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The world is talking, are you listening?

SlutWalk Brazil (@MarchaVadias) protests on the streets of Brazilian federal state capitals such as São Paulo, Belo Horizonte, Recife, Florianópolis, Curitiba, Porto Alegre, Belém, Rio de Janeiro and Vitória, and the Federal District, this weekend. They demand an end to violence against women and will be echoing slogans like “my body my rule” and “neither saint, nor whore: a woman.” Information on the social movement website.

Andrés Bermúdez comments on China Files about ” The day vallenato was sung in Chinese” [es], a musical reaction to the Chinese industrial production of sombreros vueltiaos, one of the most important artisan crafts from Colombia.

According to [es]a recent poll [es] by Taringa! in Latin America, around 10 % of Internet users say it is not necessary to have a president for the internet, 8% nominated themselves for the job and Megaupload creator Kim Dotcom got third place. Meanwhile 82% say that learning to do new things is the main thing they have accomplished thanks to the Internet. Among the worst of the Internet people voted for pop-up windows (77%) and fake download icons (76%).

Temple of Kotosh, image by Flickr user madiko83 (CC BY 2.0).

The Central Reserve Bank of Peru released on May 22, 2013, the thirteenth collectible coin part of the numismatic series “Wealth and pride of Peru” . The coin has an image of the crossed hands from the Temple of Kotosh, located in the department of Huánuco.

WOLA (Washington Office on Latin America) has published an update on the talks between the Colombian government and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC). The report concludes:

As they pass their six-month anniversary, the talks are proceeding in an atmosphere of increased, though still moderate, optimism. This will grow dramatically if the ninth round makes clear that the agenda has moved beyond the first item, and if the FARC, in its public statements, more explicitly addresses its responsibilities to its victims.

On the blog section [es] of Chilean newspaper El Mercurio [es], columnist Leila Guerriero analyzes the meaning of prestige [es] and notes:

Rock musicians have been smart: ‘rock star’ is one of the few jobs (we'd had to add non-Saxon public servants) where a loss of prestige means an increase of quotation. Almost for every other member of the human race, regardless of their profession, prestige, for some time now, is useful only to estimate the height where they will fall from.

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