SOCIAL
MOVEMENTS
The Sound of Silence: Jeju Island March/April 2025
White waves, green water, and black volcanic rock, stirred by high wind. The view was wild, but inside, all was calm. I was at a coffee shop in the Naedo neighborhood of Jeju City, on Jeju Island. A sweet Korean ballad played softly. I was alone. My partner in this...
Order, Chaos and the Desire to be Free. Egypt, January 2025
For the ancient Egyptians, the universe was composed of dualities fertile and barren, life and death, order and chaos. (1) A new museum has been built to showcase Egypt's ancient artifacts yet no structure exists to honor our desire to be free (2) People on...
People’s Living History of Northern Ireland
To understand the so-called Troubles of Northern Irleland one must remove the veils of religion, ethnicity, and even nationalism, and begin with economy, which means learning about the unique properties of the flax plant and the geography of the North Channel. The...
Third International Conference on Environmental Peace Building, The Hague, The Netherlands, June, 2024
I attended the Third International Conference on Environmental Peace Building, in The Hague, The Netherlands, in June 2024. I will keep adding to this post until I finish making a narrative from my notes. My commentary in italics Session 7:...
To Theorize and Dance in Brussels
Brussels on eve of EU & parliamentary elections. Thoughts on organizing from Marx’s time to today during this right-wing ascendancy
Confessions of a post-Impressionist in France
“The more I read, the more I acquire, the more certain I am that I know nothing.” 17th Century French Philosopher,...
Berat, Albania, Opens Windows to the Sky and Doors to the Stranger
Berat— Albania’s oldest city —has 1,000 identically-shaped windows in its Ottoman-era old town and a Byzantine city on top of one of its mountains. The Osum River runs through the town with buildings hugging the slopes. A green ridged range covers its north side....
Cuatro Cuerpos: On Feeding the Spiritual Body. Spain and Morocco
On our first night in Spain, during a short yoga routine, the online instructor said we should check in without four bodies: physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual. My physical body was aching with new debilitating pain, my left hip on fire; lightening radiating...
Educator Rooted in Love and Solidarity
https://turtleroad.org/2022/07/17/rachel-schmitt/
Calling up the Nineteenth Century to Understand our Own Times. Annette Gordon-Reed’s On Juneteenth, Barbara Kingsolver’s Unsheltered and Tony Horowitz’s Spying on the South
Annette Gordon-Reed, and Barbara Kingsolver are writers grounded in history, science, and Tony Horowitz was a writer steeped in evidence, yet reading On Juneteenth, Unsheltered, and Spying on the South together, felt like a mystical retreat with three mediums,...