Monthly Archives: November 2014

Racial Equality: The Impossible Dream

30 Sunday Nov 2014

Posted by in Human Behavior, Social Injustice, United States

≈ 9 Comments

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Outrage In Missouri Town After Police Shooting Of 18-Yr-Old ManHands Up Don’t Shoot – Justice for Mike Brown
Ferguson – Missouri – USA – November 2014
Photo Credit: Scott Olson / Getty Images

 

For millennia, humankind has been plagued with some form of inequality among its populations. As our societies grew, increased in complexity, and became globalized, so did the nature and degree of inequality.

Like a living human organism, inequality has a gender, race, ethnicity, and class that determine income and wealth disparities. To make matters worse, inequality dictates our access to a home, education, healthcare, and protection under our justice system.

Faced with racial inequality, the majority African-American community of Ferguson, Missouri, has received no justice for Mike Brown, an eighteen-year-old black male killed by a white policeman in August 2014. Continue reading →

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Guyana Faces a Moral Crisis

23 Sunday Nov 2014

Posted by in Guyana, Social Injustice

≈ 15 Comments

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Homeless and Invisible - GuyanaHomeless man asleep on sidewalk outside Parliament Buildings
Georgetown, Guyana – October 2014
Photo Credit: Mark Jacobs

 

On Monday, November 10, 2014, the Guyana government entered into shutdown mode. Facing the threat of a “no-confidence” motion from a combined opposition against his administration, President Donald Ramotar “prorogued” the 65-member National Assembly or Parliament. He invoked a provision from the 1980 Constitution, framed by the former autocratic government of President Forbes Burnham. Such a drastic move could throw the country into a state of limbo for up to six months.

After the collapse of the Soviet Union and end of the Cold War, the Indo-Guyanese dominated party of Marxist Cheddi Jagan finally came to power in 1992 and has remained in power since then. Government corruption, unsolved criminal activity, police brutality, and extra-judicial killings – common during the Burnham dictatorship – continue unabated. Continue reading →

Frustration at Filing for Divorce in Brazil

16 Sunday Nov 2014

Posted by in Brazil, Family Life, Relationships

≈ 8 Comments

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Divorce - When a Marriage FailsDivorce – When a Marriage Fails
Photo Credit: culturamix.com

 

Marriages are tested under fire. Some marriages survive the flame, forging a stronger bond. Others suffer third degree burns, weakening the union. My marriage belonged to the latter group. When it ended in Brazil, I had not only failed as a wife but also had to confront the demon of divorce.

“I can’t sponsor you and your sons to come to America unless you’re divorced,” my mother told me.

I opened my Jerusalem Bible for guidance. In the Gospel of Matthew (Chapter 19), Jesus was clear about divorce.

“[W]hat God has united, man must not divide… Now I say this to you: the man who divorces his wife…and marries another, is guilty of adultery.”

Alone and broken with two kids in a foreign country, I spent a year of soul searching to come to terms with what I needed to do in order to reunite with my family. Continue reading →

“Jungle Rot and Open Arms” – Poem by Janice Mirikitani

09 Sunday Nov 2014

Posted by in Poetry, United States

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070711-D-7203T-004Wounded War Veteran with wife at the Walter Reed Medical Center
Photo Credit: Cherie A. Thurlby / National Military Family Association

 

November 11 is Veterans Day. It’s an official American holiday to honor the men and women who have served in the U.S. Armed Forces. The date marks the anniversary of the end of World War I on November 11, 1918.

To commemorate this day, my Poetry Corner November 2014 features the poem “Jungle Rot and Open Arms” by Janice Mirikitani, a sansei or third-generation Japanese American born in 1941 in Stockton, California.

Janice Mirikitani’s life was touched by two wars: World War II and the Vietnam War. As an infant during World War II, she was interned with her family and other Japanese American families in the Rohwer Relocation Center in Arkansas.

At the end of the war, to avoid the racism still prevailing on the West Coast, Mirikitani’s family moved to Chicago. Her parents’ marriage did not survive the tumult in their lives. Writing became a source of comfort for the fledgling poet. Continue reading →

On Leaving Guyana

02 Sunday Nov 2014

Posted by in Economy and Finance, Guyana, Human Behavior

≈ 18 Comments

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Guyanese boarding Aircraft at Cheddi Jagan International AirportBoarding aircraft at the Cheddi Jagan International Airport – Guyana
Photo Credit: Guyana Times International

 

The worse part about emigration is not the brain drain. It’s the fragmentation of the family and community. Before my time came to leave the land of my birth, I had already lost to emigration, aunts, uncles, cousins, school friends, my three brothers, my sister, and my mother. Only my father and I had remained. Marriage gave me a new family with new connections.

Like thousands of other Guyanese over the years, they left for all kinds of reasons: higher education, reunite with family, economic hardships, racial and other violence, political victimization, corruption, crime, and more. Continue reading →