South America Blog
About this blog
Wayne Bernhardson is the author of Moon Handbooks to Buenos Aires, Chile, Argentina, and Patagonia. Here he shares his vast knowledge of South America and its people.
Recent Posts
- Money Matters: Exchange Rate Update
- From the Falklands: Prize-Winning Shearers, Award-Winning Services
- Outside the Medialuna: Rodeo for the Rich?
- "Creativity Can't Be Censored"
- Rock Art of Rapa Nui
- Observing Argentina: Public v. Private Property
- Casa Museo Frei: The Political & The Personal
- Getting Around Rapa Nui
- Southerly Seismic Update
- Shakin' All Over: 6.7 on the Ninth Floor
- Rain? In the Atacama?
- Boom and Consequences: Happenings in San Pedro de Atacama
- Breathless in Putre: The Coca Remedy
- Are Non-Argentine Books a Health Hazard? Moreno v. Amazon
- Here Comes the Sun: UV in the Atacama
Money Matters: Exchange Rate Update
Money is everyone’s concern, especially when traveling overseas. Getting accustomed to foreign currency, knowing where and when to change it, and calculating what things cost can be challenge even when it’s a country you know well. Governments have their own issues, which may be why Chile has recently introduced a new series of hard-to-falsify banknotes that, simultaneously, help promote the country’s attractions. more >>
From the Falklands: Prize-Winning Shearers, Award-Winning Services
When I lived in the Falkland Islands, in 1986-7, the economy was still a simple one. With no air connection with the South American continent, tourism was negligible (the only alternative being an expensive Royal Air Force charter from Brize Norton (Oxfordshire) that refueled at Ascension Island, a story in its own right that I’ll tell another time). By the end of my stay, the British government had only recently declared a fishing conservation zone around the Falklands, and only a prophet could have predicted their squid-fueled prosperity of the past quarter-century. more >>
Outside the Medialuna: Rodeo for the Rich?
In his Cowboys of the Americas, historian Richard W. Slatta provides an thorough and lavishly illustrated account of horsemen from Canada to Cape Horn, even including the vast Pacific in the person of the Hawaiian paniolo (his overlooking the riders of Easter Island and their mounts is perhaps forgivable). One characteristic event, everywhere, was the rodeo, but it could differ dramatically from country to country. more >>
"Creativity Can't Be Censored"
According to Argentine president Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, “Creativity can’t be censored,” and one’s immediate response is to wonder whether she’s praising the state statistics agency INDEC’s bogus inflation figures. In reality, though, she’s referring to a controversial advertisement, funded by her government, that shows Argentine Olympic field hockey captain Fernando Zylberberg training in Stanley, capital of the British-governed Falkland Islands. more >>
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