As we are in the habit of reading everything that was put in print or posted on the web, we are hit from time to time also with delicious stories of real lives – not just your pedestrian oil blowouts.

This Saturday I saw first the story of the Chinese woman that became Jewish to find out that whatever she does – she will always be Chinese – viewed as such and honestly proud of it just as well.

Then, fell in my hands the July 22-29, 2010, City Week of OUR TOWN of Manhattan that included a note about a Saturday afternoon “Identity Crisis” at The Midtown International Theatre Festival that seemed to me to be in the same genre of a real life story that involves Asians living in the United States and ending up, in spite of their efforts to fit in, being recognized rather for what they really are and getting to the heights of their achievements only after having made peace with themselves. www.mdtownfestival.org

Dear reader, I hope you will not be surprised to find out that the propulsion that sent me off that afternoon to the Strelsin Theater was a thought to see if I can throw some light on the best potential for achieving an energy & climate bill for President Obama – if he were only to stand up and represent his real inner self. Will he decide to do this after November 2010, when it will become clear that there is no way for a future that mimics the present of the majority that surrounds him?

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Asian Belle

This show is part of the Midtown International Theatre Festival. Here’s the official blurb: The daughter of a Vietnamese war bride spends her youth aspiring to be a Southern Belle….a funny, touching and true solo show.

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Before the show started I happened to chat with another delightful lady, Annie Guetti – a mother to a daughter about 10 years old. Annie has a  show in the Short Subjects Series of this festival – this one about motherhood – “ONCE UPON A MAMA” – at the nearby Jewel Box Theater – that same evening at 8:30 pm – and was carrying with her a suitcase – I guess with the wardrobe.  About her – www.facebook.com/pages/MAMA-Productions/160612856005

From Annie Guetti I learned that she and Michelle Glick participated in the same class that Matt Hoverman is giving for Playwriting and acting – he is a prominent coach for New York City Theatre in that he develops solo programs that encourage actor/playwrights in bringing out what is best in themselves and eventually birthing good theater.

Annie thought very highly of Michelle and said while Michelle came to the class thinking about writing on all sort of issues, it was this wonderful coach that led her in bringing out what is really part of herself – because that is her truth. Now, if dear reader, you are still with me – right there I got convinced that Matt Hoverman should get an invitation – in public or in secret – to the White House private quarters!

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Michelle Glick is  a Vietnam war product – American serviceman and Vietnamese mother. She grew up in Tuscaloosa, Alabama and was friendly there with the local belles and black guys – she thought of herself as part of the environment until she was offered in a school play the role of an Oriental Chauffeur. But she did not want to wear yellow clothes she wanted the white clothes like the other girls. She was lucky to have a feisty mother who trooped to school to tell that much to the astonished teacher – she also wanted to make it clear that her younger son’s name was Kal – a honored name for five generations in her family, and not Carl as the school was calling him. Michelle got the role of a maid.

The mother was fully adjusted to America – eventually, years later she became independent after her children grew up and she moved to California.

Michelle Glick is a terrific actress capable to switch around three or four accents. She is tall gaunt like a model and from her Vietnamese genes she got terific Cheek bones – moving around her long hands, standing on her long legs, she at times invoked the impression of a praying mantid completely adjusted to get what she wants – even when the issue is just to get her belongings monogramed – because this is the way Southern Bells have to have it. At this stage she was the perfect Asian Belle in her own image.

When she eventually moves to New York at 25, and got her first roommate right there at the baggage claim at Greyhounds, she liked to hang around Chinatown – because there she saw people with black hair like hers. There one Chinese old store owner told her that instead of copying Chinese she should go and visit Vietnam and get in contact with her own roots.

Michelle convinced her Vietnamese uncle Harry, who after release from Communist jail came to live with them in Alabama, to go back and show her around.  She saw how people can be happy with simple things in life – like holding a cup of tea with both their hands and smile to her – even there was no good verbal communication.

She sat orientally with both her legs crossed on top of the chair and said she felt her Asian background and pronounced Aloha – Hawaii – here I come. She seemed to get her way in any environment she chose to do so!

To Backstage.com, Michelle Glick said that she wants an international career spending part of the year in Asia, working “I am thinking about paving the way doing that.” In the meantime she intends to explore producing and writing.
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Now, did I make myself clear about Obama?

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NO LONGER INTERMARRIED BUT STILL CHINESE.

February 22, 2010
 http://www.interfaithfamily.com/news_and…

Because it is clear from my appearance that I am ethnically Chinese, total strangers will tell me all about their various Asian acquaintances. I think these people are trying to prove that they do not harbor racial prejudices. Frankly, I consider these experiences to be mildly annoying. But I can’t change my face, so I’ve accepted that this kind of experience is just something I will always have to deal with.

Debbie Burton is wearing her late maternal grandmother’s Chinese jacket on a visit to her cousins for Chinese New Year, January 2009. She is looking at a book of photos of the school in rural China her family established in her grandmother’s memory. She sent the photo with the note: “I feel that my Chinese family’s values of social justice and education mean that those same Jewish values particularly resonate for me.”

I also stand out in a synagogue because I do not “look Jewish”. My husband however is half Ashkenazi and thus does look more typically Jewish. So people have often taken one look at the two of us and assumed that we were intermarried. For the first 22 years of our marriage, they were right. But since I finally converted to Judaism, it is no longer the case, and I even have a real Jewish ketubah to prove that we now have a legitimate “Jewish marriage.”

But I’m still Chinese, so I still don’t look Jewish even though I am now. And people still sometimes react strangely because of my appearance, although I should point out that the strange or rude reactions are not typical, just memorable. In fact, if many Jews think it is surprising to see someone Chinese at synagogue, they are too polite to mention it. A few people have even assumed that I am a Jew by birth.

A student at a university Hillel Kabbalat Shabbat service told me very earnestly that he had read about and was excited to meet a Kaifeng Jew–meaning me. (A small Jewish community has existed in Kaifeng, China for hundreds of years.) I was sorry to disappoint him and explained that most Chinese Jews that he would meet in this country would be converts. These days I would add that they might also be adoptees, such as the two Chinese girls from the Orthodox congregation that meets in the same building as my congregation.

Before I converted, when people treated me differently because I was Chinese, I didn’t like it, but felt like maybe I “deserved” it because by marrying me my husband had violated the strong Jewish prohibition on intermarriage. I felt guilty that for some people, meeting me would only reinforce the idea that an Asian person in a synagogue was likely to be a non-Jewish spouse. I felt that it would make it that much harder for Jews who were Asian, but were born or raised their whole lives as Jews, like the adopted girls mentioned above, the three Korean adoptees in my congregation, or even my own children who were converted when they were young and are half-Chinese.

But just as my formal conversion signified my own acceptance of who I am religiously and spiritually, I’m coming to see that maybe it is not such a bad thing that my Chinese appearance means that I can’t so easily leave behind the fact that I was previously intermarried. A recent interaction that stemmed from my being Chinese even ended up being a positive experience.

My minyan meets in a Reform synagogue that is the simultaneous home for congregations from each of the three major movements (which are unaffiliated with each other, unlike minyanim at a university Hillel). I am a member of the lay-led egalitarian Conservative congregation that meets there, but one Shabbat a man from the Orthodox minyan started to talk to me as we left the building at the same time. He asked me about my ethnic background. When I replied “Chinese,” he went on to ask “And you’re Jewish?” Although I told him no, which was the technically correct answer, I added, “But I’ve been going to shul for 24 years.” I didn’t tell him that I was also studying with a rabbi for the purpose of conversion.

Some weeks later, this same man accosted me in the coat room after services and asked me why I had not converted if I had been attending synagogue for so long. I was embarrassed to be asked such a personal question with other people from both congregations around. I told him simply that the main reason was that I was afraid that my parents would take my conversion as a rejection of them. I assumed his questions stemmed from mere curiosity.

Then many months later, I saw him again and told him that I had formally converted to Judaism since we had last spoken. He seemed genuinely delighted by my news, but showed real sensitivity in telling me carefully that he was happy for me because it was something that I had clearly chosen for myself and that I was happy about it. Then he mentioned that his wife is Japanese. I thought to myself that of course she probably converted before they got married. But I had scarcely formulated the above thought when he totally surprised me by adding that his wife is not Jewish.

This news gave me a very different perspective on his questions. It sounded like his own wife was not interested in Judaism, at least for herself, and I think he wanted to understand what it was that caused me, another Asian non-Jew, to feel so drawn to Judaism. We didn’t talk for very long, but I think that he felt better to learn about another intermarriage in which the Jewish spouse was active in and committed to Judaism. And I was glad to learn about someone who self-identifies as Orthodox who is intermarried. I know from my own experience that intermarriage does not have to reflect a failure in a person’s Jewish identity, but it is such a prevalent assumption and it causes many Jews to automatically react negatively to intermarried couples.

So my looking Chinese had enabled that connection to be made because that man would never have approached me if I looked European. The experience also reminded me I don’t have to be ashamed of having been intermarried. Being Chinese makes my ethnicity more visible while obscuring my religious identity, which oddly enough pushes me to accept myself for both who I am now and who I was.

BARGEMUSIC REVISITED.

We posted the following two weeks ago, and said at the time that we will return to the Barge that is moored at Fulton Ferry Landing under the Brooklyn Bridge in Brooklyn, NY.

Our target was going to be “The HERE AND NOW Series in Celebration of Terry Riley’s 75th Birthday.

See also www.bargemusic.org

Our previous posting was:

UPDATED – With Climate Change and a local government that does not care, a decreasing quality of public transportation, scorched at 103 F (39.4 C), New York City has nevertheless BARGEMUSIC. The Innovative spirit of its people does not give up. Posted on Sustainabilitank.info on July 13th, 2010
by Pincas Jawetz ( PJ at SustainabiliTank.com)
Posted in Art Performance reviews, Eco Friendly Tourism, Future Events, New York, Reporting From the UN Headquarters in New York ?
 Meher Baba.

The performers where THE VOXARE QUARTET that included: Emily Ondracek-Peterson and Galina Zhdanova – violins,
Erik Peterson – viola, and Adrian Daurov – cello. The spirited young performers seemed to enjoy thoroughly the event and took turns in explaining the music’s background – something that in itself enhanced the audience’s understanding and enjoyment.

Legendary American composer, Terry Riley – DigiDan, 18 Mar 2010

Terrence Mitchell Riley, born June 24, 1935, in California, is an American composer associated with the minimalist school of Western classical music. He is usually mentioned together with Steve Reich and Philip Glass. However – His most influential teacher, however, was Pandit Pran Nath (1918–1996), a master of Indian classical voice, who also taught La Monte Young and Marian Zazeela. Riley made numerous trips to India over the course of their association to study and to accompany him on tabla, tambura, and voice. Throughout the 1960s he traveled frequently around Europe as well, taking in musical influences and supporting himself by playing in piano bars, until he joined the Mills College faculty in 1971 to teach Indian classical music.
Riley was awarded an Honorary Doctorate Degree in Music at Chapman University in 2007.

The Voxare presenters took the stand that it is incorrect to call Terry Riley a minimalist and at times it seemed indeed that he simply expanded classic music by introducing new elements and being ready to experiments that when picked up later by other composers led to the revolutionary 1960s in American music.

The first piece on Friday -  “Sunrise of the Planetary Dream Collector,” was composed in 1980 for the Kronos Quartet, a result of a longtime collaboration of Mr. Riley’s and included improvisations based on North Indian raga instead of formal composition, but then we were told that at Kronos’s insistence he notated the score for “Sunrise.” Still, as Ms. Ondracek explained gaily, he wrote sections of the score on different sheets of paper so the performers could decide the order of performance. The Voxare Quartet offered a high-energy performance, vividly conveying the work’s beautiful angles. It started with something that sounded like American folklore fiddles and felt like a wakening up. The two Russian-background violinist ladies really tore into the music with gusto, followed by the cello and then the viola. I got the impression that the music was debating with itself and had a lot of internal life. Eventually we had a return to the opening notes. Was this the improvisation of Voxare?

The second piece on Friday was the 1960 String Quartet. That was pure minimalism – or I do not understand the term. It was about the San Francisco Harbor foghorns. The sound came mainly from the cello, and the whole piece, considering the Barge-location was the most appropriate thing you could imagine The barge was swaying as there was a bit of rain outside – and it was a foghorn – pure and simple.

The third piece on Friday was “The Wheel / Mythic Birds Waltz.” This piece is post-Indian period of Mr. Riley and it was a result of improvisation on a piano with Indian and Jazz references and I felt that at times moved over to sound like bells and a Bela Bartok  gypsy ending.

After Intermission, on Friday, the fourth piece was G-song that  in effect was the result of a commission he got for music for a French movie. It had sort of a melancholic feeling to it and I wonder what was that movie about.

The fifth Terry Riley piece we heard on Sunday – it was “Cortejo Funebre en el Monte Diablo” from his 1998 “Requiem for Adam” the son of David Harrington of the Kronos Quartet. Young Adam died of a heart ailment.

The music starts with bell sounds and a tape of trumpets moves in. It turns out that what we hear are electronically generated sounds – this is music of a different kind. The violins move in – then the quartet stops and the funeral proceeds. It was an all around fascinating piece.

David Harrington formed Kronos after hearing George Crumb’s Black Angels, a powerful piece about the Vietnam war; ever since he has sought to give voice to twentieth century composers all over the world. At this moment there are hundreds of pieces being commissioned by them.

The Kronos have performed pieces by Thelonious Monk, John Zorn, Philip Glass, Charles Ives, Dmitri Yanovsky, Scott Johnson, Terry Riley, and a slew of European and African composers. With a balance of fervid dedication, spirituality, and a liberal sense of humor, the Kronos Quartet have taken on the awesome responsibility of saving an entire musical universe.

They have released Howl U.S.A, a grim portrait of the dark side of America, in which the The Kronos passionately accompany the voices of J. Edgar Hoover, Harry Partch, I.F. Stone, and Allen Ginsberg.

For the past twenty years the Kronos Quartet have performed music that expresses the anxiety, tension, ferocious energy and mystic yearnings in the twentieth century.

Single-handed they have saved a genre (the string quartet) that was well on its path to extinction.

With a cover Jimi Hendrix’s Purple Haze, spiffy outfits, and hip hairdos they have widened the audience of quartet music from those who were well schooled in public classrooms about classical music, to those who barely get the Bugs Bunny “Kill the Wabbit” reference to Wagner. Baby boomers and hip college students flock to the Kronos, craving music that is truly contemporary — a bracing change from dinosaur genres like classic rock. Terry Riley loved what they were doing.

The sixth Riley piece, or the second on Sunday, was “Cadenza on a Night Plain.” This is a masterpiece of early 1994 with Upper Mid-West and Native America influences. Each section is different – a different Cadenza. Mr. Peterson, the viola player, likened his section as “March of the Old-Timers.” He said that the directions say “Stoned Enthusiasm” then “Marching to more serious matters” – “which might mean smoking reef.”

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The add-ons were:

The Lou Harrison’s – 1917-2003 – striking “String Quartet Set” (1979), “Variations on Walter von der Vogelweide” revealed, we were told, Mr. Harrison’s joint interest with Terry Riley in nature and old music. The score had  five-movement piece ranges from the melancholy “Plaint” to the exuberant “Estampie,” which uses the cello as a percussive instrument. The performance was excellent, with distinctive contributions from each player. It ended with Usul – or a Turkish coda.

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Steve Reich, the opening piece on Sunday, “Different Trains” of 1988 – for String Quartet and Tape – the Tape at times being just talk and at other times further sound.

Steve Reich, born in 1936, was recently called  “our greatest living composer” (The New York Times), “America’s greatest living composer.” (The Village VOICE), “…the most original musical thinker of our time” (The New
Yorker) and “…among the great composers of the century” (The New York Times)…  http://www.stevereich.com/

The particular piece we hear on Sunday has to do with his upbringing that involved commuting by train between New York and Los Angeles as his divorced parents, both of them, shared in custody over him – so – he was having this privilege of traveling often – coast to coast by train. That was until 1942 – eventually he learned about refugees from Europe arriving to New York and going also by train to the West Coast or wherever.

The piece has three parts – America before the war – Europe during the war – America after the war.

This is not just about a Jewish boy shuttling between his two parents – but about Holocaust and its effects – the fortunate ones traveling on the same train with him – here in the US.

It is a clearly difficult concept but he came up with some appropriate music. At times it sounded to me like Robert Wilson’s shows – whoever the composer – perhaps Philip Glass? There is a repetitiveness in the background that does not allow us to forget!

The second part – in what I heard – ended in Smoke. The instrumentation called for violins being stroked by the bows backwards – the resultant sounds quite unusual.

The third part – after the war – had happier sounds.

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THE WHO -

The piece is based  on Graceland and Pete Townshend with a concept of a commune Rock farm in Ireland had it at 90 minutes length but Maher Baba reworked it and we had delightful 7 minutes. It was a real winner.

It started with Mr. and Mrs. Peterson fiddling with gusto the viola and violin and no joke – it seemed that as they went on with more force, the barge reacted and started to sway stronger – then a huge barge showed up and we realized that this was not from heaven. The piece was a clear winner and the applause laud.
 http://www.google.com/search?client=gmai…

“Baba O’Riley” is a song by the English rock band The Who, written by Pete Townshend. – Roger Daltrey sings most of the song, with Pete Townshend singing the middle eight: “Don’t cry/don’t raise your eye/it’s only teenage wasteland”. The title of the song is derived from this combination of the song’s philosophical and musical influences: Meher Baba and Terry Riley. –

Townshend originally wrote “Baba O’Riley” for his Lifehouse project, a rock opera that was to be the follow-up to The Who’s 1969 opera, Tommy. The song was derived from a nine minute demo, which the band reconstructed. “Baba O’Riley” was going to be used in the Lifehouse project as a song sung by Ray, the Scottish farmer at the beginning of the album as he gathers his wife Sally and his two children to begin their exodus to London. When Lifehouse was scrapped, many of the songs were released on The Who’s 1971 album Who’s Next. “Baba O’Riley” became the first track on Who’s Next. The song was released as a single in several European countries, but in the United States and the United Kingdom was only released as part of the album.

Baba O’Riley Lyrics
Artist(Band):The Who

Out here in the fields
I fight for my meals
I get my back into my living.

I don’t need to fight
To prove I’m right
I don’t need to be forgiven.
yeah,yeah,yeah,yeah,yeah

Don’t cry
Don’t raise your eye
It’s only teenage wasteland

Sally, take my hand
We’ll travel south cross land
Put out the fire
And don’t look past my shoulder.

The exodus is here
The happy ones are near
Let’s get together
Before we get much older.

Teenage wasteland
It’s only teenage wasteland.
Teenage wasteland
Oh, yeah
Its only teenage wasteland
They’re all wasted!

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A trip to the lower levels of Brooklyn Heights is always a joy not to be missed. Slowly, the area is being reclaimed from the old port slips. Next to the barge there is the Ice Cream Factory, and on the other side the Bridge Cafe. You can get a bite and sip wine in the open – be it 98 degrees Fahrenheit. Further there is the Bridge Restaurant.

If you love Pizza – the best this side of the ocean is to be had at GRIMALDI’S – old country – real Coal-Brick Oven Pizzeria “Under the Brooklyn Bridge.” But know ye all – the lines to this pizzeria are a block long and you can rent a chair for two dollars if you prefer to sit rather then stand in line. But, trust me – it is worth the effort – once in your life-time. For me it was a Pizza pie with extra cheese and fresh garlic cloves and a Peroni beer for a total of $28.

If you really do not want to undergo the above – let me suggest the Tutt Cafe – as in King Tutt - www.tuttcafe.com, at 47 Hicks St. where I got an excellent Merguez Pitza (that must be the old Egyptian spelling of the pie, and the Merguez is Moroccan lamb sausage), and my wife got a spicy Falafel Wrap (not a pocket) – all of it for $16 total.

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Richard Termine for The New York Times

Voxare Quartet: From left, Emily Ondracek, Galina Zhdanova, Adrian Daurov and Erik Peterson playing a Bargemusic concert in Brooklyn. The East River in the background. The picture was taken at the Friday night concert. During the Saturday afternoon concert – there was some rain and the visual effect grey.

EXHIBITION: LARRY RIVERS: POP ICONS.

Dates: Saturday July 31 – August 24, 2010

VERED ART DEALERS AND ADVISORS – EAST HAMPTON NY

* * * * * * *

BENEFITS:

Saturday July 31  Artists4Israel

Opening: Reception Saturday July 31. 2010, 9-11 pm -

Interactive-multi-media installation Sderot Bomb Shelter 2010”

A FIVE Year Anniversary of the DISENGAGEMENT from GAZA-installations to enable Vered Gallery East Hampton NY visitors to experience a present day rocket attack in a bomb shelter like those in Sderot on the border of Gaza.

Contact:  JanetLehr at VeredArt.com<... style=”font-size: x-small;”>

631 324-3303- 10-Noon

Place: Vered Gallery East Hampton Starbucks Passage.

Vered’s opening Saturday July 31^st from 9-11pm is accompanied by ‘fireworks’ Larry would have loved, supplied by Artists4Israel.

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Sunday August 1, 2010 Museum of Jewish Heritage:

Living Memorial to the Holocaust

Brunch

A Contact:  VeredArt.com – 631 324-3303

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Sunday, August 15, 2010

Israeli Aid Around The World-IDF aid in Earthquake Stricken Haiti.

Brunch, 10 – noon

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“One of the best artists in the history of American art”- Barbara Rose, Art Historian

Larry Rivers: POP Icons, spans the breadth of one of America’s most fertile artistic careers. Post Abstract Expressionism, Larry Rivers lead a new generation to whom figurative art was in a sense, more revolutionary than abstraction.

Noted art historian Barbara Rose, wrote that Rivers was; “Heralded as the progenitor of Pop art, which he certainly was, in my view he was also the last great history painter.”  Rose continued, “The only subject Larry could not bring himself to satirize was the Holocaust, which inspired some of his most moving later works.”  Larry Rivers: POP Icons, is as offbeat and funky as Rivers himself.  “For Larry the tension was between the highbrow, European, literary, and Marxist past of Eastern European Jewish intellectuals and American popular culture, which focused on fame, fashion, entertainment, and money, all of which became major themes of his energetic art.”

Larry would have embraced the three benefits which accompany the exhibition.  Each celebrates Israel during the month of August when Israel commemorates the fifth anniversary of the Disengagement, a period when Israel uprooted 8500 of its citizens in a fruitless attempt to advance the cause of peace with its neighbors.

For information and reproductions please contact janetlehr@veredart.com, 631 324 3303
or view the entire exhibition at www.veredart.com

JANET LEHR                janetlehr@veredart.com

Vered Fine Art www.veredart.com
68 Park Place 631 324 3303 / c.516 353 6450 / 212 288 6234
East Hampton NY 11937

NY Office:891 Park Avenue
New York NY 10075

For one thing, see there is a good South African Restaurant in Fort Greene, Brooklyn, and we go there for inspiration and nourishment from time to time. www.madibarestaurant.com/  – info@madibarestaurant.com.
 http://politic365.com/2010/07/19/happy-b…

Based on the above – we write: Two freedom fighters I most admire, writes Noel Anderson, Professor at Brooklyn College, in the struggle for South African democracy are Oliver Tambo and Nelson Mandela. Law partners and comrades, both men helped to shape the direction of the country, with Mandela leading the struggle from within, while Tambo raised international consciousness and money while exiled abroad. Tambo is no longer with us, but Mandela keeps the best of that struggle alive, becoming the first truly democratically elected President of South Africa after decades of imprisonment, and continuing to serve as a moral symbol for African and world affairs.

Born 92 years ago on July 18th, 1918, into a royal family in the Transkei, Mandela has been at the center of not just South African but global freedom struggles. He was the head of the ANC youth league and became a founding member of Umkhonto we Sizwe (“Spear of the Nation”) the armed wing of the ANC, before being imprisoned for 27 years.

President Obama, in tribute to Mandela’s work, has called on all to engage in community service. (In effect this past weekend everyone of us was called to put aside 82 minutes of his time and dedicate those 82 minutes to the community.  The United Nations has also recognized his birthday as Nelson Mandela International Day by calling on November 10, 2009 to make the !8th of July The International Mandela Day – and this year – the July 18th 2010, was supposed to be The First International Mandela Day. But it fell on a Sunday and that is a no-no for the UN Free Birds that must keep the weekend in New York for free enjoyment – really – what other reason for spending the time in this hot city? So, the UN moved to celebrate the day, this year, on  Thursday night and Friday Morning – 15th and 16th of 2010.

Strange as it sounds, its important to recognize that “Madiba” (his term of endearment), the 92 year old grandfather, still has a revolutionary spirit and still… very much alive. The press tends to talk about him the past tense, as if he is long gone and only his legacy survives. Yes, health concerns has led him to retreat from a once rigorous travel schedule, and his chronological age puts him in the twilight of his life. But Mandela is  mentally very lucid, weighs in on global politics and still advises in the affairs of his philanthropic foundation. Further, despite the controversial painting of Mandela, depicting him as dead and being used for an autopsy by political leaders, he still speaks with leaders on pressing concerns, and remains loyal to those countries that supported the freedom struggle.  Happy Birthday, Madiba!

{Dr. Noel S. Anderson is Associate Professor of Political Science and Education at the City University of New York – Brooklyn College. His work focuses on urban politics, human development and education and comparative issues in public policy – U.S. and South Africa}.

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The celebration started on Thursday night 6:30 pm with a series of three talks and the screening of the documentary “MANDELA: Son of Africa, Father of a Nation, in the new ECOSOC Chamber in the UN temporary North Lawn building.

No one from the high flyers of the UN was there – their place taken by fill-ins, but luckily Jonathan Demme the director, and Peter Saraf, the co-producer of the film were there – so the aesthetics of their production could be brought up.

For the UN spoke Margaret Novicki and Nicholas Haysom.

Margaret Novicki was appointed by UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan  as the Director of the United Nations Information Centre in Pretoria, South Africa.  Ms. Novicki, a national of the United States, brings to this post extensive experience in communications, media relations and journalism, much of it acquired in Africa. Prior to Pretoria she worked for the UN in Accra. She chaired the evening. She spoke on behalf  of the UN USG for UNDPI – Mr. Kiyotaka Akasaka.
Why DPI? Why not the Secretary General himself?

Nicholas Haysom, as an attorney of the South African High Court, he litigated in high-profile human rights cases between 1981 and 1993.  He acted as a professional mediator in labour and community conflicts in South Africa between 1985 and 1993, and has advised on civil conflicts in Africa and Asia since 1998. Founding partner and senior lawyer at the human rights law firm of Cheadle Thompson and Haysom Attorneys, and an Associate Professor of Law and Deputy Director at the Centre for Applied Legal Studies at Wits University in South Africa until May 1994, when he was appointed Legal Adviser to President Mandela.

Mr. Haysom was closely involved in the constitutional negotiations leading up to the interim and final Constitutions in South Africa.  He served as Chief Legal Adviser throughout Mr. Mandela’s presidency, and continued to work with Mr. Mandela on his private peace initiatives up to 2002.

Since leaving the office of the President upon Nelson Mandela’s retirement in 1999, Mr. Haysom has been involved in the Burundi Peace Talks as the Chairman of the committee negotiating constitutional issues (1999–2002). He continued to serve on the implementation committee of the Burundi Peace Accord after 2002.

Incoming UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon appointed Professor Nicholas Haysom of South Africa as Director for Political Affairs in his Executive Office, May 16, 2007. Our friend Matthew Russell Lee complained that he is never seen at the UN – but in a careful reading of the article we find there the concept of preventive diplomacy – we wish had more credence at the UN.  “He said there is a resistance to preventive diplomacy among member states, leading to the blocking of reform and regional offices of the Department of Political Affairs — he ascribed the most strenuous opposition to Latin America — and to resistance to the Responsibility to Protect doctrine and Ed Luck’s appointment as special advisor on the topic.” In short – he actually seems to be well ahead of the UN but not really of the UN – where he finds it difficult to execute policy that is factually set by only the Permant Five of the Veto Power.

What we said above was that both speakers for the UN are somehow South Africa based and not UN based.

Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela (Xhosa pronunciation: [xo?li?a?a man?de?la]; born in a Xhosa home in Qunu, Transkei,where his father, the Town Counselor, had 4 wives and the boys lived in a separate home from the parents. Chief Jogintamba saw his potential and sent him to the Clakebury Boarding School. In 1933, at 15, he got involved in the Walter Sisulu led ANC and when he reached 30 years, that is when coincidentally Prime Minister Hendrik Verwoerd’s contribution to Afrikanerdom was to dress up apartheid and make it appear respectable to his followers, and the Mandela & Tambo law-firm took on the anti-apartheid legal defense.

In 1956 Mandela prepared the Freedom Charter and the people declared – “We Stand by Our Leader.” Then in 1960 happened the Sharpeville masacre and the call changed to: “Freedom in Our Time” and Wolfie Kadesh, a white man, was an activist. In 1962 Mandela went underground and George Bizios, also a white man, was his lawyer. Eventually, Mandela was apprehended and was in jail 1961 – 1988. Gowan Mbeki was imprisoned for 25 years. In August 1989 Botha resigns and De Klerk takes over and leeds the negotiations with Mandela. November 1993 both of them get the Nobel Prize. Friday, 10 Dec 1993 was Mandela’s speech in Oslo. http://www.africa.upenn.edu/Articles_Gen…

Fully representative Democratic elections took place on 27 April 1994, and Mandela served as President of South Africa from 1994 to 1999.

Before his presidency, Mandela was an anti-apartheid activist. We saw how he got there from his village roots and we learned about the 27 years he spent as a FREE MAN behind bars – freer in his spirit then his captors that knew that they were the captives in the hands of the true Free World. Yes – those years – post World War II – when the UN was young and small – the World had hope for a future that will be very different from the way history evolved prior to those days. Today we can say that the hope tuned out to be pre-mature and Nelson Mandela who moved with his times forged an image for the World well ahead of his time. But no despair, his personal example moved at Least South Africa to ending its internal conflict even though many other conflicts in the World continue to rage on.

Mandela, son of Africa and Father of the New South Africa, depicted in advertisement as a barefoot young boy in what looks like a general’s coat, armed with a stick, said that his watchwords were TRUTH & FREEDOM.

———————-

From the screening event at the UN I hurried down to the Manhattan Village – to TEATROIATI at 64 East 4th Street (between Bowery and 2nd Av,) where Sabrina Lastman of Uruguay was having a showing of her CANDOMBE JAZZ PROJECT – mixture oral tradition AFRO-URUGUAYAN MUSIC with elements of Jazz. I bring this in here because in many ways it was befitting the Mandela event.

In the Mandela documentary we saw much of the peoples culture of the Indigenous Africans of the original South Africa, and somehow it must have been quite similar to what Africans, probably from the Congo region, brought with them to what are now Uruguay and Argentina. The fact that this music has survived, and in effect has now a revival, are signs of its resilience, but also of the influence Mandela’s achievements had world-wide.

The Candombe Jazz Project is a New York City-based ensemble playing Candombe, the Afro Uruguayan music tradition. CJP presents an exciting concert of original compositions by Sabrina Lastman & Beledo, arrangement of oral tradition songs, & songs by renown Uruguayan songwriters.

Candombe Jazz Project includes:
Sabrina Lastman – voice / compositions
Beledo – guitar / keyboard / compositions
Arturo Prendez – candombe drum / percussions
Special guests: Agrupación Lubola Macú

——————–

“PEACE IS NOT THE ABSENCE OF CONFLICT – IT IS THE CREATION OF AN ENVIRONMENT WHERE ALL CAN FLOURISH,” Mandela said. He also wanted to see the emancipation of women – not just the races. These are things the UN must write on its flag – does it?

——————

On Friday was the Official Commemorative Ceremony, in the big General Assembly Hall, that started with the usual UN delay at 10:20 am., with many Missions to the UN having one warm body sitting in their row – only South Africa, headed by a Minister, having all six seats, and some more, occupied. This was a Special Plenary, ahead of the regular daily Plenary.

The UN had the event open to outsiders, and that was nice. The problem that there were not many insiders present.

The President of the General Assembly, the former Libyan Foreign Minister Mr. Ali Abdussalam Treki, who is under a Schengen Travel Ban,  was not there, and that was good. Instead was one of his seconds, but the Press kit just goes ahead selling him to the innocents. We do not even know the name of the nice lady that chaired the meeting she defined as an “INFORMAL Meeting” of the GA.

“IT IS IN OUR HANDS TO CREATE A BETTER WORLD” said Mandela – God bless him and save the GA.

That was followed by a video message from the UN Secretary General Mr Ban Ki-moon, who said that Mandela’s greatness came from: “HE FOUGHT HIS OPRESSORS FOR YEARS AND THEN FORGAVE THEM. – HE CONSTANTLY REMINDS US HE IS AN ORDINARY MAN, BUT HE ACHIEVED UNORDINARY THINGS.”

—————–

This was followed by The Minister of International Relations and Commonwealth Relations of South Africa, Ms. Maite Nkoana-Mashbane, who said that in October 1994 he helped Free South Africa.

She continued saying that in the next two days – to July 18th, people of the globe will get together to hear the words that inspired us in South Africa. She thanks in the name of President Jacob Zuma for adopting in November 2009 this resolution to have the International Mandela Day started this year. South Africa and the World are fortunate to have had a man as Nelson Mandela. She added that the UN was all the way on “Our” side in our fight against Apartheid. We owe our freedom to the role of this august house. By celebrating Mandela Day we celebrate the best for what the UN was created. UBUNTU – we believ in ourselves for what we are.

Her words were followed by a video, and we saw February 19, 1994 people of all South Africa standing peacefully in line and giving their vote.

The Minister’s presentation was clearly the highlight of the informal ceremonial, that was then followed  {informally?} by one representative from each one of UN’s major group.

—————-

This was a sad succession of obligatory diplomatic bows with some sparks of freshness.

Egypt spoke on behalf of the Non-aligned Movement – the enigma of the UN,

The Republic of Congo on behalf of the African States, spoke of the recent World Cup,

Darussalam on behalf of the Asian States, this is the Brunei Darussalam State, that clearly needs still its own liberation,

Belarus on behalf of the East European States, spoke interestingly of a long walk to Freedom,

Saint Lucia on behalf of the Group of Latin & Caribbean States, who in our opinion was the best speech  we called the Mission and asked for the speech. We attach the full speech to the end of our posting. The Afro-Caribbean Ambassador, surely descendant of slaves, H.E. Donatus Keith St Aimee, in obvious heart felt fashion said that “Few persons whose name resonate with approval on all continents – All our efforts at the UN came to essence in his life.”

Belgium on behalf of the Western European and Other States, but was mis-introduced by the Chair as speaking for the EU as temporary President of the EU. The main point was that “Let us remind ourselves that our work is far from complete – our work is for freedom or all.”

The last speaker was for the host country – the USA. who said that Apartheid was twisted and grotesque in its effort to justify oppression. Mandela overthrew apartheid by force of example.

———————————-
STATEMENT BY H. E. DONATUS ST AIMEE.

PERMANENT REPRESENTAIVE OF SAINT LUCIA TO THE UNITED NATIONS
ON BEHALF OF THE GROUP OF LATIN AMERICAN AND CARIBBEAN STATES (GRULAC).

ON THE OCCASION OF THE OBSERVANCE OF NELSON MANDELA INTERNATIONAL DAY.

FRIDAY JULY 16TH, 2010

Mr. Chairman, I am honored to speak on behalf of Member states comprising the Group of Latin America and the Caribbean (GRULAC), as we show our respect and admiration for an icon of the ages.

In the annals of recorded history there are few individuals whose names resonate with esteem and are uttered with deference on all continents and in all societies.  There are few lives that are unequivocally admired or unreservedly revered by all races and ethnicities; and there are few persons who in a more emotional sense, are cherished and held dear by such a large segment of humanity. Like all celebrated and remarkable men or women, this person whom we come to honor today is identified internationally with one single name befitting his role in our global society and that name is – MANDELA.

We are here today to honor Nelson Mandela pursuant to the adoption of Resolution A/64/L.13. We are here today to commemorate a man who in a lifetime of dignity has come to represent the very ideal for which we struggle daily in the United Nations. All our words, all our actions, all our individual and collective efforts aim in their sum total to equal what is represented by the life of Nelson Mandela.

Nelson Mandela became an international symbol because of his struggle against oppression generally and apartheid in South Africa in particular. We know his history:

· From the early nineteen forties he was a leader of one of the most significant non-violent movements in history.
· For 27 years he was imprisoned under brutal conditions even as he heard of the death beyond his prison walls, of his brothers and sisters in the struggle against apartheid. How many times he must have wondered when his time would be coming to also face death at the hands of his captors.
· Finally he was released on 11th February, 1990.
· To understand the magnitude of his suffering and indignity of his incarceration, we must comprehend that he entered prison at the age of 45 and left at age 72.

These facts as we know them only scratch the surface of the beauty that is the life of Nelson Mandela. What was it that resulted in Nelson Mandela receiving more than 250 awards over four decades including the 1993 Nobel Peace Prize? It was not his physical incarceration that captured the imagination of people, it was not the brutality of apartheid nor the interest of so many supporters the world over to stop this aberration.

What captured our imagination was that Nelson Mandela’s indomitable spirit, his humanity, his humility and his vast love of his people could not be imprisoned in any way by iron, concrete or barbed wire. He went into prison in 1963 as an unbowed, proud, determined South African fighter and came out in 1990 as an unbowed, proud, determined 20th Century leader and icon.

As Mandela himself put in words:

“I cherish my own freedom dearly, but I care even more for your freedom… I cannot sell my birthright, nor am I am prepared to sell the birthright of the people to be free…”

Mandela turned down freedom at an earlier date because he insisted that it had to be unconditional and as President from 1994 to 1999, he frequently gave priority to reconciliation in order to harness all the resources of South Africa to lift the economic conditions of his people. His spirit of forgiveness, his turning of the other cheek has ensured that South Africa joined as an equal partner in the nations of this world, so that within the past month we have all had the great joy of watching South Africa host the World Cup in splendid and successful fashion.

How important it is that the Member States of the United Nations saw it fitting to adopt a Resolution to commemorate Nelson Mandela International Day, an annual event which the world would observe, now for the first time on the occasion of his 92nd Birthday, and for years to come.

We the Member States of GRULAC, have experienced in similar forms many of the travails experienced by South Africa and personified in the life of Nelson Mandela. Our region has had its own icons, and we remember their considerable contributions to the development of our nations when we pause here to honor the life of Mandela.  For this reason his life, his response to adversity, his humanity, resonates not just in our minds for the success of his mission but in our hearts for the beacon he has become for all peoples suffering repression.

What this man said was merely a punctuation for what he did, and what he did is being recognized today in this august forum so that present and future generations need not wonder as to the path to success in nation building, but merely need to follow the footsteps of this great man.

He truly is an ordinary man who has behaved in an extraordinary way!

July 14, 2010

CANDOMBE JAZZ PROJECT – Afro Uruguayan Music
Teatro IATI | Performing Arts Marathon – Thursday, July 15, 8 PM

Teatro IATI presents a very unique concert with the very best of South American music, the CANDOMBE JAZZ PROJECT (Afro Uruguayan Music)
The CANDOMBE JAZZ PROJECT (CJP) is a New York City-based ensemble playing Candombe, the Afro Uruguayan music tradition. CJP presents an exciting concert of original compositions by Sabrina Lastman, arrangement of oral tradition songs & music by renown Uruguayan songwriters. The CJP is comprised of Sabrina Lastman (voice/songs), Beledo (guitar/keyboard/electric bass), master of candombe Arturo Prendez (candombe drum/percussions), and special guest: Agrupación Lubola Macú.

Candombe is a drum-based musical style of Uruguay that developed in the Rio de la Plata area – Buenos Aires & particularly in Montevideo – among the black slaves brought by the Spanish colony in the 18th Century. It is based on Bantu African drumming & other influences the African community received from the new environment they lived in. In Uruguayan culture this drum-based musical style is highly significant & extremely popular, going strong on the streets, halls & carnivals all over the country. Candombe is a three-part-drums-ensemble formed by the tambores called: chico, repique & piano. The music composed on the basis of this rhythm encompasses a range of styles like funk, jazz, rock & tango, among others.

Musicians:
Sabrina Lastman (voice/songs)
Beledo (guitar/keyboard/electric bass)
Arturo Prendez (candombe drum/percussions)
Special Guest: Agrupación Lubola Macú (tambores)

Sabrina Lastman is a New York based vocalist, performer, composer and educator born in Montevideo, Uruguay. Drawing from jazz, Latin American music, and contemporary music, often integrating extended vocal techniques, Sabrina concentrates her work on jazz projects -Sabrina Lastman Quartet,  Candombe Jazz Project, Tango Jazz Duo- and the creation of interdisciplinary new music performances relating voice/sound/movement/visuals -Dialogues of Silence, On Becoming-. Sabrina has performed at Carnegie Hall, Classical Guitar Association of New York, Blues Alley Jazz, Blue Note, Museo del Barrio, Juilliard, New York University, CUNY and Queens Theatre, among others. She has played with Fernando Otero, Bakithi Kumalo, Tali Roth, Pablo Aslan, Emilio Solla, Gustavo Casenave, Pedro Giraudo, David Silliman, The M6, and Leonardo Suarez-Paz, among others. Her album The Folds of the Soul was nominated by the Graffiti Prize 2008 as one of the best jazz albums of the year.  Sabrina has toured in Israel, Uruguay, Argentina, and the United States playing in many musical and interdisciplinary projects from Tango to New Music. She graduated from The Jerusalem Academy of Music and Dance in Israel.
http://www.sabrina-lastman.com

Beledo
“Beledo is considered a real myth among Uruguayan music connoisseurs,” according to EL PAIS – Uruguay.  Piano was Beledo’s first instrument, however, he became a guitar hero  in his late teenage years captivating audiences in Uruguay and Argentina..  Later on,  his fusion effort of the early eighties in South America was noticed in the U.S. in articles for the upcoming talents  in GUITAR PLAYER magazine and JAZZIZ magazine.
“Beledo is the epitome of excellent musical individuality and a profound  example of the universality of jazz’s presence and influence in  every corner of our planet”. – Stix Hooper
http://www.beledo.com

Arturo Prendez is a percussionist born in Montevideo, Uruguay into a family with deep musical roots. His inspirations came from his father, a well known drummer and percussionist in Uruguay, developing his love for the unique African rooted drumming style of Candombe at a very young age. He has performed and recorded with numerous international artists such as, Hugo Fattoruso, Oscar Feldman, Hiram Bullock, Yabor, Chico Nobarro, Ruben Blades, Ruben Rada, Tahna Running, Bakithi Kumalo, Guadalupe Reventos, Afro-dysia and Beledo, among others. Arturo is a Master Candombe drummer, and he is the Artistic Director of “Agrupación Lubola Macu”, a tambores ensemble playing Candombe.

CANDOMBE JAZZ PROJECT – Afro Uruguayan Music
Thursday, July 15 | 8 PM
Teatro IATI | 64 East 4th Street, bet. Bowery & 2nd Ave.
Subways: F to 2nd Ave, 6 to Astor Pl, R & W to 8th St. Bus: M15 to 2nd Ave. and 4th St
General Admission: $20 / Seniors & Students: $18
Buy Tickets in advanced: http://www.teatroiati.org / ALL MAJOR CREDIT CARDS ACCEPTED
For Info: (212) 505 – 6757

IIED is proud to make available an international edition of the documentary The Climate Game and the World’s Poor, which shows what happened when 193 governments tried – and failed – to agree a global deal to tackle climate change.

The film follows delegates from some of the countries that are most vulnerable to climate change during last year’s COP15 negotiations in Copenhagen.

Featuring interviews with senior negotiators and other climate-change experts, the documentary tells the story of what happened when the critical talks began to unravel.

The documentary was directed and filmed by Jesper Heldgaard and Bo Illum Jorgensen, and produced and edited by Anders Dencker Christensen.

You can watch it online here.

http://www.iied.org/climate-change/media/climate-game-and-worlds-poor-documentary-film-inside-cop15-climate-change-summi

or here – http://tinyurl.com/35brvye

Mike Shanahan
Press officer

International Institute for Environment and Development
London WC1H 0DD
Tel: 44 (0) 207 388 2117
Email: mike.shanahan@iied.org

www.iied.org

Imagine a truly unique New York City location with charm, history and spectacular water views: a location that will delight even the most sophisticated socialite or businessperson.  And envision this against the magnificent backdrop of the New York City skyline.

The place is on the Brooklyn side under the Brooklyn Bridge – an area full of good restaurants, The Old Ice Cream Factory, but the Grimaldi’s old Pizzeria commends lines that extend a bloc long – never seen this except at lines for airport clearance.

The venue is Bargemusic, a floating concert hall that The New York Times calls “inviting… ideally intimate… with grand views.”  The 102-foot long covered barge, which was once used to transport coffee, is beloved by discriminating concertgoers around the world and is now one of New York City’s most unusual and enchanting event venues.

Anchored at the foot of the Brooklyn Bridge, Bargemusic began first Thursday night JAZZ Series in June 2007.

The address: Fulton Ferry Landing, Brooklyn, NY 11201

At a time Mayor Bloomberg, who when he got into office thought that recycling has to turn a profit, now in his third term, is decreasing public transportation service which is a boon for the taxi industry – just one more group that is important at election time political money gathering.

Oh well, but Bargemusic can still be reached by public transportation even though bus service is obviously non-existant.

Bargemusic, as said, is located at Fulton Ferry Landing near the Brooklyn Bridge.

Directions: Take the A train to High Street station (Use the Fulton Street Exit. Walk downhill on Cadman Plaza West to the East River, 3 blocks); F train to York Street (go right on Jay to Front Street. On Front Street turn left, and turn right on Old Fulton Street; walk downhill to the river); or 2 or 3 train to Clark Street station (walk west on Clark Street to Columbia Heights; turn right; walk downhill to the end of the street).

Then you see:

We received the announcement about the July – August Monday Jazz Series and got intrigued by the July 5 and July 12 concerts which we will write about here. But when we saw the Summer 2010 program we picked up this last Monday, we also saw great Friday, Saturday and Sunday concerts with a mainly classic repertoir, but quite a sprinkling of new music – like the Friday July 23 concert with Riley, Lou Harrison, and Hamza El Din music and titles like: Water Wheel, Mystic Birds Waltz, and Sunrise of the Planetary Dream. That weekend, also the Saturday night and Sunday 3pm concerts are of new music.We intend to go back for some of these concerts.

We recommend you look up www.bargemusic.org for full program.

BARGE MUSIC

The Jazz and More Monday Series:

July 5 • Monday, 8 pm
$20 ($10 students)
Jazz and More
Steven Beck, Piano
with
The Batteries Duo
Josh Frank and Gareth Flowers, Trumpets and Electronics

This is the one concert we already attended and as said, we will attend also the next concert for balance.

This first concert was all in a new adventurous genre performed by well established musicians who experimented with the unknown. Next concert will be eclectic but of the known kind – Brahms, Faure, Piazolla, Jobim, and someone all new to me – Yoed Nir – all this in a jazz format?

From the July 5th concert, Steven Beck, a star graduate pianist of Julliard with already an impressive list of appearances contributed here with two good trumpet players who alternated on the trumpet while using a computer directed electro-acoustic system that seemingly allowed them to improvise at will, and surprise Steven Beck who was doing his thing on the piano. In the end the younger folks in the audience produced strong applause, while the older folks – said Oh Well – they are really nice kids, but what did they say? Really – this is only in New York, and we are very glad it happens here. It can help you forget the real villains of the city – and these are not the musicians.

We will go back on this coming Monday, and update our readers – I hope to see you there also.

THE UPDATE IS BECAUSE WE DID GO BACK LAST NIGHT AND WANT TO REPORT ON A TERRIFIC EVENING.

July 12 • Monday, 8 pm
$20 ($10 student)
Jazz and More
Brahms Sonata for Cello and Piano in e minor, Op. 38
Yoed Nir World of Cello, improvisation for Electric Cello solo, loop station and guitar effects
Faure Après Un Reve - this was replaced by a Rachmaninoff piece.
Piazolla Libertango
Jobim How Insensitive
Yoed Nir, Cello
Ilya Kazantsev, Piano

The two main musicians, Jerusalem-Israeli Yoed Nir and Moscow-Russian Ilya Kazantsev, proved themselves in the Brahms and the Rachmaninoff pieces as extremely talented young musicians of high international promise. We look forward to watch their carers unfold as such.

Nevertheless, there is more to it, and this is why the concert was part of the new series of “Jazz and More,” rather then billed as a concert of pure classic music.  Yoed Nir also likes to use his August Diehl (Hamburg 1902) cello he got on loan from The America-Israel Cultural Foundation that was created by Vera and Isaac Stern, also as an accustic cello connected to an electronic system he operates with the sharp points of his modern shoes (by the way – I finally realized that there can be a good use for these terribly shaped shoeware).

We heard first his solo creation – “World of Cello” that was “an improvisation for Electric Cello solo, loop station and guitar effects,” and later, when he brought on also Ziv Shalev. an Israeli guitarist living in Queens, New York, a terrific rendition of Jobim’s “How Insensitive” that got long applause from the bargefull of very a mixed audience. Now, with this they can tour Brazil and be greeted as great Jobim innovators – quite a mouthful indeed.

Not to be left behind, Ilya Kazantsev cooperated with Yoed Nir on Piazzoll’s Libertango, and this piece could be taken also to Buenos Aires and create a stir there too.

In short – it was a great evening in BARGEMUSIC topped only by the great weather of last night. The temperature posted on one of the buildings near the old Fulton Ferry Landing in Brooklyn, was 77-78 F and there was a breeze and perfect visibility of Manhattan’s East Side shore that we did not experience for years. The Empire State Building tower was red-gold-red in the honor of the Spanish win at the World Cup, a long line of people was snaking along the block waiting for Grimaldi Pizza, and another line pf people was snaking out the door of the Ice Cream factory that stands on the slip next to where the barge is anchored.

See you on Friday, July 23rd 8 pm on the Barge for the Celebration of Terry Riley’s 75th Birthday.

The program will include: Riley’s String Quartet (1960) and Mystic Birds Waltz – Sunrise of the Planetary Dream Collector;  Lou Harison’s String Quartet; and Hamza El Din – Escalay (Water Wheel). The playing quartet is voxare made up of Emily Ondracek, Galina Zhdanova, and Erik Peterson on violin and Adrian Daurov on Cello.

—————————-

The continuation of the Monday Series:

July 19 • Monday, 8 pm
Tickets $20 ($10 Student)
Jazz and More
Deanna Kirk Trio

July 26 • Monday, 8 pm
$20 ($10 student)
Jazz and More
Jeff Newell’s New – Trad Octet

August 9 • Monday, 8 pm
$20 ($10 student)
Jazz and More
Jesse Elder, Piano/Composition
Logan Richardson, Alto Saxophone
Konichi Ebina, Dance/Choreography
Petr Salidar, Photography

August 16 • Monday, 8 pm
$20 ($10 student)
Jazz and More
Foldersnacks
Jesse Elder, Composition/lyrics/voice/keyboard/piano
Zack Foley, Lead Vocals
Terrence McManus, Guitar
Aidan Carroll, Electric Bass
Devin Gray, Drums

August 23 • Monday, 8 pm
$20 ($10 student)
Jazz and More
ZigZag Quartet

August 30 • Monday, 8 pm
$20 ($10 student)
Jazz and More
Rob Schwimmer’s Wild World of Piano and Theremin

———————————————————————
For reservations and further information
phone: (718) 624-2083
fax: (718) 624-1155
email: info@bargemusic.org
web: http://www.bargemusic.org/
address: Fulton Ferry Landing, Brooklyn, NY 11201

from: Citizens For Affordable Energy

The following quite amazed us and we had to do a little research:

With the help of Google we found: “THE CHARLATAN MAGAZINE IS THE OFFICIAL MAGAZINE COMPLEMENT OF THE CHARLATAN, CARLETON UNIVERSITY’S INDEPENDENT STUDENT NEWSPAPER.”

Joseph-Beth Booksellers is an independent bookseller with stores in five major US cities: Lexington, Kentucky; Cincinnati, Ohio; Cleveland, Ohio; Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania; Charlotte, North Carolina and as well The Village At Spotsylvania Towne Centre, Spotsylvania, Virginia. Then looking up the area phone code 704 – this points at Charlotte, North Carolina. Ain’t this amazing? Why then Carleton University – or are there more then one Carleton University that compete for the charlatan?

======================

Citizens for Affordable Energy

919 Milam, Suite 2070
Houston, TX
77002
US

Back from the dead, an ancient guide to the afterlife

Egyptian scrolls hidden in the British Museum’s vaults for two centuries are finally seeing the light of day.

By Arifa Akbar

Trustees of the British Museum

The Egyptian Book of the Dead will be one of 192 items on show at the British Museum’s Journey Through the Afterlife exhibition from 4 November, 2010.  For any ancient Egyptian of wealthy standing, the “Book of the Dead” was an invaluable roll of papyrus which kept within it all the secrets of the afterlife: spells, illustrations and incantations revealing the path from death to mummification and, finally, the liberation of the soul. Many of these “books” were acquired by the British Museum in the late-19th century, but have lain in vaults, too fragile to unfurl and never before seen by the public. Now, after an extensive period of conservation, they are to be displayed alongside a dazzling array of mummies, coffins, jewellery and statues in a major exhibition entitled Journey Through the Afterlife: Ancient Egyptian Book of the Dead, which opens on 4 November.

The U.S. and England have kicked off in the pivotal World Cup match-up that has been analyzed and picked apart since the groups were announced months ago. We will do our share with a very unorthodox analysis.

It happened at Rustenburg, South Africa at the Royal Bafokeng Stadium on what was there Saturday night, June 12, 2010.

Flag of the Royal Bafokeng, a Setswana speaking Nation and monarchy on 540 square miles not far from Johannesburg. King Moketle bought up farmland in the 19th century to keep it away from the incoming whites.

First some statistics – the coach of the English Capella gets now $9 million his yearly pay. The coach of the US, Bradley, only 1/18 of this.

The Globalezza aspect: When the two anthems – the US and the British – were played before the game a revealing scene got our attention. (I used the Globalezza term I picked up at the Rio Carnival – that naked beautiful woman the symbol of the Rio carnival on Brazilian TV.)

The US team held their right hand on the heart – swearing allegiance to the US – but only a minority of the players knew to sing the anthem.

The English team did not hold their hand on their heart as there was no allegiance to be displayed. England is not an Independent State and it was not the UK team that was playing – but only a minority of the team knew to sing the anthem.

With that, I pulled out my first Yuengling Original Black & Tan Porter Beer and prepared to watch the game.

=========

Probe at UN climate talks after Saudi sign smashed

Saturday, 12 June 2010 10:06
author:Reuters
POLITICS & ECONOMICS / NEWS
by Reuters, Saturday, 12 June 2010

SAUDI STANCE: Saudi angered many by blocking study of global warming. (Getty Images)

UN climate negotiators agreed to an investigation on Friday after protesters smashed a sign emblazoned “Saudi Arabia” and dropped it in toilet after Riyadh blocked a study of deeper cuts in greenhouse gases.

Many countries condemned the protest, after Saudi Arabia blocked a request by small island states at the May 31-June 11 talks for a study of tougher cuts in greenhouse gases to help slow a rise in world sea levels.

Mexico’s delegate Luis Alfonso de Alba, whose country will host the main climate talks in late 2010, said he was initiating an investigation by the U.N. Climate Change Secretariat.

from news@religionandecology.org date Sat, Jun 5, 2010

Free Music Download – www.solsticeconcert.com

Direct from Spain!

**Centerline Talent in association with Stratta Philips Productions **

Presents the New York City premier of

FESTIVAL FLAMENCO DE CÓRDOBA

WHEN: June 10, 11 and 12, 2010 PM; 8:00 PM

WHAT: “Festival Flamenco de Córdoba” comes to New York City’s The Town Hall

This spectacular three-night series features an ensemble of eleven award-winning dancers and musicians hailing from the city Córdoba, Spain. They are set to allure the audience with breathtaking performances of key flamenco styles, which include fandangos, soleá, bulerías, alegrías, taranto, guajira and seguiriya.

**Tickets are available for purchase directly at Town Hall and via Ticketmaster. (Prices Range: $60-$35)**

WHO: Critically acclaimed flamenco guitarist, Merengue de Córdoba, will lead the production.

The show features dancers Antonio Alcazar (Premio Nacional “Vicente Escudero” Award), Victoria Palacios (Premio Nacional “La Malena” Award), Desirée Rodriguez Calero “La Merenguita” (Premio Nacional “Pilar López” Award), and Maria Angeles “Coco Calero” winner of the Primer Premio De Baile Flamenco “La Estepona Flamenca”. The ensemble also includes guitarist Alberto Lucena (Premio Nacional “Manolo de Huelva” Award) and singers Carmen Garcia, Mariano Romero, and Jose Manuel Prieto (also on percussion), with supporting dancers Ester Maria Garcia and Rocío Lucena.

WHERE: The Town Hall  www.the-townhall-nyc.org, located at 123 W. 43rd St New York

Visit http://www.centerlinetalent.com/ for more info.

Richard Attias (born 1959 in Morocc) – he is a  global events producer. As chairman of PublicisLive Attias was the producer of the World Economic Forum in Davos for over fifteen years. His personal history and the history of the organizations he was involved with are plainly fascinating and we write this longer posting because we feel that he is embarking now upon even a greater voyage with his new NEW YORK FORUM, then in his previous activities.

The World Economic Forum (WEF) is a Geneva-based non-profit foundation best known for its annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland, which brings together top business leaders, international political leaders, selected intellectuals and journalists to discuss the most pressing issues facing the world, including health and the environment. Beside meetings, the WEF produces a series of research reports, and engages its members in sector specific initiatives. WEF also organizes the “Annual Meeting of the New Champions” in China, and a series of regional meetings throughout the year. In 2008 those regional meetings included meetings on Europe and Central Asia, East Asia, the Russia CEO Roundtable, Africa, the Middle East, and the World Economic Forum on Latin America. In 2008 it launched the “Summit on the Global Agenda” in Dubai.

The WEF was founded in 1971 by Klaus Martin Schwab, a German-born business professor at the University of Geneva. Originally named the European Management Forum, it changed its name to the World Economic Forum in 1987 and sought to broaden its vision further to include providing a platform for resolving international conflicts.

In the summer of 1971 Schwab invited 444 executives from Western European firms to the first European Management Symposium held in the Davos Congress Centre, under the patronage of the European Commission and European industrial associations, where Schwab sought to introduce European firms to US management practices. He then founded the WEF as a non-profit organization based in Cologny, Geneva, and drew European business leaders to Davos for their annual meetings each January.

Schwab developed the “stakeholder” management approach which based corporate success on managers taking account of all interests: not merely shareholders, clients and customers, but employees and the communities within which the firm is situated, and governments. Events in 1973 including the collapse of the Bretton Woods fixed exchange rate mechanism, and the Arab-Israeli War, saw the annual meeting expand its focus from management to economic and social issues, and political leaders were invited for the first time to Davos in January 1974.

As the years went by, political leaders began to use Davos as a neutral platform to resolve their differences. The Davos Declaration was signed in 1988 by Greece and Turkey, helping them turn back from the brink of war. In 1992 South African President F. W. de Klerk met with Nelson Mandela and Chief Mangosuthu Buthelezi at the Annual Meeting, their first joint appearance outside South Africa. At the 1994 Annual Meeting, Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres and PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat reached a draft agreement on Gaza and Jericho. In 2008 Bill Gates gave a keynote speech on Creative Capitalism, a form of capitalism that works both to generate profits and solve the world’s inequities, using market forces to better address the needs of the poor.

Frederik de Klerk and Nelson Mandela shake hands at the Annual Meeting of the World Economic Forum held in Davos in January 1992.

———————-

For The New York Forum

Contact:         Rubenstein Communications, Inc.

Iva Benson (212) 843-8271,  ibenson at rubenstein.com

Thomas Chiodo (212) 843-8289,  tchiodo at rubenstein.com

——————–

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Ligeti’s “Le Grand Macabre” of gluttonous Breughelland, explains the Louisiana suffering and Washington’s long standing lack of care. Amazing indeed!

“Le Grand Macabre by Gyorgy Ligeti” landed in Breughelland right here at the New York Philharmonic Hall. Was it all about Fossil Fuel gluttony and Washington? Prescient Louisiana? We are flabbergasted because we realized we saw it all there and decided on presenting it to you – our readers – with the hope to reach out to even a larger circle of wise folks.

We did not add an additional word to the libretto, we just shortened it by condensing it in order to bring out the flavor we were seeking. You will see clearly the obvious premonitions that there will be an environmental catastrophe and that “Ministers” will push a monarch in an administration that has good intentions but is weak on actions.

“Le Grand Macabre” was heard and shown by the New York Philharmonic May 27 -29, 2010, thanks to a bravado by new Philharmonic Music Director, Mr. Alan Gilbert who coincidentally is the first native New Yorker to hold this post. Mr. Gilbert is a Harvard graduate and of the Curtis Institute and The Julliard Schools of Music. Before coming to the Philharmonic he was the chief conductor and artistic advisor of the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra that made him conductor laureate at the end of his stay there. “Le Grand Macabre” comes at the end of Mr. Gilbert’s Inaugural Season at the New York Philharmonic. We hope that the Members of the Board will not reprimand him for this daring performance. It must be noted further that this Opera had the World Premiere of its original version in Stockholm, April 12, 1978, at the Royal Swedish Opera with Elgar Horwarth conducting. The revised and shortened version was first performed July 28, 1997 in Salzburg in a Peter Sellars production with Esa-Pekka Salonen Conducting.

It is based on on a Michel de Ghelderode play “La Balade du Grand Macabre” and the libretto resulted from a cooperation of Gyorgy Ligeti with Michael Menschke, as Ligeti decided he wanted to create an Opera from that original play. and what Ligeti was trying to answer was the question: “If you knew that the end of the world was imminent, that a comet was about to crash into our planet and obliterate it forever, how would you chose to spend your final hours?”

His answer was, supposedly, “People will spend their final moments doing pretty much whatever they have done before. They’ll jockey for power, they’ll revel in stupidity, they”ll pursue love, they”ll engage in posturing, they’ll get drunk. It is essentially an absurdist treatment in which Ligeti manages to make the unthinkable approachable by rendering it comical.” The notes say that Ligeti told a broadcast interviewer “The threat of collective death is always present – but we try to eliminate it from our consciousness and enjoy to the maximum the days that are left to us.”

The theatrical approach of the script as shaped by Ligeti belongs to the Absurdist school of Alfred Jarry and Eugene Ioneco – the latter also Romanian who lived in Paris like Ligeti. Characters from their plays could have just walked throug Ligeti’s work and cartoonist Saul Steinberg would have found himself at home there either. This is no coincidence and it is rooted in the survivalist background of someone who, born into a family in Transylvania and a history of suffering from Nazism and Stalinism, the self defense is absurdism.

The US audience did not exactly know what to make out either from the music, nor the content, but having this absurd element in it we found it great and are ready to forgive the critics that had hard time of finding their footing, or the busloads of folks that left at intermission. We loved it and had no difficulty seeing in it what we wanted to see in it. How can we miss it when it starts indeed with CAR HORNS! I saw my way from the first Car Horn Prelude – and did not miss the sequence. After all, the TVs these days are all about Louisiana and the ineptitude of Washington stretching back for generations – the Washington dominated by Oil & Car interests that made devil-deals that felled  land, water, and air.

Then who can miss the concept of BREUGHELLAND?

Just see Breughel’s Icarus http://faculty.smu.edu/tmayo/icarus.jpg for link to Ligheti, but there is more to it – Brueghel, Bruegel or Breughel (Dutch pronunciation: [?b?ø???l]) was the name of several Dutch/Flemish painters from the same family line.
To us the most interesting is Pieter Brueghel (1525-69), usually known as Pieter Brueghel the Elder to distinguish him from his elder son, was the first in this family of Flemish painters. You’ll often find his name spelled as Bruegel (Pieter spelled it like that from 1559 onwards), but just as well Breugel or Breughel – the latter as in our case here.

Pieter was born in Breda in the Duchy of Brabant, which is now part of The Netherlands but back then part of the Flanders.

His paintings are full of images of eating and feasting and being merry – plain gluttony and success. this is the image of a world that sees no limits – the world that later was built on the promisse of oil. And this is my point – Breughelland is to me gluttony-land – and this is the give away of this opera – to me – in my interpretation – these days of the Gulf of Mexico blow-out.
{Note: Flanders or Vlaanderen and the Netherlands (aka known as Holland) or Nederland share the same language. It’s called Flemish, or “Vlaams” in Belgium and Dutch, or “Nederlands” in The Netherlands. And the name Holland, although it’s often taken to mean the whole of the Netherlands, is really part of that country only, the area of the provinces called Zuid Holland and Noord Holland (South and North Holland). }

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WORK IN PROGRESS.

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CAR HORN PRELUDE – SCENE ONE:

PIET THE POT:               O golden Breughelland,
that never knows a care,
fill all your children with delight!
O long lost paradise, where are you now?

NEKROTZAR – from the burial chamber, distant as from the underworld
Perish, but not for bliss!

PIET:                                 Oh my!
All these heavenly twists and turnings!
Such curvings!

AMANDO:                       Miserable scoundrel! That for the worm!

PIET:                                 Mercy, lord! I spoke no word!
It came from above, so who spoke?
The Almighty!

NEKROTZAR:                 Shut up!
And rejoice to be still alive!

PIET:                                You spoke of death, not punishment!
Hey, friend! You go too far!
Hey! Look out!

NEKROTZAR:                Piet the Pot, your time runs out;
so hear the bitter words of these tidings:
that all, all men on earth, must perish!

PIET:                                Any fool knows that!

NEKROTZAR:                 But no one knows the hour.

CHORUS OF SPIRITS – off-stage during Nekrotzar’s declamation:
Destruction soon draws nigh,
thou art in peril great,
for death will be thy fate.

NEKROTZAR                 The will of the Almighty

PIET:                                Oh, please,
spare the people of Breughelland!
Oh please, oh please!

PIET:                                Oh, Breughelland!

CHORUS OF SPIRITS: Destruction soon draws nigh,
though art in peril great,
for death will be thy fate!
Take warning now,
at midnight thou shalt die!

Nekrotzar – mounts Piet, who serves as a horse, with difficulty:
Make room! Room for the Great Macabre!
The end of time has come!
The world! The world will meet its doom!
Gee-up, horse!

—- —- —-

SECOND CAR HORN PRELUDE – SCENE TWO – DANCE:

ASTRADAMORS:         Oh my dreary nights, dark with bitterness!
I could strangle her!
Could choke her, could stab her,
could crush her or throttle her,

brain her or drown her or knife her or hang her,
murder, slay her, kill, behead her,
hang and slaughter, impale, butcher,
poison her drink and destroy her!
Immolate, massacre, put -

PIET:                               Friend Astradamors! it’s you?

ASTRADAMORS:         Friend Piet the Pot! It’s you?

NEKROTZAR:              Fire and death I bring,
burning and shriveling!

NEKROTZAR, PIET & ASTRADAMORS: Thousands of men will die
hearing my battle cry!

NEKROTZAR:             Yes I am but a loyal
and zealous destroyer!

PIET & ASTRADAMORS:                            Death is his employer!

NEKROTZAR:                   My duty here is past When all have breathed their last!

NEKROTZAR:                   Earthquakes will soon arrive, leave not a soul alive!

NEKROTZAR:                   I am powerful!
‘Neath me ye shall cower!

NEKROTZAR:             I am the slayer,
Satan’s purveyor!

PIET & ASTRADAMORS: For we shall expire!

NEKROTZAR, PIET & ASTRADAMOR: No living thing remains!

PIET: Cock-a-doodle-doo!

—– —– —–

SCENE THREE – DOORBELL PRELUDE:

WHITE MINISTER & BLACK MINISTER:  Tweedledum!

THE WHITE MINISTER UNROLLS A WHITE DOCUMENT WITH BLACK LETTERING AND GESTICULATES WILDLY WITH IT UNDER THE BLACK MINISTER’S NOSE:    Here Black party skunk, my resignation!

THE BLACK MINISTER UNROLLS A BLACK DOCUMENT WITH WHITE LETTERING AND GESTICULATES WITH IT UNDER THE WHITE MINISTER’S NOSE:         Here white party polecat, my resignation!

PRINCE GO-GO – appears in front of the curtain:  Gentlemen, I beg you!
You should put the interests of the nation . . .

WHITE MINISTER & BLACK MINISTER:              … above mere selfish egoism?
Prince Go-Go, if you insist!
Appeasement, appeasement!

GO-GO:                                                                           Yes!

WHITE MINISTER & BLACK MINISTER:            All right, then, Highness, the riding lesson!
Mount your steed!

THE TWO MINISTERS LIFT PRINCE GO-GO BY FORCE ON TO THE ROCKING-HORSE:  Gee-up!

GO-GO:                                          We’re feeling giddy!

WHITE MINISTER:                    Gallop!
But keep the reins loose!

BLACK MINISTER:                    Now keep the reins tight!

WHITE MINISTER:                   Cavalry charge …

WHITE MINISTER & BLACK MINISTER:        … as in war!

GO-GO:                             Never war!
Stop it! We surrender!

GO-GO:                            We make a protest!
It’s laid down in our constitution …

WHITE MINISTER & BLACK MINISTER:  Constitution?
Ha, ha …

GO-GO:                          Enough! Enough! Enough!
Forgive me! beg your pardon!

BLACK MINISTER PRODUCES A BLACK SCROLL WITH WHITE LETTERING: Now memorize this speech!

WHITE MINISTER PRODUCES WHITE SCROLL WITH BLACK LETTERING:    My speech – here! Black on white!

BLACK MINISTER:                        White on Black!

GO-GO:                                              Gentleman, I beg you!
Our dear nation!

WHITE MINISTER & BLACK MINISTER: Forgive me!

GO-GO:                                             What’s that?

BLACK MINISTER:                       Well, a … hm …
A decree raising the value-added tax
by one hundred-and-only percent.

GO-GO:                                            Not one cent!
Your tax, say, is much too high!

WHITE MINISTER & BLACK MINISTER:   Highness! I shall resign!

MYSTERIOUS ENTRANCE OF THE GEPOPO CHIEF:  Pssst!

GO-GO:    Ha! Head of my secret service! What a leisure!
You turn up just at the proper time!
Well, what new intelligence message do you
bring us now?

GEPOPO:                      Cococoding Zero, Zero:
highest security grade!

GEPOPO:                      Birds on the wing!

GEPOPO:                     Double-you see!
Snakes in the grass!
Rabble. rabble, rabble!
Riot, riot!
Unlawful assemblies!
Communal insurrection!
Mutinous masses!
Turbulence!
Panic! Panic!
Groundless! Groundless!
Phobia! Wide of the matk!
Right of the track!
Hypopochondria!

GO-GO:                        What did you say?

GEPOPO:                     Password – Go-Go-lash!
Demonstrations, ha!
Protest actions, ha!
Much discretion!
Close observations!
That’s all!
Not a squeak!
Confidential!
One more thing:
Bear in mind:
silence is golden!

THE PEOPLE OF BREUGHELLAND:  Our great leader!
Our great leader!
Our Great leader!
The people’s friend!

Go-Go:                                                          Come, now let me do it!

GO-GO, ON THE BALCONY, RECEIVES THE ACCLAIM OF THE PEOPLE. THEN HE TALKS TO THE PEOPLE. HIS VOICE REMAINS INAUDIBLE; ONLY HIS GESTURES CAN BE SEEN.

WHITE MINISTER & BLACK MINISTER:      I shall resign!

GO-GO:                                                                     To hell with your resignations!
You will stay!

GEPOPO:                                                                  Stern measures!

GO-GO!                                                                     Stern measures!

GEPOPO & GO-GO:                                               Stern measures!

WHITE MINISTER & BLACK MINISTER:      Stern measures?
How come?
Against what?

THE HANGMEN AND DETECTIVES PRESENT THE GEPOPO CHIEF WITH ANOTHER DISPATCH. HE READS IT.

THE PEOPLE OF BREUGHELLAND – mixed chorus, off stage:       Hear us, Prince, oh, hear us!
Dread and fright do sear us!
Great our alarm, yet fear no harm
if thou be ever near us!

GEPOPO:                                                            Kukuriku!  Kikeriki!
He’s coming!

GO-GO:                                                               Who’s coming?

GEPOPO:                                                            Coming!

GO-GO:                                                               What is this Macabre?

GEPOPO:                                                            Coming! Coming!
Look there! There! There! There!
He’s getting in! He’s getting in! He’s getting in!
He’s in!
The guard! The Guard! The guard!
Call the guard!

THE GEPOPO CHIEF AND HIS ATTENDANTS FLEE IN PANIC. INSTEAD OF THE EXPECTED DISASTER, ASTRADAMORS SUDDENLY STORMS ON TO THE STAGE.

ASTRADAMORS:                                           Hurray, hurray!

GO-GO:                                                             Hurray, hurray!
My two Ministers have fled!

ASTRADAMORS:                                            My Prince!

GO-GO:                                                              My worthy sage!

GO-GO & ASTRADAMORS:                         Huzza, huzza!
For all is now in order!
Huzza!
Huzzarazazaza!

THE PEOPLE OF BREUGHELLAND – mixed chorus in the stalls:          Oh! Prince Hear us!

GO-GO:                                                             But tell me, my good friend, I pray:

what is this cloak you wear today?

ASTRADAMORS:                                       A funeral kind of mantilla,
ready for the Dies illa!

THE PEOPLE OF BREUGHELLAND:    Prince! Hear what we say!

GO-GO: Quiet down there!

THE PEOPLE OF BREUGHELLAND: Prince! Help us!
Please save us!

GO-GO: Yes, yes, I’m coming …
What do you want dear people?

Wailing siren: Prince Go-Go is completely intimidated; clings to Astradamors.
Help! Help me! Save me!

ASTRADAMORS: Under the table, quick, and not a sound!

Grandiose entrance of Nekrotzar with scythe and trumpet, riding on Piet’s back, together with his fiendish entourage.

THE PEOPLE OF BREUGHELLAND: Hear us!

NEKROTZAR: For the day of wrath and retribution has come!

THE PEOPLE OF BREUGHELLAND: O mighty Macabre!
Have pity!
Strike us not dead!

NEKROTZAR: Now will searing, scorching heat!
glow and burn as from a thousand suns,
and the waters of the oceans turn into vapor,
and loudly the mountains split asunder,
and the bodies of men will be singed,
and all will be turned into charred corpses
and shrink like shriveled heads!

THE PEOPLE OF BREUGHELLAND: But me, me, me, let me go on living:
pity take on me, me, me!
No, me, me, just me!
Punish all the rest,
but not me, me me;
do not kill me!
Not me! Not me! Not me!

ASTRADAMORS: There is no need to fear:
there is still some time to spare …

PIET & ASTRADAMORS;                     To our great and singular macabre colleague
Nekro, alias Tsar,
the inexorable reaper-man!

NEKROTZAR:                                       To arms now! Rise!
Time to set to work on my holy task!
But first let me sip this chalice
fill’d with human blood!
And may the pressed-out juices of my victims
serve to strengthen and sustain me
before, alas, my necessary deed begins!
Up!

PIET & ASTRADAMORS – fill Nekrotzar’s glass again:       He drinks! Hurrah!
Cheers, Nekro!
Bottoms up!

NEKROTZAR:                                       Blood tastes good!

NEROTZAR:                                          More there!
Ah yes … What was I saying?
Ah! … I’m weak and old …
My flesh is cold, so cold!
So much have I destroyed,
the world so oft made void!
Sodom, Gomorrah rent!
The great deluge sent! …
… Caligula!
Thoderich!
Genghis Khan!
Ivan the Terrible!
Napole-poleon Bonaparte!

Prince Go-Go, Piet & Astradamors, fully drunk, carry Nekrotzar with great difficulty to the rocking-horse and seat him on it.

NEKROTZAR:                                      The command comes from on high that sun,
moon, and stars
shall now be extinguished!

Suddenly semi-darkness: pale, celestial light.

Yes, it’s done! It’s done! All is done! …

– — – — – –

SCENE FOUR (EPILOGUE)

In the lovely country of Breugelland, Piet and Astradamors are floating freely above the ground, they are dreaming that they are in heaven.

PIET:                                                     Ghost Astradamors, are you dead?
See we are floating to Paradise:

ASTRADAMORS:                               We’re floating higher.

GO-GO:                                                 Is no one there?
Anyone there?
Are they all dad?

All of them, every single one dead?
Only me alive? I alone? Forgotten?

RUFFIACK, SCHOBIACK & SCHABERNACK:    Ha, we are three soldiers,
risen from the grave,
sharing all the booty
which the good God gave!

RUFFIACK:                                      Halt! A civilian!

GO-GO:                                            Oh, but no, gentleman all,
we are Prince Go-Go, the prople’s friend,
your sov’reign!

SCHABERNACK:                            You’re dead too, baby! Understand?

GO-GO:                                            You can call me baby” if you want to
At times like this we all should be good
comrades, right?
We’ll give you high decorations, silver and gold,
and relieve you of the oficial duti -

NEKROTZAR:                                Your highnes still alive?
Have I not just laid to waste the entire
goddamned world?
My scythe! My trumpet! Horse! Come!

GO-GO:                                            Later, my friend …

suddenly addressing the three ruffians –    And you! Attention! Stomach in, chest out!
to Nekrotzar:                                               –    Tell me now: who are you?

NEKROTZAR:                                  Which … where is my grave?

MESCALINA:                                   Ashtaroth! Behemoth!

NEKROTZAR:                                  Damnation!

MESCALINA:                                   Beelzebub!

NEKROTZAR:                                  Oh, save me!

Mescalina has caught Nekrotzar; she holds him firmly and about to plunge the spit into his chest.

GO-GO:                                              You there! Seize hold of that fury!

The three ruffians suddenly fling themselves on Mescalina.
to Schabernack -                             Hey you! You run and fetch a rope!

Schabernack reappears. He is dragging behind him the two Ministers, tied up with a long rope.

BLACK MINISTER & WHITE MINISTER:         Innocent! Innocuous! Virtuous! Decorous!
Altruist! Humanist! Humanitarian!
Mercy!

MESCALINA:                               Highness! These I know too!
And am ready to expose them!

WHITE MINISTER:                   Highness, it was she who thought up those infamous taxes!

MESCALINA:                               Oh ho, sweetheart, and who was it
wanted to overthrow the Prince?

BLACK MINISTER:                    Highness, the Inquisition was her idea!

MESCALINA:                               Oh, ho, dearie, and who wanted to be a tyrant and -

WHITE MINISTER:                    Who invented mass graves?

MESCALINA, BLACK MINISTER & WHITE MINISTER:  Who?

MESCALINA:                                He! You! They!

WHITE MINISTER:                    She! You! They!

BLACK MINISTER:                    You! She! They!

GO-GO:                                          Soldiers! Do your Stuff!

——————————

If no hint was clear, just think of President Obama, The Democrats, The Republicans, BP but not just BP – it is all oil and car and other power brokers. It is about fire and water and earthquakes and tremors, the military, the farmers, the engineers, the scientists – it is about you and me.

http://ipsterraviva.net/UN/currentNew.aspx?new=7644

Encroaching Forest, Oil Palm Plantations Alarm Villagers in Malaysia.
by Anil Netto for IPS

PENANG, Malaysia, May 23 (IPS) – An increasing number of natives in
Sarawak state in north Borneo are alarmed at encroaching forest and
oil palm plantations, which are taking over their native customary
land and destroying their traditional lifestyles and biodiversity.

In Long Berawan, a village in the north of the state, a community of a
thousand Berawan and Tering indigenous people who live in longhouses
is worried about plans by a reforestation and plantation group to take
over 80,000 hectares of native land. And there are other villages and
communities similarly affected. “The land is being given to the big
companies to do the plantations in our area,” says Dennis Along, a
villager who comes from a traditional farming family. “In future, it
will be very hard for the longhouse people to do farming. There is no
free land for us to do farming anymore, because the company is taking
over the land.”

The villagers here used to cultivate paddy, plant rubber trees and
grow a variety of local fruit trees – as part of a shifting
cultivation tradition that goes back hundreds of years. “We move to a
new area every year because we want to make the ground more fertile,”
explains Along. “When we move our rice fields, we plant fruit trees -
rambutan, durian, langsat, jackfruit – to help replenish the soil.”
Their land is also home to wildlife such as wild boar, monkeys, deer
and all kinds of local fish varieties.

Now, they are going to lose all that as a company has taken over their
land for plantation, laments Along, referring to Pusaka KTS, a joint
venture between timber-based conglomerate KTS Group of Companies and
the Sarawak Timber Industry Development Corporation.

Similar large forest plantation projects are slated for the Kakus and
Belaga regions.

The loss of biodiversity when land is cleared for plantations is
alarming. “When a huge area is cleared for plantations, all the plants
will be cleared, because they are clearing up the land,” explains
Raymond Abin, coordinator of the Sarawak Conservation Action Network,
which consists of environmental and indigenous rights groups in
Sarawak.

“After that, they will do the excavating work in order for them to
plant the oil palm. This will invariably lead to serious soil erosion
that would flow into the streams and rivers and kill a lot of fish.”

In addition, foreign workers hired by the plantation firms are often
concerned about their own survival and extract as much fish from the
rivers as they can. “There will be little wildlife once the forest is
gone and replaced by tree or oil palm plantation,” says Abin.

The immediate impact on surrounding communities is water pollution and
flash floods.

In Sarawak, forest plantations are mainly of fast maturing tree
species such as acacia mangium and rubberwood (timber latex clones).
Acacia mangium is a highly invasive species regarded as a threat to
natural forests and the natural environment.

Whatever the condition of the existing forest, planting fast-growing
acacia involves prior clear-felling and removal of stumps, resulting
in a denuded landscape ready for replanting. It is also a sterile
monocrop that allows little to grow beneath it. Acacia plantations
thus cannot support the rainforests’ original faunal diversity.

The ‘Global Biodiversity Outlook 3′ report released by the Secretariat
of the Convention on Biological Diversity – an international treaty
adopted in Rio de Janeiro in June 1992 – earlier this month noted that
the 2010 biodiversity target agreed to by the world’s governments in
2002 has not been met at the global level.

“The loss of biodiversity is an issue of profound concern for its own
sake. Biodiversity also underpins the functioning of ecosystems, which
provide a wide range of services to human societies. Its continued
loss, therefore, has major implications for current and future human
well-being,” the report said.

According to the website of the Malaysian Timber Industry Board, the
Plantation Industries Ministry aims to develop 375,000 hectares of
forest plantation for timber at an annual planting rate of 25,000
hectares per year for the next 15 years.

This is part of an aggressive programme that includes providing soft
loans to companies for the development of such plantations “to reduce
pressure on native forest as a source for raw materials and to ensure
its continuous availability for the domestic timber industry.” Sarawak
also plans to double its oil palm coverage to one million hectares by
this year.

The loss of biodiversity in tree plantations in Sarawak is significant
in the global equation, says political economist Andrew Aeria. “But
don’t expect Sarawak politicians to be bothered by all this. All they
are interested in is the profit margin of their crony companies and
their family-linked companies involved in tree plantation projects.”

The federal government, with the collaboration of the Sarawak
government, is in the process of finalising a mechanism on how to
solve the issue of native customary rights land in the state,
Plantation Industries and Commodities Minister Tan Sri Bernard Dompok
was quoted as saying Thursday by the Bernama national news agency.

Meanwhile, the villagers in Long Berawan are still engaged in farming
using their traditional practices – but for how much longer?

“When the plantations come – and they are starting work now…”
Along’s voice trails off. “Now they are doing work in the jungle, and
after the jungle, the native customary land, and after that, the whole
place, and definitely our farms will go.”

Arab-Americans as part of the community at large – self-deprecating friendly wit – the path to normalcy in days of horror. Muslims and Jews should start talking today as long as they are alive. You are welcome in America but do not go on the basket-ball court to play soccer in jeans. “ARABS IN WONDERLAND” a comedy show.

Young Arab-Americans feel that through comedy there is a chance to self-improve and also project an image that they are part of an American community at large.The project was started after the 2001 9/11 event.

The NYAACF is the vehicle and this year the 7th Annual New York Arab-American Comedy Festival, May 5-9, 2010, is the product. The title is “ARABS IN WONDERLAND.”

The symbol of the festival is a camel head, with a bib that says I LOVE NEW YORK, perched on a quarter-moon.

Dean Obeidallah and Maysoon Zayid are co-producers of this series of events. Both are comedians themselves and know the therapy and the bang that is hidden in the power of a laugh – specially when it is a self-deprecating laugh that creates a silver lining to the facts of life.

The venue is the Three-Legged Dog Theatre – the Bellow-Village – 80 Greenwich Street – across from Battery Park  at the 3LD Arts & Technology Center.

Last year, Melik Kaylan wrote in The Wall Street Journal (May 20, 2009) – “ARAB HUMOR … NO JOKE” – Breathing between laughs seemed impossible, especially during the stand-up acts.”

This year with Pakistani-American Faisal Shahzad in the news, as the “idiot Times Square bomber,” disowned even by the Taliban, the Arab-Americans effort is even more important then in previous years. For whatever reason the group thinks of itself as brown people – this might be a miss-concept – but it nevertheless comes in response of being seen as different by the other Americans. Even if the self view brings them into a position, they think, of being neither white nor black in the American concept, that brown coloring is really not the point even if they asked the audience if any “whites” are present, and a family of three declared themselves. The truth is that the parents generation, like mostly all immigrants to this country, thought at first that they will continue to coalesce in their separate community and it back-fired when some of their members join in the old warfare of back home. This interfered with full integration here, and slowed the acculturating process. The laughs are the therapy and the solution. Jews had this in the Sholem Aleichem writings – yes – old culture – old country based – but opening the window to new life.

The Arab-American Festival has performances in Arabic which I do not understand – so I picked two consecutive events, Saturday May 8th – the 9:15 PM Headliner Show and the 11:15 PM Haram Show. As I came a little early, I got to see also the last third of the 7:30 PM Stand Up in Arabic. The acting was excellent – in the intonations, movement and hand waving they were exactly like much of Israeli performances and there is no puzzlement here. This is because Jews that came from the Arab lands brought with them part of the Arabic culture as well, and the Arabs of Israel obviously supplied further enhancement to this sort of theater even before the introduction of stand-up. In one of the two numbers (acted by Amer Zahr) I saw, I heard “Bibi” and “Habibi”  relating to Netanyahu – the Israeli Prime Minister. I assume that even the content that I did not understand because of the language barrier, was probably alike to Israeli stand-up. The last performer was Maysoon Zayid.

The two stand-up events in English:

the first, MCd by Eman (Canada’s top Arab comedian),  featured Mike Batayeh (” You don’t Mess with the Zohan” – Born in Detroit and living now in Los Angeles),  Aron Kader (Comedy Central’s “Axis of Evil” – has a Palestinian father and a Mormon mother), Joe Derosa (“Comedy central Presents”), Nigel (Noel) Elgrably (“Sultans of Satire”  is the son of a French-Moroccan Father and a Moroccan-Israeli mother and grew up in Washington DC where he was an insurance salesman before turning to comedy), Nemr Abou Nassar (Lebanon’s top comedian), Dean Obeidalah himself (ABC’s “The View”), Jimmy Goson (from Akron, Ohio, of Lebanese heritage appeared at the Kennedy Center with Danny Thomas as MC and the following year was asked to be the MC), Maysoon Zayid (You Don’t Mess the Zohan), and Maria Shehata.

the second, hosted by Mike Batayeh, featured among others -  Joe Derosa, Aaron Kader, and Nigel (Noel) Elgrably.                   This performance it said had an R-rated as “Dirty Arab” comedy with mature themes – sex and profanity – for 18 and older. As a midnight show it clearly was not for the kids though about half a dozen young women with headdress were in attendance.

I took notes from the first English show. It started with you say Shalom we say Salam it means the same thing but what we see is 9/11 being commemorated and Hezbollah sends greetings. But after Eman’s introduction, Mike Batayeh took off on how his father insisted on introducing him to girls. This theme of set marriages is much on te mind of the Arab Americans – the younger ones laugh at their parents and do not go along. The women not allowed to drive in Saudi Arabia, flight arrivals “Insh-Allah,” the bombed out Beirut where you get driving directions by the craters in the ground and the places where you get fired at -  The “Holly Smoke” of the Middle East.

Jimmy Goson declared that Arabs never admit that they do not know something. They are always specialists – be it on the Middle East or food. Jimmy has  30 years of comedy and performed at Bar Mitzvahs and Hafli – the difference between the two is one present – the Bar or Bat Mitzvah gets one present at the Hafli – two. He mentioned the colloquial language in the US – The Jews gave America from their language, and the Arabs should do the same, he concluded. And clearly – his comedy had positive elements to it. Further – the Arab good-bye takes two and a half hours – so he suggests to start saying it at time of arrival.

Aaron Kader sayd that you are welcome in America but do not go on the basket-ball court to play soccer in jeans. Muslims and Jews should start talking today as long as they are alive.

The best presentation was by Joe Derosa who projected a poster-picture advertisement of pre-packaged Oscar Mayer sandwiches that had on the bottom saying “it does not get better then this” – it was terrific – the essence of American commercialism and the lack of a future if this stale sandwich is all you can hope for.

Oh yes, these young people are bitter. Most spoke a good English and are real Americans, but even though they laugh of the foibles of their parents, they are nevertheless proud of their heritage. The bitterness is not blinding, and they would like to see change for the better in the world. Maysoon Zayid was a delegate from New Jersey to the 2008 Democratic National Convention and she also spends 3 months a year in Palestine where she runs Maysoon’s Kids – a scholarship and wellness program for disabled children and orphans.

The general tenor in the audience and at the podium was pro-Democrat and clearly anti-Bush.

=================

http://www.sanfranciscosentinel.com/?p=72350
 http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/

TALEBAN DISOWNS TIMES SQUARE ‘IDIOT BOMBER’

8 May 2010

A Pakistani man reads a morning newspaper carrying the headline story on the arrest
of Times Square bomb suspect Faisal Shahzad, at a newspaper stall in Islamabad.

By Giles Whittell
The London Times

The alleged would-be Times Square terrorist was disowned by the Pakistani Taleban yesterday as American politicians called for him to be stripped of his US citizenship so he can be tried by a military tribunal.

Faisal Shahzad — nicknamed the “Idiot Bomber” for a series of blunders leading to his arrest — was praised by a spokesman for the Pakistani Taleban but disowned in the same breath. “We don’t even know him,” a spokesman said.

In New York, an Emirates jet was held on the runway at Kennedy airport for the second time in four days yesterday, amid reports that another “no fly” passenger had escaped detection and boarded the aircraft.

As the White House increased pressure on Islamabad to investigate possible links between Mr Shahzad and a range of militant groups based in Pakistan, new details emerged of his movements before the attempted bombing and of the lonely life in a cheap suburban flat that he was apparently attempting to escape.

Hours after Mr Shahzad allegedly left a Nissan on Times Square last Saturday night, the Pakistani Taleban appeared to claim responsibility for the failed attack in a video posted on YouTube.

Yesterday a spokesman for the group, Azam Tariq, told reporters in North Waziristan that “the job [Mr Shahzad] has done was a tremendous one and we praised him for this job but the fact is that we even do not know Faisal” (sic).

The spokesman claimed that his organisation had been framed for the attack. At the same time the Pakistani Ambassador to Washington, Husain Haqqani, insisted that it was premature to link Mr Shahzad to Qari Hussain Mehsud, known as the Pakistani Taleban’s chief bomb-maker.

Having travelled to Pakistan with his wife and children and left them there, it is now alleged that Mr Shahzad surveyed the scene of his intended attack with care, but still made errors. He allegedly visited Times Square on April 28 in the Nissan Pathfinder that he would later pack with propane and petrol, according to sources involved in his interrogation. Two days later he left a getaway car nearby.

Investigators say that he was caught by a surveillance camera changing shirts as he left the Nissan on May 1. At about this time he realised he had left his keys inside the Pathfinder, including those to the getaway car, forcing him to take public transport back to his flat in Bridgeport, Connecticut.

He asked his landlord to let him in and drove back to pick up the Isuzu with a spare set of keys the next day. The car was found at JFK airport on Monday.

Pakistan’s co-operation in questioning Mr Shahzad’s associates and reconstructing his activities is seen in Washington as a vital test of its willingness to crack down on the of militant groups operating from Waziristan.

——————————
 http://www.arabianbusiness.com/587719-uk…

not bad at all – UK department store Harrods sold by Mohammed Al Fayed to Qatar Holding for $2.3 Billion.
according to Reuters on Saturday, 08 May 2010

WORLD FAMOUS: The high-end department store is in London’s Knightsbridge district.
Egyptian-born businessman Mohammed Al Fayed has sold prestigious London department store Harrods to the investment vehicle of the Qatar royal family in a deal reported to be worth around 1.5 billion pounds ($2.3bn).

A spokesman for Lazard, which advised the Al Fayed family trust, declined to confirm the value of the deal which was reported by Sky News, citing unnamed sources.

“After 25 years as chairman of Harrods, Mohamed Al Fayed has decided to retire and to spend more time with his children and grand-children,” Lazard Chairman Ken Costa said on Saturday

We write this after having witnessed the following:

Subtantialis Corporis Mixti
(Substantial Form of the Blended Body)

THE SYNERGIES EXHIBITION OF THE BASEL, ROTTERDAM AND STOCKHOLM CONVENTIONS.

on Friday, 7 May, 6:00 – 8:30 pm
Czech Center – 321 E. 73rd Street, New York, New York

The event is open to the public and will feature an informal talk by the
exhibition curator at 6:45pm accompanied by cocktail refreshment.

It was sponsored by The Czech Republic and organized by SAFE PLANET – the UN campaign for Responsibility on Hazardous Chemicals and Wastes on the occasion of the Eighteenth Session of the Commission on Sustainable Development (CSD 18).

For more information, please see the attached flyer.

Michael Stanley-Jones
Joint Services of the Basel, Rotterdam and Stockholm Conventions
UNEP, Geneva
+41 79 730-4495 (Press enquires)
SafePlanet@unep.org

=== ===  ===

The three conventions mentioned are:

- The Basel Convention on the Control of Transboundary Movements of Hazardous wastes and Their Disposal.    www.basel.int

- The Rotterdam Convention on the Prior Informed Consent Procedure for Certain Hazardous Chemicals and Pesticides in International trade.    www.pic.int

- The Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants.    www.pops.int

These are just three out of a dozen conventions – most of them dealing with specific chemicals – many with just single transition metals that are poisonous and harmful to humans and aspects of nature. The UN cannot regulate what is done in a particular country even when it impacts the whole world – but it can come up with conventions that try to regulate international trade – and sometimes plain dumping of hazardous materials somewhere outside the guilty country – we call this plain criminal activity that dumps these materials in the poorest region of a poor country.

UNEP Executive Director and UN-USG Ahim Steiner’s opening sentence for the exhibition’s catalog says: “The challenge of hazardous chemicals can appear invisible and remote to many of us. While science offers us the rationale and objective evidence of the risks, art connects the heart: In doing so it can move and mobilize each and all of us to act in new and transformative ways.”

Industrial interests tend to sweep these miseries under the rug – so to say – and people are left suffering terrible harm as a consequence. The UN may discuss this in its chambers, but unless people get the understanding why things happen to them, to their environment, or to something they care about – they will not act.

Chris Jordan, September 2009, photographed bodies of Albatross chicks that had dropped to their deaths on Midway Atoll, a remote marine sanctuary in the middle North Pacific. They had swallowed colorful bottle caps and cigarette lighters that their parents fed them because we threw them into the open sea.

Barbara Benish, from California but living now on in the Czech Republic close to the German border, takes to the plastic toy form of “Bruno” the dolphin of Bohemia discolored by chemicals like the real Dolphins of the polluted Mediterranean and compares them with the playing dolphins of the walls of 3,000 year old palaces of Knossos. Barbara is teaching environment to Czech children and to the children of the world. She was a university classmate of the organizer of this exhibition Michael Stanley-Jones whith whom she was in contact but did not see him for 25 years until last nights event. But Michael was not the curator of the show, that fell to a professional from Texas

Floyd Newsum shows a set of three panels that in the upper two halves are covered with an orange red to show the effect of global warming upon a young female figure, that happens to be African, that is depicted in the lower one third of the middle panel. Below these panels there are three objects, – a plastic football covered stuff that looks like pollution under the right side panel,  while under the left panel there is a model bath tub – the ocean – and in it a small plastic cut out in the shape of Texas – that is the size of Texas of a plastic-covered real life region in the middle of the Pacific.

The above  collage shocked me as I just saw in the Saturday New York Times – right there on front page – the spectacular red, orange and yellow colors of oil-in water – that is the play of light in the Gulf of Mexico oil spill. How many poor girls in the US South will go hungry as their fisherman father will be out of work because we wanted that oil? I got my exhibit-update right there – the same day.

Lyn Randolph explores the Texas Gulf Coast in two large excellent paintings – “Endangered Species” in what seems an unexpected meeting of a female nude and Wooping Cranes – the woman seems to spy us and seems to be of the same endangered content as the birds. Here also we have very warm colored backgrounds but much more sharp colored center images.

Barbara Sprung and another Barbara Benish large paintings deal with vulnerable women that we have attacked by what we do to the environment – those are the turning-away wounded Venuses in our life. Their bodies might still look nice but were altered by chemicals.

Santiago Cardenas of Colombia does away with the body completely – he just shows a large coat on a hangar and an umbrella attached to a belt-loop.

Then a most surprising exhibit was by a delightful Pakistani lady that resides now in Indiana, Anila Quayyum Agha.

She showed a construct with letters that she named “My Forked Tongue.” and tried to convey the need for an international dialogue. She suspended letters in Urdu, Hindi and English and she told me it took 6 hours to mount the work here. She has dealt with political and gender issues in the land of her birth. Now she is Assistant Professor – Drawing- at the Herron School of Art and Design at the Indiana University in Indianapolis. I picked up a 40 page booklet of hers “Drawing the Invisible: Naratives of Gender, Community, and Home.” There is not a single depiction of the human body there – clearly something that has to do with her cultural background. She manages nevertheless, through color, painting, stitching, sewing, graphics… to convey the good side of humanity – what a refreshing experience after reading and hearing all the stuff about other Pakistanis in America! I spoke with her at somewhat at length and found easily that people that have a feel for humanity bind easily. This exhibit was a case in point.

The about 50 people present, many from the Czech community, but also with a sprinkling from the UN – like Matthias Kern, Programme Officer at the Basel Convention Geneva Based, Secretariat, had a good time listening to the curator, enjoying the good Czech Urquel Pilsener bier, and plainly chatting about the issues displayed. Barbara Benish was addressing everyone first in Czech language as that was a first good guess nevertheless. Luckily the Czech President Vaclav Klaus has not completely turned into his disciples the great majority of his nation. The spirit of Franz Kafka, Jaroslav Hašek, Karel Capek, Vaclav Havel is still alive.

 http://www.balanceofculture.com/2010/04/…

40th Anniversary of Earth Day Statement from Ambassador Susan E. Rice

The official statement from Ambassador Susan E. Rice on the 40th Anniversary of Earth Day:

Susan E. Rice
U.S. Permanent Representative to the United Nations
U.S. Mission to the United Nations
Washington, DC
April 22, 2010

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Today, as we celebrate the 40th anniversary of Earth Day, we are mindful of the profound responsibility we bear to future generations to leave them a healthy planet, and of the need for effective international cooperation to confront the urgent challenge of climate change.

As President Obama said in Copenhagen, “There is no time to waste.” The world’s climate is warming by the day. In Silent Spring, the historic book credited with spurring environmental activism, Rachel Carson wrote, “Seldom if ever does Nature operate in closed and separate compartments.” Indeed, climate change is one of the many security challenges we face in the 21st century that pays no heed to borders. Both its causes and its consequences are transnational in nature.

The Obama Administration is leading by example. We have taken action at home to invest in renewable energy and to promote a clean energy economy. We are committed to helping the most vulnerable countries adapt to climate change. And we are engaging vigorously in international climate negotiations sponsored by the United Nations, as well as in other multilateral settings.

In Copenhagen, President Obama challenged world leaders to “act boldly and decisively in the face of a common threat.” As we mark this historic Earth Day, we move forward to meet his challenge – and to do the critical work of protecting our planet.

————————–

04/22/2010

Analyzing Avatar Diplomacy at the United Nations

On Saturday, April 24, the ninth session of the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues will hold a special screening of James Cameron’s Avatar.

Representatives from across the globe will participate in an open discussion regarding the indigenous perspective on issues such as land, race, human rights, and religion. Director James Cameron will attend the screening, where he will join the audience in a Q & A session along with indigenous leaders.

Excerpt from the UN’s press release:

The AVATAR movie has been embraced by many indigenous peoples worldwide, who see it as echoing their own story. Throughout Latin America for example, indigenous peoples have highlighted the parallels between the movie and their own experiences dealing with private sector extractive industries and the development of mega projects on their lands.

With messages of conservation at its heart, AVATAR dramatically demonstrates how human invasion almost destroys the indigenous population’s way of life on the planet of Pandora. The indigenous population of Pandora – the Na’vi – fights to save their forest and their traditional way of life.

Regardless of one’s opinion on Avatar and its role within dialogues concerning race, religion, hard power, technology, or imperialism, the film has certainly struck a chord among vastly different communities worldwide. I’m especially intrigued by this particular screening since it actually involves key individuals from disparate, indigenous societies–coupled with the participation of James Cameron himself. Mainstream movie screenings like this one are not exactly everyday occurrences at the UN, so this crossover represents precisely what I love to witness in the arts, technology, policy, entertainment, and disparate cultures: a convergence.

From the UN Spokesman for Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, April 22,
2010: The Secretary-General is participating in this hour in a special
commemoration of the fortieth anniversary of Earth Day in Times
Square.  In his remarks, he says that Earth Day has helped create a
sense of shared responsibility for our environment and our one and
only home.  He will say that we must learn to live in balance with the
planet that sustains us and that there is a better, cleaner, greener,
healthier way to do things.
His full remarks are in my office, where you will also find the
Secretary-General’s message marking International Mother Earth Day,
which is celebrated today by the United Nations.

Question:  Maurizio Guerrero from the Mexican News Agency, Notimex.
Maybe you have tackled this issue before, and I apologize, but I
wonder why the UN is promoting the movie Avatar during this Indigenous
Peoples Forum, given that some critics characterize the movie as a
“white Messiah rescuing indigenous people”?  And I am wondering as
well, what is the deal the UN has with the movie studio, if the UN is
benefiting in some way with this deal?

Spokesperson:  I don’t quite follow you, on where and how the UN is
promoting this.  Could you elaborate where this has been happening?

Question:  They are going to screen on Saturday the movie Avatar, and
some people of the UN are calling the correspondents to go the movie
because James Cameron, the director of the movie, is going to be
there.  So for many critics, it would not sound right or correct that
the UN is promoting a Hollywood movie during this Indigenous Peoples
Forum.  So I am just wondering what is the reason that the UN is so
interested in the correspondents going there on Saturday to watch the
movie?

Spokesperson:  I would need to look into precisely who it is who is
inviting, because I am not aware of that.  But I am very happy to come
back to you on that.  I am aware of that.

[The correspondent was later informed that the idea for the screening
came about as the Secretariat for the Permanent Forum on Indigenous
Issues had heard many positive reactions (and some negative comments)
from indigenous representatives on the film and how it was echoing
their own stories.  Through personal contacts of the Secretariat and
the non-governmental organization co-sponsors, they contacted James
Cameron personally regarding the possibility of a screening.]

http://www.un.org/News/briefings/docs/2010/db100422.doc.htm

—————————–

http://www.undispatch.com/james-cameron-and-navi-come-un

James Cameron and the Na’vi Come to the UN

Mark Leon Goldberg – April 22, 2010 – 12:51 pm

In the midst of researching this post, I came across news that AVATAR
director James Cameron will host a screening of the film at the UN on
Saturday, to coincide with an annual meeting of the UN Permanent Forum
on Indigenous Issues. Color me perplexed.  I, for one, though Lawyers,
Guns, and Money blogger SEK was onto something when he described the
film thusly:

“Its fundamental narrative logic is racist: it transposes the
cultural politics of Westerns (in which the Native Americans are
animists who belong to a more primitive race) onto an interplanetary
conflict and then assuages the white guilt that accompanies acts of
racial and cultural genocide by having a white man save the noble
savages (who are also racists).” He wonders why “there is no
possibility for peaceful coexistence” presented in the film.

Well, you know who apparently disagrees with SEK and I?  ’Many
indigenous people worldwide’ — particularly in Latin America. This
from the UN’s press release for this weekend’s AVATAR screening:

The AVATAR movie has been embraced by many indigenous peoples
worldwide, who see it as echoing their own story. Throughout Latin
America for example, indigenous peoples have highlighted the parallels
between the movie and their own experiences dealing with private
sector extractive industries and the development of mega projects on
their lands.

With messages of conservation at its heart, AVATAR dramatically
demonstrates how human invasion almost destroys the indigenous
population’s way of life on the planet of Pandora. The indigenous
population of Pandora – the Na’vi – fights to save their forest and
their traditional way of life.

The event includes a Q and A with Cameron after the screening. If any
readers end up attending, let me know how it goes.