Blogs & Ecology

Chevrolet and NatGeo have launched a reality show that mixes driving, tourism, gadgets and blogging throughout South America. On The Road Again follows 6 bloggers in 6 different countries, driving around, taking tours and documenting their experiences through streaming video, blog posts and pictures, and it will later on be featured on a NatGeo channel show. Leo Prieto from Chile writes:

Today Venezuela is taking part in elections for mayors and governors. These elections will paint the political map between States and Municipalities aligned with President Hugo Chávez or not. These results depends largely on Chávez' popularity and can determine whether he tries to reform the Constitution once again allowing for reelection in 2012.

Venezuelan bloggers and twitter users are covering the election with the tag #23N (November 23). One can see the various tweets that are already using this tag.

This week in El Salvador, hundreds of technology fanatics have assembled in the capital of San Salvador to take part in the latest edition of Campus Party. The event gathers participants “with their computers with the goal of share their worries, exchange experiences and take part in all types of activities related to communication and new technologies.

Ancla2 is an educational cooperative devoted to teaching photography, technology, and media skills to children from a wide variety of communities in Venezuela. According to Ancla2, when children encounter images through photography, it is a way to discover their inner self and to value their physical and interior spaces. Thanks to Ancla2, many children from small and poor communities in Venezuela have discovered a new way to see and appreciate their own surroundings, and at the same time, have learned new life skills that will help them in many other areas.

On this second installment on the Myths, Lore and Legends of Latin America, we will get to know the Venezuelan Animas and their unfinished business, the Sayona and the Whistler, and Ecuadorian myths such as the foundation myth of Guayas and Kil, Father Almeida, the Headless Priest, the gagones (something similar to familiars) and the Cantuña Cathedral myth. You can read Part 1 here.

Simón Bécquer from the Alternative Reality blog in his post The Converse Shoes of the Socialist Youth [es] shows us the images for the new campaign for Venezuela's Socialist Youth, in which young people are asked to step into socialist shoes. However, these shoes, modelled and shown by President Chávez himself are oddly familiar: they are a red knock-off of the popular US brand Converse Chuck Taylor All Stars, with the PSUV logo instead of the traditional red and blue star.

Armed military soldiers searched for José Miguel Vivancos, spokesperson for the international NGO Human Rights Watch, and expelled him from Venezuela hours after releasing the report at a press conference, “A Decade Under Chávez: Political Intolerance and Lost Opportunities for Advancing Human Rights in Venezuela,” which included critical commentary about the administration of Hugo Chávez.

Luis Carlos Díaz of Periodismo de Paz [es] writes about the recent workshop of the use of web 2.0 in the community of Carabobo, Venezuela. Here, students learned the use of Google maps, Wikipedia and other participatory media tools.

(Photo: sonofgroucho.) At the beginning of August, Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez and his colleagues from Argentina and Brazil spoke about Latin American integration and Chavez threw an ambitious idea out: a train that would connect Venezuela's capital (Caracas) with Argentina's (Buenos Aires), and cities in between.

Citizen media videos have been uploaded informing of the situation arising in Venezuela between the Yukpa Indians of the Perijá Mountains, landowners and President Chávez. This dispute over land limits is 30 years in the making, when military forces displaced the Indigenous communities of the Yukpa by force and established landowners who have cattle ranches and have been working the lands ever since.

On the 91st anniversary of his birth, Antonio Lauro is remembered as one of the most representative ways that culture can become part of one's identity. A very talented composer born in Ciudad Bolívar, Venezuela, Lauro composed waltzes and other pieces for guitar. These pieces are often played by a lot of famous national and international guitarrists.

The roads are deathly quiet. Antonio Perez’s shabby old taxi carefully makes its way along the main highway into Caracas. Yet terror is only yards ahead…

Image via kimmco

Photo by Rußen and used under a Creative Commons license.

Venezuelans say goodbye to another of their poets in times when they need them the most. On June 6th, enthusiasts of literature and arts in Venezuela received the sad news of the death of one of the most important and influential writers in the last years: Eugenio Montejo.

In 2007, when President Hugo Chávez announced that he was going to begin the “5 engines for the construction of socialism in Venezuela,” he did not know that one year later that he would be changing speeds or in some cases, going in reverse. The socialist revolution in the petroleum-producing country appears to have some difficulties in the attempt to govern in order to resolve the country's most serious problems.

Last year, President Hugo Chávez anounced the elimination of admission tests to get into universities in Venezuela. They will be substituted by a National System of Admission. This new system must, according to the experts, create a social value, be practical, and be feasible with the country's resources. It must also be part of the public policies regarding Higher Education

Every year around 400,000 students seek to be admitted in Venezuelan public universities. Unfortunately, it is not possible to satisfy every demand, which leads to the discussion of how to assign students to a specific program based on certain criteria…but which criteria?