good thing all those soldiers are guarding us from...us

Let’s count them: four on this bench, six standing under that tree, two more chatting with the neighborhood private security guard, and one laughing on his cell phone, probably with a girlfriend…that’s 9 members of Colombia’s armed forces, in full body gear, with their shields leaned up against a group of trees over there. Not to mention the 16 standing mostly in a row just beyond the pedestrian bridge crossing 26^th Avenue to the National University. All day long, not doing much in particular.

When I get back from class, they’re taking up most of the benches around the basketball court, being used today as most days for a soccer game, cheering occasionally, looking relaxed and so young. I want to ask what they are doing, but it seems ill advised. The strike at La Nacional has been going on for months now, and the police still come out regularly to sit around and wait for something to happen. So far little has.

I’m interested in learning more about the reasons behind the paro, which I’ve been told has less to do with the leftist graffiti and painting of Che on the main plaza and more with the administration’s desire to make the academic structure at La Nacional more “American,” more private, and less rigorous. Right now most tracks are 5 years long and prepare graduates to begin work immediately, without need to continue on for a masters’ degree.

The administration apparently wants to decrease the length of time each major takes, require professors to have a PhD (many current professors have only their masters’), and weaken the entrance requirements. Right now applicants have to take a test specific to La Nacional, and a relatively low percentage of students who take the test are admitted. From what I’m told, in all of Latin America only the Universidad Nacional de Mexico (UNAM) has more stringent admission requirements.

I’m looking forward to taking classes at UNAL when the next semester begins, in March. Los Andes is turning out to be a little too much like the school I attended summer of 1997 in Ecuador – the kind of place the president sends his kids. As a matter of fact, the Colombian president’s youngest son, a student at Los Andes, is being cited for academic dishonesty…jeez. Can’t wait for March (for so many good reasons)!