Happy New Year fireworks (video)

CC Liu, Wisdom Quarterly; Volo Orbit (video)

Amazing 2017 Beijing, China New Year (2017/4714) lebration. Happy New Year's Eve fireworks

Chinese New Year: Fire Rooster 4714

Ashley Wells (ed.), Wisdom Quarterly; Josie Griffiths (thesun.co.uk); ChinaHighlights.com

Colorful Chinese women celebrating in Glasgow in 2016 (thesun.co.uk/Getty Images)

.

Top 10 Interesting Facts (China Highlights)

It’s one of the most colorful events on the calendar, when people take to the streets both in China and across the planet.

Unlike Western festivities, which always take place at midnight between December 31st and January 1st, Chinese New Year is a movable celebration -- and it all kicks off today.

(China is the most populous country in the world, and due to their diaspora, there are probably more Chinese people on the planet than any other kind).

This year has already seen tens of thousands of people brave freezing conditions at Beijing Railway Station in the hope of bagging a ticket home for the celebrations -- and huge parties are expected in the UK.

When is Chinese New Year for 2017?

Amitabha, Chinese temple

The 2017 Chinese New Year begins on Saturday, January 28. [Of course,  Chinese culture is very old -- the oldest continuous society and still going strong -- extending back 5,000 years -- so this is the year 4714. See the Chinese lunisolar calendar.]

What is a fire rooster?

Not all roosters (cocks or man-chickens) are equal. 

There are five different types, each with different characteristics. This is the year of the Fire Rooster, which last fell in 1957. Fire Roosters are known for being trustworthy, punctual, and responsible (especially at work). More

Single on New Year's Day?

Chinese New Year is a joyful time for all except for singles above the normal matrimonial age. This is because parents and relatives think they should be settled down.

Some singles resort to renting a boyfriend or girlfriend (who are just for show, not gaudy good times) for the New Year to avoid the awkwardness.

• See more interesting Chinese New Year Facts

Red money envelopes

Like Xmas in the West, people exchange gifts during the Chinese Spring Festival. The most common gifts are red envelopes.

Red envelopes have money inside and are given to children and (retired) seniors. It is not a custom to give red envelopes to (working) adults, except by employers.

Red envelopes are used in the hope of giving good luck (as well as money) to the receivers. Do you know Who to give red envelopes to and how much to give?

Praying in temple for year-long blessing

Praying in a temple during Chinese New Year is said to be a particularly blessed activity. It will lead to a smooth year. In Shanghai, China's biggest city, thousands flock to Longhua Temple, the city's biggest Buddhist temple, to pray for good fortune. More

Happy (Chinese Lunar) New Year's Eve!

Alina Simone (The World); CC Liu, Crystal Quintero, Seth Auberon (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly

There are many mysteries about the origin of the Chinese inside the wall and where they'll go.

.

Female Lunar New Year's lion dancers

Kelly Wong, lion dance instructor at the NY Chinese Freemasons Athletic Club, which was founded as a fraternal society among the first troupes in Chinatown to train women (Alina Simone/PRI).

Dating Asians?

On the fourth floor of a shabby walk-up fronting one of the busiest streets in New York's Chinatown, lions are dancing. Okay, it’s lion dancing.
 

The New York Chinese Freemasons Athletic Club (more on that name in a second) hosts what’s believed to be the longest-running lion dance troupe in New York City.

For this year’s Lunar New Year Parade, pairs of lion dancers will again don giant papier-mâché heads and colorful synthetic tails to cavort through the streets -- blessing businesses, thrilling tourists, and discreetly collecting cash. This year’s will be the club’s 61st annual parade.

Chinese New Year's Parade, prima lion dance, New York City (Alina Simone/PRI.org)

Chinese New Year's lion dance prep: "horse stance," kung fu style (Alina Simone/pri.org)

The many hidden and unknown pyramids of China built by extraterrestrials from the sun

  

Traditional Chinese Culture

Back in the 1960s, there were fewer than 10 troupes participating in Chinatown’s Lunar New Year parade; today it’s more like 40 or 50.

The dancers make it look easy, but that head can weigh up to 30 pounds. And swiveling it around on your forearms when you can see almost nothing but your feet requires a lot of flexibility, strength, and balance.

 

“It’s not like in the movies; the guy reads a book, and then he's flying through the air,” says Karlin Chan, one of the club’s veteran lion dancers. He joined the troupe as a 10-year-old, back in the late ’60s. Chan explains the Chinese Freemasons practice a form of “southern lion dance” based on kung fu.  More

Comic relief: dumb Trump, Netherlands

Ashley Wells, Seth Auberon, Pat Macpherson, CC Liu, Larry, Wisdom Quarterly; The Netherlands (comic video); JenSorensen.com; Tom Tomorrow (thismodernworld.com)

(The Netherlands) Begins at Min. 0:35. The whole world was watching the inauguration of the 45th president of the US: DJ Trump. Because the Netherlands realizes it's better for the two countries to get along, they decided to introduce their tiny country to the Donald -- in his own words and in a way that will probably appeal to him most. Voice-over by Greg Shapiro. (vpro.nl/zml/npo3.nl/zondagmetlubach).

• AUDIO: Jimmy Dore Comedy (KPFK FM)
• Over 1 million join anti-Trump women's marches worldwide
• Trump dogged by insecurity over US vote, media coverage
• Trump moves to pull US out of big Asia trade deal

Suppressed ancient artifacts (video)

The Forbidden Archeologist (video); Klaus Dona; Pat Macpherson (ed.), Wisdom Quarterly

WARNING: Crass Christian racist suffering from implicit bias and privilege looks at artifacts locals could not have created.

Suppressed ancient artifacts don't match current beliefs
Mainstream historians and governments are purposely covering up details of past archeological discoveries. Why? They would rock current popular theories about the past.

Vimana ship skims over the ocean

Some of the most important archaeological institutes in the world are actively suppressing some of the most interesting and important archaeological discoveries ever made.

We are living on a planet of extreme human antiquity (mcremo.com), and this is not the only planet humans reside, according to Buddhist lore. The human plane, or manussya loka, is spread throughout this "world system," a term which possibly refers to a solar system or galaxy, across tens and hundreds of millions of years.

(Vlad9vt) Ancient alien artifacts 2/2

The skulls of non-earthlings on earth

Let's uncover evidence of surprising, out-of-place artifacts (ooparts). According to what we were taught in school, these finding are “impossible.” They simply should not exist. And they are not isolated anomalies. There is a global pattern to them, suggesting that an ancient worldwide civilization of astonishing proportions once existed. That is to say, the world of the past was in communication from one part of the world to the other.

This video brings together many pieces of evidence of a now lost super science and the technology it created, including dozens of achievements far ahead of us today.

Klaus Dona explores the skeletal and archaeological remains of giant humans and advanced technologies, with some amazing photos of ooparts (out-of-place artifacts) and discusses what is actually known about them, why they don’t fit in the current scientific paradigm, and the implications of their existence on the history as humanity. More (megalithicodyssey.com)

What the war needs now...is a wall (Trump)

Pfc. Sandoval, Pat Mapcherson, Seth Auberon, CC Liu, Wisdom Quarterly; AP; SCPR, PRI

There is already a large, long border partition along parts of southern United States (AP)

SAN DIEGO, California - As Trump announced his plans for a wall on US-Mexico border, Border Patrol agents in California on the lookout for drugs and smugglers drove all-terrain vehicles along a barrier that reaches 18 feet, topped by razor wire and reinforced by cameras and lighting (AP).

I want us to restart our torture, too (AP).

What the world needs now is love, sweet love. It's the only thing that there's just too little of. But what Trump, sweet Trump, wants to dump dump dump along the border is a big f.u. to the US war on its enemies, the world.

Our dummy-in-chief is not the first president to embark on an aggressive buildup on the border. Here's a look at what is already there: 

SEMI-FORTIFIED BORDER

Drought ends, but water prices to stay high.

One-third of the U.S.-Mexico border, or 653 miles, is already studded with fence in a potpourri of styles, from menacing barriers to less formidable ones. The Ancient Chinese would be proud.

The barriers arose from pseudo-Pres. George W. Bush's "Secure Fence Act," which was passed quietly in the last year of his administration. You don't need to know what the "Patriot Act" actually says, so what do you need to know the full plan of taking over the U.S. from the inside out?

Let's make war on the world

Kahlo would dislike this war.

Mexicans shopped at an outlet mall that bumps up against the border. And dozens of migrants huddled in tents outside a shelter in Mexico hoping to get into the U.S. To them Trump's executive order Wednesday to build a wall seemed more like a symbolic gesture of a new chapter in U.S-Mexico relations than a real deterrent for people to enter the country without dealing with U.S. bureaucracy. More

A look at border security, fencing as Trump announces wall

HOUSTON, Texas - Trump announced his long-awaited plan today to build a "wall" on the 1,954-mile U.S. border with Mexico, calling for its "immediate construction" to stop illegal immigration, drug and human trafficking, and potential future acts of "terrorism." More

 

Trump has created Orwellian reality: read 1984 and Animal Farm to see why (pri.org).

Unpopular President Enrique Pena Nieto of Mexico says NO to Pres. Don Trump (AP)xxx

The easiest way to cross the US-Mexico border is to wade out a little at the beach (AP).

Don Trump orders a border "wall" because our fence is just not good enough (KPCC)

The Federalis, US Border Patrol cowboys on the hunt for trespassers on white man's land

Latin Border Patrol agent Olmos at secondary fence separating Tijuana, background, and US

We didn't cross "the border." The Border Crossed Us (vagabondpress.net)

The border dividing Mexico into Mexico and the US or El Norte and El Sur (AP)

• Real Donald Trump to increase deportation, but will he make records public? 
• Trump's plan to build a bigger border wall has plenty of critics
• Trump's wall met with skepticism, unease on US-Mexico border
• Scientist plan march on Washington due to Trump
• Juggalos (Insane Clown Posse fans) plan march on Washington 
• Mexican president cancels trip to US to meet Trump (Trump tries to pretend it was his idea)
• What the Mexico City rule means to women around the world
• Why does everyone hate Trump (except racists who hate being called racists)? 
• VIDEO: Kellyanne Conway, Koch Brothers' failed comedienne

1. Trump orders US-Mexico border wall, strips sanctuary city funding
2. How LA's multi-heritage kids navigate their identity
3. There are 63,000 homeless children in school in LA County
4. She turned the world on with her smile: Mary Tyler Moore dies at 80
5. LA affordable housing incentive program isn't working, audit finds
6. California's freeze on Aliso gas field use shatters in the cold
7. Who gets the drug Truvada? Study finds CDC guidelines miss HIV risk factors
8. 185-foot tower near Beverly Center gets council approval
9. UC president expected at Regents meeting after health scare
10. Medical debt named top reason collection agencies call

Water protectors weigh whether to fight or give up on Mother Earth

Water protectors stop ETP and police (rt.com)

CANNON BALL, North Dakota - Most of the peaceful demonstrators who gathered on the North Dakota plains to oppose the Dakota Access oil pipeline declared victory and departed their snowy protest camp last month after the Army announced it would halt the project, says the AP. But diehards knowing the corporation, the police, and the government are lying remained behind as "water protectors." Trump recent statements proves they were right to doubt the powers that be would choose the people and the environment over their profits and power grab. More biased reportage from the AP

(MSNBC) The Rachel Maddow gleeful on The Rachel Maddow Show

Afghanistan rebuilds destroyed statues

SCPR.org (National Public Radio, story partly funded by a Knight Luce Fellowship for Reporting on Global Religion) edited by Dhr. Seven, Amber Larson, Wisdom Quarterly

Bamiyan, the Buddhas of Afghanistan, the Buddha's hometown (Lion's Roar News)

Taller Buddha in 1963 and in 2008 after destruction (Bamiyan: UNESCO/A Lezine/Tsui)

.

Mes Aynak (Shah Marai/AFP/Getty)

The Taliban [egged on by the CIA] destroyed the historic statues a decade ago. But in a painstaking process, the two giant carvings of Buddha are being reconstructed on the side of a cliff in central Afghanistan.

 

When the Taliban controlled Afghanistan a decade ago, they were fanatical about eliminating everything they considered un-Islamic.

 

Their biggest targets -- literally and figuratively -- were the two monumental Buddha statues carved out of the sandstone cliffs in central Afghanistan. One stood nearly 180 feet tall and the other about 120 feet high, and together they had watched over the dusty Bamiyan Valley since the sixth century, several centuries before Islam reached the region.

 

Despite international opposition, the Taliban destroyed the statues with massive explosions in 2001. At the time they were blown up, the statues were the largest Buddha carvings in the world, and it seemed they were gone for good.

 

Buddhist Afghanistan, ancient Scythia/Shakya Land, where the Buddha was born (WQ)

.

But today, teams from the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization, along with the International Council on Monuments and Sites, are engaged in the painstaking process of putting the broken Buddhas back together.

 

Up to half of the Buddha pieces can be recovered, according to Bert Praxenthaler, a German art historian and sculptor, who has been working at the site for the past eight years. He and his crew have sifted through 400 tons of rubble and have recovered many parts of the statues along with shrapnel, land mines and explosives that were used in their demolition.

 

But how do you rebuild the Buddhas from the rubble?

 

"The archaeological term is 'anastylosis,' but most people think it's some kind of strange disease," said Praxenthaler.

 

For those in the archaeology world, "anastylosis" is actually a familiar term. It was the process used to restore the Parthenon of Athens. It involves combining the monument's original pieces with modern material.

 

On a recent day, Praxenthaler was leading a group through a tunnel behind the niche where the smaller of the two statues once stood.

 

"We are now on top of the Buddha," he explained. "There was just a wall and a small opening to sit on the top, or the head, of the Buddha. But now there is no head."

 

The workers were busy removing scaffolding after months spent reinforcing the wall where the Buddha's head once was. 

Mixed feelings about project

Afghanistan/Scythia/Shakya Land (upper left corner next to Himalayas), Bharat/India

 

Bamiyan is an extremely poor and remote land in one of the world's most underdeveloped countries. The Buddha statues were once a major tourist attraction, but Afghanistan has been at war virtually nonstop for more than three decades. The fighting drove away the tourists years before the Taliban blew up the statues.

 

The restoration project is designed to rebuild the historic site, as well as bring back the tourists. The project has the support of Habiba Sarabi, the popular provincial governor. And there are reasons to be hopeful. Bamiyan is now considered one of the less dangerous places in Afghanistan.

 

Yet others, like human rights activist Abdullah Hamadi, say the empty niches where the Buddhas stood are a reminder of the Taliban's fanaticism, and should be left as they are.

 

"The Buddha was destroyed," said Hamadi. "If you made it, rebuilt it, that is not the history. The history is the broken Buddha."

 

Hamadi is from the nearby district of Yakawlang, where the Taliban massacred more than 300 members of a minority group, called the Hazaras, in 2001. Those killings took place just two months before the Taliban blew up the Buddha statues.

 

While Bamiyan is much safer today, the Taliban can still strike. Recently, Taliban insurgents kidnapped and beheaded Jawad Zahak, the head of the Bamiyan provincial council, while he was driving his family toward Kabul, about 150 miles to the southeast.

 

Some in Bamiyan say they would rather see the money for the restoration project go toward services like electricity and housing, which are in desperately short supply. 

Homeless take shelter in caves

Map of Central Asia, Shakya Land (Greek name Scythia), Indo Sakastan, India

.

In fact, the caves at the site of the Buddha statues are the only shelter some Bamiyan residents can find. Homeless villagers like Marzia and her six children are living in one of the caves, while the family's goats bleat nearby. Marzia, who like many Afghans uses only one name, said she has no use for the statues.

 

"We don't have a house, so where else can we live?" she said.

 

A few enterprising villagers have found ways to make money off the story surrounding the Buddhas. One is Said Merza Husain, known around town as the man who was forced to help the Taliban blow up the statues.

 

He said he had no choice but to obey the Taliban a decade ago. If he had resisted, they would have killed him. One of his friends refused to take part, and the Taliban shot him.

 

But that is the only information Husain will share for free. To hear more of the story, he charges anywhere between $20 and $100.

 

Meanwhile, Bert Praxenthaler's team was about to halt their work temporarily during the scorching Afghan summer. One longtime worker, Ali Reza, was picking up his pay. He signed his name and received a wad of Afghanis.

 

Praxenthaler also handed him a certificate and thanked him first in Dari, then in English. Piecing together Bamiyan's Buddhas will take many more years. After a summer break, Praxenthaler's team plans to resume their work in the fall. More

• The Buddha's birthplace in Afghanistan (Dr. Ranajit Pal)

1984: No climate change under Trump (video)

Pat Macpherson, Kris, Wisdom Quarterly; Huff Post (Rachel Maddow); Business Insider

George Orwell would find it bittersweet: Sales of 1984 soar as "Big Brother" takes office.

Rachel Maddow issues warning over Trump's climate gag order

Down with Big Bro (Nineteen Eighty-Four)

MSNBC's liberal semi-comedian lesbian totally unbiased host Rachel Maddow is outing Trump. Not for being bi; no one will mention that. He's directing the EPA to stop funding climate change research. There maybe global warming or not, but let's not look into it. And lets hide previous research, which is surely biased to favor one side of the issue over the other. But it's still data the government paid for, which means -- even if it's a fraud funded to monetize carbon -- it belongs to all of us. More

(MSNBC, Jan. 25, 2017) The Rachel Maddow Show reports on how many of the concerns about how Pres.Trump (on Day 4) would regard the environment as president are coming true, with his pushing of controversial pipelines, to his EPA pick, to his lockdown on the EPA staff.

The planet's going to ruin, but at least the stock market's up! (The DOW Jones is not the market, and more importantly, the market is NOT the economy even if the media treats it that way).

Pres. Trump (and mainstream Republicans and some Democrats) wants torture (AP).

Say what, Rachel? Shut the h*ll up! I'm Big Brother president now! (AP)