#41 My horse

Моя лошадь не художник, а архитектор.
Or, my horse is not an artist but an architect. 

These updates can get a bit heavy-handed at times, so I thought I’d write about some other things this week. And the Duolingo handed me this gem.

My wife and I have this running joke about the ‘going out’ lesson in any español for beginners course. There’s a random beat in the background, an echoey room, and two estudiantes. “¿Hola María, quieres salir conmigo esta noche?” “Que no, tengo que ayudar a mi caballo diseñar un edificio.”

Spring has arrived in full swing. The Netherlands has invested over a billion euros in a series of test events to reopen society, so I could visit Artis with R. Then, we picked up a madeleine box at Rijks.

Times like these always make me want to listen to reggaeton. It’s a habit I picked up when I lived in Lima at just about the time Gasolina was a hit. I didn’t know at the time and only knew very recently that this was probably the moment the genre was made a global phenomenon. Spring is my time to check in with how the genre has developed over the past year. Tum ta tum … ta. Tum ta tum … ta. Tum ta tum … ta.

Somehow, Camilo’s Ropa Cara ended up in the Spotify playlist I used to get my 2021 dose of reggaeton. What a fantastic song.

It also addresses one of the considerable concerns I have with the genre, apart from its violence and sexism: it’s overly serious.

Next up was the late 2020 remix of Relación with…. Rosalía! ROSALÍA (which I somehow always want to spell all-caps) is definitely one of my favorite artists. I want to live in a world where every song is a Rosalía remix. Except for The Weeknd, which drove my boys to tears the first time we heard it.

But of course, there’s just one artist to really listen to if you want to know the state of reggaeton. Its founder and undisputed king: Daddy Yankee. I almost went to see him that spring of Gasolina. But because the show was in La Victoria and at the time a video of a businessman being tortured to death in that barrio was aired ceaselessly on local television, my local friends told me not to go. I also think it was very expensive.

Over the years, Daddy Yankee has made some of our favorite songs. Con Calma, the amazing Informer remix. Despacito, of course. Or the less well-known salsa song De Vuelta Pa’ La Vuelta with the equally popular (in our home) Marc Anthony. If you’re ever in NL and you see a Kia C’eed full of gringos blasting Daddy Yankee through the windows, you can be sure it’s us.

2021 brings Problema. A bit too serious for my taste. I’m still hoping for an Ace of Base remix by Daddy Yankee and ROSALÍA. Maybe this summer.

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In other news, we did another #SDGCafé, this time about financing the SDGs, which turns out to be reasonably cheap. Or rather, doable. But it needs political will. So there we are. Although the elected representative from Volt positively surprised me. Also, more good news about our upcoming festival in September, which I’ll talk more about soon. Until then, stay safe!

Mi caballo no es artista, es arquitecto.

— Jasper