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 The
World War of Beauty has come to Quito, and the Grand Dame of the Andes
is dressed for the Gala, with flowers in her hair, and flowers
everywhere. On June 1 the live telecast of the Miss Universe contest
will, for the space of three hours, place Ecuador squarely in the sights
and screens of beauty-contest fans around the world. Of course,
the live broadcast of the "finals" is only the climax of two weeks of
touring, talent, bathing suit, national dress and high fashion competitions,
which are taking place now around Ecuador to the delight and voyeuristic
fascination of the public.
Last night we walked around the historic center of Quito, and the differences
from the last time we were here, six years ago, were remarkable. The
improvements predate the Miss Universe event, and are largely the work
of Quito’s activist mayor, Paco Moncayo. The colonial architecture of
the center of the city has been restored and rehabilitated. Public squares
which on our last visit were teeming with delinquents, thieves and heaps
of trash are now safe, clean and accessible. Places we were previously
warned to stay away from are now world-class tourist attractions, populated
by families, working-class citizens and hand-holding couples until late
at night. Of course, the delinquency and seamy underbelly of the city
has not been eliminated, just moved to a more peripheral and less visible
part of Quito.
But this week the beauty of these reclaimed areas has been bolstered
by an intense campaign of public cleanliness, best-foot-forward hospitality,
and thousands and thousands of flowers. The flower industry is
Ecuador’s lone export-oriented success over the past few decades. By
uniting hundreds of small producers into a united exportation corporation,
Ecuador has become a major player in world flower production. An
industry which barely existed 20 years ago has become a major export,
and Ecuadorian flowers are now much in demand in major cities and world
capitals throughout America and Western Europe.
Mostly as a marketing ploy (but after all, what else is the Miss
Universe contest?), the city is festooned in Ecuadorian flowers. They
are around the lampposts, draped from balconies, hanging from trees and
flagpoles, decorating the plazas and narrow, cobblestone streets. They
come in all shapes and sizes, floral flags of the national colors red,
yellow and blue, garlands on statues, cascades of blooms pouring from
fountains. There are royal red asters, cinderella and amor astermerias,
million-stars gypsofilias, belladonna delphiniums, freesias in multicolored
displays of gradients and speckled petals, and of course the roses. What
roses! Over three hundred varieties, in every color of the rainbow, colors
without names, colors unknown until now outside of Ecuadorian nurseries. There
is even a "Miss Universe" variety, developed exclusively for the pageant.
On top of the intoxicating wafts of flower power on the mountain atmosphere,
there is a remarkable feeling of celebration and harmony in air. People
are being NICE to each other, and the newspapers are astonishingly clear
of the usual collection of strikes, protests, gang violence, irate citizens,
political strife and petty squabbling. Knowing that a temporary
truce has been declared by all political and social sectors for the duration
of the international spotlights lingering on the nation, a rare national
consensus to leave a good impression, only heightens the sense of dreamlike
liberation.
Unfortunately, this is the only good side of the whole phenomena of
international beauty pageants as far as we can see. In general, we consider
them crass commercial reminders of the inherent sexism of our patriarchal
society, an objectification of the female form and a case study of the
marketing of feminine mystique. But its hard to be a sourpuss when everybody
else is smiling, and the streets are awash in flowers. We have decided
to allow anthropological adaptation to trump political consciousness
for the duration, and go with the flow.
from El
Commercio
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