Just when I thought I wouldn’t have anything to talk about today, I am received by a Godsend resting comfortably in my email inbox. Ironically, I was going to publish a piece called “Panamanians and Education,” but then I saw this and I decided it would be a great preface to the article so without further adieu, here goes nothing: I’ve had the site up for a while now and I’ve become somewhat (in)famous for being someone who speaks his mind, and I do so in the most unconventional of methods with no subtleties or sugarcoating. I love it; I love that I have a space where I can speak my mind about everything that bothers me about me, the situations I’m in and my country in such a way that I can get a reaction out of people so that they do something in order to make their own situations better. In a way, that’s kind of the indirect results of blogging and I’m very happy that this site aces the reactionary aspect. Now, seeing as I’m stationed in Panama, a country whose first language is Spanish but most of the population with access to a computer has a passive knowledge/understanding of English due to our blooming economy and the subsequent job requirements it entails, I’ve ran into some readers that really loathe the things I say primarily because either a) people hate it when they’re called out on their defects, and b) they don’t understand the concept I’m trying to communicate in full because it’s in English and they’re native Spanish speakers, leading to grave misunderstandings. Today, I will address (once again) how irrationally stupid grown men and women can be if given the proper misguided incentive. I did a piece months ago alluding to “The ‘Juega Vivo’ Culture” which I think is a great piece, if a little rambly… it sparked from a post CaDs made just a few days prior or so and it got me to think so I naturally vented in this very public medium. Today I get a comment from someone named “Enuff is Enuff” saying the following:

Enuff is enuff Said:

January 23rd, 2007 at 6:47 am

There are blogs in the US that are helping people denounce different types of bad behavior like infidelity, late night loud parties at neighbors, etc. They have had a good response. For this I have created a blog NO AL JUEGA VIVO so that people can go on there and denounce whoever does a juega vivo move just like rob-rivera did. I hope he does not feel proud being part of the problem and not of the solution.

I read the comment and then proceeded, in the most natural fashion, to do the following: I chuckled, thinking it’s always great to know you have a fan. Second, I thought it was hilarious that she wrote my name with a hyphen, just like in the URL of this here site; kind of makes it seem like my first name is Rob-Rivera. As in: “Hello! My name is Rob-Rivera Rivera.” I should practice my “people’s eyebrow” and refer to myself in the third person for the full effect. Third, and this one’s the most important, was that this lady (I don’t really know if she’s a lady for sure, but my spider-sense tells me she is so what the hell. Besides, I don’t have any mythical monsters to pin on her at the moment so whatever. That’s double the indifference for you, son!) has once again proved to me how moronic some Panamanians can be. It’s happened a lot around these parts that people who want to pick a flame war with yours truly tend to be people who read all of the things I point out that are bad about the country, but when I immediately talk about ways people can stop being/doing said bad things they magically jump over those chunks of rhetoric so all they get out of at the end of my piece (heh-heh.) is how much they will strike upon me with great vengeance and furious anger those who would attempt to point and destroy their brothers (i.e. myself). Now, this would be fine and dandy if they had read the whole fucking article.

In the piece I talk about the most hands-on use of corruption I’ve used and that would be the cell phone I had during my high school years. I’m not gonna talk about it here, but what I am going to mention is a comment that I received a little after the piece got out that I thought was very thought-provoking and hits the nail on the head in regards to what the hell I’m trying to do with this chunk of digital hogwash… I know present to you the comment Gustavo posted that one time:

Gustavo Gordon Guerrero Said:

October 9th, 2006 at 10:26 pm

Hello, I do concur with most of what u say, but at the same time, I think you are contradicting yourself, or is that your example of the cell phone is just an example? My point is, are you just criticizing or trying to make things better in our country? are u taking care of this? if you are, mosh, please let me know, i would love to help but if your article is just to criticize, i think is not that helpful…

That is how you comment on a blog post. Look, if you’re going to hurl shit across the room like a rabid circus monkey then the least you could do is post an email address where the author can get back to you. Or, just for common decency or better yet, proof that you’re got balls, state your whole name. Show your face. This is why I despise anonymous users or people that have a real problem with showing who they really are. Then again, anonymous users tend to be terminally retarded as Gustavo’s comment is very centered and thoughtful. Even if I did single out the phone as an example of the Panamanian “juega vivo” construct, his point is very valid: it’s only fair that people practice what they preach and in my own way I try to do my best… hopefully 2007 will be proof of that. Anyway, “Enuff is Enuff” thinks I’m part of the problem because she can’t read worth a damn. I’d actually feel insulted if it weren’t because of her total lack of comprehension of the English language… in fact, it’s not that what bothers me because I run into people who have trouble interpreting the language all the time and it’s fine; the problem I have with these people is that they take the part they don’t like and assume it’s what the whole article/rant is about, creating a very misinformed opinion of my point of view. So then they post on the comments section and come off as dumb idiots, I make an ass out of them because they deserve it and presto! I’ve won myself a brand new super villain. Awesome! I think I’ll have a Sinister Six by the time my birthday comes around… hell, maybe this girl and the “Men in Panama” lady are related. I’ll tell miss “Enuff is Enuff” that if she thinks I’m part of the problem then she should buy and mail me this t-shirt; I’ll wear it with pride. Now, a quick DNS look-up tells me that her IP is from Spain so that reinforces my belief that the “juega vivo” thing is universal and a much more powerful source that I had ever imagined… either that or she’s at work and has promptly redirected her Internet to bypass a firewall or two. Also, she could be Panamanian and in Spain which would explain a lot but all of this rambling and assuming makes my head spin no matter what the topic so I’ll just move on by saying that this person should learn how to read.

I googled ‘NO AL JUEGA VIVO’ but sadly came up with no results regarding the blog she mentions. I even trolled around Blogs Panama to see if I could find it there but nothing… frankly, I’m disappointed. If you’re out there, miss, please post the URL of your blog on the comments section or better yet! Go to PortoDiao.com and we’ll be happy to help you get started. Personally I think that the whole denouncing thing is a great idea and if it helps alleviate some of the sprawling mess we’ve got going for ourselves as a country then I’d be very glad to help. Now, about me being part of the problem…

Truth of the matter is that we all are part of the problem. Do you know how many people I know that actually went through both the theoretical and practical exams in order to get their driver’s license without having to pay some crooked cop (or several) so that they don’t fail your ass? Two. Hell, I know people who have had gun possession charges removed because they “knew a guy.” A fast way to get out of a ticket is 5 bucks or a meal, every time. Hell, sometimes cops will stop you for no good reason because they’re broke and they’re hungry like that time I got pulled over… and that’s just with the police, people. I have trust issues with authority because all of the authority figures in my country are corrupt. I know of legal cases where they should’ve been a done deal ages ago, but when the accused (and guilty) parties are big banking conglomerates all verdicts fall in their favor because the judges are corrupt. There’s this restaurant around where Magnus lives that was caught red-handed with the most atrocious health standards I’ve ever heard of: cooked rice sitting under the leaky drain pipes of a kitchen sink, roaches the size of huskies running up the walls, 2-week old chicken piles on the floor, ready to be cooked and served, no gloves, no sanitation, nothing! They got closed down, and less than a week later the place re-opened because they magically “met all the standards requested from the Ministry of Health.” Nigga please. Just this morning I saw a news report about how a law was recently passed that prohibited alcohol in busses contracted by people who want to go to the beach; they showed images of people pushing in cases of beer, ice and rum from the emergency doors of several busses and then caught the chief of inspection at that very checkpoint saying they didn’t find any alcohol in any of the busses. In the fucking hell, brother. If our authority figures are this crooked and blatantly corrupt, how is someone in their right mind going to let themselves get fucked over? Well, by outsmarting the smartass, of course. And, as I’ve said many a time before, the “juega vivo” culture is born out of this mentality and it’s a vicious cycle that seems to have no end.

So… what do we do to stop it? We can call the noble knight within ourselves and just refuse to feed our brother’s blood machine but what’s the use of taking the high road when everyone else in the playing field is playing dirty? As I talked about earlier, the problem here is not that our fellow man has this practice up his sleeve, but it’s the circumstances as to why he has to… namely, our authority figures doing the same thing, and the only thing that separates us from them is that they have money or power, using them both to further themselves up the food chain. So, any common thinking person with his back against the wall will be 100 times more concerned with getting themselves out of the suck rather than you. Survival of the fittest is the rule of this cutthroat land, and because of it is why it will be inherently hard to change things overnight… you have the government which is a corrupt entity full of scoundrels that are more concerned with filling their own pockets rather than throw us a bone, we people who put them there to begin with. They make it so that foreign investors make us into our hemisphere’s version of India, where we work ridiculous hours for peanuts and we can’t dare complain because our asses are fired the second we show discomfort, looking for the most idiotic excuses to kick us out on the curb in the worst possible situation they can put us in; no matter what type of retaliation we strike upon them they will always be on the upper hand because the Ministry of Work is in their pocket, turning a blind eye as they cock-stab us up our collective poop shoots with shitty pay, no overtime and doing things they have no licenses for. If you, by the off chance that you have a passing knowledge of English, and I say off-chance because most of the population (or at least a big part of it) has concocted the most moronic display of patriotism I have seen in my life by fighting the notion that maybe it should be a good idea for our children to be able to learn English in public schools screaming out “gringos go home” even though we use their currency, products and services every waking moment of the day and don’t complain about those; you want that Ford pick-up truck so you try getting a job, being told that the utter fiasco that is college will actually get you a decent paying gig at whatever field it is you want to have a career on, which is of course, a lie because more and more people are graduating without knowing a God damn thing of what they were supposed to be taught by incompetent “teachers” that care more about their paychecks than to pass on their knowledge to future generations. So, you take that Engineering degree in quantum physics with NASA certification and apply for work at a call center that sells calling cards or whatever the fuck because you need the money and you go with hopes that you’ll get the gig when an 18-year old girl that’s dumber than navel lint but with breasts bigger than your head waltzes into the manager’s office for an interview… she gets the job you didn’t want but was meant for you, and a little part of your soul dies.

You don’t have connections, but you’ve done everything by the books and that’s got to count for something, right? Right? You’ve done everything exactly the way you should’ve, with no shortcuts nor loops nor anything of the sort but you’re getting the shaft anyway and you have to eat, you have to pay the bills and something’s got to give because if you don’t you’ll die but the government won’t give you a job because that’s not what they’re there for; you voted for them because they would make it easier for you to live a better life but instead they’ve took it upon themselves to make their own lives easier at your expense. Do you feel the sting yet? How do you get the daily bread if, in the most blatant example of cosmic irony in the history of man, you’re playing by the rules but aren’t seeing results? What do you do? Do you play by the same rules everyone else uses to cheat the system or do you rob? Do you kill? Perhaps you’d rather use the diploma as fuel for your bonfire as you spend the rest of your days sleeping on the sidewalk. You don’t want that. Nobody does… people want to get paid! Screw your fellow man, as long as you get what’s yours then everything’s peachy, right? This “me first” bullshit needs to stop but what do you do to halt things when everyone’s in on it?

I believe there needs to be a sociocultural reboot of such a massive proportion that it’s almost utopist of me to bring it up. How can a society that encourages chauvinistic, macho behavior ever see anything past its near-sightedness? I know women, beautiful women who let themselves get beaten up by their boyfriends. What in the fucking hell am I supposed to do when I step in and punch this idiot’s clock when this girl, my friend, decides to stay with him after he’s made a Picasso painting out of her face? What happens when people like the abuse? Why the hell bother? I have my own problems for me to go out of my way for people who like their doses of masochism.

Panama is a country that can teach you one of two things: it shows you how genuine and kind-hearted people can be when you give them a chance, but it can also teach you to trust no one. What a bittersweet reality, the one we live in. No one assumes responsibility; it’s infuriating how everyone being shown on the news points fingers when it hits the fan without having the courage to own up to their mistakes. This is why the country is the way it is: a beautiful paradise on the outside with plenty of promise, but with a cesspool of malice rotting everything under the surface.

We, the Panamanian people, showcase our “Juega Vivo” mentality all the time: have you sat down and watched the news any day of the week? I submit myself to the excruciating exercise day in and day out because even though I loathe the shit-hurling I see in the dailies, I do it because if I don’t then I feel I don’t have the right to complain. There is no other word for it: it’s infuriating how you see people block off the streets when they oppose something they don’t even understand completely… every other day some idiot group blocks off some main artery of our transit infrastructure and deliberately creates chaos, screwing everyone else over because their demands have to be met. It’s always like this, and they hide behind false reasons that sound very poetic and above themselves when all they want is for the government (it’s always the government) to throw them a bone… because that’s when they can’t help themselves. It’s like “Juega Vivo” by being the exact opposite of “Juega Vivo!” We’ve made this into an art! Quick example: the worker unions were all up in arms when the Panama Canal expansion plan was being subjected to a national vote, and they were heralding the “NO” vote giving reasons that it’s anti-patriotic, that the government is lying about what they want to do with the project, that it’ll cost more than they say, that they want to steal money, that we as citizen can’t let them get away with such travesty, that we should be smarter , that we should say “NO” to a government that promised security, work and prosperity and has provided none to us (as if we were going to receive them in a fruit basket on out doorsteps or something) and the more the government ignored them, the louder they would beat their drums… but then… but then, the government told them they’d get jobs. And free workshops to learn what would be needed for the project. Suddenly, the Panama Canal expansion plan is the most brilliant idea in the history of the fucking universe. Give me a GOD DAMN break.

Rob Rivera is part of the problem, sir or madam? I should be the least of your concerns, and there’s a lot of work to be done.

UPDATE: Had to rewrite some of it as my template pulled my dick this morning for shits and giggles and “misplaced” some of the text. It’s not as angry as the original chunk that got lost but maybe that’s a good thing. Please, comment below!

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