Join the new world

There’s a reason why, in June of 2009, Bolivia’s Founding Father, Ernesto_Guevara, invited a newbie from the eUnited States named Arjay Phoenician to come be part of the fledgling Bolivian community. We met each other at the eRepublik Forum, talked a little about philosophy and religion, and we connected quickly and easily. Those early discussions were apparently in his head when he invited me to come and be part of Bolivia, which had been on the map just a few days.

As the opening discussions commenced on the new national forum (with both English and Spanish spoken interchangeably), we were getting information that not one, not two, but THREE PTO groups were targeting Bolivia. Ernesto was putting together the “safe” candidate list, and he told me that, being at Level 13 at the time, there were many potential candidates to choose from with much more experience, but he was going to put my name on it because he had confidence in me.

In the days leading up to the election, I began using this very newspaper to call out Ripipip and eTakeOver. I was able to get hold of the Internationale, and they sent us some assistance to fend off the PTO attempts. I had only been in the game less than a month, and already I was pushing buttons and trying to make things happen. No one cared that I was doing it in English, because, as I’ve said before, honor and goodness transcend language barriers.

Apparently, the Bolivian community had the same confidence in me that Ernesto did. Though the PTO group, the AFK, won 24 of the 40 seats up for grabs, Bolivia elected Arjay to the very first Bolivian Congress.

I think at the time I was more naïve and dumb than bold, so while the community was wondering what the AFK were going to do with the country, I took it upon myself to go to their IRC channel and discuss the matter. While pleasant to talk to, they made it clear they were there to steal. Within three days, they were vacating the country, but not before they made off with over 1200 gold and 70,000 BOB, making it a theft worth about 2400 gold at the time.

It paled in comparison to some of the thieving we’ve seen the Pindonga do in recent weeks. Stealing a quarter million BOBs has got to be some sort of record for treachery.

Anyway, I had shown Ernesto and the community I not only had a loud mouth and wasn’t afraid to use it, but I also had honor and loyalty to Bolivia. While the AFK abandoned the Congress they seized, others also left Congress and Bolivia, apparently glad just to have a political win and the medal and gold that comes with it. Having donated my gold to the treasury, I was looking forward to picking up the pieces and putting Bolivia back together.

It was a foregone conclusion Ernesto would be the country’s first president, I don’t recall if he had competition. His original first choice for Minister of Foreign Affairs was SirLouen, a veteran of South American politics with a wealth of experience that dwarfed my own. However, SirLouen’s name was pulled from consideration because he could not stop running his mouth about Ernesto at the forum for the Alianza Hispano-Americana (AHA). Not wanting a MoFA with a habit for spilling his guts to the rest of Latin America, he rejected SirLouen and chose me instead. We talked about the choice, and though we both knew my lack of Spanish would make things hard in terms of regional détente, he felt I was professional and articulate enough to do the job.

What is the point to all this? There are several points.

1. Bolivia began as a bilingual country. Don’t listen to the Pindonga thieves and trolls who want to keep Bolivia a Spanish-only nation, hence a nation without diversity and without ties to the outside world. Though I learned the rest of South America was not nearly so accepting, I pressed myself upon them, talking truth to power, just as I have all over the world. Honor transcends language. It is a shame that so many would rather you vote for thieves who spoke Spanish than good guys who spoke English.

2. Arjay has long been a member of the Bolivian community. I’ve long considered Ernesto and jesusfbo my friends, and I’m honored to have worked with talomedina and Arturo Espinoza more recently. I was part of this country before most of the trolls who now badger me were even born into this world. I was in Congress for two terms and the first MoFA in Bolivian history. Though I’ve since lived all over this world, I keep finding myself coming back to Bolivia, it is in my heart. Whenever the trolls chant YANQUI GO HOME, I always shout back, I AM HOME!

3. You won’t get anywhere in this game if you’re afraid to step out and try. This is a game where game mechanics erroneously means more than individuality, where the group always takes precedent of the single citizen, where someone who wants to get ahead must give up so much of his identity. Individuals have a lot more personal power than they realize. I’m not saying you just shout to the winds, and your prayers are answered, but if you want to be a real somebody in this world, you have to speak your mind. You have to tell the world what you think. You have to stand up to bullies. You have to shine a light to uncover that which prefers to lurk in the shadows.

The Pindonga are trying to paint me into something I’m not. They think you’re stupid enough to believe their story that I’m a PTO, that I’m untrustworthy because I speak English. They don’t want you to know about how many thousands of your gold they’ve sent to Argentina. They’d much rather treat you like you’re an idiot. It’s called projection, politicians do it all the time to keep people from paying attention to their own crimes. Don’t believe them for a second. I didn’t wake up one morning, spin the globe on my desk to pick the next place in this world I’ll live, and then go and try to take power for myself. I didn’t pick Bolivia. Bolivia picked me a long time ago. Before the Pindonga thought it’d be cool to call themselves a word that translates into “prostitute” in English, before the very first Argentine invasion, before the first elections, Arjay was here, at the request of Bolivia’s founding fathers. No matter what lies the Pindonga throw at you to make you think the worst of me, it doesn’t change the fact that I’m part of the Bolivian community and have been since the community started. Regardless of what language I speak, I speak from the heart, and it’s made a difference in the past. I hope it makes a difference still.

VOTE FOR ARJAY PHOENICIAN FOR PRESIDENT OF THE PINDONGA NACIONALISTA ON DECEMBER 15!