Reporters on the Job
EVEN JOURNALISTS ALLOWED IN: For today's story about the ripple effect of Argentina's economic crisis (this page), reporter Marcelo Ballve, interviewed two down-and-out businessmen in Montevideo, Uruguay. "After I met the Deliottis [father and son] at the riverside park in front of the Carrasco casino, they insisted that I join them in their afternoon attempt to win grocery money. Inside, the older Deliotti illustrated how far Uruguay has fallen economically. He indignantly pointed out that they now allowed people wearing shorts to enter the casino. For years, it had been formal-wear only. He singled out a guy in loud Hawaiian shorts and flip flops rubbing elbows with navy-blue suited players at the roulette table."
UNITED AFTER WAR: Reporter Martin Hodgson says that reporting today's story about ex-Colombian fighters making peace (page 7) was "an incredibly moving and humbling experience."
"I met one ex-soldier, a paraplegic in a wheelchair, and asked him if he ever felt bitter about his situation. He said he didn't know who had fired the shot, and there was no point in blaming anyone for what had happened.
"Sometimes while I was listening to a veteran describe conditions in the battlefield, or life after demobilization, I couldn't remember if I was talking to an ex-soldier or ex-guerrilla. Their backgrounds and experiences were so similar. It seemed yet more proof of the senselessness of Colombia's civil war," says Martin.
David Clark Scott
World editor
Follow-up on a Monitor Story
