[speaker002:] good morning
[speaker001:] good morning
[speaker002:] uh okay go ahead yeah I understand the topic this morning is uh our policy in Latin America and you know what we've been doing down there so I don't know
[speaker001:] no no go ahead
[speaker002:] as you indicated you don't have too much input into the area it it just so happens that uh our daughter-in-law is Panamanian and uh we have been in Panama and I have worked in El Salvador and we visit Mexico occasionally so yeah we we do have a little information on it here but uh
[speaker001:] oh very good because actually um when I was in college I visited Mexico several times I was in the Peace Corps and um Peru but but recently I have been following the Middle East rather than
[speaker002:] oh uh-huh yeah
[speaker001:] Central America
[speaker002:] it does seem to have quieted down there just a little bit that's that's for sure no I the US policy uh towards Central America as far as uh well I kind of go back to to the El Salvador thing because Texas Instruments had a a plant down there for a while and I worked in there for a little while and at that particular time let's let's see that was seventy three seventy four kind of before the the uh the the uh Civil War really picked up down there and US policy at that particular time there was of course military assistance to uh to the government itself you know anything that's that's anticommunist you know we kind of had a tendency to be pro it don't matter what their excesses were and I believe at the time that I was down there that uh the
[speaker001:] right
[speaker002:] that uh the government uh the Salvadorian government you know really gotten out of hand yet the uh right wing death squad type situation I believe that that was beginning to form but I don't I I wasn't really aware of it's being you know terribly uh you know rapid at the time that that I was down there I think that really kind of developed a little bit later on but uh our policies seem to be pretty much one of uh you know trying to setup businesses down there and use the one resource anyway that Salvador had plenty of and that was people we didn't seem to be going in and taking anything out of the country other than just it's it's labor
[speaker001:] right um-hum
[speaker002:] because everything that TI did anyway we we shipped in and it was worked on down there assembled and then sent back here so I didn't feel that we really exploiting exploiting them any
[speaker001:] did that have um so you don't you don't feel that that we were um exploiting in the sense of we were benefiting and they weren't
[speaker002:] no uh in the particular incidence that I was aware of now TI wasn't the only ones in there Playtex was in there was uh several other companies and uh
[speaker001:] uh-huh
[speaker002:] of course we kind of concentrate on there wasn't much to take out of the country I felt like we're going in and taken all their um their gold or oil or bananas or coffee or anything like that because uh it just
[speaker001:] um-hum
[speaker002:] the only thing that they had a great abundance of was uh you know human beings
[speaker001:] uh-huh did did we tend to um change their attitudes attitudes like some times when Americans go into foreign countries they tend to flaunt American things Americanism um consumer products TV the whole works
[speaker002:] yeah I understand what you say there was a uh the time that I was down there I stayed quite a a bit at the uh uh one of the big hotels San Salvador and at the time I thought there ought to be a law against American tourists because they for the most part tend to be the most obnoxious as a as a group and I saw this in Panama so uh oh you know it's it's the uh the almost stereotype
[speaker001:] uh-huh
[speaker002:] you know flowery shirt shorts camera hanging around their neck you know demanding this that and the other thing you know we're we're here and we want this and we want that and that sort of thing that's that's the stereotype that's very strong down there you know that uh the you know that sort of thing I I I believe those of us who were working down there got a little bit more appreciation for you know the local uh culture I really don't believe that we were quite that bad but yet they were having to deal directly with uh you know with the uh the local people
[speaker001:] uh-huh uh-huh
[speaker002:] and uh but boy there is a there is a bad uh uh you know the old brash ugly American type
[speaker001:] uh-huh
[speaker002:] situation and I saw incidences in the hotel where I just wanted to go over and crawl in the corner and say oh my God those are those are not Americans they can't be but they are
[speaker001:] right
[speaker002:] and uh of course now I I do have to I remember one case where we had some Canadians in there who were every bit as bad but I mean it I think it's just kind of the North American situation uh in Panama they've been used to Americans down there for so darn long but I didn't see quite as much of that sort of thing as Panamanians are just about as as uh as as Americans as far as uh creature comforts you know they're uh they're they're every bit uh I I know when my my son was in the Air Force and he was stationed in Panama and he married a Panamanian girl and when she came up here uh you know she's you know except for the language situation some of the cultures she's just about an American you know is as far as TV and
[speaker001:] uh-huh
[speaker002:] and you know the the moneymaking part of it and all that matter of fact if anything she's worse but uh uh it it just there's little enclaves down there where you know Americans have a lot of influence
[speaker001:] uh-huh uh-huh
[speaker002:] and the local population kind of um you know sort of accepts that but I've also seen the other side of it too
[speaker001:] uh-huh
[speaker002:] well you were in Peru
[speaker001:] yeah I was in Peru Peru but um I there weren't as I recall or at least I wasn't aware of that many Americans there except for a very heavy concentration of Peace Corps volunteers this was when the Peace Corps first are started and it was one of the big targets
[speaker002:] uh-huh uh-huh
[speaker001:] and um I don't I don't think at that time at least Peace Corps was uh an obnoxious group in the sense that that we were very controlled regarding number of days off and and you couldn't just take up take off and leave your group and go explore and and things like that
[speaker002:] oh uh-huh
[speaker001:] but and I was working actually in the savings and loan program so that was quite specialized although I was living in the slums I was really working with the middle class
[speaker002:] uh-huh What uh what area did you live in
[speaker001:] I was up in Arequipa
[speaker002:] oh okay yeah
[speaker001:] and um
[speaker002:] I've heard of it
[speaker001:] uh-huh so
[speaker002:] well well is are they is Peace Corps still active down in there
[speaker001:] I don't have any idea um probably not I mean there were thirteen I was uh Peru Peru thirteen which meant there were twelve groups before mine
[speaker002:] uh-huh
[speaker001:] that had gone in and and some of them were quite big in the sense they were community development and they were building schools and doing coops and things like that health um inoculation and and things
[speaker002:] oh has those influences lasted do you know whether the the things that that you and your groups before you did did those did those live on or were they reabsorbed or how
[speaker001:] no no I believe they did because um some of some of the the Peace Corps uh that I knew of did marry Peruvians
[speaker002:] uh-huh
[speaker001:] and have been back and every now and then some news filters in that they went to see some of the old things and of course the savings and loan program um that was that you know that that just continued to grow in fact after my group I mean we were just a very small specialized group too to get that going and spread and then of course Peace Corps bowed out of that because that's uh uh something that nationalized very quickly and the same with the coops
[speaker002:] uh-huh well that's that was kind of the the aim wasn't it to get it started and then have it
[speaker001:] right
[speaker002:] taken up by the oh okay oh so you know well that's I had wondered sometimes I knew that there was a lot of a lot of effort and a lot of work went into a lot of that and I just wondered if if it lasted and if it took you know like yeah
[speaker001:] uh-huh yeah I've you know some of the programs I would have concern about like um the language teaching you know I mean why should we push English and a lot of people were down there teaching English and when they talked about Hungary or someplace one of the eastern law countries requesting Peace Corps to teach language you know to me that's a little bit marginal I did teach economics at the university one night a week and the textbook was in English but basically I taught it in Spanish because I mean
[speaker002:] uh-huh oh
[speaker001:] I really didn't see the point in their knowing stuff rotely and writing it on a test
[speaker002:] yeah yeah my brother-in-law teaches at uh Northern Illinois University and they were in China here a couple of years ago and he was over there at uh the University of Shah and and teaching