February 21, 2013

• Report # 974

  Well here I am back at my place in Monterrey, México after spending a week in Texas. I’ve actually been back almost three days already, so the time continues to fly. I got into the airport in Monterrey after 6:00 pm and went through the custom’s people and called my friend Arturo letting me know that I was there. He told me he would be there in 45 minutes, which would be good timing as I still had to pick up my bag and go through another part of the security.

  I got through everything and waited over 45 minutes, but Arturo was still not there. He never really arrives when he says he does so I wasn’t too surprised. He did call me, well he lets the phone ring once and then I have to call him back, and he let me know the traffic was really bad and it would be another 20 minutes. It was a bit more than that, but finally he arrived and rang me one more time saying he couldn’t find me, but I wasn’t too far away… I could see him on his phone.

  On the way home Arturo did more of his usual antics trying to talk to women on the street, but of course he got no where with that. I just had to sit next to him and act embarrassed and that I had not part in it… which I didn’t ! We finally arrived at my place and I asked him how much I should give him for the gas and he said 100 pesos (like 8 dollars) It was cheaper than the 180 that a taxi cab would have charged me just to get me to the nearest metro station so I wasn’t going to complain !

  I was still feeling not too great as I still had my cough and runny stuffed up nose, so I didn’t stay up too late before going to bed. On Tuesday morning I woke up around 9:00 am and decided to go to the Galerias mall to go to Cinépolis and watch the new Die Hard movie, It’s a Good Day to Die Hard. As expected it had tons of explosions, and some plot twists, so overall it was a pretty good movie.

  Afterwards I had a couple of pieces of pizza and picked up some donuts from the Krispy Kreme store which had finally opened in that mall. Obviously a very poor day of eating, especially for someone still not over their flu… no wonder I didn’t feel so well later. The weather on Tuesday was perfect though. It was cloudy with a great breeze, and it didn’t feel cold and it didn’t feel hot…. it was perfect. On Wednesday I woke up at 9:00 am and in the afternoon I decided to go to Fundidora park and go for a walk.

  It was quite a bit hotter than the previous day, around 30 C (86 F) and with the sun out in full force I definitely felt it. I walked through the park and down one side of the Santa Lucía river walk and headed downtown to have lunch at VIPS. I had tortilla soup with a plate of fries and a piece of chicken and just sat and read the paper for a while. After lunch I headed out and walked towards the metro station, though I relaxed underneath a tree for almost an hour just enjoying the breeze.

  I stopped at Soriana on the way home to pick up a few things and then I just got home and watched a movie, An Unfinished Life. It was about a mother who got out of an abusive relationship and left with her daughter to stay with the grandfather, who was the father of the man she was married to who died in a car crash when she was driving. And the grandfather never really forgave the daughter in law for that. Especially with Morgan Freeman and his history with a bear !

  Today will be another day of just taking it easy. I’m still getting over that nasty flu that I had. The sore throat, headache and fever are long gone, but I still have a bit of a cough and my nose is a bit plugged up. Originally I wanted to run by today, but I think I’ll give my self a few more days to get back to basically 100 %. Now that I’m back here in Monterrey, I don’t plan on staying here for too much longer. I’m hopeful that I’ll get news about the visa authorization in the next few weeks, but if not, I don’t plan on sticking around and waiting forever.

  I think I’ll wait about another month, and if I don’t here anything, I will just head home anyways. This doesn’t change much as I would have to head home if I do get the news anyways. I just can’t sit here forever waiting and waiting and spending money and not really doing anything. I am certainly hoping it won’t come to that though and that I’ll receive some answer in these coming weeks, as the foreign relations department has had my paperwork since February 1.

  I’ve known for a long time that all I can do is wait, and of course there is nothing that myself or anyone else can do to speed up this whole process so I will continue to wait. If I don’t hear anything in the next month though, it will come to a point where I just won’t want to be here waiting anymore, so the plan will be to return home in a month, with news received or without news received. It will just be time to go home and see if I can do something there while I would continue to wait. However like I said, I’d really prefer to have answers before then !

  Speaking of answers, I’m sure that is what a lot of people would like to have in terms of the story of South African olympian Oscar Pistorius. For those of you who don’t know, a lot of people were truly fascinated by this individual in the 2012 summer games in London because not only was he running on two prosthetic legs, not only in the paralympics, but in the olympics themselves with all of the able-bodied athletes.

  This was a big story at the time and a lot of people were super impressed with this individual. I can imagine he picked up at least a few endorsement deals in the following months since the olympics. Flash forward six months later, and now the life of Oscar Pistorius is in an entirely different point…. he is facing murder charges in the death of his girlfriend at his home in South Africa.

  I was shocked when I first heard the news and from what I read it just sounded like he and her had an argument and he lost his temper and shot her. Upon further reading, Mr. Pistorius is claiming that he heard noises and he thought there was a burglar in his house. Now from what I have read there have been serious problems with this case in terms of some of the evidence that has been gathered and heard, and even the detective is facing his own criminal investigation, forcing a new person to be chosen to look into this case.

  It’s always amazing how what are supposedly supposed to be professional departments operating with such problems. However it’s important not to get away from what happened here….. Oscar Pistorius clearly killed his girlfriend. Now maybe what he says about thinking there was a burglar in the house is 100 % true… it very well could be, but that doesn’t change the fact that he took the decision to grab a gun and pull the trigger. Shouldn’t he have been at least talking first to find out who was in that bathroom ?

  So in my opinion, accident or not, Oscar Pistorius clearly was responsible for his actions, and he should be punished for her death. At the end of the day if someone dies in a situation like this, someone still has to pay the price for it especially with it happening under such stupid and negligent actions. It’s just such an unfortunate thing to have happen after all of the great news people got out of reading of Mr. Pistorius and his accomplishments during the summer.

  Now we certainly can’t all rush to judge him here, but I just wouldn’t be able to understand how any court could just let this guy free without any jail time. Even if his story is 100 % true, his girlfriend is still dead and that’s 100 % his fault. As far as I’m concerned he should be in jail no matter how the case ends up, but the only thing needed to be decided is whether the guy just did something completely idiotic that led to the death of his girlfriend, or if he actually did murder her. That will be for the courts to decide, but in either situation he’s guilty of something and it’s a true shame he has put himself in this situation.

  This could be just another example of how there are so many people in this world who have guns that really shouldn’t. They clearly don’t think before using them and with a fire first, think later attitude, someone will always end up getting hurt. And in this case someone has lost their life, so murder or not, the woman is dead and now Oscar Pistorius will have to live with that for the rest of his life. For the next question:

  What do you think about the Oscar Pistorius story ? Should he be arrested and be forced to spend time in jail even if he is not found guilty of murder, why or why not ?

  I will leave you all with my final set of pictures from Dallas. Take care and I’ll talk to you all on Sunday, bye for now.

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  Sources: thestar.com/news/world Oscar Pistorius case: Lead detective removed from case after announcing he is facing attempted murder charges. By: Peoshni Govender. Reuters. February 21, 2013. Oscar Pistorius wikipedia.

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