Paraguay not so peachy for Lugo

Paraguay’s Congress ditched Fernando Lugo as president in an impeachment vote called over his handling of a fatal land eviction. The vote in the Senate was passed by 39 to 4, bringing to a dramatic end the lightning two-day impeachment. According to the constitution, deputy president, Federico Franco, was sworn in until presidential polls in April 2013. Lugo's election in 2008 ended one-party rule by the Colorado party, which had been in power for 61 years, leaving a trail of corruption. Lugo has branded the move “an express coup d’état” and a number of LatAm countries have come out in protest. But the decision was pretty overwhelming within Paraguay with a 76-1 vote in the lower house and even the Bishops urging Franco to quit (Lugo comes from their ranks). Fathering two children while he was a priest probably didn't help. Lugo is now hoping that popular support may return him to power. Paraguay is the world’s fourth biggest soya exporter but the economy lags way behind its continental peers. Over the past two decades per capita GDP has risen just 11% against 129% in Chile and a doubling in both Argentina and Peru. Paraguayan AM stations are heard from time to time, some of them playing the beautiful Paraguayan harp music. They are hard to QSL (I have sent reports to Radio Nanduti on 1020 several times) and the only one I have is from Radio Nacional de Paraguay heard on short-wave in Johannesburg in 1987.

No whining in Vienna

There are 7 billion people in the world and just 1.7 million of them live in Vienna. The place is absolutely crawling with stately buildings and museums. In the Kunsthistoriches Museum there is a coin collection going back to 600 BC. Some of the most ancient are Ionian (Greek), stunning to behold. Interestingly, the oldest coins are made of quite thick chunks of metal while many of the more modern ones are terribly thin. This is an age old tradition, reducing the metal content as much as possible and relying increasingly on the faith of the market to accord value to the currency in circulation. As we know, this has often led to dislocations. Ironically, although Greece is one of the oldest coin users it is now going through an intense financial crisis which is wiping out huge chunks of wealth. In the meantime Austria chugs along. Real GDP per capita is up 42% since 1990, a lot more than France or Germany and way more than Italy. Pedestrians obey pedestrian lights, motorists are cautious and polite. We felt a bit guilty crossing the street when the red man was flashing! The public gardens are slightly unkempt, not as Teutonically manicured as their English counterparts. The QSL is from an FM station - Blue Danube Radio - heard on a flight across Europe in 2000. In those days if you asked permission from the flight deck you were allowed to listen to ground FM stations on the radio. I used to track the flight's course this way and occasionally write to stations heard. Here is a link to the coin collection:  http://www.khm.at/en/collections/coin-cabinet/

Oh English garden, sweet 'n noisy

How many kinds of sweet flowers grow in and English country garden? So goes the song. And even in the London suburbs the gardens are bursting with the colour of a very wet spring. From both sides of our flat we look out on scintillating greens, reds, yellows and blues. This is the time for growth and bloom. And in all this growth lies the problem. No doubt 20 years ago, trusty gardeners would do the rounds with their clippers and brooms trimming, shaping and tidying up. But these days in the well-heeled suburbs it's the garden service. Suddenly, our morning peace  is shattered by a cacophony of petrol-driven hedge-trimmers. Once a week these guys patrol the suburb, obsessively boxing hedges and cutting back wisterias. Then out comes the petrol-driven blower to gather the clippings and trimmings. And of course each household has a different gardening service on different days. The one we see most often is represented by a doleful chap with long locks and moustaches who looks like he is in serious need of exercise despite his outdoor existence. The 'English Country Garden' song was a hit in the UK and also in South Africa in 1962 when I was a kid. Funnily enough, the singer was an American, Jimmie Rodgers, from Camas, WA. The QSL is from KLB Seattle Marine Radio. Seattle is about 200 km north of Camas. I heard this utility station in Joburg in 1988 on USB using 2kW and a 1.5 wave quad loop antenna beamed in the opposite direction into the north Pacific.

International Labour rumbles Rumsfeld

You've heard of Donald Rumsfeld's 'unknown unknowns' of course? You know, the things we do not know we don't know? Well the International Labour Organisation in Geneva is way out ahead of him. Here is how the ILO defines the informal sector of an economy, one that in many emerging economies provides hand-to-mouth jobs for millions. Here goes: Persons in informal employment (a job-based concept) represents the sum of informal jobs in formal enterprises, informal sector enterprises, and households producing goods for own consumption or hiring paid domestic workers (cells A+C in the matrix). Persons employed in the informal sector (an enterprise-based concept) include the informal jobs in informal enterprises plus formal jobs in informal sector enterprises (cells A+B in the matrix). Persons employed in informal employment outside the informal sector (i.e., those employed in the formal sector and households producing goods for own use or employing paid domestic workers) corresponds with cell C in the matrix. Good luck figuring that one out!  In South Africa 'persons in informal employment' make up about 1/3 of all the employed population. There is a raging, at times vitriolic, debate about how to get more people, especially youngsters into work. In India it's over 80% and even in tiny Panama, over 40%. The QSL is from the US Albrook Air Force Station in Panama heard in Joburg, South Africa on USB in 1988. This was another of my self-made cards, sent to the station along with a reception report. The Station was closed in 1997 and is now a civilian airfield.