The Next Day and two side notes.

We spent 10 hours at Jorge´s house yesterday. He bought tons of meat vegetables potatoes alcohol drinks...etc. and we ate and ate until we couldn´t... and then we ate dinner. We talked about Pinochet (of whom Jorge is a fan) about dams in patagonia, about sharing and the chilean culture of giving and sharing, we talked about european materialism, and we laughed and joked late into the night.
How did this happen? When he dropped us off near Valle Exploradores we hauled all our gear out of the truck and onto the ground and we invited him in for a visit. Then as he got in his truck to leave after hugs and photos he asked us if we had perhaps forgotten anything... no we hadn´t. No sooner had he left then we realized that we had taken his fleece jacket out of the truck by accident. Inside was a cheque for over $2500 OOPS !!! but thankfully the next day he contacted the hostal/camping area by radio (out here its the only way to communicate as there are no phones) and we arranged to bring it back to him after our icy adventures. When we phoned yesterday after arriving here he invited us to his house...

Now what I promised the new vegetarianism. I think most people can imagine why I am vegetarian if I haven´t told them straight up. It is a resource issue and a treatment issue. a) cows, pigs, chickens in canada and the states live in little boxes in their own shit b) they eat corn based products that they are not made to eat and make them sick so they are pumped full of steroids and drugs - unhealthy and painful for them, unhealthy for human beings c) all the corn that is grown takes up space that could be occupied with much more efficiency to feed human beings with fresh fruits and veggies d) the resource output for the growth and cultivation of corn and meat is astronomical - petroleum and water more than anything

So naturally I had always thought that free range was meat and hunted meat were ok because none of this applies. However as I descended into Valle del Diablo a week ago all this changed. Much of northern patagonia was colonized as late as the1930-1950. It was a land grab so the Chilean government gave land for free to anyone who could clear it for cattle. So large enclaves of chileans from around Santiago, as well as germans, french and belgians and yugoslavians colonized the area with their cattle. But how did they clear the old growth native rainforest? They set fire to it. And it burned. The fires raged for almost a decade and over 80% of the forest was burned. Stumps and trunks remain and sides of mountains are falling away due to erosion... and everywhere there are cows... These cows live happy and free but at the massive ecological and environmental expense! While practically I have not changed, I look at free range meat in a different way now, after having seen the direct and recent evidence of the work that is needed to MAKE pasture in the first place.

And now Israel. I like to be open minded. I like to be understanding. I like to love everything and everybody there is. I think this is the way to a better world. And it gives me hope.
Here in Chile and Argentina there are hundreds and thousands of Israelis. Indeed they say that there are no israelis between the age of 20 and 23 in the country because after their 2-3 years obligatory military service they travel. They dress in a certain way, they act in a certain way and lamentable they, like the brithish in spain and the australians in southeast asia, have made a bad reputation for themselves. This is of course a very delicate issue because while this has nothing to do with race or religion people are afraid to speak the truth and want to be politically correct so they think that this sort of talk is racist or antisemitic. It is not. Indeed it says more about the state of Israel and the army, the education system and the indoctrination than anything. My experience with Israelis has been largly negative but there have been some very notable exceptions. I got a ride with a bunch of israelis who had rented a van to do the Carretera Austral and we chatted about all sorts of things and they seemed very nice. But the topic of Palestine was only talked about briefly and superficially and they assured me that they did not "want to all the palestinians to die".

In the Refugio in Valle Exploradores I met three Israeli girls and we began to speak of the sort of diet that Israelis have, the sort of things they eat and so on. Then we got to mentioning the Shabat and how Israeli is completely secular. Then how multicultural it is. Then I went for it: "If neither religion nor origin unites you as israelis, what does?" the answer? suffering at the hands of the rest of the world, always and forever. Perpetual victims. This left me no other option but to speak of Palestine and to speak of others´suffering at the hands of the Israelis. It was like a hurricane. They began to yell at me (kindly, but lecturing) saying that having experienced it, the army, the military, the checkpoints the fear of rockets from the terrorists they knew. Israel is trying to help the Palestinians, they feel bad for them, they give them resources try to set up schools... it is a shame that the terrorists and Iran (YES the conspiracy the the Isreali intilligence tells its country is that Iran is behind everything) are the problem. And so my response was yes I agree they are a problem but they are angry for a reason and their poor behaviour, their violence does not require retaliation against children. They told me that anything that I see on television about Israelis killing civilians is a lie - they would know because they were in the army. It is all a conspiracy, the Iranian government and the terrorist organizations control western media and besides, it is the civilians faults for being killed by Israeli artillery because Israel sends a message to the houses that they are about to destroy to tell them to vacate their own homes, therefore it is their fault for getting killed.

At this point, speaking with apparently rational people, I lost hope completely. This issue will never be solved with this level of brainwashing and control. Indeed, at the end of our conversation one of the girls said "I think that if I had your knowledge - because you know a lot more than most people - and I didn´t live in Israel, I would think the same way as you." She admitted in effect, that she was brainwashed. This is a sad comment.

All we can do is continue to love people and maybe this will become contagious, because victimization, hate and deception do not seem to work.