identikit: A picture of a person, especially one sought by the police, reconstructed from typical facial features according to witnesses' descriptions.

German heliograph made by R. Fuess in Berlin (on display at the Museum of Communication in Frankfurt)

Heliograph

A heliograph (helios (Greek: Ἥλιος), meaning "sun", and γραφειν graphein, meaning "write") is a wireless solar telegraph that signals by flashes of sunlight (generally using Morse code) reflected by a mirror. The flashes are produced by momentarily pivoting the mirror, or by interrupting the beam with a shutter.[1] The heliograph was a simple but effective instrument for instantaneous optical communication over long distances during the late 19th and early 20th century.[1] Its main uses were military, survey and forest protection work. Heliographs were standard issue in the British and Australian armies until the 1960s, and were used by the Pakistani army as late as 1975.

automatic writing

Writing said to be produced by a spiritual, occult, or subconscious agency rather than by the conscious intention of the writer.

syzygy

A conjunction or opposition, especially of the moon with the sun.

A pair of connected or corresponding things.

A matrioshka brain[1] is a hypothetical megastructure proposed by Robert Bradbury, based on the Dyson sphere, of immense computational capacity. It is an example of a Class B stellar engine, employing the entire energy output of a star to drive computer systems.[2] This concept derives its name from the nesting Russian Matrioshka dolls.[3] The concept was deployed by its inventor, Robert Bradbury, in the anthology Year Million: Science at the Far Edge of Knowledge, and attracted interest from reviewers in the Los Angeles Times[4] and the Wall Street Journal.[5

Russian doll

(though a recent study suggests that giant manta rays can also recognize their own reflections.

fire in the stove

when it kaaw-kaaws

Life in Sulaimani

The city of Sulaimani, or Al-Sulaymaniyah as known in Arabic and some formal correspondence, was founded by prince Ibrahim from the Baban tribe, known locally as Ibrahim Pasha Baban, in 1784. The story goes that Ibrahim Pasha was out hunting in the area when he ended up in the Sharazour plain, where the city is located now. He immediately fell in love with the spot and decided to build a city there, and named the city after his father, Sulaiman Pasha Baban. Unlike other cities in the region that grew from villages, Sulaimani was founded and established as a city from day one.

Sulaimani is located northeast of Iraq and southeast of Kurdistan. It is west of the Iranian border, which is the closest neighboring country to the city, and south from the Turkish border. Historically, it has functioned as a hub for trading between the two neighboring counties of Iraq and Iran. It has also influenced political and military movements of the two countries, especially in that region.

Sulaimani has not only influenced trading and politics of the region, but also has given birth to many famous Kurdish poets such as Nali, Mawlawi, Piramerd, Bekas, and most recently Sherko Bekas to name a few. It is known for naming its main streets after some of these poets. Because of its active and continuous contribution to the society’s art culture it is known and was named the Cultural Capital of Kurdistan by the Kurdish people and the Kurdistan Regional Government.

The scenery and beauty of the city have inspired many artists and poets throughout history.  It is surrounded by beautiful and long ranges of mountains that add unique natural scenery to it, especially during the winter when the mountains are covered in snow. It is a tourism destination for tourists from inside and outside the country. In addition to the destinations that the city offers, it is close to many other famous tourist destinations in the area such as Dukan, Ahmawa, and Zewe. Additionally, the famous Halgurd mountain peak at 3607 m height is in the vicinity of the city.

The city houses a population of 800,000 people as of 2016, two public universities, and five private universities including the American University of Iraq, Sulaimani (AUIS).

http://auis.edu.krd/life-in-sulaimani

‘The police have much to learn about the relative value of psychic phenomena in criminal investigations.’

psychic

Relating to or denoting faculties or phenomena that are apparently inexplicable by natural laws, especially involving telepathy or clairvoyance.

In the early 1970s the Central Intelligence Agency supported a program to see if a form of extrasensory perception (ESP) called "remote viewing" could assist with intelligence gathering. The program consisted of laboratory studies conducted at Stanford Research Institute (SRI) under the direction of Harold Puthoff and Russel Targ. In addition to the laboratory research, psychics were employed to provide information on targets of interest to the intelligence community. 

— Ray Hyman, Skeptical Inquirer, March/April 1996

The human brain is optimized to recognize faces, which could also explain why we are so good at picking out meaningful shapes in random patterns. This phenomenon, pareidolia, could be responsible for a host of otherwise unexplained sightings, such as the face of the Virgin Mary on a toasted cheese sandwich. 

— New Scientist, 24 Dec. 2011

The promise of the Data Age is that the truth really is in there, somewhere. But our age has a curse, too: apophenia, the tendency to see patterns that may or may not exist. 

— Daniel Conover, Post and Courier (Charleston, South Carolina), 30 Aug. 2004

Clairsentience is an experience of the whole. You might get the sensation of hearing a voice, seeing an image, and even smelling a fragrance or odor.... Or you might not have any tangible perceptions, but just an overall sense of place or an event.... To get the most from clairsentient experiences, open yourself fully to the experience. 

— Rita S. Berkowitz, The Complete Idiot's Guide to Communicating with Spirits, 2002

telepathy

‘By and large, psychical researchers failed to convince the majority of the scientific and academic worlds of the existence of telepathy.’

The Douglas DC-3 that now serves as a weather vane at Yukon Transportation Museum located beside the Whitehorse International Airport.

Weather vane

A weather vane, wind vane, or weathercock is an instrument for showing the direction of the wind. It is typically used as an architectural ornament to the highest point of a building. The word vane comes from the Old English word fana meaning "flag".

Although partly functional, weather vanes are generally decorative, often featuring the traditional cockerel design with letters indicating the points of the compass. Other common motifs include ships, arrows and horses. Not all weather vanes have pointers. When the wind is sufficiently strong, the head of the arrow or cockerel (or equivalent depending on the chosen design) will indicate the direction from which the wind is blowing.

The weather vane was independently invented in ancient China and Greece around the same time during the 2nd century BCE. The earliest written reference to a weather vane appears in the Huainanzi, and a weather vane was fitted on top of the Tower of the Winds in Athens.

FidoNet

FidoNet is a worldwide computer network that is used for communication between bulletin board systems (BBSes). It uses a store-and-forward system to exchange private (email) and public (forum) messages between the BBSes in the network, as well as other files and protocols in some cases.

The FidoNet system was based on a number of small interacting programs. Only one of these interacted with the BBS system directly and was the only portion that had to be ported to support other BBS software. This greatly eased porting, and FidoNet was one of the few networks that was widely supported by almost all BBS software, as well as a number of non-BBS online services. This modular construction also allowed FidoNet to easily upgrade to new data compression systems, which was important in an era using modem-based communications over telephone links with high long-distance calling charges.

The rapid improvement in modem speeds during the early 1990s, combined with the rapid decrease in price of computer systems and storage, made BBSes increasingly popular. By the mid-1990s there were almost 40,000 FidoNet systems in operation, and it was possible to communicate with millions of users around the world. Only UUCPNET came close in terms of breadth or numbers; FidoNet's user base far surpassed other networks like BITNET.[citation needed]

The broad availability of low-cost Internet connections starting in the mid-1990s lessened the need for FidoNet's store-and-forward system, as any system in the world could be reached for equal cost. Direct dialing into local BBS systems rapidly declined. The availability of internet connectivity is by no means universal, and although FidoNet has shrunk considerably since the early 1990s, it remains in use around the world.

Yep that's me

The cost of a life...

Snake Venom Antiserum I.P 10ml

Lyophilized

For I.V use only.

Approx Price: Rs 460 / Piece(s)

Snake Venom 1 ml Glass Bottle Necklace Charm - Vial Cork Pendant

SNABIRC-KENYA

Vision

A promise for a better, healthier and safer life.

Mission

To create a better life for people through bridging the poverty gap and empowering the community.

Objectives

To prevent and reduce the number of fatalities and injuries due to snake bites.

SNABIRC-KENYA is a non-governmental organization whose aim is to reduce the number of deaths and disabilities due to snakebites and snake attacks. Snake bite is a serious problem in rural Africa and access and availability of Anti-venom is not always guaranteed. We therefore work to alleviate their pain and hopefully save their lives and reduce mortality due to snake bites. SNABIRC-KENYA also hopes rehabilitates those that become disabled as a result of snake bites. The growing number of snake bites is attributed to human-animal conflict, environmental degradation as well as global warming. It is becoming a health as well an economic and social problem. According to the conflict resolution warden with the Kenya Wildlife Service, 680 cases of snakebites that resulted in 81 deaths and 577 injuries had been reported between 2003 and June 2009.These statistics have now changed since 2009 and rising cases present the ice tip of an underestimated problem.

Experts warn that these rising cases could be as a result of the warming climate which has enabled snakes to move to previously cooler habitats, clearing of forests and the worsening droughts that force the reptiles to go into people’s houses to look for water.

Families living in snakebite prone zones are now being advised to keep water outside their houses so that the snakes can get a share and avoid venturing into the houses. The only dilemma is these zones have water scarcity problems therefore there is none to offer to the reptiles.

As previously mentioned, the availability of anti- venom serum is not always guaranteed and when available the cost is beyond the reach of most people. Health officials and those from the KWS agree that past experiences of drug stock-outs in many government hospitals has made the public believe that a snake antidote is not available in government facilities and whenever they are bitten by a snake they opt for traditional treatment.

Provision of anti-snake: we provide anti-snake venom/serum to victims of snakebite, especially in rural Kenya.

Rehabilitation program: We also rehabilitate those that have lost a limb or vision as a result of attacks by linking them to rehabilitation centers and supporting them to become useful members of the community.

Research: We are involved in research into venom production, snake species, behavior and ecology.
Policy: Policy formulation and guidelines in snakebite management.

Health promotion: We are involved in sensitizing the community on various aspects of primary healthcare, first aid, infection prevention, wound care and general community health through health campaigns and promotions.

Training: We are involved in community training as well as health care workers on matters pertaining snakebite. We also train them on how to prevent snakebites around their homes

Community empowerment: we empower community through advocacy information on compensation in cases of valid human wild life conflict.

http://www.snabirc-kenya.org/

anti-snake venom serum (ASVS)

Venomous nightmare

Horses used for producing antivenom for snake bites are being subjected to callous treatment.

http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/horses-used-for-producing-antivenom-for-snake-bites-subjected-to-ill-treatment/1/245328.html

The Internet in Space? Slow as Dial-Up

Astronauts gripe that connectivity is “very slow,” but that could change with laser-based data transmission that NASA has already tested.

Outer space has its perks. But super-speedy Internet is, so far, not one of them.

Connection speeds from the International Space Station are “worse than what dial-up was like,” the astronaut Scott Kelly said on Twitter. (His colleague, Reid Wiseman, agrees: “We have a very slow internet connection, but reliable email,” he said back in February.)

https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2015/06/the-internet-in-space-slow-dial-up-lasers-satellites/395618/

Sand Clock

Snake molting

King Cobra

Indian Gray Mongoose

schmaltz:

music, art, etc., that is very sad or romantic in usually a foolish or exaggerated way

The Boy Who Cried Wolf

Pied Piper of Hamelin

Peacock feather earrings

Cowrie earrings

Unintentional live burial

At least one (almost certainly apocryphal) report of accidental burial dates back to the fourteenth century. Upon the reopening of his tomb, the philosopher John Duns Scotus (1266–1308) was reportedly found outside his coffin with his hands torn and bloody after attempting to escape.[3] Alice Blunden of Basingstoke was said in a contemporaneous account to have been buried alive, not once but twice, in 1674.

Revivals of supposed "corpses" have been triggered by dropped coffins, grave robbers, embalming, and attempted dissections.[4] Folklorist Paul Barber has argued that the incidence of unintentional live burial has been overestimated, and that the normal, physical effects of decomposition are sometimes misinterpreted as signs that the person whose remains are being exhumed had revived in his or her coffin.[5] Nevertheless, patients have been documented as late as the 1890s as accidentally being sent to the morgue or trapped in a steel box after erroneously being declared dead.[6]

Newspapers have reported cases of exhumed corpses which appear to have been accidentally buried alive. On February 21, 1885, The New York Times gave a disturbing account of such a case. The victim was a man from Buncombe County whose name was given as "Jenkins." His body was found turned over onto its front inside the coffin, with much of his hair pulled out. Scratch marks were also visible on all sides of the coffin's interior. His family were reportedly "distressed beyond measure at the criminal carelessness" associated with the case.[7] Another similar story was reported in The Times on January 18, 1886, the victim of this case being described simply as a "girl" named "Collins" from Woodstock, Ontario, Canada. Her body was described as being found with the knees tucked up under the body, and her burial shroud "torn into shreds."[8]

In 2005, a body bag was delivered to the Matarese Funeral home in Ashland, Massachusetts with a live occupant. Funeral director John Matarese discovered this, called paramedics, and avoided live embalming or premature burial.[9][10]

In 2014 in Peraia, Thessaloniki, in Macedonia, Greece, the police discovered that a 45-year-old woman was buried alive and died of asphyxia after being declared clinically dead by a private hospital; she was discovered just shortly after being buried by children playing near the cemetery who heard screams from inside the earth and afterwards her family was reported as considering suing the private hospital.[11] In 2015 it was reported that in 2014 again in Peraia, Thessaloniki, in Macedonia, Greece, police investigation concluded that a 49-year-old woman was buried alive after being declared dead due to cancer; her family reported that they could hear her scream from inside the earth at the cemetery shortly after burial and the investigation revealed that she died of heart failure inside the coffin and found out that it was the medicines given to her by her doctors for her cancer that caused her to be declared clinically dead and buried alive.[12]

Attempts to prevent live burial

Robert Robinson died in Manchester in 1791. A movable glass pane was inserted in his coffin, and the mausoleum had a door for purposes of inspection by a watchman, who was to see if he breathed on the glass. He instructed his relatives to visit his grave periodically to check that he was still dead.[13]

Safety coffins were devised to prevent premature burial, although there is no evidence that any have ever been successfully used to save an accidentally buried person. On 5 December 1882, J. G. Krichbaum received U.S. Patent 268,693[14] for his "Device For Life In Buried Persons." It consisted of a movable periscope-like pipe which provided air and, when rotated or pushed by the person interred, indicated to passersby that someone was buried alive. The patent text refers to "that class of devices for indicating life in buried persons," suggesting that such inventions were common at the time.

In 1890, a family designed and built a burial vault at the Wildwood Cemetery in Williamsport, Pennsylvania, with an internal hatch to allow the victim of accidental premature burial to escape. The vault had an air supply and was lined in felt to protect a panic-stricken victim from self-inflicted injury before escape. Bodies were to be removed from the casket before interment.[15]

The London Association for the Prevention of Premature Burial was co-founded in 1896 by William Tebb[16] and Walter Hadwen.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Premature_burial

auspice

observation by an augur especially of the flight and feeding of birds to discover omens

mojo

a power that may seem magical and that allows someone to be very effective, successful, etc.

augury

divination from auspices (see auspice 3) or omens Ancient augury involved the interpretation of the flight patterns of birds.; also : an instance of this

metempsychosis

the passing of the soul at death into another body either human or animal

wraith

the exact likeness of a living person seen usually just before death as an apparition

clairvoyance

‘He gained an early reputation for faith healing and clairvoyance and won fame throughout Mexico for his playful and unorthodox cures for a range of maladies including cancer and lameness.’

‘She regularly flies to the USA to see clients and give talks on astrology, palmistry, tarot and how to develop clairvoyance.’

‘I should also note clairvoyance or telepathy may be the reason why some people do significantly better than chance in guessing experiments.’

‘Apparently I have the same clairvoyance that my mother had.’

‘Prophecy and clairvoyance are so widely believed by millions of people that magicians are credited with psychic powers that not even Nostradamus would dare claim.’

‘Price reports that significant fractions of Americans believe in astrology, clairvoyance, telepathy, and communication with the dead.’

‘Other terms for clairvoyance include second sight, shadow sight, prophecy, and spiritual communication.’

‘If you could do a bit of mind and thought reading, clairvoyance, prophecy and divination, that is all it takes to be a magician.’

‘Now some might call that telepathy, others clairvoyance or precognition, or others dub it a trick or coincidence.’

‘We can awaken our power of clairvoyance with training.’

‘Instead of sunshine and bright colours she sees shadows and spirits, and, having gained the power of clairvoyance, can foresee death.’

‘Things that may be pure coincidence may appear to her as signs of clairvoyance.’

‘Anecdotes about psychokinesis and clairvoyance are given more credence than experimental results questioning these effects.’

‘I have only recently begun to explore my psychic side, but have been strong in the areas of psychic dreams and clairvoyance.’

‘Thus, it is possible that the attempt to explain the déjà vu experience in terms of lost memory, past lives, clairvoyance, and so on may be completely misguided.’

‘Students who score well on one type of ESP test, such as clairvoyance, are also likely to score well on another, such as telepathy.’

‘As in both of the other experiments, there were two conditions: one testing for clairvoyance and the other for true precognition.’

‘He provides two experiments for pure clairvoyance in the Appendix, predicting that both will provide nonsignificant results.’

‘She claimed to understand black magic and to possess clairvoyance, ESP, and other senses unsubstantiated by science.’

‘Further awakening of the inner potentials gradually bestows the supernormal powers of premonition, afflatus, telepathy, clairvoyance and prophecy.’

‘Other terms for clairvoyance include second sight, shadow sight, prophecy, and spiritual communication.’

cryptesthetic or chiefly British cryptaesthetic

the power or faculty of discerning objects or matters not present to the senses — called also cryptesthesia

clairvoyance

people who claim to have clairvoyance are sometimes asked to help locate missing persons

Reprint: I wrote this for Miss Alizee: My Homage.My Soul mate: An Unfinished Quest

My Soul mate: An Unfinished Quest

This is where I love to be
La isla bonita -- A girl sings this lullaby

Every moment is ecstasy
Where scorching sunray like embers of my memory

Her voice is divine and unheard symphony
That wreathes my soul like caged birds cacophony

Her eyes -- untold tales of prophecy
Sailors' quest for the island of Destiny

Emeralds and rubies -- premonition of Shangri–la -- She's my fantasy
She makes me believe in mirages -- that's some real sorcery

This is where I love to be
La isla bonita -- A girl sings this lullaby

She's the one -- White pearl and dark red ruby
My talisman -- I lost in the echoes of her lullaby.

This is draft of my first novel. Chapter: One

Rap. Rap. Rap.

He's buried in a coffin.

Light.

Don't be afraid. This is the world of the dead.

Welcome to the world of the dead.

Your name from now on is Lazarus.

I'm Lazarus too. 

In fact, all of us are. 

He felt thirsty.

How...? I died. Water...

It's ready.

He couldn't walk. 

They entered into a room.

There's a chair...table..computer..bed..

Images rolling on the computer..his funeral...his wife crying. People..pale faces..

Cigarettes. Have a smoke. You'll feel better.

Small sips..chilled water. But there doesn't seem to be a refrigerator in this room.

They're underground. Who are these people. Angels? Satans? Life after death. This is life after death?

He reached out for cigarettes....His hands were trembling...

They were looking at him with interest.

But they weren't smiling. They looked serious.

Why do you look so confused...it's quite simple...we know how to induce you into coma like state...artificial Lazarus Syndrome. And, we'd get you back to consciousness.

Stay here for a few days...till you regain some strength.

Draft copy

A Play in Verse. BTW, is this how you write a Libretto eh?

Day: One
I met a stranger
Roses and lavender
A girl in white shirt and blue suspenders
I just looked at her in wonder.

Day: Two
Fairly tall
Draped in Kashmiri shawl
I looked into her rainbow eyes
Lost my Chinese kite.

Day: Three
I asked her about the Battle of Waterloo
She said: I've no clue.
Oogle -- Doodle I don't care
I'm already having an affair.

Day: Four
My boyfriend has a Ferrari
And, we're going on a safari

Look my Russian doll
I'm ready for a brawl

Braille...

J.K. Rowling stops her assembly-line book signing for a moment to reach across and speak to Stephen Toth, a blind 5th grader who had read all of the Harry Potter books in braille.

Gaba has learned to read braille, walk with a cane, complete math assignments and maneuver his great helper, Mo-bot the Robot, which allowed him to virtually attend classes from the hospital.

When it's finished, the free application will help people with disabilities navigate public spaces by providing information about wheelchair ramps, disabled parking, braille menus and more.

Maq: The Evil Genius...

Yesterday: I accessed a supercomputer: IBM Watson -- for the first time. I was so excited. I didn't know what to do with it. I just want to share those thrilling moments with you denizens. May God bless these folks who are sharing this giant machine with us. It's so rare to find people like that.

Where did the hunchbacked, whirling dervish go eh?

I can't write -- numb and pale -- maybe, the djinn left me -- so was I possessed eh? -- it goaded me to insanity -- but there's something shamanic in me -- it gnawed me -- it said I'm conscientious and I don't bludge like you -- that's why I chastise you... -- so, was that my alter ego? -- where did it go now huh? -- it's just me: a skeptic and a cynic -- untethered life -- bloated and shameful.

old boy network (also old boys' network)

An informal system through which men are thought to use their positions of influence to help others who went to the same school or university as they did, or who share a similar social background.

‘many managers were chosen by the old boy network’

incognito

with one's identity concealed

The ancient Greeks and Romans knew that there were times when you didn't want to be recognized. For example, a myth tells how Zeus and Hermes visited a village incognito and asked for lodging. The apparently penniless travelers were turned away from every household except that of a poor elderly couple named Baucis and Philemon, who provided a room and a feast despite their own poverty. The Romans had a word that described someone or something unknown (like the gods in the tale): incognitus, a term that is the ancestor of our modern incognito.

white feather

A white-coloured feather used as a symbol or mark of perceived cowardice. During the First World War young men seen not wearing uniform were sometimes presented with such a feather, as part of a campaign to induce men to enlist for military service.

‘on his first trip out in civilian clothes, he'd been handed two white feathers’

egotism

The fact of being excessively conceited or absorbed in oneself.
‘in his arrogance and egotism, he underestimated Gill’

Origin
Early 18th century: from French égoïste, from Latin ego ‘I’.

Usage
On the difference between egotism and egoism, see egoism

egomania

Obsessive egotism or self-centerdness.

antivivisection / antivivisectionist

Opposed to the use of live animals for scientific research.
‘antivivisection campaigners’

antagonist

A person who actively opposes or is hostile to someone or something; an adversary.
‘he turned to confront his antagonist’

Origin
Late 16th century: from French antagoniste or late Latin antagonista, from Greek antagōnistēs, from antagōnizesthai ‘struggle against’ (see antagonize).

antagonism

Active hostility or opposition.

‘the antagonism between them’

‘his antagonism towards the local people’

‘petty antagonisms and jealousies’

Origin

Early 19th century: from French antagonisme, from Greek antagōnizesthai ‘struggle against’ (see antagonist).

white van man

British
informal
An aggressive male driver of a delivery or workman's van (typically white in colour).

witter

British
informal
Speak at length about trivial matters.
‘she'd been wittering on about Jennifer and her illness’

Origin
Early 19th century (originally Scots and dialect): probably imitative.

white hope

A person expected to bring much success to a team or organization.

‘the great white hope of the Tory Left’

Origin

1911: originally referring to a white boxer thought capable of beating Jack Johnson, the first black world heavyweight champion.

whoops (also whoops-a-daisy)

British
informal
Expressing mild dismay or regret (used when someone has had an accident or made a mistake)
‘Whoops! I nearly dropped it’

white elephant

A possession that is useless or troublesome, especially one that is expensive to maintain or difficult to dispose of.

‘a huge white elephant of a house that needed ten thousand spent on it’

Origin

From the story that the kings of Siam gave such animals as a gift to courtiers they disliked, in order to ruin the recipient by the great expense incurred in maintaining the animal.

white witch

A person who practises magic for altruistic purposes.

red-blooded

(of a man) vigorous or virile, especially in having strong heterosexual appetites.
‘he was attracted to her, as any red-blooded male would be’

fall guy

North American
informal
A scapegoat.
‘he contends that he is innocent, that he was set up as a fall guy’

fallback

An alternative plan that may be used in an emergency.
‘compulsory powers should be retained as a fallback’

falling star

A meteor or shooting star.

faithless

Disloyal, especially to a spouse or partner.
‘her faithless lover’

false step

A careless or unwise act; a mistake.
‘she made her first false step when she agreed to come back’

bag lady

A homeless woman who carries her possessions around in shopping bags.

retrogression

The process of returning to an earlier state, typically a worse one.
‘a retrogression to 19th-century attitudes’

ashram

(especially in South Asia) a hermitage, monastic community, or other place of religious retreat.

emu

A large flightless fast-running Australian bird resembling the ostrich, with shaggy grey or brown plumage, bare blue skin on the head and neck, and three-toed feet.

rabble-rouser

A person who speaks with the intention of inflaming the emotions of a crowd of people, typically for political reasons.

retrograde

Directed or moving backwards.
‘a retrograde flow'

retrorocket

A small auxiliary rocket on a spacecraft or missile, fired in the direction of travel to slow the craft down, for example when landing on the surface of a planet.

bagatelle

A game in which small balls are hit and then allowed to roll down a sloping board on which there are holes, each numbered with the score achieved if a ball goes into it, with pins acting as obstructions.

hermitage

The dwelling of a hermit, especially when small and remote.

faith healing

Healing achieved by religious belief and prayer, rather than by medical treatment.

fledge

(of a young bird) develop wing feathers that are large enough for flight.
‘the young fledge around four weeks after hatching’

shaman

A person regarded as having access to, and influence in, the world of good and evil spirits, especially among some peoples of northern Asia and North America. Typically such people enter a trance state during a ritual, and practise divination and healing.

Midas touch: Origin Mid 17th century: from the story of King Midas.

Midas was a legendary king of Phrygia (in modern-day Turkey). In return for a good deed, he was granted one wish by the god Dionysus, and asked for the power to turn everything he touched into gold. When he discovered to his horror that his touch had turned his food and drink—and even his daughter—to gold, he begged Dionysus to take back the gift, and Dionysus agreed to do so. When "Midas touch" is used today, the moral of this tale of greed is usually ignored.

a pretense of ignorance and of willingness to learn from another assumed in order to make the other's false conceptions conspicuous by adroit questioning — called also Socratic irony

Socratic irony

A pose of ignorance assumed in order to entice others into making statements that can then be challenged.

banzai

Origin
Japanese, literally ‘ten thousand years (of life to you)’.

changeling

A child believed to have been secretly substituted by fairies for the parents' real child in infancy.

Gordian knot

Origin

Mid 16th century: from the legend that Gordius, king of Gordium, tied an intricate knot and prophesied that whoever untied it would become the ruler of Asia. It was cut through with a sword by Alexander the Great.

Rabelaisian

Displaying earthy humour; bawdy.
‘the conversation was often highly Rabelaisian’

Origin
Mid 18th century: suggestive of the humour of François Rabelais.

Kafkaesque:

Characteristic or reminiscent of the oppressive or nightmarish qualities of Franz Kafka's fictional world.

‘a Kafkaesque bureaucratic office’

The burial at sea of Osama bin Laden after he was killed by Navy SEALs last year followed traditional Islamic procedures, according to newly released military e-mails, but less than a dozen "leadership" members aboard the Navy carrier where the service took place were informed of ..

Dawood Ibrahim did attend the marriage of his daughter Mahrukh with Junaid, son of former Pakistani cricketer Javed Miandad. ... Top intelligence sources say Dawood travelled to Saudi Arabia for the marriage on a Pakistan passport. ... Then how did he manage to reach the ...

The 1993 Bombay bombings were a series of 12 bomb explosions that took place in Bombay, India on 12 March 1993. The coordinated attacks, carried out in revenge for riots that killed many Muslims, were the most destructive bomb explosions in Indian history. This was first of its kind serial-bomb-blasts across the world.

The 2012 Delhi gang rape case involved a rape and fatal assault that occurred on 16 December 2012 in Munirka, a neighbourhood in South Delhi. The incident took place when a 23-year-old female physiotherapy intern, Jyoti Singh,[4] was beaten, gang raped, and tortured in a private bus in which she was traveling with her friend, Awindra Pratap Pandey. There were six others in the bus, including the driver, all of whom raped the woman and beat her friend. Eleven days after the assault, she was transferred to a hospital in Singapore for emergency treatment, but died from her injuries two days later.[5][6] The incident generated widespread national and international coverage and was widely condemned, both in India and abroad. Subsequently, public protests against the state and central governments for failing to provide adequate security for women took place in New Delhi, where thousands of protesters clashed with security forces. Similar protests took place in major cities throughout the country. Since there is a law in India that does not allow the press to publicise a rape victim's name, the victim has become widely known as Nirbhaya, meaning "fearless", and her life and death have come to symbolise women's struggle to end the rape culture in India and the long-held practice of either denial of its existence within the country,[7] or otherwise blaming the victim rather than the perpetrator. All the accused were arrested and charged with sexual assault and murder. One of the accused, Ram Singh, died in police custody from possible suicide on 11 March 2013 in the Tihar Jail.[8] According to some published reports, the police say Ram Singh hanged himself, but defense lawyers and his family suspect he was murdered.[9] The rest of the accused went on trial in a fast-track court; the prosecution finished presenting its evidence on 8 July 2013.[10] The juvenile was convicted of rape and murder and given the maximum sentence of three years' imprisonment in a reform facility.[11] On 10 September 2013, the four remaining adult defendants were found guilty of rape and murder and three days later were sentenced to death by hanging.[12][13][14] On 13 March 2014, Delhi High Court in the death reference case and hearing appeals against the conviction by the lower Court, upheld the guilty verdict and the death sentences.[15] As a result of the protests, in December 2012, a judicial committee was set up to study and take public suggestions for the best ways to amend laws to provide quicker investigation and prosecution of sex offenders. After considering about 80,000 suggestions, the committee submitted a report which indicated that failures on the part of the government and police were the root cause behind crimes against women. In 2013, the Criminal Law (Amendment) Ordinance, 2013 was promulgated by President Pranab Mukherjee, several new laws were passed, and six new fast-track courts were created to hear rape cases. Critics argue that the legal system remains slow to hear and prosecute rape cases, but most agree that the case has resulted in a tremendous increase in the public discussion of crimes against women and statistics show that there has been an improvement in the number of women willing to file a crime report. However, in December 2014, the two-year anniversary of the attack, the girl's father called the promises of reform unmet and said that he felt regret in that he had not been able to bring justice for his daughter and other women like her.[16] A BBC documentary titled India's Daughter based on the attack was broadcast in the UK on 4 March 2015.[17] Indian-Canadian filmmaker Deepa Mehta's 2016 film Anatomy of Violence was also based on the incident, exploring the social conditions and values in Indian society that made it possible.

The film begins with SP Amit Kumar (Ajay Devgan) taking charge of the Tezpur District (fictitious) in Bihar. The area is notorious for its crime rate, with Tezpur Police under the control of the local don Sadhu Yadav (Mohan Joshi) and his son Sundar Yadav (Yashpal Sharma). Amit tries to instill honesty and courage in his subordinates, but in vain. Bacha Yadav (Mukesh Tiwari), who is a stooge of Sadhu Yadav visits his hideout, sees an infamous local goon Nunwa taking shelter there. Fearing that arresting him would open the lid on the nexus between Nunwa and the Tezpur Police, he kills Nunwa and misleads Police that he was killed in an encounter. Suspicious about the encounter, Amit Kumar summons Bacha Yadav, puts him off duty temporarily and also tries to keep him away from Sadhu Yadav and Sundar Yadav. Anxious that he would be transferred from Tezpur, Bacha Yadav, seeking the help of Sadhu Yadav, visits his home, where he finds out that he is being ditched by Sadhu and vows to settle score with them. Meanwhile, Sundar manhandles a Public Works Department engineer for not heeding to his word during a tendering process. Amit takes notice of the incident and also finds that a girl is missing from her home after being kidnapped by Sundar. Sensing an opportunity, Bacha Yadav urges Amit to give him one more chance, who obliges him. Bacha Yadav tricks Sundar into a factory where Amit and his men are waiting and after a brief scuffle, Sundar is arrested and produced in a local court, where the judge acquits Sundar on the account of lack of evidence against him. Sadhu Yadav's men then try to vandalise a shop of local pan vendor after he testified against Sundar, before being arrested and jailed in the police station. There, a fight arises between the accused and Bacha Yadav and his colleagues. It reaches an extreme point with Bacha Yadav piercing the eyes of the accused and pouring acid, referred locally as "Gangaajal", on their eyes. The incident raises a hue and cry in the local media, which accuses Police of vigilante justice. Angered by the incident, Amit Kumar orders his men involved to give their confessions in writing. While all, except Bacha Yadav, deny their involvement, Bacha Yadav writes his confession in a letter and submits it to Amit. When Bacha Yadav reaches his home, he finds his son and wife taken hostage by Sundar Yadav who, after a brief struggle, kills Bacha Yadav by shooting in his eyes. Enraged by the incident, Amit Kumar burns the confession letter of Bacha Yadav and issues a search warrant for Sundar and warns Sadhu Yadav to tell Sundar to surrender himself. Sadhu Yadav applies for an anticipatory bail for Sundar but before Sundar is produced in the court, he is arrested and is taken to jail. This time, the court rejects the bail application and orders the Police to keep Sundar in a 10-day custody. However, Sadhu Yadav influences local home minister and the Deputy Inspector General of Police (DIG) (Mohan Agashe) of the area, Verma, to release his son and also to send Amit on an emergency leave. After being released, Sundar disrupts the marriage of the girl who he kidnapped earlier and kills her mother in the process. Unable to bear the loss of her mother and the torture at the hands of Sundar, she kills herself in the presence of Amit. Amit detains both Sadhu and Sundar and tries to take them to Police Station. However, locals stop Amit and demand that both be killed then and there itself, before being convinced by him that they would be tried as per the law. On the way to Police Station, however, both Sadhu and Sundar escape. Amit then catches up with them and brief fight takes place between them and the film ends with both Sundar and Sadhu getting killed by falling accidentally on chisels of a plough, which incidentally pierce through their eyes.

Damini – Lightning is a 1993 crime thriller film directed by Rajkumar Santoshi starring Meenakshi Sheshadri in the title role alongside Sunny Deol, Rishi Kapoor, Amrish Puri, Tinu Anand, Paresh Rawal in pivotal role and Aamir Khan as special appearance. The story is of how a woman fights against society for justice.

Gangaajal (Devnagari: गंगा-जल English: Ganges' Waters or literally means Holy Waters) is a 2003 Bollywood crime film directed by Prakash Jha, starring Ajay Devgan, Gracy Singh and Mukesh Tiwari. The movie as a sidetrack also mentions the blinding incident at Bhagalpur. Gangaajal was a hit at the Indian box-office.

A false confession is an admission of guilt for a crime for which the confessor is not responsible. False confessions can be induced through coercion or by the mental disorder or incompetency of the accused. Research demonstrates that false confessions occur on a regular basis in case law, which is one reason why jurisprudence has established a series of rules—called "confession rules"—to detect, and subsequently reject, false confessions. Plea agreements typically require the defendant to stipulate to a set of facts establishing that he/she is guilty of the offense; in the United States federal system, before entering judgment on a guilty plea, the court must determine that there is a factual basis for the plea.

Wrongful execution is a miscarriage of justice occurring when an innocent person is put to death by capital punishment. Cases of wrongful execution are cited as an argument by opponents of capital punishment, while proponents suggest that the argument of innocence concerns the credibility of the justice system as a whole and does not solely undermine the use of death penalty.[1][2] A number of people are claimed to have been innocent victims of the death penalty.[3][4] Newly available DNA evidence has allowed the exoneration and release of more than 20 death row inmates since 1992 in the United States,[5] but DNA evidence is available in only a fraction of capital cases. Others have been released on the basis of weak cases against them, sometimes involving prosecutorial misconduct; resulting in acquittal at retrial, charges dropped, or innocence-based pardons. The Death Penalty Information Center (U.S.) has published a list of 10 inmates "executed but possibly innocent".[6] At least 39 executions are claimed to have been carried out in the U.S. in the face of evidence of innocence or serious doubt about guilt.[7] In the UK, reviews prompted by the Criminal Cases Review Commission have resulted in one pardon and three exonerations for people executed between 1950 and 1953 (when the execution rate in England and Wales averaged 17 per year), with compensation being paid.

David Gale is a professor who is a prisoner on death row in Texas. With only a few days until his execution, his lawyer negotiates a half million-dollar fee to tell his story to Bitsey Bloom, a journalist from a major news magazine. She is known for her ability to keep secrets and protect her sources. He tells her the story of how he ended up on death row, revealed to the audience through a series of lengthy flashbacks. Gale is head of the philosophy department at the University of Texas and an active member of DeathWatch, an advocacy group campaigning against capital punishment. At a graduation party, he encounters Berlin, an attractive graduate student who had been expelled from the school. While Gale is drunk at a party, she seduces him and gets him to have rough sex with her. She then falsely accuses Gale of rape. The next day, he loses a televised debate with the Governor of Texas when he is unable to point to an example of a demonstrably innocent man being executed during that governor's term. After losing the debate, Gale is arrested and charged with rape. While the rape charge against Gale is later dropped, the damage had already been done, and his family, marriage, university career and reputation are all destroyed. Constance Harraway, a fellow DeathWatch activist, is a close friend of Gale who consoles him after his life falls apart, and the pair have sex. However, the next day, Harraway is discovered raped and murdered, suffocated by a plastic bag taped over her head. An autopsy reveals that she had been forced to swallow the key to the handcuffs used to restrain her, a psychological torture technique used by the Securitate under the communist regime of Nicolae Ceauşescu, which Gale and Harraway had both protested against. The physical evidence at the crime scene points to Gale, who is convicted of rape and murder and is sentenced to death. In the present, Bloom investigates the case in between her visits with Gale. She comes to believe that the apparent evidence against Gale does not add up. She is tailed several times in her car by a person who turns out to be Dusty Wright, the alleged one-time lover and colleague of Harraway, who she suspects was the real killer. Wright slips evidence to Bloom that suggests Gale has been "framed", implying that the actual murderer videotaped the crime. Bloom pursues this lead until she finds a tape revealing that Harraway, who was suffering from terminal leukemia, had committed an elaborate suicide made to look like murder. Wright is seen on the videotape, acting as her accomplice, implying that they framed Gale as part of a plan to discredit the death penalty by conspiring to execute an innocent person, and subsequently releasing evidence of the actual circumstances. Once Bloom and her aide find this evidence, only hours remain until Gale's scheduled execution. She tries to give the tape to the authorities in time to stop the execution. She arrives at the Huntsville Unit just as the warden announces that it has been carried out. The tape is subsequently released, causing a media and political uproar over the execution of an innocent man. Later, Wright receives the fee that Bloom's magazine agreed to pay for the interview, and delivers it to Gale's ex-wife in Spain, along with a postcard from Berlin in San Francisco apologizing, all but confessing that the rape accusation that derailed Gale's life and career was false. His ex-wife looks distraught, knowing Gale told the truth and that she effectively stole their child away from him. Much later still, a videotape labelled "Off the Record" is delivered to Bloom. This tape picks up at the point where Wright confirmed that Harraway was dead. It continues to show him stepping aside to allow Gale, also present and party to the suicide, to caress the body of his lover, deliberately leaving his fingerprints on the plastic bag in the process. He then stands up and ends the recording, leaving Bloom stunned with the truth that the couple deliberately sacrificed themselves to discredit capital punishment as capable of causing the execution of an innocent man.

The Life of David Gale is a 2003 American drama film directed by Alan Parker (in his final film as a director) and written by Charles Randolph. The film is an international co-production, between the United States, Germany and the United Kingdom. Kevin Spacey played the eponymous character, a college professor and longtime activist against capital punishment who is sentenced to death for killing a fellow capital punishment opponent. Kate Winslet and Laura Linney co-star.

How'd you possibly compensate 20 years of ordeal not to just this victim of conspiracy or otherwise -- and also to his immediate family. Let's just say: Nuclear family. How?

My Comments This is the only reason I vie for abolishment of Capital Punishment. Otherwise No. Of course.

Innocent man freed after spending 20 years behind bars for attempted murder in a Compton shooting

Consider: Face/Off movie Bad Guy. Is this my Hubby? Is this my Father? Is this my Police Chief?

Hypothesis for Ethical Hackers and Our Geeks who teach How to Counter Online and Offline Impersonations and Counter Measures for Social Engineering on Social Media or Real Life Real Time Scenarios.

The term originated in the West Indies, where a zombie is a will-less, automaton-like person who is said to have been revived from the dead and must now do the will of the living.

Self-Defense Survival Guide: How To Survive When You're Fighting For Your Life

"A defendant is entitled to use reasonable force to protect himself, others for whom he is responsible and his property. It must be reasonable."

Self-defense (self-defence in many varieties of English) is a countermeasure that involves defending the health and well-being of oneself from harm.[1] The use of the right of self-defense as a legal justification for the use of force in times of danger is available in many jurisdictions, but the interpretation varies widely.

The term originated in the West Indies, where a zombie is a will-less, automaton-like person who is said to have been revived from the dead and must now do the will of the living.

In the UNIX operating system world, developers sometimes use the term to refer to a program process that has died but hasn't yet given its process table entry back to the system.

On the Web, a zombie is an abandoned and sadly out-of-date Web site that for some reason has been moved to another Web address. Such zombies contribute to linkrot.

There are a few other kinds of zombies: In one form of denial of service attack, a zombie is an insecure Web server on which malicious people have placed code that, when triggered at the same time as other zombie servers, will launch an overwhelming number of requests toward an attacked Web site, which will soon be unable to service legitimate requests from its users. A pulsing zombie is one that launches requests intermittently rather than all at once.

Typically, a zombie is a home-based PC whose owner is unaware that the computer is being exploited by an external party. The increasing prevalence of high speed connections makes home computers appealing targets for attack. Inadequate security measures make access relatively easy for an attacker. For example, if an Internet port has been left open, a small Trojan horse program can be left there for future activation.

A zombie (also known as a bot) is a computer that a remote attacker has accessed and set up to forward transmissions (including spam and viruses) to other computers on the Internet. The purpose is usually either financial gain or malice. Attackers typically exploit multiple computers to create a botnet, also known as a zombie army.

A 'hijra’s' life and hard times

Reading The Truth About Me is like experiencing a unique friendship. Translated from the original Tamil by V Geetha, this is an autobiography that has never been done before in the English language.

"‘Do you want me to arrange things so that you pee like women do, from below? Or as men do, from above?’

‘I want to live as a woman, which is why I wanted this operation. Please make it like it is for a woman.’ I did not know how women peed, but I wanted to be a woman. After two hours, I was told it was all over.’”

After that operation, done with only her lower body under anesthesia, A Revathi emerged quite “cleaned up” of her masculinity, without, as her brother would say in abuse, “her bud”. And though it was terribly painful once the effect of the anesthesia wore off, she had crossed an unusual threshold, emerging from a conflicted boyhood into a less than perfect womanhood, observing the elaborate rituals of the hijra community after nirvaanam (the operation).

Reading The Truth About Me is like experiencing a unique friendship. Translated from the original Tamil by V Geetha, this is an autobiography that has never been done before in the English language — A Hijra Life Story — as the subtitle informs you. There are some things that remain unexplained — why, for instance, are hijras called ‘Number 9’? That’s the taunt that’s frequently hurled at Revathi and others like her. But no glossary, no explanation. Familiarity with that vocabulary is assumed. If you don’t already know, go find out.

Revathi speaks to her readers like she might to a dear friend. She bares her heart, recalling her childhood. While she was still known as Doraisamy, son of a truck-owner and driver in a village in Namakkal taluk, Salem district, Tamil Nadu, she had taken part in festivities at the local Mariamman temple festival disguised as a girl. At the end of that day, the adolescent boy looked at himself in the mirror, and liked what he saw. “I had not worn a disguise, I said to myself; I had given form to my real feelings.”

Those “real feelings” run deep, and shine with sincerity. Beaten and threatened by her own family, Revathi runs away. She lives among her own kind in different cities, Delhi, Mumbai and Bangalore. Faced with poverty, she is initially left with the two options most hijras have: begging and sex work. Revathi describes her experiences with both. Ironically, among the most humiliating experiences she endures is torture at the hands of a policeman.

There is warmth and humour too, and acceptance and love. Revathi’s brother, seeing her in a sari, remarks to his wife that perhaps she could learn how to wear her sari from Revathi — stylishly, and not too high. There is even a brief spell of married love, when Revathi settles into domesticity with a senior colleague at Sangama, an NGO that works for people like her. But the romance dies out soon, and she’s left on her own again.

“Finally, I went back to work at Sangama.” That’s the end of the narrative, also something of a beginning, in medias res.

Hijra: India's third gender claims its place in law

The history of the hijra community's stretches back to antiquity. But now, with a new supreme court ruling, India's third gender has finally achieved full legal recognition

With their glittering saris, bright makeup and a reputation for bawdy song and dance, hijras, India's transgender minority, are hard to miss. But this week, after years of discrimination, the community has finally been granted legal visibility.

On Tuesday the supreme court of India ruled that transgender people would be recognised on official documents under a seperate "third gender" category. The change follows similar legislation in Nepal, Pakistan and Bangladesh. This means that now, for the first time, there are quotas of government jobs and college places for hijras. The decision has been cheered by activists, who say that, despite its distinguished history, the community too often faces violence and harassment.

Shwetambera Parashar from the Humsafar Trust, an Indian NGO that campaigns for LGBT rights, says the exclusion faced by the community has been acute – from doctors refusing to examine or treat hijras, to police harrasment and discrimination keeping them locked out of mainstream employment. This week's change in the law is a "big step", she says, ensuring that discrimination can now be challenged.

Hijras, who can be eunuchs, intersex or transgender, have been part of South Asia's culture for thousands of years. Eunuchs are celebrated in sacred Hindu texts such as the Mahabharata and the Kama Sutra. They also enjoyed influential positions in the Mughal courts.

When the British came to power in India, the community's fortunes changed, with the disgusted colonists passing a law in 1897 classing all eunuchs as criminals. Since then many have been ostracised – either for cross dressing or being intersex – and have gone on to form their own communities, around a guru or mother figure to provide emotional and financial security. Many even took to using a secret code language known as Hijra Farsi for protection. More recently, hijras have been seen as auspicious and are often asked to bless celebrations such as marriages and births. In India's larger cities this has waned, forcing many to rely on begging or prostitution. The effect of this dangerous work and the community's limited access to health and welfare services can be seen in the staggering fact that HIV rates among hijras stand at 18% in Mumbai, while the rate among the wider population is only 0.3%.

Yet, despite welcoming the change in the law, Indian activists warn that not all transgender people feel comfortable being referred to as "third sex". Many prefer to be classed simply by the gender they have chosen, as women or men. Campaigners point out that more needs to be done to stop transgender people, and hijra communities in particular, from being criminalised – such as overturning the controversial section 377 law that makes homosexual acts a crime.

Bindiya Rana, who was the first transgender woman to stand as a provincial political candidate in Pakistan, says the changes in law in her own country, which came into effect in 2012, have not been enough to change lives.

"In Pakistan we are recognised and there are some jobs – mostly on three-month contracts or with NGOs – but not across the employment sector," she says. "The government have not supported us – they haven't implemented the law. I had more opposition when I fought in the election from politicians than I did from the public. Society in Pakistan is more understanding, more accepting and supportive of us than the government is. We have claimed our space in the law, but we are not protected by it."

In 2013, transgender people in Pakistan were given their first opportunity to stand for election.[38] Sanam Fakir, a 32-year-old hijra, ran as an independent candidate for Sukkur, Pakistan's general election in May.[39] The governments of both India (1994)[40] and Pakistan (2009)[41] have recognized hijras as a "third sex", thus granting them the basic civil rights of every citizen. In India, hijras now have the option to identify as a eunuch ("E") on passports and on certain government documents. They are not, however, fully accommodated; in order to vote, for example, citizens must identify as either male or female. There is also further discrimination from the government. In the 2009 general election, India's election committee denied three hijras candidature unless they identified themselves as either male or female. In April 2014, Justice KS Radhakrishnan declared transgender to be the third gender in Indian law, in a case brought by the National Legal Services Authority (Nalsa) against Union of India and others.[17][18][19] The ruling said:[42] Seldom, our society realises or cares to realise the trauma, agony and pain which the members of Transgender community undergo, nor appreciates the innate feelings of the members of the Transgender community, especially of those whose mind and body disown their biological sex. Our society often ridicules and abuses the Transgender community and in public places like railway stations, bus stands, schools, workplaces, malls, theatres, hospitals, they are sidelined and treated as untouchables, forgetting the fact that the moral failure lies in the society's unwillingness to contain or embrace different gender identities and expressions, a mindset which we have to change. Justice Radhakrishnan said that transgender people should be treated consistently with other minorities under the law, enabling them to access jobs, healthcare and education.[43] He framed the issue as one of human rights, saying that, "These TGs, even though insignificant in numbers, are still human beings and therefore they have every right to enjoy their human rights", concluding by declaring that:[42] Hijras, Eunuchs, apart from binary gender, be treated as "third gender" for the purpose of safeguarding their rights under Part III of our Constitution and the laws made by the Parliament and the State Legislature. Transgender persons' right to decide their self-identified gender is also upheld and the Centre and State Governments are directed to grant legal recognition of their gender identity such as male, female or as third gender. A bill supported by all political parties was tabled in Indian parliament to ensure transgender people get benefits akin reserved communities like SC/STs and is taking steps to see that they get enrollment in schools and jobs in government besides protection from sexual harassment.

Most hijras live at the margins of society with very low status; the very word "hijra" is sometimes used in a derogatory manner. The Indian lawyer and author Rajesh Talwar has written a book highlighting the human rights abuses suffered by the community titled 'The Third Sex and Human Rights.'[28] Few employment opportunities are available to hijras. Many get their income from extortion (forced payment by disrupting work/life using demonstrations and interference), performing at ceremonies (toli), begging (dheengna), or sex work ('raarha')—an occupation of eunuchs also recorded in premodern times. Violence against hijras, especially hijra sex workers, is often brutal, and occurs in public spaces, police stations, prisons, and their homes.[29] As with transgender people in most of the world, they face extreme discrimination in health, housing, education, employment, immigration, law, and any bureaucracy that is unable to place them into male or female gender categories.[30] In 2008, HIV prevalence was 27.6% amongst hijra sex workers in Larkana.[31] The general prevalence of HIV among the adult Pakistani population is estimated at 0.1%.[32] In October 2013, Pakistani Christians and Muslims (Shia and Sunni) put pressure on the landlords of Imamia Colony to evict any transgender residents. "Generally in Pakistan, Khwaja Sira are not under threat. But they are in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province because of a 'new Islam' under way", I.A. Rehman, the director of the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan.[33] In a study of Bangladeshi hijras, participants reported not being allowed to seek healthcare at the private chambers of doctors, and experiencing abuse if they go to government hospitals.[34] Beginning in 2006, hijras were engaged to accompany Patna city revenue officials to collect unpaid taxes, receiving a 4-percent commission.[35] Since India's Supreme Court re-criminalized homosexual sex on 13 December 2013, there has been a sharp increase in the physical, psychological and sexual violence against the transgender community by the Indian Police Service, nor are they investigating even when sexual assault against them is reported.[36] On 15 April 2014, in National Legal Services Authority v. Union of India, the Supreme Court of India ruled that transgender people should be treated as a third category of gender or as a socially and economically "backward" class entitled to proportional access and representation in education and jobs.

Hijra (for translations, see [n 1]) is a term used in South Asia to refer to transgender individuals who are born male.[1][2] They are also known as Aravani, Aruvani or Jagappa.[3] It's of note that in many languages of India, especially outside North-West India, the term "hijra" has never been used and instead the original concept has been translated into other terms, such as the term Thirunangai in Tamil or the term chhakka in Kannada. [4] The hijras are officially recognized as third gender by the government,[5][6] being neither completely male nor female. Hijras have a recorded history in the Indian subcontinent from antiquity onwards as suggested by the Kama Sutra period. This history features a number of well-known roles within subcontinental cultures, part gender-liminal, part spiritual and part survival. In South Asia, many hijras live in well-defined and organised all-hijra communities, led by a guru.[7][8] These communities have sustained themselves over generations by "adopting" boys who are in abject poverty, rejected by, or flee, their family of origin.[9] Many work as sex workers for survival.[10] The word "hijra" is an Urdu word derived from the Semitic Arabic root hjr in its sense of "leaving one's tribe,"[11] and has been borrowed into Hindi. The Indian usage has traditionally been translated into English as "eunuch" or "hermaphrodite," where "the irregularity of the male genitalia is central to the definition."[12] However, in general hijras are born male, only a few having been born with intersex variations.[13] Some Hijras undergo an initiation rite into the hijra community called nirwaan, which refers to the removal of the penis, scrotum and testicles.[10] Since the late 20th century, some hijra activists and Western non-government organizations (NGOs) have lobbied for official recognition of the hijra as a kind of "third sex" or "third gender," as neither man nor woman.[14] Hijras have successfully gained this recognition in Bangladesh and are eligible for priority in education.[15][16] In India, the Supreme Court in April 2014 recognised hijra and transgender people as a 'third gender' in law.[17][18][19] Nepal, Pakistan, India, and Bangladesh have all legally accepted the existence of a third gender, with India including an option for them on passports and certain official documents.

Milk is a 2008 American biographical film based on the life of gay rights activist and politician Harvey Milk, who was the first openly gay person to be elected to public office in California, as a member of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors. Directed by Gus Van Sant and written by Dustin Lance Black, the film stars Sean Penn as Milk and Josh Brolin as Dan White, a city supervisor who assassinated Milk and Mayor George Moscone. The film was released to much acclaim and earned numerous accolades from film critics and guilds. Ultimately, it received eight Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture, winning two for Best Actor in a Leading Role for Penn and Best Original Screenplay for Black. Attempts to put Milk's life to film followed a 1984 documentary of his life and the aftermath of his assassination, titled The Times of Harvey Milk, which was loosely based upon Randy Shilts's biography, The Mayor of Castro Street (the film won the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature for 1984, and was awarded Special Jury Prize at the first Sundance Film Festival, among other awards). Various scripts were considered in the early 1990s, but projects fell through for different reasons, until 2007. Much of Milk was filmed on Castro Street and other locations in San Francisco, including Milk's former storefront, Castro Camera. Milk begins on Harvey Milk's 40th birthday (in 1970), when he was living in New York City and had not yet settled in San Francisco. It chronicles his foray into city politics, and the various battles he waged in the Castro neighborhood as well as throughout the city, and political campaigns to limit the rights of gay people in 1977 and 1978 run by Anita Bryant and John Briggs. His romantic and political relationships are also addressed, as is his tenuous affiliation with troubled Supervisor Dan White; the film ends with White's double homicide of Milk and Mayor George Moscone. The film's release was tied to the 2008 California voter referendum on gay marriage, Proposition 8, when it made its premiere at the Castro Theatre two weeks before election day.

Playing God. Isn't that so Ungodly. Your Conscience buzzing: Ungodly Hour. Who are these people? Control freaks? Predators? Victimizers? Puppeteer? Kick? Do they get some deviant thrills? Like role-playing Jim Corbett: For trifling, short-lived thrills and chills eh? What if this diabolic obsession backfires and boomeranges? Hey, Belgian hare? Big game eh? This is a musket skeet shooting. Ya, ya: a heavy large-caliber muzzle-loading usually smoothbore shoulder firearm; broadly: a shoulder gun carried by infantry. For trapshooting: My preferred choice of weapon is this: Ya, this -- my ancestral aborigine crossbow generously laced with frog-poison wooden not very that sharp -- left a little unhoned -- blunt trauma -- instantatenous coma -- of our Jungle invaders. Poaching is point-blank sacrilegious as well. This slingshot is just to cause distress to trespassers like you. You: Functional illiterate. I'm Mister Gunslinger. This six–shooter for juvenline -- repeat offenders: In a nutshell: Incorrigible Hooters. Yep. Are you retarded eh? Those right? Those are not only piscivorous. They're carnivorous -- omnivorous -- really real voracious. Those are real voracious alligators. This is not Lakshadweep island. Ya, neck-deep swamp! You can't even bleat or weep. Estranged but back again for second honeymoon. This jerk has Anterograde and Retrograde amnesia. Mister Fifty First Dates! Moron! Look how's he's grinning -- shameless fool. Cross-Eyed. Squinter. Those are honeymooners: Miss Gorger. Mister Devour. Undead and Unhappy Forever. Equally adept and agile even on this weedy turf. Zilch. Nothing would be left of you except remnants of carrion: A few stray uneaten, leftover chunks of dead and putrefying flesh. And, that's not their prenupital dance ritual whatever: They're like look Carnival Party Time! Aprodisiac! Lipovtian: Energy Drink from Tokyo, Japan. Hey, Honey I don't like the new one with Honey. Original Ginseng ya. Okay. Of course, HoneyPot. Anyway, without further aduie -- Let's kick this off now with a real quick hide-and-go-seek. Peekaboo! Blindman's buff / bluff. Yep, that's correct. 

One . . . .

Two . . . . 

Three . . . . 

RFID - My Comments: Could you believe that eh - I just Eureka--ed--on-this RFID-Hacking Proof Wallet for Credit cards and all at this shack near my Tea place. It's for like 140 rupees after not-so-serious basic Indian haggling.

Maybe the Technology has evolved and all -- and there're and there must be counter-measures and all -- but the point I'm trying to drive home is: ubiquitous -- imperceptibly so -- And, this person is a you know -- a peddler on the street corner -- an encroacher -- encroaching -- A nuisance for pedestrian traffic -- footpath -- Just this one person and his wares on this make-shift shack spawns into zillions of problems for all of us -- of course -- he's also a naive accomplice or propagator of it and victim of it as well. Because he's victiom of something else up in this vicious circle of . . . . -- I mean to say: This one chap and a bunch of 'em -- this'd mushroom into something colossal -- It's like in I guess 1990 or so: I stumbled on this book: Pulling Your Own Strings by Dr. Wayne W. Dyer; and I bought it from Abids, Hyderabad -- He's a victim and he's selling this book -- Isn't that so ironic eh? -- A friend was with me -- He's like my Constant-Pillion-Rider-Buddy -- you see -- those College-Days -- He's like so bluntly deriding me -- as If I don't need it -- in the first place -- maybe he's like if this zilch my meal ticket gets to understand even a wee bit of this Book -- He'd stop having anything to do with me. This person here after like zillions of years -- selling a eWallet -- like a simple credit cards et cetra thingy -- Those silver-casing Ciggy Case-like -- a litte more miniature-ish -- I don't think -- He knows anything about RFID and all that. 

I come home -- scuffling streets -- and blind alleys and everything -- huffing and panting -- dehydrated and semi-sunstroke-like delirium -- and, instead of looking for some effective on World Health Organization online resources for new formula for oral rehydration salts (ORS) -- sachet -- I start keyboarding this Blog post for you and I -- looking for the right word on Merriam Websters, Wikipedia and other online reference knowledge bases. This constant gnawning worry that my Wi-Fi connexion might conk out any time -- or there'd be an unscheduled power shutdown -- it's not so uncommon during Indian Summers -- All of us Indians -- and Expatriates in India and of course, Non-Resident Indians across the Globe -- go through this -- bugbears that get on our nerves -- By the way, Any Rakesh Sharma for Space Station so far? ISRO: Do you copy? I think we're with Eskimos. But this thing I dunno -- maybe something is in the pipeline.

That's all for now, folks: Time for some really real raunchy music for The unabashed Lothario in us. Dub. Dub. Dub. YouTube Dot Com. 

One more thing: I've buckled down for another E-book after a lull -- It's a novel about the loveless existence of an aging lothario.

Here's something Historical intro you'd moot:

Lothario comes from The Fair Penitent (1703), a tragedy by Nicholas Rowe. In the play, Lothario is a notorious seducer, extremely attractive but beneath his charming exterior a haughty and unfeeling scoundrel. He seduces Calista, an unfaithful wife and later the fair penitent of the title. After the play was published, the character of Lothario became a stock figure in English literature. For example, Samuel Richardson modeled the character of Lovelace on Lothario in his 1748 novel Clarissa. As the character became well known, his name became progressively more generic, and since the 18th century the word lothario has been used for a foppish, unscrupulous rake.

Hello, Alizee: Is that you eh? "....sometimes I think those little brats are the spawn of Satan himself".

Babes Is that you live or your voice answering machine eh? Profane words telling -- Expletives -- What me no Military Rat. Excuse moi Miss Geneva Convocation Tap Dance Function...I'm Phone Phreak ya what do you think -- Ask AT and T ya then what OMG

RFID - My Comments: Could you believe that eh - I just Eureka--ed--on-this RFID-Hacking Proof Wallet for Credit cards and all at this shack near my Tea place. It's for like 140 rupees after not-so-serious basic Indian haggling.

RFID (radio frequency identification) is a technology that incorporates the use of electromagnetic or electrostatic coupling in the radio frequency (RF) portion of the electromagnetic spectrum to uniquely identify an object, animal, or person. RFID is coming into increasing use in industry as an alternative to the bar code. The advantage of RFID is that it does not require direct contact or line-of-sight scanning. An RFID system consists of three components: an antenna and transceiver (often combined into one reader) and a transponder (the tag). The antenna uses radio frequency waves to transmit a signal that activates the transponder. When activated, the tag transmits data back to the antenna. The data is used to notify a programmable logic controller that an action should occur. The action could be as simple as raising an access gate or as complicated as interfacing with a database to carry out a monetary transaction. Low-frequency RFID systems (30 KHz to 500 KHz) have short transmission ranges (generally less than six feet). High-frequency RFID systems (850 MHz to 950 MHz and 2.4 GHz to 2.5 GHz) offer longer transmission ranges (more than 90 feet). In general, the higher the frequency, the more expensive the system.

The purpose of RFID skimming may be simple theft of funds or more complex identity theft. Most typically, thieves use an NFC- (near-field communication) enabled device that records unencrypted data from the card's RFID chip, which is broadcast into the air. In the case of a credit card, for example, the data might include the card number, expiry date and card holder name -- all that's required for transactions and, for many applications, to establish identity. 

Many smartphones are equipped with NFC and more mobile devices, such as tablets, are slated to have it. RFID skimming apps can be loaded onto mobile phones and devices can be constructed that are capable of reading RFID broadcasts at distances up to 15 feet away.

Potentially, RFID skimming is an even greater risk with debit cards, because banks often lack any policy to protect customers from fraudulent charges. The payment card industry has stated that safeguards are in place to make RFID-based cards secure. However, many researchers have demonstrated that the cards can be exploited. 

Psst: Damn you. What're you doing here huh? How did you get in -- in the first place? Give me The Book of Celestial Secrets -- you promised. Oh ya? ya Then what? Moron? Hey, how do I find my way out of this web? Anyway, what's this? Sleeping Beauty's Reading Lists of Books She wants to read...go away..freak

I'm Guest of Honor of My Chinese Comrade in Arms: A Fortress of Refuge and Faith. Six-Hundred Winged Angel at every Entrance and Gate. See If You'd Overun This Labryrinth and Maze. Destiny and Fate: Look here, Eklavya Sleeps. Abhimanyu is Leading the Bridage.

In Greek mythology, the Elysian Fields, or the Elysian Plains, the final resting places of the souls of the heroic and the virtuous, evolved from a designation of a place or person struck by lightning, enelysion, enelysios.[1] This could be a reference to Zeus, the god of lightning/Jupiter, so "lightning-struck" could be saying that the person was blessed (struck) by Zeus (/lightning/fortune). Egyptologist Jan Assmann has also suggested that Greek Elysion may have instead been derived from the Egyptian term ialu (older iaru), meaning "reeds," with specific reference to the "Reed fields" (Egyptian: sekhet iaru / ialu), a paradisiacal land of plenty where the dead hoped to spend eternity

a wolf in sheep's clothing? Trade Secret. Classified. Then what? For Your Eyes Only stuff. Ya. Bleat? Hmm. Faith. Remember any Shepherds? The Last. Herd-Neutral. Hush. Got it? What's your name eh? Hmm. Why?

I'm A Shepherd in sheep's clothing’ -- Ya, Dolly: Cry Wolf! I'm here to keep the wolf from the door -- ya Then What ya -- No way, duh -- ain't that obvious -- I'm NOT North American informal - type. Then What OMG. Did they come? Then? See.

informal A man who habitually seduces women. ‘he's the archetypal wolf in Armani threads’

Used figuratively to refer to a rapacious, ferocious, or voracious person or thing. ‘he calls the media ravening wolves’

THURSDAY, MARCH 1, 2007 The Law of Life

A cold, wet nose touched his face. At the touch, his soul jumped forward to awaken him. His hand went to the fire and he pulled a burning stick from it. The wolf saw the fire, but was not afraid. It turned and howled into the air to his brother wolves. They answered with hunger in their throats, and came running.
The old Indian listened to the hungry wolves. He heard them form a circle around him and his small fire. He waved his burning stick at them, but they did not move away. Now, one of them moved closer, slowly, as if to test the old man’s strength. Another and another followed. The circle grew smaller and smaller. Not one wolf stayed behind.
Why should he fight? Why cling to life? And he dropped his stick with the fire on the end of it. It fell in the snow and the light went out.
The circle of wolves moved closer. Once again the old Indian saw the picture of the moose as it struggled before the end came. He dropped his head to his knees. What did it matter after all? Isn’t this the law of life?

THURSDAY, MARCH 1, 2007

The Law of Life
The Law of Life
Written by Jack London

Watch offbeat news spaces.
Thread: a series of newsgroup messages following a single topic -- See 'em in a sequence. Not as just one snapshot. But a motion picture. Re-arrange. Got it?
Try to Link this with that.
Anomalies
Oh you DEF CON ya OMG
Time Travel concatenated with Time Capsule -- Don't look for historical seal-fate-decisive so-called unprecedented measures -- Look across Centuries -- An obscure moral story in some Bla-blah century and a current socio-political gnawing problem. Let's call this knack Shamanic. Read this:

Knife sharpening is the process of making a knife or similar tool sharp by grinding against a hard, rough surface, typically stone, or a soft surface with hard particles, such as sandpaper. Additionally, a leather razor strop, or strop, is often used to straighten and polish an edge.

Hone is the most apt word in this context:

to sharpen or smooth with a whetstone

to make more acute, intense, or effective :  whet

a stone used for sharpening knives, blades, etc.

I won't recommend that bicyle-guy -- pedal-powered whetting -- I'm speaking this in strictly metamorphical terms: Go back to Ancient Days. Cave Man Days. Stone-Age Days.

So if you'd get that Shamanic Intuition where figurately speaking -- you touch the razor of the blade or knife and you'd tell with some substantial certainty that something is wrong -- or, you get that Holmesian Logic bypassing the Standard Linear Approach taken to Resolve anything -- to deduce -- to make a decision -- anything -- a Swissknife approach to everything -- Master key or something they say right -- something like that -- A village elder is wise...a scientist is intellige Zoos Safaris or Jungles.

A sage. A mystic. There're always you know -- There's something in their this inevitablity of existenstinal aloneness...they're never alone. We live amongst a crowd..but we feel so distresslingly Home Alone.

Of course, I'm not professing to be the Next Osho for Rich -- I just share my stream-of-consciousness...you know...I'm so Narcisstic in this context that I re-read my own Blogs and try to find different shades of meanings and interpretation of meanings et cetra. If I write to a girl and she writes me back -- I re-read my own Chucks of Text to her and try to you know visualize -- I found this out zillions of years later while watching this movie: Hard Candy. Where this girl says to this Pedophile you guys do this stuff -- go through your E-mails to us again and again in real OCD-like fashion -- I'm improvesing here -- So obviously the Pedophile Part and writing to Lolitos -- that safely exempted -- I love reading my own writings.

I'm hunchbacked look really awful. We'd virtual date but no cam -- of course.
No Audio -- obviously. Unless you let me Voice Change with Bonzi Buddy when it used to a parrot. Er I mean Parakeet.
I still wear Suspenders.

This is excerpted from my Blog: WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 9, 2013

Girls: Expect a red-carpet welcome -- Let the boys accuse me of unabashed favoritism -- Lenient policies! :-) If you happen to spot a gray-haired guy -- hunchbacked -- in his early forties -- wearing extremely sober suspenders -- scuffling to cross the street -- you'd safely approach him -- with absolutely no caution (put that pepper spray in your clutch bag, please!) -- that's me! :-)

I'm a The Steadfast Tin Soldier.

then he thought of the pretty little dancer, whom he was never to see again, and this refrain rang in his ears:—

“Onward! Onward! Soldier!

For death thou canst not shun.”

Soldiering is burning-coal-like:

My Blog Post: FRIDAY, JANUARY 27, 2017

Sisyphus is in you.
Mettle:

Strength of spirit: Ability to continue despite difficulties.

There is no magic wand that could change boys into men but sheer, mammoth grit.
This is your life.
If you are a closet escapist opt for hot-air balloon ride. No one would ever suspect your timidity.
But if you have even a wee bit of pathfinding spunk --
Invoke the pygmy Sherpa-like relentlessness of spirit in you.
It would metamorphose into a real giant. Eventually.
Buckle down to Sisyphean ordeals.
Don't shy away from 'em.
Sisyphus is in you.
Listen to your inner voice.
Try not to muffle or squelch those echoes.


My Idealogical Soul Mate: A story of an unfinished quest . . . .

To Be Continued . . . .

Footsteps.

For instance: I just stumbled on this: Fates plural :  the three goddesses, Atropos, Clotho, and Lachesis, who determine the course of human life in classical mythology.

Novajo.

So you wanna speak Engish Native-American way -- This Brown Indian is here for just that eh! Rejoice!

Eight years ago, Leanne Rowe was in a serious car crash that resulted in a broken back and jaw. But when the former bus driver and Australian Army Reserve member recovered, she was left with something completely unexpected: a French accent.
Rowe, who is now unable to speak with her original Aussie accent, said she has become a "recluse," and often has her daughter speak for her in public.
"I am not French," Rowe told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) on Sunday. "It makes me so angry because I am Australian."
How can this occur?

Car crash leaves Australian woman with French accent

Foreign accent syndrome is an extremely rare condition in which brain injuries change a person's speech patterns, giving them a different accent. The first known case was reported in 1941, when a Norwegian woman suffered shrapnel injuries to the brain during a German bombing run -- and started speaking with a German accent. Since then there have been only a few dozen reported cases.

The man with no memory: Navy vet wakes up, speaks only Swedish

fugue: a disturbed state of consciousness in which the one affected seems to perform acts in full awareness but upon recovery cannot recollect the acts performed

Getting Out of Your Victim Habits:

As a child you were often victimized simply by virtue of your stature within your family. Your strings were being pulled constantly, and while you complained privately, you also knew there was very little you could do to take control. You knew you couldn't support yourself, and that if you didn't go along with the program outlined by the big people in your life, there were very few acceptable alternatives available to you. All you had to do was try running away from home for twenty minutes to see how helpless you were on your own. So you went along, and you learned to accept your reality. And while you worked at attaining some independece, you were often content to let others do your thinking and life-directing for you.

As an adult, you may still be carrying many left-over habits from childhood, which made some practical sense then, but which set you up as an easy victim now. Getting out of your victim traps, involves, above all developing new habits.

Dr. Wayne W. Dyer / Pulling Your Own Strings: Dynamic techniques for dealing with other people and living your life as you choose.