Tuesday 30 July 2013

Gurrumul


Gurrumul - Gopuru




GURRUMUL & BLUE KING BROWN 

Gathu Mawula Revisited


GURRUMUL TOPS CHARTS...


visit Gurrumul's website:

also see


Gurrumul - "Gurrumul History"



vid1
Skinnyfish Music
Published on Jun 19, 2011
From the album 'Rrakala' by Geoffrey Gurrumul Yunupingu. Released by Skinnyfish Music 2011.

vid2
Uploaded on Feb 23, 2011
A rare collaboration from two amazing Australian Artists, Gurrumul & Blue King Brown. Sung in Yolngu & English by Gurrumul & Natalie Pa'apa'a of Blue King Brown. Available now of iTunes Australia http://bit.ly/dVnS0l

Featured Dancers - The Chooky Dancers.

ARTIST: GURRUMUL & BLUE KING BROWN 
SONG NAME: GATHU MAWULA REVISITED
DANCERS: THE CHOOKY DANCERS
PRODUCTION COMPANY: ONE REBEL (CARLO SANTONE)
PRODUCER: CARLO SANTONE
DIRECTOR: CARLO SANTONE
CO DIRECTOR: NATALIE PA'APA'A
EDITOR: HARRY JOAQUIN CHARNOCK / CARLO SANTONE
DOP: CARLO SANTONE / HARRY JOAQUIN CHARNOCK
CAM 2: NAINA SEN
1st AC / B CAM: DAN FARMER
SONG DURATION: 3:49
RECORD LABEL: LION HOUSE RECORDS 
ASPECT RATIO: 16:9


vid3

Monday 29 July 2013

REMAIN ~ MOVE ~ RETURN + carving ashes

REMAIN—MOVE—RETURN
Thursday, August 1st, 7pm
Rhizome Café, 317 East Broadway

hosted by poets of the No One is Illegal Vancouver Coast Salish Territories and Press Release collectives.

“…we strive and struggle for the right to remain, the freedom to move, and the right to return…”

join us for some food, music, video and poetry—
with love and gratitude for a favourite space.

and you dear, bring a poem to read on the free mic…

with/ Hari Alluri—Julie Okot Bitek—Mercedes Eng—Ray Hsu—Reg Johanson—Cecily Nicholson—Razan —Naava Smolash—Lee Williams—& friends


+



hari alluri, carving ashes, book launch
published by CiCAC Press: 

friday august 2nd at 7pm 
rhizome cafe, 317 east broadway, vancouver, coast salish territories

"... carving ashes is a compendium of muscular, lyrical prayers. they're all love letters- to bangalore, to the other young black and brown dudes working the [RPS] line, to the water that connects both, travelled by brilliant kin who have always known how to steer small boats through big water...our ancestors and those to come are happy."

~ leah lakshmi piepzna-samarasinha, Lambda Award winner, author, love cake, consensual genocide, revolution starts at home

cover image: carving ashes, mixed media, by Naomi Horii
design by Ashok Mathur


(please come early to eat food!)



Sunday 28 July 2013

word and world


The Ecstatic Poetry of Hafiz
Love sometimes gets tired of speaking sweetly
And wants to rip to shreds
All your erroneous notions of truth

That make you fight within yourself, dear one,
And with others,

Causing the world to weep
On too many fine days.

God wants to manhandle us,
Lock us inside of a tiny room with Himself
And practice His dropkick.

The Beloved sometimes wants
To do us a great favor:

Hold us upside down
And shake all the nonsense out.

Excerpt from Tired of Speaking Sweetly





Fal-e Hafiz + Hafiz on Love


Khwāja Shamsu d-Dīn Muhammad Hāfez-e Shīrāzī (Persian: خواجه شمس‌ دین محمد حافظ شیرازی‎), known by his pen name Hāfez (1325/26–1389/1390),[1] was an Iranian poet. His collected works composed of series of Persian literature are to be found in the homes of most people in IranAfghanistan and Tajikistan, who learn his poems by heart and use them as proverbs and sayings to this day. His life and poems have been the subject of much analysis, commentary and interpretation, influencing post-fourteenth century Persian writing more than any other author.[2][3] 

More about this poet/source


On POEMIMAGE:

My Eyes So Soft by Hafiz

Saturday 27 July 2013

Lac Ste Anne Pilgrimage: part one









Lac Ste Anne Pilgrimage
July 2013
Michelle Sylliboy photos

~

First called Wakamne or God’s Lake by the Alexis Nakota Sioux Nation who live on the west end of the Lake and Manito Sahkahigan or Spirit Lake by the Cree, Lac St. Anne is the site of the annual Lac St. Anne Pilgrimage, one of the most unique and memorable spiritual gatherings in North America.




...
The history of this lake stretches back to the distant past. Here Native families, who in fall had scattered to winter camps and trap lines, gathered in summer for the buffalo hunt. The Crees called the lake "Manito Sakahigan" or "Spirit Lake". Later, white traders referred to it as Devil's Lake, because in storms it could quickly become dangerous. 

The mission
In 1841 a Métis name Pich‚ who lived in the area, travelled to St. Boniface to ask that a priest be sent to live among them. Priests were scarce. Bishop Provencher had only four priests to minister to a territory that stretched from Ontario to the Rockies. Still, the next spring he sent Father Jean-Baptiste Thibault, who spoke Cree, to check things out. Guiding him was Gabriel Dumont. 

By 1844, a mission was set up and a shack built to house Fr. Thibault and a young priest named Joseph Bourassa. Fr. Thibault blessed the lake renaming it Lac Ste. Anne, thus fulfilling a promise he had made to give her name to the first mission he would 'father'. This was the first permanent Catholic mission west of Winnipeg. 
...



The first Catholic mission, west of St. Boniface, Manitoba, was opened at Lac Ste. Anne in 1844. Its origin is linked with the historic Shrine of St. Anne de Beaupre, Quebec, erected by French sailors in 1658 in fulfillment of a vow made of St. Anne for having saved them from shipwreck on the shores of Newfoundland. 

The devotion to St. Anne which had been flourishing in France for almost four centuries, soon spread to New France and was widespread in Eastern Canada in the 1840s. Just as the spread of Christ’s religion had been confided to St. Anne in the East, so also God had willed that the “Cradle of Faith” in the Canadian Northwest should be placed under the solicitude of the good St. Anne. 

A veteran missionary of the Northwest Territories, Father J. M. Lestanc, O.M.I, wrote on July 27, 1910: “I was told that a young missionary priest on his departure for the missions of the Red River in 1823 had made a promise at the feet of the statue of St. Anne de Beaupre, Que., that he would dedicate in her honour the first mission and church he would build in Western Canada.” This missionary was Father J. B. Thibault who became the first resident priest in [the area now known as] Alberta. 

Sent by Bishop Provencher of St. Boniface in 1844 at the request of John Rowand, a Catholic and Chief Factor of the Hudson Bay Fort at Edmonton, to minister to the needs of the Métis and Indians of the territory, he organized a mission on the shore of a lake called Lake of the Great Spirit by the Indians, and falsely called – Father Lacombe tells us – Devil’s Lake by the Canadian Scouts. 
...
It would seem then, that the good St. Anne has accepted the role of guide and protectoress of the Church in the Canadian West. 

Western Catholic Reporter 
Written By the Director of St. Anne’s Pilgrimage  
Originally printed June 7, 1961

~

Wakamne :  God’s Lake

Manito Sahkahigan : Spirit Lake

Lac Ste. Anne : Lac St. Anne


Friday 26 July 2013

road trip: banff










Michelle Sylliboy photos
Bow River Falls
@ the Chateau






a day in Banff AB









road trip: 3 gorges






Michelle Sylliboy photos,
documenting road trip en route to Lac St Anne
Three Gorges Chateau and lake, in BC

Tuesday 16 July 2013

the person that pays the most

Feature

Barrick Under Global Pressure to Withdraw Conditions on Remedy for Papua New Guinea Rape Victims

Since January, 2013, MiningWatch Canada has raised concern about the fact that Barrick Gold is seeking legal immunity from victims of rape by mine security guards at the company’s Porgera Joint Venture Mine in Papua New Guinea (PNG). If these rape victims accept an individual remedy package they must sign a waiver that assures Barrick that they will never sue the company in PNG or anywhere else in the world. We have raised this concern in a number of public letters to the United Nations High Commissioner of Human Rights (UNHCHR). On May 14, 77 global organizations sent a letter to the UNHCHR  expressing their deep concern over this. 
News release from Innu Takuaikan Uashat Mak Mani-Utenam (ITUM): The Innu First Nation of Uashat Mak Mani-Utenam wishes to remind potential purchasers of Rio Tinto's share of Iron Ore Company of Canada (IOC) that the Canadian Aboriginal group continues to fiercely oppose IOC's mining, railway and port operations within their traditional territory.
Thursday, July 4, 2013
News release: (Ottawa) On June 19, 2013, the Constitutional Chamber (Sala IV) of Costa Rica’s Supreme Court unanimously rejected Infinito Gold’s appeal of the November, 2011 decision of the Court’s Civil and Administrative Law Chamber (Sala I) annulling the concession for the company’s proposed Crucitas open-pit gold mine.
Thursday, July 4, 2013
News release: The complaints office of the World Bank's International Financial Corporation (IFC) will undertake an audit of the IFC’s decision to purchase US$18.2 million worth of shares in Eco Oro Minerals (previously Greystar Resources). The decision supports complainants’ arguments that the International Financial Corporation did not adequately evaluate the environmental and social impacts of company’s project in Colombia. 






































Above stories from MiningWatch Canada website

Last spring, various sources:

First Nation threatens to shut down B.C. copper mine           BY PETER O'NEIL, VANCOUVER SUN MAY 2, 2013

Blasting in the open pit at the Huckleberry copper

/molybdenum mine in northern B.C.

Photograph by: David Clark , PROVINCE


Bland thought the group that made strong action “feasible” was “the Warrior Cohort” of uneducated untrained young men. However, this action was taken by Chief Ogden, a woman with a Master’s Degree. 

Making Canada work for all

 | MAY 3, 2013


Among the many examples of this flawed logic at work is the section on "social fractionalization."  To reduce this indicator of feasibility, Bland argues for a resettlement program of First Nation citizens from reserves, which he claims would increase integration and reduce the likelihood of conflict.  Yet steps in exactly that direction already undertaken by the federal government -- the policy of assimilation -- are among the major sources of anger and alienation.   
Following Bland’s prescription here would actually exacerbate the likelihood of conflict.  His views are not only logically flawed; they are dangerous.  

Chiefs stand together to demand development on their own terms By Ian Graham, Thompson Citizen,  May 3, 2013


“What is the price of these mining licences that are being illegally operated or being illegally awarded to companies?” said Dumas. “Well, the person that pays the most is the environment, the degradation of the environment. It’s also our treaty and aboriginal rights that also pay the ultimate cost for this.”

Yellowknife's Giant Mine cleanup costs to double

New documents show arsenic-contaminated site will take close to $1B to remediate

Posted: Mar 27, 2013 

Definition from federal government of cleanup is murky

Posted: Apr 16, 2013 


+

Cleanup plan can proceed to permitting as long as 27 measures implemented, including shortening time-frame for care and maintenance from perpetuity to 100 years

Posted: Jun 20, 2013


see also

Regarding Impending Evictions of South Hebron Palestinians and Negev Bedouin

Canadian Writers' Open Letter to Israeli and Canadian Leaders
Regarding Impending Evictions of South Hebron Palestinians and Negev Bedouin

We, the undersigned, urge Israeli leaders to heed the call by David Grossman, Amos Oz, AB Yehoshua and 21 other Israeli writers to halt, immediately and permanently, the eviction of about 1000 Palestinians from their homes in various villages in South Hebron, West Bank (occupied Palestinian territory), in order to clear land for an Israeli army firing zone.  These Palestinian villagers have inhabited their homes for several centuries.   Evicting them would violate international law and cause extreme hardship.

We also urge you to reject the Begin-Prawer Plan currently before the Knesset which, if fully implemented, would result in the forced relocation of between 20,000 and 70,000 Bedouin citizens of Israel from their homes in the Negev.  This Plan would also result in the destruction of up to 35 "unrecognized" Bedouin villages. We ask you to heed the European Parliament's call to withdraw the Plan, which violates the constitutional rights of the Bedouin to property, dignity and equality.

The actions planned are manifestly unjust, and will gravely damage Israel's international reputation.

We also respectfully ask our Canadian leaders to take diplomatic steps to encourage Israeli leaders to heed this call.  As the Israeli writers have said, "Each and every one of us bears the moral obligation to try and relieve the suffering."

Sincerely yours,
...




Excerpt of almost the full article, originally published with photo in The Star
Links from the original, except those back to the original article (added). Bold added.

... the plight of 1,000 obscure, traditional cave-dwellers in the arid southern West Bank has moved 25 of Israel’s most famous authors to aim the sharp end of their pens at the Israeli authorities.

Their petition, written by acclaimed novelist David Grossman – named among the 100 greatest Israelis of all time -- calls for a halt to the planned evacuation of eight Palestinian communities in the South Hebron Hills.  Israel says the move is needed to clear the way for a military training zone.

Now, as a 13-year legal battle against the evictions heads for a final appeal in Israel’s supreme court, 70 eminent Canadian writers have joined the protest, including Life of Pi author Yann Martel, Booker Prize winner Michael Ondaatje, parliamentary poet laureate Fred Wah and Holocaust survivor and author Gabor Mate.

“These Palestinian villagers have inhabited their homes for several centuries,” says their open letter to Israeli and Canadian leaders. “Evicting them would violate international law and cause extreme hardship.”

The Israeli government maintains that the military free-fire zone in South Hebron is not a “suitable environment” for permanent residence, according to the Guardian.

The Canadians also urge Israel to reject the Prawer-Begin resettlement bill, under which some Bedouin villages in the Negev desert would be formally recognized, but 30,000 Israeli Bedouins could be forcibly relocated and about 35  “unrecognized” communities destroyed. It passed first reading in the Israeli Knesset last week, and evictions are due to begin in August.

“It is inspiring to see Canadian writers demonstrating ethical leadership,” says Thomas Woodley, president of Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East, “when Canada’s leaders seem to have lost their moral compass.”

“The clarity of the situation is obvious,” said Martel, speaking from Saskatoon. “Many of the Palestinians in the (South Hebron) firing zone have been there for generations. They have papers to prove they live there. The Israelis are occupying land that not a single country in the world agrees they should occupy.”

And he adds, “it’s not just foreigners who are against this. (The petition) is backed by people on the ground.”

The Israeli writers’ petition says that Israel has been “actively expelling and displacing the inhabitants of the South Hebron Hills villages” for 20 years, damaging their archaic lifestyle as cave-dwellers who eke out a living from raising sheep and goats and small crop farming.

“Over the years they have suffered unceasing harassment by the Israeli army and settlers,” it said. Some villagers were evicted starting in 1999, and their caves blocked up. But those who were able to return pending the appeal decision lead a hardscrabble life without a water or electricity supply.

Even if the Israeli court rejects the appeal of the Palestinian cave-dwellers, and thousands of Bedouin are evicted, says Martel, “it’s about injustice, and Israel itself has suffered injustice.

“But injustice doesn’t go away. It’s being felt more palpably around the world. If these plans continue, in the short term Israel may win. But in the long term it will lose.”



from CJPME website (for full press release & letter):



"It's nothing but ethnic cleansing," said one of the signatories, Gabor Mate, in an interview with Postmedia News last week. Mate is a Jewish Canadian and Holocaust survivor, and said that personal conviction compelled him to co-sign the letter. "One thing I've learned is you don't be quiet when things happen that shouldn't happen," Maté added in his interview with Postmedia.
~from CJPME press release (link to postmedia article follows)

also see:





BY LEE BERTHIAUME, POSTMEDIA NEWS (VANCOUVER SUN)



MORE links FROM CJPME WEBSITE:

RELEVANT DOCUMENTS
  
RE SOUTHERN HEBRON HILLS EVICTIONS:
  
  
  
  
  
RE PRAWER PLAN:  
  
  
  
  
RE SKYROCKETING "SETTLEMENT" STARTS:
  
TORONTO STAR: MIDDLE EAST PEACE: CANADA'S SILENCE SPEAKS VOLUMES (OLIVIA WARD, JUNE 20, 2013)