April 3, 2013
Why travel (as a lifestyle)

There comes a time when it is appropriate to ask questions like “what got me here.” Not here in life. I’m 24. I am decidedly not having a midlife crisis. But here, physicially, where I am.

It would seem that my current existance in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, hanging out before catching a prop plane to Somalia is absolutely the perfect time to ask that question. Why do I travel the way that I do? How do I, or, if I want to project myself on an entire community (always appropriate) we as travellers, relate to the places I/we drift through. What do we hope to gain? What purpose do these places serve in our own narratives?

An amazing travel companion of mine, Pablo, once asked such a question. We were passing through Popayan, Colombia, and discussing other parts of the country that we had been to separately. Which places were “worth going to,” and which were simply… “not.”

“Isn’t it weird how we just fucking… consume places?” Pablo asked.

“Huh?!” was my response as I alternated between a beer and some sort of delicious pastry I had recently come across. Consuming places wasn’t really what was on my mind at the time. Consuming alcohol and food took priority.

“I don’t know. We just… fly or bus or hitch-hike or whatever to these countries or cities and smile at how different things are like we’re in… fucking Epcot Center or something?”

I half shrugged off the question at the time. It was interfering with my consumption of Popayan. This conversation came at the tail end of 11 months of travel, my longest stretch of unadulterated backpacking to date. I had spent a few months in Scandinavia and on the Iberian Peninsula, worked my way through the Mediterranean Middle East from Istanbul to Siwa, in Egypt’s West, and was somewhere in the middle of my five months travelling the vast majority of Spanish speaking South America. It was one of the best years of my life, and I certainly didn’t feel a strong inclination to unpack my situation. My identity at that time was as a traveller (it still might be, I’m not sure), and, like most people when they feel any sort of threat to their identities, I shut down and defended it.

And, here I am, years later. Spending my 11 day Spring Break from my teaching job in the Bronx laying around in Ethiopia. It’s my first time back to Sub-Saharan Africa since I spent 4 months between the DRC, Burundi, Rwanda, Uganda, Kenya, and Tanzania in the summer of 2009. I’ve travelled a lot in between then and now, but, more-so than I have felt this way in the last year or so, I really feel like I’ve stepped back into my old life, minus a few critical bits, my skin is no longer conditioned to the desert sun, despite my attempts to compensate with sunscreen.

I’ve spent my days talking to exceptionally friendly locals, negotiating Somaliland visas at the only existing Somaliland Consul (hence my presence in Addis) vacillating between expat hangouts (the German Beer Garden has been a favorite) and bumming around with the locals in share taxis. Tomorrow I have another day of the same. I’m not sightseeing at high speed. I’m not visiting friends. I don’t know a single fucking person. I cannot believe I have only been here for two days. Time, at least the way we measure it with our 11 day vacations or 5 day work weeks, becomes less and less relivant.

Why do we do it?

I remember an article in Lonely Planet Magazine about the benefits of travel. It mentions travel making you younger, because it makes time slow down, like when you were a kid and a week seems like an eternity. I think I buy that. But let’s be honest. We don’t travel to make time slow down.

I personally don’t buy into travelling as an escape, either. A lot of the non-travellers in my life are only able to understand my love for the… hobby? Lifestyle? What the fuck is it? By asking me what I am running from. What I’m afraid of. And while, like just about everyone, there’s a lot in the world and in my future that makes me a bit nervous, I’ve never felt like I was running away from myself. I have felt like I was trying to escape the constraints of my situation. That I’ve done.

Some old candy bar advert was centered around guys getting asked tough questions by their girlfriends, and buying a moment to think their response over by shoving a… twix? Snickers?… Into their mouths. Real, long haul travel is kind of the twix moment for our life decisions. It is literally time off of a pre-determined path to re-invent ourselves, not really in the present but in the future. It’s a chance for us to meet people who are of radicially different backgrounds than ourselves, whether we mean the people we are travelling with or the people we encounter while we pass through their communities.

But that isn’t all of it.

For many travellers, myself included, travel transitions from a string of international experiences to an international lifestyle. There are elements of this in almost every backpacker I know. I cannot count how many times I have had the following conversation:

XXX: “What’s you’re favorite country?”

Me: “That’s a really hard question to answer, I like different places for different reasons.”

XXX: “OK. Where could you see yourself living?”

And there it is. The liberation that goes beyond the temporary. I guess it makes sense. As travel becomes more and more of a lifestyle, and the countries that issue our passports become less and less relevant to our day to day lives, with international bank accounts set up to get paid from jobs overseas and without an apartment at home full of furniture, we start to think about where we could see ourselves settling down.

I have this list, a lot of us do. For me, though, I think it is far less about escapism than it is about control.

Come on. The Westerners of our generation have grown up to national economies imploding, unemployment looming at the end of university, international warfare we didn’t necessarily sign onto, and a digital revolution that makes it more and more possible to keep in touch and handle our affairs from anywhere in the world. There is less that makes life at “home” desireable, and far more equipment available to make our transitions to expat life as smooth and flawless as possible.

Even this short trip would be impossible without these technologies. I have graded student work on the stopovers. There’s wifi on my intercontinental flights so that when I get back to Manhattan I can rush straight to a dentists appointment, my work already uploaded and available to my team. My sister gets married in California three days after I get back. The shirt I need for my suit will be waiting for me in an Amazon locker a five minute walk from my apartment when I get back into the country. How’s that for portability. How’s that for control? I can be on a beach in Somalia, choreographing a bunch of tasks to make my personal and professional life run efficiently.

Beyond our collective experience, my childhood was a combination of interstate moves every few years, a rotating door of people living in our home, with the odd terminal illness or abuse case rocking the house from time to time. I never really thought of it before, but more than anything, I think this is what’s shaped me. It’s why I’ve always made sure to have access to enough cash to get away and at least make the first moves in the direction of starting over. It’s why I have backup plans around the world… places I’d go if my job fell through or became unacceptably unworkable. I’ve seen way too many people fall into the seemingly inevitable trajectories of their lives, and that isn’t what I want for myself. So I’ve made sure there was always an escape option.

There’s different degrees of this, of course. Somalia, it may surprise you to know, is not a place that I’d rush to move to. It’s a break from life. From the hustle and bustle. A twix moment. But it’s more than that. A reaffermation of freedom. Of the fact that there are doors open. A chance to challenge myself. And yeah. To lay on a beach, 8,000 miles from home, and read a book.

Andrew

3:30pm  |   URL: http://tmblr.co/ZiWeSyhptkTc
(Notes: 2)
  
Filed under: Travel Backpacking Wanderlust Africa Ethiopia International Living 
February 11, 2013
Overlooked News Dept: Leftist Leader(s) killed in Tunisia

As if this global trend seems to ever end….

Tunisia: Murder most foul

Assassination of opposition leader Shokri Belaid highlights a string of beatings and killings since country’s uprising.
Last Modified: 07 Feb 2013 14:46
 

Tunisians of all political stripes are in shock after the killing of Shokri Belaid, leader of the Democratic Patriots
party.

Of all the political turmoil the country has experienced since the 2010-11 uprising, the slaying of the leftist politician - a well-known opposition figure and vocal critic of the ruling coalition - marks a new low.

The resulting crisis has led to the collapse of the government, and could potentially doom the election that was set to take place later this year.

Many say the killing is unsurprising, and that the Islamist-led government bears a heavy responsibility for tolerating and fuelling a deep partisan divide and a culture of political violence.

A star of the Popular Front, a leftist political alliance of which his party is a member, Belaid had many supporters among those who accused the current government of failing to deliver on social justice and economic development.

He was a figurehead of the protests in Siliana last November, when tensions over unemployment and stalling economic progress erupted. Ali Laarayedh, Tunisia’s interior minister, accused Belaid of inciting the protesters against the police. Belaid in turn said the interior ministry was guilty of tyranny.

Belaid, a lawyer and activist, had also been at the forefront of the early lawyer’s protests in December 2010, which grew to become the uprising that toppled the Tunisian government in January 2011. The Ennahdha movement and most of the country’s opposition parties did not give the uprising their explicit backing until the last days.

Violent attacks

Wednesday’s shooting is the second suspected killing of an opposition politician since the uprising, and one of many violent attacks.

I
n October, Lotfi Naqdh - a regional leader of the secularist conservative Nida Tounes Party - was beaten to death in the southern town of Tatouine. His death followed an outbreak of violence between his party and government supporters, the first big flare-up of interparty violence.

The government claimed he died of a heart attack, but an autopsy last week confirmed that Naqdh had died as a result of lynching at the hands of government supporters. Said Chebli, the head of the Tatouine branch of Leagues for the Protection of the Revolution is one of the people implicated in Naqdh’s killing.

Ali Fares, a MP of the ruling Ennahdha party, called on Thursday for Chebli and other suspects in the mob lynching to be released. “These people came out into the streets for the noble cause of defending the revolution, and instead of paying them homage, they have been incarcerated,” Fares declared.

Many opposition parties, human rights groups and activists have called for the dissolution of the leagues, which some compare to militia groups. Belaid was among these critics, arguing that the groups were reinforcing a deep partisan divide and trying to assert ownership over what the revolution meant.

For its part, Ennahdha argues they are a counterforce against its secular opponents, particularly the UGTT, the mighty national union. Members of the league were accused of attacking the UGTT headquarters last December.

The media, viewed by many government supporters as being anti-Islamist, have also been targeted. At a protest against the country’s media in Sousse in December, for instance, demonstrators reportedly chanted the slogan “News, we want your skin!”

Exactly who is responsible for the assassination is unclear, and members of Ennahdha have also been targeted by political violence. Abdelfattah Mourou, the party’s co-founder and an advocate of a progressive form of political Islam, was reportedly assaulted by a group of Salafists a week ago.

Independent investigation

The UK-based rights group Amnesty International has called for an independent investigation into Belaid’s death, and for the authorities to take a more proactive stance against political violence.

“Today’s shocking killing must serve as a wake-up call to the authorities. It is their duty to protect all individuals, including those who criticise the government or Tunisia’s leading Ennahdha party, from violence. No group, regardless of its affiliation, can be above the law,” Hassiba Hadj Sahraoui, Middle East and North Africa Deputy Director at Amnesty International, said in a press statement.

Said Aidi, a member of the executive committee of the Republican Party and a former minister, said that opposition parties had been calling on the interior ministry for months to put an end to inflammatory partisan language against opposition figures.

Aidi, a conservative secularist, told Al Jazeera in a phone interview that the government was “totally responsible” for Belaid’s death because of what he described as its indifference to the intimidation of opposition activists and politicians.

“There have been incitations to murder made in the mosques against figures including Shokri Belaid,” he said. Aidi says he was himself beaten by groups he believes were linked to Ennahdha, during a peaceful march commemorating the Tunisian union leader and political philosopher Farhat Hached last December 5. He suffered a skull fracture and serious eye injury, and says his aggressors escaped with impunity. 

“These are fascist thugs,” he told Al Jazeera, adding that in the past few days, many opposition movements have had their meetings disrupted by the groups.

But Ennahdha denies any links to Wednesday’s killing, which it has firmly denounced. “This is a sad day for Tunisia … we’ve never had anything like this in our history,” said Zied Ladhari, an Ennahdha MP. “Even if there are political divergences between us, we can’t accept such acts of violence against those who don’t share our ideas.”

He told Al Jazeera in a phone interview that a serious investigation would be needed to uncover who was behind the killing, and that those behind it were trying to derail Tunisia’s democratic transition.

(Source)

7:00pm  |   URL: http://tmblr.co/ZiWeSydxpchJ
Filed under: Communism Socialism International Secularism Tunisia North Africa Middle East MENA Arab World Current Events 
December 19, 2012

climateadaptation:

China’s demand for illegal wood is devastating rare forests and killing rare species across Asia. Al Jazeera does not hold back in this in-depth look at China’s blatant ignorance of environmental destruction.

China’s skyrocketing demand for timber to fuel its economic boom is driving illegal logging and contributing to the destruction of forests in Asia and Africa, needed now more than ever to halt climate change, a new environmental report says.

China is now the biggest international consumer of illegal timber, according to the report from the Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA), which adds that the trade is causing the destruction of vast tracts of forest in developing countries.

Globally, the trade in illegal timber is worth between $30 billion and $100 billion a year, according to an Interpol and United Nations Environment Programme report.

Warning: Article is not for the weak-kneed…

(via reagan-was-a-horrible-president)

3:30pm  |   URL: http://tmblr.co/ZiWeSyZiGpUd
(Notes: 302)
  
Filed under: China Logging Sustainability International Community 
June 17, 2012
Really well done Jazeera work on the IMF’s new “recommendations” to oil producing nations.

Particularly worthwhile for anyone who’se read The Bottom Billion or other Collier work.

But really, if you’re interested in world politics/events, read them:

http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2012/04/2012499431785633.html

http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2012/04/201242411544973690.html 

3:20pm  |   URL: http://tmblr.co/ZiWeSyNaYeYF
Filed under: International Monetary Fund IMF Oil Collier Bottom Billion Development Energy Politics 
March 6, 2012
thepeoplesrecord: occupyonline: List of some of the 10 worst corporate income tax avoiders. 1)      Exxon Mobil made $19 billion in profits in 2009.  Exxon not only paid no federal income taxes, it actually received a $156 million rebate from the IRS, according to its SEC filings.  (Source: Exxon Mobil’s 2009 shareholder report filed with the SEC here.) 2)      Bank of America received a $1.9 billion tax refund from the IRS last year, although it made $4.4 billion in profits and received a bailout from the Federal Reserve and the Treasury Department of nearly $1 trillion. (Source: Forbes.com here, ProPublica here and Treasuryhere.) 3)      Over the past five years, while General Electric made $26 billion in profits in the United States, it received a $4.1 billion refund from the IRS. (Source: Citizens for Tax Justice hereand The New York Times here.  Note: despite rumors to the contrary, the Times has stood by its story.) 4)      Chevron received a $19 million refund from the IRS last year after it made $10 billion in profits in 2009.  (Source: See 2009 Chevron annual report here.  Note 15 on page FS-46 of this report shows a U.S. federal income tax liability of $128 million, but that it was able to defer $147 million for a U.S. federal income tax liability of $-19 million) 5)      Boeing, which received a $30 billion contract from the Pentagon to build 179 airborne tankers, got a $124 million refund from the IRS last year. .  (Source: Paul Buchheit, professor, DePaul University, here and Citizens for Tax Justice here.) 6)      Valero Energy, the 25th largest company in America with $68 billion in sales last year received a $157 million tax refund check from the IRS and, over the past three years, it received a $134 million tax break from the oil and gas manufacturing tax deduction. (Source: the company’s 2009 annual report, pg. 112, here.) 7)      Goldman Sachs in 2008 only paid 1.1 percent of its income in taxes even though it earned a profit of $2.3 billion and received an almost $800 billion from the Federal Reserve and U.S. Treasury Department.  (Source: Bloomberg News here, ProPublica here, Treasury Department here.) 8)      Citigroup last year made more than $4 billion in profits but paid no federal income taxes. It received a $2.5 trillion bailout from the Federal Reserve and U.S. Treasury. (Source: Paul Buchheit, professor, DePaul University, here, ProPublica here, Treasury Department here.) 9)      ConocoPhillips, the fifth largest oil company in the United States, made $16 billion in profits from 2006 through 2009, but received $451 million in tax breaks through the oil and gas manufacturing deduction.  (Sources: Profits can be found here.  The deduction can be found on the company’s 2010 SEC 10-K report to shareholders on 2009 finances, pg. 127,here) 10)  Over the past five years, Carnival Cruise Lines made more than $11 billion in profits, but its federal income tax rate during those years was just 1.1 percent.  (Source: The New York Times here) Our country & our world can no longer afford to be run by these corporations! 

thepeoplesrecord:

occupyonline:

List of some of the 10 worst corporate income tax avoiders.

1)      Exxon Mobil made $19 billion in profits in 2009.  Exxon not only paid no federal income taxes, it actually received a $156 million rebate from the IRS, according to its SEC filings.  (Source: Exxon Mobil’s 2009 shareholder report filed with the SEC here.)

2)      Bank of America received a $1.9 billion tax refund from the IRS last year, although it made $4.4 billion in profits and received a bailout from the Federal Reserve and the Treasury Department of nearly $1 trillion. (Source: Forbes.com here, ProPublica here and Treasuryhere.)

3)      Over the past five years, while General Electric made $26 billion in profits in the United States, it received a $4.1 billion refund from the IRS. (Source: Citizens for Tax Justice hereand The New York Times here.  Note: despite rumors to the contrary, the Times has stood by its story.)

4)      Chevron received a $19 million refund from the IRS last year after it made $10 billion in profits in 2009.  (Source: See 2009 Chevron annual report here.  Note 15 on page FS-46 of this report shows a U.S. federal income tax liability of $128 million, but that it was able to defer $147 million for a U.S. federal income tax liability of $-19 million)

5)      Boeing, which received a $30 billion contract from the Pentagon to build 179 airborne tankers, got a $124 million refund from the IRS last year. .  (Source: Paul Buchheit, professor, DePaul University, here and Citizens for Tax Justice here.)

6)      Valero Energy, the 25th largest company in America with $68 billion in sales last year received a $157 million tax refund check from the IRS and, over the past three years, it received a $134 million tax break from the oil and gas manufacturing tax deduction. (Source: the company’s 2009 annual report, pg. 112, here.)

7)      Goldman Sachs in 2008 only paid 1.1 percent of its income in taxes even though it earned a profit of $2.3 billion and received an almost $800 billion from the Federal Reserve and U.S. Treasury Department.  (Source: Bloomberg News here, ProPublica here, Treasury Department here.)

8)      Citigroup last year made more than $4 billion in profits but paid no federal income taxes. It received a $2.5 trillion bailout from the Federal Reserve and U.S. Treasury. (Source: Paul Buchheit, professor, DePaul University, here, ProPublica here, Treasury Department here.)

9)      ConocoPhillips, the fifth largest oil company in the United States, made $16 billion in profits from 2006 through 2009, but received $451 million in tax breaks through the oil and gas manufacturing deduction.  (Sources: Profits can be found here.  The deduction can be found on the company’s 2010 SEC 10-K report to shareholders on 2009 finances, pg. 127,here)

10)  Over the past five years, Carnival Cruise Lines made more than $11 billion in profits, but its federal income tax rate during those years was just 1.1 percent.  (Source: The New York Times here)

Our country & our world can no longer afford to be run by these corporations! 

(via anarcho-queer)

6:00pm  |   URL: http://tmblr.co/ZiWeSyHacXvz
(Notes: 513)
  
Filed under: politics communism socialsim united states of america capitalism corruption international exploitation imperialism human rights corporate rule 
January 10, 2012
"in recent decades, nearly one-fifth of the world’s population has regressed. This is arguably one of the greatest economic failures of the 20th century"

— The International Monetary Fund

1:00pm  |   URL: http://tmblr.co/ZiWeSyEZLQGi
(Notes: 17)
  
Filed under: IMF International Monetary Fund Global Capitalism Imperialism Expansionism 
January 9, 2012
Spanish superspy Francisco Paesa, 75, gets out of yet another scrape

Sierra Leone escapade follows a lifetime of intrigue including years on Interpol’s ‘most wanted’ list

1:00pm  |   URL: http://tmblr.co/ZiWeSyEWDdbf
(Notes: 5)
  
Filed under: Sierra Leone Francisco Paesa Spy espionage Opportunist Spain Europe International 
November 26, 2011
Nigerian King Sues Shell for $1 Billion

discoverynews:

A Nigerian king filed a $1 billion lawsuit against Royal Dutch Shell at the federal court in Detroit, Michigan last week.

The US Supreme Court plans to consider the lawsuit in what the AFP called “a landmark case that could make companies liable for torture or genocide committed overseas.”

King Emere Godwin Bebe Okpabi of the Ogoni and four other tribal leaders seek compensation for half a century of pollution from oil extraction and processing that has sickened people and poisoned the land and drinking water.

The civil complaint states that the Nsisioken Ogale community is “exposed to hydrocarbons every day through multiple routes” such as frequent oil spills and pervasive air pollution from refining operations, reported the AFP.

“At all times relevant to this litigation, Defendants knew or should have known that the crude oil contains chemicals hazardous to human health and to the environment and ecosystems,” the complaint said.

42-29124386The AFP noted that the king also accused Shell of cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment, gross negligence and the violation of international treaties and obligations to the United States and Nigeria.

Along with $1 billion in damages, the lawsuit seeks immediate cleanup of the pollution and an injunction to require air and water monitoring.

BLOG: Map Reveals Climate Change Injustice

The Nigerian plaintiffs filed the suit in a US court because of what they called a historical “culture of impunity” for Shell in Nigeria and “disregard” for the Nigerian judicial process, reported the AFP.

For example, the plaintiffs claim Shell has yet to pay $1.5 billion in pollution damages to the Ijaw Aborigines, or to comply with a 2005 order to end gas flaring in the Iwherekan community.

King Okpabi’s civil complaint relies on the Alien Tort Claims Act of 1789, a law designed to assure foreign governments that the U.S. would uphold international law.

Royal Dutch Shell has a notorious history with the Ogoni People, that escalated during a murder case in 1995 when a Nigerian court ordered the hanging of Kenule “Ken” Beeson Saro-Wiwa along with eight other cultural rights activists.

[read more]

(via )

4:23pm  |   URL: http://tmblr.co/ZiWeSyCSbSX2
(Notes: 741)
  
Filed under: Nigeria Shell oil energy Shell Petrolium Politics Corruption Rape Genocide Torture Ethics Capitalism International 
November 26, 2011
Activists accuse Mexican president of war crimes in drug crackdown

International criminal court asked to investigate Felipe Caldéron over killing, torture and kidnap of civilians by army and police

2:08pm  |   URL: http://tmblr.co/ZiWeSyCSE6ug
(Notes: 20)
  
Filed under: Calderon Mexico Human Rights International Criminal Court ICC Latin America Travel Wanderlust 
September 14, 2011
Pope accused of crimes against humanity before the International Criminal Court by victims of sex abuse

I am not sure how far this case will go, but the point is highly valid.  If the pope was the head of an African militia or a south Asian regime, the West would have been criticizing him, and legally prosecuting him and limiting his movement for some time.  In modern society, if religion deserves any special treatment at all, it is to be less protected than modern political bodies or revolutionary struggles, which are at least working towards the humanist cause.

3:33pm  |   URL: http://tmblr.co/ZiWeSy9WYFss
(Notes: 17)
  
Filed under: Sexual Abuse Catholic Church Ratzinger Pope International Criminal Court Charges Society Secularism Humanism 
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