The past week or so has been a great week for Gaza's kids. They beat their own Guinness record for the most amount of kites flown simultaneously, they set another record for the most amount of basketballs dribbled simultaneously and they also met MATT. Matt is one of youtube's earliest celebrity globe trotters. He basically became known for a compilation video he did of himself dancing in different locations around the world. UNRWA (The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East), which places a huge amount of its work emphasis on the youth of Gaza, has coordinated all these activites. You can see a video of the kites, basketballs and Matt's cameo.
Some Saudi designers have taken to creating abayas that reflect the flags of the participating countries in the 2010 World Cup. This move, of course, has been met with contraversary, as the colorful abayas are considered inappropriate for the norms of the society. Nonetheless, I believe the issue underscores an important note.
The motive for buying these abayas is to support a team, and there are several female fans of football, and in general, overall sports in Saudi Arabia, a country that makes it very difficult for girls to participate in sports. I am including the original source for this post, coming from Arabnews.com entitled "Abayas that mirror World Cup frenzy" by Diana Al-Jassem.
Speaking of the notion of religion, girls and sports, I am also including a youtube video for a movie trailer that I had meant to talk about earlier. It is about a group of young girls in Iran who dress up as boys in order to watch the World Cup qualifying match. The movie has been banned in Iran. FIFA had not made it easier this year by banning the Iranian girls soccer team from playing in August's inaugural Youth Olympics due to the issue of the headscarf. In May, to the happiness of the girls, who would otherwise not be allowed to play due to their country government's stance, were allowed to wear the hijaab as part of their uniform.
Kuwait, as I have written about earlier, also has been having debates on whether girls should participate in sports. Sports not only helps with instilling good a physical fitness regimen, but it also teaches youth about being team players, discipline and working towards a goal. What is wrong with that?
I tried to get a ticket for the T-REX 3D showing tonight at the Scientific Center, but was told that unfortunately, the movie would only be shown in 2-D, as the 3-D mechanisms of whatnot were broken. I decided to hold back and wait to see the film later when it is back in full throttle.
As you all might already know, however, to exit the Scientific Center, one must pass through the gift shop, which aside from the tacky glass models of skyscrapers in Shanghai (?) and the strange ceramic and crystal figurine collectibles of animals, is actually quite good.
It is a great stop to find very high quality coffee table books on Kuwait, and I also found out that the store sells en.v magazine, one of the greatest publications in the Gulf. And while they also stock some amazing, creative and educational toys and experiments for the younger ones, I noticed this time around another great feature this store has to offer.
They stock several children's books on the environment, on endangered species and biodiversity and on human impact on the ecology. Seeing that this month is the build up to the Copenhagen meeting, I thought to all you primary educators out there or parents, why not dedicate some time to reading a book with you child(ren) on these topics. I strongly recommend the gift shop as a start. You could even purchase one of their stuffed animal puppets and have "it" read the story to them.
"On the edges of a Salvation Army soup line in Paris, a soft-spoken Afghan boy told the story recently of how he ended up in Europe, alone.
The boy, who said he was 15 but looked younger, recounted how his family left Afghanistan after his mother lost her leg in an explosion in 2004. They spent three years in Iran, where he went to school for the first time, learning English and discovering the Internet. After his father suffered a back injury that made working difficult, the boy, who declined to give his name, headed west.
He spent two months working 11-hour days in a clothing sweatshop in Istanbul, he said. He was then smuggled into Greece, where he was forced to work on a potato and onion farm near Agros for nine months, finally escaping in the back of a truck. He reached Paris by train after nearly a year on the road.
“I want to go to school,” he said in English. “I would like it if I could be — it sounds like a lot to ask — an engineer of computing.” (click here for full link)
sustainable urbanization - livable cities - international politics - fair trade - ethical and inclusive globalization - international development and cooperation - economic, social and cultural rights - slum housing rights - equal access for all to the arts
The Eternal UN Declaration of Human Rights
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Jeremy Waldron assesses the Universal Declaration of Human Rights' enduring
relevance to establishing the ethics of global responsibility.
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