Tag Archives: spain

in english

Continuing with the story

The WHO has raised its alert status to level 4. There have been over 2,300 cases in Mexico now, 700 still in hospital, 150 deceased.  There are confirmed cases in Spain and Scotland, and closer to home suspected cases in Belgium, Sweden, Norway & Denmark.  To make matters even worse, there was an earthquake in Mexico City today, although there is no reports of damages.

Although Mexicans are now starting to sound worried, some still cope by joking.  Some people commented that the earthquake was basically another way of sneezing, and the influenza song now has a video.  People are still staying home, following the instructions of the government, and the school shutdown has been expanded nationwide.  If you speak Spanish, the Mexican Presidency has live video coverage of the situation here.

in english

The reactions to swine flu in Mexico (part II)

Roman Catholic masses were cancelled throughout the city, museums were closed and football matches were played behind close doors (my team, Chivas, tied) to avoid the creation of crowds.  People have been generally very calm from what I understand, stayed home and there is no panic shopping, but the streets are rather empty for a city of over 20 million people (some pictures here).  If you understand Spanish, a great chronicle of the past two days can be found here and here.  The city is not afraid, and people still make fun of the situation from time to time.

Video rentals and video stores were doing brisk business yesterday, and schools are closed until May 6th (May 1st and 5th are holidays anyway).  Military personnel have been handling masks around the city and now everybody is bracing themselves for tomorrow: will people go to work or will they home office (those who can)?

The Finnish media have complained about the slow Mexican response to the outbreak, but they seem to ignore that even the National University (UNAM) doesn’t have the equipment needed to distinguish this new virus from its old, previously known cousins and with the normal flu season just ending, there was no cause for concern.  On the other hand the World Health Organisation has praised the Mexican response.

There are confirmed cases in Mexico, the US, Canada and New Zealand, and suspected cases in France, Spain, UK & Israel (map here).  Deaths have only happened in Mexico, and even there two thirds of the 1200 cases have already been released from hospital.  According to some information in the Mexican media, vaccines don’t work, but antivirals such as Tamiflu do.  Airports haven’t been closed, but there is more stringent screening in Singapore, Hong Kong and Japan from passengers coming over from North America.

There are two different hypothesis of the origin of the virus: one points to it having started in a farm in Texas and then crossed over to the border, the other one points to farms in Perote, Veracruz, Mexico.  None has been confirmed.

If you want to know more in real time, you can follow @Veratect and @zolliker (in Spanish) on Twitter.

in english

Globalisation & my high school class

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This week I learned that two of my classmates from high school in northern Greater Mexico City are also in a relationship with Finnish girls and both are also living abroad.  That got me thinking about how many of the guys and gals I used to go to school with back then are also overseas, and the sample is quite broad.

I’m not particularly surprised of this development given that we were educated as the so-called NAFTA generation learning English (and sometimes other languages) from childhood, and given a broader view of the world than people before us (I remember attending lessons on economics, global affairs, the stock market and compared history of North America at that time).

What sets us apart from those before us I think, is not that some of us would go abroad, but that we would not concentrate in the United States as before.  In my sister’s high school class (she is only a few years older than me) most of those who are working abroad are doing so in the US (a couple here and there in Europe, but it’s a minority), whereas with us the geographic dispersion is much broader: I have classmates in Mexico, and all over the US, true, but also in Canada, Spain, Sweden, Germany, Australia, France, Brazil, UK and I believe even a couple in China.  Moreover, many of them who are back in Mexico also have international experience, either as students or during their careers.

I’m sure that this is partly due to American immigration regulations after 9/11, but I believe it also has something to do with many of us wanting to see what else was out there.  I wonder if the Institute for Mexicans Abroad will start tapping this kind of talent network too, as many of us are working for institutions like e.g.  Shell, Nokia, Microsoft, ESA or Volvo or studying at recognised institutions all over the place.  Maybe we should learn something from what the Indians and the Chinese are doing by taking advantage of their expatriates, instead of complaining about the brain drain?

Regardless, it’s good to see that most of them in Mexico or wherever they may be are doing well.

in english

Trip to Barcelona

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I visited Barcelona again a couple of weeks ago to attend an important industry conference. Besides working very hard (so much so that when I came back to Finland I went down with the flu), it was very nice to meet some good people I hadn’t seen in a while.

Speaking Spanish and having some jamón de jabugo were also very much welcome. The pictures of the trip are here.

en español

La importancia del idioma inglés

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Aún cuando estoy a favor de la diversidad lingüística (mascullando ocho idiomas no podría ser de otra manera), estoy de acuerdo con lo que hace algún tiempo posteó Martín Varsavsky en cuanto es muy difícil estar al tanto de lo que pasa en el mundo sin saber manejarse en inglés.

Me explico: alguna vez una persona que conozco me hizo burla cuando dije que tenía días sin hablar español y que en la oficina muy pocos lo hablaban, pero la verdad es que, con todo y que somos alrededor de 400 millones de hispanoparlantes, es muy poco probable que lo hables si no lo aprendiste de pequeño.  Ahondando en el tema, nos damos cuenta que la mayoría de los nuevos conocimientos generados en la mayoría de las ciencias y en buena parte de las artes se diseminan en tal idioma, que es el que tiene mayor audiencia. 

Si a eso añadimos que una importante sección del entretenimiento que consumimos también tiene sus orígenes en culturas de habla inglesa, significa que al esperar traducciones al español nos encontramos con una situación similar a tratar de ver las cosas con anteojos de cristal esmerilado.  Vaya, que incluso tenemos problemas para saber porqué actores de origen hispanoparlante han tenido tanto éxito en el mundo angloparlante si no podemos ser testigos de las razones.

No quiero que se malinterprete, no abogo por el abandono de nuestras raíces y de nuestra lengua (al contrario, la sigo conservando en el entorno familiar y no tengo la menor intención de dejarla), mas no puedo quedarme con los brazos cruzados cuando soy testigo de lo que nos estamos perdiendo por no "entrarle al quite".  El inglés es el latín de nuestra época aunque no nos guste. "De tripas, corazón".

in english

Share on Ovi is live

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You might have read it on the news, or on their blog, but it’s out there at share.ovi.com, and it’s been live for over a week.  With support for storing and sharing over 100 media types, unlimited storage and bandwidth and posting not restricted to the PC, we’re very excited indeed, so please send your feedback this way!

We held a Q&A session in Barcelona with selected bloggers (video excrepts below).

share.ovi.com Q&A session

And this is how a session like that looks from the other side:
Having fun - Share on Ovi

en español

Malas traducciones

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Como he escrito con anterioridad, en España el nivel de uso del idioma inglés es francamente bastante malo (aunque tengo varios amigos que son bastante buenos, tienden a ser la excepción a la regla).
Lo que me vuelve loco es cuando algún español utiliza términos en inglés para referirse a lugares en México (que cabe recordar es el país hispanoparlante más grande del mundo) como "He ido a Mexico City" o barbaridades por el estilo. 
La última que me pasó fue cuando estaba hojeando un libro en el aeropuerto de Barcelona.  "Las 50 batallas que cambiaron el mundo", traducido por Gabriela Ventureira, tenía un capítulo dedicado a la batalla por México-Tenochtitlán entre los aztecas y los españoles.  Lo que me sorprendió y me hizo dejar ahí el libro fue cuando me encontré a los totonacas referidos como "totonac" (su nombre en inglés), los nombres de los emperadores aztecas también en inglés y otros detalles por el estilo.  Vaya, pareciera que la traductora no se dignó en checar que los sucesos a los que se refería tenían nombres en español.

in english

Multicultural Spain

One thing that I couldn’t stop noticing when I was in Barcelona was the amount of foreigners and people from other parts of Spain who call the place home (which I personally think is a good thing). Whereas before Spain used to be a point of origin of emigrants (one only has to remember the large amount of people who fled the Civil War and the resulting Franco rule) now there is plenty of people from all over the world here, which doesn’t detract from its “Spanishness”. Now, the small neighbourhood stores are operated by Chinese or Pakistanis, many waiters are Filipinos, Ecuadorians or Argentines, and I have Mexican and British acquaintances who operate IT consultancy companies there.
Even though the immigration climate doesn’t seem hostile, it’s not all rosy and fine, as anybody who’s been shouted “sudaca” in the street will tell you. I was, however, pleasantly surprised with the relative peace I found between the different communities (then again, I was not there for long).