SPEECH BY FRENCH PRIME MINISTER MORE RELEVANT NOW THAN EVER

I am touched by the solidarity Solidarite shown by people all around the world for France and its people and also for Jewish People at this very difficult time.
I am in a remote part of South Dakota, conducting a health project for the adolescents of the Lakota tribe. I was touched that so many people came up to me, voicing concern, for my little family in Bruxelles. They remember my connection with Paris, when I used to live there.
Letters have poured in from my dearest friends in Cuba, each more eloquent than the other, condemning this inhuman act against the innocent French and Other people on French Soil. I am also very pleased with the solidarity shown to the French all around the world. 
This has united the world against an EVIL. After the mourning we will have time to reflect about the roots of this problem. Diversity of cultures while inclusion, like that seen in the USA is a good example to follow. I condemn the announcement of an Australian Muslim Party, which is an example of division rather than being diverse. We are different and equal and it takes hard work, like the Chinese in Malaysia, to attain social upward movement and economic prosperity. It does not matter at all whether the Malaysian Chinese are Christian, Animist or Taoist or Buddhist. But their desire to integrate into the country of their birth, rather than following hate preachers from another culture (Salafists from Saudi Arabia) would not bring prosperity to individuals or society as a whole.
This rule is applicable to Australia as well. However conservative American Politicians on the right are, America gives an opportunity to any one and every one and Muslims cannot disrespect that opportunity by trying to be different and divisive, in their manners and dress that sets them apart.

What sort of world are we preparing for our children?
Please watch the video by Manuel Valls, the French PM who talked after the massacre of Journalists (many of them were Jewish) as well as the Jewish shoppers at a Kosher Supermarket in Paris in January 2015.






Possibly The Greatest Denunciation of Anti-Semitism Ever

As Dennis Praeger argued in his eloquent presentation at the Oxford University, the enemy of Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, Egypt, Tunisia, Libya, Iraq is NOT ISRAEL but their own people guided by a blind faith and belief in the glory of gory deaths.

CRYING FOR PARIS, THE FRENCH NATION AND THE FRENCH PEOPLE 13.11.2015

First they came for the Jews

and I did not speak out

because I was not a Jew.

Then they came for the Communists

and I did not speak out

because I was not a Communist.

Then they came for the trade unionists

and I did not speak out

because I was not a trade unionist.

Then they came for me

and there was no one left

to speak out for me.

Friedrich Gustav Emil Martin Niemöller (14 January 1892 – 6 March 1984) was a Protestant pastor and social activist

LOOK AT THE DIFFERENCE: A CUBAN AMERICAN WOMAN EDUCATOR AND AN AMERICAN CUBAN MAN LAWYER

BORN IN CUBA, RAISED IN MIAMI, FIRST DEGREE FROM UNIVERSITY OF MIAMI, THE SECOND ONE, A DOCTORATE IN PSYCHOLOGY, FROM YALE
SHE IS A CUBAN-AMERICAN, PRESIDENT OF ONE OF THE LARGEST UNIVERSITIES IN AMERICA, COMMITTED TO EDUCATION, PROVIDING CHANCES FOR THOSE WHO CANNOT OTHERWISE GET AN EDUCATION. SHE IS OPENLY GAY

THE OTHER ONE IS BORN IN MIAMI OF CUBAN PARENTS, EDUCATED AT UNIVERSITY OF MIAMI, POLITICAL SCIENCE AND THE SECOND DEGREE IN LAW, PAID OF HIS STUDENT LOAN OF $100.000 WORKING AS A LAWYER. ELECTED A SENATOR FROM FLORIDA, HE IS HOPING TO GARNER THE REPUBLICAN PARTY'S NOMINATION FOR PRESIDENT
HE IS AN AMERICAN-CUBAN AND IT IS OBVIOUS WHAT HE IS COMMITTED TO. IT IS CERTAINLY NOT THE  ORDINARY PEOPLE WHO LIVE IN AMERICA

A member of the UW faculty since 1986, Cauce became interim president in March 2015, having previously served as provost and executive vice president, and the UW Board of Regents selected her to become the UW’s 33rd president at a special meeting Oct. 13, 2015.

Throughout her career, Cauce has championed access to higher education, including through the Husky Promise, which provides full tuition to eligible Washington students who otherwise could not attend college. As part of her strong belief in ensuring access to higher education for all, just one month into her role as interim president she engaged students in an honest discussion about race and equity, launching an effort to create a more just and diverse community.

The UW also views innovation as an imperative, and as part of that in June 2015 Cauce announced the launch of the Global Innovation Exchange. A partnership between the UW and Tsinghua University, with foundational support from Microsoft, GIX will educate the next generation of innovators through a project-based, globally focused curriculum available nowhere else.

Raised in Miami after emigrating with her family from Cuba, Cauce earned degrees in English and psychology from the University of Miami and a Ph.D. in psychology, with a concentration in child clinical and community psychology, from Yale University.

During the course of her career at the UW, Cauce has been appointed to various leadership positions, including director of the UW Honors Program, chair of American Ethnic Studies, chair of Psychology, executive vice provost and dean of the College of Arts and Sciences. In 2011 Cauce was named provost and executive vice president, responsible for overseeing the education, research and service missions of the university’s schools, colleges and other academic units.

For her teaching, scholarship and advocacy, Cauce has received numerous awards, including the Dalmas Taylor Distinguished Contribution Award, the Luis Fernando Esteban Public Service Award, the James M. Jones Lifetime Achievement Award of the American Psychological Association, the Grace Hopper Exemplary Leadership Award and the Distinguished Contribution Award from the Society for Community Research and Action. In 1999 she was awarded the Distinguished Teaching Award, the highest honor the University of Washington gives to faculty members for their work with students in and outside the classroom.

(FROM UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON WEBSITE)

FROM BBC ABOUT RUBIO

Where Rubio stands

• Immigration: Used to be pro-citizenship but now takes a harder line
• Iran: Will undo nuclear deal "on day one"
• Pro-life: Right to life "trumps virtually any other right"
• Healthcare: Repeal Obama's signature law that extends insurance to millions
• Climate change: No evidence that humans responsible
• China: Promises to "get tough" about human rights
• Gun laws: Violence is due to mental illness

The former brings GLORY to the University of Miami, the latter just INFAMY.

Any intelligent person can see the difference.. A Cuban American is not the same as an American Cuban

The Good Polish Doctor who saved thousands of Jews and Non Jews .. via False Typhus tests

I was so touched by this article that I have decided to put the entire article without editorializing.
Brave doctor, who lived by a cyanide tablet by his side, so that he could take his life if he was caught by Gestapo, was warned by a German soldier patient that Germans planned to kill him, so he was able to escape.
Polish or German, there are good people in this world with good conscience. I am happy for all the Jews and non-Jews this good doctor and his associate saved!G

The Epidemic That Saved Lives

Typhus is a bacterial-borne disease which is transmitted by flea, tick, and mite bites. It can be fatal if untreated but, thankfully, in almost all cases antibiotics are effective. And by today's standards, it's rare; an understanding of the disease has led us to control pest populations better while emphasizing personal hygiene, limiting the ability for the bacteria to spread. But go back to World War II and that wasn't the case. Typhus wasn't as treatable and less sanitary conditions led to more epidemics. To keep the disease from spreading throughout military units, Nazi Germany policy required that soldiers avoid those afflicted.

And because of this, thousands of Jewish lives were able to be saved -- with the help of a little medical misdirection.

The German typhus-prevention protocols were, as one would expect from such a regime, draconian when it came to Jews who had the disease --  Jewish patients were executed and their homes burned. But non-Jews were treated somewhat humanely -- they were quarantined until such time that the disease passed. And when it came to typhus control, pragmatism triumphed. If an area had a large enough population of non-Jews with typhus, the Germans would quarantine the entire community, even if there was a significant Jewish population in the area. 
 

It's that latter fact that Eugene Lazowski, a Polish doctor (pictured above), exploited. The test for typhus was pretty simple. If the person had the disease, his or her blood would have antibodies which the immune system produced to fight off the infection, even though that battle was often a losing one. And as it turned out, those antibodies did not just react with the typhus-causing bacteria. They also reacted with a strain of the Proteus bacteria called OX-19, which can be rendered harmless to people. To test for typhus, a sample of a person's blood was mixed with a strain of Proteus OX-19, according to Atlas Obscura. If the mixture became cloudy, the patient had typhus antibodies and, therefore, typhus.  

That's where Lazowski came in. Lazowski served in the resistance for much of World War II and provided medical services in his village, Rozwadów. He collected blood samples from people in the area -- Jews and non-Jews, Poles and Germans -- and sent them to the Germans for review. Lazowski realized that these blood samples could be used to protect thousands of Jews from concentration camps. If the Germans detected typhus among the non-Jews, Lazowski surmised, the Nazis would quarantine the area and, as a result, leave the Jews there alone. The only problem: to do that, you actually had to spread typhus.

Until Lazowski found a work-around. 

It turns out that by injecting people with the dead Proteus OX-19 bacteria strain, one could fool the test. The body would produce antibodies similar to the ones caused by a typhus infection, and therefore result in a positive test when the person's blood was tested -- despite the fact that the person wasn't ill. And injecting people with Proteus OX-19 was easier than one would thing, at least for Lazowski. Because Lazowski was a doctor in the area, many laborers who passed through Rozwadów sought treatment from him. He injected them with the harmless Proteus strain and eventually, the Germans drew an inescapable conclusion: Rozwadów was a hotbed for typhus (even though it wasn't). The area was off-limits for Nazi operatives, which meant that the Jews in the area were relatively safe. 

Lazowski was able to "infect" enough people in and around a dozen different Jewish ghettos to save the lives of an estimated 8,000 people, according to a publication by the American Medical Association. He may have been able to save more but the Germans ultimately grew wise to his scheme, and he had to flee Rozwadów. He made his way to Warsaw and then, after the war, moved to the United States. He passed away in 2006.

FROM PIERRE TO JUSTIN PIERRE TRUDEAU: SOME HOPE FOR THIS WEARY WORLD

History repeats itself

From Trudeau to Trudeau

Vive CANADA

One calculates time with changes in environment that influences ones thinking and changes its direction.

40 years ago Pierre Trudeau led the Liberal Party to victory in Canada

43 years later his son Justin Pierre Trudeau has done the same, to an astounding victory.

People talk about another time soon after the war, when the world had Nehru, Adenauer, Nasser, Kenyatta, Nkrumah; those bright stars took their grave their ideologies and inspiration. And of course not to forget that Giant of a Leader, Lee Kuan Yew...

Now we are left wanting for someone of that stature to come back, to enlighten people or satisfy the hunger for truth among the enlightened people. Look what is happening in Malaysia; while its neighbor has reached the Developed country status, the PM Najib is mired in corruption charges... of close to a billion dollars… welcome to the club of Mugabe of Zimbabwe and Obiang of Guinea Ecuatorial! Look at the Republican contenders for the President of USA! Where do these people live? Another planet?

We definitely need more Merkels and less Sarkozys. Hope Justin Trudeau brings honour to Canada and cleans its reputation from years of Conservative rule. There is no more Nelson Mandela, but we do have Zuma!

Everyone loved Mujica of Uruguay, Lula of Brazil... While there were many detractors Chavez was immensely popular and Fidel remains unique for his special contributions to humanity in face of such opposition from outside his country.

Perhaps the lack of dynamic and humanistic leaders that we flock to a humanist figure like the Pope Francisco, who has projected gentleness to the world.

Perhaps Justin Pierre Trudeau would follow those footsteps and march to the drummer to bring prosperity not only to Canada but also to the rest of the world he encounters.  Good Luck

ANCIENT WISDOM AND THE NEW SCIENCE

ANCIENT WISDOM AND THE NEW SCIENCE

When you are with Indigenous people, you begin to understand intuitively, myth, history, symbolism. Claude Levi-Strauss recognized this 80 years ago when he worked with the Indians in Brazil.

When I was introduced to Yogic Philosophy by my good friend MC in KL, I was amazed at the similarity of the philosophy of Yoga Sutra of Patanjali and the oral traditions of American Indians.
Later when I got to know the Buddhist traditions in Myanmar, once again the similarities stood out rather than the differences.
Here is a sentence from Swami Sivananda:

Worry has caused new deadlier  disease like blood-pressure, heart-trouble, nervous breakdown, etc.  Fear checks the flow of blood, and even poisons the blood.  Laughter and cheerfulness increase the circulation of blood.  They are blood-tonics.

-- Sri Swami Sivananda
and I follow this up with words by Lame Deer, a Lakota Indian

"Laughter - that is something very sacred, especially for us Indians."

-- John (Fire) Lame Deer, ROSEBUD LAKOTA
Here is the commentary on that:

Laughter is mental, laughter is emotional, laughter is physical, and laughter is spiritual. Laughter helps us find balance. If we get too angry, laughter will turn that emotion in a balanced direction. If we have a mental picture of someone who is too strong, laughter will help ease the tension. If the body is stressed, laughter will release natural relaxants into our muscles and our nervous system. Laughter often changes our attitude. We need to lighten up and laugh more.  ( American Indian Elder Wisdom )
Nobody would argue now that the tools and behaviour and compartimiento of yours that brings you happiness would also lead to Health. Of course, the cynical logic of the western mind ( Oh Descartes?) would question the qualitative nature of these statements.
Sooner or Later Science catches up.

Elizabeth Blackburn, an Australian Scientist working in the USA won Nobel Prize in Medicine for her work with Telomeres

Now we know that stress would shorten telomerre length, how to avoid the shortening ?

Laughter of course.

Back to the Indians!

Among the Native Indians there is a concept which I would call SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY, it is your part in the welfare of the Universe that includes your family and tribe and animals and birds and trees.. in short your environment. 

The Jewish equivalent of it would be TIKKUN OLAM, healing of the UNIVERSE , in fact the world OLAM, which often appears in Jewish prayers has a more elaborate meaning in Hebrew, rather than WORLD as it is commonly translated.
Eternity

עוֹלָם

Hebrew words used for space are also used for time. The Hebrew word qedem means "east" but is also the same word for the "past." The Hebrew word olam literally means "beyond the horizon." When looking off in the far distance it is difficult to make out any details and what is beyond that horizon cannot be seen. This concept is the olam. The word olam is also used for time for the distant past or the distant future as a time that is difficult to know or perceive. This word is frequently translated as "eternity" meaning a continual span of time that never ends. In the Hebrew mind it is simply what is at or beyond the horizon, a very distant time. A common phrase in the Hebrew is "l'olam va'ed" and is usually translated as "forever and ever," but in the Hebrew it means "to the distant horizon and again" meaning "a very distant time and even further." For me, the Social Responsibility of the Native Indians (which includes Relationship, Mitakuye Oyasin, We are all related) and the concept of Tikkun Olam resonate well.

Happiness and Health

Recently while in the Amazon River region, I was asked: what do you do keep yourself healthy?

There are Medical and Anthropological answer to this question and surprisingly enough, they do not coincide!

The Doctor would say:

Do not become Overweight, defined as 23 kg/M2 in people of Asian Ancestry (weight in Kg divided by Height in Metres squared)

Do not smoke

Eat Healthily (Most Health Care providers are notoriously ignorant of Nutrition)

Exercise regularly.

Some even may murmur about Positive Attitude towards Life.

An Anthropologist would say:

Be Grateful for the things you have

Practice Mindfulness. Enjoy the present moment fully, do not long for the past or worry about the future

Be a humble person

Health and Happiness cannot be separated. That may be the reason why happy people tend to do well when they are ill and recover quicker than less than happy people

Remember what the great American Philosopher once said:

Look at all these people, trying to stave off the inevitable decay of their bodies.  (Woody Allen in Hannah and her sisters)

Why don’t the joggers ever smile?

I said Good Morning to every single Health Conscious Chinese/Indian/Malay joggers along the path in Malacca, Malaysia and not a single one returned the smile or the greeting! As my good friend Joe would say: A smile is a must, even if you are exercising to stave off that inevitable decay?

I have never exercised in a Gym but have walked plenty along the Amazon River, for me the latter leads to Happiness and Health!

 WELCOME TO AMAZONIA!