Good Morning Lowcountry
Posted Courtesy of The Post and Courier (http://www.charleston.net)
Published on 10/11/04
Compiled by The Post and Courier
Churlish GMLc knows you're smirking. You've got the day off, and we have to work. It's Columbus Day, one of those new, take-it-or-leave-it federal holidays that some of Our Benevolent Employers observe and some trade out for birthdays off or other optional federal holidays. Anyhow, we are not ones to stew in our abuses. We don't resent your leisure. In the best spirit of the day, we'd like to spend a moment or two contemplating Cristophe Columbo, the trader venerated as the discoverer of the New World. No, really, we mean it. Here are a few tidbits:
EARLY SLIPS: In 1476, Columbus sailed the Atlantic Ocean for the first time, aboard a trading vessel owned by Genoa, Italy, friends of his father. It was attacked by the French (go figure) near Cape St. Vincent. The French burned the ship. Columbus swam six miles to shore to escape. In 1479, he married a noblewoman from a no-longer-so rich Portuguese family and had two children. In 1488 he had a son with another woman.
OOPS: Columbus based his scheme of opening a back door trading route to Asia on calculations in Roman miles rather than nautical miles. According to his math, the distance from the Canary Islands to Japan was a very-sailable 2,700 miles. The real distance was 13,000 miles.
WHOOPS: He landed somewhere around the Bahamas or San Salvador on Oct. 14, 1492, a date permanently imprinted in the minds of generations of schoolchildren. He was so sure he'd found Asia that he later mistook the mountains of Cuba for the Himalayas. In his log book, he described the Tainos, the native people, as friendly and peaceful. His first question to them, noticing some jewelry in their noses, was "Where the gold?"
He was so impressed with his native hosts that he wrote King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella, of Spain, "When your highnesses should so command, all of them can be brought to Castile, or be kept captive on their own island, for with fifty men you will keep them all in subjugation and make them do anything you wish." He kidnapped a thousand or so himself, threw bodies overboard as they died on the return voyage and rejoiced in his log that he had baptized one, converting the first savage to Christianity.
So there.
CREAM OF THE SLACK: A variety of leisurely scoops of culture await the idling among us today. There's a lecture, "Use the New Moon To Make Your Dreams Come True," by Renee Dougherty at 6 p.m. at Earth Fare on Folly Road. This is Our Favorite Price. Best hurry, the new moon is Wednesday.
There's also a piano performance by Douglas Ashley at 8 p.m. at the Albert Simons Center for the Arts on St. Phillip Street, part of Arts Monday Night Concert Series sponsored by the College of Charleston. It is not Our Favorite Price, but the dent in the wallet is just five little ones. For more information, call 953-5927. And, a chance to tach it and racket for a good cause.
For everyone who test drives a 2005 model at Volvo of Charleston on Savannah Highway, the dealership will donate $10 to Darkness to Light, a group working to stop child abuse.
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