The Mica Menagerie

this rihanna song is really hot:

2007-03-29T15:58:00.000-07:00

http://www.sendspace.com/file/ctr2se

called umbrella, it features references to rain man and little miss sunshine, two movies.

i like it alot, looks like its the perfect summer cruising song.

NEW BLOG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!:

2005-09-20T11:38:00.000-07:00

http://micajapan.blogspot.com

Happy Birthday To Me

2005-06-04T00:00:00.000-07:00

June 4th, 1983

when people around you say stupid shit

2005-05-28T02:00:00.000-07:00

so i'm a conference assistant yet again this summer, and unforunately unlike last year, the ca's this year aren't as fly. majority are cool, but there is one that has done some questionable things recently, that i've tried to overlook but kinda can't.

dude said he used to think that black folks talked with an 'african american accent' which i thought was incredibly stupid. tonight while discussing the book "nigger" he jokingly said "did a nigger write it". i had an issue with it because he tried to pass it off as "funny" and "just a joke" but it was the stupidest thing i've heard in a very long time as an excuse. see, this dude had the book in his room and both he (owner of book) and the other guy were talking about the book and using the title and i was like "um, you guys know you can't use that word, right?" and in retrospect, hey, it is the title of the book, so i overreacted. then they were joking and asking why did i have to make stuff unfun but getting serious (when dude mentioned the af-am accent thing, i had an issue with that too), then the "did a nigger write it" thing came out.

the problem was the people i was with seemed to turn it around and make it look like i was too sensitive, which was weird cause neither of them were black as in african american, and therefore they don't understand the implications of what it is to say "nigger" and not be black.

problem is, as mad as i am after the fact (this happened like around 5 or 6 or 7...i don't remember)i can't be too pissed cause in an effort to keep the peace and not leave which would make it uncomfortable between us all the future (which seems fair, since i was incredibly uncomfortable at that moment) i stayed around and watched the planned movie, until around 1 am which would only on some level co-sign the events that happened.

eh, i guess i'm not that strong a girl that i can't stand up to something that obviously is very wrong. i'll learn, i guess.

Thoughts about racism in image form

2005-05-22T22:54:00.000-07:00

Picture 1:

Here

Picture 2:

Thoughts?

2005 Graduation, bitches!

2005-05-15T02:25:00.000-07:00

I am now the proud owner (pending degree conferring of course) of a BA degree in Political Science, with a minor in African American Studies.

"I'm like Michael Jordan, I play for the team I own, nigga"

2005-05-07T01:53:00.000-07:00

I hate this line. Why? Because no Jay-Z you are NOT like Michael Jordan because NBA rules stipulate that you cannot in fact play for the team that you own. In fact, Jordan had to sell his part of the team when he played for the Wizards those two years....Though now that I think about it, I want to say that he sold his share to his son for a dollar just to keep it in the family...Hmmmm....

I still hate that line.

Katie Holmes?!?!

2005-04-28T23:55:00.000-07:00

No really, Katie Holmes?

And Tom Cruise.

Katie.

I can't believe this. I have literally spent the entire day wondering how this pairing could happen. Do you realize if Katie "I'm so not famous except for a long-running WB television show" Holmes can snag ballerific Tom Cruise then I actually have a shot? Fuck Janet and Jermaine, THIS is the true "Bentleys were $4 yesterday" regret. I'm not saying that Katie is anywhere near the *perplexed look* that Jermaine is, but it's just odd. I'm sure her girlfriends are like "Thank god, being friends with this lame all these years have finally paid off, I'm going to get all the secrets of what it is to be with Tom"

Also, I've just realized that Kanye's new single "Diamonds" makes absolutely no sense if you don't know that the diamonds he refers to throughout the song is the Roc sign (though I've always thought it looked more like a triangle). I mean, chances are if you are a fan of Kanye, even a casual one, you'd know this, but as I listened to the song tonight I was like "Hmmm, a fan that didn't really know that much about Kanye, but thought he was dope, would be mad confused and potentially be turned off to Kanye due to the confusion". Yes sure I'm exaggerating a bit, but still.

And in other news, the Common "Be" album is still fire, as I recently got back into it after a hiatus to turn my full attention to the wonderfulness that is "Sweetest Goodbye" by Maroon 5. This song was on repeat for a very very long time.

"Hey (wo)man, it's time to move"

2005-04-26T18:11:00.000-07:00

The above quote, which originally is "hey man, it's time to move", is from the live album"826", which is by R&B singer Jill Scott.

On the album, this is the opening track, and is an instrumental slow groove her backing band Fatback Taffy plays prior to Jill's arrival on stage. Well, it is an instrumental aside from one of the band members calling out the quote in the title....

The reason I bring that quote up is because for me, it is time to move. And by that, I mean move on to another phase in my life, that being a phase where I am much more astute, intellectually engaging, critically thinking and just an all around "better" (in every sense of the word) individual than I've been these past four years, maybe my entire life.

It's all about being the best Mica that I can be, and part of that is letting go of bad old habits and embracing new ones that are benefitical for myself and allow me to be benefitical toward others.

The phrase "the world is my oyster" has never been so true.

Beck's "Hell Yes" Is Really Fire

2005-04-19T23:25:00.000-07:00

Check it out, it's on "Guero", his latest. Peep my Brandy review for my school newspaper:

Brandy-singer, actress, public relations failure-has released 'Best of Brandy' which marks the end of her relationship with Atlantic Records. Formally let out of her contract earlier this year, and now looking to focus on acting again (after 'Moesha' was canceled in 2001) with a development deal with FOX, Atlantic and Brandy hook back up again one more time to release this collection of her supposed best tracks.

However, it seems as though Brandy hasn't lived enough nor released enough to have a 'Best of' collection. Sure, Britney released something similar earlier in the year, but Brandy seems to have made a career out of doing everything "right," and prior to this compilation, her only misstep was faking a marriage for the world to see (including showcasing it on an MTV reality show and telling the whole saga to Oprah Winfrey), once she got pregnant out of wedlock. So it is odd to see her released a collection of songs that, while entertaining to listen to, don't really have much of a punch as they are culled just from her four albums, a few soundtracks and a compilation and an overseas single.

Included are tracks from her debut, which was self titled, including "Baby," "Best Friend," and remixes of "I Wanna Be Down" (with rappers Queen Latifah, Yoyo and MC Lyte) and "Brokenhearted" (with Boyz II Men's Wanya). From sophomore album 'Never Say Never,' there is the monster smash "The Boy Is Mine," "Have You Ever?" and the remixed version of "U Don't Know Me (Like U Use To)" featuring rappers Shaunta and Da Brat.

The album, if it is already not obvious, comes across as quite duet heavy. Aside from the aforementioned duets, also included is "Top of the World" with Mase, "Talk About Our Love" with Kanye West, "Rock With You" with Heavy D (which appeared on Quincy Jones' "Jook Joint" album) and a single released only in Europe, a remake of Phil Collins' "Another Day In Paradise" featuring her brother Ray J.

With so many duets, it seems as though Brandy has had a lot of 'help' over the years in regards to star power powering her singles and anchoring her albums, and it could possibly make one wonder if Brandy would have prospered as much had she not had so much support over the years. Whether or not Atlantic Records meant for this to be discovered is unknown.

It seems cuts such as "Who Is She 2 U" and "Talk About Our Love" just aren't needed, as they were on her most recent release 'Afrodisiac,' Perhaps some of the songs could be taken off and other more obscure tracks such as the Lenny Kravitz produced "Where Are You Now" (From the 'Batman Forever' soundtrack) or songs from her TV movies 'Cinderella' or 'Double Platinum,' While it has been noted that this is supposed to the "Best" of Brandy, one might think that the more obscure stuff isn't better or worse than what is presented here.

Brandy should have waited a few more albums before she put out a 'Best of'. While it is understandable that this is all Atlantic Records is going to get from Brandy in terms of material, now that their relationship is over, one wishes that neither would have authorized this jumping-of-the-gun and just left the Brandy catalogue intact with four albums, not five

I think this is interesting...Thoughts?

2005-04-12T17:24:00.000-07:00

http://slate.msn.com/id/2116449

A Roshanda by Any Other Name

How do babies with super-black names fare?

By Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner

(4/11/05)

Which is more dangerous: a gun or a swimming pool? How much does campaign spending really matter? What truly made crime fall in the 1990s? These are the sort of questions raised—and answered—in the new book Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything. In today's excerpt, the first of two, authors Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner explore the impact of a child's first name, particularly a distinctively black name. Tomorrow's excerpt shows how names work their way down the socioeconomic ladder.

It has been well established that we live in an age of obsessive, even competitive, parenting. The typical parent is led to believe that her every move will greatly influence her child's future accomplishments. This belief expresses itself in the first official act a parent commits: giving the baby a name. Many parents seem to think that a child will not prosper unless it is hitched to the right one; names are seen to carry great aesthetic and even predictive powers.

This might explain why, in 1958, a New York City father named Robert Lane decided to call his baby son Winner. The Lanes, who lived in a housing project in Harlem, already had several children, each with a fairly typical name. But this boy—well, Robert Lane apparently had a special feeling about him. Winner Lane: How could he fail with a name like that?

Three years later, the Lanes had another baby boy, their seventh and last child. For reasons that no one can quite pin down today, Robert decided to name this boy Loser. Robert wasn't unhappy about the new baby; he just seemed to get a kick out of the name's bookend effect. First a Winner, now a Loser. But if Winner Lane could hardly be expected to fail, could Loser Lane possibly succeed?

Loser Lane did in fact succeed. He went to prep school on a scholarship, graduated from Lafayette College in Pennsylvania, and joined the New York Police Department, where he made detective and, eventually, sergeant. Although he never hid his name, many people were uncomfortable using it. To his police colleagues today, he is known as Lou.

And what of his brother? The most noteworthy achievement of Winner Lane, now in his late 40s, is the sheer length of his criminal record: more than 30 arrests for burglary, domestic violence, trespassing, resisting arrest, and other mayhem.

These days, Loser and Winner barely speak. The father who named them is no longer alive. Though he got his boys mixed up, did he have the right idea—is naming destiny? What kind of signal does a child's name send to the world?

These are the sort of questions that led to "The Causes and Consequences of Distinctively Black Names," a research paper written by a white economist (Steven Levitt, a co-author of this article) and a black economist (Roland G. Fryer Jr., a young Harvard scholar who studies race). The paper acknowledged the social and economic gulf between blacks and whites but paid particular attention to the gulf between black and white culture. Blacks and whites watch different TV shows, for instance; they smoke different cigarettes. And black parents give their children names that are starkly different than white children's.

The names research was based on an extremely large and rich data set: birth-certificate information for every child born in California since 1961. The data covered more than 16 million births. It included standard items like name, gender, race, birthweight, and the parents' marital status, as well as more telling factors: the parents' ZIP code (which indicates socioeconomic status and a neighborhood's racial composition), their means of paying the hospital bill for the birth (again, an economic indicator), and their level of education.

The California data establish just how dissimilarly black and white parents have named their children over the past 25 years or so—a remnant, it seems, of the Black Power movement. The typical baby girl born in a black neighborhood in 1970 was given a name that was twice as common among blacks than whites. By 1980, she received a name that was 20 times more common among blacks. (Boys' names moved in the same direction but less aggressively—likely because parents of all races are less adventurous with boys' names than girls'.) Today, more than 40 percent of the black girls born in California in a given year receive a name that not one of the roughly 100,000 baby white girls received that year. Even more remarkably, nearly 30 percent of the black girls are given a name that is unique among every baby, white and black, born that year in California. (There were also 228 babies named Unique during the 1990s alone, and one each of Uneek, Uneque, and Uneqqee; virtually all of them were black.)

What kind of parent is most likely to give a child such a distinctively black name? The data offer a clear answer: an unmarried, low-income, undereducated, teenage mother from a black neighborhood who has a distinctively black name herself. Giving a child a super-black name would seem to be a black parent's signal of solidarity with her community—the flip side of the "acting white" phenomenon. White parents, meanwhile, often send as strong a signal in the opposite direction. More than 40 percent of the white babies are given names that are at least four times more common among whites.

So, what are the "whitest" names and the "blackest" names? (Mica Edit: The names are below) And how much does your name really matter? Over the years, a series of studies have tried to measure how people perceive different names. Typically, a researcher would send two identical (and fake) résumés, one with a traditionally white name and the other with an immigrant or minority-sounding name, to potential employers. The "white" résumés have always gleaned more job interviews. Such studies are tantalizing but severely limited, since they offer no real-world follow-up or analysis beyond the résumé stunt.

The California names data, however, afford a more robust opportunity. By subjecting this data to the economist's favorite magic trick—a statistical wonder known as regression analysis—it's possible to tease out the effect of any one factor (in this case, a person's first name) on her future education, income, and health.

The data show that, on average, a person with a distinctively black name—whether it is a woman named Imani or a man named DeShawn—does have a worse life outcome than a woman named Molly or a man named Jake. But it isn't the fault of his or her name. If two black boys, Jake Williams and DeShawn Williams, are born in the same neighborhood and into the same familial and economic circumstances, they would likely have similar life outcomes. But the kind of parents who name their son Jake don't tend to live in the same neighborhoods or share economic circumstances with the kind of parents who name their son DeShawn. And that's why, on average, a boy named Jake will tend to earn more money and get more education than a boy named DeShawn. DeShawn's name is an indicator—but not a cause—of his life path.

Steven D. Levitt teaches economics at the University of Chicago and is a recipient of the John Bates Clark Medal, awarded every two years to the best American economist under 40. Stephen J. Dubner is a New York City journalist and author of two previous books: Turbulent Souls and Confessions of a Hero-Worshiper.

The 20 Whitest Girl Names

1. Molly 2. Amy 3. Claire 4. Emily 5. Katie 6. Madeline 7. Katelyn 8. Emma 9. Abigail 10. Carly 11. Jenna12. Heather 13. Katherine14. Caitlin15. Kaitlin16. Holly17. Allison 18. Kaitlyn 19. Hannah 20. Kathryn

The 20 Blackest Girl Names

1. Imani 2. Ebony 3. Shanice 4. Aaliyah 5. Precious 6. Nia 7. Deja 8. Diamond 9. Asia 10. Aliyah11. Jada 12. Tierra 13. Tiara 14. Kiara 15. Jazmine16. Jasmin17. Jazmin 18. Jasmine19. Alexus20. Raven

The 20 Whitest Boy Names

1. Jake 2. Connor 3. Tanner 4. Wyatt 5. Cody 6. Dustin 7. Luke 8. Jack 9. Scott10. Logan11. Cole12. Lucas 13. Bradley 14. Jacob 15. Garrett16. Dylan17. Maxwell 18. Hunter 19. Brett 20. Colin

The 20 Blackest Boy Names

1. DeShawn2. DeAndre 3. Marquis 4. Darnell 5. Terrell 6. Malik 7. Trevon 8. Tyrone 9. Willie 10. Dominique 11. Demetrius12. Reginald 13. Jamal 14. Maurice 15. Jalen 16. Darius 17. Xavier18. Terrance 19. Andre 20. Darryl

Most Popular Girl Crossover Names

1. Andrea 2. Whitney 3. Alicia 4. Kendra 5. Alexandria 6. Natasha 7. Tiffany 8. Brittany 9. Amber 10. Talia 11. Erika 12. Brianna 13. Ariel14. Gabrielle 15. Veronica 16. Alana 17. Kyra 18. Ashley 19. Breanna 20. Erica

Most Popular Boy Crossover Names

1. Vincent 2. George 3. Troy 4. Christian 5. Martin 6. Corey 7. Brandon 8. Eric 9. Craig 10. Frank 11. Cameron 12. Shawn 13. Micah 14. Gregory 15. Nathaniel 16. Marc 17. Aaron 18. Dominic 19. Theodore 20. Isaac

* * *

Lol. Funny that my name is on one of the above lists but it's not in its correct form and is meant for a boy. My name never gets any respect, whether it's for lists like these or for keychain license plates....I swear, I've never found it already emblazoned on a plate without me having to ask for one to be personally made.

Another poem....

2005-04-04T21:28:00.000-07:00

What was it that finally made you leave?
I’m glad, cause I can’t keep compromising, nor appease
It couldn’t always keep being my fault
All this guilt tripping, it must come to a screeching halt

I don’t want to listen to your reasons anymore
I think it’s best that we part
Still, I can’t help but crumble to the floor
This breaking feeling, only my heart

So here’s to what we once had
I’m only now starting to feel bad
I hope that you never feel this sad,
Well, only when you realize what you once had

Osaka, here I come!

2005-03-30T18:53:00.000-08:00

Chyeah, as Jay would say, looks like all signs point to going to Osaka in Fall 2005 to teach English. This will be cool because for those of you that don't know, I was actually born in Osaka, and it will be my first time going back since I was born 21 years (almost 22) ago.

Look, I wrote some poems...

2005-03-30T16:00:00.000-08:00

Inspired by the oh-so-gangsta weather today here in the Chi, and also inspired by Langston Hughes, I decided to write two poems. What do you think?:

What Happens #1

After it’s been deferred, it drifts
Off into the air, becoming clouds
Or onto the sea, riding waves like surfers
Or is encapsulated in a jar, closed forever

What Happens # 2

When a dream is gone
It sings like a song
It floats far away
Never to return one day
A dream that can’t be fulfilled
Looms large for some, like hills
The life they though they’d lead
The tree that never came from the seed
What can be done when life isn’t the way
You want it? You pretend it’s okay?
Do you curl up, like a raisin in the sun?
Do you cry many tears, until the day is done?

Venus Breaks Through!: 6-1, 7-6 (8)

2005-03-29T19:47:00.000-08:00

RIP, Jesse Jackson, Venus & Serena

2005-03-29T18:20:00.000-08:00

A) Rest In Peace Johnnie Cochran. I still remember in 8th grade (maybe a tad earlier?) being in class and the teacher allowing a television to be wheeled in so we could watch the verdict.

B) Lol @ Jesse Jackson. Why the hell is he with the Schiavo's? And why the hell is he soliciting Black politicians to, according to one Yahoo article, ' bring back a bill that would prohibit severely brain-damaged patients from being denied food and water if they didn't express their wishes in writing.' Apparently, the legislation was rejected earlier in the month, but I just think it's insane that he would specifically ask Black lawmakers this.

Sure Jesse is Black and all, but really why would Black lawmakers care about this, some white woman in Florida? Yes, of course you could argue that the lawmakers aren't meant to exclusively care about the people that share their skintone, culture, etc, but let's be real, there are other issues that seem to be of more importance that the Black lawmakers need to turn their attention toward.

Suzanne (Terri's sister), Jesse, Mary Schindler (Terri's mother) at the press conference today.

C) The Williams sisters are playing as I type, in Miami, Florida at the NASDAQ open. I'm hoping that Venus really really pulls through, as this isn't even the final, it's the quarter-final. But, you know, if Serena wins she'll most definitely win the title, but if Venus wins, she's been having issues closing final wins out (I see you Diamond Games, where Venus was to, if she had won the final, win a $1 million diamond-encrusted tennis racket for winning the title three out of five years). Go Venus!

New Design! (c) DJ Clue

2005-03-28T15:11:00.000-08:00

Thoughts on the new design? Hate it or love it (c) 50 and nem

Yeah, she HAS been emancipated....

2005-03-28T03:32:00.000-08:00

(Why is it that I used to pronounce this word as 'emaciated'? Why did this happen when I was doing a presentation on the Emancipation Proclamation? Why did I look mad stupid? Why?)

Okay on to the task at hand.

And that is to say when the marketers and advertisers over at DefJam Records were thinking up a tagline for Mariah Carey's new album, they did not think of an untrue statement: 'The Voice Is Back'.

I got my hands on a copy of the album and it is sooooooo fab. There has to be at least 4 or 5 #1 singles on there (including 'Stay The Night', produced by Kanye, 'Shake It Off', produced by Jermaine Dupri, 'Your Girl' produced by I Have Not Idea, and the current single 'We Belong Together', Jermaine produced). Her voice, which was really in Awesome Mode like during the Musicbox era, is back. Like fine wine (gooooo cliches!) her voice has aged to be really nice. I find it funny that despite Kanye being the Rapper Du Jour, he isn't actually rapping on his produced track. But Snoop, Nelly (RIP his sister, by the way, she passed from Leukemia and she and Nelly formed a program called Jes Us 4 Jackie to facilitate more bone marrow donation in the African American community. More info at: http://www.jesus4jackie.com/) and Twista (I guess Kanye figured he'd get his guy a job, if not himself).

So that is all. Go check for her album April 12. What it looks like:

Limited Edition (copy and paste):
images.amazon.com/images/P/B0007Y4USW.01._SCLZZZZZZZ_.jpg

Regular Folk Cover (ditto):
images.amazon.com/images/P/B0007GAERG.01._SCLZZZZZZZ_.jpg

(And no, you aren't the only one that thinks she's looking mad Beyoncesque, despite the fact that she's like 12,000 shades lighter than Yonce. And no, you aren't the only one wondering if this is one of the few cases where someone actually has their skin digitally darkened, usually it's the other way around....

Though I can remember Whoopi Goldberg being mad that Essence Magazine digitally darkened her for their cover, I think her feeling was that that made her appear more 'Black'...Similarly, I recall Time magazine digitally altering the cover image, which was of OJ Simpson's mug shot. I guess they figured arrested people aren't ever light skin.)

The most perfect man ever

2005-03-23T12:02:00.000-08:00

Mr. Thierry Henry:

This is not the most productive or thought-provoking blog ever, but it just has to be said. Dude is a soccer star from France (Paris, I think) who plays for England's Arsenal team. David Beckham is so overhyped and Thierry is much better.

That is all for now.

An Interesting Article To Ponder

2005-03-07T17:02:00.000-08:00

This article below is interesting to me because I recently decided to take it upon myself to learn French. At the moment, I'm doing it in the most simplistic of manners, by using Les Nubians' "One Step Forward" cd and finding the French songs (the album boasts songs sung in English, Spanish, French and Cameroonian dialect) and listening to them while at the same time reading the French lyrics alongside the English translation (that way I can learn what the words mean and how they sound).

Unconvential way of learning, I guess, but I took Spanish all throughout college and so now it's time to try something new. I think eventually I'll take a course to supplement whatever minimal progress I'll make.

So anyway, how that relates to the below article is it is interesting to see that French, Spanish and English are part of the eight languages total that half of the world are now speaking. The article below explains that languages are dying out and this is a problem because information is lost in translation (or not translated at all?) through the generations.

(Oh, back to Les Nubians briefly-their best song ever is on the aforementioned "One Step Forward" cd, and it is entitled "Amour à Mort", French for "Love You To Death")

On to the article:

(http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20050307/ap_on_sc/apn_dying_cultures)

'Knowledge Fades As Africa Languages Die'
By TERRY LEONARD, Associated Press Writer

MAPUTO, Mozambique - A U.N. Conference on Trade and Development report on protecting traditional knowledge argues that beyond a devastating impact on culture, the death of a language wipes out centuries of know-how in preserving ecosystems — leading to grave consequences for biodiversity. The United Nations estimates half of the world's 6,000 languages will disappear in less than a century. Roughly a third of those are spoken in Africa and about 200 already have less than 500 speakers. Experts estimate half the world's people now use one of just eight languages: Chinese, English, Hindi, Spanish, Russian, Arabic, Portuguese and French.

Villagers in Indonesia's Kayan Mentarang national park, for example, have for centuries practiced a system of forest management called Tanah Ulen, or "forbidden land." On a rotating basis, elders declare parcels of the forest protected, prohibiting hunting and gathering.
Along a boulevard lined with flowering acacia trees, young people in designer clothes and high-heeled shoes chatter on the sidewalk struggling to be heard over the driving Latin rhythms spilling from a nightclub.

Maputo's vibrant nightlife lets people forget it is the capital of one of the world's poorest countries. Here you can eat Italian, dance like a Brazilian and flirt in Portuguese.
One thing that's in ever shorter supply and perhaps even less demand: Mozambique's own indigenous languages, the storehouse for the accumulated knowledge of generations.
"Sons no longer speak the language of their fathers ... our culture is dying," laments Paulo Chihale, director of a project that seeks to train Mozambican youths in traditional crafts.

While Mozambique has 23 native languages, the only official one is Portuguese — a hand-me-down tongue from colonial times that at once unifies a linguistically diverse country and undermines the African traditions that help make it unique.

Chihale looks up from his cluttered desk at MozArte, the U.N.- and government-funded crafts project, and complains bitterly about how his nation's memory is fading away.

"Our culture has a rich oral tradition, oral history, stories told from one generation to another. But it is an oral literature our kids will never hear," says Chihale, who speaks the Chopi language at home.

Anthropologists speculate that tribal people whose ancestors have lived for tens of thousands of years on India's Andaman and Nicobar islands survived Asia's tsunami catastrophe because of ancient knowledge. They think signs in the wind, the sea and the flight of birds let the tribes know to get to higher ground ahead of the waves.

But finding economic reasons to keep tradition alive can be a challenge.

In Mozambique, cheap foreign imports have destroyed the market for local crafts beyond what little can be sold to tourists. Horacio Arab, the son of a basket weaver who learned his father's trade, said he improved his skills at MozArte but then abandoned weaving because he could not make a living.

Mozambican linguist Rafael Shambela says the pressures from globalization are often too great to resist. To conserve native languages and culture will require societies to find ways to cast them with an inherent value, he argues.

On a small campus along a dirt road south of Maputo, Shambela has joined a government effort to write textbooks and curriculums that will allow public school students to learn in 16 of the country's 23 languages. But the program is limited by Mozambique's poverty.

"A language is a culture," says Shambela, who works for Mozambique's National Institute for the Development of Education. "It contains the history of a people and all the knowledge they have passed down for generations."

The trade-off in settling on Portuguese as a unifying force after independence in 1975 has been an erosion of the rites and rhythms of traditional life. "From dating to mourning, the rules are becoming less clear," Shambela says.

Hi!

2005-03-05T21:11:00.000-08:00

I switched over from Blog Drive, as I think this blog hosting site is cooler. Um, that's all I can think of at the moment to say, other than go check out the 2 posts that I posted over prior to moving to this location.

The old blog is at:

http://themicamenagerie.blogdrive.com/

Oh yes, a bit about what I am to write about in the coming months (forever?). This blog will atempt to take a critical look at the entertainment, sports and political realms on a local, national and international level. I think it is important to take a good look at these areas, especially entertainment because people so often cast it aside as being fantasy and unworthy of a closer critical look.

To that I say that celebrities (and all the other things that entertainment encompasses) influence our lives on a near daily basis and if something is that powerful then it's a crime not to look deeper into it.

What about the kid that isn't doing well in school, and doesn't care because he is going to be a rap star like Eminem? Or the girl that gets Anorexia because a guy she likes said that Britney has a great body, so now she too wants a 'great' body? Or the woman that goes under the knife for a the lips of Angelina Jolie?

And I don't say that to put blame on the celebrity, just that we are a culture that looks to entertainment as a release and a chance to visit fantasyland, but when we are at home, we let that seep into our personal lives and at times don't know when to stop.

Anyway, that was a bit of a digression, but suffice to say, I want to bring up issues and salient points that provoke thoughts and opinions. I hope I can.