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South America is a land of varied cultures and once-in-a-lifetime sights and sounds. More specifically, the continent is home to many of the world’s finest volunteer and study abroad programs located anywhere on the globe. The continent’s favorable exchange rate, temperate climate and host of health and educated-related volunteer opportunities make it the perfect destination for recent high school graduates, Gap Year students, and professionals taking a career break; who may be looking to enrich their own lives and the lives of others.
Anyone over the age of 18 can volunteer their time in South America to great effect. Why should you consider a volunteer work program in South America? Here are 5 great reasons giving the gift of your time and experience may be one of the most fulfilling things you ever do:
1. Learn a language: While volunteering in South America you will be working with local people while becoming immersed in the local language. One of the fastest ways to learn a new language is by immersion, or the daily hearing and practicing of the new language. Learning a second language is a valuable life skill as well. With the growing number of Spanish immigrants in the United States, learning Spanish is a valuable commodity on the American job market. A number of other languages are spoken in South America, so you are not limited to only learning Spanish. Check with your volunteer coordinator as to what languages are predominately spoken in the area you will be volunteering.
2. Enjoy a new culture: South America has a vibrant, colorful, culture that you will enjoy while volunteering. Getting to know the local people will open your eyes to a new world of thought, food, and cultural entertainment. People that live in an area always know the best kept secrets, such as good restaurants and beautiful sightseeing locations, which you can investigate during your spare time. With its own languages, festivals, music, sports, art, theatre, and holidays, South America has a variety of avenues of interest for you to explore and learn about.
3. Invest in your health: Volunteering is good for the soul. Many people who have volunteered have come out of the experience with a new found look on life. Giving has always made people feel better, and what better way to give than your time? There are many areas in South American, such as Argentina, that are in need of volunteers to help build communities and provide training in life skills. As is the case in most of South America, Argentina volunteer programs are particularly geared to the area of health care and assisting children.
4. Help improve our Global Community: With the advancement of the internet and increased international TV stations, the world is becoming smaller and smaller. We are no longer alone in our corner of the world, but have become part of a Global Community. Volunteering in a foreign country promotes goodwill and understanding, improving our community as a whole. The more we understand and learn about other parts of the world, the more we grow as a world community.
5. Improve your job skills: Some companies find volunteering a valuable asset to have listed on your resume, it shows them that you are a caring and dedicated individual. Other companies even have programs that allow you time off to volunteer. While volunteering in South America you will make new friends and contacts thru the program coordinators, other volunteers, and the local people. Meeting new people opens your eyes to new ideas and concepts that will provide you with a different way of looking at your work environment.
Making a difference in the world can be as simple as one person volunteering his or hers time to benefit the life of another. South America is a great place to see first-hand the incredible benefit of this simple concept in action. Volunteer in South America and make a difference you can be proud up. Summer volunteer work program positions can fill up ahead of time – so if coming between June and August, try to decide on your summer program and sign up as early as possible. What are you waiting for, make a difference today!
I still remember the early morning of November 4, 2008, as the US Presidential election results started pouring in, I realized that something unbelievably historic was happening in America. I just couldn’t stop wondering how a Black – African American (since so many mails and messages have told me!) – could become the President of the United States of America; the same country that had earlier re-elected George Bush as the President! The whole experience was so tumultuous! I couldn’t help recall old books about America that I had read. Books about the Civil War that President Abraham Lincoln had presided over; the war that eventually resulted in the emancipation of blacks. As I wrote in my editorial in The Sunday Indian on November 9, 2008, my favourite book, of course, was Uncle Tom’s Cabin. The book – which passionately documented the immense pain of black slaves – is perhaps the greatest read for any human wishing to understand the meaning of the term ‘depth of character’, and is guaranteed to bring tears to your eyes. And on January 21, 2009, I relived the whole gamut of those emotions seeing Barack Hussein Obama emotionally taking his oath to become the 44th President of the United States of America. That day again, I actually felt that historical figures like Lincoln and Stowe did have the biggest path-breaking roles to play in changing the character of modern day America.
My appreciation for Obama is immense, and this appreciation does not simply come from his becoming the President; but from his becoming President for all the right reasons. He demanded change from his fellow Americans, not simply in economic outlook or policy orientation, but in something graver; he beseeched them to realise that in the hardships of today should not be forgotten the intensity of the American character of past. Despite all research to the contrary – that a Black presidential candidate stood no chance against the white combine of America – Obama committed passionately to his steadfast belief that American character was deeper than suspected, wider than speculated and more intense than believed by Americans themselves… and he won… a win that is not only as brilliant as the brilliance of all his outstanding speeches combined – for I have rarely seen a more powerful and emotional orator than him – but a win that mirrors Obama’s greatness as proved by his commandingly devastating books – for Obama is great not just because of the words he speaks, but because of the greatness of the words that he has written in his books, which conclusively prove his magnificent character. I go as far as to say, and perhaps demand, that after his eight years as US President (!), Obama should be made the Secretary General of the United Nations for at least a decade more; for the world needs as amazing a leader as Barack Obama if we ever want to even take a shot at one day having true global peace and equitable development of the masses.
But even as I write this, Obama faces daunting challenges in Asia. And the least of those challenges that I’m worried about is Obama’s illogical disposition towards the outsourcing conundrum, with respect to specifically India. Obama has flatly commented that he wishes to restrict the outsourcing business to countries like India. But Obama, for all the gallery motivating statements, would fail double time on this issue. To discourage government departments from outsourcing is one thing, but forcing most competitive American multinationals to follow the example? Leave in high end software consulting and development, in this era of economic deceleration, there is no way that sensible global corporations would follow Obama think to stop IT outsourcing to India simply because of a patriotic appeal, especially when the cost benefits are dramatically expansive, sometimes even reaching 90% cost reductions.
Obama’s biggest challenges lie rather in foreign policy in Asia. And I have many questions. In Iran, Obama faces his predicament, as Bush faced supposedly in Iraq. Iran, and its clearly undiplomatic-mouthed President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, have regularly threatened the US about their intentions to go nuclear. Obama’s challenge lies in the Iran Libya Sanctions Act (after which came the present Iran Sanctions Act), which was in reality put in place in 1995 by the Bill Clinton establishment. The question is, will Obama go against this Act to create his own new liberal politico-think? That has a very slim chance of happening. And under what logic will Obama justify to Iran – which technically has a democratically elected government and was even a close ally of America till 1979 – that a nuclear deal can be signed with India but not with Iran?
And that leaves Obama with a neighbouring headache, remnants of the Bush era – Iraq! Obama has claimed he’s ready to pullout troops from Iraq and relocate them to Afghanistan. And this when the Afghan President Karzai has implored Obama to stay out of Afghanistan… How then would Obama ensure that the weekly bloodied ethnic battles between Shias and Sunnis in Iraq – which occur despite US presence – would not become more regular, god forbid daily? Will Obama also come clean about past US mistakes and reimburse to Iraq the losses they have suffered on account of stolen oil, a devastated economy and a destroyed society, all because of the US? I suspect Obama will not!
If there is North Korea that is threatening to go nuclear for a second time – and Obama’s predecessors have tried everything from hardball to soft pedal the Kim Jong clan – then there is China that is so strong economically that forget criticising China’s clear human right indiscretions, Obama might have to look towards them for an economic bailout in the future. If there are Arabs who’ve been well fed on US money for years and were the main reasons for inflation (by manipulating oil prices to reach historic highs), then there is Israel that only needs a justifiable excuse and a bloodthirsty Hamas to bomb everything in sight in Palestine. Will Obama come out strongly against all of them, now that he is the President? Slim chance again…
And perhaps the worst expected response of the Obama camp will be to the Pakistan issue. Will Obama continue to irrationally mollycoddle India to ‘take it easy’ despite huge casualties in the Mumbai attacks and despite clear evidence of the Pakistan administration’s complicity? I believe that the spineless Indian politicians will actually make his task easier. But the truth is that if Obama, like his ill valued predecessor, continues to finance Pakistan and its leaders in spite of their being a terrorist state, a major part of the Indian populace – which fervently wants to believe in him – would lose complete faith in him and the values that he stands by. For in his response to terror in Asia – especially in the Pakistan-India conflict – lies his biggest nemesis. Slight Pakistan, and Obama risks losing a critical geographical military beachhead in attacking al-Qaeda targets in border regions. Slight India, and Obama risks losing long term support from an economic superpower of the future.
Unfortunately, to top it all, Obama’s fight to save the American economy would take precedence over every other global issue; for the solution to the current slowdown will require a long term structural repair program engineered by global governments, and Obama’s focus would completely be diverted to this issue for most of his first term at least. And that is the irony of it all; that though the world expects gargantuan change from a person who personifies the promise resounding in his words, most of the change would occur in the American continent only. And Asia, for most of it, will remain unchanged… lakhs would continue dying of poverty, many more would suffer ill-health, and lakhs more would succumb fatally to hunger. Asia will sadly remain unchanged.
But that in no way takes away an iota from Obama the fact that history, and future, will never remain the same. In my November 9, 2008, editorial, I was compelled to write: “Above all, it is the United States of America which won today at least the hearts of millions like me all over the world, because today, America has shown that it has in it to finally give respect to a black man at the highest level possible; and this surely will change world history forever.” Today, in Barack Hussein Obama, I see Uncle Tom’s deep emotion resounding in the dream of Martin Luther King Jr., a dream that had beseeched the character of Americans to change to a moment in history when a man would be judged by the content of his character and not by the colour of his skin. Today, in Barack Hussein Obama, I see that undeniable moment in history… And I would not give that up for anything!
Blurbs:
1. There is no way that global corporations would follow Obama’s call to stop IT outsourcing to India.
2. Will Obama continue to mollycoddle India to ‘take it easy’ despite clear evidence of Pakistan’s complicity?
Having a week-long vacation is what everybody wants to enjoy and experience. For a few days, they will be spared from all the paperwork and stress brought about by their job. And when thinking about the holidays, they usually end up going to the typical vacation destinations where many other tourists go to. As a result, they also end up paying a high price for the air fare, hotel rates, and even at the restaurants. So if you want to have a different vacation, why not try spending your holidays in Playa de las Americas instead?
More often than not, tourists want to have a relaxing vacation under the sun. There are numerous natural beaches that can be found here in Playa de las Americas. But there are also man-made beaches that are covered with dark sand as well. Hotels and restaurants are flourishing in areas near the beaches of Playa de las Americas. Therefore, you will not have a hard time looking for a place to stay, even if you do not book a room in advance.
Shopping for souvenirs and other items are part of the whole vacation. And here in Playa de las Americas, there are a wide array of shops where you can purchase duty-free goods including gadgets, clothes, perfumes, and more. One of the best ways to get a great bargain while shopping here in Playa de las Americas is to haggle. Sometimes, the salesmen are quite aggressive when it comes to selling their goods. But keep in mind that there are numerous shops selling the same items and they can offer it to you in a lower price. If you want affordable items, you can head to Torviscas Market during Thursdays and Saturdays. However, you must be an early bird so you can get the best items and avoid the crowds.
Unless you rent an apartment with a kitchen, dining out is probably one of the main activities that you will partake in while you are on vacation. You can choose from a wide array of restaurants. Some of the top-rated restaurants that you must try include the Folias, El Molino, Restaurante Chino Yue Lai, and the Blanco Vista. These are usually quite expensive when compared to the other restaurants that you can find anywhere in the Playa de las Americas. You may also opt to dine at the restaurants near the beach. Stalls sell freshly grilled seafood, where you can also watch TV shows at the same time. The foods at the beachfront restaurants are varied. You may even get to order authentic Indian as well as Chinese cuisines – if you feel like tasting one.
The nightlife here in Playa de las Americas is also thriving. If you are up for a nocturnal holiday, there are tons of nightclubs that you can go to by the time the sun sets. More often than not, these clubs are open until the wee hours of the morning. So you can still stay up until the restaurants are ready to serve breakfast.
Theatre in Latin America was already established even before the Europeans arrived to the continent. The inhabitants of Latin America had their own practices, festivals, and ceremonials. They involved dance, singing of poems, song, theatrical spoof, mime, acrobatics, and magic performances. The entertainers were trained; they dress in costumes, makeup, masks and toupees. Platforms had been assembled to make visibility better. The ‘sets’ were garlanded with plants, branches from trees and other natural items.
The Europeans exploited this to their benefit. For the first fifty years subsequent to the conquest the missionaries made use of theatres widely to proliferate the Christian doctrine to inhabitants accustomed to the image and oral quality of show. It was more efficient to use the indigenous styles of communication than to put a conclusion to the ‘pagan’ customs, the conquerors grabbed the substance of the spectacles, maintained the trappings, and exercised them to express their own message.
At first the roles played in these austere religious performances such as the nativity as well as the adoration of the Magi were acted by priests in the shelter of the church. However, as the anthology of the Church grew to embrace the passion and crucifixion of Jesus Christ, the Church was threatened with the predicament of how a priest should represent Herod. While sharing of opinion in the Church persisted as to the worth of theatrical interpretations, the constituents of the congregation undoubtedly enjoyed and were encouraged by them. The dramas persisted to grow, moving out of the Churches and into the open areas in front of the Church. Eventually, the members of town society began to play a role on these dramas, which persisted to grow more sophisticated with time. Known as passion dramas, miracle performance and morality acting, they continued their unrelenting close relationship with the Church and church festivals, but began to institute elements of typical characters that were more current in nature.
Throughout the 16th & 17th centuries the Latin theatre increased –with religion as its primary foundation. During the 16th century, they celebrated a religious festival three times annually regarded as the Corpus Christie festival which highlights the power of the Church. At the celebration, they performed dramas known as autos sacramentales. The autos sacramentales had some of the features of morality plays as well as some features of cycle plays, and they presented human as well as mystical characters. The plays that were conducted; sometimes old acting and sometimes new, were carried out by a single company and later on by two companies. The dramas were presented on carros, or carts, which held everything needed for presentations.
Pre-Hispanic ceremonies were how the natives came in contact with the religious. Spaniards exercised plays to Christianize and conquer the indigenous community of the Americas in the sixteenth century period. Theatre was a potent instrument in manipulating inhabitants already comfortable to spectacle. Theatre became a means for political influence on Latin America by colonialist plays by using indigenous routine practices to stage-manage the population. Furthermore, it presented a way for the indigenous inhabitants who were forced to involve themselves in the drama of their own downfall. In 1599, the priests even used dead bodies of Native Americans to represent the dead in the dramatization of the final judgment.
While the dramas were promoting a novel sacred order, their first precedence was to maintain the new secular, political stability. Theatres under the colonizers are principally at the service of the government. After disease, manipulation, and murder transpired to the native inhabitants, the indigenous consciousness and distinctiveness in theatre vanished, though pieces did have original essentials to them. The theatre that developed in Latin America is contended to be theatre that the colonizers brought to the Americas, not the plays of the Americas.
Development in Latin American Theaters
Internal conflict and external obstruction have been the determination behind Latin American chronicle which likewise applies to theatre. Below are the periods of Latin theater development:
1959-1968: dramaturgical composition and organization of community projects leaned more in the direction of creating a more native Latin American foundation called the “Nuestra America”
1968-1974: Theatre tries to declare a more homogenous characterization which introduces more European versions. At this point, Latin American Theatre attempted to associate to its historical ancestry.
1974-1984: The pursuit for expression entrenched in the history of Latin America developed into victims of banishment and death.
1985 – Present: Theatre producing establishments such as the Latino Theater Company emerged and continues to perform plays and comedy showcases.
After years of analyzing the Latino experience in daring, contemporary conditions, Latino Theaters continues to acknowledge and embrace the most diverse cities in the world in order to create a space that displays this rich culture and diversity.
The existing dynamic theaters nowadays will be a destination core for those practicing artistic superiority; a laboratory where both custom and innovation are respected and improved. Latino theatres will develop the creative vivacity that comes from individuals telling their own chronicles and digging deep into their own civilizations to address important matters of our day. Furthermore, it will deliver these skills and practices to young and emerging performers and generations. Mutually, the theatre and the performers, will create a freedom where the unification of people, traditions and ideas give birth to our future.
I still remember the early morning of November 4, 2008, as the US Presidential election results started pouring in, I realized that something unbelievably historic was happening in America. I just couldnât stop wondering how a Black â African American (since so many mails and messages have told me!) â could become the President of the United States of America; the same country that had earlier re-elected George Bush as the President! The whole experience was so tumultuous! I couldnât help recall old books about America that I had read. Books about the Civil War that President Abraham Lincoln had presided over; the war that eventually resulted in the emancipation of blacks. As I wrote in my editorial in The Sunday Indian on November 9, 2008, my favourite book, of course, was Uncle Tomâs Cabin. The book â which passionately documented the immense pain of black slaves â is perhaps the greatest read for any human wishing to understand the meaning of the term âdepth of characterâ, and is guaranteed to bring tears to your eyes. And on January 21, 2009, I relived the whole gamut of those emotions seeing Barack Hussein Obama emotionally taking his oath to become the 44th President of the United States of America. That day again, I actually felt that historical figures like Lincoln and Stowe did have the biggest path-breaking roles to play in changing the character of modern day America.
My appreciation for Obama is immense, and this appreciation does not simply come from his becoming the President; but from his becoming President for all the right reasons. He demanded change from his fellow Americans, not simply in economic outlook or policy orientation, but in something graver; he beseeched them to realise that in the hardships of today should not be forgotten the intensity of the American character of past. Despite all research to the contrary â that a Black presidential candidate stood no chance against the white combine of America â Obama committed passionately to his steadfast belief that American character was deeper than suspected, wider than speculated and more intense than believed by Americans themselves… and he won… a win that is not only as brilliant as the brilliance of all his outstanding speeches combined â for I have rarely seen a more powerful and emotional orator than him â but a win that mirrors Obamaâs greatness as proved by his commandingly devastating books â for Obama is great not just because of the words he speaks, but because of the greatness of the words that he has written in his books, which conclusively prove his magnificent character. I go as far as to say, and perhaps demand, that after his eight years as US President (!), Obama should be made the Secretary General of the United Nations for at least a decade more; for the world needs as amazing a leader as Barack Obama if we ever want to even take a shot at one day having true global peace and equitable development of the masses.
But even as I write this, Obama faces daunting challenges in Asia. And the least of those challenges that Iâm worried about is Obamaâs illogical disposition towards the outsourcing conundrum, with respect to specifically India. Obama has flatly commented that he wishes to restrict the outsourcing business to countries like India. But Obama, for all the gallery motivating statements, would fail double time on this issue. To discourage government departments from outsourcing is one thing, but forcing most competitive American multinationals to follow the example? Leave in high end software consulting and development, in this era of economic deceleration, there is no way that sensible global corporations would follow Obama think to stop IT outsourcing to India simply because of a patriotic appeal, especially when the cost benefits are dramatically expansive, sometimes even reaching 90% cost reductions.
Obamaâs biggest challenges lie rather in foreign policy in Asia. And I have many questions. In Iran, Obama faces his predicament, as Bush faced supposedly in Iraq. Iran, and its clearly undiplomatic-mouthed President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, have regularly threatened the US about their intentions to go nuclear. Obamaâs challenge lies in the Iran Libya Sanctions Act (after which came the present Iran Sanctions Act), which was in reality put in place in 1995 by the Bill Clinton establishment. The question is, will Obama go against this Act to create his own new liberal politico-think? That has a very slim chance of happening. And under what logic will Obama justify to Iran â which technically has a democratically elected government and was even a close ally of America till 1979 â that a nuclear deal can be signed with India but not with Iran?
And that leaves Obama with a neighbouring headache, remnants of the Bush era â Iraq! Obama has claimed heâs ready to pullout troops from Iraq and relocate them to Afghanistan. And this when the Afghan President Karzai has implored Obama to stay out of Afghanistan… How then would Obama ensure that the weekly bloodied ethnic battles between Shias and Sunnis in Iraq â which occur despite US presence â would not become more regular, god forbid daily? Will Obama also come clean about past US mistakes and reimburse to Iraq the losses they have suffered on account of stolen oil, a devastated economy and a destroyed society, all because of the US? I suspect Obama will not!
If there is North Korea that is threatening to go nuclear for a second time â and Obamaâs predecessors have tried everything from hardball to soft pedal the Kim Jong clan â then there is China that is so strong economically that forget criticising Chinaâs clear human right indiscretions, Obama might have to look towards them for an economic bailout in the future. If there are Arabs whoâve been well fed on US money for years and were the main reasons for inflation (by manipulating oil prices to reach historic highs), then there is Israel that only needs a justifiable excuse and a bloodthirsty Hamas to bomb everything in sight in Palestine. Will Obama come out strongly against all of them, now that he is the President? Slim chance again…
And perhaps the worst expected response of the Obama camp will be to the Pakistan issue. Will Obama continue to irrationally mollycoddle India to âtake it easyâ despite huge casualties in the Mumbai attacks and despite clear evidence of the Pakistan administrationâs complicity? I believe that the spineless Indian politicians will actually make his task easier. But the truth is that if Obama, like his ill valued predecessor, continues to finance Pakistan and its leaders in spite of their being a terrorist state, a major part of the Indian populace â which fervently wants to believe in him â would lose complete faith in him and the values that he stands by. For in his response to terror in Asia â especially in the Pakistan-India conflict â lies his biggest nemesis. Slight Pakistan, and Obama risks losing a critical geographical military beachhead in attacking al-Qaeda targets in border regions. Slight India, and Obama risks losing long term support from an economic superpower of the future.
Unfortunately, to top it all, Obamaâs fight to save the American economy would take precedence over every other global issue; for the solution to the current slowdown will require a long term structural repair program engineered by global governments, and Obamaâs focus would completely be diverted to this issue for most of his first term at least. And that is the irony of it all; that though the world expects gargantuan change from a person who personifies the promise resounding in his words, most of the change would occur in the American continent only. And Asia, for most of it, will remain unchanged… lakhs would continue dying of poverty, many more would suffer ill-health, and lakhs more would succumb fatally to hunger. Asia will sadly remain unchanged.
But that in no way takes away an iota from Obama the fact that history, and future, will never remain the same. In my November 9, 2008, editorial, I was compelled to write: âAbove all, it is the United States of America which won today at least the hearts of millions like me all over the world, because today, America has shown that it has in it to finally give respect to a black man at the highest level possible; and this surely will change world history forever.â Today, in Barack Hussein Obama, I see Uncle Tomâs deep emotion resounding in the dream of Martin Luther King Jr., a dream that had beseeched the character of Americans to change to a moment in history when a man would be judged by the content of his character and not by the colour of his skin. Today, in Barack Hussein Obama, I see that undeniable moment in history… And I would not give that up for anything!
Blurbs:
1. There is no way that global corporations would follow Obamaâs call to stop IT outsourcing to India.
2. Will Obama continue to mollycoddle India to âtake it easyâ despite clear evidence of Pakistanâs complicity?
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