Darfur Detainees

This past weekend, forces from the Darfur rebel group Justice and Equality Movement sought to attack Sudan’s capital Khartoum, but were stopped by government forces.

This latest incident in the conflict has raised much alarm about the safety of civilian Darfurians living in the capital. The Darfurian community in the U.S. has expressed their concern about what is happening in Sudan. One member reported and pleaded:

Since last Friday, the regime security forces raid many homes in Khartoum and arrested many people, some of them televised on Sudan TV as POW, although they had been snatched from their homes before movement fighters entered Khartoum. The regime declared all Darfurians in Khartoum are legitimate target for the regime.Our voices need to be heard loudly and we need to mobilize human right organizations to call for safety of our people in Khartoum and need make sure those detainees are treated according to international law. Please any individual or organization take action for sake those innocent civilians who are busy taking care of their families and don’t know any thing about movements.

There is also fear of increased attacks in the Darfur region by the Janjaweed:

There is also information that Janjaweed are preparing for attacks around some cities in Darfur, but nobody knows where they are heading, as I have just got information from Kebkabiya that civilians were watching Janjaweed today in the morning given a huge amount of Gas and Military equipments with land cruisers, the sames as in the past when there is plan for attacking somewhere, so people are now very afraid of may be they will be attacked at any time.

There is currently a list of about 50 detainees in Khartoum, whom people feel are residents of the area and not affiliated with the rebel movements or the attack

There is intentional ethnic targeting. All of them from Zaghawa tribe. Some were snatched from their families in a brutal manner.

It’s important to keep watch on the status of these individuals.

The Governor of 12th Street

The first time I met him was on Halloween. Mookie and I were at NYCPet on 7th avenue and he was sitting by the door making sure all the kids (the two-legged and four-legged) got treats. From then on, I’d see him from time to time sitting on the bench outside Naidre’s coffee shop or just walking on the sidewalks of 7th ave. We’d give each other a look of recognition followed by a greeting of some sort and then carry on our days.

The last time I saw him was Wednesday in a picture displayed on a table outside Naidres. It was a memorial for him. His name was John “Whitey” Glendinning, and I only learned it after his death. Neighborhood folks gathered to remember him and his contributions to the community.

I discovered more about him from this Daily News story from last year:

Six days a week, you can find John (Whitey) Glendinning working his hustle on the west side of Seventh Ave. between 11th and 12th Sts. in Park Slope. He keeps the sidewalks in front of businesses on that side of the block clean.

Whitey also does other odd jobs, like sitting in double-parked cars to ward off ticket agents while the car owner runs an errand or eats a quick meal. He had more of a work load back when the South Slope was more of a working-class neighborhood and more folks knew him. But many of those people sold out and left.

Whitey had more to his story, more to his past. He got addicted to heroine at an early age and ended up spending sometime in prison. There he was offered a deal to get out of jail if he signed up for a methadone program, which he did, but with consequences:

“Methadone is good for some people, but it’s hard to wean yourself off it,” he said. According to the Drug Policy Information Clearinghouse of the Office of National Drug Control Policy Web site, methadone is harder to kick than heroin - something Whitey knows from experience. “Once you’re on this thing, it’s got you,” Whitey said. “All but two of my teeth have dropped out. I don’t wish this on my worst enemy.”

I heard a story about Whitey on WNYC this morning. He was diagnosed with cancer and afraid of dying alone. But he was reverered and appreciated in the slope community. One resident interviewed said that Whitey was a close friend of his father and is going to make sure that he has a proper burial. They mentioned a funeral at Greenwood Cemetery next Saturday.

The community gathered signatures and created a plaque honoring him as the “Governor of 12th Street.”

Laws and Sausages

“Laws are like sausages, it is better not to see them being made.” -Otto van Bismark

What about laws about sausages?

On Monday night, the NYC Bar Association hosted a panel discussion—”Beef Recall Aftermath: Law Policy Implications For Regulation Of Farmed Animal Welfare And Food Safety”

Earlier this year, footage taken by an HSUS undercover investigator at the Hallmark/Westland meatpacking plant in California resulted in the largest beef recall in the U.S.—more than 143 million pounds of beef. Steve Bjerklie, a journalist who has been covering the Meat industry since the 1980s, noted this was at least four times the amount of any previous recall.

Why was this particular HSUS video so powerful? Andrew Martin, a food writer for the New York Times, wondered about this. He noted that while he’s received footage of abuses of chickens, he’s not sure what to do with it , what the story is and if it’s newsworthy, and is doubtful it will have the same impact as the images in the HSUS video:

Workers are seen kicking cows, ramming them with the blades of a forklift, jabbing them in the eyes, applying painful electrical shocks and even torturing them with a hose and water in attempts to force sick or injured animals to walk to slaughter.

What also struck a chord was that this company was a major supplier for the nation’s school lunch program. This was not only inhumane, but had food safety implications.

Gene Baur, co-founder of Farm Sanctuary, discussed how he had footage in that same packing plant over 20 years ago with these abuses on downed animals, but back then, there was nothing illegal about it.

In December of 2003, when the first “mad” cow was discovered in the U.S., legislation was established to prevent the slaughter of downed cows for human consumption. Downed animals are an increased risk for disease and could have BSE, but downed doesn’t necessarily mean BSE and BSE could be found in animals who aren’t downed, but testing of cows is limited.

These downer cows are usually overworked, exhausted dairy cows, who have been repeatedly and forcefully impregnated, suffering the repeated loss of their young, and milked to their limits. Once they are no longer “useful” or “productive” they are sent to slaughter. Those who have been pushed too far and can no longer stand or walk are downers. The current law however has a loophole that doesn’t sufficiently prevent cows who have been forced on their feet to pass inspection or those who go down right after inspection from being slaughtered for human consumption. HSUS is looking to close that loophole with improved legislation and oversight. Interestingly enough, Steve Bjerklie said that the industry is now on board with that as well and doesn’t want downers entering the food supply. He mentioned that recall insurance has gotten very expensive. Mike Markarian of HSUS expressed that it makes economic sense for the industry too because recalls are expensive and it impacts export policies.

But this legislation only prevents downer cows from entering the human food supply. They can still be rendered for pet food, livestock feed, or other animal products. The industry can still “milk” these downed cows for all they are worth. It doesn’t address the cruelty in the dairy industry that is also responsible for downed conditions, or downers of others species of animals.

Lester Friedlander, a former USDA veterinary inspector, offered his perspectives on the challenges of regulating this industry and how abuses can go on undetected. Whether the USDA who promotes the industry should be regulating it was also discussed. Markarian felt the Office of the Inspector General, however, did seem to be independent in this process. Felicia Nestor from Food and Water Watch felt that the USDA was able to send a message to the industry through Hallmark/Westland, but probably would have been unable to do so to one of the bigger beef giants like Cargill or IBP, who are well stocked with lawyers.

The concept of using cameras in slaughterhouses came up. Steve Bjerklie said the industry has been long opposed to it. Labor organizations were the first to suggest it, because worker rights are a big concern. The industry also feels it would be a violation of trade secrets or business practices of how they achieve their production quantities. Andrew Martin didn’t think consumers wanted to see this footage. Gene Baur brought up the importance of the public knowing what the reality is which may be different from what peoplethink the reality to be.  Felicia Nestor felt the industry would find ways to work around the cameras, so they don’t document the abuses going on. Mike Markarian brought up the reference regarding laws and sausages being the two things no one wants to see get made, but then added, yet “we have C-Span”.

The evening ended with a question from the audience directed at the meat-eaters on the panel (all except Gene Baur and Mike Markarian), who all are intimately familiar with the goings on of meat production. She asked them, knowing what they know and what they’ve seen, how they could continue to eat meat.

Silence… No one responded.

The Brindle Brigade

Max (foreground) and Shelly (in the back) were rescued by the Brooklyn Animal Foster Network, and are in need of a home. They are currently housed at the Dog’s Den in Park Slope. They are eager to run around, play and give and receive lots of affection.

Rosa was abandoned on a park bench. She’s an older girl who’s ready to find a home of her own.

To see their profiles on petfinder click here.

Interesting in volunteering, fostering or adopting? Contact Brooklyn Foster Animal Network or stop by their adoption events on Saturdays:

Outdoor Adoption & Foster Events
Every Saturday 12pm-6pm
In front of John Jay High School
7th Avenue and 5th Street
Park Slope, Brooklyn
Phone: 718 789-6865
Web Site: www.brooklynanimalfosternetwork.org

Photo Credits: Jean Kim Mars

The Sweethearts of Seventh Avenue

Meet Honey: Sweet and Golden colored. Her backside bears a bald spot where she was victim to an oil burn.

Lefty is a lap dog, a snuggle bunny.

Tiger likes to play and is a good friend to his doggy pals.

And this is Maya…

And Sandy

They are all lucky to have the foster homes with the Brooklyn Animal Foster Network, but are looking for forever homes.

Every Saturday (rain date Sunday), you can meet these sweethearts on Seventh Avenue and 5th Street in Park Slope. The Brooklyn Animal Foster Network rescues animals from the city shelters and tries to find them temporary homes until they are placed in permanent homes.

The dogs who don’t have a foster home right now are housed at the Dog’s Den Doggy Day Care Facility. These two love monsters are currently there and in need of foster care and adoption. My friend Jean and I went to visit them today and take them for a walk. They are good natured, energetic and strong and such good friends.

Shelly is eager to give hugs and high fives.

Max likes Kongs, belly rubs and tummy crawls.

I’m grateful to my neighbors Jean and Dave for introducing me to these sweethearts last Saturday. I hope they find their forever homes soon. If you are interested in fostering or adopting, you are bound to fall in love on Saturday on Seventh Avenue.

To volunteer click here. To see BAFN profiles on petfinder click here.

Outdoor Adoption & Foster Events
Every Saturday 12pm-6pm
In front of John Jay High School
7th Avenue and 5th Street
Park Slope, Brooklyn
Phone: 718 789-6865
Web Site: www.brooklynanimalfosternetwork.org

Stay tuned for more adventures of Shelly and Max…

Photo Credits: Jean Kim Mars

Duck Tales

Our duck tales started yesterday morning when I got a call from my neighbor Jean. Her husband Dave and dogter Lily discovered a duck roaming the streets of Brooklyn, more specifically the street outside our building. Little fellow found temporary shelter under a parked vehicle, but this was surely not his home. We didn’t know how he got here. A couple of other passersby notified us that the duck was there for a while (hours, possibly even from the night before). One man said he saw the duck dumped from a truck.

So what to do? In all situations animal rescue related, I call my dear friend and seasoned animal care veteran, a true Jill-of-all-Trades, Kymberlie. Luckily she’s an early riser. In between baking up a storm an making deliveries, she swung by equipped with a box and a blanket and Plan A to try to get the little fellow out.

So the three of us with two Swifter brooms and a sheet tried to encourage Mr. Duck onto the sidewalk. With a bit of effort he came out. We realized that he was both beautiful (with gorgeous blue and green streaks) and terrified, and we were unable to scoop him up.

Ironically, he found his next haven under the neighborhood’s “wildlife trapper’s” vehicle. Adorned with bumper stickers galore demonstrating a love for trapping/killing animals and disdain for vegetarians, this vehicle was no place for a duckling to hide.

Now Plan B. Call the Kym’s sister, the TV star and superhero, Special Agent Kristi Adams with the ASPCA. Luckily Kristi and her partner Debbie arrived on the scene with their netted poles. We now had five ladies covering the sides of the vehicle, but our frightened friend, made a mad dash across the street.

It was a “wild duck” chase indeed. We held up street traffic, and had some failed attempts at securing this fellow. But with the help of another friendly neighbor, the duck was caught and transferred into a carrier box.

Now the fun part. Unsure of the duck’s true origins, we didn’t know what to do. He was not injured. We hoped and speculated he possibly came from Prospect Park and decided to see if he’d survive there.

Kym, Jean and I headed over to the major duck pond. There we saw other ducks and a beautiful swan. None looked quite like our duck. But we allowed him to let himself out of the box and see where that took him. He strutted around momentarily on land, but then just jumped right in the water. He started drinking and eating and grooming and looked like this was where he was supposed to be. Not sure if it was his old home, but hopefully will be his new one.

We named him Jack after the late and very special Jackson.

This morning, Mookie and I thought we’d check up on him. When we got to the pond, we found Jack huddled in a ball sleeping on tree branch in the water. His dark feathers with blue and green streaks were so unique, he was easy to spot. He didn’t move for while, and I got nervous, but then saw him stretch and tuck his bill into his feathers. The other ducks weren’t napping, but our duck went through a lot yesterday so I can’t blame him for catching some zzzs in the sunshine.

Jean and I tried to do more research on this breed of duck. He looked like a Cayuga duck, which originally hailed from Cayuga Lake. These birds are bred for meat, eggs, and “ornamental” purposes. Kym mentioned they can be bought for $3.

Perhaps Jack the Lucky Duck escaped from a live market or was en route to one. Surely the Prospect Park Pond is better than where he came from or where he was going, and is home to several species of ducks and geese.

Jean and I and our dogs went to visit Jack again this afternoon.

We we spotted him swimming happily in the water. He was quacking, not sure to whom, and eating and drinking. These elderly women started feeding him. They pointed at him, and in another language commented at length. We presume they were admiring how handsome our duckling was.

We were happy he was adjusting to life in the pond, enjoying his freedom and being fed—not eaten—by others.

We’ll be checking in on Cayuga Jack regularly.

There’s much more to say, report and research about finding animals in the city and about our city’s live markets.

But for now, Good Night and Good Duck.

Photo Credits: Jean Kim Mars

The End of Cheap Meat

Check out my post on SolveClimate.com about the end of cheap meat.

Carbon Meatprints

Check out my  post at SolveClimate about meat and the food, fuel and climate crises.

Striking at the Roots

I was excited when my copy of Mark Hawthorne’s Striking at the Roots: A Practical Guide to Animal Activism came in the mail the other day. (I ordered my copy from Food Fight! because supporting vegan businesses is animal activism too). I’ve had the pleasure of reading Mark’s writings about animal advocacy for several years, as he was a cherished contributing writer for Satya. There I learned he loved bunnies, had a sense of humor and wrote compelling and moving pieces that inspired and resonated with animal activists.

Striking at the Roots also blends his gift of writing with his commitment to animal advocacy. Like many others, I found this book to be an indispensable resource to both the novice and seasoned activist—who both struggle to be effective against the overwhelming forces contributing to animal abuse. Mark examines different forms of animal activism from writing letters, leafleting and tabling to undercover investigations, animal rescue and rehabilitation. You meet activists working in each of these areas, and see the changes their individual efforts have made. The end of each chapter provides helpful links for further exploration. In an age of increasing infringements on civil liberties, it becomes necessary and important for all social justice activists to know their rights, and these rights in several countries are spelled out in the appendices of this book.

I was touched by the dedication : “For a certain cow in India, who showed me a kinder way of living.” That cow not only impacted Mark, but also those his writing has influenced. Striking at the Roots will no doubt help empower and sustain many in their pursuits of a kinder way of living—and acting.

Pilgrim’s Disgrace

Threatened by the rise in feed costs, the world’s biggest poultry processor, Pilgrim’s Pride, is shutting down a chicken-processing plant and six distribution centers.

The ethanol boom, climate change and growing demand for grain, has resulted in the cost of global food staples to rise. The pinch has been felt the hardest in the developing world, and UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon is speaking out on this “New Face of Hunger.”

Given the increased costs of fuel and grain and the impending food and climate crisis, the time for questioning intensive industrialized animal agriculture is long overdue. The true costs of cheap meat are starting to show, and the fact that a poultry processing giant in the U.S. was impacted is pretty notable.

But Pilgrim’s Pride gained other notoriety a few years ago, when undercover investigators at PETA documented worker abuse towards the animals:

July 2004, PETA revealed the results of an investigation into a KFC-supplying slaughterhouse in Moorefield, West Virginia, where workers were caught on video stomping on chickens, kicking them, and violently slamming them against floors and walls. Workers also ripped the animals’ beaks off, twisted their heads off, spat tobacco into their eyes and mouths, spray-painted their faces, and squeezed their bodies so hard that the birds expelled feces—all while the chickens were still alive.

These types of investigations just got some good press on the New York Times: Upton Sinclair, Now Playing on YouTube.

Hopefully with more exposure of the cruelty and the environmental and social costs of this horrific system of raising and killing animals for food, more plants will shut down.

Blood Animals

Endangered animals have joined the ranks of diamonds, timber and precious metals—exploited commodities funding conflict. This article in Newsweek revealed the Janjaweed militias have resorted to poaching to finance the genocide in Darfur and Chad:

In the past two years, they have butchered hundreds of elephants around Zakouma, say Chadian authorities, carrying the tusks back to Sudan, where they are secreted on ships bound mostly for Asia—or traded for weapons.

Extinction has a price:

The State Department estimates that the market value of illegal ivory (the most commonly trafficked contraband, at $400 a pound), tiger parts ($7,000 for a set of bones), rhino horn (up to $25,000 per pound of bone), shark fins, exotic birds (up to $90,000 for a Lear’s macaw), reptile skin, bushmeat and other illegal wildlife products has reached $10 billion a year and possibly twice that. China is the largest market, with the United States a close second.

The guardians of these animals are also vulnerable to attacks— ” some 100 rangers, outgunned and outmanned, are killed every year defending Africa’s wildlife.”

In the Democratic Republic of Congo, despite a signed peace deal and the committment of three countries to protect their remaining mountain gorillas, a group of rebels have managed to set up camp in the Virunga National Park threatening to execute any rangers returning to the region. One ranger reported that the rebels are taking tourist groups to see the gorillas a couple of times a week and generating revenue. It’s a case of eco-tourism turning into eco-terrorism or conflict tourism.

While endangered animals face extinction in these conflict zones, elephant conservation was deemed too successful in South Africa that they started to permit culling again.

Meanwhile, it appears these U.S. soldiers find amusement in throwing a puppy off a cliff.

Spider Mookie

Dogs in War

My friend Rahama Deffallah from the Darfur People’s Association of New York, traveled to Chad and Darfur last summer to visit the refugee camps and reunite with his parents. Among the hundreds of photos he took documenting this trip, I found this one. A lone dog in deep slumber under the shade of a tree. It was a picture of peace. I asked Rahama who this dog was and he told me this was the mayor of Ndjamena’s dog.

Earlier this month when violence erupted in Chad and rebels attacked the capital, causing many citizens to flee, I wondered what happened to this dog.

Yesterday NPR had a segment about a soldier in Iraq, Sgt. Peter Neesley, who took care of two stray dogs in Bagdad. He died in his sleep on Christmas morning, but his family decided to adopt the dogs, honoring Sgt. Neesley’s commitment to the lifelong care of his best friends.

Last year, another young soldier in Iraq, Marine Cpl. Dustin Jerome Lee was killed in a pipe bomb explosion. Lex, his German Shepherd, bomb-sniffing partner stayed by his side, guarding his body fiercely. After a bit of effort, the dog was retired from service and adopted by the soldier’s family.

Cesar Milan, the “Dog Whisperer,”recently did an episode on a former explosive detection dog suffering from a K-9 version of PTSD.

I remember reading that the dogs in Rwanda during the genocide started eating some of the dead, and consequently were shot.

I recently watched the film My Daughter, the Terrorist, which documents the friendship and training of two Lady Black Tigers in Sri Lanka who have signed up to leave this world with an American Claymore Mine strapped to them. In their daily routines in the bush, two dogs follow them around.  One day the girls will leave for their final mission.

What happens to dogs when their best friends are in war?

Super Tuesday

This post has nothing to do with presidential elections, although I did spend the afternoon with a young man who might become the President of Liberia in nine years. I’ll get to that in a moment. Today was for me a most interesting of Tuesdays and one that could only be possible in a city like New York.

First up was an early morning adventure to the Asia Society for a breakfast panel discussing Sri Lanka at 60: The Failure of the Peace Process and its Implications. Afterwards I enjoyed a meal at Kalustyan’s—a mujaddra vegetarian platter with salad, pickles and olives—before venturing to the Chinese Mission to the UN, where folks were gathered to put pressure on China to put pressure on Sudan to end the killings in Darfur. Hamza Ibrahim of the Darfurian community of Brooklyn joined Mia Farrow and two Olympic swimmers, Shannon Shakespeare and Nikki Dryden, in their plea to China, as host of the summer Olympics, to not let this go down as the ‘Genocide Olympics.’ Steven Spielberg, has apparently dropped out as artistic adviser to the Olympics.

I spent the afternoon with the Lost Innocents crew filming an extraordinary gentleman named Kimmie Weeks. Kimmie was 9 when the Liberian civil war reached him. He talked about his family’s displacement and the hunger and disease that they were subject to. Emaciated, jaundiced and cholera-stricken, Kimmie was taken for dead, and placed in a pile of dead bodies at his IDP camp. But he survived, and made a promise that if he made it out of that camp, he would dedicate his life to child rights advocacy. No child should know this kind of suffering. With the courage and innocence of a young boy, he initiated a children’s disarmament campaign in Liberia, meeting with rebel leaders and Charles Taylor about the issue of child soldiers. His efforts were successful, but later jeopardized his life, and he had to flee the country. He continues his activism today with his organization Youth Action International trying to promote local, sustainable, grassroots initiatives empowering young people in post-conflict areas. In nine years, he hopes to run for President of Liberia. Go Kimmie!

I had a lovely dinner at Gobo with excellent company including a certain vegan dessert diva who blesses New York with her goodies every Tuesday.

The best part of the day though, was coming home to my Mookie and Wankie for a late night play session in a snow covered Prospect Park—our very own Winter Wonderland. Mookie, apparently, loves fetching snow balls and eating them.

Oh Rats!

If I’m waiting on the platform a while for my current favorite train—the F—and I usually am, I like to look for them. Little, fast, preoccupied critters with tails. The other week I watched one persistently chase another, or perhaps it was one desperately fleeing her unwanted company. I found myself rooting for her escape. It is at these moments, an onlooker will likely find me smiling down at the rats on the tracks.

When I saw Ratatouille a few weeks ago, I wondered if Pixar could help improve the reputation of our not so revered rodents.

I remember my friend Kari would just pretend the street mice she encountered to be kittens. “What about the rats?” folks might ask, and she’d reply “Oh, you mean the cats?” It’s interesting how a change in one little letter, provokes a completely different response.

I thought in honor of the the Lunar New Year commencing the ‘Year of the Rat’, I’d do a bit of rat advocacy.

The most common up-close encounter people have with rats is when they occupy a shared space. Your space, you might insist. But just like the subway rats, the predicament is in the eye of the beholder. These days there are many options for a humane eviction, with live traps and relocation. I learned from this book review, that relocating a family of mice or rats together is an even better option. At least they have each other.

Besides being poisoned or getting kicked out of their living quarters, the major danger these critters face is vivisection. Lacking any basic protections under the Animal Welfare Act, rats along with mice and birds comprise the majority of animals used in research. Since they aren’t covered under the AWA, their numbers aren’t reported, and they suffer significant horrors.

New England Anti-vivisection Society collected the following testimonials regarding rat research:

“The lab had a room where technicians practiced on rats. Often I would open the lid of the boxes and see mother rats nursing and trying to protect their babies. Techs would reach into the boxes and grab one of the rats to practice, for example, intubation. Because speed was of the essence – a tech was required to intubate a certain number of rats per minute – rats were often injured. I saw many bleeding from their mouths and squirming in pain. They were just thrown back into the box to be used again and again until they died.” – laboratory technician

“…[the researchers] made an incision in his neck and … inserted a catheter in his heart. The tube was passed behind his ear to keep the rat from going after it. Now the anesthesia was stopped and the rat was turned onto his stomach. A plastic dome … was put over him. The tube to his heart passed out a hole in the dome, and the rat was left for the anesthetic to wear off … but his back feet and legs were taped down, because he’d try to get away. Then it was time for the heart attack…. First a paralyzing drug is shot into the catheter … and then a drug to cause a heart attack. The injections were done quickly… but death was not quick, nor was he paralyzed completely…. He jerked many times and his head turned from side to side…. Tears started to run down my face. I wanted to take the little guy and gently bury him. I keep seeing that poor helpless little creature trying to escape, twitching in pain, and lying there discarded like a used tissue.”
– member of an Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee (IACUC)

There are also scientific arguments as well as ethical ones regarding the use of non-human animals in biomedical, pharmaceutical and cosmetic testing.

In addition to buying from cruelty-free home and personal care products, you can also support humane charities that do not support animal testing.

Personally, I’m always inspired by people advocating for individuals and groups often marginalized in society. That’s what this ‘Year of the Rat’ symbolizes to me—expressing tolerance and compassion when it is more convenient not to.

Here’s to the little guy.

Morning RSS Feeds Distress Local Area Woman

I thought I’d try out a headline in the style of The Onion. Attempts at humor are withdrawn from rest of post.

The first jolt this morning was news of the series of earthquakes that affected parts of western Rwanda, eastern DRC, and Burundi.

The violence in Sri Lanka continues and escalates after the official end of the 2002 Norway brokered ceasefire. Is 2008 the year of war? The past few weeks have born witness to a series of government attacks on Tamil Tiger held regions, as well as a number of public bombings, the most recent of which include a deadly attack at the Colombo railway station and also at the aviary at the Dehiwala zoo.

The violence in Kenya continues after an agreement for a framework for peace.

Chadian rebels have seized large parts of the capital N’Djamena.

While we have the Superbowl and Super Tuesday here, I’m thinking of friends, acquaintances and strangers in these regions.

Vegan Foozeball

I mean football. Or American futbol. Or maybe this post should be called “Almost Vegan.” In Roz Cummins’ latest article on Grist entitled “On Vegans and Pigskins,” she attempts to make a “Super Bowl-worthy vegan dish.” She almost does, but “chickens out” when it comes to using non-dairy cheese. While I acknowledge the effort to offer a vegan(izable) recipe, and for Grist to have two vegan articles within a week’s time, I found this post to be disappointing. Ms. Cummins is a food writer, has vegan friends and access to the internet, and is writing for a media source that just featured a vegan cookbook. Talk about sloppy research. Even Will Shortz now knows about Veganomicon.

I know finding good vegan cheese is a contested subject, but there are ones that can do the trick, like Follow Your Heart, Sunergia, and Sheese. There are also plenty of other vegan recipes that don’t require cheese analogs. Maybe I’m just sensitive to articles emphasizing “failed veganism.” I don’t like it being portrayed as too difficult or extreme to have a dish with no animal products whatsoever. I want it to be encouraging.

A recent Wall Street Journal article talks about the Kansas City Chiefs’ player Tony “China Study” Gonzalez and his quest to be a vegan football player.

“Mr. Gonzalez joined a handful of elite athletes who have put the vegan diet to the test, either for their health or because they oppose using animals as food. But he was the first pro-football superstar to try. And the first to fail.”

He was enouraged by the team’s nutritionist (another failed veg attempt) to incorporate some animal products into is diet:

“The Chiefs’ team nutritionist, Mitzi Dulan, a former vegetarian athlete, did not believe that was enough. With the team’s prospects and Mr. Gonzalez’s legacy at stake, she persuaded the tight-end to incorporate small amounts of meat into his plant diet. Just no beef, pork or shellfish, he said; only a few servings of fish and chicken a week. “

I know Mr. China Study wants to be vegan, and I believe he can just like Mac Danzic and Salim Stoudamir, the other vegan athletes featured in the sidebars. I happen to also know a very special vegan runner who has run 5 marathons and a 50-miler. It’s possible.

Maybe on Sunday, Roz will actually come through with a vegan dish. There’s always Foodswings .

After the New York Times piece, “Rethinking the Meat Guzzler,” we all can make an effort to go the extra mile. It’s game time, folks. Go Team?

Thanks, but no.

So somewhere along the way, I got distracted on facebook and found out about this rejection letter writing competition. I didn’t need another distraction, but felt compelled to enter this competition. So I did. Here’s my submission. It will probably be rejected.

Dear Rejectee,

Thanks, but no.
— I

Now I know you are thinking that sounds harsh. I did too when I asked a host of a popular public radio program for an interview. That was his quick but direct response. This individual has only three letters in his first name, but only had the time to sign one of them.

But after some time, I realized this was the best rejection note I have received, and I hope you’ll find this to be the same. First off, you got a response. It’s better than waiting indefinitely. Waiting sucks. Second, you’ve got your answer up front. There’s no wandering through paragraph after paragraph about how competitive the applicant pool is and how difficult the decision was. Those are not words of consolation. Finally, the answer is direct with no room for misinterpretation. There’s no need to re-read this letter for clarification. Seriously, just delete from your inbox, toss in the recycled bin or reuse for some crafty art project.

It’s like a ripping off a band-aid. Speedy but effective.
The sooner you know, the sooner you move on.

Trust me, in the end you’ll realize you’ll do just fine without me,

Sincerely,
I

What is the root of the word freedom?

One of the hosts from tonight’s event asked the crowd at Park Slope Methodist Church that question. It was a subtle reference to why Debbie Almonaster was forced to resign as principal of the Khalil Gibran International Academy. Community members gathered to support KGIA and its founding principal as they struggle to get the support they need from the NYC Department of Education and New Visions. KGIA was founded as a dual language school teaching English and Arabic and opened its doors this past fall to about sixty 6th graders in Brooklyn. Members of the school’s design team spoke about their intent to create a school that promotes understanding between cultures, and emphasized the need for such an institution at this time in our city. It is not the first dual language program in NYC as others have existed in Spanish, French and Chinese, but it is the first to promote Arab language and culture. The school and it’s principal were subject to anti-arab, anti-muslim, anti-immigrant attacks largely by Daniel Pipes and the New York Sun. Having lost their leader, the staff feels the school has lost its vision and the students are receiving a compromised education. The program last night, however, was indeed a celebration of Arab culture, multiculturalism, and promoting tolerance. It was inspiring not only to the audience, but to the teachers and designers of KGIA who were showered with support and understanding. Spoken word artists like Leila Buck, and young women from Urban Word, conveyed the importance of culture. Organizations like DRUM (Desi’s rising up and moving) and a professor from Columbia University’s Middle East Program, showed their solidarity against hate propoganda . And a smart and witty host, wove in jokes throughout the evening.It is a time to question the root of the word freedom. We will not be silent.

when justice will roll down like waters, and righteousness like a mighty stream

I just finished listening to Brian Lehrer’s annual tribute to MLK and listeners phoned in with their one minute readings from someone outside their own ethnic group.

I could easily spend the rest of the day listening to MLK’s own readings and speeches. There’s a rhetoric there that I crave to hear now, and his words have so much relevance today.

I was just reading his “Beyond Vietnam- A Time to Break the Silence,” speech.

As I have walked among the desperate, rejected, and angry young men, I have told them that Molotov cocktails and rifles would not solve their problems. I have tried to offer them my deepest compassion while maintaining my conviction that social change comes most meaningfully through nonviolent action. But they ask — and rightly so — what about Vietnam? They ask if our own nation wasn’t using massive doses of violence to solve its problems, to bring about the changes it wanted. Their questions hit home, and I knew that I could never again raise my voice against the violence of the oppressed in the ghettos without having first spoken clearly to the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today — my own government. For the sake of those boys, for the sake of this government, for the sake of the hundreds of thousands trembling under our violence, I cannot be silent.