Truth be told, Venezuelans have the soul of a stubborn winner. That is why horse tracks, dog tracks, lotteries and bingo are such good businesses.
It doesn’t matter who runs the business, all betting businesses make money and even those that lose, win. A couple of weeks ago I called upon everyone to try to find rolomolos, and now my office is filled with candidates and data. The list is as long and diverse as the sunsets in Los Llanos or the moons at Magarita. Many have sent me Maria Liosa and other goddesses, presidential candidates and misses, beautiful and ugly people, mischievous and serious people. Everyone on the list embodies a little bit of a rolomo, but enough to hang their picture in the childrens’ bedroom and say: “This person is not Dorian Gray, this person is a great rolomolo! Copy him and not John or Jane Doe that embody nothing of a rolomolo”.
To call someone a rolomolo is a great responsibility for the qualifying jury and for the person selected. Defining what a rolomolo is has something in common with defining what pornography is, even though they couldn’t be more different. As famous person once said, you can’t define pornography but you know what it is when it is in front of you. The same happens with good rolomolos.
However, its is important to mention that the election criterion has to be as severe and fair just like the one used to judge Miss Venezuela, because if you don’t know what you are looking for, you don’t know what you find and what you find gets lost amidst the discussion and infighting.
It is not that I know a lot, but I am going to suggest three cardinal virtues: Integrity, courage and wisdom. Integrity is essential in a country full of contractions, in which what is good is bad and what is bad is good depending on how the rulers and the price of oil woke up.
A respectable rolomolo must be able to think independently and not be influenced by boyfriends, girlfriends or bossy in-laws. Courage is the strong flavor of a hero. How can we expect rolomolos to be heroic, emblematic and inspiring, in a country where anyone will knock you out to get you out of their way, the great rolomo has to be a bit unwary and daring in order to confront the political and economic hostilities of the moment.
He doesn’t have to take to the street yelling, but he must at least face the music when his longtime friend tells him to stay out of something silly, to not meddle in something and in addition offers him a couple of millions. We are not going to ask someone to remain faithful in their marriage when there are so many great temptations of the flesh, that are even stronger in the tropics, but that they at least keep these infidelities random and in foreign ports, since these are forgiven in the old testament and the rabbinic tradition.
Wisdom. Who even thinks you could take a dumb or insolent rolomolo seriously! Of course we want rolomolos that know what they are talking about. That are well read so that they don’t make up stupidities, and that respects what human beings have painfully learned over the centuries and through studying,
Keep sending names, but please focus on the three fundamental values: Integrity, Courage and Wisdom, and give us examples and reasons of those and other values. The Great Rolomolo 2008 will be selected here on December 2nd, 2008.
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