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Articles tagged "Kowloon"
The World's Largest Sound And Light Show: Hong Kong's Symphony Of Lights (VIDEO)
by Jessica Marati on Jan 8, 2013
Each evening at the stroke of 8 p.m., Hong Kong's Victoria Harbour is illuminated with a cacophony of dancing lights and laser beams, accompanied by a blaring soundtrack of synthesized music. It's the Hong Kong Tourism Commission's Symphony of Lights, a wonderfully tacky celebration of the city's energy, spirit, diversity – and luminescence. The nightly spectacle includes more than 40 buildings on both sides of the harbour, earning it the Guinness Book of World Records title for "World's Largest Permanent Sound and Light Show."
Best part? The show is absolutely free.
The most popular spot to view the Symphony of Lights is on the elevated Tsim Sha Tsui promenade, in front of the Hong Kong Cultural Centre on the Kowloon side of Hong Kong. Get there early, or you'll be left jostling with tourists eager for the perfect camera phone shot. A different vantage point can be had from Golden Bauhinia Square on Hong Kong Island, from which you can catch the action happening on the Kowloon side of the harbour.
More photos and video after the jump.
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[Photo and Video Credit: Jessica Marati]
"Budget Hong Kong" chronicles one writer's efforts to authentically experience one of the world's most expensive cities, while traveling on a shoestring. Read the whole series here.
Budget Hong Kong: Journey To The Past At The Hong Kong Museum Of History
by Jessica Marati on Dec 27, 2012
"The Hong Kong Story," a permanent exhibition at the Hong Kong Museum of History, isn't your standard collection of artifacts. Chronicling more than 6,000 years of natural and cultural history, the massive exhibition occupies eight galleries across nearly 23,000 square feet, with more than 3,700 static and interactive exhibits. The endeavor took more than six years and HK$200 million (US$25.8 million) to complete. And with admission at just HK$10 (US$1.30) per person, it's a bargain way to brush up on your Hong Kong history, while beating the oppressive afternoon heat.
%Gallery-174071%The exhibition begins with a look at Hong Kong's natural environment, examining the landforms, flora and fauna that make the territory unique. A full-scale forest recreation showcases the massive trees that have since been replaced by skyscrapers, along with sound bites from the island's indigenous birds and animals.
The next gallery displays artifacts from prehistoric Hong Kong, with stone tools and pottery dating back more than 6,000 years. From there, guests are led to the third gallery, on Hong Kong's majestic early dynasties, which grew with influence from mainland China.
The fourth gallery, on Hong Kong folk culture, highlights the customs of Hong Kong's four traditional ethnic groups: the Punti, the Hakka, the Boat Dwellers and the Hoklo. A highlight is a full-scale recreation of the Taiping Qingjiao ceremony, complete with a 54-foot "bun mountain," a Cantonese Opera theatre, a parade, a lion dance and a Taoist altar.
The fifth gallery is a slightly more sobering look at the Opium Wars, which led to the cession of Hong Kong to Great Britain. The causes and consequences of the wars are examined through documentation, timelines and an informative film. From there, guests can explore the growth of Hong Kong as a modern city under British rule, with its teahouses, banks, tailor shops, pawn shops and other urban structures.
The seventh gallery takes a brief look at Hong Kong during the World War II Japanese military occupation. Like in other parts of the Pacific, Hong Kong suffered heavily during the three-year-eight-month period. The propaganda video and audio clips are particularly fascinating.
Finally, visitors are introduced to the development of the modern metropolis of Hong Kong in the years following World War II. The gallery includes reconstructions of a 1960s diner-style herbal tea shop, a modern cinema and exhibits from the Hong Kong trade fair, showcasing the development of Hong Kong's manufacturing industry. With hundreds of modern artifacts and memorabilia, this exhibition has broad appeal, even for non-history buffs.
The Hong Kong Story closes with a showcase of documents related to Hong Kong's return to China in 1997 – as well as a reminder on the final placard that the city's story is far from over.
The Hong Kong Museum of History is located on Chatham Road South in Tsim Sha Tsui. Admission is HK$10 (US$1.30) for adults and HK$5 (US$0.65) for students, seniors and the disabled. On Wednesdays, admission is free.
[Photo Credit: Jessica Marati]
Budget Hong Kong: The Best Cheap Eats For Under US$5 A Bite
Tourists come to Hong Kong for a number of reasons: business, shopping, sightseeing.
Me? I came to eat.
I have long heard about Hong Kong's famed cuisine, with its unique blend of Chinese, Western, Japanese, Southeast Asian and international influences. The city is home to dozens of celebrity chefs and boasts 62 Michelin-starred restaurants. It's regularly called the culinary capital of Asia, if not the world.
I wasn't interested in Hong Kong's chichi gourmet restaurant scene, nor did I have the budget for it. Rather, I was intent on sampling the city's dizzying array of cheap eats. Dim sum. Wonton. Noodles. Tea with medicinal properties. Bakery tarts that melt in your mouth. My mouth waters just thinking of it.
Here are some of the highlights of my Hong Kong eating extravaganza, each costing less than US$5 a serving.
%Gallery-173830%Pork Siu Mai with Quail Egg at DimDimSum Dim Sum Specialty Store
Four steaming pork dumplings, each topped with a small, perfectly boiled quail egg. It's no wonder The Daily Beast named this small dim sum chain one of the 101 Best Places to Eat – in the world.
Cost: HK$18 (US$2.32 at US$0.13 to HK$1)
7 Tin Lok Lane, Causeway Bay
King Prawn Wonton Noodle at Tsim Chai Kee Noodle
The wontons at this Central District noodle shop contain succulent pieces of juicy king prawn. Select the yellow noodle option and spice to your heart's content.
Cost: HK$22 (US$2.84)
98 Wellington Street, Central
Vermicelli Roll Stuffed with BBQ Pork at Tim Ho Wan
The wait at the world's cheapest Michelin-starred restaurant is worth it: simple, home-style dim sum classics like the BBQ pork-filled vermicelli roll, prepared to perfection and drizzled in soy sauce. Though I didn't try them, the pork buns are also said to be excellent.
2-20 Kwong Wa Street, Mong Kok
Aloo Paratha at Waka Sweets in the Chungking Mansions
Hankering for curry? Look no further than the ground floor of the Chungking Mansions, which is filled with South Asian specialties like curries and sweets. The aloo paratha at Waka Sweets is greasy, but it hit the spot.
Cost: HK$8 (US$1.03)
Ground floor, past the first staircase on the right, Chungking Mansions, 36-44 Nathan Road, Tsim Sha Tsui
Coconut Sago at Ying Heong Yuen
This coconut milk drink with tiny tapioca beads is the perfect way to beat the Hong Kong heat. It's available for a pittance at most street stalls, but the version at Ying Heong Yuen in Causeway Bay is particularly good.
3-7 Cannon Street, Causeway Bay
Chrysanthemum Tea at Good Spring Company Limited
The herbal teas doled out at century-old Good Spring Company Limited are said to provide energy, eliminate bodily toxins and promote general health. The chrysanthemum tea is mildly sweet and refreshing.
8 Cochrane Street, Central
Milk Tea at Tsui Wah Restaurant
A legacy of British colonialism, milk tea is a must-drink in Hong Kong. Tsui Wah's is smoother than most versions and pairs well with the home-style diner's sweet toasted bun.
15-19 Wellington Street, Central
Egg Tart at Tai Cheong Bakery
Bakeries around the city vie for the title of best egg tart. By many accounts, including that of former British governor Chris Patten, Tai Cheong takes the cake. The secret is in the buttery cookie crust, honed over more than six decades of operation.
35 Lyndhurst Terrace, Central
Steamed Milk with Ginger Juice at Yee Shun Milk Company
This dessert, ordered hot with ginger juice, has a consistency somewhere between warm milk and pudding. The ginger adds a spicy kick to the sweetness. It is, quite simply, one of the most delicious things I have ever eaten, with a taste that stays with you long after you leave. Though there were tons of cheap eats to try, I ended up returning for seconds.
506 Lockhart Road, Causeway Bay
Budget Hong Kong: The City Of Blinding Logos
The streets of Hong Kong have a way of accosting you with neon lights and ostentatious logos. Louis Vuitton and Giorgio Armani lay claim to the Central District, while Tiffany & Co. and Burberry dominate Tsim Sha Tsui. Causeway Bay is a cacophony of luxury labels from around the globe, and let's not forget the lesser brands that sit on every street corner: McDonald's, Starbucks, 7-11. It's enough to make your head spin.
And indeed, it made mine, at about 4 p.m. on my first day in the city. From the moment I had arrived in Hong Kong, my senses had kicked into overdrive. I walked faster, talked faster, flitted my eyes from one new sight to the next. Everything was new, big, bright and exciting.
But after several hours on the town, I began to feel the effects of sensory overload. The crowds became claustrophobic. The pollution started to choke me. The tik-tik-tik of the crosswalk signs drummed an endless circle in my head. And everywhere, lit-up advertisements and shop signs taunted me, tempting me to buy, use and consume. It was enough to drive any sane person to the brink of madness.
Thankfully (and ironically) I managed to find sanctuary at a nearby Starbucks.
%Gallery-173824%Hong Kong is a magical city. But it's also an intense one – even for a downtown Manhattanite like myself. The special administrative region of the People's Republic of China is one of the world's most densely populated parts of the world, with seven million people crammed into an area of just 426 square miles. It is one of the world's most expensive cities, by many indices. The Atlantic reports that it is the priciest place to buy a home, while the Savills World Cities Review concludes that it is the most expensive city to locate ex-pat workers.
Hong Kong is also a city largely driven by consumption. Just this year, it surpassed New York as the world's costliest retail location, according to Bloomberg. For the luxury traveler, it is somewhere this side of paradise, with 62 Michelin-starred restaurants and extravagant boutiques representing nearly every high-end brand on the globe.
But I am not a luxury traveler. Far from it, in fact. My mission in Hong Kong was to experience the best of the city, on a shoestring. And once I recovered from the assault on my senses and stepped off the main tourist drags, I discovered how. My two-day trip was filled with fascinating cultural activities, unique discoveries and awe-inspiring sights.
And then, of course, there was the food. I'll save that for the next post.
Photo of the Day – Hong Kong Junk
by Jeremy Kressmann on Jul 3, 2011
I don't know that any city in the world can match the sheer "wow" factor of Hong Kong's harbor. The city's massive skyscrapers sit precariously perched on the lips of mountainous islands, always looking as if they're about to fall into the sea. There's probably no better way to take in the incredible view of this marvelous city than from the confines of a boat, particularly aboard a line like the Star Ferry. Flickr user wesleyrosenblum provides us with a fine example what the view from a Hong Kong boat ride might look like. In front of you is ancient Chinese Junk, its bright red mast floating in the breeze. Behind, Hong Kong Island aglow at twilight, a shimmering sea below and a sky of dusty orange and soft blue above. Perfect.
Taken any great travel photos of your own? Why not add them to our Gadling group on Flickr? We might just pick one of yours as our Photo of the Day.
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Proline's London Cobble Stone will bring the look of an English Garden to your back yard. This pattern offers larger, wider cobblestones that vary in size from 8" x 9.5" to a larger stone of 8" x 8.5" in a running bond pattern. The benefit of decorative concrete versus natural stone is lower cost, higher durability and inherent strength and endurance.


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Political Patrol
Chinese Real Estate Company At Center Of FBI Investigation Raked In Millions From PPP Loans
A Chinese real estate company at the center of an FBI bribery probe involving a Los Angeles city councilman raked in somewhere between $4 million to $10 million in coronavirus relief loans provided under the federal Paycheck Protection Program (PPP), the Daily Caller reported Thursday.
Shenzhen New World Group, owned by Chinese billionaire Wei Huang, received the lump sum over two separate loans for hotels operating in Los Angeles. The group's chairman is also however, accused by federal prosecutors of bribing Los Angeles City Council member Jose Huizar with $260,000 in poker chips and $600,000 to settle a sexual harassment lawsuit.
In June, Huizar was arrested for allegedly accepting an estimated $1.5 million in bribes to assist developers on downtown projects which includes at least 19 trips to Las Vegas between March 2012 and 2017. Prosecutors accuse a developer of footing the bill for "flights on private jets and commercial airlines; stays at luxury hotels; expensive meals; spa services; event tickets to concerts, shows, and sporting events; escort and prostitution services; and other gifts."
The Daily Caller reported that while prosecutors' indictment omits the Chinese developer's name from the charges, the company's building project matches the Shenzhen New World Group's 2018 proposal for a 77-story skyscraper that if built, would become the highest building west of the Mississippi River. The Los Angeles Times has also matched the description.
While the real estate company was allegedly covering the costs of Huizar's high-dollar trips, the development group submitted its application for its skyscraper project in question on June 7, 2018.
The U.S. Treasury began releasing a database identifying recipients of the taxpayer-forgivable PPP loans Monday. A total of $522 billion in funds were granted to nearly 5 million small businesses, according to the Treasury Department.
The Florida Democratic Party was also reported to have received a loan this week once the database was made public. The party announced it would be returning a $780,000 loan following bipartisan criticism.
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In this fourth and final instalment of our series of SME Growth Tips stemming from the Business Sorted event that took place in Bristol in September 2016, we look at the influence of overarching company policies and attitudes that can impact the longevity, public image and success of your business.
Whether you're dealing with customers, engaging with the general public, or negotiating and managing other business relationships such as those with suppliers and lenders, honesty and integrity are vitally important qualities. Business relationships are heavily built on trust. People like to deal with others they feel they can trust, and will be more likely to warm to you and come back for more if you prove yourself to be an honest operator.
What's more, in today's marketplace, dishonest and misleading selling and other forms of bad practice will not only lose individual customers and wreck particular business relationships, but also attract negative online reviews and occasionally even virally shared social media postings and blog posts complaining about you. Negative online feedback of these kinds can get noticed by a great many potential and existing customers and associates, damaging your credibility across the board, with potentially disastrous effects on the growth and sustainability of your business.
If someone does lash out online, address the issue in public with a polite acknowledgement, and express sorrow at the customer's unhappy experience, but leave the details and any attempts at resolution for a private conversation with your customer.
Whatever your line of business, it's important to be aware of all applicable laws, including those relating to trading standards, employment, health and safety at work, importing and exporting, tax, and accounts.
Depending on the seriousness of the offence, breaking the law could see you suffer heavy fines that bankrupt your business, get you barred from serving as a company director for a number of years, or even land you in prison.
Check out the UK government's Business and self-employed pages for a hive of information on relevant laws.
In many industries, from mining and energy supply to manufacturing, packaging and logistics, environmental considerations and standards have played an increasingly important role over recent decades. Both the tide of environmental legislation and the growth of environmentally conscientious consumer sentiment can be powerful drivers to recommend the adoption of environmentally friendlier practices by businesses today.
So even if the law doesn't yet require it, there may be commercial advantages to your business in 'going green' before your competitors do. The implementation of thorough recycling protocols and the adoption of carbon-neutral energy usage policies are among the most popular approaches for businesses working in traditionally polluting industrial sectors that are seeking to improve their environmental credentials.
If you are being green, shout about it! Include information about your green credentials on your website and in your newsletters, and make it part of your ethical company culture.
Aside from honesty, generosity is a quality that can be advantageous for businesses to cultivate and display to customers. Being customer-focused is always desirable in any case, but going that extra mile to put smiles on faces with words and deeds that show a real generosity of spirit could mark you out from competitors and help to attract and retain customer loyalty.
It could be a free gift with a large purchase, a prize competition to celebrate a product launch, or something as simple as a handwritten note of thanks on an attractive card. As the old saying puts it, 'Do as you would be done by'. Showing a generous spirit to your customers may attract generosity back to your business.
Be good, to do good.
Have you considered and evaluated how your company values, policies and attitudes look to customers and others you deal with lately? We hope that the above guidelines will be of help in keeping your business on the best footing where it matters.
Thank you for reading our four-part series of SME Business Growth Tips! We at GWS wish you every success in developing and growing your enterprise.


Point Chaud Cafe and Crepes is a coffee shop and creperie located at 1012 14th St NW. It serves both sweet and savory crepes, though it does not serve its savory crepes as traditional square, buckwheat galettes as is done in Brittany. I'm a bit of a purist when it comes to crepes/galettes and I typically order a ham, egg, and cheese savory crepe/galette, which is known as a crepe/galette complète in France. Mine was tasty, though it's not a particularly complicated food and I do wish it had been the buckwheat galette version, which is more authentic. The place is cutely decorated like an authentic French cafe, and it's a nice place to stop in for a quick bite downtown.


Abuja, 11 July 2018: South African President Cyril Ramaphosa today in Abuja addressed attendees at the Annual Meetings and 25th Anniversary Celebrations of the African Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank), telling them that the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) would provide the integrated and diversified markets that will unlock Africa's full productive capacity.
In a keynote address on the opening day of the Annual Meetings and Celebrations, President Ramaphosa said that the AfCFTA held enormous opportunities for the growth of the economies of the African continent.
He highlighted the need to address the continent's infrastructure deficit and to pursue industrial development.
In his address, Dr. Benedict Oramah, President of Afreximbank, welcomed the signing of the AfCFTA agreement by 44 African nations in Kigali in March and said that it will accelerate the integration of Africa markets, foster regional value chains and promote dynamic competitive advantage across Africa for certain kinds of goods as well as boost employment.
He further stated that it is important that the AfCFTA be thoroughly debated so that everyone can understand both the opportunities it offered and the obstacles that still needed to be overcome.
Kemi Adeosun, Minister of Finance of Nigeria's said that continued infrastructure improvements and a focus on trade, particularly regional trade, would drive sustainable growth.
Ms. Adeosun commended Afreximbank for its role during the last global recession when it supported many African countries with trade support and lines of credit at a time when others were withdrawing from Africa.
More than 100 speakers, including Heads of State, ministers, central bank governors, heads of of international organisations, business leaders, African and global trade development experts, and academics, are scheduled to speak during the four days of the Annual Meetings and 25th Anniversary celebrations.


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Elizabeth Plantan
Stalin's "Road to Nowhere", Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Okrug, Russia
Friends or Foes?:
Authoritarian Politics and Environmental Activism in China and Russia
Status: Proposal submitted
Existing accounts of state-society relations under authoritarianism tend to focus on leaders' ability to repress or co-opt independent groups; however, contemporary authoritarians often employ a mix of strategies from repression and co-optation to consultation and even encouragement. Why do state-society relations under authoritarianism vary so widely? Which groups are more likely to be repressed, and which are more likely to be encouraged by state actors?
Friends or Foes?: Authoritarian Politics and Environmental Activism in China and Russia addresses these questions by explaining why state-society relations under authoritarianism can vary so dramatically. Using the concept of an authoritarian dilemma between liberalization and control, the book develops a theoretical framework to model state-created opportunities and constraints on civil society activity from the top-down. Then, the book uses the example of environmental groups in two "state-of-the-art" authoritarian regimes, China and Russia, to show how these top-down choices structure behavior from the bottom-up. Environmental activism can be perceived as both threatening and complementary to state goals, making it an ideal window into possible variation in state-created opportunities and constraints for civil society. To unpack this variation, the book is organized around four common tactics that environmental activists use to make demands of the state, including advocating through informal or formal institutions, seeking justice through the legal system, attracting international support, or engaging in mass mobilization.
Drawing on evidence from more than 13 months of in-depth fieldwork in China and Russia, including over 150 interviews with environmental activists, NGO practitioners, and government officials, the book reveals stark differences in the state-created constraints and opportunities for environmental civil society between the two countries. Despite China's more tightly controlled political system, I find that environmental groups have greater access to policymakers through informal channels, increasing access to the legal system, and are more able to contribute to governance. While in hybrid authoritarian Russia, environmental groups are mostly excluded from governance, have fewer legal opportunities, and, as a result, often lean on mass mobilization and international ties. I argue that these differences can be attributed to how environmental groups exacerbate or support the authoritarian dilemma, including how they interact with the political system (competitive or closed authoritarian), regime legitimacy, and historical legacies of mass mobilization. The book reveals patterns in authoritarian state-society interaction between top-down management strategies and bottom-up responses, contributing to our understanding of the shifting everyday politics of authoritarianism.


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Junaci našeg doba
Junaci našeg doba (2019)
comédie | Serbie
Réalisateur: Mihailo Vukobratović, Ivan Stefanović
vendredi 9 décembre 2022 10:54
jeudi 8 décembre 2022 10:58
Note de l'utilisateur: 6/10
C'était sur les chaînes:
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The operating system announced by IBM at the low end for the System/360 in 1964 and delivered in 1965 or 1966.
Following the failure of OS, IBM designed DOS for the low end machines, able to run in 16KB(?) and 64KB memory.
DOS/360 used three memory partitions, but it had no serious memory protection. The three partitions were not specialised, but frequently one was used for spooling punched cards to disk, another one for batch job execution and another for spooling disk to printers.
With DOS/VS, introduced in 1970, the number of partitions was increased, virtual memory was introduced and the minimum memory requirements increased.
Later they released DOS/VSE and ESA/VSE. DOS/360 successors are still alive today (1997) though not as popular as in the late 1960s.
Contrary to the Hacker's Jargon File, GECOS was not copied from DOS/360.


Problems w/Mass eMails @ Dreamhost?
I run a PHPBB install with > 400 registered users on Dreamhost.
Quite a few claim they never receive any of our PHPBB mass emails, not even in their spam folder (across all email brands - AOL, Yahoo, Earthlink, ATT.net, etc).
Any suggestions as to what I can check/adjust to troubleshoot?


In the Physical Education department, we equip students with the skills, knowledge and attitudes needed to lead a healthy and active lifestyle, both within school and outside of the classroom. Our broad and balanced curriculum not only develops students' physical literacy, but enhances their interpersonal skills, from teamwork to leadership as well as building areas of self-esteem, well-being and confidence.
All students study Dance as part of the P.E curriculum. Units of work include; Performance Skills, Choreographic skills, Physical Theatre and Professional Work. These are taught by our three specialist Dance teachers.
Alongside promoting lifelong engagement in sport and physical activity, we believe in the value of fair and healthy competition. All students belong to a P.E house; Trott, Wiggins, Farah or Standing and at the end of every half-term, students join together to participate in inter-house competitions.
To enhance students' learning, homework is set once a week. This consists of a short piece of reading followed by self-quizzing questions. Students are not required to submit this but are tested on the knowledge they have obtained once a term. Along with continuous practical assessment, this forms students' assessment grades within Key Stage three.
At Key Stage four all students continue to study Physical Education as part of their curriculum. Through the exposure of a wide range of activities and experiences within Key Stage 3, we hope that by Key Stage four students have found areas of study they thrive upon and enjoy and so are given the opportunity to select which activities they study each term. We believe this opportunity enhances students' likelihood of achieving lifelong engagement in physical activity and sport. Students are not set homework or given assessment grades at Key Stage four; having gained a vast amount of fundamental knowledge and skills at Key Stage three, we believe Physical Education at Key Stage four serves a very different purpose. Students come to P.E not only to continue to develop their knowledge, skills and interests, but to have a time and space in which they can escape the stress and pressures of everyday life; a key lesson, we hope all students can take away from their experience of Physical Education at Towers.
Students are also given the opportunity to study Physical Education as one of their option subjects. By doing so, students receive an additional two lessons of P.E a week. All students who select P.E as an option study the BTEC First Award in Sport. This is a vocational qualification which is the equivalent to one GCSE and is recognised by all providers of further education. It provides students with the fundamental knowledge and skills needed to progress into the world of sport and physical activity. Areas of study include Fitness for Sport and Exercise, Training for Personal Fitness, Leading Sport Activities and Practical Sports Performance. Most students who study this qualification go on successfully studying it further within our Sixth Form at Key Stage 5.
At Key Stage 5 students have the opportunity to study the Cambridge Technical Extended Certificate in Sport and Physical Activity; the equivalent of one A-Level or the Cambridge Technical Diploma in Sport and Physical Activity; the equivalent of two A-Levels. Students also have the opportunity to join our highly successful Football Academy, run by Mr Albin. For more information about the Football Academy, please see below.
We pride ourselves on our extensive list of extra-curricular activities available to all students. These change termly, in line with the different sporting seasons. We also enter a vast amount and range of tournaments and fixtures within the Ashford and Shepway District. To learn more about our extra-curricular opportunities, please click here.
At Towers we provide an extensive range of extra-curricular opportunities for all students. Whether students want to try something new, meet new people or develop an existing interest, we encourage all students to attend at least one extra-curricular activity a week. For every activity that is offered on the curriculum, we provide an opportunity for students to enrich their knowledge, develop their talent and nurture their interest through our extra-curricular provision. Activities are offered to all year groups, but some are split per year group and others by key stage, depending on the activity or sport.
Alongside our extra-curricular activities, we provide students with the opportunity to represent Towers at sporting fixtures and events. Some of the sporting fixtures we offer include; Football, Netball, Basketball, Rugby, Badminton, Cross Country, Athletics, Tennis, Rounders and Cricket. Fixtures in these sports are offered to all year groups, for both male and female students depending on the uptake, interest and demand.
One of our most highly attended and successful extra-curricular provision is Cheerleading. This is run by one of Dance teachers and Cheerleading coach Miss Harverson. For more information about Cheerleading at Towers please see below.
Towers School Cheerleading has been running for 6 years and has been extremely successful in local, National and International competitions. We currently have teams competing in level 1, 2 in cheerleading and 1, 2 and 3 in stunt teams.
Towers Tiggers is open to all year 7 students and competes at Junior Level 1. The team currently consists of 25 year 7 students and is run on Wednesdays during Enrichment time by Miss Pochin. Towers Tiggers will be competing in The Ashford Schools Competition, BCA Schools competition and Future Cheer Schools Competition.
Towers Tigers is open to all years 8 and 9 students and competes at Junior level 1. The team currently consists of 32 years 8 and 9 students and is run on Thursday during Enrichment time by Miss Harverson. Towers Tigers will be competing in The Ashford Schools Competition, BCA Schools competition and Future Cheer Schools Competition.
Towers Tomcats is a selected team through try outs at the start of the year and competes at Senior level 2. The team currently consists of 32 years 8-11 students and is run on Tuesdays during Enrichment time by Miss Harverson. Towers Tomcats will be competing in The Ashford Schools Competition, BCA Schools competition and Future Cheer Schools Competition.
The Academy team are currently working towards competing in Level 2 stunts. The Academy team are also completing a level 2 Dance Leadership Award and coaching primary school students cheerleading every Friday. The Academy team will be competing in The Ashford Schools Competition, BCA Schools competition and Future Cheer Schools Competition.
Towers Tornadoes is a team consisting of 13 members of staff from Towers School. The team will be competing in UKCA competition in May this year.
Proline FA deliver the School Football Programme at Towers School and Sixth Form Centre.
ProLine Football Academy are delighted to announce that we will be delivering the School Football Programme at Towers School and Sixth Form Centre for the coming academic year.
ProLine Football Academy is managed by Barry Jeffreys, Regional Coordinator for Arsenal FC Youth Academy in South London & Kent, whose objective is to identify talented and gifted players between the ages of 5 and 16 years.
Our philosophy is to enhance the development of football players across the four corners, whilst encouraging free flowing attacking football.
The programme we deliver at the school will follow this philosophy of free flowing creative football.
The overall objective being to deliver a high quality programme that will develop and enhance the players technical ability and tactical awareness; whilst providing potential exit routes to elite level football clubs, to find the correct environment for individual players.
Tuesday: Tactical practice including preparation for match fixture.
Each student will receive a progress report at Christmas and Easter with individual assessment by coaching staff.
The overall programme will include academic study of BTEC Sport through the Academy system of education with PLFA supporting with technical delivery.
On completion of the programme students will have the opportunity to progress to university, proceed directly to employment or potentially enrol to the club's Gap Year Programme.
We can organise tours on the continent against teams of the appropriate level to participate in international tournaments, which are organised by affiliated clubs to their national Football Federations.
Countries include France, Italy & Spain.
We can provide a range of tours in terms of budget and playing level, to suit the needs of our players participating in the school football programme.
In association with the Kent FA, we can organise Level 1 coaching qualification courses for students interested in developing their football knowledge or wishing to explore a career in football coaching.
We can monitor student's progress and assist them through the process of gaining their qualification.
We can potentially provide coaching opportunities at various levels (including professional Academy level), for students who demonstrate a high level of skill set and attitude towards progressing within the football coaching industry.
We can provide student recommendation for the club's Gap Year Programme.
Stage 1 is based in London and provides training and development opportunities for our 'Gappers' including coaching qualifications, First Aid, Safeguarding and TEFL courses. 'Gappers' are then placed within PE departments in local schools, as well as local football projects to provide a broad experience of coaching within the community.
Stage 2 gives our 'Gappers' opportunities to coach within a wide range of community programmes and Soccer Schools either at home or abroad with one of our international partners.
Stage 3 provides the chance for a second placement, either overseas or in the UK, to ensure that our 'Gappers' have the opportunity to fully develop their skills and reach their full potential during their time with the club.
Whether you are considering a gap year before or after higher education, or even a career break, you are welcome to apply for the Arsenal Gap Year. Applicants simply need to be over 18 years of age (17 if you are from Scotland or the Republic of Ireland).
Towers arrived at the Gallagher Stadium, home of Maidstone United on the crest of a wave after returning from France on Easter Monday as runners up in Vieux Conde Tournament, having reached the final without conceding a goal and losing narrowly 1-0 in a close hard fought final.
The Towers team had been well briefed by Manager Stephane Ollier of Arsenal Soccer Schools who runs the Towers Academy. The final got underway with Ravens Wood making all the early running with sharp passing and good possession of the ball. Ravens Wood were pressing well and regained possession quickly with the strong Towers defence keeping them at bay throughout the opening encounters.
The first goal came against the run of play when a slip in the Ravens wood defence allowed Charlie Cairns to gain possession and calmly slot home the opening goal.
This was just the lift that Towers needed and they started taking control of the game and piled on the pressure to a now back pedalling Ravens Wood.
Towers kept pressing well and their good possession and pressure paid off when after some crisp passing in midfield led to the ball being fed in from the wing towards the back post to a waiting Alfie Miller who fired home Towers second goal.
Towers were now in complete control of the game and were forcing Ravens Wood to play a long ball game with some desperate clearance to thwart the continued Towers pressure.
Towers dominance of the game led to them extending their lead with Alfie Miller again getting on the score sheet slotting home his second goal and making the score line 3-0 to Towers after 30 minutes.
Towers continued to press in the Ravens Wood half looking to increase their advantage and look for a fourth goal when a Ravens Wood long ball clearance caught out the up to now solid Towers defence. With the ball clearing the Towers defence a Ravens Wood striker picked up the loose ball and entered the Towers penalty area to be brought down for a penalty which was swiftly converted leaving the half time score as 3-1 to Towers.
The second half kicked off with Towers again applying the pressure on Ravens Wood who were fighting hard to get back into the game.
As players were tiring the game opened up and there were chances being created at both ends of the pitch. Towers squandered several chances to increase their lead which started to give Ravens Wood some hope of getting back into the game.
This hope was thwarted by Towers when a loose back pass by the Ravens Wood defence prompted Libert Chanyawu to press the Ravens Wood goalkeeper who made a mess of controlling the ball and despite the presence of two recovering Ravens Wood defenders Libert showed great strength to hold off the defenders and slot the ball home to make it 4-1 to Towers.
The game was now over and the cup had been taken from Ravens Wood who were the holders having won the cup in 2015/16 and a well-deserved victory was truly well earned by the Towers Academy.
Huge congratulations to all the boys who have worked so hard in order to have such an enjoyable and successful season.
On Thursday 16th March the Towers Tigers left for Disneyland Paris to compete in the junior level one category of an international cheerleading competition.
The twenty-two cheerleaders, accompanied by Miss Harverson, Mrs Giles and Miss Davison, enjoyed three days exploring the two Disneyland parks, competed in an international competition and also performed in the Disneyland pre parade.
Eleven different countries competed in the competition on the Saturday. The Towers Tigers looked amazing on stage and hit every stunt and tumble in their routine. The team achieved 3rd place out of six teams and were the only school team in their category. We also entered a junior level one stunt team who came 6th and a senior level two team who came 4th.
On the Sunday the team performed in the Disneyland pre parade through the park with the other teams from the competition. This was a fantastic opportunity for the team!
The students were amazing throughout the trip and were a real credit to the school.
U13 RUGBY TEAM ARE KENT EMERGING SCHOOLS 7S CHAMPIONS!
A big congratulations to our U13 7s team who are Kent Emerging School 7s Champions for the second year running. Well done boys & coach!


I recently had the opportunity to spend a day with diverse stakeholders from across the state to discuss the next Comprehensive Conservation and Management Plan for the Mobile Bay National Estuary Program (NEP). This plan gathers input from leaders in business, government, experts in scientific and research communities, and coastal residents to determine the most important needs in coastal Alabama. At the end of this full day of brainstorming and planning for the future of our state's coastal resources, Representative Bradley Byrne (R-AL1) took the stage to wrap up the day, and what he said was disheartening. He told us that his office doesn't hear from voters about environmental protection, and that, unless he and others in Congress do hear from us, discretionary funding for programs like the Mobile Bay NEP will likely be cut.
This is not a new message, and it's one that we hear from leaders at the local, state and federal level. Yet, we know by working with voters around our state that protecting Alabama's natural resources is important across party lines. At the end of the day, Alabamians are clear that having places to hunt, hike, and fish are important to our communities and our culture. In 2017, when the first budget President Trump presented to Congress included cuts that would have gutted the Mobile Bay NEP's funding, 34 businesses and 14 community groups from the coast signed a joint letter to Alabama's legislative delegation asking Congress to protect funding for environmental protection. We all agreed that protecting our environment also protects our economy and communities.
Alabama receives nearly half of its money for environmental protection from the federal government. Not only would cuts to these federal dollars threaten our state's ability to run programs aimed at reducing air pollution, cleaning up hazardous waste, and ensuring public water safety; they would also threaten our ability to maintain healthy coastal communities and beaches, which are a huge economic driver for our state. While these issues have been politicized, what we hear when we talk to voters in Alabama is that our ability to maintain clean water for swimming and fishing and healthy public lands for hunting and hiking are important to all of us across the political spectrum.
It's time for us as citizens to remind our elected officials that they work for us, and that our priorities are clear: Protecting our natural resources in Alabama is the right thing to do because it benefits all of us, whether we hunt, fish, hike, or enjoy a day out on the water with our families. Let's give Representative Byrne what he asked for – our voice. Tell your elected officials in Washington that environmental protection is your priority, and it should be theirs as well.


Communication Archives - EACA Inspire!
During the week of 2nd July 2017, EACA and edcom will welcome 70 advertising & commercial communications students and young professionals from across Europe to the EACA International Advertising Summer School in Vienna (Austria).
Participants will be following daily workshops by leading advertising professionals while working in international multidisciplinary teams. At the end of the week, they will present their campaigns to an external jury composed of client representatives and industry professionals.
New this year is a brand new programme with new topics, such as learning how to build the perfect Paid Social Media campaign (Dominika Dworak), discovering how to motivate yourself and be productive at work by mastering different brainstorming techniques and communications skills (Dalia Lourenço), and understanding different personality profiles to ensure a perfect cooperation and communications amongst different agency departments and clients (Elissa Telfer).
We will also be introducing a Specialisation Day: participants will be able to choose between two topics and follow an intensive and highly interactive workshop during one day with an expert in this area. A workshop on 'Creative Storytelling' will be given by San Francisco Miami Ad School lecturer John Delacruz, while the other workshop will be on 'How to make content compelling for video in advertising' by London based specialist Peter Rudge from Duckrabbit.
In addition to these new courses, participants will also be able to gain an understanding of client-agency relationships (Richard Robinson), discover the future of brands (Dietmar Dahmen), deliver the perfect pitch (Micky Denehy) and master their presentation skills (Siobhan Stanley).
Please visit our webpage to learn more about the programme, application and deadlines fees or contact us at inspire@eaca.eu for more information. Hope to see you in Vienna!
edcom members Artesis Plantijn University College Antwerp and Erasmus University College Brussels would like to invite you to the 11th edition of International Communication Days from 4-7 December 2017.
Enter your best events to grab a competitive advantage and an indisputable quality proof at an international level.
All nominees will be offered the unique opportunity to showcase their creativity in front of a prestigious jury composed of top corporate event professionals from all over the globe. Join Bea World Festival, where creativity meets business, from November 15 to 18 in Porto.


MSA Executive Search lead the successful recruitment of Dr. Robert Thompson, Senior Vice President & Chief Medical Officer of Eastern Maine Healthcare Systems.
MSA Executive Search, an INTEGRATED company, dedicated exclusively to healthcare executive search, announced today that Robert Thompson, MD, was selected as Senior Vice President and Chief Medical Officer of Eastern Maine Healthcare Systems (EMHS) located in Brewer, Maine, following a nation-wide search. Dr. Thompson is expected to assume his duties with EMHS in early May.
An in-depth analysis of EMHS' organizational mission, vision and values followed the creation of a detailed position profile were used as a guide in the nation-wide recruitment effort led by Jane Groves, MSA Executive Search Executive Vice-President.
As Senior Vice President and Chief Medical Officer Dr. Thompson will serve as a key member of EMHS senior management participating in high-level policy formation, and direction setting to establish and achieve the strategic and operational goals of EMHS. He will also be a key leader in building a system-wide physician enterprise, including strategy, design and formation aligned with EMHS' progressive clinical integration efforts.
Reporting to President and Chief Executive Officer of EMHS, M. Michelle Hood, Dr. Thompson will also serve as the executive sponsor of the Clinical Coordinating Committee charged with developing and recommending policies and guidelines for EMHS patient care organizations, often through clinical affinity groups, and to serve in an advisory role to member organizations regarding standards for clinical practice to ensure patient safety and high quality of care.
Dr. Thompson brings with him more than 20 years of healthcare administrative experience in both inpatient and outpatient care. Throughout all of his leadership roles, Dr. Thompson maintained board certification and actively practiced in internal medicine and allergy/immunology. In his most recent position as Chief Quality and Medical Officer of Asante Health System, Dr. Thompson was responsible for driving quality outcomes through performance improvement and safety initiatives as well as assuring organization wide compliance. During his tenure at Asante, Dr. Thompson's quality initiatives lead the organization to be named a "Top 15 Health System" by Truven Health Analytics (formerly Thomson Reuters) in 2013. His passion for physician leadership and for the strength of physician engagement lead him to initiate the physician leadership academy at Asante working with the Advisory Board.
Currently Thompson chairs the Partnership for Patients Advisory Committee for the Oregon Association of Hospitals and Health Systems and serves as a member of the Oregon Patient Safety Commission Board of Directors.


UPDATE: All lanes are now open on I-10 West past Highland Road. Expect heavy delays.
BATON ROUGE- Emergency crews are working the scene of an accident that involved an 18-wheeler crashing into the tree line on I-10 West after Highland Rd.
The driver was transported to an area hospital in stable condition, according to authorities.
All lanes are now open on I-10 West past Highland Road. Congestion has reached LA 73 (approximately 8 miles in length).


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December 14, 2016 | Trump Equity-Market Boom: Real or Fleeting? What's Next?
Visit Guest's Website
Gerald Celente, who developed the Globalnomic® methodology to identify, track, forecast and manage trends, is a political atheist. Unencumbered by political dogma, rigid ideology or conventional wisdom, Celente, whose motto is "think for yourself," observes and analyzes the current events forming future trends for what they are — not for the way he wants them to be. And while Celente holds a U.S. passport, he considers himself a citizen of the world.
KINGSTON, NY, 14 December 2016—No one alive has seen anything like this. Since Donald Trump won the race for the White House, US equity markets keep hitting new highs.
However, just prior to Election Day in the US, it was the opposite story.
On Friday, 4 November 2016, FBI Director James Comey announced that "Based on our review… we have not changed our conclusions that we expressed in July," that Hillary Clinton should not face criminal charges after a review of new emails. On that news, when the markets opened on Monday, the Dow soared:
Dow roars 371 points after FBI clears Clinton again
You know it's a wild election season when a letter from the FBI sparks a global stock market rally.
The Dow soared 371 points on Monday — the biggest burst of buying since late January — after FBI Director James Comey sent a letter to Congress on Sunday once again clearing Hillary Clinton in its email investigation.
The S&P 500 also jumped 2.2%, ending a nine-day streak of losses, the longest such slump since 1980. The Nasdaq raced 2.4% higher.
The latest FBI bombshell is clearly being interpreted on Wall Street as a boost to Clinton, the favored candidate of investors.
Investors are essentially "voting" with their money about which candidate they think would be better for the market.
"There's no doubt that the day after the election, there will be less uncertainty if Hillary Clinton wins than if Donald Trump does," said David Kelly, chief global strategist at JPMorgan Funds.
In fact, there's a new Deutsche Bank research that predicts the opposite — a 10% plunge for European stocks if Trump wins on Tuesday. (CNN, 7 November 2016.)
The exact opposite happened. CNN and their paid-for-hire "experts" got it 100 percent wrong. Was it "fake news" or "pure stupidity"? Trump's win ignited a historic equity-market record-breaker rally.
Indeed, all of America's corporate-media club got the race for the White House wrong: NBC, ABC, CBS, MSNBC, NPR, The New York Times, Washington Post, etc… and so too their economic forecasts.
Across the living/dying newspaper/mainstream-media landscape (See RIP: The 4th Estate) to Google, Facebook and the Silicon Valley Geeksters who bet their mega-millions and algorithms, along with Hollywood's $100,000-a-plate Hillary Clinton/Barack "Preserve my Legacy" Obama, rappers, Hollywood's artists, campaign fund raisers… ALL LOST TO DONALD TRUMP!
However, as evidenced in the May and July editions of the Trends Journal, we were the only print media in the world to forecast a Donald Trump victory.
TREND FORECAST: The trend is your friend. Approve or disapprove of his choices, Trump has picked a corporate cabinet of top notch business leaders. Unlike politicians, Trump will run the White House like he runs his businesses. It's about the bottom line. Therefore, we forecast a strong dollar and steady economic growth. For US exporters, however, the strong dollar will dampen profits.
STAY INFORMED! Receive our Weekly Recap of thought provoking articles, podcasts, and radio delivered to your inbox for FREE! Sign up here for the HoweStreet.com Weekly Recap.
Gerald Celente December 14th, 2016
Posted In: Trends Research Institute
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Does Office Professional Plus 2016 include project?
What does Microsoft Project Professional 2016 include?
What is the difference between Office 2016 Professional and Professional Plus?
How do I install Microsoft Project 2016 for free?
Does Microsoft still support Office 2016?
Does Microsoft Office 2016 expire?
Is there a free version of Microsoft Project?
How much does Microsoft project cost?
Does Microsoft Office contain Microsoft Project?
Is MS Project part of Office 365?
What is a project professional?
The full Office for Windows 2016 suite includes new versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote, Outlook, Project, Visio and Access. There are not a lot of major new features in this release. Built-in coauthoring for the other Office 2016 apps beyond Word is also still in the works.
Microsoft Project 2016 is the last to support Windows 7 and Windows 8(. 1). New features include multiple timeline view, Tell Me, colorful/dark gray/white themes, resource engagements, resource manager views, resource capacity heat maps, ability to give feedback directly to Microsoft in the File tab.
Professional: This retail suite includes the core applications, as well as Outlook, Publisher, and Access. Professional Plus: This suite includes the core applications, as well as Outlook, Publisher, Access, and Skype for Business.
From the Office home page select Install Office apps > Other install options. (If you set a different start page, go to admin.microsoft.com/OLS/MySoftware.aspx.) Under Software, select Project. Choose the language and the bit version you want, then select Install.
Office 2016 for Windows will get security updates until October 14, 2025. The mainstream support end date is October 13, 2020, while the extended support end date is October 14, 2025. Office 2013 for Windows will get security updates until April 11, 2023—as long as you have Service Pack 1 installed.
Office 2016 has no expiration date per se. At some point in the future MS will cease to support it, and at some point you may not be able to run it on a later version of Windows , but the package doesn't expire.
Microsoft Office 2019 Editions Professional: Includes core applications plus Outlook, Publisher and Access. Uses Windows Installer method for offline installation. Professional Plus: Only available through volume licensing channels; includes core applications plus Outlook, Publisher, Access and Skype for Business.
Contrary to most of the project management tools in the market which offer free plans to users, Microsoft Project does not have any free features for its users. All the plans are paid and begin from $7 per user/month.
Project Standard 2019: $620 (one-time payment) – Installed desktop application, manage project schedules and costs, tasks, reporting, and business intelligence. Project Professional 2019: $1,030 (one-time payment) – All previous features, manage resources, online project syncing, track time, payroll, invoicing.
Microsoft Project was the company's third Microsoft Windows-based application. Within a few years after its launch, it became the dominant PC-based project management software. It is part of the Microsoft Office family but has never been included in any of the Office suites.
Although Microsoft Project Desktop is not part of the Office 365 Office suite of tools, the 2013 version enhanced the collaboration integration into the platform. You can purchase Project Pro for Office 365, which gives you the Microsoft Project desktop application, but more on that later.
Project Professional can be used as a standalone tool . Or it can be connected to a server. It also possesses additional functions. This version is the basis for working in a multi-project environment with an on-premises Project Server and Project Online. In the classic installation process, your IT administration uses local installation packages.
By Kate May 10, 2021 Other
How do you write an evidence review?
How do you make a paper peer reviewed in Word?


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DBS Warri
Warri Radio and Television Station
Months after divorce, Kanye West marries new lover
American rapper Kanye West is said to have married architect Yeezy Bianca Censori two months after his divorce from Kim Kardashian.
Ye and Kim were married for 6 years and had 4 children before breaking up in November 2022.
According to TMZ, the 45-year-old had a private ceremony with Bianca.
The couple was once caught wearing a wedding ring but has not registered their marriage.
The pair were spotted having lunch together earlier this week and have been seen together on a few other occasions. The rapper even released a tribute to his new wife titled Censori Overload.
See Also: Kanye West celebrates Pete Davidson and Kim Kardashian's breakup
Kanye West mocked ex-wife Kim Kardashian and Pete Davidson's breakup on Instagram.
He shared a fake post with the title saying that the comedian was "dead".
Kanye West seems happy that Kim Kardashian and Pete Davidson decided to split.
After the couple split after a nine-month relationship, Ye, 45, celebrated the news on Instagram on Monday morning (August 8).
He shared a fake story on the front page of the New York Times with the headline: "SKETE DAVIDSON DIE AT 28."
Kanye didn't add any captions to his scathing post, which is currently his only post on his Instagram page.
Kanye, who has four children with Kim, 41, doesn't like his ex-wife dating Pete, 28.
He threw insults at Saturday Night Live both on social media and in his lyrics earlier this year.
His threats to the point where Kim expressed concern for Pete's safety, something Ye certainly revealed on her Instagram.
In March, Ye is said to have told Kim he was going to take a break and "seek help," after which he stopped his public attacks on Kim and Pete.
After the news of Kim and Pete's breakup broke on Friday, August 5, there was a lot of speculation that the SKIMS founder and Kanye were back together, especially since Ye tried to get along with Kim so far.
But a source close to Kim confirmed to HollywoodLife that the famous exes are "working on a divorce that will be finalized soon."
The insider added that Kim, who filed for divorce from Ye in February 2021, "is not going back to him."
Kim and Kanye will continue to raise their children North, 9, Saint, 6, Chicago, 4, and Psalm, 3.
Their co-parenting relationship improved while Pete was in Australia filming a new movie.
The source told HollywoodLife EXCLUSIVE in late July, before Kim and Pete split: "Kim and Kanye are currently co-parenting amicably and that has to do with Pete's absence in Australia."
"Kanye currently lives in his house in Malibu and spends a lot of time with the kids," the insider added.
"He went to Kim's house many times to have dinner with the kids and he felt comfortable going to her house because Pete wasn't there."
INEC extends deadline for Voters card, PVCs collection
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text:
export default class MockTemplateFactory {
  constructor(name) {
    this.name = name;
  }
}

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


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Die a Million People: On 'The Colonel Who Would Not Repent'
M. Sophia Newman May 9, 2016 | 5 books mentioned 7 4 min read
The lyrics to "Song of Bangladesh" must have sounded mournful when Joan Baez first crooned them in Madison Square Garden in August 1971: "When the sun sinks in the west, die a million people of the Bangladesh / The story of Bangladesh is an ancient one again made fresh."
The occasion was as solemn as the words: along with George Harrison, Eric Clapton, and Bob Dylan, Baez was headlining the first-ever star-studded humanitarian benefit. The Concert for Bangla Desh aimed to support a soon-to-be-independent nation, then enduring a vicious armed conflict. However heartfelt that event, though, Bangladesh's plight soon lapsed into obscurity in the West. Today, those describing the events of 1971 to Western audiences must often resort to comparisons to another, similarly scaled but much later event: the 1994 Rwanda genocide.
South Asia, by contrast, views Bangladesh's founding as central to its present-day politics — and now, through Indian journalist Salil Tripathi's The Colonel Who Would Not Repent: The Bangladesh War and Its Unquiet Legacy, the story is again made fresh. Tripathi's book revisits Bangladesh's founding in comprehensive detail. Poignantly, its publication comes at a moment when the nation seems on the verge of its next existential crisis — one that includes now-frequent slayings that the author himself is speaking up against.
The basic facts of Tripathi's story are well-established. Bangladesh is a country the size of Iowa, surrounded on three sides by India and on the fourth by the Bay of Bengal. It's long been defined by its language, which boasts the first-ever Asian Nobel laureate for literature, and by its blend of secular, Hindu, and Muslim customs. The area became a province of Pakistan during India's 1947 Partition; its western masters severely subjugated it. ("Colonialism was not the word for it," journalist Anthony Mascarenhas said of Pakistan's abuse of Bengalis in his 1971 book The Rape of Bangla Desh. "A thousand statistical tables would not reflect this Bengali frustration.") By 1970, two decades of political organizing culminated in Bengalis sweeping Pakistan's national election. The government reacted to the new Bengali prime minister, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, and his party's parliamentary supermajority with desultory negotiations, and then, on March 25, 1971, a military attack. The conflict would last until Bangladesh's victory that December 16, 1971; in the 267 days between, Baez's "die a million people" arguably became a literal, perhaps even modest, tally of civilian casualties.
In recent years, authors have begun to revisit Bangladesh's history. Gary Bass's 2013 The Blood Telegram: Nixon, Kissinger and a Forgotten Genocide retraces U.S. complicity in the atrocities. Yasmin Saikia's 2011 Women, War and the Making of Bangladesh focuses on Pakistan's rapes of over 200,000 women in just nine months, and, unusually, includes Pakistani sepoys' apologies for their part in the violence. What remains less well-known is the territory where Tripathi, thankfully, spends most of The Colonel Who Would Not Repent: the experience of ordinary Bengalis. In large part, the book functions best to fill in history's rough outline with vivid depictions of wartime conditions; stories of common courage; and rare, specific recognition of innocents who died.
The best scenes come during accounts like this one, from the survivor of a massacre in a town called Chuknagar:
As Ershad Ali ran through the town…he saw Sundari. She was a child, barely six months old, clinging to her mother's breast. Her mother lay beside her, and there was blood all over her body. The mother was beautiful, and she had a sindoor in her hair, indicating she was married and a Hindu. Her eyes were wide open; she was dead. She had been feeding her daughter when the bullet got her. 'I carried the girl in my arms,' Ershad said…
He ran through the market, seeing many more dead bodies, including many Hindus he had grown up with — Kalachand, who played the drum at Hindu weddings; Bhogirath, who worked as a butcher; Digambar, who was a farmer; and Babunath Biswas, the grocer — all while he kept hearing more and more gunshots. There were many Muslims, too, among the dead –Saifuddin, the butcher; Murshid Ali, the shopkeeper who sold coal; his five children; and Inayat, the mentally disabled man with the mind of a toddler. They were all dead.
Ershad crouched low and passed the maidan and went to the home of Mandar Das, a Hindu man he knew. 'My father has just been killed,' he told Mandar. 'I am going to get the cloth to bury him. On my way I saw this girl…Her mother is a Hindu. Can you look after her?'
Mandar Das and his wife decide to adopt the girl, naming her Sundari. ("I knew she was a Hindu, that's why I had taken her to a Hindu family. I did not want her stolen from her people," Ershad Ali concludes.)
Tripathi counterbalances heart-breaking scenes like these with judicious attention to the facts of the genocide. Importantly, he acknowledges that precise counts of those killed are impossible, whether in Chuknagar (which was "a transit point," a crossroads) or countrywide. Saying as much is controversial in Bangladesh; Tripathi correctly states that many Bangladeshis irrationally insist that three million people died, and "feel that raising such a doubt undermines their suffering and belittles their identity." Yet he offers a coolheaded overview of the debate, straightforwardly concluding "We simply don't know." Just as evenhandedly, he gives credit to Pakistanis — a group who Bangladeshi protest movements have recently made the target of insults like "filthy dogs" — for a recent acknowledgment of national wrongdoing via the 2012 anthology We Owe an Apology to Bangladesh. "It was a brave thing to do," Tripathi says, "and it was commendable."
For all its careful balance of emotion and logic, The Colonel isn't entirely successful. Tripathi's decision to largely forgo a chronological structure leaves him recounting critical movements in Bangladeshi history at fairly random intervals, often jumping from before the war to after and back again. The disorganization robs the text of power. (By the time a middle-aged Sundari reunites with Ershad Ali in the final pages, the occasion feels more perfunctory than uplifting.) His often tangled management of characters and locations also make the book most comprehensible to readers already aware of Bangladesh's historical events and prominent figures. Less informed, non-South Asian readers — those for whom the story of Bangladesh truly is both ancient and fresh — will likely have a far tougher time grasping the significance of the book's more prominent people, places, and dates.
What is far more tragic is that the story is effectively neither ancient nor fresh in Bangladesh itself. Rather, it is the antecedent to the horrors unfolding now. Tripathi's book extends to the present day, and includes frank discussion of the violent riots, dysfunctional politics, and climate change vulnerability that have afflicted Bangladesh recently. The Colonel Who Would Not Repent serves, then, as a primer to the current crisis — including the extremists' slaying of foreigners, non-Muslims, and writers that has begun since the book's completion. Now pressing for international response to the slayings, Tripathi is once again working to protect the same people he champions in these pages.
M. Sophia Newman , MPH, is a journalist and a former health researcher. She has completed research on trauma at Veterans Administration hospitals in Chicago and in Bangladesh via a Fulbright grant, and has earned a certificate in global mental health via the Harvard Program on Refugee Trauma. See her writing at msophianewman.com.
A Curmudgeon on Two Wheels: The Bike Snob Book
Bill Morris August 2, 2010 | 5 books mentioned 3 4 min read
Bicycles seem to be saying more about us every day – our politics, our social class, our tribal affiliation. In a word, our values. How is it possible for a simple 2-wheeled contraption to say so much?
Bill Morris | 5 books mentioned 3 4 min read
War is Just Business: John le Carré's A Delicate Truth
Emily St. John Mandel May 14, 2013 | 5 books mentioned 5 5 min read
Seeing the Suffering Millions: On Neel Mukherjee's 'A State of Freedom'
Feroz Rather January 5, 2018 | 5 books mentioned 6 min read
Out of his own turbulent encounter with the home country after living for decades in the United Kingdom, Mukherjee forges sentences of distinct, crystalline beauty.
Feroz Rather | 5 books mentioned 6 min read
Hard-Boiled or Half-Baked?: A Review of Thomas Pynchon's Inherent Vice
Garth Risk Hallberg August 31, 2009 | 5 books mentioned 2 4 min read
Heather Curran says:
Tagore. His name is Tagore. Nice to remember George Harrison, another rock star's ill fated attempt to bring attention to the catastrophic violence that took place in the 70's, but better to remember the poet and writer who won The Nobel Prize for literature: Tagore. Amnesty International and PEN America need help and pressure from people like you and me to join and write letters, petition, donate. Let Bono et al sit this one out. Dreadful the way we remember crimes against humanity by whatever celebrity of the day chooses to adopt it. Let's keep our writers and journalists safe. Murdered, tortured, jailed world wide. It is our duty as humans to be aware and that the author of this article has to compare Bangladesh to Rwanda for people to understand, then they may as well forget it. Cambodia, South Africa, Lebanon, Sudan, Somalia, Israel, Uganda all murdering and jailing and warring and silencing activists to prevent us from knowing. Again the writer's name is Tagore.
QMS Kibria says:
Wow! Zero chill.
His first name was Rabindranath as well. Kobiguru Rabindranath Tagore. And he was joined in Bengali literature and poetry by Nazrul Islam, Mukkhopadhyay, and later the Hungry Generation, Humayun Ahmed, and many more. There is a vibrant literature in Bangladesh. No need to fret about it — only problem is many Westerners don't know the names. But they do know Harrison, et al.
Also there is a link to the Nobel Prize website there.
Ms. Newman, respect you for bringing the issue of murdered writers and bloggers to our attention and apologies for my tone, QMS, I seriously didn't see the link, but still an essay should be complete without links no? Unless it is a book mentioned (which I've never clicked, but I believe it sends you to Amazon's site. Just get a little worked up about human rights abuses which as a planet of what? several billion? we can't seem to get a handle on. Yes, I know, rape, pillage, oppression, torture, mass murder from time immemorial, yada yada yada. Chilling out now!
J Bergman says:
Joan Baez did not participate in the Concert for Bangladesh.
Well, did Joan Baez perform at the concert or not? Wikipedia says yes, but has no confirming source. George Harrison's website does not mention Joan at the concert. It seems like an oversight, or perhaps a rewriting of history to say she co-headlined the concert and then performed the song….
M. Sophia Newman says:
I looked into this via about half a dozen sources, and ultimately called Ms. Baez's manager, who says he believes she did perform.
Liz Thomson says:
I don't think she did, in fact I'm certain she didn't. Don't think Baez and Dylan appeared on the same bill (after the 1960s) until Rolling Thunder in 1975.
The Song is on her 1971 album Come from the Shadows.
Mark Spector was not her manager then so would not be certain.
My Review of The Great Fire by Shirley Hazzard
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Divorce Tool Box online sessions aim to help divorcing couples customize divorce and child custody proposals before entering the legal arena. A recent report from the U. S. Census Bureau states that children of divorce are more likely to live in poverty, but with careful prior planning provided by an expert divorce coach and educator, many burdens that children face from the effects of divorce can be greatly reduced. By contemplating current needs and anticipating future needs in advance of legalities, a divorce coach guides divorcing couples or individuals through family-focused decisions that can be difficult during such an emotional time but which will impact lives for years to come.
A recent report from the U. S. Census Bureau, based on data from the report, "Marital Events of Americans: 2009," found that children of divorce are more likely to live in poverty. As incomes are necessarily divided, available financial resources are often reduced while household expenses, including the costs of raising children, are often reduced accordingly, to detrimental effect. "As innocent emotional and financial victims of divorce, children are the ones most affected when a marriage dissolves," says Audrey Silcox, a Certified Divorce and Family Mediator. After 16 years of working with divorcing couples, including as a court-appointed mediator, she founded Divorce Tool Box, a division of Sildrey Corporation, to make her expertise available via online sessions to clients anytime, anywhere.
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"Guidance with an expert to assist parents as they contemplate divorce is a must in order to effectively—and comprehensively-- consider how a child's every day and future financial needs will be adequately met," she continues. "Working through these issues in advance of entering the legal arena can save couples many hours in legal fees, not to mention the distress of living with regrettable decisions far into the future." The online sessions can be viewed anytime and anywhere which allows the client to have flexibility of their schedule.
Silcox adds, "Divorce is stressful and draining for couples, and no matter what the ages of their children, I've seen what a difference it makes when parents take the needed time with expert insight to reduce the current and future stress that divorce brings to those children. A customized parenting plan is essential to meet not only children's every day financial needs, but also the simple pleasures in children's present and future extracurricular activities. Children can greatly benefit from this prior planning when one or both of their parents have taken these and other considerations into account when making life-altering decisions during a divorce.
Divorce Tool Box online sessions provide help for individuals or couples contemplating or currently undergoing divorce. Custody parenting plans, assets and liabilities, division of property and money matters, along with emotional support are some of the issues addressed in customized, confidential, and convenient online sessions to help people make wise decisions before entering the legal arena. This guidance can help ease a difficult process as well as save countless hours and costs in legal fees. Visit our website today at www.DivorceToolBox.com to learn more.


b) To promote life long learning in ringing both for individuals and teams and the development of support mechanisms for ringers and bands of all abilities.
Foster the recruitment and retention of ringers.
d) To support the Executive's efforts to develop strong relationships with key partners.
e) To encourage the adoption of complementary communications strategies by ringing societies.
a) To develop and manage a comprehensive historical and reference resource relating to ringers and all aspects of ringing.
b) To make these resources as widely known and appreciated as possible within the ringing community and more generally.
a) To maintain and publish for the Council authoritative reference standards for change ringing.
b) To ensure that authoritative records and analysis of published methods, published compositions and significant tower & handbell peals are available.
c) Where requested to provide guidance on methods, compositions and aspects of ringing theory.
d) To promote innovation and interest in the theory of ringing and the use of technology to support ringing.
support the Council's work and the objectives of its other Workgroups and Stewards.
to support individual ringers and ringing societies where this will deliver significant benefits to the ringing community.
What is the role of the workgroup?
We will also work in conjunction with the other workgroups to provide communications and marketing support in delivery of the Council's strategic objectives.
We will do this by building on the activity undertaken by the former Public Relations and Publications committees.
Who is in the workgroup?
The workgroup has members of the existing committees as well as some new recruits and in total there are around 20 people involved, all bringing different skills and experience and lots of ideas!
The priority for the workgroup since Lancaster has been to maintain activity that was already in progress such as the Ringing Remembers campaign, social media activity and distribution of publications. In addition, the members of the workgroup have been taking stock of the assets and information in place already.
The workgroup have started to establish a strategy for internal and external facing communications, exploring existing and new communications channels and opportunities for future campaigns and promotional activity. Initial investigations have taken place for funding options to support our activity.
The workgroup will operate in an agile way, leveraging technology to facilitate our activity in addition to face-to-face meetings as required.
Following a meeting with the Executive in early July, the communications strategy and plan will be finalised. We aim to quickly develop a plan of how we will support the activity across the other workgroups where required. One of the short term goals will be the definition of a brand for the Central Council and bell ringing. We are also reviewing the role of the Council PR Officer and how this can be evolved to support the work of the Council.
By mid-July the workgroup will have prioritised activity and assigned owners for delivery of initiatives. It is our intention that smaller focus groups may take ownership for smaller discrete activities.
There is plenty of work to be done and whilst we are a fairly large workgroup, we would always welcome new members and new ideas – if you want to be involved, don't hesitate to get in touch!
Resources – To maintain and develop the resource of historical information and artefacts relating to ringing, ringers and bells.
Accessibility – To make that resource easily available to all.
Inclusiveness – To allow as many people as possible to take an interest in and benefit from the study of the history of ringing, ringers and bells.
In the beginning, the emphasis is on "Business as Usual" (BAU) tasks and to do these, the workgroup will consist of a number of teams. For convenience at this stage we can call them "Library," "Biographies," "Rolls of Honour," "Peal Records" and "Ringing Machines." That this workgroup includes three Stewards, with their own resonsibilities and aims, is an indication that BAU is to be a key starting point.
The workgroup currently comprises about 12 members, drawn from the old committees and outside. This will be added to as activity levels increase.
While BAU tasks are being carried out and research and writing is being done, workgroup members are asked to consider wider issues. Active researchers are well placed to identify common concerns and opportunities. Issues that a central ringing organisation should work on will be added to a list of projects. Between us we will prioritise and allocate / volunteer. The list of projects and their status will be readily available on the Central Council web site. Anyone can comment on them and, more importantly, anyone can volunteer. The key factors are going to be whether an activity is considered valuable or not and if anyone is prepared to do it.
National Bell museum – similar in scale to Germany, Saundby has bell frames, need to watch Loughborough.
Everyone has a place in History. What will yours be?
The Stewardship & Management Workgroup is one of the five workgroups proposed for the reformed Central Council. The group is concerned broadly with all aspects bells and towers (ie the hardware), how bells are installed, maintained and used for ringing. It also includes important aspects of organising and managing towers and ringers. Increasingly, ringers have a duty to establish good practices and comply with statutory responsibilities associated with safety, insurance, data protection. We also need to maintain good relationships with our churches and other owners of the bells that we ring, as well as neighbours and other church users.
In broad terms, the group encompasses the scope of four existing Council Committees – Towers and Belfries, Bell Restoration, Redundant Bells, and Tower Stewardship. Clearly, the new workgroup does not operate in isolation and we are already linking with the other workgroups, as well as the Council Executive. For example, in the training of ringers and leaders of ringing (Volunteer and Leadership Development Workgroup), and communicating with ringers and other stakeholders (Communications and Marketing Workgroup).
Since the end of 2017, we have invited ringers to join the group, not just members of Council or members of the previous committees. We have met physically, as well as getting to know each other and our activities by phone / Skype. Starting to define and plan how the group will operate has been the focus – the workgroups are key to the reformed Council for the short and longer term. Initially, it is our intention that we will continue the important work that the committees have been undertaking and build further on that. Here I must acknowledge the work that they have done and thank all those who have been involved, some for many years. Many of these people are active participants in the workgroup and we intend to involve more people so that we share the workload and ensure succession.
The scope of the workgroup is wider than any former committee so it is impractical to operate as a single entity. We will set out our activities and define specific projects then work on these systematically. We will meet physically occasionally, but also work extensively using on-line systems, emails, telecalls and videolinks. This also saves travel and helps us involve fellow ringers internationally.
Workgroup membership is open to anyone who may be interested in aspects of our work. This could be a specific short project or longer term programme of work. We know that there is considerable expertise in Guilds / Associations, and may be duplicating each other. We therefore welcome people to make themselves known to us if they have specific expertise, experience, or professional knowledge that they may be willing to contribute on an occasional basis, but without being a full member of the workgroup.
If you have any questions or are interested in joining the group, then let me know.
The Technical & Taxonomy Workgroup is part of the new organisational structure of the Central Council established following its AGM in May 2018. Its role is to promote innovation and provide guidance on methods, compositions and aspects of ringing theory; maintain and publish authoritative reference standards for change ringing; and provide technical services to the Council and ringers generally. This encompasses the activities that were formerly undertaken by the Methods Committee, the Compositions Committee, the ICT Committee and the Dove Stewards. It will also be responsible for the ongoing maintenance of the Framework for Method Ringing once adopted by the Council.
The work of the Peal Records Committee, originally proposed for inclusion in this workgroup by the CRAG report, has been included in the History & Archive workgroup. Technology that is related to ringing hardware, such as bell and simulator infrastructure will be addressed by the Management & Stewardship workgroup.
The Council's official methods collections, for many years maintained on behalf of the Methods Committee by Tony Smith, are now maintained by the workgroup using Composition Library (http://complib.org) – a website database that is directly accessible to ringers, who can quickly search for methods using a wide selection of criteria; displaying the blue line, properties and related methods. First and long length performances in each method are listed and linked directly to BellBoard where data is available. Compositions – be they touches, quarter or peal lengths can also be found on the site for most methods. New methods can be added privately to obtain the correct classification and title, and warnings are given if there are potential naming conflicts. In addition, the latest collections can now be downloaded directly from Central Council web pages (http://methods.cccbr.org.uk) and are now provided in Microsiril format as well as Text and XML formats.
The workgroup's activities are being planned as a series of projects and services each supported by its own team of volunteers. Roles are being identified for each team and volunteers will be recruited specifically for the skills and enthusiasm needed to fill them, and just for the period required, rather than seeking general volunteers for the workgroup without specific roles in mind. This will be better for individuals and more efficient and effective for the Council. As new teams are formed, roles will be publicised to enable anyone interested to apply. Some teams, such as the Dove Stewards, are already aligned to this style of organisation, so minimal change is anticipated.
The Council's website and email systems are being updated in support of the recent organisational changes and the needs of the new Executive and workgroups.
The team established to draft the Framework for Method Ringing that will replace the Council's Decisions on peal ringing and methods is currently processing feedback from the ongoing consultation.
The team of Dove Stewards is continuing its project to migrate the Dove database to a new system that will provide long term assurance for the data and allow a larger team to maintain the data directly.
a project to provide assurance that, for all digital resources that are valuable to the ringing community (whether provided directly by the Council or third parties), appropriate measures are in place to protect data and software, ensure continuity of service, and provide succession for the future.
We are also developing ideas to adapt to the changing needs of conductors and composers in a digital world, for example to find the composition ideally suited to a band from the huge number now available, to help composers avoid "reinventing the wheel", and to support those conductors who want to ring an observation bell that isn't a heavy tenor. In addition, we will endorse initiatives that encourage a wider interest in methods, such as Project Pickled Egg.
The Council through its Executive and other workgroups will also have new initiatives to pursue such as a direct membership channel. The workgroup will support the selection of systems and provide design and development services if needed.
The Technical and Taxonomy workgroup plans to be proactive and creative in providing and improving technical services for ringing and is happy to collaborate with other individuals, workgroups and organisations to achieve this. If you have any ideas for new services or projects you believe would be useful, and particularly if you think you have the skills and enthusiasm to help deliver them, please get in touch with the workgroup leader, Graham John.
What is the Volunteering & Leadership Development Workgroup, its role and mission?
The Volunteering & Leadership Development Workgroup (V & L) is one of the five workgroups operating in the reformed Central Council (CC). The group is concerned broadly with people development and our mission is: To mobilise bell ringers to create and develop for themselves the teams, knowledge, resources and skills to enable ringing to flourish.
The group is not an amalgamation of previous Council Committees. Some earlier work from Education and Ringing Centres may continue if people join the group to carry things on. The group aims to develop new work and projects in areas that might not have come under any previous CC Committee. So we are looking at some fresh starts.
We existed in shadow form until May. The V&L liaison group (leaders & executive sponsors) was however, closely involved in the work following recruitment via Ringing Remembers (RR). For example V & L got the RR project going in the very early days before a more formal leader and team was appointed, and David Smith wrote the first database. This got the mutual understanding between V & L and the shadow executive off to a flying start.
In the short term we are seeking volunteers to work in V&L . Please do: you can make a difference. To create a practical programme, the Workgroup will assess the offers of help that are made before confirming what can be implemented. We have already had discussions with some very talented people who, after confirming their roles, will operate either singly or in teams on a number of projects. More are certainly needed. Some helpers may never formally join the workgroup but will help on a particular project.
The workgroup's medium term activities will be planned as a series of projects and services each supported by its own team of volunteers. We will set up teams with roles and seek volunteers with the skills and enthusiasm needed. Some will be just for a period required. We are not planning to seek general volunteers without specific roles. As new teams are formed, we may publicise as necessary to anyone interested.
We will continue to see the Education Column articles from David Smith in the Ringing World – series 4 is currently being developed. Also we are promoting a series of interviews with inspiring ringing leaders. Elva Ainsworth has done all the interviews so far, for publication in The Ringing World. The series will be part of a leadership theme which, as mentioned below, is a key priority for this group.
The new approach started last year when members of the Education Committee and the shadow V & L workgroup arranged for the Central Council 'Simulator Day' to be held at the same weekend as the ART AGM/conference in Royston in March. This event showed the cooperation between ART and CC that is so crucial. Using Roger Booth's creative ideas, we put together a group of non CCCBR experts who are now taking forward a number of related events and projects. We were working with ART on planning and social media on this event.
Retention as part of recruitment.
We intend to encourage and develop services in the area of Youth (younger ringers and university societies) for example to provide support to university societies.
We want to see an expansion in services to develop Leadership: this means training and promotion, in conjunction with ART. The people who join us and other groups we cooperate with will largely determine whether that is in the form of expanded numbers of workshops, publications, blogs, networking discussions, or articles in the Ringing World – or a combination of these.
Given the overall need to recruit and retain a very large number of ringers we seek to encourage and promote new ideas. Many consider that this may mean different structures that make it easier for new ringers to feel part of something.
We have to make sure we get good cooperation – among the new Workgroups and with others that are doing relevant work.
We need strategic partnership with ART because they are a pre-eminent group in our area of "people development". We can't do this work without them. We don't want to duplicate what they do – for example Learning the Ropes is up and working and we do not want to create a rival system. We will work in cooperation to cover any gaps. We are not trying to do everything.
Let's take Recruitment & Retention as an example of cooperation with other workgroups. Communications & Marketing has an explicit aim to : Foster the recruitment and retention of ringers. That may mean to publicise, advise on PR campaigns etc. Meanwhile Volunteering & Leadership Development 's role is implementation (eg follow up on individuals, help and advice on interpersonal and softer skills, leadership, motivation, balancing needs in a band etc). So workgroups will cooperate to attain a common goal, without rigid lines of demarcation.
We are not going to be a committee. Our style is going to be about creativity, giving people space and sharing excellence among practitioners. We should "notice and encourage". This is not a "top down" movement. The Workgroup are looking for people to run things in a devolved manner.
We will not have many large group meetings. Communication in the group is likely to be largely by email, similar e-systems and phone / video calls.
This group is aiming partly to provide, but mainly promote new services. We intend to encourage ringers to find and arrange the right structures and to promote people development to allow ringing to flourish. We are not experts but do want talented practitioners to join. We are not going to interfere but would like to draw attention to things that people find are making a difference. We do not need to be doing everything from the group, but by working with others we can be most effective.
Ideas for new services or projects are welcome. We would love to hear from you if think you have the skills and time to help deliver them.