Update!

Update about Peasant Solidarity's water project.

We did it! 

At the end of October AVE (Esperanto environmentalist organisation) will send 11,000 euros to Peasant Solidarity, in Kalima, DR.Congo. 

Their team is raring to go and they plan to start work in the middle of November.

Who were the contributors?

 

7,000 euros were donated by two German foundations:

  Wasserkraft Volk AG   (5,000)

 Stiftung Brücke bei       (2,000) 

 

4,000 euros were donated by generous individuals, clubs and small organisations in many different countries. 90% of the private contributions came from Esperantists.

Feedback from Kalima.

Etienne Katchelewa and Alphonse Waseka from Peasant Solidarity are delighted, relieved and very grateful. They look forward to  completing the project successfully.

On completion I look forward to sending you a report and photo album.

Thanks to all of you, who supported the collection. Incidentally did you know that water is a recognised

 human right.  ?

 

A momentary sidetrack.

My life is often a hotchpotch, and today I have been (momentarily) sidetracked.

This morning I got a mail from a Chinese esperantist friend, a journalist working for China Radio International. She wanted to tell me about a film competition which she is organizing with friends, colleagues and non-Esperanto associates.

Does anybody fancy a free five-day trip to Beijing?

Do you enjoy making short films?

What comes into your mind when you hear the words 'Tea and Love' ?

 The images and emotions conjured up by this phrase, tea and love, could be the first steps towards winning the first prize in an international short film competition. 

Apart from fame, what can you win?

I have already told you: amongst other things a free five-day trip to Beijing!

Who is hosting the competition?

International Esperanto Association and China Radio International.

 Tea + Love. Short film competition.

Entries with soundtracks in any language are welcome, but the subtitles have to be in Esperanto; this is NOT an obstacle, because you do not even have to know Esperanto.

When you have finished the film, get in touch with your local Esperanto organization and they will find somebody willing to translate the soundtrack for you. 

If you are seriously interested in the competition, please get in touch with me and I will send you further information (Esperanto) and once again please get in touch with local esperantists and they will be very pleased to help you.

How do I know they will help you? Because from personal experience I know they are very, very helpful.

 If I started telling you about that, I would be sidetracked far too long.

An encouraging step.

 

Campaigning for a project like this is hard work.

After writing six articles this month about Peasant Solidarity's clean water project three kind friends  generously made contributions; an encouraging step in the right direction. After opening a Facebook page in aid of the project 18 of my friends and three others  visited the page and 'liked' it. I spread the information via Twitter, G+ and few more social media sites and thought that nobody else had taken any notice of it at all.

Although I kept on telling myself: ''Rome was not built in one day'', by yesterday evening I was beginning to feel depressed.

This morning I got a very encouraging surprise. An (Esperanto-speaking) contact wrote saying he had sent information about the campaign to an organization whose goal it is to support projects like those of Peasant Solidarity. Whether anything comes of this referral is  impossible to say.

475 people have visited my blog this month. Who they all are, I do not know. What I do know is, that at least one of them passed on the information  to an organization that might or might not decide to help the people of Kalima.

It makes me hope that a few more people will take the time to do the same. In the last few years Social Media has played an important role in changing history for better or for worse. I do not want to make value judgements all I am asking you to do is to let Social Media work for the benefit of this good cause!

As you can see, it is such a beautiful day today where I am – the sun is shining, the trees are green, the birds are singing and I am in a much better mood.

Here's wishing you, wherever your are, a sunny,  peaceful and pleasant weekend!

Wisdom of hindsight.

''If I could live my life again, I would never, ever have ..

Yesterday's attempted assassination of ''one of Pakistan's best known television presenters in the city of Karachi'' made me wonder, not for the first time, why any sensible Pakistani* would choose to become a journalist. You can find many reports about previous crimes like this.

August 2013 BBC reported : '' The mutilated body of journalist Haji Abdul Razzak has been identified by his family, a day after it was found in the southern Pakistani city of Karachi.''

In her article in Al Jazheera about yesterday's event a freelance journalist Rabia Mehmood bluntly stated ''Journalism in Pakistan, a threatened existence''.

Even though Journalism Pakistan claims a slight improvement, Pakistan is still one of the most dangerous countries in the world to be a journalist.

In a previous blog I mentioned how knowing Esperanto and using Social Media have brought me into contact with interesting people, whom I otherwise would never, ever have got to know.

One of them is a Pakistani lawyer and journalist whose special interest for human rights made life so dangerous, not just for him, but also for his wife, son and daughter, that they fled to Nepal and applied to UNHCR for official recognition as refugees.

This happened at the end of April 2013. Since then they have been living in Nepal, where they have been waiting for UNHCR to reach a decision about their fate. Once a month he goes to the UNHCR office and asks for news. ''Be patient'', they say and he goes home to his family and tells them: ''We have to be patient''. Last time he went to the office they told him: ''We will let you know soon.'' They are still waiting for ''soon'' to happen,

I do not play the blame game. UNHCR has an unenviable task. With an estimated 45,2 million displaced persons in the world it is no wonder that applications like this one take a very long time.

Yesterday he told me that he is going back to the UNHCR office on Tuesday.

P.S. * Do I mean he is not a ''sensible Pakistani''? Is it sensible to keep your mouth shut about the abuse of human rights? Are journalists like my friend asking themselves: ''If I could live my life again, I would never, ever have....?

What do you think?

Water is hope.

I never, ever have to worry about where my next glass of water is coming from. 

 

When I am thirsty, I go into the kitchen, turn on the tap, fill my glass with  water and quench my thirst.

 I never have to ask myself, whether it will give me diarrhea or worse. Our water is clean, easily available and I take it for granted. 

 

The situation for people in many other parts of the world is completely different. 

 

Etienne Katcheleva is one of my Esperantist Facebook friends. Some time ago, he told me some of the hard facts about the water situation in his home town in the still troubled eastern part of the  Democratic Republic of Congo.

 

According to a report issued by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP): ''The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) possesses over half of Africa’s water reserves, yet 74 percent of its population – or approximately 51 million people – lack access to safe drinking water.'' 

 

Etienne, who is an agronomist, comes from a small town called Kalima , which lies 100 kms northeast of Kindu, the capital of the eastern province of Maniema. When Etienne was a student, he and some of his friends started a N.G.O. called Peasant Solidarity. Their aim was and still is to combat poverty by encouraging more and better horticulture, fish-farming and animal husbandry. However their number one priority is the provision of water, pure uncontaminated water for the everybody in the area.

 

Etienne told me that only 2% of the 136000 residents in Kalima have access to safe drinking water. The rest have to depend on untreated water from badly maintained reservoirs and other unsafe sources. Etienne told me, that last year 34% of the infant mortality rate was due to diarrhea.

 According to local custom, young girls collect the water, and they have to walk a very long way to find it. It is not just hard work, it can also be dangerous, because sometimes they are attacked and raped en route. As it is a taboo subject,  it is difficult to tell how big a problem it is.

Etienne has drawn up a plan to provide safe drinking water for the people in Kalima. The only snag is  money. He has proposed two schemes. The first one, would provide safe drinking water for part of the town at a cost 247,047 euros and the second one, which would cost 861, 906 euros, would solve everybody's problem.

Last year,  thanks to Associationof Green Esperantists  and the German company

 Wasserkraft Volk AG ,  Peasant Solidarity received a grant of  3380 euros, which covered the cost of water installations for the Kalima General Hospital, and a few of its immediate neighbors.

They have applied for grants  from other firms and organizations, but so far they have been unsuccessful. Possibly you are wondering why a governmental agency does not step in to help them. Well, REGIDESO which has a monopoly of drinking water in DR Congo does not operate in Kalima or in the province of Maniema.

 If you would like to read more about the history of this NGO Etienne's blog has been partly translated into English and the blog's numerous photos speak for themselves. 

For further information or to make a contribution please  get in touch with Peasant Solidarity

 Etienne Katchelewa:  pieadc2006@yahoo.fr

Tel:+243 998735042.

http://kamparanasolidareco.weebly.com/

addresses

PIEADC

City: Kalima No. 29, District: Munyangi, Country: DR Congo

Let social media vitalize education.

 

Facebook, Google+, Twitter, Instagram, Skype etc have become a part of my life, and what is more they have enriched and continue to enrich it. However for many people, not only of my generation, Social Media is still not really respectable, not to mention the fact that it could be dangerous.

Since the late1990's I have used the net on a daily basis; a combination of Internet and English was a boon for finding information and getting in touch with people. In 2005, after deciding to learn Esperanto by taking a series of on-line courses, I found that the troika of English, Esperanto and the social media rapidly expanded my international social network. Apart from giving me the opportunity of traveling more, visiting people, as well as welcoming visitors to my own home, it has also given me a vast spectrum of virtual friends all over the world. Most of these people I have never met and probably never will meet, but they are still part of my everyday life. Social media has given us the tools to talk about our hobbies, likes and dislikes, aspirations, fears and sometimes we give each other cultural insights about events at home that are often lacking in mainstream media reports.

A few days ago I had a request from my youngest Facebook friend, a lively fourteen year old boy from Katmandu, whose hobbies include singing, dancing, cooking and using his computer; Google translate and uploading videos to YouTube are child's play for him. As he wants to correspond with somebody of his own age in Denmark, I posted this information, in Danish, on my Facebook page, but only one person commented, saying that he felt he was too old to come into consideration.

Perhaps very few people noticed the status. Possibly some of those that did read it took fright, because I mentioned that in addition to English, he also speaks Esperanto. Or maybe they were alarmed, because they do not really feel comfortable with getting involved with complete strangers. They may pay lip-service to the adage: 'a stranger is a friend, I have not met yet', but in practice, they fight shy of the idea.

My memories of geography lessons are mainly of mile-long lists of rivers, islands, capital cities and mountains, whose names had to learn by heart. To pass a geography exam, you needed to know dry facts, for example, that the four main islands of Japan are Hokkaido, Honshu, Shikoku and Kyushu and that the capital city of Nepal is Katmandu. Neither the teacher nor the text book taught us very much about the customs or everyday lives of the Japanese or Nepalese that would have made the subject vital and interesting.

Nowadays geography could become every child's favorite subject, if teachers and parents taught children how to use social media intelligently. In the same way they could vitalize other subjects too.

Now if you think I am talking through my hat, please take note of the following article that appeared today on the BBC world homepage.

                      ''Social media transforms lessons

A school in Norway has taken an innovative approach to learning by equipping every student with a tablet and teaching English using social media.''

My friend in Nepal is waiting to meet somebody.He wants to chat, share knowledge, have fun and make friends.

Do you know anybody who would like to 'meet' my friend? If so please let me know.

Re. English skills, Denmark came third!

According to this report from a private language school: Denmark is the 3^rd most successful nation in the world as far as English skills are concerned. Congratulations to Norway , who came 1^st and to the Netherlands. who came 2^nd.

How did our neighbouring countries perform? Sweden was 4^th, Germany 8^th and Poland 10^th...

26^th July 2012 was the 125^th anniversary of the publication of the first Esperanto textbook, whose author was Ludoviko Zamenhof. To commemorate this event Esperanto associations in many countries have staged or are staging various events.

For example in Poland an Esperanto Conference and Exhibition: "125-years of Esperanto" has been on view in the Polish Senate since the 17th of October. The following film includes information about the foundation of the Parliamentary Group for the support Esperanto in the Polish Parliament. There is also an interview with the Esperantist business man and philanthropist Etsuo Miyoshi.

Three vice-presidents of the Polish Sejm (lower house of Polish parliament) and senate, a number of M.P.s, the cultural attaché of the Japanese Embassy in Warsaw, journalists and several esperantists from four other countries, in all seventy participants attended the inauguration ceremony which you can see part of in  this
                                                                   Film

Esperanto Forening for Danmark will also  celebrate the occasion at the annual Danish book fair taking place at Bella Center. http://www.bogforum.dk/

You can read further information in Danish here. https://www.facebook.com/events/327251034040173/HERE

Boutique Languages.

Resistance may be futile: Are there alternatives to Global English? 

 is  the title of an article by Dennis Baron is professor of English and linguistics at the University of Illinois, U.S.A. Although most of this article appears to be very well-researched his professionality seems to flag when it comes to what he calls boutique languages; in which category he includes a 'niche language like Esperanto' and 'an artisanal lingo like Klingon'.

Esperanto speakers are always quick to stand up for the language. So by the time I had read it six others had already commented on the article. They explained that Klingon is a fictional language as opposed to Esperanto, which started as a 'planned language' and has since developed like any other one. The language works well and it has more speakers than Klingon

What surprised me most of all was his usage of the word 'boutique'. According to this reference a boutique is a small shopping outlet, especially one that specialized in elite and fashionable items such as clothing and jewellery. 

This is what I think of as a boutique.

Boutiques are cool and exotic especially for people with well-stuffed wallets.

 Boutique language? What was it that Humpty Dumpty said in 'Alice in Wonderland'?

''When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean.''

What does Professor Baron mean when he refers to Esperanto as boutique language? If he means that is cool and exotic then all I can say is that he is barking up the wrong tree.

It is an everyday language for a community international roots and connections, that at present seems to be growing.

 How big is it? 

According to Dennis Baron :

'about 1,000 native speakers and as many as two million who boast some familiarity with the language. '

The truth is that nobody really knows. Membership statistics from Esperanto organisations represent only the tip of the proverbial iceberg. Thanks to internet people learn the language, get in touch with other Esperanto speakers, read Esperanto literature and journals and listen to Esperanto music. However as many of them (unfortunately) never join an organisation it is difficult to tell how many we are.

 Even more important is the lack of information with regard to how many of us are competent speakers.

Native Esperanto speakers grow up in Esperanto-speaking families - ' Elementary, my dear Watson'.

For them it is the language used for mundane affairs such as:

'What are we going to have for dinner tonight?'

'The kitchen sink's blocked again.'

'No more chocolate for you, my dear....'

'Can you collect my coat from the dry-cleaner's?'

And

Pillow-talk.. 

After all how else could there be 'about a 1000 native speakers'?

Whether or not Esperanto will ever become everyman's second language  is perhaps just a beautiful dream and this remains to be seen. However for now Esperanto is very much alive and as a living language  does it not deserve as much respect as any other living language?

P.S.This link may well give a more up to date picture of how many Esperanto speakers there are in the world. It is based on languages used in Twitter messages about the death of Steve Jobs. P.P.S.According to one esperantist's interpretation , this would indicate that perhaps there about 10 - 12 million esperantists dotted around the globe. However this sounds a bit too optimistic, in my humble opinion.

'And/or' solution for winter woes.

People living in northern Europe will probably agree that we have had the wettest and chilliest summer in living memory. Autumn too has arrived early, and according to this morning's weather forecast we can look forward to nightly sub-zero temperatures in the coming week.

Our long, dark northern winter is on its way. This depressing realisation may prompt us to start planning a winter get-away and/or a worthwhile project to help us survive the winter without sinking into a deep depression.

It looks pretty, but.....

Here is a unique 'and/or' solution that may or may not appeal to you.

Hainan is a tropical island in southern China. In January and February temperatures are between 16 and 21 degrees centigrade (61 – 70 degrees F.) In December 2009 the Chinese government decided to establish Hainan as an 'international tourist destination.

If you would like to escape post Christmas and New Year blues you could spend more than a month in this tropical paradise learning a new language; no, not Chinese, but Esperanto. The course initiators have renamed the island 'Esperanto Insulo' (Island)

From 11^th January - 12^th February 2012 you could enrol in this Esperanto immersion course on the island of Hainan.

A word of warning; this course is not meant for diletantes. With all due respect, if you prefer lounging on the beach etc. this 'and/or solution' is not for you.

Dennis Keefe from the University of Nanking has planned a course of 8 hours a day, 6 days a week classroom activities. After lessons students coming from at least 17 countries will go on talking to each other in Esperanto – and only in Esperanto. After sixteen hours of Esperanto, they will doubtless dream in it too. On Sundays an Esperanto-speaking guide will show you round the island. 

How much will it cost?

If you are willing to share a room with three other people, forgoing the luxury of a private bathroom and eating frugally it will cost about 458 euros. This also includes tuition.

A single room (including your own bathroom, gourmet meals and tuition will cost about 780 euros.

In addition of course you will have to pay your travel expenses to Hainan.

At the end of the course you should have an adequate working knowledge of Esperanto. Afterwards you will as a minumum be able to use it to keep up and develop friendships with fellow students from all over the world. Although we do not have a country we do have a culture. Knowing the language is the key to enjoying our  literature and music as well as learning about our history etc, etc.

The project's  home-page, is only in Esperanto, but if you would like to enrol,  click here. where you will find the relevant e-mail addresses.

Literature on-line

Facebook is a mixed blessing! On the one hand all those up-dates and improvements (?) are well-meant, but very confusing. On the other hand it helps me keep tags on my family, friends and acquaintances. Apart from that  it is brilliant soapbox and I appreciate  all useful information churned out by other people.

Sometimes I go off-line. For example today I read a report in Danish magazine about electronic readers and their lack of appeal in Denmark.  According to the journalist,  this is likely to change in the next few years, when both publishers and the general public catch up with trends in other parts of the world.

There are many advantages.

An electronic reader weighing less than a kilogram can contain a whole library.

No more books that sit on  shelves gathering dust.

When you move house there is less to pack and carry.

Easier on the eyes, because texts can be magnified

Many texts can be down-loaded free of charge.

Etc. Etc. Etc.

Certainly if you shudder at the idea of not being able to turn a page you will probably disagree with me,  but an electronic reader isdefinitely on my shopping list.

However back to square one; Facebook.

Today one of my  friends/contacts posted this link, which took me to

 an on-line, free of charge and  recent Esperanto translation of the short story 'The Overcoat' by the 19^th century Ukranian born writer Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol

So instead of doing a few tedious jobs I spent half an hour reading it from beginning to end. 

 It is the gripping life-story of a respectable and conscientious clerk,  who although appreciated by nobody, has his hour of glory and then loses everything. Only after his death is justice done. Although it is an intrinsically sad story, Gogol tells the story in an ironically humourous way.

You can find an English translation here. 

If you are wondering why anybody would want to  read it in Esperanto, when they could read it in an English translation, please consider the following.

Accordingto this report from 2000, 17.65% of the world's population speaks English.

Flabbergasting Interest.

I started learning Esperanto in January 2005.

This  new interest flabbergasted most of my friends, who, amongst other things, said:

'What's that?'

' Oh, Esperanto? My granny used to dabble in that.'

'Why Esperanto? Why not Klingon ? You would get much more out of Star Wars.

'Oh no! Have you become an esperantist? I met one of those once......'*

'Why bother learning a language that nobody speaks? It's dead, didn't you know that?'

' Do you mean, you can actually speak it?'

'Stop wasting your time! English is your native language and everybody speaks English!'

'It must be ever so difficult.'

'Couldn't be bothered with that; it hasn't got a culture.'

I too was flabbergasted; why make wild assertions instead of asking relevant questions? These reactions irritated me and I wanted to prove them wrong. What is more even after a few months of studying Esperanto I had discovered that it is alive, it is relatively easy to learn, it is much more useful than Klingon, it has got a culture and it is fun.

 With regard to the universality of English and Esperanto speaking bores:

 English is not as universal as most people think. 

All kinds of people choose to learn Esperanto and some of us end up exasperating our friends; sorry we are only human.

Before Television and Internet took over our lives people used to join clubs and other cultural associations. Nowadays for many of us our social network functions on-line. This naturally also applies to esperantists,

Generally speaking the internet has given a considerable boost to the language, community and movement. This site provides up to date information about Esperanto in the modern world and how you could set about learning it – on-line and free of charge.

Music.

The following is a Catalonian folksong translated to Esperanto. Birdeto mia means my little bird.

My surroundings

I live in Denmark. Here's a statue of Hans-Christian Andersen.

Danish fast-food; hot-dogs.

Why bother to blog?

I scrapped my last English blog, only because it fell foul of a virus. Whom to blame? An unidentified evil genius with a dubious sense of humour, or myself?  Probably the latter, as I do tend to get carried away by widgets and other digital temptations. Anyway, as my true friends and followers decided it was too risky to go on reading my page, I deleted it.

No doubt, if I had had the patience to wade through blogs with incomprehensible (for me at least) I might have resucued it. However I reasoned, , it only takes a couple of minutes to create a new page, so why bother? Two years on, I have found the time to spend a few minutes to create this one. No more weird and wonderful widgets for me. Instead I will get down to the nitty-gritty and start blogging.

Why do WE bother to blog?

This not just a rhetorical question; please feel free to comment.

I blog because:

I find the written word more pleasing than the spoken.

I should like to tell people about the people and things that interest me.

Life can be confusing and it helps me (at least) to sort it out on paper – sorry- on my computer screen.

Speakers Corner in Hyde Park used to be one of my favourite places to be. Although I never dared to jump on a soapbox myself. Blogging is much more convenient: no risk of getting soaked to the skin, hecklers are less of a problem and if you make a mistake, you can always delete it, before anybody else notices it. Check this out other people have already got the idea.

Am I writing this blog because I want to save the world?  NO! With my 70th birthday pending, I'm beyond harbouring  delusions.

Blogging is fun.

What interests me?

Languages especially Esperanto.

Current events.

Music especially songs.

People in general.

My surroundings;

 for example this view from my balcony. 26th September 2011.