Category
Historical Curiosities
14 articles
Klein-Venedig: when Venezuela almost became German
For nearly two decades, part of Venezuela was administered by German bankers under the Spanish Crown. A province turned into a contract.
The samurai who arrived in Acapulco
In 1614 a Japanese galleon dropped anchor in Acapulco carrying a samurai ambassador. He crossed Mexico, reached Rome, and his sailors still have descendants in a town near Seville.
Rescuing the Bardellini Tower
It stood on Guayaquil's Malecón for only four years before falling to a structural miscalculation. I rebuild in 3D the clock tower the city almost forgot.
The History and Origin of All the Tomalás
Behind the Tomalá surname hides a story of balsa rafts, caciques, empires and resistance: the chief of Puná Island who would not surrender to Huayna Cápac or to the first colonial order.
The Giant Stones of Yap and What Money Really Is
On a tiny Pacific island, money was made of giant stones — some so heavy they never moved, and one of them sat at the bottom of the sea.
The Story of a Fruit That Was Rented
A few years ago, I was researching for the book Guayaquil, Historias a Color, reviewing photographs of Guayaquil from over a century ago
Fiction or Prophecy? 20 Cartoons and Films That Predicted Our Present
For decades, animation and film have served as windows into possible futures. What once seemed like
The Robot That Defeated Napoleon
At the end of the 18th century, a Hungarian inventor built a magical automaton. Dressed in oriental attire, the
The Pope's Corpse That Was Put on Trial
It happened in the year 897, during a turbulent period in the history of the Catholic Church known as
Barbecued Meat and the Origin of the Buccaneers
The buccaneers were a fierce and ruthless breed of pirates who prowled the seas back in the 17th century
The 1949 Ambato Earthquake: One of Ecuador's Most Devastating Disasters
The 1949 Ambato earthquake was one of the most devastating natural disasters in Ecuador's history
The Invisible Giants and Their Shoulders of Concrete: The Story of Forgotten Brilliant Minds
A phrase I've always liked, for everything it carries behind it, is one uttered
The Priest Who Hunted Supernovas
A supernova is basically a stellar explosion of massive proportions. Imagine if our sun exploded. Of course, in the
The Chilling Origins of the Word Defenestrate
With all the political instability here in Latin America, this peculiar little word keeps echoing through the news, to describe