http://jerusalempost.com : Jerusalem Post - this is the online version of the Jerusalem Post newspaper
http://www.jerusalem-times.net - The Jerusalem Times - this is based in East Jerusalem and has Palestinian & Arabic news, though their website is often hacked so there's not much to read there
http://www.sderotmedia.com - Sderot Media - news and info about the city of Sderot which is targeted regularly and constantly by missiles from Gaza. myth busting site - here you can see that Israel actually helps Gaza residents and counter arguments against the propaganda that the media portray about the area. articles with people living in Sderot
most of the cafes and taxis here in Jerusalem listen to Galatz Radio - this is the Israeli Defense Force (IDF) station. army service is a part of everyone's life here in Israel with teenagers having to serve after they finish high school. they have a Hebrew news services & play popular Israeli and International music.
of course there's also Voice of Peace Radio which used to broadcast from a ship in the Mediterranean Sea off Tel Aviv. VOP was very popular with the Israeli people and peace protester Abie Nathan was it's main stalwart. this was the first Israeli pirate radio station broadcasting from 1973 to 1993. it's since closed down, though I read they might start it up again one day - not sure if this has happened. they had a reunion in 2006, and a double album tribute cd was released in 2007.
"India produces everything - it doesn't import anything ..." - this is what the Indian guys from work were telling me. I'm not sure if it's an exaggeration or spot on. but when I was there I certainly saw most things were locally made - from Tata & Reliance and other large corporations. I think some of the Westerners laugh at some of the locally made products - some are a little rough around the edges. but I wonder who'll be laughing in the next 10 years when India is the global economic power it's touted to be/come.
I wonder what percentage of things Australia imports? I know Australians love to support Australian-made - the green & gold. I think for Australia to stay in the list of leading countries it needs to keep producing it's own goods.
I've read that the USA doesn't produce anything any more (obviously an exaggeration) - and perhaps this will be it's downfall, especially if they keep printing more money to buy more things and 'pay off' their debts.
from 2007 : http://environment.guardian.co.uk/print/0,,329758811-121568,00.html
If we want to save the planet, we need a five-year freeze on biofuels
- Oil produced from plants sets up competition for food between cars and people. People - and the environment - will lose
George Monbiot
Tuesday March 27, 2007
It used to be a matter of good intentions gone awry. Now it is plain fraud. The governments using biofuel to tackle global warming know that it causes more harm than good. But they plough on regardless. In theory, fuels made from plants can reduce the amount of carbon dioxide emitted by cars and trucks. Plants absorb carbon as they grow - it is released again when the fuel is burned. By encouraging oil companies to switch from fossil plants to living ones, governments on both sides of the Atlantic claim to be "decarbonising" our transport networks.
the coincidences abounded this week again - or perhaps I could refer to it as the interconnectedness Starhawk mentioned in week 1's class. she spoke more about the connections between the Gaian world though. apparently these messages are always there but when you start learning or noticing something new, then you are more open to seeing these messages. I noticed Dan, a facebook friend, joined a Sydney Permablitz- Changing the World One Garden at a Time fb group. so I took a look and joined also. this led me to the permablitz website. and friends of the earth website. I noticed one of the forum messages was for an Introduction to Permaculture - Sydney - Jun 08 - it's being held on the last weekend in June. I might even be back in Sydney by then, but I'll have to wait and see before signing up in case there's a delay. I took a look at their flickr photos and saw some of the previous projects they've done. the hidden garden in Newtown looks great.
then I noticed the flickr user was cicadas and the person was Kirsten Bradley - I've never met her but I've seen her name around heaps - at electrofringe and different festivals. she's always working on a great project! I was looking at flickr contacts and somehow I ended up on one which had INSPIRE!, a street / artist from Israel / Tel Aviv - who's messages I see around the streets all the time, bilateral, and a couple of the guys who do the ShiftSpace project (who are Israelis in USA) - I was trying this out earlier this year but after Angus died I didn't feel like doing much for a while. this is lifting now though so the links in the labyrinth are unwinding. it's amazing how interrelated we all are. I had an email from Daniel Liss of pouringdown.tv from videoblogging list (some of my favourites!) who said he knows the ShiftSpace guys too and is using it - I think he went to uni/course or something with one of them? there really is only 1 degree of separation. I'd love to do a festival and have them all in Australia - what an amazing collection of artists they would be!! if only I could afford it ...
anyway, it's week 2 already in the Earth course - time seems to fly. I've been doing the MLA courses pretty much non-stop since the PKD class last year. each has been interesting and I've learnt much - some I hadn't known much about to start with.
this week we've had readings and audio talks and forum questions about AIR. we were asked to share our observations about Wind - especially if we've been noticing any differences in our weather patterns.
here's my reply. I might start keeping the course journal online (I won't include the course specifics - just my notes / impressions)
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this morning I walked into the city to the post office - it was a little cool but I didn't put my jumper on so I could feel the sun & the wind more whilst I walked. I noticed some of the trees' leaves flutter only on the edges whilst with others, the whole tree sways in the wind (even if the trees near it just have the light fluttering leaves). so it was interesting to notice the difference. also next week is the 60th year celebrations so many of the cars have flags on them and also people have hung flags and banners from their balconies. so the wind is very noticeable at the moment - it's adding life & movement to the ideas and celebrations of the people. similarly for the protesters banners being held outside the prime ministers house in the city. the wind moves the banners and makes them more noticeable as people seem to notice movement of things around them.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/aliak_com/2459378005/ is a quick video of a flag in the wind (on a parked car) - I love watching the flags move - they have bursts of energy, then the wind dies down and they take a rest.
the wind for me also brings relief on a hot day - a light breeze is enough to cool your skin when you're overheated. a couple of weeks ago (I was overseas) there were a few days of 40degree heat - unusual for this time of year. now it's back to being cool in the evenings again.
the city here doesn't have tall highrises casting shadows over the streets so it doesn't seem as cold as some cities I've been in. and the wind doesn't catch between them. I've stayed in highrises in Auckland where the wind howls past the buildings. I used to record some of the sounds it made. it was almost like the sky was making the noise to annoy the building as the wind & sky's space was being taken up by the buildings! it's a strange feeling being up so high and hearing the power of the wind around the building. the sounds are much more pronounced than what you hear from the lower & ground levels. Auckland is known for it's wind at certain times of the year so it can get pretty strong.
Taksim - improvisation : A specific sequence of classical Turkish musical forms become a fasil, a suite an instrumental prelude, an instrumental postlude (saz semaisi), and in between, the main section of vocal compositions which begins with and is punctuated by instrumental improvisations taksim
today I went to the western wall and left a note in the wall with my friend Angus' (RIP) name (this is what the Jewish people do - it's their holiest place being the last remnant of the Temple which was destroyed a couple of times) and then went to the Church of Holy Sepulchre (built over the spot where Jesus died so a holy spot for Christians) and lit some candles for him. and I went to Dome of Rock, one of the holiest places for Islam but because it's friday only Moslems are allowed in so I took a photo at the door. (this is the closest I've been able to get to Dome of the Rock - it's always closed when I go). I recorded video whilst walking but the camera was by my leg so most of it is of my legs walking on the stones, so I've extracted the audio. I felt so bad that I couldn't get home to Brisbane in time for his funeral. I've been thinking about him non-stop so I wanted to remember him and leave something for him in Jerusalem. if there is a God and he is close to this spot then I wanted to make sure he was looking out for Angus. I thought of other people close to me who'd passed away too, and lit candles for them too in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre on my next visit. this walk was for Angus.
I always get a bit lost in the Old City. the market lanes and labyrinth starts looking the same and I often can't see above to get a sense of direction. so I tend to always go to the Wall first, then work my way in from there. today was the first time I found the quickest route to the Dome of the Rock - which is quite obvious in hindsight but I've always missed it and walked past. not knowing how to read Arabic has been part of the reason on other visits. the Christian quarter area is less marked too. some of the streets have recognisable names but I seem to miss the signs to the Church. today I was determined though and I had less offers from market stall owners to visit their shops. I went in the afternoon when most would be closing up soon. I was thinking of my friend the whole way, sometimes getting a bit teary.
the sound was recorded on a Nokia N95 8Gb phone - it was recorded along with video and I extracted the audio only later. I've left my mini-disc, microcassete recorder and microphone back home in Australia now so I carry less gadgets. I wondered how much disk space would be used up but it was less than 2Gb and I still have plenty left.
jugglers in jerusalem's ben yehuda mall. my friend darren & late friend angus are both jugglers so I took this to show them. my timing was out a bit as I watched the guys juggle for a while then remembered to start filming.
it snowed in Jerusalem for a couple of days. the first day many of the roads were closed. the stores close - the city shuts down. my workplace was closed for both days (so a long weekend for some!). the second day by mid morning the sun was out and sky was blue.
one of the workshops we did at electrofringe 2006 was on max / msp with Bruce Mowson
our group made a simple max patch which rotated through a few video clips we recorded of people who were in the workshop. we had limited time which is why we chose something simple - so we had a chance of completing it! we'd asked them to say something about the electrofringe / this is not art festival. the patch was basically a random video player. we only had an hour to make it. we had to show Bruce the following day. our patch worked and we were one of two groups (well our group + 1 person from another group) who turned up the next day to demonstrate the finished patch
I've just installed the alexa toolbar so I can now see my site's rating. I'm not sure if it matters to me yet - still thinking about this - it seems to rate mostly US based sites, so I guess because this is a .com not .com.au it's included, not really sure. but interesting to see movement
01/02/2008 # 1797395
03/02/2008 # 1798744
08/02/2008 # 1606121
21/02/2008 # 963009 - under 1 million! what's going on?? (this is after the drupal 5 upgrade)
06/04/2008 # 597674 - almost under 500K! (crazy - this is after the drupal 6.1 upgrade. I hadn't been able to post for about 3 weeks - which turned out to be a net connection problem no site issue)
12/04/2008 # 580183
* Aliak.com has a traffic rank of: 597674 (up 1627945)
* Speed: Not available What's This?
* Other sites that link to this site: 30
* Online Since: 19-Dec-2000
