HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

My sincere wishes for this new year:
I wish you all a happy and prosperous 2012, may it bring only good things to those who deserve them and may we see the light at the end of this tunnel called crisis.

Short Stories to read and listen

Are you looking for something to read this Christmas? The Guardian is running a series of short stories. They call it Literary Christmas Crackers and they are here for you to enjoy. They´re parcelling up two short stories every day – one to read, and one to listen to, featuring authors such as Colm Toibin, Margaret Drabble, Julian Barnes and Jennifer Egan. You can also find stories by Tèa Obreht and David Nicholls, two of the big names in 2011. So, give it a try, I sure will.

The Snowman by Raymond Briggs

One of my favourite christmas stories is the wonderfully drawn The Snowman by Raymond Briggs and that is saying a lot as I usually dislike anything that has to do with Christmas. Curiously enough, the author himself apparently shares this opinion, according to this article in The Telegraph: 'It can be a grim time of year, Christmas," He says.
You can watch an interview here 
The Snowman was once voted  the top story for Christmas by British children and since its first broadcast in 1982 it has been a favourite at Christmas in the UK.
The book is wordless, as is the film except for the song "Walking in the Air". The story is told through picture, action and music.
Thanks to the magic of youtube we can all enjoy the film online. The following is the whole film in two parts, 





The lyrics to the song Walking in the Air:

We're walking in the air
We're floating in the moonlit sky
The people far below are sleeping as we fly

I'm holding very tight
I'm riding in the midnight blue
I'm finding I can fly so high above with you

Far across the world
The villages go by like dreams
The rivers and the hills, the forests and the streams

Children gaze open mouthed
Taken by surprise
Nobody down below believes their eyes

We're surfing in the air
We're swimming in the frozen sky
We're drifting over icy mountains floating by

Suddenly swooping low
On an ocean deep
Rousing up a mighty monster from his sleep

And walking in the air
We're dancing in the midnight sky
And everyone who sees us greets us as we fly

We're walking in the air
We're walking in the air

You can watch Raymond Briggs' other Christmas story, Father Christmas, here thanks to Nicog79
It is a great story too but it's more difficult for English language learners as it has a lot of dialogue. Give it a try though, you never know.

WORLD AIDS DAY

Today is World AIDS Day, a day dedicated to raising awareness of the AIDS pandemic caused by the spread of HIV infection. 

"Thirty years ago, in New York and San Francisco, a small number of young men became inexplicably and very seriously ill. Some had a particular cancer while others had a form of pneumonia that had never before troubled that age group. Their immune systems were shot, their bodies unable to fight back, and they died. They were the first documented cases of Aids, a new disease that would terrify entire populations as it scythed down rich and poor, celebrity and nonentity. Rock Hudson. Freddie Mercury. Arthur Ashe. And thousands whose names were known only to those who loved them.

Today, on World Aids Day, the disease is still incurable – but not untreatable. The great news this year is that scientists have now tentatively offered us a way to end Aids. Studies in recent months have shown that the drugs that keep people alive also stop them infecting others.

The Global Fund's decision to cancel grants will reverse the huge gains made in combating Aids, TB and malaria. 

Now is not the time to cut funding for HIV and Aids.

There are more than 6 million people in poor countries on the drugs now – but just as many are still in need, and many more will soon join the waiting lists. Without treatment and continuing effort, three decades of progress could be reversed."(excerpt from the Guardian)

For more information like this about Aids and AIDS WORLD DAY go to the Guardian, my source of information

 

In 1987, a quilt created by The Names Project Foundation covered the National Mall in Washington, D.C., memorializing those we lost to AIDS. We can help create a quilt online. Add your panel to the (2015)QUILT here. The beginning of the end of AIDS starts with you.

Here's my choice to commemorate the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women, albeit three days too late. This is a crude, straightforward poem. You will find no metaphors here, this is the awful truth. This isn't a poem to enjoy, it is a poem to make you think.

With No Immediate Cause

every 3 minutes a woman is beaten
every five minutes a
woman is raped/every ten minutes
a little girl is molested
yet I rode the subway today
I sat next to an old man who
may have beaten his old wife
3 minutes ago or 3 days/30 years ago
he might have sodomized his daughter
but I sat there
cuz the men on the train
might beat some young women
later in the day or tomorrow
I might not shut my door fast
enough push hard enough
every 3 minutes it happens
some women’s innocence
rushes to her cheeks/pours from her mouth
like the betsy wetsy dolls have been torn
apart/their mouths
menses red split/every
three minutes a shoulder
is jammed through plaster and the oven door/
chairs push thru the rib cage/hot water or
boiling sperm decorate her body

I rode the subway today
and bought a paper from an east Indian man who might
have held his old lady onto
a hot pressing iron/ I didn’t know
maybe he catches little girls in the
parks and rips open their behinds
with steel rods/ I can not decide
what he might have done I
know every 3 minutes
every 5 minutes every 10 minutes
I boughtt the paper
looking for the announcement
there has to be an announcement
of the women’s bodies fond
yesterday the missing little girl
I sat in a restaurant with my
paper looking for the announcement
a young man served me coffee
I wondered did he pour the boiling
coffee on the woman because she was stupid
did he put the infant girl in
the coffee pot because she cried too much
what exactly did he do with hot coffee
I looked for the announcement
the discover of the dismembered
woman’s body
victims have not all been
identified today they are
naked and dead/some refuse to
testify girl out of 10 is not
coherent/ I took the coffee
and spit it up I found an
announcement/ not the woman’s
bloated body in the river floating
not the child bleeding in the
59th street corridor/ not the baby
broken on the floor/
“there is some concern
that alleged battered women
might start to murder their
husbands and lovers with no
immediate cause”
I spit up I vomit I am screaming
we all have immediate cause
every 3 minutes
every 5 minutes
every 10 minutes
every day
women’s bodies are found
in alleys and bedrooms/at the top of the stairs
before I ride the subway/buy a paper of drink
coffee from your hands I must know
have you hurt a woman today
did you beat a woman today
throw a child cross a room
are the little girl’s pants in your pocket
did you hurt a woman today
I have to ask these obscene questions
I must know you see
the authorities require us to
establish
immediate cause
every three minutes
every five minutes
every ten minutes
every day
-NTOZAKE SHANGE

I should have posted this poem last Thursday, Thanksgiving Day, as I wanted to post a poem to commemorate the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women on Friday. As it turned out, I ended up doing neither. So I'm doing it today and my intention is to post the other one tomorrow.  This poem is clearly an anti war poem but it can also mean more than that. For me it's also about how unfair life is and how fortunate or unfortunate we are just because we were born in a certain place on earth. Do you get the pun? Thanksgiving Letter from Harry
by Carl Dennis
I guess I have to begin by admitting I'm thankful today I don't reside in a country My country has chosen to liberate, That Bridgeport's my home, not Baghdad. Thankful my chances are good, when I leave For the Super Duper, that I'll be returning. And I'm thankful my TV set is still broken. No point in wasting energy feeling shame For the havoc inflicted on others in my name When I need all the strength I can muster To teach my eighth-grade class in the low-rent district. There, at least, I don't feel powerless. There my choices can make some difference. This month I'd like to believe I've widened My students' choice of vocation, though the odds My history lessons on working the land Will inspire any of them to farm Are almost as small as the odds One will become a monk or nun Trained in the Buddhist practice We studied last month in the unit on India. The point is to get them suspecting the world They know first hand isn't the only world. As for the calling of soldier, if it comes up in class, It's not because I feel obliged to include it, As you, as a writer, may feel obliged. A student may happen to introduce it, As a girl did yesterday when she read her essay About her older brother, Ramon, Listed as "missing in action" three years ago, And about her dad, who won't agree with her mom And the social worker on how small the odds are That Ramon's alive, a prisoner in the mountains. I didn't allow the discussion that followed More time than I allowed for the other essays. And I wouldn't take sides: not with the group That thought the father, having grieved enough, Ought to move on to the life still left him; Not with the group that was glad he hadn't made do With the next-to-nothing the world's provided, That instead he's invested his trust in a story That saves the world from shameful failure. Let me know of any recent attempts on your part To save our fellow-citizens from themselves. In the meantime, if you want to borrow Ramon For a narrative of your own, remember that any scene Where he appears under guard in a mountain village Should be confined to the realm of longing. There His captors may leave him when they move on. There his wounds may be healed, His health restored. A total recovery Except for a lingering fog of forgetfulness A father dreams he can burn away.

Friday's Poem #7

"In Flanders Fields" is probably the most popular poem written during World War I. John McCrae wrote it on 3 May 1915, after he witnessed the death of his friend, Lieutenant Alexis Helmer, 22 years old, the day before.
The poppies referred to in the poem grew in profusion in Flanders in the disturbed earth of the battlefields and cemeteries where war casualties were buried and thus became a symbol of Remembrance Day .
There's a museum dedicated to this poem, you can visit their website.


In Flanders Fields

By: Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae, MD (1872-1918)
Canadian Army
 

In Flanders Fields the poppies blow

Between the crosses row on row,

That mark our place; and in the sky

The larks, still bravely singing, fly

Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago

We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,

Loved and were loved, and now we lie

In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:

To you from failing hands we throw

The torch; be yours to hold it high.

If ye break faith with us who die

We shall not sleep, though poppies grow

In Flanders fields.

War Poetry