Facundo Cabral

So I was going to read today before going to sleep then a friend of mine posted a link on facebook and I went to read an article on this guy Facundo Cabral. I will leave a link to the whole article at the end if you want to check it out but there was a great quote and story at the start of the article that I just felt like passing on.

After walking for so long in this world, I’ve come to realize that there’s only one religion: love. There’s only one language: the one that comes from heart. There’s only one race: humanity. And there’s only one God, and he’s everywhere…

And here is the story,

One day, God decided to come down to a small town, so he incarnated in the body of a homeless man. He looked for the town shoe repairman and he asked him: “brother, I’m very poor and I don’t have a single coin in my pocket. These are my only sandals and they are old and torn up. Can you please help me fix them?

The shoe repairman said: “I’m tired of everyone coming in and asking for things without giving me anything in return.”

God then said: “I can give you something that you might need.”

Expressing doubt, the shoe repairman replied: “Can you give me a million Dollars that I need so I can be happy?”

God said: “Yes, I can give you ten times more, but I will need something of yours, like your legs.”

The shoe repairman asked: “But what could I do with $10 million if I won’t be able to walk?”

God then said: “Okay, I can give you $100 million in exchange for both of your arms.”

The shoe repairman asked: “But what could I do with $100 million if I won’t be able to eat on my own?”

Then, God gave him one more offer and said: “Well, I can give you $1 billion in exchange for both of your eyes.”

The shoe repairman asked: “But why would I need a $1 billion if I won’t be able see my wife, my children, and my friends?”

God replied by saying: “Oh, my brother! How fortunate you are and you don’t even know it!”

And here is the link to the rest of the article.

http://deadlinelive.info/2011/07/10/influential-antiwar-poet-and-songwriter-facundo-cabral-assassinated-in-guatemala/

Photoshoot

So this is just going to be a really short post. Although it always starts off that way in my mind but I just can't help but type out more words then are necessary to explain a situation.

Anyways, usually I have updated lately when I have finished a slough of books to report on I haven't finished any books lately but I have two on the run and they are 1984 by George Orwell (so far it's great) and also I am reading Love Wins by Rob Bell (so far it is great).

However the point of this post today is to tell you that the other night Janelle and I got some engagement photos taken and they have been posted on my Aunt's blog, because she was our photographer and she was awesome. So I just think that every single one of you should go to her blog look at the photos and maybe even make a comment on her site because you never know, you might want her to be your photographer one day and she would do great at it. So here is the site, I know some may have seen this on facebook already but that's fine because people love to read things twice these days.

www.obabyphotography.blogspot.com

Also in other news, the handshake is the new Hi-5, so next time you see someone and want to say hello with physical contact choose a handshake because it says, "I care about you enough to stop and shake your hand rather than slap it and keep walking."

Reading

So since I started working and I guess at the end of school I have started on my reading goal.. The goal is really just to read more and I can say that in the past month or so I have become a reading machine! I feel very proud because I used to be that person who would always say that he wanted to read but never did. Well now I have read some books which mean that I can recommend some books. Here is the list of the books that I have read/re-read.

Ender's Game - Orson Scott Card

Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck

The Time Machine - HG Wells

Animal Farm - George Orwell

About a Mountain - John D'agata

Stalin's Genocides - Norman Naimark (I still like history so some of the books I read are not your standard novels)

I must say that they were all very good but to pick my favorite is actually quite easy. Of Mice and Men was one of the best books I have read potentially ever. It's a short quick read that I would definitely recommend. I don't want to go into details about the book but it really captures the reader and I will honestly say that I became emotionally attached.

Anyways my stack of books is constantly growing because I have recently realized that I love yard sales and used books stores. The books on my shelf now include the following, although I will say many of them I know nothing about but they were in a deal of 10 books for $5.

A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man - James Joyce

Tom Jones - Henry Fielding

Demons - Fydor Dostoevsky

Catch 22 - Joseph Heller

Guns, Germs, and Steel - Jared Diamond

The Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck

The War of the Worlds - HG Wells

The Invisible Man - HG Wells

A Clergyman's Daughter - Gorge Orwell

The Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger

That is just a snippet of what I plan to do this summer. Suggestions are always welcome, even though...(prepare yourself for big announcement) my now fiance!!! Does not necessarily understand my constantly growing book and reading addiction because it will be a lot of stuff to move. Stay tuned for more updates soon... and maybe even an engagement story sometime.

PS I also decided that I want to start a tagline for the end of every post like... Malech Out or Stay Classy or... really anything. Please recommend what you think I should make my sign-off.

Food for Though

I was just taking a brief break from studying to peruse the internet and I found my self at the Adbusters website. From there I found a link to a website called Kick it Over. And on that website I found a quote that I have been searching for. So I Just decided to share it so that I don't forget it.

"[We] are being persuaded to spend money we don't have, on things we don't need, to create impressions that won't last, on people we don't care about."
—Tim Jackson

Just something to think about.

Birthdays

So generally I am not one to make a big deal about my birthday so that is why I have waited until now (almost a week since turning 22) to tell you about the most amazing birthday that I had planned for me. Let me set the scene, Janelle tells me that she would like to celebrate my birthday with me, I obviously agree informing her that I don't want anything to big or special and it can just be treated like any other day. Ok thats enough background. The day begins...

I wake up Sunday morning and as per usual in keeping the day normal Janelle and I go to church, and "it was good" (I quote this because in church the topic of creation was mentioned, you understand the quotes now). After church Janelle tells me that we must go to her house before meeting up with my family for lunch so that I can receive gifts from her to tell my parents about. We go and I get the coolest gifts ever!!! First I must say I had received an earlier gift of the book Mein Kampf by Hitler (I'm not crazy I needed it for research, and it was given earlier because my paper I needed it for was due before my birthday). Then on that Sunday I have two more gifts awaiting me, first I open up a belt buckle, this is not just any belt buckle, on the buckle is a picture of Rocky and Clubber Lang! Please click the link to see. I'm so excited about this I have not even thought about the fact that there is another gift. I open it and to my amazement it was a picture of my favorite painting, The School of Athens, I can't explain why I like it so much but I just think it's a great representation of how cool it would be to go out and just talk and listen to people share their ideas. Two amazing gifts that show how cultured I have become.

Day goes on and we go out for brunch with my family to buccacinos! Excellent food. After this I still have no idea where we are going. After it seems like we had aimlessly driven around for a while we wind up in front of the Museum. I need to tell you that the Museum is so cool, if you haven't been since elementary school I urge you to go again and relive those field trips and to actually take in what you read. Janelle and I had a great time walking through the museum and playing with the games and experiments in the Science Museum area. After the museum we went to my parents place and had supper with the Malech family. It was eventful as always. After we played a round of Bohnanza with my family, and even though I still have never won at that game I enjoy it every time.

We left my parents and I thought that we were just going to get some cheesecake watch a movie and call it a night. But Janelle insists that we walk to Cousins where we had our first date to cap off the night at a memorable location. To my surprise I am greeted in Cousins by my close friends, it was a the perfect end to a perfect day. Thanks for making my 22'nd birthday incredible and definitely memorable.

Strike

Lately one of the things that I have been thinking about is the potential strike at the University of Winnipeg. I think back to a day when I was much younger as perhaps a junior high or high school student when I would have been so excited to have the teachers go on strike so that I would not have to go to school. Now every time I think about this potential strike I am anything but excited and at best I feel incredibly ripped off.

The professors in my opinion are essentially holding the students as hostages in a way. We are now to the teachers no more then a bargaining piece that they can use when they are negotiating. I can honestly say I have played out this situation in my head several times and there is no situation where the students get a good deal. So say the teachers go on strike we miss classes that we have already paid for. There are several potential situations,

1. The strike is short we only miss a little bit.

2. The strike is longer and they push classes and exams back to make up for it.

3. Long strike and either all classes are deemed incomplete or we get credit for the year based on not the entire thing.

Even in what seems like being good situations, we as the students will pay for it next year when our tuition is hiked up to pay the teachers new salaries.

Now a bigger problem here is the point of this teacher union. I am fairly sure the original point of unions was to make sure that workers didn't have to work unreasonable hours for little pay in unsafe conditions to put it simply. As far as I know professors are working very reasonable hours for I'm sure a pretty good salary and I don't think that they are being forced to live in poverty because the administration won't pay them enough. But I mean what do I know.

The main point is for a university that prides itself in being for the students as the You of W, this doesn't sound like a situation that is for the students. I wish everyone all the best in their bargaining however I will not be supporting the professors on the picket line.

Welcome

She's going to hate me for this, but I have to do it. It is the duty of the other bloggers to advertise freely for other new bloggers. So my lovely girlfriend has started a blog and I think that she is great and has a lot of excellent ideas so you should all read and follow her blog that she just started. Don't worry I will also provide a link for you I won't make you all just go look for it blindly.

http://janellethiessen.blogspot.com/

The biggest problem is that nobody reads my blog so this might be a fruitless effort, but I'm ok with that because I just needed to pass on this information because I feel it part of my blogging duty.

Equality of Opportunity

Sometimes I wish that I was the writer for a globally popular blog that would stage large online debates about everything I wrote. I mean like even if the issue was entirely meaningless that people would find it worth their time to subscribe their time to read my blog. Or even better when the blog was heart wrenching or controversial that people would find it worth their time to comment and continue to check back and debate with other people. But when I have these ideas I think back to something that a professor once said, "Writing is actually quite arrogant because it means that you think people care about what you write."

Regardless that isn't what I wanted to write about. My main thing that I wanted to write about is brief and open ended because I'm still trying to piece together all my thoughts so I thought that I would see if anybody else had any thoughts, and then in the next day or two I would share mine. You see I view this blog as a relationship with the readers and good communication makes for a great relationship. So here is my question and background to the question.

Today while I was in my history class we were talking about social revolutions and the beginning of socialism. When talking about the definition of socialism it was basically said that it was working for the best interest of the group and when the best interest of the group is met that is when the individual will thrive. That being said generally the best interest of the group from a socialist perspective is ultimately equality, i.e. no social classes, little to no differences in wages and everyone helps each other.

Now when this was happening we talked about what the liberals would believe to counter this and that was that they would say that their system also promotes equality. But that Equality is through Equal Opportunity. Now here is the question, Is there really such thing as equal opportunity? I will just leave it at that, like I said very open ended. Tell me what you think. Hopefully I have motivated you to all engage in conversation. And really even if you don't respond I am still going to tell you what I think regardless in a few days anyways. Happy responding.

Just Another Daily Rambling

I was encouraged the other day by a famous young man. It wasn't his soft baby like facial features or perfectly flipped hair that inspired me. Nor was it his large amount of fame or his musical abilities. I'm sure you can probably guess who I am talking about by now, but I am not going to tell you until the end.

As some of you might know I think that one day I would like to write a book, or maybe have a book written about me by someone else. Now I am not entirely sure what I want the book to be about, I'm not incredibly creative so that leaves fiction out of the question and although I am incredibly interested in people in general and the way that they act and the things that they do I am not all that interested in writing a biography on someone else. I think that if I wrote a book on a specific topic it would feel more like an essay assignment for school, so really my only hope is that one day I have enough life experience to write a book about my findings and wisdom that I can acquire. That would involve living a life that other people find intriguing and worth reading about. Thanks the aforementioned young man named Justin Bieber I am fully confident that I can one day sell a book.

He recently came out with his autobiography. And I mean good for him but really? How much life experience and insight does he have that he could have a book written about him. Thanks to him I am fully confident that anybody can write their own autobiography and probably be somewhat successful. The irony of this is that clearly writing a book about yourself is not a big deal any more because it seems as if anybody can do it, regardless of the life or wisdom that you have achieved.

Resolutions

I have never really been one to make a resolution at New Years and this year is like no other. The reason being because I always feel that I don't need a New Year to decide to change something suddenly. Plus every year my New Year resolution is usually the same thing like lose weight, or stay in shape throughout the whole year and not just for like four months at a time, or maybe workout three times a week and don't go for seconds. But really I think that I New Years resolution should benefit more people then just yourself, right? Maybe it doesn't necessarily matter if it benefits more then just yourself, and I mean yes my personal physical physique (note the alliteration) does make me more pleasing to your eyes it really does not benefit anyone other then me.

That being said I don't think that Resolutions are bad at all and it's probably just my pride that I don't want to submit to the idea that we all must resolve to be better somehow in the New Year. But this is a little poem/proverb that I found and I think that it would probably count as a good Resolution. Although the last line kind of goes against my whole idea of benefitting everyone but hopefully you will still understand.

Fear less, hope more;

Whine less, breathe more;

Talk less, say more;

Hate less, love more;

And all good things are yours.

Anyways I just think that is a good thing to resolve to. Maybe I am softer in my older years choosing a poem as my "mantra" for the New Year, but I just think this puts it nicely. And despite the last line of all good things are yours, I think that if you are going along with the other parts of the poem good things will come for all. At least that is how I am choosing to defend my point.

Happy New Year everybody.