Today Feels Like a Roller Coaster

Today Feels Like a Roller Coaster

10 October 2025

Fifteen years after 10-10-10, I’m still trying to make sense of where we’ve landed. The current crisis is best captured within the only governing party — a power struggle that has made the position of the most powerful minister untenable. Curaçao, as an autonomous country within the Kingdom, feels like a shoe one size too small: no matter what you do, it will never fit.

At the same time, the world seems to be holding its breath. There’s talk of a breakthrough in Gaza — a ceasefire, hostages released. Hope flickers, but the question lingers: is it real, and will it last? Peace, after all, is more than the absence of war or violence — and that, tragically, remains far from reality.

Meanwhile, chaos builds closer to home. The island buzzes ahead of the World Cup qualifier between Curaçao and Jamaica at the packed Ergilio Hato, the SDK Stadium. And as if the day weren’t charged enough, the Nobel Peace Prize winner is about to be announced. The Gaza deal came too late for Trump — the jury had already spoken.

The world learns that the prize goes to Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado. With that, the world officially brands Maduro a dictator — and, in my view, legitimizes Trump’s anticipated strike against his regime. The pace of events could now quicken, perhaps even spiral, with Curaçao right at the doorstep.

And so, while Curaçao engages in its own local power games, the world spins faster around us. The island feels smaller by the day, lost in its own navel-gazing. What strikes me most is that nearly all the reflections I see come from Dutch voices or people of Dutch descent. My sense — subjective, perhaps — is that we ourselves are not yet able to reflect on this day.

Miguel Goede