{"id":2119,"date":"2004-02-20T22:51:09","date_gmt":"2004-02-21T02:51:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.law.harvard.edu\/dbnews\/2004\/02\/20\/the-great-experiment-phase-one-reveale"},"modified":"2004-02-20T22:51:09","modified_gmt":"2004-02-21T02:51:09","slug":"the-great-experiment-phase-one-revealed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/dowbrigade\/2004\/02\/20\/the-great-experiment-phase-one-revealed\/","title":{"rendered":"The Great Experiment – Phase One Revealed"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n
\n

The Great Experiment is in the final stage of preparation.
\n The countdown has begun. During the past few days we have become aware
\n that some of our regular readers are worried that their erratic correspondent
\n is
\n about
\n to disappear into South America.<\/p>\n

In order to allay the growing concern and avoid alarmist speculation,
\n let us take this opportunity to unveil the first phase of the three-part
\n Experiment.  Phase One, which starts when we bid a fond adieu to
\n our last batch of students after lunch next Friday, features the Dowbrigade
\n disappearing into South America. This is not a surprising departure for
\n the Dowbrigade; rather it is a return to form.<\/p>\n

Our career as a wandering Jew began when the 17-year-old Dowbrigade,
\n recently and prematurely ejected from East High School (although with
\n a diploma), took off from La Guardia Airport in NYC on his first solo
\n international
\n adventure, headed for Tel Aviv. The Dowbrigade’s family, alarmed
\n at his precocious propensity for getting into trouble, was hoping that
\n a stint of hard manual labor on an agricultural kibbutz in the land of
\n his ancestors would straighten him out. Little did they know.<\/p>\n

For that maiden flight we were seated next to an exotic older woman
\n of maybe 19 who soon into the flight and in casual conversation claimed
\n to have one breast several sizes larger than the
\n other.
\n It
\n was
\n hard to
\n tell through her bulky cable knit sweater, but the claim would later
\n be proven in a cheap Tel Aviv hotel room. Is it any wonder we were immediately
\n hooked on the traveling life?<\/p>\n

Thus began a dizzying
\n career of globe-spanning escapades and narrow escapes, serious research
\n and a concerted search for alternate realities. Over the ensuing 33 years,
\n the Dowbrigade spent roughly half his time outside of the United States,
\n chiefly in Latin America but also Europe, Asia and the Middle East.<\/p>\n

For
\n almost ten years we were the lone Gringo on the faculty of the National
\n University of Peru, until being advised by close friends and colleagues
\n with connections in the Revolutionary Underground that the Maoist Sendero
\n Luminoso suspected the Dowbrigade was in the employ of the dastardly
\n CIA! Omagine! As anyone with a more than passing acquaintance of the
\n Dowbrigade knows that is as ridiculous as speculating that Dick Cheney
\n is a deep cover sleeper agent
\n for Al Queda.  However, Sendero Luminoso is not a bunch of chicos
\n and chicas you want to mess around with, or try to convince of your revolutionary
\n credentials, so deciding discretion was the better part of valor, we
\n left.<\/p>\n

Two years later, at that point on the Harvard faculty, we returned with
\n some colleagues for a conference of our own invention, and were robbed
\n inside
\n of a bank, kidnapped by ANOTHER guerilla group, the Movimeinto Revolucionario
\n Tupak Amaru, and left standing in our underwear in the desert dawn off
\n the Pan-American Highway in northern Peru.<\/p>\n

Despite these setbacks the Dowbrigade continued to travel and work abroad.  Why?
\n Quite simply, we believe that a healthy outlook requires a variety of
\n viewpoints.  In a way impossible to imagine until one has lived
\n outside the US for an extended period, everyone in this country, despite
\n the incredible variety of lives, ages, sexual orientations, political
\n views and family backgrounds, shares a certain version of reality. To
\n a high degree, the American version of reality is painted on a backdrop
\n of constant advertising, corporate realityscaping, major media news and
\n entertainment, and intense cultural chauvinism. This isn’t the only version
\n of reality available.<\/p>\n

Fortunately, by heading for the airport, any citizen of the world with
\n a credit card and a passport can immerse themselves in any one of
\n thousands of alternate realities still existing around the globe today.
\n Since we carry around an encapsulating bubble
\n of
\n our own culture
\n in our clothes, books, gadgets and minds, one needs to spend a bit of
\n time in one of these alternate cultural realities before really "getting"
\n it.  Unfortunately, the supply of these alternate
\n realities is dwindling fast<\/a>, so get out there an experience one before it disappears.<\/p>\n

This time the Dowbrigade is heading for Ecuador, one of our favorite
\n Latin American locales, and the native land of the Sra. Dowbrigade, the
\n lovely Ecuadorian economist Norma Yvonne. We have been a big fan and
\n regular visitor to this Andean wonderland since a stint  of undergraduate
\n research into Shamanism, long before we knew Norma.<\/p>\n

Known primarily as an Andean nation, the true magic of Ecuador is that
\n it includes all three of the major ecosystems of South America – the
\n dry desert coastline, the amazing profusion of human, animal and plant
\n life in the Andes, and the stygian darkness of the planet’s lungs, the
\n Amazon rain forest, all within a friendly, accessible, democratic country
\n slightly smaller than the state of Nevada. In half a day, one can go
\n from an Andean glacier (no lifts but you can cross-country ski) west
\n to a tropical beach, or east to an Amazonian tributary.<\/p>\n

For the first part of his Great Experiment, the Dowbrigade has rented
\n an apartment in Manta, a medium-sized city on the beach in the northern
\n Ecuadorian province of Manabi. It is a popular tourist destination for
\n both Ecuadorians and foreigners and has all the accoutrements of a modern
\n third-world city with few of the problems.  Of crucial imp[ortance
\n to the Dowbrigade, there is a good University and a good tennis club.<\/p>\n

Manta also has a considerable American presence. Although not widely
\n known outside the area, an important part of the US Southern Command
\n displaced from Panama has relocated to an old airforce base in Manta.
\n Two years ago the 12th Division of the US Air Force, under General Mark
\n Randall, set up shop and are using the base for drug interdiction flights
\n and electronic surveillance, supposedly of Colombian cartels and terrorists.
\n Whether having a US military base next door is an advantage or disadvantage
\n remains to be seen, but it is an interesting development and a sign of
\n how hard it is to completely escape the power of the American empire.<\/p>\n

Ecuador is actually one of the countries in the whole world most friendly
\n to the United States. A veritable island of peace and tranquility poised
\n between its problematic neighbors Colombia and Peru, Ecuador has a reputation
\n for adventure tourism, friendly natives and incompetent government. At
\n one point recently they had six Presidents in three months. But prices
\n are low, the economy is wide open, elections are regular and lively,
\n and
\n Americans
\n are welcome.  The Ecuadorians went so far as to adopt the US dollar
\n as their official currency, so there is no complicated exchange rates
\n to deal with.  Your US Bank card will work just fine at the ubiquitous
\n ATM’s.<\/p>\n

Which is not to say that the whole country is some kind of discount
\n Latin American amusement park. It IS still a third world country, and
\n some of the rough edges, unfinished construction, crude capitalism and
\n exposed hypocrisies will grate on American sensibilities, but that is
\n as it should be. And of course, there is corruption everywhere. It is
\n a friendly, smiling, open-faced and open-palmed Latin corruption, almost
\n refreshing in its overtness, but confusing to outsiders used to more
\n indirect and
\n subliminal corruption.<\/p>\n

The key to Latin American corruption is figuring out who to pay off.
\n This can be extremely difficult for an outsider, and mistakes can lead
\n to wasted money, or worse, hurt feelings on the part of someone who can
\n severely mess you up. The solution is simple.  You need a "fixer",
\n someone who knows the ins and outs of local graft.  Properly directed,
\n the payoffs are quite low by US standards and usually product instant
\n solution to problems that can drag on for years in the states.<\/p>\n

There are two kinds of fixers, those motivated exclusively by greed
\n and those who sincerely want to help dumb Gringos for non-financial reasons
\n of their own.  Obviously, fixers of the second type are preferable,
\n as their commissions are lower.<\/p>\n

But we are wandering again, planning for problems which have yet to
\n rear their ugly heads. Summing up, these are the main reasons that the
\n Dowbrigade has decided to take his show on the road:<\/p>\n