The first round of voting for President in Peru has come and gone. The world and much of Peru are shocked at the results. The two winners, Ollanta Humala and Keiko Fujimori, will have a runoff in June since neither garnered the 50% of the votes necessary to win in the first round. Ollanta Humala is a former military officer and Keiko Fujimori is the daughter of a former president. Neither has any experience in the political arena according to all the news articles I have read. Humala, leans far to the left. Originally, he modeled himself after Hugo Chavez in Venezuela. Now he appears to be aiming more in the direction of Lula de Silva, a populist former President of Brazil. A couple of things 
they worry about, he wants to change the constitution so that he can run for consecutive terms and nationalize some industries. Keiko Fujimori on the other hand seems to be running only to give her father a Presidential pardon. He is in jail for corruption and crimes against humanity (a 25 year sentence). These two were swept into first and second place on the votes of the poor. Peru has long ignored their plight and now have what many consider to be two extremists running for President. The moderates really have no one to vote for. Most say that neither candidate will be able to accomplish anything without an alliance to the other parties. Neither has anything approaching a majority in congress. I certainly understand the peoples frustration with past administrations here. Peru has the strongest economy in South America and the highest GDP. The worldwide crash did not really affect Peru because of the economic policies put into place. None of that has filtered down to the poor. As an “expat” living here in this wonderful country, I doubt that any of this will affect me. I will still write, enjoy coffees and breakfasts with friends, and visit other parts of this beautiful country.
We have finished the first draft of our novel, “The Prince Charming Murders.” Now it waits for the first run at editing it. I have sent it to our good friend Katrina for her comments on content and characters. I personally will let it sit to the side for at least a month before jumping in and actually doing some editing. I already have some issues with the book but I understand that no writer as ever been satisfied with his work. You just come to a point where you have to let it go. In the meantime, I will work on a few other projects, short stories mostly, and start thinking about how I want book two to go.
The writers’ group met on Thursday again. We went over a piece by Larry, one of his best to date as far as I was 
concerned. Victoria was absent, she wasn’t feeling well. Naturally, we missed her input. It´s nice having four. In the past, if one couldn’t make it, we would just cancel the meeting. Now, hopefully, we will always have enough for a good discussion about our writing. Of course, we spent a lot of time talking politics also.
I have been working on several short stories. I seem to get them to a point and get stuck. Then I set them aside for a while hoping that time and distance will help me further the plot. These are stories I will be submitting to magazines for publishing. It’s time I got serious about my writing. Not that writing a book isn’t serious, I would just like to get paid for it.
All my friends here are doing well so nothing to tell in that area. I went to the movies last night with Steve, his brother Antonio, his older brother Alex and Alex’s fiancée Joyce. We saw “Sucker Punch.” It was quite a visual event and the story line wasn’t bad at all. I personally liked it a lot but don’t think it’s a movie for everyone. For me it was easily a 4 Llama movie where as others might only give it three Llamas.
Have a great weekend everyone. Enjoy every moment, and look for the beauty all around you.