Americas | GlobalPost

Is baseball dead in Canada?

Sandro ContentaApril 28, 2010 06:38Updated May 30, 2010 13:31

TORONTO, Canada — It’s never pleasant living in a city where major sports teams always lose. Better a losing team, however, than no team at all. In hockey, the last time the Toronto Maple Leafs won the Stanley Cup, as every school child here knows, was 1967. In basketball, the Toronto Raptors entered the NBA in 1995, but have only once reached the semifinals.

More Good News For American Newspapers (South American, That Is)

Seth KugelApril 26, 2010 17:50

It’s what passes for good news these days in American print journalism: circulation at American newspapers shrunk less rapidly during the six months ending March 31 than it did in the six months before that, according to the AP. But if I were bleeding profusely after, say, a swordfight, and then began bleeding less profusely, would that be good news? Or would it would mean I was simply running out of blood to lose?

Hairdressers respond to "fashion emergency"

Lezak ShallatMay 8, 2010 08:05Updated May 30, 2010 13:30

CUREPTO, Chile — In the Chilean town of Curepto, all is void and emptiness. The picturesque rural town was flattened by the 8.8-earthquake in February and almost all its stores are still closed — including its two beauty parlors. Enter two hair stylists from Santiago: Andi works on film sets with movie stars and Mauri at a top salon.

Priest of Chile’s elite accused of sexual abuse

Pascale BonnefoyApril 24, 2010 00:04

A priest whose parish has for decades catered to Chile’s conservative political and economic elite was accused this week by four of his former followers of sexually abusing them when they were teenagers.

Literacy, Bureaucracy, and Swim Goggles

Seth KugelApril 23, 2010 18:50

One of Brazil’s great leaps forward in recent decades was to make primary education available to all children, producing – in theory, at least – a generation of literate young adults. One of its centuries-old hexes is its ingrained tendency to create stupefying bureaucracies, part of the famous “Brazil cost” that scares multinational companies and would-be local entrepreneurs alike.

Slideshow: A night at a famous tango hall

Nadja DrostApril 26, 2010 06:43Updated May 30, 2010 13:30

MEDELLIN, Colombia — When Latin music aficionados think of Colombia, they usually think of the Cali’s steamy salsa clubs, the drum beats of the Atlantic coast’s Cumbia or the nostalgic ballads of accordion-based Vallenato. Tango normally doesn’t make the list. But in Medellin, a tango culture has remained so vibrant for decades that the city is widely considered to be the world’s tango capital after Buenos Aires. After Carlos Gardel, the Argentine godfather of tango, died in a plane crash in Medellin, the city cemented its obsession with tango.

Five Frames: Best photos of the week

News DeskApril 24, 2010 08:49Updated May 30, 2010 13:30

BOSTON — From GlobalPost's editors, a selection of the best pictures of the week. A man works at an orchard in Vakifli, Turkey, the country's last surviving Armenian village. Read about how, as Armenians stop to reflect on Ottoman-era mass killings today, a survivor quietly moves on. (Nichole Sobecki/GlobalPost)

Free-market makeover

Nick MiroffApril 23, 2010 14:44Updated May 30, 2010 13:30

HAVANA, Cuba — The Cuban government keeps close tabs on its citizens, but at least it’s getting out of their hair. Starting this month, in a small but significant nod to market economics, the Castro government has begun handing over state-run barbershops and beauty salons to their employees, marking the first time communist authorities have ceded control of retail-level small businesses that were nationalized in 1968.

Mexico: A phone call, a scream and a plea for help

Michael E. MillerApril 26, 2010 06:25Updated May 30, 2010 13:30

MEXICO CITY, Mexico — On a Saturday morning this February, Rosario Garcia picked up her cell phone and heard the sound Mexicans have come to fear most: the scream of a loved one in trouble. “Mom, help me! Something horrible has happened,” said a voice so like that of her 33-year-old daughter that Rosario was sure it was she. “Paula, is that you?” she asked, panicked. “They have me in a car. I’ve been kidnapped,” answered the voice. Then a man came on the phone.

A monument to shoddy reporting

John OtisApril 23, 2010 11:05

BOGOTA, Colombia — Colombia’s right-wing government and Hugo Chavez, Venezuela’s socialist leader, are always squabbling and have even talked of going to war. Usually, the rhetoric is overheated. The latest diplomatic brouhaha is a good example: it involves a statue of a terrorist — that doesn’t exist.