Nobel Prize for Literature

An Oversight

In October 2016, Bob Dylan was described by the New York Times and the Guardian as the ‘first songwriter to win the Nobel Prize for Literature’ for his discography of around 500.

In 1913, Bengali writer, Rabindranath Tagore, as significant to literature as Joyce, Eliot or Proust, won the Nobel Prize for Literature. His poems and songs are credited as over two thousand. His significant contribution Gitanjali (geet song) and (anjali offering)

Notes from Angad Roy, thank you.

COOL IT MR. PRESIDENT

Cool it, Mr. President.

“Fire and fury like the world has never seen.” Trump

You not only seem bent on destroying your own country but the rest of the world as well.

The world does not belong to you. Not even America belongs to you. Your people have chosen you as the President to look after them for four years. And in doing that well you could enhance other lives around the world.

No peace can be achieved with threats of annihilation. In seeking to wipe out N. Korea – one leader and his army, you will destroy friends and foes and kill millions of innocent human beings. Win or lose, or lose as in the case of Vietnam, and Iraq, now Afghanistan, war brings decades of hardship and irreparable destruction. Aid given after the destruction of a human race is little compensation compared to human cost. The dead, the living maimed and plagued with ills.

You know little about North Korea, a proud nation, with its ancient culture. America has, for far too long, given millions of dollars and military support to the South and shunned the North with sanctions. Surely by now we know sanctions don’t work, they only help place much hardship on citizens, create poverty, malnourishment and ill health. Isolation creates enemies, suspicion and hatred.

Why do you have to conduct joint military exercises with South Korea right on the doorstep of North Korea at a time when you complain about the sanctioned North? I think it a foolish threat.

Pay attention to one of your distinguished politicians, Donald P. Gregg, a highly-qualified statesman, a North Asia specialist who knows more about the North Koreans and their sovereign state than “any living American.”

Gregg says, “Kim Jong Un, North Korea’s current leader, is smart, tough, and a risk taker who sees his nuclear arsenal as protection against a U.S. attack.” He says, “People are shocked when I tell them Pyongyang is an attractive, functioning city…The North Koreans aren’t suicidal. They don’t want a war… Despite the rhetoric and the propaganda, North Korea’s leaders are thoughtful, well-educated pragmatists.”

Other countries like Israel and Pakistan, who own large arsenals of nuclear weapons, are friends of America. These ‘friends’ have received millions in aid and weaponry. Israel’s cruel suppression of the Palestinians, Pakistan giving shelter to Afghan Taliban is well-known. How many wars do you plan for your four-year term? You threaten Iran, China, Russia. You have your own home grown terrorists.

How different are you from your many enemies? Your threats and counter threats put you in the same basket as those who threaten you. Eradicate your “dangerous rhetoric”.

You are brilliant businessman, find diplomatic ways to help people.

SENT A CHILL THROUGH ME

Sent A Chill Through Me

Never has any political event troubled me or affected me so deeply.

Future

Trump’s inauguration came upon me as a finality soon after the shock of the American people having voted him in. This person will vastly affect our world values and its future. Negatively.

A quote from one of my favourite authors. Ian McEwan:

Charles Darwin could not believe that a kindly God would create a parasitic wasp that injects its eggs into the body of a caterpillar so that the larva may consume the host alive. The ichneumon wasp was a challenge to Darwin’s already diminishing faith. We may share his bewilderment as we contemplate the American body politic and what vile thing now squats within it, waiting to be hatched and begin its meal…this unique tragedy of national self-harm whereby a suspected con-man … this narcissistic and cynical vulgarian of limited attention span becomes the most powerful man on earth, ready by his own account to begin his assault on liberal democracy, rational discourse, civil liberties, and all manner of civil decencies, which are known to him as political correctness.

Trump’s inaugural speech was one of negativity and bleakness: giving voice to his assumption that America is not great, not proud, not safe, not strong, not wealthy. This leader, well documented for twisting the truth, promised “We will make America great again”, not have this “carnage” of “inequality, abandoned factories like tombstones” and “the crime and the gangs and the drugs”, “disrepair and decay”. He promised “America First”, prompting shades of Nazi sympathizers.

His address did not invoke hope and joy for a new, greater beginning. “We’ve defended other nations’ borders while refusing to defend our own,” says he. A well worded threat to future immigrants.

Saturday, 21st January, his first day in office. While Donald Trump was at the National Cathedral asking his god to forgive his sins and lies and to guide him in adding billions to his and his cronies’ coffers, more than a quarter of a million people came to Capitol Hill. The Women’s March called him a ‘misogynist’ and ‘reprehensible’. They marched against his immigration reform. They marched in fear of repression of minorities. They came to seek religious freedom. They declared they were against racism. They asked for protection of the environment. They were concerned about healthcare. They feared his pro-life and anti-LGBTQ-rights views. A nation divided.

For many of his followers, Trump’s  campaign slogan – “Make America Great Again”  is another way of saying “Make America White Again”.

It was at this precise time I came across how white Americans tried to keep America white in the early 19th century.

I was reading The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead. A quote from the novel.

They had not traveled long when Martin stopped the horses. He removed the tarpaulin. “It will be sunrise soon, but I wanted you to see this,” the station agent said.

Cora did not immediately know what he meant. The country road was quiet, crowded on both sides by the forest canopy. She saw one shape then another. Cora got out of the wagon.

The corpses hung from trees as rotting ornaments. Some of them were naked, others partially clothed, the trousers black where their bowels emptied when their necks snapped. Gross wounds and injuries marked the flesh of those closest to her, the two caught by the station agent’s lantern. One had been castrated, an ugly mouth gaping where his manhood had been. The other was a woman. Her belly curved. Cora had never been good at knowing if a body was with a child. Their bulging eyes seemed to rebuke her stares, but what were the attentions of one girl, disturbing their rest, compared to how the world had scourged them since the day they were brought into it?

I NEVER SAID THAT!

A UNIQUE TRAGEDY

Equality

To the great thrill of Trump followers, to the huge disappointment of the democrats, and to the horror of the world, Trump has emerged as the next president of the No-More-United States of America. The best con the world has seen. Time for an Idiot’s Guide on How to pull off a Presidency.

An election won with followers holding up placards portraying the lady opponent with a noose around her neck. Won with shouts of “lock her up”, with hordes of supporters raising their fists in the air, shouting, ‘Kill her’. So much venom, shades of the Ku Klux Klan. One political button said: “KFC Hilary Special: Two Fat thighs, two small breasts, one left wing” – such disgusting personal attacks by Trump followers. Not only did the president-to-be condone what was said and done but he himself had a whole list. He called her a nasty woman, said she was a liar, and insulted her with personal and gender remarks.

A new ugly tribe is born.

Time to wonder how a democracy can get it so wrong. A flawed and an unique American election in which one party can get fewer individual votes and win.

Trump does not have to spend time worrying about running his country or building relations with the rest of the world. He has his family, and his team of advisers to do that. He can attend to urgent matters – Him…The Tweeter. Emperor Tyranny Trump.

“Y’all just go make America big, do you hear. Make it the best in the world.”

One might ask:

What about China?

“China, don’t worry about them. Just cancel all trade deals. Bring all the Chinese companies to America so they can work in-country. We need those cheap goods. We don’t even have to pay them minimum wage. Keep our people safe from those dangerous factory floors. We can keep an eye on those foreigners who manipulate our currency, steal our intellectual property.”

What about Free Trade?

“What Free Trade? What Geneva Convention? What NATO? Rip them up. They’ve been no good to anybody.”

Russia?

“Putin and I, yes, we are pals. It is not like I’m in Alaska looking out of my window to see Russia. We have a relationship; we have a deep understanding. He can do whatever he likes. I am all for that. Lock up all his dissenters, torture them. I trust him.”

You are conservative, right?

“Who? Me, a conservative? Nah, I have gone through two wives, now married to a third. My children have different mothers. My wife has posed nude. You know she has a beautiful body. Go check the internet, if you don’t believe me. And what more I love women. I have groped so many young women, they just love it. I’m a family man with values.”

What about LGBT?

“No. I don’t tolerate those. I am a Christian. The Christian God did not make them. Some other god must have created them. That is why I feel we should not tolerate other religions. Like the Muslims. No more! They are not going to come our country spread terrorism. All those who are here should go back?”

Back to where?

“To anywhere, to where they came from. If they have nowhere to go that’s their problem. We will not allow Muslims into this country.”

What about your friend, the Malaysian Prime Minister, the man cleared of billions involved with 1MDB debt? He’s a Muslim.

“He’s an exception. He’s my favourite prime minister, Najib Razak. We are golf buddies. I even signed a selfie of us for him. ‘To my favourite Prime Minister’.”

Climate change?

“No I don’t believe in all that, it isn’t real. But if you ask me about El Nino. Now there’s something to worry about. The reason I want to build a 2,000 mile wall. Keep the Mexicans out, all those El Ninos and the El Ninas.”

It’s been said you are against abortion. You have been accused of being a racist, a sexist, a cynic. They say you are a homophobic, xenophobic, Islamaphobic promoting hate, preaching intolerance’.

“All lies, not true. Lies!  Listen to what I say not what is said about me.”

What are your plans when you are in the White House?

“I have an eight-year plan in the White House. I am all for transparency. It is going to be the best reality show. The world will get it live, stream it through the universe.”

THE END

… of the world as we know it. Let us not be lulled into a new norm.

BAD KARMA FOR BHUTAN

Now, in this much enlightened time, why does the Bhutanese authority decide to add to green house gases and destroy its precious ecology.

A country globally admired for its policy of Gross National Happiness is going against all Buddhist principles in promoting violence and bad karma by moving into mega cattle rearing and promoting meat eating. Quite disgusting.

Spare Sentient Beings

https://www.change.org/p/prime-minister-tshering-tobgay-stop-the-bhutan-mega-meat-processing-projects?

‘Dharma Voices for Animals is a non-profit organization based in the United States of America whose mission is to increase awareness of the suffering of animals within the Buddhist Dharma community.’

TIME STANDS STILL, AGAIN

Let each one of us make eye contact with everyone we meet. Let us show love and understanding, eradicating hate. Let us leave peace as our legacy for the children of the world.

Let us create a world free of nuclear weapons.

Today, Friday 27 May 2016, time stood as I listened to President Obama’s powerful speech at the Hiroshima Peace Memorial. I was choked with emotion as he recalled the horrific tragedy of 6 August 1945, 71 years ago when 70,000 men, women and children were directly killed in Hiroshima with the dropping of one nuclear bomb.

Let us not repeat this tragedy.

A Nuclear Weapons–Free World

On this memorable day, 5 August, the 70th anniversary of Hiroshima’s devastation, death and suffering, let our plea be a nuclear weapons–free world.

10 years ago, on 5 August, I posted this message:

Sasaki Sadako was given only twelve years on the wings of a thousand cranes.

Today on the wings of every child’s crane let there be this request:

“Please bequeath the universe to us intact, in peace, and in love. Let us live.”

Are we naive to think we are closer to this request?

BLOOM READY FOR BLOODSHED

Imagine a Boy

Bloom ready for Bloodshed

Imagine a child, a boy 3 or 4 years old, from a family of six to ten children, too poor to give him a full meal, a proper home or education. Or imagine an orphan with no one to care for him. This boy will be taken on by a Madrasa run by fundamentalists. They will feed him and clothe him and educate him. He will spend his growing up years in the company of boys and men.

He will not learn anything but Koran related and religious matters, and of the might that once was held by the Muslims. He will learn of the suppression of the Muslims, according to the fundamentalists. He will learn of the atrocities and  the decadence of the West, the evil and sinful ways of the rest of the world. He will only get to know the harm done to the fundamentalists. He will read no newspapers or watch television.

He will grow up never ever having played with a girl, or ever having known the love of a girl or woman. He would never have been hugged by a female. As a teenager it is possible he may not know what a woman looks like except for a face or a pair of eyes. But there is a much promise for this young man: Virgins in paradise.

This parallel world produces the fundamentalists.

HARUKI MURAKAMI SPEAKS

Aurhor Haruki Murakami

Encouragement from a great source for the Hong Kong Occupy Youth.

“Accepting the award on Friday, he spoke of his own memories of the Berlin Wall prior to its fall 25 years ago this weekend, and attributed ongoing conflicts throughout the world to a system of walls that drive people apart based on intolerance, greed and fear.

Murakami said it is the task of novelists to help readers penetrate these walls, and that harnessing the power of each person’s imagination “could be the starting point of something.”

A world without walls can be created “in the quiet but sustained effort to keep on singing, to keep on telling stories, stories about a better and freer world to come, without losing heart,” he said. “We can see (a world without walls) with our own eyes, we can even touch it with our own hands if we try hard.

“I’d like to send this message to the young people in Hong Kong who are struggling against their wall right now at this moment.”

Student led peaceful protests in Hong Kong began on 28 Sept 2014 and is still going strong.

“Student-led blockades of major roads in Hong Kong have continued since Sept. 28 (2014) in response to an Aug. 31 decision by authorities in Beijing to restrict candidates for the territory’s 2017 leadership election to those vetted by a committee.

Six weeks into its struggle for democracy, the once-carefully planned Occupy movement has grown and shifted in ways beyond the imagination of organisers. And that raises a question: is the protest still a civil disobedience campaign?

More than a year before Occupy kicked off, its founders discussed their plans, organised meetings and wrote articles on their thoughts for a civil disobedience campaign. They published a detailed “manual of disobedience” for protesters to follow.

The ultimate aim of the campaign is to establish a society embracing equality, tolerance, love and care. We fight against the unjust system, not individuals. We are not to destroy or humiliate law enforcers, rather we are to win over their understanding and respect. We need to avoid physical confrontation, and also avoid developing hatred in our hearts.”

100 HOURS AND MORE IN HONG KONG

In Thunder, Lightning, and Storm

Today, 1^st October 2014, is an auspicious day, People’s Liberation Day.

Ironically, Hong Kong is seeking liberation too, liberation of another kind.

This cosmopolitan place where people come and go has been built by the hard work of all who live here. Hong Kongers are here to stay. The majority of Hong Kong people do not hold foreign passports and they will not up and leave when things don’t suit them.

The Occupy Central protest is a demonstration requesting choice. It is for the rightful selection of representation for our government, for a majority say — a free, transparent and open election. The protest is asking for freedom, for our country to be governed by democracy now and for generations to come. Those who oppose have a choice too; they may prefer communism, they could apply to be accepted by the liberated People’s Republic.

I fully support and greatly respect these young people of peace. I admire their persistence, their strong stance and their patriotism. They’re standing up for their future. It does not mean they disrespect the motherland. There is much talk of the motherland by the opposition. Does a mother not want her sons and daughters to progress, to move forward? Why is there only talk of gloom and damnation and punishment?

Mainland China, having destroyed its tradition, its art and culture, having murdered its writers and artists, having stamped on individuality, has still not learned an iron fist does not rule the world.

Under a Storm
Photo Felix Wong

I cannot be there but I feel myself in the midst of the protesters. They have been bombarded by tear gas, squirted in the face with pepper spray. They have endured extreme heat and humidity, and they’ve been hungry and thirsty. They have gone without beds to sleep in, they have had no shelter during lightning, thunder and downpour. This shows determination and strength of character. The rest of us have a right to hear them out.

Photo Sam Tsang

It is possible it will end in checkmate, in which case Hong Kong may have to back down. Our motherland may not relent but she’ll be a little more careful in future, withdraw her iron iron fist a little, knowing how our youth can rear their heads again. And next time be even stronger.

The world will remember. There will be support.

HARD WORK PLUCKING STORIES

OUT OF ONE’S IMAGINATION…

But the pay off is great for for authors who make it. A recent short chat about my demise of interest in the Hong Kong International Literary Festival and it’s dearth of well-known authors has brought to light that we in Hong Kong need sponsors, big ones at that if the HK International LitFest is to survive. We have enough number of millionaires here, it is time to get them interested in improving the Hong Kong culture of books and authors.

I read with some interest that  investors of start-ups in Bangalore are backing  literary culture in India’s technology capital. The Bangalore Literary Festival is getting a big boost, big sponsorships from the business sector.

And here in Hong Kong the festival has had yet another change at the top. We now have a new manager, 26-year-old Jessie Cammack. Her SCMP profile says she “has lived in Hong Kong little more than a year” and has “spent the first four months doing an intensive Cantonese course”. Here’s wishing her and the festival the best of luck.

Our festival runs from October 31 to November 9, 2014.

Become an award winning writer if you want to travel first class, live in mansions and get rich.

It is unfortunate that Sir Naipaul’s agents did not state upfront what fees are expected for his showing up.

And now to who is invited and how it works.

An extract from a longer article in the Sydney Morning Herald:

“The late cancellation of Nobel laureate V.S. Naipaul from next month’s Ubud Writers and Readers Festival has exposed the fierce competition and delicate negotiations behind the flourishing international festival scene.

Since Janet DeNeefe founded the festival 11 years ago as a healing response to the Bali bombings, the Australian-born restaurateur and writer has built a successful annual event that attracts almost 26,000 visitors to enjoy talks, performances and food amid Ubud’s hillside rice paddies, art galleries, temples and resorts.

While her main mission is to showcase Indonesian culture and social-political issues, DeNeefe knows she needs big names to appeal to the foreigners – mostly Australians – who make up half the audience. She has just signed the musician-writer Nick Cave – a guest in 2012 – as an international festival patron.”

V. S. Naipaul

Lost headliner: V.S. Naipaul was let go after a fee demand.

“For this year’s festival from October 1-5, she invited the American writer Paul Theroux, who had expressed interest after eating at her Ubud restaurant Indus. When she rejected his request for a fee for which, she says, “I could have got David Attenborough”, Theroux agreed instead to appear at the Singapore Writers Festival in November.

DeNeefe then invited V.S. Naipaul, the distinguished but difficult 82-year-old Trinidad-born British writer, who recently ended a long feud with Theroux. To her amazement the Wylie Agency accepted, with the promise of first- and business-class travel and a luxurious villa.

The festival program was launched on August 1, headlined by “a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to meet a literary legend of the 20th century”. But this month the Wylie Agency contacted DeNeefe again, demanding a $20,000 fee, and after agonised consultation she decided to let Naipaul go.

As she announced his withdrawal on Friday, “the result of us being unable to accommodate Sir V.S. Naipaul’s 11th-hour requests”, he and Theroux were named as guests of India’s Jaipur Literature Festival in January.

“To be told about a week ago is pretty atrocious,” DeNeefe said. “When we did our sums we realised we would not be able to pay wages post-festival or move premises when we lose our donated space post-festival.

“Our cash sponsorship so far this year is less than $100,000, so we can’t spend 50K of that on him. I actually rejected some Indonesian musicians because we can’t afford them.”

Like DeNeefe, Australian writers’ festival directors resist appearance fees, and writers are generally content with travel expenses, a modest honorarium, publicity, book sales and a pleasant trip. Sydney Writers’ Festival brought Vince Gilligan, Alice Walker and Dave Eggers this year for no extra payment.

However, Perth Writers’ Festival is understood to have paid Martin Amis between $30,000 and $50,000 for exclusivity this year, perhaps to counter its isolation. The Sydney Opera House commonly offers $10,000 and paid more to bring Salman Rushdie to last month’s Festival of Dangerous Ideas. Melbourne’s Wheeler Centre pays some speakers on its year-round program.

While pressure is building to pay popular writers for their time on the road, most festivals run on tight non-profit budgets (though Singapore’s, for example, receives generous government funding – $A1.2 million in 2012).”

Land and Sea of Blood

“Blood Swept Lands and Seas of Red”

888,246 red ceramic poppies are displayed in Britain on 100th anniversary of World War I. Reminding us of lives lost for peace. But peace we have not achieved.

Since then we have managed a Second World War. Battles and killings still rage all around us. Governments pushed by greed for power to occupy and control thrive on more and more powerful weaponry and send out able-bodied men and women to kill fellow humans.

We have come across epic battles of bloodshed and horror in verses of the Hindu Ramayana and Mahabharata and the poetry Homer’s Iliad.

We did not learn.

We are incapable of learning it would seem.

And here the magnificent and dramatic display poppies showing blood shed – Gannon Burgett

Poppies Tower of London

http://petapixel.com/2014/08/02/breathtaking-photos-tower-london-adorned-888246-ceramic-poppies-commemorate-wwi/

The poppy as a symbol of the fallen soldiers of World War I comes from

In Flanders Fields and Other Poems from John McCrae’s collection of 1919

‘In Flanders fields the poppies blow

Between the crosses, row on row,’

About 10 million soldiers and seven million civilians were killed in World War I. Writers; and poets like Thomas Hardy, Rupert Brooke, Siegfried Sassoon, William Butler Yeats, Robert Graves, and Wilfred Owen responded writing about the great tragedy, the loss, the horror and the brutalities.

From one of my favourite poets: Wilfred Owen (1893-1918)

“This book is not about heroes. English Poetry is not yet fit to speak of them. Nor is it about deeds, or lands, nor anything about glory, honour, might, majesty, dominion, or power, except War. Above all I am not concerned with Poetry. My subject is War, and the pity of War.”

And the poem he wrote just months before his death in 1918.

Dulce et Decorum Est

Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,

Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,

Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs

And towards our distant rest began to trudge.

Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots

But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;

Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots

Of tired, outstripped Five-Nines that dropped behind.

Gas! GAS! Quick, boys! — An ecstasy of fumbling,

Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;

But someone still was yelling out and stumbling

And flound’ring like a man in fire or lime . . .

Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light,

As under I green sea, I saw him drowning.

In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,

He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.

If in some smothering dreams you too could pace

Behind the wagon that we flung him in,

And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,

His hanging face, like a devil’s sick of sin;

If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood

Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,

Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud

Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues, –

My friend, you would not tell with such high zest

To children ardent for some desperate glory,

The old lie: Dulce et decorum est

Pro patria mori.

[it is sweet and right to die for your country]

THE ISRAEL/GAZA DEBACLE

They Are Not Our Children

The Israel/Gaza debacle. I have the solution but only for one year.

Read on.

Sympathy of the world would, no doubt, be with a country that is constantly attacked by rockets, and the phrase is ‘unprovoked attacks’. But what kind of provoking is called for when the attacker in question is imprisoned in his country?

Gazan lives are completely controlled by Israel.

The Gaza strip is an area of 365 sq. km (141 sq. mi). It supports 1.82 million Palestinians whose lives are completely controlled by the Israelis. Gaza is locked in the south by Egypt. And the rest of the country, North and East is controlled by Israel, and bordered by a 3 km buffer zone. The 42 km long waterfront too is under Israeli control, no fishing and no shipping allowed, and recently children playing on the beach were killed by Israeli attacks.

Anything you can do we can do better is Israel’s policy and they can too. Hamas’s home-grown rockets and Palestinian boys’ sticks and stones against a Goliath. Israel fire power helped by US technologically advanced power of fighter jets, bombers, and tanks is no match for a defenseless Gaza.

Israel has accused Hamas of hiding weaponry in homes, schools, and mosques. Israel say their attacks are are pinpointed and target military installations, weapons cache and terrorists in Gaza. How is anyone able to pinpoint anything in a confined overcrowded place without killing and wounding civilians? There is nowhere for the civilians to escape to.

The most recent pinpoint has been a UN-run school, a place where civilians were sheltering. An attack was carried out even though the UN authorities had given the exact co-ordinates to Israeli authorities. More than 15 killed and 200 injured in this safe haven.

‘Chris Gunness, a spokesman for the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine refugees (Unrwa), also said the Israeli army had been formally given the co-ordinates of the shelter in Beit Hanoun.’ BBC.

And pin-pointed it is too when Flechette shells are used. These are illegal under international law and are not to be fired at civilians.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jul/20/israel-using-flechette-shells-in-gaza

Flachette Shell Darts

This image provided by the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights of darts from a flechette shell it says the Israeli military fired in Gaza last week.

‘The shells release thousands of 37.5mm metal darts that embed mini arrow in the body. Does Israel care for international law or common humanity?’

Come to the negotiating table but with no preconditions. Why would this be possible? Why would the Gazans want to continue to be blocked and live as they do, imprisoned in their own country?

The United States seems ready to step in and help resolve the problem each time there is a flare up. But U.S. shows no balance.

Good to hear the US has promised a $47 million aid to the Palestinians.

US aid to Israel amounts to billions. (US$130 million per year on going) Israel has been the largest annual recipient of U.S. foreign assistance for some time and much of this aid goes to help develop Israeli military power. Since 1976, millions have been given to develop their anti-missile system. U.S is the chief supplier of arms and military technology to Israel. Through the Excess Defense Article Israel also receives free rifles, grenade launchers and machines guns.

And all this to be used against whom?

The world watches this unbalanced debacle – the Palestinians imprisoned and killed and wounded in their own country for choosing to their own government and to live as they want.

I have a solution.

Role reversal. Let the 2million Israelis move into Gaza for a year under the same conditions that exist now, let them enjoy the restrictions. And the Gazans move into the border regions in Israel and enjoy what the Israelis have: freedom of movement, and basic necessities like medical attention, good water supply, constant electricity, fresh food.

And the Israelis in Gaza please don’t send off any rockets, for this is what you have been asking Gaza not to do.

JULY 1 PROTEST MARCH

Protest March, 1st. July 2014

Hong Kong

Tuesday 1 July 2014 will go down in the history as the day the people of Hong Kong spoke for Democracy.

Whichever way we look at it, whether half a million or a quarter million that turned out on the protest march, the number is huge.

Photo credit:
Brandon Cheung

The logistics of organising such a gathering is enormously mind-boggling. The march portrays tremendous stamina and patience and focus of the thousands that waited and marched for hours on a summer’s day of sun and downpours. Humidity was high and temperatures topped 33c. There were an array of small demands but two key points are what got our protest going: universal suffrage and one country two systems. We will not take this lightly.

Hong Kong has flourished for 17 years with no misunderstanding about the basic law: One Country, Two Systems. Hong Kong has vastly contributed to China in the way of trade and charity. And now Beijing warns that it holds the ultimate authority over our financial centre. The call for democracy by the majority for the seven million of Hong Kong is causing stirrings of great fear in the giant heart of the mainland, the Central Government.

Beijing feels that the high autonomy of jurisdiction enjoyed by Hong Kong has been due to an ‘oversight’ on its part and in trying to set us straight the Central Government came out with a White Paper explaining to us what our separate system is. In doing so the Central Government has shot itself in the foot. Hong Kongers are horrified, justifiably so and more determined for democracy.

The White Paper projects Hong Kong’s future in a different light. Hong Kongers realize they have to stand firmer. We will accept no new jurisdiction over us. The call for democracy is nothing new. Our determination is clear, 800,000 voted in the referendum, we want to elect our chief executive.

Since 1997 Hong Kong, the miniscule dot on the vast China continent, has contributed to the mainland’s economy. We are the largest offshore renminbi market. We have no desire not to prosper and when we do so does China. There is no doubt about co-operation. Love and loyalty come naturally.

The world is watching.

Listen to the people; it’s the people that make the country.

Hong Kong belongs to the Hong Kong people.

MY BIRTHDAY

On this my birthday

I wish all my family and friends safe and peaceful lives. The world is shrinking with hate. I am shocked by the atrocities fellow humans inflict on each other and so much in the name of a God. Time to reflect and spread goodwill amongst all religions.

Love to all.

Shanta – Peace

It is by chance Shanta’s photo, age four, got into this image magenta lilies. And she is forty and a bit, and still symbolizes peace.

The Mysterious Disappearance

GRATITUDE LOST

MH 370, a plane and its load of crew and passengers disappeared on March 8th. Millions of dollars have been spent. Thousands of multinational specialists risking lives have spent hundreds of man-hours searching for the missing plane. The most advanced machinery known have been used.

Not a sign and not a clue of the missing plane. Every move made to find this plane by scientifically advanced nations has been fully reported. The whole world knows what is going on. A big puzzle indeed as we have moved past the 50th day.

But above all that what puzzles me most is the attitude of the grieving relatives and friends. Their belligerence and obnoxious behaviour confounds and shocks me. There has not been a word of gratitude, no appreciation shown for what’’s being done. No patience and no tolerance visible. The mourners insist their ‘request be taken seriously’. They want the Malaysian government and the airline ‘to return their disappeared relatives and friends’, and failing that tell them where they are.

Is this a new middle class risen up with new expectations? A new class raised to believe in unreasonable demands, blindly seeking certain rights.

The mourners have been flown to Kuala Lumpur by the Malaysian authorities. They have been fed and quartered in hotels in Kuala Lumpur and Beijing. Doctors and psychologists have looked after them and their emotional needs. The mourners have taken up squatters’ rights, resorted to violence towards airline personal and others looking after them. They have held protests both in Kuala Lumpur and Beijing. Protesters have been allowed with impunity to march to and be violent at the Malaysian Embassy in Beijing by a government that tolerates no protests.

I am flummoxed. These indeed are strange times we are living in. No appreciation for anything that is being done. Horrific, childish temper tantrums cloaked as sorrow seeking justice. And as one of Shakespeare’s characters may have said, ‘I want that pound of flesh, and I want it now.’ Though in reality the one that could offer that pound of flesh has disappeared without a trace.

Ha!

I DID YOU NO HARM

I DID YOU NO HARM

Night scene in a butcher’s in old back street, Georgetown, Penang

I Did You No HARM.

My wife rolled on her side contented. Siblings Curly,

Thumbs, Scuffles tumbled in mud.

Charmy, PinPot , Trotters wallowed, snouted by the trough.

I, stress free, rooted in straw rustle.

In pig parlour well fed all.

With not a care I watched proud my family grow.

One dim dawn a man-army burst into our dream filled hoghood.

Grunts turned into fearful screams.

Men poked, prodded, netted all six little ones, rounded up for roasting.

My wife they dragged away dislocating her hips. For bacon fat.

I froze in the corner, they netted me.

A flash of cleaver last I saw.

June 4th. What I remember

My memory of June 4th 1989

Fax Machine, Red Convertible, Candlelight Vigils.

Important dates in one’s lifetime remain memorable. In Hong Kong most adults over certain age will not forget 1997, our handover date, we were handed over to China by the British.

And most of us in Hong Kong will not forget the spring of 1989 – the year of student demonstrations in Beijing. Students came to mourn the death of Hu Yaobang, a liberal who stood up for political and economic reform, but soon began a protest. The news of protesters that came out was sketchy and smuggled. Newsreel pictures we watched on TV were mostly reconstructed video frames.

At the time I was running my business ‘The Prince of Wales Pub’ at Sun Hung Kai Centre in Wanchai. Long working hours of arriving early and leaving late left me little time for world affairs, television or radio. I kept up with the news with quick readings of the South China Morning Post during breakfast and lunch breaks. And it was on such an ‘innocent’ morning that Wolfgang, who had his business headquarters in China Resources Centre next door, breezed in saying, ‘Did you hear the latest?

It was June 1st, and no, I had not.

‘Changan Avenue is totally blocked, the crowds are getting heavier.’

Tienanmen Square protests, which were into their seventh week, had taken a turn for the worse.

‘How do you know?’ I asked.

‘The fax machine,’ he said. ‘My office in Beijing is in Changan Avenue.’

His staff was sending him first-hand news. I had not yet installed a fax machine in my office and did not realize how instantly the messages came through. There was the machine working overtime, pouring out news, ream after ream.

Staff in his Beijing office took turns to visit the square and send him news. The next day, my friend sent his office boy over with rolls of faxed news of Tienanmen happenings, and when the faxes stopped he sent me handwritten bits of information. I became totally immersed in the happenings. At times, on reading some of the fearsome details of the protest I felt as if my heart would stop. In spite of all, I was not prepared for the subsequent massacre.

The protest snowballed in numbers and discontent, and lasted seven weeks. The city of Beijing had seen student protests before but never one on such a large scale. The students, in the end close to a million, began voicing other grievances against the party elite, corruption, and inflation, and they demanded freedom of speech and freedom of the press. They sought workers’ rights. In short, democracy is what they asked for. Protests started up in other cities too, but not on such a large scale as in the square. As time passed, tents were put up, a plastic Goddess of Freedom installed, and the number of loudspeakers began to grow.

The square, the biggest in the world (about 90 football fields) and in the centre of Beijing, had filled with protesters – close to a million. The government, at a loss as to how to suppress something this large, saw only one solution – quell it with fire-power.

By June 2nd the roads were closed to traffic as more and more protesters, at first sympathetic and focused and later confused, poured in. And on the night of June 3rd, 250,000 troops were ready to come in from all sides, including from the Forbidden City. The protesters refused to leave and they were also trapped. Students tried surrounding bus-loads of officers who had come in. Soldiers using batons and tear gas rescued these military personnel. Things got pretty nasty. More and more protesters kept arriving on foot and by bicycle. The number of supporters and onlookers  was largest by night, and growing.

On the night of June 3rd, one of Wolfgang’s staff slept in the office for fear of stepping out. Before he went to sleep, he heard much cheering and shouting and sound of shooting. By about 4am, he was awakened by a commotion outside the office. He could not see much out of the window, though he had a good view. The streetlights now dimmed by smoke. He could only see rows and rows of military vehicles and tanks. He stepped out of the room and was told to keep away from the windows and not go out onto any balconies. The noise of artillery and strong smell of cordite filled the corridors.

June 4th Massacre. Martial law and a bloody day.

Unarmed civilians trying to block the troops’ advance and others had been mowed down. The troubled morning was filled with the sirens of ambulances, the sound of gunfire, and low-flying helicopters.

Shockwaves moved across the world. In many countries it triggered sympathy protests denouncing the Chinese Government.

We in Hong Kong reeled in shock as news, wave after wave, of the horrific incidents reached us. The reports spread wildly and we were stunned and seized with panic. We could talk of nothing but the massacre of the students and the arrests of thousands. What was to happen to us after 1997? In eight years’ time we were to be ‘returned’ to China.

Hong Kong mourned openly and showed its support for the students. People wore black armbands. Taxi drivers had black pennants flying from their taxis. I drove around in my red convertible with a black flag streaming from my radio antenna. I ignored warnings from friends it was dangerous to do so, to so expose myself and my feelings.

That was 24 years ago. Doom and gloom has not been inflicted on us. We are still free to think and protest.

Hong Kong still commemorates the day, June 4th. We pay our respects to those who died that day and to those who were tortured and later died in prisons. We sympathize with those who  are still in prison. We ask for families under house arrest to be released. We ask the Chinese Government not to delete history and pretend nothing happened.

On the 4th of June every year, close to 200,000 Hong Kongers, many of them  born after 1989, turn up in Victoria Park for candle vigils. Protesters and students take part in sit-ins or go on hunger strikes to show their concern.

We want to know why China does not apologize to the participants and their families for the atrocities carried out, why those who sought democracy are still in prison or under house arrest.

China demands apology from Japanese for WWII war atrocities, but overlooks what it has done to its own people and what it is still doing in Tibet, Mongolia, and Xinjiang.

SUPER SCOOPS

Super Scoops

Breaking News is breaking faster and getting chunkier. The sightings and the search for the brothers who carried out the Boston horrors is the latest example. BBC and CNN that I check everyday for news stopped the world and stayed on ‘live’ repetition, twenty-four hour, second by second live news of the shut down of Boston and the search for the terrorists.

Everyone wants to be the first with a scoop whether that person is on the scene or not, and whether he has a way of knowing the accuracy of what he reports. Face Book ‘posters’ and Twitterers were out there quick and fast. When it was reported wrongly that the police had apprehended a dark skinned person I could excuse that. It was night and the sunglass-wearing policemen could have mistaken the white boys for brown boys. But when super sleuths, not only amateur but stupid too, came up with an Indian name, and I will have you know it was not even a Red Indian name,they outdid themselves. They did some serious harm to the Sunils of the world.

Everyone wants the universe to know ‘you heard this from ME first’. We are moving into instant and speedy breaking news, mobile phone style, and often speculated reality.

What next? I saw it before it happened? Shades of Minority Report?

RAPE AND VIOLENCE

Rape and violence against women and girl children.

More than twenty years ago I was in Nairobi, Kenya, at an international Women’s conference. We spent long days discussing poverty and the lack of education amongst women. We discussed this universal problem of treating sons different from daughters. In most rural societies boys are fed better and boys have better chance at receiving education. We agreed strong and educated girls grow up to be better mothers and make better families.

We drew up resolutions that were sent to the United Nations and heads of governments all over the world.

Now twenty years later we know so little has changed. Boys are still the preferred tribe. They are still pampered and put on pedestals.

As long as women and girls remain backward or are made to remain backward with no education and no equal opportunities they cannot be enlightened mothers.

Mothers bring up the sons. A lot of anger is directed towards men as a species when discussing rape and violence. I feel we women have much to do with the attitudes of our sons who grow up to be men with little or no respect for women. We are the carers and nurturers and if we do not instil the right values we are to blame. Preference for a male child has to be wiped out. Mothers need to teach their sons that their sisters are equally important, teach boys to respect their sisters, mothers and grandmothers. We need to teach boys to be responsible in the home. I personally know of many families where women feel differently about daughters and daughters-in-law and treat them unfairly. Sons and sons-in-law are treated as elite, given false values. Women in so-called civilized households also allow men to think they are special. In many families men rape servants and the women in the family turn a convenient blind eye.

Until every woman realizes her girl child is equal to her male child, and someone else’s daughter is equally precious we can never wipe out these horrendous crimes of rape and violence.

GUNS, GUNS, GUNS

GUNS

Guns Guns Guns

Gun owners say it is people not guns that kill people.
What an inanity!

It is proposed teachers be armed.
Would the teacher carry it on her person all the while?
Or would the teacher keep it locked in the classroom.

If there are no guns people who want to kill will find ways.
Yes, but not kill quite as easily and as many, powerfully and instantly.

States in the US allow students to carry concealed guns on college campuses.
I would suggest don’t even buy your children toys guns.

If the teacher had a gun she could have protected the children.
The mother had 3 guns and could not protect herself from the son.

Nearly half of US states have adopted some type of “Stand Your Ground,” or “Shoot First” law.
Amazing.

Guns for protection. Why would one need guns that hold a hundred bullets ?
Expecting an army to hold you up.

Hunting is killing.
Put a cap on hunting.

Wake up America, the world is shocked and laughing at your cowardice. Pathetic comments and brain-dead logic is what the gun lobbyists and gun owners put forward.

Help can be on the way: Irradiate poverty, educate children, distribute wealth and place high taxes on gun sales, price ammunition out of the market.

Buy back guns, give incentives to voluntary hand over.

Republican Spell Check Gods

Spell Check Gods

The Spell Check Gods are not taking kindly to Insult Throwing Republicans in America:

Rick Santorum sent out emails to reporters: Santorum’s “Publc” Schedule
Jon Huntsman issued press passes: with his name as “John” (misspelt)
And now our very own Romney App: A Better “Amercia”

Boys, boys! Is it too much Partying? What did they put in your Tea?

With a clown stepping in with support Mr Mitt Romney does not care how he gets there: “Just get me there, give me that 50.1%”

What next for the Presidency to be! The world is waiting with abated laughter.

Denim Jeans

Stressed Distress

When I first went to Britain I heard the statement buy black, black does not show dirt. I was quite taken aback with this. Having been brought up in the tropics, where we change clothes a few times a day, not only because we sweat but dirt is dirt. Just because dirt is not seen it does not mean the garment worn over a period of time is not dirty.

But recently when I went to Japan more of that dirt situation came into focus. My friend, TJ believed in travelling light. On a ten-day trip my TJ wore the same pair of denim jeans. Ten days in Tokyo and two days of travel there and back, twelve days in all. I was quite appalled.

Then I came to hear the story of denim jeans not being washed for six months. Six months for the lived-in look to create your own body fashion. The lived in jeans gives you ‘whiskers, honeycombs and stacks’… big body fashion statements and your very own too. Your own body distressed denims. Denim fades not only with wash but also with wear. Jeans not washed but worn over a long period of time creates whiskers on the upper thighs, honeycomb behind the knees and stacks around the ankles. For the last you need to buy a size long in the legs. One could try to look even more distressed by creating one’s own raggedy fashion ripped with a pair of scissors.

Weighing The Distress

Jeans fabric originally came from Nimes in France, a serge, Serge de Nimes. It became popular in America in the late 18th Century. Mostly miners and construction workers found it to be sturdy due mainly to the weft supported by more than one warp, which can be seen on the reverse side.

The number of indigo (natural or synthetic) dips gives the fabric the different blue shades, and stretch fabric is created with the introduction of elastic to the fabric.

Denim jeans, distressed or not, is now universal wear.

Dirt Fashion.

OCCUPY CENTRAL HONG KONG

This new social experiment needs a due date

Occupy Central Hong Kong

Occupation Central began as early as the 70’s. Having spent six-week days looking after Hong Kong families and children and pets, our domestic helpers occupy pavements, walkways and parks in Central on their day off. They gather to meet friends and relatives, to socialize, share food, news and gossip.

Sunday, their day off.

Foreign domestic helpers in Central

As of the 15th October 2011 we have another Occupy Central group.
Protesters have occupied the ground floor space of the Hong Kong and Shanghai Banking Corporation for more than a month. The migrant workers, an accommodating lot, have been displaced from this space. On Sundays they are squeezed around the periphery.

The Meeting

Periphery

There is much admiration for this peaceful demonstration, Occupy Central. It is indeed a noble gesture that a group of our citizens demonstrated, showed their support for the Occupy Wall Street Movement with placards and slogans and waving fists, denouncing the greed of our own Banks and other Corporations.

Forty or so demonstrators decided to occupy the ground floor beneath the HSBC with all the paraphernalia of a home away from home. Tents, sleeping bags, sofas, bicycles, bookshelves, guitars, tables, stools, computers, laundry, a clothesline, a generator, and a mini-kitchen make this the most unsightly happening in our lovely city.

I have much sympathy for the demonstrators and their cause…the ‘Greed’ has indeed spread around the world. ‘1% holds the wealth of the world’ the placard says but looking at the occupiers last Sunday afternoon did not give me much hope for a successful outcome of snatching part of that 1%. What I saw seemed an untidy group of twelve or so tired and bored.

Our HK group is indeed lucky, they do not have to worry about inclement weather, the very bank they are angry about gives them a comfortable squatting space beneath its tower, the Asian headquarters of HSBC Holdings.

Accessible and nearby is the clean public loo and washing facility. Rubbish collection and ample lighting are provided by the very government one wishes to topple.

‘Everyone is equal’ said one slogan. It reminded me of the slogan that some are more equal since the migrant workers had their space taken by the all are equal group.

‘There are no designated leaders at “Occupy Central”, and all matters are put through an extensive decision-making process to reach a consensus. Everything is shared, from water to food and cigarettes,’ said a report.

Great sentiment, I thought, but leaderless leads to nowhere.

‘I want to tear down capitalism’ screamed a placard. Anti-capitalist passion, and I hope the how has been sorted out.

‘The gap between the poor and the rich people in Hong Kong is the most serious in the world,’ said another.

And one twitter has the right invitation:‘to night let us bros and sis have our first hot pot together at occupy central’

What is the focus?
What is the outcome so far?
What, when is the end?

The food and hygiene and environment and other authorise have turned a blind eye to the unsightly squatter mess of sleeping quarters, a mini kitchen, and laundry blowing in the breeze on Queens Road, Central.

Let us hope when the authorities finally decide enough is enough, as is happening in the US right now, they will be compassionate and give our squatters enough time to move away. And our protestors for their part will peacefully move on to somewhere else or find a different route to solving the international problem.

This new social experiment needs a due date.

Let’s Stay Connected

Let’s all stay connected, yippee yay!

Peaceful air travel is at an end. After all the hassles of getting to the airport on time, dealing with cancelled flights, changed boarding gates, immigration formalities and customs checks don’t look forward to sitting back and relaxing to the droning throb of your flight. Try not to switch off for you are going to be switched on in a big way. Forget the reading, contemplating, sleeping. All this will soon be of the past with plans for the new kind of travel.

The importance of connectivity is here. Flying three hours, or fifteen hours does not make a difference. Above 10,000 feet? Not a problem. We shall be moving with the times. Singapore Airlines will the first with this great connection innovation and Cathay Pacific Airlines is soon to follow. Access to wifi, internet and mobile, yes, mobile telephone service, not just texting or sending and receiving of emails but real life calls.

Just lean back, stay connected, talk, talk, talk. A mobile phone stuck to the ear and multi-tasking – eating, drinking, filling up forms or anything else one does on the plane. One might have to bring two or three mobile phones for those urgent calls that come in while you are on one. Of course, the airline company will take into consideration the other passengers like me, who will be slowly sliding into total insanity with a talking passenger next me. To minimize my discomfort a code of conduct will be introduced. Travellers will be asked to follow the new flying etiquette – consideration for fellow passengers. The staff will be trained to help everyone in this respect.

‘Please set your phone to silent mode and talk at a normal level.’ Note the key word here is normal. And more etiquette bonus. During night-time flights, voice function of the mobile phone will be disabled. Wow!

Flying days with innovative airlines will soon come to an end for some passengers. I am saving up for a private jet or maybe grow a pair of wings in my garden along with herbs, potatoes, papaya and banana.

CookieJacking

Cookies, not the edible ones.

Cookiejacking
Do not be alarmed, I have been using search engines for a long time and purchase all that I can online. There are ways of protecting yourself but:
Be aware, be responsible, protect yourself.
Five simple ways to protect yourself from identity theft
1. Make difficult, good passwords
2. Do the same with PINs
3. Delete emails containing passwords
4. Keep computers safe from loss
5. Shred sensitive documents
Leela

Horizons from Christian Science Monitor
Chris Gaylord

“How ‘cookiejacking’ could steal people’s Facebook passwords. Cookiejacking could let hackers compromise Facebook profiles, says a computer security expert. But Microsoft argues cookiejacking isn’t a high-risk threat.

Cookiejacking could hijack your Facebook log-in credentials by Chris Gaylord May 27, 2011

A new hacking scheme called “cookiejacking” could expose a person’s usernames and passwords for Facebook, Twitter and countless other websites, says Rosario Volatta Internet security researcher.
Most websites that require you to log in will save your online credentials as “cookies”. These small browser files can contain anything from passwords and site preferences to the contents of an online shopping cart. Cookiejacking, according to Mr. Valotta, lets hackers steal those cookies and get away with your personal information.
“Any website. Any cookie. Limit is just your imagination,” Valotta told Reuters.
Cookiejacking only works against people using Internet Explorer he says. But all versions of the browser, including the latest edition of IE9, are vulnerable.
There is, however, a very big catch: To access your cookies, a hacker must design a website or game that convinces you to drag an object from one side of the screen to the other. For example, Valotta “built a puzzle that he put up on Facebook in which users are challenged to ‘undress’ a photo of an attractive woman,” reports Reuters. Once players move the digital clothing, they unwittingly trigger the cookiejacking trap.
Valotta says he harvested more than 80 cookies from his 150 Facebook Friends in less than three days.
Microsoft says it isn’t too concerned about cookiesjacking, according to company spokesmen. A hacker needs to jump through too many hoops for this tactic to be a major threat.
“Given the level of required user interaction, this issue is not one we consider high risk,” Microsoft’s Jerry Brant told Reuters. “In order to possibly be impacted a user must visit a malicious website, be convinced to click and drag items around the page and the attacker would need to target a cookie from the website that the user was already logged into.”
While cookiesjacking goes down as yet another potential exploit against PCs, Mac OS has suddenly come under attack from malware. First Mac Defender and now Mac Guard have tricked Apple users into installing malicious software onto their computers.”

WRITING RULES

My six

I often come across fellow writers who advice me not waste time worrying about Writing Rules. Rules curb your creative process they say.
I write without rules when I create the first draft. I try to churn out at miles per hour, definitely no rules here, very creative indeed.

Writing rules can be broken to your advantage and to your writing needs but you need to know and understand rules first to know which to bend and which to break rather than not know rules and make a hash of your writing. There are some guidelines you ought to adhere to.

It is important to avoid:

1. Jumping from character to character in the same paragraph. It tends to confuse readers.
2. Use of a profusion of noun/verb qualifiers. It leads to flowery language.
3. The use clichés, too many similes and metaphors to further enlighten the reader.
4. Reduce foreign words. A smattering adds colour, too many add annoyance.
5. Overuse of weak words like ‘was and were, and –ing words’ lead to telling not to showing.
6. Passive writing. Passive loses the positive punch.

I am a big fan of ‘the simpler the writing the better’ and am working hard towards that goal.

Sendai (t)Sunami

Sendai (t)Sunami

Earth Quake

Snow falling broken heart
Searching in dread grey

Stumbling in mud
Debris wind weaving
Shields underfoot a shroud

Somewhere water sprays calm
Smell of gas, bodies buried
Smoke, a spark, a fire eaten home

A new toy a recent laughing child

Ocean-bottom hides shameful menace

Sea smiles welcome, innocent
Soothing tide forgets the big wave

Did I hear birds scream an agony

In Branches

I was not here five days ago
The tsunami took him, my love

I have no need for the rest
No purpose, no now, no tomorrow
A dawn, a waking, an evening twilight

Gone, swept away

A no-where moment
I have showed up

I know not why, how
And now
What for

There is no need
No need
To be

Leela Devi Panikar
15 March 2011

Hong Kong Protests

Street Brawlers

We, in Hong Kong, are given every chance to protest and have rules in place to practice our rights. Local and international protesters have taken to the streets. Protests have been effective and have brought a lot of good for Hong Kong.

But let’s not forget when a large protest is scheduled taxpayers’ money is used for deployment of manpower to allow it to place under safe conditions for those in the business of protesting and the rest of the public. I say business of protesting for protestors are uniformed in various and colourful logo-ed T-shirts and caps, string miles of banners, carry posters, and protest toys such as plastic hammers and fake rice bowls, paper coffins and all manner of interesting objects and symbols.

Much inconvenience is caused: roads closed off holding up public transport and shop frontages blocked, daily life disrupted.

We put up with all but thuggish behaviour of small groups and individual protestors is getting totally out of hand. These so called people’s representatives and concerned groups are resorting to bullying and violence. Every new incident is more shocking than the last. The latest scuffle involving our Chief Executive should not have been allowed to take place. There should have been better security than by-standing body guards.

Throwing of objects, bodily bulldozing their way and leaping over railings to attack government officials or the police is increasing. This type of behaviour is shocking, is an embarrassment to peaceful Hong Kong and sets very bad example for the young, our future protesters.

Our politicians and representative of government have become street brawlers and thugs. The deranged should be barred or expelled from the legislature. Severe penalties are called for.

Gaddaffi

Muammar Gaddafi
Dictator Supreme

Heavy virgins uniformed
Girl guards for a world thug
Billionaire magnate evildoer
Fed on camel milk fresh
Lockerbie ransom for oil

Dissidents rise, tortured, hanged
Gunfire, screams, corpses
No smooth fight this
Visas refused, news-less
No foreign journalists

Videos, people phone
Sneaked, life risked, real
Truths truer told, potent
Not edited bullet ricocheted
Citizens gunned down

Bed sheet gowned despot, hatted
Unhinged press call from car
Mustachioed menace on last leg
Umbrella wielding and ready to shed
Last drop of blood for country

Desperado on a white charger
Ranting, raving
‘My kingdom for a face-lift’.