The Gem

 

 I usually lose things, rarely find things. That's why I remember well the only time when I found something beautiful.

It was about 15 years ago. I left a place with my eyes in tears. (that's  another story). While walking on the pavement, I saw through the tears a glitter. It looked like a  zirconia (white, colorless gem) fallen from a ring. It was evening, there was nobody around, the street seemed deserted, so  I picked it up and brought it home.

I opened my jewelry box and fitted the found squarely shaped gem in a  gold setting, and there it stayed; never wore it until recently. Why? I wouldn't have felt comfortable to wear something that had belonged to someone else who unfortunately lost it.

Recently I've decided to put the ring on my finger. A friend suggested that I have the gem checked at a jeweler; 'maybe it's a diamond', he said. I don't think so;  the area where I found it was not one where people wear and lose diamonds.  Besides, I'm pleased with it as it is. I don't care about its market value, and I don't intend to spend money to have it checked by a professional. 

I  like to recall this story.  It was as if God wished to wipe away my tears by making me find the gem. And then, at home to find the perfect setting for it was unbelievable! as if the setting was just waiting  for it. (The gold of the setting is not the usual yellow, but more like the silver color - it's called white gold, methinks, and is perfect match).

Last week the world was informed that the third largest diamond (over 1000 carat) was found in Botswana. Good for Botswana, good for the world! That's good news if we consider the other news that make up our daily life: violence, climate change, covid variants, economy decline.

The Geniuses Among Us

  

A young Intel. officer, a software genius,  was recently found dead in his prison cell. The details were banned from publication.  According to the media  he was a phenomenon in the field of computer from an  early age. 

 
One of the speculations is that his abilities have aroused the envy / anger of his superiors, his activity got suppressed. As a result, he  planned revenge that would  have harmed  them, and the country. Perhaps he has even managed to carry out some of these plans.  Anyway, he was arrested and jailed. Now he's dead (rip).

Besides the obvious tragedy of the loss of a young bright man,  and the mystery (yet to be uncovered) וmposed on the case ׂׂ -  the event brings to mind the  concept of  'genius' (a person of extraordinary talent) and the list of geniuses among us - past and present.

There is a nice, little  poem  with the name 'The geniuses among us'  by Marilyn L Taylor, Wisconsin poet laureate. She calls them 'high perennials above all the rest of us',  'bright testimonials to the scale of human possibility.' These people, according to her poem - 'take us by surprise every generation , with unprecedented notions and visions'.

So far, the  great minds of  the past ( like Einstein) and present  (like Bill Gates) - have submitted the fruits of their genius, to the country, to the world, for the benefit of mankind. (As a matter of fact, not every invention was for the benefit of the world - the atomic bomb, for instance. R. Oppenheimer was "the father" of the Nuke.).

But times are changing. Perhaps these geniuses are beginning  to feel underappreciated,  even bullied. There's danger in this as the next stage could be something like: "either I rule or I destroy."  Words like 'majority', 'democracy' might mean nothing to these bright people as the above notions already mean quite  little to the average individual.

 

 

The Politics of Food

 
Much has been said and written about pharmaceutical companies and their tendency to fund  only research  that could fill their pockets, and make people totally dependent on their products ."The Pharmaceutical industry does not create cures, they create customers" (seen on FB). 

Food companies are not far behind. Moreover, the food industry exerts its influence to prevent publication of research that could directly affect its profits, such as serious scientific finds on ultra processed food (junk food, fast food).

I've recently read  about a biochemist at the Agriculture Faculty in Jerusalem, prof. Ephrat Oren, who tried to publish the results of a long- term research based  on rats and humans,  dealing with the effect of junk food on children's growth  (obesity and bone disorder mainly). 

It got rejected by all relevant publications. She suspected it had to do with 'politics of food', so she arranged a meeting with another scientist, prof. Robert Lustig of California university in USA,  known as an expert in 'food politics'. 

After checking her work for several weeks, he said to her - 'that's explosive material you have here'. (He was probably referring, among other things, to  her suggestions on the need to lay heavy taxes on ultra processed food, and put restrictions on ads. regarding that kind of food).

He advised her to try and rewrite the article, giving it some sort of  dry- facts 'facelift' .  She followed his advice;  the article  was accepted  and published at the end of 2020, in the prestigious 'Nature' medical journal under the subject of Bone Research.

*

Politics in its various forms, is the source of much evil. Most of us people, know that, but seem to be quite helpless about it.

Parents could do a lot about ultra processed food, but they are too weak and too busy to resist buying for their kids sweet corn flakes for breakfast, pizza, hamburger for the rest of the day. And so, this kind of food stays triumphant and might definitely harm children's growth in ways we are not even aware of, until later in life.

 * - web pictures.

 

DNA and more

 

Ancestry com. (popular in North America) and My Heritage - with a smaller data (popular in Europe), started as small companies helping people build their family trees, and offering genealogy info on migration.

Next, they entered the DNA industry offering genetic testing kits and analysis. ( Ancestry uses saliva sample, My Heritage - cheek swab). That's quite a fascinating industry! They offer paternity tests, ethnicity tests, health screening tests, and more.

In Israel, My Heritage and its partner Billion Graves (collecting cemetery data) are the dominant genealogical companies. 

I have some experience with Ancestry com.  In 2006, I was trying to locate my grandfather's family descendants in the USA. I started with almost nothing,  but I managed to do a good job using data from various sources, mainly Ellis  Island  and Ancestry com. records.

I have no experience yet with My Heritage, but I often find myself asking questions about its partner , Billion Graves. I suspect the latter buys all the data regarding  cemeteries and graves from the relevant state offices, and  monopolizes the rights . Unlike in the past, when you could easily find  online info, now, you have to subscribe to them, if you wish to get it.

At first, I said to myself, oh, well, it seems  they offer work, employ ׂׂyoung people (probably students), and send them to  cemeteries to take pictures of the headstones. That's an easy, convenient job for them. 

Lately, I'm not quite sure about that. The company has remote control equipment,  and uses various gadgets; the people with the camera could well be volunteers, not paid workers (the fine weather here during most of the year, draws people outdoors, and even cemeteries are an option for volunteering or other sort of activity).

I'll have to do some research. Not that it will help me or others much.  We have to face it : we live in a capitalist society, in which the State gives away its resources placing them in private hands - cemeteries and their dead inhabitants included.  Sad.

'

 

Mamad, Helmet, and the British Actress

 

You should never ever need one, but it's good to have one, just in case.  It could save lives .  

Mamad (acronym for the hebrew 'merchav mugan' - meaning  protective space)  is a fortified room with reinforced, cemented walls and ceilings, thick floor, airtight steel door and window. It is supposed to be impenetrable to rockets carrying bombs or chemical/biological stuff. In peace time, it can be used as a storage/study/play room, but not as a kitchen or bathroom.

The law that requires a newly built house/ building /apartment to have a 'mamad', is from year 1993, after the notorious "Gulf War".  There are certain regulations with which I am not familiar as I  myself don't own a 'mamad'.

The thing is, a five year old boy, was critically injured during one of the recent rocket attacks, ( he later died in hospital-rip), when a shrapnel punctured the window of the 'mamad'. It is considered a rare incident, and it is under investigation. 

There were also some people who got injured by falling on their way to the mamad.  A 73 year old woman, awaken by the alarm, got quickly off her bed, ran towards the mamad and fell on her head before reaching the mamad. She died a few days laterׂ - rip (perhaps, a light helmet should be considered for prevention of tragic cases like this one.)

Those who don't have that kind of room (like me) are advised to stay in the most inner spot of their home, away from windows and exterior walls.That's what I do upon hearing the siren, and, immediately start ...praying to God asking for protection.

By the way, I became aware of how deadly a fall on the head could be, while following the news about the tragedy of Natasha Richardson, british actress, daughter of the great Vanessa Redgrave, wife of actor Liam Neeson. She fell on her head while skiing in Quebec, Canada, and died in a matter of days in 2009 (rip). I think since then, a helmet has become mandatory on ski slopes.

 

 

The Silence of Stone

 
We usually become aware of the above kind of silence  when  visiting cemeteries ׂ(headstones) and deserted places (stone of ruins and abandoned houses).

In summer 2015,  I visited the  leper colony (1903-1957) of Spinalonga (Crete, Greece). The silence of the stone there , was telling  us about the struggle of the  former inhabitants  to survive under terrible, unimaginable, conditions .

Their suffering  got through the stone and reached us, visitors.  Despite the midsummer scorching heat, I felt a shiver along my spine during the whole trip.  

Great sadness fell upon those walking on the islet and learning about  the people  with leprosy gathered  and brought to a place with no way of return.

In spite of it all - sickness, hardships, stigma - there was life going on there (people fell in love , married, had children; built houses, two little churches, an hospital , a cemetery). The place , once nicknamed 'the land of the living dead', is seen nowadays as a monument  to human pain and spirit.

                                                            the gate (tunnel) of no return

                                                   by the window of a  deserted stone house

                                 access to a little dock where supplies were brought in         

(more photos and details in my post of Oct. 2016).

 *

The message conveyed through the silence of stone is that suffering ultimately leads to death and decay, but the spirit stays on.  It is a comforting thought.

There's a dramatic song on YouTube named "The Spirit goes on" whose refrain says:

"If I die  tomorrow I'll be alright

Because I believe

That after we're gone

The spirit carries on"                                                         

                                                              

 

The Alphabet

 

Whatever we learn, or at least some of it, goes with us; it never gets completely lost.  I've realized that when visiting Moscow, a few years ago.

In the higher grade of elementary school, in communist Romania,  we started  to learn russian  as a second language. It was  difficult for us, native speakers of a romance language (romanian) because of  russian's Cyrillic script as opposed to the Latin script.   Besides, our teacher was young and inexperienced, so the teaching was not very productive.

teacher of russian holding bouquet of flowers (my head touching it).

Years later, I managed to remember only a few random russian words,  but I did remember well  the alphabet. The knowledge of the alphabet was of tremendous help to me in two places in Moscow: the stunning Metro (reading the names of the stations), and the famous Novodevichi cemetery where all the 'Who's Who' of Russia were buried (reading the names on the headstones).

T-shirt with the map of the metro stations. It's made of fine cotton,
 

(The signs  everywhere in the city were in russian only, which made it very difficult for a tourist without a guide or group to find his way around).

After visiting the tombstones of politicians (Khruschev, Yeltsin), of writers (Chechkov, Gogol), composers (Shostakovitch), ballet dancer (Galina Ulanova), wives of Stalin and Gurbachev (Nadhezda, Raisa), violonist (David Oistreich), opera singer (Shaleapin) and others, I approached a small group of tourists in a corner I was about to explore on my own.

Yeltsin's  headstone; it catches the eye with its unusual shape and colors.

 

ballet dancer Galina Ulanova's tombstone

It turned out, the group I approached  was  israeli . While listening to the guide's explanations  (in hebrew),  I got the strange feeling he didn't know any russian. I was probably right, as he pointed to a headstone and said ;'here liesTupolev' (aircraft designer, the designer of the famous Tupolev  russian military bombers). 'No, I found myself intervening, Tupolev  lies next; have a look at the name on the stone'. There was silence in the air, and I felt badly about it.

Obviously, the guide could  not read russian.  I could....due to those rather boring russian lessons in elementary school. lol.