Stories about Youth from April, 2008
Lithuania: Bloggers’ Conference
Babel in Vilnius reports on the second Lithuanian bloggers conference – BLOGin 2008 – held in Vilnius in early April.
Estonia: Dozor Night Game
AnTyx writes about playing the Dozor Night Game in Estonia, which “[grew] out of games that have been played for centuries; and certainly after the fall of the Soviet Union every young boy (and a surprising share of girls) all over its former territory went crawling around crumbling industrial parks....
Bulgaria: “Options for the Disabled”
Maya Markova of Maya's Corner writes asks for help in finding a suitable institution for one disabled young woman – and describes the overall situation in Bulgaria: “After the BBC exposed the shocking conditions in Bulgarian institutions for abandoned disabled children and our European partners began to exercise much needed...
China: American Teacher Attacked
Love Hunan posted at Zhuzhouwang about an American teacher being beaten up by secondary school students[zh] outside Carrefour in Hunan Zhuzhou district in April 20. Shanghaiist has an update.
Uzbekistan, Ukraine: Tashkent Blacksmith and His Children
A monument to an Uzbek family that adopted 15 children during WWII has recently been dismantled in Tashkent. Below is a Ukrainian blogger's moving story of how her father helped one of these adopted children find his biological family.
Brunei: Making a bank bag
Spiritual Garden shows how she made a bank bag using a used envelope wrapped with papers torn from a fashion magazine.
Brazil, USA: Sex, Crime and the Vatican
Antônio Mello, from blogdomello[Pt], blogs about “Sex, Crime and the Vatican” — a BBC documentary (parts 1, 2, 3 and 4)[En, subtitles in Pt] about children sexual abuse by catholic priests and the shelter provided by the Vatican to the accused ecclesiastics — and a Vatican internal document named Crimen...
Venezuela: The Simpsons Not Welcome Anymore
One of the world's most popular television programs in any language, The Simpsons, was recently deemed inappropriate by the Venezuelan government for being a a bad influence on children, and ordered it off the air. Even though it has been on the air since 1989 and on a daily basis in re-runs, Venezuelan bloggers think that there are worse influences on children, and what makes it worse is that the show was replaced by Baywatch.
Maghreb netizens respond to 8 year-old Yemeni girl's petition for divorce
Tunisian blogger Stupeur!! Un nouveu depart!! (Stupor!! A New Beginning!!) responds to a Yemen Times article about an 8 year-old girl who is trying to file for divorce from a 30 year-old man she says her father forced her to marry.
Jamaica, Guyana, U.S.A.: Virginia Tech Remembered
Jamaican Geoffrey Philp links to Guyanese poet Fred D’Aguiar's poem for Virginia Tech on the one-year anniversary of the shootings.
Haiti: Reasons for Riots
The Haitian Blogger says that “amid food riots in Haiti, US claims of ‘success’ in Haiti sound hollow.”
Algeria: Sectarian Violence in Berraine
Nouri the Moor updates us about the outbreak of inter-communal violence in the Algerian town of Berriane, in Ghardaia province.
Israel: Teenage Girls Usage of Mobile Phones for Dating
Playing with fire? That is what some Palestinian teenage girls do when they accept mobile phones from boyfriends, and have to hide them away from their parents and families, according to a new study, which Gilad Lotan writes about today.
Bahamas: Collective Responsibility
“We have real problems in the Bahamas. For us to play like we don’t see our own flesh and blood out there hurting is just turning a blind eye to what is happening and we shall all experience the results later on”: Craig Butler believes that Bahamians must take responsibility...
Bahamas: For Shame?
“Have we in the Bahamas become so insensitive and so lacking in shame that there is not a public outcry about this prescription for socio-economic disaster?” Sidney Sweeting at WeblogBahamas.com blogs about teenage pregnancy.
Lebanon: Turf on concrete sidewalk
“…some dude ‘planted’ turf right on gemmayze street… midst a heated turf war right on gemmayze street! (pubs vs residents),” reports finkployd with photos and video.
Bolivia: Homeless Children in El Alto
Santos Huanca of El Poder de la Palabra [es] writes about the plight of some mistreated and homeless children in the city of El Alto, Bolivia.
Iran:Videobloggers in action
According to Iran Inside Out,a project of Rising Voices,veteran Iranian videobloggers will partner with the Tehran-based Young Cinema Society to identify aspiring young filmmakers and teach them the skills to both produce short videos.
El Salvador: Blogging for Justice in a Little Girl's Murder
Katya Miranda was young girl who was murdered in 1999 in El Salvador, in a crime of shocking depravity. All the charges against the suspects, who have ties with the military and police, were subsequently dismissed in legal proceedings widely criticized by human rights organizations. With the ninth anniversary of Katya's murder, Salvadoran bloggers are raising a call for justice to be done in this case.
Hungary: Neo-Nazi
Hungarian Spectrum writes about Budapest's neo-Nazis and those who oppose them – here and here.
Jamaica: Teenaged Sex
Blogging at Yardflex.com, Rootzgirl says: “Teenage sex is rampant, as is the increasing number of teenaged pregnancies…something needs to be done…before there is no hope for this generation.”
