xmascard 06: credits, comments
- This year's theme seemed to sum up the mess we are in, a year when so many
hopes were dashed in so many ways while we continued ignoring the global
consequences of our short-sighted society's myopic march into the future.
Global warming is only one blind spot. The increasing militarism of the USA
that is not fighting for truth or justice or the mythical American way has
had major unpleasant consequences for so many people around the world and
this year especially in the Middle East and nearby parts, yet most Americans
are relatively clueless about our place in the world or are trapped in some
dogmatic worldview that has little basis in reality.
Still too much to deal with in a card sent
with a touch of humor to keep connections alive with many people we have met
scattered over the planet.
Notes:
- Al Gore's movie: An
Inconvenient Truth. If you can't see the movie, spare a few moments for
the website:
http://www.climatecrisis.net/. And while you're at it, maybe a glance at
Fast Food Nation would not
hurt. As for the various wars, one film is not enough to uncover the ugly
truths.
-
Hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil: an English language saying
that not everyone has heard perhaps, possibly of Japanese origin.
- "War...": with the
disaster in Lebanon that affected us directly, and the mess in Iraq that has
killed so many (realistic numbers denied by those responsible of course),
and the increasing violence in the occupied territories (not to mention the
genocide in Darfur), bob had to make
some reference to it all.
Listen to the sound clip of the song on-line.
- Photos:
Rockefeller Center off 5th Avenue in NYC, with its annual Christmas tree,
photo by Raffi.
May wedding: Sabrina and Kester in Rome; Chiara, daughter of Adele and
Gianpaolo, joined by an earlier April Rome wedding, another weekend visit by
ani and bob.
An occasional stop at the Coffee Kiosk in the indoor atrium behind Trump
Tower on 5th Avenue NYC on our frequent but not quite annual December trip
to Manhattan.
-
Remembrances:
Leopold Halpern, physicist and so many other things...
Maurizio Cosma, G9 rome system manager.
Etc.:
-
The color of the paper this year was lavender (Kinko's name: orchid) to
match the lavender 39 cent wedding stamp, which was the closest we could get
to a Love stamp (it has a heart in the design, with a dove or some bird), of
which there was none for sale this season for the first time in many years.
For international mailings we discovered that Air Mail stamps were a thing
of the past (we were ignorant of their demise), and just got the only 84
cent stamp for mail to most of the world to save time with the stamping. In
our haste to get this out before Christmas (Christmas morning we had to be
on a 6am flight for Punta Cana, for 7 day all-inclusive resort beach
vacation), about 20 envelopes---almost all air mail---did not get stamps
somehow, and were waiting for us upon our New Year return to resend. Better
late than never still applies.
-
This annual enterprise to sent out to about 460 recipients all over the
world now costs almost 400 bucks for photocopying, envelopes, stamps,
address labels and return addresses. Confirming our
negative profit status. Sure it would be
better spent helping some just cause, but this is the price of bob's desire
to stay in contact with a lot of good people.