SEE YOU NEXT WEEK
ΘΑ ΣΑΣ ΔΟΥΜΕ ΠΑΛΙ ΣΥΝΤΟΜΑ!
(Brexians lair)
6794
28/10/2006
ΘΑ ΣΑΣ ΔΟΥΜΕ ΠΑΛΙ ΣΥΝΤΟΜΑ!
Φερνάντο Μποτέρο
Απέρριψαν τον Μποτέρο ...λόγω Άμπου Γκράιμπ
25/10/2006
Συντάκτης: Αθηνά Σαλούστρου
Πηγή: ΑΠΕ
Οι πίνακες ζωγραφικής και τα γλυπτά του Κολομβιανού καλλιτέχνη κοσμούν μουσεία και δημόσιους εκθεσιακούς χώρους σε όλο τον κόσμο. Όμως ο πασίγνωστος καλλιτέχνης αντιμετώπισε σχεδόν καθολική απόρριψη όταν επιχείρησε να πραγματοποιήσει μια έκθεση στην Αμερική. Ο λόγος; Το θέμα της έκθεσης ήταν η φυλακή του Άμπου Γκράιμπ. Η σειρά πινάκων ζωγραφικής που απεικονίζουν τα βασανιστήρια Ιρακινών στην φυλακή του Άμπου Γκράιμπ από στρατιώτες των ΗΠΑ απορρίφθηκαν από όλα τα αμερικανικά μουσεία στα οποία προτάθηκε να εκτεθούν, πριν συμφωνήσει να τα δεχθεί η Γκαλερί Μάρλμπορο στο κεντρικό Μανχάταν, όπου παρουσιάσθηκαν για πρώτη φορά την περασμένη εβδομάδα και θα παραμείνουν έως την 18η Νοεμβρίου.
"Εδώ υπάρχει απόλυτη ελευθερία έκφρασης. Γι’ αυτό ήταν τόσο ανησυχητικό το ότι τα μουσεία δεν ήθελαν να εκθέσουν αυτά τα έργα", είπε ο Μποτέρο. Οι πίνακες, σχολίασε ο 74χρονος ζωγράφος, είναι εμπνευσμένοι από κείμενα που περιέγραφαν τα γεγονότα και δεν αποτελούν απομίμηση των διαβόητων φωτογραφιών των βασανιστηρίων. "Δεν αποκάλυπτα τίποτε που δεν ήταν ήδη γνωστό. Απογοητεύτηκα που το καλλιτεχνικό αυτό όραμα δεν μπορούσε να εκτεθεί", δήλωσε. "Μου είπαν ότι δέχθηκαν πολλές οργισμένες τηλεφωνικές κλήσεις στην γκαλερί", λέει ο Μποτέρο. Προσθέτει ότι δεν νοιάστηκε να ρωτήσει γιατί οι προτάσεις του προς τα μουσεία να εκθέσει τους συγκεκριμένους πίνακες απορρίπτονταν. Ο κριτικός τέχνης Ντέιβιντ Ντ’ Αρσί εκτιμά ότι τα μουσεία αποφεύγουν να προκαλούν την Κυβέρνηση.
"Αν επρόκειτο για άλλα έργα του Μποτέρο, θα τα δέχονταν αμέσως. Είναι ίσως ο πιο αναγνωρίσιμος σύγχρονος καλλιτέχνης", εξηγεί ο Ντ’ Άρσί. Αλλά, προσθέτει, "το τελευταίο πράγμα που θέλουν τα μουσεία είναι να στιγματισθούν. Υπήρξε μια εποχή που τα μουσεία ήθελαν να σοκάρουν τον κόσμο.
Αυτή η εποχή έχει παρέλθει". Ο Μποτέρο έχει φιλοτεχνήσει 42 πίνακες και 38 ελαιογραφίες για το θέμα. Ο ίδιος λέει ότι εργαζόταν "με μονομανία" επί 14 μήνες για να τους ολοκληρώσει. Άρχισε πέντε μήνες μετά την αποκάλυψη των γεγονότων από τον δημοσιογράφο Σέιμουρ Χερς στο περιοδικό New Yorker, τον Μάιο του 2004. Ο ζωγράφος δηλώνει ότι ελπίζει η έκθεσή του να βρει καταφύγιο σε ένα αμερικανικό ή ευρωπαϊκό μουσείο, όμως διευκρινίζει ότι δεν προτίθεται να πουλήσει τους πίνακες, παρά μόνο να τους δωρίσει. "Δεν πιστεύω στην αποκόμιση χρημάτων από την εκμετάλλευση του ανθρώπινου πόνου", εξηγεί.
(Brexians lair)
ALEXANDER THE GREAT
(Brexians lair)
WILLIAM PYE THE WATER SCULPTOR
THIS ONE CALLED "CHARYBDIS"
(Brexians lair)
ΠΑΡΕΛΑΣΗ ΜΑΘΗΤΩΝ
ΜΑΘΗΤΙΩΣΑ ΝΕΟΛΑΙΑ ΠΑΡΕΛΑΥΝΟΥΣΑ ΣΤΑ VP* TOY LA**
*VP=ΒΟΡΕΙΑ ΠΡΟΑΣΤΙΑ
**LA=ΛΕΚΑΝΟΠΕΔΙΟ ΑΤΤΙΚΗΣ
(Brexians lair)
26/10/2006
24/10/2006
All applauds Schumacher's die-hard finale
Although most Germans are fans of the seven-times world champion and proudly wear his red Ferrari colors, there have been a fair number of detractors in a home country that has ties to several other Formula One teams.
Until Sunday, that is, when the 37-year-old Schumacher's riveting ride through the field from last to fourth at the Brazilian Grand Prix turned the final naysayers into believers, newspapers said.
"Schumi said goodbye with the most thrilling catch-up race of his career," wrote Bild newspaper, which devoted three full pages to Schumacher on Monday after 12 on Sunday.
"He fought his way back from last place to fourth with one of the best races in his 16-year career," the daily wrote.
The General-Anzeiger in Bonn, near Schumacher's hometown of Kerpen, said his fighting spirit made believers out of his enemies and brought tears to the eyes of his legions of fans.
"Even those who have absolutely no interest in motor sport could not help being captivated by his final run," it said of the race watched by 12 million Germans.
"The hopes for an eighth title were minimal but despite technical problems and a punctured tire, the champion raced like a young rookie full of cheek and fury -- chapeau Schumi!"
SCHUMACHER MAGIC
The Rheinische Post, published in Duesseldorf, called it "Schumacher magic, one last time."
"Even if he didn't make it to the podium, Schumacher showed one of the best races ever. He squeezed everything out of his Ferrari engine as if he were squeezing on a lemon, had one 'all or nothing' lap after another, and passed rival after rival."
The Berliner Zeitung said he had deserved a more glamorous farewell with a spot on the podium if not his 92nd career victory.
But it added his inspired rally stole the show, especially in passing Giancarlo Fisichella and Kimi Raikkonen.
"He drove a fabulous race in his final outing and didn't even make it to the podium," it wrote.
"With audacious, reckless and truly championship maneuvers, he even passed Fisichella and his Ferrari successor Raikkonnen to grab fourth place."
Chancellor Angela Merkel paid tribute in an open letter to Bild newspaper, putting him in a line of German sporting heroes with Max Schmeling, Franz Beckenbauer and Steffi Graf.
"You used your talent and your German virtues -- hard-work and a tireless will to succeed --- to get to the top," Merkel wrote. "And even for those outsiders who don't well understand Formula One, you enriched the sport with your brilliance."
(Brexians lair)
23/10/2006
19/10/2006
Halloween Special
Myth-diagnosis:
Vampirism or Porphyria?
What creature has very pale skin, has teeth of an unusual colour, sports long fingernails and only comes out at night? Everyone knows it’s a vampire.
Or is it?
The vampire legend probably arose from the appearance and behaviour of people suffering from porphyria, a disease that is actually a group of related disorders.
All variants of the disease are caused by overproduction of porphyrins—chemicals that do not normally accumulate in the body. Although symptoms are many, most notable is extreme sensitivity to sunlight.
Porphyria is rare, especially outside Eastern Europe, and difficult to diagnose. Symptoms of the disease mimic those of many other ailments: They include insomnia, anxiety, skin lesions, nausea and muscle weakness; some types of porphyria also cause excessive nail growth and receding gums. Exposure to sunlight causes the skin to become so fragile it breaks easily, and people with porphyria avoid being outside at any time during the day—hence the idea that vampires fear sun and roam the earth only at night.
Shedding Light on the Vampire Legend
The most notorious alleged vampire lived in 15th-century Romania. Vlad the Impaler was indeed a ghoulish ruler, whose bloodthirsty habits were known far and wide even before Bram Stoker’s day, but he was not the earliest vampire legend. Records of vampire stories exist from 12th-century England. The Impaler’s sadistic punishments for minor offences certainly fuelled legends, and by all accounts he did actually indulge in the blood of his victims.
By the 17th century, vampires were linked to evil and witchcraft. The 18th century saw vampire hysteria in Eastern Europe into which even government officials were drawn. And in the 19th century, of course, Bram Stoker’s Dracula cemented into popular cultures the myths that had developed over centuries.
The early beliefs—that vampires drank blood, were creatures of darkness, and were fascinated with counting—were enriched by the newer aspects of the myth. Only within the last 200 years were we introduced to vampires who are dressed in capes and who turn into bats. But with the migration of cultures and their legends, some of the interesting traditions were lost—such as leaving a pile of seeds outside the door so a vampire would be distracted by counting them, thus losing interest in drinking the inhabitants’ blood.
Even with some of the finer details lost, and with evidence that porphyria was the likely cause of an odd appearance and behaviour, the vampire has captured the imagination of the public like no other legend.
Werewolves or hypertrichosis
The myth of the werewolf or "shape-shifter" dates back to the cavemen. The condition on which the myth was based is almost surely older than that.
A condition that probably contributed to the werewolf myth is hypertrichosis or hirsutism, which causes excessive hair growth over the entire body. The condition is linked to endocrine malfunction, which can be genetic and present at birth. The gene that causes the disease was recently isolated by geneticists and is thought to be an atavism, a once common genetic trait that became less common as humans evolved. The trait is sex-linked and dominant; males who inherit the disease from their mothers develop the condition, while females who inherit only one of the trait-bearing chromosomes exhibit the thick hair growth in random patches.
The condition can also develop over the course of a lifetime. Often, acquired hypertrichosis is the result of hormonal irregularities.
Hypertrichosis, especially from birth, is rare, but well-documented. In the past and even today, people with the condition have appeared in circuses as "wolf-men" or "dog-boys." No doubt these public exhibitions have contributed to the werewolf fascination.
The Werewolf Evolves
Every culture has its werewolf. The mythology has had a stronger hold on some cultures than others. Germany is famous for its werewolves, popularized by the Brothers Grimm. In early legends, people who became werewolves were cursed with the condition, and simply acted as wolves after they were transformed. In later legends, the werewolf was better able to control the transformation, usually using a salve or special article of clothing, and used the ability only to attack livestock in enemy farmers’ fields. In these stories, people are accidental victims of the werewolf, if victims at all.
Over time, werewolf folklore evolved from simple shape-shifting and animal worship to the 19th century and present-day conceptions, which are closely, linked to both witch and vampire legends. The Western werewolf, epitomized in Stephen King’s The Silver Bullet, transforms according to lunar changes which are linked to witchcraft, and can only be killed by a silver bullet formed from a molten crucifix, reminiscent of vampire lore.
Copyright © Demetrios the Traveler
(Brexians lair)
17/10/2006
Airplane-Giant K-7 now & then
In early 30's aviation design bureau, lead by K.A.Kalinin, was a well set team capable to solve absolutely new unexpected problems in aircraft design. For example, the 1929-1930 schedule KB included producing 3-engined passenger aircraft K-7, also designated as "K-Tjazholij" (K-Heavy), for the 500hp German BMW "Hornet" engines. It was designed to carry 22 passengers. Mockup prototype was tested in the TsAGI wind tunnel in September 1928, and was approved for production by the Scientific-Technical Commetee VVS in March following year.
But production was not started, and designation K-7 was used later for transcontinental aircraft project, started in 1928. 'Idea to built K-7,- K.A.Kalinin wrote later,- came to me long ago, as early as 1925. In 1929 the project was formulated and after two years of refinement it started to come to life... During creation of new huge machines new paths lead to new schemes of aircraft, to using of the wing to house payload. It means that those paths lead to the flying wing, which is exactly the perfect aircraft. To complete the transition to flying wing it is necessary to build a plane following the concept "everything is in the wing"'.
Original aircraft design was whole-wood with a 5-spar wing. But it suffered of luck of strength resource, and after long debates K.A.Kalinin decided to switch to whole-metal welded construction with 3-spar wing.
The K-7 was a gigantic elliptical wing of extremely thick airfoil (span 53m, area 452m2) with two triangle section tailbooms, carrying tailfin and tailplane with control mechanics. The wing had almost strait center (width 6m, length 10m, height 2.33m) where rooms for payload and people was arranged. Elliptical consoles with 14 fuel tanks were attached to the centroplane. The center was covered with duralumin, consoles with fabric. There were no such a thick tubes to comply with requirements of central spar so it was made of two parallel tubes. The rest of wings frame also was made of welded steel tubes.
A nacell was proturbed from the leading edge, with cockpit for two pilots, navigator, radio-navigator and chief mechanic. Seven more crew members were located in other sections of aircraft and communicated by internal telephone.
The aircraft was designed for 6 BMW engines, but later decision was made to install homemade AM-34. Six water-cooled engines lacked power, and K.A.Kalinin was forced to add 7th pusher engine on the trailing edge of the wing between tailbooms. Designer was aware that this engine will increase airflow turbulence and can lead to vibration of all aircraft, but he had no other choice. Early AM-34 engines were not equipped with gearboxes and had power only 750hp.
Triangle tailbooms were proturbed from the last spar to the tail. Tailbooms were equipped wit pneumatics, protecting the tail from undesired contact with the ground.
Original main gear design allowed aircraft to have a horizontal position while on the ground. Main gear consisted of two wide placed undercarriage of frame design with oil-pneumatic wheel suspension, the first attempt in Soviet heavy aircraft. Another innovation for this aircraft class were tires with cameras "GoodYear". Soviet industry had no such tires in production, and it had to start it in future for production aircraft.
Undercarriage had 3 wheels each and were covered with fairings - metallic 'pants' - left of which had an entry door and stair leading into the wing.
Yet on design stage it became clear that it will be hard for pilot to control the plane because enormous load on the controls. Though for the original design K.A.Kalinin proposed decision which later was widely used in aviation - electric 'boosters'. Contract was signed with one of Moscow electrotechnic institutions, which took a duty to develop and manufacture new system. But developers failed to do so, and control planes of K-7 were equipped with surfaces, placed on light booms.
Theoretical problems of heavy aircraft control by use of surfaces was solved by aerodynamic team lead by N.F.Freiman. On the TsAGI wind tunnel more than 300 successful tests were performed, and in 1932 surfaces were tested on the K-5 flying laboratory. The functionality was perfect, and it was recommended to install them on K-7.
K.A.Kalinin also decided to use chromium-molibdenium tubes for aircraft frame - it was the very first use of those tubes in our country. Calculation for the frame were lead by professor A.S.Balinsky - prominent scientist in the field of materials strength. But aircraft was overweight still in project, because calculation had to take into account loose strength of tubes near wielded joints.
Steel tube production started (at the same time with aircraft design) at the Dnepropetrovsk Metal Works. Until this similar tubes were imported from Sweden, and to buy tubes for single K-7 could cost as much as 100,000 golden rubles ($$ ? - 30's). As the TsAGI commission noted in 1932, the K-7 deserve to be a big step forward in aircraft design just because it stimulated practical use of chrome-molibdenium tubes in the USSR.
K-7 was designed as a multipurpose civil and military aircraft. One of passenger options was developed to carry 128 passengers up to 5,000km. Other design - "luxe" - supposed to arrange 16 luxirily cabins for 64 passengers. Aircraft supposed to have a comfortable club-room, snack-bar and kitchen. This was the first aircraft design allowing mechanics in-flight access to running engines.
A lot of efforts were spend on K-7 by armament team lead by D.I.Grigorov. Military version of aircraft was a real "flying fortress", which emerged 10 years before the American Boeing B-17. Defenses of Kalinin's giant reached as much as 12 gunner positions (8 20mm cannons and 8 7.62mm machine guns). Special electric cart (running on strings inside of tailbooms) was designed for "transportation" of gunners to two tail machine guns. Aircraft had no "blind spots", and every direction was under fire at least from 3 gunners, what greatly increased reliability of defence.
Bombs were located in wing bomb bays, and bomb bays frames were included into wing structure. Depending on the required range, bomb load varied from 9,900kg to 16,600kg (25,550 - 42,840lb). External fuel tanks allowed 2,400km flight with 6,000kg bombs.
Other military modification could carry 112 fully equipped paratroopers. Opportunities to carry 8,4tons tank or other parachute dropable equipment between main gears was also under study.
The technical project was completed early 1932. In the yard of the Kharkov Aviation Factory wooden mockup of aircraft central part was built in scale 1:1. The size of aircraft was too big for existing manufacturing areas, and new assembly hall was built. In November 1932 assembly of experimental aircraft started, and was completed just in nine months.
In the early August 1933 aircraft was taxied to the runway. Its test pilot was M.A.Snegirev, co-pilot - A.N.Giatsinsky. First start of all engines revealed serious vibration of different aircraft parts; those were urgently strengthened. On August 19 A.M.Snegirev made the first straight flight on 5m altitude. More troubles were revealed - elevators were vibrating with amplitude up to 1m! In few days tail of the aircraft was redesigned - it became a 'biplane' with additional stabilizing surface between tailfins. Surfaces from tailfins were deleted, and those on tailplanes were moved closer to elevators.
Day before the first flight P.I.Baranov (head of the Major Management of Aviation Industry) together with test-pilot M.M.Gromov arrived to Kharkov. At 6a.m. August 21, 1933 K-7 was 'on the start' with running engines. The weather was fair despite some light clouds. Seven crew members took their positions. And, as usual, at the last moment co-pilot's seat was occupied by Kalinin himself.
After few taxis, plane took off smoothly. As A.M.Snegirev told later, 'aircraft was very responsive. It was easy to control. Hard to believe, but you just pull the yoke - and machine responds'.
K-7 made a circle over Kharkiv, and safely landed on the factory airstrip. After pilot's report M.A.Snegirev received appreciations, and K.A.Kalinin - symbolic punishment for illegal flight on the test aircraft.
In next flights became clear, that vertical vibration is gone with new tail design, but horizontal is still there. But M.A.Snegirev, employing his rich experience of test pilot, found way to suppress it by changing of engines regime. Continuous test revealed fair flying characteristics of the plane. The last factory test flight was scheduled for November 20, and plane had to fly to Moscow. It was planned to measure maximum ground level speed. This flight (10th one) was completed successfully, but ground team made a mistake which spoiled the measurements.
Next attempt was planned for November 21. For now K-7 had over 5 hours in flight. Flight plan included approaching of the 'measuring kilometer' on altitude 1000m, then lovering aircraft to 100m and triple passing of the 'ruler' on the maximum speed.
At 2p.m. K-7 took off with 20 crew members on board. Here is story of D.A.Chebyshev, one of ground engineers participated in tests : "As scheduled, K-7 flew over us and pilot figured out that we are ready for measurements. Aircraft made a turn, accelerated and started approach. In 3-4km from us it made a sudden dive at 30-400 at full speed. The first hit into the ground knocked away landing gears. Aircraft jumped and with running engines hit the ground again. Fire started..."
What was recalled by on of five survived crew members, P.I.Semerenko : "Approaching the 'measure kilometer' Snegirev gave full throttle. Tail booms vibration came up. I counted 15-20 hits. Suddenly to the noise of running engines was added sound of breaking apart left tailboom lower tube. Displaced tube edges locked the elevators, and K-7 was not able to get out of dive. I am notifying vibration, on eye estimate dive angle... Near surface aircraft makes a left pitch. I'm waiting for the end. Controls are still dead. Smash..."
Technicians and designers suffered destruction of their creation and death of 15 crew members. K.A.Kalinin was out for two months because of heart problems. But despite this catastrophe the team did not lose self-confidence. To investigate causes of the crash few competent commetees were created, with participation of the most prominent aviation experts of the country. It was concluded that destructive vibration was caused by surfaces during some regimes of the seventh engine. But there were no 'theoretical' prove of this conclusion. Only few years later M.V.Keldysh explained this (and many other similar) crash and found a solution to fight the flatter - weight balancing of elevators. But it was too late...
After obtaining expert conclusions, revealing no mistakes in aircraft design, the head of GUAP ordered Kalinin to start urgent production of two new (passenger and military) K-7's with scheduled roll-out in the beginning of 1935. Production was assigned to new base - The Voronezh Aviation Factory.
Changed views of country aviation leadership on production of heavy aircraft did not allow the team to complete development of K-7. Both planes were 'preserved' (aka 'abandoned' - A.S.), one of them half-built. Few times Kalinin tried to prove necessity of this aircraft class, but he failed to overpower opposition to his project.
(Brexians lair)
"ΔΕΝ ΠΤΟΟΥΜΕΘΑ, ΔΕΝ ΙΔΡΩΝΕΙ ΤΟ ΑΥΤΙ ΜΑΣ"
οταν ακουμε "φαλτσα"
- στην πολιτικη
- στην κοινωνια
- στην οικογενεια
- στον δρομο
- στην δουλεια..............παντου!!!
εχουμε γινει χοντροπετσοι
(Brexians lair)
16/10/2006
15/10/2006
ΑΥΤΗ ΤΗ ΣΤΙΓΜΗ ΣΤΙΣ ΚΑΛΠΕΣ ΓΙΝΕΤΑΙ ΜΙΑ ΣΥΛΛΗΨΗ
ΝΕΟΙ ΔΗΜΟΤΙΚΟΙ ΑΡΧΟΝΤΕΣ ΘΑ ΓΕΝΝΗΘΟΥΝ ΚΑΙ ΔΥΣΤΥΧΩΣ,
ΑΛΛΟΙ ΘΑ ΑΝΑΓΕΝΝΗΘΟΥΝ ΣΑΝ ΤΟΝ ΦΟΙΝΙΚΑ ΑΠΟ ΤΙΣ ΣΤΑΧΤΕΣ ΤΟΥΣ.
ΚΑΠΟΙΟΣ ΕΙΠΕ ΚΑΙ ΕΙΧΕ ΔΙΚΙΟ,
ΟΤΙ ΕΧΟΥΜΕ ΟΤΙ ΑΡΧΟΝΤΕΣ ΑΞΙΖΟΥΜΕ.
Copyright © Demetrios the Traveler
(Brexians lair)
Gary Numan's Porsche Lyrics
In a half-faced mask made of tinted glass
Walking streets of creased wet concrete
where her curse [attacks] sometime
by the screaming chain-store signs
You can feel each bruise with each shakey hoof
which conveys her through this limbo
where the blue lights [at full tide]
Deny the facts of her life
When you ruled by his [????]
[by his broken his children]
You beat up on the Joneses
[Only robots could kill me]
Because you know he was with you
when you buried your future
you were lost and 18
Lost
CHORUS:
You justify the use of force
by the well-armed world that [did you so short]
as the years roll on by like a drunk old horse
and you purr like Gary Numan's Porsche
See the midlife hacks with their [...] of cash
get to live for long enough
to see nostalgia and pastiche
stored in leather and mesquite
But they take out 'f'-words
and they take out the 'p'-words
and they take out the 'j'-words
and they take out the 'zed'-word
and they take out the 'u'-word
and they take out the 'end'-word
All that's left is the garbage
but that will do--CHORUS
On Gary Numan's Porsche
it says, "Bring back the 60's, save the queen [but gas the poor]"
Gary Numan's Porsche
is waiting outside of the stage door
so don't deface the room
He'll be leaving soon...I hope
Well, it's 80's Night, her remaining light
as the Bedsit '81 fades into Suicide '94
2,000,094
and the future [we told]
[like the snow-in ????]
and the one which we live in
Charmless and boring
Gary, please, can you fix it?
take us up in your spaceship
Set us free in this Porsche
which says...
You justify the use the force
by the well-armed world that knows you're cornered
in the work of [...]
there are better things to do than name the days--CHORUS"
Copyright © Demetrios the Traveler
(Brexians lair)
ME AND MY SON
One night a young man had a dream. He dreamed
he was walking along the winter forest with me.
Across the sky flashed scenes from his life.
For each scene he noticed two sets of
footprints in the snow: one belonging
to him, and the other to me.
When the last scene of his life flashed before him,
he looked back at the footprints in the snow.
He noticed that many times along the path of
his life there was only one set of footprints.
He also noticed that it happened at the very
lowest and saddest times in his life.
This really bothered him and he
questioned me about it:
"Hey, you said that once I decided to follow
you, you'd walk with me all the way.
But I have noticed that during the most
troublesome times in my life,
there is only one set of footprints.
I don't understand why when
I needed you most you would leave me."
And I replied:
"My son, my precious child,
I love you and I would never leave you.
During your times of trial and suffering,
when you see only one set of footprints,
it was then that I carried you."
Copyright © Demetrios the Traveler
(Brexians lair)
AN URBAN BLUES
Somewhere out there on that horizon
Out beyond the neon lights
I know there must be somethin' better
but there's nowhere else in sight
It's survival in the city
When you live from day to day
City streets don't have much pity, no
When you're down, that's where you'll stay
In the city, Ah huh oh, oh
In the city Ah huh
I was born here in the city
With my back against the wall
Nothing grows, and life ain't very pretty
No one's there to catch you when you fall
Somewhere out on that horizon
Faraway from the neon sky
I know there must be somethin' must be somethin' better
And I can't stay another night
In the city, Ah huh oh, oh.
In the city, Ah huh oh, oh, another night
In the city, Ah huh oh, oh.
In the city, Ah huh oh, oh,
Copyright © Demetrios the Traveler
(Brexians lair)
(Round And Round - Toys In The Attic)
If you believe in me
Like I believe in you
You wouldn't be tellin' me things
That weren't exactly true
Now everything changes
Ain't got nothing to say
I'm having the strangest feeling, baby
I can't remember my name
'Cause the life I've been livin'
And the love I've been givin'
Will be sure to send you spinnin'
With your feet never touching the ground
Goin' round n' round
When it was one for all
And it was all for one
And everything that we did
Never bothered anyone
Now everything changes
Ain't nothing the same
I'm having the strangest feeling, baby
I can't remember my name
'Cause the life I've been livin'
And the love I've been givin'
Will be sure to send you spinnin'
With your feet never touching the ground
Goin' round n' round
Can you remember the days
When you were sweet sixteen
And always followed the ways
Of someone elses dream
Now everything changes
Ain't nothing the same
I'm having the strangest feeling, baby
I can't remember my name
'Cause the life I've been livin'
And the love I've been givin'
Will be sure to send you spinnin'
With your feet never touching the ground
Goin' round n' round
Goin' round n' round n' round n' round....
Copyright © Demetrios the Traveler
(Brexians lair)
14/10/2006
McLAREN GOOD.. BAD.. UGLY
Ο ΚΑΛΟΣ...ΕΡΧΕΤΑΙ
Ο ΚΑΚΟΣ....ΠΑΕΙ FERRARI
Ο ΑΣΧΗΜΟΣ....ΠΑΕΙ ΣΠΙΤΙ ΤΟΥ
(Brexians lair)
one way or another
One way or another, I'm gonna find ya'
I'm gonna get ya', get ya', get ya', get ya'
One way or another, I'm gonna win ya'
I'm gonna get ya', get ya' ,get ya', get ya'
One way or another, I'm gonna see ya'
I'm gonna meet ya', meet ya', meet ya', meet ya'
One day maybe next week, I'm gonna meet ya'
I'm gonna meet ya', I'll meet ya'
I will drive past your house and if the lights are all down
I'll see who's around
One way or another, I'm gonna find ya'
I'm gonna get ya', get ya', get ya', get ya'
One way or another, I'm gonna win ya'
I'll get ya', I'll get ya'
One way or another, I'm gonna see ya'
I'm gonna meet ya', meet ya', meet ya', meet ya'
One day maybe next week ,I'm gonna meet ya'
I'll meet ya' ah
And if the lights are all out I'll follow your bus downtown
See who's hangin' out
One way or another, I'm gonna lose ya'
I'm gonna give you the slip
A slip of the lip or another I'm gonna lose ya'
I'm gonna trick ya', I'll trick ya'
One way or another, I'm gonna lose ya'
I'm gonna trick ya', trick ya', trick ya', trick ya'
One way or another, I'm gonna lose ya'
I'm gonna give you the slip
I'll walk down the mall, stand over by the wall
Where I can see it all, find out who ya' call
Lead you to the supermarket checkout, some specials and rat food
Get lost in the crowd
One way or another I'm gonna get ya'
I'll get ya'
I'll get ya', get ya', get ya', get ya'
Where I can see it all, find out who ya' call
Copyright © Demetrios the Traveler
(Brexians lair)
ΤΑ ΤΡΕΝΑ ΠΟΥ ΦΥΓΑΝ
Τα τρένα που φύγαν
αγάπες μού πήρανε.
Αγάπες και κλαίνε,
ποια μοίρα τις μοίρανε;
Δώς μου χέρι να πιαστώ
να πιαστώ, να κρατηθώ,
ένα γέλιο, μια ματιά
κι ανασταίνετ' η καρδιά.
Το τρένο σε πήρε
πουλί, χελιδόνι μου.
Σε τύλιξ' η νύχτα
κι ορφάνεψα μόνη μου.
Στίχοι: Βαγγέλης Γκούφας
Μουσική: Σταύρος Ξαρχάκος
Πρώτη εκτέλεση: Βίκυ Μοσχολιού
(Brexians lair)
ΤΑ ΣΟΝΕΤΤΑ ΤΟΥ ΚΥΝΗΓΟΥ
Ένα μεγάλο, θαλερό Δάσος και με η ψυχή μου.
Λίγος ο δρόμος ως εκεί, καθώς έχεις σιμώσει.
Μονάχα μην αργοπορής μην τύχει και νυχτώσει
και δε σε ιδούν τα μάτια μου και μείνω μοναχή μου.
Εκεί τα δέντρα είνε ψηλά καθώς οι στοχασμοί μου.
Η χλόη πάνω στις πίκρες μου γλυκιά ’πό χάδια στρώση
κ’ ένα λουλούδι φλογερό μονάχα ανθίζει, η ευχή μου
ναρθής εκεί με όλη σου την κυνηγήτρα γνώση.
Θα σε μεθύση η μυρωδιά και δε θ’ ακούς τι ψάλλουν
κρυφά, καθώς ερωτικά τρυγόνια τα όνειρά μου,
μα πληγωμένα και νεκρά μπροστά σου σαν προβάλουν,
Θα ειπής βαθιά σου ψάχνοντας τότε, πούνε η χαρά μου;
Κι’ όπως θα βλέπης γύρω σου, βουβά και λυπημένα
θα γίνης όνειρο, καημός, τραγούδι εσύ για μένα.
ΜΑΡΙΑ ΠΟΛΥΔΟΥΡΗ
(Brexians lair)
ΥΠΟΨΗΦΙΟΙ ΖΗΤΟΥΝ ΤOΝ ΨΗΦΟ ΜΑΣ...
ΜΑΥΡΙΣΤΕ ΤΟΥΣ
MAY THE FORCE BE WITH YOU
Copyright © Demetrios the Traveler
(Brexians lair)
LET'S SEE...
UNITED NATIONS APPOINTS REPUBLIC OF KOREA’S BAN KI-MOON AS NEXT SECRETARY-GENERAL;
BAN, DEEPLY TOUCHED AND INSPIRED, VOWS TO ‘BUILD BRIDGES, BRIDGE DIVIDES’
Secretary-General Praises Ban as ‘Exceptionally Attuned’ to All Countries, Peoples
The General Assembly today appointed Foreign Minister Ban Ki-moon of the Republic of Korea as the next United Nations Secretary-General, giving him a two-and-one-half-month transition before taking over the helm of the world body from Kofi Annan on 1 January.
Acting on the Security Council’s recommendation, the Assembly adopted a resolution formally appointing Mr. Ban to a five-year term. Diplomats and United Nations staff in the packed chamber cheered the decision. Mr. Ban becomes the eighth Secretary-General in the United Nations’ 60-year history, and will oversee an Organization with nearly 100,000 peacekeepers in 18 countries around the world, and a $5 billion annual budget.
Mr. Ban will succeed 2001 Nobel Peace Prize winner Kofi Annan, of Ghana, who will retire at the end of December, after leading the 192-member world body for a decade. Earlier in his 40-year diplomatic career, Mr. Ban, 62, served in his country’s Mission to the United Nations and, in 2001, was Chef de Cabinet to then-Assembly President Han Seung-soo, of the Republic of Korea. Mr. Ban will be the first Asian to lead the Organization since U Thant, who held the post from 1961 to 1971.
“I stand before you deeply touched and inspired,” Mr. Ban told the Assembly. As Secretary-General, he vowed to work “diligently to materialize our responsibility to protect the most vulnerable members of humanity, and for the peaceful resolution of threats to international security”. He added that: “The true measure of the success of the UN is not how much we promise, but how much we deliver for those who need us most… We need not shout [the Organization’s] praises or preach its virtues. We simply need to live them every day: step by step, programme by programme, mandate by mandate,” he said.
Pledging to carry out reforms, building on Mr. Annan’s legacy, the Secretary-General-designate said: “My tenure will be marked by ceaseless efforts to build bridges and close divides.” He declared that his leadership would be one of harmony, foreswearing division.
“Let us remember that reform is not to please others, but because we value what this Organization stands for,” he said, laying out his vision of a truly reformed United Nations that could effectively meet the challenges of the twenty-first century. “We need reform because we believe in the future. To revitalize our common endeavour is to renew our faith not only in the UN’s programmes and purposes but also in each other. We should demand more of ourselves, as well as of our organization,” he said.
Mr. Annan praised Ban as “a future Secretary-General who is exceptionally attuned to the sensitivities of countries and constituencies in every continent -- a man with a truly global mind at the helm of the world’s only universal organization”.
He recalled that, more than 50 years ago, the first Secretary-General, Trygve Lie, had used the following words in greeting his successor, Dag Hammarskjöld: “You are about to take over the most impossible job on Earth.” Mr. Annan said that, while that might be true, he would have to add: “This is also the best possible job on Earth.”
Welcoming Mr. Ban, General Assembly President Sheikha Haya Al Khalifa of Bahrain said his appointment came at a time when the United Nations was deeply engaged in a wide-ranging reform process. “We are grateful to Secretary-General Kofi Annan, who has played a major role in shaping a clear and comprehensive vision to address the many global challenges confronting us,” she declared. She was confident that the Organization would build upon its past achievements and move ahead to become an even more effective body under Mr. Ban’s leadership.
Kenzo Oshima of Japan, whose delegation holds the Security Council’s rotating Presidency for the month, presented the work undertaken by that 15-nation body leading to Mr. Ban’s appointment by the Assembly. The chairpersons of the United Nations five regional groups, and representatives of the European Union and the “Group of 77” developing countries and China, as well as of the host country, each took the podium, praising the Secretary-General-designate for his diplomatic skills and personal qualities. They said the world body would be in able hands, as it faced the challenges to come. The speakers also paid tribute to Mr. Annan for his work in steering the United Nations through 10 difficult years.
Outgoing United Nations Secretary-General, KOFI ANNAN, congratulated his successor and said he was pleased his election had been “early and orderly”. He believed everyone recognized the depth of Mr. Ban’s experience, the breadth of his connections, and his ability to operate effectively at the highest levels.
“But as someone who has known and worked with you several years, I think they will soon discover something more, if they do not see that already: a future Secretary-General who is exceptionally attuned to the sensitivities of countries and constituencies in every continent. A man with a truly global mind at the helm of the world’s most universal Organization,” Mr. Annan said.
Mr. Ban’s early election will give the United Nations community a head start in ensuring the smoothest possible transition, said Mr. Annan, giving the new United Nations chief one piece of advice: “Try to make full use of the unparalleled resource you will find in the staff of the Organization. Their commitment is the United Nations’ greatest asset, and has been the surest source of strength for me in my work as Secretary-General.”
He said that, more that 50 years ago, the first Secretary-General of the United Nations, Trygve Lie, greeted his successor, Dag Hammarskjold, by saying: “you are about to take over the most impossible job on Earth.” And, while that might be true, Mr. Annan said he would now add “this is also the best possible job on Earth”.
“As you ready yourself to take over, I wish you strength and courage. You will need those attributes, but equally, you will need a healthy sense of humour -– which I know you posses in abundance, so don’t forget to have fun along the way,” said Mr. Annan, in closing.
BAN KI-MOON, United Nations Secretary-General-designate, said he stood before the Assembly “deeply touched and inspired”. He followed a line of remarkable leaders, each of whom had faced this moment at a critical juncture in the Organization’s history. In particular, outgoing Secretary-General Kofi Annan, who had astutely guided the United Nations into the twenty-first century. “You have defined an ambitious agenda that has made the United Nations truly indispensable to peace, prosperity and human dignity around the world. Our debt to your courage and vision is immeasurable. I resolve to build on your legacy,” he told Mr. Annan.
He said that his own rapid election by the Assembly had provided him with an unprecedented opportunity: never in the history of the Organization had an incoming Secretary-General been given sufficient time to prepare for the job. He would use the next two months to consult widely on how to proceed with the Organization’s common agenda of reform and revitalization. “I will listen attentively to your concerns, expectations and ambitions,” he said. Proud to be the second Asian to lead the Organization -- following U Thant -- he said his dynamic and diverse region aspired to take greater responsibilities in the world.
He was from a part of the world where modesty was a virtue, but that was about demeanour, not vision and goals, he explained. The Asian region also exemplified “quiet determination in action to get things done without so much fanfare,” adding that that “might be the key to Asia’s success, and to the United Nations’ future.” He said: “We should be modest in our words, but not in our performance. The true measure of the success of the UN is not how much we promise, but how much we deliver for those who need us most…We need not shout [the Organization’s] praises or preach its virtues. We simply need to live them every day: step by step, programme by programme, mandate by mandate.”
The United Nations was needed now more than ever, Mr. Ban said. In the previous century, the Organization’s core mission was to keep countries from fighting each other; in the new century, the United Nations’ defining mandate was to strengthen the inter-State system, so that humanity might be better served amid new challenges.
“From the Balkans to Africa, from Asia to the Middle East, we have witnessed the weakening, or absence, of effective governance, leading to the ravaging of human rights and the abandonment of longstanding humanitarian principles,” he said, stressing that the international community needed “competent and responsible States” to meet the needs of the people for whom the United Nations was committed. “And the world’s people will not be fully served unless peace, development and human rights -- the three pillars of the United Nations -- are advanced together with equal vigour,” he added.
He said that “the road we must pave toward a world of peace, prosperity and dignity for all has many pitfalls”. As Secretary-General, he would make the most of the authority vested in his Office by the Charter and the mandate given to him by the member States. He would work with dignity to make real the responsibility to protect the most vulnerable members of humanity and for the peaceful resolution of threats to international peace and security.
Turning to Organizational reform, he said that the thorough-going exercise had taxed the attention and energies of both delegations, and the Secretariat. “But, we must stay the course,” he said, calling on the United Nations family to muster the human, institutional and intellectual resources required for the task, and organize them properly.
“We should do our part in meeting the Millennium Development Goals, expanding peace operations, threats posed by terrorism, proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, HIV/AIDS and other pandemics, environmental degradation and the imperatives of human rights,” he said.
At the same time, he went on, the United Nations was not reforming to please others. “We reform because we value what the Organization stands for. We reform because we believe in its future.” He urged the member States to demand more of each other, and of the Organization. To cut through the “fog of mistrust,” however, was going to take more intensive dialogue. “We cannot choose everything at once, but if we choose wisely, and work together transparently, flexibly and honestly, progress in a few areas would lead to progress in many more,” he promised.
He pledged to build bridges, in order to bridge gaps, to foreswear divisions, and to remain faithful to his constituency. He would also take full responsibility for Secretariat management.
He was proud to join the ranks of the world’s premier Secretariat, and pledged his utmost support, dedication and solidarity to the able and courageous men and women who served the Organization, he said. The aim of Secretariat reform was not to penalize, but to reward, so that talent and skill, experience and dedication might be fully mobilized and utilized. Calling for the Secretariat’s unsparing support as he took up the helm of the Organization, he pledged to seek excellence with humility, and to lead by example. Promises should be kept, and he pledged to work with all stakeholders for a United Nations that delivered on its promises.
“I earnestly hope that the young boys and girls of today will grow up knowing that the United Nations is working hard to build a better future for them. As Secretary-General, I will embrace their hopes and hear their appeals. I am an optimist, and I am full of hope about the future of our global Organization. Let us work together for a United Nations that can deliver more and better,” he said.
Acting on the Security Council’s recommendation, the Assembly adopted a resolution formally appointing Mr. Ban to a five-year term. Diplomats and United Nations staff in the packed chamber cheered the decision. Mr. Ban becomes the eighth Secretary-General in the United Nations’ 60-year history, and will oversee an Organization with nearly 100,000 peacekeepers in 18 countries around the world, and a $5 billion annual budget.
Mr. Ban will succeed 2001 Nobel Peace Prize winner Kofi Annan, of Ghana, who will retire at the end of December, after leading the 192-member world body for a decade. Earlier in his 40-year diplomatic career, Mr. Ban, 62, served in his country’s Mission to the United Nations and, in 2001, was Chef de Cabinet to then-Assembly President Han Seung-soo, of the Republic of Korea. Mr. Ban will be the first Asian to lead the Organization since U Thant, who held the post from 1961 to 1971.
“I stand before you deeply touched and inspired,” Mr. Ban told the Assembly. As Secretary-General, he vowed to work “diligently to materialize our responsibility to protect the most vulnerable members of humanity, and for the peaceful resolution of threats to international security”. He added that: “The true measure of the success of the UN is not how much we promise, but how much we deliver for those who need us most… We need not shout [the Organization’s] praises or preach its virtues. We simply need to live them every day: step by step, programme by programme, mandate by mandate,” he said.
Pledging to carry out reforms, building on Mr. Annan’s legacy, the Secretary-General-designate said: “My tenure will be marked by ceaseless efforts to build bridges and close divides.” He declared that his leadership would be one of harmony, foreswearing division.
“Let us remember that reform is not to please others, but because we value what this Organization stands for,” he said, laying out his vision of a truly reformed United Nations that could effectively meet the challenges of the twenty-first century. “We need reform because we believe in the future. To revitalize our common endeavour is to renew our faith not only in the UN’s programmes and purposes but also in each other. We should demand more of ourselves, as well as of our organization,” he said.
Mr. Annan praised Ban as “a future Secretary-General who is exceptionally attuned to the sensitivities of countries and constituencies in every continent -- a man with a truly global mind at the helm of the world’s only universal organization”.
He recalled that, more than 50 years ago, the first Secretary-General, Trygve Lie, had used the following words in greeting his successor, Dag Hammarskjöld: “You are about to take over the most impossible job on Earth.” Mr. Annan said that, while that might be true, he would have to add: “This is also the best possible job on Earth.”
Welcoming Mr. Ban, General Assembly President Sheikha Haya Al Khalifa of Bahrain said his appointment came at a time when the United Nations was deeply engaged in a wide-ranging reform process. “We are grateful to Secretary-General Kofi Annan, who has played a major role in shaping a clear and comprehensive vision to address the many global challenges confronting us,” she declared. She was confident that the Organization would build upon its past achievements and move ahead to become an even more effective body under Mr. Ban’s leadership.
Kenzo Oshima of Japan, whose delegation holds the Security Council’s rotating Presidency for the month, presented the work undertaken by that 15-nation body leading to Mr. Ban’s appointment by the Assembly. The chairpersons of the United Nations five regional groups, and representatives of the European Union and the “Group of 77” developing countries and China, as well as of the host country, each took the podium, praising the Secretary-General-designate for his diplomatic skills and personal qualities. They said the world body would be in able hands, as it faced the challenges to come. The speakers also paid tribute to Mr. Annan for his work in steering the United Nations through 10 difficult years.
Statement by Secretary-General
Outgoing United Nations Secretary-General, KOFI ANNAN, congratulated his successor and said he was pleased his election had been “early and orderly”. He believed everyone recognized the depth of Mr. Ban’s experience, the breadth of his connections, and his ability to operate effectively at the highest levels.
“But as someone who has known and worked with you several years, I think they will soon discover something more, if they do not see that already: a future Secretary-General who is exceptionally attuned to the sensitivities of countries and constituencies in every continent. A man with a truly global mind at the helm of the world’s most universal Organization,” Mr. Annan said.
Mr. Ban’s early election will give the United Nations community a head start in ensuring the smoothest possible transition, said Mr. Annan, giving the new United Nations chief one piece of advice: “Try to make full use of the unparalleled resource you will find in the staff of the Organization. Their commitment is the United Nations’ greatest asset, and has been the surest source of strength for me in my work as Secretary-General.”
He said that, more that 50 years ago, the first Secretary-General of the United Nations, Trygve Lie, greeted his successor, Dag Hammarskjold, by saying: “you are about to take over the most impossible job on Earth.” And, while that might be true, Mr. Annan said he would now add “this is also the best possible job on Earth”.
“As you ready yourself to take over, I wish you strength and courage. You will need those attributes, but equally, you will need a healthy sense of humour -– which I know you posses in abundance, so don’t forget to have fun along the way,” said Mr. Annan, in closing.
Statement by Secretary-General-designate
BAN KI-MOON, United Nations Secretary-General-designate, said he stood before the Assembly “deeply touched and inspired”. He followed a line of remarkable leaders, each of whom had faced this moment at a critical juncture in the Organization’s history. In particular, outgoing Secretary-General Kofi Annan, who had astutely guided the United Nations into the twenty-first century. “You have defined an ambitious agenda that has made the United Nations truly indispensable to peace, prosperity and human dignity around the world. Our debt to your courage and vision is immeasurable. I resolve to build on your legacy,” he told Mr. Annan.
He said that his own rapid election by the Assembly had provided him with an unprecedented opportunity: never in the history of the Organization had an incoming Secretary-General been given sufficient time to prepare for the job. He would use the next two months to consult widely on how to proceed with the Organization’s common agenda of reform and revitalization. “I will listen attentively to your concerns, expectations and ambitions,” he said. Proud to be the second Asian to lead the Organization -- following U Thant -- he said his dynamic and diverse region aspired to take greater responsibilities in the world.
He was from a part of the world where modesty was a virtue, but that was about demeanour, not vision and goals, he explained. The Asian region also exemplified “quiet determination in action to get things done without so much fanfare,” adding that that “might be the key to Asia’s success, and to the United Nations’ future.” He said: “We should be modest in our words, but not in our performance. The true measure of the success of the UN is not how much we promise, but how much we deliver for those who need us most…We need not shout [the Organization’s] praises or preach its virtues. We simply need to live them every day: step by step, programme by programme, mandate by mandate.”
The United Nations was needed now more than ever, Mr. Ban said. In the previous century, the Organization’s core mission was to keep countries from fighting each other; in the new century, the United Nations’ defining mandate was to strengthen the inter-State system, so that humanity might be better served amid new challenges.
“From the Balkans to Africa, from Asia to the Middle East, we have witnessed the weakening, or absence, of effective governance, leading to the ravaging of human rights and the abandonment of longstanding humanitarian principles,” he said, stressing that the international community needed “competent and responsible States” to meet the needs of the people for whom the United Nations was committed. “And the world’s people will not be fully served unless peace, development and human rights -- the three pillars of the United Nations -- are advanced together with equal vigour,” he added.
He said that “the road we must pave toward a world of peace, prosperity and dignity for all has many pitfalls”. As Secretary-General, he would make the most of the authority vested in his Office by the Charter and the mandate given to him by the member States. He would work with dignity to make real the responsibility to protect the most vulnerable members of humanity and for the peaceful resolution of threats to international peace and security.
Turning to Organizational reform, he said that the thorough-going exercise had taxed the attention and energies of both delegations, and the Secretariat. “But, we must stay the course,” he said, calling on the United Nations family to muster the human, institutional and intellectual resources required for the task, and organize them properly.
“We should do our part in meeting the Millennium Development Goals, expanding peace operations, threats posed by terrorism, proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, HIV/AIDS and other pandemics, environmental degradation and the imperatives of human rights,” he said.
At the same time, he went on, the United Nations was not reforming to please others. “We reform because we value what the Organization stands for. We reform because we believe in its future.” He urged the member States to demand more of each other, and of the Organization. To cut through the “fog of mistrust,” however, was going to take more intensive dialogue. “We cannot choose everything at once, but if we choose wisely, and work together transparently, flexibly and honestly, progress in a few areas would lead to progress in many more,” he promised.
He pledged to build bridges, in order to bridge gaps, to foreswear divisions, and to remain faithful to his constituency. He would also take full responsibility for Secretariat management.
He was proud to join the ranks of the world’s premier Secretariat, and pledged his utmost support, dedication and solidarity to the able and courageous men and women who served the Organization, he said. The aim of Secretariat reform was not to penalize, but to reward, so that talent and skill, experience and dedication might be fully mobilized and utilized. Calling for the Secretariat’s unsparing support as he took up the helm of the Organization, he pledged to seek excellence with humility, and to lead by example. Promises should be kept, and he pledged to work with all stakeholders for a United Nations that delivered on its promises.
“I earnestly hope that the young boys and girls of today will grow up knowing that the United Nations is working hard to build a better future for them. As Secretary-General, I will embrace their hopes and hear their appeals. I am an optimist, and I am full of hope about the future of our global Organization. Let us work together for a United Nations that can deliver more and better,” he said.
Copyright © Demetrios the Traveler
(Brexians lair)
12/10/2006
φετος θα φαει μαλλον τους αντιπαλους του...
17/10/2005
Εντοπίζεται στην Ελλάδα, το πρώτο ύποπτο κρούσμα της γρίπης των πτηνών σε γαλοπούλα σε οικόσιτη μονάδα στις Οινούσσες. Η πρώτη εξέταση δείχνει ότι ένα από τα εννέα δείγματα πουλερικών βρέθηκε θετικό στην παρουσία αντισωμάτων της γρίπης των πτηνών Η5.
Ωστόσο δεν διευκρινίζεται αν διαγνώσθηκε το στέλεχος του φονικού H5N1. Σύγχηση προκαλούν οι δηλώσεις του υπουργού Αγροτικής Ανάπτυξης Ε.Μπασιάκου σχετικά μ' ένα χαμένο δείγμα γαλοπούλας. Τα δείγματα στέλλονται στη Θεσσαλονίκης και στη Βρετανία για περαιτέρω εξετάσεις. Τα πουλερικά των Οινουσσών τίθενται σε καραντίνα, ενώ οι απασχολούμενοι στην οικόσιτη μονάδα τίθενται σε ιατρική παρακολούθηση. Στις 19/10, ο υπουργός Υγείας Νικήτας Κακλαμάνης επισκέπτεται τις Οινούσσες διαβεβαιώνοντας ότι δεν υπάρχει κανένα πρόβλημα για τους κατοίκους του ακριτικού νησιού και γενικότερα της Ελλάδας ενώ ως αντίδοτο στον πανικό γευματίζει με κοτόπουλο στο νησί.
Στις 20/10, αυτοψία στο χώρο εκτροφής των ύποπτων πουλερικών στις Οινούσσες κάνουν εμπειρογνώμονες της Ε.Ε. Στις 29/10, αρνητικά είναι τα τελικά αποτελέσματα των αναλύσεων στα δείγματα των πουλερικών από τις Οινούσσες για τον ιό της γρίπης των πουλερικών, που έγιναν σε Βρετανία και Θεσσαλονίκη.
Το υπουργείο Αγροτικής Ανάπτυξης, με τη σύμφωνη γνώμη της Κτηνιατρικής Υπηρεσίας της Ε.Ε., αίρει τα μέτρα που είχαν ληφθεί στο νησί.
Copyright © Demetrios the Traveler
(Brexians lair)
Τουρκία μαινόμενη
Για το νόμο περί γενοκτονίας των Αρμενίων
Πηγή: AΠΕ-Reuters-Associated
Την έντονη αντίδραση της Τουρκίας προκάλεσε η ψήφιση από την Κάτω Βουλή της Γαλλίας, νομοσχεδίου που ποινικοποιεί τους αρνητές της γενοκτονίας των Αρμενίων από τους Οθωμανούς Τούρκους, το 1915. Το υπουργείο Εξωτερικών, της Τουρκίας σε αυστηρή ανακοίνωσή του, θεωρεί την απόφαση βαρύ και σκληρό πλήγμα στις σχέσεις των δυο χωρών και την θεωρεί αποτέλεσμα της ανεύθυνης στάσης μερίδας Γάλλων πολιτικών που δεν μπόρεσαν να δουν τις συνέπειες της πολιτικής που ακολουθούν". Η γαλλική κυβέρνηση ωστόσο ανακοίνωσε σήμερα ότι δεν θα υποστηρίξει την συγκεκριμένη πρόταση νόμου. Την λύπη της, για την ψήφιση της πρότασης εξέφρασε η Ε.Ε, ενώ το Ελληνικό Υπουργείο Εξωτερικών, σε σχόλιο του, αφού υπενθύμισε ότι η Ελληνική Βουλή έχει υιοθετήσει σχετικό ψήφισμα από το 1996 επισήμανε πως "στο σύγχρονο κόσμο το παρελθόν δε θα πρέπει να αποτελεί τροχοπέδη για το μέλλον".
Σκληρές αντιδράσεις
Ο Τούρκος υπουργός Εξωτερικών Αμπντουλάχ Γκιουλ, αναφερόμενος στην υπερψήφιση του νομοσχεδίου χαρακτήρισε την υπόθεση "εθνική", η οποία έχει δημιουργήσει έντονες αντιδράσεις σε επίσημο και λαϊκό επίπεδο.
Ο Γκιουλ, απέφυγε να απαντήσει για το ποιες θα είναι οι επόμενες κινήσεις της Τουρκίας, όσον αφορά το συγκεκριμένο γεγονός, ενώ εξέφρασε την ελπίδα, "η Γαλλία να βγει από το αδιέξοδο αυτό".
Απαράδεκτη χαρακτήρισε την απόφαση ο πρόεδρος της Τουρκικής Εθνοσυνέλευσης Μπουλέντ Αρίντς ο οποίος επισήμανε ότι "πρόκειται για εχθρική κίνηση εναντίον του τουρκικού έθνους".
Ο Τούρκος υπουργός Οικονομικών Αλί Μπαμπατσάν, από την πλευρά του δεν απέκλεισε μάλιστα το ενδεχόμενο να υπάρξουν συνέπειες για τις γαλλικές επιχειρήσεις μετά την ψήφο των Γάλλων βουλευτών, αποκλείοντας όμως κάθε ενδεχόμενο να επιβληθεί μποϊκοτάζ σε γαλλικά προϊόντα.
Την λύπη της για την ψήφιση της πρότασης εξέφρασε η Ευρωπαϊκή Επιτροπή, εκτιμώντας πως το συγκεκριμένο γεγονός "θα εμποδίσει το διάλογο για τη συμφιλίωση" ανάμεσα στην Τουρκία και την Αρμενία.
Ωστόσο όπως ανέφερε ο πρόεδρος της Επιτροπής της Τουρκικής Εθνοσυνέλευσης για την εναρμόνιση της Τουρκίας με την ΕΕ και πρώην υπουργός Εξωτερικών Γιασάρ Γιακίς, τα μέτρα που θα ληφθούν εναντίον της υπερψήφισης του νομοσχεδίου "δεν θα πρέπει να βλάψουν την Τουρκία".
Ο Γιακίς επεσήμανε ότι "υπάρχει ακόμη χρόνος" και με κριτικό ύφος προς την κυβέρνηση, τόνισε ότι "αν η κυβέρνηση κινηθεί πιο έγκαιρα αυτή τη φορά, ενόψει της συζήτησης του νομοσχεδίου στη γαλλική Γερουσία, αν καταφέρει να οργανωθεί με τρόπο που να επηρεάσει τους Γάλλους βουλευτές και γερουσιαστές, έχουμε πιθανότητες να είμαστε περισσότερο πετυχημένοι".
Με ανακοίνωση του ο Σύνδεσμος Τούρκων Βιομηχάνων και Επιχειρηματιών (TUSIAD) αφού καταδικάζει την ψήφιση της πρότασης απάντηση υπογραμμίζει ότι: "Η καλύτερη απάντηση που μπορεί να δοθεί στη Γαλλία είναι να συνεχίσουμε την πορεία μας στο δρόμο προς την πλήρη ένταξη στην ΕΕ, επιταχύνοντας τις πολιτικές μεταρρυθμίσεις, συμπεριλαμβανομένων ιδιαίτερα αυτών που αφορούν την ελευθερία έκφρασης".
Την απόφαση της Γαλλίας καταδίκασε και το Αζερμπαϊτζάν, παραδοσιακός σύμμαχος της Τουρκίας, εκτιμώντας ότι η Γαλλία "παρασύρθηκε από την επιρροή αρμενικών κύκλων".
Το Αζερμπαϊτζάν, πρώην σοβιετική δημοκρατία του Καυκάσου, έχει έντονες διαφωνίες με την Αρμενία όσον αφορά τον αμφιλεγόμενο θύλακο του Ναγκόρνο Καραμπάχ, που έχει προσαρτηθεί από το Αζερμπαϊτζάν με σκληρές αιματηρές μάχες τη δεκαετία του 1990, και όπου η πλειοψηφία των κατοίκων του είναι Αρμένιοι.
Η πρόταση νόμου, που πρέπει να επικυρωθεί και από την Άνω Βουλή -Γερουσία- για να αποτελέσει νόμο του κράτους, προβλέπει ότι όποιος αρνείται την πραγματικότητα της αρμενικής γενοκτονίας κατά τη διάρκεια του Α’ Παγκοσμίου Πολέμου θα τιμωρείται με φυλάκιση ενός έτους και πρόστιμο 45.000 ευρώ.
Copyright © Demetrios the Traveler
(Brexians lair)
the end .....DOORS
αναφορικα με το πιο κατω ιστογραμμα!
This is the end
Beautiful friend
This is the end
My only friend, the end
Of our elaborate plans, the end
Of everything that stands, the end
No safety or surprise, the end
Ill never look into your eyes...again
Can you picture what will be
So limitless and free
Desperately in need...of some...strangers hand
In a...desperate land
Lost in a roman...wilderness of pain
And all the children are insane
All the children are insane
Waiting for the summer rain, yeah
Theres danger on the edge of town
Ride the kings highway, baby
Weird scenes inside the gold mine
Ride the highway west, baby
Ride the snake, ride the snake
To the lake, the ancient lake, baby
The snake is long, seven miles
Ride the snake...hes old, and his skin is cold
The west is the best
The west is the best
Get here, and well do the rest
The blue bus is callin us
The blue bus is callin us
Driver, where you taken us
The killer awoke before dawn, he put his boots on
He took a face from the ancient gallery
And he walked on down the hall
He went into the room where his sister lived, and...then he
Paid a visit to his brother, and then he
He walked on down the hall, and
And he came to a door...and he looked inside
Father, yes son, I want to kill you
Mother...i want to...fuck you
Cmon baby, take a chance with us
Cmon baby, take a chance with us
Cmon baby, take a chance with us
And meet me at the back of the blue bus
Doin a blue rock
On a blue bus
Doin a blue rock
Cmon, yeah
Kill, kill, kill, kill, kill, kill
This is the end
Beautiful friend
This is the end
My only friend, the end
It hurts to set you free
But youll never follow me
The end of laughter and soft lies
The end of nights we tried to die
This is the end
(Brexians lair)
11/10/2006
Yahoo to digitally encapsulate 2006
If there's any intelligent life out there with the right technology, they can expect to receive a laser-guided load of multimedia messages from our little blue-green planet, thanks to Yahoo.
The search company announced today the launch of an Internet time capsule, intended to document life in 2006. People from around the globe are invited to submit digital photos, text, movies, and audio files on topics such as love, sorrow, beauty, the past, and the present.
At the end of the project (about 29 days from now), the time capsule will be saved onto a digital archive and sealed at the Yahoo HQ to be opened in 2020. Another copy will go to the Smithsonian Folkways Recordings archive in Washington D.C.
Finally, in a move that has PR stunt written all over it, Yahoo on Oct. 25 through 27 will project the capsule contents onto one of the world's oldest time capsules, the Pyramid of the Sun in Teotihuacán, Mexico, and beam it into space from the pyramid. This event will be viewable live via Webcast.
"Wherever people use Yahoo -- from Mexico, Germany or China to the U.S. -- we want them to represent their culture and show us what's impor-tant to them by participating in this historic Internet time capsule event," said Jerry Yang, co-founder and "chief Yahoo." "It will be fascinating to see what people submit as their part of this 2006 snapshot, which will be shared with generations to come."
The time capsule, accessible at timecapsule.yahoo.com, was designed by artist Jonathan Harris, and it shows. Aesthetically speaking, I think Harris has done an impressive job of designing an application that's not only aesthetically pleasing but also intuitive for making contributions and sifting through them.
There is, for example, a neat Facts page, where you can view all sorts of data about what kind of contributions have been made to the capsule.
(I did observe that some contributors didn't quite grasp the proper technique of tagging contributions, though.)
Also nice: Yahoo will be donating $100,000, divided among eight charities. When you add to the time capsule, you may select which charity of the eight you support.
My only hope is that no one contributes a clip from the show "ALF." I think that could serve to antagonize otherwise peaceful aliens out there who don't take kindly to being portrayed so demeaningly.
Copyright © Demetrios the Traveler
(Brexians lair)
YAHOO KAI ΦΥΓΑΜΕ......
Η Πυραμίδα του Ήλιου στο Μεξικό, κάποτε το κέντρο ενός προκολομβιανού πολιτισμού, θα γίνει σύντομα η αφετηρία μιας απόπειρας επικοινωνίας με εξωγήινους.
Το Υahoo θα μεταδώσει μήνυμα της ανθρωπότητας με μια δέσμη λέιζερ που θα εκπεμφθεί από το μνημείο.
Το πρόγραμμα Χρονοκάψουλα (Time Capsule) του δημοφιλούς δικτυακού τόπου δέχεται από την Τρίτη τις συνεισφορές των χρηστών, κείμενα, εικόνες και ήχους που αντανακλούν την ανθρώπινη φύση.
Το τελικό μήνυμα θα ψηφιοποιηθεί και θα εκπεμφθεί στο Διάστημα από την πυραμίδα στις 25 Οκτωβρίου, αναφέρει το Reuters.
Η τοποθεσία του Τεοτιχουακάν, κοντά στην Πόλη του Μεξικού, αποτέλεσε το κέντρο ενός πολιτισμού που άκμασε στη Μεσοαμερική την πρώτη χιλιετία μ.Χ., αλλά εξαφανίστηκε πριν από την άφιξη των Ευρωπαίων για άγνωστους λόγους.
«Έχουμε αυτή την απίστευτη αρχαία τοποθεσία και από την τοποθεσία αυτή μπορούμε να προβάλουμε σύγχρονο περιεχόμενο» δήλωσε αρχισυντάκτρια του Yahoo.
Δεν είναι η πρώτη φορά που ο άνθρωπος στέλνει μηνύματα στο Διάστημα με την ελπίδα ότι κάποτε θα τα λάβουν εξωγήινοι πολιτισμοί. Τη δεκαετία του 1970, ο αστρονόμος Καρλ Σέιγκαν δημιούργησε έναν χρυσό δίσκο, πάνω στον οποίο χαράχθηκαν χαιρετισμοί και εικόνες της Γης, ως πορτραίτο της ποικιλότητας της ζωής και του πολιτισμού στον πλανήτη.
Τοποθετημένος στο διαστημικό σκάφος Voyager, ο δίσκος ταξιδεύει τώρα έξω από το Ηλιακό Σύστημα.
news.in.gr
(Brexians lair)
08/10/2006
Rugged Pathways to a Simpler Time
An old stone house in Fajã de Caldeira de Santo Cristo, one of many seaside villages on São Jorge in the Azores.
THE path starts where the dirt road ends — at the crest of the ragged spine that makes up the whole of Sγo Jorge, one of the nine islands of the Azores. When the clouds lift, which happens now and then, the Atlantic Ocean appears some 2,000 feet below —a sheet of smooth, blue-gray glass. But just as often, you will commence your hike shrouded in a white mist.
Sometime in the last year or so someone put up a sign. Between it and what remains of a rough-hewn wooden milking shed, forsaken now for mobile machines, the path plunges between two rows of hydrangeas with bright blue flowers as plump as muskmelons, and the inevitable deposit that marks it as a regularly traveled cow path.
The Azores — and Sγo Jorge particularly — are covered with these paths. They are called canadas or caminhos and they crisscross the rugged Azorean landscape, bisecting pastures and linking towns and villages. On Sγo Jorge, they provide the only access — except by sea — to some of the island’s fajγs, seaside villages built on the flatlands created from the subsidence of the volcanic peaks.
In recent years, the authorities in the Azores, a semiautonomous region of Portugal in the Atlantic, have begun marking these paths, hoping to attract tourists willing to hike up and down the very edge of Europe. I have been coming to Sγo Jorge since 1991, the year I married an ιmigrι born on the island, and back then I would hear of some of these paths, like lore, from my wife’s relatives. Others we encountered simply by starting down a village road, which would ultimately devolve into a foot-trail and then descend into the verdant ravines that cleave the island.
One of the first I trekked began in the village of Santo Antγo, where my father-in-law, Josι Xavier, grew up, and ended in Cruzal, the village of Teresa Luis, my mother-in-law. The walk is only two miles or so, but steep in places, and retracing his footsteps I came to appreciate the effort he made to court this woman some 50 years ago.
The paths are not exactly a step back in time, but at least a long walk into a simpler place of natural beauty, unspoiled but for the necessity of earning a living. On Sγo Jorge this means milking cows and making a pungent cheese named for the island.
The longest trail winds for several miles along the island’s uppermost ridge, passing the highest peak, Pico da Esperanηa, nearly 3,400 feet above sea level, at the top of which you will find a small lake nestled in a meadow of mountain grass and flowers. From here, on a clear day, you can see the four other islands of the Azores’ central group.
Another begins at Fajγ dos Vimes, a village on the southern coast. Hugging the coast, the path leads to Fajγ dos Bodes, but a couple of years ago a rockslide severed the path, which has yet to be restored I picked up the path farther on, past a riotously pink church.
Starkly visible across the strait is the island of Pico, named after its dominant geographical feature, a perfectly conical volcano that is the highest point in all of Portugal at 7,713 feet. (In 2004, I climbed Pico with a guide and ate lunch on the summit, sitting above the clouds, warmed by volcanic vapors emanating from a vent.)
The trail jackknifes back and forth, up and down before ending three miles later — and more than 1,800 feet below — in the Fajγ de Sγo Joγo, an assemblage of whitewashed, red-tile-roofed houses. The village has a chapel with 19th-century cast-iron bells and a forlorn but friendly cafe that serves ice cream and ice-cold beer.
Each fajγ has its own semitropical microclimate, and the Azoreans long ago carved terraces into the hillside where they still grow potatoes, bananas, figs, taro and coffee, as well as grapes for wine made in ancient stone presses. Once I met a man on the road who insisted I try his homemade white, a sturdy, earthy vintage that by the third glass left me woozy. (There’s a road down to Sγo Joγo, and in such circumstances it is best to call a taxi.)
The best of the three marked paths — there are four now — is the one that begins at the old milkshed and rows of hydrangeas and leads from the island’s ridge to the Fajγ da Caldeira de Santo Cristo, famous for its lagoon and the cockles in it (the only place in the Azores where they live). Because of the cockles’ scarcity, the locals are allowed to harvest them only from Aug. 15 to May 15. Five swinging gates punctuate the trek. They are fashioned from local wood in warbled designs that recall Gaudν and are perfectly balanced to swing shut, though you are asked to make sure they close so that cows do not escape from field to field.
The hills are covered in dense forests of heather and cedar, interspersed with steep pastures. On some trips I have met herders or other tourists, but last year we descended in solitude. The clouds above us did not obstruct the view of two other islands, Terceira to the right and Graciosa to the left.
The first stone house on the path appears more than an hour later. It is abandoned, probably after the earthquake on New Year’s Day 1980, which devastated much of the island and hastened emigration. Just past it, however, is another house, newly painted, a sign that life here perseveres.
The path crosses a stone bridge, and another trail, barely discernible, leads off to the right, dropping into a grove of dragon trees. It twists around two boulders and leads to a waterfall feeding a small swimming hole, a perfectly shaded place to rest.
The main path dips, crests and dips again, like a roller coaster. The Fajγ da Caldeira de Santo Cristo appeared. It has only a dozen or so stone houses, nestled at the base of Pico do Brejo, which looms nearly 2,500 feet above. The village’s most visible landmark, aside from the lagoon, is the church, also Santo Cristo, a small stone structure, with a bell tower. It is never locked.
At Caldeira, you have a choice: you can continue walking another three miles to the Fajγ dos Cubres or go back up the way you came. I did that, once. Better to continue past the lagoon, the abandoned cemetery and the mostly abandoned fields of Fajγ dos Tijulos. The path rises and falls again before reaching the Fajγ dos Cubres, which also has a lagoon and a church with an altar made from cork.
A paved road reaches Cubres (though it, too, was swept away a few years ago and was closed for a couple of years), and after a cold drink in the cafe opposite the church, you can ride back to the top of the mountain.
This year, for the first time, the island’s village councils began organizing tours that are led by old-timers. The project is intended to help others learn what I discovered by happenstance: that these old, nearly abandoned paths contain, as a brochure put it, “a memory that is important to preserve.”
VISITOR INFORMATION
WALKING TOURS
Aven Tour (351-295-416-711 or 351-963-219-751; on the Web, only in Portuguese, at www.aventour-net.com) in Calheta, Sγo Jorge’s second town, organizes walking tours on the island.
WHERE TO STAY AND EAT
The Hotel Sγo Jorge Garden (351-295-430-100; fax 351-295-412-736; on the Web, only in Portuguese, at www.hotelsjgarden.com) is the biggest and most traditional hotel in Velas, the island’s main town, with double rooms costing 65 euros, (about $85 at $1.30 to the euro) in winter.
The Casa do Antσnio, (351-295-430-330; fax, 351-295-432-008; e-mail antonio@viagensaquarius.com) opened last year in a rambling structure overlooking the harbor in Velas; a statue of a mermaid is perched atop the building. Next summer, prices for a double will be 88 euros and a “quarto da torre” — a room in one of the turretlike towers — will be 100 euros. Doubles in October are 66 euros and only 55 and 65 euros November to March.
Not far away, above the quay, is the Restaurante Marisqueira Clube Naval de Velas (351-295-412-945), which specializes in seafood. Dinner for two costs 30 to 40 euros.
The Quinta do Canαrio (351-295-412-800; fax, 295-412-802; on the Web, only in Portuguese, at www.quintadocanario.com) is a small stone house in Santo Amaro, with a private double with a bathroom for 100 euros and two rooms that share a bathroom at 90 euros each.
Sometime in the last year or so someone put up a sign. Between it and what remains of a rough-hewn wooden milking shed, forsaken now for mobile machines, the path plunges between two rows of hydrangeas with bright blue flowers as plump as muskmelons, and the inevitable deposit that marks it as a regularly traveled cow path.
The Azores — and Sγo Jorge particularly — are covered with these paths. They are called canadas or caminhos and they crisscross the rugged Azorean landscape, bisecting pastures and linking towns and villages. On Sγo Jorge, they provide the only access — except by sea — to some of the island’s fajγs, seaside villages built on the flatlands created from the subsidence of the volcanic peaks.
In recent years, the authorities in the Azores, a semiautonomous region of Portugal in the Atlantic, have begun marking these paths, hoping to attract tourists willing to hike up and down the very edge of Europe. I have been coming to Sγo Jorge since 1991, the year I married an ιmigrι born on the island, and back then I would hear of some of these paths, like lore, from my wife’s relatives. Others we encountered simply by starting down a village road, which would ultimately devolve into a foot-trail and then descend into the verdant ravines that cleave the island.
One of the first I trekked began in the village of Santo Antγo, where my father-in-law, Josι Xavier, grew up, and ended in Cruzal, the village of Teresa Luis, my mother-in-law. The walk is only two miles or so, but steep in places, and retracing his footsteps I came to appreciate the effort he made to court this woman some 50 years ago.
The paths are not exactly a step back in time, but at least a long walk into a simpler place of natural beauty, unspoiled but for the necessity of earning a living. On Sγo Jorge this means milking cows and making a pungent cheese named for the island.
The longest trail winds for several miles along the island’s uppermost ridge, passing the highest peak, Pico da Esperanηa, nearly 3,400 feet above sea level, at the top of which you will find a small lake nestled in a meadow of mountain grass and flowers. From here, on a clear day, you can see the four other islands of the Azores’ central group.
Another begins at Fajγ dos Vimes, a village on the southern coast. Hugging the coast, the path leads to Fajγ dos Bodes, but a couple of years ago a rockslide severed the path, which has yet to be restored I picked up the path farther on, past a riotously pink church.
Starkly visible across the strait is the island of Pico, named after its dominant geographical feature, a perfectly conical volcano that is the highest point in all of Portugal at 7,713 feet. (In 2004, I climbed Pico with a guide and ate lunch on the summit, sitting above the clouds, warmed by volcanic vapors emanating from a vent.)
The trail jackknifes back and forth, up and down before ending three miles later — and more than 1,800 feet below — in the Fajγ de Sγo Joγo, an assemblage of whitewashed, red-tile-roofed houses. The village has a chapel with 19th-century cast-iron bells and a forlorn but friendly cafe that serves ice cream and ice-cold beer.
Each fajγ has its own semitropical microclimate, and the Azoreans long ago carved terraces into the hillside where they still grow potatoes, bananas, figs, taro and coffee, as well as grapes for wine made in ancient stone presses. Once I met a man on the road who insisted I try his homemade white, a sturdy, earthy vintage that by the third glass left me woozy. (There’s a road down to Sγo Joγo, and in such circumstances it is best to call a taxi.)
The best of the three marked paths — there are four now — is the one that begins at the old milkshed and rows of hydrangeas and leads from the island’s ridge to the Fajγ da Caldeira de Santo Cristo, famous for its lagoon and the cockles in it (the only place in the Azores where they live). Because of the cockles’ scarcity, the locals are allowed to harvest them only from Aug. 15 to May 15. Five swinging gates punctuate the trek. They are fashioned from local wood in warbled designs that recall Gaudν and are perfectly balanced to swing shut, though you are asked to make sure they close so that cows do not escape from field to field.
The hills are covered in dense forests of heather and cedar, interspersed with steep pastures. On some trips I have met herders or other tourists, but last year we descended in solitude. The clouds above us did not obstruct the view of two other islands, Terceira to the right and Graciosa to the left.
The first stone house on the path appears more than an hour later. It is abandoned, probably after the earthquake on New Year’s Day 1980, which devastated much of the island and hastened emigration. Just past it, however, is another house, newly painted, a sign that life here perseveres.
The path crosses a stone bridge, and another trail, barely discernible, leads off to the right, dropping into a grove of dragon trees. It twists around two boulders and leads to a waterfall feeding a small swimming hole, a perfectly shaded place to rest.
The main path dips, crests and dips again, like a roller coaster. The Fajγ da Caldeira de Santo Cristo appeared. It has only a dozen or so stone houses, nestled at the base of Pico do Brejo, which looms nearly 2,500 feet above. The village’s most visible landmark, aside from the lagoon, is the church, also Santo Cristo, a small stone structure, with a bell tower. It is never locked.
At Caldeira, you have a choice: you can continue walking another three miles to the Fajγ dos Cubres or go back up the way you came. I did that, once. Better to continue past the lagoon, the abandoned cemetery and the mostly abandoned fields of Fajγ dos Tijulos. The path rises and falls again before reaching the Fajγ dos Cubres, which also has a lagoon and a church with an altar made from cork.
A paved road reaches Cubres (though it, too, was swept away a few years ago and was closed for a couple of years), and after a cold drink in the cafe opposite the church, you can ride back to the top of the mountain.
This year, for the first time, the island’s village councils began organizing tours that are led by old-timers. The project is intended to help others learn what I discovered by happenstance: that these old, nearly abandoned paths contain, as a brochure put it, “a memory that is important to preserve.”
VISITOR INFORMATION
WALKING TOURS
Aven Tour (351-295-416-711 or 351-963-219-751; on the Web, only in Portuguese, at www.aventour-net.com) in Calheta, Sγo Jorge’s second town, organizes walking tours on the island.
WHERE TO STAY AND EAT
The Hotel Sγo Jorge Garden (351-295-430-100; fax 351-295-412-736; on the Web, only in Portuguese, at www.hotelsjgarden.com) is the biggest and most traditional hotel in Velas, the island’s main town, with double rooms costing 65 euros, (about $85 at $1.30 to the euro) in winter.
The Casa do Antσnio, (351-295-430-330; fax, 351-295-432-008; e-mail antonio@viagensaquarius.com) opened last year in a rambling structure overlooking the harbor in Velas; a statue of a mermaid is perched atop the building. Next summer, prices for a double will be 88 euros and a “quarto da torre” — a room in one of the turretlike towers — will be 100 euros. Doubles in October are 66 euros and only 55 and 65 euros November to March.
Not far away, above the quay, is the Restaurante Marisqueira Clube Naval de Velas (351-295-412-945), which specializes in seafood. Dinner for two costs 30 to 40 euros.
The Quinta do Canαrio (351-295-412-800; fax, 295-412-802; on the Web, only in Portuguese, at www.quintadocanario.com) is a small stone house in Santo Amaro, with a private double with a bathroom for 100 euros and two rooms that share a bathroom at 90 euros each.
A stone church nestled in the side of the mountain.
(Brexians lair)
ΜΟΜΙΧ ΚΑΙΝΟΦΑΝΕΙΣ ΚΑΙ ΥΠΕΡΟΧΟΙ
ΜΟΜΙΧ ΛΟΥΝΑΡ ΚΑΙ ΜΟΜΙΧ ΠΑΣΣΙΟΝ
(Brexians lair)
ΧΩΡΙΣΤΕ ΚΑΙ ΞΕΠΟΥΛΙΣΤΕ
ΑΥΤΑ ΣΥΜΒΑΙΝΟΥΝ ΣΤΗΝ ΑΝΤΙΠΕΡΑ ΟΧΘΗ ΤΟΥ ΑΤΛΑΝΤΙΚΟΥ, ΕΔΩ?
By KATHRYN SHATTUCK
GABRIELLE TORELLO drowned her wedding band — the cheap one — in the Hudson River, stuffed the diamond rings and earrings her ex-husband had given her into a pair of old shoes at the bottom of her closet, and treated herself to some commemorative sparkle, like the ring she bought when she survived her first court date.
“It makes me very happy every time I wear it,” said Ms. Torello, a communications consultant in Hackensack, N.J. “It was such a bad time that I don’t want to wear anything from that period in my life. I really wanted a new beginning.”
Jay Johnson, upon discovering that his girlfriend was two-timing him with one of his friends, simply packed everything she had given him — all the letters and boudoir pictures and sappy sentiments — into a box and mailed them to his rival with a note that said, “Good luck, Dave.”
“Hopefully, he gleaned something,” said Mr. Johnson, a ventriloquist whose show, “The Two and Only!” just opened on Broadway. “I know that they weren’t together all that long.”
And then there is Ellen Barkin, who on Tuesday will unload some $15 million worth of possessions at Christie’s, the detritus from her marriage to Ronald O. Perelman, in a move that may strike some as coldly pragmatic.
Still, when it comes to divorce, as the celebrity divorce lawyer Raoul Felder pointed out: “Sentiment goes out on the courthouse steps. Sentiment is yesterday’s news.”
In an age of unparalleled acquisitiveness, the quandary of what to do with the accumulated belongings of a relationship has become a predictable ingredient in the noxious stew of separation and recovery. Do you erase all traces of a love gone wrong, or recreate yourself within the debris?
“How acrimonious the divorce is — that’s probably the first issue that plays into the decision of whether to purge or not,” said Anya K. Luchow, a divorce mediator and psychologist in Tenafly, N.J. “The second is what their basic personality style is, divorce aside. Finally, economics are a big function in divorce. It’s easier for someone of wealth to part with objects they don’t need for survival.”
In other words, she said, “there is no rule.”
“I see it as an issue of control, especially for people who are being left,” she added. “For them in particular, dealing with the mementos is a way to gain some sort of control over a situation that, until now, has been beyond their control.”
That often includes a detoxification of that symbolic marital nest, the bedroom.
“The mattress and the sheets are the first to go,” Ms. Luchow said.
Some people will continue to divest their homes of furniture, artwork and photographs until nothing remains of the people responsible for their misery.
“I certainly don’t recommend doing that when a child is involved,” Ms. Luchow said. “I try to help people remember that as angry as they are and as much as it’s not working now, they need to hold on to some of the nice memories they have for the children’s sake.”
Marla Maples kept her daughter, Tiffany, in mind when she rid her life of certain objects given her by Tiffany’s father, Donald J. Trump.
“I did sell my engagement ring through an auction, and I donated a big part of it to my charity, Spirituality for Kids,” Ms. Maples said. “It was a big decision, because, of course, having a daughter, I wanted to make sure she was O.K. with it.”
Ms. Maples also put a sports car and a fur coat on the block at eBay, but she kept the wedding album, some family portraits and a stash of tender letters.
“I spent a third of my life with him at the time, so it carried a lot of weight,” she said. “I feel like it will be Tiffany’s choice later on to decide what she wants to hold on to of Mom and Dad.”
In “The Ex-Wives Club,” a makeover series for those left in the lurch, coming to ABC this winter, Ms. Maples will dispense her hard-won advice alongside Shar Jackson, who was dumped by her boyfriend Kevin Federline for Britney Spears, and Angie Everhart, who was engaged to Sylvester Stallone for two months and married to Ashley Hamilton for three.
Auction houses have traditionally been the refuge for those suffering from what John L. Marion, a former chairman of Sotheby’s North America, called the Three D’s: division, divorce and death.
But the equation works well only for women like Ms. Barkin and Ms. Maples, whose wealthy husbands bought major adornments for them, said Mr. Felder, the divorce lawyer. And even they don’t get an even trade.
“With the jewelry, there’s always a rude awakening, because the Van Cleef diamond ring, when you want to sell it back to the store, is worth 25 percent of what your husband paid,” Mr. Felder said.
“It’s fair to say when there’s an important jewelry collection,” he said later, “most women get rid of it because it usually represents a considerable amount of money that they can use to get on with their lives.”
The fashion designer Anait Bian didn’t want to wear the diamond ring an old boyfriend bought for her during a trip to Paris, but she didn’t want to sell it either.
Then one day Ms. Bian’s mother brought a fortuneteller to her house in New York. “She said: ‘You have to look around you. Something in your house been given to you, and it’s got bad energy,’ ” Ms. Bian recalled.
Despite her certainty that the woman was a scam artist, Ms. Bian handed over the ring.
Alas, the fortuneteller called several days later and said the ring was so tainted she had had to purge it herself.
“I thought it was an interesting way of getting rid of it,” Ms. Bian said. “I thought that if she had brought it back, it was meant to be mine. Then I could wear it without any doubt.”
Sometimes the universe has a way of telling you that something is over even before you realize it yourself.
Only weeks before Gail Greiner and her husband separated, she returned home to find that a shelf in her cupboard had collapsed, leaving her wedding china smashed on the floor.
“My son, poor guy, went about trying to salvage it and talked about how we could glue pieces together,” said Ms. Greiner, a writer and editor in Palisades, N.Y. “But I found that with the demise of my marriage came the end of my sentimental feelings about a lot of things, including my wedding china. I swept it up and put it in the garbage, telling my son that it was just ‘things’ and not that important. As soon as he saw that I was O.K. about it, he was, too.”
Still, there are those who manage to move on alongside certain reminders of the past. When the publicist Liz Derringer divorced, she discovered that although she could part with her husband, the rocker Rick Derringer, she was loath to part with his things, particularly his Les Paul Jr. guitar.
“It wasn’t that we were so in love by then, but it was all those years of memories that we had together, and our journey through the 60’s and 70’s,” she said. “We’re friends now, but we weren’t for a long time. When I look at those mementos, they make me really happy, and really sad. It’s so gut-wrenching, it really is, when you spend that much time with someone.”
Judy Steinberg turned that nauseating feeling into a series of symbolic gestures to help women move on with their lives after a breakup, in her book “Fabulous After 50 and Sexy at 60!” (Plume, 2006, written with Raechel Donahue), “because even if it’s amicable, it still shreds your self-esteem,” she said.
Ms. Steinberg should know. When her own marriage to the comedian David Steinberg ended after 24 years, she hit him where she thought it would hurt most — his vanity — by igniting a stack of his head shots in the parking lot of his favorite restaurant.
“Seeing that Chiclet smile go up in smoke was elevating, to say the least,” she said.
She decided to write a book about getting over the relationship when she learned that her ex-husband’s girlfriend had written one titled “How to Survive Your Boyfriend’s Divorce.”
“In my own case, I found my strength at the gym,” she said. “I started lifting weights at 57, and I started to behave like someone who was strong again.”
In the end, she, too, purged. “I didn’t have JAR jewelry, but I sold some coats and a lot of clothes — whatever I needed to do to launch myself into my own life,” she said.
“I read that she is going to start a new film company,” Ms. Steinberg said of Ms. Barkin. “And moving past the horror of being dumped so publicly is the perfect way to use that money. What could be more rewarding?”
She lowered her voice to a conspiratorial whisper.
“And it’s the best revenge.”
(Brexians lair)
House of Mirth
Antoni and Alison are best known as fashion designers but they
have gained recent notoriety as photographers,
with images like that of a brick tied with ribbon.October 8, 2006
By IAIN R. WEBB
To visit the new Web site of the British fashion and design team Antoni Burakowski and Alison Roberts is to enter a parallel world. “Welcome to the house of Antoni & Alison,” the narrator intones as you are taken on a virtual tour of the four-story Georgian town house in newly trendy South London that the pair have spent the last two years renovating as a headquarters and showcase for their work. On the ground floor, the camera pans 360 degrees to reveal polished floorboards and bare brick walls decorated with an ornate gilded mirror, battered brown leather furniture, two standard lamps and a display case filled with woodland figurines. “The house ... is set in a terrace of dilapidated buildings and ... Charles Dickens is believed to have walked past here several times,” the commentary continues. “Please see, on the sofa, a Charles Dickens book.”
This mock National Heritage presentation may be in vogue among London artists like Grayson Perry, whose recent show, “The Charms of Lincolnshire,” was dedicated to the darker side of rural Victorian life and featured genuine and faux-historical artifacts. But it is also typical Antoni & Alison humor. Burakowski and Roberts met in the early 1980’s at St. Martin’s School of Art, where he was studying fashion and she was studying fine art. And while they have been part of the London fashion scene for almost 20 years, they are not what you would call fashion designers.
Their conceptual approach bears comparison to the Dutch designers Viktor & Rolf, while their deadpan, quintessentially British, if not nostalgia-tinged, sensibility puts them shoulder to shoulder with artists like Gilbert and George. Since setting up the business in 1987, Burakowski and Roberts have cultivated their professional marriage, appearing together disguised as goths or, say, donkeys, and even referring to themselves as Mr. & Mrs. Antoni & Alison (in reality they each live with their own partners). Creatively, however, they are inseparable. “That was more important than anything,” says Roberts, whose nunlike modesty plays off Burakowski’s love of the outrageous. “Whatever we put our minds to, we could achieve together.”
At first glance their work is blatantly what-you-see-is-what-you-get, as in their trademark one-word T-shirts, with messages like “Loser” and “Modernist.” Context is key. “Our very first shows, there were no clothes,” Burakowski says. Or not clothes on models anyway: “It was more of an installation thing.”
When they opened a store in 1997, it was not on Bond Street, W1, but on Rosebery Avenue, EC1, next door to a postal sorting office. Called “The Factory of Lights and Experiments,” it featured some of the actual Blackpool Illuminations (the light-display tourist attraction that decorates the seaside town of Blackpool, Britain’s answer to Las Vegas) alongside the stock.
Other fashion presentations have included slide shows and films containing an apparently random jumble of images, often accompanied by a soundtrack of amusing bons mots and surreal observations penned by Roberts.
“A slide show that related to nothing,” Roberts says, explaining that these were made purely for their visual and aural impact. “It was
about things which just happened to excite us at the time.”
Lately, what has excited them is photography. Self-taught and using the roof of a local parking garage as a daylight studio, Burakowski and Roberts are now represented by the respected Photographers’ Gallery in London, their work exhibited worldwide. Their still lifes are purposefully naοve, featuring odd juxtapositions of mundane objects like a house brick tied with a satin ribbon, or a sausage covered in sequins; in a series called “Corrected Masterpieces,” the pair have updated various famous paintings, including Thomas Gainsborough’s “Mr. and Mrs. Andrews,” to which they added a brick.
Antoni & Alison focus on the kind of objects to which other people give little regard. A biscuit or a potato chip might become a print on a skirt, a discarded china figurine given center stage in an artwork. Their latest installation piece, “Cabinet of Curiosities” (originally created for an exhibition in a trendy Clerkenwell hotel and now in their headquarters), features an old cupboard filled with objets d’art that they have used in their photographs. Included in it are a porcelain rabbit ornament with a bandaged ear and a head of lettuce — they seem to never throw anything away. Victoria and Albert Museum’s archive now houses much of their back catalog — from sketches and patterns to utility bills and even a letter from Burakowski’s mother pleading with him to “get a proper job.” Similar items can be found on their Web site (www.antoniandalison.com), along with reissues from previous collections, special limited editions and “souvenirs,” like dish towels, oven gloves and even fabric, all available for purchase.
“The idea of the Web site was our way of making a perfect vision of us,” Burakowski says. While much of their new town house has been stripped to the exposed brickwork, there are lots of incongruous additions, like a black sink that belonged to Sir Billy Butlin, the famous British holiday-camp proprietor; French windows that were taken from the set of a Robbie Williams pop video; and chairs from the ABC theater in Northampton. “They were almost certainly used by the Beatles when they played there in 1963,” the narrator on the Web site helpfully confides. Alongside each item in the house are little brass plaques that tell their story. “They are things that we’ve found and loved and kept,” Burakowski says.
Adds Roberts, “Putting them back together again in the wrong place makes them modern.”
At first glance their work is blatantly what-you-see-is-what-you-get, as in their trademark one-word T-shirts, with messages like “Loser” and “Modernist.” Context is key. “Our very first shows, there were no clothes,” Burakowski says. Or not clothes on models anyway: “It was more of an installation thing.”
When they opened a store in 1997, it was not on Bond Street, W1, but on Rosebery Avenue, EC1, next door to a postal sorting office. Called “The Factory of Lights and Experiments,” it featured some of the actual Blackpool Illuminations (the light-display tourist attraction that decorates the seaside town of Blackpool, Britain’s answer to Las Vegas) alongside the stock.
Other fashion presentations have included slide shows and films containing an apparently random jumble of images, often accompanied by a soundtrack of amusing bons mots and surreal observations penned by Roberts.
“A slide show that related to nothing,” Roberts says, explaining that these were made purely for their visual and aural impact. “It was
about things which just happened to excite us at the time.”
Lately, what has excited them is photography. Self-taught and using the roof of a local parking garage as a daylight studio, Burakowski and Roberts are now represented by the respected Photographers’ Gallery in London, their work exhibited worldwide. Their still lifes are purposefully naοve, featuring odd juxtapositions of mundane objects like a house brick tied with a satin ribbon, or a sausage covered in sequins; in a series called “Corrected Masterpieces,” the pair have updated various famous paintings, including Thomas Gainsborough’s “Mr. and Mrs. Andrews,” to which they added a brick.
Antoni & Alison focus on the kind of objects to which other people give little regard. A biscuit or a potato chip might become a print on a skirt, a discarded china figurine given center stage in an artwork. Their latest installation piece, “Cabinet of Curiosities” (originally created for an exhibition in a trendy Clerkenwell hotel and now in their headquarters), features an old cupboard filled with objets d’art that they have used in their photographs. Included in it are a porcelain rabbit ornament with a bandaged ear and a head of lettuce — they seem to never throw anything away. Victoria and Albert Museum’s archive now houses much of their back catalog — from sketches and patterns to utility bills and even a letter from Burakowski’s mother pleading with him to “get a proper job.” Similar items can be found on their Web site (www.antoniandalison.com), along with reissues from previous collections, special limited editions and “souvenirs,” like dish towels, oven gloves and even fabric, all available for purchase.
“The idea of the Web site was our way of making a perfect vision of us,” Burakowski says. While much of their new town house has been stripped to the exposed brickwork, there are lots of incongruous additions, like a black sink that belonged to Sir Billy Butlin, the famous British holiday-camp proprietor; French windows that were taken from the set of a Robbie Williams pop video; and chairs from the ABC theater in Northampton. “They were almost certainly used by the Beatles when they played there in 1963,” the narrator on the Web site helpfully confides. Alongside each item in the house are little brass plaques that tell their story. “They are things that we’ve found and loved and kept,” Burakowski says.
Adds Roberts, “Putting them back together again in the wrong place makes them modern.”
A sausage covered in sequins.
(Brexians lair)
για ένα προχωρημένο στύλ..
πολυθρόνα απο τον Hans J. Wegner, για τον οίκο Carl Hansen & Son, το ύφασμα της ταπετσαρίας είναι απο οπτικές ίνες, σε σχέδιο του Verner Panton, μόνο $4,111 .
www.carlhansen.com.
Το χαλί απο μαλλί και μετάξι της Paola Lenti για τον οίκο Karkula. Μόνο $ 567 το τετραγωνικό μέτρο.
www.karkula.com.
(Brexians lair)
στυλάτο φως
αν σας αρεσει κοστιζει $1,300.
Και το βρίσκετε στο Lee's Studio, 220 West 57th Street, στην Νέα Υόρκη φυσικά.
Και το βρίσκετε στο Lee's Studio, 220 West 57th Street, στην Νέα Υόρκη φυσικά.
(Brexians lair)
Φρούτο δροσερό επιδόρπιο GOURMET
• ένα κιλό ελληνικό στραγγιστό γιαούρτι με όλα τα λιπαρά!
• δυο μήλα GOLDEN JONAS
• ένα ώριμο Μάνγκο
• ένα φακελάκι Σαφράνι, ( Ζαφορά ή Κρόκο )
• δέκα κομμάτια κάρδαμο ή κακουλέ
• ένα φλιτζάνι ασπρισμένα και καβουρδισμένα αμύγδαλα
• ένα φλιτζάνι καθαρισμένα ανάλατα φιστίκια Αίγινας
• ένα φλιτζάνι ζάχαρη
• χτυπάμε το γιαούρτι και την μισή ζάχαρη μέχρι να αφρατέψουν και τα βάζουμε στο ψυγείο.
• σε ένα μπρίκι με λίγο νερό ρίχνουμε το Σαφράνι και τα κάρδαμα να πάρουν μια βράση τα κατεβάζουμε από το μάτι και τα αφήνουμε να κρυώσουν.
• Σε ένα τηγάνι ρίχνουμε το Μάνγκο και τα μήλα κομμένα σε μικρά κομμάτια, την υπόλοιπη ζάχαρη και 2 κουταλιές της σούπας νερό με κάρδαμα και σαφράνι και τα γκλασάρουμε για 15 λεπτά ή μέχρι να κάνουν ένα βαρύ σιρόπι.
• Βγάζουμε το γιαούρτι από το ψυγείο ρίχνουμε τους ξηρούς καρπούς και το μισό από το νερό με το σαφρανι και τα κάρδαμα και ξαναχτυπάμε για 2 λεπτά σε χαμηλή ταχύτητα.
• Σερβίρουμε σε ανοιχτό μπολ το γιαούρτι και από πάνω περιχύνουμε τα φρούτα και το σιρόπι
Καλή όρεξη
MAY THE FORCE BE WITH YOU
(Brexians lair)
07/10/2006
quotes about prediction and statistics
"The best qualification of a prophet is to have a good memory. "
--Marquis of Halifax,
This quote is very applicable to statistical models which require long periods of past data in order to be reliably estimated.
"Some things are so unexpected that no one is prepared for them. "
--Leo Rosten in Rome Wasn't Burned in a Day
This is particularly relevent to non-stationary processes such as the the climate and the business world. For example, the appearance of the Antarctic ozone hole in the mid 1970s was quite a surprise.
"An unsophisticated forecaster uses statistics as a drunken man uses lamp-posts - for support rather than for illumination. "
--After Andrew Lang
Careful application of statistics is essential for obtaining and judging predictions and can provide much insight into the assesment of skill in the predictions.
"An economist is an expert who will know tomorrow why the things he predicted yesterday didn't happen today. "
--Evan Esar
Post-analysis of predictions is often very revealing especially concerning model weaknesses.
--Evan Esar
Post-analysis of predictions is often very revealing especially concerning model weaknesses.
"Prediction is very difficult, especially if it's about the future."
--Nils Bohr, Nobel laureate in Physics
This quote serves as a warning of the importance of testing a forecasting model out-of-sample. It's often easy to find a model that fits the past data well--perhaps too well!--but quite another matter to find a model that correctly identifies those features of the past data which will be replicated in the future.
(Brexians lair)
Ο δίσκος της Φαιστού
Ο δίσκος της Φαιστού βρέθηκε το 1908 στα ερείπια του παλαιού Μινωϊκού ανακτόρου της Φαιστού στην Κρήτη. Χρονολογείται γύρω στο 1700 π.Χ. περίπου. Είναι φτιαγμένος από πηλό, η μέση του διάμετρος είναι 16 εκ. και το πάχος του 2.1 εκ. Η μυστηριώδης του επιγραφή αποτελείται από 241 σύμβολα, 122 στην πλευρά A και 119 στην πλευρά B, σε σπειροειδή διάταξη. Τα 45 διαφορετικά σύμβολα τυπώθηκαν στον πηλό και μετά ο δίσκος ψήθηκε στη φωτιά. Γι αυτό το λόγο ο δίσκος της Φαιστού αποτελεί το αρχαιότερο δείγμα τυπογραφίας.
Αναρίθμητες προσπάθειες έχουν γίνει για την αποκρυπτογράφηση του δίσκου της Φαιστού, χρησιμοποιώντας τελείως διαφορετικές μεθόδους και καταλήγοντας σε εντελώς διαφορετικά συμπεράσματα για το σκοπό, το περιεχόμενο του και τους δημιουργούς του. Για μια συλλογή από τέτοιες προσπάθειες δες αυτή τη σελίδα.
Πρόσφατα η Έφη Πολυγιαννάκη δημοσίευσε στην Ελλάδα ένα βιβλίο με τίτλο "Ο δίσκος της Φαιστού μιλάει Ελληνικά" (2000, 3η έκδοσις, Εκδόσεις Γεωργιάδη, Ακαδημίας 84, Αθήνα και στα βιβλιοπωλεία) . Το βιβλίο επίσης μεταφράζεται από το Δρ. Θ.Αντίκα και σχεδιάζεται να εκδοθεί σε άλλες χώρες μέσα στο 2004).
Σε αυτό το βιβλίο παρέχει πειστικά επιχειρήματα για το ότι ο δίσκος της Φαιστού γράφτηκε σε ένα συλλαβικό σύστημα γραφής μιας αρχαίας Ελληνικής διαλέκτου. Σύμφωνα με την αποκρυπτογράφησή της, το περιεχόμενο του κειμένου είναι θρησκευτικό. Όπως αναφέρει η συγγραφέας:
"Από την 3η π.Χ. χιλιετία ως τα μέσα της 2ας περίπου με κέντρο την Κρήτη άνθισε ένας Αιγαίος πολιτισμός αυτόφωτος και πρωτότυπος, που όμοιό του σε επίπεδο δεν είχε γνωρίσει μέχρι τότε η ανθρωπότητα! Ποιοί ακριβώς ήσαν, όμως, οι δημιουργοί του Μινωϊκού πολιτισμού; Ποιά είναι δηλαδή η φυλετική ταυτότητα και η καταγωγή τους, και ποιά γλώσσα εν τέλει κρύβεται πίσω από τα μυστηριώδη Κρητικά ιερογλυφικά, την άγνωστη Γραμμική γραφή Α και την κυπρομινωϊκή;
Στο παρόν βιβλίο πιστεύω ότι δίνονται οι απαντήσεις στα σοβαρά αυτά ερωτήματα. Νέες τεκμηριωμένες θέσεις θα ταράξουν τα ήρεμα νερά της επικρατούσης ιστορικής αντιλήψεως σχετικώς με τα παραπάνω θέματα, η οποία όμως ούτως ή άλλως εστηρίζετο σε κάποια επισφαλή επιχειρήματα, παραμένοντας καθηλωμένη σε μια αρχική διατύπωση. Το βιβλίο έχει δομή "πυραμίδος", με κορυφαίο λίθο την μέθοδο αναγνώσεως του αινιγματικού κειμένου του πασίγνωστου μνημείου της κρητικής ιερογλυφικής γραφής, του Δίσκου της Φαιστού!"
(Brexians lair)
Δεύτερος ξεκινά ο Montoya
Ο Juan Pablo Montoya εξέπληξε ακόμα και τον εαυτό του με την πρώτη του εμφάνιση στους αγώνες Stock Car στους οποίους θα συμμετέχει το 2007. Έχοντας αποδεσμευτεί από τη McLaren, έχει την ευκαιρία να συμμετέχει ήδη σε αγώνα του θεσμού με σκοπό την καλύτερη προετοιμασία ενόψει της επόμενης χρονιάς. Στην πίστα Talladega Superspeedway κάνει την πρώτη του εμφάνιση ο Montoya και από τις ελεύθερες δοκιμές κινήθηκε πολύ γρήγορα. Στα χρονομετρημένα που ακολούθησαν ο Montoya σημείωσε έναν καλό πρώτο γύρο που θα τον έφερνε στην πρώτη δεκάδα. Στο δεύτερο και τελευταίο γύρο σταμάτησε το χρονόμετρο στο 50:546, επίδοση που του έδωσε τη δεύτερη θέση στην εκκίνηση, μόλις 9 χιλιοστά του δευτερολέπτου πίσω από τον ταχύτερο οδηγό, τον Bobby Gerhart που είναι δεύτερος στη βαθμολογία του θεσμού.
Ο ίδιος ο Montoya είπε πως στη συγκεκριμένη πίστα είναι μεγάλο πλεονέκτημα να έχεις καλό αυτοκίνητο και το αυτοκίνητο της ομάδας του είναι πάρα πολύ καλό. Η καλή του επίδοση στα χρονομετρημένα δεν αλλάζει το στόχο του που παραμένει «εκπαιδευτικός». Θέλει να τερματίσει χωρίς ζημιές, να ολοκληρώσει χωρίς λάθη τη διαδικασία των pit stop και, όπως δήλωσε, είτε τερματίσει πρώτος, είτε πέμπτος είτε απλά τερματίσει, είναι το ίδιο για αυτόν. Θέλει απλά να αποκομίσει εμπειρίες για την επόμενη χρονιά.
Ο ίδιος ο Montoya είπε πως στη συγκεκριμένη πίστα είναι μεγάλο πλεονέκτημα να έχεις καλό αυτοκίνητο και το αυτοκίνητο της ομάδας του είναι πάρα πολύ καλό. Η καλή του επίδοση στα χρονομετρημένα δεν αλλάζει το στόχο του που παραμένει «εκπαιδευτικός». Θέλει να τερματίσει χωρίς ζημιές, να ολοκληρώσει χωρίς λάθη τη διαδικασία των pit stop και, όπως δήλωσε, είτε τερματίσει πρώτος, είτε πέμπτος είτε απλά τερματίσει, είναι το ίδιο για αυτόν. Θέλει απλά να αποκομίσει εμπειρίες για την επόμενη χρονιά.
(Brexians lair)
06/10/2006
Ύπαρ και όναρ
Ο άνθρωπος είναι πολίτης δυο κόσμων. Απολαμβάνει δυο ξεχωριστά είδη εμπειρίας, το ύπαρ (πραγματικότητα) και το όναρ (όνειρο, φανταστικό). Καθένα έχει τη δική του λογική και τα δικά του όρια κι ούτε υπάρχει φανερός λόγος για να θεωρηθεί το ένα πιο σημαντικό από το άλλο. Ο πρώτος κόσμος είναι ο κόσμος της παγιότητας, ο δεύτερος κόσμος αποτελεί εμπειρία διαφυγής από τα δεσμά του χρόνου και του χώρου.
(Brexians lair)
ποιητική εντροπία
να τραγουδήσω μου ζητά η ψυχή. Εσείς θεοί μου,
της μεταμόρφωσης η αιτία, βοηθήστε με και το τραγούδι
πλέξτε αδιάκοπο απ' την αρχή του κόσμου ως τις μέρες μου.
Ovidios, Metamorphoses
(Brexians lair)
Νομιμοποίηση του Κόμματος των Παιδοφίλων (PNVD)
MAY THE FORCE BE WITH YOU Copyright © Demetrios the TravelerΑΠΙΣΤΕΥΤΗ ΑΠΟΦΑΣΗ
Μετά την απόφαση του Διεθνούς Δικαστηρίου της Χάγης, η οποία βασιζόμενη στην ελευθερία της έκφρασης, του εκλέγειν και εκλέγεσθαι, δεν απαγόρευσε την ίδρυσή του, η Ολλανδική Κυβέρνηση αναγνώρισε και επίσημα το νεοϊδρυθέν Κόμμα των Παιδοφίλων (PNVD).
Σε αυτή την περίπτωση η ελευθερία της έκφρασης λειτούργησε εναντίον των δικαιωμάτων των παιδιών.
Βασικοί στόχοι του κόμματος είναι:
- Η νομιμοποίηση της σεξουαλικής επαφής μεταξύ ενηλίκων και ανηλίκων από 12 ετών
- Η νομιμοποίηση της κατοχής παιδικού πορνογραφικού υλικού για προσωπική χρήση
Επίσης, κάθε νομοθεσία, που απαγορεύει την σεξουαλική επαφή μεταξύ ανθρώπων και ζώων, τους βρίσκει ρητά αντίθετους.
Κάθε συνειδητοποιημένος πολίτης στην Ευρώπη αλλά και σε ολόκληρο τον κόσμο οφείλει να αντιταχθεί στην νομιμοποίηση αυτού του πολιτικού κόμματος.
Η Φινλανδία, έχοντας την Προεδρία της Ε.Ε. πρόκειται να αιτηθεί την καταστολή της δράσης του Κόμματος των Παιδοφίλων στην Ολλανδία. Η αίτηση από την Πρωθυπουργό της Φινλανδίας κα. θα παραδοθεί στον Επίτροπο της Ε.Ε. κ. Franco Frattini, Αρμόδιο για Εσωτερικές Υποθέσεις, στο τέλος του τρέχοντος έτους.
Στα πλαίσια Ατυπης Συνάντησης μεταξύ των Υπουργών Δικαιοσύνης και Εσωτερικών της Ε.Ε. η οποία πραγματοποιήθηκε 20-22 Σεπτεμβρίου στην πόλη Tampere, οι Φιλανδοί πολίτες παρέδωσαν τις πρώτες υπογραφές στην Υπουργό Δικαιοσύνης της χώρα τους.
Όσο περισσότεροι σε ολόκληρο τον κόσμο συνυπογράψουμε το αίτημα τόσο μεγαλύτερη θα είναι η ισχύς του!
Σας καλούμε όλους να συμμετέχετε στην παγκόσμια αυτή διαμαρτυρία
συμπληρώνοντας το ονοματεπώνυμο & την ηλεκτρονική σας διεύθυνση
(πατήστε εδώ και δώστε μας τον ψήφο σας) Όλα τα στοιχεία θα αποσταλούν από «Το Χαμόγελο του Παιδιού» στην αρμόδια Επιτροπή Συλλογής Υπογραφών
(Brexians lair)
STAR TREK Christie's Auction This Week!
10.02.2006
Click here to watch the auction LIVE on the History.com exclusive webcast!
The countdown begins! This Thursday, October 5, is hammer time as Christie's auction house in New York begins bringing the gavel down on items spanning the entire 40-year career of the Star Trek franchise. This historic auction will take place over the course of three days (Oct. 5-7) and promises to be a huge hit throughout the galaxy.
Now, if you have not already registered to participate, you can check out the Christie's site for more information, but time is seriously running out! If you would just like to know what is going on, then be sure to check out STARTREK.COM in the next week or so for updates and news from the proceedings.
If you want to watch the event live, but can't attend, check out the History.com website for the exclusive webcast. (Story here.)
From "Star Trek Generations" Call Sheets and Costumer's Notes (Lot 1) to the filming model of the Enterprise NCC-1701-A (Lot 1,000), they are all set to go, as the contents of the vaults of CBS Paramount Television are turned over to the public for the first time.
For CBSNews.com's recent coverage, please check the link below for video footage, including an interview with George Takei ("Sulu").
Click here to watch the auction LIVE on the History.com exclusive webcast!
The countdown begins! This Thursday, October 5, is hammer time as Christie's auction house in New York begins bringing the gavel down on items spanning the entire 40-year career of the Star Trek franchise. This historic auction will take place over the course of three days (Oct. 5-7) and promises to be a huge hit throughout the galaxy.
Now, if you have not already registered to participate, you can check out the Christie's site for more information, but time is seriously running out! If you would just like to know what is going on, then be sure to check out STARTREK.COM in the next week or so for updates and news from the proceedings.
If you want to watch the event live, but can't attend, check out the History.com website for the exclusive webcast. (Story here.)
From "Star Trek Generations" Call Sheets and Costumer's Notes (Lot 1) to the filming model of the Enterprise NCC-1701-A (Lot 1,000), they are all set to go, as the contents of the vaults of CBS Paramount Television are turned over to the public for the first time.
For CBSNews.com's recent coverage, please check the link below for video footage, including an interview with George Takei ("Sulu").
(Brexians lair)
Wide Range of Rocket Tech for Civilian Spaceflight
By Ker Than
04 October 2006
NEW YORK
A new era of human spaceflight is upon us, and its movers and shapers say it will be cheaper, safer and aimed at the masses.
Whether you just want to experience weightlessness, take a quick suborbital jaunt or spend a few days aboard the International Space Station or a space hotel, new space companies are cropping up, eager to compete for your business.
Representatives of the new industry spoke Saturday at Wired Magazine's NEXTFest. While fun and games capture the public’s imagination and open pocket books, serious long-term commercial goals are also driving the push, said the five-person panel, which included a NASA spokesman as well as the presidents and CEO's of Space Adventures, ZERO-G, Virgin Galactic and Rocket Racing League.
By filling in niches, such as orbital and sub-orbital flight, once occupied by NASA, private space companies will free up the agency's resources for other missions.
"NASA's budget is 16.8 billion dollars-six-tenths of one percent of the federal budget," said Chris Shank, special assistant to NASA chief, Michael Griffin. "For us to finish the International Space Station, go to the Moon and then on to Mars is going to require commercial and international investments. NASA can't do it by itself."
Shank says the agency plans to shift some of the workload involved in getting to space onto private businesses, freeing up the agency to focus on its federally mandated Moon, Mars & Beyond mission. This is happening already. For example, NASA recently awarded Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) and Rocketplane Kistler to deliver crew and cargo to the ISS.
"NASA is pioneering as it should, and hopefully abandoning parabolics, low-Earth orbit and letting industry take over as it moves forward," said ZERO-G president and co-founder Peter Diamandis.
"What NASA is rightfully doing is being the first out the doorway, going to the farthest bounds of science and exploration," added Alex Tai, president and CEO of Virgin Galactic. "That's not what we, at Virgin Galactic and the people on this platform, are trying to offer."
Options galore
With backing from Virgin mogul Sir Richard Branson, Virgin Galactic is planning to roll out its new commercial spacecraft, SpaceShipTwo, by 2008. Designed by X-Prize winner Burt Rutan, SpaceShipTwo will climb into suborbital space and give passengers a chance to experience weightlessness for several minutes. The price tag for the 2.5 hour trip: $200,000.
That cost is less than one percent the cost of another space package offered by the Virginia-based space tourism company Space Adventures. For about $25 million, a person can sign up with the company and, under a deal arranged with the Russian Federal Space Agency, blast off into space aboard a Soyuz rocket and spend more than a week aboard the ISS. Since 2001, four space tourists have signed up for the trip. The latest, Anousheh Ansari, was the first woman to do so.
Whether you just want to experience weightlessness, take a quick suborbital jaunt or spend a few days aboard the International Space Station or a space hotel, new space companies are cropping up, eager to compete for your business.
Representatives of the new industry spoke Saturday at Wired Magazine's NEXTFest. While fun and games capture the public’s imagination and open pocket books, serious long-term commercial goals are also driving the push, said the five-person panel, which included a NASA spokesman as well as the presidents and CEO's of Space Adventures, ZERO-G, Virgin Galactic and Rocket Racing League.
By filling in niches, such as orbital and sub-orbital flight, once occupied by NASA, private space companies will free up the agency's resources for other missions.
"NASA's budget is 16.8 billion dollars-six-tenths of one percent of the federal budget," said Chris Shank, special assistant to NASA chief, Michael Griffin. "For us to finish the International Space Station, go to the Moon and then on to Mars is going to require commercial and international investments. NASA can't do it by itself."
Shank says the agency plans to shift some of the workload involved in getting to space onto private businesses, freeing up the agency to focus on its federally mandated Moon, Mars & Beyond mission. This is happening already. For example, NASA recently awarded Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) and Rocketplane Kistler to deliver crew and cargo to the ISS.
"NASA is pioneering as it should, and hopefully abandoning parabolics, low-Earth orbit and letting industry take over as it moves forward," said ZERO-G president and co-founder Peter Diamandis.
"What NASA is rightfully doing is being the first out the doorway, going to the farthest bounds of science and exploration," added Alex Tai, president and CEO of Virgin Galactic. "That's not what we, at Virgin Galactic and the people on this platform, are trying to offer."
Options galore
With backing from Virgin mogul Sir Richard Branson, Virgin Galactic is planning to roll out its new commercial spacecraft, SpaceShipTwo, by 2008. Designed by X-Prize winner Burt Rutan, SpaceShipTwo will climb into suborbital space and give passengers a chance to experience weightlessness for several minutes. The price tag for the 2.5 hour trip: $200,000.
That cost is less than one percent the cost of another space package offered by the Virginia-based space tourism company Space Adventures. For about $25 million, a person can sign up with the company and, under a deal arranged with the Russian Federal Space Agency, blast off into space aboard a Soyuz rocket and spend more than a week aboard the ISS. Since 2001, four space tourists have signed up for the trip. The latest, Anousheh Ansari, was the first woman to do so.
For an additional $15 million, Space Adventures is offering participants the chance to take part in 90-minute space walks. And plans are in the work for a 3-day trip to the moon and back for $200 million.
If $200,000 still doesn't sound like quite a deal, then for $3,750, ZERO-G will let you experience weightlessness while flying up and down in a modified Boeing 727-200 aircraft. Or if you prefer to glimpse the future of spaceflight from the safety of the ground, then the new sport of rocket racing might be for you.
Safer spaceflights
Granger Whitelaw, President and co-founder of Rocket Racing League, describes rocket racing as a "21st century sport built with 21st century technology for 21st century people."
Essentially a rocket-powered NASCAR in the sky, rocket races will consists of at least 10 rocket-powered planes flown by professional pilots in a three-dimensional racetrack in the air.
Whitelaw insists that rocket racing will be about more than just entertainment. "In rocket racing, we're going to be testing a lot of technologies," he said. "It's like a Formula One IndyCar with big auto manufacturers—those technologies end up in your car. Competition breeds innovation, and innovation is what makes it safer and funner."
Spacecraft safety was another thing that all the panelists agreed would benefit from the new space tourism industry. Currently, there is a 1 in 100 chance of something going significantly wrong with the launch of each NASA space shuttle.
"Would I go on a space shuttle? Of course I would, I'd go in a heartbeat," Tai said. "Would I go a hundred times? I would have to think about that one. What we're doing with SpaceShipTwo is making it tens of thousands of times safer."
But as with flights aboard airplanes, the risks involved in human spaceflight will never be zero.
"Everyone here is trying to build the safest possible vehicle, but there is risk," Anderson said. "We can't deny that risk because that would not enable us to progress. So we must all understand that while we're trying to innovate and change things, people that fly in these vehicles in the early years should not think there is no risk. There is always risk, and you just have to be able to accept that risk to open the frontier."
If $200,000 still doesn't sound like quite a deal, then for $3,750, ZERO-G will let you experience weightlessness while flying up and down in a modified Boeing 727-200 aircraft. Or if you prefer to glimpse the future of spaceflight from the safety of the ground, then the new sport of rocket racing might be for you.
Safer spaceflights
Granger Whitelaw, President and co-founder of Rocket Racing League, describes rocket racing as a "21st century sport built with 21st century technology for 21st century people."
Essentially a rocket-powered NASCAR in the sky, rocket races will consists of at least 10 rocket-powered planes flown by professional pilots in a three-dimensional racetrack in the air.
Whitelaw insists that rocket racing will be about more than just entertainment. "In rocket racing, we're going to be testing a lot of technologies," he said. "It's like a Formula One IndyCar with big auto manufacturers—those technologies end up in your car. Competition breeds innovation, and innovation is what makes it safer and funner."
Spacecraft safety was another thing that all the panelists agreed would benefit from the new space tourism industry. Currently, there is a 1 in 100 chance of something going significantly wrong with the launch of each NASA space shuttle.
"Would I go on a space shuttle? Of course I would, I'd go in a heartbeat," Tai said. "Would I go a hundred times? I would have to think about that one. What we're doing with SpaceShipTwo is making it tens of thousands of times safer."
But as with flights aboard airplanes, the risks involved in human spaceflight will never be zero.
"Everyone here is trying to build the safest possible vehicle, but there is risk," Anderson said. "We can't deny that risk because that would not enable us to progress. So we must all understand that while we're trying to innovate and change things, people that fly in these vehicles in the early years should not think there is no risk. There is always risk, and you just have to be able to accept that risk to open the frontier."
The Future of Travel: Aquatic to Cosmic Destinations
Virgin Galactic Unveils SpaceShipTwo Interior Concept
Space Tourism Survey Shows Cost, Access Key Selling Points
Public Space Travel: Building the Business Case
Space Tourism: Keeping The Customer Satisfied
VIDEO: Virgin Galactic: Let the Journey Begin
MAY THE FORCE BE WITH YOU
Copyright © Demetrios the Traveler
(Brexians lair)
Baked Savory Custard With Cheese
2 cups cream, half-and-half or milk
1 sprig thyme, optional
1 clove garlic, optional
3 eggs plus 2 yolksPinch cayenne
½ teaspoon salt
½ cup grated semihard cheese, like Gruyère, Comté or Emmenthal
½ cup grated Parmesan.
1. Put cream in a small pot with thyme and garlic, if you’re using them. Cook just until it begins to steam. Heat oven to 300 degrees and set a kettle of water to boil.
2. Put eggs, cayenne and salt in a medium bowl and whisk or beat until blended; stir in the cheese. Remove thyme and garlic from cream, then add cream gradually to egg mixture, whisking constantly. Pour mixture into a 1-quart dish or into 4 ramekins or custard cups.
3. Put dish or ramekins in a deep baking pan and pour boiling water in, to within about 1 inch of top of dish or ramekins. Bake until mixture is not quite set; it should jiggle a bit in middle. This will take about 30 minutes for ramekins and longer for baking dish; also, cream sets faster than milk. Serve warm, at room temperature, or cold within a few hours of baking.
MAY THE FORCE BE WITH YOU
Copyright © Demetrios the Traveler
(Brexians lair)
Eggs Poached in Red Wine
2 cloves garlic, lightly crushed
4 thick slices day-old good bread
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
2 cups fruity red wine, like a HAJIMIHALI'S dry red, or Chianti
4 eggs, removed from the shell
Grated pecorino or other hard cheese for garnish
Chopped fresh parsley leaves for garnish.
1. Put 3 or 4 tablespoons oil in a large skillet and turn heat to medium. Add garlic and cook, turning occasionally, until it just begins to colour. Lower heat a bit and add bread; sprinkle it with a little salt and pepper. Cook, turning once or twice, until bread is crusty and golden.
2. Meanwhile, heat wine in a saucepan, preferably one with sloping sides; add some salt. When wine boils, reduce heat to a low simmer. Carefully slip eggs in and cook, spooning wine over them, until whites are barely firm.
3. Scoop eggs into 2 or 4 bowls, along with some wine. Add a piece or two of bread to each bowl garnish with cheese and parsley, and serve.
MAY THE FORCE BE WITH YOU
Spicy Scrambled Eggs
3 tablespoons butter or neutral oil, like corn or soya
1 tablespoon minced garlic
1 tablespoon minced fresh ginger
½ cup trimmed and roughly chopped red onions
1 jalapeño or other fresh chilli, stemmed, seeded and minced, or to taste
Salt and pepper to taste
8 eggs
1/3 cup chopped fresh parsley leaves.
1. Put butter or oil in a skillet, preferably non-stick and turn heat to medium-high. Add garlic, ginger, onions, chilli and a sprinkling of salt and pepper. Cook, stirring occasionally, until garlic begins to colour, about 3 minutes. Remove from heat and let cool for about 5 minutes.
2. Beat eggs lightly with a little more salt and pepper. Return pan to medium-high heat and add eggs. Stir occasionally, until curds begin to form, then remove from heat and stir to break up curds. Return to heat and repeat, stirring occasionally until mixture begins to clump. Cook and stir until eggs are creamy and thick but not dry: they will continue to cook under their own heat after you remove them from pan, so stop a moment short of your desired consistency.
3. Stir in parsley and serve immediately.
(Brexians lair)
Hard-Cooked Eggs in Tomato-Onion Sauce
3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
2 onions, chopped
1 tablespoon minced garlic
3 dried chillies, optional
3 sprigs thyme or rosemary
8 eggs
3 cups chopped tomatoes (canned are fine)
Salt and pepper
Chopped parsley leaves for garnish.
1. Put oil in a skillet and turn heat to medium. A minute or 2 later, add onions, garlic, chillies if you’re using them and herb.
Cook, stirring, for a minute or 2, then cover pan and turn heat to medium-low.Cook until onions are very soft but not brown, 10 to 15 minutes.
2. Meanwhile, put eggs in cold water to cover. Turn heat to medium-high, bring to a boil, then turn off heat and cover; set a timer for 9 minutes.
3. When onions are done, uncover and turn heat to medium-high. Add tomatoes, a pinch of salt and some pepper, and cook, stirring occasionally, until mixture bubbles. Cook for about 5 more minutes.
4. When eggs are done, put them in a bowl of ice water, then place under cold running water until they feel cool, then peel. When tomato sauce is ready, add eggs to it; cook an additional 5 minutes or so. Taste and adjust seasoning, garnish and serve hot.
HARD-COOKED EGGS IN SPICY TOMATO SAUCE:2nd version
For an Indian flavour, use neutral oil, like grape seed or corn. With the onion and garlic, cook a couple of chillies (fresh or dried) and 1 tablespoon minced ginger. When onions are done, stir in 1 teaspoon ground cumin, 1 teaspoon ground coriander, 1 teaspoon ground turmeric, ½ teaspoon ground fenugreek and ¼ teaspoon ground cinnamon. Cook and stirring for a minute, before adding tomatoes. Proceed with recipe and garnish with fresh cilantro.
(Brexians lair)
04/10/2006
03/10/2006
mooddy blues
(Brexians lair)
01/10/2006
Ο ΚΟΣΜΟΣ ΓΙΝΕΤΑΙ ΚΑΘΕ ΜΕΡΑ ΚΑΙ ΠΙΟ ΠΕΡΙΕΡΓΟΣ
(Brexians lair)
AUTUMN TO DO LIST
- going to a new restaurant,
- dressing differently,
- taking a (cooking) class,
- trying a new sport,
- saying hi to a stranger,
- changing your daily routine,
- learning to pole dance,
- taking a different route to (or from) work,
- getting a new hairstyle or new colour,
- trying new food items,
- listening to new music,
- learning to play an instrument / a new language / a new dance,
- reading different books,
- going to new supermarket,
- joining a book club,
- learning to knit,
- taking a trip to a nearby city or how about exploring a new neighbourhood that you haven’t set foot in before.
- dressing differently,
- taking a (cooking) class,
- trying a new sport,
- saying hi to a stranger,
- changing your daily routine,
- learning to pole dance,
- taking a different route to (or from) work,
- getting a new hairstyle or new colour,
- trying new food items,
- listening to new music,
- learning to play an instrument / a new language / a new dance,
- reading different books,
- going to new supermarket,
- joining a book club,
- learning to knit,
- taking a trip to a nearby city or how about exploring a new neighbourhood that you haven’t set foot in before.
(Brexians lair)
Why do we love Fidel?
Because we love the idea of “Fidel”
Because we think there has to be some other way
That there must be more to life and to living than this
That life and living must have some meaning too
We loathe the things that they force down our throats day and night
We love freedom:Freedom from the chains of television and commercials
Freedom from the chains of futility
Freedom from humiliation
Yet, we know Fidel’s time is past
We know the idea of “Fidel,” too, will some day succumb to the unipolar world that is getting narrower every day
Still, we keep hoping
Still, we see signs that the idea of “Fidel” may be permeating into other places too
Fidel who, once the Soviet Union fell, was left isolated and friendless, is finding new friends and allies
But the unipolar world, too, is hard at workIts slogan is “You are either with us or with the terrorists”
Its slogan is “democracy,” but only if democracy doesn’t harm its own interestsIt supports all autocratic governments, but considers Fidel a dictator
A dictator who has given free education and healthcare to his country’s people
And many other things besides
So we must either be with Bush or with Fidel
But even if some day Fidel had to leave, he will go with honor
He will hold his head highThe same way that his nation – his comrades – hold their heads high
Because he never yielded
He was never like autocratic rulers who sell everything that they have and that they are, all in return for worldly power and status
Fidel will become immortal
Because there will never be another Fidel
In the same way that there will never be another Gandhi, another Mossadegh, or another Allende
And, yes, another Khomeini or another Arafat
And yet…Such words don’t give us fancy clothes
They don’t give us credit cards, loans, debt, and alienation
They don’t give us the “American Dream”
So, long live CNN and the “free” press, the boundaries of whose freedom are set by multinational corporations!
Long live the hundreds of meaningless brand names, trade marks and logos!
Long live luxury cars and even more luxurious houses, which most of us only see in our dreams!
Long live the material world!
(Brexians lair)
a nasty joke
Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert was sitting in his office wondering how to invade Lebanon when his telephone rang. Beirut's most famous imaginary character announces to him in a heavily accented voice:
"This is Abul Abed and I am calling to tell you that we are officially declaring war on you." "How big is your army?" replies Olmert.
"Right now," said Abul Abed, "there is myself, my cousin Mustafa, my next-door neighbor Abu Khaled, and the whole team from the teahouse. That makes eight!" Olmert paused.
"I must tell you Abul Abed, that I have 1 million men in my army waiting to move on my command."
Abul Abed paused, then said: "Mr. Olmert, the war is still on! We have managed to acquire some infantry equipment!" "And what equipment would that be Abul Abed?", Olmert asked. "Well sir, we have two Mercedes 180s, and a truck." "I must tell you Abul Abed that I have 10,000 bombers and 20,000 fighter planes. My military complex is surrounded by laser-guided, surface-to-air missile sites. And since we last spoke, I've increased my army to 2 million!"
"Mr. Olmert, we have to call off this war," said Abul Abed. "I'm sorry to hear that," said Olmert. "Why the sudden change of heart?"
"Well," said Abul Abed, "we've come to realize that there is no way we can feed 2 million prisoners!
(Brexians lair)
Εγγραφή σε:
Αναρτήσεις (Atom)
