The topic of the future someday maybe if-I ever do-it dissertation is an examination of how drug policy intersects with urban planning. In that, I am trying to understand how drugs and softened drug policy in certain city areas can actually act as an attractiveness policy for young professionals. Those young professionals are what cities want in order to improve their tax base, grow the economy and attract high tech companies. In order to attract these young professionals, not only do you have to provide jobs, but also something to do. What do these people do? They drink and do drugs. I'm serious.

Forbes just printed an article about the top cities in the US for young professionals, one of the factors being a solid entertainment industry.
If cities were to soften up on petty drug charges, such as personal possession and dealing, in certain areas, they may be able to also focus police presence with knowledge of certain activity, as well as the application of harm reduction methods. Bourbon Street in New Orleans, is a good example of concentrating drug and alcohol activity into a specific area with concentrated police presence. Although it is not the most successful of these types, there is potential. Dolphin Street in Austin, is probably a better example, but just doesn't hold the same place in my heart.

Certain entertainment drugs often are used by a large percentage of the population only once in a while, on weekends, special events or experimentally, and do not pose any type of addiction or criminal problems. Rather than crack down on something that throughout all history has failed to be supressed, why don't we work together to make people safer and smarter. Along with that, we should shape our cities to make entertainment activity safer and more contained.

"In large numbers democracy is obviously unworkable" -The City in History - Lewis Mumford (the book I am currently reading)

Ok, so I ordered a vibrator to keep me company in Costa Rica. Female Sexual Liberation! Go me!

So, the vibrator was ordered March 2nd. I finally got it into my hand yesterday, thats June 22nd - thats 2 months and 20 days later. Apparently vibrators are questionable and tax-worthy shipments that are monitored by the Central American country of Costa Rica.

About a week after I made by order on the internet, I received a shipping receipt from Fed-Ex, then about 3 days later a second arrived. Since I had to have it shipped to the International Studies Office (how un-catholic! - gasp!), they only received the slips, but not the package. I needed some Spanish speaking help to find the package, I had to let my friend Josue in on the secret that I had ordered a vibrator. He called three times inquiring to which he was informed that the package had been signed for by someone and was therefore in the hands of some happy Tica. By the way, my original vibrator was stolen by another pleasure seeking lady baggage handler out of my luggage at the airport. Those Ticas will do anything for a good time.

I sadly resigned to my fate, but after about a month, decided to give it another shot and called the US FedEx call center. Lo and behold, they had found my package! It was here.....in....Panama City!!?!
"But I live in Costa Rica!" I whined, to which I was put on hold again but then informed that no, it had been located in my hometown of San Jose. Only a bus and taxi ride away.

So, plans were made, and Taila and I rode the San Pedro bus into town, walked 6 blocks to the Alajuela bus, got off at the mall and caught a taxi to the shipping center. Why did I think that it was going to be that easy? We were sent to Tikal, the place where all the packages go. So off we went (with the taxi meter running the WHOLE time) to Tikal to show them my packing slip. "Hmmm... bueno", the man said, and without entering anything into a computer or giving us a form, said "Vayan al aduana", which of course is at the airport, and off we went. The taxi maria is running like a super-charged pleasure machine while we go to the customs office, fill out forms, get back in the taxi and back to Tikal, where we perform several other strange and useless steps. The most exciting of which is when we get to accompany the customs officer into the back room to examine the package. Its a vibrator!!! Well, Señor was quite professional about it all, but certainly gave it a good examination. I caught a scent of male hormones and giggling package handlers sneaking peeks from behind the desk. How un-catholic! What heathen Unitedstatian women!

Moving on, all we had to do was go to the bank a mile down the street to pay taxes on my vibrator in the pouring rain, then pay the equivalent of $40 for the holding fee. The taxi cost $30.

But it was finally in my possesion! The most expensive and long awaited pleasure was to be mine! Well thats of course when I find some batteries...

In that I only have 10 more days left before returning to the United States, I have begun to brush up on current Unitedstatians events. More specifically, New Orleans events.

I have been reading some blogs about New Orleans, and realizing that:

A: Oh my god I love that city.

B: I don't think I ever want to live in New Orleans again.

C: People put the most amazing information on their blogs.

I am on mailing list run by Alan Gutierrez of Think New Orleans who connected me to a few New Orleans blogs this morning that were quite fascinating. First, I visited Da' Po Boy's blog who has done GPS murder mapping on his own using yahoo maps. He showed how murders in New Orleans are in specific neighborhoods and even more, how the murders themselves occur in clusters. In my own personal research, I have discovered that deteriorating urban space causes unhealthy activity which degrades the space even more (Hembree et. al.). This is a new line of thought because it was previously thought that poor people destroyed their spaces, not that destroyed spaces caused poverty and dangerous activity. Clearly in New Orleans, we have destroyed spaces.

The second blog I read today is from Ashley Morris, who asks "What Country are You From?", to which she states "New Orleans". I borrowed the title of my blog from her too. The reason I did this is because I am asked where I am from all the time here in Costa Rica since I have an accent. At first I said, "the US", but since the Ticos are pretty savvy about the States, I started saying New Orleans. What country is Dana from? New Orleans (also called Destructo-land)!!

When I was in High School, this song by Harvey Danger was really popular. I memorized all the words and bounced around singing them, while cramming 9 people into my 1989 Dodge Aries (which by the way is the coolest car ever) and sneaking into playgrounds to drink 3 beers amongst the 9 of us. You know, things like that. Now, about 10 years later, certain memories are hazy, but I clearly remember the line "If you're bored then your boring", and how much that means to me.

I AM BORED


My childhood mind is racing in circles, incapable of entertaining myself, wishing my mom would show up with a project all set up, or a trip to the park. My adult mind is trying to fill the time, weighing practical actions against each other and coming up with piles of dust. When I was a child I kept a journal. Why do I not now? Where does all that time go? I keep telling myself, only three more weeks, only 18 more days, etcetera, etcetera, but then once I lose those days, Ill never get them back, and I won't even have fuzzy memories attached to them.

I officially have one month left of school in Costa Rica. While I have been able to endure the daily joys of undergraduate hormones rushing about, I have also managed to learn quite a bit about social movements and Costa Rica. Which for me, the most most poignant moment occurs when pieces of the puzzle begin to fit together and information relates to my experience within society. After all, the study of the social quagmire is impossibly reflexive. In the field of sociology we often study about centers and peripheries. In the most simple sense of this concept, the center is the dominant power, the periphery can be seen as a reflection or a diluted copy of the original. However, this relationship can also be understood as one of control and dominance, in that the discourse of the center is so powerful that it drowns out the voice of the subjugated group. In fact, this is exactly what Patricia Hill Collins was talking about when she looked at male centered forms of knowing through a feminist methodology.

Specifically speaking, looking at ideas using feminist theory forces us to examine the social construction of knowledge, from a male dominated viewpoint. Men have always had the power, they created the discourse, which created the knowledge that we accept as true. Therefore the way we understand the world is through mens eyes.
Hill Collins uses the feminist methodology to understand what she called the matrix of domination, the foundation for Black Feminist thought. Not only are women all over the world oppressed on account of their position on the periphery, but Black women are subjugated twice, because of their oppression as people of color. In Costa Rica, Ticos have, like all countries, their own system for sorting class, race, color, appearance, intelligence etc. However, as a nation, they are peripheral to the dominant cultural and mass media machines of the Western World. This is yet another point within the matrix of domination. However, rather than discussing the personal implications, on a social scale, Costa Rica has adopted cultures and personality that often reflects the mainstream, dominant and current leader in the world race, but in a diluted way. Globalization creates and destroys, but is unavoidable as we all live within the capitalist system (thanks Marx for reminding us). However bulldozing by dominant cultures is dangerous and we should all be aware of the voice coming from the periphery, It may be difficult to hear, but can provide valuable and perhaps better knowledge that has been subjugated from centuries of capitalistic competition.