Loud, Dirty, and Dark.

Listening: Carcass “Corporeal Jigsore Quandary,” Decapitated “Spheres of Madness”

Reading: Dean R. Koontz “Hideaway” and Thomas Harris “Red Dragon”
 

So, I finished reading the second of the Stieg Larsson's books. He was a very good popular writer, and yet the second installment left me thinking he was just setting up his next one. I decided then that the best curse of action would be to take a brake and read something else. Therefore, I plan to start reading Thomas Harris. I haven't read anything from him and am looking forward to see what the hype is about. Hopefully it's not going to be like “The Da Vinci code” which I read for a while and just had to abandoned due to his very bad style.

I'm reading 2 books. One I read on my Kindle and one I read on a paper version so I can take it on the bus and won't be afraid someone is going to take it away from me (although... someone stole my 1960's copy of Dr. Zhivago once... hope they kill over.) The paper one is, and a bit ashamed of admitting it: another Koontz. There has been no more money to buy other books, so I'll finally read what I have. Haven't you found that collecting books makes you feel alive? Ha! It makes me feel purposeful.

In “Hideaway” I found this:

Inside, the club was everything he liked. Loud, dirty, and dark. Reeking of smoke, spilled liquor, and sweat. The band hit the chords harder than any musicians he'd ever heard, rammed pure rage into each tune, twisting the melody into a squealing mutant voice, banging the numbingly repetitious rhythms home with savage fury, playing each number so loud that with the help of huge amplifiers, they rattled the filthy windows and almost made his eyes bleed.

It reminds me of a time, long ago, when I was getting my hair cut. I was a child living in Guatemala City. You see, in Guatemalan barber shops the reading material is very poor in selection. Aside from your playboy's and hustlers, there are also comics. It was in one of this that I found one that told of devils and witches dancing to music that would make other creatures insane! I thought this was tacky and yet could not forget it. I must have been 7 or 8 years old.

So, as any good nature and angry boy I started to learn guitar. I wanted to play this sort of music that would rattle the filth out of your soul and make the devil and his company shake uncontrollably. I don't know if I did, but I still play my guitar. I like the fastest most disruptive musical constructions I can play. The feeling of getting on stage is what other people might experience with drugs. elation. Acceleration. Freedom.

This is the point of all this rant then... Freedom. Long live metal. I'll head bang until my head falls off!

Drug legalization in Guatemala

Drug legalization in Guatemala.

I don't know if anybody else knows but the president of Guatemala has issued an initiative to discuss the possibility of legalization. Now at first I thought that it was a great plan, after all the government in this Central American country spends a lot of money fighting “the war on drugs.” This money could be used to prevent children from going hungry or providing them with schools to get Guatemala out of the pitiful state in which it is. But, then I thought if there is actually other countries in which legalization had worked so we could compare its results to this country's various idiosyncrasies to see how feasible it would be.

So, everybody knows that drugs are legal in Holland right? Wrong! Drugs are not legal in the Netherlands as I found out by a quick search on the internet. In Dutch legislation there is a difference between what they call hard drugs (opiates and stimulants, ei. Morphine and cocaine) and soft drugs (marihuana and hash). Soft drugs carry a penalty of a fine, so if you are in Amsterdam and carry with you 5 grams of marihuana for personal use the police can fine you but they never do. This is something like a relaxed view towards these soft drugs.

OK, so back to square one, where are drugs legal? Well, according to the internet drug possession is legal in Portugal. But with just a bit more research you'll find out that drugs are still illegal in Portugal. The only change, from 2001 was that now if you carry less than a 10 day supply of your favorite recreational drug, you don't go to jail. Instead justice makes you go to rehab and do community service. Good idea, help junkies don't put them in jail (and if you knew how bad things are in Guatemala's jails you would also agree with the Portuguese.) Still, no legalization.

The more I search the more convinced I am that legalization is very far into the future. With out anything to compare it to, I'd have to rely on my knowledge of Guatemala's personality to give my opinion on the matter. We are, after the before mention meditation, not ready for legalization. But a change that would improve our policies towards the Portuguese or Dutch model is something that is worth discussing and implementing.

Further reading and bibliography:

http://www.holland.com/global/tourism/Article/Dutch-Drug-Policy.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drug_policy_of_the_Netherlands

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prohibition_of_drugs

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drug_policy_of_Portugal#Laws_and_regulations