The full dataset viewer is not available (click to read why). Only showing a preview of the rows.
The dataset generation failed
Error code: DatasetGenerationError
Exception: ArrowInvalid
Message: JSON parse error: Missing a closing quotation mark in string. in row 57
Traceback: Traceback (most recent call last):
File "/src/services/worker/.venv/lib/python3.9/site-packages/datasets/packaged_modules/json/json.py", line 153, in _generate_tables
df = pd.read_json(f, dtype_backend="pyarrow")
File "/src/services/worker/.venv/lib/python3.9/site-packages/pandas/io/json/_json.py", line 815, in read_json
return json_reader.read()
File "/src/services/worker/.venv/lib/python3.9/site-packages/pandas/io/json/_json.py", line 1025, in read
obj = self._get_object_parser(self.data)
File "/src/services/worker/.venv/lib/python3.9/site-packages/pandas/io/json/_json.py", line 1051, in _get_object_parser
obj = FrameParser(json, **kwargs).parse()
File "/src/services/worker/.venv/lib/python3.9/site-packages/pandas/io/json/_json.py", line 1187, in parse
self._parse()
File "/src/services/worker/.venv/lib/python3.9/site-packages/pandas/io/json/_json.py", line 1403, in _parse
ujson_loads(json, precise_float=self.precise_float), dtype=None
ValueError: Trailing data
During handling of the above exception, another exception occurred:
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "/src/services/worker/.venv/lib/python3.9/site-packages/datasets/builder.py", line 1997, in _prepare_split_single
for _, table in generator:
File "/src/services/worker/.venv/lib/python3.9/site-packages/datasets/packaged_modules/json/json.py", line 156, in _generate_tables
raise e
File "/src/services/worker/.venv/lib/python3.9/site-packages/datasets/packaged_modules/json/json.py", line 130, in _generate_tables
pa_table = paj.read_json(
File "pyarrow/_json.pyx", line 308, in pyarrow._json.read_json
File "pyarrow/error.pxi", line 154, in pyarrow.lib.pyarrow_internal_check_status
File "pyarrow/error.pxi", line 91, in pyarrow.lib.check_status
pyarrow.lib.ArrowInvalid: JSON parse error: Missing a closing quotation mark in string. in row 57
The above exception was the direct cause of the following exception:
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "/src/services/worker/src/worker/job_runners/config/parquet_and_info.py", line 1529, in compute_config_parquet_and_info_response
parquet_operations = convert_to_parquet(builder)
File "/src/services/worker/src/worker/job_runners/config/parquet_and_info.py", line 1154, in convert_to_parquet
builder.download_and_prepare(
File "/src/services/worker/.venv/lib/python3.9/site-packages/datasets/builder.py", line 1029, in download_and_prepare
self._download_and_prepare(
File "/src/services/worker/.venv/lib/python3.9/site-packages/datasets/builder.py", line 1124, in _download_and_prepare
self._prepare_split(split_generator, **prepare_split_kwargs)
File "/src/services/worker/.venv/lib/python3.9/site-packages/datasets/builder.py", line 1884, in _prepare_split
for job_id, done, content in self._prepare_split_single(
File "/src/services/worker/.venv/lib/python3.9/site-packages/datasets/builder.py", line 2040, in _prepare_split_single
raise DatasetGenerationError("An error occurred while generating the dataset") from e
datasets.exceptions.DatasetGenerationError: An error occurred while generating the datasetNeed help to make the dataset viewer work? Make sure to review how to configure the dataset viewer, and open a discussion for direct support.
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Arcadia Books
About Us and Sales Information
Killing of Anna Karenina, The
Richard Freeborn’s 2014 release breaks a century and a half of mystery to shed light on what really may have happened to Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina. Thought to have committed suicide by throwing herself under a train, Freeborn’s unstoppable imagination opens a new chapter surrounding the heroine’s death – brought to vivid life.
Anna Karenina, the heroine of Leo Tolstoy's masterpiece and the finest female portrayal in Russian fiction, became a social pariah through adultery. In suicidal despair, she threw herself under a train. This was her alleged death. The truth is much more comlex.
When Prince Dmitry Rostove suffers an accident on a cycling holiday beside Wordsworth's 'sylvan Wye', he encounters a ghostly white figure, a strange black boat, a blood-red rose cast on the water, a train whistle and a gunshot. All of which makes him witness to a 'gap in nature' that leads to a unique quest for the truth about a veiled, reclusive lady. Clever detective work and some good luck then enable the Prince to reveal the specifically Russian reasons for The Killing of Anna Karenina.
Price £:
After service in the RAF and post-war work in Germany, where he also attended Goettingen university, Richard graduated from Oxford, did doctoral research and was posted by the FO to the British embassy in Moscow, joining what was called the Secretariat. Invited back to Oxford, he became a don and spent ten years there as tutor and lecturer before being offered a professorship at UCLA. This was followed by a professorship at Manchester University and finally appointment to the chair of Russian literature at London (SSEES). In the course of his career he has interpreted for many major figures, including prime ministers and members of the Supreme Soviet, and travelled fairly widely in the Soviet Union in the immediate post-Stalin period, although in later decades he found he was persona non grata and not granted visas. He married his wife Anne, an embassy colleague while in Moscow, and they have four children and seven grandchildren.
Titles by Richard Freeborn
Join our mailing list and stay up to date with new books, special previews, special offers and much more.
OFFERS COMING SOON
ARCADIA BOOKS LTD
139 Highlever Road
London W10 6PH
Company registration no. (UK): 08404164
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Archives Project Opens Access to Historical Newspapers
The Log Cabin Democrat, Conway, Arkansas,
March 27, 1917, Chronicling America
In the next few weeks, the Arkansas State Archives will have scanned 40 newspaper titles, or about 103,000 pages, and sent them to the Library of Congress. People will have a whole new way to access these historical records online, said Wendy Richter, state historian and director of the Arkansas State Archives.
“One of my biggest goals for the Arkansas State Archives has been to make records more accessible to the public,” Richter said. “This project puts tens of thousands of documents at the fingertips of more people in Arkansas and nationwide.”
The Archives was awarded a National Endowment for the Humanities grant of $208,128 in 2017 to be part of a National Digital Newspapers Program that created the website Chronicling America, which is an open-source website.
The Newspapers Program is a long-term effort to develop an internet-based, searchable database of U.S. newspapers. Institutions from across the country are participating in the project, which is a joint effort of the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Library of Congress.
The Library of Congress serves the U.S. Congress and is the de facto national library for the U.S. The National Endowment for the Humanities is an independent, federal agency that supports research, education, preservation and public programs in the humanities.
To make sure the process runs smoothly, the Arkansas State Archives partnered with the Mississippi Department of Archives and History to help with technical aspects of creating and sending quality images. Apex CoVantage, the vendor the Archives uses, has been duplicating microfilm and digitizing newspapers from the duplication. Using the duplicated film protects the originals, staff said.
Processing the newspapers and getting them online has been slow. At one point, the Library of Congress experienced a backlog, but as of last month, 35,947 pages from Arkansas newspapers were put online. More will go up soon, said Kelsey Kahlbaum-Hoisington, project archivist.
“For me, the most interesting thing about this project is getting to read the historical newspapers,” Kahlbaum-Hoisington said. “I was surprised by the amount of humor in the newspapers.”
The last pages for this grant cycle will be sent to the Library of Congress in July, said Kahlbaum-Hoisington, but the State Archives has applied for another grant to continue the program, Richter said.
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SARA Genealogy Symposium a Success!
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Wednesday’s Wonderful Collection - Anita Turner pa...
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The Metropolitan Opera is located at Lincoln Center in New York, New York. It was founded in April 1880. The first Metropolitan Opera House opened on October 22, 1883, and was located between 39th and 40th Street on Broadway. The original Metropolitan Opera House was designed by J. Cleaveland Cady and was gutted by fire on August 27, 1892. After extensive renovation it continued to be used until 1966, when the opera company moved to their present location at Lincoln Center. The original building, having failed to obtain landmark status, was razed in 1967.
Metropolitan_opera_1937.jpg
A full house at the old Metropolitan Opera House, seen from the rear of the stage, at the Metropolitan Opera House for a concert by pianist Josef Hofmann, November 28, 1937.
The Metropolitan Opera House at Lincoln Center was designed by architect Wallace K. Harrison. The "New Met" opened on September 16, 1966, with the world premiere of Samuel Barber's Antony and Cleopatra. The building is clad in white travertine and the east facade is graced with five similar arches. On display in the lobby are two murals created for the space by Marc Chagall. The Opera House holds nearly 4,000 people on several levels. The gold Proscenium is 54' wide and 54' high. The main curtain is custom-woven gold damask and is the largest tab curtain in the world. The stage of the Metropolitan Opera House is highly mechanized. There are 7 full stage elevators, (60' wide, with double decks). There are 3 slipstages: the upstage one also contains a 60' diameter revolve (turntable). There are 103 motorized battens (linesets) for overhead lifting. There are two 100' tall fully-enveloping cycloramas. All of this stage equipment is needed because the Metropolitan performs opera in repertory, that is, alternating productions on a nightly basis. The scenery at the Metropolitan Opera is extraordinarily large and detailed.
The Met (as it is also called) is also known worldwide for its live radio broadcasts. The first broadcast was on December 25, 1931, a production of Engelbert Humperdinck's Hansel und Gretel. The famous Saturday afternoon broadcasts sponsored by Texaco began on December 7, 1940 with Mozart and Lorenzo da Ponte's Le nozze di Figaro. After its merger with Chevron, the combined company, ChevronTexaco ended its sponsorship in April 2004 but the Met has found financing to continue them at least through 2005. In the seven decades of broadcasting, only three announcers have been heard. Milton Cross served from the inaugural broadcast until his death in 1975. He was succeeded by Peter Allen, who retired at the end of the 2003-2004 season. Twice during Cross and Allen's tenures Lloyd Moss substituted. The new announcer for the 2004-2005 season will be Margaret Juntwait.
The Metropolitan Opera (http://www.metopera.org)
History of Metropolitan Opera (http://www.metopera.org/history)
Metropolitan Opera Broadcast Information (http://www.operainfo.org)
Full text of Chapters of Opera (http://www.gutenberg.net/etext/5995) by Henry Edward Krehbiel from Project Gutenbergda:The Metropolitan Opera
de:Metropolitan Opera es:Ópera del Metropolitan ga:an Opera Meitreapólach ja:メトロポリタン歌劇場
Retrieved from "http://academickids.com/encyclopedia/index.php/Metropolitan_Opera"
Categories: New York City culture | Manhattan | Opera houses | Opera companies
This page was last modified 14:04, 10 May 2005.
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About Avon Construction Training Group
Our Aims and Our People
Objectives of the Training Group
Our main objective is to encourage member companies to give maximum possible emphasis to training and development of staff in the workplace.
This includes to:
organise and co-ordinate all such training as may be required throughout the South-West
provide a first class training service
co-operate and liaise with all appropriate ancillary bodies connected with training in the construction industry.
promote a positive message that the Construction Industry offers a wide range of exciting career opportunities.
help organise New Entrant Training including Apprenticeships
assist with development National Vocational Qualifications
Meet the Avon Construction Training Group Team
Vanessa Wilmut
Group Training Officer
After working for a major finance company for 20 years, Vanessa joined Avon Construction Training Group in 2003, working part-time as a personal assistant to the Group Training Officer, she then took over the GTO role in 2006 when the existing officer retired.
Vanessa is the main point of contact with its members and is responsible for sourcing, organising and booking their training courses as well ensuring key information from CITB and other sources are communicated to its members as well as the day-to-day running of the office.
Vanessa continues to enjoy the varied and sometimes demanding role that this position provides.
Email: vanessa@actg.co.uk
Paul Curry
Chairman and Director
Paul has been actively involved with the Training Group since 2003 initially as Vice-Chair and for the last nine years as Chair.
The role is to; lead the Training Group and its management committee; agree and meet the criteria set by the CITB; ensure that the Group understands and delivers the services and support required by members and to ensure we have a commercial plan to remain financially viable for the future.
Paul has worked in the construction industry for the specialist National Painting & Decorating Contractor, Alfred Bagnall and Sons, for 28 years. He is a main board Director responsible for four branches across the South of the UK.
He is also a Director of four other Bagnall businesses, including the branch in Bristol. Bagnalls have been actively involved in the Training Group since its inception in 1988.
Pina Hunter
Pina joined the Training Group as a Director on 1 December 2015. She also the Human Resources Manager and Training Manager for Tercon Construction Limited a family company established in 1960 by her father in law (she is married to one of the two Directors Robert Hunter – Construction Director).
Pina spent her early career with National Westminster Bank for approximately 21 years, finishing at NatWest Bath Service Centre as Administration Manager for some 40 staff.
She left to have her first child and decided to diversify and utilise her qualifications and background in the field of Construction which was an overwhelming transition.
Pina works part time in her role at Tercon and has also become a CITB Construction Ambassador to help support and promote work in the Construction Industry which she is very passionate about.
Paul Lord
Paul is the Health, Safety and Training Manager for the Construction and Surfacing divisions of Churngold having until recently been responsible for the creation and development of the training department.
Paul has a wealth of experience within the Construction Industry, having been a Site Manager with a number of Main Contractors on numerous projects over the years and he uses this experience to bring a common sense and practical approach to the management of Health, Safety and Training.
He interacts well with all levels of personnel and is totally committed to eliminating accidents and incidents to all persons connected in the industry.
Alan Greenfield
Group Development Officer
Alan joined the training group in March 2017 as the Group Development Officer. This role is to help the training group achieve its stated objectives, whilst working closely with Vanessa the Group Training Officer .
Alan spent over 28 years with the CITB, ending up as the Company Development Adviser for the Bristol, Bath and Weston Super Mare area. During that time he worked closely with the ACTG and their CITB registered member companies.
Before he joined CITB Alan worked in local government (Avon County Council), working with long term unemployed young people as part of the then Careers Service. He has also served as a Director of a local homeless charity & has helped with many voluntary groups over the years.
Chris Gingell
CITB Advisor
Chris is the CITB’s Advisor for the West of England and works with the Avon Construction Training Group to provide advice and support for member companies. There are a range of grants and funding available from CITB to help support and incentivise training and Chris works with the group to ensure they are aware of what their members can expect from CITB.
Chris has worked for CITB for over 10 years, starting in the role of Apprenticeships Officer in Gloucestershire and then working with CITB’s Apprentices in Bristol, Bath and Weston-Super-Mare. Chris spent 2 years as the Construction Careers Advisor in the West of England and has been in his current position since August 2016.
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Tonika Johnson and Natasha Ritsma Bring Englewood to the Magnificent Mile and Beyond
by Lise McKean | Oct 15, 2018 | Blog
Tonika Johnson’s Folded Map at the Loyola Museum of Art closes Saturday, October 20, 2018
Interview and photo essay by Lise McKean
Tonika Johnson with installation view of Folded Map
LM: Today we’re going to be talking about Natasha’s role as curator at LUMA and Tonika’s current exhibition, Folded Map. Natasha, could you tell us about your pre-LUMA background before moving on to your work here as at curator at LUMA.
NR: My master’s degree is in art history with a focus on history of photography. That’s one of the reasons I love working with photographers. Then I decided to get my PhD from Indiana University in Communication and Culture and American Studies.
I ended up working at the art museum in Bloomington for three years when I was ABD. I started working there under a grant that was funded by the Mellon Foundation and was trained by a really wonderful arts educator to be a curator of academic programs. Mellon was funding a new initiative trying to bridge the disconnect that often happens between university art museums and the rest of campus. I was trained to work closely with the faculty, students and student groups. I wasn’t planning to work in museums before that. I was going to be a professor, but then I fell in love with this work. Connecting people across disciplines with art. It was so enriching to work with chemistry professors, art historians, anthropologists…
LM: I imagine it would take a lot of creativity and imagination to reach out to people across all those disciplines. For example, what’s your pitch to a chemistry professor?
NR: It was so much fun because it forces you to be creative and think outside the box. I got a job at Kenyon College before I finished my PhD to be the curator of academic programs at the gallery there. That was a really great experience working in a contemporary art gallery. I got to work on some amazing shows. We showed Ragnar Kjartansson, Carrie Mae Weems, and William Kentridge. I had the opportunity to work with Kenyon professors on curating a material culture exhibition on Gullah culture and related programming. Then I had to leave that position to finish my dissertation.
LM: It’s hard to do both at one time.
NR: It is. I was also interested in returning to Chicago. I took nine months out, finished the dissertation, defended, graduated and then started this job two weeks after graduating.
Natasha Ritsma, LUMA curator
LM: What about your dissertation? What was it about?
NR: My focus in grad school was on documentary films and films on art. I became really interested in the history of how people learned about art on celluloid after World War II. I looked at how these films on art were made, circulated and then how they were used in schools, because at that time, it was a new technology. I did many interviews, archival work, and watched as many of these films that I could get my hands on in 16mm.
LM: It also seems to connect well with the idea of connecting art with academic programs. I imagine there were pedagogic elements in those films. It could give you some ideas of directions to go or to avoid.
NR: Right. Both. A lot of the films were very didactic. It’s a really interesting history and it was a lot of fun to research. Then I started at LUMA, as I mentioned, right after finishing the dissertation and met Tonika about a year after starting here. I’m about to start my third year at LUMA. I started in January 2016. The chief curator left the month I started and shortly thereafter the director left, a position which hasn’t been filled yet. The positive side to this is that I have had a lot of agency in being able to pick shows that I feel really passionate about. That’s how Tonika and I were able to work together, and put together TWO shows.
TJ: You made a call.
NR: If we had a director maybe they wouldn’t have let me do that and might have said, “One show is enough.”
LM: Tonika, your first show, Everyday Englewood, really struck me because I have a connection with Englewood through work I’ve done over the years with community groups there and through Ernest Dawkins, who organizes the musicians’ residency at Hamilton Park and the Englewood Jazz Festival. The vitality of your photos is powerful. There’s also tenderness in the photos, a feeling that they were taken by someone who’s connected to who and what the photos are showing. Would you tell us how that first exhibition came to LUMA, and then we can make our way to Folded Map.
TJ: Well, there’s two versions of how Everyday Englewood happened.
LM: Let’s hear both.
From Tonika Johnson’s, Everyday Englewood series.
TJ: When I heard in Natasha’s version, I thought, “Oh my gosh, it’s so funny.” I had my first real gallery exhibition at Rootwork Gallery in February of 2017.
LM: Was it after you had the photography fellowship?
TJ: The timeline is this: I have been documenting my neighborhood for a long time through the community work that I was already doing. In 2016, a few of my artist, mentor/friends who I call my big sisters in art said to me that with the political climate and me always complaining about how not only Chicago is treated unfairly and the presidential campaign, but also about Englewood, “You really should do something with your photography because you just don’t do anything with it.”
They encouraged me to apply to see if I could get some exhibitions. I slowly went to the Chicago Artists Resource website and I saw a posting for an exhibition at the Harold Washington Library. So I submitted for that. Then I submitted for the Chicago Culture Center’s 50×50 exhibition, where a person from a neighborhood could submit work. I was lucky enough to actually get accepted into those exhibition spaces. It was very small, but it was my first time. It wouldn’t have happened if my friends didn’t encourage me.
LM: Encouragement is important but it wouldn’t get you shows if you didn’t have work that’s as strong as it is.
TJ: Yeah, but I didn’t view it that way at the time. Again, my friends told me, “Apply for this DCASE individual arts grant.” So I did and I received it. That got the attention of a new curator who was working for the City of Chicago’s Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events. Then, Tracy Hall, who is the owner of Rootwork Gallery, invited me to have an exhibition there, because I had visited her gallery. I fell in love with it and I was like, “Oh my gosh, I would love to have my work here.” She was like, “Okay, let me see your work.”
All of those things together in addition to this large community campaign that we were doing in Englewood—to have a billboard campaign where we rented five billboards in Englewood over the course of nine to ten months. The billboards had photography and slogans like “I am Englewood.” A lot of the photography was mine. The billboard campaign was my community’s response to the frustration, “Chicago is getting a bad rap. Englewood is getting a bad rap. Let’s just do something about it.”
Englewood Billboard project. Photo by Tonika Johnson.
I got those exhibitions and then the billboard campaign started getting popular. Media coverage started. In the midst of all of that, I get an email from some Loyola students who heard about all of this and they had a class assignment. They wrote, “We would love if we could interview you. We heard about your recent exhibitions and you’re part of this billboard campaign.” I thought, “Okay. That’s great.” About eight Loyola students interviewed me. They also wanted to purchase some of my prints to show with their presentation. They wanted to purchase eight or ten. I told them, “Okay, just give me $100 and I’ll ship them to you.” They sent me the video footage of our interview. Then they sent me a follow up email saying, “Oh, everyone loved your photos. Thank you so much. I believe we’re going to get a great grade.”
The last email from them with the update on their presentation was a few months before I got a call or email from Natasha and wanting to talk to me. Of course, when I see your email I think, “Loyola University Museum of Art. What? A museum? It’s interested?” It wasn’t until we actually met that she told me how she found out about me.
Photo from Tonika Johnson’s Everyday Englewood series.
NR: It’s a good story. One of my interns at the time, Amanda Malstrom, was taking a class with Dr Robert Morrison in the Psychology department at Loyola. Before going into academia, Dr. Morrison had a career in the arts and now teaches a very popular honors class called the Psychology of Creativity. Some students in his class learned about Tonika’s work and did a presentation on it. The whole classes loved the presentation and Dr. Morrison instructed Amanda to let me know about it. He told Amanda, “Natasha needs to contact this artist and needs to look at her work. This could be great for LUMA.”
NR: Thanks to him. Amanda got me Tonika’s information. I went to her website, looked up her work and I was just blown away. My reaction was: “Wow. This is amazing. These photographers are beautiful.” Then I just emailed her “Hi. I’m from LUMA. Do you want to get coffee?”
We had a conversation. She told me about Everyday Englewood, these were the photos I saw on her website and thought would be a great for LUMA. Beautiful portraits. I remember at the very end of our meeting she started telling me, “Well, there’s this other project that I’m even more excited about…”
She started telling me about Folded Map and said, “I’m really interested in looking at corresponding addresses between the North and the South Side. That’s when we realized that Loyola University in Rogers Park is quite literally Englewood’s map twin. People that are students, faculty, staff at Loyola University are the corresponding map twins for many Englewood addresses. We both got excited and realized, “Oh, this is such a good match. We could bring two communities together and really start this conversation.” She had told me about how she had started photographing the houses. Had you photographed Wade and Nanette yet?
TJ: I was doing them. The reason I even told her about Folded Map is because by the time we had a meeting, I was a fellow at City Bureau. That’s when I started working on Folded Map. I was two months in because I went part-time at my job so I could work on Folded Map with City Bureau. One, they’re great and they had resources that I knew I was going to need. I was ready to just get this idea out of my head.
LM: I’d love to hear the backstory on picking the addresses. I get the twinning part, but there’s a lot of addresses out there. Did you knock on doors? Did you start in Englewood?
Tonika Johnson, Folded Map installation view.
TJ: I started in Englewood because I knew the streets that went all the way North and how far North they went, because I used to live up there. I just pick the exact streets and then how far South that I wanted to focus on based on how far those specific streets went up North. I knew that a lot of the addresses were mirroring each other at 5500 North, 5500 South to basically 6900 North.
Then it was just mapping and googling and mapping, and then going to visit to see, “Okay, how does it look visually?” Then also trying to make sure that the corresponding Englewood address, that all of them weren’t just vacant lots, because a lot of the addresses that are in Englewood are in West Englewood, which has a lot of homes, but they also have a lot of vacant lots. I didn’t want to just pair a whole bunch of North Side homes with vacant lots. When I had already identified the Englewood Street, I started moving towards identifying the residents.
LM: As an ethnographer, someone who goes out and talks to people and tries to get people to talk to me, I’m curious about your experiences approaching people about your project.
TJ: City Bureau is a civic journalism lab. They launched their first photography fellowship. They primarily work with journalists and reporters. I pretty much anticipated that I was just going to photograph address pairs. I thought that’s strong enough. When I was photographing the addresses, it was residents’ homes. They started coming out talking to me, which makes sense, because I’m photographing their house. But I wasn’t ready to start engaging with people. Because, one, it’s a weird concept, and then I thought, “Oh, I’m going to have to talk and even explain it.” I just started doing that with Wade’s wife, Jennifer, who was the first resident in Edgewater that I’ve told you about it. She got it and she understood. She was really excited about it.
She invited me to their block club party the next weekend. That’s how I started talking to residents. I went back to City Bureau and told them, “She invited me to come to their block party and I will possibly meet other residents.” They told me, “You have to be prepared to talk to them. You need to take some audio.” I really didn’t want to do that. But they taught me how to use the audio. I went and I started talking to people and telling them about the project. They were so interested that I sat on the front porch of Wade and Jennifer’s house and took turns recording people.
Meeting of Folded Map address twins. Photo by Tonika Johnson.
LM: So you started by explaining your project and hearing what they thought about it?
TJ: It was explaining the project and me kind of off the cuff asking them questions based off of their interest level. I took that material back to City Bureau and they told me, “You’re focusing on all of the systemic stuff, so let’s come up with clear cut questions.” That is how I figured out what questions I wanted to ask because I had that initial test run.
LM: You took a very organic community participatory research approach, where you go in, you talk to people.
TJ: Oh, it’s the term for it.
LM: Yes, much of the work that I did in the community was participatory research. The things that we researched came out of concerns of the community that they needed investigated and documented in a systematic way. Often, we would find out the concerns through ongoing conversations. Then we’d go back and formulate the specific questions to find out more about specific concerns.
TJ: I need to be an anthropologist. I want to go to school to be an anthropologist.
LM: It sounds like you have a natural inclination for it. How did it go in Englewood when you were asking to meet with people?
TJ: That went fine because I’m from there and I knew people that lived on those blocks. Then if I didn’t know anyone in the exact address that I wanted to use, I knew someone else who knew somebody. That was a lot easier, especially since I do a lot of community work in Englewood. They kind of know that, “Oh, she also does photography.”
LM: Some people might have been aware of your billboard project.
TJ: Exactly. Since my training is in photojournalism, I kept in touch with people that I photographed and I would also get their information. I had a nice network of people who knew, “She’s going to be asking something crazy or interesting.” I had those people engaged already. But when I said, “You’ll have them come over to your house. Your map twin is going to come visit you,” their response was, “You want me to do what?” They thought it was the wildest thing.
LM: The meeting of map twins in the exhibition’s video is very relaxed, cordial exchange. Is the video showing the first time they met.
TJ: With Nanette and Wade, I only had audio at their first meeting. Their exchange was so powerful and I hated I didn’t get it on video. That’s when I knew that I needed video for the first meeting. Prior to the address twins meeting, I had already asked each of the participants those same questions. That way I knew they won’t be surprised by the questions and are comfortable with them. The only thing I didn’t know is their response to each other and whether they would change their answers. I was interested to see their interaction around answering those same questions. Now they’d be answering them while sitting with someone who is going to give the opposite answer.
LM: I think the video is also a testament to how comfortable they felt with you personally. Obviously, there’s a certain openness given that the people agreed to participate. Still, they didn’t seem to have the kind of discomfort or awkwardness that black and white strangers from the other end of the city might have.
TJ: Yes, they’re already invested in this larger issue. There also was some relationship building. With some I went to their house and sat with them and talked to them about the project. To get to that comfort level, I had to treat people like they were my family.
LM: I think in this time when people are talking about deterioration of civic and civil conservation, it’s important to see people talk together about their lived differences. Natasha, you spoke about doing the outreach on the academic level to different disciplines. How do you find your way past the closed door? Outreach takes a certain kind of patience and kind of humility.
TJ: Natasha is very patient.
NR: What I really love about this show how it connects to so many departments. When I’m interested in a show I look for an interdisciplinary reach. I was hoping that many different disciplines from around the university would be interested in this. With Tonika’s guidance and dedication to this, it’s just been amazing. We have an event co-sponsored by the Writing Department and Center for Urban Learning and Research. Several theology classes came in for the exhibition, because they’re saying that this exhibition exemplifies the Jesuit mission of Loyola University. Being able to talk through difference and have conservations—bringing people together to tackle uncomfortable and difficult topics that need to be addressed. That’s what Folded Map has done in an amazing way
LM: Some Loyola students are from here in Chicago. Some aren’t, but it’s where they live now. This is their city. It’s not something far away. It’s here. There’s going to be one or the other address in each pair that they’ll identify with more. By the pair of addresses, it gives both sides of racial segregation at once.
TJ: Exactly. That’s how my first map twin she explained to her map twins up North. She said that it felt like they didn’t view her as the victim. That she was having a real conversation. That her twins were truly listening and not reducing her to being a victim or someone to sorry for. She said she appreciated that.
NR: Didn’t you say they’re also friends now?
LM: Their friendship also shows a hidden cost of segregation. People don’t get to know each other, to make friends. The mixing doesn’t happen. It’s a wonderful demonstration by positive example of what is lost. And you can’t quantify that. Measurement and quantitative analysis are important but there’s so much in life that is important and immeasurable. Folded Map shows us how art can bring to light something immeasurable and ignored.
TJ: Marisa Novara from the Metropolitan Planning Council, who spoke about that too when referring to a recent study on the cost of segregation in Chicago. She said that she was personally interested in Folded Map because represents what can’t be captured in the study.
LM: This brings us to the connection between art and activism. Natasha, your vision as a curator seems be leading LUMA in that direction. We’re inundated with quantitative information all the time. From student test scores to eligibility for a bank loan. Everything seems to be quantified, run through algorithms—without which it’s vanished into nonexistence. The arts can question the tyranny of quantification. The aesthetic experience of art brings to awareness other modes of being and values.
NR: Since starting at Loyola I’ve been really influenced by the Jesuit model of focusing on social justice, of trying to connect multiple communities and have difficult conversations. I’ve worked at many universities, but a Jesuit school was something new. Loyola’s president just sent a campus wide email stating, “Together, we’re educating students to challenge boundaries, work across social and political divides, and become engaged citizens of the world.” That’s one of the core goals: focusing on dialogue, reflection, and action. I think that’s something we can connect with at the museum by selecting art and artists to promote and showcase at LUMA. We’ve been so lucky to be able to work with Tonika.
TJ: It’s so funny that Loyola’s mission is very similar to RAGE’s mission, Resident Association of Greater Englewood: connect, build, and action. That’s the same three words.
NR: That must have been one of the reasons it felt such an organic connection to work together on this.
LM: You’re making your task of reaching out to the faculty much easier by bringing this kind of art into the galleries. They’re going to see the connection, because you’re both operating within Loyola’s shared values.
NR: Exactly. I have to say for this exhibition, I did a bit of outreach, but it’s really been responding to professors reaching out to me, which is new and I love it and I hope that continues. Just so many people have been interested in this project, whether bringing in classes or groups or using it as part of a class project. Social justice is really deeply integrated into the university as a whole. At the Water Tower campus alone, the law school focuses on it, the business school even has classes on how to incorporate social justice into business practices. The school of social work is also very deeply involved.
We also bring in artists from around the world when possible. Right now, we have Following the Box, an exhibition where we’re showing ten contemporary artists from West Bengal. It’s also on view at LUMA until October 20, 2018.
TJ: That’s also a folding of the map. I was deeply inspired by Following the Box. I definitely want to even replicate that by youth in Englewood do a reflection on the old photos of Chicago, the ones that I projected.
LM: Tell me a little bit about the project with the youth.
TJ: I formulated that because it’s been my dream to do a large-scale video projection in my neighborhood in Englewood. My friend, the artist and urban planner, Paola Aguirre of Boarderless Studio who created the map and the interactive mapping feature of Folded Map, also assisted me in making my pop-up projection dream come true. She secured the projector, which was the primary barrier, because I knew that I would be able to get people out to it at a specific site in Englewood. We not only included contemporary work by black photographers in Chicago, including some of my work, we also partnered with the archivist Renata Charlise, who’s created Blvck Vrchives, an archive of visual narratives from across the African diaspora.
I thought it would be great to have contemporary photography and old Chicago, black Chicago, South Side neighborhoods, West Side neighborhoods. Then we added the other component and had people submit their old family photos from back in the day in Englewood—and then we projected all of it.
LM: So instead of creating geographical pairs, your second project creates time-based pairs, comparing the historical with the contemporary of both people and the places of Englewood.
TJ: We chose the projection site at 63rd and Justine because the wall was clean and fresh since it was a new wall. It was a new vacant lot. A historic building that had a bank that was abandoned for a couple of decades had just been demolished. We also chose that site because people were saying, “It’s just weird. That building is gone now.” We had information about the building at the video projection, and people’s response to it made me think about Following the Box. People love seeing the old photos. I’m talking about the guys that hang out at the barbershop. They were coming out of the barber shop to look at the photos. I took pictures of that, because it’s hilarious. It’s not what anybody would expect. The guy with a baseball cap that works at the barbershop, he’s looking at old photos of black Chicago. I thought, “I want to know what people think when they see these.”
LM: Have you seen the display at the Cultural Center on the first floor with the historic photos and posters from Bronzeville jazz clubs? It’s very compelling.
TJ: There’s something about seeing old photos of a place that either you currently live in or that you have known. I’m learning that people are even more fascinated by that than I ever would have thought in this day of age of selfies and everything. People really do like looking at old photos.
Englewood Projection Party
LM: I think they can open up the imagination. You’re looking at this person or a place in the photo and wondering, “What was it really like then?” How different and how similar it might have been. When you were talking about your projection project and the bank that was down and I couldn’t help but think of the Stony Island Arts Bank. Listening to what you’ve accomplished and have yet to accomplish, I’m thinking there must be another bank that needs to be saved.
TJ: Funny you mention that, because there’s a building. There is a building. In Englewood because there are so many vacant spaces and not enough businesses and amenities, people are using the Park District buildings a lot for personal gathering spaces—when they want to have a baby shower, stuff like that. If you don’t want to have it at your house, it’s really hard to find where to have it. It’s a severe deficit. We need a communal space that’s nice and beautiful that people can rent. I was looking at an one old building An architect friend said it was built in 1918. It’s a little house and set far back on the lot. It’s basically a ridiculously huge front yard, because apparently this house must have been attached to some other bigger house. We’re still investigating.
I thought, “What if that could be the communal space that has art, and that people can rent?” My friend and I pulled up the information and wrote out a business plan for some kind of art center. Then we tabled it because I had all this other stuff going on. It’s a little house, not a bank.
LM: Theater Gates started didn’t start with the Stony Island Arts Bank. He first bought those row houses on the side streets and then he built up to the bank.
TJ: Yeah, he did. I forgot about that.
NR: You should start with this little house.
TJ: It’s very cheap. I think they said it was like $20,000.
NR: You were so successful with your Kickstarter. I think you could do another. For the house!
LM: We haven’t talked about LUMA’s outreach beyond its own student population. The Smart Museum has partnerships with schools. Is that something that you’re involved with?
NR: We do have a lot of partnerships. One of the key things that I’ve done since I started was we changed the upstairs children’s gallery into Art Expressways. We work with nonprofit organizations from around the city and this exhibition has let us build our partnership program. Most recently, we’ve partnered with Archi-Treasures and SkyART. Right now, we have a show up with Urban Gateways. Next, I’m going to be working with Yollocalli and then Marwen. I’ve been trying to build up the community partnerships by having a space to showcase the wonderful work different communities are doing with teaching artists and then showcasing the students’ work in an art museum next to exhibitions like Tonika’s, Victoria Martinez’s, and Following The Box.
The students can come in, look at those exhibitions and then go upstairs and see their work in the same building. We’ve connected with Metropolitan Planning Council because they partnered with us for Tonika’s public programs. They’ve advertised the exhibition and given us their publications about segregation that we’ve been handing out.
LM: It sounds like the partnerships are proliferating. What bringing in new audiences and artists?
Folded Map, installation view. From Instagram.
NR: Each exhibition provides new opportunities to connect with new audiences. With Following the Box, we’ve been trying to connect with the Indian community. Our guest curators Jerry Zbiral and Allen Teller have been bringing a lot of different groups to the exhibition. We also regularly partner with the Poetry Foundation. Tonika did a program with them for Everyday Englewood. Tara Betts did a reading of her poems about Tonika’s photographs while we projected them. I really want to get her to come in and do it again and record her voice with the images. We also try to bring in schools. This summer we had a lot of groups from After School Matters and MapCore.
LM: You and Natasha talked in the beginning about the enormous response to the show. I don’t know what you were anticipating, but it seems to be getting a lot of attention. What are you seeing in terms of range of response?
TJ: I did not want to have the difficulty of trying to find more map twins since I wanted to continue the project. Natasha and Loyola helped me secure the map twins up North. My first clue as to the response was the contact form in the gallery. Within three weeks after the opening reception, more than 100 people filled it out. I haven’t checked it in a week and a half, but last time, it was at 225.
NR: People keep asking me also. “Can I get involved?” I tell them, “Go to Tonika’s website.”
TJ: People who have filled out that form, they definitely want to be a part of the project. They want to find their map twins. That’s one response. Then I didn’t foresee the teachers, the academic world was going to respond to it this way. So many student groups and high school groups.
LM: What is it about your show and what you’ve done that’s caused such a response?
TJ: One thing people tell me, “I thought of that too.” I really think a lot of people are connected to it because of their own personal buy-in. They’ve actually thought about it, or went to the wrong address before. When they learned about it, they’re like, “Oh yeah, that’s right. Yeah, that is possible. It happened to me.” I think people feel connected to it in that way. Then also, just the fact that it’s showing the inequity that we all know exists. Everyone just uses the Red Line train as the example. I think people are intrigued, “Oh, this is another way to look at it.”
LM: If I were a teacher trying to talk about redlining or segregation in terms of lived experience, Folded Map is so effective because it shows it with photos and by asking basic questions like, “What do you have in your neighborhood? What don’t you have in your neighborhood?” Also, your portraits of the people and the buildings are beautiful. The way you’ve composed the photographs gives each one individuality and dignity. They’re very eloquent.
TJ: Thank you. I have to credit City Bureau for encouraging me to talk to the residents, which made the project evolve into portraits. It would have not been as powerful with just the address pair. It wouldn’t have humanized it. I was just so adamant. I was fed up. I thought, “Oh, Chicago, let me just show you.” The fact that people are involved definitely added that special touch that people connect to.
LM: For starters, we all have an address. That’s something most everyone can relate to. One last thing, do you have a twin?
TJ: Yes. I actually do. Green Street doesn’t go all the way North, it is a different street name. I haven’t yet looked for my exact numeric map twin. But I found my neighborhood and life-like map twin. This is part of the response. She grew up in Edgewater and like me went to Lane Tech. She said, “I believe I’m your map twin. We should meet. We should record it and our parents should talk too.” That was such a great concept. I told her, “We’re going to do it. Just let me get through the exhibition first.” She was really interested in how our parents decided to, one, send us to Lane Tech. Her father is originally from New York and moved to Chicago. She knew my story and saids, “It would be so great if they could talk to each other and talk about us.”
LM: It sounds like the responses bring in new ideas.
TJ: That’s what I wanted to tell you. The academic response showed me that Folded Map needs a curriculum. Then I had a theater group contact me saying, “The video is so rich with material that it could be a play.” When they started explaining it to me, I was thought, “I’m not a theater person. I didn’t see it.”
LM: The twinning and the video conversation of Folded Map are dialogic like a play. People are talking to each other in a particular place about living in that place.
TJ: The responses to Folded Map get me thinking about it in ways I never would have thought about had it not been exhibited. The University of Chicago Press said they were interested. I was like, “What? An actual book?” They’re interested in books that look at Chicago from a unique perspective that’s not only academic.
LM: Natasha, is there anything else you’d like to add before we close. We’ve learned a lot about your vision and what you’re doing within and beyond the walls of LUMA.
NR: I think in the future, we hope to continue in this direction. There’s so many talented Chicago artists. So much rich material. I’m really excited about future projects. Just to go back to what we were talking about a minute ago. Some responses that I’ve seen that I really loved are from the kids who come in and light up when they see the mural-size map.
LM: The map’s large scale of is terrific. It shows so many neighborhood details.
NR: They get so excited by seeing the city in a new way. I would like to thank Paola Aguirre at Borderless Studio for the concept and creation of the interactive map. It’s a wonderful starting point to engage groups in conversations about this project. We have also had so many high school and college groups coming in. In many ways it is the perfect project to engage students and connect to things that their teachers are trying to teach them. Then we’ve had so many community members that live in one or the other side of the city and say to me, “You need to tell the artist this.” And they start telling stories. It’s a great exhibition for people to share all kinds of things and talk about how neighborhoods have changed. Some people lived in both neighborhoods. It’s been really great that it’s been such a wide-reaching exhibition in so many ways. People from Chicago love it, because they’re invested and they can put their addresses on the wall and they’re a part of the project. I’ve had international groups too. A group from France loved it.
TJ: Did they get it?
NR: They got it and loved it. The woman from France took me aside and told me how much she loved the project and connected to it. She was really just taken by it. People have gotten really emotional about it.
TJ: That’s amazing. A student from Colombia said, “The Chicago’s map reminds me of the map at home.” They’re the only city in Colombia that has a numeric system. He said, “It could be applied to my home too.” He even emailed me to show the map and numbers.
NR: It makes me think about segregation around the world. You’re encouraging people to connect that would never meet. It’s kind of a random connection to live on opposite ends of the city with the same address. But there’s something there. It brings people together in such an interesting way. Someone came in yesterday who kept saying, “I keep getting mail for my map twin. They keep delivering it to me by accident.” We are connected in unexpected ways to our map twins.
TJ: That’s true. I never thought of it. This is a little piece of somebody else’s life, the twin address.
LM: I think also about the everyday life part of it that you’ve been working on in your other Englewood projects. When you pose questions for the map twins, you’re not asking, “How do you experience segregation?” You find out but the answer emerges out of their everyday experience. For example, the woman who says about shopping in Englewood, “All the stores here are second rate. The few that are here, I wouldn’t want to shop in.” That says a lot about her experience of the neighborhood. I thought it was so interesting that a man in Englewood said that there’s no places for entertainment and he thought it would be great to have a bowling alley. It made me think of the book, Bowling Alone. It’s about the decline of forms of social interaction and community life such as bowling. His response makes me wonder, someone wants to go bowling, what else does that signify? It may be the longing for somewhere to go and meet and enjoy being with other people. Like the small house in Englewood that you have your eye on.
TJ: Yes. The future Englewood Arts Center. We’ll see.
NR: I do one last thing I’d like to say. Lise, in an email you were asking about the connection between aesthetics and social activism. Another reason Tonika’s work is so strong is that she has such a great eye and creates beautiful portraits. That is very evident in Everyday Englewood. In Folded Map I love the portrait of Maurice. You have the eye of an artist able to portray these things in visually compelling way, but that is paired with your interest and dedication to starting these important conversations. You co-founded RAGE. The fact that you are also a full-time activist and artist fully dedicated to changing the conversation about Englewood and focus on segregation allows this to be such a successful show.
LM: I agree. And as an artist you’re not new to thinking as an activist. The art is leading as much as the ideas and the social commitment underneath it. There are many artist-activists, but often one or the other side is weak. Either its conceptualization of what it means to be activist and the issue they’re supposedly being activist about, or the quality of the artwork. I don’t see this problem in your work.
Photo by Tonika Johnson from Everyday Englewood series.
NR: I know your background was in photojournalism and you’ve been photographing for most of your life. You’ve been dedicated to these two different things for most of your life. The fact that you’re able to bring your talents together in these projects is so fantastic
LM: That’s what’s distinctive about your two LUMA shows. Sometimes, work can be innovative and edgy, but it has some ways to go. I see a lot of art and talk to a wide range of artists. It’s always a pleasure when the ideas and the thinking are at the same high level as the execution of the art. That’s when I say to myself, “I’d like to see more of their work.”
NR: That’s why when I heard about your project, I’m like, “That’s a great idea, but let me see this.” Then I looked at the Everyday Englewood photos and was thrilled. You are also fantastic at engaging people in conversations about your work, and this is so important. You’ve been amazing with the press and giving interviews. Sometimes you can have a really talented artist that has good ideas and does beautiful work, but then they have trouble talking about it.
TJ: It’s hard. I just thank God for having people like you in my orbit, but I feel so comfortable with you and the people that you’ve connected me. You helped me have the confidence that it’s my story. To know that I don’t have to deviate from that. It makes it a lot easier to talk about when I feel like I don’t have to speak differently or I have to speak in a way that doesn’t come naturally to me.
LM: That’s also something very refreshing about your work and the way you talk about it. A lot of artists, often those who’ve been through MFA programs, learn to speak in a certain way. And they think they have to speak in that way to be taken seriously. They use an academic language that doesn’t connect with as broad an audience as you can connect with. Yet at the same time, you convey the fact that your thinking can handle complex ideas.
NR: There’s a lot of depth to your project. It allows people to talk about the history of segregation, red lining, the grid map. All of these relevant topics in Chicago. There are many levels. That’s why it’s really important that you’re able to talk about it in this way—and to so many audiences.
TJ: As a matter of fact, I’m going to Vocalo Radio tomorrow.
Lise McKean
Lise McKean is a writer, editor, and anthropologist based in Chicago.
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Top 5 Weekend Picks! (4/19-4/21)
Episode 581: NIC Kay
Not Giving a F*ck with Conrad Freiburg
How We Work: An Interview With Sara Drake
Does the whole = the sum of it’s parts?
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Home Health | 50+, and HIV-plus
HEALTH / OLDER PATIENTS
Those in the 50-plus age group form the second largest chunk of HIV infected persons. But this group is clearly not at the heart of the AIDS control programme. Puja Awasthi reports.
02 November 2012 -
Seema Singh's sentences are peppered with the adjectives, saaf (clean) and ganda (dirty). The first she uses for herself, the second for her HIV positive status. Ever since this 52-year-old, Lucknow school teacher discovered her condition two years ago (during a blood test preceding a surgery), she has alternated between silence and shame. The silence is used as a weapon against her husband, a 56-year-old bank employee who she blames for infecting her with the virus while, shame is her defence for cutting off all social ties.
"How could a clean woman like me be infected with this dirty disease? This is God's way of punishing me", she reasons.
Singh's reaction is not unique among people of her age. According to Rahul Mishra, a Kanpur-based consultant of dermatology, venerology and AIDS medicine, people of the 50+ age group view their positive status very dimly. "Younger PLHAs (people living with HIV-AIDS) are better read and better informed. They consider their condition manageable. I have young PLHAs coming to me wanting to marry their negative partners. Advances in medicine have made that possible. However, for the older age group, HIV remains a death sentence."
The numbers of PLHAs in the 50-plus age group form the second largest chunk of total HIV infections in the country. According to the Technical HIV Estimation Report (see this link) published by the country's National Aids Control Organisation (NACO), in 2009, approximately 2.39 million people were living with HIV in the country. Of these, 13.2 per cent were above the age of 50. In 2008, the share of the 50-plus age group in the total infections (2.44 million) was 12.5 percent.
Thus, while the total number of HIV infections in the country has fallen, the number of infections in the 50-plus age group is rising. Mishra says this could be worrisome. "If people are diagnosed much later in their lives (despite having been infected with the virus earlier), they could have reached the stage where the first line of treatment becomes ineffective", he says. When treatment is initiated at a later stage, there is increased risk of mortality. Also, with age, other health problems start to show up and impact wellness as a whole.
However, as 83 per cent of the HIV infections in the country occur in the 15-49 age group, the 50-plus group is clearly not at the heart of the AIDS control programme. These victims are also left off the testing radar, as they are considered a group with little or no sexual activity.
While the total number of HIV infections in the country has fallen, the number of infections in the 50-plus age group is rising.
• All women are at risk
• The younger side of AIDS
Laxmi Srikhande, senior vice president of the Federation of Obstetric and Gynaecological Societies of India (FOGSI) says, "The biggest concern for policy makers, and correctly so, is women in the reproductive age group, as mother-to-child transmission (MTCT) is high. A child born with HIV becomes a huge burden on the country's resources. For women, who have crossed the reproductive age, it is more an individual health problem. Such women are also socially in a better position, unlike younger women who may be shunned by their in-laws and husbands. The older population is emotionally mature to handle its status, and often turns to religion for solace. For the young, burdened with family responsibilities, this is not an option."
In addition to lack of specific focus, older PLHAs also have the spending pattern of the AIDS control programme stacked against them. A relatively small portion of the programme funds goes into care, support and treatment. According to NACO's annual report of 2010-11, (link) while 67.20 per cent of the total funds went into prevention activities, only 16.9 per cent went to care, support and treatment. Also, many drugs of choice used in the programme in India have negative side effects, which can become more pronounced in an older age group (for this reason, they have been abandoned in other parts of the world).
Lucknow-based Sumit Roy, 54, battled with finding the right combination of drugs in the government set-up for months after he was detected positive in 2006. "I was first diagnosed with tuberculosis. Then they found out that my CD4 count (a measure of infection fighting white blood cells) had fallen below 200. The medicines I was given did not work with the TB medication. I turned to the Internet for information and support. Finally I had to seek help from a doctor in Delhi for my medication to be tweaked appropriately."
Roy's act of turning to the virtual world and away from the real might have been initially driven by compulsion, but even after he had come to terms with his condition ("I was plain unlucky", he says), he continued to shun human company. He took up meditation and exercise as a means of recovery, but outside that, confined himself to the company of an ailing mother.
Having given up his job in Delhi, he lost his circle of friends and made no new ones in Lucknow. "Developing a relationship is difficult even though I know I need to get back into a more social environment. I want to be upfront about my status, but am not sure of being understood", he says.
While Roy is single, Amitabh Awasthi, the President of the Lucknow Network for Positive People (LNP+) says that in his seven years of work in the field he has observed that those in the 50-plus age group tend to become more aloof and asocial upon discovery of their status. "The young deal with the discovery in a very matter-of-fact way and do not delve into its source. Older people tend to think too much and are often consumed by guilt. If they have unsettled children, they concentrate on them and shun other ties", he says. They are thus also less likely to seek support groups or counselling.
Mala Kapur Shankardass, sociologist, health social scientist and gerontologist, says, "Older people are more ashamed and are very reluctant to discuss their health issues, they do not want to seek medical help also. They try to hide their symptoms with excuses of old age." This reluctance to seek medical help is however not HIV-specific, as India's older population is generally lackadaisical in its approach to health, believing itself to be of little value to family and society. In the case of HIV - when coupled with ignorance - it becomes dangerous.
As in the case of Bhanu Pratap, a 55-year-old head constable in the reserve police forces, who believes that HIV is a condition just like any other, and will be cured by medication. Living away from his family (which is ignorant about his status), Pratap says he leads a "normal" life that includes unprotected, paid sex. "Since I started my medicines, the pain in my knees is much better. The other problem will also be cured soon", he beams. Clearly, the strong awareness campaign within the police forces has made no impact on him.
At the other extreme is Singh (quoted earlier), who says, "My life is over. My only wish is to get my two sons married off. I can then die peacefully".
Between Singh and Pratap the fact that medical advances in the field of HIV have been far swifter than those in other fields and the condition can be managed to lead a long, productive and healthy life, with proper precautions is lost. This breach in the country's efforts to tackle HIV cannot be ignored for long.
manoj kumar gohil I liked this article a lot, since it contains a lot of information. The article is really very good which clearly reflects the hard work done behind. Such article should have reach to maximum people so that people could be aware of.
November 04 2012, 3:27 PM · 0 · 0
Ritesh Jaiswal A good article on AIDS providing a correct status of this problem in india.Although it has been controlled upto a limit but not fully .For more info and reports related to Aids in India Kindly visit. www.unicefiec.org
May 27 2013, 12:48 PM · 0 · 0
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Home Women | Going through with their pregnancies
WOMEN / HIV-POSITIVE WOMEN
The risk to the unborn child from an HIV-infected mother is significant, but with advances in science and medical care, more women are hopeful about choosing to keep the child. Puja Awasthi reports.
19 July 2010 -
When Saroj Chakravarty (23) first came to know she was HIV-positive, she was seven months pregnant. Like her, Savita Sinha (19) too discovered she was infected only in the sixth month of pregnancy. And Saima Khatoon (23) was in the first trimester of hers. All three women chose to keep their unborn child.
Despite established medical opinion that there is a high risk of mother-to-child transmission (MTCT) of the disease, first-time mothers rarely terminate their pregnancy. In some cases that determination might be born of sheer ignorance, as in Khatoon's case - she thought being HIV-positive was 'just another illness', and even breast-fed her son for two years, in the process increasing his chances of contracting the virus manifold. In some other cases, as with Chakravarty, the discovery comes too late to terminate the pregnancy without significant risk to the life of the mother herself.
Dr Urmila Singh, Professor at the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the Chattrapati Shahuji Maharaj Medical University (CSMMU) says, "Depending on which trimester of pregnancy an HIV-positive mother approaches us, we counsel her to consider adoption instead. But no one can take away a woman's right to be a mother. One of the precautions we take is to go in for a caesarian delivery to limit the loss of blood. There is greater need for follow up in such cases. For instance we have to ensure that the mother does not breast-feed her child. And if that is happening, top feed should never be mixed with the mother's milk."
According to an UNAIDS paper on the Prevention of MTCT (see here) "In recent years, projects to prevent mother-to-child transmission in resource-limited settings have primarily focused on provision of single-dose intrapartum and neonatal nevirapine, which cuts the risk of HIV transmission by more than 40 per cent."
"The only information I got was from television. And I did not think at all of the seriousness of the situation." (Saima Khatoon with her son.)
• Surviving a battle every day
Figures put out in 2009 by the National AIDS Control Organisation (NACO), the highest body for implementation of HIV-AIDS related programs in India, say that the chances of MTCT are 5-10 per cent, even in cases where the mother has her delivery in a hospital and the child is given the necessary medicines. During normal labour and delivery these chances increase to 10-15 per cent, while breast-feeding gets these figures to jump to 20-25 per cent.
But such figures made little difference to Chakravarty, a resident of Nawabganj, an outer fringe of Lucknow. "I had been married for eight years and this was my first child. Though it came as a huge shock to me, there was no question of an abortion", she says. Her son, Moni is nine months old now and Chakravarty will not know the status of her son till he is at least 18 months old. Till then she will swing between fear and hope.
Khatoon was luckier. Her 4-year-old son is negative. Her husband Afzal died a year ago, aged 28. He was a skilled zardozi embroidery artisan and had worked in Mumbai and Goa for a number of years before getting back to his family in Lucknow. Khatoon says that though she was tested twice at the government hospital, there was no counseling offered. "The only information I got was from television. And I did not think at all of the seriousness of the situation. Had I, perhaps I would not have had my child", she says. She is supported by her in-laws and her brother but wishes to do some work of her own.
Sonia Singh (30) lost her husband Sundar Singh, who owned a shop in Mumbai, four years ago after 10 years of marriage. Her husband had been suffering from low haemoglobin, as well as tuberculosis and epilepsy. The only time he was prescribed an HIV test, he died before the results were out, showing he was a carrier of the virus. Her son, who is now in class six, is also positive. Singh, under immense financial pressure, refuses to leave her marital home. "My husband and his brothers had a shop, the income from which was divided amongst them. If I leave, who will fight for my son's rights?" she asks. Her brother pitches in with some help but she says she can barely make ends meet.
Sinha also lost her daughter (now two and negative) to her husband, who forced her out of her marital home after her positive status was known. She is unsure how she could have been infected, and has made her peace with the fact that at least with her husband her daughter is ensured a decent upbringing, something she will be unable to offer with the Rs.2500 she earns as a counselor in the voluntary sector. "I still hope to make up with my husband some day for the sake of my daughter. And also to block any chances of a remarriage for him", her voice trails off. Sinha knows that after her mother is gone, there will be no one to care for her at her parental home.
Dr Saurabh Paliwal, counselor at the Anti Retroviral Therapy Centre (ART) at CSSMU says, "Most positive people have little reason to look at life with hope. Often a child is the only source of joy for such people."
Dr Rekha Sachan says that of the 100 outdoor patients she examines every day at the CSSMU outdoor patient department, "at least one is HIV positive". She adds that if the CD4 count (a measure of how well the immune system of a person is functioning) is healthy, there is greater foetal risk rather than danger to the mother. "There are greater efforts and greater care required. But we have sent back healthy mothers and babies. Motherhood is a joy and no woman can be denied it, except in extreme cases".
The debate on whether HIV-positive women should become mothers is far from concluded. But there seems to be some kind of consensus that given the advances in medical science, and with greater care and support, such women should not be denied the happiness motherhood brings.
Kartika This is a topic of vital interest to those like me who work on the field. Thanks to you we get such articles which are totally missing from the mainstream media.
July 28 2010, 9:17 PM · 0 · 0
To be banned or not?
Why rural girls need more than just sanitary napkins
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What’s turning women in labour away from hospitals?
Barefoot auditors ensure health for tribal mothers
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Calmare Theraeutics Cautions Shareholders
Fairfield, CT – December 20, 2017 – Calmare Therapeutics Incorporated, (OTC PINK: CTTC) ("CTI"), the pain mitigation company ("Calmare"), today confirmed that a definitive consent solicitation statement has been filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission ("SEC") by a minority complaining group of stockholders (the "Minority Complaining Group").
In their statement, the Minority Complaining Group have stated their intent to: (a) solicit consents to, among other things, remove the 80% of directors on Calmare's Board of Directors who are not members of the Minority Complaining Group (this does not include the one member of the Board who is a party to the Minority Complaining Group); and (b) replace those four directors with the Minority Complaining Group's own hand-picked nominees.
The Minority Complaining Group, which calls itself the "Calmare Committee to Restore Stockholder Value," also stated that its handpicked board nominees intend to remove and replace the existing officers of Calmare. In its consent solicitation statement, the Minority Complaining Group asserts that it collectively owns approximately 20% of Calmare's outstanding shares.
Calmare issued the following statement:
Eighty percent of Calmare's Board and its entire management team are committed to executing the Company's strategic five-year plan to drive enhanced stockholder value. Calmare continues to pursue its strategy to grow revenue and will maintain its focus on current strategic initiatives by gaining FDA approval for more of the Company's devices and selling the devices to a large customer base following FDA approval.
Calmare noted that stockholders should be aware and concerned that the Minority Complaining Group is attempting to take control of Calmare's Board and the Company without providing a detailed and credible plan as to how they would create long-term stockholder value when considering the various regulations Calmare is subject to in selling its devices.
Calmare urges all Calmare stockholders to refrain from taking any action, including not returning any consent card sent by the Minority Complaining Group at this time. Calmare's Board has formed a Special Board Committee (the "Board Majority"), which consists of the 80% of the Board that is not affiliated with the Minority Complaining Group. The Board Majority, in consultation with its legal advisor, is carefully evaluating the Minority Complaining Group's proposals. The Board Majority will advise Calmare stockholders of its recommendation regarding the Minority Complaining Group's solicitation in due course as soon as it has filed and cleared its documents with the SEC.
About Calmare Therapeutics, Inc.
Calmare Therapeutics, Inc. researches, develops and commercializes chronic, neuropathic pain and wound affliction devices. Our flagship medical device – the Calmare® Pain Therapy Device (the "Calmare Device") – is the world's only non-invasive and non-addictive modality that can successfully treat chronic, neuropathic pain. The Company holds a U.S. Food & Drug Administration 510k clearance designation on its flagship device, which grants it the exclusive right to sell, market, research and develop the medical device in the United States. The Calmare Devices are commercially sold to medical practices throughout the world. They are also found in U.S. military hospitals, clinics and on installations.
Important Additional Information and Where to Find It
Calmare Therapeutics, Inc., 80% of its directors, and its executive officers are deemed to be participants in a solicitation of consent revocations from Calmare's stockholders in connection with a pending consent solicitation by a group of minority stockholders seeking consents to, among other things, remove and replace 80% of Calmare's current directors (the "Minority Consent Solicitation"). Information regarding the names of Calmare's directors and executive officers and their respective interests in Calmare by security holdings or otherwise can be found in Calmare's proxy statement for its 2016 Annual Meeting of Stockholders, filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on October 25, 2016. To the extent their holdings of Calmare's securities have changed since the amounts set forth in Calmare's proxy statement for its 2016 Annual Meeting of Stockholders, such changes have been reflected on Initial Statements of Beneficial Ownership on Form 3 or Statements of Change in Ownership on Form 4 filed with the SEC. These documents are available free of charge at the SEC's website: http://www.sec.gov.
Calmare intends to file a majority consent revocation statement (the "Majority Consent Revocation Statement") and accompanying majority consent revocation card with the SEC in connection with the Minority Consent Solicitation. Additional information regarding the identity of participants, and their direct or indirect interests, by security holdings or otherwise, will be set forth in the Majority Consent Revocation Statement, including the schedules and appendices thereto.
INVESTORS AND STOCKHOLDERS ARE STRONGLY ENCOURAGED TO CAREFULLY READ THE MAJORITY CONSENT REVOCATION STATEMENT AND THE ACCOMPANYING MAJORITY CONSENT REVOCATION CARD AND OTHER DOCUMENTS FILED BY CALMARE WITH THE SEC IN THEIR ENTIRETY WHEN THEY BECOME AVAILABLE, AS THEY WILL CONTAIN IMPORTANT INFORMATION.
Stockholders will be able to obtain the Majority Consent Revocation Statement, any amendments or supplements to the Majority Consent Revocation Statement, the accompanying Majority Consent Revocation Card, and other documents filed by Calmare with the SEC for no charge at the SEC's website at http://www.sec.gov. Copies also will be available at no charge at the Investor Relations section of Calmare's corporate website at http://www.calmaretherapeutics.com, by writing to Calmare's Chief Executive Officer at Calmare Therapeutics Incorporated, 1375 Kings Highway, Suite 400, Fairfield, CT 06824, or by calling Calmare at (203) 368-6044.
Certain statements contained in this press release are forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties. The statements contained herein that are not purely historical are forward-looking statements within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended. Forward-looking statements deal with the Company’s current plans, intentions, beliefs and expectations and statements of future economic performance. Forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks and uncertainties that may cause the Company's actual results in future periods to differ materially from what is currently anticipated. Factors that could cause or contribute to such differences include those discussed from time to time in reports filed by the Company with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The Company cannot guarantee its future results, levels of activity, performance or achievements.
Direct inquiries to
Conrad F. Mir
Email: This email address is protected. Javascript must be enabled to view it.
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Doing Things Quietly Is For Other People…
CYNTHIA NICKSCHAS – Egoschwein
M.I.GOD. – Crossing The Threshold
M.I.GOD. – Specters On Parade
BraveWords Interview: KOBRA AND THE LOTUS – Success In The Snakepit
BraveWords Interview: LEE AARON – Blues Maiden Canada
BraveWords Interview: AYREON – A Kind Of Prog Metal Magic
DOUBLE CRUSH SYNDROME – Die For Rock N’ Roll
BraveWords Interview: DIMMU BORGIR – Night Comes Out Of Black
BraveWords Interview: SANCTUARY – Revisiting The Past Through The Looking Glass
FALL OF CARTHAGE – The Longed-For Reckoning
IN FLAMES - Behind The Jester's Door
CHILDREN OF BODOM - Halo Of Blood (Listening Session - March 16th, 2013)
ANNEKE VAN GIERSBERGEN – Making Changes: Epicloud And Proud
JEREMY SAFFER - "Death To False Photography"
ANETTE OLZON - Careful What You 'Wish For
KAMELOT - Enter Haven: "Be Our Guest..."
ALISSA WHITE-GLUZ - The March Of Mephisto
ALISSA WHITE-GLUZ In ARCH ENEMY Territory - "Êtes-Vous Fucking Prêt?!"
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Tag: Trillium
HDK – Singing Songs From Hell With SANDER GOMMANS And AMANDA SOMERVILLE
This story was originally published on this site back in April 2014, heralding the arrival of HDK’s new album Serenades Of The Netherworld. Or rather, the first taste of the record in the form of two singles to get people talking, which they did. Here’s the updated version of the story to coincide with the full album’s September 1st release.
By Carl Begai
It’s been five years since former After Forever guitarist Sander Gommans broke his self-imposed hiatus from the music business with HDK, a slavering beast of a project that flew in the face of his former band’s symphonic goth metal sound. The debut album, System Overload, was a full-on metal assault that presented both Gommans and vocalist/co-conspirator Amanda Somerville (Trillium, Avantasia) entering unexplored territory, showing off a very different and altogether volatile side of their musical personalities. A second HDK album was always in the cards; it was just a question of when the pair would get around to writing and recording it in amongst other projects that were on the go, which included the launch of Gommans’ studio/music school The Rock Station, working on albums from Trillium and Kiske / Somerville, and tours with Trillium, Avantasia and Rock Meets Classic. Serenades Of The Netherworld has finally surfaced – creeping into the light slowly but surely – as a bigger and more melodic take on System Overload. It’s certainly more dynamic and less bent on bludgeoning the listener into submission, but not at the expense of healthy sonic violence.
Amanda: “That wasn’t because of me. That was definitely Sander’s fault (laughs).”
Sander: “The thing is, with the first album I wanted to do something really different from After Forever. I’d wanted to do it for years and years, and that’s what came out. Since then I’ve had time to work with other artists and re-think some stuff. I wanted to write a new HDK album that was similar to the previous one but it came out much more symphonic and way more melodic. I didn’t have to distance myself from After Forever anymore, and I was ready to write stuff that was more melodic anyway like I did for Trillium and Kiske / Somerville. And I worked with keyboard players this time, so that gave the music a different feel as well. The new HDK is still heavy but it’s different from the first album..”
Amanda: “On the first album Sander was saying ‘There aren’t going to be any keyboards on the album because After Forever is full of frickin’ keyboards…’ (laughs). I think that has a lot to do with how the new HDK album turned out.” Continue reading HDK – Singing Songs From Hell With SANDER GOMMANS And AMANDA SOMERVILLE
Posted on September 1, 2014 September 1, 2014 Author carlCategories The InterviewsTags After Forever, Amanda Somerville, Avantasia, Dead Man's Curse, Geert Kroes, HDK, Sander Gommans, Trillium
SANDER GOMMANS And TRILLIUM – …By The Power Of The Flower
During a recent interview for the as-yet-untitled follow-up to his HDK album from 2009, System Overload, former After Forever guitarist Sander Gommans discussed his involvement on the new metal solo album from singer/songwriter and Avantasia / HDK vocalist Amanda Somerville. Gommans enjoys being his own boss, but he freely admits the creative process for the Trillium debut, Alloy, made him realize that even the master of the universe has to take the back seat once in a while.
“In the beginning it was hard for me because normally you wrote something for somebody and let it go, but since Amanda and I are partners, I didn’t let it go that easily. I wanted to make the best out of it, and I wanted Amanda to make the best choices. I helped her out with some of the administrative stuff and I wrote a few songs, but it was really Amanda’s project and I had to get used to her big involvement. Not so much in the writing of my songs, but in the vocal arrangements and lyrics. She had a really good idea of how the album should sound and what she wanted, and I kept telling her ‘It’s not metal enough… it needs to be more metal.’ And she would tell me, ‘This is my project, I want to have it exactly the way I want to have it…’ (laughs).”
“She made the choices in the creative aspects of the album, and now that it’s out, it’s about surprising to me how cool it is. It offers so much more than the average metal band, and it has so much more to it that you can really see what a talented person Amanda is when it comes to having her own vision. In my arrogance, I found out that I should stop being arrogant and shut up sometimes (laughs).” Continue reading SANDER GOMMANS And TRILLIUM – …By The Power Of The Flower
Posted on January 22, 2012 January 22, 2012 Author carlCategories On The InsideTags Alloy, Amanda Somerville, Avantasia, HDK, Sander Gommans, Sascha Paeth, Trillium
TRILLIUM – Act Your Rage
Back in July, vocalist Amanda Somerville spilled the beans on her first official metal solo project, Trillium (interview available here). With the release of the debut album, Alloy, only weeks away she shot a video for the song ‘Coward’, and we got together the following morning over tea to delve a little deeper into the new album.
It’s safe to say Somerville efforts will surprise a lot of fans – in a good way – and earn her some new ones along the way as Trillium plays out. And while it’s a no-nonsense metal album, anyone that’s followed Somerville’s decade-long non-metal career will wonder if some of the songs were consciously tweaked from a singer / songwriter / acoustic state to the tough-as-nails tracks we’re hearing now. Take away the distortion and the tracks in question would easily fit on her 2009 solo album, Windows.
“It was very conscious, actually,” Somerville reveals. “Songs like ‘Path Of Least Resistance’, ‘Purge’ and ‘Mistaken’ were pretty dark, and I’d planned to put them on my next solo album, which was going to be darker and heavier than anything I’d done before anyway. I had all this material that was building up, and since I’m a piano player and not a guitar player, it was clear to me I’d have to work with someone who played guitar as their main instrument like Sascha (Paeth / producer) or Sander (Gommans / HDK) so they could metal it up. That was the idea from the start, and the way things progressed led to those songs being on this album.”
“The songs that I wrote with Sander – and he’s a prolific songwriter, cranking them out like crazy – we already them had in mind for this project. Sander was totally into it, and every time he sits down with his guitar a song comes out of it. The way we typically work, he writes the instrumental parts and then I come in and suggest whatever changes I think should be made. Then I take the song and write a vocal line and lyrics to it. Sander likes a good challenge as well, though, and when he heard the piano / vocal demo I had for ‘Machine Gun’ he asked if he could work on it. He came up with the big main riff, which really supplements the running theme through the whole song.” Continue reading TRILLIUM – Act Your Rage
Posted on October 29, 2011 November 12, 2011 Author carlCategories The InterviewsTags After Forever, Alloy, Amanda Somerville, Avantasia, Epica, Jorn Lande, Miro, Sander Gommans, Sascha Paeth, Trillium1 Comment on TRILLIUM – Act Your Rage
TRILLIUM – …By Any Other Name
There was a time when Amanda Somerville’s name was merely another footnote in the metal biz. Her career as a solo artist had legs as of 2000, but in the world of greasy long-haired distortion and debauchery Somerville was a behind-the-scenes helper, credit given where it was due on a guest artist roster or in a thank you list. In 2003 she took the daring plunge into a realm that was still something of a mystery to her, creating the Aina – Days Of Rising Doom metal opera with her Gate Studios colleagues, finally putting a voice and face to her name. Since then, Somerville has become a popular member of the metal world, garnering a fanbase that follows and her work even if it may not always float their respective hull-of-steel boats. Now, after years of offering her voice and knowledge to acts like Epica, Avantasia, HDK and Kiske/Somerville, “the blonde chick” has stepped into a spotlight of her own making.
And it’s very, very metal.
“I’ve been throwing around the idea of doing this over the last few years,” she reveals. “It really kind of tipped the scales doing HDK. There’s a saying in German, ‘I licked blood,’ which is disgusting but appropriate I guess, since there’s a song about vampires on the album (laughs). I’ve always done my own thing. People know me mainly from collaborations I’ve done with and for other bands, but I started out as a solo artist and I stayed one throughout. Having done all of this stuff in the metal scene for more than a decade now, it’s only natural that it rubbed off on me. I like it, and the songs that I’ve written in the last several years have been very dark and gotten heavier. Basically, I was just going to make my next solo album more metal, but then I decided I’d prefer to keep the waters a little cleaner in terms of doing a metal project. It’s a little weird if I say I’m going to do a metal album and then throw in a jazz ballad (laughs). I don’t want to compromise, and I’ve got so much material now that I might as well do a total metal album and keep my solo stuff completely separate. That way I can do what I want and not have to apologize to anybody.”
Sounds suspiciously like a typical day at the office for former Strapping Young Lad mad scientist Devin Townsend, another prolific singer / songwriter / musician prone to switching musical gears and doing so effortlessly. Somerville is in good company.
“Yeah, like that. It’s me, Devin and Garth Brooks doing his Chris Gaines thing (laughs). It’s us funky musicians and our split personalities.” Continue reading TRILLIUM – …By Any Other Name
Posted on July 24, 2011 September 20, 2011 Author carlCategories The InterviewsTags Alloy, Amanda Somerville, Devin Townsend, Gate Studios, Sander Gommans, Sascha Paeth, Trillium
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Arsenal Detroit on Gooner.com
Confidence Restored
Well, I have to say that was pleasant to watch. None of this stress stuff that's been happening with Arsenal games of late, but a genuinely solid performance from players who really looked like they wanted to win.
Ozil's goal was awesome. Perhaps not the most spectacular goal of all time but a goal that will do him the world of good. Everyone, including myself has been questioning his effort a little bit in the last few games, but not yesterday. His runs were effective yesterday, but it was his defending that stuck out to me the most. The googlie eyed German legged it all the way back on one specific Everton counter attack (something they were quite good add) and made a fine tackle just inside the box. The only thing that was different with the Ozil yesterday was the effort. It was most certainly there against Everton, and that's all we really ask, right?
Obviously Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain got the memo about showing up today, because once again he was one of our best and most exciting performers of the pitch Saturday. Every time he touched the ball it made me straighten my back and take notice, he's just got that bit of electricity and flair that you know he's more than capable of making something happen. Yeah, he lost the ball more than a couple of times, but every single time he chased it down and made sure he reclaimed possession. He's got to be picked for England in my opinion, especially with Walcott most likely not making the trip to Brazil. The Ox sat on the sidelines the entire season after getting injured during the first game, and has returned with the fire and desire you can only hope for from one of your teams' players. It's awesome to see him turn into a legitimate Arsenal player and no longer a hot prospect or potential talent. He's contributing to the team now, and has been one of our best players the last few weeks.
A trip to Wembley for the FA Cup semi-final will go some way to motivating this group of players to end the season on a high note. A loss against Everton could have proved disastrous for the rest of our season. As is stands now, realistically we've got to start preparing ourselves for a fight to finish in the top three, as winning the Premiership is coming less and less of a reality. However, if we perform as we did yesterday against the Man Cities and the Chelski's then we might be in for a great finish, but you and I both know games against the 'big teams' are usually made more difficult by our timidness and lack of those hairy things called balls. I hope Wenger and his boys prove me wrong.
There was some other disturbing news this past week regarding Bacary Sagna and his rather strange contract situation. Nothing is official yet, but rumours are starting to float around (a bit like old farts float around) about Sagna declining to sign a new contract and instead opting to survey his options at the end of the season. Come this summer he'll be out of contract so this could well be his last season as a Gunner. A rather sad one really, as he's been by far and away our most consistent player in the last seven years, the first name on the team sheet for me. Carl Jenkinson is a little raw and needs time but he's not a bad right back at all. We just think he's a bit shittier than he is because we're so used to having Sagna flying up and down our right wing. After so long it'll be some big shoes to fill for whoever we decide to plant in that spot.
I think you've got to put it down to a couple of things; It sounds like he wanted a bit more money than we were offering, and personally I would have offered him whatever he wanted. Granted, he's into his thirties and Arsenal are not a club that treats over-thirty players that well when it comes to contracts, with their policy of only offering one year contracts, but this is a guy that's played the vast majority of games since he's been here at Arsenal and rarely, if ever disappoints. I think the fact that we didn't offer him a contract a year ago might have left a bad taste in his mouth too. Last year he had just come back from a double leg break, which saw him out for months, so when he came back into the squad he was understandably a bit rusty. The club probably wanted to see how he'd make his way back to fitness before they offered a new contract, being cautious that a thirty year old coming back from two broken legs might not be the player he was before the injury. But, come one, this is Bacary Sagna we're talking about here: a player who would (and has!) put his body literally on the line for this football club. It will no doubt be a big shame if he leaves us in the summer, but there is absolutely no doubt whatsoever in my mind that he will give absolutely everything he has in his final games for Arsenal. Who knows, maybe he'll change his mind.
Just a couple of days and then off to Germany to play the second leg of our match up against Bayern Munich. We're down 0-2, so almost identical task to the last time we visited the German giants. Except this time winning 2-0 in Germany would send us to extra time and eventually penalties. A situation that doesn't sound that bad, but there's the small matter of getting two goals against Bayern... again. And I don't think Bayern are a team that would fall for the same mistakes twice. An interesting game for sure.
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Let’s Analyze: Super Bowl XLVI
Posted by Jason Sharma
Did you watch a record-breaker this weekend? Well, if you watched Super Bowl XLVI, you sure did!
This year’s Super Bowl didn’t break just one record, it broke plenty of them. Super Bowl XLVI is the most watched program in the history of U.S. broadcast television (with 111.3 million viewers—only 1 of 4 programs to exceed 100 million). It set a new record of tweets-per-second (12,233 to be exact) with Beckham claiming a fair share). Social TV was on the up and up thanks to social media. And it was the first-ever live stream of a Super Bowl and most watched sports event online (though it also caused internet traffic to dip 20% overall). But according to the trend, this is all of course before next year, when we might see records broken again.
Excuse us while we get carried away with our love of football…
As for the game itself… It was both what we expected, and yet entirely out of the blue. The supposedly mighty New England Patriot came into the game with a 13-3 record, a flashy quarterback in Tom Brady and a two-headed monster of behemoth tight ends in Rob Gronkowski and Aaron Hernandez. Their opponent, the Giants (yes, they were on a hot streak) “surged” into the playoffs with a 9-7 record behind Eli Manning: a quarterback who cannot grow a beard, and a defense that gave up 17 points to Alex Smith despite Derrick Williams best effort to hand-deliver them a win, gift-wrapped, and on a silver platter. So how the heck were the Giants thrilling win “expected?” Because we’ve seen this all before, and we know how it turns out.
The game was nearly identical: the Giants dominated the first half and yet the Pats kept it close, Brady got hot and torched the Giants – fooling the general public into thinking they would win. Then, Patriots got the yips (again), they started dropping crucial passes (again), and their defense started to look tired (again) while the Giants defense seemed to get stronger (you get the point!)
The next act in-this-paint by sequel to Giants vs. Pats Super Bowl I was like a 007 movie: the audience is just waiting for Bond to heroically break out of his seemingly impenetrable captivity. So, yes, we were due for a miracle play from Eli Manning. Eli’s throw to Mario Manningham, while Bill Belichick screamed at his defense to make them throw to Manningham rather than the Giants other dangerous receivers, was just that.
After that catch, the rest was nearly a foregone conclusion. Of course, the Giants scored. Of course, the Patriots put together a few plays to put the fear of god in all of us and then took a crucial sack. Of course the game ended on a way too-close-for-comfort Hail Mary throw that Brady nearly willed into a diving Gronkowski catch.
Was it awesome? Well, yeah. But even to the most hardcore fan, this game felt a little bit like a sequel and not a masterpiece. Still, that didn’t stop any of you from watching, and so in turn the media followed the storylines like sharks to blood-in-the-water.
Without a doubt, coverage of the Super Bowl has been immense. Our News360 team has been hard at work analyzing articles and their proliferation before, during, and after the Super Bowl weekend*. The day before the game, we found 2,461 stories leading up to the Super Bowl. Not surprisingly, on Super Bowl Sunday, we recorded 6,650 articles—that’s astonishing 170% increase from Saturday! The largest ramp up of these stories—a full 1,001 to be exact—came just at the game concluded at the 10:00 PM mark local time. As expected, coverage held strong into Monday with an additional 7,116 articles or 7% increase following game day.
ESPN led the pack with the most published articles surrounding the Super Bowl with 176 entries, but most surprising was the appearance of the Daily Mail (UK) in the top ten media outlets by volume—it sat at number nine with 89 stories. It won’t be long until the Brits finally start calling soccer… “soccer” too!
Based on percentage of articles focusing on the Super Bowl, NFL News topped the list of media outlets with 63%. No real surprise there. Local Indianapolis affiliate, Fox 59, came in fourth with 48% coverage focused on the game they were hosting. What was curious was that Entertainment Weekly, normally focused on film, television, and celebrity fashion, dedicated 46% of its coverage to the game earning a spot at number five.
It might have been the love for football, it might be the size of the population, or there just might be less pride on the East Coast because California (1,130), Colorado (658), and Texas (533) were the top three, respectively, when it came to articles in local media regarding the Super Bowl. Massachusetts (Patriots) came in fifth (443), while New York (Giants) came in seventh (245).
Brady sure gets the attention, even when he’s a on a losing team. More articles mentioned the Patriot’s quarterback (5,927) than Manning (4,769). Eli can’t even get a break when the Giants win the Super Bowl!
It’s even worse for the Giant’s quarterback when it comes to headlines, where he came in third with 479 mentions. Again, Brady took the top spot with 573 mentions. M.I.A. came in second, without a doubt thanks to her little stunt during the halftime show, with 500 mentions. She even bested halftime show headliner Madonna, who came in fourth with only 213. No mention of the other musical acts from the Super Bowl in the top ten, including Kelly Clarkson who did sing the National Anthem before the game. Katy Perry, however, managed to sneak in at ten with 147 mentions because she partied it up with the Giants after their victory. Really, journalists?
Brand-wise, the NFL (689), the Patriots (557), and NBC (363) received the most mentions in article titles most likely due to the league itself, losing, and ratings. The winning Giants came in fourth (259), while car manufacturers Chrysler and Ford came in fifth (191) and sixth (120) thanks to their Super Bowl ads.
It’s unfortunate, but based on the mentions and sentiment, Super Bowl XLVI looks to be remembered as the game Brady and the Patriots lost, rather than the one Manning and the Giants won. Either way, the Super Bowl was an amazing event as always and we’re looking forward to the next season. In the meantime, someone should let baseball know they are clearly no longer America’s national pastime—the numbers speak for themselves.
* As a disclosure, we anchored publication time and date to UTC-5 or Indianapolis’ time zone due to the fact the Super Bowl was held at the Lucas Oil Stadium there.
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Bible Topics In The Christian Library
ACTS CHAPTER 17
Acts 17:1- "Now when they had passed through Amphipolis and Apollonia, they came to Thessalonica, where there was a synagogue of the Jews. 2 Then Paul, as his custom was, went in to them, and for three Sabbaths reasoned with them from the Scriptures, 3 explaining and demonstrating that the Christ had to suffer and rise again from the dead, and saying, "This Jesus whom I preach to you is the Christ.""
A. "Now when they had passed through Amphipolis and Apollonia"
1. The word "they" suggests that Paul left Luke, and possibly Timothy, behind in Philippi to continue the work. Luke rejoins them in, or at least in mentioned with Paul, at Acts 20:5-6.
B. "they came to Thessalonica, where there was a synagogue of the Jews."
1. THESSALONICA (Thehs suh loh ni' kuh) The name of modern Thessaloniki, given to the city about 315 B.C. by Cassander, a general of Alexander the Great. He founded the city in that year, naming it after his wife who was the daughter of Philip II and half sister of Alexander. Located on the Thermaic Gulf (Gulf of Salonika) with an excellent harbor--and at the termination of a major trade route from the Danube--it became, with Corinth, one of the two most important commercial centers in Greece. In the Roman period, it retained its Greek cultural orientation and functioned as the capital of Macedonia after 146 B.C. See Macedonia.
When the apostle Paul visited the city, it was larger than Philippi which reflected a predominantly Roman culture. Thessalonica was a free city, having no Roman garrison within its walls and maintaining the privilege of minting its own coins. Like Corinth, it had a cosmopolitan population due to the commercial prowess of the city. The recent discovery of a marble inscription, written partly in Greek and partly in a Samaritan form of Hebrew and Aramaic, testifies to the presence of Samaritans in Thessalonica. The Book of Acts testifies to the presence of a Jewish synagogue there (17:1).
2. Thessalonica was about 100 miles southwest of Philippi. It was a commercial center, thus would be a magnet for Jews who engaged in commerce. And having a synagogue guaranteed that there would be a number of Gentile "God fearers" present.
C. "Then Paul, as his custom was, went in to them, and for three Sabbaths reasoned with them from the Scriptures..."
1. Paul's usual practice was to attend the local Jewish synagogue where he would have the opportunity to preach Christ to an audience hungry for a messiah. Because Thessalonica was a free city, it retained a sufficient population of Jews.
2. Paul began in the Old Testament scriptures to prove that Jesus was the Messiah, that he was prophesied by them to suffer on the cross and rise again.
3. Even though we are not told here, we know that Paul's ministry in Thessalonica included the confirmation of his message by miraculous means. See 1 Thessalonians 1:5.
Acts 17:4-5 "And some of them were persuaded; and a great multitude of the devout Greeks, and not a few of the leading women, joined Paul and Silas. 5 But the Jews who were not persuaded, becoming envious, took some of the evil men from the marketplace, and gathering a mob, set all the city in an uproar and attacked the house of Jason, and sought to bring them out to the people."
A. "And some of them were persuaded..."
1. His preaching had a positive effect on many, especially on the Gentile "God fearers."
2. They "joined Paul and Silas", i.e. obeyed the Gospel.
3. The overwhelming majority of the converts seemed to come from the Gentiles. See 1 Thessalonians 1:9.
4. Paul and Silas' message seemed to have the least effect on those whom had the greatest spiritual blessings, the Jews.
B. "But the Jews who were not persuaded, becoming envious, took some of the evil men from the marketplace.."
1. Among these, no doubt, were many of the leaders of the synagogue who were jealous of Paul and Silas' success among the Gentiles. It is a common thing among preachers for there to be some jealousy on the part of some preachers toward one who is having some success in his ministry.
2. They knew they could not legally persuade a court that Paul and Silas had done anything wrong. They therefore chose to stir up a mob against them.
3. Knowing that Paul and Silas stayed at the house of Jason, the mob went there in hopes of dragging out the two missionaries for much the same treatment that they suffered in Philippi.
Acts 17:6- "But when they did not find them, they dragged Jason and some brethren to the rulers of the city, crying out, "These who have turned the world upside down have come here too. 7- ""Jason has harbored them, and these are all acting contrary to the decrees of Caesar, saying there is another king; Jesus."" 8 And they troubled the crowd and the rulers of the city when they heard these things. 9- So when they had taken security from Jason and the rest, they let them go. 10- Then the brethren immediately sent Paul and Silas away by night to Berea. When they arrived, they went into the synagogue of the Jews."
A. "But when they did not find them, they dragged Jason and some brethren to the rulers of the city"
1. When they arrived at the house of Jason they found Paul and Silas gone. They proceeded to grab their host and drag him to the magistrates of the city.
2. Thessalonica was a free city under the direct administration of local officials, although it was the residence of the Roman procounsel of the region.
3. The word politarch is found nowhere else in Greek literature. However, it has been found inscribed on an arch found in Thessalonica and kept in the great British Museum.
B. "These who have turned the world upside down have come here too. ..."
1. The gist of the accusation was two fold-
a. They had disturbed the peace - "turned the world upside"
b. They had preached that there is another king - Jesus.
2. Both accusations were technically true but high dubius.
a. As to the first it was the backlash of Paul's enemies that caused the stir. Paul and his company never encourage brethren to react violently. Christians were always peaceable.
b. As to the second the unbelieving Jews were giving lipservice to looking for the Messiah, their king. Paul and his friends never preached that Christians were supposed to not obey the Roman authority. See Romans 13:1-7.
C. "And they troubled the crowd and the rulers of the city when they heard these things."
1. The officials were concerned about the accusations, lest word of them would reach authorities and endanger their prilileged status.
2. It is quite possible that Paul and Silas would have received a similar beating here as Philippi if they had be at Jason's home at the time. But there was really no charge against Jason which would stand up to legal scrutiny.
3. The magistrates made Jason put up a "peacebond" to guarantee future tranquility and then released him.
D. "Then the brethren immediately sent Paul and Silas away by night to Berea. When they arrived, they went into the synagogue of the Jews."
1. Since Paul did not desire to be a burden or a source of danger to his brethren, he moved on to Berea.
a. This is not to say that Paul ceased being concerned for the welfare of the Thessalonian church. Exactly the opposite. 1 Thessalonians 2:17-20 tells us that he was still with them in heart and ernestly desired to see them. In fact, he was so concerned that he stayed alone in Athens for a time and sent Timothy back to check on them (1 Thessalonians 3:1-2).
2. Berea - (Bih ree' uh) Place name meaning, "place of many waters." City in Macedonia to which Paul escaped after the Jews of Thessalonica rioted (Acts 17:10). The Jews searched the Scriptures as Paul preached, and many believed. Jews came from Thessalonica and forced Paul out, and so he continued his second missionary journey. A traveling companion on the last leg of his third journey was Sopater of Berea (Acts 20:4). Berea was not situated on the major highways. Surrounded by springs in the plain below Mount Bermion, it was 45 miles west of Thessalonica. It is modern Verria.
3. It must have been a hard journey for Paul and his little company. Even though it was on a good Roman, it was not the better travelled Via Egnatia, and it was still at night when they set out. It was over forty miles from Thessalonica to Berea. Travel was very dangerous, especially at night. Travel was usually unheard of at night, this was probably the reason why the brethren sent him away them. His enemeies would not suspect that he would leave then. They, like Paul, trusted that the Lord would protect him in his continuing work. Berea was an out of the way place. It was likely here that Paul hoped to be able to stay for awhile, maybe the Winter, as they worked their way down to Athens.
Acts 17:11-12 "These were more fair-minded than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness, and searched the Scriptures daily to find out whether these things were so. Therefore many of them believed, and also not a few of the Greeks, prominent women as well as men."
A. "These were more fair-minded than those in Thessalonica"
1. The Jews in the Berean synagogue was more open minded to the preaching of the gospel. They did not immediately turn against Paul, but looked to the Old Testament books to see if what Paul was preaching was true.
2. They were not prepared to immediately reject Paul's claim, but to test it. This is an attitude that we should all possess.
B. "in that they received the word with all readiness, and searched the Scriptures daily to find out whether these things were so."
1. In each point which the went to the Word and confirmed, they accepted. This shows an amazing lack of prejudice and a desire to be pleasing to God.
2. There was daily teaching by Paul and daily study by his hearers.
3. Jesus says that an honest search of the Scriptures will show to the student that he is the Messiah. See John 5:39.
C. "Therefore many of them believed...."
1. Paul's labor began to bear fruit. Many of them, the faithful Jews, became Christians as a result of searching the Scriptures.
2. Many of the Gentiles of the city, either through the teaching in the Synagogue or later in teaching at an open-air Greek market, obeyed the truth as well.
3. The church in Berea soon became a strong and growing one.
Acts 17:13- "But when the Jews from Thessalonica learned that the word of God was preached by Paul at Berea, they came there also and stirred up the crowds. 14 Then immediately the brethren sent Paul away, to go to the sea; but both Silas and Timothy remained there. 15 So those who conducted Paul brought him to Athens; and receiving a command for Silas and Timothy to come to him with all speed, they departed."
A. "But when the Jews from Thessalonica learned that the word of God was preached by Paul at Berea..."
1. One commentator says that Paul probably stayed through most of the winter in Berea preaching. News travelled slower in those days than in ours. With the time of year, with diminished travel, it is likely that word of Paul's evangelistic work did not not arrive in Thessalonica until late in the winter.
2. As good as it was to the Thessalonian brethren, it was infuriating to the Jewish enemies of Paul who stirred up the trouble in Thessalonica.
3. Immediately they set out to cause the same problem in Berea as they did in Thessalonica. Even in Berea there would be enough shiftless ones to stir into a mob.
4. The brethren, fearing for Paul, sent him by boat to Athens. Silas and Timothy stayed, however, and continued the profitable Berean. It is probable that Paul stirred up special hatred on the part of the Jews for him personally because he had been such a rabid enemy of Christianity who now was preaching it. He would be looked upon as a traitor by many.
B. "So those who conducted Paul brought him to Athens; and receiving a command for Silas and Timothy to come to him with all speed, they departed"
1. Upon arriving in Athens, Paul sent word back by his boat, for Silas and Timothy to come as fast as they could to Athens to join him in the work.
Acts 17:16- "Now while Paul waited for them at Athens, his spirit was provoked within him when he saw that the city was given over to idols. 17 Therefore he reasoned in the synagogue with the Jews and with the Gentile worshipers, and in the marketplace daily with those who happened to be there."
A. "Now while Paul waited for them at Athens, his spirit was provoked within him..."
1. While Paul awaited Silas and Timothy he continued his work of evangelism alone. It is likely that he saw idolatrous shrines on the road coming into Athens. This stirred his souls with digust toward the false idols and love for the souls who were being misled.
B. Paul had two primary fields in Athens, as well as other cities where he journeyed.
1. He would preach in the synagogues, where there would be Jews present who believed in the God of the Bible.
2. He would often preach in the marketplace, which was a public meetingplace for discussions of politics, religion, and philosophy. This was where the Stoics and Epicureans came into contact with him.
Acts 17:18- "Then certain Epicurean and Stoic philosophers encountered him. And some said, "What does this babbler want to say?" Others said, "He seems to be a proclaimer of foreign gods," because he preached to them Jesus and the resurrection."
A. "Then certain Epicurean and Stoic philosophers encountered him."
1. These were two of the major philosophies of the day, which competed for the spiritual allegiance of the ordinary man.
2. Epicurean philosophy centered on the search for happiness. Pleasure is the beginning and fulfillment of a happy life. It advocated the worship of the gods, even though it taught that the gods were not really concerned with everyday life. It taught that man should not be concerned with the hearafter but be solely concerned with everyday pleasure and happiness. It was founded in Athens by Epicurus, who was born in 314 B.C. It was one of the major religious beliefs that competed with Christianity in the first century.
3. Stoicism, on the other hand, downplayed the physical. They held that the highest good could be found in a complete selfdiscipline amounting to the denial of the natural and necessary desires of man. This often degenerated into self-degenradation. It's greatest disciple was the emperor Marcus Aurelius, who would carry out a great persecution of Christian a century later. It was another of the great philosophies which competed with Christianity.
B. And some said, "What does this babbler want to say?...."
1. There seemed to be a divided opinion of Paul among the philosophers in Athens.
2. Some dismissed him as a babbler, i.e. in the greek "a seed-picker (as the crow), i.e. (fig.) a sponger, loafer (spec. a gossip or trifler in talk):--babbler."
3. Others had listened to him enough to recognize that he spoke a new religion. Paul talked about the resurrection from the dead, which was unique among the current major religions of the day.
Acts 17:19- "And they took him and brought him to the Areopagus, saying, "May we know what this new doctrine is of which you speak? 20 For you are bringing some strange things to our ears. Therefore we want to know what these things mean." 21 "For all the Athenians and the foreigners who were there spent their time in nothing else but either to tell or to hear some new thing."
A. "And they took him and brought him to the Areopagus, saying..."
1. They literally grabbed him and pushed him to the place where there were regular religious discussion taking place.
2. AREOPAGUS (ehr ih ahp' uh guhs) The site of Paul's speech to the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers of Athens (Acts 17:19). It was a rocky hill about 370 feet high, not far from the Acropolis and the Agora (marketplace) in Athens, Greece. The word also was used to refer to the council that originally met on this hill. The name probably was derived from Ares, the Greek name for the god of war known to the Romans as Mars.
3. The KJV uses "Mars Hill" in verse 22.
B. It was a curiosity that motivated these philosophers.
1. Athens was noted for it's philosophical pursuits.
2. There were idlers who did nothing but sit around and discuss the various religions and philosophies of the day. The only problem was that it made little difference in their lives.
Paul's Sermon on Mar's Hill
Acts 17:22-23 "Then Paul stood in the midst of the Areopagus and said, "Men of Athens, I perceive that in all things you are very religious; 23 for as I was passing through and considering the objects of your worship, I even found an altar with this inscription: TO THE UNKNOWN GOD. Therefore, the One whom you worship without knowing, Him I proclaim to you:"
A. Paul compliments them.
1. He says that they are very religious. KJV rendering here is mistaken .
2. Literally "very demon fearing." ASV renders it thus. McGarvey goes into detail to explain how the ancient Greco-Roman world diefied good or prominent men after death and worshipped them. They would then be referred to as demons. Not in the Christian sense as wicked helpers of Satan.
3. Whichever the rendering, it is certain that the Athenians took it as a compliment.
B. Paul refers to the UNKNOWN GOD.
1. This shows both the piety and pitiable nature of polytheism. It was very zealous and spiritual in seeking to worship all gods. But it was also sad because the worshipper would never know if he had worship all the gods that existed and had control over him. This shows the groping of the ancient mind for the great unknown.
2. Paul says that this " unknown god" was in reality the one true God. It is he whom Paul will explain to them. They had been ignorantly worshipping Him.
I. Creator of all. 24-26.
Acts 17:24-26 ""God, who made the world and everything in it, since He is Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands. 25 Nor is He worshiped with men's hands, as though He needed anything, since He gives to all life, breath, and all things. 26 And He has made from one blood every nation of men to dwell on all the face of the earth, and has determined their preappointed times and the boundaries of their dwellings,"
A. Made all things
1. He is the creator of the Universe.
2. In shorthand is Genesis 1-3. He created the universe. It tells us that He created ex nihilo, i.e. out of nothing.
B. Lord of heaven and earth
1. He is not subject to any other being, being the only true God. He is not god of the sea, or furtility, or war, but of all.
C. Dwells not in any one place.
1. Because he is God of All He is too great to dwell in any single building. The Old Testament, although it speaks extensively of the Lord's temple, never suggest that it was the sold dwelling place of Jehovah. It was where Jehovah's visible manifestation would join with his people.
D. Not served by men's hands
1. This God was not a man to be made a likeness of and bowed down to.
2. See John 4:27.
E. The maker of nations
1. All men, regardless of race, are "one blood." They are all descended from a single common ancestor. The Bible tells us that Eve is the mother of all living (Genesis 3:20). It is remarkable that recently science "discovered" that all men originated from one source, one man. They place him in Africa long before the Bible record, but it is amazing that Science, even with its' trapping of evolution, bears out what the Bible has said all the time, that mankind all sprang from one source.
2. The New Testament is clear in stating that there is no real differences between men. This was remarkable in the ancient world. But today we know that we are all the same "under the skin." Spiritually, the New Testament has set aside any racial or national distinctions. See Galatians 3:26-28.
11. Within reach of all. 27-29.
Acts 17:27- ""so that they should seek the Lord, in the hope that they might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us; 28 for in Him we live and move and have our being, as also some of your own poets have said, 'For we are also His offspring. 29 Therefore, since we are the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Divine Nature is like gold or silver or stone, something shaped by art and man's devising."
1. In Him we live, move and have our being
2. We are His offs ring or creation
3. Cast away then t ese idols and worship the true God
111. Gives salvation to all. 30-31.
Acts 17:30-31 ""Truly, these times of ignorance God overlooked, but now commands all men everywhere to repent, 31 because He has appointed a day on which He will judge the world in righteousness by the Man whom He has ordained. He has given assurance of this to all by raising Him from the dead.""
1. The days of ignorance are over
2. Men now should repent and turn to Christ
3. This to be done in lieu of the final judgment
Copyright 1999 by Grady Scott may be reproducted for non-commercial purposes at no cost to others.
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You are at:Home»Stories»Air Cav
By Jeff Bacon on November 18, 2011 Stories
Sometimes things happen that make you feel old.
A few weeks ago I got an email from an Army UH-60 Blackhawk pilot stationed overseas who sent me some cartoons. He is a proud member of the Air Cav, and his cartoon strip pokes fun at the lives of Army helo pilots. He has been published in theater and in the Ft. Campbell Courier.
In his email he told me that we had met about a dozen years ago. He told me that his dream was to fly, and good for him – he did it. He also said I gave him a book, and it’s pretty cool that he is doing that too.
None of that makes me feel old.
When we met, he was a 15-year old high school student. Now he flies Blackhawks for the Army.
That makes me feel old.
Good luck Evan DeWan – you’re on your way!
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Tag Archive | "sociedad"
Avoiding banks, immigrants save their own way
Posted on 08 December 2010. Tags: banks, Melrose, Mott Haven, sociedad, sociedades, unbanked
Denisse Lina Chavez keeps her cash savings in a Heineken bottle that she hides behind the counter of her store in Mott Haven, a practice she has kept for at least 10 years. This unique savings method helped Chavez pay for her expansion to a neighboring store and then later to open a Mexican restaurant she ran for a while before selling it. While she could have placed that money in a bank and collected interest, she said she doesn’t trust banks and prefers her system instead.
Denisse Lina Chavez behind the counter where she keeps her savings. Photo: Nick Pandolfo
Chavez is one of thousands in the Bronx shying away from the formal financial system. According to a June 2010 report released by the Office of Consumer Affairs Department of Financial Empowerment, the Bronx, at 28.6 percent, is the borough with the highest percentage of unbanked people. While 13.4 percent of New York City residents are without bank accounts, a staggering 56 percent of the roughly 86,000 residents of the neighborhoods Mott Haven and Melrose are unbanked.
But just because many people are not using formal banks does not mean they lack access to savings and credit services. Mexican immigrants bring their cultural practices to the Bronx in the form of informal savings groups called sociedades. They consist of a group of people who contribute some amount of money on a regular basis. Then, each member takes the entire pool of money weekly or monthly.
“The point is that you are forcing yourself to save,” said Adrian Franco, director of financial advocacy non-profit Qualitas of Life. “It’s a way to develop an attitude to saving money.”
Chavez is the organizer of a sociedad. In hers, 11 women each contribute $400 weekly, and the pot of $4,400 is given to a different member over the course of 11 weeks. Although the formal group is only 11 women, members without enough money during any given week may ask family and friends to contribute.
“We don’t get rich,” said Chavez. “We just help each other.”
But her group has a much greater chance of bigger returns than most other savings clubs like it. Franco explained that the $400 weekly contribution is extremely high for sociedades, with people normally giving more like $50 a month or $15 or $25 a week. He said he wouldn’t be surprised if there were as many as 50 or 60 people indirectly participating in Chavez’s sociedad.
Chavez explained that in her sociedad, no interest is charged and the group functions to create opportunities for people to make bigger purchases that may be necessary like clothing and rent, or to cover an emergency. She said that a member and her husband have bought two houses in Mexico with their shares of the money.
Sociedades are not replacements for banks, however, because they don’t provide people with a formal credit history. Experts and financial advocates said they serve to help people, especially women, collect savings and attain some financial independence by creating a social structure through the sociedad. Belonging to a sociedad carries with it certain cultural practices and assumptions.
“There is a social pressure attached,” said Alicia Portada, a financial literacy coordinator at the Union Settlement Federal Credit Union, a non-profit group that works in all five boroughs. “You don’t want to be the one who didn’t give the money. Everybody will wonder why and you’ll get left out in the future.”
It is difficult to track how many sociedades actually exist because members are often undocumented and there is no paper trail. But it’s easy to understand why they are so popular.
In all of Mott Haven and Melrose, there are only eight banks, as compared to the 44 across the river in Manhattan’s Upper East Side. Financial illiteracy also plays a big role in pushing these alternative systems forward, “It might be that they don’t know better.” said Portada. “It takes time to learn the minimum required.”
Lack of English skills also drives people to sociedades, said Adrian Franco, director of Qualitas of Life, another non-profit group providing financial literacy classes to Hispanics. Immigrants who don’t understand a bank’s policies and complicated procedures prefer these informal savings groups where they can communicate with other members in their native language.
Sociedades and other groups like them have their pitfalls as well. It’s easy for people to run away with the money, which is why these functions work best with friends and family members. “They must be managed well or people can fail to pay and the system collapses,” said Deyanira del Rio, who works at a financial advocacy non-profit organization called the Neighborhood Economic Development Advocacy Project. “If it works well, it can be a disciplined form of savings.”
Margarita Gutierrez, a former member of Chavez’s sociedad, used her savings to buy her store on 138th Street. Four of the 11 members of Chavez’s group were recommended by Gutierrez. “It’s good because it gives credit to people who don’t have social security numbers or documents,” said Gutierrez.
Advocacy groups working toward increasing financial literacy in immigrant populations see the value in being part of an informal savings group like sociedades, but are careful to also acknowledge their limitations.
“It’s a tool,” said Catherine Barnett, vice president of Project Enterprise, a non-profit that administers small business loans to immigrants. “It’s filling a gap. It’s not the total gap, but it’s a start.”
Posted in Bronx Neighborhoods, Money, Southern BronxComments (0)
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Facts to Know About Field Hockey
Allow athletes to fight, unbelievable rules in hockey
The History of Field Hockey
Angry at losing, the American hockey coach refused to shake hands with the Russian coach
Lots of scary injuries in hockey
Petr Cech keeps his form with hockey
President Putin criticizes the referee for Russian hockey losing to the US
Hockey: A Great Sport
Why Hockey is a Great Sport
Why Women are Encouraged to Play Hockey
Ice hockey – sports that incorporate teamwork
How to Enjoy Hockey
Qualities Needed to Enjoy Hockey
What It Takes to Enjoy Hockey
Inspired by Hockey
How Alex Danson Inspires Future Generations
The Making of Anna Flanagan: Australian Hockey Star
Women’s Inter-Korean hockey team was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize
There are no breaking news at the moment
Swedish hockey players boycott the training
in About Hockey — by editorpc — September 18, 2019
The Swedish ice hockey federation said it was notified of the boycott that appeared and was surprised by the decision.
A total of 43 national team players were involved in the boycott, apparently due to the lack of compensation they received when on duty with the national team. One statement was posted on social media by Swedish player Erika Grahm. He said that the action was taken to develop and create better conditions in the national team to show encouragement and respect for current and future generations. They say the player’s needs are not ridiculous but do not disclose specific issues.
The move is similar to what happened two years ago in North America, where the US women’s national team threatened to boycott the 2017 World Championship at home, demanding a lot of money and treatment. similar to what the men’s team receives. They have reached a four-year deal with US Hockey which has risen to $ 4,000 per month with the ability to earn about $ 71,000 annually and up to $ 129,000 during Olympic years. America’s World Cup women’s soccer team is also in a fight for more compensation, with that dispute likely to go to court.
Many Swedish players have a full-time job away from the pitch, so it has to fit in with games around schedules and family needs. Travel schedules for the national team games can be tight, affecting the preparation. The Swedish League says it does not compensate players in women’s or men’s national teams, and instead, it adopts a financial agreement between the top leagues and clubs.
The Swedish League says it does not compensate players in women’s or men’s national teams, and instead, it adopts a financial agreement between the top leagues and clubs.
Sweden, traditionally one of the best teams in the world, failed to reach the quarter-finals of the World Championship in Finland in April after losing three of their four group matches. That means the team has relegated for the first time in their history and will play in the IA League of the 2020 World Championship for women.
Tags: best teams, Finland, IA League, Swedish player
Author: editorpc
Do you know the history of hockey?
Discover unbelievable things in hockey
Hockey becomes one of favorite sports in Germany
Ice hockey – a sport that unites teamwork
About Hockey
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Krista Franklin
From Deletionpedia.org: a home for articles deleted from Wikipedia
This article was considered for deletion at Wikipedia on April 24 2016. This is a backup of Wikipedia:Krista_Franklin. All of its AfDs can be found at Wikipedia:Special:PrefixIndex/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Krista_Franklin, the first at Wikipedia:Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Krista_Franklin. Purge
Krista Franklin is a poet and visual artist that the Poetry Foundation says[1] was influenced by American poet Nikki Giovanni, African-American poet Sonia Sanchez and the writers of the Black Arts Movement and whose main artistic focus is collage where artwork is made from an assemblage of different forms, thus creating a new whole.
3 Books and poetry
4 Exhibitions
6 Awards and fellowships
Franklin is originally from Dayton, Ohio, received her BA from Kent State University, her MFA in Interdisciplinary Arts-Book and Paper from Columbia College Chicago and is based in Chicago, Illinois.[1][2][3]
"Her themes of surrealism and utopic and dystopic visions are intricately woven with subtexts of black beauty, self-reflection, and the African Diaspora.[4] In an interview, Franklin has described her approach as both AfroFuturist and AfroSurrealist.[5] Her poetry is influenced by American poet Nikki Giovanni, African-American poet Sonia Sanchez and the writers of the Black Arts Movement.[1] Franklin's artwork has been featured on the television show Empire.[6]
Regarding her talent in the art of collage, Franklin said, “I learned the art of collage through watching my family make something out of nothing,” she said. “That’s really where my collage aesthetic comes from. It comes from an idea of necessity, you know, how you make something beautiful out of scraps.”[7]
Books and poetry
Franklin’s poetry is included in the anthologies of Penguin Books The Bust Guide to the New Girl Order (1999),[8] and Penguin Books Bum Rush the Page: A Def Poetry Jam (2001) [9] and Penguin Random House book Bum Rush the Page: A Def Poetry Jam (2001).[10] In 2011, Franklin was a featured performer as well as a celebrity judge at the The Gypsy Poetry Slam held in Lexington, Kentucky.[11]
Franklin’s collages are, also, featured on the covers of several poetry collections[1], including John Murillo’s[12] Up Jumps the Boogie (2010)[13] and Lita Hooper’s[14] Thunder in Her Voice (2010)[15].
"Like Water"[16][17]
"FEAR"[18]
"Dreams In Jay Z Minor"[19]
"Heavy Rotation"[6]
"We Wear the Mask"[20]
"Library of Love"[4]
"SEED (The Book of Eve)"[21]
Study of Love & Black Body[22]
Cave Canem Fellow[23][2]
↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 "Profile: Krista Franklin". Poetry Foundation. http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems-and-poets/poets/detail/krista-franklin.
↑ 2.0 2.1 Super User. "Krista Franklin". http://www.blancchicago.com/index.php/artists/krista-franklin.
↑ Sabine Quetant (16 April 2015). "8 Afrofuturist Artists You Need To Follow Right Now". Blavity. http://blavity.com/8-afrofuturist-artists-who-are-out-of-this-world/. Retrieved 25 April 2016.
↑ 4.0 4.1 "FEATURE: Required Intelligence, Punk Artistry In The Midwest - Krista Franklin". afropunk.com. http://www.afropunk.com/profiles/blogs/feature-required-intelligence-punk-artistry-in-the-midwest-krista. Retrieved 25 April 2016.
↑ "Sixty Inches From Center » Black To The Future Series: An Interview with Krista Franklin". http://sixtyinchesfromcenter.org/archive/?p=15558.
↑ 6.0 6.1 "Afrofuturist Artist Krista Franklin: And, Also, Too". JSTOR Daily. http://daily.jstor.org/and-also-too-krista-franklin/. Retrieved 25 April 2016.
↑ "The Daily Northwestern : NU Arts Night brings Chicago artists to Northwestern". The Daily Northwestern. http://dailynorthwestern.com/2015/05/21/campus/nu-arts-night-brings-chicago-artists-to-northwestern/. Retrieved 25 April 2016.
↑ http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems-and-poets/poets/detail/krista-franklin
↑ "Bum Rush the Page". PenguinRandomhouse.com. http://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/112841/bum-rush-the-page-by-edited-by-tony-medina-and-louis-reyes-rivera/9780609808405/. Retrieved 25 April 2016.
↑ "Gathering Ground". The University of Michigan Press. https://www.press.umich.edu/104392/gathering_ground. Retrieved 25 April 2016.
↑ "Poetry Slam Returns With New Award, Headliner Krista Franklin - UKNow". uky.edu. http://uknow.uky.edu/content/poetry-slam-returns-new-award-headliner-krista-franklin. Retrieved 25 April 2016.
↑ "Profile: John Murillo". http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems-and-poets/poets/detail/john-murillo.
↑ http://www.amazon.com/Up-Jump-Boogie-John-Murillo/dp/0981913148
↑ "Profile: Lita Hooper". http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems-and-poets/poets/detail/lita-hooper.
↑ https://willowlit.net/our-authors-2/thunder-in-her-voice-by-lita-hooper/
↑ ""Like Water": A Solo Exhibition of Works by Krista Franklin". https://arts.uchicago.edu/event/water-solo-exhibition-works-krista-franklin.
↑ "The Chicago Maroon — Krista Franklin’s Like Water exhibit explores female ability to shapeshift". The Chicago Maroon. http://chicagomaroon.com/2015/10/15/krista-franklins-like-water-exhibit-explores-female-ability-to-shapeshift/. Retrieved 25 April 2016.
↑ "Face it". daytoncitypaper.com. http://www.daytoncitypaper.com/face-it/. Retrieved 25 April 2016.
↑ "Bronzeville’s New Blanc Gallery featured by writer Kylie Zane for latest exhibit “Dreams In Jay Z Minor” by Amanda Williams and Krista Franklin - And The Ordinary People Said". chicagonow.com. http://www.chicagonow.com/and-the-ordinary-people-said/2012/11/bronzevilles-new-blanc-gallery-featured-by-writer-kylie-zane-for-latest-exhibit-dreams-in-jay-z-minor-by-amanda-williams-and-krista-franklin/. Retrieved 25 April 2016.
↑ "Art. Krista Franklin. Afrofuturism. Afrosurrealism.". SUPERSELECTED - Black Fashion Magazine Black Models Black Contemporary Artists Art Black Musicians. http://superselected.com/art-krista-franklin-afrofuturism-afrosurrealism/. Retrieved 25 April 2016.
↑ http://chicagoartmagazine.com/2011/07/are-you-ready-to-alter-your-destiny-chicago-and-afro-futurism-part-1-of-2/
↑ "On Blackness Re-imagined: A Performance and Conversation with Krista Franklin and Michael Warr". https://www.wbez.org/shows/wbez-news/on-blackness-reimagined-a-performance-and-conversation-with-krista-franklin-and-michael-warr/404f2f09-e71c-4ab8-b0d0-132b86ffb764.
↑ Derricotte, T.; Eady, C.; Dungy, C.T.; (Organization), Cave Canem (2006). Gathering Ground: A Reader Celebrating Cave Canem's First Decade. University of Michigan Press. ISBN 978-0-472-06924-8. http://books.google.com/books?id=dWCKQ6CDG4MC&pg=PA197. Retrieved 25 April 2016.
Retrieved from "http://deletionpedia.org/w/index.php?title=Krista_Franklin&oldid=40303"
Deleted April 2016
American women artists
American women poets
People from Chicago, Illinois
People from Dayton, Ohio
American educators
21st-century American artists
21st-century American poets
This page was last edited 16:06, 25 April 2016 by Kasper's bot.
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Home > About your Council > Active and Completed ePetitions
Active and Completed ePetitions
An e-Petition is a petition which collects signatures online. This allows petitions and supporting information to be made available to a potentially much wider audience than a traditional paper based petition.
Anyone who lives, works or studies in the area can submit or sign an e-Petition.
E-Petitions are part of the Council’s ongoing commitment to listening to and acting on the views of the public.
Select an earlier date range below to find completed e-Petitions and responses from the Council.
Submit a new ePetition
Show for date range:
ePetitions
Deadline to sign by
Re-establish Cycle Lanes on Stockport Road, Altrincham 3 03/04/2020
Parking on Peers Close 5 02/07/2020
Gain funding for Level 3 Food science at Urmston Grammar school 3 01/09/2020
Supporting an e-Petition
To support an existing e-Petition choose an e-Petition and add your name, address and email address.
To find out more about the issue, see the supporting information, provided by the lead petitioner, attached to the e-Petition.
Submitting an e-Petition
An e-Petition can relate to any issue on which the Council has powers or duties or on which it has shared delivery responsibilities through the Local Area Agreement or other partnership arrangement.
This Council accepts no liability for the petitions on these web pages. The views expressed in the petitions do not necessarily reflect those of the providers.
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Three Washington State Stories Reflect Underlying Credit Conditions…
…And Washington State is certainly NOT alone!
The Washington State economy has been relatively better off than some of the hardest hit areas. Our economy tends to lag the rest of the nation by about 18 months. This used to be due to our dependence on Boeing and the fact that the airline aircraft order cycle tends to be out of phase with business cycles due to the lag time. Now, of course, our economy is way more diverse with companies like Microsoft, Amazon, Starbucks, and other high tech companies as well, many of which now reside in Bellevue, just east of Seattle.
Incidentally, the Bellevue area still looks like a high tech boom town and is Washington State’s version of Orange County – you know, modern, clean and nice looking. I just drove the length of I-5 from LA to Seattle and can tell you that I-5 in California does not look as well kept as it did in the past. There are areas where the weeds are growing several feet tall on the shoulders and the freeway is noticeable deteriorating in certain areas, something that I’ve never seen before on I-5.
At any rate, I have read three articles in the local Puget Sound Business Journal lately that underscore how deteriorating credit conditions are finally impacting Washington State.
The first article states that retail sales have dropped the LARGEST AMOUNT IN HISTORY! In the second quarter of this year, retail sales, as measured by taxable receipts (again, not susceptible to manipulation), fell by a whopping 14% year over year! That’s an ACCELERATION from a yoy drop of 12.8% the first quarter, and a 10.8% drop in the quarter prior:
Washington state retail sales drop sets record
Puget Sound Business Journal (Seattle)
In the second quarter of 2009, Washington state taxable retail sales dropped 14 percent compared with the same time a year earlier; a quarterly decline so large that state officials said it set a new record.
Sales fell to $25 billion in the latest April-to-June quarter.
In the first quarter of 2009, sales fell 12.8 percent compared with the first quarter of 2008. In the fourth quarter of 2008, sales fell 10.8 percent compared with a year earlier. Those two quarterly drops are the second and third-largest declines since the 1974, when the state said reliable records began being kept.
Among the biggest declining industries in the latest quarter, retail sales from construction dropped 26 percent to $4.3 billion and motor vehicle and parts dropped 21 percent to $2.3 billion.
In Seattle, total taxable retail sales fell 13.1 percent to $3.8 billion in the second quarter.
This is the type of revenue hit that all municipalities are facing. Yes, they have the power of taxation, but buyers and holders of municipal bonds need to be paying attention. RISK is rising while at the same time the Federal government is artificially forcing interest rates down. This can and will eventually snap back – as interest rates rise, the price of bonds fall.
Now, please consider the percentage drops in taxable sales and compare them to the statistics being reported in such phony baloney statistics as Goldman’s ICSC or the Redbook who’s greatest yoy sales decreases are in the 4+% range. Why the discrepancy, and how can retail sales only be down 4% per year when imports are down 30%+ year over year?
Here’s the answer… just like the stock market indices, these “indices” are vulnerable to SUBSTITUTION BIAS. If you are measuring same store sales, for example, how does that “index” handle it when one of their store chains goes out of business? Why they are no longer counted, of course! So the index only counts companies that are still around and does not capture those that have gone out of business, just as the DOW Jones Industrials doesn’t capture the fact that only one of the original companies in the index, GE, is still in business and that ALL THE REST HAVE FAILED or been bought up by other companies. So, that’s why the sales tax data captures what is really happening in the economy and why those other reports are close to worthless.
The next article is related to imports and exports. The Port of Tacoma is one of the largest and busiest in the nation. They had been so busy that they planned on spending $1 BILLION on expanding the terminal! But now that’s on hold “until cargo volumes return:”
Port of Tacoma shelves $1B terminal project
Puget Sound Business Journal (Seattle) - by Steve Wilhelm
The Port of Tacoma has decided to shelve a $1 billion plan for a massive terminal and waterway development project until cargo volumes return.
The port announced Oct. 1 that it won’t build the planned $300 million, 168-acre terminal on the Blair Waterway for NYK Line, which is to start calling at the port in 2012.
The terminal project was just part of a $1 billion port development plan that included building roads, railway connections and a new terminal for Tacoma-based Totem Ocean Trailer Express Inc., which operates cargo vessels between Tacoma and Anchorage. All of these steps were necessary to develop the NYK terminal.
Tokyo-based NYK will still come to the port. It will share space with Horizon Line at the existing AP Moeller terminal directly in front of Port of Tacoma headquarters on the Tacoma Tideflats.
“I will be able to see their ships from my desk,” said Port of Tacoma spokeswoman Tara Mattina.
Totem Ocean Trailer Express Inc., also called TOTE, will stay in its current terminal on the Blair, she said.
The port decision was driven by declining cargo volumes, which are down 15 percent so far this year, coupled with a 20 percent increase in the cost of the larger development plan, Mattina said.
“This is one way to bring NYK without spending that money,” she said.
Last year, container volume at the port dropped 3 percent to the equivalent of 1.9 million 20-foot containers. The worsened slide this year could pull volumes down to 1.6 million containers for 2009.
In a statement, Port of Tacoma Executive Director Tim Farrell called the decision “an important step to balance supply and demand,” which leaves the port with room for “substantial growth” in the long term.
That’s $1 billion less that is not going to ripple through the local economy. Notice they don’t do the math for you to express how much container traffic is down this year… well, the .3 million of 1.6 million containers equal an 18.75% drop in container traffic this year, right in the same range that retail sales are down, how ‘bout that?!
The third article that caught my attention is related to both housing and the travel industry…
Starwood says it will fill its Seattle excavation
Puget Sound Business Journal (Seattle) - by Jeanne Lang Jones
A big hole in the ground at Second Avenue and Pine Street in downtown Seattle, next to Macy’s parking garage, should be filled just in time for the holidays.
Connecticut-based Starwood Capital Group Global, which had planned to construct a luxury hotel and condominium tower on the site, mothballed the project when the economy soured. Starwood will start filling the excavation next week, according to a company spokesman. The firm will retain ownership of the property.
Work on the 23-story 1 Hotel & Residences stopped in the fall of 2007 after Starwood Capital failed to obtain construction financing on acceptable terms.
In a press release, Starwood Capital said, “As we wait for capital markets to stabilize sufficiently enough for us to realize our vision of building a world-class hotel and residences at the gateway to Seattle’s retail district, we are working in partnership with the city to ensure the property remains clean and presentable over the short-term at this important location.”
Starwood said its affiliate, Avstar Seattle LLC, the entity that owns the property, “remains committed to Seattle as an investment opportunity and has a vested interest in seeing downtown Seattle be successful.”
Starwood bought out its former partner in the project, Portland developer Paul Brenneke, in June 2008.
Note that it was only the middle of last year that Starwood took on this project and already they are abandoning it and filling in the foundation! Perhaps their “forecasts” were a little optimistic about the strength of the Seattle area?
All three of these stories show the result of a collapsing credit bubble. Consumer spending, port traffic, hotel/travel traffic… all way down. Down so far that the numbers no longer can justify the huge expense. $1 billion on just one port expansion? Last time I checked, a billion was still a lot of money. That money must come from somewhere, and that somewhere for local governments is usually through bond offerings. They don’t number out, and that’s because the price to build, just like subprime housing, has reached ridiculous heights on the back of cheap credit, the largest credit bubble in the history of mankind. DEFLATION is what’s required to bring the math back in line. Stop building ridiculous hotels, stop spending billions on port expansions, consumers stop spending money they don’t have and price will fall back in line with EARNINGS. This is the cleansing of misallocation that is CAUSED BY OUR OWN GOVERNMENT and their failure to regulate the creation of money.
Of course, if you peruse the Puget Sound Business Journal, you’ll find all kinds of articles and opinions by “experts” talking up the strength of the area and putting their naturally positive spin on the situation. The truth is that Washington State is not all that far behind California in relation to it’s size.
Here’s a local newspaper article from last year showing the massive deficits the State is running:
State's projected budget deficit: $5.1 billion
Figure is nearly $2 billion more than was predicted 2 months ago
By AMY ROLPH
P-I REPORTER
Washington's projected budget deficit has ballooned to $5.1 billion, nearly $2 billion more than predicted just two months ago.
That means when lawmakers convene in January to assemble the next two-year spending plan they'll have to drastically cut state programs or raise taxes, something Gov. Chris Gregoire has said she won't do.
"This will be ugly," said Rep. Ross Hunter, D-Medina, chairman of the House Revenue Committee. "It's much larger than I expected it to be."
Tax revenues are expected to drop $1.9 billion below the state's former projections, meaning a possible doomsday for some programs -- and substantial belt-tightening just about everywhere else.
In September, the state's projected deficit for the 2009-2011 biennium was pinpointed at $3.2 billion. Now, not only has that deficit burgeoned to $4.6 billion, but the state's current budget is also suffering a $500 million shortfall.
The nation's economy has been widely blamed for Washington's growing deficit. As financial markets continue to experience record measures of volatility, consumers aren't spending like they used to -- and that means sales and real estate taxes aren't pouring into state coffers…
Let’s see… that’s $5.1 billion short of a $30 billion budget, hmmm…. The trusty calculator says that’s a 17% shortfall, once again the same exact range as the numbers we’re seeing in the articles above – HUGE! That $5.1 billion divided into the state’s 6.5 million people means that the one year shortfall equals $785 for every man, woman, and child ($3,140 for my family of four), for just the year 2008 and just for the state’s shortfall, not the local town and not the Federal Government, just the State.
And Washington State is certainly NOT alone. The following study was published just last week from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. It lists the current and forecast shortfalls for all the states including the years 2010 and 2011. Keep in mind as you see the horrific numbers in this report that those projections are forecasts which are proving to be wildly optimistic in their assumptions.
For the year 2010, 48 states are projected to run deficits and their income will fall short of their expenditures by a whopping 24% of their budgets, or more than $168 Billion, $350 Billion for 2009/2010 combined! Please spend some time looking at the table for your state, especially if you live in California…
Paul Simon – Slip Sliding Away:
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So you want to make movies with Ron Perlman in CNY?
DeWITT, N.Y. – Ron Perlman said he wants to hire as many Central New Yorkers as possible to work for Wing and a Prayer Pictures, his film production company he’s planning to move here this year.
That could include as many as 200 people working on a film. Perlman said he plans to put as many as four films into production by early next year.
You want a part of that action?
Full story here
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» Wednesday, September 7, 2011
« PMQs | Back to most recent briefing | Afternoon press briefing for 7 September 2011 »
The Prime Minister’s Spokesperson (PMS) began by informing the assembled members of the press that the Prime Minister (PM) had discussed various issues with the European President Herman van Rompuy, including the European economy, the review of European neighbourhood policy, stabilisation in Libya and the EU’s response to Arab Spring.
Asked if the PM and President Van Rompuy had discussed a new EU treaty, the PMS replied that the meeting had focussed on the topics he had previously mentioned. He said that there were no current proposals for a new treaty.
Asked if the PM would support further fiscal integration, the PMS replied that the Government’s priority was to protect our national interest. He stressed that in any discussion on further fiscal integration, the Prime Minister would be very clear to ensure that it did not undermine the single market or Britain’s national interest.
Asked for detail on the PM’s discussion with President Van Rompuy on stabilisation and Libya, the PMS replied that they had discussed EU progress in this area. The discussion had centred around the review of EU neighbourhood policy and the support that the EU provided through this.
original source.
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A Story of 4 Non Blondes
Zoe Jones
Elizabeth Mary Regan
Brian O'Neil
James Debth
Craig Durr
Rachel Grabel
John Johnston
Don Sunukjian
Khurshid Anwar Arfi
Dan Levine
Scott Lee
Karl Fickenscher
Doug Kilday
Anish Vergis
Emiliana Lapina
Guadalupe Jimenez
Norma Rodriguez
Juanita Flores Smith
Susan Siegal
Christa Hillhouse
As Interviewed by Zoe Czarnecki, March 12, 2013
"I had to infiltrate the music industry, I think, being a gay person and being a woman – I mean, I had to fight for that right in a way."
Introductory Profile: About Christa Hillhouse
Christa Hillhouse, former bassist of 4 Non Blondes, is a successful woman in the music industry. She has played in the incredibly popular band 4 Non Blondes and several others. She continues to work as a bassist and also as a media designer. Christa Hillhouse built her way up as a gay, female artist. She has an amazing attitude towards her experience and her life. Christa’s insight about her encounters with social justice are fascinating and inspiring.
Christa Hillhouse was a pleasure to interview. She had a lot to say and was fun and easy to talk to. Christa was born in 1961 in Arkansas. She started playing bass at age fifteen and became the bassist for the band 4 Non Blondes when she was about 28. 4 Non Blondes’ song “What’s Up” went platinum and was a worldwide hit. Today, she is in her early fifties, with short gray hair and tattoos up her arms.
As a lesbian musician Christa worked to develop her career and skill as a bassist without many role models. Throughout that process, she witnessed violence and discrimination but prevailed and made her way to success. She has become a role model for girls today.
In Christa’s words, “I had to infiltrate the music industry.” Christa Hillhouse is an amazing woman who inspired many through her music and continues to inspire with her story. She faced a struggle with social justice as a gay woman in the music industry that resulted in a powerful experience with fame in a successful band, and an impressive attitude towards life.
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Some Mexican Immigrants Experience Discrimination at the Hands of Their Fellow Citizens
Bones Macias
As Interviewed by Kaitlyn M., March 14, 2015
Bones Macias: In His Own Words
My name is Bonifacio Macias.I grew up in Reynosa, Mexico until I was nine-years-old then in the Valley for the rest, ‘till I was 18.
My mother saved enough money to bring us across and get us a Green Card and get us legalized in the United States. My father was a Bracero worker, that the government used to bring from Mexico to build a railroad.
My experience coming to the U.S., not knowing the language, nine-years-old -- never had gone to school until I came to the United States. I went into first grade not knowing the language and I had to repeat first grade because I had to learn to read it and speak it. It took me two years to learn that, and I was ten-years-old by the time I got out of first grade.
The people were friendly but the teachers expected you to speak English and me, not knowing how to speak the language, they were at times mean. They felt like I needed to learn the language fast, and I was making their job harder. They saw it as an inconvenience.
The teachers were frustrated when you would speak Spanish in the class -- they would hit you with a ruler. What made it hard is when I went home, my parents did not speak any English; they wanted us to speak Spanish. I was always confused because I had no help to learn English at home and I had no help to learn Spanish at school. It seemed like I was learning everything halfway.
We had no special programs like they have now in school, where it’s bilingual education. They threw us in class and we had to learn it. I thought being hit with a ruler was unnecessary -- it wasn’t my fault I couldn’t speak English. I was brought to the United States when I was nine, I was just a kid. I felt mistreated just because I was born in Mexico. By the time I was in second grade I was a B student. I picked it up pretty fast. We knew we had to get good grades so we could get a career and we could buy the things we wanted and not have to work so hard.
Every time we went to the stores it always seemed like we had someone follow us into the store. It was like we were going to steal. In that regard we felt like we weren’t equal to the people who were not Mexicans like we were. They could tell we couldn’t speak the language so they watched us closely. It was like we were suddenly thieves or something, but we were just different -- because we didn’t speak the language. or didn’t drive a nice car. We weren’t thieves, we were just poor.
There was always people that called us names. “Dirty Mexicans” or “Go back to Mexico” -- “What are ya’ll doing here?” But that was all part of the 60s when a lot of us were being discriminated against.
We were being pulled out of school in May and April to go work up north, like in Ohio. As migrant workers we would go and pick tomatoes, pickles, apples. We would leave in April and come back in October, so we would miss a lot of school. We lost two months at the end and two months at the beginning every year. Every time we went back to school we had to work harder to catch up to the other kids.
We got to school and we were mistreated, but we didn’t care. We knew we wanted to finish school. That was the way to get ahead. Working on the fields picking pickles, picking tomatoes from sun up to sun down, at 7am to 7pm, every day except for Sunday, was hard work -- and we knew we didn’t want to do that the rest of our lives. The book in school was a way to get out. It didn’t matter if they mistreated us or hit us with a ruler or called us names, we knew education was they way to get out and be equal to everyone else. What motivated me was not to go back and work in the fields, when it’s really hot in the summer. You’re on your knees, bent over all day long, your back hurts. That motivated me more than anything -- I did not want to do that kind of work.
The problem with my parents -- my parents did not know the value of education. They never went a day to school. Why would they see anything wrong with nothing they never experienced? They could not even sign their name -- they would put an “X.” My parents did not know the difference between the good grades and the bad ones.
We motivated ourselves because our parents did not know how important education was. I had no one to follow. We had no one to follow. We had to do it all on our own. Even in school they treated us different because we were migrant workers and we spoke Spanish. They saw us as: “Well, those kids aren’t going to get anywhere” -- so the teachers don’t help you, the counselors don’t help you. So you end up doing it all by yourself. You do what you think you need to do.
I started feeling like everyone else when I started high school. I started playing football. Once you start playing football you are pretty much in the mix. You start to feel equal, you feel the same. But it took eight years to be equal. Americans, when they are born, from day one they feel equal.
I have worked for everything I have. That’s what gets you ahead. It’s learn, learn, learn.
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Prince Gustaf Adolf, Duke of Westrobothnia
Prince Gustaf Adolf of Sweden, Duke of Westrobothnia (Gustaf Adolf Oscar Fredrik Arthur Edmund Bernadotte, April 22, 1906 – January 26, 1947) was the eldest son of King Gustav VI Adolf of Sweden and his first wife Princess Margaret of Connaught. His mother was a granddaughter of Queen Victoria since she was the daughter of HRH Prince Arthur, Duke of Connaught and his wife, Princess Margaret Luise of Prussia.
On October 19, 1932 he married Princess Sibylla of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, daughter of Carl Eduard, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha. Princess Sibylla was a great-granddaughter of Queen Victoria, a granddaughter of HRH Prince Leopold, Duke of Albany. They had five children:
Princess Margaretha, Mrs. Ambler (1934-)
HRH Princess Birgitta (1937-)
Princess Désirée, Baroness Silfverschiöld (1938-)
Princess Christina, Mrs. Magnusson (1943-)
HM King Carl XVI Gustaf (1946-)
Prince Gustaf Adolf was killed in an airplane accident at the Copenhagen Airport in Copenhagen, Denmark.nl:Gustaaf Adolf van Zweden sv:Gustav Adolf av Sverige
Retrieved from "http://footwww.academickids.com/encyclopedia/index.php/Prince_Gustaf_Adolf%2C_Duke_of_Westrobothnia"
Categories: Swedish princes | Dukes of Swedish Provinces | Heirs apparent who never acceded
This page was last modified 19:52, 9 Jun 2005.
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