Basic HTML Version
INTERNATIONAL
DESK
WhatWas
Missing
atEXP086?
B
VANCOUVER,
Britisb Columbia
Y THE TIME
most readers read
this, EXPO 86 will be over. Congratulations
to the organizers for one of the most
comprehensive, colorful and well-planned,
upbeat world expositions ever.
Relaxed Canadian hospitality took the edge
off frustration while waiting in crowded lines for
the best exhibits.
Not many nations could have staged EXPO 86 as
successfully. Canada has the resources, and the right
credentials. Canadians are thought of as honest
brokers on the international stage, and they seem to
get along well with almost everyone. So east and
west , north and south, friends and rivals, big and
small could all coexist along tbe False Creek
exhibition site.
The theme was a "World in Mot ion- World in
Touch" and the exhibits focused around
transportation and communication. Each nation put
its best foot forward . Europe and the J apanese
dazzled everyone with high tech wizardry. The
Chinese capitalized on their· long history and their
exquisite handicrafts.
Unfortunately the shuttle accident cast a shadow
across the United States' exhibit, which focused on
achievements in space. Equally ironically the Soviet
Union chose to feature Kiev as a model Soviet city.
They planned it before Chernobyl.
But overall, EXPO 86 was a positive place. Each
pavilion tried to capture tbe atmosphere and
ambience of the homeland, and they generally
succeeded.
Australians, we could see, are fun loving, but they
take their magnificent country seriously. Germans
-
take their lives seriously until you join them for
lunch in the
Bier Haus.
There is much more to
modern France than wine and cheese; and Britain, in
spite of its problems, still has sorne bright ideas.
The mini-states of the Caribbean and even
struggling nations in Asia and in Africa were there
to show wbat they could do. Their displays had a
special charm. At EXPO you realized that every
nation has something to offer, and all people have at
least one thing they do better than anyone else. lt
showed the world the way we would like it to be.
In the midst of the optimism, the United Nations
pavilion sounded a sobering note. The world
organization reminded us that glittering technology is
all very well, but before we really have a "world in
motion-a world in toucb," we have to solve a few
fundamental problems, otherwise there isn't going to
be any world left.
The U.N. exhibit centered around a poignant
audiovisual presentation that explained how the
human race is one family living together on a small
planet that uniquely supports life.
Leading scientists and futurists reiterated how
utterly insane it is to allow a situation where we, the
only known life in the universe, deliberately and
consciously produce the means to wipe it out.
But that's the way it is. Our real life situation is a
long way from being the constructive bappy world of
EXPO 86. Most of us are realists, and we know this.
But do we understand
why?
Why, when we are
surrounded by incredible invention and instant
communications, is half the world still trapped in
grinding poverty?
Why, wben there is more than enough for
everyone (there real ly is, you know), does an African,
a Latín American or Asían baby die of hunger every
1O seconds? Why will hundreds of thousands of
children go blind this year, for want of a few pennies
worth of vitamins? And why, since we all want
peace, are about 1,000 lives still being lost through
mini -war every day?
What is the reason why the human race, while
airning bigh, keeps shooting itself in the foot. This is
something that scientists, futurists , politicians and
others who try to plan the future don't understand .
They could, and you can too.
Long ago, God foresaw the condi tion we would be
in at the end of the 20th century. The problems were
inevitable, given the direction mankind was heading.
Man, made in the image of God, would progress and
grow. God knew that progress, without bis guiding
hand, would be a mixed blessing, and ultimately an
11