Eva

[evazegna]

Oh so Italy.

Many people have talked about the complete death state of the Italian economy. There has been a lot said about how Italy has failed to develop and keep up with infrastructure. Personally I have been one of the many voices echoing that idea. I went to High School in Italy a decade ago and unlike my Australian High School where assignments were typed and classes regularly involved computers for practically from the beginning, in Italy I didn’t see one computer at either of the schools I went to. The results from that mistake are probably evident. Italy took longer than any other founding European nation to have computer uptake.  Computer literacy, though much improved, is still not like other European or OECD nations. On my many trips back to Italy- the old country – I have been frustrated and disappointed by the slowness that everything seemed to have. Buying train tickets online never seemed to work. Cinema times on Google were always wrong. To me when I was growing up, Italy was just behind the ball.

To add to my dissatisfaction with Italian modernisation my family house was destroyed in a natural disaster. Not long after that I started full time work and my ability to cart myself around the world was limited by strict holiday leave, rent and (dare I say it) life. Italy and I had a bit of a break from each other.

Then earlier this year I went back to my home town. I was enraged at the lack of reconstruction and appalled by the conditions that my paesani are now living in. Their houses had been taken away from them and in return they were shoved into temporary homes an eighth of the size of what they previously had. I visited friends from high school- now ten years on most of them were unemployed or in crap jobs. Didn’t seem to matter if they had gone on to tertiary education. I had coffee with a girlfriend who was delighted to tell me she was pregnant. She was so delighted mainly because it would give her something to do because in the 10 years since High School she hadn’t had any sort of serious employment. I told all and sundry that Italy was fucked and there was no hope for its recuperation.

But then something happened.

 A dear friend had commented on my skin and mentioned that the products I was using were too strong. She suggested I used an Italian brand and went on to give me the last of the bottle of cleanser she was using. I laughed until I did some research- thought the brand had been around for about 15 years it was starting to set up stores across Europe. Back in France I noticed this brand was everywhere and in the space of 6 months since moving to France 6 stores popped up in the place I live. An Italian company, rising like a phoenix from the ashes of what seems to be the economic disaster that lays the country.

Then I went on vacation with my parents. I mentioned that I didn’t have a train ticket and my father popped on the internet and booked me a seat on the famous high speed train that was leaving within the hour. He emailed it to me and in total disbelief the train conductor accepted it from my ipad.

Ten years ago this was not possible- and frankly I didn’t think Italy would be able to come this far.

In the space of about a week I have decided that the old country isn’t as fucked as I thought it was. Don’t get me wrong, there is a lot that needs to be sorted out here. But it is moving forward. Slowly. And I have started to smell the hope. You can get from Milan to Rome in 3 hours overland. And though the young don’t seem to have work, the summer has brought a sense of entrepreneurship that wasn’t here in the winter. My hope to the old country is they don’t make the same mistakes of the past where they lost their bright young minds to places like Argentina, America, and Australia. 

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Gun Control, Gunning Control, Controlling Guns, Control is gunning

This is the year where the country that calls itself the best in the world faced senseless shooting after senseless shooting. Though the piling numbers of dead is sicken, I was particularly shaken by little faces whose lives were taken from them. My heart bled for the Sikh families who had to listen to the (un)pattriotic rants of a terrorist nut job who thought he was doing something for his country when really his own utter ignorance shattered the lives of members of a peaceful and beautiful religion just because of their appearance. Then there was the Anderson Cooper special where the names and stories of people shielding the ones they loved on a night out at the movies because some crazed lunatic managed to get their hands on a plethora of life ending bullets and play out his psychotic fantasy. These are just the monsters who made it to the news. There are hundreds if not thousands of shootings in the United States every year. When I first arrived in America I shared a cab with a friend to Hollywood. I was so excited to walk in the foot steps of hundreds of thousands of other tourists tip-toeing over names and stars. Naturally it didn't long for me to become confronted Walmart. The wonder that is America. The Holy Grail for everything at the right price. It was there, at Walmart in the outskirts of Los Angeles, did I realise there was a real problem. I was buying sheets and pillows for my newly rented room when I stumbled across an armoury. Guns. Under the same roof as corn chips and cotton blend knickers. There for the taking. Different colours and different sizes. I remember B-lining it out of there. From the outside, looking in, most of the civilised world can't help but think: "What the fuck do you need all that shit for?" From my position, it looks like you're using a constitutional amendment designed for a country with no army as an excuse, as a permission slip. America needs to start looking at real measures of gun control. Stop saying people kill people and realise that people with guns kill people. They kill people more than people with anything else kill people. People with guns need to be controlled and monitored. For the record I ended up buying my sheets at IKEA.

[evazegna]

[evazegna]

[felixsalmon]

Only 36 percent of those who listened to or watched the Republican convention said that it made them more likely to vote for Romney, versus 46 percent less likely. As far back as 1984, there is no precedent for a convention that repels more voters than it attracts… While the impact of the Democratic convention was below average, the Republicans managed to stage the least effective convention in modern political history.

Mitt Romney’s Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Campaign | The New Republic (via felixsalmon)

[evazegna]

-Open Letter to Glynnis Keir-

Dear Mr Keir,

I am nothing short of disturbed to hear that you have taken the liberty to include words like lolz, ridic, douchey and (this clearly is the worst of them) vajazzled to the Oxford Online Dictionary. 

What are you thinking? Has an army of cavemen infiltrated your institution? Have the stars retards bogans plebeians characters from The Only Way is Essex taken you hostage? Do you require assistance?

If this is not the case then I can only assume the recent addition of more trash common words is an under armed method of assuring that those of us who pride ourselves on speaking "The Queens" still purchase the Oxford Dictionary (in short addition) instead of lazily relying on our iPhones for the online versions.

I can assure you this is a lesson learned. I will no longer be using the online version of the Oxford Dictionary simply because it has fallen into the same category of accuracy of an American World War Two documentary.

Regards

Eva Zegna (Concerned world citizen)

[evazegna]

Sometimes you just gotta be a wolf

[evazegna]

Looks like Penelope Disick just realized she’s a Kardashian. Sorry, kid.

Suri's Burn Book

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Article questioning Asma Al-Assad

[evazegna]

Last night before I went to sleep I check the news to find out that Australia was one of the first countries to start expelling Senior Syrian Diplomats. Listening to William Hague this morning- it would seem that over night, this is been reciprocated by a number of other ‘western’ countries. Yesterday I woke up again to the terrible news that the continued violence in Syria has brought more bloodshed. As I left for my run I noticed Kofi Annan sitting down with Syrian leaders in an attempt to stop the spill. While my world keeps going around as clock work, it would seem for many Syrians, their world is still falling apart. The Syrian leader faces intense criticism from his Arab brothers and the world’s leaders. Kofi Annan has continued his attempts at trying to tell President Assad to stop the killing. He is no longer welcome in the European Union and his wife, Asma al-Assad is face virtual exclusion from birth lands of the United Kingdom. For Syria the Arab spring has been long and costly. Concerning still is that there Gaddafi Style Rhetoric seems to be streaming from official channels. Any government opposition is accused of being a terrorist and is painted as being un-reasonable. During the press conference held after the Security Council’s urgent meeting, I watch the British ambassador to the United Nations skilfully play down the terrorist accusations made by the Syrian government against the Free Syria Army. He clarified that the United Nations did not see the unrest as terrorist related. But clearly Syria does. The Security Council is slow going and this morning (at least on my side of the pond) there was speculation that perhaps Russia could diplomatically pull its finger out and perhaps allow the Security Council to take some action. The point of the Security Council is that the world won’t stand by and allow massacres of this scale to happen over and over again. Assad needs to realise that the patients of the rest of the world is running out.

[evazegna]

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Asylum from the Asylum Debate

There has been much said about Australia's policy of mandatory detention. Both sides of politic are winning votes by promising they will be tough on Asylum Seekers.

Too many times I have had contact with someone who announces they are sick of refugee's and think they are all just queue jumpers. Hating people for seeking asylum has become an acceptable part of our culture. Why? Because our political leaders don't have the backbone to stand up and support basic human rights. Tony Abbott and Julia Gillard alike are not doing enough to educate the Australian public. The truth, unfortunately, isn't worth as much air time. Refugees take up less than 7% of Australia's average immigration intake, with most immigrants being on some sort of business/work visa. Nearly all refugees that come to Australia arrive of QF52 or other Asian originated flights. They don't come on boats and they don't jump queues. Speaking of queues- there is no magical queue where you show up and take a number and wait in an orderly fashion. There is a department which deals with a tonne of claims but churning through the easy ones and working on the harder ones when they can. It's as simple as that.

At the moment the government is in a transition phase where they are moving towards community based processing rather than detention based process. But they are not moving fast enough. A young vietnamese girl has pleaded to the Government to re-think, even the transitional "community" based phase. 10 year old children shouldn't be depressed because they are held in detention with out charge- at least not in this country. 

History will be a harsh judge on Australia's action during the time. We should all be ashamed that we are not doing more.

[evazegna]

[evazegna]

Get Serious on Syria

The Arab Sping is about to hit its first birthday. What started as protests spread over Tunisia, Libya, Egypt and it would seem is still burning.

Right now Syria is looking like the place of concern, though so are other Arab states like Bahrain and maybe even Oman. It seems as though the Assad regime is pulling out all the stops in its attempt to keep control over the “rebels”.

The United Nations Security Council resolutions have been block by China and Russia on the basis that neither country wants to interfere with any other state, but the General assembly has still be able to vote in a resolution with UK Foreign Secretary claiming a “strong message” has been sent to Syria.

Its interesting thought that a Libya style intervention hasn’t been discussed. The reports of deaths are on par with what was happening in Libya. It was at this stage that the “Western” Branch of the international community decided to do something about it. France, Italy and the United Kingdom got together and organised a NATO lead intervention. When shit hit the fan in Libya the humanitarian needs of Libyan were spruiked as being the priority numero uno- naturally and NATO was “forced” to “Take action”.

Yet right now the international community is waiting for UN resolution and asking neighbours like Turkey and Jordan to help put pressure on the Assad government. This is a much softer approach to the “get in, get Gadaffi, get out” approach. Clearly the humanitarian needs of Syrians fall second to the fact that Assad hasn’t pissed off nearly as many people as Gadaffi. No one is really bothered, or annoyed by him and the fact that a few hundred people keep dying almost daily as the military “steps up” doesn’t seem to warrant a Libya type of response.

The right to self determinationfor a state becomes irrelevant once the citizens of that state are no longer protected. Uprisings like these are a desperate plea for democracy and should be taken seriously by the international community. Harsh military responses like that which Assad has ordered cannot be tolerated.

Though intervention (which was technically part of the Bush doctrine) has got a bad wrap after Iraq and Afghanistan, surely the success of Libya should perhaps provide some weight to this argument. Are we really going to wait for Assad to turn into Gadaffi before we take real action?

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10 years on

Guantanamo Bay has been open for business for a full decade now. The military base, affectionately know as Gitmo, has taken a bit of a back seat since the US left Iraq and since operations in Afghanistan have been closing down. But it is a place that we need to keep in mind There are people who have been held in Guantanamo for over a decade now. None of these people have been charged or convicted, let alone sentenced. Their detention is mandatory and there are no avenues of appeals. Pleas of guilty seem to flow left, right and centre. Ten years on the biggest question that comes to mind is “why is this place still open?” David Hicks is the Australian guys who’s book caused minimal controversy when it came out in Australia in 2010.He was one of the first foreign fighters who was taken to Guantanamo after he was found by the Northern Alliance in Afghanistan. The man explains what he was doing in Afghanistan, how he got there and his reasons for going. He describes how he was captured, how he was handed over to the Americans, how he was interviewed by a Journalist whilst he was filthy and covered in lice from a makeshift Afghani prison. He goes through details of beatings, interrogations and plain torture. He recounts being kept in a cage in the open, sweltering in a shipping container, freezing in air-conditioning, blacked out in darkness and of course sleep deprivation. One thing he does point out though is- when is it ever ok to treat human beings in this way? President Obama’s first broken promise was to shut down Gitmo and every since then he has been playing a hard game with congress over what to do with the stricken prison. The United Nations has looked upon this as a “ failure of US governments to ensure accountability for the serious human rights violations that have taken place.” Here’s hoping Guantanamo Bay will be closed before the next decade it out.