anne marie caluwaert

THIS IS WHY I WON'T PERFORM IN CHINA......I KNOW IT WON'T MAKE ANY DIFFERENCE BUT AT LEAST I'M MAKING A PERSONAL STATEMENT

In Nepal, there is a festival called Kukur Tihar where people express gratitude to dogs for their loyalty and companionship.

In Vinnytsia, Ukraine, a female stork was widowed when her mate died. She is incubating her eggs and is unable to feed herself. Local residents have started feeding her.

Join me if you can at Tamworth Castle on July 21 - entry price includes a glass of Pimms! I'll be talking about Tamworth's Anglo-Saxon connections and on the trail of one Anglo-Saxon woman in particular... (no, not that one!) ticketsource.com/stedithas/athe…

Only the worst people can hurt an animal

For years, an old man has been caring for this ray ever since it was a baby, feeding and looking after it. The ray recognizes him as its human grandfather and approaches him like a giant friendly sea pet.

@Helen_Fields I agree - the rich relatives could help out their poorer relatives? After all they managed to get rich?

I read a comment on this thread yesterday (no credit to me) that said…why does the male relative have enough cash to buy the child bride but not enough decency to help out financially to stop his relatives from starving. Whoever made that comment should be replacing the journalist who wrote this piece.

'An 18 year old Polish countess faces the death sentence in World War I on the Eastern Front. Tightly written and lyrical.' #YA Editor's Choice: Beyond Seven Forests by Amanda McCrina, reviewer Lyn Miller-Lachmann historicalnovelsociety.org/reviews/beyond…

@BhattiLaib9960 Odin

@historyinmemes The Stasi was not just a spy agency it was a tool of oppression ask any former East German who is old enough to remember that regime...

@historyinmemes 4.According to the International Rehabilitation Council for Torture Victims, there are between 300,000 & 500,000 victims of these gross human rights violations The Stasi employed over 90,000 full-time staff maintained a massive network of up to 500,000 unofficial collaborators

A Stasi operative photographs a Central Intelligence Agency operative who is simultaneously photographing him in return during the 1960s. During the Cold War, East Germany’s Ministry for State Security — better known as the Stasi — operated one of the most extensive domestic surveillance systems in modern history. This photograph, usually dated to the 1960s, is often described as showing a Stasi operative photographing a suspected Central Intelligence Agency operative who was photographing him at the exact same time. The image became a powerful symbol of the constant cat-and-mouse atmosphere that defined Cold War espionage, where Eastern Bloc intelligence agencies and Western operatives were perpetually monitoring one another. The Stasi relied heavily on photography, hidden cameras, informants, and physical surveillance to track both foreign intelligence targets and ordinary East German citizens. By the 1980s, the agency employed around 90,000 official personnel and oversaw a vast network of civilian informants spread throughout East Germany. On both sides of the Iron Curtain, intelligence officers regularly carried out counter-surveillance operations, creating a world in which spies were often watching other spies while simultaneously trying not to be watched themselves.

@wat17969 @yaakovkatz @Dauntbooks irishtimes.com/culture/books/…

@yaakovkatz @Dauntbooks

Am in London for a few work meetings, and stopped by a bookstore. This time it was @Dauntbooks. As expected, and perhaps unsurprisingly given the current climate, the Middle East section was front and center. As you can see in the photos, prominently displayed were books accusing Israel of genocide, books about alleged Israeli war crimes in Gaza, books about the so-called occupation and of course @PeterBeinart’s latest book about his problem being Jewish while watching the Jewish state defend itself. What was nowhere to be found? Rachel Goldberg-Polin’s “When We See You Again”. Didn’t make a difference that it was number one on the @nytimesbooks bestseller list. “While Israel Slept” was obviously not there as well. The one exception was Eli Sharabi’s “Hostage” almost missed on a whole different bookcase. This is not accidental. It is by design. Bookstores like this don’t curate books for intellectual diversity or genuine scholarship. They curate to promote a narrative. When I was younger - and probably more naive - I used to think bookstores were meant to provide readers with a range of titles that could get people to think, could encourage debate and could expand minds. Now too many seem interested in something else entirely: narrowing them.

Just a dog having the best day of its life.

Members of the Women Courage Movement in Afghanistan continue to raise their voices despite threats, writing on walls against child marriage. Child marriage is a violation of human dignity and a threat to the future of children. The world must not stay silent. Where is the UN?