El periodismo cruzeno

I've been blessed with a great guide to Santa Cruz's active news media. Osman, a former reporter and ombudsman for the region's most respected newspaper, El Deber (www.eldeber.com.bo), has dragged me over the past few days to reporter union meetings, newsrooms and a city council meeting in a poor part of town. Seems like there are quite a few people, like Osman, who want to practice serious journalism and are embarrassed by the bikini girls on the front page. It also seems like there are a lot who don't know how to do it. El Deber -- I remind you, the region's most respected newspaper -- had to issue a front page retraction of a profile published last month on a German Catholic bishop. The reporter had written in the story that, "It is said that the priest has a girlfriend and four bastard children." How's that for attribution? Osman is amazed that the author of the story and the three editors who read it are still working at the paper. But he isn't shocked. He was driven from his job as the reader's representative by reporters who resented his attempt at keeping them honest. "I lost all my friends there," he said with a shrug.

The council meeting we attended this morning was one of 12 held each year each of the city's districts. In this case, it was a poor barrio in the western part of town where roads are unmarked and unpaved, the milkman rides in a horse-drawn cart, and kids play in the dirt. Osman was doing a remote dispatch for his brother's morning radio show using a cell phone. The council was an hour late and Osman's brother was left vamping...and taunting the council. Playing recorded sounds of snores, he beckoned them to wake up. His co-host, a guy who talks in a nasal clown voice, accused them of having spent the night dancing the "chuculun" (a raunchy reggaeton dance that has scandalized the country).
Eventually they showed to dodge demands from residents to pave streets, build soccer fields for children, and increase security. Reminded me of New Jersey.

Sonya's scratching her bowler hat

When Bolivia's Miss Universe candidate, a fair-skinned 6-footer from Santa Cruz, was asked by pageant judges last year what a common misconception about her country was, she gave the following answer: Bolivia is primarily "poor people, short people, Indian people." She went on to say that she was from "the other side, from the east ... We're tall, white, and speak English." Needless to say, the comment caused a flap in this country, where outside of Santa Cruz, the majority of citizens are from various indigenous ethnic groups.
In the U.S., not much attention would be given to what a beauty contestant had to say about anything. But middle class cambas are obsessed with Western, big-boobed, bottle blonde beauty. Plastic surgery clinics are almost as common as gyms. And several pages in each of the daily newspapers are devoted to coverage of models and beauty pageants.
So Sonya and I weren't sure what to think when we saw the following photo run in one of the city's newspapers. Was it a progressive step toward inclusion or a mean-spirited poke at the underclass?

To put things in perspective...

Bolivia is the poorest country in South America, is almost all non-white and has some of the most striking scenery anywhere. Santa Cruz is pretty white, pretty wealthy, pretty ugly -- but visitors from North America can live quite well. You're looking at a shot of our living area and the garden outside. We're in the fancy suburb Equipetrol off a strip of bars and restaurants where the rich "Cambas" (that's what Cruzenos like to call themselves) play.

Fun in Bermejo

We had our first excursion from Santa Cruz into real Bolivia on Sunday. We hired a car driven by a nice man named Roy (trill the "r" and it becomes a Spanish name) and drove 80 kms out of town, through orange groves and crowded markets of women in braids and bowlers trading corn for sugar cane for baby goats. We hiked up a dirt path to the rim of a volcano and looked out into a valley of red dirt, a brown river and stone arches like those in Utah. Roy bought us oranges on the ride back, tight little packets of juice and seeds that squirted all over the back seat as we ate. It was nice to have some fresh produce after all the beef and very fried fries we've been eating.