Monday, May 25, 2009

A breath of fresh air

Imagine you are practicing that sport of free diving, where you dive deep down into the ocean without equipment to assist your breathing. You must hold your air, despite the increasing pressure and the burning of oxygen in your lungs to your blood. Suddenly, you realize you are short of air, you start feeling a pulse behind your eyes, your throat feels a growing pressure between holding back and wanting to breathe -knowing well you can't since you are dozens of meters below sea level- and you wonder what to do.

My wife says she wants to be "normal" again, meaning she doesn't have to question whether she will have free access to internet tools and websites.

I never knew what I had in Costa Rica until I left to study peace and conflict transformation in Norway for a couple of years. Costa Rica is a demilitarized nation, and I only knew what it meant when I was gone and when I started studying the causes of war and the consequences of having military armies, both in developed and in developing nations.

Now that I have moved again I have started to realize the treasures we have in Costa Rica with our democratic system, where we can be certain that every four years, every citizen will have the right to vote for the candidate of their choosing to lead the country. Where you have a Constitution that guarantees your individual freedoms, your civil and political rights, your human rights.

There are many things to improve in our system. Yes. Definitely. A lot of work to do. It is not time to fail, falter or rest. We must be aware of what we already have, to know that progress and transformation and sustainable development will start from a very strong, solid base that our ancestors have already constructed. It is the inheritance we have received and we must do the best we can to make it better, to multiply our talents, to think about what we will inherit onto the generations yet to be born.

I inhale deeply and enjoy the smell and taste of clean, fresh, free air.

Until next proxy.

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