Bolchevique "traveco" - LUIZ FELIPE PONDÉ
FOLHA DE SP - 02/07
Todos os tipos de esquerda têm um traço em comum: são frouxos, como diria Paulo Francis
A esquerda é uma praga da qual não nos livramos. Egressa da tradição judaico-cristã messiânica, traz consigo a tara do fanatismo daquela. Mas ela tem várias faces.
No Brasil, após a ditadura, a esquerda tinha o absoluto controle da universidade e, por tabela, de muitas das instâncias de razão pública, como escolas de nível médio, mídia, tribunais e escolas de magistratura. Coitadinha dela.
Neste caso, do aparelho jurídico, sente-se o impacto quando vemos a bem-sucedida manobra da esquerda em fazer do Código Penal uma província ridícula do politicamente correto, para quem, como diz a piada, entre matar um fiscal do IBAMA e um jacaré, é menos crime matar o fiscal.
Com a crise da Europa e a Primavera Árabe, a esquerda se sente renovada. Interessante como, no caso árabe, ela flerta com os movimentos islamitas. A razão é, antes de tudo, sua ignorância completa com relação ao Oriente Médio. A esquerda sempre foi provinciana. Ela confunde o fanatismo islamita com o fanatismo revolucionário. Lá, não existe "povo em busca de igualdade democrática", mas sim fiéis em busca de tutela absoluta.
Antes de tudo, devo dizer que há uma forma de esquerda que respeito: os melancólicos de Frankfurt. Para estes, como Adorno e Horkheimer, vivemos o "échec" (impasse, fracasso) da modernidade, devido à mercantilização das relações. Para mim, isso é um fato. E, enfim, a melancolia sempre me encanta. Os melancólicos têm razão.
Desde Deleuze, Derrida e Foucault (três chifres da mesma cabra), a esquerda assumiu ares de revolução de campus universitário, que encampa desde movimentos como o engodo do Maio de 68, passando pela crítica da gramática como forma de opressão (risadas...), até a ideia boba de que orientação sexual seja atitude revolucionária. Que tal sexo com pandas? Por falar em pandas...
Outra forma é a esquerda-melancia. Verde por fora, vermelha por dentro. Essa se traveste de preocupação com os pandas para querer roubar o dinheiro e o esforço alheios, além de refundar a união das Repúblicas Socialistas Soviéticas, mas com obrigação de comida orgânica no cardápio.
Existe também a esquerda "de classe executiva" que vai a jantares inteligentes. O mais perto que ela chega de qualquer coisa vermelha é do vinho que gosta de discutir, marca de sua falsa "finesse". Nada mais "fake" do que falar de vinhos como modo de elegância afetada.
Há também a religiosa, que se divide em duas. A budista "light", aquela que acha que o budismo é uma espiritualidade "progressista". A outra, a católica, pensou que Marx precisava de um Che Jesus e se deu mal. Nem a esquerda a leva a sério, nem a igreja a considera mais.
Claro, não podemos esquecer do feminismo, aquele que acha que o patriarcalismo é responsável por todos os males e afirma que Shakespeare era uma menina vestida de menino. Outra forma é a esquerda multicultural. Essa confunde o mundo com uma praça de alimentação étnica de um shopping center de classe média, achando que "culturas" (esse conceito "pseudo") se misturam como molhos.
Outra forma é a esquerda "aborígene", aquela que entende que a vida pré-descoberta da roda é a forma plena de habitar o cosmo.
Há também a esquerda da psicologia social, composta basicamente de psicólogas, pedagogas e assistentes sociais a favor da educação democrática e da ideia de que tudo é construído no diálogo. Essas creem que se pode dialogar com serial killers, culpando a escola, o capital e a igreja pelas mulheres que eles cortam em pedaços nas redondezas.
Todos esses tipos têm um traço em comum: são todos frouxos, como diria Paulo Francis.
Mas existe uma outra esquerda, a bolchevique "traveco". Os bolcheviques eram cabras que gostavam de violência e a praticaram em larga escala. Hoje, para a esquerda, pega mal pregar violência. Ela sofre com um problema que é a imagem de si mesma como um conjunto de seres puros, dóceis e pacíficos.
Então, para os simpatizantes da violência revolucionária bolchevique, a saída é se travestir de gente dócil e falar em "violência criadora". O amor e a violência são os mesmos, mas a saia confunde.
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Tuesday, July 03, 2012
Monday, June 18, 2012
Friday, June 15, 2012
So de sacanagem by Elisa Lucinda
Meu coração está aos pulos! Quantas vezes minha esperança será posta a prova? Por quantas provas terá ela que passar?
Tudo isso que está aí no ar: malas, cuecas que voam entupidas de dinheiro. Do meu dinheiro, do nosso dinheiro que reservamos duramente pra educar os meninos mais pobres que nós, pra cuidar gratuitamente da saúde deles e dos seus pais. Esse dinheiro viaja na bagagem da impunidade e eu não posso mais. Quantas vezes, meu amigo, meu rapaz, minha confiança vai ser posta a prova? Quantas vezes minha esperança vai esperar no cais? É certo que tempos difíceis existem pra aperfeiçoar o aprendiz, mas não é certo que a mentira dos maus brasileiros venha quebrar no nosso nariz. Meu coração tá no escuro. A luz é simples, regada ao conselho simples de meu pai, minha mãe, minha avó e todos os justos que os precederam. 'Não roubarás!', 'Devolva o lápis do coleguinha', 'Esse apontador não é seu, minha filha'. Ao invés disso, tanta coisa nojenta e torpe tenho tido que escutar! Até habeas corpus preventiva, coisa da qual nunca tinha visto falar, sobre o qual minha pobre lógica ainda insiste: esse é o tipo de benefício que só ao culpado interessará! Pois bem, se mexeram comigo, com a velha e fiel fé do meu povo sofrido, então agora eu vou sacanear! Mais honesta ainda eu vou ficar! Só de sacanagem!
Dirão: 'Deixe de ser boba! Desde Cabral que aqui todo mundo rouba!
E eu vou dizer: 'Não importa! Será esse o meu carnaval! Vou confiar mais e outra vez. Eu, meu irmão, meu filho e meus amigos.'
Vamo pagar limpo a quem a gente deve e receber limpo do nosso freguês. Com o tempo, a gente consegue ser livre, ético e o escambal.
Dirão: 'É inútil! Todo mundo aqui é corrupto desde o primeiro homem que veio de Portugal!'
E eu direi: 'Não admito! Minha esperança é imortal, ouviram? Imortal!'
Sei que não dá pra mudar o começo, mas, se a gente quizer, vai dar pra mudar o final!
Tudo isso que está aí no ar: malas, cuecas que voam entupidas de dinheiro. Do meu dinheiro, do nosso dinheiro que reservamos duramente pra educar os meninos mais pobres que nós, pra cuidar gratuitamente da saúde deles e dos seus pais. Esse dinheiro viaja na bagagem da impunidade e eu não posso mais. Quantas vezes, meu amigo, meu rapaz, minha confiança vai ser posta a prova? Quantas vezes minha esperança vai esperar no cais? É certo que tempos difíceis existem pra aperfeiçoar o aprendiz, mas não é certo que a mentira dos maus brasileiros venha quebrar no nosso nariz. Meu coração tá no escuro. A luz é simples, regada ao conselho simples de meu pai, minha mãe, minha avó e todos os justos que os precederam. 'Não roubarás!', 'Devolva o lápis do coleguinha', 'Esse apontador não é seu, minha filha'. Ao invés disso, tanta coisa nojenta e torpe tenho tido que escutar! Até habeas corpus preventiva, coisa da qual nunca tinha visto falar, sobre o qual minha pobre lógica ainda insiste: esse é o tipo de benefício que só ao culpado interessará! Pois bem, se mexeram comigo, com a velha e fiel fé do meu povo sofrido, então agora eu vou sacanear! Mais honesta ainda eu vou ficar! Só de sacanagem!
Dirão: 'Deixe de ser boba! Desde Cabral que aqui todo mundo rouba!
E eu vou dizer: 'Não importa! Será esse o meu carnaval! Vou confiar mais e outra vez. Eu, meu irmão, meu filho e meus amigos.'
Vamo pagar limpo a quem a gente deve e receber limpo do nosso freguês. Com o tempo, a gente consegue ser livre, ético e o escambal.
Dirão: 'É inútil! Todo mundo aqui é corrupto desde o primeiro homem que veio de Portugal!'
E eu direi: 'Não admito! Minha esperança é imortal, ouviram? Imortal!'
Sei que não dá pra mudar o começo, mas, se a gente quizer, vai dar pra mudar o final!
Monday, June 11, 2012
Not so experts from the economist
Buttonwood, The Economist
ASK enough people for advice, they say, and you will eventually find someone who will tell you what you want to hear. But the need for advice burns so strongly that people become blind to its quality. There is a remarkable tendency to trust experts, even when there is little evidence of their forecasting powers. In his book “Expert Political Judgment”, Philip Tetlock shows that political forecasters are worse than crude algorithms at predicting events. The more prominent the expert (ie, the more they were quoted by the news media), the worse their records tended to be. There is also an inverse relationship between the confidence of the individual forecaster and the accuracy of their predictions.
The remarkable tendency for individuals to rely on expert advice, even when the advice clearly has no useful component, was neatly illustrated in a recent academic paper* about an Asian experiment. Undergraduates in Thailand and Singapore were asked to place bets on five rounds of coin flips. The participants were told that the coins came from fellow students; that these would be changed during the process; that the coin-flipper would be changed every round; and that the flippers would be participants, not experimenters. Thus there was a high likelihood that the results would be random.
Taped to the desk of each participant were five envelopes, each predicting the outcome of the successive flips. Participants could pay to see the predictions in advance, but they saw them free after the coin toss had occurred.
When the initial prediction turned out to be correct, students were more willing to pay to see the next forecast. This tendency increased after two, three and four successful predictions. Furthermore, those who paid in advance for predictions placed bigger bets on subsequent coin tosses than those who did not.
Paying for financial advice might not seem quite as bizarre as paying for coin-toss predictions, but there are some similarities. Nobody can reliably forecast the short-term outlook for economies or stockmarkets; Warren Buffett, the world’s most successful long-term investor, thinks it is not worth trying to do so. But plenty of economists and strategists earn a good living doing just that. The average active-fund manager fails to beat the stockmarket index; no reliable way has been found for selecting above-average managers in advance. Yet investors are still willing to pay for the services of active managers.
The sheer complexity of modern financial markets and the torrent of information that is published each day are a boon to the providers of financial advice. Investors may feel that they simply do not have the time to analyse all the data, and they therefore need to rely on the advice of professionals. This is true even if they think the markets are a “rigged game” played for the benefit of insiders; it still makes sense for them to pay for an insider’s view.
There may be another, psychological, reason why investors want to pay for advice: the avoidance of regret. If you choose to put all your money into technology stocks on the back of your own research, and such stocks collapse, you only have yourself to blame. But if you have listened to the advice of an expert, then the decision is not your fault.
Some financial advice may be extremely useful. Many advisers steered their clients away from Bernie Madoff’s fraudulent funds. Investors also need to be made aware of the benefits of diversification and of the effect on their portfolios of tax rules and regulations. There is also evidence that market valuations revert to the mean over the long term, so pointing out when markets look historically cheap or dear can help.
The problem for the industry is that such advice will not be needed very often, and that limits the potential fees. So instead investors are bombarded with endless research on why stock A is better than stock B, why one currency is bound to outperform another and so on. Clients end up churning their portfolios, even though the costs erode their returns.
Perhaps the financial-advice industry survives because the idea that the future is unknowable is just unsatisfying. Some forecast—any forecast—is therefore comforting. Mr Tetlock suggests that “we believe in experts in the same way that our ancestors believe in oracles; we want to believe in a controllable world and we have a flawed understanding of the laws of chance.”
* “Why Do People Pay for Useless Advice? Implications of Gambler’s and Hot-Hand Fallacies in False-Expert Setting”, by Nattavudh Powdthavee and Yohanes Riyanto, Institute for the Study of Labour, May 2012.
ASK enough people for advice, they say, and you will eventually find someone who will tell you what you want to hear. But the need for advice burns so strongly that people become blind to its quality. There is a remarkable tendency to trust experts, even when there is little evidence of their forecasting powers. In his book “Expert Political Judgment”, Philip Tetlock shows that political forecasters are worse than crude algorithms at predicting events. The more prominent the expert (ie, the more they were quoted by the news media), the worse their records tended to be. There is also an inverse relationship between the confidence of the individual forecaster and the accuracy of their predictions.
The remarkable tendency for individuals to rely on expert advice, even when the advice clearly has no useful component, was neatly illustrated in a recent academic paper* about an Asian experiment. Undergraduates in Thailand and Singapore were asked to place bets on five rounds of coin flips. The participants were told that the coins came from fellow students; that these would be changed during the process; that the coin-flipper would be changed every round; and that the flippers would be participants, not experimenters. Thus there was a high likelihood that the results would be random.
Taped to the desk of each participant were five envelopes, each predicting the outcome of the successive flips. Participants could pay to see the predictions in advance, but they saw them free after the coin toss had occurred.
When the initial prediction turned out to be correct, students were more willing to pay to see the next forecast. This tendency increased after two, three and four successful predictions. Furthermore, those who paid in advance for predictions placed bigger bets on subsequent coin tosses than those who did not.
Paying for financial advice might not seem quite as bizarre as paying for coin-toss predictions, but there are some similarities. Nobody can reliably forecast the short-term outlook for economies or stockmarkets; Warren Buffett, the world’s most successful long-term investor, thinks it is not worth trying to do so. But plenty of economists and strategists earn a good living doing just that. The average active-fund manager fails to beat the stockmarket index; no reliable way has been found for selecting above-average managers in advance. Yet investors are still willing to pay for the services of active managers.
The sheer complexity of modern financial markets and the torrent of information that is published each day are a boon to the providers of financial advice. Investors may feel that they simply do not have the time to analyse all the data, and they therefore need to rely on the advice of professionals. This is true even if they think the markets are a “rigged game” played for the benefit of insiders; it still makes sense for them to pay for an insider’s view.
There may be another, psychological, reason why investors want to pay for advice: the avoidance of regret. If you choose to put all your money into technology stocks on the back of your own research, and such stocks collapse, you only have yourself to blame. But if you have listened to the advice of an expert, then the decision is not your fault.
Some financial advice may be extremely useful. Many advisers steered their clients away from Bernie Madoff’s fraudulent funds. Investors also need to be made aware of the benefits of diversification and of the effect on their portfolios of tax rules and regulations. There is also evidence that market valuations revert to the mean over the long term, so pointing out when markets look historically cheap or dear can help.
The problem for the industry is that such advice will not be needed very often, and that limits the potential fees. So instead investors are bombarded with endless research on why stock A is better than stock B, why one currency is bound to outperform another and so on. Clients end up churning their portfolios, even though the costs erode their returns.
Perhaps the financial-advice industry survives because the idea that the future is unknowable is just unsatisfying. Some forecast—any forecast—is therefore comforting. Mr Tetlock suggests that “we believe in experts in the same way that our ancestors believe in oracles; we want to believe in a controllable world and we have a flawed understanding of the laws of chance.”
* “Why Do People Pay for Useless Advice? Implications of Gambler’s and Hot-Hand Fallacies in False-Expert Setting”, by Nattavudh Powdthavee and Yohanes Riyanto, Institute for the Study of Labour, May 2012.
Tuesday, June 05, 2012
Uma desaceleração estrutural by PAULO GUEDES
Após uma forte desaceleração econômica ao longo de 2011, o Brasil encerra o primeiro trimestre de 2012 com a economia praticamente estagnada. O esfriamento da economia brasileira tem sido atribuído ao aprofundamento da grande crise contemporânea. Seríamos vítimas do fenômeno da desaceleração econômica global. Estariam contribuindo para a frustração de nossas expectativas de crescimento a frágil recuperação da economia americana, o esfriamento das demais economias emergentes - novas fronteiras de crescimento da economia mundial - e, principalmente, o buraco negro da Zona do Euro.
O agravamento da crise europeia é a bola da vez. A armadilha social-democrata de baixo crescimento, com regimes previdenciários irrealistas e legislações trabalhistas anacrônicas, tornou inflexíveis os mercados de trabalho. Produzida por décadas de práticas políticas obsoletas da social-democracia europeia, a euroesclerose estilhaçou o maior mercado potencial do planeta em imensos bolsões "nacionais" de desemprego. A balcanização econômica da Europa e a insatisfação de eleitorados nacionais com a estagnação da produção e do emprego tornaram-se explícitas com a emergência do euro ao status de moeda forte.
Essa armadilha de baixo crescimento é o resultado da falta de sintonia de classes políticas nacionais com os requisitos de uma nova ordem global. Aprisionou a economia europeia, condenando-a ao crescimento medíocre e à incapacidade de gerar empregos. Crítico contumaz da globalização, que considera uma singularidade histórica anglo-saxã de consequências desastrosas para o resto do mundo, o filósofo e cientista político britânico John Gray julga irreconciliáveis as contradições entre as práticas políticas social-democratas e as práticas econômicas de livres mercados globais.
A desaceleração econômica brasileira não é apenas uma sincronização com a crise global, como efeito do buraco negro europeu. "O requisito básico para escapar do baixo desempenho econômico é o claro entendimento de que se origina de instituições deficientes, que por sua vez resultam de crenças e percepções inadequadas diante de uma nova realidade. A estrutura institucional existente é um poderoso obstáculo às necessárias mudanças, pois reage em defesa de interesses adquiridos", adverte o Prêmio Nobel de Economia Douglass North, em "Compreendendo o processo das mudanças econômicas" (2005).
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Costa Maya
www.CruiseCritic.com
Costa Maya
Chacchoben Ruins
Maps provided by
Overview
If you build it, they will come. Costa Maya, the newest port in the Western Caribbean, may be located on a peninsula but in effect it feels more like a private island created from scratch expressly for cruisers. Costa Maya is located on the Caribbean Sea approximately 100 miles south of Playa del Carmen and quite close to the border of Belize.
Costa Maya is what you'd expect if, say, Disney World decided to create its own private island in Mexico: a man-made tourism village with bars, restaurants, shops and pools at the ready. The faux village itself was created solely to woo cruise passengers and it has a myriad of facilities -- pools, restaurants, bars, shops and a small beach (though it's too rocky to swim). Since Costa Maya first began accepting cruise passengers in February of 2001, the developers have added a beach house and water sports area, which is actually well away from the main village and is typically used by cruise lines as a shore excursion option.
Beyond that? What's interesting is that in developing an entire destination out of scratch in a place whose only settlement was the nearby village of Mahahual, 200 residents strong, the folks who created Costa Maya had to build everything. They worked with Coca-Cola to install water sanitation systems (and yes, it is safe to drink water within the Costa Maya confines). They built brick-paved roads and concrete cottages for the employees who pretty much all come from elsewhere and needed housing.
For travelers who just want to get into the "don't worry, be happy" mindset, the lure of Costa Maya can pretty much consume the day. Those who want to venture further have intriguing options, too. The region is home to some lesser known (but still important) Mayan ruins. The site most cruise passengers come here to see is Chacchoben, a city dating back to around 350 A.D.
Another place worth visiting beyond Costa Maya's boundaries is the seaside village of Mahahual. Once a simple haunt for fishermen, now there are seaside huts serving fresh ceviche, lovely white sand beaches with shallow surf (perfect for families) and way, way too many entrepreneurs selling the usual souvenirs.
If Costa Maya -- and Mahahual -- feel shiny new these days it's because they are. In August 2007, Hurricane Dean, a five category storm, came ashore here and created much havoc and destruction. In Costa Maya. The port, which was closed for 14 months for rebuilding, required cosmetic facelifts for its restaurants, shops and pools. The Uvero Beach Club, which was totally destroyed, was completely rebuilt.
In Mahahual, residents took advantage of the terrible hurricane to rebuild and improved the village's appearance in the process. New is a gorgeous 1.5 mile beach promenade with restaurants and shops alongside.
Costa Maya welcomed its post-Hurricane Dean cruise ship in October 2008.
Currently, Costa Maya can handle at least three ships, resulting in more than 6,000 visitors per day.
Best Cocktail
Any fruity concoction sold in a yard-long plastic tumbler called, appropriately, "la yarda." If three feet of banana daiquiri or strawberry margarita doesn't float your boat, quench your thirst with a few bottles of Bohemia or Sol, the requisite beers.
Language
Spanish, though English is widely spoken, as most places in the area cater to tourists.
Currency & Best Way to Get Money
The Mexican peso; one U.S. dollar is equivalent to approximately 10 pesos. However, many vendors will gladly accept U.S. currency.
Where You're Docked
Ships dock right at Costa Maya's purpose-built facilities.
Hanging Around
A "faux" village created solely for cruise passengers is just steps from the dock. The pier-side village features a number of free-to-use pools, one of which is huge with a swim-up bar; restaurants, bars and shops including the usual suspects like Diamonds International and a small beach lined with chairs and hammocks for relaxing, though it's too rocky for a good swim.
Getting Around
A taxi ride into Mahahual is about $5 per person roundtrip. Local buses to Mahahual are located behind the shopping area; tickets for the $3 fare are must be purchased in advance and are sold at a booth located in the same area. Golf carts and Jeeps are also available for rent for around $12 an hour or $60 per day, respectively.
Don't Miss
For first-timers to Costa Maya, a trip to the Mayan ruins at Chacchoben, in a jungle setting roughly an hour or so by motorcoach from the port, is an interesting and worthwhile outing. Chacchoben (the Mayan word for "red corn") dates back to around 350 A.D., but was largely unexplored until 1999. Visitors can ascend the steep stairs of "El Gran Basamento," the only structure available for climbing. What's also kind of special is that the site has not been fully excavated; our guide explained that wherever you see a hill in this otherwise flat area of Mexico you can bet there are ruins beneath. The site also houses a gift shop selling a genuinely distinctive collection of crafts.
Take the five-minute cab drive to Mahahual, a quirky and eccentric fishing village with lots of character. The main "boulevard," a street of sand that runs between a pretty white beach and some concrete shacks on the other side, has now been made a pedestrian throughway. Though the shopping is standard at best (owners are persistent to sell typical cheap trinkets), the beach is clean -- and the water, protected by a reef, is very calm and shallow so it's a perfect place for families. You can also get beach massages ($20 for 45 minutes), and rent Jet Skis and kayaks.
Been There, Done That
Xcalet is a small, off-the-beaten-path village within the Xcalak National Reef Park. Here, visitors can dive or snorkel among shipwrecks (there have been hundreds over past centuries) in Chinchorro Banks, Mexico's largest coral atoll.
Lunching
By the Port: The chain-restaurant-style Mexican food at Mamacita's, the pier-side beach-front restaurant, plays second fiddle to the fun atmosphere and live entertainment (who would have thought men in sombreros would rock out on a Rolling Stones cover?).
In Mahahaul: The best eatery along the strip is El Faro, which means lighthouse in Spanish; order the conch ceviche and quesadillas with homemade guacamole.
Shore Excursions
For Active Travelers: Explore Costa Maya's coastline on a bike and kayak adventure. Cyclists ride along a dirt road and through the fishing village of Mahahual for views of the water before arriving at the beach and boarding two-person kayaks. The tour is approximately 2 1/2 hours and costs about $48 for adults and children (minimum age: 12).
For Ruins Enthusiasts: If you have already seen Chacchoben or just want to kill two birds with one stone, take a Mayan explorer excursion that combines the archaeological ruins at Kohunlich, near the border of Belize, and Dzibanche, known for beautiful pottery and breathtaking temples. The tour is approximately eight hours and costs about $98 for adults and children.
For Beach Bums: Spend the day at popular Uvero Beach. Cruise line beach break packages, approximately $38 for children and adults, include entrance to the beach, open bar, use of hammocks, non-motorized water sports (based on availability) and roundtrip transportation. There are bars and a fast food restaurant (plan for an a la carte experience there).
For Off-Roaders: Reach the beach in style: A bilingual guide will take you through the jungle in a World War II class S Mercedes Benz Unimog. For more, check out www.costamaya-mexico.com.
Staying in Touch
There's an Internet cafe in the village of Costa Maya.
For More Information
On the Web: www.costamaya-mexico.com
Cruise Critic Message Boards: Costa Maya
The Independent Traveler: Mexico Exchange
--Updated by Carolyn Spencer Brown, Editor in Chief.
Costa Maya
Chacchoben Ruins
Maps provided by
Overview
If you build it, they will come. Costa Maya, the newest port in the Western Caribbean, may be located on a peninsula but in effect it feels more like a private island created from scratch expressly for cruisers. Costa Maya is located on the Caribbean Sea approximately 100 miles south of Playa del Carmen and quite close to the border of Belize.
Costa Maya is what you'd expect if, say, Disney World decided to create its own private island in Mexico: a man-made tourism village with bars, restaurants, shops and pools at the ready. The faux village itself was created solely to woo cruise passengers and it has a myriad of facilities -- pools, restaurants, bars, shops and a small beach (though it's too rocky to swim). Since Costa Maya first began accepting cruise passengers in February of 2001, the developers have added a beach house and water sports area, which is actually well away from the main village and is typically used by cruise lines as a shore excursion option.
Beyond that? What's interesting is that in developing an entire destination out of scratch in a place whose only settlement was the nearby village of Mahahual, 200 residents strong, the folks who created Costa Maya had to build everything. They worked with Coca-Cola to install water sanitation systems (and yes, it is safe to drink water within the Costa Maya confines). They built brick-paved roads and concrete cottages for the employees who pretty much all come from elsewhere and needed housing.
For travelers who just want to get into the "don't worry, be happy" mindset, the lure of Costa Maya can pretty much consume the day. Those who want to venture further have intriguing options, too. The region is home to some lesser known (but still important) Mayan ruins. The site most cruise passengers come here to see is Chacchoben, a city dating back to around 350 A.D.
Another place worth visiting beyond Costa Maya's boundaries is the seaside village of Mahahual. Once a simple haunt for fishermen, now there are seaside huts serving fresh ceviche, lovely white sand beaches with shallow surf (perfect for families) and way, way too many entrepreneurs selling the usual souvenirs.
If Costa Maya -- and Mahahual -- feel shiny new these days it's because they are. In August 2007, Hurricane Dean, a five category storm, came ashore here and created much havoc and destruction. In Costa Maya. The port, which was closed for 14 months for rebuilding, required cosmetic facelifts for its restaurants, shops and pools. The Uvero Beach Club, which was totally destroyed, was completely rebuilt.
In Mahahual, residents took advantage of the terrible hurricane to rebuild and improved the village's appearance in the process. New is a gorgeous 1.5 mile beach promenade with restaurants and shops alongside.
Costa Maya welcomed its post-Hurricane Dean cruise ship in October 2008.
Currently, Costa Maya can handle at least three ships, resulting in more than 6,000 visitors per day.
Best Cocktail
Any fruity concoction sold in a yard-long plastic tumbler called, appropriately, "la yarda." If three feet of banana daiquiri or strawberry margarita doesn't float your boat, quench your thirst with a few bottles of Bohemia or Sol, the requisite beers.
Language
Spanish, though English is widely spoken, as most places in the area cater to tourists.
Currency & Best Way to Get Money
The Mexican peso; one U.S. dollar is equivalent to approximately 10 pesos. However, many vendors will gladly accept U.S. currency.
Where You're Docked
Ships dock right at Costa Maya's purpose-built facilities.
Hanging Around
A "faux" village created solely for cruise passengers is just steps from the dock. The pier-side village features a number of free-to-use pools, one of which is huge with a swim-up bar; restaurants, bars and shops including the usual suspects like Diamonds International and a small beach lined with chairs and hammocks for relaxing, though it's too rocky for a good swim.
Getting Around
A taxi ride into Mahahual is about $5 per person roundtrip. Local buses to Mahahual are located behind the shopping area; tickets for the $3 fare are must be purchased in advance and are sold at a booth located in the same area. Golf carts and Jeeps are also available for rent for around $12 an hour or $60 per day, respectively.
Don't Miss
For first-timers to Costa Maya, a trip to the Mayan ruins at Chacchoben, in a jungle setting roughly an hour or so by motorcoach from the port, is an interesting and worthwhile outing. Chacchoben (the Mayan word for "red corn") dates back to around 350 A.D., but was largely unexplored until 1999. Visitors can ascend the steep stairs of "El Gran Basamento," the only structure available for climbing. What's also kind of special is that the site has not been fully excavated; our guide explained that wherever you see a hill in this otherwise flat area of Mexico you can bet there are ruins beneath. The site also houses a gift shop selling a genuinely distinctive collection of crafts.
Take the five-minute cab drive to Mahahual, a quirky and eccentric fishing village with lots of character. The main "boulevard," a street of sand that runs between a pretty white beach and some concrete shacks on the other side, has now been made a pedestrian throughway. Though the shopping is standard at best (owners are persistent to sell typical cheap trinkets), the beach is clean -- and the water, protected by a reef, is very calm and shallow so it's a perfect place for families. You can also get beach massages ($20 for 45 minutes), and rent Jet Skis and kayaks.
Been There, Done That
Xcalet is a small, off-the-beaten-path village within the Xcalak National Reef Park. Here, visitors can dive or snorkel among shipwrecks (there have been hundreds over past centuries) in Chinchorro Banks, Mexico's largest coral atoll.
Lunching
By the Port: The chain-restaurant-style Mexican food at Mamacita's, the pier-side beach-front restaurant, plays second fiddle to the fun atmosphere and live entertainment (who would have thought men in sombreros would rock out on a Rolling Stones cover?).
In Mahahaul: The best eatery along the strip is El Faro, which means lighthouse in Spanish; order the conch ceviche and quesadillas with homemade guacamole.
Shore Excursions
For Active Travelers: Explore Costa Maya's coastline on a bike and kayak adventure. Cyclists ride along a dirt road and through the fishing village of Mahahual for views of the water before arriving at the beach and boarding two-person kayaks. The tour is approximately 2 1/2 hours and costs about $48 for adults and children (minimum age: 12).
For Ruins Enthusiasts: If you have already seen Chacchoben or just want to kill two birds with one stone, take a Mayan explorer excursion that combines the archaeological ruins at Kohunlich, near the border of Belize, and Dzibanche, known for beautiful pottery and breathtaking temples. The tour is approximately eight hours and costs about $98 for adults and children.
For Beach Bums: Spend the day at popular Uvero Beach. Cruise line beach break packages, approximately $38 for children and adults, include entrance to the beach, open bar, use of hammocks, non-motorized water sports (based on availability) and roundtrip transportation. There are bars and a fast food restaurant (plan for an a la carte experience there).
For Off-Roaders: Reach the beach in style: A bilingual guide will take you through the jungle in a World War II class S Mercedes Benz Unimog. For more, check out www.costamaya-mexico.com.
Staying in Touch
There's an Internet cafe in the village of Costa Maya.
For More Information
On the Web: www.costamaya-mexico.com
Cruise Critic Message Boards: Costa Maya
The Independent Traveler: Mexico Exchange
--Updated by Carolyn Spencer Brown, Editor in Chief.
Tuesday, February 07, 2012
Tuesday, November 08, 2011
Literature in search of liberty by mario lvargas losa
By MARIO VARGAS LLOSA, WSJ
What is lost on collectivists is the prime importance of individual freedom for societies to flourish and economies to thrive.
The blessings of freedom and the perils of its opposite can be seen the world over. It is why I have so passionately adhered to advancing the idea of individual freedom in my work.
Having abandoned the Marxist myths that took in so many of my generation, I soon came to genuinely believe that I had found a truth that had to be shared in the best way I knew—through the art of letters. Critics on the left and right have often praised my novels only to distance themselves from the ideas I've expressed. I do not believe my work can be separated from its ideals.
It is the function of the novelist to tell timeless and universal truths through the device of a fashioned narrative. A story's significance as a piece of art cannot be divorced from its message, any more than a society's prospects for freedom and prosperity can be divorced from its underlying principles. The writer and the man are one and the same, as are the culture and its common beliefs. In my writing and in my life I have pursued a vision not only to inspire my readers but also to share my dream of what we can aspire to build here in our world.
Those who love liberty are often ridiculed for their idealism. And at times we can feel alone, as there appear to be very few dedicated to the ideals of true "liberalism."
In the United States, the term "liberal" has come to be associated with leftism, socialism, and an ambitious role for government in the economy. Many who describe their politics as "liberal" emphatically favor measures which desire to push aside free enterprise. Some who call themselves liberal show even greater hostility toward business, loudly protesting the very idea of economic freedom and promoting a vision of society not so different from the failed utopian experiments of history's socialist and fascist regimes.
In Latin America and Spain, where the word "liberal" originated to mean an advocate of liberty, the left now uses the label as an invective. It carries connotations of "conservative" or reactionary politics, and especially a failure to care for the world's poor. I have been maligned in this way.
Ironically enough, part of the confusion can be pinned on some who champion the market economy in the name of old liberalism. They have at times done even more damage to freedom than the Marxists and other socialists.
There are those who in the name of the free market have supported Latin American dictatorships whose iron hand of repression was said to be necessary to allow business to function, betraying the very principles of human rights that free economies rest upon. Then there are those who have coldly reduced all questions of humanity to a matter of economics and see the market as a panacea. In doing so they ignore the role of ideas and culture, the true foundation of civilization. Without customs and shared beliefs to breathe life into democracy and the market, we are reduced to the Darwinian struggle of atomistic and selfish actors that many on the left rightfully see as inhuman.
What is lost on the collectivists, on the other hand, is the prime importance of individual freedom for societies to flourish and economies to thrive. This is the core insight of true liberalism: All individual freedoms are part of an inseparable whole. Political and economic liberties cannot be bifurcated. Mankind has inherited this wisdom from millennia of experience, and our understanding has been enriched further by the great liberal thinkers, some of my favorites being Isaiah Berlin, Karl Popper, F.A. Hayek and Ludwig von Mises. They have described the path out of darkness and toward a brighter future of freedom and universal appreciation for the values of human dignity.
When the liberal truth is forgotten, we see the horrors of nationalist dictatorship, fascism, communism, cult fanaticism, terrorism and the many savageries that have defined all too much in the modern era. The problem is less pronounced in the United States, but here there still remain problems resulting from the abandonment of these key principles.
Many cling to hopes that the economy can be centrally planned. Education, health care, housing, money and banking, crime control, transportation, energy and far more follow the failed command-and-control model that has been repeatedly discredited. Some look to nationalist and statist solutions to trade imbalances and migration problems, instead of toward greater freedom.
Yet there is reason for hope here and elsewhere. The American system still allows for open dissent, the hallmark of a free society, and in a healthy fashion both left and right practice this cherished freedom. Throughout the world, anti-Americanism and anticapitalism are in decline. In Latin America, outside of Venezuela and Cuba, dictatorship of the old socialist and fascist varieties is dead, with market reforms sweeping even nominally leftist regimes.
The search for liberty is simply part of the greater search for a world where respect for the rule of law and human rights is universal—a world free of dictators, terrorists, warmongers and fanatics, where men and women of all nationalities, races, traditions and creeds can coexist in the culture of freedom, where borders give way to bridges that people cross to reach their goals limited only by free will and respect for one another's rights. It is a search to which I've dedicated my writing, and so many have taken notice. But is it not a search to which we should all devote our very lives? The answer is clear when we see what is at stake.
Mr. Vargas Llosa, the 2010 Nobel laureate in literature, will receive the Alexis de Tocqueville Award on Nov. 15 from the Independent Institute at its 25th anniversary celebration. He wrote this essay for the occasion.
What is lost on collectivists is the prime importance of individual freedom for societies to flourish and economies to thrive.
The blessings of freedom and the perils of its opposite can be seen the world over. It is why I have so passionately adhered to advancing the idea of individual freedom in my work.
Having abandoned the Marxist myths that took in so many of my generation, I soon came to genuinely believe that I had found a truth that had to be shared in the best way I knew—through the art of letters. Critics on the left and right have often praised my novels only to distance themselves from the ideas I've expressed. I do not believe my work can be separated from its ideals.
It is the function of the novelist to tell timeless and universal truths through the device of a fashioned narrative. A story's significance as a piece of art cannot be divorced from its message, any more than a society's prospects for freedom and prosperity can be divorced from its underlying principles. The writer and the man are one and the same, as are the culture and its common beliefs. In my writing and in my life I have pursued a vision not only to inspire my readers but also to share my dream of what we can aspire to build here in our world.
Those who love liberty are often ridiculed for their idealism. And at times we can feel alone, as there appear to be very few dedicated to the ideals of true "liberalism."
In the United States, the term "liberal" has come to be associated with leftism, socialism, and an ambitious role for government in the economy. Many who describe their politics as "liberal" emphatically favor measures which desire to push aside free enterprise. Some who call themselves liberal show even greater hostility toward business, loudly protesting the very idea of economic freedom and promoting a vision of society not so different from the failed utopian experiments of history's socialist and fascist regimes.
In Latin America and Spain, where the word "liberal" originated to mean an advocate of liberty, the left now uses the label as an invective. It carries connotations of "conservative" or reactionary politics, and especially a failure to care for the world's poor. I have been maligned in this way.
Ironically enough, part of the confusion can be pinned on some who champion the market economy in the name of old liberalism. They have at times done even more damage to freedom than the Marxists and other socialists.
There are those who in the name of the free market have supported Latin American dictatorships whose iron hand of repression was said to be necessary to allow business to function, betraying the very principles of human rights that free economies rest upon. Then there are those who have coldly reduced all questions of humanity to a matter of economics and see the market as a panacea. In doing so they ignore the role of ideas and culture, the true foundation of civilization. Without customs and shared beliefs to breathe life into democracy and the market, we are reduced to the Darwinian struggle of atomistic and selfish actors that many on the left rightfully see as inhuman.
What is lost on the collectivists, on the other hand, is the prime importance of individual freedom for societies to flourish and economies to thrive. This is the core insight of true liberalism: All individual freedoms are part of an inseparable whole. Political and economic liberties cannot be bifurcated. Mankind has inherited this wisdom from millennia of experience, and our understanding has been enriched further by the great liberal thinkers, some of my favorites being Isaiah Berlin, Karl Popper, F.A. Hayek and Ludwig von Mises. They have described the path out of darkness and toward a brighter future of freedom and universal appreciation for the values of human dignity.
When the liberal truth is forgotten, we see the horrors of nationalist dictatorship, fascism, communism, cult fanaticism, terrorism and the many savageries that have defined all too much in the modern era. The problem is less pronounced in the United States, but here there still remain problems resulting from the abandonment of these key principles.
Many cling to hopes that the economy can be centrally planned. Education, health care, housing, money and banking, crime control, transportation, energy and far more follow the failed command-and-control model that has been repeatedly discredited. Some look to nationalist and statist solutions to trade imbalances and migration problems, instead of toward greater freedom.
Yet there is reason for hope here and elsewhere. The American system still allows for open dissent, the hallmark of a free society, and in a healthy fashion both left and right practice this cherished freedom. Throughout the world, anti-Americanism and anticapitalism are in decline. In Latin America, outside of Venezuela and Cuba, dictatorship of the old socialist and fascist varieties is dead, with market reforms sweeping even nominally leftist regimes.
The search for liberty is simply part of the greater search for a world where respect for the rule of law and human rights is universal—a world free of dictators, terrorists, warmongers and fanatics, where men and women of all nationalities, races, traditions and creeds can coexist in the culture of freedom, where borders give way to bridges that people cross to reach their goals limited only by free will and respect for one another's rights. It is a search to which I've dedicated my writing, and so many have taken notice. But is it not a search to which we should all devote our very lives? The answer is clear when we see what is at stake.
Mr. Vargas Llosa, the 2010 Nobel laureate in literature, will receive the Alexis de Tocqueville Award on Nov. 15 from the Independent Institute at its 25th anniversary celebration. He wrote this essay for the occasion.
Thursday, August 04, 2011
60 Small Ways to Improve Your Life in the Next 100 Days by Marelisa
60 Small Ways to Improve Your Life in the Next 100 Days
May 30 by Marelisa | 108 Comments and 1169 Reactions | Lifestyle | Tags: improve your life, life improvement, small ways to improve your life, work/life-balance
Contrary to popular belief, you don’t have to make drastic changes in order to notice an improvement in the quality of your life. At the same time, you don’t need to wait a long time in order to see the measurable results that come from taking positive action. All you have to do is take small steps, and take them consistently, for a period of 100 days.
Below you’ll find 60 small ways to improve all areas of your life in the next 100 days.
Home
1. Create a “100 Days to Conquer Clutter Calendar” by penciling in one group of items you plan to declutter every day, for the next 100 days. Here’s an example:
Day 1: Declutter Magazines
Day 2: Declutter DVD’s
Day 3: Declutter books
Day 4: Declutter kitchen appliances
2. Live by the mantra: a place for everything and everything in its place. For the next 100 days follow these four rules to keep your house in order:
If you take it out, put it back.
If you open it, close it.
If you throw it down, pick it up.
If you take it off, hang it up.
3. Walk around your home and identify 100 things you’ve been tolerating; fix one each day. Here are some examples:
A burnt light bulb that needs to be changed.
A button that’s missing on your favorite shirt.
The fact that every time you open your top kitchen cabinet all of the plastic food containers fall out.
Happiness
4. Follow the advice proffered by positive psychologists and write down 5 to 10 things that you’re grateful for, every day.
5. Make a list of 20 small things that you enjoy doing, and make sure that you do at least one of these things every day for the next 100 days. Your list can include things such as the following:
Eating your lunch outside.
Calling your best friend to chat.
Taking the time to sit down and read a novel by your favorite author for a few minutes.
6. Keep a log of your mental chatter, both positive and negative, for ten days. Be as specific as possible:
How many times do you beat yourself up during the day?
Do you have feelings of inadequacy?
Are you constantly thinking critical thoughts of others?
How many positive thoughts do you have during the day?
Also, make a note of the emotions that accompany these thoughts. Then, for the next 90 days, begin changing your emotions for the better by modifying your mental chatter.
7. For the next 100 days, have a good laugh at least once a day: get one of those calendars that has a different joke for every day of the year, or stop by a web site that features your favorite cartoons.
Learning/Personal Development
8. Choose a book that requires effort and concentration and read a little of it every day, so that you read it from cover to cover in 100 days.
9. Make it a point to learn at least one new thing each day: the name of a flower that grows in your garden, the capital of a far-off country, or the name of a piece of classical music you hear playing in your favorite clothing boutique as you shop. If it’s time for bed and you can’t identify anything you’ve learned that day, take out your dictionary and learn a new word.
10. Stop complaining for the next 100 days. A couple of years back, Will Bowen gave a purple rubber bracelet to each person in his congregation to remind them to stop complaining. “Negative talk produces negative thoughts; negative thoughts produce negative results”, says Bowen. For the next 100 days, whenever you catch yourself complaining about anything, stop yourself.
11. Set your alarm a minute earlier every day for the next 100 days. Then make sure that you get out of bed as soon as your alarm rings, open the windows to let in some sunlight, and do some light stretching. In 100 days you’ll be waking up an hour and forty minutes earlier than you’re waking up now.
12. For the next 100 days, keep Morning Pages, which is a tool suggested by Julia Cameron. Morning Pages are simply three pages of longhand, stream of consciousness writing, done first thing in the morning.
13. For the next 100 days make it a point to feed your mind with the thoughts, words, and images that are most consistent with who you want to be, what you want to have, and what you want to achieve.
Finances
14. Create a spending plan (also known as a budget). Track every cent that you spend for the next 100 days to make sure that you’re sticking to your spending plan.
15. Scour the internet for frugality tips, choose ten of the tips that you find, and apply them for the next 100 days. Here are some possibilities:
Go to the grocery store with cash and a calculator instead of using your debit card.
Take inventory before going to the grocery store to avoid buying repeat items.
Scale back the cable.
Ask yourself if you really need a landline telephone.
Consolidate errands into one trip to save on gas.
Keep track of how much money you save over the next 100 days by applying these tips.
16. For the next 100 days, pay for everything with paper money and keep any change that you receive. Then, put all of your change in a jar and see how much money you can accumulate in 100 days.
17. Don’t buy anything that you don’t absolutely need for 100 days. Use any money you save by doing this to do one of the following:
Pay down your debt, if you have any.
Put it toward your six month emergency fund.
Start setting aside money to invest.
18. Set an hour aside every day for the next 100 days to devote to creating one source of passive income.
Time Management
19. For the next 100 days, take a notebook with you everywhere in order to keep your mind decluttered. Record everything, so that it’s safely stored in one place—out of your head—where you can decide what to do with it later. Include things such as the following:
Ideas for writing assignments.
Appointment dates.
To Do list items
20. Track how you spend your time for 5 days. Use the information that you gather in order to create a time budget: the percentage of your time that you want to devote to each activity that you engage in on a regular basis. This can include things such as:
Transportation
Housework
Leisure
Income-Generating Activities
Make sure that you stick to your time budget for the remaining 95 days.
21. Identify one low-priority activity which you can stop doing for the next 100 days, and devote that time to a high priority task instead.
22. Identify five ways in which you regularly waste time, and limit the time that you’re going to spend on these activities each day, for the next 100 days. Here are three examples:
Watch no more than half-an-hour of television a day.
Spend no more than half-an-hour each day on social media sites, such as Facebook, Twitter, and Stumbleupon.
Spend no more than twenty minutes a day playing video games.
23. For the next 100 days, stop multi-tasking; do one thing at a time without distractions.
24. For the next 100 days, plan your day the night before.
25. For the next 100 days, do the most important thing on your To-Do list first, before you do anything else.
26. For the next 14 weeks, conduct a review of each week. During your weekly review, answer the following:
What did you accomplish?
What went wrong?
What went right?
27. For the next 100 days, spend a few minutes at the end of each day organizing your desk, filing papers, and making sure that your work area is clean and orderly, so that you can walk in to a neat desk the next day.
28. Make a list of all of the commitments and social obligations that you have in the next 100 days. Then, take out a red pen and cross out anything that does not truly bring you joy or help move you along the path to achieving your main life goals.
29. For the next 100 days, every time that you switch to a new activity throughout the day stop and ask yourself, “Is this the best use of my time at this moment?”
Health
30. Losing a pound of fat requires burning 3500 calories. If you reduce your caloric intake by 175 calories a day for the next 100 days, you’ll have lost 5 pounds in the next 100 days.
31. For the next 100 days, eat five servings of vegetables every day.
32. For the next 100 days, eat three servings of fruit of every day.
33. Choose one food that constantly sabotages your efforts to eat healthier—whether it’s the decadent cheesecake from the bakery around the corner, deep-dish pizza, or your favorite potato chips—and go cold turkey for the next 100 days.
34. For the next 100 days, eat from a smaller plate to help control portion size.
35. For the next 100 days, buy 100% natural juices instead of the kind with added sugar and preservatives.
36. For the next 100 days, instead of carbonated drinks, drink water.
37. Create a list of 10 healthy, easy to fix breakfast meals.
38. Create a list of 20 healthy, easy to fix meals which can be eaten for lunch or dinner.
39. Create a list of 10 healthy, easy to fix snacks.
40. Use your lists of healthy breakfast meals, lunches, dinners, and snacks in order to plan out your meals for the week ahead of time. Do this for the next 14 weeks.
41. For the next 100 days, keep a food log. This will help you to identify where you’re deviating from your planned menu, and where you’re consuming extra calories.
42. For the next 100 days, get at least twenty minutes of daily exercise.
43. Wear a pedometer and walk 10,000 steps, every day, for the next 100 days. Every step you take during the day counts toward the 10,000 steps:
When you walk to your car.
When you walk from your desk to the bathroom.
When you walk over to talk to a co-worker, and so on.
44. Set up a weight chart and post it up in your bathroom. Every week for the next 14 weeks, keep track of the following:
Your weight.
Your percentage of body fat.
Your waist circumference.
45. For the next 100 days, set your watch to beep once an hour, or set up a computer reminder, to make sure that you drink water on a regular basis throughout the day.
46. For the next 100 days, make it a daily ritual to mediate, breath, or visualize every day in order to calm your mind.
Your Relationship
47. For the next 100 days, actively look for something positive in your partner every day, and write it down.
48. Create a scrapbook of all the things you and your partner do together during the next 100 days. At the end of the 100 days, give your partner the list you created of positive things you observed about them each day, as well as the scrapbook you created.
49. Identify 3 actions that you’re going to take each day, for the next 100 days, in order to strengthen your relationship. These can include the following:
Say “I love you” and “Have a good day” to your significant other every morning.
Hug your significant other as soon as you see each other after work.
Go for a twenty minute walk together every day after dinner; hold hands.
Social
50. Connect with someone new every day for the next 100 days, whether it’s by greeting a neighbor you’ve never spoken to before, following someone new on Twitter, leaving a comment on a blog you’ve never commented on before, and so on.
51. For the next 100 days, make it a point to associate with people you admire, respect and want to be like.
52. For the next 100 days, when someone does or says something that upsets you, take a minute to think over your response instead of answering right away.
53. For the next 100 days, don’t even think of passing judgment until you’ve heard both sides of the story.
54. For the next 100 days do one kind deed for someone every day, however small, even if it’s just sending a silent blessing their way.
55. For the next 100 days, make it a point to give praise and approval to those who deserve it.
56. For the next 100 days, practice active listening. When someone is talking to you, remain focused on what they’re saying, instead of rehearsing in your head what you’re going to say next. Paraphrase what you think you heard them say to make sure that you haven’t misinterpreted them, and encourage them to elaborate on any points you’re still not clear about.
57. Practice empathy for the next 100 days. If you disagree with someone, try to see the world from their perspective; put yourself in their shoes. Be curious about the other person, about their beliefs and their life experience, and about the thinking process that they followed to reach their conclusions.
58. For the next 100 days, stay in your own life and don’t compare yourself to anyone else.
59. For the next 100 days, place the best possible interpretation on the actions of others.
60. For the next 100 days, keep reminding yourself that everyone is doing the best that they can.
May 30 by Marelisa | 108 Comments and 1169 Reactions | Lifestyle | Tags: improve your life, life improvement, small ways to improve your life, work/life-balance
Contrary to popular belief, you don’t have to make drastic changes in order to notice an improvement in the quality of your life. At the same time, you don’t need to wait a long time in order to see the measurable results that come from taking positive action. All you have to do is take small steps, and take them consistently, for a period of 100 days.
Below you’ll find 60 small ways to improve all areas of your life in the next 100 days.
Home
1. Create a “100 Days to Conquer Clutter Calendar” by penciling in one group of items you plan to declutter every day, for the next 100 days. Here’s an example:
Day 1: Declutter Magazines
Day 2: Declutter DVD’s
Day 3: Declutter books
Day 4: Declutter kitchen appliances
2. Live by the mantra: a place for everything and everything in its place. For the next 100 days follow these four rules to keep your house in order:
If you take it out, put it back.
If you open it, close it.
If you throw it down, pick it up.
If you take it off, hang it up.
3. Walk around your home and identify 100 things you’ve been tolerating; fix one each day. Here are some examples:
A burnt light bulb that needs to be changed.
A button that’s missing on your favorite shirt.
The fact that every time you open your top kitchen cabinet all of the plastic food containers fall out.
Happiness
4. Follow the advice proffered by positive psychologists and write down 5 to 10 things that you’re grateful for, every day.
5. Make a list of 20 small things that you enjoy doing, and make sure that you do at least one of these things every day for the next 100 days. Your list can include things such as the following:
Eating your lunch outside.
Calling your best friend to chat.
Taking the time to sit down and read a novel by your favorite author for a few minutes.
6. Keep a log of your mental chatter, both positive and negative, for ten days. Be as specific as possible:
How many times do you beat yourself up during the day?
Do you have feelings of inadequacy?
Are you constantly thinking critical thoughts of others?
How many positive thoughts do you have during the day?
Also, make a note of the emotions that accompany these thoughts. Then, for the next 90 days, begin changing your emotions for the better by modifying your mental chatter.
7. For the next 100 days, have a good laugh at least once a day: get one of those calendars that has a different joke for every day of the year, or stop by a web site that features your favorite cartoons.
Learning/Personal Development
8. Choose a book that requires effort and concentration and read a little of it every day, so that you read it from cover to cover in 100 days.
9. Make it a point to learn at least one new thing each day: the name of a flower that grows in your garden, the capital of a far-off country, or the name of a piece of classical music you hear playing in your favorite clothing boutique as you shop. If it’s time for bed and you can’t identify anything you’ve learned that day, take out your dictionary and learn a new word.
10. Stop complaining for the next 100 days. A couple of years back, Will Bowen gave a purple rubber bracelet to each person in his congregation to remind them to stop complaining. “Negative talk produces negative thoughts; negative thoughts produce negative results”, says Bowen. For the next 100 days, whenever you catch yourself complaining about anything, stop yourself.
11. Set your alarm a minute earlier every day for the next 100 days. Then make sure that you get out of bed as soon as your alarm rings, open the windows to let in some sunlight, and do some light stretching. In 100 days you’ll be waking up an hour and forty minutes earlier than you’re waking up now.
12. For the next 100 days, keep Morning Pages, which is a tool suggested by Julia Cameron. Morning Pages are simply three pages of longhand, stream of consciousness writing, done first thing in the morning.
13. For the next 100 days make it a point to feed your mind with the thoughts, words, and images that are most consistent with who you want to be, what you want to have, and what you want to achieve.
Finances
14. Create a spending plan (also known as a budget). Track every cent that you spend for the next 100 days to make sure that you’re sticking to your spending plan.
15. Scour the internet for frugality tips, choose ten of the tips that you find, and apply them for the next 100 days. Here are some possibilities:
Go to the grocery store with cash and a calculator instead of using your debit card.
Take inventory before going to the grocery store to avoid buying repeat items.
Scale back the cable.
Ask yourself if you really need a landline telephone.
Consolidate errands into one trip to save on gas.
Keep track of how much money you save over the next 100 days by applying these tips.
16. For the next 100 days, pay for everything with paper money and keep any change that you receive. Then, put all of your change in a jar and see how much money you can accumulate in 100 days.
17. Don’t buy anything that you don’t absolutely need for 100 days. Use any money you save by doing this to do one of the following:
Pay down your debt, if you have any.
Put it toward your six month emergency fund.
Start setting aside money to invest.
18. Set an hour aside every day for the next 100 days to devote to creating one source of passive income.
Time Management
19. For the next 100 days, take a notebook with you everywhere in order to keep your mind decluttered. Record everything, so that it’s safely stored in one place—out of your head—where you can decide what to do with it later. Include things such as the following:
Ideas for writing assignments.
Appointment dates.
To Do list items
20. Track how you spend your time for 5 days. Use the information that you gather in order to create a time budget: the percentage of your time that you want to devote to each activity that you engage in on a regular basis. This can include things such as:
Transportation
Housework
Leisure
Income-Generating Activities
Make sure that you stick to your time budget for the remaining 95 days.
21. Identify one low-priority activity which you can stop doing for the next 100 days, and devote that time to a high priority task instead.
22. Identify five ways in which you regularly waste time, and limit the time that you’re going to spend on these activities each day, for the next 100 days. Here are three examples:
Watch no more than half-an-hour of television a day.
Spend no more than half-an-hour each day on social media sites, such as Facebook, Twitter, and Stumbleupon.
Spend no more than twenty minutes a day playing video games.
23. For the next 100 days, stop multi-tasking; do one thing at a time without distractions.
24. For the next 100 days, plan your day the night before.
25. For the next 100 days, do the most important thing on your To-Do list first, before you do anything else.
26. For the next 14 weeks, conduct a review of each week. During your weekly review, answer the following:
What did you accomplish?
What went wrong?
What went right?
27. For the next 100 days, spend a few minutes at the end of each day organizing your desk, filing papers, and making sure that your work area is clean and orderly, so that you can walk in to a neat desk the next day.
28. Make a list of all of the commitments and social obligations that you have in the next 100 days. Then, take out a red pen and cross out anything that does not truly bring you joy or help move you along the path to achieving your main life goals.
29. For the next 100 days, every time that you switch to a new activity throughout the day stop and ask yourself, “Is this the best use of my time at this moment?”
Health
30. Losing a pound of fat requires burning 3500 calories. If you reduce your caloric intake by 175 calories a day for the next 100 days, you’ll have lost 5 pounds in the next 100 days.
31. For the next 100 days, eat five servings of vegetables every day.
32. For the next 100 days, eat three servings of fruit of every day.
33. Choose one food that constantly sabotages your efforts to eat healthier—whether it’s the decadent cheesecake from the bakery around the corner, deep-dish pizza, or your favorite potato chips—and go cold turkey for the next 100 days.
34. For the next 100 days, eat from a smaller plate to help control portion size.
35. For the next 100 days, buy 100% natural juices instead of the kind with added sugar and preservatives.
36. For the next 100 days, instead of carbonated drinks, drink water.
37. Create a list of 10 healthy, easy to fix breakfast meals.
38. Create a list of 20 healthy, easy to fix meals which can be eaten for lunch or dinner.
39. Create a list of 10 healthy, easy to fix snacks.
40. Use your lists of healthy breakfast meals, lunches, dinners, and snacks in order to plan out your meals for the week ahead of time. Do this for the next 14 weeks.
41. For the next 100 days, keep a food log. This will help you to identify where you’re deviating from your planned menu, and where you’re consuming extra calories.
42. For the next 100 days, get at least twenty minutes of daily exercise.
43. Wear a pedometer and walk 10,000 steps, every day, for the next 100 days. Every step you take during the day counts toward the 10,000 steps:
When you walk to your car.
When you walk from your desk to the bathroom.
When you walk over to talk to a co-worker, and so on.
44. Set up a weight chart and post it up in your bathroom. Every week for the next 14 weeks, keep track of the following:
Your weight.
Your percentage of body fat.
Your waist circumference.
45. For the next 100 days, set your watch to beep once an hour, or set up a computer reminder, to make sure that you drink water on a regular basis throughout the day.
46. For the next 100 days, make it a daily ritual to mediate, breath, or visualize every day in order to calm your mind.
Your Relationship
47. For the next 100 days, actively look for something positive in your partner every day, and write it down.
48. Create a scrapbook of all the things you and your partner do together during the next 100 days. At the end of the 100 days, give your partner the list you created of positive things you observed about them each day, as well as the scrapbook you created.
49. Identify 3 actions that you’re going to take each day, for the next 100 days, in order to strengthen your relationship. These can include the following:
Say “I love you” and “Have a good day” to your significant other every morning.
Hug your significant other as soon as you see each other after work.
Go for a twenty minute walk together every day after dinner; hold hands.
Social
50. Connect with someone new every day for the next 100 days, whether it’s by greeting a neighbor you’ve never spoken to before, following someone new on Twitter, leaving a comment on a blog you’ve never commented on before, and so on.
51. For the next 100 days, make it a point to associate with people you admire, respect and want to be like.
52. For the next 100 days, when someone does or says something that upsets you, take a minute to think over your response instead of answering right away.
53. For the next 100 days, don’t even think of passing judgment until you’ve heard both sides of the story.
54. For the next 100 days do one kind deed for someone every day, however small, even if it’s just sending a silent blessing their way.
55. For the next 100 days, make it a point to give praise and approval to those who deserve it.
56. For the next 100 days, practice active listening. When someone is talking to you, remain focused on what they’re saying, instead of rehearsing in your head what you’re going to say next. Paraphrase what you think you heard them say to make sure that you haven’t misinterpreted them, and encourage them to elaborate on any points you’re still not clear about.
57. Practice empathy for the next 100 days. If you disagree with someone, try to see the world from their perspective; put yourself in their shoes. Be curious about the other person, about their beliefs and their life experience, and about the thinking process that they followed to reach their conclusions.
58. For the next 100 days, stay in your own life and don’t compare yourself to anyone else.
59. For the next 100 days, place the best possible interpretation on the actions of others.
60. For the next 100 days, keep reminding yourself that everyone is doing the best that they can.
Monday, August 01, 2011
Top ten international tourism destinations in 2010
Out of a global total of 940 million tourists, the top ten international tourism destinations in 2010 were
Rank Country International tourist arrivals
1 France 76.80 million
2 United States 59.75 million
3 China 55.67 million
4 Spain 52.68 million
5 Italy 43.63 million
6 United Kingdom 28.13 million
7 Turkey 27.00 million
8 Germany 26.88 million
9 Malaysia 24.58 million
10 Mexico 22.40 million
Rank Country International tourist arrivals
1 France 76.80 million
2 United States 59.75 million
3 China 55.67 million
4 Spain 52.68 million
5 Italy 43.63 million
6 United Kingdom 28.13 million
7 Turkey 27.00 million
8 Germany 26.88 million
9 Malaysia 24.58 million
10 Mexico 22.40 million
top ten destinations in Americas in 2010
Out of the total of almost 150 million tourists to the Americas in 2010, the top ten destinations were:
Rank Country International tourist arrivals to the Americas
1 United States 59.75 million
2 Mexico 22.40 million
3 Canada 16.10 million
4 Argentina 5.29 million
5 Brazil 5.16 million
6 Dominican Republic 4.13 million
7 Puerto Rico 3.68 million
8 Chile 2.77 million
9 Cuba 2.51 million
10 Colombia 2.39 million
Rank Country International tourist arrivals to the Americas
1 United States 59.75 million
2 Mexico 22.40 million
3 Canada 16.10 million
4 Argentina 5.29 million
5 Brazil 5.16 million
6 Dominican Republic 4.13 million
7 Puerto Rico 3.68 million
8 Chile 2.77 million
9 Cuba 2.51 million
10 Colombia 2.39 million
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