The Road to the Horizon The Road to the Horizon Short stories about travelling to remote places, working in unusual places, life as a humanitarian aid worker, expeditions and sailing. But mostly about enjoying the road more than reaching the destination. Articles
News: Italian court: "Women can lie to hide an affair.."
2008-04-19 19:37:00 Italy's highest appeal court ruled that married women who commit adultery are entitled to lie about it to protect their honour.The court gave its landmark ruling after hearing the case of a 48-year-old woman, convicted of giving a false testimony to the police by denying she had lent her mobile phone to her lover.The appeal court did not agree that she had broken the law. It said bending the truth was justified to conceal extra-marital relationships. (Full)More post about Italy on the Road to the Horizon.Picture courtesy VinMag.com More About: News , Women , Italy , Italian , Court
News: US school book: "Global warming will avoid high heating bills"...
2008-04-19 13:52:00 Friends of the Earth is calling via an email campaign on one of the US largest textbook publishers to correct a school book containing a discussion of global warming "so biased and misleading it would humble a tobacco industry PR man.""American Government", 11th edition is published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt and approved for use in high school Advanced Placement courses in the United States. On page 559, the textbook's authors write that "it is a foolish politician who today opposes environmentalism. And that creates a problem, because not all environmental issues are equally deserving of support. Take the case of global warming. (..) On the one hand, a warmer globe will cause sea levels to rise, threatening coastal communities; on the other hand, greater warmth will make it easier and cheaper to grow crops and avoid high heating bills." (Full)Whether or not global warming is a proven scientific fact (see this post), I can not imagine what a simplistic mind would even think of p... More About: News , Global Warming , School , Book , Global
Rumble: Songs for me - Leaving on a Jet Plane
2008-04-19 12:43:00 All my bags are packedI?m ready to goI?m standing here outside your doorI hate to wake you up to say goodbyeBut the dawn is breakingIt?s early morningThe taxi?s waitingHe?s blowing his hornAlready I?m so lonesomeI could die?So kiss me and smile for meTell me that you?ll wait for meHold me like you?ll never let me gocause I?m leaving on a jet planeDon?t know when I?ll be back againOh babe, I hate to go.On several occasions, I have told you music plays an important part of my life. Music picks me up when down, makes me float when on a high, calms me down when enerved and inspires me when too deflated for any inspiration. Music pumps me up when low on energy, soothes me when sad.Many individual memories are linked to music. Hearing a certain song brings back the image, scent, vibe and mood of a certain event or period. I can be talking with people, and just like a remote perfume of a person walking by, a few seconds of a song can snap me out of the discussion, out of the present, and j... More About: Songs , Plane , Leaving
Rumble: Lunch at the beach
2008-04-19 12:18:00 This is the view from the restaurant, we had lunch yesterday. It lays right at the rocky beach in Brindisi , built at the end of the airport runway, next to the yacht harbour, and facing the sea. It stood by itself, just in the middle of nowhere... No frails, only sober tables and plastic chairs in a square room with an overall Balkans feel to it. More About: Beach , Lunch
Rumble: Just a building....
2008-04-18 14:52:00 I am back in Brindisi for a few days. Stayed an extra day as I can think much clearer while not sitting in a crowded office in our Rome headquarters, allows me to take a distance and re-evaluate some of the stuff we work on...Despite the fact it is still pretty cold for the time of the year (and certainly at 7:30 in the morning), I had my morning coffee and cornetto outside, on a terrace. I was looking at the building in the picture.Nothing extraordinary. Just a building, out of the thousands in Brindisi, probably millions similar ones in Italy. Just a window, of just a house, in just a street, of just a town. And yet, that image, at that moment, grabbed me. I know, when that happens to me, it means something.. It is a sign on the road of life. I sat back, with my coffee and cornetto, at 7:30 in the morning, and let my mind run free for a while. Different thoughts came up:- It is strange how there is beauty in ordinary things... This is just a window, just a wall, and yet the colour... More About: Building
News: Global Warming: Global Scam or not?
2008-04-17 20:56:00 Before you read this post, a disclaimer: I firmly believe we are grossly raping the environment and make only minimal progress to protect and respect the earth as the soil for our children. Punto. (as they say in Italian: Full stop!).Last year, "Warming of the climate system is unequivocal," concluded a report by 600 scientists from governments, academia, green groups and businesses in 40 countries. Worse, there was now at least a 90 percent likelihood that the release of greenhouse gases from the burning of fossil fuels is causing longer droughts, more flood-causing downpours and worse heat waves, way up from earlier studies.For the first time, "Global Warming " was no longer the "Inconvenient Truth". It became "The Mainstream Truth".And forgive me, but when something becomes mainstream, and certainly when "Green goes Commercial" and "carbon credits" become one of the most profitable investments (covered amongst others in this post), I just *have* to question it, even if the Non-Glo... More About: News , Scam
News: Berlusconi - Part III.
2008-04-17 19:39:00 Last weekend, I wrote about Italian politics, as the first part of the series "Living in Italy ", predicting ex-premier and current-billionaire politician Berlusconi would win. And he did.Berlusconi's block takes 47% of the vote, compared with 38% for Mr Veltroni's centre-left, in both the Senate and the lower Chamber of Deputies. That translates into a 101-seat lead in the Chamber, and a 38-seat advantage in the Senate. (Full)This means two things:One- the political spectrum has shifted solidly to the right.Secondly- last weekend's balloting wiped out the small parties. This might have been good as it eliminated the need for the governing party to make a fragile coalitions with several small parties. The latter haunted Italy's infamously unstable politics for 60 years as they had the power to make, break and paralyze the governing coalition.I am saying "this might have been a good thing", as on one hand, a more solid step towards a two party deal, could bring more political stab... More About: News , Part
Rumble: Working from home
2008-04-16 23:50:00 I was working from home yesterday? Too crowded in the office. And it was such a nice day.. Worked from a table, facing the windows.And with a view like this, what could go wrong? No wonder I got much more work done than when I work from the office. The setting in which I work, defines my productivity. More About: Home , Working
Rumble: Stop the Clash of Civilizations.
2008-04-15 12:02:00 The video is made by Avaaz.org, a community of global citizens who take action on the major issues facing the world today. The aim of Avaaz.org is to ensure that the views and values of the world?s people shape global decisions.Because the public opinion is the most powerful tool.Thanks to "E" for the link. More About: Stop , The Clash , Clash
News: Sudan - From the 1994 famine to five years of Darfur. What is the sol
2008-04-15 01:09:00 This photo by Kevin Carter won the ?Pulitzer Prize? in 1994 and became a symbol of the Sudan famine at the time. The picture depicts stricken girl crawling towards an United Nations camp, located a kilometer away. The vulture is waiting for the child to die so that it can eat her.This picture shocked the whole world. No one -including the photographer- knows what happened to the child.Here is the story behind the picture: In 1993 Carter headed north of the border with [his colleague] Silva to photograph the rebel movement in famine-stricken Sudan. To make the trip, Carter had taken a leave from the Weekly Mail and borrowed money for the air fare. Immediately after their plane ) touched down in the village of Ayod, Carter began snapping photos of famine victims. Seeking relief from the sight of masses of people starving to death, he wandered into the open bush. He heard a soft, high-pitched whimpering and saw a tiny girl trying to make her way to the feeding center. As he crouched to... More About: News , Darfur , Years , Famine
News: The world in pictures: Food Riots
2008-04-14 22:01:00 In case you think the raising food prices are not really a problem... Here are the pictures from just the last few weeks:Food riots in HaitiFood protests in MexicoFood riots in IndiaFood riots in ArgentinaFood riots in EgyptFood riots in MozambiqueFood riots in BangladeshPictures courtesy AFP, Reuters, Daniel Garcia (AFP-Getty Images), Al Jazeera, BBC. More About: News , World , The World
News: Darfur peacekeepers: UN-armed or unarmed?
2008-04-14 16:09:00 On April 9th, gunmen have attacked a UNAMID (UN African Mission in Darfur ) police patrol, two kilometres (one mile) from the Zam Zam camp for internally displaced persons.The officers were ordered out of their vehicles and the four gunmen stole their personal belongings and official identity cards. One officer was repeatedly hit in the neck by the back of an AK-47 when he hesitated in obeying instructions to get back into the vehicle."UNAMID police do not carry weapons and Wednesday's patrol was operating without protection", according to Noureddine Mezni, the UN African Mission spokesman. He added that "this was for confidence-building purposes and for easier contact with the civilians they aim to protect". (Full)Picture courtesy Reuters More About: News , Sudan , Armed
Rumble: As aidworkers, are we allowed to have a life?
2008-04-13 23:12:00 Frida, a fellow blogger who previously worked in Afghanistan, Timor-Leste and Palestine, posted something recently that made me think.She wrote about the guilt she felt, living back home in New Zealand:All the people I've met in Afghanistan, Timor-Leste and Palestine whose lives continue to be insecure, poor and relentlessly harsh. All the people I worked with who are still there, working through the cold, dark winter to bring a little relief, to provide a little security. All the people I have never met but whose conflict and natural disaster afflicted worlds are more real to me some days than this fantasy land we live in here in New Zealand.I'm terrified of forgetting them. But how could I ever forget them? Seriously. It's impossible, right? But I've been so afraid of it that I've been clinging to my guilt as a kind of reminder. Every time I get too close to relaxing into joy, pleasure and fun my guilt kicks in like one of those electric shocks that scientists give to rats in... More About: Life
News: Five WFP drivers killed in past weeks
2008-04-13 21:39:00 Five truck drivers delivering food for the U.N. World Food Program have been attacked and killed in Sudan over the past three weeks.Four of the five were killed in southern Sudan and one was killed in the western Darfur region.In the latest attack, two WFP-contracted drivers were shot dead in southern Sudan on Monday after returning from delivering food supplies.Previously, three other WFP workers were killed in Sudan late March. (Full)Picture courtesy WFP More About: News , Drivers , Past , Killed
Rumble: Living in Italy - part 1: Italian Politics
2008-04-12 23:20:00 Since I moved here last year, people ask me "So how is it to live in Italy "? This prompts me to a series of blogs I want to start, to describe live in this Mediterranean country.First let me start with the disclaimer: I love the culture, the climate, its people, its food, and the country. I love Italy. Punto. But it is a country 'with an edge', which makes it fun at times, frustrating in other times. So I might come across as critical (or cynical at times), do bear in mind: I loooove Italy.As the Italian s will vote for parliament tomorrow, maybe we should start this blog series with Italian politics. I can summarize this topic in a oneliner: Italy had 61 governments since World War II. That is an average of about one government per year. That says it all.Critics say the current electoral law gives disproportionate power to small parties in Parliament, making stable government nearly impossible. Proof of the matter: the recent withdrawal of a tiny centrist party from the governing ... More About: Politics , Living , Part
News: After "War on Terror" and "War for Oil" comes "War for Food"?
2008-04-12 17:41:00 In the past months, I have been posting regularly about the global food crisis:- Oil, Biofuel, World Hunger and Crimes Against Humanity.- The Global Food Crisis: A Perfect Storm- The Food Crisis: A Global OverviewThose of you who have been following this blog for a while know I work for a humanitarian agency, so automatically my view of news articles is biased: scanning news bulletins I am rather sensitive to possible lurking crisis, be it armed conflicts, natural disasters or plain economic issues that could cause humanitarian problems. Plus of course, this is our job, this is what we do for a living: trying to spot, mitigate and react to humanitarian crisis in the making or unfolding.On top of this, working for a food aid agency, the issue of raising food prices, the dilemma of biofuel production versus food production, changing weather patterns decreasing the food production are automatically issues which catch my eyes faster.So I have been asking myself the question: "Is the glo... More About: News , War On Terror , Terror
News: Nelson Mandela (90) is still on US Terrorist List.
2008-04-12 01:27:00 The African National Congress (ANC) was designated as a terrorist organisation by South Africa's old apartheid regime. Since that time, things changed. Apartheid is not legal anymore, Nelson Mandela was released from prison, and the ANC became the government.Other things have not changed: all ANC leaders, including Nelson Mandela , are still tagged as 'terrorists' in US security databases and need to get a special waiver to enter the US.US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has now asked for the "embarrassing" travel restrictions to be lifted. Good. I am happy the US administration is keeping up with the fast moving pace of world politics. The ANC has been South Africa's governing party since 14 years. (Full)Soon, one embarrassment less. Some more challenges still to tackle, though. Like convincing US President Bush statements like "Mandela is dead" is not really OK. Not really.It might have something to do with the fact that Mandela has never been short of criticism on US polit... More About: News , List , Terrorist
Rumble: Talks with a security guard
2008-04-11 23:25:00 A story from my friend Enrico, who works in Bor, South Sudan :I was leaving the UN compound heading to the office. The security guard who had just opened the gate for me, asked me for a lift into town since his shift was over. He hopped in.Even though the drive took just 10 minutes, but I felt obliged to keep a bit of a conversation going.Me: ?Have you received any security training??The guard: ?Yes!?Me: ?Can you give me an example??The guard: ?How to switch on the security lights??Me: ?What would you do if you saw a thief in our compound??The guard: It?s like when you hunt a wild animal: stalking and attacking?Me: ?What if he?s armed??The guard: ?I?m not allowed to use a gun myself, it?s against the rules, but I have the stick I use to kill the snakes at night!?Read more stories from Enrico about life in Sudan.Picture courtesy Ulrik Pedersen More About: Security , Guard
News: The Peace Symbol turns 50. Are we any closer to peace?
2008-04-09 20:08:00 Gerald Holtom, a designer and former World War II conscientious objector from London, designed the peace symbol originally for the Direct Action Committee Against Nuclear War (DAC), arguing their aims would have greater impact if they were conveyed in a visual image. The "Ban the Bomb" symbol was born.Holtom used the letters from the semaphore - or flag-signalling - alphabet, super-imposing N (uclear) on D (isarmament) and placing them within a circle symbolising Earth. Holtom later explained that the design was "to mean a human being in despair" with arms outstretched downwards.The symbol had its first public outing 50 years ago as thousands of British anti-nuclear campaigners set off from London's Trafalgar Square on a 50-mile march to the weapons factory at Aldermaston. (Full)Current wars and armed conflicts are still abound today: Iraq, Afghanistan, Chad, Sudan, Somalia, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Palestine, Nepal, Kashmir, Kurdistan. I wonder if in 50 years of peace movement, we have ... More About: News , Peace , Closer
Rumble: Tagged...
2008-04-09 18:31:00 Vagabondblogger, a fellow blogger and regular visitor to The Road, "tagged" me.. The task given is to tell 10 random things about myself.Ok, I will take the challenge... Trying to define 10 things about me that I might not have explicitly covered on my blog:1/ The most important things in my life: Tine, Lana and Hannah, my three girls at home. And my closest friends. The circle of love around me.2/ My aspiration in life: To be able to take my grandchildren on my knee and say two things: "I tried to make a difference for the better in life of others" and "I lived life fully." Related to that, my biggest joy in life is to make a positive difference in someone's life. Professionally or personally.3/ Things I like the most in people: truthfulness, honesty (also to themselves), frankness, openness.4/ Things I dislike the most in people: hidden agendas in all possible shapes and forms.5/ I am 47, but Tine would say: "mentally: 3!"6/ My biggest vice: I smoke.7/ My second biggest vice: I d... More About: Tagged
Rumble: How truthful are we?
2008-04-09 17:08:00 I have an issue. I have an issue with people who are not honest, to others or to themselves. People who are not forthcoming with their true opinion, their true intensions. I have an issue with hidden agendas and hypocrisy.But in the end, I trust that ?Good comes to those who do good, and bad comes to those who have mal-intensions?. Saw it too many times.Here is a story:We moved into our house in Belgium many years ago, just as the previous tenant was moving out. He worked as an assistant professor in the faculty of Biology, at a Belgian University. He was the second in command in the laboratory of Nature Conservation and Ecology. You would think he would give an example to others, being a nature conservist by profession.Less so. Before the guy moved out of the house, he dumped most of his waste and stuff he did not want to move, in the garden. He tried to burn some of it (it is difficult to burn pots, pans, shoes and bottles, I tell you) and half buried whole boxes of expired pharma...
Rumble: The Jar of Life
2008-04-08 14:30:00 A Professor stood before his philosophy class and had some items in front of him.When the class began, wordlessly, he picked up a very large and empty mayonnaise jar and proceeded to fill it with golf balls. He then asked the students if the jar was full. They agreed that it was.So the Professor then picked up a box of pebbles and poured them into the jar. He shook the jar lightly. The pebbles rolled into the open areas between the golf balls. He then asked the students again if the jar was full. They agreed it was.The Professor next picked up a box of sand and poured it into the jar. Of course, the sand filled up everything else. He asked once more if the jar was full. The students responded with an unanimous "yes."The Professor then produced two cups of coffee from under the table and poured the entire contents into the jar, effectively filling the space between the grains of sand."Now," said the professor, as the laughter subsided, "I want you to recognize that this jar represent... More About: Life
Rumble: Back on the road...
2008-04-06 13:04:00 Yesterday, we drove the 1000 km from South Tyrol back home. It took us 12 hours, instead of the usual 10. Loads of traffic but a scenery to be enjoyed. Even though it was pretty dark and gloomy, it gives a 'happy kick' driving through the mountains in the snow. It also gives me a knot in the throat driving through the Fernpass bordering Austria and Germany, knowing it will take one more year before you see the snow and the mountains of this part of the world again... And who knows what will happen in that year. This evening, I am flying back to Rome. Back to work. More About: Road , On The Road , The Road
Rumble: Last ski pictures
2008-04-06 12:41:00 Two days ago, we went up to Cortina, one hours drive from our hotel. The scenery and ski slopes were great, but it was windy and bloody cold, as you can see from the pictures:The family:Tine and Lana on the lift:Hannah on the lift:Is there anything else but pride a father can feel when seeing his daughters growing up, and becoming independent, adventurous, happy? Here are our two girls trying to jump higher than dad... :-) More About: Pictures
News: USA: Rich Nation, Poor Nation...
2008-04-03 18:50:00 "The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little."?Franklin D. RooseveltMeet Roberta. She lives in a mountain village with her six brothers and sisters and her mom. They have a trailer with no electricity and they draw their water from a muddy pond down the lane. They don't own a car and jobs are scarce, so Roberta and her family are always hungry, and dependent upon the kindness of others.Roberta is not from a third world country. She lives 100 miles of Nashville, Tennessee USA. (Source)35.5 million Americans, including 12.6 million children, live in households that experience hunger or the risk of hunger. This represents more than one in ten households in the United States (10.9 percent). (Source)According to the UN, 854 million people in the world do not have enough to eat (Source). This means 4.1% of the world's hungry live in the USA.In 2006, official census figures stat... More About: News , Rich , Nation , Poor
News: Ethiopia's forgotten war
2008-04-02 22:56:00 Ridwan Hassan Sahid awoke under a pile of corpses to a pricking sensation on her face. Ants were biting her eyelids and the inside of her mouth. The pain, however, brought relief to the 17-year-old. "I thought, 'I'm alive,' " she thought as blood oozing from rope burns around her neck. Fearing that the Ethiopia n soldiers who had left her for dead in a roadside ditch would return, she brushed away the ants and shut her eyes, then slipped back into unconsciousness.The brutal assault and her escape mark a chilling story to emerge from an unfolding but hidden tragedy in eastern Ethiopia.Ever since exiting colonialists arbitrarily stuck a triangle-shaped wedge of land with 4 million ethnic Somalis inside Ethiopia's border, violence and suffering have plagued the region. Now, many of them have been caught up in a nasty war between the Ethiopian government and a separatist group known as the Ogaden National Liberation Front, which gets little media attention. (Full)Picture courtesy Cri... More About: News , Somalia , Forgotten
News: Can Geeks Save the UN?
2008-04-02 19:13:00 Information is power. But in the UN, the information is so dispersed, so full of bureaucratic slang that its information is virtually inaccessible. We can sit, bitch and whine about it all, or we can do something about it.A small group, describing themselves as "civil hackers", decided to make a change. They have a track record of achieving their goal too: they helped 2 million people tracking their MPs' voting records via the site theyworkforyou.com and through farmsubsidy.org, got the EU to publish full subsidy data.They set up UNdemocracy.com, an attempt to shed light on the inner workings of the UN.How? The UN has for some time made copies of its resolutions and other information online at un.org, but like a lot of government initiatives the data published is hardly reusable in any meaningful way. URLs are not persistent, and data formats are not open. The group around Julian Todd, in Liverpool is laboriously scraping the data out of the site and republishing it with persistent... More About: News , Internet , Geeks , Save
News: Indians want "more water, less Coca Cola!"
2008-04-02 00:27:00 For several years, Indians have been protesting against the presence of Coca Cola plants in their community. Yesterday 1500 villagers marched to the Coca-Cola company's bottling plant in Mehdiganj in Varanasi demanding that the bottling plant shut down immediately. They accuse the Coke Company of creating severe water shortages in the area and polluting the water and land.During a two-day conference on Right to Water a representative of the Uttar Pradesh State Pollution Control Board admitted the Coca-Cola bottling plant in Mehdiganj did not have a current hazardous waste authorization required to operate.Worse is that data collected by the Ground Water Board confirms ground water levels have dropped up to 8 meters (26 feet) in the first seven years of Coca-Cola's operations, from 1999 to 2006, leaving wells and hand water pumps dried up.As local farmers rely on the ground water to meet their needs, and over 80% of the community in Mehdiganj engage in agriculture, "Do we need to s... More About: News
Rumble: The Sellaronda
2008-04-01 23:44:00 Remember the local legend of King Laurin and his rose garden I posted last year? Well, today we went skiing very close to those mountains. We did a tour around the Sella mountain where connecting ski lifts and slopes form a circuit called the "Sellaronda". The weather was perfect, the skiing was just great. It took us just over five hours to finish the Sellaronda, including a one hour lunch.
News: Back to Soylent Green?
More articles from this author:2008-04-01 23:26:00 While on holiday, I can not but read the news headlines. And get worried:March 28:Al Jazeera - Asian rice crisis starts to bite (Full)March 30:Reuters - Tensions rise as world faces short rations (Full)March 31:The Wall Street Journal - Rice Hoarding Pressures Supplies (Full)The Guardian - Farmers fall prey to rice rustlers as price of staple crop rockets (Full)International Herald Tribune - World food prices soar as Asia consumes more (Full)April 1:The Wall Street Journal - Fewer Acres of Corn Likely To Keep Prices High (Full)April 2 2022:The World Today - Soylent Green feeds half of the world....As a 13 year old, I got sleepless nights after watching "Soylent Green" a movie set in the year 2022, depicting a dark future:The water and soil have been poisoned and airborne pollution has produced a year-round heatwave from the greenhouse effect. Most housing is dilapidated and overcrowded, and impoverished homeless people fill the streets. Food as we know it today ?including fruit, veg... More About: News , Back 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 |
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