there’ve been some new developments, though, and I’ll get to them after a couple personal notes.
First, congrats to my kid brother Colin and the Beaufort (South Carolina) Academy high school soccer team, who won their second straight state championship yesterday. BA triumphed 2-1 over Greenville’s […]
Calm may have returned to La Paz, but new president Carlos Mesa knows his job is fraught with danger.
The BBC forecasts: “Bolivia’s hastily-appointed new president, Carlos Mesa, has told his cabinet that any mistakes they make could consign the country to the abyss.”
Mesa swore in a new cabinet of political unknowns yesterday. And the New […]