Cooking up a tasty meal… of information (and data)
“What’s that for?” I asked.
“To cook…. yes, it’s to cook,” laughed Onno Widodo Purbo, who calls himself “an independent ICT writer who dreams to see a knowledge-based society in Indonesia.”
Dr. Purbo showed every sign of enjoying his joke tremendously.
But in a little while, things were up and running. It was about information, not steamed rice or sambal.
As participants at the PANALL2009 camp finished lunch, the diminitive former academic turned tech-campaigner mounted the stairs and began his strange demo.
By the time he finished, everyone was astounded by the simplicity of the technology he used. And it’s power.
In short, what he was doing was to take a wok — the versatile round-bottomed cooking vessel originating in China — added on a wifi pen drive, and manage to create rough-and-ready and cheap tool to extend the wireless capacity of your computer. In this way, one could link up dozens of others while sharing a single fat pipe to the Net.
This makes Net access a whole new ball game, specially in resource-poor, talent-rich countries where most can’t afford the luxury of the internet.
Purbo, a PhD, counts among his current priorities “spreading knowledge — through many workshops, demos, seminars in Indonesia — on low cost Internet access using wokbolic, neighbourhood network, open source software, internet telephony etc.”
To know more about his work, search for the terms “wokbolic” or “wajanbolic” (the “wajan” is the Indonesian term for the “wok”). The second part of the name, of course, refers to the parabolic reflector, which is what it is, even if of an unusual kind.
Some of the papers he has written are in Indonesian, but there’s enough images to guide one around.
See this Bahasa Indonesia note which gives a detailed design and step-by-step guide on how to create a “wokbolic and bazooka” antenna for 3G.
Caution: PVC tubing and aluminium tape is to be used to create this low-cost weapon against information-poverty.
Measurements have to be precise too, explains Dr Purbo, as he talks in fractions… so as to get the exact size and shape to reflect the wireless link and connect computers, almost magically it would seem.
By using this ingenuity, Purbo makes a USB wifi stick — which could link computers a few metres away — to connect over hundreds of metres. Someone was asking about using such a tool “in series” — as kind of repeater stations.
Yes, that’s possible too! This author of a thousand articles, and over 40 books, should know!
An http://www.idrc.ca/en/ev-45872-201-1-DO_TOPIC.html earlier article on Dr Purbo.
Tags: wifi, low-cost, technologies, indonesia, wokbolic, wajanbolic
Getting another chance, with Second Life
Second Life? What’s that?
I too plead guilty of only having heard vaguely of this space-in-cyberspace, till before the PANALL2009 event. In hindsight, we found that it was indeed useful, and even before the meet got together, it actually got some of the discussions going.
“HatHead’s” “photo” of a Second Life meet-up underway, before we actually got down to Penang.
Co-ordinating an online ‘lecture’ (as Second Life helped PANALL to do earlier this month and in late May) must have been a logistical challenge. There were some timezone complications to contend with, apart from getting people familiar with the idea and how it worked. In India, it was just before dawn when the meet-ups happened. But why complain?
I made it for two such events. It was useful to virtually meet Arun Mehta and tune into his ideas once again, though I’ve known for quite some time. It was also an opportunity to encounter Jeremy Malcolm (whom I know virtually) from Consumer International before we meet up in real-life.
Unfortunately, GNU/Linux might not work too well with Second Life (or the other way around). Meaning, it was not possible to view the slides being shown as the speakers made their presentations.
“Online lectures can otherwise tend to get boring. So having avatars and the like does make the event more colourful,” Arun Mehta said, as we spoke when we met up. In hindsight, it’s a fairly useful tool which can be meet-before-you-actually-meet; before encountering it, I though this space didn’t have anything useful in it! This article on The Wikipedia points to criticism and controversy over Second Life.
But tools are what you make of them!
(Phet Sayo, before one Second Life meetup, showed how one could get an avatar to dance. Interesting! Just that I couldn’t get — on time — the instructions on how to stop it from doing so. A hard reboot later, I lost the audio channel, and couldn’t hear what was going on. But all it took was a restart into Second Life.
So do you believe in cyber-reincarnation?
Tags: SecondLife, panall2009, pre-events
Goodbye to a teacher, friend and guide
Ivan Rocha, a popular teacher from North Goa’s Mapusa town’s St Britto’s died at 61, and here are some scenes from his funeral at the village of Parra.
Indian head massage… for a five-year-old
Says wikiHow: “Massages can be given to aid the process of injury healing, relieve psychological stress, manage pain and improve circulation. The effectiveness of Indian head massage, also known as Champissage (champi is an Indian word for head), is based on alternative medicine principles, specifically those surrounding energy flow, or chakras. It’s an ancient technique that Ayurvedic healers have been using for thousands of years, and it’s becoming more and more popular in the Western world.” http://www.wikihow.com/Do-an-Indian-H…
A Goan slumdog millionaire? Nothing so glamourous
An attempt by volunteers (with official support) to help students in government run primary schools (mostly attended by the poor) to pick up English language skills in Goa, a former Portuguese colony.
Aren and Maths … and a gazillion distractions
A four-and-half year old from Goa talks about Math, numbers and other issues from life.
Video + school = videoshala
When video starts being educational in parts of Gujarat (western India), it gets called videoshala. Shala is the world for school. Deepika explains the concept behind VideoShala.
Going Dutch in cyberspace, researching India (25 years ago)… etc
Patrice Riemens from the Netherlands has his own understanding of issues of technology and society… Here he talks about the role the Dutch have played in cyberspace (and why), and his research in India on multinationals coming out of here even a quarter of a century ago!
Sandra Sudhoff… on mapping
Sandra Sudhoff is from CartONG. This organisation delivers “assistance for information management and mapping in the field”. Its main partner is the UNHCR. Says she, “We have worked on the Google Outreach project and created a Google layer in collaboration with UNHCR to present some of their humanitarian projects in a pilot phase. Next phase is scheduled to kick off in 2009.
A small bookshop from Baga
Last week, I ran into Jay-Jay’s, a second-hand bookshop run by Nairobi-born Bosco and his wife. “We started it a few years back, with a little bit of reject stock from the Mandovi (hotel bookshop). It was something the foreigners looked forward to. We grew from then,” says Bosco. “The bookshop has been our pride,” says Bosco, who also runs a restaurant too. What makes it special, he believes, is the type of books: books which
are popular among Europeans. “We have quite a few books that you don’t get in Goa,” he says of his 2000-title strong collection. “We don’t want to overstock because people get confused, so we mostly select (popular books from) the top bracket.” Their books include non-fiction (guide, biographies and autobiographies, true-stories), French, German, Swedish books. Says he: “We are dealing with tourists.” Their model is interesting. They buy second-hand books, from the tourist, and sell them also to the tourists. When you buy the book, you’re free to return it back, and you get half the price.Virtually a library, without the danger of losing books.
There’s a renaisance happening in Goan Western music — Schubert Cotta
An interview with Germany-returned musician who has inspired local talent to go further.
Upcoming soon: a book on Goan music and more
Francis Rodrigues, lawyer based in Toronto, talks about a book project he launched recently. It’s an introduction to Goan music, in an unusual way. It focuses on music of the past fifty years, and attempts to take it across to those wanting to understand and play this music… music is transcribed (for solo instruments, flute, bands, guitars), lyrics got written down (and set to English verse) and even translated. “Most of the people were (most) interested in the translations,” says he. “What we’ve also done, as a header to each song, there’s a story to each song… the composer’s intentions are there, and the history behind this song.”
The writer’s life… Isidore Dantas
Retired bank officer Isidore Dantas of Pune/Mumbai reluctantly agreed to be captured on tape, after showing his work on a book related to Konkani films. Dantas, who traces his roots to Saligao, had his family
based in the Curchorem area, where his grandfather was a regidor (village official). He has also volunteered translations in the past, for an attempt to build up a Konkani wikipedia…. Email: Keywords: konkani, roman script, film, writing, sayings, konkani sayings, dictionary, konkani dictionary
Flock is back!
Good going. After a telephonic talk with Derek Cordeiro, I just managed to reinstall Flock. It makes blogging really very easy and fast…
Dr Timothy Walker, plants, colonialism, Goa, India, Portugal
Dr Timothy Walker has been studying the role medicinal plants played in the colonial economy. Check this out…
Sitting in dusty archives rooms in Goa, Dr Timothy Walker has unearthed an amazing story of what the Portuguese learnt from Indian and South Asian traditions of plant-based medicines in the early colonial phase (around the 16th century). After a recent (Thursday, Jan 15, 2009) talk at the Fundacao Oriente, he spoke to FN and explained what his research was all about.
Keywords: medicinal plants, goa, india, portugal, 16th century, old goa, colonialism
On Thursday, Jan 15, 2009 at 6 pm, Timothy’s talk was titled, Supplying medicinal plants for the royal hospital: an
Indo-Portuguese medicinal garden in Goa 1680-1830.
As he put it:
Three hundred years ago, the practice of medicine in Goa’s colonial health institutions relied heavily on medicinal plants from India and even Africa, South America and China. It had become thoroughly hybridized. To ensure a ready supply of common local and imported healing herbs, the Royal Military Hospital in Goa maintained on its premises a medicinal garden, supervised directly by the Chief Pyshician of the Portuguese Asian Empire.
Professor Walker’s talk focussed on this garden as a multicultural space, wherein European and non-European concepts about healing blended. He described the physical space of the garden, its Indo-Portuguese caretakers and their unique medicinal cosmology. He described various medicinal plants cultivated in Indo-Portuguese hospital gardens, their applications and effects, as well as the social context in which the medicinal practitioners who employed these plants operated.
Timothy Walker is assistant professor of history at the University of Massachussets, Dartmouth, USA, and a visiting professor at the University Alberta in Lisbon, Portuguese. His teaching and research fields include Early Modern Europe, the Atlantic World, the Portuguese and their empire, maritime history and European global colonial expansion.
From an earlier report:
In 2005, Dr Timothy Walker (University of Massachusetts Dartmouth and Universidade Aberta de Lisboa) spoke on ‘The Early Modern Globalization of Ayurveda: Portuguese Dissemination of Drugs and Healing Techniques from South Asia on Four Continents, 1670-1830.
This work discussed the methods and effect of the dissemination through the Portuguese maritime colonial network of Ayurvedic medicinal substances and healing techniques originating in India. Portuguese colonial agents (missionaries, colonial officials, marine commanders and state-licensed medical practitioners) accomplished this dissemination in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, when Indian medicine played a significant role in the state-sponsored health care institutions of the Portuguese colonies.
Walker’s work has focussed particular analysis on consignments of typical Ayurvedic medicines shipped from Goa, the administrative capital of the Estado da India, to such destinations as Macau, Timor, Mozambique, Brazil and Continental Portugal. Colonial officials generally sent such consignments to stock official colonial medical facilities.
He has also devoted attention to official reports about Indian medicines produced by colonial medical authorities in India at the request of the Portuguese Overseas Council in Lisbon, the royal body responsible for colonial administration.
Such reports were an important conduit of information, not only to crown officials in the metropole, but also to medical officials in other parts of the empire. These reports provide a telling gauge of the state of contemporary knowledge about certain medicinal substances from South Asia, and about what techniques were thought to be efficacious.
Dr Walker says he intends “to demonstrate that Indian medicinal preparations and healing techniques became widely known in Portuguese-controlled enclaves in the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, far from their indigenous roots, and were fully incorporated into the lexicon of tropical medicine in the Lusophone colonies”.
Timothy D Walker (B.A, Hiram College, 1986; M.A., Ph.D., Boston University, 2001) is assistant professor of History at the University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth, and a visiting professor at the Universidade Aberta in Lisbon, Portugal. Teaching fields include Early Modern Europe, the Atlantic World, the Portuguese and their empire, maritime history and European global colonial expansion.
Current research topics focus on the 17th and 18th centuries, and include the adoption of colonial indigenous medicines by European science during the Enlightenment, slave trading in the Atlantic and Indian Oceans, as well as commercial and cultural links between the Portuguese overseas colonies in Asia, Africa and the Americas.
Email contact: Timothy Walker tdwalker2001 at yahoo.com
Alternative media is alive and well all over Latin America. — Marie Trigona (Argentina)
Marie Trigona
A writer, radio producer, and film maker, her work focuses on labour struggles, social movements and human rights in Latin America.
Her writing has appeared in publications including Z Magazine and ZNet, NACLA, Monthly Review, Canadian Dimension, The Buenos Aires Herald, Left Turn, Americas Program, Clamor, Venezuela Analysis, Upsidedown World, Dollars and Sense and many other publications.
She also blogs at [http://mujereslibres.blogspot.com/]
FN: We’ve seen the media move over almost en bloc to support the entertainment industry, or itself entertain the fancies of the affluent. This has happened globally. At times like these, what is your own motivating fuel as a journalist? What are the values you search for in work and in life?
What an interesting paradigm: the entertainment and media industries cater to the affluent, yet they really aim to make us into mindless drones. So either the affluent want to make us stupid, or they have a very-low cultural and intellectual appetite. I am forever surprised by the lack of intellectual and cultural content in the mass media.
For me as a writer, radio producer and video maker I try to produce intelligible yet accessible analysis.
As a journalist, I really enjoy challenging myself to tell stories that aren’t being told in other places. I also try to focus on stories that I am a part of.
I believe that my own subjectivity as a person fighting for social change helps and enriches my work. I hold a lot of values dear — so it’s hard to narrow them down. Yet:
* Freedom (in my personal, professional and political life). Freedom to decide what I write, how it is presented, and of course fighting for freedom from exploitation and oppression.
* Revolutionary perspectives and gender balance. (You’d be surprised, a lot of people believe revolution is necessary and possible).
* Self-managing parts of my own life and researching self-management (in a utopia, all media and aspects of life would hopefully have elements of self-management).
FN: Do journalists as a community recognise the power of info-activism?
I don’t know if all journalists even consider activism or social change when reporting. From what I read, hear and see on the news I would say no. However, there are some journalists even in mass media reporting on interesting stories, but I would say they are the minority.
There is a large community of journalists and media makers developing alternative media. They certainly see that media can be used as a political and organizing tool for social change.
Even the anarchists from the beginning of the 19th century used info-activism with their own newspapers, theatre performances and literature.
FN: Can there be information without activism? What’s your view? I mean, can information be “without value” or “wholly neutral”?
Marie Trigona
To me, the most honest media and information come from a subjective perspective, someone telling their personal story and experience.
Luckily, I never went to journalism school, so I missed out on the objectivity lesson.
FN: Of all the diverse media you worked in, what do you see as the most powerful? Why?
Definitely video has been the most effective and far reaching.
I participate in a video collective Grupo AlavÃo– we create materials that are artistically, journalistically and cinematically adept yet at the same time produce a new working class subjectivity.
One myth that surrounds alternative media is that even though videos are distributed in informal circuits with small budgets, they can’t reach a massive audience.
In Grupo AlavÃo’s experience this has been the case, tens of thousands of people, if not more have viewed our materials. After screenings it is common for political debates and organizing efforts to take place.
FN: What’s your advice to activists wanting to get a sympathetic hearing from the (mainstream) media? Is it possible? Does it happen often? A remote chance? Just luck?
Of course if you have an issue or struggle you are trying to win, you have to rely on the mass media. That’s why we need to produce savvy press releases and do actions to catch the media’s attention.
But we can’t always count on the mainstream media to paint a sympathetic picture. This is why people need to create their own media — so we can express our own popular culture, set our own media agendas and give voice to those who wouldn’t have a voice otherwise.
FN: In bullet-points, what do you see the state of the alternative media in Latin America today as being? Is it better due to the recent upsurge of people’s movements, and ascendence of less-regressive governments?
Alternative media is alive and well all over Latin America.
I would say that there are several reasons for the growth of alternative media.
* Mainstream-media in Latin America is filled with a lot of junk, and many news programs don’t give social problems any focus.
* The upsurge of social movements throughout Latin America.
* Some governments (like in Venezuela and Bolivia) have supported alternative media initiatives.
Video activism is moving in full speed; many people are producing wonderful documentaries. Radio stations and television stations are also blossoming.
However, in many parts of Latin America community radio stations and television stations have no way of broadcasting legally. And, in some cases, alternative media outlets have been persecuted and journalists threatened.
In Argentina, for example, only three media groups own most of the country’s media. To top it all, all the legislation written during the military dictatorship in the 1980s bar all community association from accessing a broadcast license — creating a virtual monopoly on TV.
FN: As a journalist, what do you see as the three biggest challenges before info-activism today?
* Access to technologies and funding (especially for people in the Third World)
* Social movements really understanding the importance of creating their own media
* Training and information exchange.
FN: Is this your first visit to India, and if so, what are your expectations?
I never thought I’d ever have the opportunity to visit India, so this is a special experience. What a great way to begin 2009.
I’m looking forward to getting out of the city and enjoying nature. I am also very excited about trying new foods from India — here in Argentina Indian food is hard to come by. And most importantly, connecting with activists from the region.
My collective also told me that I need to track down activist videos from India with Spanish subtitles
CONTACTS: Marie Trigona
Info-activism?
Info-activism? What’s that?
If you’re curious, check out my blog posts at http://www.informationactivism.org/blog
Interviews with a number of persons… from across the globe. And I hope to be doing more…
Vidura: Battles of another kind?
Language media in the electronic age
Business and religion in the Gujarat media
Print media in Kashmir, post-1989
… and, of course, a number of smaller informative snippets.
Vidura’s annual subscription is Rs 200 for four issues, and Rs 500 for 12 issues spread across three years. Email pii@gmail.com
Discussing… and music-book to be (and other gossip)
Francis Rodrigues, Goanetter based in Canada, was down recently. Some unofficial shots from a discussion at the much-hyped (but modest) Cafe Prakash in Panjim. Get a whiff of the coffee (and the kind of discussions that go on there everyday). And you thought the creative (and critical) process was dead in Goa?
Of Konkani, writing, cartooning… and reviewing
Quepem-based Walter Menezes has been working to promote the tiny Konkani language for a long time now. Some of his experiences.
Goa’s oldest Konkani newspaper completes platinum
Vavraddeancho Ixtt, the only Konkani weekly THAT HAS BEEN IN CONTINUOUS PUBLICATION since 1933, CONCLUDES its platinum jubilee
celebrations with a special closing ceremony function ON COMING MONDAY.
In 1933 Vauraddeancho Ixtt, a Konknni weekly was started by Fr. Arsencio Fernandes and Fr.Graciano Moraes. It is still run by the Pilar Society till date. Today Vauraddeancho Ixtt is the only weekly of its kind published in this script and language.
AT A FUNCTION TO BE HELD on December 22, 2008 at Pilar Seminary Annexe at 4 pm, GOA’S REVENUE Minister Jose Philip D’Souza will be the chief guest for the function while editor of Renovocao and Diocesan Centre for Social Communications Media, Fr Francisco Caldeira will be the guest of honour. The Superior General of the Society of Pilar, Fr Tony Lopes will preside.
On the occasion, V Ixtt awards will be distributed to several Konkani writers and those who have contributed towards the Konkani language and Goan culture. Besides, young Konkani writers and social activists, who have been closely associated with the Konkani weekly and Goa, will also be felicitated.
Prizes will be distributed to the winners of various competitions conducted during the V Ixtt platinum jubilee celebrations.
The highlights of the programme will include the release of the special issue, almanac and the launch of the new ‘V Ixtt‘ supplement. The cultural programme will comprise of platinum jubilee song, violin instrumental with piano accompaniment, raag, comedy skit, dance and a mando.
The programme is open for the general public.
Started in 1933 as the Church attempted to retain its links with the workers in a world fast turning secularised and politicised, the weekly was to reach out the working class and people at the grassroots to educate, inform and educate them on issues like “Communism vis-a-vis religion”.
However, over the years, and as it gained wider popularity, the scope extended to the coverage of social, political, cultural and religious themes. V Ixtt can boast of a glorious past as one weekly that provided news and views that satisfied the reading appetite of a large readership in Goa and Mumbai.
Having run by priests and the Society of Pilar, its credibility and respect always remained consistent. In recent years, its editors have been young priests of the Society of Pilar, like Fr Peter Raposo and Fr Feroz Fernandes, who managed the publication while in their 20s and 30s.
Ixtt’s contribution to the freedom movement of Goa is worth the mention.
Ixtt under the aegis of the Society of Pilar followed a line of thought closer to the aspiration of the freedom movement of our Motherland India and Goa. It was on the Vespers of the independence of India that V Ixtt began to publish from the precincts of the old Monastery of Pilar, where its editorial office and press was housed.
The weekly enjoyed quite good freedom to express itself without rigorous Portuguese censorship upto the early 50’s. However, the picture started changing after the Liberation of Dadra and Nagar Haveli and the freedom struggle movement to liberate Goa from the clutches of the Portuguese.
“During this period, the Press buckled under the pressures of rigorous Portuguese censorship. Nothing could be published in Goa without getting it censored by the Portuguese Police with the rubber-stamp of approval that read ‘Visado pela censura’ (Seen by the Censor),” says former editor Fr Peter Raposo, in an essay tracing the history of Romi Konkani journalism in Goa.
Ixtt, under the editorship first of Fr. Conceicao Rodrigues (1944-54) and later of Fr. Jeronimo Pereira (1954-69), had to face insurmountable pressures to toe the Portuguese line. In order to survive most of the times, Ixtt maintained silence towards the policies of Salazar the Portuguese dictator without however openly
criticizing the Portuguese Government, which would be suicidal.
But this silence itself was construed as opposition to the Portuguese Sovereignty in Goa.
On August 12, 1961, three months before the liberation of Goa, the Governor Vassalo da Silva, by his decree, suspended the publication of Ixtt for 90 days as a punishment for not being patriotic towards Portugal and showing pro-India tendencies. Thus Ixtt was the only paper of Goa which remained firm and suffered for its nationalistic aspirations.
Today Ixtt still continues to be popular. At present Ixtt has almost 7000 regular subscribers and in fact this number is increasing. Ixtt was online since 1999 sharing a link on Goacom.com, today it has its own website (http://www.v-ixtt.com).
Tags: Ixtt, Konkani, newspapers, Goa
Journos debate… the impact of a pair of shoes
Via the South Asian Journalists Association network
FROM : Salil Tripathi
Dear Raja,
Thanks. This reporter did not speak truth to power; he acted as an activist, a combatant, using physical force against an individual. He brought shame to the profession of journalism, even though he may have acted all right from an activist/protester standpoint.
Reporting on a war means reporting on a war. You report what you see, hear and can verify; if you are restricted from seeing, or hearing, disclose that to your readers/viewers. You don’t interpret data unless you are a commentator; you get others to corroborate the story you think is getting advanced. Reporting on a war does not mean taking up weapons and fighting for a side. You are welcome to do that, but then don’t disguise yourself as a reporter.
Embedded journalism is bad, but no journalism is worse. If readers/viewers are told that what they’re seeing is controlled, then the reporter has done his/her duty. Iraq’s
pre-occupation government was frequently interviewed by the media. That press officer who was later known as Comical Ali as a regular part of the broadcasts. What you call Iraq’s resistance movement is seen by many Iraqis as a bunch of fundamentalist militants, many of them not Iraqis, whose target is hardly the “occupation force” but ordinary Iraqi civilians.Journalists are not supposed to throw shoes at anybody. They are supposed to ask tough questions. The one who hurls a projectile in a press conference has usually lost the verbal argument.
I agree that the reporter’s protest will go down history as an act of protest – but please, don’t besmirch the memory of non-violent actions like the Boston Tea Party and the Salt Satyagraha, by equating this violent action with what Gandhi and the New Englanders did. Yes, it may be in line with the way Shiv Sainiks among Hindus and intifadaists among Palestinians might act. But this act was by no way Gandhian. Please. — Salil/London
On Tue, Dec 16, 2008 at 4:25 AM, raja swamy wrote:
Does loyalty to the profession absolve a journalist of the responsibility to speak truth to power? The comments on this forum seem to suggest exactly that. However, I would like to know what exactly “profession” means when it comes to reporting on war and occupation (and I reject the fantastic views of the professional soldier (and happy pro-occupation denier of occupation, that all is hunky dory in occupied Iraq)). Is embedded journalism “professional?” Is reporting word for word the pronouncements of the aggressor country’s administration WITHOUT once getting the views of the Iraqi government (pre-occupation), the resistance movement (post-occupation), the critiques from
around the planet about this disastrous and genocidal war of neocolonial occupation, professional?What I am confounded by is the cavalier attitude of some like Bhaskar Dasgupta towards the life of Muntadar al Zaidi. Is this how a journalism list engages with the question of imminent physical harm to a journalist who did no more than throw shoes at an aggressor who launched missiles, bombs and what not murdering more than a million people and maiming scores? Shouldn’t SAJA be leading the
call to defend the Al Zaidi’s life? Instead we get the blinkered view that the occupation has made such acts possible and as such there is nothing to worry about except perhaps the damage done to something these geniuses determine to be the “profession.”It this sycophantic practice of siding with the powerful and making excuses for genocide that is being propounded as the “profession” by some SAJA’ers. As a South Asian, I am ashamed by these comments and would like to reiterate that Al Zaidi’s action represents a genuine response by a
genuine journalist – who hasn’t forgotten that the most fundamental obligation of a journalist is to stand up to the powerful, and that he did. This incident will go down in history books as one of the greatest acts of protest, alongside the Boston tea party, the Salt satyagraha, and the Palestinian Intifada.Bravo Muntadar al Zaidi! Wish there are millions of journalists like you!
raja..
From: Tejinder Singh
Very appropriate Chinki. The reporter did not go in there as a freeman but as a accreditated journalist which most commenting here are forgetting. An accreditated journalist gets rights to ask
but also has duties. Those of us who sit on Councils to negotiate with govt institutions to decide terms and conditions of such procedures, know what harm those Shoes have done to the profession. Some of us are so close to leaders, we can punch or slap them so is that what our duty is?Tejinder Singh
Brussels, Belgium
Sent via BlackBerry offered by Proximus
Tejinder Singh +32 473 677 985 Editor-in-Chief, New Europe, the European Weekly, Brussels
www.neurope.eu
—-
EU Correspondent, APM News (Formerly part of Reuters), Paris www.apmhealtheurope.com
—–
Member, Council, Association de la Presse Internationale/ International Press Association, Brussels
http://www.api-ipa.eu/
—-
Life Member, South Asian Journalists Association,NYC www.saja.org
From: “Chinki Sinha”
of course it mars the trip because it is not about “liberators” as John uses it here but about the deep
anguish and hurt and disappointment of iraq’s people who first suffered under saddam and now suffer the loss of dignity under the current occupation. it is not about the freedom of expression because the reporter, who hurled the shoes at Bush during the press conference, was arrested on
unspecified charges. You also have to look at the specifics of the conference which was celebrating the US occupation of Iraq as one of the most successful in the history of United States military efforts. Freedom is not about hurling shoes at others. It is about peace and human rights and not fearing about getting killed ever moment …Chinki Sinha, Principal Correspondent, Indian Express, Bahadur Shah Zafar Marg, New Delhi,
9717654063, chinkis@gmail.com http://chinkisinha.blogspot.com/
On Mon, Dec 15, 2008 at 7:49 PM, John Laxmi :
In a blatant case of bias, the Associated Press says the incident in Baghdad “mars” Bush’s farewell tour, instead of celebrating it! Could a reporter (or anyone else for that matter) have expressed his dissent in this manner (or any other) during Saddam Hussein’s regime? Shouldn’t we applaud both the reporter for his free expression and the Liberators who made it possible? — Regards, John Laxmi, NJ http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2008/12/15/world/AP-Bush.html?_r=1
Bush’s Iraq-Afghan Farewell Tour Marred by Dissent
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: December 15, 2008
KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — President George W. Bush wrapped up a whirlwind trip to two war zones Monday that in many ways was a victory lap without a clear victory. A signature event occurred when an Iraqi reporter hurled two shoes at Bush, an incident the president called ”a bizarre moment.”
Bush visited the Iraqi capital just 37 days before he hands the war off to his successor, Barack Obama, who has pledged to end it. The president wanted to highlight a drop in violence and to celebrate a recent U.S.-Iraq security agreement, which calls for U.S. troops to withdraw from Iraq by the end of 2011.
”The war is not over,” Bush said, but ”it is decisively on its way to being won.”
Bush then traveled to Afghanistan where he spoke to U.S. soldiers and Marines at a hangar on the tarmac at Bagram Air Base. The rally for over a thousand military personnel took place in the dark, cold pre-dawn hours. Bush was greeted by loud cheers from the troops.
”Afghanistan is a dramatically different country than it was eight years ago,” he said. ”We are making hopeful gains.”
But the president’s message on progress in the region was having trouble competing with the videotaped image of the angry Iraqi who hurled his shoes at Bush in a near-miss, shouting in Arabic, ”This is your farewell kiss, you dog!” The reporter was later identified as Muntadar
al-Zeidi, a correspondent for Al-Baghdadia television, an Iraqi-owned station based in Cairo, Egypt.
In Iraqi culture, throwing shoes at someone is a sign of contempt. Iraqis whacked a statue of Saddam with their shoes after U.S. Marines toppled it to the ground following the 2003 invasion.
Bush told reporters later that he didn’t think ”you can take one guy throwing shoes and say this represents a broad movement in Iraq. You can try to do that if you want but I don’t think that would be accurate.”
Reaction in Iraq was swift but mixed, with some condemning the act and others applauding it. Television news stations throughout Iraq repeatedly showed footage of the incident, and newspapers carried headline stories.
In Baghdad’s Shiite slum of Sadr City, supporters of radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr called for protests against Bush and demanded the release of the reporter. Thousands took to the streets Monday, chanting, ”Bush, Bush, listen well: Two shoes on your head.”
Talking to a small group of reporters after the incident, Bush said, ”I didn’t know what the guy said, but I saw his sole.” He told the reporters that ”you were more concerned than I was. I was watching your faces.”
”I’m pretty good at ducking, as most of you know,” Bush joked, adding quickly that ”I’m talking about ducking your questions.”
On a more serious note, he said, ”I mean, it was just a bizarre moment, but I’ve had other bizarre moments in the presidency. I remember when Hu Jintao was here. Remember? We had the big event? He’s speaking, and all of a sudden I hear this noise — had no earthly idea what was taking
place, but it was the Falun Gong woman screaming at the top of her lungs (near the ceremony on the White House lawn). It was kind of an odd moment.”
The Iraqi government condemned the act and demanded an on-air apology from Al-Baghdadia television, the Iraqi-owned station that employs Muntadar al-Zeidi.
Several people descended on the man immediately after, wrestling him to the ground, and it took a minute or two for security agents to clear the crowd and start hauling him out. As they dragged him off, he was moaning and screaming as if in pain. Later, a large blood trail could be seen on the carpet where he was dragged out of the room.
He was taken into custody and reportedly was being held for questioning by Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki’s guards and is being tested for alcohol and drugs.
Other Arab journalists and commentators, fed up with U.S. policy in the Middle East and Bush’s decision to invade Iraq in 2003 to topple Saddam, echoed al-Zeidi’s sentiments Monday. Abdel-Bari Atwan, editor of the influential London-based newspaper Al-Quds Al-Arabi, wrote on the newspaper’s Web site that the incident was ”a proper goodbye for a war criminal.”
After a meeting with Hamid Karzai in the capital of Kabul, Bush said he told the president of Afghanistan: ”You can count on the United States. Just like you’ve been able to count on this administration, you’ll be able to count on the next administration as well.”
The mixed reactions to Bush in both countries emphasized the uncertain situations Bush is leaving behind in the region.
In Iraq, nearly 150,000 U.S. troops remain in Iraq, protecting the fragile democracy. More than 4,209 members of the U.S. military have died and $576 billion has been spent since the war began five years and nine months ago.
In Afghanistan, there are about 31,000 U.S. troops and commanders have called for up to 20,000 more. The fight is especially difficult in southern Afghanistan, a stronghold of the Taliban where violence has risen sharply this year.
——
Associated Press writer Qassim Abdul Zahra in Baghdad contributed to this report.
This is the SAJA E-mail Discussion List http://www.saja.org/lists To switch to the articles only
list, unsubscribe by sending a blank email to leave-saja-disc-20122S@lists.jrn.columbia.edu and then send a note to sree@sree.net asking to be placed on the articles list. Give us feedback on the SAJA Stylebook http://www.saja.org/stylebook
40 Inspirational Speeches in 2 Minutes
40 Inspirational Speeches in 2 Minutes
http://ca.video.yahoo.com/watch/4091988/11042227
