Top models from around the world had an opportunity to have their say in Vogue's April, 2020 issue. Kaia Gerber from the United States, who has over five million Instagram followers, noted, "When you have a big platform, it seems irresponsible not to use it for good."
What models have to say on every subject lacks credibility, but in some areas they are experts. Liu Wen from China observed fashion is a subject that draws people from everywhere together for a creative cultural exchange. And all people should see themselves represented, said the UK's Fran Summers, who has seen a shift from what used to be one stereotype of a beautiful woman. Ugbad Abdi, the model who first wore an Islamic hijab on the cover of Vogue, agrees.
Although models, like professional basketball players, are taller than average women and men, there is neither one type of Brazilian beauty, says Kerolyn Soares from Sao Paulo, nor one type of black beauty, adds Anok Yai, who was born in Egypt. At age 37, Taiwan's Gia Tang also counters the idea that all models must be younger. Jill Kortleve, a Surinamese-Dutch model with tatoos, who stopped trying to exist on one banana a day, now books runway appearances in her body's normal size. Paloma Elsesser from the United States, a curvy, larger model of color, claims "a whole new guard of image-makers" exists. Latinx model, Krim Hernandez from Mexico, hopes the growing acceptance of inclusive images can lead to a broader acceptance of diversity in general.
Models also possess credibility to speak on subjects besides fashion and how the media represents women. Growing up in a refugee camp in Kenya and later in Australia, South Sudanese-born Adut Akech advocates for the rights of displaced refugees and the needs of those who suffered losses in Australia's bushfires. Speaking with a distinctive gap in her two front teeth reminiscent of model Lauren Hutton's pioneering look, Ms. Akech simply reports she is doing and saying what she knows best. What Adesuwa Aighewi knows best are authentic products from artisans in her West African, East Asian, and Southeast Asian heritage. She knows kitenge textiles featuring traditional African patterns are made in China. Ros Georgiou, a model born in Greece, is using her backstage access at runway shows to learn photography and to become a director. From her base in Milan, Italy, Villoria Cerelli applauds the new respect and opportunity she sees being accorded young photographers, hair stylists and makeup artists.
For Mariam de Vinzelle from France, modeling is a diversion, a hobby. Since she is currently an engineering student, in the future she expects to speak with authority outside the fashion field. India's Pooja Mor already speaks with authority on the Buddhist and Taoist principles of the Falun Gong spiritual practice that grounds people in peace and happiness.
During Vogue's round-the-world fashion shoot, although all models wore some form of the universal fabric, denim, no one expressed the fashion industry's concern for sustainability: landfills bulging with discarded clothing, recycling and the global water shortage. The fact is, blue jean manufacturers recognize the need to reduce the 500 to 1800 gallons of water needed to grow, dye, and process cotton for one pair of jeans and often to use additional water to prewash or stonewash denim. Even though Demna Gvasalia is the creator director of the venerable fashion house, Balenciaga, the hardships he experienced as a refugee from the Georgia that was part of the Soviet Union influence his attention to sustainability and global sociopolitics. In the March, 2020, issue of Vogue, Mr. Gvasalia discussed his use of upcycled and repurposed denim, questioned how much value to place on material items, and suggested falling in love improves productivity.
There always is a cause waiting for young people to attract attention to a cure on platforms that reach one friend, their family, a scout leader, teacher, coach, dance class....
Showing posts with label Mexico. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Mexico. Show all posts
Saturday, March 28, 2020
Thursday, March 21, 2019
On the Mexican Side of the Border
The days of confining children in tent cities on the dusty Texas side of the Rio Grande are over. Guards need no longer bar the concerned visitors who set red balloons afloat over the camps to show those inside someone cared about them.
But migrants still cross into Mexico from Guatemala, Honduras, and
El Salvador. In the five-year span from 2010 to 2015, the UN estimates over 300,000 left Central America. The Economist magazine (March 16, 2019) mentioned 8,000 left in January and February this year.
Mexico understands the plight of Central Americans who seek asylum from government repression of the poor, gang violence, and soldiers, like those who murdered San Salvador's Archbishop Oscar Romero and four nuns in 1980 and the environmental activist, Berta Caceres, in Honduras in 2016. Besides fleeing violence, migrants also risk the long, hot and dangerous journey north when they are displaced by mining activities and when coffee and other crop prices drop or when a lack of rainfall, heat, and a plague of insects reduce crop yields. (Also see the earlier post, "How Can Bananas Be 29 Cents A Pound?")
Since Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador became Mexico's President in December, 2018, his humanitarian welcome has cut into the estimated $2.5 billion organized crime was used to pocketing for trafficking migrants through Mexico to the U.S. border. As requested by Washington, D.C. migrants seeking asylum in the U.S. now remain in Mexico until close to their court dates.
But migrants still cross into Mexico from Guatemala, Honduras, and
El Salvador. In the five-year span from 2010 to 2015, the UN estimates over 300,000 left Central America. The Economist magazine (March 16, 2019) mentioned 8,000 left in January and February this year.
Mexico understands the plight of Central Americans who seek asylum from government repression of the poor, gang violence, and soldiers, like those who murdered San Salvador's Archbishop Oscar Romero and four nuns in 1980 and the environmental activist, Berta Caceres, in Honduras in 2016. Besides fleeing violence, migrants also risk the long, hot and dangerous journey north when they are displaced by mining activities and when coffee and other crop prices drop or when a lack of rainfall, heat, and a plague of insects reduce crop yields. (Also see the earlier post, "How Can Bananas Be 29 Cents A Pound?")
Since Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador became Mexico's President in December, 2018, his humanitarian welcome has cut into the estimated $2.5 billion organized crime was used to pocketing for trafficking migrants through Mexico to the U.S. border. As requested by Washington, D.C. migrants seeking asylum in the U.S. now remain in Mexico until close to their court dates.
Thursday, February 21, 2019
Winning Oscars and Making Money at the Movies
Oscar-nominated films highlight the international contributions of the movie industry's directors, actors, and technical experts. This year, on Sunday, Feb. 24, a film-maker from Mexico, Alfonso Cuaron, or Pawel Paiolikowski from Poland could win two Academy Awards, one for best director and the other for best foreign language film.
As in the past, international filmmakers frequently are nominated in the categories: animated and live action shorts. These movies are not shown in many movie theatres, and that is not a loss this year, because, except for two films, they portray depressing themes not suitable for young audiences. Adults and children would enjoy the funny Animal Behavior, however. In this Canadian entry, a dog psychiatrist tries to cure a pig, praying mantis, bird, and other animals of their most annoying habits. A gorilla with anger management issues takes exception to the person in front of him in the "10 or Less" line who wants to count the five bananas in his one bunch separately. He reacts by tearing up her bag of frozen peas and says, "Now, you have a thousand."
Children already may have seen the Oscar-nominated Bao, a Chinese word for dumpling, that Pixar screened before Incredibles 2. On her second try, Bao's director, Domee Shi, was hired by Pixar as an intern. She is now the first female director in its shorts department. At age two, Ms. Shi migrated with her family from Chongqing, China, to Toronto, Canada. Her father, a college professor of fine art and landscape painter, recognized her talent for drawing, and her mother's dumplings sparked the idea of using food as an entry into understanding another culture. Japanese anime films and manga comics and graphic novels also inspired Ms. Shi, as well as the Mexican theme of the animated feature, Coco, that won an Academy Award last year.
China is among the growing number of countries joining Hollywood, India's Bollywood, and Nigeria's Nollywood in the film and music video industries. By 2019, however, authoritarian control by Chinese authorities was causing film investors to flee. On the other hand, filmmakers in Nigeria aided government efforts, when suspicious circumstances delayed a presidential election in Nigeria. A drone camera was deployed to record singing Nigerian film stars urging voters to remain cool in a video shown on social media. Off the east coast on the other side of Africa, the island of Mauritius is using the advantage of year round good weather to attract job-creating firm-makers.
Chinese billionaire Wang Jianlin of the Dalian Wanda Group had high hopes for the 400-acre, 30 sound stage, $8 billion Oriental Movie Metropolis he opened in the east coast port city of Qingdao three years ago. Although offering to pay film-makers 40% of their production costs, producers were wary of censoring by China's State Administration of Press Publications, Radio, Film and Television. Other setbacks included: the failure of China's big budget film tribute to Tibetan mythology, Asura; social media references to Chinese President Xi's resemblance to Disney's Winnie the Pooh; and the ill-advised joint U.S.-Chinese film, Great Wall, starring Matt Damon as a mercenary soldier fighting with a secret Chinese army defending the Great Wall of China from monsters.
Recent films produced for China's domestic market are generating higher box office returns. Dying to Survive opened with a $200 million weekend by telling the story of Lu Yong, who took on the high Chinese prices of Western medicine by importing illegal cancer drugs from India. The Wandering Earth, a sci-fi thriller about the expanding sun's threat to Earth, trapped in Jupiter's gravitational pull, netted $440 million during the first ten days of China's New Year of the Pig. By downplaying its Warner Bros. connection, the U.S.-Chinese co-production, The Meg, a film about a deep sea diver who saved a submersible disabled by a prehistoric Megalodon shark, earned $528 million globally.
As in the past, international filmmakers frequently are nominated in the categories: animated and live action shorts. These movies are not shown in many movie theatres, and that is not a loss this year, because, except for two films, they portray depressing themes not suitable for young audiences. Adults and children would enjoy the funny Animal Behavior, however. In this Canadian entry, a dog psychiatrist tries to cure a pig, praying mantis, bird, and other animals of their most annoying habits. A gorilla with anger management issues takes exception to the person in front of him in the "10 or Less" line who wants to count the five bananas in his one bunch separately. He reacts by tearing up her bag of frozen peas and says, "Now, you have a thousand."
Children already may have seen the Oscar-nominated Bao, a Chinese word for dumpling, that Pixar screened before Incredibles 2. On her second try, Bao's director, Domee Shi, was hired by Pixar as an intern. She is now the first female director in its shorts department. At age two, Ms. Shi migrated with her family from Chongqing, China, to Toronto, Canada. Her father, a college professor of fine art and landscape painter, recognized her talent for drawing, and her mother's dumplings sparked the idea of using food as an entry into understanding another culture. Japanese anime films and manga comics and graphic novels also inspired Ms. Shi, as well as the Mexican theme of the animated feature, Coco, that won an Academy Award last year.
China is among the growing number of countries joining Hollywood, India's Bollywood, and Nigeria's Nollywood in the film and music video industries. By 2019, however, authoritarian control by Chinese authorities was causing film investors to flee. On the other hand, filmmakers in Nigeria aided government efforts, when suspicious circumstances delayed a presidential election in Nigeria. A drone camera was deployed to record singing Nigerian film stars urging voters to remain cool in a video shown on social media. Off the east coast on the other side of Africa, the island of Mauritius is using the advantage of year round good weather to attract job-creating firm-makers.
Chinese billionaire Wang Jianlin of the Dalian Wanda Group had high hopes for the 400-acre, 30 sound stage, $8 billion Oriental Movie Metropolis he opened in the east coast port city of Qingdao three years ago. Although offering to pay film-makers 40% of their production costs, producers were wary of censoring by China's State Administration of Press Publications, Radio, Film and Television. Other setbacks included: the failure of China's big budget film tribute to Tibetan mythology, Asura; social media references to Chinese President Xi's resemblance to Disney's Winnie the Pooh; and the ill-advised joint U.S.-Chinese film, Great Wall, starring Matt Damon as a mercenary soldier fighting with a secret Chinese army defending the Great Wall of China from monsters.
Recent films produced for China's domestic market are generating higher box office returns. Dying to Survive opened with a $200 million weekend by telling the story of Lu Yong, who took on the high Chinese prices of Western medicine by importing illegal cancer drugs from India. The Wandering Earth, a sci-fi thriller about the expanding sun's threat to Earth, trapped in Jupiter's gravitational pull, netted $440 million during the first ten days of China's New Year of the Pig. By downplaying its Warner Bros. connection, the U.S.-Chinese co-production, The Meg, a film about a deep sea diver who saved a submersible disabled by a prehistoric Megalodon shark, earned $528 million globally.
Friday, January 4, 2019
What Happens After Wars?
Wise decision making does not need data from another war. Human history already has enough data about the positive and negative results of wars to make additional surveys unnecessary. Marathon runners race 26 miles in the Olympics, because the Greeks defeated the Persians in 490 B.C. But no battle is responsible for Olympic figure skating.
Clearly, wars have resulted in: disarmament, unemployed military personnel and weapon designers and manufacturers, collective security, land grabs and new borders, displaced populations, inflation, economic collapse, new financing for rebuilding, foreign aid, competing ideologies, independence and self determination for ethnic populations, release of prisoners, and medical advances. The question is: could positive outcomes from wars be achieved without bloodshed?
Students attend Model UN meetings to discuss current world problems, and each year the Foreign Policy Association (fpa.org) prepares a Great Decisions Briefing Book and DVD to guide group discussions and provide topics for student essays. There also could be summits where students decide what wartime achievements could be gained without wars. (In 2019, the Great Decisions' discussion topics include: nuclear negotiations, cyberwarfare, U.S.-China trade and U.S.-Mexican relations, regional conflict in the Middle East, refugees/migration, European populism.)
The challenge is to find out how similar subjects have been handled successfully after past wars. Has there ever been a way to incorporate a country's former rebel and military leaders into a productive government? Or could the Kurds who now live in Iraq, Turkey, and Syria break away peacefully and form their own country the way the Czech Republic (Czechia in English) and Slovakia did? Instead, as U.S. troops began pulling out of Syria, President Trump has called on Turkey's government, which is responsible for harsh treatment of its Kurds, to protect the Kurds the U.S. troops fought with in Syria, a questionable idea.
Clearly, wars have resulted in: disarmament, unemployed military personnel and weapon designers and manufacturers, collective security, land grabs and new borders, displaced populations, inflation, economic collapse, new financing for rebuilding, foreign aid, competing ideologies, independence and self determination for ethnic populations, release of prisoners, and medical advances. The question is: could positive outcomes from wars be achieved without bloodshed?
Students attend Model UN meetings to discuss current world problems, and each year the Foreign Policy Association (fpa.org) prepares a Great Decisions Briefing Book and DVD to guide group discussions and provide topics for student essays. There also could be summits where students decide what wartime achievements could be gained without wars. (In 2019, the Great Decisions' discussion topics include: nuclear negotiations, cyberwarfare, U.S.-China trade and U.S.-Mexican relations, regional conflict in the Middle East, refugees/migration, European populism.)
The challenge is to find out how similar subjects have been handled successfully after past wars. Has there ever been a way to incorporate a country's former rebel and military leaders into a productive government? Or could the Kurds who now live in Iraq, Turkey, and Syria break away peacefully and form their own country the way the Czech Republic (Czechia in English) and Slovakia did? Instead, as U.S. troops began pulling out of Syria, President Trump has called on Turkey's government, which is responsible for harsh treatment of its Kurds, to protect the Kurds the U.S. troops fought with in Syria, a questionable idea.
Friday, October 26, 2018
Disabilities Need Not Define Anyone
Nobel prizes do not begin to recognize all the scientific advances overcoming human frailties. Actually, scientists and others have a lot to work with: the capabilities of the human body, including its immune system, and brains.
From a wheelchair-accessible igloo built by a Dad to robotic legs that enabled a veteran to walk for the first time in 30 years, people are not giving up on those with infirmities. A performer with no feet can be "Dancing with the Stars" on TV, a young lady with Downs Syndrome has modeled a gown on a designer's catwalk, a sightless artist's paintings hang in a gallery, a former spy recovered from being poisoned by foreign agents. Google's 2019 Super Bowl commercial showed how video game controllers can be adapted for those with disabilities. Users can open packaging for games with their teeth, if necessary.
Around the world, people are figuring out how to provide the little boost some need to keep connected with society. That's always been done. Ben Franklin realized older people needed bifocals when their eyes' focus changed. Someone came up with white canes to help sighted people look out for the blind. FDR could become President with the help of leg braces, a wheelchair, and a car's driver. And Dr. Salk created a cure for polio so victims of the disease no longer needed these assists.
At abledata.com, check out "assistive technology information" about the wide range of products available to overcome walking, sitting, personal care, communication, hearing, and other limitations.Also see usicd.org (the U.S. International Council on Disabilities), the authors at disabilityinkidlit.com, and read The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl 2 Fuzzy, 2 Furious by Shannon and Dean Hale. A teen character wears a hearing aid.
Several special projects deserve mention. In Washington, D.C., deaf, hard-of-hearing, and hearing employees run a Starbucks using American Sign Language. In Brazil, trendwatching.com tells how a foundation for the blind and a beer institute teamed up to teach blind students to employ their enhanced smell and taste in service to the sensory analysis of beer. The first of "The 50 Best Inventions of 2018" featured by TIME magazine this year (Nov.28/Dec.3, 2018 issue) is a robotic arm that updated the artificial arm, shown on PBS's "Antique Roadshow," that was invented for injured soldiers in the American Civil War.
While helping an 80-year-old friend navigate a luncheon outing, I saw how easily she converted her walker to a wheelchair, locked a brake, and hung her purse on the handle. If she wanted to take any of what she didn't eat home, she had a bag hanging ready on the other handle. To fit in my car, the unlocked walker/chair easily collapsed. In his final years, a therapy dog helped former President George H. W. Bush the way animals, including a horse, assist and comfort ill, blind, and other disabled people.
According to TIME magazine's section on 2018's innovations (Nov. 26/Dec. 3, 2018), three million Americans need to get around in wheelchairs. Whill's new $4,000 electric Model C1 wheelchair, available in different colors, can travel 10 miles indoors and out, climb 2-inch obstacles, maneuver in cramped spaces, and disassemble for transport in minutes.
Elsewhere, scientists work to discover what can help us and what can hurt us. Glyphosate was hailed as a way to rid fields of weeds but it also was discovered to be a possible cancer-causing agent for humans. The same gene editing that promises to rid the world of malaria-carrying mosquitoes can inject dangerous mutations into generations of humans. Controversy continues to fuel debate over how cellphone radiation might contribute to memory loss, brain cancer and sperm damage. The manufacturer of Truvada tries to warn those who use the pill that reduces the risk of contracting HIV through sex that additional safe sex practices are still needed to prevent pregnancy, syphilis and other sexually transmitted infections. Besides, for Truvada or its generic equivalents to work, those who need it have to come forward.
The good news is: young people always will have an opportunity to create ways to overcome human limitations, and all of us humans know there are folks thinking up ways to make our lives better.
From a wheelchair-accessible igloo built by a Dad to robotic legs that enabled a veteran to walk for the first time in 30 years, people are not giving up on those with infirmities. A performer with no feet can be "Dancing with the Stars" on TV, a young lady with Downs Syndrome has modeled a gown on a designer's catwalk, a sightless artist's paintings hang in a gallery, a former spy recovered from being poisoned by foreign agents. Google's 2019 Super Bowl commercial showed how video game controllers can be adapted for those with disabilities. Users can open packaging for games with their teeth, if necessary.
Around the world, people are figuring out how to provide the little boost some need to keep connected with society. That's always been done. Ben Franklin realized older people needed bifocals when their eyes' focus changed. Someone came up with white canes to help sighted people look out for the blind. FDR could become President with the help of leg braces, a wheelchair, and a car's driver. And Dr. Salk created a cure for polio so victims of the disease no longer needed these assists.
At abledata.com, check out "assistive technology information" about the wide range of products available to overcome walking, sitting, personal care, communication, hearing, and other limitations.Also see usicd.org (the U.S. International Council on Disabilities), the authors at disabilityinkidlit.com, and read The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl 2 Fuzzy, 2 Furious by Shannon and Dean Hale. A teen character wears a hearing aid.
Several special projects deserve mention. In Washington, D.C., deaf, hard-of-hearing, and hearing employees run a Starbucks using American Sign Language. In Brazil, trendwatching.com tells how a foundation for the blind and a beer institute teamed up to teach blind students to employ their enhanced smell and taste in service to the sensory analysis of beer. The first of "The 50 Best Inventions of 2018" featured by TIME magazine this year (Nov.28/Dec.3, 2018 issue) is a robotic arm that updated the artificial arm, shown on PBS's "Antique Roadshow," that was invented for injured soldiers in the American Civil War.
While helping an 80-year-old friend navigate a luncheon outing, I saw how easily she converted her walker to a wheelchair, locked a brake, and hung her purse on the handle. If she wanted to take any of what she didn't eat home, she had a bag hanging ready on the other handle. To fit in my car, the unlocked walker/chair easily collapsed. In his final years, a therapy dog helped former President George H. W. Bush the way animals, including a horse, assist and comfort ill, blind, and other disabled people.
According to TIME magazine's section on 2018's innovations (Nov. 26/Dec. 3, 2018), three million Americans need to get around in wheelchairs. Whill's new $4,000 electric Model C1 wheelchair, available in different colors, can travel 10 miles indoors and out, climb 2-inch obstacles, maneuver in cramped spaces, and disassemble for transport in minutes.
Elsewhere, scientists work to discover what can help us and what can hurt us. Glyphosate was hailed as a way to rid fields of weeds but it also was discovered to be a possible cancer-causing agent for humans. The same gene editing that promises to rid the world of malaria-carrying mosquitoes can inject dangerous mutations into generations of humans. Controversy continues to fuel debate over how cellphone radiation might contribute to memory loss, brain cancer and sperm damage. The manufacturer of Truvada tries to warn those who use the pill that reduces the risk of contracting HIV through sex that additional safe sex practices are still needed to prevent pregnancy, syphilis and other sexually transmitted infections. Besides, for Truvada or its generic equivalents to work, those who need it have to come forward.
The good news is: young people always will have an opportunity to create ways to overcome human limitations, and all of us humans know there are folks thinking up ways to make our lives better.
Saturday, July 7, 2018
What Happens When the World's Children Leave Home?
In the news lately, I've been struck by the growing number of children who are with parents fleeing their home countries, who wish they could escape their home countries, who attend schools in a different country, or who just seek foreign adventures.
Brazil's super model, Gisele Bundchen, left her country and married the U.S. New England Patriots quarterback, Tom Brady. Nowadays, nearly two-thirds of those in Brazil's 16-34 year old age population also want to leave the country, even if they aren't leaving to marry a foreign celebrity. Their motivation: escape from a slumping economy, from corruption, and from a lack of police security.
In the recent migration from Mexico and Central America, parents brought as many as 3000 children to the United States also to escape violence, gangs, and rape and to find economic opportunities.
Children among the six million refugees fleeing Syria try to escape the bombs, poisoned gas, and starvation inflicted on their families by the dictator, Bashar al-Assad.
Children also are among the Muslim Rohingya refugees who have fled from Myanmar to Bangladesh to avoid violence in their home country or from Yemen to get away from air attacks.
In Nigeria, terrorists chase women and children from their villages to rape and attack them with knives.
Latest numbers show more than 600,000 students left China last year to study in the West. Many were avoiding, not violence, but the gaokao, a test that values memorization and determines who enters China's top universities.
Was it a youthful quest for adventure that caused 12 Thai boys and their soccer coach to ignore flood warnings and endanger their lives and those of their potential rescuers when they became trapped in a cave between Thailand and Myanmar? One of the boys showed he was a good student when he understood a British rescuer's question about how many were trapped and responded, "13," in English. Two were the first to make it out undertaking a dangerous, submerged two-mile route.
Displaced populations pose a host of problems.They might indicate destabilization in the countries they are fleeing, and they place a burden on the services provided by host countries. Unless new arrivals are accepted and integrated into the host country's population, rising nationalism leads to protests against the government and the immigrants, especially if refugees look different, profess a different religion, and have a different ethnic heritage.
Nuns who work with refugees in the U.S. expect to see victims of violence and those who have suffered the trauma of long journeys, often on foot, who need counseling. Some new arrivals are afraid to go out alone because they are not used to being able to trust anyone. They are amazed when they receive donations of clothing, toys, diapers, and even furniture, such as cribs, from strangers.
Shelters know they need to provide legal services for asylum seekers and bond for detained refugees navigating foreign court systems, where their next court dates might be three years away. When cases are not settled in 180 days in the U.S., attorneys know immigrants are entitled to work permits that enable them to find jobs to support themselves and their families. Asylum used to be granted in the U.S., if someone were escaping domestic or gang violence, but only persecution because of race, religion, political opinion, nationality, or membership in certain groups applies now.
Besides legal aid, families need help learning the local language. Nuns in a U.S. shelter try to make a new language fun by letting children write English words with their fingers in shaving cream. Then, there is the help needed to enroll children in schools, to apply for health services, and to become a member of a religious congregation.
In shelters, nuns see people begin to develop confidence about living among those who speak different languages and have different cultural practices. I remember reading about displaced families from Syria who left where they had been settled in rural Baltic States that provided creature comforts to slip into Germany, where they could join the others who had been settled there and shared their Muslim Arabic culture.
Practices that would seem OK in a home country might be objectionable in a host country. Smoking, spitting, stealing, and getting drunk can fall into that category. Players who join teams from other countries often need to be schooled in the ways of their new countries. For example, women in the U.S. object when Latin baseball players yell, "Hey, chickee babie."
Brazil's super model, Gisele Bundchen, left her country and married the U.S. New England Patriots quarterback, Tom Brady. Nowadays, nearly two-thirds of those in Brazil's 16-34 year old age population also want to leave the country, even if they aren't leaving to marry a foreign celebrity. Their motivation: escape from a slumping economy, from corruption, and from a lack of police security.
In the recent migration from Mexico and Central America, parents brought as many as 3000 children to the United States also to escape violence, gangs, and rape and to find economic opportunities.
Children among the six million refugees fleeing Syria try to escape the bombs, poisoned gas, and starvation inflicted on their families by the dictator, Bashar al-Assad.
Children also are among the Muslim Rohingya refugees who have fled from Myanmar to Bangladesh to avoid violence in their home country or from Yemen to get away from air attacks.
In Nigeria, terrorists chase women and children from their villages to rape and attack them with knives.
Latest numbers show more than 600,000 students left China last year to study in the West. Many were avoiding, not violence, but the gaokao, a test that values memorization and determines who enters China's top universities.
Was it a youthful quest for adventure that caused 12 Thai boys and their soccer coach to ignore flood warnings and endanger their lives and those of their potential rescuers when they became trapped in a cave between Thailand and Myanmar? One of the boys showed he was a good student when he understood a British rescuer's question about how many were trapped and responded, "13," in English. Two were the first to make it out undertaking a dangerous, submerged two-mile route.
Displaced populations pose a host of problems.They might indicate destabilization in the countries they are fleeing, and they place a burden on the services provided by host countries. Unless new arrivals are accepted and integrated into the host country's population, rising nationalism leads to protests against the government and the immigrants, especially if refugees look different, profess a different religion, and have a different ethnic heritage.
Nuns who work with refugees in the U.S. expect to see victims of violence and those who have suffered the trauma of long journeys, often on foot, who need counseling. Some new arrivals are afraid to go out alone because they are not used to being able to trust anyone. They are amazed when they receive donations of clothing, toys, diapers, and even furniture, such as cribs, from strangers.
Shelters know they need to provide legal services for asylum seekers and bond for detained refugees navigating foreign court systems, where their next court dates might be three years away. When cases are not settled in 180 days in the U.S., attorneys know immigrants are entitled to work permits that enable them to find jobs to support themselves and their families. Asylum used to be granted in the U.S., if someone were escaping domestic or gang violence, but only persecution because of race, religion, political opinion, nationality, or membership in certain groups applies now.
Besides legal aid, families need help learning the local language. Nuns in a U.S. shelter try to make a new language fun by letting children write English words with their fingers in shaving cream. Then, there is the help needed to enroll children in schools, to apply for health services, and to become a member of a religious congregation.
In shelters, nuns see people begin to develop confidence about living among those who speak different languages and have different cultural practices. I remember reading about displaced families from Syria who left where they had been settled in rural Baltic States that provided creature comforts to slip into Germany, where they could join the others who had been settled there and shared their Muslim Arabic culture.
Practices that would seem OK in a home country might be objectionable in a host country. Smoking, spitting, stealing, and getting drunk can fall into that category. Players who join teams from other countries often need to be schooled in the ways of their new countries. For example, women in the U.S. object when Latin baseball players yell, "Hey, chickee babie."
Saturday, May 12, 2018
You Have To Be Carefully Taught
If a child has never met a blind student from Peru, a Muslim actor, or a rich Chinese businessman, how will he or she feel about these people? In the musical, South Pacific, the U.S. soldier who begins to fall in love with an island girl he meets during World War II sings "You have to be carefully taught."
Lucky children like Meghan Markle might have a black and a white parent, and a young President Obama even had a mother from the United States and a father from Kenya, got to spend early years in Indonesia, and grew to a young man in the diverse cultures of Hawaii. Lucky kids might get to know Hispanic, black, and white kids while playing basketball together on a neighborhood court. Korean and Italian kids could meet singing together in a church choir. And before a teen in a wheelchair and the school's aspiring ballerina publish their first comic book, they might have worked together on the school's newspaper.
All sorts of robotic, marketing, math, trivia, and forensic competitions bring together kids with different backgrounds and genders. Yet, news events constantly show the danger of relying on luck to form children into adults who acknowledge the similarities and respect the differences of others. The fact is, children have adult mentors who influence them to think about people in ways that help or harm the world.
In the United States, children are about to honor their Mothers on Mother's Day this weekend and their Fathers on Father's Day next month. Around the world, mothers and fathers should be honored, because they are in a powerful position. They can pass on their prejudices or open young minds.
When trendwatching.com reports the Mexican startup company Sign'n, uses software to employ artificial intelligence that translates speech into Mexican sign language, we suspect someone nurtured a young inventor's concern for those marginalized because of their hearing disability. Likewise, visually-impaired Brazilians employed to use their enhanced smell and taste senses as beer sommeliers have someone to thank for helping a young person learn to consider and remedy the needs of others.
A Muslim friend recently introduced me to a book, Crescent Moons and Pointed Minarets, that uses rhymes and English translations of Arabic to present various shapes and to convey Islamic traditions and terms. At the end of the book, a Glossary provides definitions of the Arabic words used and a phonetic guide to their pronunciations.
As an example of the way the book's author, Hena Khan, and artist, Mehrdokht Amini, combine words and art, picture how, under an arch embellished with complex borders and patterns of flowers and vines that resemble those in Persian rugs. readers learn:
Lucky children like Meghan Markle might have a black and a white parent, and a young President Obama even had a mother from the United States and a father from Kenya, got to spend early years in Indonesia, and grew to a young man in the diverse cultures of Hawaii. Lucky kids might get to know Hispanic, black, and white kids while playing basketball together on a neighborhood court. Korean and Italian kids could meet singing together in a church choir. And before a teen in a wheelchair and the school's aspiring ballerina publish their first comic book, they might have worked together on the school's newspaper.
All sorts of robotic, marketing, math, trivia, and forensic competitions bring together kids with different backgrounds and genders. Yet, news events constantly show the danger of relying on luck to form children into adults who acknowledge the similarities and respect the differences of others. The fact is, children have adult mentors who influence them to think about people in ways that help or harm the world.
In the United States, children are about to honor their Mothers on Mother's Day this weekend and their Fathers on Father's Day next month. Around the world, mothers and fathers should be honored, because they are in a powerful position. They can pass on their prejudices or open young minds.
When trendwatching.com reports the Mexican startup company Sign'n, uses software to employ artificial intelligence that translates speech into Mexican sign language, we suspect someone nurtured a young inventor's concern for those marginalized because of their hearing disability. Likewise, visually-impaired Brazilians employed to use their enhanced smell and taste senses as beer sommeliers have someone to thank for helping a young person learn to consider and remedy the needs of others.
A Muslim friend recently introduced me to a book, Crescent Moons and Pointed Minarets, that uses rhymes and English translations of Arabic to present various shapes and to convey Islamic traditions and terms. At the end of the book, a Glossary provides definitions of the Arabic words used and a phonetic guide to their pronunciations.
As an example of the way the book's author, Hena Khan, and artist, Mehrdokht Amini, combine words and art, picture how, under an arch embellished with complex borders and patterns of flowers and vines that resemble those in Persian rugs. readers learn:
Arch is the mihrab
that guides our way.
We stand and face it
each time we pray.
In contrast to picturing Muslims as over a billion religious people known for the early contributions of their mathematicians and astronomers, today's news reports Boko Haram added to its Nigerian terrorist kidnappings and killings by bombing a mosque and market. And Islamic fighters in Iraq commit genocide and sell Yazidi women and girls into slavery or hold them as sex slaves. Somehow these Muslims have not been carefully taught right from wrong.
Regimes, like those in Iran, China, and Russia, seem oppressive because they censure the broadcast and social media they allow their populations to see. But aren't we doing much the same thing, when algorithms select the books we read, the films we watch, and the news and ads we see, or when we self-censure by only watching the cable news stations that agree with us? Teaching ourselves and our children to keep open minds takes work, work both needed and worth doing...very carefully.
Wednesday, April 4, 2018
Student Elections: Training for the Real Thing
Since votes in elections cause or hinder action, student elections offer a meaningful training ground for affecting change. Even massive demonstrations, such as the March for Our Lives of U.S. students demanding actions to eliminate gun violence, cannot have as great an impact as an elections where voters choose or defeat candidates, such as those funded by the National Rifle Association (NRA).
Before student elections, urge student voters to discuss the elements of fair and winning elections.
Candidate selection: Should anyone be allowed to run? Should candidates need to get a certain number of signatures? Could committees select candidates? Should there be a primary election to narrow the choice of candidates? What affects a candidate's popularity? Research shows candidates can use status or likability models. Status comes from a person's visibility, dominance, and influence on a group. These candidates gain attention by bullying and disparaging voters and by exercising power over them with control of the media, a commanding voice, and even their height. Likability is related to treating people with respect, cooperating/compromising, and knowing how to help people feel good about themselves. A likable leader connects with people and involves everyone in creating group norms, harmony, and a solution everyone buys into.
Funding: What costs go into an election? Posters, flyers, giveaway items, ballots, voting booths, ballot boxes, travel expenses, communication, staff, including staff for accurate tabulation of ballots. Who pays for each? Should there be a spending limit? Can candidates allowed to distribute candy or some other type of "bribe"?
Date of election and event scheduling: One day of voting or more? How soon after new students enter a school should an election be scheduled? Should those about to graduate vote for those who will attend next year? Select dates that do not conflict with other major events. When should elections be announced?
Length of campaign: Should campaigns have beginning and ending dates? or be open-ended?
Platform: What is most important to voters? Should voters be surveyed to identify main issues?
Can candidates get away with wild promises? lies?
Campaign slogans: What to say? Negative or positive themes. How many words? Include candidate's name? Where to use slogan (posters, bumper stickers, yard signs, T-shirts, commercials)? I still remember this slogan a student used in a high school election campaign, "You will not be forgotten. Cast your vote for Kathy Hotten." Check out student election poster samples at
postermywall.com/index.php/posters/search?s=student election.
Public events: Will each candidate have a campaign kickoff event? Will all candidates give a speech at an all school assembly? Will candidates visit each classroom? Will students be invited to submit questions a moderator could ask candidates at an assembly? How many events?
Dirty tricks: What are some examples? How will hecklers by handled? Misplaced/stolen ballot boxes. Do you need security officers?
Voter eligibility: Need to develop voter lists. If those who check voter lists won't know everyone, how will voters identify themselves and be sure to only vote once? Print official ballots in a way they can't be copied (colored paper?)
If students have an opportunity to watch an election campaign in any country, they could write a short paper about their observations and make a prediction of whom they think will win.
Upcoming presidential elections in 2018
Before student elections, urge student voters to discuss the elements of fair and winning elections.
Candidate selection: Should anyone be allowed to run? Should candidates need to get a certain number of signatures? Could committees select candidates? Should there be a primary election to narrow the choice of candidates? What affects a candidate's popularity? Research shows candidates can use status or likability models. Status comes from a person's visibility, dominance, and influence on a group. These candidates gain attention by bullying and disparaging voters and by exercising power over them with control of the media, a commanding voice, and even their height. Likability is related to treating people with respect, cooperating/compromising, and knowing how to help people feel good about themselves. A likable leader connects with people and involves everyone in creating group norms, harmony, and a solution everyone buys into.
Funding: What costs go into an election? Posters, flyers, giveaway items, ballots, voting booths, ballot boxes, travel expenses, communication, staff, including staff for accurate tabulation of ballots. Who pays for each? Should there be a spending limit? Can candidates allowed to distribute candy or some other type of "bribe"?
Date of election and event scheduling: One day of voting or more? How soon after new students enter a school should an election be scheduled? Should those about to graduate vote for those who will attend next year? Select dates that do not conflict with other major events. When should elections be announced?
Length of campaign: Should campaigns have beginning and ending dates? or be open-ended?
Platform: What is most important to voters? Should voters be surveyed to identify main issues?
Can candidates get away with wild promises? lies?
Campaign slogans: What to say? Negative or positive themes. How many words? Include candidate's name? Where to use slogan (posters, bumper stickers, yard signs, T-shirts, commercials)? I still remember this slogan a student used in a high school election campaign, "You will not be forgotten. Cast your vote for Kathy Hotten." Check out student election poster samples at
postermywall.com/index.php/posters/search?s=student election.
Public events: Will each candidate have a campaign kickoff event? Will all candidates give a speech at an all school assembly? Will candidates visit each classroom? Will students be invited to submit questions a moderator could ask candidates at an assembly? How many events?
Dirty tricks: What are some examples? How will hecklers by handled? Misplaced/stolen ballot boxes. Do you need security officers?
Voter eligibility: Need to develop voter lists. If those who check voter lists won't know everyone, how will voters identify themselves and be sure to only vote once? Print official ballots in a way they can't be copied (colored paper?)
If students have an opportunity to watch an election campaign in any country, they could write a short paper about their observations and make a prediction of whom they think will win.
Upcoming presidential elections in 2018
- Azerbaijan, April 11
- Montenegro, April 15
- Paraguay, April 22
- Venezuela, May 20
- Colombia, May 27
- Mexico, July 1
- Mali, July 29
- Bosnia and Herzegovina, October 7
- Brazil, October 7
- Afghanistan, October 20
- Madagascar, November 24
- Democratic Republic of the Congo, December 23
Tuesday, February 6, 2018
February's International Film Festival
One of the most pleasant ways to learn about a country is to go to a movie made in or about somewhere you don't live. When Oscar nominations for short and feature films are announced, it's time to start looking for theatres that show them, because many of these potential Academy Award winners have an international connection.
This year, in the animated shorts category, South Africa presents Revolting Rhymes based on Ronald Dahl's dark spin on fairy tales. One French short, Negative Space, shows a sad relationship between father and son can exist in any culture, and, in another French short, two amphibians explore a deserted mansion. These shorts are shown together with two U.S. films: the Pixar short, Lou, that ran before Cars and Kobe Bryant's retirement letter, Dear Basketball.
Since the live action shorts nominated for Oscars often portray news events, they can be a pleasant way to see both uplifting and unpleasant aspects of a country. Watu Wote (All of Us) shows how Muslims risked their lives to protect the Christians riding on a bus with them, when Islamic terrorists attacked in Kenya. The British short, The Silent Child, introduces the social worker who taught a deaf 4-year-old girl the sign language that enabled her to come out of the shadows and be included in family conversations. Two U.S. entries cover a school shooting in Atlanta titled DeKalb Elementary and My Nephew Emmett based on the 1955 racist murder of Emmett Till. Australian humor is on display in The Eleven O'Clock, a short about an appointment between a psychiatrist and patient that try to treat each other.
Families already may have seen the animated feature, Coco, which has a Mexican theme depicting how a death in the family shouldn't end memories of a relative. Loving Vincent probably won't have wide distribution, but if young people have a chance to see this Polish-British feature, it might be their only time to see a movie where each frame about Vincent Van Gogh is made by an oil painting. Since Angelina Jolie produced The Breadwinner, this animated feature likely has wider distribution. It shows how an 11-year-old girl disguised herself as a boy to grow up with more opportunities under the Taliban in Afghanistan.
Although too advanced to be appropriate or understood by young people, the live action foreign language films nominated for Academy Awards provide adults with points of view from Chile (A Fantastic Woman), Lebanon (The Insult), Russia (Loveless), Hungary (On Body and Soul), and Sweden (The Square).
Oscar winners will be announced on Sunday, March 4, 2018.
This year, in the animated shorts category, South Africa presents Revolting Rhymes based on Ronald Dahl's dark spin on fairy tales. One French short, Negative Space, shows a sad relationship between father and son can exist in any culture, and, in another French short, two amphibians explore a deserted mansion. These shorts are shown together with two U.S. films: the Pixar short, Lou, that ran before Cars and Kobe Bryant's retirement letter, Dear Basketball.
Since the live action shorts nominated for Oscars often portray news events, they can be a pleasant way to see both uplifting and unpleasant aspects of a country. Watu Wote (All of Us) shows how Muslims risked their lives to protect the Christians riding on a bus with them, when Islamic terrorists attacked in Kenya. The British short, The Silent Child, introduces the social worker who taught a deaf 4-year-old girl the sign language that enabled her to come out of the shadows and be included in family conversations. Two U.S. entries cover a school shooting in Atlanta titled DeKalb Elementary and My Nephew Emmett based on the 1955 racist murder of Emmett Till. Australian humor is on display in The Eleven O'Clock, a short about an appointment between a psychiatrist and patient that try to treat each other.
Families already may have seen the animated feature, Coco, which has a Mexican theme depicting how a death in the family shouldn't end memories of a relative. Loving Vincent probably won't have wide distribution, but if young people have a chance to see this Polish-British feature, it might be their only time to see a movie where each frame about Vincent Van Gogh is made by an oil painting. Since Angelina Jolie produced The Breadwinner, this animated feature likely has wider distribution. It shows how an 11-year-old girl disguised herself as a boy to grow up with more opportunities under the Taliban in Afghanistan.
Although too advanced to be appropriate or understood by young people, the live action foreign language films nominated for Academy Awards provide adults with points of view from Chile (A Fantastic Woman), Lebanon (The Insult), Russia (Loveless), Hungary (On Body and Soul), and Sweden (The Square).
Oscar winners will be announced on Sunday, March 4, 2018.
Saturday, October 28, 2017
World's Water Glass: Half Full
Around the world, people who have taken to heart United Nations statistics about water, 663,000,000 people don't have access to safe drinking water and 80% of untreated human wastewater discharges into rivers and seas, are coming up with creative methods to reach the U.N.'s goal: universal access to safe, affordable water.
Members of the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility (ICCR), which includes religious orders, are activist shareholders in key companies. At corporate meetings, they file resolutions requiring corporations to hold suppliers responsible for safe water practices, since, under the U.S. Clean Water Act, companies can be charged with criminal violations in federal courts. Tyson Foods, for example, has paid millions in fines for dumping fish-killing water from its chicken slaughtering and processing facility into a Missouri creek.
Even if ICCR resolutions don't gain enough support for a vote at a corporate annual meeting, ICCR members meet with corporation executives directly. They successfully pressured the Campbell Soup Corporation to monitor activities in its supply chain. Farmers who fail to meet Campbell's standards for water conservation practices are no longer suppliers. In Africa and Central Asia, ICCR members help villagers who wash in polluted water where mines and tanneries dump harmful chemicals, contact executives in multinational corporations and present their cases for pressuring suppliers to treat water responsibly.
Lack of access to drinkable water in developing countries is especially hard on the women and children who walk miles to wells each day rather than attend school or work for an income. Children also have drowned when water swept them away, while they were filling buckets in streams. Working in villages in 41 countries, including in disaster areas after earthquakes in Mexico and during the war in Syria, nongovernmental organizations, Mother's Hope and Water with Blessings, identify smart young mothers they call "water women" and educate them to share free information about hygiene and how to purify dirty water using a portable filtration system.
Unlike India and Bangladesh, countries that worry a Chinese dam will cut off their water supply from a river that flows south from Tibet, conflict between Muslims in northern Cameroon and the Christians in the South does not prevent harmonious cooperation on OK Clean Water projects in over 50 villages. First, villagers locate an accessible source of spring water. Then, the OK Clean Water organization's partnership of unskilled workers and skilled help from a local water engineer go to work using local materials. From the top of a hill, gravity carries spring water through pipes to a large storage tank and then to faucets close to villages.
In The House of Unexpected Sisters, the latest book in an Alexander McCall Smith series, the protagonist describes a system for watering her vegetable garden in Botswana, Africa.
From a drain in the house, a hose pipe stretches across the dusty garden to raised vegetable beds in the back of their plot. "There the hose fed the water into an old oil drum that acted as reservoir and from which much smaller pipes led to the individual beds. The final stage in the engineering marvel was the trailing of cotton threads from a bucket suspended above the plants; water would run down this thread drop by drop to the foot of each plant's stem. No water thus fell on ground where nothing grew; every drop reached exactly the tiny patch of ground where it was needed."
Contributions to both kiva.org and Water.org fund small loans to help villagers gain access to safe water. At kiva, for $25, individuals can choose water and sanitation projects in the regions of the world where they want to invest. Kiva gift cards are wonderful holiday stocking stuffers and birthday gifts that help students get involved in solving world problems.
UNICEF USA (at PO Box 96964, Washington, DC 20077-7399) collects donations of:
$92 for the personal hygiene and dignity kits 2 families need in emergencies
$234 for 50,000 water tablets that purify deadly, polluted water to make it safe for a child to drink
$415 for a water hand pump that provides clean, safe drinking water for an entire community
Wells of Life (wellsoflife.org), a nonprofit organization that builds wells in East Africa, gratefully accepts donations from those who would like to build a well dedicated to an individual or group. A member of the organization's advisory board, John Velasquez, recently dedicated his contribution for a bore hole and water well in Uganda to a Benedictine nun on her 104th birthday.
Finally, major research projects are working on large scale government policy solutions to the world's water crisis. Based on studies, mayflies, stoneflies, and caddisflies have been found to help governments predict the health of streams and rivers all over the world. When these aquatic insects disappear, water is in trouble.
As urban populations grow throughout the world and pavement covers land that used to absorb water, policies for managing both scarce water and floods become critically important. When Sao Paulo, Brazil, managed a drought by reducing pump pressure at certain times of the day, there were unintended consequences. Homes on higher elevations often had no water, while tanks serving homes in lower elevations never had a shortage. Studies showed a lack of central control over water management in Mumbai, India, gave control to plumbers who knew each area and those who had the political connections to hire them. It is no surprise to find flood conditions require government budgeting for backup energy sources to provide electricity to keep water pumps and drinking water treatment plants working.
Water is everywhere and so are the people determined to find it, keep it clean, and manage it effectively.
Tuesday, June 13, 2017
Babies Helped with Unused Vojta Therapy
Using the Vojta (YOY-tuh) method, developed by the Czech neurologist, Vaclav Vojta, in the early 1950s, pressure applied to nine zones of a baby's body can activate muscles, mental activity, and proper breathing in those born with the motor disabilities associated with cerebral palsy and Down's syndrome.
One medical book describes Down's syndrome as a birth defect of Mongoloid children who have "stubby fingers and hands, a flat face, slanted eyes and a sweet disposition." The book goes on to say, "Mongolism can usually be detected by sampling the amniotic fluid so that an abortion can be performed if the fetus is affected."
Why would doctors skip to an abortion, when the development of a baby with a sweet disposition could be helped by the Vojta method, used, not only in the Czech Republic, but also in Germany, Italy, Norway, Poland, Romania, Taiwan, Korea, Japan, India, Mexico, Chile, Colombia, Peru, and Syria?
A Vojta therapist at the Jubilee Mission Medical College and Research Institute in Thrissur, India,
suggests the therapy is not widely used, because there is no profit payoff. Once parents are trained, they perform the pressure therapy regularly at home with no equipment or drugs. Perhaps, there also is another answer. As in the case of blue light phototherapy found to destroy the superbugs that resist the antibiotics used to kill staph infections, Western doctors discounted research on the Vojta method conducted in a country behind the Iron Curtain during the Cold War (See the earlier post, "Medical Profession Suffers from International Conflict.")
Since the successful reduction of motor problems depends on how early the Vojta treatment begins and how efficiently it is applied, there should be no delay in trying this therapy in every country. After undergoing treatment before a baby turns 1 year old, although there is no cure for the underlying medical defects, speech problems and a delay in crawling and walking can be overcome. Most Vojta-treated children can learn to speak and walk.
One medical book describes Down's syndrome as a birth defect of Mongoloid children who have "stubby fingers and hands, a flat face, slanted eyes and a sweet disposition." The book goes on to say, "Mongolism can usually be detected by sampling the amniotic fluid so that an abortion can be performed if the fetus is affected."
Why would doctors skip to an abortion, when the development of a baby with a sweet disposition could be helped by the Vojta method, used, not only in the Czech Republic, but also in Germany, Italy, Norway, Poland, Romania, Taiwan, Korea, Japan, India, Mexico, Chile, Colombia, Peru, and Syria?
A Vojta therapist at the Jubilee Mission Medical College and Research Institute in Thrissur, India,
suggests the therapy is not widely used, because there is no profit payoff. Once parents are trained, they perform the pressure therapy regularly at home with no equipment or drugs. Perhaps, there also is another answer. As in the case of blue light phototherapy found to destroy the superbugs that resist the antibiotics used to kill staph infections, Western doctors discounted research on the Vojta method conducted in a country behind the Iron Curtain during the Cold War (See the earlier post, "Medical Profession Suffers from International Conflict.")
Since the successful reduction of motor problems depends on how early the Vojta treatment begins and how efficiently it is applied, there should be no delay in trying this therapy in every country. After undergoing treatment before a baby turns 1 year old, although there is no cure for the underlying medical defects, speech problems and a delay in crawling and walking can be overcome. Most Vojta-treated children can learn to speak and walk.
Tuesday, August 2, 2016
Share the Olympic Experience
Teams coming from around the world to begin competing in the Olympic Games Friday will experience new people, products and sights in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. To help us share their experiences, I checked the innovations trendwatching.com now sees in Central and South America.
In Brazil, Olympians might pick up a new smartphone and learn Twizer provides help choosing apps, making the most of apps, and incorporating a new phone into daily lives. The Twizer service is free for everyone.
Other interesting things Olympians might hear about in Brazil include: the fact that for six hours on one day, Uber drivers picked up clothes, bedding, personal hygiene items, non-perishable food, and pet products for free to help Porto Alegre Prefecture's vulnerable people during the winter. Olympians might see the Ben & Jerry's inspired social media campaign, #amoreprogresso, disagree with love. Last spring Ben & Jerry's opened its store in Sao Paolo to let people discuss, over ice cream, contentious issues about corruption and politics.
Olympians coming from countries with a corruption problem also might look into Peruleaks, an independent, secure platform that enables citizens anonymously to provide encrypted information about crimes and corruption to journalists who check accuracy before publishing a whistleblower's observations. Peru's Peruleaks is part of the Associated Whistleblowing Press (AWP), a Belgium-based nonprofit, that combats corruption.
Venezuela is trying out a new crime fighting measure of interest to Olympians from almost any country. In the El Hatillo district of Venezuela, empty out-of-service police cars park in the city's most dangerous areas to serve as a security presence criminals are loath to ignore.
Olympians from countries writing a new constitution, such as Thailand, might ask competitors from Mexico to tell them about the system in Mexico City that invites citizens: 1) to submit proposals for a new constitution at Change.org and 2) to vote on proposed changes. Ideas that receive more than 10,000 signatures are submitted for consideration by a government panel.
Athletes determined to keep fit by eating healthy foods with no added hormones would be interested in the Chilean company called the NotCompany, which relies on the artificial intelligence (AI) expertise of the Giuseppe startup to make meats, cheeses, and milk out of nuts, peas, grains, and other plant-based crops.
Female Olympians thinking about life after competition could check out Peru's Laboratoria program for training women with little to no computer science knowledge and no college education. After graduating from a 5-month coding course, women receive job placement services in Peru, Chile, and Mexico.
And, finally, what can Olympians do with plastic bottles after they finish drinking their water? If they pass through Panama, they might see the Plastic Bottle Village being built by a Canadian entrepreneur. Once steel mesh frames are filled with up to 10,000 plastic bottles for insulation, concrete covers the frames to make walls.
In Brazil, Olympians might pick up a new smartphone and learn Twizer provides help choosing apps, making the most of apps, and incorporating a new phone into daily lives. The Twizer service is free for everyone.
Other interesting things Olympians might hear about in Brazil include: the fact that for six hours on one day, Uber drivers picked up clothes, bedding, personal hygiene items, non-perishable food, and pet products for free to help Porto Alegre Prefecture's vulnerable people during the winter. Olympians might see the Ben & Jerry's inspired social media campaign, #amoreprogresso, disagree with love. Last spring Ben & Jerry's opened its store in Sao Paolo to let people discuss, over ice cream, contentious issues about corruption and politics.
Olympians coming from countries with a corruption problem also might look into Peruleaks, an independent, secure platform that enables citizens anonymously to provide encrypted information about crimes and corruption to journalists who check accuracy before publishing a whistleblower's observations. Peru's Peruleaks is part of the Associated Whistleblowing Press (AWP), a Belgium-based nonprofit, that combats corruption.
Venezuela is trying out a new crime fighting measure of interest to Olympians from almost any country. In the El Hatillo district of Venezuela, empty out-of-service police cars park in the city's most dangerous areas to serve as a security presence criminals are loath to ignore.
Olympians from countries writing a new constitution, such as Thailand, might ask competitors from Mexico to tell them about the system in Mexico City that invites citizens: 1) to submit proposals for a new constitution at Change.org and 2) to vote on proposed changes. Ideas that receive more than 10,000 signatures are submitted for consideration by a government panel.
Athletes determined to keep fit by eating healthy foods with no added hormones would be interested in the Chilean company called the NotCompany, which relies on the artificial intelligence (AI) expertise of the Giuseppe startup to make meats, cheeses, and milk out of nuts, peas, grains, and other plant-based crops.
Female Olympians thinking about life after competition could check out Peru's Laboratoria program for training women with little to no computer science knowledge and no college education. After graduating from a 5-month coding course, women receive job placement services in Peru, Chile, and Mexico.
And, finally, what can Olympians do with plastic bottles after they finish drinking their water? If they pass through Panama, they might see the Plastic Bottle Village being built by a Canadian entrepreneur. Once steel mesh frames are filled with up to 10,000 plastic bottles for insulation, concrete covers the frames to make walls.
Thursday, June 23, 2016
Characters with Diverse Nationalities Populate A Summer Reading List
Children who read for fun under a shady tree or beach umbrella this summer will be in good company. Microsoft's co-founder, Bill Gates, considers "the chance to sit outside reading a great book" summer's gift for "gutting out" the rest of the year inside.
No doubt young people will find the reading list selections made by Elizabeth Perez, a children's librarian at the San Francisco Public Library, more to their liking than the books Bill Gates put on his list:
The Vital Question by Nick Lane, who explores the role energy plays in all living things, and
How Not to be Wrong, Jordan Ellenberg's take on the role of math in all things, and
Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind, in which Noah Yuval Harari speculates on the way things like artificial intelligence and genetic engineering will change future humans.
Perez chose books featuring characters with diverse nationalities, including children from Mexico, the Caribbean, Guatemala, Ghana, Somalia, and Korea. Her choices also include children who have dual nationalities, American and Vietnamese, for example. She has age-appropriate selections for students from age 4 to age 14.
For ages 4-8
Emmanuel's Dream: the True Story of Emmanuel Ofosu Yeboah by Laurie Ann Thompson.
A Ghanaian boy, born with one less developed leg, becomes a professional athlete.
For ages 5-8
I'm New Here by Anne Sebley O'Brien
Children from Guatemala, Somalia, and Korea begin to adjust to a new school with the help of new classmates.
Mango, Abuela, and Me by Meg Medina
A parrot becomes a go-between for a little girl who doesn't speak Spanish and her grandmother who does.
Mama's Nightingale: A Story of Immigration and Separation by Edwidge Danticat
Librarian Perez advises adults to read this book first before deciding if children should find out letters are the only way some children have contact with their parents in detention camps.
For ages 5-9
Juna's Jar by Jane Bank
Juna uses a Korean kinchi jar to store her dreams.
For ages 6-10
Funny Bones: Posada and His Day of the Dead Calaveras by Duncan Tonatiuh
A non-fiction book about an illustrator famous for drawing Mexican Day of the Dead skeletons.
For ages 8-12
Listen, Slowly by Thanhha Lai
Unwillingly an American girl visits Vietnam with her Vietnamese father and grandmother to learn what happened to her grandfather during the Vietnam War and to discover the Vietnamese part of her identity.
Full Cicada Moon by Marilyn Hilton
This book uses a half Japanese girl's interest in space to describe her feeling of being an alien in a town where almost everyone is white.
For ages 9-12
The Jumbies by Tracey Baptiste
An heroic young girl is determined to save her Caribbean island from the ghostly Jumbies that appear in folk tales.
For ages 10-14
Echo by Pam Munoz Ryan
During World War II a harmonica weaves together stories about a family living in Nazi Germany and a Mexican-American family and Japanese-American family living in the United States.
No doubt young people will find the reading list selections made by Elizabeth Perez, a children's librarian at the San Francisco Public Library, more to their liking than the books Bill Gates put on his list:
The Vital Question by Nick Lane, who explores the role energy plays in all living things, and
How Not to be Wrong, Jordan Ellenberg's take on the role of math in all things, and
Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind, in which Noah Yuval Harari speculates on the way things like artificial intelligence and genetic engineering will change future humans.
Perez chose books featuring characters with diverse nationalities, including children from Mexico, the Caribbean, Guatemala, Ghana, Somalia, and Korea. Her choices also include children who have dual nationalities, American and Vietnamese, for example. She has age-appropriate selections for students from age 4 to age 14.
For ages 4-8
Emmanuel's Dream: the True Story of Emmanuel Ofosu Yeboah by Laurie Ann Thompson.
A Ghanaian boy, born with one less developed leg, becomes a professional athlete.
For ages 5-8
I'm New Here by Anne Sebley O'Brien
Children from Guatemala, Somalia, and Korea begin to adjust to a new school with the help of new classmates.
Mango, Abuela, and Me by Meg Medina
A parrot becomes a go-between for a little girl who doesn't speak Spanish and her grandmother who does.
Mama's Nightingale: A Story of Immigration and Separation by Edwidge Danticat
Librarian Perez advises adults to read this book first before deciding if children should find out letters are the only way some children have contact with their parents in detention camps.
For ages 5-9
Juna's Jar by Jane Bank
Juna uses a Korean kinchi jar to store her dreams.
For ages 6-10
Funny Bones: Posada and His Day of the Dead Calaveras by Duncan Tonatiuh
A non-fiction book about an illustrator famous for drawing Mexican Day of the Dead skeletons.
For ages 8-12
Listen, Slowly by Thanhha Lai
Unwillingly an American girl visits Vietnam with her Vietnamese father and grandmother to learn what happened to her grandfather during the Vietnam War and to discover the Vietnamese part of her identity.
Full Cicada Moon by Marilyn Hilton
This book uses a half Japanese girl's interest in space to describe her feeling of being an alien in a town where almost everyone is white.
For ages 9-12
The Jumbies by Tracey Baptiste
An heroic young girl is determined to save her Caribbean island from the ghostly Jumbies that appear in folk tales.
For ages 10-14
Echo by Pam Munoz Ryan
During World War II a harmonica weaves together stories about a family living in Nazi Germany and a Mexican-American family and Japanese-American family living in the United States.
Saturday, April 9, 2016
Let There Be Environmentally Friendly Light
An estimated 1.3 billion people live without electricity in the so-called off-grid world. Even in countries that are moving from low-income to middle-income status, such as India, Ghana, Pakistan, and Vietnam, Bill Gates has observed that there are pockets of poverty that have no electricity. Unless families can purchase an expensive and heavy lead storage battery that needs to be carried to and recharged at a shop all day, going outside after dark is dangerous, indoor kerosene lamps release toxic fumes, and children can barely read or do homework by candlelight.
Around the world, individuals, non-profit organizations, and for-profit companies are working on solar solutions that provide electricity without increasing greenhouse gases from fossil fuels.
Thanks to startup funds from Pepsi, the Zayed Future Energy Prize, and other sources, Philippines-based Liter of Light is putting solar-powered lights in thousands of low-income homes in the Philippines, Colombia, Malaysia, and Mexico. Liter for Light is a project run by the non-governmental-organization, My Shelter Foundation, founded by social entrepreneur and actor IllacDiaz. While studying in the US at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Diaz discovered an invention by Brazilian mechanic, Alfredo Moser. Moser had used sunlight on water in a plastic bottle (including some bleach to prevent algae growth) to emit light from a ceiling "bulb" during the day. At night, light was emitted from a plastic water bottle holding LEDs wired to a little solar panel that had been exposed to sun for three to four hours during the day.
M-Kopa Solar is the Kenya-based "pay-as-you-go" commercial energy supplier for 280,000 homes in Kenya, Tanzania, and Uganda that lack electricity connections. Customers buy a $30 solar system that they operate with credits for use purchased in 50 cent increments. Of the $51 million
M-Kopa Solar raised in 2010, London-based Generation Investment Management invested $19 million. Debt and other investments accounted for the rest.
Solar Home System is a project developed by South Korean, Akas Kim, in order to install a rooftop solar panel that can light homes in Cambodia for four hours. Families combine their incomes to make an initial payment of $200 and another $350 in monthly installments.
South Korea's 2007 Social Enterprise Promotion Act is worth studying by other countries. By providing work spaces, mentoring, and government and private funding from companies such as Samsung and Hyundai, the Act backs startups that have a social purpose.
(An earlier post, "Don't Study by the Fire," mentions a backpack that has a solar powered light.)
Around the world, individuals, non-profit organizations, and for-profit companies are working on solar solutions that provide electricity without increasing greenhouse gases from fossil fuels.
Thanks to startup funds from Pepsi, the Zayed Future Energy Prize, and other sources, Philippines-based Liter of Light is putting solar-powered lights in thousands of low-income homes in the Philippines, Colombia, Malaysia, and Mexico. Liter for Light is a project run by the non-governmental-organization, My Shelter Foundation, founded by social entrepreneur and actor IllacDiaz. While studying in the US at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Diaz discovered an invention by Brazilian mechanic, Alfredo Moser. Moser had used sunlight on water in a plastic bottle (including some bleach to prevent algae growth) to emit light from a ceiling "bulb" during the day. At night, light was emitted from a plastic water bottle holding LEDs wired to a little solar panel that had been exposed to sun for three to four hours during the day.
M-Kopa Solar is the Kenya-based "pay-as-you-go" commercial energy supplier for 280,000 homes in Kenya, Tanzania, and Uganda that lack electricity connections. Customers buy a $30 solar system that they operate with credits for use purchased in 50 cent increments. Of the $51 million
M-Kopa Solar raised in 2010, London-based Generation Investment Management invested $19 million. Debt and other investments accounted for the rest.
Solar Home System is a project developed by South Korean, Akas Kim, in order to install a rooftop solar panel that can light homes in Cambodia for four hours. Families combine their incomes to make an initial payment of $200 and another $350 in monthly installments.
South Korea's 2007 Social Enterprise Promotion Act is worth studying by other countries. By providing work spaces, mentoring, and government and private funding from companies such as Samsung and Hyundai, the Act backs startups that have a social purpose.
(An earlier post, "Don't Study by the Fire," mentions a backpack that has a solar powered light.)
Sunday, March 20, 2016
Diamond Flaws
President Obama will visit one kind of diamond, when he takes in a baseball game in Cuba this week.* And June brides have a many-faceted diamond on their ring fingers. For the independent miners paying the violent armed groups who control access to the rivers in the Central African Republic (CAR), the diamonds they find represent a treacherous way to scrape out a living.
These miners are far removed from those who wear the diamonds and gold found in the CAR, Zimbabwe, Burkina Faso, Angola, and Mexico and the precious stones from Afghanistan and Myanmar (Burma) and from those who rely on the mobile phones, cars, computers, and other products that contain tungsten from Colombia and tantalum, tungsten, and cobalt from the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Before these raw materials become part of finished products, they change hands often in secretive and poorly regulated supply chains that span the globe.
The UN, OECD, US, and EU all are taking measures to pressure companies to ask their mineral suppliers more questions and to notice warning signs. Berne Declaration, a Swiss non-governmental organization (NGO), knew Togo produced little or no gold, yet Swiss companies thought they were buying gold that originated there. Instead, their gold was coming from Burkina Faso. True to its advertising, De Beers is assuring consumers "a diamond is forever" by launching a pilot program to buy diamond jewelry and loose diamonds for resale, thereby reducing the need to buy new diamonds from unknown sources.
Not only is there growing concern about the human rights abuses associated with the dangers independent miners face, but conflict in the world's poorest countries relies in part on financing from selling licenses to miners, collecting tolls on transportation routes to the mines, taxes, and mineral sales. In Zimbabwe, even the national security forces and secret police supplement their government budgets and escape government oversight by engaging in the mineral trade.
There are money and jobs enough in the mineral trade for both miners and manufacturers to benefit by behaving responsibly.
*See the earlier post, "Good News from Cuba," for background on President Obama's trip to Cuba.
These miners are far removed from those who wear the diamonds and gold found in the CAR, Zimbabwe, Burkina Faso, Angola, and Mexico and the precious stones from Afghanistan and Myanmar (Burma) and from those who rely on the mobile phones, cars, computers, and other products that contain tungsten from Colombia and tantalum, tungsten, and cobalt from the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Before these raw materials become part of finished products, they change hands often in secretive and poorly regulated supply chains that span the globe.
The UN, OECD, US, and EU all are taking measures to pressure companies to ask their mineral suppliers more questions and to notice warning signs. Berne Declaration, a Swiss non-governmental organization (NGO), knew Togo produced little or no gold, yet Swiss companies thought they were buying gold that originated there. Instead, their gold was coming from Burkina Faso. True to its advertising, De Beers is assuring consumers "a diamond is forever" by launching a pilot program to buy diamond jewelry and loose diamonds for resale, thereby reducing the need to buy new diamonds from unknown sources.
Not only is there growing concern about the human rights abuses associated with the dangers independent miners face, but conflict in the world's poorest countries relies in part on financing from selling licenses to miners, collecting tolls on transportation routes to the mines, taxes, and mineral sales. In Zimbabwe, even the national security forces and secret police supplement their government budgets and escape government oversight by engaging in the mineral trade.
There are money and jobs enough in the mineral trade for both miners and manufacturers to benefit by behaving responsibly.
*See the earlier post, "Good News from Cuba," for background on President Obama's trip to Cuba.
Sunday, January 3, 2016
Chocolate Tasting Party and More
Controversy about the taste of $10 chocolate bars produced by Rick and Michael Mast in the Bronx, USA, suggests kids throughout the globe might enjoy their own chance to sample the world's chocolate.
Mast's chocolates claim to be made from paste of melted chocolate from Valrhona, a company chef Alberic Guironnet founded in France in 1922. The Mast bars come in three flavors: dark, almond, and goat's milk.
Other expensive chocolates, often found at airport newspaper shops, are Scharffen Berger Extra Dark and Green & Black's Dark.
Less expensive chocolates can be found in a bag of Nestle's morsels used to make chocolate chip cookies, Hershey's bars, and Mars bars.
Serrv (serrv.org/chocolate), a fair trade nonprofit organization, provides a wide variety (dark, dark with mint, dark with raspberries, milk chocolate with hazelnuts, etc.) of Kosher-certified, 3 and a half oz. $3 bars. Serrv bars use cocoa produced by the Kuapa Kokoo cooperative in Ghana, Africa, which strives to increase the earnings of cocoa farmers and to run programs designed to bolster the confidence of women cocoa farmers.
While sampling a piece or two of chocolate candy or building replicas of the Leaning Tower of
Pisa or Great Wall of China out of chocolate (like those shown in the February, 2016 issue of National Geographic Kids), there are a few things about chocolate to consider. Chocolate was a popular food of the Maya people who lived in what is now Mexico and Central America over a thousand years ago. The Mast brothers say they learned small-batch chocolate making by studying methods used by Mayans.
Fast forward to 2015. Ghana and the Cote d' Ivoire account for at least half of the world's cocoa that goes into chocolate. Much of the rest comes from Brazil, Nigeria, and Cameroon. In Africa cocoa bean farmers are not being replaced by younger farmers, because the income they earn keeps them below the $2 a day global poverty level. Ghana's cocoa farmers can earn as little as 84 cents a day; in the Ivory Coast, earnings may be 50 cents a day. A video produced in mid-2014 showed how excited cocoa farmers in the Ivory Coast were when, for the first time in their lives, they tried chocolate made from the beans they grew and harvested.
The 2015 Cocoa Barometer report (cocoabarometer.org) issued by non-governmental organizations describes how the concentration of 80% of the cocoa-to-chocolate retail chain in a few companies provides no incentive to raise cocoa farmer incomes, to end child labor, to increase crop diversification, to improve infrastructure, or to provide market information for farmers.
(Chocolate also is the subject of the earlier post, "Chocolate's Sweet Deals.")
Mast's chocolates claim to be made from paste of melted chocolate from Valrhona, a company chef Alberic Guironnet founded in France in 1922. The Mast bars come in three flavors: dark, almond, and goat's milk.
Other expensive chocolates, often found at airport newspaper shops, are Scharffen Berger Extra Dark and Green & Black's Dark.
Less expensive chocolates can be found in a bag of Nestle's morsels used to make chocolate chip cookies, Hershey's bars, and Mars bars.
Serrv (serrv.org/chocolate), a fair trade nonprofit organization, provides a wide variety (dark, dark with mint, dark with raspberries, milk chocolate with hazelnuts, etc.) of Kosher-certified, 3 and a half oz. $3 bars. Serrv bars use cocoa produced by the Kuapa Kokoo cooperative in Ghana, Africa, which strives to increase the earnings of cocoa farmers and to run programs designed to bolster the confidence of women cocoa farmers.
While sampling a piece or two of chocolate candy or building replicas of the Leaning Tower of
Pisa or Great Wall of China out of chocolate (like those shown in the February, 2016 issue of National Geographic Kids), there are a few things about chocolate to consider. Chocolate was a popular food of the Maya people who lived in what is now Mexico and Central America over a thousand years ago. The Mast brothers say they learned small-batch chocolate making by studying methods used by Mayans.
Fast forward to 2015. Ghana and the Cote d' Ivoire account for at least half of the world's cocoa that goes into chocolate. Much of the rest comes from Brazil, Nigeria, and Cameroon. In Africa cocoa bean farmers are not being replaced by younger farmers, because the income they earn keeps them below the $2 a day global poverty level. Ghana's cocoa farmers can earn as little as 84 cents a day; in the Ivory Coast, earnings may be 50 cents a day. A video produced in mid-2014 showed how excited cocoa farmers in the Ivory Coast were when, for the first time in their lives, they tried chocolate made from the beans they grew and harvested.
The 2015 Cocoa Barometer report (cocoabarometer.org) issued by non-governmental organizations describes how the concentration of 80% of the cocoa-to-chocolate retail chain in a few companies provides no incentive to raise cocoa farmer incomes, to end child labor, to increase crop diversification, to improve infrastructure, or to provide market information for farmers.
(Chocolate also is the subject of the earlier post, "Chocolate's Sweet Deals.")
Friday, July 3, 2015
Break into a Happy Dance
What do festivals and weddings include? Dancing. Whether dancers are doing a Mexican Hat Dance or Horah to the tune of Hava Nagila at a Jewish wedding, there's a smile on everyone's face. Through the years, the same happy attitude has accompanied the slow graceful French minuet, spirited Italian tarantella, Virginia Reel from Scotland, Irish step dancing, Poland's mazurka and polka, the Sailor's hornpipe, clogging, square dancing, and break dancing by b-boys on the street. Colorful costumes often add to the joy.When Michaela DePrince was a hungry little girl living in an orphanage in Sierra Leone, Africa, she saw a magazine picture of a happy ballerina standing on her toes and wearing a pink dress. To be happy, she thought, I want to be like that girl. Defying all expectations, she was adopted and, carrying the picture of the happy ballerina with her, she came to the United States. As soon as her new momma saw the picture, she said, "You will dance." Ballet classes followed, and Ms. DePrince, now one of the few black ballerinas in the world, dances with the Dutch National Ballet. She tells her story in Ballerina Dreams.
Misty Copeland, who just became the first female African-American principal dancer in the American Ballet Theater's 75-year history, is another happy ballerina. Her memoir, Life in Motion: An Unlikely Ballerina, tells how she pursued her career despite beginning ballet lessons at, for a ballerina, the advanced age of 13.
Dancing is for the very young and very old. Multicultural Kids (multiculturalkids.com) offers children All Time Favorite Dances on DVD and CD formats and international tunes for dancing on Ella Jenkins Multicultural Children's Songs and I Have a Dream World Music for Children by Daria. Making conversation with two elderly women at a party, I asked how they met. "At folk dancing," one said, and, on the spot, she did a few steps to show me one of their dances. At the University of Wisconsin in Milwaukee, the Ko-Thi Dance Company (ko-thi.org) gives children and adults lessons in traditional dances from Africa and the Caribbean on Saturday mornings. For world travelers, trips can include learning a few steps after watching hula dancers in Hawaii or girls performing the classic Khmer apsara in Cambodia. Trip planners at AAA.com/TravelAgent promise travelers to Argentina will never forget their private dance lessons at an authentic tango house in Buenos Aires.
Tuesday, May 26, 2015
Coffee Prices Going Up; Allowances Going Down?
Children may be looking at a cut in their allowances, if the adults who provide them are big coffee drinkers.A quick lesson in economics teaches disposable income is the money people bring home from work after taxes are removed. For most people, a large portion of disposable income pays for such necessities as food, housing, transportation, and clothing. After paying for these necessities, what is left over is discretionary income that can be spent on things like a mango, doll, game system, or any other things children want.
For those who need their morning cups of coffee, the anticipated increase in the world's price of coffee beans will reduce the amount of disposable income they have left over for discretionary spending. Is an allowance a necessity that has a claim on disposable income? If it is, it won't be affected by higher coffee prices. But a child's allowance may suffer, if the adult paying it considers an allowance in the same category as discretionary spending for a new toy. Increased coffee prices that reduce the amount of disposable income left over for discretionary income can cause a reduction in a child's allowance. If that happens, older children might decide to look for jobs that give them an income and the power to decide their own disposable and discretionary spending.
Considering a wider economic context, kids might learn to ask why coffee, banana, soda, bus fare, and other prices go up and down. When a supply increases and demand stays the same, prices go down. But, when supplies decline and consumer demand increases, prices also increase. That explains a coffee price increase.
In Brazil, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ethiopia, Kenya, and Tanzania, because of climate change, temperatures are rising in the high altitude tropical regions that grow high-quality Arabica coffee beans. There, coffee bean output is threatened by the pests and plant disease that flourish because of long periods of drought and short periods of heavy rainfall. The International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT) in Colombia suggests survival for Arabica growers will require them to move 300 to 500 meters farther above sea level, an impossibility for Brazil's highly mechanized, commercial coffee plantations that supply 70% of the world's 1.6 billion cup daily coffee demand.
Although growing coffee under a canopy of trees, such as shown in the photo of coffee growing in Mexico, would increase the predators that feast on insects that damage coffee beans, reduce the costs of chemical pesticides and fertilizer, and curtail polluting run-off, for all but a few specialty brands, the trend in the past 20 years has been away from shade-grown coffee. High-yield Robusta coffee, like that grown in Vietnam and Indonesia, can withstand higher temperatures, but its lower quality is used mainly for instant coffee. Wet processed coffee beans from the Indonesian island of Sumatra gives them a different taste that some coffee drinkers dislike but others enjoy, especially when, for example, McDonald's mixes them with beans from other sources.
Whatever the coffee type, the same conflicts the palm oil and timber industries face regarding deforestation, questions of land ownership, competition among food crops, and water scarcity affect all types of coffee growers.
While the future of coffee production is uncertain, increased demand is certain. Using Arabica grown in Ethiopia, Rwanda, and Tanzania, Starbucks, in partnership with Taste Holdings, is planning to open in Johannesburg, South Africa in 2016. Positioned as part of the fashionable, upscale urban scene in Shanghai and Beijing, coffee consumption in traditional tea-drinking China is growing faster than anywhere else in the world. Although China's four-cup-per-person-per-year is very low compared to the U.S. and Europe, Starbucks and Costa are responding to the potential for growth by planning to double and triple the number of their shops in China by 2020. Sumerian, a local company, also has entered China's coffee shop scene. Although China currently imports most of its coffee beans, domestic growers have increased their production from 60,000 to 120,000 tons in five years. Unfortunately, most Chinese coffee is grown in the sun in southern Puer, Yunnan, where more fertilizer and water are required and, at the moment, all but 30% of Yunnan's coffee is exported because it is a lower quality than what Chinese shops prefer to serve.
With coffee consumption increasing, coffee bean growers have an incentive to solve production problems and meet high quality standards. Children who receive an allowance from coffee-drinking adults have an incentive to keep an eye on coffee prices.
Wednesday, March 11, 2015
Hearing Voices from Mexico and Russia
Journalist Sam Quinones in his book, Dreamland, challenged me to think about where we get the news of the world that we tell our children. He wrote, "Mexican media rarely covered the stories of anyone outside the upper classes...." A few days later, I read in Time magazine (March 16, 2015) that RT (Russia Today) beams President Vladimir Putin's view of the world to 700 million people in at least 100 countries. Mikhail Lesin, who was credited with inspiring the creation of RT, was found dead in a Washington, DC hotel on November 5, 2015. Although the Russian embassy claimed Lesin died of a heart attack, in March, 2016, DC's chief medical examiner said the cause of his death was blunt force trauma to the head. His body also showed injuries to his arms, legs, neck, and torso. When the US imposed financial sanctions on Putin's closest associates after Russia annexed Crimea in 2014, Lesin failed to comply with an order to bring home his foreign assets and those of his children.Quinones tells the story of the well-mannered farm boys from Xalisco, in the Mexican state of Nayarit, who are much different from the imagined image of heroin dealers. Instead of cold, conniving cartel killers or thugs; they don't use drugs; and they crave all things American: cars, action heroes, McDonald's, and girls.
The stories Quinones finds among U.S. immigrant communities would make for an illuminating family dinner table conversation about U.S. immigration legislation and executive orders. A question like, "Did you know Cambodians don't know what doughnuts are?" could lead to the story of the Cambodian refugee, Ted Ngoy, who now runs an empire of doughnut shops in the Los Angeles area. Ngoy brought his nephew to the U.S. only after the young man escaped from a Cambodian re-education camp, walked through the jungle while being stalked by panthers, feared ambush by Khmer Rouge gunmen every step of the way, and spent a year in a Thai refugee camp.
Russia as victim and the West as villain is an ongoing theme on RT. Protests led by Zoran Zaev in Skopje, Macedonia, were blamed on the West. Albanians who make up nearly a quarter of Macedonia's population, demanded greater rights, and Zaev's opposition demands the resignation of Prime Minister Nikola Gruevaki. His administration is being charged with wiretapping the press, judiciary, elected officials, and religious leaders. When these recordings were released, they appeared to show vote rigging and a murder cover-up.
In February, 2015, RT viewers heard that the murder of dissident Boris Nemtsov, while he was walking near Red Square, was the work of enemies determined to discredit the Russian government. In later developments, TIME magazine (June 28, 2015) reported a Russian deputy commander of an elite Chechen battalion was charged with Nemtsov's murder. (Chechen hit men also were accused of murdering Anna Politkovskaya. See the earlier blog post, "Hope for the Future.) A re-education campaign once changed Russia's Chechnya rebels into fighters willing to follow orders from President Putin. Chechen forces took over part of Ukraine as volunteers acting for Putin, By tattooing his name and address on his arm, Lesin had avoided a similar deployment in Angola in an unmarked uniform. If his dead body were found there, Russia's clandestine involvement in this 1970s Cold War proxy conflict would have been exposed. Currently, Ramzan Kadyrow seems free to act on his own agenda in Chechnya. After Nemtsov's murder, dissidents in Russia realized they have to fear both Chechen assassins and Putin's security forces.
Apparently Moscow also fears some of the returning volunteers, who went to Ukraine to defend ethnic Russians, consider Putin's government ineffective and corrupt. (See mention of Putin's corruption in regard to Litvinenko's assassination in the earlier post, "Hope for the Future.") Realizing these troops are combat trained and capable of leading protests, they are being closely monitored and any weapons they are trying to smuggle home are being confiscated at the border. In a reaction to Russia's aggression in Ukraine, the U.S. has plans to deploy missiles in Poland and Romania.
At the time of Nemtsov's assassination, Russian TV viewers did not see the Moscow march protesting Nemtsov's murder, because RT showed a documentary about U.S. racial abuses. Reports of Nemtsov's murder failed to mention he was compiling information to challenge President Putin's claim that Russia was not supplying military equipment and regular Russian army troops to support separatists in Ukraine. Although 80% of older Russians receive their news from state-television, where anti-Putin activists and journalists are not allowed to appear, during Putin's 17 years in power, the younger generation has slipped away to watch YouTube and other social media outlets that show authorities with millions in assets and Russian troops seizing Crimea. Technically, we now know some of the Russian soldiers fighting in Ukraine were volunteers who had temporarily resigned from Chechen's regular army. Coffins returned to Russia following battles at a strategic rail hub in Ilovaisk and at Debaltseve in Ukraine. Some of Nemtsov's information came from relatives of dead Russian soldiers who had not received the compensation that they had been promised.
Using online video to inform scattered dissidents of opposition protests is an aim of Open Russia, a foundation founded by exiled oligarch, Mikhail Khodorkovsky, whom Putin issued an arrest warrant for in December, 2015. Just as Putin, in his annual question-and-answer session on TV, was claiming that Russia's oil and gas based economy, which has shrunk 4.6%, would recover in two years and downplaying the conflict in Ukraine, security forces from the anti-extremism office of the Interior Ministry raided the Moscow offices of Open Russia. On May 26, 2015, Vladimir Kara-Murza, the coordinator of Open Russia and an adviser to Nemtsov, had collapsed in his office as a result of being poisoned by a toxin that shuts down a whole body in six hours. That attempt failed as did another in early 2017. Kara-Murza, who holds dual UK-Russian citizenship, believes he is targeted due to his successful effort to pass the Magnitsky Act in both the US and UK. The Act, which is named for Sergei Magnitsky, a Russian tax expert, sometimes characterized as a lawyer, who died in a Russian prison in 2009, prevents powerful Russians who abuse human rights at home from keeping their wealth in Western banks. Kara-Murza also believes athletes should attend competitions, such as the 2018 World Cup, in Russia but western democracies should not honor Putin by sending their leaders to such games.
Russia, which planned to deliver S-300 surface-to-air defense missiles to Tehran, along with the United States, China, France, the UK, Germany and the European Union, negotiated what Iran calls the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action to impose restrictions on Iran's nuclear program. Once Putin determined ISIS brought down Russian Flight 9268 over the Sinai peninsula in October, 2015, Russia agreed to join the US and French bombing ISIS positions in Syria. But Russian bombers also operated against forces fighting Syria's dictator rather than ISIS. In March, 2016, Putin announced Russian troops would leave Syria before the cost escalates, but Russia would keep a naval base, air base, and air-defense systems there. In April, 2017, Syrian civilians died from chemical poison dropped on them from a Russian-made airplane which may or may not have been piloted by a Russian.
Voices abound in this age of apps, the Internet, broadcast and cable TV, radio, magazines, newspapers, books, and movies. The more we see, hear, and read, the better we are able to help children form an accurate view of their world and ours.
Monday, March 2, 2015
What If We Don't Speak the Same Language?
These days we don't need to travel to a foreign country to meet people whose first language is different from ours. Especially in college and university towns, such as where I live, students from around the world will be doing the same things we are: shopping, mailing packages at the post office, riding the bus, renting an apartment, working, attending religious services, eating in restaurants, visiting museums, doing laundry, throwing out the trash.Smiling and saying "Hi"
Whether you come in contact with a woman wearing a scarf over her hair or a foreigner mopping an office building's hall, a smile is always an appropriate greeting.
When you begin to see the same person almost every day, it's easy to start saying, "Hi." One day, when I met the visiting Chinese mother, who was carrying the daughter of my neighbor, we both said "Hi" at the same time. The grandmother also raised the little girl's hand to wave at me.
Weather brings us together
Since it's been really cold here lately, it was very easy to exchange a few words with an Hispanic maintenance man when I came in shivering. He asked if I had always lived here. It gave me an opportunity to ask where he was from and if he had a chance to return there very often.
When I came in this morning, a student from China asked me if it was cold, so he would know how to dress to go out. I suggested it was colder than China here, but he told me he had gone to college "on the same latitude." We agreed that he was familiar with this kind of weather.
A woman from India who works at the local grocery store speaks English with a heavy accent that is somewhat difficult to understand. On a day when the temperature was six below zero, I mentioned it sure was different from India. That led to an extended conversation about her friend who was visiting from India and planned to travel on to even colder weather in Minnesota. I could tell her about a friend of mine who came to visit from Texas without an overcoat.
When we're sweltering this summer, maybe I'll meet someone from Finland, and we can exchange observations about the heat.
Animals attract attention
It's hard to remember not all countries have the same animals. One day, when I was in the park with my granddaughter, a man pointed to a squirrel and sort of shook his head as if to ask what it was. Not all cultures have pets either. Two little Muslim boys who live across the hall from us are fascinated with our cat, Claire. When I see them, I linger outside the door to let them study Claire, while their mother and I exchange smiles.
The world watches some sporting and entertainment events
Just as it's easy to strike up a conversation with someone wearing a cap with the name of a team on it, it's easy to ask a foreigners if they've been watching the Olympics or a World Cup soccer game.
After the Academy Awards, I knew a Mexican neighbor would be eager to exchange a few words about Alejandro G. Inarritu and his Oscar-winning Birdman film.
(For other ideas on this topic, see the earlier posts "Getting to Know You" and "How Do You Say?")
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