Among Bulls & Bosses

Winging homeward from the U.S., Ecuador's Galo Plaza stopped off for more state visiting in Mexico and Venezuela.

At the Hacienda Pasteje, famed bull-breeding ranch near Mexico City, he spent a memorable Sunday. Years ago, wearing the short Andalusian suit of an aficionado practico (practicing fan), Plaza had fought bulls as an amateur in Ecuador. Now a non-practicing fan, he sat in a jeep on rolling fields, to watch the artful passes at the young beasts made by his old friend of the cape, Jesus ("Chucho") Solorzano. Leathery Bullfighter Juan Silveti rolled up, slapped the President on the back, roared: "How's it going, Plaza old boy?" Plaza grinned. "I have a lot of friends in Mexico," he beamed, "who are bound to me by the craziness of bullfights." Later, there was an informal buffet supper, where Ecuador's President and 600 other guests consumed 15 barbecued lambs, two calves, 30 turkeys, 5,000 tortillas, 60 kilograms of beans, 14 gallons of mole, six gallons of chili sauce, three barrels of pulque (Plaza drank two glasses and liked it).

In Caracas, where he arrived on the eve of Venezuela's Independence Day, Plaza maintained a more serious mood. He sat for a press conference, and Venezuela's usually censored press printed his remarks: "Democracy without liberty of the press is impossible. It's no help to the government to have a press which only praises it." Then, though Venezuela now lives under a military dictatorship, he said forthrightly that armies should not mix in government: "Anyone who uses the army as an instrument for political aspirations is defeated beforehand." After this ringing statement, Plaza tactfully decorated the three members of Venezuela's ruling junta.

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