Affected
I woke up at 2am, and have basically been up continuously since then. I tried a few times to get back to sleep, to no avail.
One of the things I got done is that I confirmed that all I should need for Remy to cross into Canada is proof of his rabies vaccination. I discovered that Canada keeps a continuously-updated list of Countries Recognized as Rabies Free for Domestic Cats and Dogs. The United States is not on this list.
One of the bits of Indian history that has been rattling around in my head is the weird "Naxalite" Maoist-Christian nexus. I guess it came towards the front of my mind on Friday (I've been reading about it in India After Gandhi, but I haven't read that in about a week) when I was looking at video's on The Globe and Mail's "Breaking Caste" page. I looked for more information about Sister Sudha Varghese, a Catholic nun who runs a school for Dalit girls in Bihar, and instead found stories about Sister Valsa John, who was killed when she went back to the Santhal village in Jharkhand, where she had lived and helped organize the Santhal to resist being expropriated by coal companies.
This, then, reminded me of the murder of Swami Lakshmanananda, which was committed either by Maoist Naxalites or by Christian communal guerillas, both of whom find support from the local Kondh "tribals" in Orissa. The RSS, a fascist organization built around a sense of India's nation-hood that rejects Islam and Christianity, doesn't much trouble itself to distinguish Maoists and Christians, and there was widespread communal violence after the murder.
This morning, I saw this article, where the national government refused to designate 5 districts in Assam as "Maoist-affected," which would be absurd-funny if it weren't so absurd-tragic.
Hm. This was a downer post. Go back and look at those videos on "Breaking Caste." They're great. You might even go to see these Kashmiri kids sing "Rolling in the Deep."
One of the things I got done is that I confirmed that all I should need for Remy to cross into Canada is proof of his rabies vaccination. I discovered that Canada keeps a continuously-updated list of Countries Recognized as Rabies Free for Domestic Cats and Dogs. The United States is not on this list.
One of the bits of Indian history that has been rattling around in my head is the weird "Naxalite" Maoist-Christian nexus. I guess it came towards the front of my mind on Friday (I've been reading about it in India After Gandhi, but I haven't read that in about a week) when I was looking at video's on The Globe and Mail's "Breaking Caste" page. I looked for more information about Sister Sudha Varghese, a Catholic nun who runs a school for Dalit girls in Bihar, and instead found stories about Sister Valsa John, who was killed when she went back to the Santhal village in Jharkhand, where she had lived and helped organize the Santhal to resist being expropriated by coal companies.
This, then, reminded me of the murder of Swami Lakshmanananda, which was committed either by Maoist Naxalites or by Christian communal guerillas, both of whom find support from the local Kondh "tribals" in Orissa. The RSS, a fascist organization built around a sense of India's nation-hood that rejects Islam and Christianity, doesn't much trouble itself to distinguish Maoists and Christians, and there was widespread communal violence after the murder.
This morning, I saw this article, where the national government refused to designate 5 districts in Assam as "Maoist-affected," which would be absurd-funny if it weren't so absurd-tragic.
Hm. This was a downer post. Go back and look at those videos on "Breaking Caste." They're great. You might even go to see these Kashmiri kids sing "Rolling in the Deep."