Well for a change I was not scheduled to be on the tennis courts this morning now winter is here more snow birds come down and our group gets larger so not so many games but I was lucky I joined another group for a drop in this afternoon.
I was in town by 10 am as I had to go to the Doctors to get some blood work done I need the reports for the medical insurance I am applying for…it was all very simple the nurse took the blood I paid 500 pesos and I go back this afternoon for the results!!!
I then went to see Sylvester to see if he had been able to fix my camera but when I got to his house he was sorry but he could not get it going so then I went into a photography store in town where the owner told me to bring the camera in and he would check it out and he also said that he could not repair it!!!!
Next stop was to go sit in the main square and just watch the festivities, the children and life go by…I also had brought some lunch as I was starving because I had fasted to have the blood work done and I enjoyed the lunch and just watching, listening and thinking!!!
Went to the courts at 1pm and joined the other 11 players and we changed partners and all played for two hours it was fun and a lot different playing in the middle of the day as opposed to the usual 9 o clock start….I do love my new racquet still getting used to it but it has a great feel and of course I smile and think that it is a gift!!!!
After tennis I went back into town and picked up my results and I need to see the doctor on Monday to talk about them and then get them sent away to the insurance folks!!!!
I was home by 4.30pm in time to relax with a cup of tea and then get showered and changed and I went back into town to attend the play at the local church…I go there quite often it is a good night out for only 20 pesos and tonight it was a raunchy comedy!!!!
So now here I am back home and have decided I need to get a new camera so I have talked to my friend Gregg who is leaving on Monday for the States and will return first week in January and he is going to order and bring me a new camera and I have decided on exactly the same camera this one has served me really well……. wondering where the day went.
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This letter below was sent to me by a friend and I trust you read it and think……..
From Hiba, a Pakistani woman, mother, sister, artist, and peacemaker.
Dear Glennon,
Two days ago when you posted about Pakistan, I wanted to write to you and thank you for your heart, but I felt shy.
Today, when you have written about stepping gently into each other’s worlds, I am compelled to reach out to you; to somehow make this invisible thread connecting us, stronger, more tangible.
You see, I am a Muslim Pakistani woman. I am the ‘other’ in many, many ways. And I am of a people reeling from tragedy. 132 of my school children have been killed by people who profess to follow my faith. It’s so hard, so very hard, to be of a race and a faith that is the subject of so much misunderstanding, so much misrepresentation, so much hate both internal
and external. But we can do hard things, right?!
I am connecting with you today to make a deliberate declaration, however inconsequential, to those who spread hate that peace and goodness and bridge building will always be more powerful than they are. To announce that whether we are a Muslim Pakistani woman like me, or a Christian Florida gal like yourself, we are all the same. To prove that Love Wins.
I am sharing below an excerpt of something I wrote on the day of the school massacre. Some people asked why, as a Muslim writer, I included a Christmas carol. I’d like to think it is because, like you, I insist on dreaming of the possibility of that ONE world where grace and miracles abound, where it doesn’t matter who is quoting what as long as they are truth-telling and hope-spreading.
Glennon, in Islam, we believe that Muslims, Christians and Jews worship the same One God, the same Ii’lah. May that One God bless you with increasing wisdom, continued eloquence, a bigger cloffice and ever-excellent coffee.
Merry Christmas to you and yours and a happy new year.
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My three year old daughter adores the color pink. Every time she sees it, no matter where, she exclaims joyfully, “For me? For me!” Last week, I was at the beach with my kids. As the sun began to set, pinks and purples streaked and lept across the sky in a breathtaking evening dance. When I pointed it out to my little girl, she exclaimed, in her particular high sweet voice, “The sky is so beautiful for me, Mama? For me!”. I held her in my arms, kissed her head, in the way that us sappy moms do when our kids school us in Life, and said “Yes. Yes, of course it’s for you.” Because she was absolutely right, it was.
There is a beautiful sky above us today, Pakistan. It is for us. There is
beauty, in every shade and color, all over our beloved country today and every day. It is for us.
These terrorists, these evil, loathsome, misguided individuals, win when we
tell ourselves and our children that this world is all darkness. They win when we stop believing with our very core that “Hum aik hain. Hum naik hain,” We are one. We are good.
Tomorrow, when you wake up and your stomach sinks and you remember the horror of this day, do something good for those one hundred children no longer with us. One hundred random acts of kindness for one hundred strangers. Give one hundred rupees to as many people as you can. Light one hundred candles. Recite one hundred verses from the Quran. Spend one hundred seconds in reverent silence. Do whatever you can to announce loudly and proudly to your heart and whoever else wants to hear you that “Pakistan is for me! This world is for me!”
There is a beautiful Christian hymn of which one part is:
“Said the King to the people everywhere
Listen to what I say
Pray for peace people everywhere
Listen to what I say
The child, the child
Sleeping in the night
He will bring us goodness and light
He will bring us goodness and light.”
May these sleeping children pave the way for goodness and light for Pakistan. May the horror of today become the promise of tomorrow. And may in God’s wisdom and mercy we always trust, amen.
Hiba
*********************
Amen, Hiba. Love You True and Deep and Real. We are one. We are good. We belong to each other. G
and another local article!!!!
Mexico police reform: How might it work?
By Will Grant BBC News, Mexico City
Police stand guard at a Mass for the dead students in Iguala
The Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto has unveiled a plan to reform the police, two months after they were implicated in a mass abduction in the town of Iguala which ended in the disappearance of 43 students. The attorney general's office says gang members confessed to murdering them.
Mr Pena Nieto hopes this plan will mark a turning point in the crisis. "After Iguala, Mexico should change," he said.
His supporters believe the 10-point plan will tackle the ingrained problems in policing and justice in the country, but opponents say the proposals fail to tackle the levels of corruption and impunity that allowed the disappearances to happen in the first place.
Here we look at five key proposals and some of the issues around them.
1. Replace the country's 1,800 municipal police forces with state-level forces
Presidential spokesman Eduardo Sanchez says this will ensure Mexicans will have "well-trained, well-equipped police capable of carrying out their duties efficiently". He cites the example of the state of Nuevo Leon, where a recent purge of municipal police forces produced "extraordinary results".
Recent attempts at purging local police forces, such as in the drug war-ravaged state of Coahuila, have failed but he says that the new measure will mean reforms are underpinned by federal law and "won't depend on the good will of individual governors or mayors".
Asked about the fate of existing municipal police officers, Mr Sanchez said there will be a purge but that "any citizen who meets the requirements of these (state-level) police units will be eligible to join."
Alejandro Hope, a drugs war analyst based in Mexico City, questions the value of applying what happened in Nuevo Leon to the rest of the country. He says the state has not been able to find enough new police to be an effective force.
2. Give the central government powers to dissolve local governments allegedly infiltrated by drug cartels
Eduardo Sanchez says the proposal is based on an Italian measure, enacted when there are "solid indications that the mayor or the local government is linked with organised crime". Some are already questioning the wisdom of copying on an Italian law, when the country has had Mafia problems for decades.
In addition, there are concerns that it is "another example of the centralisation of power", says Alejandro Ramos from the Centre for Human Rights in Guerrero
Mr Ramos, who has been working closely with the families of the 43 disappeared students, says he is wary any move that might increase the power of the presidency.
Alejandro Hope says that there are laws already to dissolve local authorities that the attorney general considers have been "compromised" by the cartels, but that the political will to do so has always been lacking.
3. Give national identity numbers to all Mexicans
Mexicans already have citizenship cards, so the proposal is for a new system that will include more information about physical appearance, and therefore be harder to counterfeit. The proposal is also to create some form of a national database. Government spokesman Eduardo Sanchez says the plan will "provide the certainty that Mexico has a register of its entire population".
Critics say the plan will add a new layer of bureaucracy to a country already deeply entrenched in government paperwork, but Mr Hope thinks the plan is a good idea.
"There could be some practical difficulties, as we already have a national identity number, but the key is to link legal identity to physical identity," he says.
4. Boost federal security forces in key areas
There are already around 10,000 members of the federal security forces in Guerrero and thousands more have been deployed to the three other troubled states: Michoacan, Jalisco and Tamaulipas. The government says more reinforcements are needed.
The idea assumes, of course, that the federal forces are trustworthy. Alejandro Ramos is far from convinced: "It's not just the municipal [police] forces who are 'contaminated'. All the police forces in Mexico are affected."
5. A national emergency hotline
There is no single number in Mexico to call in an emergency. Each state has its own number for key emergency services.
Few would argue against the creation of a single number around which all emergency services could coalesce, but representatives of the disappeared 43 students say that in today's Mexico, even a phone call is a question of trust.
"A national emergency number would be useful," says Alejando Ramos, "but at the moment civil society just wouldn't believe it. We know that the people who'd attend your emergency are the same police that are linked to organised crime."
Yashi Kochi!!!!
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