The Red Bulls

CONTINGENCY OPERATING BASE BASRA, Iraq – What is Columbus Day? Many people in the United States recognize it as the celebration of Christopher Columbus’ discovery of the eastern coast of North America. Many others protest the recognition of Columbus because of the politics of Spain and Italy, in regard to slavery and the ‘invasion’ of North America by European conquerors.

Christoffa Corombo or the Italian Cristoforo Colombo was actually born in Genoa in 1451. Christopher Colombus, the angilicization of the Latin Christophorus Columbus, had been trying for a number of years to finance his quest to locate a western route to India. He travelled to Spain and was commissioned by Queen Isabella of Castile in the hope of entering the spice trade oversea. Columbus underestimated the distance and “accidentally” discovered a new continent. Mistaking an island in the Bahamas for the East Asian mainland, he named it San Salvador and referred to its inhabitants as ‘Indios’.

Columbus conducted three additional trips to the Americas but didn’t actually visit North America. On his third trip he briefly landed on the northern coast of South America in 1498 east of Caracas, Venezuela, and he explored the island of Trinidad and Tobago. In 1502 he explored the coastline between what is now Honduras and south to Panama in Central America.

President Franklin D. Roosevelt set aside October 12 as Columbus Day, establishing it as a federal holiday in 1934, but it didn’t become officially recognized until 1970. The first U.S. President to observe the holiday was Benjamin Harrison in 1892 when he called for the people of the United States to celebrate the occasion on its 400th anniversary.

Columbus Day, as it is known in the United States, is known as Día de la Raza (Day of the Race) in many countries in Latin America, as Día de las Culturas (Day of the Cultures) in Costa Rica, as Discovery Day in The Bahamas, as Día de la Hispanidad and Fiesta Nacional in Spain, as Día de las Américas (Day of the Americas) in Uruguay and as Día de la Resistencia Indígena (Day of Indigenous Resistance) in Venezuela after 2002 under Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez.

Since 1971 the holiday has been observed in the United States on the second Monday in October in order for federal organizations to take advantage of the three day weekend.

For those in Iraq, enjoy your Columbus Day.