To mark Barbados’ Independence Day, and inspired by a discussion I had recently with the Trini Gourmet, here’s a recipe for Bajan Conkies.
Happy Independence Day to all Bajans at home and abroad!
To mark Barbados’ Independence Day, and inspired by a discussion I had recently with the Trini Gourmet, here’s a recipe for Bajan Conkies.
Happy Independence Day to all Bajans at home and abroad!
Following is an excerpt from the text of a message from Kofi Annnan, Secretary-General of the United Nations, marking the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women.
Violence against women causes untold misery, harms families across generations, and impoverishes communities. It stops women from fulfilling their potential, restricts economic growth, and undermines development. When it comes to violence against women, there are no civilized societies.
You can read the entire message here.
In 2003, the Secretary-General undertook to conduct an in-depth study on all forms of violence against women. The results of that study were issued last month. From the executive summary of the report (PDF document):
Violence against women is a form of discrimination and a violation of human rights. It causes untold misery, cutting short lives and leaving countless women living in pain and fear in every country in the world. It harms families across the generations, impoverishes communities and reinforces other forms of violence throughout societies. Violence against women stops them from fulfilling their potential, restricts economic growth and undermines development. The scope and extent of violence against women are a reflection of the degree and persistence of discrimination that women continue to face. It can only be eliminated, therefore, by addressing discrimination, promoting women’s equality and empowerment, and ensuring that women’s human rights are fulfilled.
See the entire report, and some supplementary material.
Bahamian writer Lynn Sweeting writes powerful words about the brutal treatment of a woman by the Bahamian police.
It began occurring to me then that this police station horror was part and parcel of your whole life, being a Bahamian woman in these violent days.
Because a Bahamian woman's life is not beautiful.
[via Nicolette Bethel]
The official song for the ICC Cricket World Cup Tournament 2007 will be launched tomorrow in Port of Spain.
Described as a “high energy, up tempo, soca-inspired beat with lyrics themed around the spirit of cricket and the passion which Caribbean people have for the sport,” the song has been in the works for the past few months and is now ready for its international roll-out.
Definitely interested in hearing what this is going to sound like.
Colombia Reports is a blog written by the journalist who made the video about how cocaine is manufactured.
Take Back the Tech is a campaign with a call for women to reclaim information communications technology (ICT) and use it in activism to eliminate violence against women. The site provides some examples of how ICT can be, and has been, used in this way (as well as examples of how ICT can and has been used in harmful ways to perpetrate violence against women). The site suggests actions you can take for each of the 16 days* and invites readers to submit their own action list. There’s a Take Back the Tech photoset and a Take Back the Tech photo pool on Flickr. You can also participate by joining their Take Back The Tech blogathon. [via black looks]
A Trinidadian mother of two brutally murdered, reportedly by a male relative.
Assessments of the state of human rights in Trinidad and Tobago repeatedly identify violence against women as a chronic societal problem. In 2002, the UN Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women, in their report on Trinidad’s compliance with the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, made the following comments:
...entrenched stereotypical attitudes with regard to the role of women and men and the persistence of gender-based violence within the society constitute obstacles to the full implementation of the Convention
...despite innovative legislation, policies and programmes, violence against women remains a serious reality that is being perpetuated by deeply rooted traditional patriarchal attitudes, apparently tolerated by society.
...The Committee urges the Government to place a high priority on measures to address violence against women in the family and in society in accordance with the Committee’s general recommendation 19 and the Declaration on the Elimination of Violence against Women. The Committee recommends that the Government introduce measures to raise public awareness about violence against women and urges the Government to strengthen its activities and programmes to focus on sexual violence, incest and prostitution.
On the positive side,
The Committee commends the State party for its comprehensive programme to combat domestic violence through such initiatives as a 24-hour hotline, the establishment of a Domestic Violence Unit within the Gender Affairs Division, a male support programme and community-based drop information centres. The Committee commends the Government for steps to provide emergency legal aid, in particular in cases of domestic violence
I’ve found two lists (list 1 and list 2) of women-focussed organisation in T&T, including several agencies working to eliminate gender-violence and to assist victims of gender-violence. If any readers can add any more about similar support agencies in Trinidad and Tobago (or, indeed, anywhere in the Caribbean), please leave the information in the comments.
The Global Gender Gap Report, issued by the World Economic Forum, “measures the size of the gender gap in four critical areas of inequality between men and women”: economic participation and opportunity, educational attainment, political empowerment, and health and survival. The highest ranked country on the list is Sweden, the lowest ranked is Yemen. Jamaica is the highest ranked Caribbean country (of three included in the ranking), at number 24 out of 115. The entire report is available for download, in PDF format.
A video showing the manufacture of cocaine (or the pre-cursor to cocaine). The process involves weed-whackers, used gasoline, quicklime, cement (?!), and lots of dirty rags. [via defamer]
In a Jamaica Observer article on violence against women Margarette May Macaulay stresses the importance of “legislation to deal specifically with what really is a scourge in every society”. The Observer also reports on Prime Minister Portia Simpson-Miller’s recent remarks about gender-based violence, given as part of an address to a national consultation on “Women, Change and Development: Charting the way forward”. The Jamaica Gleaner offers some coverage of the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women as well, but I think the article’s closing request for readers to submit answers to the questions “what would drive you to kill your partner?” and “what do you think would drive a man to kill his partner?” is in poor taste and not at all in the spirit of the 16 days*.
In June of this year Amnesty International published Just a Little Sex, an article about sexual violence against women and girls in Jamaica. The Panos Institute of the Caribbean has published the report Against Her Will: a situational analysis of rape in Jamaica (PDF document).
A while back I posted about Save the Children’s 2006 Mother’s Index, found in their annual State of the World’s Mothers report. The index indicated that many African nations are among those lowest ranked for mother and newborn wellbeing.
In related news, just recently the World Health Organisation’s Partnership for Maternal, Newborn and Child Health issued a report on the health and well-being of babies in Africa:
Each year at least 1.16 million newborn babies die in sub-Saharan Africa. This region has the highest risk of newborn deaths and the slowest progress in reducing mortality. More than two thirds of these babies could be saved with low cost, low tech interventions, most of which are already in policy but do not reach the poor.
For more information, read the report’s executive summary, or the complete document (optimistically titled Opportunities for Africa’s Newborns). Both the exec summary and the full document are in PDF format.
British Prime Minister Tony Blair has expressed “profound sorrow” for Britain’s role in the slave trade, but stops short of issuing a formal apology. Barbadian Pan-Africanist David Commissiong says that this is not good enough. He’s not alone in his thinking, as activists call for a full apology and a “practical demonstration of atonement”.
November 25 was International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women, and the beginning of 16 days (from November 25 to December 10, International Human Rights Day) of Activism against Gender Violence. To mark the 16 days, the UN Population Fund webpage highlights 16 forms of gender-based violence, and the Center for Women’s Global Leadership has produced a call for action (PDF document) to support the campaign to end violence against women in the Caribbean and Latin America.
The head of the local bar association appeared on a talk-programme last night and encouraged men who are being abused or stalked by their (ex-)partners to seek recourse before the courts under domestic violence law. He says that men don’t explore this alternative because they are ignorant of the fact that the Domestic Violence (Protection Orders) Act offers protection to men as well as women. I’m not arguing with the truth of that statement, but I think that the more significant contributing factor is the other point that he raised: most Bajan men, deeply entrenched in their machismo, would be ashamed to go before the courts and confess that they are being beaten, abused or harassed by a woman, for fear that they become targets of public derision.* “Looka he, he’s the man that went to the police and complain dat de woman did ‘busing he, and he need protection. Wuh, he’s a bare mock-man. He ain’t no man at all, he could only be a mouse!”
The news report on the barrister’s comments was immediately followed by some “humorous” banter between two (male) radio personalities, in which they made a mockery of the notion of a man seeking protection under the law from an abusive woman, caricaturing such men as cowards and weaklings beaten into submission by their 300-pound Amazon wives or girlfriends, and laughing about the embarrassment a man would experience if his application for a protection order were to be publicised in the local media. They qualified their jesting by remarking that “But of course, this is no joke, physical abuse is nothing to laugh at,” all the while guffawing away as if they’d never heard anything funnier in their lives.
Physical abuse is nothing to laugh at. Domestic violence is nothing to laugh at. All people in Barbados, women, men and children, are afforded protection from domestic violence under the laws of the land. All people in Barbados should feel free to seek protection under the laws of the land without having to face ridicule for taking steps to ensure their personal safety and well-being. That’s the way it should be. When will that be the way it is?
Penguin Books’ “My Penguin” project (tag line: “Books by the Greats, Covers by You”) sounds like a fantastic fun idea. Penguin will be issuing six classic novels with plain white art-quality paper covers, so that readers can create their own cover art. They’ve also launched “My Penguin” gallery, and will be accepting submissions from the public. [via boing boing]
Related: the winners of the We Made This Design Your Own Penguin Cover competition.
Barbados Buildings is a wonderful photoset of old Bajan structures. (Anton, the photographer, is an active member of the Flickring Bajans group, which is for “Bajans, folks with Bajan roots, or anyone with pictures of Barbados or Bajan life overseas they’d like to share”. Great photos posted there regularly.)
I recently discovered Trini Gourmet, a food blog featuring “mouthwatering Trinidadian fusion recipes and international cuisine”. It got me wondering how many other Caribbean food blogs there are out there: I found Can Cook, Must Cook (right now there’s a rather, um, striking picture of a pig’s head on the front page; I don’t think I’m particularly squeamish, but it shook me a little bit, so I’m giving you due warning), Lifespan of a Chennette, and Petit Careme. Interesting to note that all these sites are run by Trinidadians; are Trinis bigger foodies than other Caribbean people? If anyone knows of any other Caribbean food blogs, I’d be glad for links in the comments.
A neuropsychologist at the University of Edinburgh has found 10 people who involuntarily taste words when they hear or read them. It’s a particularly rare example of synaesthesia.
It appears that New Line Cinema will be making a movie of The Hobbit without Peter Jackson. This makes Sir Ian McKellen sad. It makes me a little bit sad too.
Some philosophical problems with folksonomy.
Folksonomy is a scheme based on philosophical relativism, and therefore it will always include the failings of relativism. A traditional classification scheme will consistently provide better results to information seekers.
And a reply, by the author of Tagging and why it matters (article in PDF format).
Folksonomies are not only frequently more useful than top-down taxonomies; they better reflect the bottom-up, messy, ambiguous, inconsistent, social nature of meaning—despite Aristotle and the tradition his genius spawned.
I was immensely impressed by the agility of the bomb-maker in the first chase scene in Casino Royale—that guy was amazing; some random link-hopping today revealed that he was played by Sébastien Foucan, the co-founder of the sport/discipline of Parkour, also known as free running.
More accurate Wikipedia warnings, from Cracked magazine.
This article does not cite its references or sources. You can help by not citing “My friend Carl” as a source.
I was saying to someone recently that, strictly speaking, an adult who is sexually attracted mainly/exclusively to teenagers is not a paedophile; I knew that there was another word that’s more correct to describe such a person, but I couldn’t remember what it was. It’s “ephebophile” (or ephebophiliac, as that article terms it). More on ephebophilia from Wikipedia.
One of the things that puzzled me about Casino Royale was exactly how Le Chiffre had managed to lose his clients’ money. It nagged at me so much that I kept whispering to my friend about it until he got annoyed and asked, “Are you going to keep talking about that for the next two hours, or are you going to actually watch the movie?” Anyway, I looked it up on the internet and found out that what Le Chiffre had done was “short the stock” (which I think Judi Dench actually said, but I kind of missed it because I was talking at the time). By selling a stock short, you make money when the price of the stock goes down, as opposed to when it goes up. I feel much better now that I know that.
A group of Muslim women have met in New York to examine the possibility of forming an international all-female council of Islamic scholars to interpret and issues pronouncements (known as fataawa) on Islamic law.
Conference attendees say a muftia council could prompt wider support for women’s struggles. “The women who we’re trying to help, for them religion is very important,” says Zainah Anwar, head of the Malaysian group Sisters in Islam. “It’s empowering for them to know that their desire to not be beaten by their husband can actually be justified in the name of Islam.”
I saw Casino Royale last night, and really enjoyed it, which was a pleasant surprise. It was miles better than the other Bond films I’ve seen, which seemed almost to be caricatures of themselves. And Daniel Craig makes Pierce Brosnan’s 007 (I’ve not seen any of the pre-Brosnan Bond movies) seem like a one-dimensional cardboard cutout of a secret agent (albeit a really good-looking cardboard cutout). Craig’s Bond reminds me more of the Bond from the books: hard-edged, tough, ruthless, as well as self-assured to the point of arrogance. Craig’s Bond feels dangerous. Brosnan’s Bond was dapper, debonair, dashing, a real dish, but dangerous? Not really. I like this new Bond, and I’m looking forward to the next installment in the franchise.
The Executive Coloring Book is funny. “Color my underwear important.” [via wider angle]
Sokari over at Black Looks posts about the discriminatory treatment meted out to renowned Kenyan author Ngugi wa Thiong’o while he was staying in a hotel in San Francisco, USA. [via global voices]
I’ve written a few posts (from an observer’s point of view) about the Barbadian music industry, the most recent of them being this one. As the date for the 2007 Barbados Music Awards approaches, I am happy to say that the local music industry appears to be hitting its stride. Over the past few weeks, I’ve been hearing a lot of new Bajan music on my radio—rap, reggae, dance, R&B, neo-soul, pop, jazz, rock, all sorts of good stuff. The fact that it’s Independence season, with the accompanying emphasis on things Bajan, probably has a lot to do with the recent increase in the amount of local music receiving airplay (and explains why I’m also hearing a lot of the old classics from the previous golden age in Bajan music, records that radio DJs apparently retrieve from the vaults around this time of year), so it remains to be seen whether the trend continues past the end of November. I’ve got my hopes up that it will.
Apparently, Robert Green’s The 48 Laws of Power is the new hot source of life advice for famous hip-hop artists like Busta Rhymes, 50 Cent, Kanye West and Jay-Z. Read The New Yorker’s article on Greene (PDF document). Greene also has a blog, catchily titled “Power, Seduction and War”. (Unfortunately, my attention span is too short for his 4-screen-long posts.) Here’s a list of the 48 Laws. [via Slate]
Su Blackwell creates book-cut sculptures, “externalising the pages of the book and allowing it to be read in another way”. Her work reminds me of the beautiful A4 papercut work by Peter Callesen. Callesen and Blackwell speak of their art in very similar language, describing the “materialization of a flat piece of paper [into a 3D form]” as an “almost magical process”/“almost a magic process”.
Adrian Loveridge asks What is to become of the Barbados Concorde? (See also: my post regarding the Concorde from about a month ago.)
If you’re a regular visitor to this site, and you notice that things look different, it’s because the site that was previously at the links.gallimaufry.ws sub-domain has been moved to the gallimaufry.ws domain.
I am working on integrating the content of the two sites, so that I don’t lose the posts/articles that were here prior to the move. However, those posts/articles are probably not going to be at the same URLs as before: you may have to hunt for them using the handy search box over there on the right.
My apologies for all the recent upheaval around here. I think I’ve got things sorted now, so there shouldn’t be any more major changes for a while.
The New York Times has a not very complimentary review of Shottas, a Jamaican gangsta film starring Spragga Benz and Kymani Marley. Overall, the reviews of the film have been fairly unflattering, to say the least. I bet that when it hits cinemas here (if it hasn’t already, I don’t know), audiences will just love it.
Time Magazine compiles a list of the all-time 100 “greatest and most influential records ever”. It’s sorted by decade (from the 50s to the 2000s) and unranked. The Caribbean is represented by the The Harder They Come movie soundtrack and Bob Marley and the Wailers’ Legend.
An experiment involving two species of lizards on islets in the Bahamas suggests that natural selection can began to exert a noticeable effect in periods as just a few months.
Did you know that there is website devoted entirely to information and speculation about the heights of celebrities? Ah, the marvel of the internet.
Kristian von Hornsleth, a Danish artist, is offering residents of the village of Buteyongera in Uganda free livestock if they change their names to his (apparently their given names, not their surnames). He is hoping eventually to get them to change the name of their village. He says that “he is trying to help the villagers by highlighting the failure of international aid.” The Ethics and Integrity Minister in Uganda (I find it fascinating that there’s a Minister of Ethics and Integrity) says that the whole thing is “demeaning [and] racist”. He intends to lodge an official diplomatic complaint with the government of Denmark. The Danish ambassador to Uganda says that he thinks that Hornsleth “is acting in bad taste. But I don’t see it as an insult against Uganda.”
Word Shoot is a typing game, and more fun than that simple description makes it sound.
Zinio offers an international digital magazine subscription service. your subscription provides you with regular delivery of an electronic version of the magazine of your choice; you view the magazines using Zinio’s Reader programme. They explain here a bit more about how it works. Sounds like it could be a potentially cheaper alternative for international subscribers (like me), with the benefit of being paperless, making it perhaps more environmentally friendly than a subscription to the actual magazine (though I personally still have a fondness for tangible dead-tree media). [via apartment therapy]
Computer graphics are becoming increasingly more sophisticated and life-like. (Aside: when I went to see Cars, as the opening racetrack scene was showing, the friend I was with exclaimed, “I thought you said this was a cartoon! This isn’t a cartoon, this is a real movie!” The animation was that convincing. But I digress.) Can you tell the difference between real and computer-generated? Try the fake or foto challenge. I got seven right out of ten.
Photographer Jill Greenberg was the centre of a small storm of controversy earlier this year over her “End Times” series of photographs. The photos in the series were of small children provoked to tears by various means (like offering them a lollipop and then taking it away). I wouldn’t say that I like the photos (and I really don’t like the way Greenberg has politicised them with the titles she’s used), but they are certainly skillful and striking images. Greenberg has also taken some fantastic photos of monkeys, using the same sort of lighting as for the “End Times” series; the monkey photos I really like. They’ve been compiled into a book, which is going right onto my Amazon wishlist.
Hair-printed silk curtains. These freak me out, not in a good way. [via apartment therapy]
Stephen Schenkenberg quotes Zadie Smith on good reading.
I think of reading as a skill and an art. ... When you practice reading, and you work at a text, it can only give you what you put into it. It’s an old moral, but it’s completely true.
I think I am a fairly avid reader, but I know that I’m not a particularly good one. It’s something I’d really like to improve.
In the future at least half of road signs and traffic signals in Fuenlabrada, Spain, will be required to show stick figures with feminine attributes (“such as a skirt, ribbon or ponytail”) instead of the usual stick figure man. [via feministing]
i became angry at “that white woman.” not “that woman.” and it told me that there is some imaginary “white woman” who haunts me, who i perceive is ready to make me feel small. “that white woman” in my mind has power over me and we don’t even know each other. i’m ready to let her go. can i? and how?
Light-skinned-ed Girl examines the anatomy of a perceived racial slight.
Also seeking submissions: The Bridgetown Film Festival. The Bridgetown Festival has featured films from Russia, Spain, India, Bangladesh, Brazil, St. Lucia, Jamaica, Guyana, Trinidad and Tobago, and, of course, Barbados. The festival will be held in and around Bridgetown, Barbados, from April 28 to May 5, 2007. The submission deadline is March 9, 2007.
The Women’s International Film Festival is seeking submissions for their second annual festival in South Florida USA. The festival’s theme is “Celebrating Women All Over The World”. Festival entries will be accepted into two main categories, US Fem-Cinema, for women from or living in the United States and World She-view for women who come from other countries. The submission deadline is November 30, 2006.
Some photos of the most dangerous road in the world, so designated by the Inter American Development Bank. A BBC correspondent writes about the perilous Bolivian mountain road:
Every year it is estimated 200 to 300 people die on a stretch of road less than 50 miles long. In one year alone, 25 vehicles plunged off the road and into the ravine. That is one every two weeks.
The find it! game presents photos where some element/item changes gradually. The challenge is to guess and click on that changing item before time runs out. I’ve found that the most successful approach for me is to look at the picture for a while, then look away, look at it again and click on whatever first strikes me as different, even if I’m not quite sure how it’s different. [via boing boing]
Tom Bartlett of Slate reviews seven irons to find out which one presses best. I agree that a good iron can make ironing, not enjoyable, but at least more bearable, but US$130 for an iron? Holy wow!
Runner’s World magazine identifies 15 foods to help runners achieve good health and top performance. The dark chocolate that’s in my fridge right now? It’s an important part of a nutritional regimen intended to help boost my running.
Wordblog questions the purpose of newspaper blogs. I’ve mainly thought of them as either (1) a way for papers to write a bit more about the workings of the paper (sort of like what the BBC does with their Editors’ Blog, and yes I know the BBC is not a newspaper) or (2) an extension/expansion of news stories/commentary covered in the paper or (3) an outlet for material that doesn’t, for whatever reason, make the paper. And in all those cases, blogs provide a forum for more immediately interactive journalism, in the form of comments from readers.
I recently started reading the Telegraph Blogs and they really do leave me wondering what their purpose/point is; they are a set of blogs written by people who write/work for the Telegraph, certainly, but I find it difficult to figure how else they specifically relate to or enhance the Telegraph’s offerings as a newspaper. Shane Richmond of the Telegraph attempts to explain.
A man found a bag full of written prayer requests at a New Jersey beach.
“There are hundreds of lives here, a lot of struggle, washed up on the beach … This is just a hint of what really happens. How many letters like this all over the world aren’t being opened or answered?”
The finder plans to auction the letters on eBay.
A recent 7-hour island-wide electricity outage in Barbados was apparently triggered by a monkey on a high-voltage power line.
Paul Tergat, world record holder in the Marathon, invites runners around the world to join him in World Run Day 2006 on November 5, 2006 (Mr. Tergat will be running the NYC marathon on that day).
World Run Day is an international event “intended to promote the sport of running and charitable giving”. In 2006, the focus is on reducing child hunger worldwide. The World Run Day press kit provides more information about how it’s all supposed to work.
Runners register to run their favorite distance and pledge a donation to their favorite charity. Results are posted and then calculated for a worldwide total. ... [Participants]can run in a race, with family, with friends, or even by themselves. They can enter a local 50-yard dash, local 5k race, marathon, or even run on their treadmill watching a marathon! It’s for runners of all ages. They run, they donate. They are part of a great global event!
The site lists the Cayman Island, Trinidad and Tobago, Jamaica and Belize as places in the Caribbean where World Run Day events will be held; unfortunately there’s no way to get in touch with the directors of most of these events. Still, you don’t have to be in an organised event to be part of World Run Day — just run and donate, it’s as simple as that. I think I’m going to give it a go.
Texan-born billionaire Allen Stanford is going to receive a knighthood during Antigua and Barbuda’s independence celebrations this year. (November 1 is independence day in that twin-island nation. Happy Independence, Antigua and Barbuda!) Stanford is perhaps best-known in the region as the mastermind of the recently held Stanford 20-20 Cricket Tournament, as well as for his involvement with Caribbean Star airlines. Opinion about the decision to bestow the country’s highest honour on Mr. Stanford is, unsurprisingly, split.
Mr. Stanford, as a “Friend of the Caribbean”, is also to be honoured later this year at the Caribbean American Heritage Awards with an award for Outstanding Corporate Citizenship.
News Sniffer is a project which aims to “monitor corporate news organisations to uncover bias”. They attempt to do so by monitoring and highlighting revisions to news stories in major UK news outlets, as well as by checking for censored comments on the BBC’s Have Your Say pages. Many of the revisions they find are editorial or information updates, but the recommended revisions feature is intended to identify more substantial story revisions. Site readers who find a revision on the site to be particularly interesting, for whatever reason, can click to vote to “recommend” it. (I think News Sniffer needs to explain how recommending a revision works, and what the point is; it’s really not very clear, and I don’t think that the function is as useful as it could be, especially as there’s no avenue for voters to explain why they thought any given revision was interesting and worthy of recommendation.)
Steve Herrmann of the BBC Editors’ blog writes about News Sniffer and a bit about the BBC’s revision process.
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