When you lose your father...

Writing about my dad is very hard because I lost him just less than 3 months ago and because I still can’t accept it. He left too soon…

I have been through a roller coaster of feelings…something I wasn’t prepared for, something no one prepares you for…

I saw him without life…yet I can’t believe it…

I keep asking myself: Where is he? Where is his soul? But the thing is that I don’t know the answer…We know so many things and we can create and destroy life…yet we have no idea what happens after…what happens when we go? It can’t be over…it just can’t be…otherwise life means nothing…

I recently met a man who is 88 and he is still learning…he is a retired surgeon and now he studies Italian language, among other things and he speaks Italian quite well, he is very intelligent and seems such a special person! He keeps going as if life was eternal…but it isn’t…or is it?

We spend so much time discovering things…why can’t we discover what happens after we go?

I keep wishing I could turn back time and save my dad…that is all I wish for…

I used to live in a nice world where nothing bad ever happened and then one day my husband had a terrible accident and almost lost his life…I could bring him home safe and he miraculously fully recovered after months of pain and hope.

…but I could not bring my dad home safe from the hospital, I had to leave him there…I did hold his hand until the last minute, until it was so cold…then I had to give up and let him go…the saddest feeling I ever had…and now sometimes I find myself feeling a strange pain inside of me…like a hole in my heart…

Nobody told me before I would have felt this way…I wish they did, I wish they had told me that my dad was part of me, that losing him would have hurt more than words can say…if I only knew that I would have spoken to him every day, I would have been there more often and I would have made sure he knew every day how much I loved him.

Letter to the Old Europe

Dear Europe,

The good thing about being an old Continent is that you get to be wiser than others: you have history and experience that give you so much knowledge. You should teach the USA – over there they are faster than you and look more attractive perhaps, but exactly because they are young they make so many mistakes - and you shouldn’t follow the USA blindly, because you know where those kind of mistakes will lead you in the future…a war.

But of course if you forgot your history and the history of those around you, than you have nothing to teach and when you don’t know your past you don’t even know where you are going and you end up losing your identity.

Having said that: sanctions to Syria, really? Helping the extremists Muslims gaining power in that beautiful land? Isn’t your history in those areas too? Weren’t the Romans there? Don’t we still have so many similar traditions to the Syrians? Have we completely forgotten that?

Who are they trying to fool in the media? Haven’t they demonized Saddam Hussein, Mubarak, Khadafy already…and now even Doctor Assad? Who is next? And in those Countries where the USA and European governments were claiming that the population didn’t want their leaders anymore, have you Europe together with the USA brought democracy over there as you wanted to do? That looks like quite a strange democracy I have to say. It does seem like things were actually better without your intervention. Or is it that you are trying to do something that we are not supposed to know? Maybe a pipeline of natural gas, which is supposed to pass through Syria? Well this is all another article actually, which deserves full attention.

Let’s see this article from today to better understand how you are trying to fool our perception of things (and this is just one of the so many similar articles you are reading these days):

From Reuters (Feb 4 2012): my notes are between parenthesis.

BEIRUT/MUNICH (Reuters) - Syrian forces killed more than 200 people (where are they? Who are they?) in an assault on the city of Homs, activists said (who exactly? What’s your definition of activists? You mean perhaps the mercenaries sent to Syria by other Countries?), the bloodiest day of an 11-month uprising giving sudden urgency to a push for a U.N. resolution calling for President Bashar al-Assad to cede power.

The Arab League, Europe and the United States leaned hard on Assad's veto-wielding ally Russia to let the Security Council pass a resolution later on Saturday backing an Arab call for Assad to transfer powers to a deputy.

Moscow said the resolution was not "hopeless," but it needed to be adjusted to avoid "taking sides in a civil war."

French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe called the killings in Homs a "massacre" and a "crime against humanity." In remarks clearly aimed at Moscow, he said any country that blocked U.N. action would bear a "heavy responsibility in history." (This Minister is threatening Russia? Why? They can’t disagree with France?)

After what U.S. officials called "vigorous" talks between Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, Moscow announced that Lavrov would fly to Syria in three days to meet Assad.

Death tolls cited (cited???!! Is that the only proof we have?) by activists and opposition groups (who are they, can we have some more information?) ranged from 237 to 260 (names? photos? did these people even existed before being killed?) , making the Homs attack the deadliest so far in Assad's crackdown (crackdown? Is the journalist accusing Assad even if he has no proof of what he is talking about?) on protests and one of the bloodiest episodes in the "Arab Spring" (does this killing still look like an Arab Spring? So many soldiers in Syria were killed and there are names and proof for this information: when the protests are not peaceful, they are not protests anymore, and those who kill are assassins) of revolts that have swept the region.

Residents said Syrian forces began shelling the Khalidiya neighborhood at around 8 p.m. (1800 GMT) on Friday using artillery and mortars. They said at least 36 houses were completely destroyed with families inside (whoever is talking was so lucky! His house was untouched looks like and none of the neighbors he knew got killed since he is just talking in general of families he doesn’t know, no names, ages, no details at all)

"We were sitting inside our house when we started hearing the shelling. We felt shells were falling on our heads," said Waleed, a resident of Khalidiya (but they didn’t! lucky person! Or…)

"The morning has come and we have discovered more bodies, bodies (bodies! Again so general that means nothing) are on the streets," he said. "Some are still under the rubble. Our movement is better but there is little we can do without ambulances and other things."

An activist in the neighborhood contacted by Reuters (contacted by Reuters? What are the chances they knew an activist in that area? 1 in a million?) said residents were using primitive tools to rescue people. They feared many were buried under rubble.

"We are not getting any help, there are no ambulances or anything. We are removing the people with our own hands," he said, adding there were only two field hospitals treating the wounded. Each one had a capacity to deal with 30 people, but he estimated the total number of wounded at 500.

"We have dug out at least 100 bodies so far, they are placed in the two mosques."

A third Khalidiya resident, speaking by telephone with wailing and cries of "Allahu akbar" (God is greatest) audible in the background (a proof that they are talking to a possible extremist Muslim? Is he talking the truth this person or he is just against the regime and therefore he can’t be taken seriously?), said at least 40 corpses had been retrieved from streets and damaged buildings.

…

And there is more but I won’t continue commenting, when it is so evident how this article is deceiving and just giving an example of terrible journalism (otherwise called propaganda). The journalist is so assertive and yet has no proof of what he is writing. This article is so ridiculous and approximate, that doesn’t deserve any other comment.

All I’m trying to say is – yes we are very occupied with our jobs, our families, our life but we are not stupid…stop the propaganda!

Syria is us, it’s our history and their President is just like one of our Presidents who is doing his job, perhaps even more intelligent than many other Presidents. Smart his decision to ally with Russia in this occasion (I’m sure at a dear cost though). Mubarak tried with the USA and we all know how it went, Khadafy tried with France and Italy (he even sent a letter to Berlusconi) and he got killed.

Why are we not reading what the Russian government has to say? If you look into the news it is extremely hard to find the reasons for Russia and China to use their veto power on the UN resolution.

Simply, they had to veto the UN resolution on Syrian government because the resolution was one-sided: it was a demand for an end to violent action by the Damascus government, without also imposing special, specific obligations on the armed groups battling the Assad regime. And isn’t this a pretty good reason? One side can continue the killing and the other one has to stand there without doing anything?

Thanks to Russia and China maybe things can be saved: maybe Assad hopefully sooner or later  can establish some serenity again over there, start working on some reforms for the population and bring prosperity to that beautiful Country, which we should visit one day to discover some important history that belongs to all of us and enjoy the amazing hospitality of the people who live there now.

The slow death of the middle class

As I woke up and checked the news on my computer this morning of the first day of the year 2012, it immediately concerned me to read among the news on the first page of the “Corriere della sera”: “European leaders advise: economical crisis will still be protagonist in 2012”.

So I’m thinking, ok let’s put this in perspective. This is not 1929 for sure!

The real definition of the actual “economical crisis” of our times is very simple: “the death of the middle class”.

We can find how slowly we have been going into the direction of the “elimination” of the middle class over the last few years (we can easily say that it all started with the introduction of the Euro currency in Europe and with the war in Iraq in the US).

In the last few years we have had the collapse of the house markets, which was actually the collapse of the house markets for the middle class people (the poor people couldn’t afford to buy a house before and the rich people can and always will be able to afford to buy a luxury home: # 1 Hyde Park, Knightsbridge in London luxury apartments were sold long before the end of the works in fact).

We have also seen how the food market changed: you can buy an apple full of pesticides for only 15-20 cents and an organic one for about $1.00 or more.

And the clothes: we are truly going into the direction of either super cheap clothes from H&M, Forever 21, Gap… or absolutely expensive clothes from designers.

What you may still find in the middle between cheap and luxury is actually over priced cheap clothes (which sometimes even have a brand name).

In the US the sudden bankruptcy of Filene’s Basement and now Sears closing almost 100 shops in the US should open our eyes. Those were among the stores where the middle class was mainly shopping! Here people were looking for some quality, without having to spend a fortune.

And the quality items? Did you know that in Venice now you can buy a real Murano glass plate for about $100 or a similar one made in China for only $10 (inside most of the shops you will see that on one side of the store it says "made in PRC" a fancy name for "made in China" and on the other side of the same store it says "made in Italy). The funny thing is that when the cheap fake Murano glasses made in China were not sold in Venice, the real price of the plate than now costs you $100 was about $20.

Where are we going? Are we really going back to “aristocracy” and the “poor working class”?

About Syria...

I am following a bit the situation in Syria reading the news from US, UK, French and Italian newspapers and I am truly fed up with reading so many distorted news.

Historically Syria has always been a beautiful Country and Damascus –according to most historians- is the world’s oldest continuously inhabited city.

In this land, men discovered the secrets of Agriculture, Metallurgy and invented the very first alphabet.

There really is so much history in Syria: it has been a crossroad of civilizations. Philosophies, language of trade, systems of urban development: all were developed in the Ancient geographical Syria.

Who is President Assad? Of course he is a President who wasn’t elected, like in most Countries in Middle East and not only.

Bush was elected in the US, but he is the son of the ex President Bush …what are the chances that his son was going to be elected too? Anyway…let’s not go too far from the subject. This is just to say that even where there is democracy there is “hidden” corruption…Even in Italy for example we have always had corruption. Don’t we all know that if you give too much power to someone he will most likely abuse it?

They want us to believe that the actual government in Damascus is killing people, people that are supposed to be fighting for freedom and democracy. It might all have started in a good way, with people who were really fighting for high ideals, but unless we are stupid and we don't want to open our eyes it’s clear how the scenario has all changed...and extremist muslims are now trying to gain power with the help of governments that are doing the opposite of what they should do.

Assad is a highly educated man, with a wife born and raised in the UK, he has children and he is against all kind of religious extremists. His government is corrupted – as I mentioned before is there really such a thing as a non corrupted government?- but Assad is only doing what he has to do as a President (Machiavelli teaches…) and I strongly believe he can’t step down, otherwise he would have done that already and be free and happy with his family, probably enjoying a great and comfortable life in England.

His government might be bad, whoever is around him probably committed crimes and injustice, but would Syria be better with an extremist Islamist government? I don’t think so and yet this is the only realistic option after Assad government...

Syria has been the Country where Muslims, Jewish and Christians have so far lived in peace together, it has developed a lot in the last few years and people have started to enjoy more and more freedom comparing to other places in the Middle East. People there are so beautiful, nice and extremely welcoming – please read “A diplomatic baggage” and “Damascus” by British journalist and writer Brigid Keenan if you want to know how much this great historic city has developed- and I really hope they’ll be strong enough to fight this unjust “war” and enjoy a great life as they deserve, as we all deserve. We truly don’t want to destroy that Country and that amazing population and then enter into a war with Iran as this is the direction some crazy politicians are aiming to take!

The effects of a bad economy

Chicago, July 24th 2010

I have been thinking recently about writing something related to the effects that “bad economy” has had on people.
First of all bad economy is something that does not exist, is something that we convince ourselves it exists...There has been “terrorism” on television and on the magazines insisting that there is less money in general, that people are spending less, that people are losing their jobs and their houses and guess what? Companies thought that maybe in fact it wasn't the right time to invest or hire new people and banks thought it wasn't the right time to land money to buy new houses and all this and more initiated a chain and a vicious circle from where it will be quite hard to come out, unless we finally start saying “enough”!
But for now I don't even want to go and explain in details my economic point of view...I wrote a thesis on the Crac of the '29 and that was a real crisis, much different than what we are facing these years even if some people keep comparing that crisis to this one.
I will surely have my saying about this important matter in another article, but for now let's concentrate on something really important: “the effects of the so called bad economy”.

Have you noticed how people who have a good job and earn good money all over the sudden became “cheap”? What are they doing? Saving for the tough times? Or are they giving their money to the poor people? Of course not! They are just thinking it's fine to be cheap as on television they are saying there is a “bad economy” and we should watch out our spending!
This type of people are spending on themselves as usual to show off that they are still rich, but saving on their loved ones and their friends anyway they can.
I know of people who never buy presents to their loved ones and ask their parents for money even if they now earn much more than them and people who go to restaurants with their friends and try to take advantage of them making them paying more (I promise I saw a rich person who -when the check arrived- told everyone to pay $30 and he put $20 without “almost” anyone realizing what he was doing) or making sure they are not paying the 2 or 3 extra dollars for the one who ordered a soda!
Two ex best friends are not talking to each other anymore because of $2 extra one paid for his friend's drink!
I did travel all over the world and never experienced this before: I think this new “cheap trend” has officially started more or less a year ago.
I would not call it just “cheap trend”, maybe I should say “disgusting and deceiving trend” but this is becoming almost “normal” nowadays and so many people are joining in, that I don't know who's feet I'm stepping on right now!
Of course we always had “cheap people” and generally they were the richer ones in our group or the poor who became all over the sudden rich, but now all sorts of categories have subscribed to the “club”.
The same people go and ask themselves why nobody likes them and why they don't have friends...Did they ever hear the saying: -Fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me- ?
Well, friends are not stupid and they shouldn't be treated like that: if they are stupid they'll join the “cheap club” with you and try to take advantage of you next time, but if they are not stupid they'll go and find better friends somewhere else.
There are things more important than money and this comes from someone who absolutely thinks that -time is money- and those things are family and real friends! You can't mess with them...they are in your life, they are your life! Be good and generous to them and it will come back to you one day!
I know this is not the time anymore for the good movies, but everybody should watch again Frank Capra movie “It's a wonderful life”! George Bailey was saved by his friends who gave him the money they could afford to save him from going to jail for something he didn't do. And the Angel in the end of the movie wrote him a simple and great message :- No man is a failure who has friends-.
By friends he surely didn't mean the ones we have on Facebook! Good friends are a treasure and they can't be more than 10-15 if you have been a loving and generous person in your life!

So if you have been lucky and you do have money and intelligence enough to make even more use it wisely, make your family happy, treat them for a vacation and put a smile on their face, go and tell your good friend, who helped you find the new position you wanted, that dinner next time is on you and leave a few extra dollars to the nice waiter who treated you better than he was supposed to during your dinner!
Not only in your little way you'll contribute to stop the vicious circle of the bad economy, but you'll be a better person, someone who has real friends and that people respect and admire!

Religulous

Religulous

In the part of Europe where I lived (Italy, UK, Spain, France), religion was used to be (and still is) something quite private. Nobody would come and ask you what is your religion or if you go to Church or not...They would look at you in a curious way only if you go out showing the symbols of your religion, but they usually still would not ask questions.
If someone tells you “god bless you” in Italy, you either have a priest in front of you or a crazy person, in which case you would touch wood, iron or something else (ask Italian men and they'll tell you) to avoid bad luck.
Over here in the USA, once they ask you where you are from, they want to know (with direct or indirect questions) what is your religion! They absolutely feel the need to put a label on every person they meet, which is so unpleasant. And they say “ god bless you” even when you are just polite to keep the door open for someone...

In Countries where you study Latin, Literature and Philosophy the majority of people know very well that religions are just a fantasy, all of them, and one is not better than the other. Some of these people might have their own spirituality and decide to believe just part of what they are told: they do not accept what is just written or said somewhere, they have plenty of questions and doubts.
I am of course not saying that we should deny anything: everybody should be free to believe what they want to believe, Zeus, God and even Pinco Pallino if they feel like it, but this “freedom should end where other people freedom starts” and nobody should feel superior to another or try to make others believe in what they believe. Spirituality should be something we have inside and there should be no need at all to show it with any external symbols. How good we are or simply what we are is determined purely by our actions.

Everyone should read Lucrezio, Leopardi, Schopenhauer and open their mind to what other important people before them experienced and felt in their life...people, not gods!
We have been living in this Earth for so many centuries and if we exclude technology, we are still the same kind of people we were centuries ago. Religions and politics (sometimes they become the same thing) still try hard to keep the population ignorant in order to control them, instead of helping them.
We keep putting walls in front of us and we call them religions and races.
We did not learn to respect other people opinions and we still did not learn to listen and open our mind to new ideas: only very few people do it unfortunately!
We still do not understand that actions are better than prayers: sometimes we can help and we just don't want to do it. A human being can be powerful with his mind, his heart and his money!
This is the reality!

I like what the famous Oncologist Umberto Veronesi said about religion: - La religione, per definizione, è integralista, mentre la scienza vive nel dubbio , nella ricerca della verità-, literally -Religion for definition is fundamentalist, while science has doubts and is always searching the truth-.
To what he said I would just add that Science together with Art are the truth, they are our truth, they are what we see, what we know, what we can do!

Is there a life after death? Who knows, maybe there is...but nobody knows it for sure or has been able to demonstrate it.
We do have this life right now though and we better make it worth it: we should study and learn and achieve great things while we are here and while we can!