This supercollider is the one that **was** going to be built in Waxahachie, Texas before he Republican Congress dubbed the “Republican Revolution” came into power in 1994.  This work *could* have been done in the United States.  Instead, we have outsourced our place as the leader of innovation and cutting-edge science to other countries that do not spend over half of their annual budget on making military contractors rich.  Furthermore, Jesse’s knee-jerk reaction to condemn science is so typical among Americans these days that we now have a country in which the majority of people (a) think its a good idea to teach the Bible in public schools, (b) think that Creationism should be taught in science class, and (c) deny that Global Warming is even happening despite the mountains of evidence.  where did my country develop this irrational fear of science????  and what’s so crazy is that they are not scared of science that they *should* be scared of such as genetic modification of food and so-called “clean coal” power plants.

Hi All, it’s been a while I know! Partly my lack of emails is because i’m not very good at keeping in touch (as pointed out very clearly by my sister last week!) and partly because I didn’t think I had that much to report. I’m settled here now and my life has it’s routine just like it did in the UK. That’s what I thought until I had an instant-messenger conversation with a friend a couple of nights ago:
Me: “Everything’s good here, very quiet really, except for the birds, spring is definitely here!”
Neil: “I read things were bad in Hebron, have you been back recently?”
Me “Oh yes, i was there last week and couldn’t leave cos the army invaded and sealed off the checkpoint. The settlers had driven a JCB into the Old city- they want to expand their colony and were trying to knock down some Palestinian owned shops. Oh, and Beit Jala was raided early yesterday morning- I slept through it! And another raid into Bethlehem, I swear I’m bad luck, everytime I go to do my shopping the army seem to follow me! Not so quiet then I guess…”

After only 5 months this has all become a bit normal for me. If I don’t see it happening with my own eyes i hear of it on the radio or TV- everyday- Hebron, Tubas, Nablus, Jenin, a village, a refugee camp raided, one teenager dead, one child shot but still alive, several with rubber bullet injuries, an elderly woman collapsed from tear gas inhalation. A couple of days ago Al Walajah was raided just as my friend Ahamd was leaving his home. They had come to arrest a 17 year old boy. The only reason Ahmad told me was because it was part of a funny story about the bad day he’d had- it started with the army raiding his village and making him late for school, then at school he got into trouble for being late from the headmaster, he was kept back after school but couldn’t call to tell his brother as his phone had no credit….etc etc. An army helicopter and harrassment from fully armed soldiers was just an incinental part of his story.
This isn’t accidental, this normalisation of daily violence and injustice, it’s a survival strategy. When I’d been here for about three months I went through a period when i couldn’t sleep. Whenever i tried my mind would begin to wander and i’d strart thinking and getting upset about things I’d seen and heard that day: my friend Wael worrying about money, playing with the four lovely children that he’s so worried about finding the money to feed, remembering going through the Bethlehem checkpoint and having to explain in bad arabic how it all worked to a bewildered woman visiting her family for the first time if 5 years or remebering that i’d noticed that the construction of the aparthied wall was creeping ever closer to Walajeh or thinking about a report on Al Jazeera that quoted Condaliza Rice saying that sanctions on Palestine wouldn’t lifted until Hamas recognised Israels right to exist and another report that said that the number of illegal Israeli colonies had increased again during 2006 and…….
It was driving me crazy, and this isn’t even my country…
I told a friend about this and asked how he coped with it day in day out. He said that he’d stopped himself thinking about it. If he saw a soldier beating a friend at a checkpoint he’d cry about it there and then, and then push all feelings and memories of it aside and lock them away. If he didn’t, he’d go mad. He advised me to stop watching Al Jazeera just before I go to bed.
So this is what i’ve done. Most nights I manage to fall asleep, if i feel my mind wandering i gather up those memories and put them aside. I have wild and crazy dreams and wonder what this is doing to my mental health, but at least i am sleeping.

And all of this after just 5 months. Just imagine what it must be like if this was your country, your entire life, past present and foreseeable future….

Two weeks in Bethlehem (a city smaller than Leeds):
Bethlehem city raided three times.
Aida Camp raided twice
Al Walajah village raided one
Al Khader village raided once
Al Souwara village raided once
Beit Jala raided twice
16 taken to unknown locations by the Israeli army.

www.palestinecampaign.org
www.bigcampaign.org.uk
www.enoughoccupation.org

Sx
P.S. It was 23ºC here yesterday, spring in Palestine is beautiful!

And I realize that he, Mr. English, is not the only guy.  I look around and notice there are so many attractive looking guys in the world.  For example, look at Mr.  Italian!  He looks gorgeous, cheerful and friendly.  I imagine I can have a great time with him.  So, I decide to break up with my boyfriend, tell him that we should have some time apart, and leave him for handsome Mr. Italian!

Mr Italian and I hit it off very well from the beginning.  For the first several weeks, I feel thrilled by every experience with my new boyfriend.  He gives me new perspectives and pleasant surprises, which have been missing in the relationship with my ex.  Even our differences amuse me. (I even find our differences amusing.)  More than anything, I’m happy to see my improvement every day.  Could he be my soulmate?

However, after the honeymoon, things start to change.  He begins to show me his dark sides.  He looks happy-go-lucky, but deep inside, he’s complicated and difficult to get along with.  I am disappointed to find that his amiable manner is just superficial.  For instance, when I tell him that I’ll see a friend of mine, he always asks if the friend is male or female… always!  My ex-boyfriend was not so nervous.  He had only surprised me by asking whether I wanted to see one friend or a few friends.

I now realize how simple my life was with my old flame.  Suddenly, a lot of memories come back to me – how I first met him, our first fight and making up… Hey, I miss my ex!  OK, I know he has a lot of negative aspects, but I think I can handle them because I’ve become used to them in our long relationship.

After all, he’s my Mr. Right.

So, I dump Mr. Italian and go back to Mr. English.  Acknowledging I was wrong, I tell him I’ve realized how much I loved him after leaving him.  And I ask him if he’ll give me another chance.

Mr. English opens his arms to me and we get back together again.  I’m trying to make things work and feel comfortable being with him, at least for now.  Still, the world is full of temptations.  I may have another fling or a one-night stand if I get tired of our relationship again.  Because, some guys are just irresistible, you know?  Hey, that’s Mr. Arabic.  Doesn’t he look exotic?

I am back in the states after my 7 month trip to Southern Mexico where I
spent mid July until December learning from and photographing the
incredible uprising occurring in Oaxaca followed by two months in Chiapas.
In Olympia this week, through photos, video clips, and stories, I hope to
share the spirit and creativity of the teachers strike turned full scale
popular rebellion that managed to take control of the city for multiple
months demanding the resignation of the corrupt state governor, Ulises
Ruiz Ortiz. My presentation will cover the reality that led to the
uprising, the media and government building takeovers, the 1,800
neighborhood barricades, the formation of the Popular Assembly of the
Peoples of Oaxaca (APPO), and the brutal repression and assassinations of
movement members at the hands of paramilitaries and police. Witnessing
this diverse movement in Oaxaca has left me truly inspired and
re-energized. In the face of grave government repression the people of
Oaxaca are continuing this struggle and in great need of international
solidarity.

For those of you in Olympia my presentation will occur twice this week…

[ email ROB if you want deets ]

Please feel free to forward this on to lists and individuals who you feel
may be interested!
Hope to see you there.
Thanks for following my travels…
with love…
Rochelle

It has been quite some time since I sent out a report from my time here in
Chiapas. I have been working with Frayba, a human rights organization
that sends internationals into Zapatista and other indigenous communities
to do peace observing work, documenting any threats or actions against the
communities by paramilitaries as well as any movement by the Mexican
military. It has been an incredible experience and I am hoping to spend
two more weeks in a community before I begin the long road home. I was
also fortunate to be able to atten the International Zapatista Encounter
that was held at the beginning of this month. I have included my report
back from that event below. In the middle of February I will be returning
to Oaxaca briefly to say goodbye to some folks and learning about the
latest developments in the struggle. I will then be back in the Northwest
for a couple weeks before flying to Sweden.

I am hoping to do at least one public slide show report back in Olympia in
early March. If anyone would like to help out in coordinating or
publicizing that event or if anyone has further ideas of opportunities for
me to share stories from the Oaxaca struggle, please let me know.
Although Even though the movement has been in hiding and happening behind
the scenes now due to the severe governmental repression, I have truly
been re-energized by the people of Oaxaca and want to share that with my
limited time in the states. The creativity and diversity of tactics,
widespread nature of the mobilization and the creation of an alternative
governing structure are incredibly inspiring not to mention Oaxaca needs
the eyes and solidarity work of the international community now as much as
ever.

As my trip is wrapping up I want to thank you all for listening to stories
from my travels and from all the exciting movement building going on here
in Mexico.

with love…
rochelle

Unbreakable Dignity: Report from the Zapatista International Encounter

Prior to the Zapatista uprising, for generations, the 700,000 indigenous
people of Chiapas have lived in oblivion. From the perspective of the
global economy, being neither large consumers or producers, they have been
ignored and simply in the way. The endless appetite of the global economy
has resulted in, according to Subcomandante Marcos (leader of the
Zapatista Army), “the destruction of our land, our culture, our collective
way of working, the destruction of our women, the lack of appreciation for
our elders, and the merchandising of our youth. All of this, including
the lack of maintenance of our educational system and the social security
system is for the benefit of the grand capital extranjero [foreigner].” On
New Years Day 1994, the first day NAFTA took effect, the Zapatista
National Liberation Army rose up and took over municipalities throughout
Chiapas, birthing a movement which today continues not only to resist the
theft of their resources but is also creating alternative autonomous
governing bodies, schools, clinics, cooperatives and means of
communication. On December 29th to January 2nd the Zapatistas invited
internationals from around the world to come together for an Encounter
between the Zapatistas and the people of the World. The invitation stated
“At this encounter the Zapatista communities will speak on the experiences
we have had these past years with our autonomous governments; the
challenges and problems that we have faced constructing this
anti-capitalist project and we will try to, with humility and respect, to
respond, speak and exchange, and above all, share our errors and
stumbling, and also our modest achievements.”

Haves and the Have Nots

The gathering took place in Oventic, one of the five caracoles (municipal
seats) of the 32 Zapatista municipalities. On the way to the gathering,
driving through the rural villages one can clearly see that very little
money is making it to these communities. Federal and state government
policies have benefited the foreign investors that exploit resource rich
Chiapas and in turn line the pockets of the politicians and Mexican elite.
With this setup, the indigenous people are losing land and many have been
forced to migrate to the North, relocate to the urban centers or work on
large agribusiness farms to provide low wage labor. Racism from the
government is also clearly at work in Chiapas as shown in the poverty
statistics. In a community where the indigenous population is less than
10 percent, 18 percent of the people are at or below the poverty line; for
municipalities where the indigenous population is between 10 and 40
percent, 46 percent of the people are poor; and for those where the
indigenous make up more than 70 percent of the population, over 80 percent
are poor. The majority of the Zapatistas are Mayan Indians who live in
wood slat and mud houses with dirt floors and do not have running water
even though Chiapas provides close to 90% of the water consumed by the
rest of Mexico.

Encounter Begins

Recognizing the reality most of the Zapatistas live in it is clear where
the fuel came from to ignite this struggle, and yet with access to so few
resources it is hard to imagine what alternatives they could be capable of
creating. On the first day of the encounter thousands of Zapatistas who
attended the conference set up stick structures covered in black plastic
sheeting to sleep in for the duration of the encounter. In sharp
contrast, the 2,000 internationals from 44 countries began to set up fancy
tents. The structure of the encounter included a series of workshops
providing updates on the progress of the autonomous governments, schools,
health care systems, and cooperatives in each caracoles as well as the
struggles for land and for equality for women. I could feel such strong
unity and pride in the Zapatistas who attended the encounter and it was an
incredible experience to sit with them as the leaders they selected laid
out their accomplishments throughout the workshops.

The tactics of the Zapatistas have been extremely diverse throughout the
thirteen year struggle from the initial armed uprising and government
negotiations to the creation of the autonomous communities. The Mexican
government response has been fairly consistent and limited to the use of
force and intimidation mixed with rhetoric and promises never fulfilled.
Even within this climate, much has been accomplished as in achieving
autonomy as highlighted by the workshops. As one of the representatives
explained “Because we can not change the world we struggle so that the
world will not change us.” Reports from three of the workshops are
included below.

Autonomous Education

From the internationally recognized health clinics to the primary and
secondary schools, many of the communities are receiving services they
never received from the government, often with support of NGOs and
internationals. The Zapatista educational promoters, who are chosen by
their communities to develop schools and train teachers from within the
community, explained that the government schools their children used to
attend were staffed mostly by teachers from the city who spoke only
Spanish. “The government schools discriminated against the indigenous
culture, language and traditions of our youth. They did not respond to
our realities in the villages. They prepared our kids for the city, not
to stay in our communities.” Many parents decided to pull their students
out of the government schools with the hopes of creating autonomous
schools that “teach liberation, not domination” and “the value of being
not having.” Schools have been constructed in all five of the caracoles
and many recently celebrated the graduation of their first class.
Although the teachers are not paid the community provides them with food.
Each region also expressed a lack of resources to train future promoters
and to build new schools. Their eyes lit up as they shared the largest
dream of one day establishing an autonomous university.

Autonomous Governments

The representatives of the caracoles are selected through
their community
for a three year term. They can not run again to give all opportunity for
leadership and to prevent people from becoming disconnected from the
community and power hungry. They too do not receive payment but the
community also provides them with food. Initially when the government
councils were first created they were male dominated but today there are 6
women and 7 men. Although clearly they have the capacity to govern
themselves, the representatives explained that they have faced many
challenges with few resources and villages with great need. The leaders
stressed the huge contrast between themselves and the bad governments,
those who run the state and country. For example, unlike the corrupt
justice system throughout Mexico, the caracol representatives deal with
conflicts by first attempting to find a solution through dialogue and
compromise and if no compromise is reached the one who is found wrong must
complete work to benefit the community, like the construction of a bridge.
Repeatedly the representatives stressed that they “lead by obeying” and
“propose not impose” with “humility and no self promotion.”

Struggle for Land

Due to armed uprising in 1994 many wealthy landowners abandoned their
land. The Zapatistas have reclaimed much of this land to work
collectively to sustain their communities. “The land belong to those who
work it” and “to sell the land, would be to sell our mother.” Each region
faces different struggles over land. The threat of losing land remains
strong and paramilitary activity continues with intimidation and even the
murder of Zapatista community members. Currently in the Aguazul region the
government is attempting to force a Zapatista community off the land by
the creation of an ecotourist destination, which will also allow the
government to exploit water reserves and other resources. Also the
implementation of neoliberal programs by the government, such as PROCEDE,
also work to destroy the possibility of collectively worked lands. “Today
we are living a global offense of exploitation, of being kicked off our
lands, and of a development of politics that will destroy us. The only way
to confront this is by struggling for the impossible, or in other words,
the necessary,” explains Sergio Rodriguez from the Zapatista Rebeldía
magazine. The lands that they have recuperated are farmed organically
without the use of genetically modified seed. Agro-ecology promoters have
recently been selected to educate themselves and then their community on
sustainability practices.

Life of Resistance

On January 1st at close to 2a.m. in the morning, Subcomandante Marcos and
many members of the Zapatista National Liberation Army arrived to
celebrate the thirteenth anniversary of the rebellion. The cultural event
lasted for hours with music and dance. In the indigenous language of
Tzotzil, Marcos stated “What we have learned on the road of our struggle
is that we could not win unless we united with the people who struggle
everywhere.” The Zapatistas need the support of internationals to achieve
their goals in the face of an system that continuously tries to eliminate
them. As they establish stronger and stronger concrete alternatives their
threat to the system grows. The eyes of internationals are critical in
preventing the human rights abuses the Mexican government is notorious
for. We have a long way to go to cross the cultural barriers necessary to
provide the ultimate solidarity but on the last night looking through the
mist out on to the basketball court where thousands of internationals and
Zapatistas were dancing together to traditional music, it felt possible.
As I watched the dancers, many in their early twenties, I realized that
the rebellion began for many of these Zapatistas when they were less than
ten years old, they have truly lived a life of resistance. Throughout the
length of the encounter I was struck by their humble spirit mixed with the
depth of their accomplishments, not only the autonomous governments,
schools, clinics, radio stations, coffee and craft collectives but also
the incredible wealth of beauty in their vision and their unity.

This is why the entire debate about the Iraq “surge” is as much a sideshow as Britney’s scalp. More troops in Baghdad are irrelevant to what’s going down in Afghanistan and Pakistan. The surge supporters who accuse the Iraq war’s critics of emboldening the enemy are trying to deflect attention from their own complicity in losing a bigger battle: the one against the enemy that actually did attack us on 9/11. Who lost Iraq? is but a distraction from the more damning question, Who is losing the war on terrorism?

We already have 4G in Japan…. and it is already too slow but boasts speeds of 100mbps.
3g is only good for non-mobile systems. It only goes a max of 384kbps for mobile systems, and that is if it has a good connection…

Dude explained:

beacause the US is so concerned with “preserving the free market”, our
government refuses to mandate a standard. Therefore, we have
competing standards and no one wants to risk buying and deploying the
wrong standard. In addition, we have a state (and federal)
legislature that is woefully ill-prepared for considering such issues,
and they have been swindled by the telecom industry who has lobbied
them to believe that making it illegal for municipalities to deploy
free WiFi networks is in the public interests. It is argued that the
public sector is inherently ill-equipped to handle such a high-tech
utility and will ultimately result in mismanagement and excessive
taxpayer expense. Of course the truth is that huge telecom copmanies
like AT&T (Formerly SBC), Verizon, Time Warner, etc. want to force
people to buy WiFi and they conjure up these tortured arguments so
that they can make more money at the expense of progress. The result
is that Japan has 4G WiFi all over the city and in subways and other
difficult areas, and that most major cities in the US have spotty
cellular service for which people pay through the nose, and no free
WiFi. Isn’t laissez faire capitalism awesome!?!?

So I have been experiencing some sort of writers block. I had intended to
send this update last week but ended up needing some time to reflect and
decompress. The repression by the Mexican government that I described on
the 25th has continued. On October 29th the government leaked that they
had compiled a list of 100 internationals from video footage who they
alleged were committing vandalism alongside the movement and who they
intended to deport. I am not sure I believe such a list exists (not to
mention I have never seen close to 100 internationals in Oaxaca), it may
have simply been a fear tactic but mixed with the news that they had
picked up a french woman and her lawyers were unable to speak to her or
find out where she was, I decided it was best to go. I had been in Oaxaca
for so long and I don’t exactly blend in and I did not want to risk
deportation, not to mention rape and torture. If I had stayed I would
have been stuck in my apartment and decided I could do more just as much
writing from a far. So now I am in San Cristóbal Chiapas and looking
forward to attending an international encounter planned by the Zapatistas
at the end of this month. Then I hope to spend the last month and a half
doing volunteer work in the Zapatista villages in the jungle. On the way
home I will stop in Oaxaca to say goodbye to many folks and check in with
the situation. I will be in the Olympia/Portland area for two weeks the
end of February through early March and would love to do a slide show and
reportback of the Oaxaca struggle if anyone is willing to help me find a
space and do a bit of publicity. Let me know if you are interested. Ok,
enough about me. On to the current situation…

There have been over 500 people detained, many tortured by the government
throughout the 6 months of this struggle. Currently there are over 200
imprisoned, over 100 of them have been transferred to federal prison in
states outside Oaxaca. Stories coming out of these prisons include
stories of torture, 60 reports of sexual assault, rape threats and forced
confessions. There are still many outstanding arrest warrants for members
of APPO. Because one of the major goals of APPO has been to create a
democratic governance structure, they have been highly transparent and the
names of those involved and elected as representatives of various regions
are easily found in meeting minutes and online. This has made it easy for
the government to target those involved in the movement. The police have
made numerous private home searches and have taken teachers from in front
of their students in their classrooms (in front of children as young as
kindergardeners). Governor Ulises himself recently acknowledged that up
to 80% of those detained on the 25th were not associated with APPO but
were concerned citizens in the streets.

On December 1st, Felipe Calderon from the conservative PAN party who took
the election through fraud was inaugurated. Thousands gathered outside
before dawn, constructing barriers to prevent Calderon’s entrance into the
Chamber of Deputies. Inside brawls had broken out between member of the
PAN and PRD (the party of leftist Lopez Obrador who was cheated out of the
position) parties. Chairs had been thrown, doors blockaded, pillows were
handed out the members of the different parties had fought over sleeping
on the platform where the inauguration was to take place. A fake
presidential convoy was used to distract the demonstrators while Calderon
snuck in through basement parking garage. The entire ceremony took less
than 4 minutes and it was impossible to hear over the screaming from PRD
members.

Calderon was able to give a speech later in a military installation. I
watched on television as he spoke to an audience of men in uniform
standing in formation. Oh democracy. In less that a month he has already
made cuts to education and has created a cabinet including Francisco
Javier Ramírez Acuña as his Interior Minister, in charge of domestic
security. Ramírez, past governor of Jalisco, was accused by Amnesty
International of serious human rights violations, including ordering a
brutal crackdown on anti-corporate globalization protesters. Eduardo
Medina Mora was selected as Secretary of Public Safety. He has strong ties
to banking interests and is a member of El Yunque, an ultraconservative
group similar to the Christian right in the states. Making his policy
clear in dealing with social uprising, on December 4th members of APPO
including two highly visible elected reps were arrested in Mexico city two
hours after announcing they had come to negotiate with the federal
government.

On December 3rd APPO released a declaration stating… “The APPO is more
alive than ever in the hearts of the workers, indigenous people,
campesinos, housewives, students, youth, children, and all the exploited
and oppressed in Oaxaca and Mexico. The State Terror that has been
unleashed on the people of Oaxaca and the international community with
increased brutality since November 25 has not weakened our desire to be
free men and women.” A march was held on December 10th. Even in the face
of the incredible risk of being arrested and tortured tens of thousands
marched calling for the release of prisoners and continuing the call for
Governor Ulises to go. The march was led by families of the disappeared,
representatives of APPO and senators from Lopez Obradors PRD party.

The movement has taken a huge blow through the fierce repression but the
logic that you can simply wash over a movement with fresh paint and jail,
disappear and torture its members without acknowledging the root cause of
the unrest shows the barbaric and shortsightedness of the government
strategy to deal with this movement. So much of this response is created
through pressure from the United States to maintain the status quo to keep
the positive climate for foreign investors to come in and take the
resources and exploit the labor of Mexico without opposition from the ever
growing poor, which in turn keeps the pockets of the Mexican elite lined
with dollars. This corruption and repression is facing greater and
greater resistance and we can recognize our own role in the situation and
support the movement however we deem possible. The Zapatistas have called
for an International Day of Action on December 22nd in solidarity with
people of Oaxaca. I will include that declaration below.

Thanks for listening and keeping the people of Oaxaca in your minds…
rochelle

Communique of the Indigenous Revolutionary Clandestine Committee – General
Command of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation. Mexico.

December 2 of 2006

To the people of Mexico:
To the people of the world:

Brothers and Sisters:

The attack that our brothers, the people of Oaxaca suffered and suffer
cannot be ignored by those who fight for freedom, justice and democracy in
all corners of the planet.

This is why, the EZLN calls on all honest people, in Mexico and the world,
to initiate, starting now, continual actions of solidarity and support to
the Oaxacan people, with the following demands:

For the living reappearance of the disappeared, for the freedom of the
detained, for the exit of Ulises Ruiz and the federal forces from Oaxaca,
for the punishment of those guilty of torture, rape and murder.

We call to those in this international campaign to tell, in all forms and
in all places possible, what has occurred and what is occurring in Oaxaca,
everyone in their way, time and place. We call for these actions to come
together in a worldwide mobilization for Oaxaca on December 22, 2006.

The people of Oaxaca are not alone. We have to say so and demonstrate it,
to them and to everyone.
Democracy!
Freedom!
Justice!

By the Indigenous Revolutionary Clandestine Committee – General Command of
the Zapatista Army of National Liberation. Mexico.

Insurgent Subcommander Marcos.
Mexico, December of 2006

So do me a favour, think about how this would make you feel, spare us
a thought over the holidays, and next time you hear about Hamas
refusing to recognise Israels right to exist bear in mind the
continuous humiliations and tragedies inflicted on every Palestinian:
man, woman and child.

Suzy xx