Friday 24th...Bhalobasha

Then the rainstorm came, over me
And I felt my spirit break
I had lost all of my, belief you see
And realized my mistake
But time threw a prayer, to me
And all around me became still

I need love, love's divine
Please forgive me now I see that I've been blind
Give me love, love is what I need to help me know my name

Through the rainstorm came sanctuary
And I felt my spirit fly
I had found all of my reality
I realize what it takes

'Cause I need love, love's divine
Please forgive me now I see that I've been blind
Give me love, love is what I need to help me know my name

Oh I, don't bet (don't bend), don't break (don't break)
Show me how to live and promise me you won't forsake
'Cause love can help me know my name

Well I try to say there's nothing wrong
But inside I felt me lying all along
But the message here was plain to see
Believe me

'Cause I need love, love's divine
Please forgive me now I see that I've been blind
Give me love, love is what I need to help me know my name

Oh I, don't bet (don't bend), don't break (don't break)
Show me how to live and promise me you won't forsake
'Cause love can help me know my name

Love can help me know my name.

GIVE

Children Dream
Adults Gaze
The Dead Die again
when we stop living righteously


Water, light & earth, earn & play their part
Music, dance, words, give a head start
Emotions are forced into accepting the truth


The cycles of heaven and earth are mysteries untold
We cry in the ocean and flood the earth
The waters are bitter sweet, the earth gives gold, to the old

Time, Love and Happiness are our precious
The vain caries the blood
The stream has one movement
Unity is the central focus
Colours of a global way, a path only the mind can see
The spirit can feel and only the heart can chase.

Curated by Lorenzo Fusi & Naeem Mohaiemen
http://papesse.org

Palazzo Papesse Centre for Contemporary Art in Siena will present a
new show "SYSTEM ERROR: WAR IS A FORCE THAT GIVES US MEANING." The
show is co-curated by Papesse head curator Lorenzo Fusi and New York
+Dhaka based artist Naeem Mohaiemen, on February 3- May 6 2007

The curators set out to explore this fundamental question: if war is
universally opposed, why do new conflicts keep breaking out? Is there
an addiction to warfare in the human psyche? Has it become a drug we
cannot quit? These and many other questions including the nature of
"hard" and "soft" conflict; the allure of flags, national anthems and
nationalism; and pop culture's profitable fascination with bloody
violence are explored in this project.

While certain conflicts tend to dominate global media, the curators
also emphasized conflagrations that often slip under the radar. These
include Beslan school raid, U2's expensive lawyers, rebranded School
of Americas, East Timor library, Oaxaca burning, Darfur refugee
camps, Rome assassination, Iraq's managed chaos, "Safe" Area Gorazde,
D.W. Griffith's Night Riders, Vietnam's burning monk, Oliver Stone's
9/11 blockbuster, Jetblue's t-shirt policy, Paris cat graffiti,
Newsweek's Rwanda amnesia, Iranian embassy takeover, Che Guevara's
New York visit, Bangladesh's gun culture, and Thailand's rose coup.

Featuring the artwork of more than 40 international artists including
internationally established pioneers (Chris Marker, Alfredo Jaar,
Lebbeus Woods) to newer artists (Chris Naka, Rheim AlKadhi, Yara El-
Sherbini), as well as those who have never shown in the museum or
gallery context (Chaleerat Ngamchalee, Israel Rosas). While some
artists have exhibited at venues such as the Whitney, Venice and
Sydney Biennial, the curators also discovered many of these works
while attending protest rallies, going to a concert, browsing a comic
book store, and surfing YouTube and Flickr. In the choice of artists,
mediums and genres, this project looks at some possible futures for
politically engaged visual arts, both inside gallery walls, and on
the streets of modern cities.

As well as established mediums such as video, sculpture, print, and
conceptual art, the selection has an emphasis on newer mediums and
genre-breaking work: flash animation (Young-Hae Chang), Hollywood
mashups (Chris Naka, Jackie Salloum, Chris Moukarbel), TV satire
(Yara el-Sherbini), t-shirt wars (Usman Haque), comic books (Joe
Sacco, Dawolu Jabari Anderson), video games (Jon Haddock), library
rescue (Tom Nicholson), music mix (DJ Spooky), street performance
(Richard DeDomenici), museum intervention (Meir Gal), bullet opera
(Emily Jacir), radio piracy (Negativland), and musicals (Damir Niksic]

- SHOBAK NEWS :-)

A Chronology of Conflict.
Western Military Intervention in the Middle East/North Africa since 1950

Introduction:

"any attempt by any outside power to gain control of the Persian Gulf region will be regarded as an assault on the vital interests of the USA and such an assault will be repelled by any means necessary, including military force"
- Jimmy Carter, then U.S. President in his State of the Union (1980) address following the Iranian Revolution and the rise to power of the Ayatollah Khomeini.

Read more...

In 1950's America, the equality of man envisioned by the Declaration of Independence was far from a reality. People of color, blacks, Hispanics, Orientals, were discriminated against in many ways, both overt and covert. The 1950's were a turbulent time in America, when racial barriers began to come down due to Supreme Court decisions, like Brown v. Board of Education; and due to an increase in the activism of blacks, fighting for equal rights.

Martin Luther King, Jr., a Baptist minister, was a driving force in the push for racial equality in the 1950's and the 1960's. In 1963, King and his staff focused on Birmingham, Alabama. They marched and protested non-violently, raising the ire of local officials who sicced water cannon and police dogs on the marchers, whose ranks included teenagers and children. The bad publicity and break-down of business forced the white leaders of Birmingham to concede to some anti-segregation demands.

Thrust into the national spotlight in Birmingham, where he was arrested and jailed, King organized a massive march on Washington, DC, on August 28, 1963. On the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, he evoked the name of Lincoln in his "I Have a Dream" speech, which is credited with mobilizing supporters of desegregation and prompted the 1964 Civil Rights Act. The next year, King was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

The following is the exact text of the spoken speech, transcribed from recordings. (Click "Read More" for the Speech)

Ps: Martin & I share the same birthday in January.

Read more...

A voyaging ship was wrecked during a storm at sea and only two of the men on it were able to swim to a small, desert like island. The two survivors, not knowing what else to do, agree that they had no other recourse but to pray to God.

However, to find out whose prayer was more powerful, they agreed to divide the territory between them and stay on opposite sides of the island.

The first thing they prayed for was food. The next morning, the first man saw a fruit-bearing tree on his side of the land, and he was able to eat its fruit. The other man's parcel of land remained barren.

After a week, the first man was lonely and he decided to pray for a wife. The next day, another ship was wrecked, and the only survivor was a woman who swam to his side of the land. On the other side of the island, there was nothing.

Soon the first man prayed for a house, clothes, more food. The next day, like magic, all of these were given to him. However, the second man still had nothing.

Finally, the first man prayed for a ship, so that he and his wife could leave the island. In the morning, he found a ship docked at his side of the island. The first man boarded the ship with his wife and decided to leave the second man on the island. He considered the other man
unworthy to receive God's blessings, since none of his prayers had been answered.

As the ship was about to leave, the first man heard a voice from heaven booming, "Why are you leaving your companion on the island?"

"My blessings are mine alone, since I was the one who prayed for them," the first man answered. "His prayers were all unanswered and so he does not deserve anything."

"You are mistaken!" the voice rebuked him. "He had only one prayer, which I answered. If not for that, you would not have received any of my blessings."

"Tell me," the first man asked the voice, "what did he pray for that should owe him anything?"
"He prayed that all your prayers be answered."

For all we know, our blessings are not the fruits of our prayers alone, but those of another praying for us. When Jesus died on the cross he was thinking of you!

REMAIN BLEST (Blessed)

DID YOU REMEMBER TO PRAY TODAY?
LUKE 18 : 1, 1Thessalonians 5 : 17.

NO ONE CAN PLEASE GOD WITHOUT FAITH, FOR WHOEVER COMES TO GOD MUST HAVE FAITH (KNOW) THAT GOD EXISTS AND REWARDS THOSE WHO SEEK HIM
Hebrews 11:6

connected from Africa
& light became and light was
And light we have for the right cause
THE TEAR OF GOD
The blood of angels
The power of tears
To know and to believe

In earth in fire and in air
In laying, standing, flying
Love is the summom
Respect is the tercium
Unity is the binium
Health is the quartium
And happiness, the idium

Still in the ocean that thinks like a pond
Undefined is the surface of being and not being
A united language for the seeing and not seeing
Reading & not reading, breathing & not breeding,
What lies beyond is the feeling, of not feeling,
in the beginning, to be but not ending,