Friday, March 5, 2021

Odds and ends, Moon River

"Moon River"" on YouTube

http://www.youtube.com/shorts/SneFlvjTS0YSongs


Aluminum foil dangers in cooking

https://www.thealternativedaily.com/3-scary-reasons-ditch-aluminum-foil/

 

10 longest rivers

https://www.thoughtco.com/longest-rivers-in-the-world-1435149?utm_campaign=wilat&utm_medium=email&utm_source=cn_nl&utm_content=23084656&utm_term=


Does the UK use toilet paper?

When I was a child, there was a little poem we used to recite:

In days of old,

When Knights were bold,

And paper weren’t invented,

You’d wipe your arse

On a piece of grass

And walk away contented.

To be serious, we have been using it a long time. Where I lived as a child, in the Northeast of England, some people still had outside toilets, because there were still lots of Tyneside flats.

Traditionally, poor working class families hung squares of newspaper on string on a peg to use as toilet paper, though that was fast disappearing even 60 years ago.

I recall that there was a special kind of shiny paper you used to get in toilets in institutions like school, which was totally non-absorbent and utterly useless. I’m glad this has now disappeared. Horrible stuff.

 


Monday, March 1, 2021

Odds and ends, London symphony

 London symphony

https://youtu.be/6SlwnNKsidw



"Ninja technique of splitting stone" on YouTube

https://youtu.be/B7R-DW9tQSw




Does anyone call the queen by her first name? What would happen if a normal person did?

I only know of one person in the world who called her “Elizabeth” after she was about 6 or 7 years old, when her sister dubbed her “Lilibet”. That became the name her parents, sister, and cousins all used.

Prince Philip is known to call her “Bet”, when he’s not calling her “Cabbage”. “Lilibet” is still used by the older relatives. I saw a documentary filmed a few years ago where her former nanny/nurse also called her “Lilibet”. That one surprised me, but I guess it’s not easy to constantly call your charge “Your Highness” when you’re trying to get her to eat her spinach or make her bed.

So, back to the one person who called her “Elizabeth” and lived to tell the tale. This man:

Nelson Mandela called her “Elizabeth” at their first meeting.

“And during his 90th birthday party celebrated here in London, Her Majesty the Queen phoned Nelson Mandela in the middle of his party and he was handed the phone and said: ‘Hello Elizabeth, how’s the duke?’

“After which his wife Graça Machel scolded him, saying: ‘You cannot refer to Her Majesty the Queen on first name terms,’ to which he replied: ‘But she calls me Nelson.”‘ Duke and Duchess of Sussex praised by Nelson Mandela’s goddaughter

And, according to Mr Mandela’s son, their fondness for one another morphed into him calling her “Lizzie”. Nelson Mandela's sweet nickname for Queen Elizabeth

Apparently, Her Majesty quite enjoyed it.

From Quora


His majesty King Leopold II.



Background:

The Congo Free State was a corporate state in Central Africa privately owned by King Leopold II of Belgium founded and recognized by the Berlin Conference of 1885. In the 23 years (1885-1908) Leopold II ruled the Congo, he massacred 10 million Africans by cutting off their hands and genitals, flogging them to death, starving them into forced labour, holding children ransom and burning villages. The ironic part of this story is that Leopold II committed these atrocities by not even setting foot in the Congo. Under Leopold II’s administration…


A Congolese man looking at the severed hand and foot of his five-year-old daughter who was killed, and allegedly cannibalized, by the members of Anglo-Belgian India Rubber Company militia.

(Just imagine yourself instead of this man )

The 

man in photograph is Nsala.

Photograph was taken by Alice Seeley.

Her written account about this photograph is in the book, Don’t Call Me Lady: The Journey of Lady Alice Seeley Harris:





He hadn’t made his rubber quota for the day so the Belgian-appointed overseers had cut off his daughter’s hand and foot. Her name was Boali. She was five years old. Then they killed her. But they weren’t finished. Then they killed his wife too. And because that didn’t seem quite cruel enough, quite strong enough to make their case, they cannibalized both Boali and her mother. And they presented Nsala with the tokens, the leftovers from the once living body of his darling child whom he so loved.

The ABIR Congo Company (founded as the Anglo-Belgian India Rubber Company and later known as the Compagnie du Congo Belge) was the company appointed to exploit natural rubber in the Congo Free State. ABIR enjoyed a boom through the late 1890s, by selling a kilogram of rubber in Europe for up to 10 fr which had cost them just 1.35 fr.



Men holding hands severed from victims .

A catholic priest quotes a man, Tswambe, speaking of the hated state official Léon Fiévez:

From all the bodies killed in the field, you had to cut off the hands. He wanted to see the number of hands cut off by each soldier, who had to bring them in baskets…A village which refused to provide rubber would be completely swept clean

An illustration from HM Stanley’s “The Congo and the founding of its free state; a story of work and exploration.



Under the reign of Leopold II, the Congo’s unique wildlife was fair game for sport killing by almost any hunter who could book passage and pay for a hunting license.

King leopold II was also depicted in “Heart of darkness” by Joseph Conrad.

References:

. Father stares at the hand and foot of his five-year-old, severed as a punishment for failing to make the daily rubber quota, Belgian Congo, 1904

.

http://atrocitieswatch.org/king-leopold-of-belgium-in-congo/

.

Colonialism in Africa: Bondage, exploitation and developments

.

The Crime of the Congo

. Responsible For 10 Million Deaths, Why Isn't King Leopold II As Reviled As Hitler?



Sunday, February 21, 2021

Odds and ends

Nanda Malini

https://youtu.be/yMtnx9rEiYk



Spotted Dove in the home garden

 First Asian ladies, qualifying as Doctors

An Indian woman, a Japanese woman, and a Syrian woman, all training to be doctors at Women’s Medical College of Philadelphia. - October 10, 1885 Indian woman, a Japanese woman, and a Syrian woman, all training to be doctors at Women’s Medical College of Philadelphia. - October 10, 1885


Lightning strike

https://www.thoughtco.com/what-lightning-does-to-your-body-373600?utm_campaign=wilat&utm_medium=email&utm_source=cn_nl&utm_content=22996194&utm_term=