Travel restrictions in an economic collapse‏

Hello Ferfal,

You mentioned in your book and blog that it is a good idea to have country B and C ready to move to in case country A (the one you are currently in) goes into trouble. Also you mentioned about getting European passports for yourself and your family.

What about those who can only get passports of their home country (country A)? Based on your experience in Argentina, did this group of people (native Argentineans) face difficulties in going overseas during the economic collapse. I imagine the government would want to limit the efflux of brains and money out of the country. I am sure the elite would have their ways to get around such restrictions (if any) but what about the man in the street?

Thanks for answering.

Ken

Hi Ken,

Interesting question and sorry for the delay in replying.

Those of us that had our passports ready could travel more easily, those that had to ask for visas or apply for citizenship had a hard time.

My grandpa, a pretty smart man, he made sure we applied for our Spanish citizenship “just in case” and took us himself when my parents where to busy with other things. I was about 18 years old at the time, and I remember we just walked into the embassy, we had no lines to do, no waiting. A few years later, specially after 2001, people would form lines that went around the block, some waited for DAYS to get their applications in and get information. You see, anyone can leave a country, but what do you do for a living when you get to your destination? Having the citizenship ensured that you would find a descent paying job, at least in those days.

Of course the most extreme case is just closing the borders but that’s pretty extreme. It can happen of course, but it’s a more far fetched situation. A much less controversial measure is to just make it very, very hard for you to leave: Expensive tickets few can afford in the first place, taxes if you intend to take with you anything that could be considered of artistic value. Making you wait for months until they issue you the Argentine passport needed to leave the country, “loosing” it after shipping it to you. All that ensures that the amount of people that actually manage to leave are pretty few indeed.

That’s why I recommend having your passport, possible locations and other plans for leaving the country ready BEFORE things get that crazy and everyone is trying to do the same thing.

For college students, ask for reports of your grades every year in case you want to leave after SHTF and everyone else is asking for the same thing. How about your cell phone? What do you need for it to work abroad? Ask those things now. What would you need if you where planning to leave? Think of what you would need now and work on it while you have the time. Even if you never leave its good mental practice getting your ducks in a row will make things easier if you ever have to leave for real.

The man in the street as you say, he had a much harder time. First of all, he didn’t have enough savings to leave in most cases. Even those that had some, they couldn’t take it out of the bank, and when they finally could, they only have 25%-33% of what they used to have. Plane tickets kept their international price in dollars, so they went up in price accordingly. 

If average Joe had EU citizenship, he was the luckiest guy in the block. Those that had a father or grandparent to get it from, they were lucky but not nearly as lucky as the guy that had it already. Those guys had to wait for years before they got their because everyone suddenly started the paperwork to get it and the offices couldn’t handle that much people. Other just went with a tourist’s visa and stayed there illegally afterwards. Those guys were always worried about being deported and working for less than minimum wage because of their illegal status.

Get busy now, just in case.

FerFAL

America and Christianity Reply: Survivalism, Socialism and Catholicism.

Jan said...
@Serge Truth "Christianity is not just a religion, it is a way of life. Take it away and you get people turning to drugs and sex to give their life meaning."

Hi Serge!

I don't think Christianity isn't the only valid way of life. (and it certainly isn't the only religion)

I'm an agnostic and don't do drugs. The sex is nice but doesn't harm anyone. I work for a living.

What gives meaning to my life is learning how to be self-reliant, trying to make the world a better place and helping other people.

Not everybody needs to be afraid to go to hell to be kind to others.

@FerFAL "you end up with 50% of the population working and paying taxes to sustain the other 50% that spend all day skateboarding and actually working at screwing the interviews they go to so as to keep collecting unemployment"

I agree that this is a big problem in Spain. But Spain is one of the more catholic countries in Europe and yet the other EU countries aren't worse.
Systems can be abused and should be adjusted to eliminate blatant abuse. That this situation is tolerated suggests neglect from those in power. Politicians don't like to take unpopular decisions, but when the money runs out they will have to. Economic reality is catching up with them in 3... 2... 1...

Cheers,

Jan
June 21, 2010 3:30 AM

First of all, let me say again what I’ve said before, but apparently some people aren’t getting it: I’m not saying Catholicism and Christianity are the only acceptable forms of lifestyle or religion, what I’m saying is that Christianity and specially Catholicism, their values and the idea of a Christian family, are currently under attack. Mocked, ridiculed and even said that its just a fantasy that never existed in the first place because under the happy family picture dad is really gay, mom is a cocaine addict and the Goth kids sleep with each other.


The problem is that the silly mass seems to believe that things just happen on their own, that as if by magic they are going to have a perfect family and when they don’t they look all surprised. No family IS perfect, you MAKE it that way with commitment, self sacrifice and discipline and a lot of love. The love part is much easier said than done, and in today’s world where people believe sex and love are the same thing they don’t even get that part, let alone sacrifice and self discipline.
All of these things, you will be hard pressed finding in a place like Spain. Spain USED to be a very Catholic country, but you go that wrong, its not any more. 

The last couple times I went there, I saw its getting worse. During religious ceremonies you only see a handful of very old people (the old conservative catholic type Spain) and almost no young folks.
Today in Spain, its all gay pride parades, cheap philosophical discussions on TV talk-shows as of why you’re pretty much an intellectual if you do drugs, and 40 year old teenagers sewing their parents because they’ve got tired of them not having a job (ever) and wanting to kick them out of the house. The parents are of course the bad guys, because a 40 year old slob is supposed to stay in his room all day playing videogames.
Its no coincidence and its been an ongoing process since the socialists took power. 

Approved by the European Council in 2002, and enforced by decree 1631/2006, public schools in Spain now teach something called “Education for the Citizen” (Educacion para la Ciudadania). Supposedly to promote a “Free, fair and tolerant” society. Truth is, this class promotes promiscuity at a pre-teen age, homosexuality as a choice, the practice of masturbation in classes with children as young as ten years old, and intolerance against Catholicism. Think this is crazy? It gets even better (or worse): These mandatory classes, in public schools, not only teach ten year olds how to masturbate, they even have Sex Shops from Madrid as special guests to introduce the children to various “sex toys” for them to use. Recommended reading by the Ministry of Education in Spain? “Ali Baba and the 40 Fags”(Ali Baba y los 40 Maricones) I’m not making any of this up, you can google it all up though most of it is in Spanish of course. According to the Ministry of Education’s website itself, it’s a “fun comic of the adventures of the daily life that occur in an apartment building in today’s Barcelona, mostly inhabited by gays”.

How about the austerity during tough economic times? The Ministry of Equality spends over €800.000 to research various masturbation techniques to teach to the kids, including a “Clitoris map” that cost taxpayers € 26.000. The Church is of course against all this but does not have enough strength to change anything. Catholic Spain? Maybe 50 years ago, but not any more. 

My parents have been living over there since 2002, and my mother in particular used to find all the liberal BS funny. I never did. I didn’t like the socialist liberal combination one bit and I saw it as a recipe for a weak society and poor family values.
When a family fails, sometimes catastrophically with a kid killing himself or others, what happens? They blame the gun, an inanimate object. That would be like blaming the printer for a bad novel. They blame the TV with all the violence, or even better videogames. I’ve watched all of the Friday 13 and Freddy Kruger movies by the time I was 6. Sure I had nightmares but I didn’t blow up my school. My son played Grand Theft Auto since he was like four, he watched 300 with me on TV, curiously enough he’s a lovable little seven year old. Bloody movies, videogames, and guns. Oh, I’ve took him to the shooting range too, by the way. According to the media experts he should be a freak of nature. But he’s not, because he has a close, loving family, a solid emotional foundation. Instead of blaming guns, TV and videogames, why don’t these people look at themselves in the mirror? That’s where the problem really is.


When mom and dad use their jobs, shopping or the gym or any other excuse they can think of so as to be home the least amount of time possible, that’s where the problem lies. Going out for dinner with friends every free night instead of being home, because they can’t stand their own children, that’s the real problem. But its easier to blame inanimate objects, games and movies which kids already identify as a fantasy at an early age anyway, its better to do that than to take responsibility for their actions.


I’ve been thinking a lot about all this since yesterday, why its something that I believe in so much and why did I write about it here. Religious issues? Yes, I’m Catholic, but I’m not the type that goes to Church every Sunday, not by a long shot. I do respect the Church, and yes I’d ask a priest if I ever need advice from someone other than my family. I’ve done it before with excellent results. Not because a priest is a booth between you and God like the anti Catholics promote, but because they are basically well educated people, with similar beliefs and most of all with a lot of experience in helping people with problems of all kinds.
But why here, why in a place where we talk about survivalism? Because these are all emotional weaknesses, and having an adamant will is the core to a proper survival mindset, not only for emergencies and disasters but for life in general.

The lax Spaniard society, the “everything goes”, self centered and self pleasing people I saw ( with a few exceptions as always) is a very poor reflection of what it once was. My grandparents were hard working, sacrificed people with a backbone, not the metrosexual wimps you see today. You see them at the sales in clothes shops after Christmas and man, its hard to tell the men from the women, they are starting to dress alike. Maybe it’s the thirty years of South American machismo view of what a man and women should be, but the women there are more masculine than many of the guys and the guys are far too feminine, even the ones that aren’t gay.

Are these people ready for what’s coming, for what’s already happening over there? No they are not. Even my mother, who couldn’t be considered a prepper or survivalist in any way, told me yesterday “People here aren’t ready for what’s coming. They don’t understand and they are not used to it like people are in Argentina”. Its not that Argentines are better than Spaniards, but people in Spain are so damn spoiled, I completely understood what she was saying.


Sorry for the rant, I just wanted to say this before moving on to something else. When I talk about mindset, a lot of what I mean has to do with this. You certainly don’t have the right mindset if someone’s greatest concern in life, specially a guy’s, if combining the right Manolo shoes with his tight trendy pants, or when its socially accepted that a twenty something year old guy spends all day smoking pot with friends. That’s not the right mindset, not at all.

FerFAL

America and Christianity

Wow,

Out of all the emails you published about the Tea Partiers, you chose NOT to publish my quotation from Sinclair Lewis. The U.S. is under siege from crazy religious fundamentalists who would change the country so as to make Argentina look like paradise. It's starts by equating the U.S. with god, then patriotism with god, then the U.S. with Christians, then non-Christians as un-American, then non-Christians as tools of the devil. The separation of church and state has been an extremely important principle in America that is now at risk from the Christian Right.

I would caution you to be aware as you move here to look carefully at the agendas of various individuals within groups, if not the groups. I don't trust Tea Partiers any more than I trust Republicans or Democrats and I've been here 62 years. I certainly don't trust anyone who brings religion to political causes. The Catholics have been trying to take away abortion rights here for years.

Steve

Hi Steve, I dont remember your exact comment but I did reject several emails that were against tea parties, some more rude than others. I apologize if yours was well articulated and not insulting.

As I said before, I understand that people don’t appreciate receiving that kind of comments through their feeds, for them its just a waste of time, and I can see how it would bother them to receive such comments in their mails when they are registering to my blog, which is clearly conservative. Think of it this way: You join a vegetarian website, do you want to receive emails through it on how to butcher a cow and make a wonderful “asado”? I love asado myself, yet I would understand why that person would not appreciate those emails.

About one nation under God, I think its pretty self explanatory and in spite of religious freedom I think it would be better if people just accepted USA as mainly a Christian nation. 

If Christianity offends people so, there are other countries that have other religions as their main religion, practiced by the majority of people there. Just as an example, if an Islamic individual is offended by Christianity in USA, maybe it would be in their best interest to move to an Islamic country where that religion is more main stream. That’s what I would do.  If communists like Michael Moore are offended by capitalism and the American way of doing things, there’s always Cuba to go to. Why not sell his big fat American company and move with his millions to Cuba or Venezuela? I’m sure Chavez would receive him with open arms. He could then settle his firm there and when Chavez takes it over he would actually be living the communist dream for real. 

Why am I saying this and why do I think its important? Because if not you end up with stupidity like banning Christmas in schools and public buildings, people thinking that Easter is about chocolate eggs and pink bunnies and not having a clue of what it really means.

And why do I think this is this important? Because the family is the core of a society, and with all its limitations I think that the traditional Christian family is the one that holds dear the values I cherish the most.

I’m not asking everyone else to agree with me or do as I do, but I am demanding that they don’t attempt to DESTROY it either, and unfortunately that’s what happening in today’s world.

The traditional Christian family is mocked as if it were a joke, even something that only existed in sitcoms during the 60’s , something that was never real to being with. Catholics priests? They are pedophiles, all of them. That’s what the media feeds us isn’t it? Funny thing is, I went to a Catholic university for several years, we did more charity there and helped a lot of extremely poor people in some of the farthest away corners of the country. (Salta for that matter, a place of extreme poverty in spite of what BS real estate developers like Doug Casey may say) 

You’re wrong about the current religious situation in Argentina. Since the Ks took power, they’ve been methodically attacking the catholic Church, like good socialists. The methods used are similar to the ones applied in USA: Media campaigns, the spreading of every single bad thing they can dig out about it, never mention any of the good things they do, mocking their traditions or down right banning them so as not to “offend” others. 

Soon enough you receive “happy holyday” letters or even more repugnant “Happy Xmas!” ones, lets be careful not to offend anyone with the word “Christ”, God forbid. (the irony)

And then people wonder why you have kids that consider Marilyn Manson a god (or even more evil, Miley Cyrus :-) ) Why a normal looking guy from UK becomes an Islamic fanatic and tries to bomb his own home town, why a kid goes to school with a gun to shoot people. In the good old days when those evil Christian families and their values where the norm, kids practiced target shooting in their schools and you didn’t have a massacre every week. In my school, they shot with 22LR and 7,65 Mauser, no one ever got shot.

You think America is at “risk” of becoming extreme Christian? 1) Why would that be a bad thing? 2) Its becoming more atheist, socialist big brother new world order, not conservative Christian.

“The Catholics have been trying to take away abortion rights here for years.”

Well, at least they are trying, hope they succeed one day. And I hope that abortion stops being a “right”, to become only a “necessity” in the most extreme case. By the way, why don’t you call it what it is, maybe you’ll see how wrong it is if you use the right words: The right to kill an unborn child.

Hey, I want to start a campaign, the right to kill people that listen to boy band crappy pop music. That at least sounds less ridiculous than the “right” to kill babies in their mother’s womb.

Other than killing a baby to save the mother, what gives you the right to kill a child? Today, most women getting abortions aren’t rape victims or women that need it for life or death medical complications, but slutty girls with equally slutty and liberal parents that are to self centered and spoiled to avoid bringing a child to this world in the first place. “oh, but the right of the brat to be a careless whore!” What about the right of the baby to… gee… live?

But I forgot, unborn babies don’t vote. Hmm… interesting approach, millions of stupid parents and equally stupid kids that represent millions of votes versus babies that will be killed anyway and translate into a grand total of ZERO votes, lets make the idiots happy, doing the right thing be damned.

I remember one time I was walking down a boulevard here in Buenos Aires, two girls holding hands were walking ahead of me, to one side. Dressed in black clothes, face full of piercing and goth makeup and hair cut covering half their faces. One was telling to other “I hate her, she has one of those “perfect” families.” I couldn’t help thinking, “Dear, you really could have used one of those.”

And people sometimes wonder why we live in such a sick society.

Today is Father’s Day here in Argentina. I was woken up by my kids and wife, opened my presents.

One of the cards was written by my wife:

“My love: Happy Father’s Day! You are the best father a child can have. I wanted to thank you for everything you do for our family, for protecting us and caring for us with love. I love you Fer, happy father’s day- Laura”

My one year old son wrote a card with a bunch of circles inside, my wife swears that “daddy” according to him. My seven year old boy wrote me another one, inside he drew one of those horrible perfect families. You know, the kind that you see in nightmares and would mean the end of the world if there was more of them.

Take care people, happy Father’s Day to all the Dads out there.

FerFAL

EDC Fighting Knife

Ferfal,

I have another candidate for an every day carry knife for defensive use.
The knife is the Boker Jim Wagner Reality Based folder.
It is not made to use as an ordinary knife.  It's purpose is purely defensive.
It has an ultra sharp point that penetrates very, very well.
It has a serrated recurve blade for viscious cutting ability.

When I first saw it, I dismissed it as a gimmick.
Once I understood what it was for I bought 2.

Take a look.  You might like it.

http://www.boker.de/us/pocket-knife/boker-plus/tactical-knife/01BO054.html
Thanks,

L



Hi L,
It's not a gimmick and it has been around for several years now. It has, as you describe, several fighting worthy features that make it a better than ordinary knife for fighting.
The narrow tanto tip would be excellent for penetration AND making a good wound profile.(gets thick quick, so it creates both a deep and wide wound)
The recurved edge works as you describe, it "catches" material in its concavity and forces it into the edge of those serrations, becoming a much better slashing weapon than ordinary blades of similar or slightly longer lenght.
I like this knife and I'm actually ordering one now for a hands on review. I do know enought about knives to say that, unless there's some freak quality issue, this knife is very good for its intended purpose. The handle is generous, well proportioned, and those finger groves will help have a better weapon retention.




I will say though, even if I think this is a very good weapon, I like the Cold Steel Vaquero even better. If you analyze it, it has many of the qualities the Jim Wagner knife has, and its almost twice as big (3.25" vs 6") if you go for the largest model they offer, the Vaquero Grande, which is the one I carry. A mean Nogales tip that penetrates well, recurved "S" serrated blade too. The handle isn't perfect, a bit thin for my taste, but it pays off in ease of carry for such a big blade.

A 6" blade or even the 5.5" blade in the Extra Large Vaquero, that's hardly an inch less than a 7" full sized Marine K-Bar knife!... Folded in your pocket! and in spite of the size I can carry it all day in my front jeans pocket, foget about it until I need it.

I've been around knives since I was 10 years old. This  is the first time I've seen people used to guns and knives take a step back when you bring this thing out. It is very impressive, capable of lots of damage if used with enough skill or determination.

Both knives are at the top of the game for defense knives, at least in my opinion and what I look for in such a knife. Will the JW Boker knife get things done very well? I dont doubt that, I just think that the Vaquero can do even more damage given is brute size.

FerFAL

Times Changing and a few other thoughts

In reply to "Doorstep bank raids plague cash-loving Argentina" post,
Anonymous said...
I stopped at a U.S. Walmart on the "not-so-good" part of town at 10:30 p.m. When the cashier held my 100 Dollar bill up in the light to verify if it was real or not, and again with a fifty for good measure, I felt as if every eye at the front of the store focused on me. It got real quiet too, I think you could've suddenly heard a pin drop. I've had a cashier check my money before, but the crowd never reacted before. Even the cashiers acted nervous. I half thought, I might have to run, WTF? Just played it cool tho, even when I saw the loud freaky people, who were pushing a shopping cart through the store yet were leaving with nothing, at the same time I was. It wasn't much but I exited through the opposite doors.

I was shopping monthly, I think I'll try shopping more often, get less, and man was it reassuring having a sharp knife just in case, some of the characters in the store were big, or shifty (and more importantly - in groups) and all around just plain freaky - WAA-KA!.

The stuff I learned in your book, on this blog, it's like a can of instructions which pop out when you need it like one of those surprise paper snakes. "You're doing this idiot, you know not to do this, so now do X to compensate, be quick about it."
June 12, 2010 11:30 PM

Thanks. There’s things that you may read in my blog and my book that at first you don’t think much about but later on as things change they make more sense, pieces of information that suddenly come in handy later on.

Money getting checked is something we do here all the time, specially with 50 and 100 bills. I do it too so I’m not offended when other people check my money as well. Its just the way it is.
What I do is stay calm, check the money, and then smile back and say good bye have a nice day. It’s nothing personal, its just that there’s a lot of funny money around here so you have to make sure.
What I found interesting in your comment is that the situation itself made you uneasy. That happens a lot and we tend to let it affect us. You feel self conscious about turning around to check your back when your instinct is telling you to do so. “But what will the person behind me think if I suddenly tunr around and stare at him!?” is what our politically correct subconscious tells us and we are often stupid enough to listen to it.

Picked up money that you thought you should check? Better not, I might offend the person that just handed it to me. These are the things you later end up regretting. You have to learn to listen to that gut feeling instead, and learn to let go of the stupid self consciousness that tries to suppress it. As usual, thisisn’t just about survivalism, its good advice that works for everything elsein life as well.

Getting used to say “no” more often, for example. We are brainwashed since we are born by TV, school and most people around us, that you have to be good, but the politically correct version of good extends to more liberal connotations that include weak and eager to please. People will most often say “yes”, even before thinking, just because its the nice thing to do, what pleases others. 

A “no” may not be as popular but its stronger and in many cases it leaves you space to ponder the situation better. When in doubt, get used to saying no first instead.
How many girls have been lured by rapists, asking their victims for help? how many older, good natured folks, have been manipulated into opening their door to strangers that tricked them with some request to which they agreed?

Being so damn nice all the time has cost people their lives, has cost others losing their money to various fraud schemes.
Nice is over rated if you ask me. :-)


Take care,


FerFAL