Sudan, a Time for War and a Time for Peace
Exultant voices sing “Halleluiah! Halleluiah! Praise be to the Lord God all mighty!” There is no music, no instruments playing; and even if there were, the jubilant voices would drown them out entirely; for these are the persecuted. These are the raped and tortured. These are the people of Darfur Sudan. These are the people who are not supposed to be here. These are the people who can be killed for no reason, for they have no rights; they have no property; in fact some are considered property. They are Christians in a land dominated by Muslims. They gather in that little mud hut crumbling to the ground from war and drought to celebrate the birth of a small child. One who lived against all odds. His mother died in childbirth before he even left the womb. The day he arrived into the world, there was a doctor there from the Red Cross. That doctor saved the child’s life. The crowd is singing and clapping and praising their God with all their souls because this one made it; this one can live and grow in the spirit and keep alive the hope that someday they might be delivered from slavery. The pastor got up and raised his hands in signal to pause the worship for a moment. This was the moment, the reason why everyone risked his or her lives to gather there today. This was the dedication of the small child: the one that lived. The father walked up to the pastor, his face gleaming with pride, joy and wonder; and the pastor said “I praise God for every one who came today. This is a rare moment, this day. For this is a day that God has made for us to worship him. We are gathered here to witness the dedication of this child to the lord and to his brothers and sisters in Christ. So, Joseph,” the pastor said turning his attention to the father “do you promise to care for this child, love him and keep him safe to the best of your ability? If so, say I will.”

“I will,” responded Joseph

“And do you, the church promise to help this new father keep his pledge of care for his child? If so, say we will.”

“We will,” responded the church in unison.

“Very good. This is a momentous day, one that will live on if not in history, then in our hearts. Believe in the hope that we can survive--and one day, we will.”


At the same time, millions of miles away, in Tyler, Texas to be exact, a fragile young girl was born. She barely made it, but only after enduring four days of fighting that was, for her, more brutal and urgent than ten years in Iraq. Hope, as they called her was born a month and a half prematurely and her lungs were underdeveloped. However, she made it and her proud parents brought her before the priest with amazed smiles and a vigor that only new life can create. There was singing, but the spirit that was found in the Sudanese was lacking. Why be jubilant when you go to the same church every Sunday, sometimes even weekdays? Why look on acquaintances as if you have not seen them in years and a hole in your heart is temporarily filled when you see the same faces almost daily? There wasn’t the same joy because there wasn’t the same escape from pain.

Hope was introduced into a life of relative ease. Do what is expected and you don’t have to worry about anything. No real pain, no hunger, nothing but luxury and boredom. Her life was one taken for granted.

At fourteen, just a freshman in a 2000+ high school, Hope was dating young men five years her senior. She liked to believe that her parents didn’t know, but she knew that they weren’t completely ignorant. There were too many times that she came home after curfew (every such time, she got grounded) too late for her to be dropped off by any of her 16 year old friends. Too many times, the police brought her home saying that she had been caught with cigarettes, which none of her friends could buy for her. Just too many slip-ups that made her look more and more suspicious in the eyes of her parents.

Hope was, again, a 14 year old girl in a high school with over 2000 kids; just about 550 in her class. Hope was failing school. No one cared enough to see that she needed help nobody saw that she was on the brink. Hope had friends, but they weren’t the type that one could count on. She was a pretty girl, and that got her a seat at the “demigoddess” table at lunch. Not the popular table full of the early bloomers, but the table where the others sat. Her friends were as flaky as one might expect when friendship is based off of superficiality; Hope talked on the phone, but the conversations were just as real as the bonds with her “friends”.

Hope had good parents. They loved her and gave her everything that she needed and most of what she wanted, but they weren’t as involved as she might like. She was afraid to open up to them because she was afraid of what they might think or do or say. Her friends’ parents were all acquainted with each other, and, as in any small community, word spreads. And that is the last thing that Hope needed.


Joseph watched Ben playing soccer with his friends in the refugee camp in Chad where he had brought what was left of his family three years ago. Ben had been a lucky kid since birth. Born in the war ravaged Darfur regions, Ben’s mother, Sarah, had died bringing him into the world. Joseph had been devastated by her sudden departure but at the same time envious that she didn’t have to endure the pain of oppression, Sarah didn’t have to worry about waking up to a gun to her head or a knife at her throat, and had Ben not survived, Joseph would have left this world soon after his beloved wife. But Joseph had moved on, or at least he had tried to. He remarried so that Ben would have a mother in his life; his whole existence was for Ben now.
Just having the soccer ball was a miracle in itself. The camp that they were at now was one of the more fortunate ones. Being in Chad, the Janjaweed hadn’t discovered the little group of tents lost in the desert made up of defiant infidels as they were called in the Khartoum regions of the north. The Red Cross had its own tent set up which was manned two to three days out of the week. The Peace Corps, which gave the soccer ball and some other small toys, was there too. Though the help wasn’t much, it was still help and that’s all that mattered.
“Honey, I sent you out here to get Ben for supper.”

“We’ll be there in a minute.”

Supper, yet another miracle that was given to the refugees here.
“Ben! Time for dinner. You can come out later if it’s still light out.”


Disclaimer: This story is not trying to compete with other stories. I wrote this off of a whim and I wanted to see what you guys thought. If you like it, then I’ll mix it in with the news. Sooo…?

Excuse us for this interruption...

My loyal fans, I am going to be gone for an undisclosed amount of time (It won't be very long). I am doing some school-related activities (including at least two trips to various capitals pics to come) and will not be able to make new posts for a little while. Never fear, I will be commenting on other blogs, just not publishing for a few days/weeks. Thank you for your understanding.

The Magical Kingdom shall fall!!

Hello and welcome to Whathimsay Weekly. I’m Screaming Buffalo flying solo on this Saturday, February 4, 2006…

Well, there are some interesting things that happened this week, so I will skip the usual journalistic pleasantries and jump right into the action.

The Iranian missile crisis: The Irannis have managed to piss everybody in the world (well, almost everybody) off AGAIN. How you ask? Well…the US Security Council has concluded that Iran is only a few years from having weapons-grade Uranium. They already have rockets that can deliver a nuclear payload and need only to make the final breakthrough of enriching Uranium and purifying it. While insofar as the US can tell, there is really no threat to the Continental US, but Israel, Russia, Iraq and Afghanistan are all within Iran’s crosshairs. The US has been trying to sit down in talks with Iran similar to what we did in North Korea, but Iran has just said no, citing that they have every right in the world to pursue nuclear research for peaceful purposes.

Disney Siege: It was a bitter sweet business day on Thursday in China, where they are celebrating the New Year (it’s the dog this year) and obviously, a lot of Chinese families decided that it was as good a time as any to go to Disney World. Well, about a hundred and fifty people too many had the same thought because Disney World, China sold out and had to close it’s gates. The extra hundred and change people that were left out of the happiest place in China weren’t too happy and stormed the gates lifting their children and themselves over the spiky gates. Reportedly, there were shouts of “The Magic Kingdom shall fall!!” and “The Gates of Disney shall not prevail against us!” No reported injuries.

Air Force Serviceman Shot By Cops: In a troubling story this week, a police officer shot and wounded an Air Force serviceman back from Iraq after a short police chase where Elio Carrion was the passenger in a Corvette with his friendLuis Escobedo. The cops tried to pull over the car because it was alledgedly going over 100 mph and when the lights flared up, Escabedo fled the police. The chase ended when the car crashed into a wall in Chino Calif. The Sherrif's Deputy, John Webb pulled his weapon and was holding Carrion at gunpoint when he told the young man to stand up so that he could be cuffed and put in the squad car. Then Webb opened fire upon Elio and shot him twice in the chest and once in the leg. The shots, while not fatal, were obviously painful and as Carrion lay in the ground, the deputy yelled at the Air Force Security Officer to be quiet and to stay still. Mr, Carrion is in the hospital listed in good condition and could soon go home. Mr. Webb is on paid administrative leave and an investigation is ongoing into the necessity of the deadly force used in this case. All of this was captured on a home videotape that is being used to find out exactly what happened. Click here to see the video and here for more information.

Virginia Coal Mines: After the high profile deaths of 16 miners in three accidents, Virginia Governor Tim Kaine has asked for and received the cooperation of all of the coal mines in Virginia to voluntarily shut down operations to allow inspectors to see what the hell is happening in Virginia mines that makes them so dangerous.

Flag Burned: In a shocking story, A FLAG OTHER THAN THE AMERICAN STAR SPANGLED BANNER WAS BURNED!!!!! That’s right people, for the time being, a Danish newspaper has been the object of scrutiny and a pleasant break for Americans in the area from the usual DEATH TO AMERICA chants. France Soir published cartoons in one of its issues this week that insulted Allah which is considered blasphemous. One of the cartoons depicted Allah with a turban on his head that looked like a bomb. Muslims all over the world are demanding that an apology be made by the Danish government for the insult to their religion. The editor of the newspaper made a public statement apologizing if they offended Islamic people, but he refused to apologize for printing the cartoons referencing that in his country, there was the freedom of the press. This statement caused an outbreak of small scale rioting in the streets including the burning of several Danish flags. In Gaza, and in other Islamic parts of the world, there was a boycott of European products until a “proper apology” is made. DEATH TO DENMARK!!


Free Speech Infringed Upon: At the State of the Union address this Tuesday evening, the ever controversial Cindy Sheehan and Rep. Bill Young’s wife Beverly Young were both forcibly removed from the public gallery in the 2nd level of the House of Representatives. Both women had T-Shirts on with wording. Cindy had a shirt spelling out the number of dead in Iraq (2,245 how many more) while Young’s shirt said: Support the Troops that Defend our Country. Sheehan was removed before the speech started and was later arrested for illegally protesting. When informed of her charges, Sheehan called her arresting officer an idiot. When the prosecutor reviewed the case, Sheehan was proven right; she should have not been arrested because the shirt she was wearing was considered free speech. Mrs. Young was removed during the President’s speech when the security personnel informed her that she either had to leave or change the shirt because she was “also protesting illegally in the capitol”, she told them that her shirt was in support of the troops and her President. It was concluded later that neither Sheehan nor Young should have been removed. One of the President’s biggest points is that America is addicted to oil and that we should pursue alternate energy sources. It’s kind of ironic that both women were denied FREE SPEECH at one of the biggest SPEECHES of a president’s term. Lame point, I know.

DUH HUR! Macintosh has been sued. As with many lawsuits in America, it’s a dumb one. According to the plaintiff, their ears were damaged when they turned the music on their i-Pod up too high. You’re kilin’ me Smalls!

Super Bowl: Well, it’s that time of the year when Dominos and Frito Lay believe in God for just a brief moment: The Super Bowl. This year it’s the Pittsburgh Stealers and the Seattle Seahawks. According to my sources (people I know), Pittsburgh is the favorite to win for sentimental reasons seeing as Stealer’s running back Jerome Bettis is retiring after this season and Detroit is his home city. Bettis gave an inspirational speech directly before the AFC championship game where they beat the Denver Broncos 34-17 in which he obviously persuaded his team to help bring him back to his home city for his final game. The Super Bowl is not only a big football event, but it is also the biggest event for advertisers in the country. The ads this year are going at a rate of $500,000 per minute ($250,000 for thirty seconds if you can’t divide). The 40th Super Bowl is in Detroit this year and the city is passing out free tickets today to people who would not have had the chance to attend the Super Bowl otherwise. Look for a lot of Detroit Lions in the stands with those free tickets.

Egyptian Ferry Accident: In a very sad story, a 327 foot Egyptian roll-on-roll-off ferry called Al Salamm traveling from Saudi Arabia filled with pilgrims from Mecca was crossing the Red Sea when its radar signal suddenly was lost. There were approximately 1400 people on board including the crew. Right now, there isn’t that much information about what happened, but at the time of the accident, there was a large sandstorm with high winds and waves. The best guess that investigators have at this time is that the waves crashed over the deck of the ferry and started to rock with the boat eventually forcing the boat to capsize. At this point in search and rescue efforts, around 300 people are known to have survived. The SAR helicopters first over the scene reported to have seen bodies in the water. It is speculated that there were not enough life boats for all of the passengers. This is eerily similar to Life of Pi and the Titanic, though I don’t believe that there were any icebergs or Bengal Tigers out there. God be with the people that died in this accident and their families.

That’s all for this week’s first edition of Whathimsay Weekly, I’m Screaming Buffalo saying good night and good luck (nothing from Serenity unfortunately RaJ).

Merry F’ING CHRISTMAS

Many people, I hope, have heard that Boston this year in the name of political correctness, has called the huge evergreen tree in their main plaza a Holiday tree as opposed to the customary Christmas tree. Boston is not and isolated incident. This CHRISTMAS season, commercials, workplace memos, school breaks, and even Christmas cards have been omitting the word Christmas for more politically correct, less offensive words alluding to but not actually saying Christmas. Some examples of this political substitution include: “This Holiday season…”, “Happy Holidays!” and my personal favorite: “during the time period that falls between December 24 and December 26 have a nice couple of days!”
Christmas trees are a fixture in almost any community that you see in America and in most places in Europe. And more to the point, these trees are used exclusively for celebrating Christmas. I really don’t see the point in calling them something other than what they really are. I mean you don’t see Jewish families flowing out of the woodworks to go and buy their Hanukah trees or people that observe Kwanza slogging through the snow to find the perfect tree to put wherever they put their Kwanza paraphernalia. No, that is a tradition for people that celebrate Christmas alone.
I think that this goes beyond just political correctness. For years, people have been taking more and more religious elements out of mainstream American life. It used to be that you learned parts of the bible, you prayed and you called Christmas break, well Christmas break when you went to school. Then, drinking became the new craze (I’m not bashing Bud Light, if you want a beer, then by all means, crack one open), there was fermented barley juice everywhere. Then the advent of the condom, now people don’t have to live with half the consequences they did when the first thing that came to mind after the word Trojan, the was horse, not man. All of these things mixed together times ten gives you what America is today. Then take into account the fact that over the last five years, atheists and others are trying to de-Godify society.
“Under God” and “In God We Trust” are now in question because they signify that our government believes in God. The Ten Commandments aren’t allowed to be displayed in courthouses because they were mentioned in the Bible. Teachers or any other school employees for that matter aren’t allowed to lead prayer anymore because it “forces religion on others”. Now, people are sooo afraid that the government is going to get sued again, they are appeasing the God Damned atheists (pun is intended).
Jay Leno mentioned something that made sense for once. He said that we still call Halloween the same thing, yet we have to substitute something for Christmas. So what we are subliminally saying is that Satan and Count Dracula are acceptable, yet, Jesus and Santa are bad.
I think that this is a national crisis. So until FEMA gets here:
MERRY F’ING CHRISTMAS!!

The Unknown Region of Fashion Designers and Ripped Jeans...

Have you ever noticed that women are THE most complicated creature on the planet? Screw the Loch-ness monster, the creepy fish so far down in the ocean that humans couldn’t be there (oh, and they light up like a city) and those fish someone found in the Indian Ocean that had armor; no, women are the most complicated and not to mention scary and downright psychotic creatures that have, are presently and ever will roam the Earth.
For instance, have you ever noticed that in a high school, girls can be buddy buddy and be “Like hey, do you want to hang out later?” to a poor, unsuspecting person (of any gender) and then turn around five minutes later and ask the nearest person if “Like hey, did you see her legs? Like since when did we let a bear into the school?” Then when the subject of the controversial legs goes to the specified location to “hang out”, there’s no one there and they have to call their mom to come pick them up and make up the excuse that she got her dates mixed up.
Now, I don’t know about all of my readers (or just poor people who happened to type in an extremely incorrect website and ended up reading this instead of finding those pictures of rare jungle animals for Biology (wikipedia.org)) out there, but if a girl doesn’t like someone, why can’t they just say that to the person’s face and get it over with instead of leading them on and then crushing them in their fists like human Venus fly traps? That’s probably exactly what a guy would do; of course, girls say that guys like that are barbaric and uncivilized. I don’t see the logic in this, but hey if that’s what they call honesty nowadays, I guess that’s how it is.
On the issue of being psychotic; girls take things too far. If they see themselves in a mirror, and they actually can’t count the ribs on their sides (the inhumanity!!!) they decide that they are fat and need not to eat for 6 months or until their parents notice that their little baby doll is sinking into a sea of clothes that were too tight a couple of months ago (which coincidentally, in today’s world is just about the same time). Another thing they take too far is the brand of clothes or the designer of the shoes/ purses they wear. If you give a girl a choice between a $25 pair of jeans with tears and patches (from the local Wal-Mart), and an identical pair of pants that everyone else has for $125 (from the Gucci store two hours away), that girl would go for the $125 pair of jeans because, if the price is higher, then the jeans must be better. To me, that’s kind of stupid. If you get a cheaper pair of pants, you can get more clothes for less, and when (not if, but when) that ink toner cartridge busts in your hands and sprays all over your $5 shirt and $25 jeans, it won’t be the end of humanity like it would have been if you bought that $50 Hollister T and those infamous $125 pair of Gucci jeans that you would have worn that day.
Moving on to the designer issue; I have noticed that along with the price of something, girls also tend to look at designer names. A little while back, I came to school and a certain girl was walking in front of me. She was toting this purse with the discretion of a male peacock in the middle of mating season. I found out later that day that it was a Luis Vaton purse; and the one that she was carrying was $325 and had a waiting list of 6 months on it. All of the girls were soooo jealous of her because they wouldn’t get theirs for another 4-5 months. Now I don’t know why you’d want a purse that costs more than a video game system and four brand new games, and, to want one so bad that you put your name on a waiting list for it, but most all the girls at my school did. I know that this is not an isolated incident because the Today © Show did a special segment on the “latest fashion designer clothes”. Some of these clothes were priced upwards of $1500 (which ended up being a pair of sandal/shoes that were completely and undeniably ugly). And to top this, these revolting shoes had a waiting list of 3 YEARS on them. The reason these shoes were in the price range of a lap top computer even though the unsightly foot pieces were so repulsive (or any other synonym of ugly) was because a famous designer (that must have been gay) had made them. My brain just can’t compute the logic behind this. If you take the same philosophy of the Gucci jeans, (only you don’t spill ink toner on them, you get caught out in the rain with them and because they are sandals, they have no ankle support and because they are high heels, you can’t run to the nearest coffee shop in them) you see that as Meijer © says: “A low price beats a high price every time” ®.
I am aware that most of these comments are sexist, stereotypical and don’t have a single shred of falsity in them, so, to all of my female readers, straight fashion designers that make ugly sandal shoes, or the people that haven’t moved on to wikipedia.org to look up those jungle critters, I am sorry that I had to say these things and that if you didn’t like what I was saying that you didn’t just not read this.
This is Screaming Buffalo saying: That’s all folks!!!!

School's Out For Summer! Dun Dun Dun....

Well, it’s the last day of school for me today. Whoooooohooooooooo!!!!! Sophomore year is probably the worst year of high school. Ya know why? Because you can’t drive for starters. I mean you try getting through a whole Saturday sitting at home because you don’t have a ride to go do anything. Your mom is screaming at you to get your homework done and clean your room. I mean c’mon, it’s a Saturday for god’s sake! Isn’t Saturday the day where you take girls on dates and go to the beach? That’s another thing. Taking girls on dates. When you don’t have a car, you have to either meet the girl where you’re going which means that you’re not going to get a kiss or anything farther than that because you have to meet and greet and say goodnight at the flippin’ place, or you have to loan a ride from your parents to take the girl and if you have parents like mine, that would be the last date you would go on with any girl for the rest of your high school and the start of your college career.
Actually, if you had parents like mine, you wouldn’t be going on a date until you are freakin’ 16. That’s right, 16; when my parents adopted me, they decided that I wouldn’t be allowed to watch R rated movies and I couldn’t go on a date until I was 16. Now I don’t know if I’m overreacting about this issue or my parents are having a complex about me getting older or they just want to control me in every possible way, but it’s driving me up the wall and through the roof right up to the moon because I don’t even have the option of going on a date. As I said before, I wouldn’t go on a date with my parents driving in the first place because they’d embarrass me so bad that I’d have to go into a bunker in Latvia for the rest of my adolescent years. It just irks me that I can’t even hit on a girl because I have to stop at that, I can’t ask her to go to dinner because my parents have a total separation complex going on and as long as I plan on going to college, playing sports, or even going to my cousin’s house, I have to play by their rules.
And then there’s the issue of R rated movies, why can’t I watch ‘em like everybody else when they turn 10? I couldn’t even watch certain PG-13 movies until I was 15 and I still can’t watch some like The Fast and the Furious, XXX (the movie), Titanic, the Matrix series, The Simpson’s, shall I go on? I know that I’m not the only sheltered child on this planet, but to any parents reading this, and they see any part of this extensive complaint spewing from my key-board in themselves, they need to really look inside themselves and see that if their parents did this kind of torture to them, that they would all the sudden have the need to kill something, or write a strongly worded memo to their parents telling them exactly how they feel.
Bottom line is that parents need to lighten up. When they were our age, they did, I’m sure, lots of stuff that is way worse than nowadays.
Screaming Buffalo Over and out.

Terry Schiavo

Terry Schiavo' feeding tube should not be put back in. She has been in a persistent vegetative state for 15 years. Her existance is pitiful and there is no point in keeping her alive. After 15 years I don't think she's gonna come back. Yes she will be starved to death but she cannot feel anything in the state she is in. I know that starving someone to death is not humane but sticking a tube in a person's abdomen and letting them sit in a bed for 15 years and leaving a husband to grieve isn't either.