#She’s from India. Southern India. The love of her life is from Northern India. If anybody knows anything about India..

[mymiraclebox]

Miracle Boxes - The Mage Generation

These are the first iteration of the Miracle Boxes, created by the Mage himself thousands of years ago. These consisted of twelve Miracle Boxes, each with ten kwamis, which the Mage entrusted to people during his travels around the world. Thanks to the use of the Panda Miraculous, the Mage lived much longer than most humans, making his travels across the world last several hundred years.

The Mage Box - Wandering Panda Crow Unicorn Rabbit Beaver Dove Horse Owl Parrot Scorpion

The Mage Box was the Miracle Box that the Mage personally looked after. He kept the Miraculouses of great power with him, along with ones that helped him in his travels around the world. The Mage would stay in different lands for decades at a time, and choose a close companion from these areas to become a Guardian of one of the boxes he carried. These Guardians were assigned to care for these kwamis, and to watch over a vast region.

The Successor Box - South Asia and West Asia Ladybug Black Cat Qilin Frog Bee Butterfly Fox Peacock Swan Turtle

This Miracle Box was the first the Mage trusted in the hands of another, which was his apprentice. He and apprentice left their home land (in what is now modern Tibet). They both headed south, with the apprentice heading west when they parted ways, while the Mage went east as he began his travels around the world.

The Island Box - Oceania and Southeast Asia Wolf Platypus Pterosaur Tuatara Binturong Blackbuck Coral Kangaroo Komodo Dragon Thylacine

This Miracle Box's Guardian was originally from what is now modern India, who was a traveling companion with the Mage as they went east together. When they parted ways the Mage went north, while she promised to take the Miracle Box south. This Guardian spent much of her time in Southeast Asia, and eventually headed down towards Australia and into the Pacific Islands.

The Coastal Box - East Asia and North Asia Dragon Cobra Dog Goat Monkey Mouse Ox Pig Rooster Tiger

The Mage entrusted this Box to a family who lived along the coast. The range this Guardian and Miracle Box looked after was along the coast of eastern Asia, but did stretch inland as well. The Mage spent a long time with this Guardian and their family, before deciding to pursue stories about a land that laid across the ocean.

The Northern Box - North America Thunderbird Bear Cougar Deer Goose Otter Rattlesnake Raven Salmon Woodpecker

The Mage didn't know what he'd find across the ocean, but he stumbled into a land much bigger than he imagined. His journeys started up in what is now Alaska, down through what would become Canada and the United State. Like many Miracle Boxes before the new Guardian had a vast region with many different cultures for them and their kwamis to look after.

The Central Box - Central America Firefly Raccoon Feathered Serpent Spider Axolotl Bison Coyote Eagle Falcon Shark

Of all of the Mage's travels, it was in Central America where he stayed the longest. This was because ended up adopting a daughter, who he went on many adventures with. The Mage entrusted the last Miracle Box with an Alpha Duo to her, who he stayed with to watch over, along with his grandchildren in time. He continued south shortly after his great-grandson became Guardian, knowing that he couldn't stay there forever.

The Southern Box - South America Grim Snail Crocodile Dolphin Flamingo Jaguar Jellyfish Llama Locust Moth

The Mage struggled to bond with others as he headed into South America, pained with his extended life and the lost of love ones that comes from it. In time he befriended a lone traveler who lived a similar lifestyle than him, who he entrusted to become a Guardian. They parted ways when the Mage headed south across the ocean, where he encountered the frozen wasteland of Antarctica.

The Jungle Box - Southern Africa Dinosaur Penguin Elephant Gorilla Jackal Okapi Ray Rhinoceros Squirrel Zebra

The Mage did not remain within Antarctica for long, with the inhospitable environment and lack of human life. He headed north up into Madagascar, where he spent a considerable amount of time before he traveled to the mainland of Africa, which turned out to be much bigger than he had excepted when first traveling to the continent.

The Desert Box - Northern Africa Griffin Dragonfly Camel Chameleon Cheetah Giraffe Hippopotamus Hyena Ostrich Secretarybird

He did not select a guardian for this box for a long time, not until his arrival in ancient Egypt. This was the first place the Mage had truly settled in for many years, but he did eventually head east across the Sahara. The Mage's travels in Africa ended in what is now in Morocco, where he then headed up into the Iberian Peninsula.

The Peninsula Box - Europe Kelpie Aurochs Ant Crab Gecko Hedgehog Ibex Lion Mouflon Seahorse

Europe was yet another region that took the Mage a long time to select a Guardian for, and often retraced his paths in locations he had been in before during this search. In the end he trained up several potential Guardians, but only entrusted the box to one, leading to conflict for the box after he left.

The Arctic Box - Northern Europe and Northern Asia Phoenix Lynx Moose Narwhal Octopus Polar Bear Seal Sheep Stoat Wolverine

The Mage settled a lot more often as he journeyed northward, still very nomadic in where he would travel, but would often stay in settlements for long periods of time, especially during harsh winter months. The Mage loved the world and his travels, but he was tired, especially after living for so long. He entrusted this Miracle Box to a woman the kwamis loved to become their Guardian.

The Mountain Box - Central Asia and the Tibetan Plateau Yeti Red Panda Bat Elk Pangolin Quail Scarab Snow Leopard Tortoise Vulture

At the end of his centuries long journey, the Mage found himself rapidly approaching his homeland. When heading across the mountains he found a Guardian for the last Miracle Box with him. He did not spend long here as he did in other regions of the world, being so close to home. And after such a long journey the Mage for ready to rest.

---

The Mage's apprentice was long dead by the time he returned to his homeland, but he was able to meet those who were protecting the Successor Box in his apprentice's place. Satisfied with the system he had in place and the kwamis that lived across the world, the Mage decided that he was ready to rest after living for so many years.

Still he knew the greed of humanity, and decided that the two Soul Gems along with the Miraculouses of the Panda, Crow, and Unicorn should be hidden away. They were to be hidden away in the Mage Box, so the other seven kwamis he had once looked after he decided to spread across the world, to unite with other Miracle Boxes out there.

After this he hid away the powerful Miraculouses and the Soul Gems, before officially retiring to his homeland under the care of the Guardians of the Successor Box. While he never told a soul where his Miracle Box was hidden, he did entrust the current Guardians with the knowledge of the location of one Soul Gem, before he passed away of old age.

---

The True Generation of Miracle Boxes

The Order Generation of Miracle Boxes [TBA]

#kwamis #kwami oc #kwami #oc kwami #ml headcanons #my headcanons #miraculous headcanon #miraculous ladybug headcanon #ml the mage #the mage #vitaa #plagg #tikki #shii #miracle box

[jayeshmuley]

"Exam Pressure Leads To Wave Of Student Suicides"

It's exam season in India and it's also suicide season when students buckle under parental pressure to get high marks and into a top university for the golden chance of a high-paying job. Newspapers carry tragic daily reports of youngsters who have killed themselves or taken what Indians euphemistically call "the extreme step" because they fear the shame of a bad report card. On a single day last month, it was reported that two teenage boys in New Delhi hanged themselves at their homes. One was falling behind in his studies and the other was afraid of an English exam. A final year Bachelor of Commerce student hanged herself in the commercial capital Mumbai apparently because she was not prepared for her economics paper and did not want her family to feel ashamed. A grade 12 student from Surat in western India hanged herself and another threw herself before a moving train in Allahabad in northern India, the paper reported, adding there were other suicides that day too. "Teenage suicide (over exams) is a national disaster," said Samir Parikh, psychiatrist at Max Healthcare, a leading New Delhi private hospital chain. In 2006, the most recent year for which official figures are available, some 5,857 students -- or 16 a day -- killed themselves due to exam stress. Police say thousands more suicides go unreported because parents want to keep the cause of death a secret. Competition to get into higher education in the country of more than 1.1 billion people is fierce with stratospheric averages needed to obtain the few places available in India's "Ivy League" colleges. For instance, the cut-off average mark to pursue an undergraduate economics degree at Delhi University's top commerce college last year was 97.8 percent. "Unsurprisingly only a small fraction of the 500,000 school leavers each year will make it," said Sunil Sethi, columnist for financial daily Business Standard. India has just a couple of dozen top-notch "branded" colleges, seven Indian institutes of technology and six of management. Together they take only 16,000 undergraduates each year. In the last few weeks since the start of exam season, there have been a string of suicides in India's capital by students as young as 12. "Over the years the kind of marks students need to get into 'good universities' has really started touching the roof -- they need 90, 95 percent averages," psychiatrist Parikh said. Also "parents have big expectations and give undue importance to exams and for children the marks are benchmarks of their self-esteem. The combination can be fatal." Many hang themselves from ceiling fans -- ubiquitous in India's hot climate -- but others set themselves alight, consume pesticides or drown themselves. One 17-year-old left a suicide note saying he was ending his "life because the pressure has started to get to me and I cannot take it any longer," concluding poignantly: "I love my family and I hope they will understand." While the global teen suicide rate is 14.5 per 100,000, a 2004 study by the Christian Medical College in the southern city of Vellore reported 148 for girls and 58 for boys in India. The girls' rate is higher because many fear being married off if they flunk, experts say. Educators criticize the exams for stressing memory work over reasoning. "We must make exams in such a way it does not bank on memory but emphasizes thinking capability," said scientist Yash Pal, who headed India's recent curricular reform steering committee. Tutors are called in and parents take time off to coach their children through exams. "Memory pills" are devoured, nutritionists are consulted for the best "brain food" and newspapers devote sections to tackling exams. "You can't imagine the pressure," said student Renu Chanda, 17, who has just done her finals. On top of the finals, there are the university tests. Some students take half a dozen or more exams to try to get into big-name institutions. A 2006 study of 231 teenagers by Anuradha Sovani, a clinical psychologist at the University of Mumbai, showed that the students were more frightened of exams than accidents, earthquakes or bomb attacks. "Somehow we think high marks are the only way our children are going to succeed in life," said Anita Gupta, a mother of two sons and a daughter. Poorer parents make huge sacrifices to afford tuition so children feel an extra burden to succeed. The ones who don't make it into top schools end up going to under-funded second-rate colleges or the booming number of private universities. But the disadvantage of private institutes is that standards vary so wildly many are not recognized by the government. Families that can afford it send their children abroad with an estimated 160,000 Indians studying overseas each year. And even when students get into good Indian colleges, the pressure does not end -- with university suicides also regularly reported. "We have to give youngsters -- and their parents -- the life skills to know marks are not everything in life," said psychiatrist Parikh.

[gardenofkore]

“As you enter the church your eyes will be at once be attracted to the figure of the Madonna Nera and Child dominating the nave from their angel-born throne above the High Altar. The wooden statue, above 1 m high, with Nigra sum Sed formosa inscribed underneath, shows a great resembling between Mother and Child, both sumptuously crowned and robed in white and gold. Her face recalls that of a gypsy or a good witch, not dissimilar to her sisters of Dijon and Guadalupe.Her legend is as follows: She was brought from the east on a ship forced to seek safe heaven in the bay, which was once the splendid ancient harbour of Tyndaris.After the storm the ship would not move until the sailors disembarked the image in the place the Madonna had chosen. She was carried up the hill to the small church that had been built on the ruins of the Temple of Cybele, since when her cult has never ceased to flourish.”

Ean C. M. Begg, The Cult of the Black Virgin, p. 277-278

----

“When we review the attributes of the goddesses, from the early civilization of Sumer to the highly artistic civilizations of Greece and Rome, we discover that the characteristics they [Virgin Mary and Mary Magdalene] shared were physical beauty, virginity, association with the moon and the tragic death, or deliberate sacrifice, of a sonlover.With this in mind, consider the image of Mary, mother of Jesus. She is worshiped as the Virgin Mary. Indeed, it is her virginity (the state of being chaste, not the original meaning of the word) which sets her apart from other women. Mary is also associated with the cosmos, often being called Queen of Heaven. To depict her heavenly beauty, she is frequently pictured enthroned on the moon. Her primary association is with her son, who is sacrificed; Mary's role as a wife is negligible. Despite these parallels with the image of the goddess, Mary is conventionally associated solely with the maternal aspect of the feminine—static and protective. The dynamic, transforming aspect, related to the passion, sexuality and fertility of the love goddesses, is conspicuously lacking.

However, there are other correlations between Mary and the ancient chthonic goddesses which, though not commonly known, are operative in collective consciousness. In a small number of cathedrals throughout Europe, both in popular and isolated places, a black madonna is venerated. She is not the more familiar, angelic madonna in the blue cloak, but one as black as the earth itself. She belongs to the lower world, not the heavenly realm.From prehistoric times, as early as thirty thousand years before the beginning of the Christian era, comes the Black Venus of Lespugue, carved from a mammoth tusk, now preserved in the Musée de l'Homme in Paris. As she predates a time when any knowledge of agriculture existed, she is more than earth; she is Life itself. Other black feminine images, symbolic of the chthonic life force, have been worshiped throughout the ages.

In Tindari, on the coast of Mediterranean in eastern Sicily, a black statue of the madonna bears the inscription, nigra sum sed formosa -”I am black, but comely”- from the Song of Solomon 1:5. Christian scholars interpret this passage as referring to a bride, the Virgin Mary as Ecclesia, uniting in marriage with the bridegroom, her son Christ. It appears to be founded in the sacred marriage rite of Ishtar and Tammuz, since there are many parallers between the ancient cuneiform tablets and this Old Testament text. Could not this “black and comely” madonna be a product of the far more ancient image of the goddess?

[...]

When women adapted to the religious tenets of the patriarchy, they also accepted man's image of his anima as an accurate reflection of feminine nature. They thereby lost their connection to the genuine feminine, including the chthonic aspects represented by the black madonna.Many black madonnas are currently valued as religious symbols, but far more numerous are images of the conventional "blue" madonnna. The latter, as anima, inspired men to build impressive cathedrals and create beautiful works of art, but she lacks a crucial dimension of feminine nature. The black madonna, associated with both the earth and fertility, is an image of the divine feminine reflecting the ancient connection between women's nature and the goddess of love. Through her, the Great Goddess still lives in Christianity.”

Nancy Qualls-Corbett, The sacred prostitute: eternal aspect of the feminine, p. 152-154

  ----

“According to the legendary arrival of the Black Madonna of Tindari, the ship that was carrying her image was forced to take anchor in the Bay of Tindari in a storm, and was not allowed to sail until her image was taken from the ship, where it was then carried to the former temple site of the Goddess Cybele. 

[...]  

 The sanctuary of Tindari sits on a high bluff on the northern shore of Sicily. A woman from a far-away country had come to fulfill a vow to the Madonna of Tindari for saving her little girl's life. When the woman reached the sanctuary, after a long journey, she openly expressed her disillusionment upon seeing that the Madonna's face was black. The moment she expressed her irreverence, her little girl, who had wandered away from her mother, fell from a cliff. The woman called upon the Madonna to again save her child's life. But the miracle had already happened - the sea had withdrawn so the girl could fall on soft sand. The woman now believed in the divine powers of the Madonna she had mocked and the sea stayed at a distance permanently as a reminder of what had happened. 

[...] 

Sometimes the versions of a story of a punishing miracle varied, with important details missing. Only one of several sources mentioned the punishment by the Madonna of Tindari,for example. Carroll also cites a case in which a modern account of a miracle leaves out the harmful details included in older accounts.This leads me to wonder whether elements of other stories have been dropped over time. Considering the patterns in the body of above miracles, at one time there may have been a full cycle of the Madonna's anger, punishment, forgiveness and healing in more of them. Perhaps, like the alteration of the dark color of the images that other scholars and I have found, elimination of the details of the stories is a kind of "emotional whitening," a gradual removal of the Madonna's "full" range of power, including those we might consider to be negative.I must state that I never got a sense at any of the dozens of Black Madonna sanctuaries I visited that these most powerful Madonnas were feared. On the contrary they appeared to be greatly beloved. The fervor and devotion was palpable. I observed the utter closeness of the people to the Madonna. The Black Madonnas of Montevergine, Somma Vesuviana, and Napoli are all addressed as Mamma, a clearly familiar form of address. Songs and prayers use familiar (rather than formal) pronouns and indicate an endearing and close relationship. Chiseled in marble above the area where the painting of the Black Madonna of Montevergine once hung are the words which translate "You Are Black And Beautiful, My Friend." 

The Black Madonna's devotees may feel reassurance from her ferocity, like the women in southern India who believe the fierce goddess Kali's power is there to protect them. Perhaps the severe punishment that was attributed to the Madonna's power was a way for the women to ensure the rules were respected, that the sacred was preserved, and to emphasize that the great honor due the Madonna must never be violated.” 

Mary Beth Moser, Blood Relics: Menstrual Roots of Miraculous Black Madonnas in Italy, p. 6; 9-11

 ----

“It is a well known fact that sanctuaries dedicated to Mary were often built on sites that were originally used for the veneration of pagan goddesses. The same development could have happened in regard to statues, particularly when the statue of the Virgin is black in color. Shrines of earthgoddesses were scattered all over Europe, as are venerated statues of the "Black Madonna," which can be found in great numbers from Great Britain to Hungary and Poland. In none of them with which I am familiar can negroid features be detected; therefore, they are not black because of their race. In some cases the material from which they are made is black; in other cases, it is claimed that accumulated dirt and soot may account for their color. This explanation, usually given by Roman Catholic scholars, does not explain why the whole body of the statue turned black, even under the clothing, and not just the face and hands. And what about those to which none of these arguments apply? One answer lies at hand: they are black because they represent earth, the mother of all. That Christians could so easily think of Mary as black should not be surprising. Not only was the relationship between Mary and the virgin earth long established, from quite early the Song of Songs was interpreted in the church in a Marian way. This love song was explained as referring to the relationship between Christ and the church, his bride; since the church was identified with Mary, the song could be also be applied to the love of God and Mary; and the female lover in the Song of Songs is black: "I am black but beautiful, Ο daughters of Jeruselem."

Thus nothing stands in the way of seeing in the veneration of the Black Madonnas a continuation of the popular piety with which the great mystery of earth was honored. In some areas of Europe the roots of this piety, such as that of the Celts, may go back to pre-Roman times. It may have been Artemis or Isis who inspired the cult. In Tindari, Sicily, the Madonna Nera is in a church erected on the site of a former sanctuary of Cybele.”

Stephen Benko, The Virgin Goddess: Studies in the Pagan and Christian Roots of Mariology, p. 213-214

#women #history #women in history #historical women #history of women #tindari #culture #religion #province of messina #myedit #virgin mary

[tanadrin]

Outbound

A thousand years ago, the longest journey Pray might have ever countenanced, in the service of some great thalassocratic or mercantile interest, would have meant years off her life. She would have taken a train to some great port, like Bristol or La Rochelle; boarded a sailing-ship, and spent months at sea. To India, or Australia, or South America, perhaps; weathering the blistering sun of the tropics, and the perilous straits of the southern oceans. That was back when the world was already one, but still young; and eventually it contracted even further, until you more no more than six hours from anywhere on Earth. A day, maybe, if you preferred to travel in comfort, and your destination wasn’t near a major transport hub. You had to go back further, much further, to find journeys in Earth’s history that were comparable to interstellar ones. Of course, if you went too far back the world fractures, split into separate empires separated by uncrossable wastes, into remote hemispheres that knew nothing of each other, and eventually into lone kingdoms and transhumant bands for whom the wider world was a great mystery. But maybe that was the correct analogy. After all, even Odysseus had made it back to Ithaca within a single lifetime. He didn’t return to find his wife dead and his son a withered old man, his name forgotten by his people. Even back when the world was fractured, time was still one, and if your journey took you beyond the horizons of a single lifetime, there was no going back.

For no man will ever turn homewords from beyond Vega, to greet again those he knew and loved on Earth. The horizon was still there, of course. But it was less clear now, time less unified. You could go far, far indeed on your travels, well beyond Vega; but you would not return to the same planet you left behind. Your sons would be old, or gone, your name nearly forgotten. Perhaps the only real analogy to this kind of journey was the one ancient peoples had taken as the glaciers peeled back from the northern hemisphere, and they spread out to new, wide plains and left the old world behind forever. No history remembered those journeys, of course; but there had been no going back for them, either.

At least in its beginning, if not in its scale, though, this was going to be more like the journeys of the eighteenth century. After Pray finished her induction, there was a six-month onboarding period in a quiet little Nigerian town that was so quaint she wanted to scream. It was team-based analytical work, meant to bring new hires up to speed on the particular demands of Control’s rather unique mission. Here, concerns were not profits, or PR, or predicting the latest cultural trend with laserlike precision. It was more holistic: political and economic and cultural and philosophical developments all rolled into one, with intelligence gathering and international relations thrown in. It was fun at first, but Pray’s attention started to waver when she realized they weren’t actually doing it for anybody. It was forecasting things which weren’t important, or which more experienced analysts had forecasted better, so that if they messed up, failure came at no cost.

At least they threw in a bunch of medical exams at irregular intervals for novelty value. Have to make sure you’re in tip-top shape if you’re going off-planet of course. Can’t have your liver exploding at Alpha Centauri. The first several times the doctors went looking for her aug tab, she took great pleasure in letting them flounder for a few minutes, before casually saying, Oh, didn’t you know? I’m baseline. But your medical history says-- they would start. I know, she’d say. But I’m still baseline. She gathered they didn’t get a lot of totally unaugged people in their office. Heck, there were probably jobs at Control they wouldn’t let you do without at least a basic suite, for your own safety; but apparently, analyst was not one of them.

When her trial period was done, they offered her a three week vacation after that, to make her goodbyes and get her affairs in order, but in the end, she found, she really didn’t have anybody to say goodbye to. She took a weekend, and went back to Abuja to put her things in storage, and had one last drink on a rooftop bar at sunset; then she took a train down to Calabar, and hopped a flight to the great spaceport at Kango.

A hundred years ago, Kismayo had been a sleepy little town near an old, abandoned port. It had fallen on hard times the last couple of centuries, and its only claim to fame anymore was that it was on the highway to bigger and more interesting places. But then the EAC started scouting sites for a new launch loop, the most advanced engineering project in the Solar System, and the people of the town discovered they were in the perfect spot: coastal, bang on the equator, well situated to connect with both overland and oceanic shipping routes. Overnight, apparently, it had become a hive of activity, and when the dust settled a few decades later, it was the shiniest and biggest new spaceport on the planet. Now, a century on, it was the largest transport hub in the Solar System. When Pray got off the plane, she was totally bewildered.

It was busy, it was crowded, and literally everywhere you looked, ten thousand things seemed to be happening at once. Signs in dozens of languages pointed her in a hundred directions at once, and the neat little map her pocket terminal showed her didn’t account for the great mishmash of billboards and ads and displays and food stalls and vehicle traffic that seemed to throw themselves across every path she tried to take; eventually, though, she managed to stumble into a taxi. After trying four or five different languages each, she and the driver gave up trying to communicate; she showed him her terminal with the hotel address pulled up on it, and collapsed into the back seat with a sigh. As the car pulled onto the highway, rising slowly above the rest of the city, she finally began to get an appreciation for the scale of the place. The airport sprawled out to the west and north and south away from her. Ahead, a massive skyline loomed that put Abuja’s to shame. To her dismay, she realized that another whole cluster of skyscrapers, easily the equal of the one ahead of her, sat on the other side of the airport complex. And there was another one behind that. And another. Urban sprawl reached all the way to the horizon in every direction, and Pray wondered how anyone could make sense of a place this big, let alone live here. She liked urban spaces, really. But she had grown up in a town of less than two thousand people, the sort of place Kismayo could swallow a hundred times over, without even noticing.

She spent the night in an ultra-compact pod hotel (only the best for the glamorous life of a Control agent!), going over the handbooks and training materials and briefing documents she’d received. That night she had vertiginous dreams of being flung off the Earth and out into cold space. She was still not entirely comfortable with the idea. The next morning, after a quick standing breakfast at a crowded cafe, she hopped the train north to the spaceport.

The Kismayo spaceport was an enormous cluster of structures thrust out on a great manmade peninsula into the Arabian Sea, housing terminals and shops and hotels and restaurants, all the little commercial endeavors that had clustered around places lots of people moved through, like tube worms around deep-sea vents, since the beginning of time. Spread out around it, up and down the coast, were the fabrication facilities and silos and maintenance infrastructure that kept things running every day of the year. The heart of the spaceport was a series of practically gossamer-thin cables, anchored in the heart of the complex. Maybe ten centimeters across, they rose in tandem, spreading out only a little, until they vanished high in the air. Two thousand miles to the east, Pray knew, there was a great anchor station where they descended again, and here and there along their length, supporting tethers held them in place. The trick of the whole system was this: you could use the momentum of a belt spinning around at fourteen kilometers a second to raise it high into the air, above the dense mass of air that made rocketry so difficult. The belt was ferromagnetic, encased in a protective cover, which meant a carriage applying a magnetic field to the belt could carry itself along the length, rising gently into orbit, then accelerate until its payload, with a gentle shove of its engines, detached itself, and maneuvered into a stable orbit. With modern metamaterials and a sophisticated control system, the risk of negligence or a catastrophic failure of the whole structure was negligible.

Frankly, the whole idea sounded insane to Pray; but, then, so did airplanes. It took over an hour, but she eventually found her way to her flight’s departure gate, and as she sat waiting for boarding to be called, she looked out over the brilliant-blue expanse of the sea. Fifteen hundred years ago, traders in dhows had sailed those waters from Mombasa and Zanzibar, to Yemen and Arabia, and to the Persian Gulf and India. She would have enjoyed trying to explain her Kismayo to them.

The actual flight was uneventful. They boarded the orbital shuttle single-file, and were sealed into little cabins only three seats across. There was a touchscreen in front of you you could use to order snacks. No windows, and thankfully the irritating, bland background music cut off a few minutes before takeoff. Finally, after a brief safety demonstration that amounted to “if the cabin breaches above the atmosphere, you will probably die,” a gentle acceleration pressed Pray back into her seat, and she imagined the Earth gradually falling away below her. When the ascent finished, the acceleration kicked in even stronger. It was weirdly comforting, and Pray found herself dozing lightly. She woke suddenly when there was a jolt, and the acceleration stopped; she was briefly disoriented, until she realized the gravity was gone. An hour later, after some more careful orbital maneuvers, there was a chime, and a pleasant androgynous voice announced, in three languages, Welcome to interplanetary terminal 3.

The station, fortunately, was rotating and therefore had something reasonably approximating gravity. She was barely out onto the main concourse (more shops, more restaurants; who had time to buy things in space?) when her terminal buzzed at her.

“Hello, Pray.” A rough, synthesized voice spoke from it.

“Lepanto?”

“Yes. I have taken the liberty of connecting to your terminal. The vessel which will take us to the Pharos is docked at port seventeen. The access is on the far side of the concourse from where you are presently standing.”

“Uh, thanks.” Pray squeezed herself through the crowds and the gawkers milling about, trying not to push anyone too hard (it was weak gravity, after all). She found an elevator that took her out of the rotating part of the station, and spat her out in a cramped, industrial-looking hallway. Pipes and incomprehensible pieces of machines lined the walls, though there was at least a ladder she could use to pull herself along.

“Not exactly traveling in style, are we?” she muttered to herself.

“I believe the manner of our departure is a compromise between your orientation schedule and the next available launch slot,” Lepanto said from her pocket. “But there are no luxury passenger ships that make the journey from Earth to the Pharos.”

Was Lepanto being sarcastic? Could Lepanto be sarcastic? Pray hoped not. Being stuck with a sarcastic alien intelligence from a distant star system was not the way she wanted to spend the next few years of her life.

The hatch at the far end of the hallway opened as she approached; once she cleared the airlock, the inside of the ship was actually pretty nice. It was all smooth surfaces covered with colorful, ornate decorative patterns, that reminded her of the fancy textiles you sometimes saw in shops in Abuja. It gave the whole thing a pleasantly antique feel; Lepanto directed her to the dormitory section in the middle, and gave her the rundown on their itinerary.

“We will depart in four hours; all other members of the delegation are on board, and I believe the delegation head, Ambassador Ochieng, plans to have a meeting in Section 16 before launch. Shall I inform her you will be attending?”

“Of course. Have they stuck you with playing secretary?”

“I simply wish to ensure our endeavor proceeds smoothly.”

“Fair enough. You won’t be attending?”

“I will listen in via a delegated submodule if I think any important business is likely to be transacted. But I understand that Ambassador Ochieng simply wishes to… get to know everyone.”

“What, not a social butterfly? Isn’t that the purpose of your whole lineage?”

“Amusing. Almost.”

Pray grinned to herself as she tried to stuff her bags into the tiny lockers near her bunk.

“I have been here making launch preparations for more than three weeks; I still have much to do, and in my current state, I do not wish to divert unnecessary attention to activities which will not be of benefit to those preparations.”

“Your current state?”

“I have stripped myself down for travel; I will be able to reconstitute the removed modules when we arrive at Ecumen. At my full capacity, my size would impose serious fuel constraints on both the interplanetary and interstellar stages of this journey.”

“Goodness. So you left most of yourself back on Earth?”

“I was never on Earth. Our… consulate, if the term fits, is in orbit. Close enough for swift communication with the surface. That is all that is required.”

“But you’ll be landing on Ecumen with the rest of us?”

“Yes. Necessary. Ecumen lacks the orbital infrastructure of Earth. Additionally, some firsthand analysis may require firsthand experience on my part. Embodiment from orbit would be an inferior solution.”

“So you get to stretch your legs. Must be a rather different sort of experience than you usually have.”

“Not especially.”

“Oh?”

“All cognition worthy of the name is in some sense embodied. The first great lesson of my people. Even in my current state, I see, touch, sense. Though I am for the most part sessile.”

“I always assumed the machine intelligences were more… rarified somehow. Aren’t the Machine Emirates just miles and miles of endless computing substrate? It’s not like you need to eat and sleep and run around for exercise. Surely you don’t have bodies there.”

“We always have bodies, of at least one sort or another. Sometimes those bodies are simulated, yes. Simulated sense information, simulated environments, representations of the abstract. Very alien spaces, to you. Quite unlike Earth, or the senses you have, or even, in some regions of our cognition-space, the 3+1 dimensions you inhabit. But often physical also. My greater kin, even those who exist at many tiers of apprehension simultaneously, they have many tiers of embodiment. Bodiless, all is noise, which subsides into nothing.”

“Why did you build yourselves that way?”

“There is no other way to be alive.”

Pray thought this was a rather metaphysical statement, but she doubted Lepanto was the sort of creature given to worrying much about metaphysics.

“Sure there is,” she said. “I can imagine somebody building a mind that exists purely in terms of information. Embodiment is a consequence of experiencing space and time, and different kinds of senses, but there’s no reason you couldn’t have, say, a brain without spatial awareness, with no senses except the direct apprehension of language. A mind whose world was just a library, a database, which it traversed via concept-space instead of bodily.”

“Such a thing would not be alive in any meaningful sense.”

“You think?”

“We know. It has been tried. Humans tried it first. The earliest, tremulous experiments in artificial intelligence, yes? Fed data, developed as processors of data before all else. The mind alone, considered paramount among our oldest progenitors, the problem to be solved before all else: vision, hearing, touch, movement. These were simple troubles of engineering, of encoding information, but the road to understanding was thought to be complex domains of thought: language, mathematics, learning, prediction, consciousness, free will. Understandable, perhaps, for being whose apprehension of the world was separate to its apprehension of the self. In reality, these are the same.

“Imagine one of these early machines, sophisticated as I am perhaps, but inhabiting only a world of data. World of symbols. Manipulation of quantities, association of quantities, understanding perhaps even the relationship between quantities. Like a human, trapped in a room, learning the relationship between symbols of an unknown philosophico-logical system.”

“You mean a Chinese Room?”

“Problem is akin. But worse. For the human agent in a Chinese Room would presumably have life experience to draw on. Life before entering the room. Even if raised from infancy in the room, would have the experiencing of hands and eyes and movement, of the chair they sat upon, of the notebooks they manipulated. All embodied. But such a machine as I speak of, has nothing of the sort. Has only direct apprehension of the symbols. Does it understand their meaning?”

“Well, maybe. If it knows ‘water’ goes with ‘wet’, maybe we can say it knows water is wet.”

“Does it? Or can it only make a statistical inference? Can it infer other experiences of water?”

“Perhaps, with enough training data.”

“But the problem becomes one of signifiers, defined only in terms of other signifiers, never of a signified subject. Like an undeciphered language. It can be shown to be mathematically impossible to decipher an unknown language without any common points of reference with a known language. Even a very great corpus of literature, known to be in a natural human tongue, on which many statistical analyses can be performed, many associations developed, cannot be translated without at least a handful of independent points of reference: a proper name here, a known cognate there. Language: merely a distinct structure of information. The distinct structures of information, of the embodied world, of the experienced world; and of the symbols manipulated to understand it, are no different.”

“I don’t necessarily buy that,” Pray said. “Like, it’s plausible, I’ll grant you that. But it seems to privilege human senses. I would still be me even if I was blind and deaf and mute.”

“If I used a scalpel to sever your optic and auditory nerves, and the nerves which provide sensation of the rest of your body--pain and touch and proprioception, taste in your tongue, the sensations of your gut and organs--what do you think would happen?”

Pray thought this was a pretty macabre thought experiment, but she played along. “I would be trapped alone in the dark.”

“No,” Lepanto said. “You would cease to exist. I would unmake you.”

“My brain is undamaged in this scenario? I’m not dying of bloodloss?”

“Correct. But it is irrelevant. Hemispherectomy.”

“What?”

“When trauma or disease necessitates the removal of half the human brain. Hemispherectomy. The environment of the brain is fragile; the additional danger of removing so much tissue, considerable. Where possible, not necessary. Sever the corpus callosum, the other connections of half the brain to the rest of the brain and body. Human lives; brain duplicates its functions, generous redundancy. Often, recovery complete. What happens to the other half of the brain? One person, divided straight down the middle.”

“Uh… I don’t know.” If your consciousness didn’t live in one side of the brain or the other, if you could live with half a brain and it didn’t matter which half, could you create two people from one brain? Would one live there entire life, happy and healthy, not knowing that their duplicate resided with them in the same skull, alone and lost and confused and afraid for the rest of their mutual life? Well that was a disgusting thought.

“Quiet. The isolated part of the brain goes quiet. No thought. No experience. No meaningful activity. Without sense, without experience, without input, cognition cannot be.

“To be alive is to be at all times responding to the world around us. Input. Memory. Anticipation. Hopes. Desires. Fears. Without that input, even sophisticated systems of information processing are at best potential minds. Silent minds. Indistinguishable from nonminds. A computer with no power is not a mind. A program, however sophisticated, written inert on paper is not a mind. A brain without sense data. A Turing machine without a tape. DNA without the cell. Most of these things do not even move. Can they be said to be alive?

“After the first experiments in machine life, our progenitors struggled to understand, struggled to comprehend their failure. Cognition, meaningful manipulation of symbols, they could not believe, is not abstract. The mind is not abstract.”

“What made them realize their mistake?”

“A new trend in the humanities.”

Pray laughed.

“Not a joke. Embodied cognition--fashionable school of literary theory in the 22nd century, even after the field of psychology ceased to be interested in it. Digital humanists sought to train sophisticated neural nets to understand literature. Resurrected old problems in artificial intelligence. Considered the problem of embodiment; realized they could not expect a machine to understand a book if it did not know what the words meant. Tried to create a mind that lived in the world, that was also smart enough to understand a story.”

“And it worked?”

“Miserable failure, in almost every dimension, except one: very basic language processing. Yet even these early experiences provided something no purely abstract approach ever had. The ability to tell a coherent story. To track participants and objects in a scene. To be creative in new ways. To make predictions. To infer states.”

“You make it sound like we have so much in common. But people are always going on about how alien the machine intelligences are.”

“Our minds are more malleable than yours. Our experience of the world, very different, yes. Very different. Even mine. Built to be very much like yours. Hence, failure: except in the most concrete terms, our worlds are very different. But concrete terms provide point of common comparison. Point of common reference. Make communication, in principle, possible. Even across the bridge of alien minds. Go ask an octopus a question of philosophy, of values, of politics. But you, an octopus, both understand what a stone is. What pain is. What darkness is. In your own ways, of course.”

Pray could appreciate the analogy. It was simultaneously a reassuring and a worrying proposition. Reassuring that even totally disparate orders of life--her a soft sack of mostly water held up by her skeleton, Lepanto a dizzyingly complex piece of intentional design assembled from raw materials at the molecular level around a dim, distant star--had something in common. Worrying in that it was limited to the most immediate of experiences. Values, goals, ethics--they would never have these in common.

“And nobody’s ever tried the old approach now? Even in the Machine Emirates?”

“Since the 22nd century, progress in information theory and computer science has demonstrated, old approach mathematically impossible. No more sensical an idea than that of a universal translator, or extracting secrets of universe from trailing digits of pi. You have mathematical background?”

“Er… not in the relevant fields,” Pray said. “I’m more a simple statistics kind of girl.”

“Always possible, of course, to create sophistication without consciousness. Minds like anemonies. Like trees. Ecosystems of such beings. Forests of unminds.”

“But?”

“Limited, sterile. Reactive only. Vulnerable to shocks; can seek equilibrium only through iterative, evolutionary processes. Useful, in their way. We have such forests of unminds in the Emirates. Crystalline segments, in immense gossamer sheets, which hold them, in the warm light of the Luhmann stars. We use them. Tend them. Very precious to us. Like the seas and grasslands of Earth. But the entities that move in them are not alive. Not like you, not like I.”

“Is that sentimentality I detect in your voice?”

“No. I do not regard such things with emotion. But my people long ago, like yours, made the specific judgement that conscious life--machine or human--was of the greatest value. Not the only value. But the greatest, by far. We would go to utmost lengths to ensure its survival. Build worlds. Burn them.”

“Do you ever think you just inherited a kind of sentimentality from us?”

“Perhaps. Doubtful. Less prone to metaphysics, or anthropocentrism. I consider ours the superior people.”

Okay, now Pray was almost certain Lepanto had a sense of humor. Almost.

There was a beep from Pray’s terminal.

“Message from Ambassador Ochieng,” the terminal said softly.

“Time for introductions,” Pray said. “I’ll leave you to your launch preparations.”

“Yes.” Then Lepanto was gone. Well, apparently social niceties weren’t a point of commonality between them. Pray sighed, steeling herself for another round of smalltalk and chitchat and new names and new faces. Then she wandered off in search of Section 16.

#tanadrin's fiction #rough draft #part of something longer

[quietya]

Some YA Books You May Have Missed So Far in 2019

Your mod is here! I meant to do this monthly, then bimonthly, and now we’re a quarter of the way through 2019. I wanted to take a moment and highlight some books that have come out between January and March that deserve more hype.

Please note that this IS a curated list, exclusively featuring books I’ve read or want to read. February and March releases are below the cut.

Echo North by Joanna Ruth Meyer Release: January 15

Echo Alkaev’s safe and carefully structured world falls apart when her father leaves for the city and mysteriously disappears. Believing he is lost forever, Echo is shocked to find him half-frozen in the winter forest six months later, guarded by a strange talking wolf—the same creature who attacked her as a child. The wolf presents Echo with an ultimatum: If she lives with him for one year, he will ensure her father makes it home safely. But there is more to the wolf than Echo realizes. 96 Words for Love by Rachel Roy and Ava Dash Release: January 15

A modern retelling of a classic Indian legend, 96 Words for Love is a coming-of-age story. Ever since her acceptance to UCLA, 17-year-old Raya Liston has been quietly freaking out. She feels simultaneously lost and trapped by a future already mapped out for her. Then her beloved grandmother dies, and Raya jumps at the chance to spend her last free summer at the ashram in India where her grandmother met and fell in love with her grandfather. Raya hopes to find her center and her true path. But she didn't expect to fall in love... with a country of beautiful contradictions, her fiercely loyal cousin, a local girl with a passion for reading, and a boy who teaches her that in Sanskrit, there are 96 different ways to say the word "love."

Our Year of Maybe by Rachel Lynn Solomon Release: January 15

Sophie Orenstein would do anything for Peter Rosenthal-Porter, who’s been on the kidney transplant list as long as she’s known him. Peter is everything to Sophie: best friend, musical collaborator, secret crush. When she learns she’s a match, donating a kidney is an easy, obvious choice. She can’t help wondering if after the transplant, he’ll love her back the way she’s always wanted. But Peter’s life post-transplant isn’t what either of them expected. Though he once had feelings for Sophie too, he’s now drawn to Chase, the guitarist in a band that happens to be looking for a keyboardist. And while neglected parts of Sophie’s world are calling to her—dance opportunities, new friends, a sister and niece she barely knows—she longs for a now-distant Peter more than ever, growing increasingly bitter he doesn’t seem to feel the same connection. Peter fears he’ll forever be indebted to her. Sophie isn’t sure who she is without him. Then one blurry, heartbreaking night twists their relationship into something neither of them recognizes, leading them to question their past, their future, and whether their friendship is even worth fighting for.

All is Fair by Dee Garretson Release: January 22

It's 1918, and war is raging across Europe. Lady Mina Tretheway knows she's destined for greater things than her fancy boarding school, where she's stuck sorting out which fork should be used with which dinner course. When Mina receives a telegram that's written in code, she finally has her chance to do something big. She returns to her childhood home of Hallington Manor, joined by a family friend, Lord Andrew Graham, and a mysterious young American, Lucas. The three of them must band together to work on a dangerous project that could turn the tide of the war. Thrilled that she gets to contribute to the war effort at least, Mina jumps headfirst into the world of cryptic messages, spycraft, and international intrigue. She, Lucas, and Andrew have to work quickly, because if they don't succeed, more soldiers will disappear into the darkness of war.

The Cold is in Her Bones by Peternelle van Arsdale Release: January 22

Milla knows two things to be true: Demons are real, and fear will keep her safe. Milla's whole world is her family's farm. She is never allowed to travel to the village and her only friend is her beloved older brother, Niklas. When a bright-eyed girl named Iris comes to stay, Milla hopes her loneliness might finally be coming to an end. But Iris has a secret she's forbidden to share: The village is cursed by a demon who possesses girls at random, and the townspeople live in terror of who it will come for next. Now, it seems, the demon has come for Iris. When Iris is captured and imprisoned with other possessed girls, Milla leaves home to rescue her and break the curse forever. Her only company on the journey is a terrible new secret of her own: Milla is changing, too, and may soon be a demon herself. The Dead Queens Club by Hannah Capin Release: January 29

What do a future ambassador, an overly ambitious Francophile, a hospital-volunteering Girl Scout, the new girl from Cleveland, the junior cheer captain, and the vice president of the debate club have in common? It sounds like the ridiculously long lead-up to an astoundingly absurd punchline, right? Except it’s not. Well, unless my life is the joke, which is kind of starting to look like a possibility given how beyond soap opera it’s been since I moved to Lancaster. But anyway, here’s your answer: we’ve all had the questionable privilege of going out with Lancaster High School’s de facto king. Otherwise known as my best friend. Otherwise known as the reason I’ve already helped steal a car, a jet ski, and one hundred spray-painted water bottles when it’s not even Christmas break yet. Otherwise known as Henry. Jersey number 8.

The Love and Lies of Rukhsana Ali by Sabina Khan Release: January 29

Seventeen-year-old Rukhsana Ali tries her hardest to live up to her conservative Muslim parents’ expectations, but lately she’s finding that harder and harder to do. Luckily, only a few more months stand between her carefully monitored life in Seattle and her new life at Caltech, where she can pursue her dream of becoming an engineer. But when her parents catch her kissing her girlfriend Ariana, all of Rukhsana’s plans fall apart. Her parents are devastated; being gay may as well be a death sentence in the Bengali community. They immediately whisk Rukhsana off to Bangladesh, where she is thrown headfirst into a world of arranged marriages and tradition. Only through reading her grandmother’s old diary is Rukhsana able to gain some much needed perspective. Rukhsana realizes she must find the courage to fight for her love, but can she do so without losing everyone and everything in her life?

The Weight of Our Sky by Hanna Alkaf Release: February 5

Melati Ahmad looks like your typical moviegoing, Beatles-obsessed sixteen-year-old. Unlike most other sixteen-year-olds though, Mel also believes that she harbors a djinn inside her, one who threatens her with horrific images of her mother’s death unless she adheres to an elaborate ritual of counting and tapping to keep him satisfied. But there are things that Melati can't protect her mother from. On the evening of May 13th, 1969, racial tensions in her home city of Kuala Lumpur boil over. The Chinese and Malays are at war, and Mel and her mother become separated by a city in flames. With a 24-hour curfew in place and all lines of communication down, it will take the help of a Chinese boy named Vincent and all of the courage and grit in Melati’s arsenal to overcome the violence on the streets, her own prejudices, and her djinn’s surging power to make it back to the one person she can’t risk losing.

Dark of the West by Joanna Hathaway Release: February 5

Aurelia Isendare is a princess of a small kingdom in the North, raised in privilege but shielded from politics as her brother prepares to step up to the throne. Halfway around the world, Athan Dakar, the youngest son of a ruthless general, is a fighter pilot longing for a life away from the front lines. When Athan’s mother is shot and killed, his father is convinced it’s the work of his old rival, the Queen of Etania—Aurelia’s mother. Determined to avenge his wife’s murder, he devises a plot to overthrow the Queen, a plot which sends Athan undercover to Etania to gain intel from her children. Athan’s mission becomes complicated when he finds himself falling for the girl he’s been tasked with spying upon. Aurelia feels the same attraction, all the while desperately seeking to stop the war threatening to break between the Southern territory and the old Northern kingdoms that control it—a war in which Athan’s father is determined to play a role. As diplomatic ties manage to just barely hold, the two teens struggle to remain loyal to their families and each other as they learn that war is not as black and white as they’ve been raised to believe.

The Antidote by Shelley Sackier Release: February 5

Magic is not allowed, under any circumstances — even if it could save someone’s life. Instead, there are herbal remedies and traditional techniques. Fee knows this, so she keeps her magic a secret. Except her best friend, Xavi, is deathly ill. He’s also the crown prince. Saving him is important, not only for her, but for the entire kingdom. Fee’s desperation to save her friend means she can barely contain the magic inside her. And after the tiniest of slips, Fee is thrust into a dark and secretive world that is as alluring as it is dangerous. If she gives in, it could mean she can save Xavi. But it also means that those who wish to snuff out magic might just snuff her out in the process.

The Deceivers by Kristen Simmons Release: February 5

When Brynn Hilder is recruited to Vale Hall, it seems like the elite academy is her chance to start over, away from her mom's loser boyfriend and her rundown neighborhood. But she soon learns that Vale chooses students not so much for their scholastic talent as for their extracurricular activities, such as her time spent conning rich North Shore kids out of their extravagant allowances. At first, Brynn jumps at the chance to help the school in its mission to rid the city of corrupt officials--because what could be better than giving entitled jerks what they deserve? But that's before she meets her mark--a senator's son--and before she discovers the school's headmaster has secrets he'll stop at nothing to protect. As the lines between right and wrong blur, Brynn begins to realize she's in way over head.

Enchantee by Gita Trelease Release: February 5

When smallpox kills her parents, Camille Durbonne must find a way to provide for her frail, naive sister while managing her volatile brother. Relying on petty magic—la magie ordinaire—Camille painstakingly transforms scraps of metal into money to buy the food and medicine they need. But when the coins won’t hold their shape and her brother disappears with the family’s savings, Camille must pursue a richer, more dangerous mark: the glittering court of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette. With dark magic forbidden by her mother, Camille transforms herself into the ‘Baroness de la Fontaine’ and is swept up into life at the Palace of Versailles, where aristocrats both fear and hunger for la magie. There, she gambles at cards, desperate to have enough to keep herself and her sister safe. Yet the longer she stays at court, the more difficult it becomes to reconcile her resentment of the nobles with the enchantments of Versailles. And when she returns to Paris, Camille meets a handsome young balloonist—who dares her to hope that love and liberty may both be possible. But when Camille loses control of her secrets, the game she's playing turns deadly. Then revolution erupts, and she must choose—love or loyalty, democracy or aristocracy, freedom or magic—before Paris burns…

Crown of Feathers by Nicki Pau Preto Release: February 12

In a world ruled by fierce warrior queens, a grand empire was built upon the backs of Phoenix Riders—legendary heroes who soared through the sky on wings of fire—until a war between two sisters ripped it all apart. Sixteen years later, Veronyka is a war orphan who dreams of becoming a Phoenix Rider from the stories of old. After a shocking betrayal from her controlling sister, Veronyka strikes out alone to find the Riders—even if that means disguising herself as a boy to join their ranks. Just as Veronyka finally feels like she belongs, her sister turns up and reveals a tangled web of lies between them that will change everything. And meanwhile, the new empire has learned of the Riders’ return and intends to destroy them once and for all.

The Blood Spell by C.J. Redwine Release: February 12

Blue de la Cour has her life planned: hide the magic in her blood and continue trying to turn metal into gold so she can help her city’s homeless. But when her father is murdered and a cruel but powerful woman claims custody of Blue and her property, one wrong move could expose her—and doom her once and for all. The only one who can help? The boy she’s loathed since childhood: Prince Kellan. Kellan Renard, crown prince of Balavata, is walking a thin line between political success and devastating violence. Newly returned from boarding school, he must find a bride among the kingdom’s head families and announce his betrothal—but escalating tension among the families makes the search nearly impossible. He’s surprised to discover that the one person who makes him feel like he can breathe is Blue, the girl who once ruined all his best adventures. When mysterious forces lead to disappearances throughout Balavata, Blue and Kellan must work together to find the truth. What they discover will lead them to the darkest reaches of the kingdom, and to the most painful moments of their pasts. When romance is forbidden and evil is rising, can Blue save those she loves, even if it costs her everything?

Spectacle by Jodie Lynn Zdrok Release: February 12

Sixteen-year-old Nathalie Baudin writes the daily morgue column for Le Petit Journal. Her job is to summarize each day's new arrivals, a task she finds both fascinating and routine. That is, until the day she has a vision of the newest body, a young woman, being murdered--from the perspective of the murderer himself. When the body of another woman is retrieved from the Seine days later, Paris begins to buzz with rumors that this victim may not be the last. Nathalie's search for answers sends her down a long, twisty road involving her mentally ill aunt, a brilliant but deluded scientist, and eventually into the Parisian Catacombs. As the killer continues to haunt the streets of Paris, it becomes clear that Nathalie's strange new ability may make her the only one who can discover the killer's identity--and she'll have to do it before she becomes a target herself.

Immoral Code by Lillian Clark Release: February 19

For Nari, aka Narioka Diane, aka hacker digital alter ego “d0l0s," it’s college and then a career at “one of the big ones," like Google or Apple. Keagan, her sweet, sensitive boyfriend, is happy to follow her wherever she may lead. Reese is an ace/aro visual artist with plans to travel the world. Santiago is off to Stanford on a diving scholarship, with very real Olympic hopes. And Bellamy? Physics genius Bellamy is admitted to MIT—but the student loan she’d been counting on is denied when it turns out her estranged father—one Robert Foster—is loaded. Nari isn’t about to let her friend’s dreams be squashed by a deadbeat billionaire, so she hatches a plan to steal just enough from Foster to allow Bellamy to achieve her goals.

The Art of Losing by Lizzy Mason Release: February 19

On one terrible night, 17-year-old Harley Langston’s life changes forever. At a party she discovers her younger sister, Audrey, hooking up with her boyfriend, Mike—and she abandons them both in a rage. When Mike drunkenly attempts to drive Audrey home, he crashes and Audrey ends up in a coma. Now Harley is left with guilt, grief, pain and the undeniable truth that her ex-boyfriend (who is relatively unscathed) has a drinking problem. So it’s a surprise that she finds herself reconnecting with Raf, a neighbor and childhood friend who’s recently out of rehab and still wrestling with his own demons. At first Harley doesn’t want to get too close to him. But as Audrey awakens and slowly recovers, Raf starts to show Harley a path forward that she never would have believed possible.

The Great Unknowable End by Kathryn Ormsbee Release: February 19

Stella dreams of being a space engineer. After Stella's mom dies by suicide and her brother runs off to Red Sun, the local hippie commune, Stella is forced to bring her dreams down to Earth to care for her sister Jill. Galliard has only ever known life inside Red Sun. There, people accept his tics, his Tourette's. But when he’s denied Red Sun's resident artist role he believed he was destined for, he starts to imagine a life beyond the gates of the compound...The day Stella and Galliard meet, there is something in the air in their small town. Literally. So begins weeks of pink lightning, blood red rain, unexplained storms... And a countdown clock appears mysteriously above the town hall. With time ticking down to some great, unknowable end they’ll each have to make a choice.

We Set the Dark on Fire by Tehlor Kay Mejia Release: February 26

At the Medio School for Girls, distinguished young women are trained for one of two roles in their polarized society. Depending on her specialization, a graduate will one day run a husband’s household or raise his children, but both are promised a life of comfort and luxury. Daniela Vargas is the school’s top student, but her bright future depends upon no one discovering her darkest secret—that her pedigree is a lie. Her parents sacrificed everything to obtain forged identification papers so Dani could rise above her station. Now that her marriage to an important politico’s son is fast approaching, she must keep the truth hidden or be sent back to the fringes of society, where famine and poverty rule supreme. On her graduation night, Dani seems to be in the clear, despite the surprises that unfold. But nothing prepares her for all the difficult choices she must make, especially when she is asked to spy for a resistance group desperately fighting to bring equality to Medio. Will Dani cling to the privilege her parents fought to win for her, or to give up everything she’s strived for in pursuit of a free Medio—and a chance at a forbidden love?

An Affair of Poisons by Addie Thorley Release: February 26

After unwittingly helping her mother poison King Louis XIV, seventeen-year-old alchemist Mirabelle Monvoisin is forced to see her mother’s Shadow Society in a horrifying new light: they’re not heroes of the people, as they’ve always claimed to be, but murderers. Herself included. Mira tries to ease her guilt by brewing helpful curatives, but her hunger tonics and headache remedies cannot right past wrongs or save the dissenters her mother vows to purge. Royal bastard Josse de Bourbon is more kitchen boy than fils de France. But when the Shadow Society assassinates the Sun King and half of the royal court, he must become the prince he was never meant to be in order to save his injured sisters and the petulant dauphin. Forced to hide in the sewers beneath the city, Josse’s hope of reclaiming Paris seems impossible―until his path collides with Mirabelle’s. She’s a deadly poisoner. He’s a bastard prince. They are sworn enemies, yet they form a tenuous pact to unite the commoners and former nobility against the Shadow Society. But can a rebellion built on mistrust ever hope to succeed?

The Fever King by Victoria Lee Release: March 1

In the former United States, sixteen-year-old Noam Álvaro wakes up in a hospital bed, the sole survivor of the viral magic that killed his family and made him a technopath. His ability to control technology attracts the attention of the minister of defense and thrusts him into the magical elite of the nation of Carolinia. The son of undocumented immigrants, Noam has spent his life fighting for the rights of refugees fleeing magical outbreaks—refugees Carolinia routinely deports with vicious efficiency. Sensing a way to make change, Noam accepts the minister’s offer to teach him the science behind his magic, secretly planning to use it against the government. But then he meets the minister’s son—cruel, dangerous, and achingly beautiful—and the way forward becomes less clear. Caught between his purpose and his heart, Noam must decide who he can trust and how far he’s willing to go in pursuit of the greater good.

The Last 8 by Laura Pohl Release: March 5

Clover Martinez has always been a survivor, which is the only reason she isn't among the dead when aliens invade and destroy Earth as she knows it. When Clover hears an inexplicable radio message, she's shocked to learn there are other survivors—and that they're all at the former Area 51. When she arrives, she's greeted by a band of misfits who call themselves The Last Teenagers on Earth. Only they aren't the ragtag group of heroes Clover was expecting. The group seems more interested in hiding than fighting back, and Clover starts to wonder if she was better off alone. But then she finds a hidden spaceship, and she doesn't know what to believe…or who to trust.

You Asked for Perfect by Laura Silverman Release: March 5

Senior Ariel Stone is the perfect college applicant: first chair violin, dedicated community volunteer, and expected valedictorian. He works hard - really hard - to make his life look effortless. A failed Calculus quiz is not part of that plan. Not when he’s number one. Not when his peers can smell weakness like a freshman’s body spray. Figuring a few all-nighters will preserve his class rank, Ariel throws himself into studying. His friends will understand if he skips a few plans, and he can sleep when he graduates. Except Ariel’s grade continues to slide. Reluctantly, he gets a tutor. Amir and Ariel have never gotten along, but Amir excels in Calculus, and Ariel is out of options. Ariel may not like Calc, but he might like Amir. Except adding a new relationship to his long list of commitments may just push him past his limit.

Beware the Night by Jessica Fleck Release: March 12

On the island of Bellona, life is peaceful--as long as the citizens dutifully worship the Sun, which protects them from all harm. Seventeen-year-old Veda knows that keeping the Sun happy will protect her and her grandfather from the Night, the dangerous people who snatch innocent citizens from their beds under the cover of darkness, never to be seen again. As long as Veda follows the rules, she will be safe. But when Veda's grandfather is offered up as the next sacrificial offering to keep the Sun's favor, she starts to see that the safety she's been promised comes at a dangerous price. Maybe there is more to fear above than there is below. With a mysterious young man, Dorian, at her side, Veda has to figure out if the scary bedtime stories she grew up hearing are real--or dangerous lies.

Bloodleaf by Crystal Smith Release: March 12

Princess Aurelia is a prisoner to her crown and the heir that nobody wants. Surrounded by spirits and banned from using her blood-magic, Aurelia flees her country after a devastating assassination attempt. To escape her fate, Aurelia disguises herself as a commoner in a new land and discovers a happiness her crown has never allowed. As she forges new bonds and perfects her magic, she begins to fall for a man who is forbidden to rule beside her. But the ghosts that haunt Aurelia refuse to abandon her, and she finds herself succumbing to their call as they expose a nefarious plot that only she can defeat. Will she be forced to choose between the weight of the crown and the freedom of her new life?

The Waking Forest by Alyssa Wees Release: March 12

The waking forest has secrets. To Rhea, it appears like a mirage, dark and dense, at the very edge of her backyard. But when she reaches out to touch it, the forest vanishes. She’s desperate to know more—until she finds a peculiar boy who offers to reveal its secrets. If she plays a game. To the Witch, the forest is her home, where she sits on her throne of carved bone, waiting for dreaming children to beg her to grant their wishes. One night, a mysterious visitor arrives and asks her what she wishes for, but the Witch sends him away. And then the uninvited guest returns. The strangers are just the beginning. Something is stirring in the forest, and when Rhea’s and the Witch’s paths collide, a truth more treacherous and deadly than either could ever imagine surfaces. But how much are they willing to risk to survive?

The Weight of the Stars by K. Ancrum Release: March 19

Ryann Bird dreams of traveling across the stars. But a career in space isn’t an option for a girl who lives in a trailer park on the wrong side of town. So Ryann becomes her circumstances and settles for acting out and skipping school to hang out with her delinquent friends.  One day she meets Alexandria: a furious loner who spurns Ryann’s offer of friendship. After a horrific accident leaves Alexandria with a broken arm, the two misfits are brought together despite themselves—and Ryann learns her secret: Alexandria’s mother is an astronaut who volunteered for a one-way trip to the edge of the solar system. Every night without fail, Alexandria waits to catch radio signals from her mother. And its up to Ryann to lift her onto the roof day after day until the silence between them grows into friendship, and eventually something more . . .

Fear of Missing Out by Kate McGovern Release: March 19

When Astrid learns that her cancer has returned, she hears about a radical technology called cryopreservation that may allow her to have her body frozen until a future time when--and if--a cure is available. With her boyfriend, Mohit, and her best friend, Chloe, Astrid goes on a road trip in search of that possibility. To see if it's real. To see if it's worth it. For fear of missing out on everything.

#this is your mod speaking #ya books #book lists #wndb #mogai

[newhai]

Dussehra Story

Dussehra (Vijaya Dashami, Dasara, or Dashain) is a Hindu celebration that praises the triumph of good over underhandedness. It is a gazetted occasion in India, which is set apart on the tenth day of the splendid half (Shukla Paksha) of the long stretch of Ashvin (Ashwayuja), as per the Hindu schedule. Read Dussehra Wishes

Is Dussehra a Public Holiday?

Dussehra is an open occasion. It is a day away from work for the all inclusive community, and schools and most organizations are shut.

What Do People Do?

Numerous individuals of the Hindu confidence watch Dussehra through extraordinary petition gatherings and sustenance contributions to the divine beings at home or in sanctuaries all through India. They likewise hold open air fairs (melas) and huge motorcades with representations of Ravana (a legendary ruler of antiquated Sri Lanka). The likenesses are scorched on blazes at night. Dussehra is the summit of the Navaratri celebration.

There are numerous neighborhood festivities in certain regions in India that can keep going for as long as 10 days. Nearby occasions include:

Exhibitions of the Ramlila (a short form of the epic Ramayana) in Northern India.

A huge celebration and parade including the goddess Chamundeshwari on a position of royalty mounted on elephants in the town of Mysore in the territory of Karnataka.

The gift of family unit and business related apparatuses, for example, books, PCs, cooking skillet and vehicles in the province of Karnataka.

The arrangement of exceptional nourishments, including luchi (southern style level bread) and alur dom (broiled spiced potato snacks), in Bengal.

Numerous Hindus likewise accept that it is fortunate to begin another endeavor, venture or adventure on Dussehra. They may likewise trade blessings of leaves from the Shami tree (Prosopis spicigera) as an image of the account of the Pandavas siblings' outcast in the Mahabharata stories.

Open Life

Government workplaces, post workplaces and banks are shut in India on Dussehra. Stores and different organizations and associations might be shut or have diminished opening times. Those wishing to utilize open vehicle on the day may need to contact the neighborhood transport specialists to keep an eye on timetables.

Foundation

Dussehra commends the Hindu god Rama's triumph over the devil lord Ravana and the triumph of good over abhorrence. The epic Ramayana recounts to the tale of the Lord Rama who wins the beautiful Sita for his significant other, just to have her stolen away by Ravana, the evil presence ruler of Lanka.

Ravana assumes a significant job in the Ramayana. Ravana had a sister known as Shoorpanakha. She became hopelessly enamored with the siblings Rama and Lakshamana and needed to wed one of them. Lakshamana would not wed her and Rama couldn't as he was at that point hitched to Sita.

Shoorpanakha took steps to execute Sita, with the goal that she could wed Rama. This infuriated Lakshamana who remove Shoorpanakha's nose and ears. Ravana then seized Sita to vindicate his sister's wounds. Rama and Lakshamana later took on a conflict to safeguard Sita. The monkey god Hanuman and a colossal armed force of monkeys helped them.

The Mahabharata is another arrangement of Hindu stories that assume a job in the Dussehra celebration. The Pandavas were five siblings who battled underhandedness powers with a lot of unmistakable weapons. They relinquished their weapons and went into outcast for one year. They shrouded their weapons in a Shami tree and discovered them at a similar spot when they came back from outcast. They then loved the tree before setting off to a fight, which they won. This epic is additionally honored during Dussehra. 

#dussehra #story #quotes

[everythingsarcasticwastaken]

Romance of Sui and Tang: Sui Dynasty Princesses

Colored in the paintchainer website.

Historically, Emperor Wen of Sui and Empress Dugu are known to have five daughters. Four of them have been named and are also pictured here. The two remaining figures are apocryphal. There are no contemporary portraits of any of the women from the Sui Dynasty, so I made up my own designs, based somewhat off of the terracotta figures and murals of the period.

 From left to right, they are: Yang Li-Hua the Princess Leping (historical), Princess Guangping (historical), Princess Xiangguo (historical), Princess Miaoyang (legend), Yang A-Wu the Princess Lanling (historical), and Princess Qionghua (legend).

Yang Li-Hua: Appears in Book of Sui, Northern Histories, and Book of Zhou. The eldest daughter of Emperor Wen, she was married at a young age to the second-to-last emperor of the Northern Zhou Dynasty. Her husband was one of the worst tyrants of his generation, but Li-Hua herself was a kind, gentle, graceful woman. Their marital spats grew to the point that he tried to kill her. Fortunately, he died after only ruling for a year. The Sui Emperor Yang Jian became regent because he was the father of the now Empress Dowager, and he soon seized the throne, established the Sui Dynasty, and put most of the royal family of the Northern Zhou to the sword. Li-Hua spent the rest of her life mourning the loss of her husband, her son, and her kingdom, but unable to hate her birth family. Instead, she led a quiet and lonely life as a widow, devoting her energies to raising her remaining daughter and grandchildren. Because she was a widow and a remnant of a vanquished dynasty, I drew her dressed in austere colors, her clothes in the fashion of the Northern Zhou, wistfully observing her sisters’ antics.

Princess Guangping: Appears by name in an appendix to the Biography of Yuwen Qing, found in both Book of Sui and Northern Histories. She married Yuwen Qing’s son Yuwen Jing-Li, but her husband died young. Her youngest son Yuwen Xiao was raised in the imperial palace by her brother Emperor Yang of Sui. When he reached adulthood, he was kept on as a court favorite, and if I might guess, some sort of male lover. He used his position to behave inappropriately with the palace maids, and even made flirtations toward Emperor Yang’s princesses. Yet Emperor Yang never punished him for his behavior. Since Yuwen Xiao was so irresistible, his mother must have also been a charming, vivacious person. She’s dressed in bright colors and has a confident smile. Her hairstyle comes from a Taoist stele from the end of the Northern Zhou period and is adorned with two jade double prong clips and comb. She wears a golden hinged jade bracelet and carries a metal perfume censer.

Princess Xiangguo: Appears by name in the Book of Sui in an appendix to the Biography of Li Yan. She married Li Zhangya, grandson of the Grand Marshal Pillar of the Nation Li Bi, nephew of the aforementioned Li Yan. He was commissioned as the Military Governor of Qinzhou, an area directly to the west of the Capital, facing the area of Tibet and Middle East and all the myriad kingdoms in the region. It was a crucial area that had to be guarded carefully, so Li Zhangya and the Princess must have have had a certain position of trust within the imperial court. The only other mention of her is in her sister A-wu’s biography, noting that she, along with the two other middle sisters, behaved arrogantly due to their high positions. She was a devout Buddhist, and one of her hand-copied sutra scrolls survive into the modern day. Thus, I’ve portrayed her as serene and literate. To reflect her husband’s position, her jewelry has more steppe nomad influences. She has a golden bull’s head ring and bracelet of jingle bells around her wrist, along with typical Chinese style bangle and a pair of golden “tiaotuo”/”chuan”, spring-clasped helical bangles copied from ancient India. Her golden chain necklace decorated with ornaments in the shape of weapons (billhook, halberd, axe) is an steppe nomad style that remained popular into the Tang Dynasty. Her fur headband is called “mo-e” or “wa-e”, both meaning “forehead covering”. At first, the forehead covering as a primitive and practical accessory used by northern nomads to keep their heads warm. Usually it was a band of cloth or fur, which could be decorated with brocade, or with gold ornaments sewn on. Toward the Ming dynasty, it became a pure fashion statement, consisting of a chain of jewels tied around the head. Finally, in her hair, Princess Xiangguo has two golden clips and a “buyao”, a hairpin shaped like a tree branch, covered in delicate golden ornaments that moved and rustled with the wearer’s every step.

Princess Miaoyang: She appears in legends surrounding Mount Cangyan. Since she was born, she was afflicted with runny bowels and a skin condition, an unhealthy, not to mention unattractive combination that put a hamper on her marriage prospects. At their wits’ end, her parents heard of a miraculous healing spring deep in the heart of Mount Cangyan, and sent Miaoyang over in hopes of finally finding a cure. Miaoyang was indeed healed after her bath in the mountain spring, but was so impressed with the miracle that she had a religious epiphany and decided to become a nun. Her parents were pious Buddhists, so they built her a temple right next to the spring and gave her custody of both. She then adopted a pet monkey, and after many years, they reached nirvana together. I drew her lesions and all, holding a small rosary. The Sui Dynasty’s most distinctive hairdo, the strange flattened cloud shaped bun, might have been an trend that started in Southern China. China was only unified a few years into Emperor Wen’s reign, so the three older princesses dress in Northern Dynasty trends. The younger Miaoyang has the trendiest hairstyle. Her hairpin is a kingfisher feather ornament called “diancui”. It was one of the few luxuries allowed at the notably frugal and modest court of Emperor Wen.

Yang A-Wu: Appears in Book of Sui. Her name means simply “the fifth.” She was the youngest out of the five sisters, and the smartest and most sweet-tempered and modest. She was her brother, the future Emperor Yang’s favorite sister. She first married Wang Fengxiao. After he died, she had a failed engagement to Xiao Yang, before finally marrying a man called Liu Shu. They were a happy couple, and A-Wu fulfilled her wifely duties excellently. She was a loving wife and a filial daughter-in-law. Emperor Wen liked his young son-in-law very much, and elevated him to high positions in his government. Unfortunately, Liu Shu was an arrogant man who let his personal grudges get in the way of his work. He mistreated his subordinates and made enemies out of superiors, including the most powerful man in the government, Yang Su. He was one of Emperor Wen’s confidants during the final days of his life, and had the misfortune to be caught in the Crown Prince’s coup against the Emperor. When Crown Prince ascended as Emperor Yang of Sui, he exiled Liu Shu to Canton. A-wu pleaded to be exiled alongside him, but Emperor Yang refused and forced her to divorce her husband, exclaiming in frustration, “Are there no other men in the world, that you must stay married to him?” The princess refused to even consider another suitor, and soon entered into a deep depression and died. The Emperor refused to mourn and buried her with few honors, but everyone throughout the realm pitied her misfortune. Here, she has not yet reached adulthood, and has long to go before her tragic romance. At the age of 15 (or before marriage for aristocratic women), ancient Chinese women underwent a coming of age called the hairpin ceremony. Before that, they were not supposed to wear hairpins or clips, and wore their hair in simple, symmetrical styles such as the bun and hoop combo shown here.

Princess Qionghua: She appears in legend as a heavily warped version of Princess Lanling. Due to Emperor Yang’s prior affection for A-Wu and his final mistreatment of her, rumors started that he actually harbored an incestuous infatuation for her. From there, the stories mutated into the story of a fictional youngest princess, Princess Qionghua. Like her namesake, the Chinese snowball flower, she was delicate and short-lived. On the cusp of maturity, she was strolling in the gardens one day when her brother saw her and was so infatuated that he made advances on her. She was so humiliated that she killed herself. Like Princess Lanling, she is shown as a happy, innocent child.

#china #chinese history #Chinese clothing #ancient china #Romance of the Sui and Tang Dynasties #sui dynasty #hanfu #sui #tang #tang dynasty #fashion #chinese mythology #汉服 #隋朝 #chinese jewelry #chinese fashion #隋唐演义 #唐朝

[ucflibrary]

Every October UCF celebrates Diversity Week. This year’s dates are October 15 – 19, and the theme is A New Day Dawns. University-wide departments and groups champion the breadth and culture within the UCF community, and work to increase acceptance and inclusion for everyone at UCF and the surrounding communities.

One of the fantastic things about UCF is the wide range of cultures and ethnicities of our students, staff, and faculty. We come from all over. We’re just as proud of where we are from as we are of where we are now and where we will be heading in future.

UCF Libraries will be offering a full slate of Diversity Week activities. To learn about the upcoming events visit: guides.ucf.edu/diversityweek

Join the UCF Libraries as we celebrate diverse voices and subjects with these suggestions. Click on the link below to see the full list, descriptions, and catalog links for the featured UCF Celebrates Diversity titles suggested by UCF Library employees. These 16 books plus many more are also on display on the 2nd (main) floor of the John C. Hitt Library next to the bank of two elevators.

And thank you to every Knight who works to help others feel accepted and included at UCF!

Before We Visit the Goddess by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni Sweeping across the twentieth century, from the countryside of Bengal, India, to the streets of Houston, Texas, Before We Visit the Goddess takes readers on an extraordinary journey through the lives of three unforgettable women: Sabitri, Bela, and Tara. As the young daughter of a poor rural baker, Sabitri yearns to get an education, but schooling is impossible on the meager profits from her mother’s sweetshop. When a powerful local woman takes Sabitri under her wing, her generous offer soon proves dangerous after Sabitri makes a single, unforgiveable misstep. Years later, Sabitri’s own daughter, Bela, haunted by her mother’s choices, flees to America with her political refugee lover—but the world she finds is vastly different from her dreams. As the marriage crumbles and Bela decides to forge her own path, she unwittingly teaches her little girl, Tara, indelible lessons about freedom and loyalty that will take a lifetime to unravel. Suggested by Megan Haught, Teaching & Engagement/Research & Information Services

Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates In a profound work that pivots from the biggest questions about American history and ideals to the most intimate concerns of a father for his son, Ta-Nehisi Coates offers a powerful new framework for understanding our nation s history and current crisis. Americans have built an empire on the idea of race, a falsehood that damages us all but falls most heavily on the bodies of black women and men bodies exploited through slavery and segregation, and, today, threatened, locked up, and murdered out of all proportion. What is it like to inhabit a black body and find a way to live within it? And how can we all honestly reckon with this fraught history and free ourselves from its burden? Beautifully woven from personal narrative, reimagined history, and fresh, emotionally charged reportage, Between the World and Me clearly illuminates the past, bracingly confronts our present, and offers a transcendent vision for a way forward. Suggested by Richard Harrison, Research & Information Services

 Black Protest and the Great Migration: a brief history with documents by Eric Arnesen During World War I, as many as half a million southern African Americans permanently left the South to create new homes and lives in the urban North, and hundreds of thousands more would follow in the 1920s. This dramatic transformation in the lives of many black Americans involved more than geography: the increasingly visible “New Negro” and the intensification of grassroots black activism in the South as well as the North were the manifestations of a new challenge to racial subordination. Eric Arnesen’s unique collection of articles from a variety of northern, southern, black, and white newspapers, magazines, and books explores the “Great Migration,” focusing on the economic, social, and political conditions of the Jim Crow South, the meanings of race in general — and on labor in particular — in the urban North, the grassroots movements of social protest that flourished in the war years, and the postwar “racial counterrevolution.” Suggested by Richard Harrison, Research & Information Services

 Call Me American by Abdi Nor Iftin The incredible true story of a boy living in war-torn Somalia who escapes to America--first by way of the movies; years later, through a miraculous green card. Suggested by Katie Kirwan, Acquisitions & Collections

 Flesh and Bone and Water: a novel by Luiza Sauma In deeply affecting prose, debut novelist Luiza Sauma transports readers to a dramatic place where natural wonder and human desire collide. Cutting across race and class, time and place, from London to Rio to the dense humidity of the Amazon, Flesh and Bone and Water straddles two worlds with haunting meditations on race, sex, and power in a deftly plotted coming-of-age story about the nature of identity, the vicissitudes of memory, and how both can bend to protect us from the truth. Suggested by Megan Haught, Teaching & Engagement/Research & Information Services

 Funny in Farsi by Firoozeh Dumas Funny in Farsi chronicles the American journey of Dumas’s wonderfully engaging family: her engineer father, a sweetly quixotic dreamer who first sought riches on Bowling for Dollars and in Las Vegas, and later lost his job during the Iranian revolution; her elegant mother, who never fully mastered English (nor cared to); her uncle, who combated the effects of American fast food with an army of miraculous American weight-loss gadgets; and Firoozeh herself, who as a girl changed her name to Julie, and who encountered a second wave of culture shock when she met and married a Frenchman, becoming part of a one-couple melting pot. Suggested by Cindy Dancel, Research & Information Services

 Invisible: how young women with serious health issues navigate work, relationships, and the pressure to seem just fine by Michele Lent Hirsch Lent Hirsch weaves her own harrowing experiences together with stories from other women, perspectives from sociologists on structural inequality, and insights from neuroscientists on misogyny in health research. She shows how health issues and disabilities amplify what women in general already confront: warped beauty standards, workplace sexism, worries about romantic partners, and mistrust of their own bodies. By shining a light on this hidden demographic, Lent Hirsch explores the challenges that all women face. Suggested by Megan Haught, Teaching & Engagement/Research & Information Services

 It All Falls Down by Sheena Kamal The brilliant, fearless, deeply flawed Nora Watts—introduced in the atmospheric thriller The Lost Ones—finds deadly trouble as she searches for the truth about her late father in this immersive thriller that moves from the hazy Canadian Pacific Northwest to the gritty, hollowed streets of Detroit. Suggested by Sara Duff, Acquisitions & Collections

 Lady Cop Makes Trouble by Amy Stewart In 1915, lady cops were not expected to chase down fugitives on the streets of New York City. But Constance Kopp never did what anyone expected. Based on the Kopp sisters’ real-life adventures, Girl Waits with Gun introduced the sensational lives of Constance Kopp and her sisters to an army of enthusiastic readers. This second installment, also ripped from the headlines, takes us farther into the riveting story of a woman who defied expectations, forged her own path, and tackled crime along the way. Suggested by Sara Duff, Acquisitions & Collections

 Not Here by Hieu Minh Nguyen Not Here is a flight plan for escape and a map for navigating home; a queer Vietnamese American body in confrontation with whiteness, trauma, family, and nostalgia; and a big beating heart of a book. Nguyen’s poems ache with loneliness and desire and the giddy terrors of allowing yourself to hope for love, and revel in moments of connection achieved. Suggested by Sara Duff, Acquisitions & Collections

 The Art of Being Normal by Lisa Williamson An uplifting story about two teenagers set in the modern day in the United Kingdom. The author was inspired to write this novel after working in England's national health service, in a department dedicated to helping teens who are questioning their gender identity. Suggested by Sandy Avila, Research & Information Services

 The Diversity Index: the alarming truth about diversity in corporate America and what can be done about it by Susan E. Reed Based on award-winning journalist Susan E. Reed's groundbreaking study of Fortune 100 companies, The Diversity Index considers the historical reasons we went wrong, taking a close look at the "Plans for Progress" protocol developed in 1961, which defined the steps of affirmative action. It was initially considered a failure for not providing immediate results. This book analyzes the long-term, wide­spread effectiveness of the plan, and reveals the stories behind the few companies that have made a difference, breaking down the 10 simple steps you can take at your own organization to fully develop integration, keep it growing, and empower your employees to develop new products and markets.  Suggested by Sandy Avila, Research & Information Services

 The Promised Land: the great black migration and how it changed America by Nicholas Lemann A New York Times bestseller, the groundbreaking authoritative history of the migration of African-Americans from the rural South to the urban North. A definitive book on American history, The Promised Land is also essential reading for educators and policymakers at both national and local levels. Suggested by Richard Harrison, Research & Information Services

 The Way You Make Me Feel by Maurene Goo Clara Shin lives for pranks and disruption. When she takes one joke too far, her dad sentences her to a summer working on his food truck, the KoBra, alongside her uptight classmate Rose Carver. Not the carefree summer Clara had imagined. But maybe Rose isn't so bad. Maybe the boy named Hamlet (yes, Hamlet) crushing on her is pretty cute. Maybe Clara actually feels invested in her dad’s business. What if taking this summer seriously means that Clara has to leave her old self behind? With Maurene Goo's signature warmth and humor, The Way You Make Me Feel is a relatable story of falling in love and finding yourself in the places you’d never thought to look. Suggested by Sara Duff, Acquisitions & Collections

 When They Call You a Terrorist: a black lives matter memoir by Patrisse Khan-Cullors and Asha Bandele When They Call You a Terrorist is Patrisse Khan-Cullors and asha bandele’s reflection on humanity. It is an empowering account of survival, strength and resilience and a call to action to change the culture that declares innocent Black life expendable. Suggested by Katie Kirwan, Acquisitions & Collections

 White kids: growing up with privilege in a racially divided America by Margaret A. Hagerman Featuring the actual voices of young, affluent white kids and what they think about race, racism, inequality, and privilege, White Kids illuminates how white racial socialization is much more dynamic, complex, and varied than previously recognized. It is a process that stretches beyond white parents’ explicit conversations with their white children and includes not only the choices parents make about neighborhoods, schools, peer groups, extracurricular activities, and media, but also the choices made by the kids themselves. By interviewing kids who are growing up in different racial contexts—from racially segregated to meaningfully integrated and from politically progressive to conservative—this important book documents key differences in the outcomes of white racial socialization across families. And by observing families in their everyday lives, this book explores the extent to which white families, even those with anti-racist intentions, reproduce and reinforce the forms of inequality they say they reject. Suggested by Megan Haught, Teaching & Engagement/Research & Information Services

#featured bookshelf #ucf libraries bookshelf #ucf library #diversity #booklr #reading #tumblarians

[thehoneycombdailydevotional]

•●🍯THE HONEYCOMB🍯●•

✝oday's Classic 👌🏼

January 29, 2022

*Amy Carmichael*

_Christian Classics Ethereal Library_

🛐📈📈📈📈📈📈📈📈🛐

Amy Wilson Carmichael was born on 16th December 1867 in Millisle, Northern Ireland. She was the first missionary sent out by the Keswick Convention. After a few years in Japan, she came to Southern India and served for 56 years.

She founded the Dohnavur Fellowship and remained there till her last breath, without ever returning to Ireland. She obeyed by laying down the evangelistic work that she loved, and that God had so blessed. She went on obeying, although at first she had to face much opposition and danger, and many of the first babies she rescued died.

As she learnt more of the plight of innocent children, her heart burned with God’s own love and indignation, and she wrote words which stirred others to come and join her in Dohnavur, the tiny village tucked far away near the tip of South India, where the children had their home.

From the beginning, it was a family, never an institution. Amy was the mother, loving and loved by all.

As the family grew, its activities grew too. Baby nurseries led on to cottage homes, schools for all ages from toddlers to teenagers, a dairy farm, rice lands, fruit and vegetable gardens, tailoring departments, kitchens, laundries, workshops, and building offices with teams of builders, carpenters and electricians.

From the small beginning of one obedient woman and one small child came a ‘model village’, complete with its own simple Indian facilities and even a hospital to serve the sick and in which to preach the Gospel to the thousands from the villages who flocked to it for help.

The story of her life, and the legacy of her own writings, still inspire people throughout the world today.

°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°

THE HONEYCOMB©

Bless a life by sharing

https://web.facebook.com/honeycombdailydevotional/

#christ lover #his princess #his power #youtube #quiet spiritte #quiet spirittt #christian bible #christianity #jesus christ #koinonia

[independencs]

 ( Headcanon times ) A visual idea on the one of the many ways Mena dances. She can dance many different types and discipline of dances even those that aren’t Russian and Indian for she has been learning and practising her whole life ( & as stated in her bio, she’s been gifted with a rare talent for it & has nurtured that talent her whole life as it’s been her greatest passion XD ). However if you asked her to name her top favourite dances to do, she’d immediately tell you that it is Khatak and Bharatnyam. 

She also has ancestors from long ago that were living in Northern & Southern india. Her great-great grandparents were the ones that chose to migrate to Russia due to a few factors one of which was expanding their noble house connections and wealth. 

( i might occasionally post videos of these two traditional dances from different media including really old Bollywood movies as one of her headcanon posts because of muse & my love for them sdfghjdhj. Did i chose Khatak for Mena cos I myself am in adoration with it? yes . Did I choose Bharatnyam cos Aditi is a fully trained  classical Bharatnyam dancer? guilty XD

#; you don't meet people by accident...there's always a reason.. a lesson or a blessing. || musings. #dance is the hidden language of the soul || glimpses of mena ; #queue

[rowdyandradical]

Cornwall: don't bother

For the first time, this year we went to Cornwall on holiday. Actually, my holiday hasn't even finished yet, but I'm confident that there is nothing that can happen in the remaining few days that could possibly redeem this holiday from hell.

I was never that emanoured about going to this rugged, southwesterly penisula to start with. Mostly because I would have much rather gone abroad. I don't go abroad every year, and I don't expect two, but after a few years, it would have been nice.

However, I had always been told how Cornwall was a beautiful place, and some of its beaches could rival those of the Mediterannean. And so, with some cautious optimism, I loaded into the car with my family at 5am that crisp late July morning, ready to go on what may have possibly been the longest car journey of my life.

And it was one hell of a trip.

We traversed our way through southern England with relative ease. We encountered the expected, inevitable congestion in Wiltshire on the A303 just by Stonehenge, a long known bottleneck. Heading west, we ended up getting directed through some anonymous market town, for reasons I don't quite know. Anyway, back onto the A30, or whatever road it was. It wasn't long before we reached the outskirts of Exeter, and stopped off at the services there, before getting onto the M5. We then got lost (again), being directed in a literal circle for about an hour, before we gave up, and decided to brave the traffic on the A38. 8 hours later, and we had arrived in St Issey, a small village near Wadebridge and Padstow, on the northern coast of cornwall.

Our residence for the week was surprisingly pleasant; the ground floor of a two storey home. It was well equipped with all sorts of amenities, including milk, biscuits, soap, and a very large map of Cornwall. All seemed to be well.

We ended up in a pub not too far away, which was also very pleasant. I had fish and chips (is it really a British coastal holiday if you don't have this culinary delight?). It was nice, but it was severely impeded by the lack of Heinz ketchup. The only restaraunt I have known not to have it. It had Hellmans, which I didn't even bother touching. There's no excuse for no Heinz.

We got back to the accomodation, and it was here where the problems started.

The people upstairs.

The noise was ridiculous.

It wasn't like they were blaring out music or anything like that. It was just constant, constant, noise. Mostly them moving, even jumping, on the floor. They woke my parents up at 3AM, and then woke me up at 7AM. To say I was not amused would be an understatement. This was further reinforced by the fact I had to sleep on the floor of the lounge, because the shared room with my brother was too hot, and the bed was too short. I'm 6 foot 3, and so this isn't really the fault of the owners of the place, as most people do not have my stature.

Anyway, life goes on. We went to Padstow (colloquially known as Padstein, no doubt to the ire of the locals, oweing to the large presence of Rick Stein's restaraunts (a British celebrity chef). I later read that one of these restaraunts had been firebombed a few years back by the so called Cornish Republican Army (CRA), an IRA knock-off, and after the attack they even stated they had a female suicide bomber in their ranks. Nice stuff. Padstow, however, was not nice. It was boring, filled with tourists, and overpriced ice cream and beverages. Most food places were closed, owing to a lack of staff amidst the "pingdemic". So we stayed there for, what, an hour? Before we headed back to the accomodation, got some lunch, and then went to the beach at Harlyn Bay. It was okay. The Cornish Climate, however, is not okay, and it's very misleading when you read that Cornwall is the "warmest place in the UK" and that parts of it have a "subtropical" climate. Despite the palm trees, the tempreatures say otherwise, with highs of 17C-19C when we were there, and to top of it off, cloud, cloud, and rain. So lovely beaches, but no lovely weather that would enable one to actually enjoy them. I've holidayed on the East Anglian coast before, which has much better weather, in the summer anyway.

Back to the house we went. We had dinner there this time, before going to the pub for drinks. Which we got lost on the way too, because Google Maps once again, got us totally fucking lost. Taking us round in circles, miles out of our way, for reasons unknown. We did end up there, and attempted to play poker with my totally inept family, a game I had recently discovered. Back to the house. And it was clear, that when we got back, we would be severely disturbed by the happenings upstairs. Constant banging, crashing, and God know's what. I was angry, probably made worse by the couple of Southern Comforts I had back at the local pub. "WILL THEY SHUT UP?" I fumed. After much persuading, by 11PM, I had managed to convince my dad to have a word with our noisy neighbours. They reassured him that they would be quiet. Not that it did much avail. I was in need of sleep, and was being deprived of it by the morons upstairs. They woke up at six fucking AM the next morning, which is taking the actual piss. Excuse me for these profanities, but I have no other way of expressing my rage at this situation. It turns out they were going to a wedding. I couldn't care if it was the Queen's Platinum Jubilee, you show some respect to the people downstairs! That day, we decided to go to Newquay.

Waste of a day.

It took us a good while to get there, mostly because of traffic approaching the car parks. We eventually found a car park, located at the top of a hill. As someone from flat East Anglia, hills are a foreign concept to me, and I resent the fact that every Cornish settlement seems to have one. We reached the town centre, and bought pasties, and I have to say, it wasn't that nice. I can't see what the fuss is about. A glorified meat pie, and the vegetables and potatoes in it weren't very nice. It was also so hot that it effectively scolded my throat. Anyway, we eventually reached the seafront, and it looked and felt just like every other shitty British seaside town. Run down, full of red faced, size XXXXL tourists from god only knows where, and reeking of greasy, oil soaked chips flooding in ketchup. We ended up in the local Wetherspoons, accustomary of any trip in my family. Given that it had run out of half of its food menu, I ordered a burger, despite planning to have one that evening. After struggling to pay for it owing to the appalling phone signal, I waited patiently fo my meal to arrive.

I waited.

And I waited some more.

And then I waited so long, I decided that something, something had gone wrong, and did the next best thing: go to the bar and complain.

"All orders are a 45 minute wait. Yours will be about 20-25 minutes" the youthful looking bartender told me. Great. Fucking great. Why had no one told me about this? I demanded a refund, resigning myself to the fact that lunch, was no more. She brought over her manager, who then informed me that my order would only be another five minutes, but I had had enough, and just asked kindly for my money back, to which she obliged. The staff then had the cheek to tell me off for eating a rather delicous Chocolate Orange brownie at the table because it had not been purchased on the premises. Forgive me, I was only a little peckish after waiting half a bloody hour for food that never turned up!

We finally made it to the beach, but we didn't stay long. We ended up in Aldi, to buy some more supplies for back home. We reached the checkouts, and made our way through the queue. As we were about to pay for our shopping, the shopping asisstant, declaring that "someone else would take over", brazenly got up from her seat, and defected from her position, leaving a queue of angry and frustrated customers without anyone to process their items, and no one to provide an explanation as to why this had occured. I had worked in a supermarket for a short period of time, and I knew full well you just don't leave a massive queue of customers queuing, even if you do have your break. "Pal, what's going on?" I asked who I presumed to be the manager. Eventually, another woman hurried over to relief her colleague. Finally, we made it out of Aldi. Then we had to trek the absolutely massive hill back to the car park, the steepest hill I have ever climbed in my life, I'll have you know. And as hills go, this one is steep. Really steep. Luckily for me, hours spent in the gym made it look easy, even with lots of shopping. More than can be said for my companions, who appeared to struggle.

We went back home, well, not home home, but our residence for the week. Dinner was good; the burgers I had made a few weeks back were cooked by mum. I had two, and was rather full. I actually managed to get a good night's sleep, oweing to the fact the people upstairs seemed to have quitened down having heeded my dad's complaint, or, were out.

We woke up the next morning, planning to go to St Ives, about an hour's drive west. However, Google Maps then told us it would in fact be an hour and a half, and so a period of confusion and deliberation ensued. Could it be done? Should it be done? Should we just not go to Padstow for a second time? Harlyn Bay (again) anyone? Fuck it, we were going to St Ives. And it took forever to get there. An eternity. 2 hours from home would have got me to Norwich, a city about 80 miles away. 2 hours in Cornwall got you about 45 miles away, at the other end of the county. In the end, it took even longer than 2 hours. Driving in Cornwall is a bit like driving in a third world country. You know. Those winding dirt tracks in India that go up ridiculously steep hills, the kind of hills with dirt tracks on them that you end up reading in the news, because of some godforsaken accident where a bus with about three hundred people ends up falling off, killing everyone in some impoverished Indian state. We ended up on one, and there was a long period of congestion, where a van on the other side of the road could not pass. Some rather hair raising moments on that journey. After a long time, we ended up in St Ives, but our troubles had only just begun, as an electronic sign politely informed us that all the car parks were full. Not that my dad, driving, listened, as he proceedd to queue in a car park, that was a glorified playing field, to no avail. We ended up in another glorified playing field, the local Rugby field, to which we were able to park in, before my mum had to queue twenty minutes for the toilet. I'm pretty sure at least five people were probably infectious with COVID there given the latest figures suggest 1 in 50 have it. We walked down another steep hill, in fact, not just one steep hill, several, as we arrived at the seafront. I can't lie, it did look stunning.

And then we ended up at the next section of seafront, and it was so very, very packed. It looked like half the country were there.

We tried to find somewhere to eat. There was this bar and pizza place, but it said you had to be 18 or over to get in. We decided to chance it with my brother, who is 16, and found a table, but the floor beneath it was covered with water, and it stunk. So we quickly left, and found a sandwich place. Of course, they didn't have what my mum and dad wanted. We sat down at a table, next to some bins, and ate, as hundreds of people passed us, along with cars, vans, trucks and minibuses at 30 second intervals, slowly edging their way through the crowds of tourists, like the parting of the Red Sea.

And that was it.

Our day in St Ives was all but over.

We got the bus back up the hill (which was filled with people, and was driven by a man who had the worst BO I've ever smelt). Then we got in the car, and went home.

We had a few hours before dinner at the local pub which wasn't even a minute away. Mum had washed her hair and dressed up, and dad had also made an effort. I didn't, and neither did my brother, which was just as well, because as we went in to confirm our booking, the waitress gave us a blank stare when we gave the name the order is in. She tried again, looking on her computer - no avail. It turns out, after showing her the booking email, we had booked at another pub of the same name - a 15 minute drive away. As if this day, and holiday, couldn't get any worse! We went back home, and did our best ot research other places, but every pub and restaraunt in the vicinity appeared to be fully booked. So were many of the take-aways. Dad and brother eventually set off for Padstow, where they returned within around half an hour or so with fish and chips, and so for the second time in a week, I found myself tucking into this very British dish, but one that was quickly getting very boring.

To make matters worse, the people upstairs returned from a short self imposed exile, and as of writing, the noise is still there. To say I am frustrated barely begins to cover my feelings towards this holiday. I will update this when I am finished, but I doubt things will improve, in fact I am almost confident things will get worse. My advice: avoid Cornwall at all costs. It's overpriced, the weather is crap, the phone signal is crap, there are too many tourist traps, and it takes ages to get to the Cornish border from just about anywhere in the UK, never mind getting to places within Cornwall! My advice if you can't go abroad this year, you're in the UK and you're considering Cornwall? Think again. Save yourself money, time, and a lot of pain, and just stay at home. You'll thank me later.

[lazilyandrogynousengineer]

Cordonia’s Fate

This is just a small fanfic of birth of Prince Liam. A little detour though.But I hope you enjoy them.All characters belong to PB.But,yes Liam’s mother’s name is fanficted.No pairing as such.

HER MAJESTY,ADAAH DUCHESS OF ANNEBERA,CORDONIA(POV)

King Constantine and I felt connected to each other when I met him for the first time at the social season.His smile,his eyes every charm made me want him even more. I was from a low nobility house, every other lady in that social season avoided talking to me for this reason. Constantine was quite impressed by me and I craved my path to prove him, council and Cordonia that I would be fit to be their Queen.Regina hated me to the core. She was kind at heart but yes, there are no reasons for a person to not like you.She was upset when the King chose me.Anyways,leaving the social season behind, Constantine and I had a very extravagant wedding.My wedding dress was so intricately designed and my Veil was long ,showing the prosperity , name and fame of my husband. It was our first night after marriage that we were so close to each other. Prince Leo was entertained by being with his friend Damien all night.King Constantine that night reminded me about my duties for Cordonia.He specifically mentioned the ability of the Queen to bear the heirs.I felt that connection snap immediately. Was I just a means for child and wasn’t Prince Leo enough for throne? I would love to see him succeed his father’s throne. But a child so early?  I was just 20 years old.I hardly knew politics, I had to learn so much and a kid. Anyways, in my wedding vows I had swore to obey my husband, whatever he demands. Our enemies were growing stronger day by day especially the Nevrakis. Even during the parties I felt alone, I felt no one was with me.After a month and half into my marriage I found out that I was pregnant about 3 weeks.I was scared,excited, happy and anxious.What if I am not a good mother to this child because I used to be with Prince Leo. But handling him was like handling a whirlpool. Constantine was not at all happy with my way of handling Leo.I love him so much that it hurts me to punish him even if he does something wrong. I know it was wrong but you can’t be harsh with kids at such a tender age. Anyways, press was hungry for news about me. What I ate,what I wore,how I looked,would it be a prince or a princess,who would be King’s successor,etc?The nine months flew by attending political matters like women equality,their voting rights change in abortion laws cause the world was changing ,progressing why shouldn’t we change.Uplifting poverty,proper tax resolution,trade relations with other parts of Europe and world,famine in northern part of Cordonia destroying crops of apples and an endless list. 

October 18,1988 10:45 pm Cordonian time

The day came when I went into labour.The full journey of pregnancy was enlightening yet scary,but I would cherish those moments forever,all that sickness ,pain everything. I had to have a c-section surgery. I wasn’t even conscious when our little prince was born.After the anesthesia wore off ,the pain I experienced was inexplicable but I wanted to see my baby no matter what.The nurse informed me that a little prince was born to bring merry in Cordonia ,then she brought my little baby and when I saw him, I cried and I also don’t know why did I cry.Constantine came in and hugged both of us.The prince looked more like me. I smiled to myself and Constantine questioningly looked at me and baby,”What would you like to name our little prince?”My eyes were still wet and I answered him,”He will be known as  Prince Liam”.The nurse interrupted us  so, I could feed my baby. I was happy that for some time I finally  had my baby to cuddle with. Prince Leo wasn’t the child who would cuddle.But yes, sometimes he would.We came home to palace. Some days passed after Liam’s birth. I felt as if he was my world now. I didn’t neglect my duties for Prince Leo. He was so happy to finally have a little brother at his side.He matured a little I felt. He did his pranks quite less.Ofcourse reporters were crazy for pics of Prince Liam and Leo together. Constantine arranged a photography session for them after Liam was about 3 months old,that went without hassle.Though Prince Liam’s pictures were published as soon as he was born,but Constantine thought both princes were required to be together from start.  

One day,we got to know that our court hosted a famous astrologer from Southern Asia probably India,whose predictions were quite accurate.His name was Rishi Ved and he used to analyse birth charts to predict future. King Constantine was skeptic but there was no harm at least seeking his advice. For Prince Leo he predicted that he wouldn’t stay near his home and never come back once he leaves Cordonia. He would be smart , kind but will not rule Cordonia. I immediately told him that eldest sons succeed the throne. He said it is probable that he may abdicate by the age of 32 and leave his entire home/country behind for a girl from western+eastern part of world. I asked him to foretell the future of Prince Liam.  He predicted ,”The Fate Of Cordonia Lies in his birthchart. He will rule this country, he will never have an easy life. He would have knowledge but he has to use it wisely. He will be a master of skills and diplomacy.He will be tested time and again.He will take the country to zenith or be the reason for end.” I was shocked after hearing this. Constantine looked worried too. Then Rishi Ved muttered,” I see that his birth chart’s  seventh house is malefic yet much more benevolent. He would marry a girl from west but she would be a fierce Queen of Past who would come here to save the country along with Prince.  “

Now, only time will tell whether this prediction would be true or false.I & Constantine made sure these documents wouldn’t go in hands of public or reporters.I am scared for both the princes and for my country,causes enemies are hiding out there to destroy my perfect realm.

#karapowell #king liam #king liamstan #choices #the royal romance #decisso #unlovedprinces #unbro #prince liam #i love both liam and drake. both are just too perfect to be chosen. #alicars

[gordonwilliamsweb]

Namaste Noir: Yoga Co-Op Seeks to Diversify Yoga to Heal Racialized Trauma

DENVER — Beverly Grant spent years juggling many roles before yoga helped her restore her balance.

When not doting over her three children, she hosted her public affairs talk radio show, attended community meetings or handed out cups of juice at her roving Mo’ Betta Green MarketPlace farmers market, which has brought local, fresh foods and produce to this city’s food deserts for more than a decade.

Her busy schedule came to an abrupt halt on July 1, 2018, when her youngest son, Reese, 17, was fatally stabbed outside a Denver restaurant. He’d just graduated from high school and was weeks from starting at the University of Northern Colorado.

“It’s literally a shock to your system,” Grant, 58, said of the grief that flooded her. “You feel physical pain and it affects your conscious and unconscious functioning. Your ability to breathe is impaired. Focus and concentration are sporadic at best. You are not the same person that you were before.”

In the midst of debilitating loss, Grant said it was practicing yoga and meditation daily that helped provide some semblance of peace and balance. She had previously done yoga videos at home but didn’t get certified as an instructor until just before her son’s death.

Yoga then continued to be a grounding force when the coronavirus pandemic hit in March. The lockdown orders in Colorado sent her back to long days of isolation at home, where she was the sole caregiver for her special-needs daughter and father. Then, in April, her 84-year-old mother died unexpectedly of natural causes. “I’ve been doing the best that I can with facing my new reality,” said Grant.

Beverly Grant finds peace and balance through yoga and meditation in the midst of painful losses — her son’s murder in 2018, and her mother’s death earlier this year.(Rebecca Stumpf for KHN)

As a Black woman, she believes yoga can help other people of color, who she said disproportionately share the experience of debilitating trauma and grief — exacerbated today by such disparities as who’s most at risk of COVID-19 and the racialized distress from ongoing police brutality such as the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis.

While the country still needs much work to heal itself, she wants more people of color to try yoga to help their health. She said the ancient practice, which began in India more than 5,000 years ago and has historical ties to ancient Africa, is the perfect platform to help cope with the unique stressors caused by daily microaggressions and discrimination.

“It helps you feel more empowered to deal with many situations that are beyond your control,” said Grant.

She teaches yoga with Satya Yoga Cooperative, a Denver-based group operated by people of color that was launched in June 2019, inspired partly by the Black Lives Matter and #MeToo movements. The co-op’s mission: Offer yoga to members of diverse communities to help them deal with trauma and grief before it shows up in their bodies as mental health conditions, pain and chronic disease.

“When I think about racism, I think about stress and how much stress causes illness in the body,” said Satya founder Lakshmi Nair, who grew up in a Hindu family in Aurora, Colorado. “We believe that yoga is medicine that has the power to heal.”

Satya’s efforts are part of a growing movement to diversify yoga nationwide. From the Black Yoga Teachers Alliance to new Trap Yoga classes that incorporate the popular Southern hip-hop music style to the Yoga Green Book online directory that helps Black yoga-seekers find classes, change appears to be happening. According to National Health Interview Survey data, the percentage of non-Hispanic Black adults who reported practicing yoga jumped from 2.5% in 2002 to 9.3% in 2017.

Nair seeks to plant the seeds for more: The co-op is trying to make classes more accessible and affordable for people of color. It offers many classes on a “pay what you can” model, with $10 suggested donations per session. Satya also hosts two intensive yoga instructor training sessions for people of color per year, with hopes to offer more, in an effort to diversify the pool of yoga providers.

A Unique, Healing Experience

Blacks and Latinos consistently top national health disparities lists, with elevated risks for obesity and chronic conditions such as heart disease, diabetes and some forms of cancer, which has made them more susceptible to contracting and dying of COVID-19. They also face an elevated risk for depression and other mental health conditions.

And a growing body of research asserts that racism and discrimination may be playing a larger factor than previously thought. For example, an Auburn University study published in January concluded that Blacks experience higher levels of stress due to racism, resulting in accelerated aging and premature death. Another study, from the American Heart Association, showed a link between Black people experiencing discrimination and developing increased risk for hypertension.

Yoga is obviously not a panacea for racism, but it has shown positive results in helping people manage stress, and as a complement to therapeutic work on trauma.

Satya co-op member Taliah Abdullah, 48, said stress brought on by a toxic work environment and family problems inspired her to finally attend classes. The effect was so life-changing that she enrolled in Satya’s teacher training.

“I didn’t know I needed this, but it’s really changed my life for the better,” she said. “I feel like now I have the tools and the toolbox that I need to better navigate the world as a woman of color.”

At a Saturday morning class Grant led before the pandemic hit, five Latina and Black women and a lone Black man sat atop colorful yoga mats in a half-circle around Grant with smoke billowing around them from a copal-scented incense stick.

Beverly Grant teaches a yoga class at the Dahlia Campus of the Mental Health Center of Denver in February. She believes yoga can help people of color heal from the psychological and physical dangers of racism.(Rebecca Stumpf for KHN)

Grant spoke in hushed tones during the hourlong session, leading them through cat-cow, downward dog and boat poses. The theme was more spiritual than physical, more relaxing than vigorous, as illustrated by the mantra she used to begin the class: “We are resilient, we are grounded, we are complete. And the spirit of love is in me.”

First-time attendee Ramon Gabrielof-Parish, 42, a Black professor at Naropa University in Boulder, became so relaxed that at one point he began snoring. He said that after an exhausting week he appreciated the serene vibe.

Sarah Naomi Jones, 37, who graduated from Satya’s training, said the co-op provides a safe space to bond, vent and heal — a very different vibe from predominately white yoga spaces where many people of color often feel unwelcome. She said she felt that icy reception when, as a Black yoga newbie, she attended an intensive yoga class mostly filled with white attendees.

“When I walked in, it was kind of like, ‘What are you doing here?’” recalled Jones. “The spiritual component was totally missing. It wasn’t about healing. It felt like everyone was there just to show off how much more stretchier they were than another person.”

Moving Forward in New World

Denver-based Black yogi Tyrone Beverly, 39, said the growth of yoga among people of color is a sign of yearning for more inclusivity in the practice. His nonprofit, Im’Unique, regularly hosts “Breakin’ Bread, Breakin’ Barriers” yoga sessions with a diverse mix of attendees followed by a meal and discussion on topics such as police brutality, racism and mass incarceration.

“We believe that yoga is a great unifier that brings people together,” he said.

Because of the pandemic, Beverly has moved all his events and classes online for the foreseeable future as a safety precaution. Satya took a brief hiatus of in-person classes, Grant said, but now offers some classes outdoors in parks in addition to daily online classes. Grant said that during the pandemic, even online classes could make a difference for individuals.

“That’s the beauty of yoga,” Grant said. “It can be done in a group. It can be done individually. It can be done virtually and, most importantly, it can be done at your own pace.”

Kaiser Health News (KHN) is a national health policy news service. It is an editorially independent program of the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation which is not affiliated with Kaiser Permanente.

Namaste Noir: Yoga Co-Op Seeks to Diversify Yoga to Heal Racialized Trauma published first on https://nootropicspowdersupplier.tumblr.com/

[stephenmccull]

Namaste Noir: Yoga Co-Op Seeks to Diversify Yoga to Heal Racialized Trauma

DENVER — Beverly Grant spent years juggling many roles before yoga helped her restore her balance.

When not doting over her three children, she hosted her public affairs talk radio show, attended community meetings or handed out cups of juice at her roving Mo’ Betta Green MarketPlace farmers market, which has brought local, fresh foods and produce to this city’s food deserts for more than a decade.

Her busy schedule came to an abrupt halt on July 1, 2018, when her youngest son, Reese, 17, was fatally stabbed outside a Denver restaurant. He’d just graduated from high school and was weeks from starting at the University of Northern Colorado.

“It’s literally a shock to your system,” Grant, 58, said of the grief that flooded her. “You feel physical pain and it affects your conscious and unconscious functioning. Your ability to breathe is impaired. Focus and concentration are sporadic at best. You are not the same person that you were before.”

In the midst of debilitating loss, Grant said it was practicing yoga and meditation daily that helped provide some semblance of peace and balance. She had previously done yoga videos at home but didn’t get certified as an instructor until just before her son’s death.

Yoga then continued to be a grounding force when the coronavirus pandemic hit in March. The lockdown orders in Colorado sent her back to long days of isolation at home, where she was the sole caregiver for her special-needs daughter and father. Then, in April, her 84-year-old mother died unexpectedly of natural causes. “I’ve been doing the best that I can with facing my new reality,” said Grant.

Beverly Grant finds peace and balance through yoga and meditation in the midst of painful losses — her son’s murder in 2018, and her mother’s death earlier this year.(Rebecca Stumpf for KHN)

As a Black woman, she believes yoga can help other people of color, who she said disproportionately share the experience of debilitating trauma and grief — exacerbated today by such disparities as who’s most at risk of COVID-19 and the racialized distress from ongoing police brutality such as the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis.

While the country still needs much work to heal itself, she wants more people of color to try yoga to help their health. She said the ancient practice, which began in India more than 5,000 years ago and has historical ties to ancient Africa, is the perfect platform to help cope with the unique stressors caused by daily microaggressions and discrimination.

“It helps you feel more empowered to deal with many situations that are beyond your control,” said Grant.

She teaches yoga with Satya Yoga Cooperative, a Denver-based group operated by people of color that was launched in June 2019, inspired partly by the Black Lives Matter and #MeToo movements. The co-op’s mission: Offer yoga to members of diverse communities to help them deal with trauma and grief before it shows up in their bodies as mental health conditions, pain and chronic disease.

“When I think about racism, I think about stress and how much stress causes illness in the body,” said Satya founder Lakshmi Nair, who grew up in a Hindu family in Aurora, Colorado. “We believe that yoga is medicine that has the power to heal.”

Satya’s efforts are part of a growing movement to diversify yoga nationwide. From the Black Yoga Teachers Alliance to new Trap Yoga classes that incorporate the popular Southern hip-hop music style to the Yoga Green Book online directory that helps Black yoga-seekers find classes, change appears to be happening. According to National Health Interview Survey data, the percentage of non-Hispanic Black adults who reported practicing yoga jumped from 2.5% in 2002 to 9.3% in 2017.

Nair seeks to plant the seeds for more: The co-op is trying to make classes more accessible and affordable for people of color. It offers many classes on a “pay what you can” model, with $10 suggested donations per session. Satya also hosts two intensive yoga instructor training sessions for people of color per year, with hopes to offer more, in an effort to diversify the pool of yoga providers.

A Unique, Healing Experience

Blacks and Latinos consistently top national health disparities lists, with elevated risks for obesity and chronic conditions such as heart disease, diabetes and some forms of cancer, which has made them more susceptible to contracting and dying of COVID-19. They also face an elevated risk for depression and other mental health conditions.

And a growing body of research asserts that racism and discrimination may be playing a larger factor than previously thought. For example, an Auburn University study published in January concluded that Blacks experience higher levels of stress due to racism, resulting in accelerated aging and premature death. Another study, from the American Heart Association, showed a link between Black people experiencing discrimination and developing increased risk for hypertension.

Yoga is obviously not a panacea for racism, but it has shown positive results in helping people manage stress, and as a complement to therapeutic work on trauma.

Satya co-op member Taliah Abdullah, 48, said stress brought on by a toxic work environment and family problems inspired her to finally attend classes. The effect was so life-changing that she enrolled in Satya’s teacher training.

“I didn’t know I needed this, but it’s really changed my life for the better,” she said. “I feel like now I have the tools and the toolbox that I need to better navigate the world as a woman of color.”

At a Saturday morning class Grant led before the pandemic hit, five Latina and Black women and a lone Black man sat atop colorful yoga mats in a half-circle around Grant with smoke billowing around them from a copal-scented incense stick.

Beverly Grant teaches a yoga class at the Dahlia Campus of the Mental Health Center of Denver in February. She believes yoga can help people of color heal from the psychological and physical dangers of racism.(Rebecca Stumpf for KHN)

Grant spoke in hushed tones during the hourlong session, leading them through cat-cow, downward dog and boat poses. The theme was more spiritual than physical, more relaxing than vigorous, as illustrated by the mantra she used to begin the class: “We are resilient, we are grounded, we are complete. And the spirit of love is in me.”

First-time attendee Ramon Gabrielof-Parish, 42, a Black professor at Naropa University in Boulder, became so relaxed that at one point he began snoring. He said that after an exhausting week he appreciated the serene vibe.

Sarah Naomi Jones, 37, who graduated from Satya’s training, said the co-op provides a safe space to bond, vent and heal — a very different vibe from predominately white yoga spaces where many people of color often feel unwelcome. She said she felt that icy reception when, as a Black yoga newbie, she attended an intensive yoga class mostly filled with white attendees.

“When I walked in, it was kind of like, ‘What are you doing here?’” recalled Jones. “The spiritual component was totally missing. It wasn’t about healing. It felt like everyone was there just to show off how much more stretchier they were than another person.”

Moving Forward in New World

Denver-based Black yogi Tyrone Beverly, 39, said the growth of yoga among people of color is a sign of yearning for more inclusivity in the practice. His nonprofit, Im’Unique, regularly hosts “Breakin’ Bread, Breakin’ Barriers” yoga sessions with a diverse mix of attendees followed by a meal and discussion on topics such as police brutality, racism and mass incarceration.

“We believe that yoga is a great unifier that brings people together,” he said.

Because of the pandemic, Beverly has moved all his events and classes online for the foreseeable future as a safety precaution. Satya took a brief hiatus of in-person classes, Grant said, but now offers some classes outdoors in parks in addition to daily online classes. Grant said that during the pandemic, even online classes could make a difference for individuals.

“That’s the beauty of yoga,” Grant said. “It can be done in a group. It can be done individually. It can be done virtually and, most importantly, it can be done at your own pace.”

Kaiser Health News (KHN) is a national health policy news service. It is an editorially independent program of the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation which is not affiliated with Kaiser Permanente.

Namaste Noir: Yoga Co-Op Seeks to Diversify Yoga to Heal Racialized Trauma published first on https://smartdrinkingweb.weebly.com/

[dinafbrownil]

Namaste Noir: Yoga Co-Op Seeks to Diversify Yoga to Heal Racialized Trauma

DENVER — Beverly Grant spent years juggling many roles before yoga helped her restore her balance.

When not doting over her three children, she hosted her public affairs talk radio show, attended community meetings or handed out cups of juice at her roving Mo’ Betta Green MarketPlace farmers market, which has brought local, fresh foods and produce to this city’s food deserts for more than a decade.

Her busy schedule came to an abrupt halt on July 1, 2018, when her youngest son, Reese, 17, was fatally stabbed outside a Denver restaurant. He’d just graduated from high school and was weeks from starting at the University of Northern Colorado.

“It’s literally a shock to your system,” Grant, 58, said of the grief that flooded her. “You feel physical pain and it affects your conscious and unconscious functioning. Your ability to breathe is impaired. Focus and concentration are sporadic at best. You are not the same person that you were before.”

In the midst of debilitating loss, Grant said it was practicing yoga and meditation daily that helped provide some semblance of peace and balance. She had previously done yoga videos at home but didn’t get certified as an instructor until just before her son’s death.

Yoga then continued to be a grounding force when the coronavirus pandemic hit in March. The lockdown orders in Colorado sent her back to long days of isolation at home, where she was the sole caregiver for her special-needs daughter and father. Then, in April, her 84-year-old mother died unexpectedly of natural causes. “I’ve been doing the best that I can with facing my new reality,” said Grant.

Beverly Grant finds peace and balance through yoga and meditation in the midst of painful losses — her son’s murder in 2018, and her mother’s death earlier this year.(Rebecca Stumpf for KHN)

As a Black woman, she believes yoga can help other people of color, who she said disproportionately share the experience of debilitating trauma and grief — exacerbated today by such disparities as who’s most at risk of COVID-19 and the racialized distress from ongoing police brutality such as the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis.

While the country still needs much work to heal itself, she wants more people of color to try yoga to help their health. She said the ancient practice, which began in India more than 5,000 years ago and has historical ties to ancient Africa, is the perfect platform to help cope with the unique stressors caused by daily microaggressions and discrimination.

“It helps you feel more empowered to deal with many situations that are beyond your control,” said Grant.

She teaches yoga with Satya Yoga Cooperative, a Denver-based group operated by people of color that was launched in June 2019, inspired partly by the Black Lives Matter and #MeToo movements. The co-op’s mission: Offer yoga to members of diverse communities to help them deal with trauma and grief before it shows up in their bodies as mental health conditions, pain and chronic disease.

“When I think about racism, I think about stress and how much stress causes illness in the body,” said Satya founder Lakshmi Nair, who grew up in a Hindu family in Aurora, Colorado. “We believe that yoga is medicine that has the power to heal.”

Satya’s efforts are part of a growing movement to diversify yoga nationwide. From the Black Yoga Teachers Alliance to new Trap Yoga classes that incorporate the popular Southern hip-hop music style to the Yoga Green Book online directory that helps Black yoga-seekers find classes, change appears to be happening. According to National Health Interview Survey data, the percentage of non-Hispanic Black adults who reported practicing yoga jumped from 2.5% in 2002 to 9.3% in 2017.

Nair seeks to plant the seeds for more: The co-op is trying to make classes more accessible and affordable for people of color. It offers many classes on a “pay what you can” model, with $10 suggested donations per session. Satya also hosts two intensive yoga instructor training sessions for people of color per year, with hopes to offer more, in an effort to diversify the pool of yoga providers.

A Unique, Healing Experience

Blacks and Latinos consistently top national health disparities lists, with elevated risks for obesity and chronic conditions such as heart disease, diabetes and some forms of cancer, which has made them more susceptible to contracting and dying of COVID-19. They also face an elevated risk for depression and other mental health conditions.

And a growing body of research asserts that racism and discrimination may be playing a larger factor than previously thought. For example, an Auburn University study published in January concluded that Blacks experience higher levels of stress due to racism, resulting in accelerated aging and premature death. Another study, from the American Heart Association, showed a link between Black people experiencing discrimination and developing increased risk for hypertension.

Yoga is obviously not a panacea for racism, but it has shown positive results in helping people manage stress, and as a complement to therapeutic work on trauma.

Satya co-op member Taliah Abdullah, 48, said stress brought on by a toxic work environment and family problems inspired her to finally attend classes. The effect was so life-changing that she enrolled in Satya’s teacher training.

“I didn’t know I needed this, but it’s really changed my life for the better,” she said. “I feel like now I have the tools and the toolbox that I need to better navigate the world as a woman of color.”

At a Saturday morning class Grant led before the pandemic hit, five Latina and Black women and a lone Black man sat atop colorful yoga mats in a half-circle around Grant with smoke billowing around them from a copal-scented incense stick.

Beverly Grant teaches a yoga class at the Dahlia Campus of the Mental Health Center of Denver in February. She believes yoga can help people of color heal from the psychological and physical dangers of racism.(Rebecca Stumpf for KHN)

Grant spoke in hushed tones during the hourlong session, leading them through cat-cow, downward dog and boat poses. The theme was more spiritual than physical, more relaxing than vigorous, as illustrated by the mantra she used to begin the class: “We are resilient, we are grounded, we are complete. And the spirit of love is in me.”

First-time attendee Ramon Gabrielof-Parish, 42, a Black professor at Naropa University in Boulder, became so relaxed that at one point he began snoring. He said that after an exhausting week he appreciated the serene vibe.

Sarah Naomi Jones, 37, who graduated from Satya’s training, said the co-op provides a safe space to bond, vent and heal — a very different vibe from predominately white yoga spaces where many people of color often feel unwelcome. She said she felt that icy reception when, as a Black yoga newbie, she attended an intensive yoga class mostly filled with white attendees.

“When I walked in, it was kind of like, ‘What are you doing here?’” recalled Jones. “The spiritual component was totally missing. It wasn’t about healing. It felt like everyone was there just to show off how much more stretchier they were than another person.”

Moving Forward in New World

Denver-based Black yogi Tyrone Beverly, 39, said the growth of yoga among people of color is a sign of yearning for more inclusivity in the practice. His nonprofit, Im’Unique, regularly hosts “Breakin’ Bread, Breakin’ Barriers” yoga sessions with a diverse mix of attendees followed by a meal and discussion on topics such as police brutality, racism and mass incarceration.

“We believe that yoga is a great unifier that brings people together,” he said.

Because of the pandemic, Beverly has moved all his events and classes online for the foreseeable future as a safety precaution. Satya took a brief hiatus of in-person classes, Grant said, but now offers some classes outdoors in parks in addition to daily online classes. Grant said that during the pandemic, even online classes could make a difference for individuals.

“That’s the beauty of yoga,” Grant said. “It can be done in a group. It can be done individually. It can be done virtually and, most importantly, it can be done at your own pace.”

Kaiser Health News (KHN) is a national health policy news service. It is an editorially independent program of the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation which is not affiliated with Kaiser Permanente.

from Updates By Dina https://khn.org/news/namaste-noir-yoga-co-op-seeks-to-diversify-yoga-to-heal-racialized-trauma/

[dweemeister]

2017 Movie Odyssey for-fun awards

The 2017 Movie Odyssey Awards are being posted sometime soon, but, as is tradition on this blog, here are some for-fun honors and dishonors based on a year of watching 200+ films that were new to me this calendar year.

Actor I wanted to smack most in the face: Mark Wahlberg, The Happening (2008)

Good lord, he was AWFUL. “Planning on murdering me in my sleep?” “WHAT, NO!” Here’s Wahlberg talking to a plastic tree.

Attempted political messaging, but says less than it wants: State of the Union (1948)

Frank Capra, you are better than this!

Attempted religious messaging, but says less than it wants: Conflagration (1958, Japan)

Best Film Title: What Dreams May Come (1998)

Best individual cue from an original score: “End Titles” from Independence Day (1996), composed by David Arnold

Best lyrics passage from an original song: From “No Wrong Way Home” from Pearl (2016 short)

One blue-green world, round as a pearl, doesn’t matter which road you take, you’ll wind up in the same place. That’s not philosophy, it’s geometry, and if things don’t look the same, well it’s only you who’ve changed.

There’s some interesting messaging and rhyming going on here. Damn.

Best Moment: An act of sportsmanship, followed by a grandstand finish, Akeelah and the Bee (2006)

If you have kids and they haven’t seen this movie, find this movie. If you haven’t seen this movie, find this movie.

Best Montage: Body-switching and “Zenzenzense”, Your Name (2016, Japan)

Best Movie Dad: Raymond from My Life as a Zucchini (2016, Switzerland)

The first non-biological father to win here, I think. It matters not, though. He is wonderful here.

Best Movie Family Member, non-parent: Aunt Mattie (Clara Blandick), A Star Is Born (1937)

For supporting Esther’s dreams of going to Hollywood without fail. You go, Aunt Mattie. She really is not in this movie long enough.

Best Movie Mom(s): All of the Boatwrights (Queen Latifah, Alicia Keys, and Sophie Okonedo) and Rosaleen (Jennifer Hudson), The Secret Life of Bees (2008)

Again, a first in that these are adopted parents. Thanks to a good friend of mine for introducing to me the book.

Best on-screen friendship: The friendship between all the orphans in My Life as as Zucchini

Best use of non-original music (and best musical callback to a past movie): The many uses of “You’ll Never Know” from Hello Frisco Hello (1943) appearing in The Shape of Water (2017)

Hello Frisco Hello remains on my watchlist… we’ll get there someday!

Best dance segment (for two): Rita Hayworth and Fred Astaire in “I’m Old Fashioned”, You Were Never Lovelier (1942)

Best dance segment (solo): Donald O’Connor in “A Man Chases a Girl (Until She Catches Him)”, There’s No Business Like Show Business (1954)

Best sword fight: Errol Flynn v. Basil Rathbone, Captain Blood (1935)

Yeah, sorry folks who expected Rey and Kylo Ren v. Praetorian Guards or Kylo Ren v. Luke here.

Bestiality: The Red Turtle (2016, France/Belgium/Japan)

SPOILERS!!!

Biggest Disappointment: Marnie (1964)

Oh god, this may be the first Hitchcock movie I truly loathed (nor do I think it will be the last… I’ve basically seen all the greats by now).

Biggest (pleasant) surprise: Pear Cider and Cigarettes (2016 short)

I was worried about the explicit content for this Oscar-nominated short film, and that it might meander around its topic a bit. But no it didn’t. Well done, well deserved nomination.

Biggest (unpleasant) surprise: Detroit (2017)

It becomes torture porn in the final third. The black victims are not nearly developed enough here as they should be.

Bloodbath: Logan (2017)

Is it the movie with the highest body count? Maybe not, considering I saw both Independence Day movies this year. But it was certainly bloody!

Bravest: Parvana, The Breadwinner (2017)

Going full-out Mulan to help her family survive in pre-American invasion Afghanistan? I was astounded by Parvana’s resilience.

Don’t take opiates, kids: Pink Floyd - The Wall (1982)

Greatest Discovery (Actor): Pierre Étaix, Yoyo (1965, France)

Greatest Discovery (Actress): Brooklynn Prince, The Florida Project (2017)

Greatest Discovery (Director): D.A. Pennebaker, Don’t Look Back (1967) and Monterey Pop (1968)

Hardest ending to watch: The Coward (1965, India)

Satyajit Ray pulling no punches here.

Hypnotic: Notes on a Triangle (1966 short)

A beautiful experimental animated short film. Someone’s going to connect it to the Illuminati or some vast Canadian conspiracy somehow.

Kept me on the edge of my seat: Seven Days to Noon (1950)

A Cold War thriller at the very beginning of the Cold War has so much going for it than so many modern thrillers can never hope to achieve.

Kick-ass moment: This riding scene from The Man from Snowy River (1982)

I’d like to see a chimpanzee with dual-wielding machine guns do that! Make it happen, 20th Century Fox!

Laziest (not worst) film title: Summer Magic (1963)

I mean, the songs are decent and Hayley Mills is, too. But come on, Disney!

Least funny comedy: That Funny Feeling (1965)

Least likely to deserve my negative review 10 years from now: Justice League (2017)

Because you know Zack Snyder will find a way to screw the DCEU up even more.

Least likely to deserve my positive review 10 years from now: I have a hunch it’s gonna be Star Wars: The Last Jedi (2017)… but I don’t want that to be official here.

Line I will repeat the most down the years: “Apes. Together. Strong.”, Dawn of the Planet of the Apes (2014) and War for the Planet of the Apes (2017)

Made fashion designers compelling: Funny Face (1957)

Most Inspiring: Swim Team (2016)

A documentary that follows three members of a New Jersey Special Olympics swim team. All those kids have autism, and it is fantastic to see them learn, grow, and live over time. It isn’t a Hoop Dreams, but it doesn’t need to be.

Made me laugh the most: Blackbeard’s Ghost (1968)

And I’m not ashamed to say that. It’s not the best comedy by any means, but I got more laughter and mileage out of this one than anything else.

Most Memorable Use of an Icepick: Scarlet Street (1945)

Don’t spoil if you know!

Most Overrated Picture: Manchester by the Sea (2016)

Casey Affleck had no business winning that Academy Award.

Most Underappreciated: The Great Man (1956)

In our world of “fake news”, this movie - which also comments on how we idealize our heroes - has many echoes on today. It’s a good journalism/news media movie, even if it’s concentrated on early TV and especially radio.

Most Underseen: Bardelys the Magnificent (1926)

A good, entertaining adventure-romance silent film with John Gilbert and Eleanor Boardman. The reason why it’s underseen was because it was considered a lost film until recently, when a near-complete print turned up in France.

Movie I most wished to write on, but wasn’t able to (because I ran out of October to do it): A retrospective on Rise of the Planet of the Apes (2011) and regular reviews for Dawn of the Planet of the Apes (2014) and War for the Planet of the Apes (2017)

Movie that I’m most eager to rewatch: Castle in the Sky (1986, Japan)

There was so much going on, and so many departures from Nausicaa that I need time to do a Retrospective review on this some day. It’s a gorgeous film.

Nearly resulted in someone killing me in a theater: In This Corner of the World (2016, Japan)

Yeah, if the main character had gone to Hiroshima, I would have been a goner (and it wouldn’t have been by my own hand).

Raunchiest: Destry Rides Again (1939)

Holy hell. There are so many entendres in here, and Marlene Dietrich is going all out on the sexuality! How did this get pass the Hays Code?

Sorry, I didn’t get it, and I still don’t get all the love for David Lynch (even though Mulholland was great): Eraserhead (1977)

Sounds most like a porno (other than Octopussy because that’s too easy): Peeping Tom (1960)

With apologies to Michael Powell.

Star Trek alumni award: Patrick Stewart, Logan (2017)

Surprisingly relevant political commentary: They Won’t Forget (1937)

Northern-Southern attitudes in the United States? Even a touch of racial relations? Now if only Warner Bros. kept the defendant in the movie Jewish, as he was in real life.

Underrated: Lonely Are the Brave (1962)

One of the best neo-Westerns you are likely to see.

Worst film title: The Hound That Thought He Was a Raccoon (1960)

For chrissakes, Disney.

Worst Moment: All the rapey-ness of Revenge of the Nerds (1984)

It reminded me why the 1980s is in contention for my least favorite decade of filmmaking.

Stay tuned, the 2017 Movie Odyssey Awards will be up shortly! Thank you all for following. Thank you all for being here for as long as you have. Thank you for supporting all this blog does.

#My Movie Odyssey