Autobiography - The Galindo Group

Ram Galindo THE MAKING OF AN AMERICAN Page 107
reaching a certain landmark just before the haze line, my valiant captain set his
chronometer to zero, trimmed down the gas feed to the engines and announced that we
would enter a glide slope at a certain bearing for 45 minutes after which time we should
be at our destination. I knew we were flying over completely inaccessible and
unexplored territory in total blindness. But my thoughts were absorbed by the stories the
two pilots were telling me about the close calls they had had and the possible locations
of other planes that had disappeared while attempting the same feat we were now
accomplishing. They were very comforting!
At the appointed time he began to drop below the pre-set glide slope and soon we were
able to see the green pastures and trees below through the darkening haze. After about
five minutes of circling, we found the town of Trinidad and landed safely under the last
rays of sunlight near the makeshift slaughterhouse. Suddenly I recuperated my sense of
smell and realized I had stood up at the threshold of the bulkhead the entire flight. I
unlocked my hands with difficulty and effusively thanked the good pilots for their expert
flying but silently promised myself not to use them again. That night I was able to
accomplish my mission regarding the sinking barge.
Several years later, my younger colleague and friend, Luis de la Reza, another civil
engineer graduated from Texas A&M who had gone back to Bolivia and worked for
Consultores Galindo Ltda. was repeating the adventure. He was actually returning from
the Beni in another “meat plane” with destination Cochabamba. Tragically, the plane
had to attempt a forced landing just after entering the valley. In the crash that ensued,
Luis, who apparently was standing at the same bulkhead threshold, was crushed to
death by the stocked carcasses. No doubt that I had, and still have, a special star
shinning over my head.
In his autobiography, “Memorias de un Ingeniero,” my father describes in great detail
the work he did to build Bolivia’s infrastructure and how he formed the pre-eminent
locally-owned construction company in the country. When I look back at the Herculean
tasks he undertook to accomplish his goals, I am forced to draw a parallel, albeit in a
minuscule scale, at the early efforts of Ferdinand De Lesseps starting the Panama
Canal. In logistics, De Lesseps had an advantage, in that Panama had a choice of ports
while nothing could arrive easily in Bolivia, since it was landlocked and had very little
infrastructure of any kind. Just to build sewer lines, my father had to import from the
U.S. not only the cement, but the rock crushers, the centrifuges, molds and even the
picks and shovels, anything made of steel. The hard part began after the shipments
were unloaded at a Pacific port. The climb up the Andes was no easy feat.
Instead of training Chinese laborers imported for the job, he had to train indigenous
people, often starting by teaching them to read and write. Somewhat like De Lesseps
also, in broad strokes, my father suffered deep disenchantment with the ultimate pay-off
he received for his works of creation, which in many ways were my inspiration. A
paragraph from his book, courageously written against what clearly was the common
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