Stories from Quick Reads from June, 2014
The Clock on Bolivia's Legislative Building Now Runs Counterclockwise
The clock on top of the Plurinational Legislative Assembly of Bolivia in La Paz's Murillo Square stopped working and had some defects. So a decision was made to repair it along with making some changes: the old Roman numbers on the face were replaced by new natural numbers. Another change that...
Facebook and Its Terms of Use
On her blog, Andrea shares a very thorough report about Facebook and some terms of use often overlooked. First, she explains what those terms of use are: (Las condiciones de servicio) te explican cuáles son las condiciones de uso del servicio, qué pueden hacer con tus datos, tus responsabilidades y...
Goethe's Faust, Between Classicism and Romanticism
It's sometimes complicated to understand or discuss terms like Classicism or Romanticism, especially for someone who is not involved in literature. But that's not the case with Mª Gemma Romero Perea, who thinks Goethe, through his Faust, shows a rare synthesis between Romanticism and Classicism. She explains: Fausto es la obra...
‘A Shift From Surveillance Mode to Elimination Mode’ in China
The Chinese government under the leadership of Xi Jinping has been prosecuting citizen right lawyers, activists and dissidents in past months. Prominent Chinese human right lawyer Tien Biao pointed out that the previous “stability maintenance” model of political control has transformed into elimination of dissents.
Hong Kong Is ‘Haunted’ by China's ‘One Country, Two Systems’ White Paper
Famous blogger on mainland Chinese political news, @yanghengjun, ran into a protest against the mainland Chinese official document on the practice of “one country and two systems” in Hong Kong. As the document is called the White Paper, protesters dressed in white with white papers stuffed in their mouths, like...
Trinidad & Tobago: Give Suarez a Menu
It is irrefutable now. Uruguay and Liverpool striker Luis Suarez either needs a psychologist or a new dietician. Thank heavens Uruguay was not playing Chile. Wired868 sinks its teeth into a post about the behaviour of the Uruguayan footballer after he bit an opposing player in his team's World Cup...
Trinidad & Tobago: Can Brazil Win the 2014 FIFA World Cup?
Backing Brazil to win the FIFA World Cup? Trinidadian travel blogger Rishi Sankar explains why you shouldn't count on the host country taking home the trophy.
“Not All Opinions Deserve to be Respected, Some Must be Fought”
Teacher Luis María Llena León publishes regularly on his personal blog No hay mejor maestra que la vida (There is no better teacher than life; es), and wrote recently his opinion about the sensitive issue of tolerance, noting that “to respect every opinion is a fallacy”, as it has been...
The Problem of Bullying in Cuba
Abuse at school is an issue that is rarely discussed in the national media, but it affects hundreds, even thousands, of students across the country. Generacion Y blogs about bullying in Cuba.
Kyrgyzstan's First Full Length Animation to be Released
Neweurasia.net report on the upcoming release of Kyrgyzstan's first animated film, Aku, drawn by Tolgobek Koichumanov. Judging by the trailer Koichumanov's illustrations will offer the perfect introduction to Kyrgyzstan, capturing both the republic's startlingly beautiful nature as well as the less startlingly beautiful aesthetic of its capital city, Bishkek. According...
The Story of Famine Refugees from Niger in Eastern Algeria
In the past few weeks, hundreds of Sub-Saharan immigrants from Mali or Niger have migrated to Algerian cities by the Eastern border. Liberté Algérie narrates the stories of those who made the choice to immigrate and why [fr] : Les conditions de vie au hangar de la cité Bourroh sont inhumaines....
Mapping the 567 Ebola Cases in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone
On June 16, 49 new Ebola cases, 12 of them deadly, were reported by the WHO. Bart Janssens, director of operations of The international NGO Doctors without Borders (Medecins Sans Frontieres, or MSF)) released a statement saying that: The epidemic is out of control, with the appearance of new sites in...
Jamaica: Beauty & the Beast
The issue is that there is an idea in Jamaica of who is beautiful and who isn’t…that this idea of beauty is, to a large extent, a racially constructed one. Kei Miller recounts a heartbreaking story of the dark side of beauty pageants and contends that the Miss Jamaica franchise...
The Female Perspective on the 2014 World Cup
Dalia Gutmann reviews the football players she's had a crush on from 1990 FIFA World Cup Italy to the current one in Brazil on the website OhLaLá!. After mentioning her favorite one in each of these sporting events, she confesses: Como notarán, la única razón por la que puedo registrar a un...
Homecoming Revolution in Africa
Homecoming Revolution is an organisation that encourages skilled Africans to come back to the continent: Homecoming Revolution, which showcases career, property, investment and entrepreneurial opportunities for expatriates in sub-Saharan Africa, has helped almost 360,000 South Africans to return home in the past five years. It has an active database of...
Jamaica: The Colours of the FIFA World Cup
Active Voice posts a compilation of tweets about the FIFA World Cup in which “race, religion, colour, ethnicity, nationality, all came in for comment”.
Costa Rica's Pre-Columbian Stone Spheres Declared World Heritage
Four archaeological sites with pre-Columbian stone spheres located in the canton of Osa, Puntarenas, in Costa Rica were included in UNESCO's World Heritage List. The decision was announced on Monday, June 23, 2014, during the 38th session of the World Heritage Committee in Doha, Qatar. Costa Rican former president Laura...
African Union Moves Towards Gagging Free Speech Online
The 23rd African Union Heads of Government Summit in Malabo, Equatorial Guinea starting on June 26, 2014, might adopt the African Union Convention on Security in Cyberspace and Personal Data Protection. Moses Karanja, in this article in AfricanHadithi, argues that this legislation might be a cover to limit online free speech...
Mexican Bloggers Support Their National Team
Samantha Martínez is blogging on Tarjeta Azul about the day-to-day at the 2014 FIFA World Cup in Brazil. This time, she shares her passion for her country's national team, Mexico, and sums up the rivalry between this team and the local one, and shows her support for the Mexican crew:...
Jonbeel, a Barter Market in the 21st Century
The centuries old Jonbeel Mela, a community fair in the northeast Indian state of Assam, has a unique ritual. Around 10,000 indigenous people from tribes like the Karbi, Khasi, Tiwa, and Jayantia of the northeast come down from the hills to the Jonbeel wetlands with their produce or catch and...
The Inca Road Is a New World Heritage Site
For the first time in the 40 years of World Heritage convention, six countries united to submit a joint application to designate a cultural site as world heritage. Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador and Peru requested that the Incan Road be included as a cultural heritage site. The announcement was made in...
