Haiti: One Year Later

Incredible that it was just one year ago that Haiti was rocked by a horrendous earthquake that toppled the country, destroying infrastructure and the economy, and driving nearly a million people from their homes into temporary housing - tents and shanties. Today, a March in NYC will remember that tragedy and call for aid for the Haitian people.

Billions in international aid were promised that have never completely materialized ($1.15B out of $5.3B promised.) Where's the money asks The Nation ?

Haitians 'long for change after a year in hell.' Article here

A slew of prominent New York City leaders, including Rev. Al Sharpton and Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly, will speak at Marching for Change, a solidarity march commemorating the one-year anniversary of the earthquake that devastated Haiti on January 12, 2010. Facebook and other sites indicate that the Marrch for Change is stil la go.  The march will feature two rallies, one in Times Square and the other at the United Nations. Speakers include:

Times Square: City Councilmembers Matthieu Eugene and Jumaane Williams; Brooklyn Deputy Borough President Yvonne Graham; National Action Network Executive Director Tamika Mallory; Housing Works Pres. and CEO Charles King

United Nations: Rev. Al Sharpton; Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly; City Councilmember Ydanis Rodriguez; Rev. Jacques Andre DeGraff; Diaspora Community Services Executive Director Carine Jocelyn

The Marching for Change route will take marchers past the Haitian consulate at 39th and Madison. Marchers will demand that Haitian and world leaders address the unacceptably slow pace of earthquake recovery by committing to four specific actions:

1) Remove the Rubble: More than 50% of the original 19 million cubic meters of rubble remains uncleared. President Clinton has called the situation "totally unacceptable."

2) Provide Safe and Secure Shelter: One million Haitians are internally displaced. More than 1,000 camps dot the country, potential incubators for cholera, sexual violence and the spread of HIV.

3) Provide Clean Water and Sanitation: 40% percent of camps lack access to water. 30% do not have toilets. Water-borne cholera has claimed more than 3,000 lives.

4) Provide Jobs: Post-quake, unemployment quadrupled in areas of Port-au-Prince and its outskirts. The estimated Haiti unemployment rate is 80 percent.

MARCH DETAILS:
2 PM: Kick-off Call to Action rally in Times Square (42nd St. and 7th Ave.)
2:30 PM: March to the Haitian Consulate at 39th St. and Madison Ave.
4 PM (approximate): Rally at the United Nations’ Dag Hammarskjold Plaza at 47th St. and 1st Ave.

Carine Jocelyn, Executive Director of Diaspora Community Services: "Next year we don't want the issue to be that one million people are still living under tents. This is unacceptable to the global community and must be a priority of funding and action." DCS helps Haitian immigrants in New York obtain health care and other services and operates a community health center in Port-au-Prince.

Charles King, President and CEO of Housing Works: “We will use this march to come together, show our support and solidarity with Haiti and demand action!” Since the earthquake, Housing Works has opened two medical clinics in Haiti.

PARTICIPATING ORGANIZATIONS: Bailey House; CAMBA; Caribbean American Chamber of Commerce; Catholic Charities; CHE; Diaspora Community Services; Dwa Fanm; HAFALI; Haiti Cultural Exchange; Haiti Solidarity Network NE; Haitian Centers Council; Housing Works; JCRC; Lambi Fund; MADRE; National Action Network; NHAHA; New York Immigrant Coalition; People's Organization for Progress

You Tube trailer here

NY1 news clip on the Gallery photo exhibit at the Umbrage Editions Gallery exhibition called "Tent Life: Haiti" displays 22 of photographer Wyatt Gallery's photographs. He visited the country twice over the course of 2010.

More on the book, which portrays the struggle and hopes of the Haitian people in photos by Wyatt Gallery and an essay by Edwidge Danticat here

From Snowmageddon to Snowbigdeal

The cruel alarm went off at 5 AM as usual, and it took another 15 minutes or so before 1010 WINS' Lee Harris announced, "drum roll please!" that NYC public schools were opened. An email from a sanit pro that I know who had just come off of a 12 hour shift offered hope that "the streets are clear and you should have no trouble getting to work."  I got ready for the day and headed out to the driveway to dig out the van for My Better Half who is a special education teacher in Far Bushwick and has no other viable options to get to work. In a typically Herculean effort for a 56 year old mandarin of Italian-American peasant stock, I cleaned off the car, dug it out, and shoveled out our 30 foot driveway so that she could get to the street. A thank you kiss and a half a cup of coffee later I was trudging up East 17th street to the Q train at Newkirk Plaza which was happily waiting for me at the station.

Trains were light. Traffic was light. Basically, I guess, because the snow was light. Brooklyn Heights, as usual, is remarkably clear, although none of the coffee cart guys or newspaper hawkers were out there. I don't know what role the Mayor played in all of this. However, indications that he was in Bermuda over Christmas rang as always of the venial sin of cover up. It wasn't so much that he was away, as he didn't want anyone to know about it.  Then, as the NY Observer reported, it appears he flew home in the storm to appear at the press conference the next day. Now DITHOB understands -- esta clara -- the poor Mayor went to all of that effort to get back to NYC and NO ONE APPRECIATED IT. No wonder he was so testy and pissed at the press conference. Whether the last blizzard was a perfect storm of a lot of snow, coming on the heels of a holiday, plus miscues by some folks in the Administration (face it, Mike, you just can't get good help these days), even if combined with budget cuts and labor issues,  it was a mess.

Some folks were stressed over not knowing until the early morning hours today whether school was opened or not. One extremely hard working and underpaid parochial school teacher I know was doing the hoochie coochie from last evening. But just as there are people pointing fingers in this economic climate at public sector employees, pensions, job security, etc., instead of organizing and fighting for similar demands of their private sector masters, I wonder why (or whether) parochial and private school families who pay a substantial amount of money to send their kids to non-public schools,  so easily and readily accept the closings of their kids' schools. I am sure there are many parochial (if not private) school families who will lose a day's pay because they had to stay home with their kid. The idea of public and private sector employment needs to change, and be replaced by a new consensus and different demands to counteract the clearly failed "business-management centric model," which, like Paul Krugman suggested, is like a zombie political economy, that has failed, but continues to rise from the dead.  None of us are Mike Bloomberg. We are all, regardless of our relative salaries, working stiffs of one sort or another. Maybe not today, but some day, there will be a renewed call for workers rights and a new social security in the private sector. It is an issue currently hidden in the collective unconscious, although obscured by the American dream of material happiness, celebrity, sports, music business or lotto success, reality TV, and the belief that criticizing business is un-American. But it is an issue that will resurface as advanced capitalism which is based on finance and complex stock market and corporate legerdemain and not on production/ employment marches on. As people get deeper into the hole, it is a new reality that will surface, as people demand a new model which hasn't been clearly elucidated yet. But I guess that is a discussion for another time.

For today, though, lucky for the Bloomberg administration and the citizens who struggle under the day-to-day reality of the working life, the "Weather Emergency" was a piece of cake.

The Stylites (Not to Be Confused with the Chi-Lites)

January 11th is the feast day of Theodosius the Cenobiarch. He was a great ascetic of the Eastern Orthodox Church. In his travels, when he reached Antioch, he visited and was influenced by St. Simeon the Stylite, a Christian ascetic saint who achieved fame because he lived for 37 years on a small platform on top of a pillar near Aleppo in Syria.

In order to get away from the ever increasing number of people who frequently came to him for prayers and advice, leaving him little if any time for his private austerities, Simeon discovered a pillar which had survived amongst ruins, formed a small platform at the top, and upon this determined to live out his life. It has been stated that, as he seemed to be unable to avoid escaping the world horizontally, he may have thought it an attempt to try to escape it vertically. For sustenance small boys from the village would climb up the pillar and pass him small parcels of flat bread and goats milk.

When the monastic Elders living in the desert heard about Simeon, who had chosen a new and strange form of asceticism, they wanted to test him to determine whether his extreme feats were founded in humility or pride. They decided to tell Simeon under obedience to come down from the pillar. If he disobeyed they would forcibly drag him to the ground, but if he was willing to submit, they were to leave him on his pillar. St Simeon displayed complete obedience and humility, and the monks told him to stay where he was.


This first pillar was little more than four meters high, but his well-wishers subsequently replaced it with others, the last in the series being apparently over 15 meters from the ground. At the top of the pillar was a platform, with a baluster, which is believed to have been about one square metre.


According to his hagiography, Simeon would not allow any woman to come near his pillar, not even his own mother, reportedly telling her, "If we are worthy, we shall see one another in the life to come." Martha submitted to this. Remaining in the area, she also embraced the monastic life of silence and prayer. When she died, Simeon asked that her remains be brought to him. He reverently bade farewell to his dead mother, and, according to the account, a smile appeared on her face.


The 1964 classic by Luis Bunuel on "Simon of the Desert" with its totally fascinating, anachronistic yet perfectly suited ending, here:   "

"You must stay til the end!"

Closing Today: Chaos and Classicism: Art in France, Italy and Germany, 1918-1936

Adolf Ziegler, The Four Elements

Ziegler's painting, highlighting the transition to the art of tbe Fascist era, was owned by Hitler and decorated his Munich apartment in the late 1930s.Ziegler later curated the famous exhibition of "Degenerate Art." 

Following the chaos of World War I, a move emerged toward figuration, clean lines, and modeled form and away from the two-dimensional abstracted spaces, fragmented compositions, and splintered bodies of Cubism, Futurism,Expressionism, and other avant-garde styles of the opening of the 20th century. In response to the horrors initiated by the new machine-age warfare, artists sought to recuperate and represent the body, whole and intact. For the next decade and a half, classicism—a return to order, synthesis, organization, and enduring values, rather than the prewar emphasis on innovation at all costs—dominated the discourse of contemporary art. Chaos and Classicism: Art in France, Italy, and Germany, 1918–1936 traces this interwar trend as it worked its way from a poetic, mythic idea in the Parisian avant-garde; to a political, historical idea of a revived Roman Empire, under Benito Mussolini; to a neo-Platonic High Modernism at the Bauhaus, and finally to the chilling aesthetic of nascent Nazi culture. The exhibition interweaves the key movements that proclaimed visual and thematic clarity, Purism, Novecento Italiano, and Neue Sachlichkeit, through several closely related but distinct themes. This vast transformation of interwar aesthetics in Western Europe encompasses painting, sculpture, photography, architecture, film, fashion, and the decorative arts, and the show presents works by Balthus, Giorgio de Chirico, Jean Cocteau, Otto Dix, Pablo Gargallo, Hannah Höch, Fernand Léger, Henri Matisse, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Pablo Picasso, and August Sander. Chaos and Classicism is curated by Kenneth E. Silver, Guest Curator and Professor of Modern Art, New York University, assisted by Helen Hsu, Assistant Curator, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, with Vivien Greene, Curator of 19th- and Early-20th Century Art, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, as curatorial advisor.

More details here

Sega Introduces "Toylets" in Japanese Urinals

Wired UK reports that:
"Sega has announced that it's testing consoles called "Toylets" in urinals around Tokyo, which asks the user to strategically vary the strength and location of his urine stream to play a series of games.

"Each urinal is installed with a pressure sensor and an LCD screen is mounted on the wall above, which lets you select from and play four different minigames. There's "Mannekin Pis", which simply measures how hard you can pee, and "Graffiti Eraser", which lets you remove paint by pointing a hose in different directions."

"There's the faintly misogynistic "The North Wind and Her", where you play as the wind trying to blow a girl's skirt up, and the harder you pee, the harder the wind blows. Finally, the bizarre "Milk from Nose" is a multiplayer game where you compete against the person who last used the urinal. The strength of your urine streams are compared, and translated into milk spraying out of your nose. If your stream is stronger, your milk-stream knocks your opponent out of the ring. If you do particularly well on any of the games, you can download and save your information to a USB stick."

Aside from the bizarre concept of creating competition over urine-stream pressure, the system also will offer advertisements to the (captive) audience.
Details from Wired.UK here

Not from "The Onion" - University Professor Arrested for Suspicious Bagel on Plane

A Florida professor was arrested and removed from a plane Monday after his fellow passengers alerted crew members they thought he had a suspicious package in the overhead compartment.


That "suspicious package" turned out to be keys, a bagel with cream cheese and a hat.

Ognjen Milatovic, 35, was flying from Boston to Washington D.C. on US Airways when he was escorted off the plane for disorderly conduct following the incident.

Monday's incident is another example of other passengers essentially becoming the authority on terrorist activity on planes. Details here

Yes, but this begs the question -- if they would arrest the guy for a bagel, what would they do about roti?

To be continued.....

Ohio's Brooklyn-Born Panhandler With the Golden Voice

Ted Williams, Brooklyn-born Ohio resident, on hard times, has an amazing radio voice, which has resulted in his discovery and a possible new radio career, on a Columbus, Ohio radio station. Check out this cool clip of the guy with the great, mellow voice:



Full NY POST print story here

The Numerology of 2011

"For the last dozen years or so, there has been a dominating presence of both the 0 and 1 and the 1 and 2 patterns. These are numbers that push things apart and away. So while the obvious political, military and religious forces continue to bring conflict and separation, there is actually an underlying evolution taking place on a deeper and more humane level, carrying us toward a more harmonious existence while the changes playing out on the surface seem to be pushing us toward our ultimate demise.

Unfortunately, we might not see the effects of this harmonious existence until a few more years down the line. On the visible stage, 2011 still brings stagnation, denial and downright obstruction on a national and global level. More and more, it appears that people focus on the differences between them, causing hateful rhetoric and violent encounters. There will also be a further widening of economic gaps in developed countries, and most visibly in the United States -- the rich get richer and the poor get poorer ... and the percentage of people considered to be poor increases exponentially. Religions, without exception, also become more polarized, and this reflects itself in less tolerance, more dogmas and likely more violence. In fact, look at any aspect of human life -- political, religious or any other -- and simply sharpen the angles, and there is the picture for 2011."

"Looking at 2011 month by month, January stands out as chaotic, bringing unexpected changes that will see us, figuratively speaking, reeling and scrambling to survive. Not so metaphorically will be the real danger of volcanoes, earthquakes and other acts of God that we can expect during January, with a second wave occurring in October.

February of 2011 is more stable and brings some of our basic needs to the foreground, especially family affairs and loyalty. The economy shows signs of improvement, and one or more important medical breakthroughs may give hope and brighten the future for many. March then brings with it acts of religious fanaticism and other dangerous side-effects of spiritual and intellectual ignorance.

April is ruled by an 8 and should bring a measure of balance, but also more violence and aggression, especially by and against authority. May should have a calming effect, bringing progress in many areas, but mostly in politics and diplomacy, including a genuine effort to bring peace to parts of the world where harmony has been a rare commodity.

June and July bring a surge of energy with some sensational and history-making events, scientific breakthroughs and a boost to the global economy. Then August has a more creative energy.

September puts the brakes on everything and is the month most illustrative of the energies and influences of the year 2011 as described before; including the lack of vision and the emphasis on trivial matters. October is disruptive and brings turmoil similar to what occurred during January, while November brings a more compassionate energy.

December will go down as the month when a new voice is first heard worldwide, a voice of reason, a voice of humanity, a voice of hope. For those of us who can read the subtle signs, it offers the first glimpse of the hidden evolution that was mentioned earlier. In a way, December is a precursor to what the second half of this transformative nine-year cycle brings.

More here

Reflections in an Unploughed Street

A lame duck plutocrat Mayor who is detached from governing? Labor organizations covertly fighting budget cuts and staffing reductions by a political culture that overlooks the economic failures of Wall Street speculators and bubble manufacturers and blames the civil service class for pension, health and economic benefits that were hammered out over many decades through collective bargaining. An extreme storm brought on by climate change in conjunction with the Christmas holiday.

Besides the unploughed streets, so many sidewalks unshoveled. Is everyone giving up? Tired? In surrender to the complexity, despair, and pessimism of the 21st century recession and decline of empire?

Or just the snowstorm that fell through the cracks?

The Ploughman Cometh

The ploughman finally arrived on our street at about 9:30 pm...and so one phase of the Blizzard of Late 2010 came to a conclusion....

CODA: Snowmageddon, continued

Incredibly, it appears the uptown Q isn't running on the normal Q/B line, it is running on the D line between Coney Island-Stillwell and DeKalb Avenue, meaning our section of Brooklyn is still without subway service (except for hiking a mile over to the Flatbush Junction) and still unplowed, preventing any automobile access. Downtown q may be intermittently available.

Snowmageddon, continued

Following oral surgery last week, I needed a follow up visit with my oral surgeon. Of course, the Q wasn't running, and the #3 train, which I walked to and took to my office in Brooklyn Heights yesterday, terminates at the Flatbush Junction. 

My Better Half who kindly offered to come along for the walk and I set out for our hike from near Glenwood Road to Voorhees near Avenue Z. Only express buses headed for Manhattan ran on Ocean Avenue.  There were no local buses. Sidewalks near many apartment buildings were clear, but many stretches remained covered in snow.  It was quite a hike.The dental thing worked out OK, and I had a chat with a bilingual Haitian Creole Special Ed teacher and a retired assistant principal from Staten Island.

It appears there are still issues with the Q train, which was running earlier, but is either experiencing delays or down again.

After getting home, shoveling the cars with my son, (with no plans to go anywhere in the near future), settling issues for  my oldest daughter before she takes the Chinatown bus up to Boston for a few days, I dried off and settled down to watch the excellent Never Cry Wolf, directed by Carroll Ballard and starring Charles Martin Smith, as a biologist living alone in the Canadian arctic wilderness regions, studying wolves. A great thoughtful film about nature, humans, and unexpected adventures, whether involving force majeure like blizzards, bumbling political-plutocrats with whisk brooms and snow shovels, or arctic hikes along Ocean Avenue. Curious Twenty first century experiences and dreams, in a modern metropolis, brought to heel by Gaia.

 

Never Cry Wolf here

Snowpocalypse Now

After hearing the Mejor announce how all city offices were open even though many people decided to stay home, I once again had to come to grips with the fact that Mayor Mike is an extremely wealthy patrician with seemingly well-meaning intentions, generally with a control of the media that is quite remarkable, but who, once in awhile, displays ignominious traits that belie his apolitical, compassionate stance. As Jedediah Leland says to Charlie Kane:

Leland (as he speaks, only Kane's pants leg can be seen at the left of the frame): You talk about the people as though you owned them, as though they belong to you. Goodness. As long as I can remember, you've talked about giving the people their rights, as if you can make them a present of Liberty, as a reward for services rendered...Remember the working man?



Kane: I'll get drunk too, Jedediah, if it'll do any good.


Leland: Aw, it won't do any good. Besides, you never get drunk. You used to write an awful lot about the workingman...He's turning into something called organized labor. You're not going to like that one little bit when you find out it means that your workingman expects something is his right, not as your gift! Charlie, when your precious underprivileged really get together, oh boy! That's going to add up to something bigger than your privileges! Then I don't know what you'll do! Sail away to a desert island probably and lord it over the monkeys! [imagery of Xanadu and its private zoo]

The Q train still isn't running, so I walked a mile or so to the Flatbush Junction. Streets are littered with abandoned cars and buses. Rappelling snow banks to get to the train. People, incredibly, still trying to use their autos, even though the end of most Brooklyn streets terminate in a snowdrift or an abandoned vehicle.
 
Getting on the 3 train at around 7 AM , it was like the last train leaving Saigon, people squeezing in, arguing:
 
Woman #1 - "Move your fat ass so  I can get on the train!"
Woman#2- "You ain't no size 8 neither!" followed by a mutual exchange of barnyard epithets and vituperation.
 
Things finally settled down around Franklin Ave. as folks got off to switch for the Lex. I got off at Borough Hall -Brooklyn stop, grabbed a yogurt and a coffee and fell on my butt near the corner of Court and Livingston, near where Barney's (Beauty Aids/Pharmacy/Cigar Vault) stood for many years.
 
I made it in and am trying to accomplish a few things, amidst new people appearing and comparing Snowpacalypse notes. Although I am glad that My Better Half and the kids are saved from the travel chaos by the holiday break, it promises to curtail our activities for the rest of the week. As it is, My Better Half (AKA +0.5) and two of my daughters just lit out for the Junction to accompany our other daughter back home, who is training back to Flatbush on the less familiar IRT line, having been stranded in the Slope for two nights.
 
May the end of 2010 bring a Happier 2011 for all.  Ciao.
 
--Brooklyn Beat

Please Come Home for Christmas: Charles Brown

The Eagles' version sung by Don Henley is an absolute treasure, but there is nothing like the original......

Winter Wonderland: Garrett Morris and Saturday Night Live Season One