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I am going to let you in on a little secret: sometimes, on days when I feel overwhelmed and cranky – I find it difficult to see the kindness in the world.
That sentence could also read – I am going to let you in on a little secret: I am human.
Because really, all of us, each and every one, have days when all we can see is anger. Or hatred. Or sadness.
But here is my real secret: on days like that, when I am a bit more clever and not wallowing in self-pity, I make it a point to OPEN MY EYES AND BE ON THE LOOK-OUT FOR KINDNESS. Like, actually pay attention and notice it. Because it is there, it is always there. And when I take time to breathe, to look, to listen – I see it. And I am inspired. And suddenly, the day that felt dark and dreary lightens up, and my perspective changes. And I smile.
And at times when I really need a wake-up call, I sit myself down and write about kindness. It’s a bit selfish really. It is as much for me as it is for you reading this. But at least I am honest about that! So here we go – let’s open our eyes and our hearts and talk about a KINDNESS ACTIVIST.
|Peggy - the newest KINDNESS ACTIVIST!|
Annette has glioblastoma (brain cancer). She was diagnosed in July and it has been a confusing whirlwind of a few months for her and our family. We have met surgeons, oncologists, nurses, social workers, rehab staff… Dealing with brain cancer is a maze of scary tests, terms, and medicines.
But through all of the sadness, scariness, and confusion – PEGGY has been a constant source of KINDNESS.
Peggy visited at the hospital. Came to rehab. Had long, deep conversations with Annette.
And here is the thing that has made me so happy, PEGGY TOTALLY STEPPED UP AND HELPED OUT. She set up PEGGY DAY – one day a week where she picks up Annette, takes her to doctor or rehab appointments, goes out to eat, gets a pedicure, anything and everything.
Peggy Day has been
amazing. It is a day that Annette always
enjoys – she gets to laugh and hang out with her friend. And it is a day that the rest of the family
knows means it is our time to relax, recharge, get our non-medical things taken
care of. All while knowing that Annette
is in great hands. It is awesome.
|At the cancer center on Peggy Day|
I must mention that I know Peggy Day cannot always be easy for Peggy. She has a very busy life of her own! Her mom is not well, her own sister died of cancer, she herself has had cancer, she has a daughter with a disability that she cares for, etc. It is not like Peggy is just sitting around waiting for things to do, mind you! Even though she enjoys hanging out with Annette, it means taking time out of her schedule to do it. It means arranging child care, driving Annette around, and giving of herself.
|Peggy and her sweet daughter|
|Peggy and her daughter spending time with her mom|
PEGGY IS WONDERFUL.
And she is kind.
Which is why she is being named a Kindness Activist.
Thank you, Peggy. You are amazing. You have been a source of support for our family more than you can know. And you are an inspiration. Someday I hope to be able to grace a friend with Susan Day – where I will carry on your tradition of love, support, and kindness.
|Peggy - a KINDNESS ACTIVIST extraordinaire!|
P.S.- Among the countless other KIND THINGS Peggy does, she is also on the planning committee for the fundraising gala Annette’s friends are throwing her this month! And she also sends me encouraging messages and funny stuff late at night to make me smile. See, her kindness never ends!

domain: literature


text:
We loved reading Ravi’s Roar by Tom Percival! My daughter told me she wants to grab this book the next time she gets upset to re-read it. And the next day, my son started screaming and crying, and she looked at me, threw up her arms, and said, “Ok, I’m getting the book.” She explained to her brother reading it would help him feel better. It made my mama heart so happy to watch this exchange. Here are some of our favorite activities for Ravi’s Roar.
Ravi’s Roar Read- Aloud Mini-Lesson Focus:
- Symbolism from colors
- Cause & effect
- Problem & solution
- Feelings & emotions
Animal Characteristics and Feelings Comparison
Using animal figures, I asked my kids which animals showed different emotions. I let them act out a feeling and then showed how the various animals would demonstrate the same sentiment. For example, my son’s favorite was pretending to be an angry t-rex roaring and stomping.
Follow-Up Activity- Story of the Day with Ravi’s Roar
I wrote notes as the children acted out the emotions and feelings of different animals. Then they picked one animal to create their own story of the day. I was their scribe and wrote their ideas down. Then typed out their ideas, and they illustrated them.
Another idea is to show pictures of animals and ask children to write a sentence pretending to become that animal and act out the emotion demonstrated by the animal. My daughter then had a text to text connection remembering the line from Quick as a Cricket, “I’m as a sad as a Bassett hound” by Audrey and Don Wood. We grabbed that book and started making more animal and emotion comparisons.
Book Discussion Focus Questions
After reading the book, we talked about our emotions and behaviors. Below are some questions that helped drive our conversation, but Dr. Becky’s Podcasts and IG account are better than mine; Dr. Becky Podcast- Good Inside. She has the most incredible scripts and advice that has made an enormous difference in our home. I love hearing my kids start to use her wording back to me when they get upset. For example, “I didn’t expect that to happen.”
- What would you do if you were Ravi before he roared?
- What strategies can you think of that he could use next time?
- Why did Ravi turn into a tiger? Was it one thing or many that added up?
- If Ravi was your brother, how could you help him when he gets frustrated or angry?
Follow-up Read-Aloud Picture Books
- Quick as a Cricket by Audrey Wood & Don Wood
- Animal Colors Life-The-Flap Learning Fun
For more book activities for with the book Quick as a Cricket and other Audrey Wood books, please visit my blog; Audrey Wood Book Activities.
Thank you for visiting Live Learn Literacy.
Please see other posts below for more educational play ideas for young learners.

domain: library


Elderly couple dies in early morning house fire
FAYETTE - AL —
An elderly couple is dead following a fire at theirhome early Saturday morning.
Fayette Firefighters responded to 38 County Road32 just after 4:00 a.m. Two people, a male and a female in their 70s, died inthe fire.
The fire is under investigation by the Alabama Fire Marshal, alongwith the assistance of Fayette Fire Department. The cause of the fire has notbeen determined.


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A team of scientists announced Wednesday they have found significant evidence music can be an important tool for alleviating anxiety, pain and fatigue in cancer patients.
Although the study doesn’t link music to actually treating cancer, listening to music does seem to significantly help with reducing many of the disease’s most debilitating symptoms. In fact, many patients claimed music intervention, where patients listen to music provided by a doctor, nurse or therapist, is a moderate-to-strong reliever of anxiety.
The study was published in the journal Cochrane Library by researchers from Drexel University in Pennsylvania.
“We found that music therapy interventions specifically help improve patients’ quality of life
,” study leader Joke Bradt said in a statement. “These are important findings as these outcomes play an important role in patients’ overall well-being.”
The study examined more than 52 trials where music therapy was utilized with 3,731 cancer patients involved. Bradt and her team found music could be a viable replacement for some of the large amount of drugs used by many cancer patients, all without the risk of addiction and potentially dangerous side effects.
“The results of single studies suggest that music listening may reduce the need for anesthetics and analgesics, as well as decreased recovery time and duration of hospitalization, but more research is needed for these outcomes,” the Drexel team noted in the study.
Not only did music have specific benefits for the health of patients, including reducing heart rates and blood pressure, the researchers found it improved their qualities of lives.
“We hope that the findings of this review will encourage health care providers in medical settings to seriously consider the use of music therapy in the psychosocial care of people with cancer
,” Bradt said.

domain: medical


text:
…Refusal of President to Sign after 30 Days …Several Members will not Return to the Parliament Angered by the outcome of the political parties’ primaries which will see several members of the House of Representatives not returning to the green chamber, there are concerted moves to override President Buhari’s refusal to sign the amended Electoral
…Refusal of President to Sign after 30 Days
…Several Members will not Return to the Parliament
Angered by the outcome of the political parties’ primaries which will see several members of the House of Representatives not returning to the green chamber, there are concerted moves to override President Buhari’s refusal to sign the amended Electoral Act (2022) which has stayed for longer than 30 days with the President.
Refusal of the President to append his signature to a bill is interpreted as a veto in parliamentary language. In the past, where the President had reservations about a bill he intends to sign, he would return the bill with a correspondence to the leadership of the National Assembly pointing out his areas of his reservations.
Proceedings at the House of Representatives on Wednesday shows plans may have been concluded to override the President, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.), on Section 84(8) of the Electoral Act 2022 which seeks to provide for statutory delegates at the meetings, congresses and conventions of political parties.
A formal motion to embark on this route may be moved on Thursday or next week but the debate leading to this was started by two members of the Peoples Democratic Party – the Deputy Minority Leader, Toby Okechukwu and Ben Igbakpa – who failed to get return tickets to the green chamber had protested on the floor of the House about the President’s failure to sign the amendment.
This came on the heels of a speech by the Speaker of the House Rt. Hon. Gbajabiamila at Tuesday’s plenary faulting the way political parties conducted their primaries leading to the failure of members of the National Assembly to get tickets of their respective parties to seek reelection in the 2023 general elections.
The Speaker blamed the non-signing of the bill for the failure of the parties to allow statutory delegates to vote for candidates at the primaries as the National Assembly had proposed in the amendment to Section 84(8) of the Electoral Act 2022.
The National Assembly transmitted the bill to the President for his assent on May 13, 2022 but this was yet to be signed as at June 13, 2022, exactly 30 days after. However,
Leading the debate on Wednesday, Hon Okechukwu said, “I want to take notice regarding the very copious and auspicious comments you (Speaker) made on Tuesday regarding the Electoral Act where, in the circumstances, it has been weaponised; where as a matter of fact, there was an aspiration to make the law a more perfect law to remove every ambiguity; and where there isn’t any material difference between the 2010 Act and that of 2022. And suddenly, the majority of members, where it has been weaponised, have become victims.
“Something is wrong in an environment – in an institution – where the two (Majority and Minority) Leaders of the Senate would have to cross to other parties because of inherent inclement conditions. Anything that occasions it, anything that warrants it, if it is our Electoral Act, if it is our politics, if it is the environment where we operate, we need to retool. And like you said, we have to do better work and we have to fight on.
“For me, it is just a battle that is lost, the war is on and we should go ahead to make sure that that law is retooled, made clear. And if it requires this parliament to take action to override what has not been signed, we should be willing to do so.”
Hon Ben Igbakpa (Delta State) went down memory lane and recalled how the legislators were recalled from recess to quickly consider and pass the amendment to Section 84(8) and it was transmitted to the President for assent.
“Mr President did not just ignore (the amendment bill), he travelled out of the country on a condolence visit to Dubai and that created a lot of problems for the country. There was tension and many of our political parties, out of the tension, created what will now be for us in the 2023-2027 electoral process.
“Nigerians are crying for good leadership and the leadership recruitment process starts with our primaries. You have worked hard and that is why I took us to Section 58 (of the Constitution). We are to make laws and present to Mr President and where he does not sign (a bill into law), that same 58 gives us the powers to make sure that we pass that law without Mr President’s assent.
“There is nowhere in the Constitution that says that one arm of the government is subservient to the other. And that is why we cannot continue to act as if we are under the Executive arm of government.
“This Constitution gave us the powers, just as it gave to them. We must wake up as a parliament. When we pass laws and we are sure that we have done the right thing, we should start overriding Mr. President, because this is just the beginning.
“Today, the NDDC Act is in force because the parliament, which you were part of, did it. Why are we afraid? Mr. President has not committed any offence. What he has done is the rule of law and the Constitution, and I believe by the time we do our own by overriding his veto, we would not have committed any offence. We would be working according to the Constitution and the rule of law.
“I think it is time for us, before some of us leave, if we manage to come back, that this parliament must stamp its feet and tell Nigerians that we are working for them and not for any party or any individual.
“Mr. Speaker, I implore you as a great leader, to please, it is time, if we are sure we have done what is right to the Electoral Act 2022, rise up, take our pens, collect signatures and by the grace of God, override Mr President and give Nigerians the enabling electoral law that will stand the test of time.” he submitted.
Responding, the Speaker listed the conditions under which the lawmakers could override a veto successfully. “Clearly, the Constitution says he has 30 days leeway and we have since gone beyond the 30 days. But the Constitution also says it is not automatic that you override, it is if you are convinced as a House that that amendment must stand. If you are not convinced with the arguments advanced by the president, or in this case there is really no argument advanced, then you can override.
“For us to override, I believe we require two-thirds majority and it cannot be by voice vote neither can it be by way of signatures unless, of course, you have enough two-thirds by signatures what I will suggest is that you bring the application – a formal motion on notice – perhaps tomorrow (Thursday) or whenever you are able to do that and we will determine whether or not this House is ready to override or not.
“I think that is the way to go. That is the proper procedure. I appreciate your comments and I believe you are talking about the provision of statutory delegates which Honourable Toby alluded to earlier. We will go ahead. You can file your motion and hopefully we will be able to list it tomorrow or whenever the calendar permits.” Rt. Hon. Gbajabiamila said.

domain: law


text:
Bzzzzz … sting! Some little ones get stung by a bee and it is over as fast as it started, but for others who are allergic, these stings are life-threatening. These yellow, fuzzy insects sitting on your child’s favorite flower can be dangerous, so it is very important to be prepared for sting treatment and what symptoms lead to a trip to Pediatric Urgent Care.
How to treat a bee sting:
- Remove the stinger as soon as possible. This will stop the spread of venom.
- Gently and carefully clean the area on the skin with water and soap. This will disinfect the area and prevent further infection.
- Apply an ice pack or cold, wet washcloth directly to the sting for a few minutes.
- Raise the infected area to reduce swelling.
- If your child gets stung inside the mouth, take her to a doctor immediately. The mouth may swell so much that airways may become closed .
Parents may not know their child is allergic to bees until after a sting occurred. Consult your doctor if your young one experiences any of the following symptoms:
- Trouble breathing
- Loss of consciousness
- Swollen lips, tongue or face
- Hives, flushed or pale skin
- Stomach cramps
- Nausea or vomiting
- Weak or rapid pulse
- Dizziness or fainting
- Rash or significant swelling around the sting
If your children deal with bee allergies, it is important for you to educate him or her on the severity of stings. Here are some tips for avoiding these pesky insects:
- Wear shoes when playing outdoors.
Wear long pants and long sleeves if weather permitting
- Stay far away from hives or nests.
- Avoid wearing bright colors or floral patterns.
- Cover food when eating outside.
- Do not wear sweetly smelling perfume, lotions or hair products.
We hope that you never have to treat a bee sting, but when accidents occur, Pediatric Urgent Care is ready to get your little one back on their way!


text:
CeraLiv is the third brand created by CHOOSE NanoTech. The first two brands have made great achievements in industrial and automotive coatings respectively. Many customers from the two areas have asked about the application possibilities of home building materials. CeraLiv hence was born. Due to the rich experience, strong research and development of the head office, CeraLiv's products have very mature technology and foundation as soon as the brand was launched.
Revolutionary Bonding Technology
High-standard ceramic coatings often need heating to be cured, which is difficult for daily use applications. However, CeraLiv's R&D center breaks through the bottlenecks of the heating process. By combining with the moisture in the air, our coatings adhere to the objects surfaces strongly during the drying process, and will not fall off due to ultraviolet radiation, weather changes, and daily use.
The color-change is inevitable during the curing process of ceramics. However, CeraLiv not only overcomes the heating procedure but also the transparency obstacle. Our liquid ceramic technology allows our coating become a transparent micron-level film even after curing. With patented bonding technology, this layer of protection firmly adheres to the surface and provides excellent stain resistance, durability and high temperature resistance.
LOAD MORE EXAMPLE
CeraLiv’s coating has a double-layer structure. The bottom layer is a nano-ceramic film which provides resistance to dirt, acid and alkali.
The surface layer is hydrophobic which gives excellent water repellent effect to block water or liquid from erosion. All the properties above make our coating anti-fouling and easy cleaning.
CeraLiv’s coating is a transparent nano-ceramic composition which will not affect the original color and appearance of the material. It provides excellent anti-fouling, easy-to-clean, acid and alkali resistance, and waterproof protection properties. More importantly, it maintains the original touch feeling. CeraLiv’s coatings also withstand the damage of solvents such as 99% alcohol, turpentine and even toluene. There’s no need to worry about sanitize the house but damage CeraLiv’s coating.
Once the CeraLiv’s coating is cured, it can only be removed by mechanical polishing. Therefore, if it is not damaged by external strong forces, the CeraLiv coating remains permanently.
The hydrophobic layer will be consumed by daily use, and the water repellent effect will decline after a period of time. However, the bottom layer still provides excellent protection.
It is recommended to use CeraLiv DIY coating “ENHANCE” at least once a week to replenish the surface layer. The water repellent effect will be restored and achieving the most comprehensive protection.
All CeraLiv’s home ceramic coatings are tested and certificated safe by SGS
Certificated by REACH EU regulations for absolute free of substances of very high concern (SVHC)
Certificated by the ASTM F963 inspection specification, CeraLiv coating does not contain eight heavy metal substances
Certificated by the CPSC-CH-E1003-09.1 inspection specification, CeraLiv coating does not contain toxic heavy metal.
CeraLiv’s coating is harmless to health, and there is no need to worry about any health concerns to children or pet.
The surface condition must be perfect before coating. If there are cracks, stains, scratches, or serious water erosion, etc., it is recommended to have professional repairs first.
CeraLiv nano-ceramic coating is a high polymer coating that overlaps on the surface to form a dense net-shape of ceramic structure and adheres to the substrate strongly. Normally, it takes about 2-3 days for complete curing. Do not touch during the period and make sure no water and liquid is accidently spilled on the surface to have the best protective effect.
CeraLiv coating must be applied by our home detailers. The home detailing process includes evaluating the characteristic of the material, the feasibility of the case, the best way to apply the coating. Above all, it is not recommended to DIY.
Yes, it can be home detailed regardless of whether it is a new house or a house that has already been moved in. However, there will be more or less stains after use. The surface condition will be evaluated before coating. In addition, it takes 2-3 days for the coating to be cured and should not be touched during the period.
As a result, the most suitable time for home detailing is after the interior decoration is finished.
The price is based on the dimension of the area which is 300 NTD per one sai (30*30cm). CeraLiv’s sales person will communicate with the costumer and take the precise measurement. Surely the larger dimension is, the better discounts we are going to offer.
CeraLiv develops various coatings for common building materials. Basically every objects, big or small, in the house can be coated to have the protective and easy-to-clean properties.
Bathroom detailing: hardware and glass door, prevent lime scale and soap scale from happening
Kitchen detailing: countertop, resistant to oil stains and is easy to keep clean
Stone detailing: anti-graffiti, resistant to acid and common liquid
Glass detailing: hydrophobic effect, prevent lime scale from happening
Hardware detailing: prevent oxidation from happening and maintain high gloss
High-quality goods detailing: prevent oxidation from happening, maintain high gloss, water repellent
The warranty is 18 months. During this period, if the coating fails doesn’t come from improper use, CeraLiv will redo the home detailing and only charge for transportation and minimum wage.
1. Communication, understand the needs
We communicate with the costumer first and understand his/her needs on the internet or phone. Evaluating the materials conditions, planning preliminary process, and making an appointment for measurement
2. Measurement and quotation
Giving advices based on the surface condition and taking measurement. Quote the price afterward.
At this stage, we do the final confirmation with the costumer about price, dimension, date.
4. Pre-treatment and cleaning
Before applying the coating, we fully clean and even lightly polish the surface to make sure the best quality.
5. Home detailing
Choose the most suitable products based on the condition of the surface and costumer’s need.
6. Acceptance inspection
After the coating is cured, acceptance inspection will be carried out to make sure the coating is doing its work. The subsequent maintenance will be taught as well.
Measurement will charge transportation fees as follows
Taipei and New Taipei City-Free
Taichung Region-500 NTD
Tainan Region-800 NTD
ualien and Taitung Region-800 NTD
After the home detailing is completed, if there is any concern of the material surface, please do communicate with the detailer. Once confirmed everything is good, it will be the effective date of warranty which lasts 18 months.
During the warranty, if the coating goes wrong, please contact the salesperson to examine the condition. If redo is needed, we only charge transportation fee and minimum wage.
If the coating is damaged by improper use, the warranty will not be effective. For example: scratches, chipped corners, cracks caused by hard objects such as tableware, cutlery, metal, and glass; or highly corrosive liquids such as strong acids and alkalis spilled on the coating surface, causing foggy surface, erosion and stains.
CeraLiv is only responsible for applying the coating, not for repairing the surface.
If you have any questions, please communicate with the salesperson to reach a consensus before applying coating.

domain: chemistry


text:
I first started watching makeup tutorials when I was in high school. The very first beauty blogger that sparked a greater interest in makeup and blogging was U.K.based, Beauty Crush, Samantha Maria. She was the person who introduced me to E.L.F and all of the amazing products that soon became one of my favorite makeup brands. Her YouTube channel is one I would visit on a weekly basis to check for new videos. Her videos range from beauty reviews, tutorials and talks about girl things to fashion look books and travel vlogs. All of her videos are full of such artistic talent and creativity. Her website has posts dedicated to her many interests and talents, style, fashion, beauty, food, travel, etc. She and boyfriend Jason David, are now creators of fashion label Novem & Knight, so nothing is impossible for this blogger. Follow her on Instagram to see her lovely posts!
Estee Lalonde is also a U.K. based beauty blogger who is an amazingly creative in her own right. Her blog essiebutton.com/ esteelalonde.com consists of beauty, diy, food, travel fashion and lifestyle. Pretty much everything I’m interested in, she has made countless posts involving my interests. She is talented, goofy and full of entertaining and informative videos and posts. Her YouTube channel is in my top favorites! Her book, Bloom is currently being published and is set to be released October 4, 2016. It will include her perspective on her travels, life, beauty, interior decor and many more! Preorder here!

domain: artistic


|STEP 1: Hardware Installation
- Turn OFF the power to your computer system and disconnect the power cords.
- Touch a metal plate on your computer system to ground yourself and discharge any static electricity.
- Remove the cover from your computer chassis and select an empty PCI slot in your computer.
- You should refer to your computer system documentation for any special instructions on installing expansion cards and peripheral equipment.
- Unscrew and remove the slot cover from your selected PCIe slot. Note: Teh AES16e can be installed into any type or size of PCIe slot, from x1 to x32.
- Insert the Lynx card into the selected PCIe slot and press it down so that the contacts are securely seated.
- Secure the bracket of the Lynx card to the computer chassis using a chassis screw or retaining bracket.
- Replace the computer chassis cover and reconnect the power cord.
- Connect the Audio cables to the Lynx card. See the AES16e User's Guide for more information.


text:
As we have walked across Spain, two of our guidelines have been to avoid busy highways when possible and to choose the the coastline route when given the choice. On three consecutive days in the last week — our walks from Otur to Navia, Tapia de Casariega and Ribadeo — we left the traditional Camino for part of each day to walk along gorgeous coastal paths.
Most of the routes were along cliffs towering over the water variously known as the Cantabrian Sea, the Bay of Biscay or the North Atlantic Ocean.
In a few places we passed by peninsulas jutting into the sea known as castros — sites of fortified and sometimes moat-protected villages dating from the Iron Age to Roman times.
Check our photos below, followed by Relive videos showing other scenes from our walks those three days. As always, click on any photo to view larger versions of all the photos.

domain: travel


Land Rover designer turns to modern art as inspiration for the 2020 Defender
LOS ANGELES — Do you remember what your life was like 23 years ago, the year Great Britain ceded control of Hong Kong to China, President Bill Clinton started his second term in office, and Princess Diana died in a car crash.
That would be 1997, the last year that Land Rover sold the Defender in the United States. For fans of the vehicle, the wait for a new one has been too long, although their patience is about to be rewarded.
Unveiled in November in Los Angeles, the four-door Land Rover Defender 110 is scheduled to go on sale in May with prices starting at $49,900 in the U.S. The two-door Land Rover Defender 90 First Edition will be available come summer starting at $65,100, while the remainder of the Defender 90 models arriving in the fall, priced around $50,000.
The Land Rover Defender is a descendent of the first Land Rover, the Series I, a vehicle that mimicked the Jeep developed for the U.S. Army. Uniquely, it used aluminum construction because of steel shortages in postwar Britain. Ultimately Rover, the company that built the Land Rover, added luxury variants while always keeping a utilitarian line intact. That would be the Defender, which debuted in 1983 and remained in production through 2015, although U.S sales stopped for the 1998 model year when U.S. Department of Transportation regulations required a costly redesign that proved prohibitive given the Defender’s meager sales volume. Nevertheless, its design became iconic, mostly because Land Rover lacked the resources to change it. Eventually, it became too archaic to meet changing government regulations worldwide.
Which brings us to the new 2020 Defender, one of three product families at the Land Rover alongside Discovery and Range Rover.
The 2020 Defender, still built of aluminum, uses a new D7x platform and is offered in ascending Standard, S, SE, HSE, First Edition and X trim levels. Standard and S models get a 300-horsepower 2.0-liter turbocharged four-cylinder engine wearing a “P300” badge, while other variants get a 400-horsepower 3.0-liter inline six-cylinder engine wearing the “P400” badge. A new Terrain Response system, twin-speed transfer case, locking center differential, active rear and locking differential ensures the Defender’s capability regardless of terrain.
Creating a new version of such an iconic consumer product is a tough assignment, but not to Gerry McGovern, chief design officer for Land Rover. “I wasn’t constantly thinking about the old one and told the team not to do that either,” he said. “I think if we became preoccupied with that, it would become debilitating.”
Instead, McGovern and his team developed the vehicle as if had never existed while maintaining its legendary off-road capability and durability. The resulting exterior styling changed little from the first prototype, although the same is not true of the interior, which initially had a lot more exposed structure, but couldn’t pass safety regulations.
“I think the car pays a very respectful nod to the original without being held back by it,” McGovern said. “It would be completely dishonest as a group of professional designers to create something for today that looks like something that was designed 60 years ago.”
While the new model comes as a shock to those accustomed to the old Defender, the new model reinterprets classic Defender styling along with Land Rover cues to create a uniquely modular look that stands apart — just like the previous model.
“It’s got these big open eyes; it’s confident,” McGovern said. “It’s not trying to be overtly aggressive. It’s happy, but no less bold. It’s got a charm about it, which when you start seeing this car on the road, its charm and its character will start to become more apparent.”
One of the more interesting details in the new Defender are its floating pillars, metal plates that float below the roof and above the vehicle’s beltline and are designed to hold different accessories, such as the exterior-mounted gear carrier, which holds up to 37.5 pounds of mucky equipment.
“To me the car is more interesting visually with it,” said McGovern, whose design sense is a natural outcome of his own interests.
“The honest thing is I’m not a car nut; I am a designer.”
In 2019, Land Rover’s U.S. sales hit a record 94,736 units; up 3% from 2018. With the coming Land Rover Defender, expect consumers to break that record in 2020.
As McGovern put it, “They can see the value of getting that balance between design leadership and engineering integrity.”


text:
Fan Art Reimagines Xbox Series X as Inevitable "Xbox Series S"
With the next console generation fast approaching, an Xbox fan took it upon themselves to reimagine the inevitable updated version of the Xbox Series X, aptly naming it the “Xbox Series S.” Despite concerns that both the PS5 and Xbox Series X could be delayed, fans are still showcasing their excitement for – and speculation regarding – the upcoming systems. The Xbox Series X was announced as Project Scarlett at E3 2019, with its official name and design unveiled at The Game Awards 2019. Since then, the industry has been buzzing with rumors and hearsay, with only official revelations by Microsoft quelling inaccurate information, such as the reveal of the console’s full specifications.More...
Read Full Story at ScreenRant
Hey, don't leave without the comment!ERROR,db,Something is wrong in your syntax obok 'Xbox Series S"") AND ID<>79192 ORDER BY MATCH(TITLE) AGAINST ("Fan Art Reimagine' w linii 1

domain: entertainment


BNSF intermodal facility on hold as Port of Los Angeles and City ponder next move
A $500 million intermodal project in Southern California is on indefinite hold as its backers, the Port of Los Angeles, the City of Los Angeles and BNSF, wrangle with legal challenges over the new facility.
The five members of the Port of Los Angeles’ harbor commission will meet with their attorneys today on the future of the Southern California International Gateway, a 153-acre, near-dock railyard aimed at handling the growing container volumes coming out of the top two ports in the U.S.
Under the plan, BNSF will build the near-dock railyard on land to be leased from the Los Angeles Harbor Department for fifty years. The project, which would take three years to complete, would first handle 570,800 twenty foot equivalent units (teus), before eventually hitting full capacity of 2.8 million teus.
But the Gateway project, which was first proposed in 2005, must go back to the drawing board due to extensive legal challenges from the nearby City of Long Beach, residents and businesses adjacent to the project.
The opponents scored a legal victory in January when a California appellate court partially upheld a decision from a lower court that said the Gateway’s sponsors did not address certain issues in the final environmental impact report.
The appellate court said that the City of Los Angeles will have to “suspend project activities” until a revised environmental impact report is submitted.
The Port of Los Angeles said in a statement that it has already set aside its prior approval of the environmental impact report as well as the 50-year operating permit to BNSF. It said the onus is now on the City of Los Angeles and BNSF to find a way to move it through the regulatory process.
“The City has suspended all (Gateway) project activities, which shall not resume unless the City and BNSF take future actions to certify a revised (environmental impact report) . . . and adopt related environmental and project approvals,” the Port of Los Angeles said.
The City of Long Beach, parts of which the Gateway site will straddle, has opposed the project due to its impact on local residents. Attorneys for Long Beach have highlighted that the all-hours intermodal facility would be located near schools and homes.


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George Szirtes 1948–-
Contemporary British poet, literary critic, and translator.
The following entry provides information from 1979 through 2001 on the life and career of Szirtes.
Szirtes is best known for his ability to tackle multifaceted historical issues with a clarity of vision and deep human sympathy. His unique perspective enables him to delve deep into the realm of painful history while maintaining a unique balance of formal lyric language and vibrant imagery. His enlightening poetry has received nearly universal critical acclaim.
George Szirtes was born in Budapest, Hungary, on November 29, 1948 to Laszlo and Magdalena Szirtes. His father was an engineer and his mother was a photographer. Szirtes emigrated with his family to London, England in 1956 after the Hungarian uprising. Szirtes attended the Harrow School of Art from 1968-69. On July 11, 1970, Szirtes married Clarissa `, who is also an artist, and they had two children, Thomas and Helen. Szirtes went on to earn a B.A. from Leeds College of Art in 1972, and an A.T.C. from the University of London in 1973. Szirtes' held part-time teaching jobs until 1975, when he became head of art at the Hitchin Girls' School, where he remained until 1980. He was the director of art and history of art at St. Christopher School in Letchworth, England from 1980-89. In 1989, he divided his time between St. Christopher School and the Norfolk Institute of Art and Design, where he became a senior lecturer in poetry in 1991. In addition, he has worked as a freelance writer and translator since 1987. Szirtes began publishing his poetry in 1972, though he did not receive a great deal of critical acclaim until 1979's The Slant Door, which won him a Geoffrey Faber Memorial Prize from Faber & Faber Ltd./Arts Council in 1980. Among other accolades, Szirtes was elected fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 1982. He subsequently won an Arts Council fellowship in 1984. His work was listed among the Poetry Book Society choices and recommendations in 1984, 1986 and 1988, he was granted a British Council fellowship in 1985, he received the Cholmondely Prize for Poetry in 1987, and he held the post of Writer in Residence at Trinity College, Dublin, in 2000. A return trip to Hungary in 1984 renewed Szirtes' interest in his native country and inspired him to begin translating into English the works of contemporary Hungarian poets. His first translation, Imre Madách's The Tragedy of Man, was published in 1989. He has since translated nine more volumes of poetry Hungarian poets, as well as anthologies of poets past and present. His translations won the Dery prize for translation in 1991 and the Gold Star of the Hungarian Republic in the same year. In addition, he won a European Poetry Translation Prize in 1995 for his translation of Zsuzsa Rakovszky's New Life (1994). Szirtes' works appear regularly in national and international anthologies. His poetry has also been translated into several other European languages. A few of his poems appear in anthologies aimed at children. He currently resides in England and is a member of International PEN, and a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.
Szirtes published his first book of poetry, Poems, in 1972. But it wasn’t until he published The Slant Door in 1979, which was hailed as a master work, that Szirtes earned critical acclaim and garnering him international attention for the first time. Szirtes continued to publish his poetry and won more critical acclaim with the publication of The Photographer in Winter (1986), Metro (1988), and Bridge Passages (1991). His tour de force, Portrait of my Father in an English Landscape, published in 1998, cemented his reputation as a master of complex poetic forms. More recent works, such as The Budapest File (2000) and An English Apocalypse (2001), have only added to his reputation. In addition to his own poetry, Szirtes has worked tirelessly to translate the work of contemporary Hungarian poets into English. He translated and co-edited an anthology, The Colonnade of Teeth: Twentieth Century Hungarian Poetry, published in 1996, which has also received praise from critics all over the globe.
George Szirtes started publishing his poetry in 1972, but his poetry went largely ignored in literary circles until the publication of The Slant Door. The critical reception this volume received was unusual for a poet as little known as Szirtes was at that time. Subsequent works were received with similar accolades, though critics are often divided when discussing Szirtes' writing style. Some offer awed praise for his use of iambic pentameter, his sonnets, and complicated structures that pull the final lines from 13 different stanzas and includes them in a final summary sonnet at the end of a chapter of verse. Others complain about his ornate and stilted use of language. Alan Brownjohn critiques, in a review ofThe Slant Door in Encounter, the poet's “habits of using the painter's eye for intriguing detail to get poems off the ground and employing a rather garish surrealist fantasy.” Also writing in Encounter, Alan Jenkins praises Szirtes’ poetry for its “strange and dangerous benedictions, and for its subtle paradoxes and contradictions...” There seems to be little middle ground in this debate—critics either love the structure and complexity of his formal style or they declaim it as a weak crutch.
The Iron Clouds 1975
A Mandeville Troika [with Neil Power and Peter Scupham] 1977
An Illustrated Alphabet 1978
Poetry Introduction 4 [with others] 1978
At the Sink 1978
Silver Age 1979
The Slant Door 1979
Sermon on a Ship 1980
Homage to Cheval 1981
November and May 1981
The Kissing Place 1982
Short Wave 1984
The Photographer in Winter 1986
Bridge Passages 1991
Blind Field 1994
Selected Poems 1996
Portrait of my Father in an English Landscape 1998
The Budapest File 2000
An English Apocalypse 2001
A Starwheel Portfolio, The Transparent Room, Strict Seasons, Spring Offensive, Cloud Station, States of Undress [editor, 6 vols.] (verse and etching portfolios) 1978-84
Imre Madách: The Tragedy of Man [translator] (play) 1989
Sándor Csóri: Barbarian Prayer [translator] (poetry) 1989
István Vas: Through the Smoke [translator] (poetry) 1989
Dezsō Kosztolányi: Anna Édes [translator] (novel) 1991
Ottó Orbán: The Blood of the Walsungs [translator] (poetry) 1993
Zsuzsa Rakovszky: New Life [translator] (poetry) 1994
The Collected Poems of Freda Downie (poetry) 1995
The Colonnade of Teeth: Twentieth Century Hungarian Poetry [co-editor and translator] (poetry) 1996
The Red All Over Riddle Book (children's book) 1997
The Lost Rider: Hungarian Poetry 16-20th Century [editor and translator] (poetry) 1998
Gyula Krúdy: The Adventures of Sindbad [translator] (short stories) 1999
Lászlo Krasznahorkai: The Melancholy of Resistance Novel [translator] (novel) 2000
Exercise of Power: The art of Ana Maria Pacheco (biography) 2001
New Writing 10 [editor, with Penelope Lively] (anthology) 2001
The Night of Akhenaton: Selected Poems of Ágnes Nemes Nagy [translator] (poetry) 2003
William Palmer (review date December 1980)
SOURCE: Palmer, William. “A New Slant.” Poetry Review 70, no. 3 (December 1980): 68-70.
[In the following review, Palmer writes favorably about The Slant Door.]
George Szirtes has achieved in The Slant Door that rare thing—a book that cannot be wrapped in a five hundred word review and dropped to oblivion. It is one of the best first books of poetry to be published in the past few years, that is, if we judge by successful poems and not by promise or critically adduced intentions.
This, of course, is to take the book as a whole, and in an unusually meaty book, with poems crowded together on the page, there is a fair amount of XXth century poetic stock:
Sunlight laces the book The dying light shudders The trees fling their doily patterns high
The last line is from one of those of poems about the pathos of old age that now seem obligatory in any young poet's book.
But there is also this:
Look, it has snowed in the light And the roads are bright as skin Lit by the moon: the snow is moonlight And there will be no morning ever again, We shall live in white like brides Never stirring, nor shall light be over To discover the bed unmade or the windows thrown wide Or the street stopped in its course like a river.
This may appear slight at first, and this is the whole poem, but it is a whole poem and shows a quite unforced balance and subtlety of thought and rhythm as the language is moved through modulation and oppositions, moved to that last line and held there. It has mastery and fitness; the scene is general, we can supply the detail; what is left out is the presence of the poet; for its duration we exist in the poem.
In ‘Salon des Indépendants’, the view is specific, frozen in the past and lifted out like a glass slide; unless I am mistaken the poem is an accurate translation into words of a painting by the Douanier Rousseau. Another poem, ‘Nativity Scene’, seems to imitate the spring steel lines of a Crivelli:
The caged god turns in his mother's arms and presses Against her ribs with a unique strength …
Where in a lesser poet this cold yet fiery poem would be typical of a number of cold look-alikes, the brilliance of description causes one to turn back...
(The entire section is 974 words.)
Alan Jenkins (essay date August 1982)
SOURCE: Jenkins, Alan. “A Barbarous Eloquence.” Encounter 59, no. 2 (August 1982): 55-61.
[In the following essay, Jenkins discusses Szirtes's poetic style.]
The poems contained in George Szirtes's November and May are largely concerned with propitiating the grimmer or less manageable gods and with trying to wrest a quirky, by no means comforting morality—in both senses—from the already quirky occurrences of the everyday and the domestic. The epigraph from Mac-Neice's “Snow” (“There is more than glass between the snow and the huge roses”) suggests that Szirtes has sensed the limitations of meticulousness, starkness, cleanliness, a strong visual...
(The entire section is 495 words.)
John Lucas (essay date 13 January 1984)
SOURCE: Lucas, John. “Sight Lines.” New Statesman 107 (13 January 1984): 24-5.
[In the following essay, Lucas writes about Szirtes's word choice and use of rhythm.]
There is more than a trace of Geoffrey Grigson in the manner of George Szirtes' relish for the observable world. Describing a bullfinch perched on a lilac flower, he says that the bird's weight ‘bothered the lilac, she bent / a little, her small tent / of pleasure collapsing / inward with the swaying’. Although those lines could never be mistaken for Grigson, the weighting and positioning of rhyme and phrase owe something to his example. In Short Wave, notation becomes poetry: ‘Tired, you...
(The entire section is 630 words.)
Andrew Motion (review date April 1984)
SOURCE: Motion, Andrew. “Too True.” Poetry Review 74, no. 1 (April 1984): 64.
[In the following review, Motion discusses the love poetry of Szirtes.]
Once in a while, or maybe only once in a lifetime, most of us want to write love poems. And most of us, especially if the love we want to write about is happy, find it dismayingly difficult. Why? The most obvious reason—or at least the most commonly given, and the one made famous by Larkin—is that ‘happiness writes white’. It's an appealing excuse for the elegiac English sensibility. But behind it lies a complicated question about audience. It's usual for poets to claim that their relationship with their...
(The entire section is 765 words.)
John Lucas (review date 26 August 1988)
SOURCE: Lucas, John. “A Rose for the Betrayed World.” New Statesman 1, no. 12 (26 August 1988): 38.
[In the following review, Lucas looks at the political nature of poems in Szirtes's collection Metro.]
At the end of “Five Men”, a poem which records with level, factual honesty the assassination of political dissidents (or so one assumes them to be), Zbigniew Herbert remarks that a poet can also “once again / in dead earnest / offer to the betrayed world / a rose.” He does not intend to mock such earnestness. But then what is the subject for poetry? Or rather, is it possible to find a procedure—a tone, a style, a formal manner—that makes possible...
(The entire section is 868 words.)
Mark Ford (essay date 19 January 1989)
SOURCE: Ford, Mark. “Sssnnnwhuffffll.” London Review of Books 11, no. 2 (19 January 1989): 14-5.
[In the following essay, Ford discusses the themes of Szirtes's book Metro.]
George Szirtes is a less frolicsome poet than Morgan, and his new volume, Metro, has him dealing with particularly grim subject-matter. The book's long title poem is set in the Hungary of 1944-45. The country has been overrun by fascist forces, and Hungarian Jews, including the poet's own mother, are being rounded up and sent to concentration camps. The poem's narrative cuts between his own childhood memories of Hungary and the fates of various branches of the Szirtes family, but mainly...
(The entire section is 672 words.)
George Szirtes (essay date spring 1989)
SOURCE: Szirtes, George. “Being Remade As an English Poet.” New Hungarian Quarterly 30, no. 113 (spring 1989): 149-59.
[In the following essay, Szirtes writes about his youth and writing poetry in a new language.]
At the age of twenty-seven I felt “I needed to be remade as an English poet.” It was of course a form of groping in the dark. What does it mean to be remade? If I ask myself this question now I am immediately led back into that odd twilight world in which the past becomes an unwitting liar, the clear conclusions that spring from it fade like mirages, and even the apparent certainties of what has come to be begin to lose their definition. Now I travel...
(The entire section is 5221 words.)
Stephen Romer (review date 16 August 1991)
SOURCE: Romer, Stephen. “Events through Glass.” Times Literary Supplement, no. 4611 (16 August 1991): 24.
[In the following review, Romer discusses the emotions found in the poetry of Szirtes's Bridge Passages.]
Geòrge Szirtes's new book carries the dedication “For my friends in Hungary”, which puts us instantly in the picture, given that most of the poems were composed in Hungary itself during the momentous months of 1989-90. To outsiders, the demise of the Communist regime there was perhaps less spectacular, and in a sense less public, than the similar events in Poland, Czechoslovakia, and especially Romania. As if in keeping with our more muffled perception...
(The entire section is 850 words.)
Stan Smith (review date 9 January 1992)
SOURCE: Smith, Stan. “Imagining the Suburbs.” London Review of Books 14, no. 1 (9 January 1992): 22-3.
[In the following review, Smith discusses the imagery in Szirtes's book Bridge Passages.]
Whole systems of thought have been founded on the French language's inability to distinguish differing from deferring. Perhaps Napoleon is to blame (‘Not tonight, Josephine’). In Britain, we do things differently. Whereas Baudelaire's vrai voyageur preferred travelling joyfully to the letdowns of arrival—in modern terms, couldn't stop playing with his signifier—Forster's Mrs Moore remains convinced that there is a real India to make her passage to, Conrad's...
(The entire section is 2624 words.)
Nicholas Murray (review date 7 June 1996)
SOURCE: Murray, Nicholas. “Retro to the Metro.” Times Literary Supplement, no. 4862 (7 June 1996): 26.
[In the following review, Murray examines Szirtes's selections for his book Selected Poems. 1976-1996.]
“I'm merely a reporter whose truth lies / in diction clear as water”, declares the narrator of “Street Entertainment”, a poem from Bridge Passages (1991), the sixth of the seven collections raided for this impressively consistent and accomplished Selected Poems: 1976-1996. George Szirtes has always cast a cool eye on the human and the physical landscapes—often reading one in terms of the other—and is reluctant to draw too many...
(The entire section is 706 words.)
Caitriona O'Reilly (essay date March-April 1999)
SOURCE: O'Reilly, Caitriona. “Possibilities of Vision.” Poetry Nation Review 25, no. 4 (March-April 1999): 79-80.
[In the following essay, O'Reilly discusses the technical merit of Szirtes's poetry in his book Portrait of My Father in an English Landscape.]
Portrait of my Father in an English Landscape is Hungarian-born poet George Szirtes's most recent collection. The volume is concerned with the poet's memories of his family and early childhood in Eastern Europe, and in an England overshadowed by deprivation and war. This translates symbolically into a poetry which is obsessed by effacement and decay. ‘Four Villonesques on Desire’ comprise a witty...
(The entire section is 374 words.)
Judith Kitchen (essay date summer 1999)
SOURCE: Kitchen, Judith. “Tensions.” Georgia Review 53, no. 2 (summer 1999): 368-84.
[In the following essay, Kitchen explores the father-son relationships described in Szirtes's poetry volume Portrait of My Father in an English Landscape.]
Portrait of My Father in an English Landscape by George Szirtes is one of the most elegantly formal books I've read in recent years. Szirtes is a master of iambic pentameter, of the sonnet in particular, and seems to have found ways to make English rhymes sound new. One way he does this is through innovative use of enjambment; the stanzas unfold seamlessly while the intricacy of the pattern establishes itself, as in the...
(The entire section is 1011 words.)
George Szirtes with András Gerevich (interview date winter 2001)
SOURCE: Szirtes, George with András Gerevich. “Hungarian Roots, English Traditions.” Hungarian Quarterly 42, no. 164 (winter 2001): 100-06.
[In the following interview, Szirtes and Gerevich discuss Szirtes's life and work.]
George Szirtes, born in Budapest in 1948, left Hungary with his family as a child in 1956 and settled in England. So far he has published 13 volumes of poetry, the most recent of which are The Budapest File, Bloodaxe/Corvina, 2000, a collection of his poems on Hungarian topics, and An English Apocalypse, Bloodaxe, 2001. He has received numerous prestigious British awards, including the Faber Prize and the Cholmondeley Award. He...
(The entire section is 3237 words.)
James Sutherland-Smith (review date September-October 2001)
SOURCE: Sutherland-Smith, James. “In and Out of Focus.” Poetry Nation Review 28, no. 1 (September-October 2001): 68-9.
[In the following review, Sutherland-Smith discusses Szirtes's life in relation to his book The Budapest File.]
George Szirtes so far has enjoyed a distinguished career as a poet and translator with the occasional acerbic review to add bite. His change of English publisher has resulted in a Collected poems about Budapest and Central Europe. The book is dedicated to the memory of his mother and to his father both of whom emerge as remarkable presences in the book, as does the poet himself, rather more so than the city of Budapest which...
(The entire section is 1503 words.)
James Hopkin (essay date 27 October 2001)
SOURCE: Hopkin, James. “Wrestling with Englishness.” Guardian (27 October 2001): 11.
[In the following essay, Hopkin writes about Szirtes's transition from being Hungarian to being English.]
’Xenophobia is not what it used to be,” says Anglo-Hungarian poet and translator George Szirtes, and he should know. Ever since he walked across the Austrian border as an eight-year-old refugee in 1956, Szirtes has lived the life of a hyphenated being, never quite belonging to his adopted country, England, and never quite leaving behind his native Hungary.
When he began writing in his late teens, he realised that the struggle for identity was located in...
(The entire section is 957 words.)
Marshall, Alan. “Forgive this Garrulousness.” Daily Telegraph (16 December 2000): 1.
Critiques Szirtes's writing style.
Murray Davis, Robert. Review of The Budapest File. World Literature Today 75, no. 2 (spring 2001): 342.
Gives a quick review of Szirtes's book The Budapest File.
Additional coverage of Szirtes' life and career is contained in the following sources published by the Gale Group: Contemporary Authors, Vol. 109; Contemporary Authors New Revision Series, Vols. 27, 61, 117; Contemporary Literary Criticism, Vol. 46; Contemporary Poets,...
(The entire section is 74 words.)


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Will the world run out of food?
David Proenza, President of the International Congress on Controlled Environment Agriculture [ICCEA] mentioned some interesting facts during a recent keynote address.
He highlighted the fact that global farmers are facing severe challenges, expected to soar during this century if the status quo on food production stays unchanged.
Some of the main factors mentioned include
- The ever increasing cost of energy, mechanisation and labour
-- Urbanisation - people moving into cities!
--- Water shortages - less water for crop production
---- Shrinking farmland areas suitable for crop production
----- Increased cost of transport
------ High use of chemicals and pesticides, which might be detrimental to our health
------- Controlling pests and diseases
------- -Climate change and inclement weather.
These are only part of the challenges that are treatening food insecurity and food scarcity during droughts, freezing weather, heavy rainfalls, floods and other common natural disasters.
People are moving into cities!
Cities with the biggest population
- Tokyo, Japan, with 38 million dwellers, tops the list as reported by the UN.
- Delhi, India (25 million inhabitants), expanded 40% over the past decade and is expected to rise swiftly to 36 million by 2030!
- Mexico City, Mumbai and São Paulo each has around 21 million urban inhabitants.
- Osaka, Japan has a population just above 20 million.
- Beijing, the Chinese capital, also has about 20 million city dwellers, followed closely by
- The New York-Newark area and Cairo; with around 18.5 million inhabitants each.
The UN report predicts that, towards 2050, India will top the chart with 404 million urban inhabitants while China will come second with 292 million city dwellers, with Nigeria third with 212 million inhabitants.
There will be many megacities with 20, and even 40 million people, with some running up to 120 million people (more than double the total South African population!) living in one city.
From 1950 to 1960, 60% of the growth of megacities was in the developing world.
Between 2000 and 2010, the developing countries accounted for 90% of the growth of megacities.
Out of the 28 biggest cities on Earth, only six are in the developed countries.
Global food output will have to double 50 years from now to meet the demand for food for this rapidly expanding population.
However, almost everything that we need to increase the food production by 50% is becoming scarcer and more expensive every day. These items include soil, water, energy, nutrients, technology, fish, capital and a stable, reliable climate.
It is this collision between huge demand and huge scarcities that is making food the challenge of our time.
Farmers will be expected to produce 50% more food from shrinking production areas using much less water and energy than today.
Ten major challenges of our age:
Population explosion - expected to reach 10,000,000,000 x 2050!
Hunger – 870 million people go to bed hungry every night! (UN 2012 survey).
Water – can trigger world War 3. Agriculture uses 80% of all the freshwater on the planet.
Energy – fossil fuel no longer the long-term answer – renewable energy!
Waste – building up at alarming rates but already replaces coal and nuclear power for electricity generation in Sweden and other countries.
Urbanisation – 80% urban population by 2050; increasing food demand in cities
Shortages – arable land, fresh water, fertilisers, energy et cetera
Obesity – 1.4 billion people are overweight(WHO 2008 survey). Statistically, food is three times more lethal than tobacco!
Pollution – including chemicals such as pesticides etc.; health and other issues
Greenhouse gas emissions and climate change.
Help us to address the Critical issues of our time: Health, Wealth & Improving the environment.
Join our group on our home page now!

domain: news


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Schoolchildren have become pawns in the fierce conflict between Cameroon’s mainly French-speaking government and separatist fighters demanding independence for the country’s English-speaking heartlands.
The separatists are enforcing a lockdown across cities, towns and villages in the North-West and South-West regions to ensure schools remain shut for a fourth academic year in a row.
The regions are heavily militarised, with troops battling insurgents who use hit-and-run tactics.
Schools were due to open on 2 September – instead parents and children have been fleeing their homes in their thousands as they fear an escalation of the conflict.
Most schools in the two regions – including in villages – have been empty for three years, with buildings covered by long grass.
In some areas, the government deployed troops to guard classrooms but with the army being the main enemy of the separatists, this increased the risk of attacks by separatist gunmen.
The United Nations Children’s Fund, Unicef, says the ban on education has affected about 600,000 children, with more than 80% of schools shut and at least 74 schools destroyed in the troubled regions.
In one incident, 80 pupils, their principal and a teacher – who defied the lockdown – were kidnapped last year, before being released about a week later.
Separatist fighters denied involvement, but the government blamed them for the abductions.
The conflict has its roots in the government’s decision to increase the use of French in schools and courts in the mainly English-speaking regions in 2016.
It triggered mass protests and morphed into a rebellion the following year as some civilians – angry that the government deployed troops to crush the protests – took up arms.
Thousands of people – civilians, separatists and soldiers – have been killed and more than 500,000 displaced.
The economy is also in ruins, with businesses going bankrupt and workers not being paid.
Worst of all, children have been orphaned and some of them have gone into the bush to join one of the many armed groups that have emerged to fight for what they call the independent state of Ambazonia.
What was once unthinkable has become a reality: Cameroon – like some other African states – now has child soldiers.
They blame government troops for the deaths of their parents and have vowed to take revenge.
The separatists have targeted schools, more than anything else, because they are the softest of targets, and because they want to thwart the government’s efforts to make children – the next generation of English-speaking Cameroonians – fall under greater French influence.
In the past, separatists ordered lockdowns for a day – usually on a Monday. Anyone who defied the order were branded “sell-outs”, and risked being assaulted and even killed. This time, the lockdown will be for two and possibly three weeks.
Bamenda – the biggest English-speaking city with a population of about 400,000 – has been in lockdown since last week, while in other areas the lockdown started this week.
In the days leading up to the lockdown, transport fares more than doubled as thousands of people fled villages, towns and cities for safer areas in mainly French-speaking Cameroon – including the capital, Yaoundé, and the commercial heartland of Douala.
This has worsened the humanitarian crisis, with some people stranded at bus stations in the two cities because they have nowhere to go.
Despite this, some government officials have buried their heads in the sand – the North-West governor, Adolphe Lélé L’Afrique, described those fleeing as holidaymakers returning to their homes before the start of the new academic year.
With such an attitude, many people are in despair, wondering whether there is a future for them – and more importantly their children – in mainly English-speaking Cameroon or whether they should emigrate.
I myself moved to Canada in January, as Bamenda – where I lived – became too dangerous for me to work as a journalist.
Indonesia Deports 36 Igbo Boys After Prophet Odumeje’s Crusade
Not less than thirty six (36) Nigerians who are of Igbo extraction have been reportedly deported from Indonesia after controversial Onitsha-based clergyman, Prophet Chukwuemeka Odumeje recently visited and held a crusade in the country.
The church program was reportedly organized by some Nigerians living in Jakarta and it allegedly began with spraying of money which is said to be part of the Anambra-based Pastor’s style of ministration.
Post Views: 48 Not less than thirty six (36) Nigerians who are of Igbo extraction have been reportedly deported from Indonesia after controversial Onitsha-based clergyman, Prophet Chukwuemeka Odumeje recently visited and held a crusade in the country. The church program was reportedly organized by some Nigerians living in Jakarta and it allegedly began with spraying of money which is said to be part of the Anambra-based Pastor’s style of ministration. READ ALSO: Xenophobia: “I Will Bring Down South Africa”, Weird Nigerian Prophet Vows [VIDEO] In their usual practise, Odumeje and his disciples turned the crusade ground into a money spraying festival. Their flamboyant display of wealth however caught the attention of the authorities who raided the venue and reportedly arrested some persons, and subsequently deported about 36 of them who were domiciled in the country illegally. More to follow…
HOW ISIS LEADER DIED DURING US RAID
President Donald Trump on Sunday said that elusive Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was killed, dying “like a dog,” in a daring, nighttime raid by US special forces deep in northwest Syria.
Trump told the nation in a televised address from the White House that US forces killed a “large number” of Islamic State militants during the raid which culminated in cornering Baghdadi in a tunnel, where he set off a suicide vest.
“He ignited his vest, killing himself,” Trump said.
“He died after running into a dead end tunnel, whimpering and crying and screaming all the way,” Trump said, adding that three of Baghdadi’s children also died in the blast.
Trump said that the raid — which required flying more than an hour by helicopter in both directions from an undisclosed base — had been accomplished by help from Russia, Syria, Turkey and Iraq.
Special forces “executed a dangerous and daring nighttime raid in northwestern Syria and accomplished their mission in grand style.”
At its height, Islamic State-controlled swaths of Iraq and Syria in a self-declared state known as a caliphate, characterized by the brutal imposition of a puritanical version of Islam.
In addition to oppressing the people it governed, Islamic State planned or inspired terrorism attacks across Europe, while using expertise in social media to lure large numbers of foreign volunteers.
It took years of war, in which Islamic State became notorious for mass executions and sickening hostage murders, before the caliphate’s final slice of territory in Syria was seized this March.
The death of Baghdadi comes as a big boost for Trump, whose abrupt decision to withdraw a small but effective deployment of US forces from Syria caused fears that it would give Islamic State remnants and sleeper cells a chance to regroup.
Trump took a storm of criticism, including from his own usually loyal Republican Party.
In keeping with his liking for showmanship, Trump had teased the news late Saturday with an enigmatic tweet saying merely that “Something very big has just happened!”
A war monitor said US helicopters dropped forces in an area of Syria’s Idlib province where “groups linked to the Islamic State group” were present.
The helicopters targeted a home and a car outside the village of Barisha in Idlib province, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which is based in Britain but relies on a network of sources inside Syria for its information
The operation killed nine people including an IS senior leader called Abu Yamaan as well as a child and two women, it said.
An AFP correspondent outside Barisha saw a minibus scorched to cinders by the side of the road, and windows shattered in a neighbour’s house surrounded by red agricultural land dotted with olive trees.
A resident in the area who gave his name as Abdel Hameed said he rushed to the place of the attack after he heard helicopters, gunfire and strikes in the night.
“The home had collapsed and next to it there was a destroyed tent and vehicle. There were two people killed inside” the car, he said.
From the outskirts of Barisha, an inhabitant of a camp for the displaced also heard helicopters followed by what he described as US-led coalition air strikes.
They “were flying very low, causing great panic among the people,” Ahmed Hassawi told AFP by phone.
Another resident, who gave his name as Abu Ahmad and lives less than 100 meters away from the site of the destroyed house, said he heard voices “speaking a foreign language” during the raid.
The area of the night-time operation had been cordoned off by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, a group dominated by members of Syria’s former Al-Qaeda affiliate controlling Idlib.
Between the trees, bulldozers could be seen at the site, clearing out the rubble.
– ‘Joint Intelligence’
Turkey, which has been waging an offensive against the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) in northeast Syria in recent weeks, had “advance knowledge” about the raid, a senior Turkish official said.
“To the best of my knowledge, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi arrived at this location 48 hours prior to the raid,” the official told AFP.
The commander-in-chief of the SDF, who have been fighting IS in Syria, said the operation came after “joint intelligence work” with American forces.
Trump also said that Iraq had been “very good” over the raid.
He said no US soldiers were wounded, despite “doing a lot of shooting” and “a lot of blasting.” The only US casualty was a military dog in the tunnel with the trapped Islamic State leader.
Long pursued by the US-led coalition against IS, Baghdadi has been erroneously reported dead several times in recent years.$25 million reward
Baghdadi — an Iraqi native believed to be around 48 years old — was rarely seen.
After 2014 he disappeared from sight, only surfacing in a video in April with a wiry grey and red beard and an assault rifle at his side, as he encouraged followers to “take revenge” after the group’s territorial defeat.
His reappearance was seen as a reassertion of his leadership of a group that — despite its March defeat — has spread from the Middle East to Asia and Africa and claimed several deadly attacks in Europe.
The US State Department had posted a $25 million reward for information on his whereabouts.
In September, the group released an audio message said to be from Baghdadi praising the operations of IS affiliates in other regions.
It also called on scattered IS fighters to regroup and try to free thousands of their comrades held in jails and camps by the SDF in northeastern Syria.
Under U.S Law, IPOB NOT a terrorist group – USA
The Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) is not viewed as a terrorist organization by the United States.
A spokesman for the US Embassy in Nigeria, Russell Brooks made this known to PUNCH news.
He said, “The United States Government is strongly committed to Nigeria’s unity. Important political and economic issues affecting the Nigerian people, such as the allocation of resources, are worthwhile topics for respectful debate in a democracy.
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domain: sociology


text:
A sleek, modern unisex wedding band or men's ring. This ring is flat and smooth for a clean-edged minimal appearance. The inside edges are comfort-fit for a polished, easy wear. The lightweight-to-medium width is sturdy and strong, without being uncomfortably thick.
Please contact us if your size is not represented! We are limited in the number of options our website allows.

domain: design


text:
We stayed at this hotel over the Christmas holiday. We were visiting family and wanted inexpensive accommodations. The Quality Inn provided us a clean comfortable stay.
This hotel has a great location, centrally located between the Walt Disney World, Universal Studios,Sea World and other area attractions. Since it was Christmas the hotel was filled to capacity at night, but emptied out during the day.
They do serve continental breakfast, but you have to get there VERY early to avoid a long line and wait for food and a table.
I would certainly stay here again.
- Official Description (provided by the hotel):
- Whether traveling for business or pleasure, make the Quality Suites Universal your home away from home whe visiting Orlando. Our great location, affordable rates and top-notch service are the winning combination you are looking for. ... more less
- Reservation Options:
- TripAdvisor is proud to partner with Booking.com, Expedia, Hotels.com, Priceline, Ctrip TA, Choice Hotels, Travelocity, TripOnline SA, Hotwire, Cheap Tickets, Cancelon, Agoda, getaroom.com and HotelQuickly so you can book your Quality Suites Universal South reservations with confidence. We help millions of travelers each month to find the perfect hotel for both vacation and business trips, always with the best discounts and special offers.
- Also Known As:
- Quality Suites Universal South Hotel Orlando
- Comfort Suites Orlando
- Orlando Comfort Suites
- Comfort Suite Orlando


text:
NEW YORK CITY PARENTS UNION STATEMENT ON THE RELEASE OF THE NEW YORK CITY DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION’S SCHOOL CLOSINGS LIST
New York, NY– Today, the New York City Department of Education (“DOE”) released the first of its annual list of schools to be closed or phased out for “poor performance.” The New York City Parents Union is not surprised by the DOE’s actions. The DOE has made this exercise an annual event – one where parent and community voices are ignored because of “Mayoral Control” (formally known as the New York City School Governance Law.)
Mayoral Control gives Mayor Bloomberg and his successors full power over the public school system and thoroughly disenfranchises parents and communities. We are saddened to hear about these school closures but we will take action. The New York City Parents Union will seek to formally empower parents and communities by proposing changes to Mayoral Control that would become effective in 2014, when the next Mayor takes office and attempts to modify the New York City School Governance Law to suit his or her vision of control over our schools.
The New York City Parents Union will not perpetuate the the futility of attending Panel for Educational Policy (PEP) meetings where the Mayor has a “rubberstamping super majority” of the members. Mayor Bloomberg controls eight of thirteen PEP members — eight individuals who have never in the 10 years of Mayoral Control heard the voices of parents and communities and therefore have never voted for the best interests of our children.
In Mayor Bloomberg’s final year of office, the New York City Parents Union will aggressively lobby state legislators to give parents and communities policy power. We understand that, amongst other oppressive practices, the PEP’s composition must be significantly changed. Otherwise, we will continue to have our schools closed and the voices of our communities will continue to be ignored.


The Mercedes-Benz V-Class Marco Polo camper van is now on sale, with prices starting from £53,180 for the entry-level V 220 d Sport. The V 220 d AMG Line is £55,320, the V 250 d Sport £55,055 and the V 250 d AMG Line is £57,195. The Marco Polo is based on the popular V-Class, and can seat or sleep four people. It comes with a full range of equipment including a built-in kitchenette with a fridge and hob, plus a two-seater sofa which can easily be transformed into a bed (with under-bed storage). It also features a roof bed, accessed via an electrically raising roof; a wardrobe and a generous luggage compartment. A choice of two engines are available: 220 d and 250 d, both using a turbocharged 2.1-litre diesel engine. The 220 d has an output of 163 hp and maximum torque of 380 Nm, with fuel economy of 44.8 mpg on the combined cycle and CO2 emissions of 166 g/km. The 250 d generates 190 hp and 440 Nm of torque, can achieve 44.8 mpg and emits 169 g/km of CO2. A 7G-TRONIC PLUS automatic transmission is standard across the range.
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text:
by The Curious Scribbler
I was one of thirty people who joined Beca Davies, Project Community Outreach Officer for the Pendinas Hillfort Archaeology Project, on a relaxed evening stroll around the lower slopes of Pendinas yesterday evening.
We met at the gate in Parc Dinas, traversed the middle path across the flank of the hill and returned on the lower path past the horse field and across the former rubbish dump. Stopping at intervals along the route Beca and Richard Suggett contributed their knowledge and further insights emerged from the group.
The Wellington monument, which stands within the iron age hill fort, was the brainchild of William Eardley Richardes of Bryneithin. Richard Suggett reminded us that public subscription had been limited and as a result the proposed equestrian statue of the Duke of Wellington was never placed on top of the gun barrel column. This is perhaps not surprising in view of the fact that it was not constructed until 1856, forty years after the battle of Waterloo! William E Richardes had, as a young officer, served in the army of occupation after the victory, but this was a monument stimulated by the death of the Duke of Wellington aged 83 in 1852. Possibly local interest in him had considerably waned by this time. More significantly the monument was sited such as to form a splendid eyecatcher when viewed from William’s home at Bryneithin! Today it would be considered very poor taste to erect a modern monument on top of such an important ancient site!
We looked out, across the Tanybwlch flats and its palimpsest of the trotting races etched on the grass, towards the tree-fringed hill top which is the site of the original Aberystwyth castle. This was Gilbert de Clare’s ring and bailey castle with a wooden stockade, built in about 1110 AD and repeatedly fought over by the Welsh and the Norman invaders. Llywelyn Fawr took it back in 1221 and later built a stronger fortification on the stony headland to the north. In 1277 after more than 150 years of skirmishing Edward I massive stone castle was built there, north of the mouth of the Rheidol but the name was never changed. Perhaps to the King and his strategists In London the geographic niceties of Aberrheidol Castle seemed unimportant. Prof Fred Long brought us a similar story from the 1940s. Two war time radar stations were to be built in Ceredigion, one at Llanrhystud and one at Tanybwlch. The Tanybwlch site was soon deemed unsuitable, probably because of the risk of flooding. So the radar station was installed on Constitution Hill instead, but was always known in the army documentation as Tanybwlch!
Our outward path then led us past the foundations of a two storey farmhouse which stood beside a natural spring adjoining the path. Beca showed us a black and white photograph where the farm was occupied and the farmer stands surrounded by chickens outside his front door. A barn stood at right angles to the house. The image is thought to have been made around 1930.
I’ve since looked out a much earlier picture, in the collections of the National Library of Wales. Drawing Volume 56 contains twenty two North Ceredigion scenes described as the work of ‘Welsh Primitive’ c.1830-1853 . Pendinas seems a little taller lumpier than it looks today and the foreground shows fishermen apparently below a weir on the river. But the divisions of the fields on the slope, the farmhouse, and the track we walked along seem accurately represented. The monument is depicted on the top, so the picture cannot be before 1856.
The fishermen’s costumes may give further indication of the date.
Another view entitled Pendinas and the River Ystwyth shows the farm on the hill and a rider fording the river near a watermill below the south slopes. Here too the monument is shown.
We learnt about the common lizards and slow worms which are numerous on the Pendinas. Chloe Griffith’s Nature of our Village project has led to a much wider understanding of the importance of the site. The spring is home to palmate newts. This water source was presumably also important to the iron age inhabitants, for without it they would have had to carry water all the way up from the river Ystwyth at sea level.
A third picture in the volume is captioned Tanycastell Bridge Perhaps it was painted a few years earlier, for the monument is not to be seen.
One of the Welsh cobs at Spencer’s sheds entered into the spirit of the evening by trying to nibble Beca’s backpack. Frustrated in this endeavour it rhythmically and noisily kicked a big galvanised box until we all moved on.
The return journey was on a less historic path which was created after the old town rubbish dump had been covered with soil and re-vegetated in the 1990s. Willow scrub, gorse, brambles and nettles form an impenetrable undergrowth. Here the path cuts down through the reclaimed ground and fragments of bottles and polythene appear at the surface where they have been excavated by the rabbits, foxes and badgers whose paths run through the brambles and bushes.
In the 1980s I remember when the wire fences on the Tanybwlch flats were festooned with tattered polythene bags whipped away from the dump by the wind. We should be proud that Pendinas now looks almost as pristine as it did in these old paintings.

domain: geography


Meaning | Concept | Definition:
A Bowden cable is a cable mechanism that uses a thin braided cable that runs inside a flexible outer casing. The Bowden cable has been used since the late 19th century and was designed to replace complex cable and pulley mechanisms for bicycles and automobiles. The hollow outer casing of this device is usually constructed of spirally wound steel wire encased in a plastic sheath.
The inner wire of this mechanism is typically used to perform a pulling motion, although it sometimes provides a pushing force in shorter applications. Bowden cables are most often used in automobile and motorcycle clutches and throttles.
The first patent for the Bowden cable was issued to Ernest Monnington Bowden in 1896. The cable was originally intended for use as part of a bicycle braking mechanism and was well received by cycling enthusiasts.
Bowden’s original brake mechanism consisted of a brake calliper containing a set of rubber pads mounted in line with the metal rim of the rear wheel. The footpeg was controlled by a Bowden cable connected to a lever mounted on the bicycle’s handlebars. This early mechanism required expert installation to provide a reliable and effective braking force.
The outer shell of a typical Bowden cable is constructed of a tightly wound helix of square or round steel wire. This casing is usually lined with some type of plastic material to prevent rust and corrosion from forming on the external and internal steel wires.
Modern versions of this cable employ a plastic coating inside the casing to further reduce the risk of corrosion and rust. Usually some type of dry lubricant is applied to promote smooth operation of the inner wire. Some outer casings have hollow threaded ends to facilitate length adjustments when necessary.
In pulling operations, the inner wire of this cable is usually made of stranded steel wire. Heavy duty cables may also have a solid steel wire in the center of the stranded wire. Bowden cables in pushing operations generally contain a single steel wire inside a hollow plastic casing.
A Bowden cable that pulls is generally much more flexible than one that is used for pushing. In brake and shift applications, the inner cable ends often have a small piece of metal attached to them for connection purposes.
Bowden cables are used in a wide variety of automobile, motorcycle, and bicycle applications. Pull cables are commonly used for throttles, shifters, brakes, clutches, and cruise control devices.
Push cables are often used on throttles and chokes on lawnmowers and tractors. Bowden cables have many aeronautical applications, such as throttle controls, propeller pitch mechanisms, and flap adjustment.


Universal Credit will be rolled out in Ashfield this month and we are bracing ourselves for the fallout, writes Gloria De Piero MP.
The Tories’ disastrous policy has plunged people up and down the country into financial chaos and hardship, but still the Government insists on ploughing on with it.
Universal Credit is replacing a number of old benefits, including family tax credits, working tax credit, income-based jobseeker’s allowance and income-based employment and support allowance.
It is supposed to make the benefits system simpler and fairer, but even Government ministers admit that families will be worse off when on it – some by £200-plus a month.
The problems start with the claims process, which can only be done online and which causes instant access issues for some claimants.
Then there is the five-week wait for the first payment.
This wait means that claimants are facing financial pressure before even having a chance to see if the new benefit will work for them.
Rent arrears and an increase in food bank usage are just two of the recognised consequences of this wait.
In-work poverty is increasing and I am extremely concerned that child poverty will get worse in the coming months.
Despite this catalogue of failings, the Government is refusing to either halt or slow down the rollout.
The poorest and most vulnerable in our society are doing more, and suffering more, to help this country balance its books than the bankers who caused the recession in the first place.
Universal Credit was designed to lift people out of poverty and to make work pay but it does neither.
If the Government genuinely wanted work to be a route out of poverty it would adopt Labour’s policy of introducing a £10 National Living Wage.
This country needs a system that supports people in time of need, which allows them to afford to live and smooths the transition into work. Right now, only a Labour Government can provide that solution.


text:
Civil society is made up of associations, mainly non governmental organisations (NGO) and trade unions that are distinct from the public sector, and are not part of political parties. Civil society is also composed of diversified groups concerned with issues related to development, and various aspects of human rights. In its nature, it is diverse, dynamic, and constantly changing because new members are regularly cropping up as new societal issues arise. The main role of civil society is to defend the interests of citizens, based on principles and values of justice, equality, and equity. It is supposed to ensure that these values and principles guide policy formulation and implementation in all areas of society to the benefit of all, especially the poor and disabled.
Civil society strengthens the state by holding it accountable and ensuring that the state involves and listens to the voices and demands of citizens. Civil society proposes, persuades, challenges, opposes, and even causes the reversal of policies that work to the detriment of the people. It is populated by groups that are usually described as “citizen voices” because they ensure that government is transparent, accountable, and participatory, so as to be competent to serve the interests of all the people.
These activities of civil society usually cause one-party and repressive regimes to consider them as voices of dissent that undermine the government. This is why during the one-party days in Cameroon, the regime acted like a vast refrigerator that reduced civil society to a stupor. This torpor replaced the habits of freedom with servitude, and the sovereignty of the people with the whims and caprices of administrative officials.
Events of the early ‘90s gave the impression that the refrigerator had broken down at last, and that the thaw was causing civil society to rear its head. The role of the bar council - which is part of civil society – in the Yondo Black affair left the impression that civil society would play an important role in the democratisation process in the country. Unfortunately, that has been the only significant thing that can be remembered of the bar council since then, although much has been crying out for their intervention, like extra-judicial killings, rampant acts of torture and other gross violations of human rights, haphazard registration of voters, repeated flawed elections, glaring cases of settlement of political scores using the law courts, and much more...
A look at the present legal dispensation in relation to civil society is further confirmation that the present regime in Cameroon is repressive, and is still guided by a one-party mindset. Whether it is law n° 90/053 of 19 December 1990 relating to the liberty of association as modified and completed by law n° 99/011 of 20 July 1999, or law N° 99/014 of 22 December 1999 relating to the organisation of NGOs as completed by Prime Ministerial decree n° 2001/150 of 3 May 2001, the effort is more to gag than to structure civil society and allow it to bloom. The legal framework gives overwhelming powers of life and death over civil society organisations to the minister of territorial administration and decentralisation. The existence of repressive instruments like obnoxious law no. 90/054 of 19 December 1990 relating to the maintenance of law and order, and the dissolution of Human Rights Watch and Cap Liberté in the early ’90, testify to this power.
Good governance programmes like those proposed by the HIPC-I, ACP-EU, and NEPAD recognise that democratic governance can only result from a serious partnership that includes government, civil society, and the private sector. Such partnership is supposed to make governance more inclusive, participatory, and democratic. To play its role effectively in such a partnership, civil society should be populated by countless citizen initiatives, campaigns, and movements with members that work hard, mostly on voluntary basis, to make contributions in every domain of society.
Citizens have rights and responsibilities. However, government is usually more interested in ensuring that citizens meet their responsibilities (like paying taxes), than enjoy their rights (like their right to vote their representatives). It is the role of civil society to organise citizens to stand up for their rights. Training, research, dissemination of information, lobbying, and advocacy should be the daily preoccupation of civil society.
In all countries where there has been change through people’s power in the ballot box or in the streets, civil society has always played a frontline role. Such change always fulfils John F. Kennedy’s saying that each time a man stands up for an ideal or acts to improve the lot of others, or strikes out against injustice, a tiny ripple of hope is sent out; many of such ripples from different centres of energy and daring, build a current which can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance. Such centres of daring and energy are little advocacy groups of courageous individuals in society.
MINATD organised flawed elections under our watchful eyes, and walked away scot-free with its agents. NEO came and danced at the periphery of the circle, without ever stepping into the centre, while we watched it in amusement as if they were stage acting. Here comes ELECAM with the same methods, strategies, and tools unmodified, mesmerising us with fine talk without any convincing work, while the people again watch in frustration and apparent helpless. Will the real civil society please stand up and organise the people to channel their frustration towards confronting ELECAM for their electoral rights!
© The Entrepreneur Newspaper 2010. All Rights Reserved.

domain: politics


Skintomb was an Australian horror fiction/film fanzine published by Rod Williams in Brisbane, Queensland, Australia.
Skintomb was formerly titled Skinned Alive. The zine focused on reviews, essays, critiques of books, zines and films, fiction and art work.
Contributors of short fiction included Marc McAuliffe, Todd Mecklem and Kirstyn McDermott, among others.
Featured were interviews with Steve Carter and Antoinette Rydyr (Cold Cuts), among others.
Reviewed in The Mentor #87, from July 1995, Ron Clarke writes; "The subheading says it all: Horror Reviews, Art, Fiction, Censorshit News. This is a very slick looking issue - Rod has obviously lavished much time on polishing it’s looks. Much of the art is his own - and as I’ve published some of his smaller pieces, you may have some idea of how good he is. There are LoCs, articles on Horror: Exploitation or Communication?, which covers the horror artists, including Virgil Finlay and lots of reviews of films, book and horror zines. The best thing in this issue is an interview by Rod of Steve Carter and Antoinette Rydyr in which they explain their life view."


text:
(Corrects to remove quotation marks in paragraph 12)
By Terrence Edwards
Feb 16 Mongolia plans to nationalise a 49 percent stake in a copper mine sold to a domestic private firm last year, bringing one of Asia's biggest copper producers under full control in a move its former Russian owner said could deter foreign investors.
The country's parliament voted to nationalise the Erdenet mine last week after a probe by lawmakers concluded the June 2016, $400 million sale by state-owned Russian holding company Rostec to little-known Mongolian Copper Corp (MCC) was unconstitutional as it was agreed without lawmakers' approval.
For more, go to:


text:
Wife should have safe environment to live in
I feel really sympathy with the pregnant wife who is tired of her husband smoking the medwakh in front of her and their unborn baby... How careless this man can be to risk the health of his newlywed wife and the unborn baby?? For what reason the young people falling into this very bad habit of the medwakh pipe – nobody knows – and I can understand the concerns which this young married woman has now since she is aware of this very bad habit of her new husband. It’s very sad that she only discovered this side of him after their wedding – I feel so sorry for her. Surveys show how bad passive smoking can be for people’s health and of course a pregnant woman is more sensitive to ANY bad odour.


Plus: one landlord claims that arguing over the deposit somehow means even higher charges when you move out.
Plus: a mysterious agency that changes its name and refuses to repair anything.
Plus: a university charging a £3,000 deposit for accommodation? It could only be Oxbridge.
From bitter comments to fallouts and awkwardness, the bank of mum and dad is creating new class divisions.
Hello, to loss, denial, grief and crucially: realising you’re old, and looking for a new place on your own.
In this week's rental advice column, a nasty neighbour threatens to snitch on a letter-writer for being too loud in their flat.
“The price of a pint.”
Ben Leonard, who recently won a court case against his landlord, told us how he and his housemates fought the system.
After the company's deal collapsed in New York, the next community-upending project might be a tougher sell.
"It’s so cozy. But I’d still really quite like a toaster!”
Savings tips are classist garbage and belong in the trash.
The housing market is so bad that it made me wonder: how bad does a room have to be to actually put people off?


text:
A NEW youth group has been formed in the hope of shining a light on the positive side of the Sudanese community.
The Sudanese Australia Youth Action Group (SAYAG), launched in Footscray, is tackling issues such as education and employment along with representation in mainstream media.
Founding member Asunta Akeri said the group aimed at making improvements for the community via education and other ways.
"We hope things will change for the better. We want to see less youth on the street. We also want to show that there are positive things. There are not enough positive messages getting out."
The Tarneit student believes Sudanese youths face extra scrutiny, with negative portrayals making it difficult for them to get ahead.
"We feel, as youths, everyone can mess up, but when they are constantly showing the problems in our community that is not good," she said, "and it also causes difficulties when it comes to gaining employment.
"People need to understand that not everyone is exactly the same."
Fellow founding member Victor Victor echoed Ms Akeri's concerns.
"We are fed up with seeing negative images of African youth in the media and the bad reputation we have amongst Australians. We want to show people there's another side to the story."
The group, supported by the Centre for Multicultural Youth, hopes to find long-term solutions to some of the issues they face, in education, racism and community engagement.
"We want to make Australia our home and be proud to live here," Ms Akeri said.
"We feel a shift in our communities. The older generations will always be important as well, but we want to be there to mentor the younger generations.
"Hopefully we can support them and open those doors to give them the right start in life."
To become involved, contact SAYAG via firstname.lastname@example.org