Angel Falls bedevils Chavez, who wants name changed

[The_Dude 1,142]

[zqt3344 21]

Thank you Kathryn41, I have to deal with insults all the time out of these people, you are right.

Stop the insults - you both know that insults are a violation of TOS. If you cannot find a civil way to express disagreement with someone else's point of view or respond to an insult by insulting back you will face a suspension.

[Saddle Bronc 124]

Stop the insults - you both know that insults are a violation of TOS. If you cannot find a civil way to express disagreement with someone else's point of view or respond to an insult by insulting back you will face a suspension.

Eh, aren't insults of a foreign chop who is not a VJ member allowed?

[thongd4me 69]

I think all the other countries of the world should band together and replace Venezuela on their maps with the word "Underpants."

Why can't this be a serious discussion like "Arab Gulf" vs. "Persian Gulf?"

I think the real test for a place name known the world over is whether

Andy Rooney from "60 Minutes" can pronounce the name or not.

Personally I don't see anything wrong with the name change,

but if I can't pronounce it I probably won't remember it.

I have a friend from Myanmar who still calls it Burma.

So do most of the Thais in Thailand (why not)?

Edited December 23, 2009 by thongd4me

[thongd4me 69]

I think all the other countries of the world should band together and replace Venezuela on their maps with the word "Underpants."

Why can't this be a serious discussion like "Arab Gulf" vs. "Persian Gulf?"

I think the real test for a place name known the world over is whether

Andy Rooney from "60 Minutes" can pronounce the name or not.

Personally I don't see anything wrong with the name change,

but if I can't pronounce it I probably won't remember it.

I have a friend from Myanmar who still calls it Burma.

So do most of the Thais in Thailand (why not)?

Could you imagine the local merchants curses when they hear of Chavez' officially changing the name of the falls?

They are just looking at their inventories of "Souvenir of Angel Falls" items that the government is telling them they have to re-name.

Can you guess which of the items the tourists that come there will want to buy?

I always thought the falls were named after some local guy "Yo, Angel!" who just wandered into a clearing and saw the magnificent falls for the first time.

I had no idea it was named after a virtually unknown American pilot with a monomaniacal agenda to take over South America.

I guess that's because cartographers are just looking for a logical name and not necessarily a political one when they make their maps.

The fact that Venezuela was not a particularly powerful nation-state at the time also played a part.

As the head of state, Chavez is definitely within his rights to propose a name change.

Whether it's good for the country or his people, that's for them to decide.

Political figures will often stir up nationalistic emotions by changing the name of a country, city or famous landmark.

Like Maggie Thatcher, they may also go to war over marginal issues (Falklands) when their hold on power appears to be shaky.

In the west we remember the "Falklands War" but Argentina with a presumably equal claim said "Las Malvinas son Argentinas!"

It was settled by force but that doesn't make the outcome right. If the other side won the same could be said.

Thought-provoking argument for changing Thailand back to Siam

Edited December 23, 2009 by thongd4me

[Saddle Bronc 124]

Could you imagine the local merchants curses when they hear of Chavez' officially changing the name of the falls?

They are just looking at their inventories of "Souvenir of Angel Falls" items that the government is telling them they have to re-name.

Can you guess which of the items the tourists that come there will want to buy?

I always thought the falls were named after some local guy "Yo, Angel!" who just wandered into a clearing and saw the magnificent falls for the first time.

I had no idea it was named after a virtually unknown American pilot with a monomaniacal agenda to take over South America.

I guess that's because cartographers are just looking for a logical name and not necessarily a political one when they make their maps.

The fact that Venezuela was not a particularly powerful nation-state at the time also played a part.

As the head of state, Chavez is definitely within his rights to propose a name change.

Whether it's good for the country or his people, that's for them to decide.

Political figures will often stir up nationalistic emotions by changing the name of a country, city or famous landmark.

Like Maggie Thatcher, they may also go to war over marginal issues (Falklands) when their hold on power appears to be shaky.

In the west we remember the "Falklands War" but Argentina with a presumably equal claim said "Las Malvinas son Argentinas!"

It was settled by force but that doesn't make the outcome right. If the other side won the same could be said.

Thought-provoking argument for changing Thailand back to Siam

In a way it was equal. Maggie needed something to divert attention from the wear-off of her political honeymoon (after three years in power) and the junta of Argentina needed something to divert attention from their despotic and corrupt misrule (and the failure of their bellicose claims against Argentina's other neighbours to do this).

Argentinian junta's bellicosity came back to clobber it--as the neighbours (particularly Chile) took opportunity to cash-in against them.

How about replacing "Venezuela" with "vast tip" (tip: Brit slang for landfill)?

Edited December 24, 2009 by Saddle Bronc

[thongd4me 69]

In a way it was equal. Maggie needed something to divert attention from the wear-off of her political honeymoon

(after three years in power) and the junta of Argentina needed something to divert attention from their despotic and corrupt misrule

(and the failure of their bellicose claims against Argentina's other neighbours to do this).

Argentinian junta's bellicosity came back to clobber it--as the neighbours (particularly Chile) took opportunity to cash-in against them.

How about replacing "Venezuela" with "vast tip" (tip: Brit slang for landfill)?

That's my point. It takes two to tango.

(I failed miserably at the tango but admire a couple that can do it well.)

Politics is just a game of "Quien Es Mas Macho?"

[panamania79 2]

CARACAS (AFP) – The world's tallest waterfall -- Angel Falls in southern Venezuela -- should be stripped of the name by which it is widely known in favor of its indigenous one, President Hugo Chavez said.

The falls, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, were spotted by US pilot Jimmy Angel in 1937, bringing international attention to what has become one of Venezuela's top tourist attractions, though it is in remote Bolivar state.

"How could we accept this idea that the falls were discovered by a guy who came from the United States in a plane. If we do that, that would be like accepting that nobody was living here," Chavez mused on his weekly radio and television show, "Hello Mr President."

"Nobody should speak of Angel Falls any more," Chavez said. "That is ours, and was a long time before Angel ever got there."

In indigenous Pemon, the falls are called Kerepakupai meru, meaning "waterfall of the deepest place."

Chavez is a fan of name changes.

After he came to power in 1999, the firebrand leftist leader changed his own country's name, from just plain Venezuela to the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela. That move was to pay homage to independence fighter Simon Bolivar.

He then renamed a mountain in Caracas -- previously known as Cerro Avila -- with its indigenous name, Guaraira Repano.

Chavez is a crackhead!

link

[thongd4me 69]

If "Oogo" really wants to be smart, he can do like the Japanese do with their baseball teams.

Instead of naming them for the city "Fukuoka Hawks" they are named for a company "Daiei Hawks"

How about the "Exxon-Mobil Falls?"

Warms the cockles of your heart and gives you a chill down the spine at the same time

[Ricardo_C 4]

Still. The falls are still in Venezuelan soil; hence it does not much matter what anyone thinks. And nooooo, I am not a Chavez fan --- but I am a self-determination fan.

I don't recall Venezuelans being consulted on the name change.

It's only self-determination in that Chávez made the decision by himSELF

[panamania79 2]

I don't recall Venezuelans being consulted on the name change.

It's only self-determination in that Chávez made the decision by himSELF

Just Chavez,doing what he does best!

[PhiLandShiR 18]

There are a lot of precedents for changing anglicized names back to the names given by the local culture to certain areas and cities. I think he has a valid point in this situation as well and see nothing wrong with a name change.

Yup,

Case in Point :

Mount McKinley or Denali ("The Great One") in Alaska....

-Phil