Costa Linda, You Lovely Island... *Locked Post*
Okay, so it's not an island. It still reminds me of that song from West Side Story. The main drags of San Batista is pretty enough. Tourist delight, mixed with a healthy dose of pretensions of grandeur. But the rest of the place...
...I've been in a few nasty holes in my time. This place definitely makes the top 10 list. General Fuentes has all the mercy of a rabid shark. The peasants work their hands to the bone, and half the food they grow goes right into the bellies of the army, via the oh-so-enlightened distribution system of "Give us what we want or we shoot you."
Not that they grow much food around here. The big crops are the cash crops for the rich gringos to the north. Coffee and cocoa aren't food, but at least they might put a little money in some farmers' pockets. But the big crop these days is coca. And it doesn't look like the drug lords are exactly paying fair price for value on it. Dammit, but I hate these drug-pushing scumbags. This is a place that desperately needs cleaning up.
There are people trying to do it, too. San Batista has a clinic set up by Doctors Without Borders, and a couple of other agencies are trying to bring in food and supplies. But Fuentes doesn't make it easy. His thugs "inspect" every shipment, and if something is reported missing after the fact, it's chalked up to "insurgent activity", which basically means that the people these organizations are trying to save get dragged out into the streets and shot "as an example".
I'm impressed with the old leader, too. Like a lot of Third-World presidents, Reyes got in on the promise of an end to corruption and crime. Thing is, he didn't do so bad a job of it. He cleaned out his cabinet first thing, including a couple of real stinkers who were coca farming as a sideline. Then he went to work on the druglords. He didn't get them all, but he sure as hell made a good start. Until the man he put in charge of the army decided he'd rather collect the money from those coca plants than burn 'em and help the farmers plant something legal.
'Lina's right. Nothing's going to change in this place until someone gets rid of Fuentes. I'm tempted to start making a difference down here myself, but that's just throwing stones at the beehive.
I'm going to catch the next flight out of here. Once I'm back in Star City, I can start making sure 'Lina's friends down here have the funding to release Presidente Reyes and help him take back this place.
...I've been in a few nasty holes in my time. This place definitely makes the top 10 list. General Fuentes has all the mercy of a rabid shark. The peasants work their hands to the bone, and half the food they grow goes right into the bellies of the army, via the oh-so-enlightened distribution system of "Give us what we want or we shoot you."
Not that they grow much food around here. The big crops are the cash crops for the rich gringos to the north. Coffee and cocoa aren't food, but at least they might put a little money in some farmers' pockets. But the big crop these days is coca. And it doesn't look like the drug lords are exactly paying fair price for value on it. Dammit, but I hate these drug-pushing scumbags. This is a place that desperately needs cleaning up.
There are people trying to do it, too. San Batista has a clinic set up by Doctors Without Borders, and a couple of other agencies are trying to bring in food and supplies. But Fuentes doesn't make it easy. His thugs "inspect" every shipment, and if something is reported missing after the fact, it's chalked up to "insurgent activity", which basically means that the people these organizations are trying to save get dragged out into the streets and shot "as an example".
I'm impressed with the old leader, too. Like a lot of Third-World presidents, Reyes got in on the promise of an end to corruption and crime. Thing is, he didn't do so bad a job of it. He cleaned out his cabinet first thing, including a couple of real stinkers who were coca farming as a sideline. Then he went to work on the druglords. He didn't get them all, but he sure as hell made a good start. Until the man he put in charge of the army decided he'd rather collect the money from those coca plants than burn 'em and help the farmers plant something legal.
'Lina's right. Nothing's going to change in this place until someone gets rid of Fuentes. I'm tempted to start making a difference down here myself, but that's just throwing stones at the beehive.
I'm going to catch the next flight out of here. Once I'm back in Star City, I can start making sure 'Lina's friends down here have the funding to release Presidente Reyes and help him take back this place.