In that part of the world, it has long been used by the indigenous Guarani Indians both medicinally and as a sweetener in mate, an herbal tea.

In 1603 in South America, Jesuits began founding "reductions," or self-supporting parishes, with the hope of forming utopian communities for the Guarani Indians, but the fact that "each of these colonies was slotted into the hierarchical machinery managed from Madrid and Rome" finally doomed them.

The Great Wall of China' America's Statue of Liberty, Italy's Venice and its lagoon, the Auschwitz concentration camp in Poland, the Kathmandu Valley in Nepal, the jesuit Missions of the Guarani Indians in Argentina, Brazil and Paraguay, Italian artist Da Vinci's painting of The Last Supper and Ghana's Ashanti traditional African buildings are all listed.