Calling all Tigers - International Tiger Day (Julio Pomar and other favourites..)

After the news of the mighty, and magnificent Cecil, loved by so many, who like few of his kind enjoyed posing in his natural habitat (in freedom)  to show his beauty (i've always thought it just to call a group of lions - a Pride)
- we come to a day that exists to make us aware of other mighty, extraordinary cats, and how close we are to losing them for good.

I shall leave straight away two LINKs, one repeating the online PETITION  I had posted in my last blog, for Cecil (please read and if you agree, sign), the other for TIGER_DAY_ORG with some facts and figures on the subject of tigers.

Of course I'm also partial to the exquisite Snow Leopard
with its large paws and incredible tail, other big cats, wolves, bears (♥ polar bears and others), dolphins, oh - and elephants (so wonderful), plus many more that share and inhabit this delicate blue spot in the universe.


The first time I came upon one of Julio Pomar's latest series of work - his Tiger series, it baffled me. He is one of those authors (artists) that I have a hard time finding work that doesn't "click" with me, every time i'd view his craft i was moved. With the Tiger series I felt something different and wasn't sure what I felt towards his work, I knew I had to see it "face to face", so to speak.
When I finally did get a chance to see work from this series I was struck to the core. It was incredible. I can't say enough times that, similar to the recordings of music, representations of the work are fine (in some cases extremely valuable, especially in music) but nothing substitutes the experience of seeing them "live".


In music, for instance, going to the actual concerts. even though the recordings may be magnificent, when it comes to the "live" experience of the work, well, what can I say? It is hard to put into words, and anyone with a love for music knows exactly what I mean.



I'll leave you with images of some of the work from Pomar's Tiger series that can be found in various different internet connections (making it hard for me to say who originally posted or took their pictures at the moment and for this I apologize for I always like to name the sources. I shall do so in the future, placing it in the comment section as soon as I find out the correct sources).

As a very small child, and growing up, I was so very fond of Winnie the Pooh's "Tigre" persona, had a large stuffed tiger

(or lion doll not sure any more, but since he had no mane, i believe he was a tiger - he was a solid pinkish, salmon colour, but i was told that that was due to it being washed so many times)

- that I'd take everywhere with me.
He was my first love.

Bigger than me for so long, more my size near the end, I remember him still with an affection one has for a beloved family member from one's most tender years and still have that feeling I had had when at age five or six he finally had to be taken.  It took forever for the grownups to get him away from me as I felt he began to disappear for hours on end (to be washed), and feared his eventually not coming back.



Now that I think of it, I now appreciate all the more those who in the past showered me as an adult with Calvin & Hobbes when it came out, on birthdays and such. Yes, I see the added humour..



Three or four years ago, one of the culprits gave me this t-shirt..

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Wishing all a very nice day.





Once again - beautiful Cecil

Image: Bryan Oxford

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Post scriptum

Oh, by the way, since we're on the topic of magnificent creatures I cannot leave out this link to a past article, regarding Polar bears among other things. With the insane will to drill the arctic (a calamitous move) these days, I am left without words.., but say this: it is imperative that we protect the Arctic.
LINK












Taking into consideration that they should be in their natural habitat, it is always the best and preferable, one knows that some people for bizarre reasons  try to take them on as pets. Thankfully they can be, and sometimes are, rescued from this idiocy - and although their being able to be returned to the wild as they should be is compromised due to the folly
(no longer able to survive as they would had they not been "kidnapped") the following seems not only a lesson as to getting along despite our differences, but a good solution for such sad cases of animal mistreatment, and commendable when no other option is available.







When I think of the madness some of us commit to our own species, be they babies - adults, or elders of respectable age, as well as these magnificent creatures, my heart sinks.
Thank goodness not all of us are as daft as some.
We were born with brains, we should use them.
The world can be such a wondrous and wonderful place if we don't "complicate" things.

Here is "Gaia" (the Earth) once more;
I try my best not to but, I do sometimes repeat things I find beautiful.

Cecil - a Zimbabwe King of cats

it's hard to fathom what is in the head and heart of someone who could do this, to look upon such a magnificent being and to.........
- It sickens one's soul.














( beautiful cat)

I can comprehend an Inuit person, for instace, hunting a seal to eat and use the animal's fur to fend against the cold. I can even sometimes comprehend non-Inuits hunting to eat - Non-Endangered animals and when - outside of their mating and nurturing of their babies' - season - if at least they are given a very decent chance to escape, as a fire arm by far out matches one side and makes it such cowardice any other way. 
Some non-sapien animals hunt to eat as we do, but do not hunt for trophies and are not cowards when doing so. 

This non-sapien animal even if it were not a protected animal 

(which he was, and so increbibly well known) 

residing in a sancuary, that doesn't have to know any "human" boundary stating that if it were to wander from said sanctuary (even a centimetre and thus believed to be "legal" to hunt - which it still wasn't as it was lured out, among other things) - had a name. It should remind us of the magnificence of life and Being, deserving admiration and love.


His dead body is as ugly a sight - as his life and live body was beautiful. 

He should remind us of the magnificence of life and Being, deserving admiration and love.
We should respect and protect such creatures, never destroy them. This act is a horrible thing, an abomination. His dead body is as ugly a sight - as his life and live body was beautiful. 

PETITION - please read and if you agree, sign.



 - The act doesn't stop here, the cubs will now most likely be killed by others wanting to take over the pride due to their father Cecil's demise, and for what?

Coming Together - Live (Germany)

Concert at the

Mayer's Brauwerk

If you love music and you have a chance to go -  by all means do not miss this.





Coming Together 

July 26 (Sunday) - 11:00h

Richie Beirach - piano
Regina Litvinova - keyboards/vocoder
Christian Scheuber - drums/percussion

(I hadn't gotten around to posting their concerts when on tour in France but hope to redeem myself by listing one now)

LINK to the event @Mayerbräu (Jazz-Matineen)

LINK to the event on fb

Mandela Prize - The first attribution ever (United Nations Awards) 2015 | Primeira atribuição do prémio "Nelson Mandela"

Jorge Sampaio - Helena Ndume

It is such a pleasure to post something positive regarding politicians (something that is not that common a thing for me to do).

Considering the award's namesake - Nelson Mandela (♥ the great Madiba), all the more pleasure in doing so.

As is known the award is destined to be attributed once in every 5 years, each time to be bestowed upon one man and one woman, beginning this summer (of 2015) - for the first time, in honour of Mandela's day of birth.


LINK - UN article (today - July 24th, 2015)

(other articles regarding the award's first presentation - below)
LINK   - article: June 22nd, 2015 announcing the prize  |  LINK  - article regarding the ceremony to be held today








Helena Ndume's work not only commands respect it is absolutely beautiful - LINK
I admit to, only to have become aware of her actions due to the prize and am truly moved upon hearing of it. The more I read, the more I am in awe.

What can I possibly say about  Jorge Fernando Branco de Sampaio?
I admired him even before he became Mayor of the country's capital city of Lisbon (and later on President of the Republic of Portugal).   In an age where politicians in the nation (left to right - literally) either embarrass or irritate me he is and has always been the opposite. I will not say his work surprises me, I can't, but to see him win the award does not only remind me (thankfully) that one can be thankful for the gems amidst the mud, but recall how the air seemed all of a sudden fresher and purer each time, and the moment, he was elected (not an easy thing to feel after the fall of the Berlin Wall and the onset of our Neo-Whatever-It-Is world).
I'm so happy he is is being thus recognized. To me he belongs to the league of the likes of Lester B. Pearson (from my other land), even though one comes from one political background and the other came from another.





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I truly had no idea when I had posted a picture of flowers (magnolias from a magnolia tree just at the entrance of the historic heart of the village of Sintra, at the end of the "Volta do Duche", in the proximity of it's hospital and adjacent royal residence (Palacio da Vila & Hospital da Vila), a place I love dearly as it was the birthplace of my father (Freguesia de São Martinho - Sintra) and also so very dear to President Sampaio)
- on that sad day when the world bade adieu to the great Madiba, that one of the two to receive the prize would be so connected to that tree's location.

♥

Estudo I - Mémoire d'une Présence Absente (1969) de Jorge Peixinho (1940/95)
Piano - Jorge Peixinho (GMCL)

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(all images in this post come from the UN - ORG)

John Taylor........................

♥ 

flights of angels take thee to thy rest beautiful one

Message to His Excellency, Prime Minister Αλέξης Τσίπρας

I wish to convey my respect, and admiration for the battle you face, in attempting to not only save your nation but what Europe should stand for.  It is ironic the nation that gave birth to "Western Thought" and to Democracy should stand up to the face of that which now so openly opposes both and the "European dream", a dream built at such a high cost in the not so distant past. It further commands respect and solidarity when considering the hardship your country is subjected to. Even the absurd excuse of using "creative" accounting in the past by the very same entities that now directly or indirectly bleed you as well as the rest of the European peoples (Goldman Sachs comes to mind, among other vicious thieves) is not only unacceptable but Kafkian to say the least.


As said by a great human being in the past:
"In the end we will not remember the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends" (Martin Luther King Jr.)



My government here in Portugal and the head of state by no means represents me or many I hold dear, in this country and abroad.



This has not even been an issue of Left or Right for some time now, but rather right and wrong.
"They" (the assassins of Europe and democracy) are wrong.
They have turned a "WE" into "they", into "those over there" and "these over there" - typical of those who see human beings as a commodity and not as people.

"They" do not respect people. "They" do not like the Spaniards, Germans, Portuguese, Danes, Belgians, Italians, Fins, Mattese, Irish, Austrians, Swedes, British, French, Greeks, or any other peoples of Europe. In fact, they do not like People, period. (whether from inside or outside of Europe).


Although, as I said above, I do not feel represented by the government in this country (Portugal), I must say that if any person exterior to this land were to be so base and improper in an official summit or meeting of any kind as (oh my, I seem to have forgotten the man's name though I do recall that no nation elected him to be the head of any state - let us call him "What's His Name")..
- as What's His Name, towards the person this sovereign state elected (even if the person is the one we presently have, or others we've had in the past, much to my despair) it would not only be foul in terms of protocol (if such meetings are to be taken seriously by the people in general) but an insult to the nation and the nation's freedom to elect whomsoever they please, as well as the other heads of state and states in said meetings. I'm constantly shocked by our election outcomes, seldom not, nevertheless it would still be unacceptable.  Moreover, those who elect are the ones who can keep or eventually remove a nation's government unless there is an invasion, a state of WAR and an invasion.
This is another reason I write to you, dear sir. I am shocked that Europe has "officially" come to this and not just behind questionable curtains of Lobbies and hidden agendas.

Those who know me personally would find it bizarre to see me speak either of protocol or of nations in this way (I never was, nor am I, fond of borders - and - protocol is to me just a ritual that sometimes aids dialogue between who may or may not get along, but nevertheless must talk. Since I'm in the Arts, I have as much use for it as a giraffe has for crochet needles. As a matter of fact, just the mention of a giraffe using crochet needles poses many images, all of them with much more dignity and productive than ..ah, if only I could recall the man's name).

I ask your indulgence for my "casual" way of writing and am embarrassed that Europe has become "cannon fodder" for lowly people such as What's His Name. "They" do in fact have an uncanny resemblance to those in ISIS and the likes. I would not be in the least bit surprised if I were to find out, for instance, that they
"invest" - or had invested - in oil from certain oil fields, it seems to be concurrent with "their" religion.
I shall not mention What's His Name any more for he is soiling my message.






I humbly thank you, and how I wish my thanks could be of any practical use. It is but words, though they are sincere.

Even though I do not know if you will see this message,
I truly wish you the very best, and that you receive the aid you not only deserve, but need.



Any man who can retain his dignity amidst such dealings not only commands respect, he shines the light of dignity upon those who placed him in office.

Image: a rather old but effective way to keep thieves at bay (window in my hometown | Convento dos Cardaes - founded by Dª Luisa de Távora, built in the early XVII century, resisted the catastrophic earthquake & tidal wave of 1755 - photo by G. Almeida)

Post Scriptum:

 I'm not aware of where negociations are exactly at this point, but I see some reactions on "twitter" to suggest one has been reached, I  hope that any "deal" made on behalf of your people does not come out as further pillage. I will say no more for it is easy for me to sit and write a message. I have no idea what it is to have the responsibility of relieving  a nation that has seen in the past weeks even more relentless underhanded attacks through the "temper tantrums" of babies (without the lovability of infants) who have far too much power and have been spoiled rotten by the EU.
I can not imagine the pressure of knowing you must be able to put "food on the plate" (I use the metaphor but fear how literal it may infact be for your nation under such ruthless bullying by psycopathic, terrorist thought and capabilities from people who are in dire need of a good spanking).

LINK - to a past article

another LINK - to another past article (there are more)

(post author: Maria M FA Costa)

Agora vamos ver como funciona o sistema digestivo da Europa, e de outros.. (post language: PT)

Li ontem, foi escrito ainda antes do fecho das urnas, e não podia deixar de partilhar o seguinte texto. 

(autor Joseph Praetorius)

Numa Weuropa posta a ferros (financeiros) testa-se hoje, na Grécia, a resistência política das soluções adoptadas, as que já falharam na América Latina contra a qual se lançam hoje as estratégias de sedução: os USA restabelecem relações diplomáticas com Cuba e Francisco de Roma inicia hoje a digressão que exibirá o seu sorriso humano em toda a América do Sul.
A África sub-sahariana tornou-se um objectivo, porque os chineses estão em toda a parte e a Weuropa em parte nenhuma; e aí temos Hollande rastejando em Luanda por mil milhões de euros que, de resto, conseguiu. Nessa mesma África porém, pairam as sombras do Estado Islâmico, prodigioso mistério da política externa americana, que estende a sua sombra ameaçadora da Nigéria e Argélia ao Afeganistão, passando pelo controlo territorial de vastas zonas do Iraque e da Síria, fazendo-se notar até nos Balkans e anunciando-se no Cáucaso.Na margem noroeste do Mar de Azov prossegue o drama ucraniano, com uma retirada surpreendente das milicias em frente a Mariupol, parecendo hoje evidente que deixou de haver Ucrânia cuja unidade a ocidente e a leste possa manter-se a ferro e fogo na mais negra miséria.
A serena Rússia exibe à Polónia e aos baltas uma prefiguração do que seria a vida deles sem ela. E a UE ainda não se deu conta de que não pode arrostar com os custos de um confronto de que se imagina capaz estando, como está, integralmente dependente da compra de energia àqueles a quem imagina poder conter, se não mesmo vencer. A construção dos gazodutos para a China e para a Weuropa corre a bom ritmo. A Turquia e a Grécia descobrem assim interesses comuns que podem - já não era sem tempo - impor a paz entre ambos com fundamentos muito pragmáticos e isso não é pequena utilidade.
Ao FMI opôem-se soluções em alternativa que já começaram a funcionar, mas que dependem evidentemente da capacidade de resistência política dos países cooperantes dessas novas soluções. As conspirações estão ao rubro em todo o lado. Os serviços de inteligência trepidam e os seus agentes transpiram.
E neste curioso momento, a Grécia emerge da irrelevância do indigente e atinge a glória do nobre rebelde, ao alcance de cuja galhardia estão alguns pontos nevrálgicos do projecto de dominação em curso - mas em refluxo - e hoje, ao fim do dia, teremos ideias mais claras sobre a consistência das forças no terreno. Mas os confrontos atingiram uma fase onde se espera o desempenho de pessoas normais. Creio que acabou a fase das nobrezas palatinas de eunucos e das cortesãs mais envilecidas que envelhecidas. (E que curiosa fase, esta).
As direitas tradicionalistas (posição sobretudo moral) e as esquerdas liberais (outra posição sobretudo moral) convergem em atitudes comuns de resistência contra a miséria imposta pela especulação financeira e pela trama de corrupções que sustenta e onde se sustenta. Os estupores das velhas e os seus bandos de capões parecem já coisa passada. Assim o consinta O Clemente.

Earth photograph - Nasa | Apollo 8 | Dec. 1968 (first photographs taken of our planet)

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Agora que se sabe o resultado: 61,31% não | 38,69% sim , aguarda-se como vão digerir a coisa. Eu tenho uns sais de frutos (a Ginjinha, é só para pessoas amigas.., sais de frutos e já vão com sorte)

Pois..... e conviver com democracia deve ser mesmo complicado para alguns que,
vão ter que se "desobstipar" com isto.

Não sei o que vem amanhã, mas o evento de ontem foi épico e de grande beleza, por isso..

Bom dia.