On this day in 2016, a general strike on the island of Curacao took place in support of striking contract workers at the oil refinery Isla. The strike caused massive power outages, affecting 80% of the island; workers won by the next day.

Refinery workers had been striking unsuccessfully for more than a week, demanding a lump sum of 3,000 guilders (USD $1500) as compensation for the years in which the employers did not compensate their pay for inflation.

On September 13th, seventeen unions and two trade union federations wrote a letter to the Governor in support the strikes, including the demand of the lump sum. That afternoon, former minister and union leader Errol Cova announced a general strike that would begin on September 15th.

On that day, the general strike began, causing massive power outages that affected up to 80% of the island. The lack of air conditioning in the hot climate was frustrating for both locals and tourists.

By the next day, the workers won their demands, including the lump sum, in total 1.8 million guilders for union members. Despite the widespread labor action, there were no reports of rioting or violence according to the Curacao Chronicle.

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  • HarryLime [any]
    ·
    2 years ago

    In A Tale of Two Cities, Charles Dickens describes a French Aristocrat having to use four richly-dressed servants in his personal ritual for drinking hot chocolate:

    Monseigneur, one of the great lords in power at the Court, held his fortnightly reception in his grand hotel in Paris. Monseigneur was in his inner room, his sanctuary of sanctuaries, the Holiest of Holiests to the crowd of worshippers in the suite of rooms without. Monseigneur was about to take his chocolate. Monseigneur could swallow a great many things with ease, and was by some few sullen minds supposed to be rather rapidly swallowing France; but, his morning's chocolate could not so much as get into the throat of Monseigneur, without the aid of four strong men besides the Cook.

    Yes. It took four men, all four ablaze with gorgeous decoration, and the Chief of them unable to exist with fewer than two gold watches in his pocket, emulative of the noble and chaste fashion set by Monseigneur, to conduct the happy chocolate to Monseigneur's lips. One lacquey carried the chocolate-pot into the sacred presence; a second, milled and frothed the chocolate with the little instrument he bore for that function; a third, presented the favoured napkin; a fourth (he of the two gold watches), poured the chocolate out. It was impossible for Monseigneur to dispense with one of these attendants on the chocolate and hold his high place under the admiring Heavens. Deep would have been the blot upon his escutcheon if his chocolate had been ignobly waited on by only three men; he must have died of two.

    This ludicrous indulgence and inability to do anything for himself is meant to symbolize the decadence and decrepitude of the Ancien Regime, and show that they were ultimately deserving of their fates in the Revolution.

    This occurred to me for no particular reason while I was thinking about how King Charles has seven eggs cooked every day so that he can have one to the perfect level of soft boil and the rest are just discarded.