The Salvation Army Temple Band

The Salvation Army Temple Band of Mississauga sent a small group to represent them in Square One Mall. This group played Christmas carols with their big, deep, brass sound. They were in the mall yesterday, and I stayed listening to them to the very end (about an hour's worth of music). I managed to take these photos during that time.

I tried to find out more about their program, but I couldn't so far. I would think they will be back soon. Christams season has only just started.


Under a twinkling tree


Waiting for donations


The band leader


Jokes during the break


Changing the guard

[Photos By: KPA]
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Posted By: Kidist P. Asrat
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New York Just About Any Time

The movie You've Got Mail takes place in a tiny radius of the Upper West Side of New York City, which cleverly fits the film's story of two people interacting through "the internet" using pseudonyms. It is a silly romantic story, but it is earnest, and truthful. I like the perseverance of the main characters, determined to get the best of, or at least some happiness in, life.

But, I like it especially because it is the part of New York I know better than other parts (although it is a little further south then I am accustomed to, although the neighborhood - the shops, coffee houses, parks, newspaper kiosks - looks exactly the same). And for all the "big cityness" of New York, it is very much a city of neighborhoods. The two main characters of You've Got Mail hardly venture out of ten blocks from their neighborhood, and bump into each other in the grocery store, the coffee houses, and the bookstores.

On my next trip to New York, I will try to visit these places, as seen in You've Got Mail.

Unfortunately, the Shop Around the Corner was a fictitious place, and it is now an uninteresting dry cleaners. Here is the history of the location, at 69th St., between Broadway and Columbus::

For the exterior, they filmed at Maya Shaper’s Cheese and Antique Shop, which has since closed sadly. Then, it turned into Cafe Sonatina, which has also shut down. These days, it’s La Mode Cleaners.

I have to add that everyone criticizes Meg Ryan, but I find her authentic, and a good actress.


Verdi Square: Broadway and 72nd St., in the Fall


Verdi Square Greenmarket, late summer
I'm not sure if the film's Verdi Square Greenmarket on 72nd St. and Broadway,
as shown in the film on still exists,
but NYC.gov lists several outdoor markets in the Upper Westside,
at 79th, 97th, and 125th street.


72nd Street Subway


The Starbucks on 81st. and Broadway


Kathleen's apartment on 89th and Riverside Drive


Joe Fox's apartment which says 152 Riverside Drive in the film is
in on 210 Riverside Drive along West 93rd Street


Zabar's, on 80th and Broadway


Barney Greengrass Deli, between 86th and 87th street on Amsterdam


Gray's Papaya, 72nd and Broadway


Cafe Lalo, on 83rd between Broadway and Amsterdam


L'Occitane, somewhere around Broadway and 70th and 80th


Ocean Grill Restaurant, on Columbus Ave and 78th St.


91st Street Garden in Riverside Park, in Spring


Kathleen in her "Shop Around the Corner" putting up Christmas Decorations
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Posted By: Kidist P. Asrat
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The Ferguson Riots

Left: The burnt down Fashion R boutique
Right: Bertha Ewing (left) manager, and Juanita Morris, the owner of Black-owned Fashion R boutique
The interview with CNN is here
Laura Wood at The Thinking Housewife has posted an intelligent commentary on the Ferguson Riots.

Interestingly, Ben Carson, who is getting ready to start his run for the presidential race, said something very similar on Hannity's Fox News program a couple of nights ago. I've been looking for the direct quote, but he essentially said that he wants more information on why the police officer (Wilson) had to shoot and kill Michael Brown.

Hannity was a little bewildered by this comment. He said something to the effect that as this giant of a man was charging at the officer, then the officer had no choice but to shoot. I think Hannity missed the point (he finished off the interview right after that and didn't let Carson explain further). I think that what Carson meant was why it had to be a lethal shot, rather than an incapacitating shot.

I think Hannity didn't post the video because he was surprised by it. He expected Carson to say that Wilson was cornered, and shot in self-defense (Hannity made this "explanation" himself as he wrapped up the interview).

I have a slightly different take on this.

There is no doubt that Brown was an imposing man. Wilson had also heard about the robbery earlier, and the description of the thief fit Brown's physique.

Wilson described the approaching Morgan as "demonic." I think Wilson was temporarily "blinded" by this large, approaching figure. Combine that with the prevalent racial tensions everywhere in America, where whites have always to be super-cautious and blacks can be belligerent even towards the police, then I can see where Wilson behaved the way he did.

I watched the Fox News report on the riots (it is hard to call them demonstrations).

I just kept thinking how sad it all was. Was this all that there is left, complete mayhem?

My sadness was justified, since many of these businesses were actually owned by blacks (see top image and corresponding CNN story). So, the riot, which was supposed to protest racism of whites against blacks, ended up with blacks destroying the hard-earned buildings (often one-room businesses) of other fellow blacks.

The whole thing was also fascinating to watch, how an entire city was hijacked by something outside reason, as though some evil force was flowing through like thick lava spilling through the streets as it engulfs and destroys everything along its way.

And even as lucid and astute as Carson may be, he still is reacting within this hyper-saturated racial atmosphere, which led to the incredible two nights of unchecked mayhem of fire and rocks and a demonic environment.

But, as usual with this stories on race, there is more.

According to the journalist Debbie Schlussel, the owner of the convenience store which Morgan robbed used the store as a front for laundering money and arms to the PLO.

She writes:

When I learned that the market Michael Brown robbed was called “Ferguson Market & Liquor,” the name rang a bell. And one of my twitter followers (follow me on Twitter) reminded me that I’d written about its owners’ 2008 indictment for laundering money to and financing of Palestinian Islamic “entities” after an FBI Terrorism Task Force investigation, using the store as a front for that operation. They later pleaded guilty to the scheme. Here’s a flashback:

Fourteen people have been indicted on charges of using convenience stores to trade in stolen goods and contraband cigarettes, sending the profits to groups in the Palestinian territories. Five stores were raided Tuesday as part of an alleged racketeering organization and at least nine people were arrested, authorities said. The FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force was involved in the investigation.

The indictment . . . said that since 2000, the organization profited from bank and wire fraud, receipt of stolen property and sales of contraband cigarettes. The organization, led by 33-year-old Bassam Hamed, operated convenience stores that were used to sell stolen goods, Hanaway said. He and two of his brothers were among the 14 people charged.

The indictment . . . said members of the “Hamed Organization” transferred money to “entities” in the Palestinian territories. Officials would not disclose those entities but said they were not individuals.

As I noted then, the “entities” probably had names like HAMAS, Islamic Jihad, Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, etc. Sadly, the men got very light sentences after pleading guilty to racketeering and money-laundering.

It is no wonder that Wilson felt the evil of this incident.

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Posted By: Kidist P. Asrat
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Giving Thanks for the Power of Beauty

For some reason, I felt compelled to post the photographs I selected to display at my presentation at the Power of Beauty conference.

Perhaps it was a sub-conscious desire to reflect on beauty, in the intense manner I had to while preparing for the conference. Perhaps it is the lack of beauty I see around me, and trying to figure out what to give thanks about.

Ultimately, all we have is our strife and struggle, our effort. It is not enough to talk and discuss, as is the norm these days, or to relinquish the reigns to other powers. We have to look for that beauty, grab it, and make it stay. It is a fight we're in.

But, at the same time, by looking at beauty, and reflecting on beauty, we (I) begin to realize that there is indeed much to be thankful for, even an old, dog-eared, photograph with its colors faded but its image still there.


Cliffs of Dover



Devant La Madeleine



Dover College Library



Susquehanna Valley Sunset



Sous Les Toits de Paris



Northern Spirit: Canada



Fourth of July, New York



Riverside Drive, New York



Franciscan University, Steubenville, Ohio
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Posted By: Kidist P. Asrat
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Happy Thanksgiving

Norman Rockwell (1894-1978)
Freedom From Want
1943
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Posted By: Kidist P. Asrat
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Return to the Classics

William A. Nathans
Photograph with Self Portrait
[Source: Academy of Realist Art]

I posted a portrait of Dietrich von Hildebrand by artist William A. Nathans in my last post.

Here is more on Nathans (from these sites here and here):

Education:
- Academy of Realist Art, Toronto, Ontario
- BFA Illustration School of Visual Arts, New York, New York

Experience:
- Academy of Realist Art, Toronto, Ontario
- Freelance Illustration Commissions
- Freelance Landscape Commissions
- Currently working on two commissioned portraits of
His Eminence Cardinal Justin Rigali Archbishop of Philadelphia

Exhibitions:
- Finalist for the Art Renewal Center’s 2006 Annual Juried Saloon Competition
- Connecticut Plein Air Painters Society at the Fine Art and Framing Gallery in Hartford, CT
- Mamaroneck Artists’ Guild Annual Small Works Show in Larchmont, NY
- Represented by the Mary Anderson Fine Art Gallery located on St. Simon’s Island, Georgia
- Finalist for the 2011 Portrait Society of American Competition

And from his Linked In page:

Fine Artist: oil painter
Fine Artist and Portraitist
April 2008 – Present (6 years 8 months)
Fine Artist trained in traditional oil painting technique working within the genres of portraiture, landscape, still-life and religious figurative works.

Spent 7 months of 2010 painting in Europe and completing 6 commissioned portraits and teaching two workshops in Temple Bar, Dublin, Ireland

Currently commissioned to paint portrait of His Eminence Cardinal J. Rigali of Philadelphia

Currently working on new portrait commission of His Eminence Cardinal Edwin F. O'Brien, Grand Master of the Equestrian Order of the Holy Knights in Jerusalem.

Recently returned from traveling for three months throughout Ireland painting plen air landscapes as well as teaching 5 workshops in Portrait and Figure Painting in Dublin, Ireland.

Recently completed commissioned portrait of His Eminence Cardinal Edwin F. O'Brien, Current Grand Master of the Equestrian Order of the Knights of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, now hanging in Vatican City.

And his CV:

William A. Nathans, Painter
b. 1981
Education:
- School of Visual Arts, BFA, 1999- 2003
- Academy of Realist Art Atelier, 2003-2006

Travelled throughout Europe, Great Britain and Ireland copying and studying Old Master works in museums

Commissions of Note: 2007-Present
- Invited to work in Zurich, Switzerland producing 11 portraits and several landscape paintings for private collections
- Commissioned to paint three Cardinals of the Roman Catholic Church, one of which hangs in Vatican City
- Currently Commissioned to paint His Eminence Cardinal Christoph Schonborn, Archbishop of Vienna, Austria and President of the Austrian Bishops' Conference
- Continue to work on private commissions globally

Teaching: 2008-Present
- Instructor at the Silvermine Guild of Art teaching Life Painting and Life Drawing
- Instructor of several workshops in Dublin, Ireland from 2010 to present teaching Life Painting and Drawing

Awards and Honors
- Finalist in the 2011 Portrait Society of America's International Portrait Competition held in Atlanta, GA

Additional Awards (Linked In page)
- Finalist with portrait "Sean" in the 2011 Portrait Society of America Competition.
- 2nd Place in Commissioned Portrait cat, for the Portrait Society of America Members Competition 2011
- 2nd place, CT Society of Portrait Artists "Faces of Spring" 08 "the Mackem and Tackem"
- Finalist, ARC 06 International Salon Show
Commissioned by His Eminence John Cardinal Foley to paint portrait hanging in Vatican City

And more on his training at the Acadamy of Realist Art, to study i the Classical Realist tradition. From the ARA website:

Will Nathans is a professional artist and instructor in the Classical Realist tradition who came to ARA after attaining a degree in Fine Arts. His vision was to refine his technical abilities and explore his passion for portraits and religious painting. After completing his studies at ARA, Will was selected over a number of international competitors to execute a commissioned portrait of His Eminence John Cardinal Foley in Rome.

Portrait of Dietrich von Hildebrand
Carbon Pencil on paper
By: William A. Nathans
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Posted By: Kidist P. Asrat
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Hildebrand: "a crisp, feisty writer...as he fought against the emerging Hitler regime"

Portrait of Dietrich von Hildebrand
Carbon Pencil on paper
By: William A. Nathans

Below is a quote from the review of My Battle Against Hitler by George Weigel, from the online journal First Things (which I received on the Hildebrang Project Facebook page):

"Here was a Hildebrand I’d never met before: a crisp, feisty writer, who wore his emotions on his literary sleeve as he fought against the emerging Hitler regime and the Catholic intellectuals who were seduced by it." 

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I keep saying (or thinking) that my trip to Steubenville, with all the obstacles I faced (here is an account of my trip to an email list), keeps unfolding in interesting, useful and encouraging ways as time goes by.

First, of course, is the invitation requesting my participation in the conference.

Then, I paid $30 for the book My Battle Against Hitler (it's an investment, I kept saying), which allowed me to participate in the online conference (which I've commented on here), and which allowed me to be a member of the Hildebrand Project, and also to make contact with a variety of people involved with the book, including book publishing.

Then, at some point in my presentation, or at least during the question and answer period, I made the connection between the nefarious world of the Nazis, intent on destroying the Judeo-Christian West, and our current Western-civilization-hating post-modern world. Here is my full presentation. Below, I've highlighted the parts where I say that we have been through this before.

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And it was while I was doing the Trillium piece that many things came together.

Art needs to be local. We need to “see” what we’re representing. That art needs to have an aesthetic dimension - it has to be beautiful. And that there is a spiritual dimension to art, not always, not aggressively, but still subtly and present.

I realized that modern artists were discarding these elements, and creating works that people couldn’t identify with. That their purpose was not to create works with beauty, rooted in reality and with a transcendent element, but to recreate their own godless transcendence, their own reality, and they discarded beauty as something frivolous which distracted from their own serious messages (usually of doom and gloom). The less talented of them went on with post-modernism, which was a distorted assemblage of objects to produce their “ironic” commentary on the world around them.

And multicultural artists were throwing away the reality that surrounds us, in Canada, and were bringing their own reality for their far-away lands, imbued with a strange and alien aesthetics.

When I put these two together, multiculturalism and modernism/post-modernism, I realized what was at stake here was the art I know, which I have studied and participated in from a very young age ever since my fateful journey to that most beautiful city. It was Western art that was at stake, made vulnerable by these aggressive elements which were not at all shy about demanding what they wanted: “Hey, hey, Ho ho, Western Culture’s Gotta go.”

I didn’t clearly articulate this then, but soon after, I started a blog called Camera Lucida working on the words “Chamber of Light” where I (rather immodestly!) could shed some light on the world around me. And a few years later, after many postings, altercations with readers, and a maturity of my thoughts, I started my blog (about a year and a half ago) my blog Reclaiming Beauty.

I started the blog on January 1, 2013 (a new blog for a new year), and on February 5, 2013 I wrote at Camera Lucida:

I have started a new project. It is bigger than a website.

I hope to reclaim beauty from the avant-garde, nihilistic environment that surrounds us. Rather than fight it, I thought I would start a site that would ba study of beauty, a critique our our current beautiless, or anti-beauty, environment, as well as a place to give and receive practical guides and accounts on how to acquire and reclaim the beautiful. I hope to have a list of regular contributors to the site, who will eventually become a part of a bigger movement.

And on September 29, 2013, I posted at my Reclaiming Beauty blog my proposal for a book, but with a bigger vision of starting a Beauty Movement:

My book Reclaiming Beauty aims to document the contribution that beauty has made toward our Western civilization, from the earliest records of God’s love of beauty, to a young child who sees beauty almost as soon as he is born. Our civilization thrived, prospered and matured because of beauty. Our great artists, architects, writers, philosophers and scientists have always referred to beauty with awe and wonder. It is in the modern era that beauty began to be undermined and eventually neglected by artists and other intellectual leaders.

Reclaiming Beauty will show that the abandonment of beauty leads to the death of culture, and eventually society. Modern man’s neglect of beauty has initiated the cult of ugliness, leaving us with bleakness and nihilism.

But, people want beauty. And they will surround themselves with some kind of aesthetic quality. Still, beauty is the business of the knowledgeable. The man on the street may be able to recognize beauty, but he would not be able to explain why it is beautiful. That is the task of the experts.

With Reclaiming Beauty, I aim to present my ideas, observations and analyses on beauty, and to provide a guide for recommendations on how to remove oneself from the nefarious influences of our beauty-rejecting world. This way, we can build a parallel world which will eventually form a growing movement of beauty-reclaiming individuals, who can start to shape a world where beauty is not minimized and rejected.

As I presented my ideas at the conference, I also said:

Our civilization thrived, prospered and matured because of beauty. Our great artists, architects, writers, philosophers and scientists have always referred to beauty with awe and wonder. It is in the modern era that beauty began to be undermined and eventually neglected by artists and other intellectual leaders. 

Reclaiming Beauty will show that the abandonment of beauty leads to the death of culture, and eventually society. Modern man’s neglect of beauty has initiated the cult of ugliness, leaving us with bleakness and nihilism.

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I should add that this world of bleakness and nihilism is ultimately the Gottedammerung that the Nazis were so ready to leave us with.

We need to continue with the battle that Hildebrand thought he had completed. We need more Hildebrands. Each one of us needs to draw out that heroism, bravery, and innocence for such a cause.

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Posted By: Kidist P. Asrat
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New York Just About Any Time

The movie You've Got Mail takes place in a tiny radius of the Upper West Side of New York City, which cleverly fits the film's story of two people interacting through "the internet" using pseudonyms. It is a silly romantic story, but it is earnest, and truthful. I like the perseverence of the main characters, determined to get the best of, or at least some happiness in, life.

But, I like it especially because it is the part of New York I know better than other parts (although it is a little further south then I am accustomed to, although the neighborhood - the shops, coffee houses, parks, newspaper kiosks - look exactly the same).

On my next trip to New York these are the places I will try to visit, as seen in You've Got Mail...

- Verdi Square: Broadway and 72nd St.




-Verdi Square Green Market
West 72nd & Broadway
Sat 8am-5pm
June to December




- 72nd Street Subway


- The Starbucks on 81 and Broadway



- Zabar's on 80th and Broadway


- Cafe Lalo on 83rd and Amsteram


- L'Occitane, somewhere around Broadway and 70th and 80th


- Ocean Grill Restaurant on Columbus Ave and 78th St.


- 91st Garden in Riverside Park



- New York in Christmas

Meg Ryan in her "Shop Around the Conrenr" putting up Christmas Decoarions

And just walking around the city, with each season eliciting "Don't you just love New York in...." (fill in the blank with: Fall, Winter, Summer and Spring). Joe ask Kathleen "Don't you just love New York in the Fall?" While Kathleen seems to like the Spring, or Christmas, or just about any time.
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Posted By: Kidist P. Asrat

"Sheep May Safely Graze"

Aria Four of Bach's Hunting Cantata: Sheep May Safely Graze.


San Francisco Early Music Ensemble Voices of Music
Sheep May Safely Graze, by J.S. Bach
Soprano: Susanne Ryden
Recorders: Hanneke van Proosdij and Louise Carslake
Viola da Gamba: William Skeen
Baroque chamber organ: Rodney Gehrke

The secular cantata Was mir behagt, ist nur die muntre Jagd! (‘The lively hunt is all my heart’s desire’, known as the ‘Hunt’ Cantata)...makes use of four solo singers, including two sopranos representing Diana and Pales. The instruments involved include two corni da caccia, recorders, two oboes and an oboe da caccia, basson, strings and continuo. Diana, in an opening recitative, sings of the pleasures of the hunt, continuing, in an aria appropriately accompanied by the two corni da caccia (hunting-horns), to declare hunting the pleasure of the gods. Later in the cantata, Pales, the goddess of sheep and flocks, follows suit. Her recitative leads to one of the most famous of all arias, widely known in English as ‘Sheep may safely graze’ (‘Schafe können sicher weiden’), words that, in context, have no religious connotation. [Source]

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Sheep may safely graze
Sheep can safely graze,
Where a good shepherd watches over them.
Where rulers are ruling well,
We may feel peace and rest
And what makes countries happy.

German:
Schafe können sicher weiden
Schafe können sicher weiden,
Wo ein guter Hirte wacht!
Wo Regenten wohl regieren,
Kann man Ruh und Friede spüren
Und was Länder glücklich macht!
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Posted By: Kidist P. Asrat
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The Meaning of Words

From Stilettos (and mini-skirts) to Sneakers (and sweaters): The Fox Five Bunch

The irritating commentary group The Five comes on periodically on Fox News. I don't know their schedule, and if I find them when I tune in, I listen for a while to see if they have anything worth listening to. Sometimes they do.

The infantile Greg Gutfeld, who almost always wears sneakers and some kind of sweater, and has his hair disheveled like a toddler, did have something to say yesterday.

The topic was Obama signing the two executive orders on Friday to delay deportation of illegal immigrants [KPA: I didn't know he signed them on Air Force One. Is this another of Obama's nonchalant and casual attitude when it comes to the laws, and the governing, of the United States?], then heading over to Las Vegas to rally support for his actions.

About two thirds into the video (below), which just has a portion of the hour-long program, Gutfeld talks about words that he says have been "abused." Gutfeld thinks he's a bit of a wordsmith, and adds his own embellishments usually at the end of the program, with words he declares "banned."



Gutfeld makes his case for a brief half a minute between 13:18 to 13:40 before he got interrupted. I've transcribed what he said:

America has a hard time trusting a President when the language keeps changing, when terrorism is "workplace violence." If breaking the law is considered "dreaming" [KPA: as in the Dream Act, Well Done Gutfeld!], consider the implications. Could theft be "A wish to own something?" We're screwing with the language so that the logic allows for a redefinition of abuses. So that almost anything could mean can mean anything. Rioting could mean...

Gutfeld was on a playful roll, but his dry co-hosts (one of the women is a lawyer) bring in the clearly obvious problems with these politicized words, and they drowned the insightful and amusing commentary Gutfeld was making. I think if he went any further, he would have brought up Orwell, 1984 (and probably Animal Farm), and how they relate (because they do!) to our present time.

The problem with "The Five" is that there are too many of them, they take themselves too seriously, and they are pedantically obvious. There is not much insight to be found there, except occasionally with Gutfeld, and if you can bear his sophomoric presence. Dana Perino is the most serious of the group, although she doesn't take herself as seriously as they do themselves), but she is strangely self-conscious. I don't think she has much practice in front of the camera like her other co-hosts, and she's probably thrown off by their juvenile banter.

Gutfeld has his own blog, so he probably has (or will have) this idea about Obama's words completed and written up somewhere.
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The Acrtic in Mississauga

C-Cafe, in Mississauga, has displayed fifteen of George Hunter's photographs
(visible in the back of the room, by the window).

There was a retrospective on the life and work of Mississauga (native) photographer George Hunter on November 7 at C-Cafe, which for some reason I missed. That's too bad! I suppose I should be more in tune with online announcements (the information was here), rather than other ways of publicity. Although, to the credit of the cafe folk, they do leave behind upcoming programs at their front tables, but I must have missed this one.

The announcement for the exhibition has this biography:

Mississauga’s George Hunter’s remarkable images span seven decades and
create memorable impressions of people and places from across Canada and
more than 100 countries world-wide. Appointed to the Royal Canadian Academy
of the Arts in 1977 and widely published, his work includes photo spreads in
TIME Magazine and a major exhibit by the National Film Board of Canada. His
prints are found in permanent collections across Canada and locally in the Art
Gallery of Mississauga. Stories from a lifetime of photography and images from
Hunter’s iconic career will be shared with the cafe audience by two contemporary
artists, Tom Bochsler and Ken Clayton.

Fifteen of Hunter's photographs are now on display at C-Cafe. I took a photograph of a few images on display, but the one below was what caught my attention because of the drama of the train ploughing through the snow. I took a photograph of the photograph! Somehow I knew copies would be hard to find.


George Hunter (1921–10 April 2013)
Manitoba: Early Morning Salutations, Baker Lake
1946
51cm x 62cm

[This is a photograph I took of the display. It's not very good. I was too far away when I took it, and there was too much light reflecting on the glass. I will try another time.]

I showed the staff at the C-Cafe the photograph below, and joked a little.


Arctic in Mississauga
[Photo By: KPA]

"I can say that I got took this photo while on assignment in the Arctic!"

"Where did you take it?"

"Right out there, where the fountains usually are."

The very shallow pool has been converted into a skating rink, and this was before anyone had skated on it, and the zamboni didn't need to smooth it out. The scratches are probably from the Christmas tree and other things being dragged across the ice.
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Commenting on Commenters

I've shortened my post Truth Doesn't Have To Be Palatable to this version below.

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I commented on an Asian immigrant’s response to Laura Wood’s post at The Thinking Housewife on Obama’s plans to give amnesty to border-crossing Mexicans.

Asian Immigrant commenting on The Thinking Housewife: 

I feel a sense of helpless dread after reading that five million illegals are going to be given legal status next week at the stroke of a pen. I am a new citizen who did everything correctly.

- My answer at The Thinking Housewife (portions):

-  I don’t have much sympathy for the Asian...

- He sounds like he’s sorry for himself. He’s put himself in the victim’s role. It was he who made the difficult and risky decision of leaving his country to come to the U.S. and try his luck. No one pulled him here.

- ...he seems to be saying that because he “did everything correctly” he is owed something. Why?

- Lawrence Auster talked [and wrote] about the perils of LEGAL immigration.  That if people came from backgrounds and cultures incompatible with the Western, Judeo-Christian, American culture, then they will feel alienated.

- All Asians know how CULTURALLY different the U.S. (and Canada and Europe) is [from their countries].

The whole post, and interaction, is available here.

The interesting thing is that the Asian immigrant has remained silent, and instead it is another correspondent who has responded to my comments.

I will refer to the correspondent, David J. as DJ (how apt, he is the deejay for the AI). Below are his comments, and my response (here on my website).

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David J. (DJ): 

For quite some time, I have tried to hold my proverbial tongue about the opinions of Ms. Kidist Paulos Asrat concerning Asians, but her post above is about all that I can take of her seemingly undeserved criticisms of this human group. Firstly, how can such a short, innocuous, and commonsensical comment made by a lone Asian reader warrant such a lengthy diatribe by Ms. Asrat, an Ethiopian immigrant in Canada? The Asian reader has dutifully obeyed our immigration laws and is disheartened that admitted lawbreakers will unjustly receive the same reward of American citizenship as he. Were he white or Hispanic, would Ms. Asrat have taken him to task for such a simple expression of despair over an obvious injustice?

Here is my response:

- Since when have short sentences been given full amenity over harm and stupidity?  

- He is saying that because I am an immigrant (his definition of me), then I have no right to criticize other immigrants. 

- He underlines “Ethiopian” as well. This is clearly a reference to “race” as in non-whites cannot criticize other non-whites.

- Just because the Asian has followed the immigration laws doesn't give him a free ticket into America. 

- I think DJ's cleverly saying that I am racist towards Asians. 

- I have always called myself Canadian, and never refer to my Ethiopian background except when the conversation requires it.  

DJ continues with a post I wrote about a year ago about swimwear designer Jessica Rey:

Further, I have read her unreasonable criticisms of an Asian Christian woman named Jessica Rey. What are Mrs. Rey’s wrongs? She sells relatively modest swimsuits (are such not needed to combat the whorish swimwear of today or should women avoid the water entirely?).

DJ continues:

[Rye] runs her own business, even though she has a husband and children (did not the Bible’s model of a virtuous woman in Proverbs 31 diligently work to sell linens and handle commercial affairs while simultaneously fulfilling her wifely obligations to her family?)

KPA:  

[Rey's] not selling linens, she’s selling glorified underwear! 

A commenter at Laura Wood's The Thinking Housewife wrote about a year ago responding to my comments on Rey's swimwear:

[Rey's] whole “modesty” schtick seems to be more of a marketing ploy rather than a true interest in modesty and reclaiming beauty.

DJ continues:

If I remember correctly, Mrs. Rey posed while pregnant in a tank top with her husband on a website...

I respond:

So much for modesty - showing her protruding stomach in a “tank top.”

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Posted By: Kidist P. Asrat
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Snow Out of Season

[Photos By: KPA]

We got a load of snow yesterday. It was a one-day event. The weather forecast has cleared us of any more storms for the next two weeks.

But, it is still winter (actually, not even officially winter yet). We have an three months to go.

I look forward to it.

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