Making History in the Belly Button of the World

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Those of you on my email lists probably could have seen this blog coming, but even had I not been fanatical about getting everyone I know to sign the One or Live 8 petitions, I would still have to write about this concert. Because this day stands out as the single greatest event I have ever participated in, and just as I remember when the Berlin Wall fell and where I was on September 11, 2001, I will remember this day as one of the greatest historical events of my time.

For those of you who somehow missed the media coverage and hype about the event, Live 8 was an international effort to bring poverty to the forefront of the agenda of the world’s leaders before the next G8 meeting convenes this Wednesday, July 6th in Scotland. What started as 8 turned into 9 concerts around the world on July 2nd, an event that brought at least a million spectators to the concerts themselves and an estimated 2 to 3 billion viewers via TV and internet. A world record was set when more than 26 million people used today’s technology to send text messages to show support for the Live 8 campaign. Dubbed by the media as “the greatest show on earth,” concerts in London, Berlin, Paris, Rome, Moscow, Tokyo, Philadelphia, Barrie (Canada), and Johannesburg were put on free of charge to raise awareness and involve the mainstream in raising our voices to demand change from our leaders.

Hands down, the best lineup was in London, where the idea for the Live 8 came largely from U2’s Bono, modeling the plan on the Live Aid concert held in the 80s to raise charity money for the Ethiopia famine victims. This time the concerts were not about simply raising money for handouts, but rather to push for justice through structural changes that will hopefully produce positive results for years to come. In an age where the twenty-somethings are so often seen as apathetic, it was exactly this generation that was most engaged in the largest single political rally to date. In an act of solidarity, millions of people wore white bands or bracelets or headbands to demonstrate our united concern in wiping out poverty. Hundreds of humanitarian groups and millions of people have put aside petty differences in objectives to give support to these three demands on the world leaders: 1) To cancel debt in the poorest countries of the world without western-biased economic strings attached, 2) to double the aid to Africa in programs that will support local growth and provision of basic needs, and 3) to put fair trade principles - not FREE trade, which the developed countries themselves did not use on their own paths to development - in place so poor countries can build up their own economies.

The Rome concert was held in Circo Massimo, formerly one of the grandest arenas in the Roman empire for chariot races (though the present day ruins are no more than a pile of stones and the dusty arena is most commonly used by Roman citizens as a jogging track). Two hundred thousand people showed up throughout the day, which kicked off at 2 pm in the 37 degree celsius heat and lasted for nearly 12 hours. My personal foray into the festivities wasn’t until 4 pm, just in time to see Tim McGraw and Faith Hill, who, along with Duran Duran added an international mix to the otherwise steady stream of Italian artists. Between sets live concert footage from around the world and anti-poverty videos played on the large screens set up throughout the arena. The messages of Live 8 were repeated often: “We don’t want your money; we want your voice!”

The images were chilling: toddlers orphaned by the AIDS epidemic wandering around the streets digging in sewers, a mother standing over an empty pot pretending to cook, telling her children over and over when they came to her with big dewy eyes, “It’s not done yet; just lie down and rest a little longer” until they fell asleep…hungry….again. And the videos created superimposing the frivolities of western spending habits on pictures of malnourished and barely clothed children were just as impressive…obviously so, since I remember that $40 million are spent each year on Barbie dolls and $60 million on perfumes and $600 billion on vacations. And yet, a $1 shot of medication can prevent a child from contracting AIDS at birth and we seem to have a hard time dishing it over. Think about it next time you’re spritzing on your Calvin Klein. While the primary causes of death in the West are now obesity-related, tens of thousands of people are dying of hunger each day. How absolutely nonsensical does that seem to you?

A fortune cookie I once had stated, “The best exercise is to reach down and help someone up who is in need.” So it was amazing to be part of this crowd, whose white-banded fists rose in the air after each of these clips, whistling and clapping to show their support for wiping out poverty. Despite a general Italian incompetency in English, the loudest applause came when Nelson Mandela presented his message: ‘‘History and the generations to come will judge our leaders by the decisions they make in the coming weeks. I say to all those leaders: Do not look the other way, do not hesitate ... It is within your power to prevent a genocide.’’ The cheering was only disrupted by the hissing and booing that erupted when the pictures of the leaders of the G8 were flashed on screen, not surprisingly, the loudest and most passionate dissent shown for Bush and Berlusconi, which was followed by 5 minutes of chanting “Berlusconi, pezzo di merda!” Most of you with lingual skills can figure out what that means. :0)

Sometimes silence speaks much louder than words ever can. I still remember 7 years ago when I went to see Saving Private Ryan in the theater. The immense amount of gunfire and cannons and bombs rattled our eardrums for three hours, but at the end of the film, as the screen grew black on the waving flag and the music faded out to nothing, it was the sound of silence that made the war tragedies we had just seen so profound. I can still see that darkened theater in my head, and can still hear the minute long silence broken only by the muffled sobs and sniffling of the viewers.

It was precisely this kind of silence that resonates in my mind as the defining moment of the Live 8 concert. As each concert in a different country began, the already existing concerts screamed and shouted to welcome them into the event. Being 6 hours behind standard European time, the US concert in Philadelphia was the last to start, and was therefore the one that brought us all together at the same time. Will Smith, who was hosting the event, recapped the demands and dreams of the Live 8 supporters and called for everyone to take action in signing the petitions and raising a universal fist to the world’s leaders to take notice of our demands. Re-emphasizing the child death rate in Africa, one child dies every 3 seconds, the ONE video was played at all the concerts simultaneously, in which stars from around the world snapped their fingers every three seconds to represent another life lost. From one minute to the next a jovial, roaring, laughing crowd fell absolutely silent, the minutes-long hush broken only every 3 seconds by the snapping of another child’s death. When the clip stopped and cameras panned out of Philly again, the crowd stood there a few moments in that eerie silence, pondering what we had just witnessed. This silence will surely stick with me the rest of my life.

While there were certainly people who came to each of the concerts solely for the music, the event was very educational and it is hard to walk away and do nothing when you look at something that crass in the eye for 12 hours straight. FIFTY THOUSAND people die every day due to extreme poverty, and tragically, from things that are mostly preventable. Ignorance is bliss - because it would be much easier to sleep at night without those images in my head - but knowledge is power, and I honestly believe that everything is not out of our control, that one person CAN make a difference in the life of another, and that the reason more injustices don’t change in this world is precisely because there is a naysayer or two or twenty reading this right now saying, “Naïve. Dreamer. It will never happen.” instead of believing that it is WE who choose to either accept the conditions placed upon us by doing nothing or to reject those conditions by doing SOMEthing.

One of the other memorable messages showed people in body bags all over the place, saying (this is not verbatim, but you get the gist), “If 50,000 people died in Liverpool today, if 50,000 people died in Osaka on Sunday, if 50,000 people died in Cannes on Monday, if 50,000 people died in Kansas City on Tuesday, if 50,000 people died in Dusseldorf on Wednesday, if 50,000 people died in St. Petersburg on Thursday, if 50,000 people died in Vancouver on Friday, and 50,000 people died in Naples on Saturday… the leaders of those countries would get together to find a way to stop it.” It made the relative inaction of those countries smack of xenophobia in a way, particularly when the disparities of the first and third world were displayed onscreen with Martin Luther King’s “I Have a Dream” speech playing in the background. Unfortunately the surrealistic optimism of this day was broken when I sampled firsthand precisely this nasty taste of racism, which reared its ugly head among the Italian police.

I have to preface this telling of tales by explaining one dark side of the Italian psyche and the even darker side of the Italian civil forces. (Oh, and just in case you don’t know me personally and are reading this, I’m not making these generalizations off just a one month courtship with this country, this is also from my previous studies here and from 5 years of exploration into the Italian mind through my most favorite of its citizens.) Although Italy has a negative growth rate due to Italian couples’ tendencies to have only one, or at the most two children, which makes immigration an absolute necessity to maintain the workforce levels, there is a general sense of disdain regarding foreigners among the Italians. Now, this is not to say that I have actually hung out with anyone who has made sweeping racist comments, but I have heard the grumblings among people of all ages regarding “the immigrants.” (One of the less cheery aspects of actually being able to understand the Italian conversations going on around me now.) And perhaps they are echoing ideas that politicians plant, because I have read headlines that have pointed some accusatory fingers at the non-Italian residents for the rest of the country’s economic problems. But the thing is, from what I gather from people around the country, there is plenty of work to be had, in fact in the north of Italy, they have the problem that they they can’t find enough people to work. But the north-south rivalry is long and bitter; the north thinks that the south is lazy and rides completely on the back of the hard-working northerners, the south considers anything north of Rome to not even be Italian and considers them cold and sterile. So southerners do not easily take to the idea of giving up their bastions of sunshine, sea, and southern hospitality to move up to “non-Italy.” However, given the geography of Italy, it is much more likely that the immigrants from Africa and from southeastern Europe via Albania all end up in southern Italy, thus exacerbating the idea that unemployment is running rampant. Though I would hope that no sweeping generalizations would be made that all Italians are racist (in fact, I have also found some of the most open and tolerant and welcoming people in the world here), the danger of a general negative feeling towards foreigners is the possibility for it to cast shadows of anger, doubt, or suspicion on someone due solely to the color of their skin. Unfortunately, from my observations it seems that this idea has taken root in the Italian police forces.

A couple weeks ago I was checking in three college age American guys who were asking questions about Rome, when they said, “And another thing, are the police allowed to hit you here? Because when we were out last night, this police officer came up and asked us for our documents and we showed him our passports and he let us go. But this other guy who was from Poland or eastern Europe somewhere did the same and they started hitting him with their billy clubs and stuff.” I might have questioned the possibility of them exaggerating a little more had one of the guys I know, Paolo, not been terribly bruised up by the Vigilanza 2 nights prior when he stepped in to defend the 8 month pregnant South American girl they singled out at the Spanish Steps and told she had to leave.

Back at the concert, after a few hours near the stage, I fell farther back seeking shade and a refill from the water trucks that had been brought in to keep everyone hydrated. I ended up next to this lively couple of guys who were obviously not Italian wearing pants that looked very similar to ones sold in Guatemala. Turned out they were from Peru but have been living and working in Italy for the past 5 years, and I joined them, a guy from Chile, one guy from Italy, and 3 guys vacationing from Mexico in enjoying the rest of the concert. Around midnight one of the Peruvians and I climbed up to the top of the arena for a potty break, only to be told that if we left we weren’t going to be allowed to come back in. (Which was stupid anyway because it was a free concert and I later found out you could still get in from the way other side of the arena.) So I started looking around for another way out farther down when David came hobbling over to me and told me to go use the handicapped restroom. Apparently he had lied to the event staff to be able to get me to go in, and I don’t think it’s a smart thing to lie about being handicapped, but I wasn’t aware of it at the time and had barely finished when there was a pounding on the door and there were 8 police officers standing there. I didn’t really know what was going on since I hadn’t heard what he had told them to begin with, but apparently they were questioning what he was doing me and I heard him tell them that I was his girlfriend. Of course the police officers assumed that I couldn’t speak Italian and started asking me in English if this guy was my boyfriend, and I said yes, and when David said, yes, see, she is my girlfriend, the cop next to me slapped him across the face and said, “Oeh! Non capisci? Devi stare zitto!” (Don’t you understand? You need to shut up) Then they separated the two of us and started leading him outside the concert area and I had 5 police officers standing around all asking, “This guy is your boyfriend? He is really your boyfriend?” My heart was pounding fast as he disappeared from my range of sight, and I asked what they were doing with him. At the end, the one cop said this was a handicapped bathroom and I couldn’t use it and another cop told me I had to leave the concert. I asked why and told him that I was not leaving because my bag was still down at the bottom of the hill. He was quite insistent that I had to leave, but I was quite insistent that there was no way I was going to because I hadn’t broken any laws (and if they tried to tell me it was against the law to use that bathroom I would have laughed in their face because this is about THE most non-handicapped friendly city I have ever been in, so they sure as hell don’t have accessibility laws), and besides, I told them, my keys, my telephone, my wallet are all in my bag, where on earth am I going to go if I leave there without it? So he told me to go get my bag but that I then had to leave. Yeah right.

So I made it back to the bottom of the hill and in my frazzled state couldn’t get out one sentence in Spanish to explain to the Mexican guys what had happened, luckily I found Diego a minute later to explain in Italian that they took David, but as soon as I got done saying it, David appeared. They had roughed him up a bit, slapped him and punched him, but he went around the back and came back into the concert, and thanked me profusely for lying for him.

The thing is, here we are at a concert to show solidarity, that problems affecting one part of humanity cannot be ignored because of the color of one’s skin or the country you happen to be born in by fate… and yet the police single someone out based on the obvious fact that someone was a foreigner and apply brute force for no reason. In fact, even though David did lie, the staff working there let me use the bathroom; they didn’t block the door or something like that! So I obviously have a huge disdain for the Italian civil forces now - not to mention that the Carabinieri who guard the government building at the end of my block are among the worst of the ‘Ciao bella’ hissers in the city…hard to trust the police forces too much when you get sexually or physically harassed by them.

So when Marinella Annoia (sp?) sang a rendition of Manu Chao’s Clandestino, our little group was beside ourselves cheering and singing along. But the most memorable musical act to me was Jovanotti’s L’Ombelico del Mondo - the Bellybutton of the World. The song itself talks about people of different colors, different backgrounds, so it was really fitting for the event, but as I jumped and sang along with Italians, Peruvians, Mexicans, Chileans and later danced to the bongo drums played by guys from Senegal, Jamaica, and Bolivia, I really felt like I was in the center of the world. In the sense of the Live 8 concerts too, geographically we were the navel, with London, Paris, and Berlin making up the head and shoulders, our feet planted firmly in South Africa, and one arm reaching through Canada and the US to clasp hands in Japan with the arm running through Russia. As such, it was hard not to get caught up in the stir of the event, to feel the political blood flowing and the importance of being part of history in the making. I fear, however, that my countrymen have paid little attention to the whole ordeal, preferring instead to focus on what to pack for the 4th of July picnic. In this respect as well, despite the unspoken idea by many there that the US is the head of the world, I hate to inform them that it is truly an extremity. Though they be powerful as a hand that holds grenades and keys to the coffers, they are very disconnected from the main body of the world that throbs and pulsates in a more interconnected rhythm. I was disappointed to read press articles over the last few days that the US had limited TV coverage of the event and that it was hardly mentioned on the following day’s news shows.

While there was a strong Africa focus to the event, even in the Live 8 logo itself, the poverty I saw in my Central American travels and the effect that debt and unfair trade policies have had there made this event and the demands of Live 8 very personal to me. Some things are not so easily put into words, and as such have never made their way to my blogs before. But they are images that are burned so deeply into my mind that I cannot turn a blind eye. I remember the little 8 or 9 year old boy who slept on the street in Granada, who snapped up defensively when we put money underneath his resting arm. And I remember the “houses” on Ometepe that were nothing more than scraps of junk metal and old Coca Cola signs on two sides with a sheet hanging across it and 4 hammocks inside. And the 6 year old boy with his machete working in the fields with his male relatives instead of singing songs and painting pictures in school like my 5 year old nephew does.

Tomorrow starts the big conference…but it’s not to late to show your support for this event if you haven’t already. If it were your 5 year old nephew, or son, or daughter, or sister, or cousin dying of hunger or living in the sewers, you would take 60 seconds of your time to help them, wouldn’t you? If you are interested, and for the love of humanity I hope you are, make history! You can sign the petition at Live 8 As the organizers of this awesome and inspiring event said, "Mahatma Gandhi freed a continent, Martin Luther King freed a people, Nelson Mandela freed a country. It does work. They will listen…NOW IS THE TIME, THIS IS THE YEAR - OUR LEADERS HAVE THE POWER TO END POVERTY - BUT WE HAVE THE POWER TO MAKE THEM USE IT.”

We’ll be watching you, G8.

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Photos

Even the Quirinale statue is getting into it
As U2's Bono asked of us: "We're not asking you to put your hand in your pockets but we are asking people to put their fist in the air. This is your moment. Make history by making poverty history."

Ancient meets Modern
Flawlessly beautiful day with all the modern concert equipment of 2005 under the shadow of the ancient Roman Empire's Palatine ruins

Fists raised with the white bands
"Stop alla Povertà!"

Tim McGraw
You can take the girl out of the country....

My concert buddies
Fabio, Diego, and David

What a great concert venue
Another shot of the ruins surrounding Circo Massimo

Comments

[Janette]

It sounds like you had tons of fun at the Live 8 concert. I hope all is well in Italy and and in the rest of your travels. Ciao!

[Stefano]

You are racist!
Italians are not racist. Pehaps Americans are racist. Why in American Tv Italian is always a stupid mafioso or a pathetic eat-spaghetti?Because Americans are all ignorant and racist. Police man ask you if that man was your boyfriend because in Italy there were a lot of violence against women made from immigrants.Italians said you pehaps "ciao- Bella" speak with you but finally they respect you Don't worry. You said :"not to mention that the Carabinieri who guard the government building at the end of my block are among the worst of the ‘Ciao bella’ hissers in the city…hard to trust the police forces too much when you get sexually or physically harassed by them." You are the typical foregners. Soldier pehaps want only spekas for you and said you "bella" to make a nice thing,to be nice with you. In Italy is easy to speak with people but it's not sexually or physically violence!Have you seen that Italians socialize in Piazza and not with beer as you? You could have smile and belong to speak with them in quiet way. We are not sexually maniacal. American are fear to speak but in the evening they dring a lot.(they are the only girl drunk in Italy )and then they go to the boys to talk.In Italy is always the man that make the first step! You think that if a man want speak with you is for sex. For example the friend of my girl is American. I went home to my girl. I wait her. I offer something to American friend and she pehaps think that I wanted make sex with her. For you if a man talk with you if for sex. Open your mind.Than after 2 month in Italy the same girl said that Italians are very gentle-man,nice and generous with all girl. Open your mind,study Italians culture and rember Cristoforo Colombo! I repete pehaps some Italians in Rome is very "friendly".In Italy we think that American girl are easy " but we are not sexual maniacal!

[Jenni Jen]

Dear Stefano: Don't jump the gun
Perhaps you should read my next blog where I wrote: "But just as I get upset that a small percentage of young traveling females engage in promiscuous and reckless behavior that creates stereotypes and makes traveling for the rest of us difficult, I would also have to stand up for the Italian male public and note that most of them are normal, polite, chivalrous, and even charming and respectful." I already emailed you a reply so I won't go any farther on the fact that you are stereotyping me as some ignorant beer-guzzling ignoramus who doesn't realize the difference between harassment and friendly conversation, when in fact I have great respect for Italian men and culture on the whole.

[Anactoria]

Great post.