Social Justice & Collective Action - with Carlos Mancilla of BCSicletos

Latin America Correspondent Jon Bonfiglio speaks to Carlos Mancilla of groundbreaking local La Paz organization BCSicletos, alongside journalists Ludwig Elias Franz and Paul Schmidt-Troschke.

https://bcsicletos.org/

Transcript

Jon Bonfiglio: 0:00

Hi everyone. Here we are again, Latin America Correspondent continuing the series of interviews and discussions that are taking place in the northwest of Mexico in Baja California, in and around La Paz. This uh pretty incredible place, incredible part of the world, has so much going on in terms of social, environmental, civic organizations and narratives uh that are taking place. Today we're going to hear an interview with Carlos Mancilla from BCSicletos. That's a fascinating fascinating organization that um do well they started with bicycles. They started with promoting um bicycle lanes and um providing alternatives to public transport, self-paddled public transport. But then as you'll hear during the interview, moved into uh a lot, a lot more. Hope you enjoy it. So BCSicletos. Yeah. How does it start? What is it?

Carlos Mancilla: 0:56

Well, BCSicletos is an NGO that was born in like a collective in 2009. Um actually in the 2015, BCSicletos uh take the uh I don't know how to say, but they uh will be recognized by the state like a real NGO in 2015. So that they start the the groups the collective starts with uh topics mainly focusing on urban mobility, focusing on uh on mainly on bicycles, like this that's the reason for the name, like BCSicletos. And the the organization starts to work to promote the urban cycling here in La Paz, and mainly focusing on uh improve the bike lanes in the city and local regulation and all that stuff for many, many years, maybe like four or six years. But in 2020, previously to the to the uh pandemic season and all that stuff, uh the uh the organization starts to work with the communities, with local communities. Why? Because we we saw that the La Paz are uh suffering uh huge, huge uh urban changes related to gentrification and on the mainly touristification. That means the all that urban spaces are changing, focusing on the tourists, on the tourist, and and we uh start to work with our neighborhood that's called Barrio El Manglito. And in the barrio we start to work with the community with a fight that they had 30 10 10 years 20 years ago, they were fine to obtain a local park, a community park. And they fight with uh big, big corporation that won the space when the that space that the community wants to be a part. And BCSicletos uh work with the community to with in this fight, and the community won, finally won the park, and that's make a big change inside the organization, and the organization starts to thinking about the complexity of the urban uh inequities here in Baja California Sur. So that's that makes a big change, and actually we continue work with topics with mobility and uh quality air problems and all that stuff. But uh I think the main program right now is focusing on work with the communities and the neighborhoods that are fighting for the public spaces and against the uh uh actually we're make working with the communities, we're fighting against the uh ecologi the energetic transitions that the government wants to give us that's mainly focus on LNG production and and produce the the energy that's uh focusing on LNG and combo and combustolio. I don't know how to say the work in English. Combustibles? Yeah, my combustibles, yeah. That's mainly not not oil, just the it's the one process for the oil and the combustible. I don't know how the the term in English, real.

Jon Bonfiglio: 4:53

Just before we carry on. So the manglito is um is a really interesting area, which is so if you think about the the map of the Bay of La Paz, there's the big, there's the Sea of Cortez, and then there's the Bay of La Paz, and then as you fly over, there's another little bay inside the Bay of La Paz, which is where El Manglito is. And El Manglito is like a historically a neighborhood right in the center of La Paz of working class fishing communities, fishing families.

Carlos Mancilla: 5:18

Yeah, and one of the communities founders the city here in the Barrio El Esterito, this is right right here, close to the center, near to the center, and Barrio El Manglito was the two communities that found that that city. And with locally by local fishermen's as the yeah.

Jon Bonfiglio: 5:39

So I guess from you from the perspective of Bicycletos as well, it's sort of it's an important focal point because it remains, I mean, to some extent, it remains a working class fishing community, which of course is the basis of what La Paz was founded at.

Carlos Mancilla: 5:52

Yeah, and it's very, very important because our neighborhood, the the Manglito Barrio, are actually fighting against the gentrification because they're very near to the to the beach, to the coast. So I mean it's here, it's walkable. Yeah, yeah, it's walkable. Yeah, like uh 20 20 20 minutes uh walking from here. So yeah, it's very, very close to here. And the community starts to disappear, and the community is start to thinking, hey, what happened with this? Because a lot of uh people came to buy our land, and and actually you can only find a little community, uh organized community, mainly in collective, women collective, that's called the Guardianas El Conchalito. I think many people talk about that, but the Guardianas worth making a really very huge effort to preserve the traditions to the local fishermen in that place.

Jon Bonfiglio: 6:53

And they've reseded as well, haven't they? In the mang in the manglito, the the bay within the bay. Yeah, historically, that community, the fishing. I mean, correct me if I'm wrong, but so the fishing community also over a period of time saw the ecosystem disappearing and started re-seeding because it's famous for a couple of different kinds of conch.

Carlos Mancilla: 7:09

Ah, yeah, yeah, a lot of hope. Yeah, but one one specific uh uh in one specific area, many people steal that uh production from the local fishermen. So the the women's their uh wives from fishermen and all the stuff organize to protect that space because many people are still the the the clams and all that stuff. So they organized and they they uh and they found the Guardianas, Esther al Conchalito, and actually uh when she starts to protect that zone, immediately the man group starts to grow up and restoration. So actually they are a big, big group, organized woman group in that space. And also they work very, very close to bicicletos in that five from the neighborhood, so the barrio. We call that we are mega defense territorial, territorial defense actions. So that's very, very important for us. And bicicletos are working with that. We're we're uh working, we have a collaboratory, urban collaboratory, and we made a lot, a lot of uh work doing with maps and interactive maps and collaborative maps with the communities. The and the objective of that is uh create data from the for and from the communities. All the data is from the communities, and the data is used mainly from the defense of the public spaces and their their lifestyle. So that's the main topic, right? We're working right now. But also we had uh we developed an air quality monitors that we use in the bike. That's um is very important because here in La Paz, many people told this place is the paradise. La Paz is the paradise. Come to visit the paradise, come to live in the paradise. But what's the cost of that paradise? Also, we talk about the the energetic problem here, and we have Punta Prieta here. You can see the uh the chimneys from the uh energetic production here, and 60% of that energy is sent to Los Cabos to maintain that specific uh uh I don't know develop basic development uh of tourism of the of exclusive tourism developing Los Cabos. So we can we can uh we assume that uh a sacrifice zone for that type of development. So it's very, very important to talk about this because you can see here where it's a very, very cloudy and very, very windy space here, but the air is very, very polluted. Very, very polluted. We can see because it's it's from the air, but that's the reason we developed that air quality monitors, and that monitors uh showed us that we have a lot a lot of problems related to the air quality. Uh also with the communities that we work, I we work on a Afro-Mexican community, is near to the power plant, near to the power plant, and we found a lot of cancer, a lot of asthma, and a lot of a lot of diseases from related to the air quality. So that's the price that we need to pay to this to maintain this uh paradise.

Jon Bonfiglio: 10:54

So there's this kind of discrepancy, isn't that? Because you've got um tens of thousands of hotel rooms south in San José del Cabo and Los Cabos. And uh historically La Paz is a sort of a progressive. I mean it's it's complex, but basically historically it's a progressive environment socio-environmental space here. But there's this trade-off, as you say, where actually the pollution and the generation of the uh of the electricity for all of that external mess comes from here because it's an administrative center.

Carlos Mancilla: 11:30

Yeah, 60% of the energy was is is for Los Cabos. So and actually the government uh announced and it's actually start to work with that to expand uh an energy plant in Los Cabos that produces five times more like the the Punta Prieta, like the plant from here, is five times bigger, and they want to uh develop uh I don't know, it's a pipeline, a big gas pipeline to connect that that infrastructure related to the energy products to LNG, and um want to develop uh they had up a power, uh a small power plant, and they want to increase the capacity of that power plant that use LNG too. So uh what happened here? We are uh we our um our point of view is that they want to develop uh a big uh super energy production. And it's why because this is the thing that the the uh the the um I don't have to say that the sector immobiliario, the real estate sector need to develop all that pro that process in in these spaces. Why? Because they have faced the problem of the water. We we're uh we're in the desert, so we have a uh a few water, but the the technology saved that. They they put the the desaladoras, I don't know how to say the name. The desalination plants. Yeah, uh they had uh five big plants in Los Cabos, so the desalation process is very, very hard in that space. So the the water is solved from that sector, no? And the only thing that we we have to stop the develop of that infrastructure infrastructure is the energy. And the and now actually the government wants to develop that, so we're fighting against that. Actually, we had a uh a legal process against all that projects. So actually they're stopped, they're stopped because we are dealing with that uh uh legal legal fight against that. And actually, tomorrow we'll visit some uh communities that are that are um they want to join to the fight against that mega project, synergy mega projects, because that's the only that's the only uh step that we have to develop all that infrastructure from the tourist and mega, mega, mega buildings and all that stuff.

Jon Bonfiglio: 14:21

So again, correct me if I'm wrong, I'm just gonna contextualize a bit. But so one of the things about Baja California is it's got comparatively a really uh especially Baja California Sur, a really um small population, but it's also historically really isolated from the mainland. So it's also really interesting from an energy transition perspective because if you were to try and make any sort of independent energy transition in Mexico City or Veracruz or Yucatán o Querétaro, it's impossible because you're part of a big space. But the relative isolation of Baja California, specifically Baja California Sur, means that there's a degree of energy transition autonomy that can be argued, and that a lot of organizations like Bicicletos are getting behind saying we can actually organize ourselves differently in terms of an energy transition. It doesn't have to look like what the rest of the country looks like.

Carlos Mancilla: 15:06

Yeah, and and and I think this is very important to focus on the uh uh to the communities, uh to the communities, uh lifestyles and the decisions that they made. Because it's very easy to to see, okay, they had the the the experts saw that this is that many communities uh live in uh energetic poverty. But we we are to try to deal with that uh term because many communities are telling us, okay, if you think that is energy poverty, we like the energy poverty because that means we can maintain our lifestyle just like this.

Jon Bonfiglio: 15:53

Self-sufficiency versus energy poverty.

Carlos Mancilla: 15:55

Yeah, because uh the the technician says, okay, we can install power, solar power plants and the wind plants and all that stuff, but they say, hey, what what why energy for who and for what? I think that's the main the main uh questions here. The problem is not the the communities don't have energy, the problem is that the uh private sector and the government want to develop a lot of energy projects, but from for what and for who? So that's I think that's the the real deal. It doesn't matter is clean energy or polluted energy. The topic here is what happened with that energy.

Jon Bonfiglio: 16:44

And it's um it's not a new argument, which is obviously an argument of modernity, but also like it's pretty straightforward to argue is also a neo-colonialist argument, which is we're doing this for you. Yeah. The argument is we're doing it to help you, but actually it's in order to allow permission and other things.

Carlos Mancilla: 17:03

And the communities had that knowledge. The communities are tired to the data speeches. So, oh, we need we came here to help you, and mainly are from the NGO organization that uh uh work with that communities, and I I think the the communities uh feel like very, very angry and sad with all that process. And we are well, we'll have a lot of uh discussions here against the um the conservative organizations that fight against the local fisher communities that said, hey, this is my lifestyle for many, many uh generations. And you came here to see okay, this needs this space need to be conserved and need to be preserved, and they fight against the community. So it's very, very hard to uh to uh to understand the real complexity of this territory. So that's the deal at Bicicletos, and it's very, very uh strange to think because we start to work with bicycles, and also we are uh working with many, many topics with energy, with uh urban development, with uh urban policy, and and all that stuff, no? So that's the I think that's the amazing work that we made here in Bicicletos because we are not only focusing on bicycles and mobility, because we see that the urban complexity is very, very hard. And the and we are we know that the the communities and the local populations need to be in the center of this activism and this uh take decisions process. So yeah.

Jon Bonfiglio: 18:55

Let's just come back to BCSicletos in a minute, but just to add another little bit of context in terms of something Carlos was just saying is that there's this kind of um irony that where you have governments saying to fishing communities, you can't fish, because almost exclusively all of the fishing communities here are artisanal fishing communities. So it's small-scale, individual, couple of individuals on a boat, it's not mass fishing. And where mass fishing enters, it's in order to produce food that is designed again for the tourist market or for export, it's not actually for the local community here. So there's this kind of disconnect between local fishing communities and what they historically work for and produce food for against the sort of the mass external um external market. In terms of bicicletos, um like it seems to me really obvious and unsurprising that an organization like Bicicletos, that has values at its core, should go, should grow into unusual spaces. But for a lot of people externally, it's like we don't understand what you do.

Carlos Mancilla: 19:58

Yeah.

Jon Bonfiglio: 19:58

Because you start doing other things. But of course, it's consistent with the values rather than with the actual angle of work. I'm guessing it here in La Paz it's been less of an issue, but you must still come across that. Like people who think industrially, we don't understand what it is you specifically do.

Carlos Mancilla: 20:15

Yeah, and I we think it's uh a very discussion from the from the community about what happened with bicicletos and what bicicletos are uh fighting against the vicar ships and the uh the energetic plants and all that stuff. So we saw that we are focusing to fight against the urban uh uh inequities. So that's our uh our goal to to fight. And this that is our so we we the the mobility is one part of that complexity. So many people say, hey, but you need to work on the on the bike lanes and the public transports and all that. But our opinion of about that is yeah, but what city we are creating with that. One of the specific fights that we have is one uh bike lane that uh pass across the one community, and the community uh fight against that bag lane. So and they said, hey, bicicletos do that, and uh and they is they start a fight against the bicicletos and all the stuff. And and that's what a very, very good lesson for us, because we need to talk with the communities and and and ask what happened with that. And and we need to develop a lot of techniques and methods to take the the voice of the communities in the public decisions. So that's the the reason we change or or or or way to do the things. But also the I think the the the maybe the private sector is the that are make the that can uh question our job but the communities and the and the locals here from from Baja California Sur, from the the local fisher communities and from the neighborhoods and the Afro-Mexican communities that live here are with us and we are working with them. So I think that's the the the strongest of the of the organization and the mainly of the social movement that we are creating and working with all that people. So I think it's important.

Jon Bonfiglio: 22:46

It seems to me there's always been this um that oftentimes when there's when people want to make things happen even with good intentions that there's this sort of top down thing.

Carlos Mancilla: 22:56

Yeah.

Jon Bonfiglio: 22:57

But then there's always this critique with uh well not critique there's this reality that I always hear with development which is that um somebody in an NGO or a government sector then says oh we did these all these things for the community and then they didn't care then they didn't use the what but it's exactly because of that reason because it's top down and there's there's not a local investment within that. So it's kind of it's more complex and it's muddier and it's slower. But the only way to make change happen in the long term is yeah is this way.

Carlos Mancilla: 23:26

Yeah and here in this territory that is a huge mess because a lot of NGOs work with that type of techniques no like oh I have the technical solution I see the communities and say okay here I am with the solution eh that's it yeah just what happened the communities ask why wait on ask me to you I I don't really want this or something like that. So it's hard in to to make that change of of the the work here and mainly here in in La Paz because we had a lot of lot of NGOs working here and mainly I think the the most of the NGOs works in that terms are very very close to the technical solutions but they don't take a view of the local communities and the social issues and the social ways of life of the community so I think that's the difference from bicicletos. Bicicletos give all the attention to the communities and we part from the base that the community all that the community wants to do it's that bicyclets do. If the community don't want anything of the ideas or or the of the projects or that something's okay it's okay we can change it and we develop another project with the community.

Jon Bonfiglio: 24:57

So I think that's the the the difference and the base of the work from BCSicletos and and just in terms of like the functionalities of like community meetings and community work is it do you work with community leaders do you call meet how do how does that what's the what's the physicality of these of the community work and the community consultations?

Carlos Mancilla: 25:15

Well that's very interesting because the communities uh search for us the the communities ask us our help we don't uh arrive to the communities and say hey where bicicletus and we're gonna help you to work in anything you want it no that's different the the communities ask our ask for our help so we make uh an analysis from the community well first of all we make an analysis from our uh our our own capacity from in the in the organization and we have we uh if we can deal with the the topic that the community asks for us for our help so that's the first the first step and the second we uh we go to the communities and start to make that uh uh like i i said like uh like map we develop uh collaborative maps with the communities mainly for uh uh uh to develop a uh a diagnosis from that's the spaces and the problematics and the the people are interesting to work with in that topic so that's the the the idea so it's it's very hard for us because a lot of community ask for our help but we we can give our help because we don't develop the our projects only to okay this is a project and we start here and we finish here and goodbye now with we uh we make a process to to the with the communities from in a long-term condition because we want to develop mainly the the conditions the local conditions to develop all the projects by their own so we are our our type of activism is related to the long-term projects not only for short term projects so it's it's it's it's foundational work not results driven exactly right exactly you're generating you're working on generating the conditions by which these communities can self-support and make their and be self-supporting in their own decisions rather than saying we're gonna bring water in here or we're gonna deal with this waste plant. Yeah we develop a lot of worships related to the local community organization democratical tools and all that stuff so to but also it's very very interesting because many people ask for us hey we want to develop uh some projects related to the bicycle and kids no hey can can uh you can can bring to the community their bike school here yeah yeah it's okay and uh and when the the people that are working in the in the bike school and all that stuff we start to work with the women and the and the fathers and we start to develop another group to work and those yes that like we we call that the bicycle of Troy. I was gonna say there's a Trojan horse yeah absolutely it's a Trojan we call that that's you use the bicycle as the entry point yeah the that's the mainly where where because we don't change the name of the organization because the bicycle always there so the we we arrived the communities with the bikes and all the stuff and the people also here with the with this uh with this heat and this uh this is a a a very very hot uh territory and the people the communities uh saw us arriving in bicycles what a fucking crazy man with doing that people we say okay that's our that it's it's it's our way to to work and it's our way to to leave the city so I think that's very very important for the community they said hey they are not that the same that all the organizations that are driving in a big trucks and all that stuff and we're arriving in bicycles and we're very sweetie and all that no and the community gave a lot of uh of uh of confidence about that so we work in in the the this that's the the first step and and here in in Baja California the the children are very very important for the community so we we've we work with the children with the kids with you know and also open that that way open us the the the doors to the to to talk about with their parents or the local community leaders and all that stuff so I think that that's the the key from the that we can continue work with advice it's it's a very potent symbol as well partly the self-powered thing but also the fact that it's not like you say it's not lots of people in one space there's like a community of it's like a um um uh a sense of collective power in the yeah in the arriving as yeah and the and the next steps is to organize the the local uh organizations from the neighborhoods to s to start work together so that's the that's our the our sort of work today where we have the the good the the the uh it's very important for us that develop that organization and that spaces to communication between the organization groups from the communities because they have their own uh methods to take decisions and they had their own um for example the Afro-Mexican community developed their own uh uh techniques to have their to to develop some local uh commerce inside the community and they share to the people to the fishermen to the fishes fishermen in the manglito so that that's the the the knowledge that we want the community share and we and that's our that's our job with Bicicletos is the is the the the glue of that of that uh of that piece what's the what's the territory that you how how how far does bicycletos spread? Okay well bicycletosis work only in La Paz but actually with that uh uh energetic uh issues we start to work with communities uh near to Los Cavos La Rivera uh Ligui in in in Loreto and la La Rivera I I I can't remember the the the other community but but we we will work to to that community in in in today santos we're working with people in todos santos and this is small small communities from fishermen's communities mainly fisher communities but yeah we we are expanding our our uh way to to our or zone action zone actually we're starting right now but mainly if in in La Paz that's the the zone we're working for when I um and I think I am quite conscious already um I catch myself always with this uh impulse to help uh what you said like there is like a German uh play from Luther Faust um which says uh where uh the devil says um I am part of the of a course which wants the evil but creates the good and you can turn that around and I think many people who say oh I'm part of something good create the evil yeah so do you have any experience on how to explain to people in a like non-violent way um what they are actually perpetuating I think mainly the we're very very that's the reason we are very focusing on develop the collective data and the collective maps and all that stuff because we we try to the the communities understand the problems based on their own experience. So we keep all that information and we process in our collaboratory and we redevelop and we give the we return the information to the community but very very related to their to the to their quotidianity. So that's the reason we are that's I I think that's our method to to develop that that specific issues because if you think many people told us hey what happened why are you telling me that uh more energy is is bad for me because we had a lot of power cuts here and all that stuff and so what happened so that's it's uh I think it's a a a a real hard and fine work we need to do with the communities and we need to to find the the topics and the and the their their local interests their very very local interests that hold that big issues for us.

Jon Bonfiglio: 34:56

So I think that's our method I I I might just add if if I may I think it's an ivory tower issue I think it's um organizations that are set up to do good from London or Paris or New York is problematic because there's a distance there's a disconnect and so as a result what you end up doing is you end up just making decisions from where you are based on your own parameters and it's almost always um specific specifically based around a topic because you also need to report it to a funder and that's the second thing I'd say is actually I think having money is counterproductive because having money actually means that you perceive that you have a deliverable deliverable thing which you want to put the money into and then return back. Whereas I think and it's not just BCSicletos like the the most incredible organizations that I know whether it's in Jacmel in in Haiti or in Colorado or here or different places the organization doesn't make sense. It doesn't make sense in a conventional way of thinking you can't box it in. And BCSicletos is a classic example of that. Like if I always think I'm sure I've said this to you guys before but if somebody can give you an easy answer something's wrong. Whereas most people think the reverse if you can't give an easy answer then they're suspicious. But actually the truth is that if you're getting your hands dirty on the ground and you're scrubbing around for for funding and you're working with local communities there's never easy answers around that. And so that's counterintuitive whereas if you ask an NGO in New York again they're gonna be able to tell you in a sentence they're gonna have a mission statement and they're gonna be able to tell you very definitely what it is that they want to do and ultimately it's going it's gonna deliver a thing but it's not going to deliver a thing and that thing is going to die as soon as that the the context around it is is removed.

Carlos Mancilla: 36:40

Okay soundright um the only thing anybody can do is give information collect information or not even that like it's only about empowering not not about outside from not coming from the outside but so realizing that if if I want that other people add it better right and in the end it's just let them do it it's not about us yeah it's about us yeah that's the difference yeah yeah and I also did not only from the NGO here the the governments do the same yeah they take decisions in the desk and don't ask the communities from the public policy production and all that stuff. So that's that's our way to to work the the communities ask the politicians and asks the the local government the the public policies that they really need. So that's the way we can change the the term to of the the to create democratic organizations you know then and they find on the that are based on the on the local community wellness which is messy but it's also very direct democracy isn't it yeah do you want to just say some explain to Carlos about the the your work on the direct democracy bus?

Ludwig Elias Franz: 37:59

Yeah in Germany I work with an organization that basically does similar work which is not easy to explain in two sentences but um what came to mind listening to you was your your work of empowering people to take responsibility and to actually feel capable to take action and to to create their own environment rather than putting it off to someone or like getting it taken by someone who wants to impose whatever uh whatever agenda they are they are after say um yeah which is basically just you you said most of it right it's it's about talking to the people knowing what the people want and maybe helping them to develop solutions themselves because they know best I can't do it for anybody but I can uh maybe support you with the contact I have or with whatever uh why because I'm riding around Germany and talking to a lot of people that they don't have a glue clue that they even exist, right? Because really like especially in Europe I think it's the communities are way less existent than they are here so so it's very hard to give the people a feeling of we are many and we can change them things. Except uh in in opposite to I feel very alone with what I want to do and what I feel in my heart is right. So I kind of just resent and don't do anything.

Carlos Mancilla: 39:48

Yeah yeah yeah I think that's the the deal no with working with the communities and also here I think the the the the difference with Bicicletos is we are focusing on the the empower communities to take the territorial decisions that they really want to know because this territory is very very uh is on the focus on the on the all the in the old uh and enterprises and all that the companies they want to develop a lot of uh houses and hotels and all that stuff so that's the that's we think they're very very important the communities start to to make some small changes around their community and with their own effort and also that's the the difference and we made the difference about that and and also as I I told the we actually we're working to put together all that techniques local techniques together dialogue one to other to develop another collective way to take decisions from the communities.

Jon Bonfiglio: 40:59

And I mean it is worth saying as well that the the prevailing model of economic development necessarily involves social fracture. Yeah which obviously and the and and the point of like I said you know I haven't brought up the the political word but there is politics behind it because organizing and um being connected is also a form of defense necessarily. Yeah yeah it's a territorial defense the yeah and territorial not just territory but also culture history you know who who you are yeah which then also is automatically lost again with this sort of economic fracture that yeah that the prevailing model yeah that is that which makes which makes us sound very Marxist.

Carlos Mancilla: 41:40

Yeah yeah yeah but you can divorce it of course but that yeah that that is unfortunately that is how um neoliberal economizing views this kind of stuff is that it's yeah I think the we need to to have it in in the discussion the topic of development what type of what it means yeah yeah yeah and who's it for yeah and it's for and who's the same the same the same questions from the energy you know development for who it's all the same thing for what well and it comes back to bicicletos because I think the thing you guys have got very clear is it's all the same thing. Yeah yeah we think this is a very very complex topics so we need to talk we need to work with all that uh all that scenario not only for one scenario not just bike lines yeah because we don't so the the the work maybe can work and will be can be bet can be worse if we are only focusing on okay the bike lines and the public transfers and all that stuff but for what type of infrastructure we're developing for who because many communities are displaced from their places because they are selling their their houses and all the stuff so we need to to think in the complexity of the problems so that's the reason we're working that way and that's the reason we have an urban collaboratory because it's our brain is a brain we are uh we are the anal we are made of that analysis and we think about what happened in that specific areas and what projects are keen and we can what projects we can uh we can what projects we can fight against them with the in the legal terms and all that stuff so that's the that's why we uh developed that uh urban collaboratory because we need that area to to have our many tools to confront that complexity that we are working with.

Ludwig Elias Franz: 43:46

And that's that's particularly true for the industrial complex right or for every industrialized company really that or uh you can already see it in the education system right so you have More and more people that are very well informed on a very specific topic and they walk around in their own row, but they don't have the connection to the other things, and they don't see what they are, what they might be messing up by by not taking the whole picture into account.

Jon Bonfiglio: 44:21

It's machinery. It's again, as you say, it's an industrialized process where you just do you do one thing hyper well, but actually it doesn't you stop belonging to a broader, sort of messier community, ultimately.

Ludwig Elias Franz: 44:36

And and that that changes it from singularity back to a multi-holder uh yeah, to a multiverse, basically, where you can't really you can't really make a five-year plan and stick to it. But it's it's a lot about being and like being present and being able to see where there's angles or where there's uh opportunities uh emerging, right? Yeah. A lot of what what we're doing as well, just saying yes to what feels right, um and kind of trust in in the intelligence of life.

Jon Bonfiglio: 45:17

Yeah. Yeah. But I think I think it also needs a particular kind of um, I mean, that leads to a particular kind of sensibility, which again, most standard education models don't provide you with, most social models don't provide you with because it does they do channel you down a particular way. And so you're sort of ingrained to not questioning that. I'm sure I've said this to you before, but there's a really nice line by an American feminist called Gloria Steinem who says, when you start asking questions, there's no turning back. And I think there's that thing that you and it's not just asking a question, it's if you come across an answer you don't like, you need to look at that, you need to interrogate that answer and go, well, what does this mean for me rather than it be a pretend question and a pretend answer? And then I think that gradually takes you again into this messy, these messy contexts, which don't help us live our lives.

Carlos Mancilla: 46:08

No. It's very hard not right now to understand.

Jon Bonfiglio: 46:12

Thank you so much.

Carlos Mancilla: 46:13

No, no, it's a pleasure for me. Ah yeah, yeah, it's a pleasure to talk about bicicletos.