text:
Q: Функция, принимающая строку и разворачивающая сокращения с использованием {} Как должен выглядеть алгоритм для раскрытия сокращений строки с фигурными скобками?
Нужно написать функцию, принимающую строку и разворачивающую
сокращения с использованием {}, конструкции могут вкладываться на любую глубину.
Например, строка
ab{cde{fg,h}xy,st{uv,zx}d}wer

разворачивается в
abcdefgxywer,abcdehxywer,abstuvdwer,abstzxdwer

Пытаюсь придумать алгоритм для развертывания с 2+ глубиной.
Но пока реализовал только для строки с 0 глубиной.
def raz(myStr):
    r = myStr.split("{")
    r1 = r[1].split("}")
    r2 = r1[0].split(",")
    cOf = 0
    str = ""
    for y in myStr:
        if y == ",":
            cOf += 1
    for i in range(cOf + 1):
        str += r[0]
        str += r2[i]
        str += r1[1]
        str += " "
    res = str.split(" ")
    for j in range(cOf + 1):
        print(res[j])

inStr = "cde{fg,h}xy"
raz(inStr)

A: Можно рассмотреть строку
ab{cde{fg,h}xy,st{uv,zx}d}wer

как дерево, при этом альтернативы становятся узлами на одном уровне. Для примера в вопросе можно построить следующее дерево:

Отсюда видно, что построение всех вариантов — это просто обход в глубину и складывание значения узлов.

Пример простой реализации построения дерева можно увидеть ниже.
В примере используются две функции:

*

*parse - которая возвращает узел со значением и ссылкой на дочерний узел

*parseGroup - которая возвращает список узлов имеющих один родительский узел

Для вывода самих строк используется функция dfs обходящая дерево в глубину попутно накапливая строки.

var str = 'ab{cde{fg,h}xy,st{uv,zx}d}wer';
var str2 = 'cde{fg,h}xy';

function parse(arr, node = {
  val: ''
}) {
  var curNode = node;
  while (arr.length) {
    var cur = arr.shift();
    switch (cur) {
      case '{':
        curNode.child = parseGroup(arr);
        break;
      case '}':
        arr.unshift(cur);
      case ',':
        return node;
        break;
      default:
        curNode.child = {
          val: cur
        };
        break;
    }
    curNode = curNode.child;
  }
  return node;
}

function parseGroup(arr) {
  var node = {
    nodes: []
  };
  while (arr.length) {
    var cur = arr.shift();
    switch (cur) {
      case '{':
        node.nodes.push(parseGroup(arr));
        break;
      case '}':
        return node;
      case ',':
        break;
      default:
        node.nodes.push(parse(arr, {
          val: cur
        }));
        break;
    }
  }
  return node;
}

function dfs(node) {
  if (node.nodes) {
    var c = dfs(node.child);
    return node.nodes.map(dfs).flatMap(s => s).map(s => c.map(ss => s + ss)).flatMap(s => s);
  }
  if (node.child)
    return dfs(node.child).map(s => node.val + s);

  return [node.val];
}

var tree = parse(str.split(/([{},])/));
console.log(tree);
console.log(dfs(tree));
console.log(dfs(parse(str2.split(/([{},])/))));
.as-console-wrapper {
  max-height: 100% !important;
}

A: Я написал 2 функции, которые вызывают друг друга рекурсивно:

// функция разбивает строку по { и } на нулевом уровне
// блок вне скобок просто дописывается к результату
// блок внутри скобок передается в split
function unpack(s) {
  // изначально начинаем с одной строки
  let list = [ "" ];
  // счетчик уровней вложенности
  let level = 0;
  // текущий блок
  let block = "";
  for (let i = 0; i < s.length; ++i) {
    // погружаемся на уровень выше
    if (s[i] == '{' && level++ == 0) {
      // сюда попадем если были на нулевом уровне
      // дописываем к каждой строке накопленный блок
      // если было list=[a, b] и block=c
      // то станет list=[ac, bc]
      list = list.map(w => w + block);
      // начинаем собирать следующий блок
      block = "";
    }
    // всплываем на уровень вверх
    else if (s[i] == '}' && --level == 0) {
      // сюда попадем если всплыли на нулевой уровень
      // разбиваем строку
      let parts = split(block);
      // вот здесь количество результатов увеличится
      // если было list=[a, b] и parts=[c, d]
      // то станет list=[ac, ad, bc, bd]
      list = list.flatMap(w => parts.map(p => w + p));
      // начинаем собирать следующий блок
      block = "";
    }
    // иначе просто добавляем текущий символ к текущему блоку
    // все { } на ненулевом уровне будут здесь же
    else block += s[i];
  }
  // дописываем к каждой строке самый последний блок
  list = list.map(w => w + block);
  return list;
}

// функция разбивает строку по запятой на нулевом уровне
// и для каждой части вызывает unpack
// все части собираются в один список
function split(s) {
  // изначально начинаем с пустого списка
  let list = [];
  // счетчик уровней вложенности
  let level = 0;
  // текущий блок
  let block = "";
  for (let i = 0; i < s.length; ++i) {
    // погружаемся на уровень глубже
    if (s[i] == '{') ++level;
    // всплываем на уровень вверх
    else if (s[i] == '}') --level;

    // нас интересуют только запятые на нулевом уровне
    if (s[i] == ',' && level == 0) {
        // распаковываем накопленный блок
        // т.е. все что вернет unpack будет добавлено в список
        list.push(...unpack(block));
        // начинаем собирать следующий блок
        block = "";
    }
    // иначе просто добавляем текущий символ к текущему блоку
    // все { } и запятые на ненулевом уровне будут здесь же
    else block += s[i];
  }
  // распаковываем самый последний блок
  list.push(...unpack(block));
  return list;
}

let s = "ab{cde{fg,h}xy,st{uv,zx}d}wer";
console.log(unpack(s).join(" "));

console.log(unpack("{1,2,3}").join(" "));
console.log(unpack("12{3,{4,5}6}{7,{8,9}0}").join(" "));
console.log(unpack("1{2,3}4{5,6}7").join(" "));

A: Альтернативным вариантом решения может стать простой replace, который будет брать внутренние скобки со словами по краям, например cde{fg,h}xy и раскрывать их "cdefgxy,cdehxy"
Далее повторять этот процесс в цикле, пока в строке не уберутся все фигурные скобки.
Для поиска нужного шаблона можно воспользоваться следующим регулярным выражением:
/(\w+)?{([^{}]+)}(\w+)?/g

При совпадении в первую группу попадет текст слева от скобки, в третью - справа, а во вторую группу попадет перечисление вариантов.
В обработчике замен, следует разбить вторую группу по , с помощью метода split, и добавить к каждой получившейся части значения из первой и третьей группы, например с помощью метода map
Ограничить количество замен можно с помощью метода test, который вернет false если в строке не будет найдено ни одного совпадения.
Пример:

var str = 'ab{cde{fg,h}xy,st{uv,zx}d}wer';
var str2 = 'cde{fg,h}xy';

function unpack(str){
  while(/(\w+)?{([^{}]+)}(\w+)?/.test(str)){
    str = str.replace(/(\w+)?{([^{}]+)}(\w+)?/g, ($0,$1,$2,$3)=>$2.split(',').map(s=>($1||'')+s+($3||'')));
  }
  return str;
}

console.log(unpack(str));
console.log(unpack(str2));
console.log(unpack('{1,2}{3,4}'));

Как заметили в комментариях данное решение не подходит для некоторых специальных случаев, в частности присутствия нескольких вариантов последовательно, например, для строки '{1,2}{3,4}' вернется '1,23,4' . Однако его можно расширить добавив возможность отслеживать такие ситуации и применять к ним специальную замену, например:

var str = 'ab{cde{fg,h}xy,st{uv,zx}d}wer';
var str2 = 'cde{fg,h}xy';
var str3 = '1{2,3}4{5,6}7';
var str4 = '{1,2}{3,4}{5,6}';
var str5 = 'cd e{fg,h}xy';
var str6 = '{1,2}';

function unpack(str) {
  while (str.includes('{')) {
    var flag = false;
    str = str.replace(/([^,{}]+)?{([^{}]+)}([^,{}]+)?/g, function($0, $1, $2, $3, startIndex, fullStr) {
      var replacement = $2.split(',').map(s => ($1 || '') + s + ($3 || ''));
      flag = flag || fullStr[startIndex + $0.length] == '{';
      return flag ? '{' + replacement + '}' : replacement;
    }).replace(/{([^{}]+)}{([^{}]+)}/, ($0, $1, $2, startIndex, fullStr) => {
      var a = $1.split(',');
      var b = $2.split(',');
      if (fullStr[startIndex + $0.length] == '{')
        return '{' + a.map(s => b.map(ss => s + ss)).flatMap(s => s) + '}';
      else
        return a.map(s => b.map(ss => s + ss)).flatMap(s => s);
    });
  }
  return str;
}

console.log(unpack(str));
console.log(unpack(str2));
console.log(unpack(str3));
console.log(unpack(str4));
console.log(unpack(str5));
console.log(unpack(str6));

A: Не судите строго мою попытку написания алгоритма.
Минус - решает только правильные входные данные (думаю как исправить).
Ещё пытаюсь переписать без рекурсии.
Буду рад объективным советам и замечаниям.
class Graph():
    def __init__(self):
        self.graph = {};
        self.all_path_list = [];

    def add_node(self, node, child):
        if ( node not in self.graph ):
            self.graph[node] = [];
        if ( child not in self.graph ):
            self.graph[child] = [];

        self.graph[node].append(child);

    def echo(self, init_node, end_node):
        self.find_all_path(init_node, end_node, '');

        return ','.join(self.all_path_list);

    def find_all_path(self, cur_node, end_node, path):
        path += cur_node;

        if ( cur_node == end_node ):
            self.all_path_list.append(path);
            return;

        if ( not self.graph[cur_node] ):
            return;

        for node in self.graph[cur_node]:
            self.find_all_path(node, end_node, path);

graph = Graph();

#        00000000001111111111222222222
#        01234567890123456789012345678
stash = 'ab{cde{fg,h}xy,st{uv,zx}d}wer';

sep = ['{', ',', '}'];
init_node = end_node = None;
parents = {};

def deploy(i = 0, node = None, deep = 0):
    global stash, sep, init_node, end_node, parents;

    parent, node = node, '';
    back = False;

    while ( i < len(stash) ):
        ch = stash[i];

        if ( ch not in sep ):
            node += ch;
            i += 1;
            continue;

        elif ( ch == sep[0] ):
            if ( init_node is None ):
                init_node = node;

            if back:
                for item in parents[deep + 1]:
                    graph.add_node(item, node);
                del parents[deep + 1];
            elif ( parent is not None ):
                graph.add_node(parent, node);

            i, parents[deep + 1] = deploy(i + 1, node, deep + 1);

            back = True;
            node = '';

        elif ( ch == sep[1] ):
            if ( init_node is None ):
                init_node = node;

            if back:
                for item in parents[deep + 1]:
                    graph.add_node(item, node);
                del parents[deep + 1];
            else:
                graph.add_node(parent, node);

            parents[deep] = [];
            parents[deep].append(node);

            node = '';
            i += 1;
            continue;

        elif ( ch == sep[2] ):
            if back:
                for item in parents[deep + 1]:
                    graph.add_node(item, node);
            else:
                graph.add_node(parent, node);

            parents[deep].append(node);

            return i + 1, parents[deep];

    end_node = node;
    for item in parents[deep + 1]:
        graph.add_node(item, node);

deploy();

out_str = graph.echo(init_node, end_node);
print(out_str);  #  abcdefgxywer,abcdehxywer,abstuvdwer,abstzxdwer


In support of the Munich retreat now taking place without Rinpoche, let us all be together for a worldwide Guru Yoga practice and if possible integrating the Vajra Dances.
We connect as we always do during a webcast retreat with Rinpoche, who explained about the importance of being together in the state of contemplation for the benefit of evolution and world peace. It is also the supreme practice to dedicate for the health and well-being of Rinpoche if we, the Sangha, unite in the essence of the teaching and continue in this presence and awareness reflected in all our activities.
In Munich five Mandalas can be activated through the practice. Please connect on your local Mandalas at the same time or practice Guruyoga, integrating by singing the Song of the Vajra as many times as you wish, combining as well with the Vajra Dance of Space of the 12 A.


We invite all prospective families to visit The Covenant School. It would be our pleasure to introduce you to our school and tell you how we engage the minds of our students as well as their hearts.
Apply Online. Students applying for PreSchool—6th grade are required to fill out an application and submit to their current teacher a teacher recommendation form. Students applying to grades 1-6 should also submit a school transcript request to the student's previous school. The teacher recommendation and transcript request forms are available through our online application.
Upon submission of your application, Christy Johnson will contact you to schedule an interview with Dr. Katherine Koonce, and if needed, an evaluation of your child. Testing is administered for students applying to Kindergarten—6th grade.
For priority consideration, we encourage you to submit applications by December 31st. Admission decisions are mailed on the first Friday in March.


text:
Carver Watson.
Vernon Vipers land Watson in trade
Veteran defenceman joins BCHL team
Aug. 15, 2018 11:35 a.m.
The Vernon Vipers have obtained the playing rights to 20-year-old Carver Watson from the Chilliwack Chiefs in exchange for 17-year-old Will Dow-Kenny in a B.C. Hockey League swap of defencemen.
Watson, an Applewood, Wis. product, compiled three goals and 15 points with the Green Bay Gamblers of the USHL last year after producing eight goals and 25 points with the with the Chiefs, as part of a team that went to the Fred Page Cup finals and the Western Canada Cup.
Watson is also the younger brother of former Viper d-man Cooper Watson, who is committed to Michigan Tech Huskies for next season.
"When you get an opportunity to add an offensive defenceman the calibre of Carver to bolster your blueline, you take it," said Viper head coach Mark Ferner. " He's a very talented, puck-moving defenceman who has a ton of Junior A experience." In dealing away Will Dow-Kenny, Ferner says, "Without question, this was a difficult decision. Will Dow-Kenny will be a great player in this league."
VERNON VIPERS ADD TWO NCAA-BOUND PLAYERS
The 5-foot-11, 170-pounder is the second-youngest of four brothers; his two older brothers, Cliff and Cooper, have played multiple USHL seasons. The oldest brother, Cliff, 22, is a junior D and co-captain for the Huskies that played 120 games with the Sioux City Musketeers from 2011-13. Cliff was drafted by the San Jose Sharks in the sixth round of the 2012 NHL Entry Draft.
Dow-Kenny is a 6-foot, 170-pounder out of Abbotsford. He rang up eight goals and 30 points in 34 Major Midget games with the Fraser Valley Thunderbirds last season.
sports@vernonmorningstar.com
Canadian soccer captain Christine Sinclair continues to lead fight against MS
Dinos high on Vernon Panthers

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


text:
His mother was a Russian, a schoolteacher in Saransk, when his father met her before the start of World War One. The town and garrison were in the Penza, four hundred miles southeast of Moscow. Antanas Staskevicius, a Lithuanian, was an officer in the Russian Imperial Army.
Saransk later became the capital city of the Republic of Soviet Monrovia, but long before that happened Antanas Staskevicius had returned to Lithuania.
Saransk was founded as a fortress, on the left bank of the river Isar, at the crossroads of Moscow and the Crimea. Before First World War its commercial life revolved around leather, meat, and honey. After the war its factories were closed for more than ten years when there weren't any available fuels or raw materials
"My father was trained as an officer and sent to serve there in the Czar's army with an infantry regiment," said Vytas Staskevicius. "It was a hard post for him, because back then they used to say drinkers go to the navy and dimwits to the infantry."
The Imperial Russian Army had more than a million men, most of them conscripted, most of them peasants. There were a quarter million Cossacks, too. Only the Cossacks knew what they were doing.
"He courted my mother, Antonina, and they got married. They had my older sister, Eugenia, in 1917. We always called her by the name of Genute. My sister Gaile was born the next year."
Vytas was born six years later, in 1924, in Siauliai. "My father named me after King Vytautas the Great." His mother called him Vytas. His sisters called him many things, including the little prince.
Siauliai is home to the Hill of Crosses, a hill where there had once been a fort less than ten miles from the town. It is covered with tens of thousands of crosses, crucifixes, and statues. It was after Czarist forces crushed the November Uprising of 1831 when the first crosses appeared.
By 1918 Lithuania had been missing from the map for more than one hundred years, having been disappeared after the Partition of Poland. Since that time it had been under the thumb of the Russian Empire. In late 1919 , when Russia was being consumed by its Bolshevik revolution, Antanas Staskevicius went home to newly independent Lithuania.
"Lithuania didn't have many officers when they formed their own army," said Vytas Staskevicius. "Most of them were men who had been conscripted into the Imperial Army before the war. My father fought in the post-war battles around Klaipeda and after that he served in the secret service in Kaunas, which was the capital."
Lithuania declared independence in February 1918 and for almost three years fought Soviets, West Russians, and Poles for their land. Finally, in 1920 they formed their own government, although they later lost Vilnius to the Poles, with whom they remained officially at war with little warfare until the start of World War Two.
"After the fighting my father got some land for serving his country, near Siauliai. We lived on a farm."
During World War One most of Siauliai's buildings were destroyed and the city center was obliterated. Since its founding in the 13th century Siauliai had burned down seven times, had been struck by plague seven times, and World War Two was the seventh conflict that wrecked the town.
"We lived in Siauliai for several years, but then my father became the governor of the Panevezys district and we moved to the city there."
Panevezys, a royal town founded in the early 16th century, is on the plain of the Nevezis River, about fifty miles east of Siauliai. During the interwar years Lithuania was divided into 24 districts and each district had its own governor.
"My father was the governor of Panevezys until 1938."
Vytas went to grade school and high school in Panevezys, but then his father was transferred to Zerasai, a place that was a summer resort. In 1834 Zerasai had burned down and been rebuilt. Two years later it was renamed Novoalexandrovsk, in honor of Czar Alexander's son, but after the Great War the name was expunged.
"When my father became the governor of Zerasai, my mother didn't want to move there, since it was more than seventy-five miles east of where we lived, so I stayed with her. But I didn't get along with the students at the high school there. It was a strict school and everyone had to dress nice. On my first day of classes I was dressed up too nice, like I was going to a party, with a tie and everything, and everybody laughed at me. Where are you from, they all said. I didn't make any friends there."
He told everyone, "I'm going to Zerasai." He moved there in 1939 and lived with his father.
"We always studied a second language in school, and since my mother was Russian, studying it was easy for me. But when I got to Zerasai I found out they only had English as a second language, no Russian. My father had to hire a tutor to help me."
All during the 1930s the world had been changing fast. In 1940 the Lithuanian world completely changed. Father and son moved back to Siauliai.
"The Soviets came in 1940. All the high officials were let go and the Russians selected new people who they wanted to run the country. They always said they didn't run the country themselves, we Lithuanians did, but it was the Lithuanian Communists who were in charge, so it was actually the Russians."
The Staskevicius family went to their farm, while renting a house in Siauliai, dividing their time between town and country.
"It was only a few miles from our farmhouse to town. I used to walk or bicycle to Siauliai. But the mood was bad. Everybody thought something terrible was going to happen."
The Russian annexation of Lithuania was completed by the late summer of 1940. Businesses were nationalized and collectivization of land began. As the Russian presence expanded the family discussed leaving the Baltics.
"Why don't we go to Germany?" asked his mother Antonina.
"We had a chance to leave the country then and go somewhere else. My mother wanted to go. We talked about it often, about going to Germany."
But his father didn't want to leave Lithuania.
"I have never done anything wrong that they would put me in jail," he told his family. "I have always good to the people. They aren't going to put me in jail."
In the fall of 1940 a passing troop of Soviet infantry commandeered their farm for several days.
"They didn't do anything bad, or mistreat us, but they hadn't washed in months. They stunk bad. and they rolled their cheap tobacco in newspaper. They smoked all the time. It took a week to air out the house."
The family stayed on their farm through the winter. Then, as the mass arrests and deportations of almost 2-,000 Lithuanian policemen and politicians, dissidents, and Catholics began in June 1941, Antanas Staskevicius was picked up by NKVD plainclothesmen.
"He was gardening in our yard, wearing a shirt, old pants, and slippers when they drove up, a carload of Russians, and stopped, saying there was something wrong with their engine. I'll help you out, my father said. He walked over to the car with them and never came back. They shoved him into their car and drove him to jail."
Vytas was in school in Siauliai taking his final exams that morning.
"My mother called the school and told me my father had been taken. I ran out of class and went home right away on my bike."
His mother packed clothes, socks and shoes, and soap for her husband. She went to see him the next day.
"The man who was running the jail was a Jewish fellow. He had grown up with us and was a friend of our family, but when my mother asked him to help us he said the times have changed."
There was a new order.
"He was a Communist and had been in and out of jail because of his political activities. He was always in trouble. My father usually let him go after a few days, telling him to not get involved in politics anymore. Just be a nice boy, he would tell him, but then the next thing we knew he would be in jail again. He wouldn't help my father when he was arrested. Everything's different now, he said. Times have changed. Everybody is looking out for themselves, only themselves."
The man who had once commanded the local police stayed in his jail cell.
"They didn't let my mother talk to my father. We went to the jail several times, but they never let us see him. We never saw him again."
Antanas Staskevicius was taken to Naujoji Vilnia and loaded onto a boxcar. The train left Lithuania on June 19, 1941. Four days later, between June 23 and 27, at the Battle of Raseiniai, the 4th Panzer Group, part of the first phase of Operation Barbarossa, the German invasion of Russia, finished the almost complete destruction of Russian armored forces in Lithuania.
Within a week Nazi Germany seized Lithuania.
His father was transported to Russia's far east to a labor camp near Krasnojarsk in Siberia. He worked logging in the thick forests and starved to death in the winter of 1942. Anton Chekhov, a noted Russian short story writer, once wrote that Krasnojarsk was the most beautiful city in Siberia.
"The morning after my father was arrested I drove our horse and wagon to school to finish my exams. I had to deliver milk to my teacher's family, too. But when I stopped at his house, he ran out with his family and said, help take us to the railroad station. I said OK and they all got into my wagon, he and his wife and their two children. I took them to the station. After that day I never saw them again or ever found out what happened to them.
"The next day one of our neighbors told me the Russians had come to the teacher's house that same afternoon looking for him. Teachers, lawyers, anybody from an educated family, they were worried about all of them. They were afraid high-class people were against them. "
When Russian NKVD men began mass arrests of Lithuanians, Soviet officials seized their property, and there was widespread looting by Lithuanians among themselves. It was every man for himself, unless you were a Red.
"If you were a Communist then you were all right. The father of one of my friends was a metal worker. He didn't even know how to read, but the Russians made him the mayor of Siauliai because he was a Communist."
His mother, sister Genute, and Vytas stayed on the farm after his father's arrest. His sister Gaile was then living in Vilnius. When the mass arrests intensified they became alarmed.
"We were determined on leaving the farm. It was dangerous. We went into the forest. But then my mother told me to go to Vilnius and tell Gaile our father had been arrested. She wanted Gaile to know to be very careful. I took a train to Vilnius, but as soon as I got there I got a phone call saying my mother had been arrested.
"When I got back to Siauliai I was told she was being deported. Somebody probably complained and informed on her. We had land, 160 acres, so we were considered capitalists. We weren't rich, but we weren't poor, either. There was no real reason that I ever found out about for why they took her. I went to the train station, but didn't see her anywhere. She was sent to a prison camp."
His mother was released from the Gulag in 1956, after Stalin's death, but not allowed to return to her home in Siauliai.
"My God, you've gotten older," was the first thing Antonina said when she saw her son Vytas again in 1979, thirty-eight years after being transported to Siberia.
After his mother's arrest and exile Vytas, not yet 17-years-old, left Siauliai and moved to Vilnius, staying with his sister Gaile and her husband. At the time almost everyone living in Vilnius was either Polish or Jewish. Lithuanians in the former capital city of Vilnius were strangers in their own land.
"The day the Russians left and before the Germans came, everybody rushed to the food warehouses and broke into them. It wasn't that we were robbing them, but everybody was doing it, since there was no food. Gaile and I went, too. We filled up our bags with bread and pork, all kinds of food, and took everything home. When the Germans arrived they put a stop to it."
He stayed in Vilnius for several months, but then decided to go home before the end of summer. The family farm had to be cared for, but, first, he had to get a travel permit.
"I couldn't get in to see a single German to apply for a permit, but finally I talked to someone who had known my father, and got an appointment. The officer told me they weren't issuing any more and to come back, but after we talked about my father a little, he said all right, and wrote one out for me."
He took a train back to Siauliai and walked home, but when he got there he discovered a company of Wehrmacht had taken over the farm.
"They were there about three weeks, more than seventy of them. I couldn't even get into our house since the officers had taken it over. But those Germans were good men. They didn't do our farm any harm. They had their own quarters and their own mess. I made friends with some of them. We drank wine together at night."
His father's business practice had been to have a foreman run the farm. The foreman hired three men and three women every spring. Although the farm had chickens and pigs, and horses to do the heavy work, it was mostly a dairy farm with more than twenty cows.
"It was a model farm," said Vytas. "Every summer students from the agricultural academy would tour our farm. When I came back, my sister Genute was there, but she wasn't interested, so she didn't do any work.
"I started taking care of things, even though I didn't know anything, nothing. I knew the cows had to be milked and the milk had to go to the dairy. But about growing crops, and the fields, I didn't know anything.
"But I worked as though I knew what I was doing."
That fall he sent his farmhands out to till the ground in a nearby field. When his nearest neighbor saw them working he ran across the road to him.
"What in the hell are you doing?" he yelled.
"I told him we were preparing the ground for next year. He said, you're ruining this year's seed and you won't have any grass next year. We stopped right away. I learned what to do."
A year later he was on a horse-drawn mower cutting hay when he saw storm clouds gathering. He thought he would be better served walking the horses, so they could pull the mower faster, and jumped down from his seat.
"As I hopped down I stumbled and fell right on the blades of the mower. The horses stopped dead. My hand was almost cut off. The boy who was helping me ran over. When he saw what happened, and saw my injured hand, he passed out.
As the war dragged on he had problems keeping the farm going. He had only partial use of his injured hand and farmhands everywhere were deserting the land.
"I went to the prisoner-of-war camp where I knew they used to give Russians out. They gave me five of them. They were nice guys, worked hard, and sang at night. One morning after a month I woke up and there wasn't one of them left. They were all gone.
"I had to go back to the Germans and ask for five more. My God, how they yelled about it. One officer shouted that I hadn't looked after them, shouted that I needed to lock them up at night, and shouted that they weren't going to give me anymore. In the end I said, I need five more, so they gave me five more. I kept them locked up after that and they were still there until the Russians came back."
In 1944 the Red Army stormed into Lithuania. Vytas escaped with a mechanized company of Germans, whisked up by them as they passed. They had been stationed near the prisoner-of-war camp. They told him he had five minutes to decide whether or not he was coming with them as they retreated.
"They told me the Russians were on the other side of the Hill of Crosses. They were in a hurry. I only had time to fill a bag with a few clothes, a little money, and photographs of my parents."
His sister Genute, not at the farm that day, fled separately. She got across the border into East Prussia, and later into Germany. His other sister, Gaile, wasn't able to escape Lithuania in time.
"She had a problem at the border and didn't make it. The Soviets had taken that area, so Gaile was forced to stop in a little town there. She had her daughter and her husband's mother with her. In the end the three of them were forced to stay there.
"She finished school, became a nurse, and never told anyone where she was from. The Russians never found out anything about her."
In July the Red Army captured Panevezys. Later that month they took Siauliai, inflicting heavy damage on the city. Two months later the counterattacking German 3rd Panzer Army was destroyed and for the next nearly fifty years Lithuania became part of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.
"I was glad to get out of Siauliai in 1944," said Vytas "I was very glad to get out in time."
147 Stanley StreetEd StaskusEugenia MackeviciusEugenia StaskeviciusGaile StaskeviciusSiauliaiVytautas Staskevicius
Going Heavy
In 1120, soon after the First Crusade recaptured Jerusalem for Christendom, a new monastic order was created to support and protect caravans making pilgrimage to the Holy Places. But, unlike earlier monastic orders, the Poor Fellow-Soldiers of Christ and the Temple of Solomon, or Knights Templar, was different.
Christian monasticism had always been a devotional practice. The basic idea of the practice, even today, is withdrawal from the world. Christian monks lived ascetic, often cloistered lives, dedicated to worship. It is similar to Pratyahara, one of the forgotten limbs of yoga. Pratyahara literally means "gaining mastery over external influences." It is grounded in the same kind of tradition.
The Knights Templar, however, was a military monastic order, among the most skilled fighting men of the Crusades. In 1177, at the Battle of Montgisard, fewer than 500 heavily-armored Knights Templar, backed by only a few thousand infantrymen, defeated the Muslim Sultan Saladin's army of more than 26,000.
Although men of the cloth and masters of war may seem like strange bedfellows, they are not.
In the 13th century St. Thomas Aquinas, the scholastic philosopher, wrote, "A religious order can be fittingly established for the military life, for the defense of divine worship." In the 16th century monks of the Shaolin Temple routinely battled Japanese pirates, who had been raiding their Chinese coastline for decades. Servants of God sometimes acted as shock troops during Europe's Wars of Religion in the 16th and 17th centuries.
Buddhist monks have lately joined the likes of Hindu nationalists, fundamentalist Christians, Muslim radicals, and ultra-Orthodox Jews in advancing their religious points-of-view at the end of a gun barrel.
Since they have all the answers, it is doubtful they have any faith, even though they insist otherwise, often at the boiling point. Faith is what implies there might be a mystery at the heart of things.
Yoga has long been perceived as being built on several core principles, among them non-violence. "The first yama – ahimsa or non-harming, which asks us to embrace non-violence at the level of speech, thought, and action – is truly the cornerstone of yoga as a way of life," Rolf Gates wrote in his book Meditation From the Mat.
Both cornerstone and culture, it is a behavior essential to the yogic lifestyle. "Practicing ahimsa is a way of cultivating an attitude of kindness, gentleness, and forgiveness in all situations," says Heather Church, an Adjunct Teaching Professional at Ohio University, where she teaches yoga and yogic philosophy.
But, in a country that possesses 50% percent of the guns on the planet, even though it accounts for only 5% of the world's population, according to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, and where tens of millions practice yoga of some kind or other, according to Yoga Journal, it was probably inevitable that guns and the practice would one day cross swords.
In the brave new world of today's yoga some are taking an age-old tack on the issue of violence, eschewing self-restraint and ahimsa. They are taking an Old Testament approach, bumping the Buddha off the starting line. It's an eye for an eye outlook.
"I'll be damned if some religious extremist decides in his twisted head that he thinks he'll clean the world by popping off some godless hippies and decides to walk in and spray some bullets into my studio with my students," Cheryl Vincent wrote in an op-ed piece for Elephant Journal.
"You better believe I'll be packing."
The central maxim of the National Rifle Association, better known as the NRA, is, "The only way to stop a bad guy with a gun is with a good guy with a gun."
It's High Noon showdown time. When good yogis pack pistols their accuracy is generally better than most, making them daunting adversaries. Writing in Women's Self Defense Weekly, which offers advice such as "The Neck Grab and Throat Punch", Laura Simonian pointed out that the best-kept secret about yoga is that "it helps your shooting."
She added that it was "great" for mental strength, core strength, balance strength, breathing control strength, and self-discipline, all leading to an aim that is true. "I bet you didn't know all those core conditioning boats, crows, and warriors were benefitting you in more ways than flexibility and mental well-being. Yoga can actually aid your shooting."
Shooting guns takes focus and concentration. "Yoga's Zen-like quality can be applied to shooting guns in a lot of ways," says Deirdre Gailey, a yoga teacher and vegan chef in New York City. "I like to shoot guns."
The rise of women's gun culture is a 21st century phenomenon. Babes with bullets shot up almost 50% in the United States between 2001 and 2010, according to the National Sporting Goods Association, leading to pink pistols and purses with holster slots. Samuel Colt made all men equal in the 19th century. Now women are catching up.
Brandon Webb, the marksman who trained the writer Laura Simonian on bolt-action rifles, described her as a "natural born killer" and explained that he has "definitely witnessed firsthand the positive effects yoga has had on my own shooting."
Laura Simonian trained with a Glock 34 handgun, too. Although its longer barrel results in a slightly slower draw time out of the holster, it is still used by some as a concealed weapon. No one should try messing with yoga girl Laura.
A 2013 Gallup Poll revealed that protection is the top reason Americans own guns, followed by hunting, sport and target shooting, and 2nd Amendment rights. Gun owners say that having a gun makes them feel safer. The NRA argues that if more law-abiding citizens had guns everyone would be safer from gun violence.
The NRA doesn't say anything about more Americans having been killed in gun-related incidents in the past 50 years than in all the wars fought in all of American history.
"You see peace and tranquility in the country and I see the Blair Witch Project," Texas novelist Ruth Pennebacker wrote in "Yoga and Guns".
"You see cows and horses and I see lethal rattlesnakes ready to strike. You see friendly, down-to-earth farmers and homespun families and I see the two murderers from In Cold Blood. A gun. Shooting lessons. Sign up now. Before it's too late."
But, a study in the Southern Medical Journal in 2010 found that owning a gun is 12 times more likely to result in the death of a family member or guest than in the death of an intruder. It is the protection paradox. The risks of gun ownership overshadow the benefits. The more guns there are the more shootings there are. That is why in countries with few guns there are few shootings.
After Australia enacted sweeping gun control laws in 1998 mass shootings involving four-or-more people dropped to zero. In the United States mass shootings happen every day, literally. In 2016 there were 383.
For many people the joy of owning guns is entwined with the joy of hunting.
"Every shotgun and rifle in my family's gun safe is brimming with stories," wrote Babe Winkleman in The Sportsman's Guide. "I wonder where those walnut tress grew [for my rifle stock]. Was there ever a deer shot from the very tree that grew the wood for my deer rifle?"
Although more and more people in the United States live in cities, hunting expanded 9% from 2006 through 2011. Some tramp through fields and woods because "doing things outdoors is healthy," says Dan Ashe, director of the Fish and Wildlife Service. Some hunt because it is a rite of passage, growing up in families that have always hunted, and passing their knowledge down. In "Buddhists With Guns" the writer Justin Whitaker, a Buddhist scholar, noted he and his sister, a yoga instructor, grew up in rural Montana and were introduced to guns early in life.
"I think I skipped the 'you'll shoot your eye out!' bb-gun that many friends were getting and moved on to a pump-action single shot pellet-gun around the age of 8," he said.
Others hunt to harvest their own food. In 2011 almost 14 million Americans went hunting, shooting squirrels, pheasants, turkey, and deer, among other wildlife. Old-school yoga skips hunting season. It eschews eating animals. Sri Pattabhi Jois, progenitor of Ashtanga Yoga, recommended not eating meat because "It will make you stiff."
Most people who practice yoga today eat animals, but are sometimes sensitive about the issue. "When the rare occasion does rise for me to indulge in animal food, I do so with great respect and meditation on the sacrifice of the animal," said Jerry Anathan of Yoga East in Cape Cod.
More than 150 billion animals a year are killed for food, both in slaughterhouses and forests. That is a great deal of killing. It may be what guns are made for, but whether that much suffering aligns with yogic values is an open question.
By 2010 shooting was enjoying a renaissance in the United States. 35 million Americans were participating in formal and informal sport and target shooting, surpassing all earlier estimates of the sport. "Firearms sales are way up, so it's really no surprise that more people are enjoying the shooting sports than ever before," said Steve Sanetti, president of the National Shooting Sports Foundation, based in Newtown, Connecticut.
"AR-style [semi-automatic assault-style, in other words] rifles are rugged, accurate, fun to shoot, and they're here to stay," he added.
Fun on the mat and fun on the firing range sometimes vibrate on the same plane.
"Shooting guns and taking yoga on the same day was the biggest 'You got chocolate in my peanut butter!' moment I've had so far in my life," wrote Patton Oswalt in The New York Times. "I was one with my target, and my target was bliss. Namaste. Lock and load."
Guns are the "new yoga" CBS News reported recently. However, instead of foam blocks and cloth straps, the new props of the new yoga include high-velocity metal projectiles.
Although it is hard to hear over the racket of gunfire, shooting a gun can be "just like yoga – meditative," Caitlin Talbot recounted gun owners describing the gunfire around them in her article in Elephant Journal. The same skill sets often apply. Slow yourself down. Be in the now.
In the same way that consciously relaxing your body, focusing your thoughts and gaze, and breathing evenly are the basic tools of meditation, they are the basic tools of shooting, too. When shooting a gun the fewer muscles used the steadier the shooter's position will be. Focusing on the task at hand puts the shooter in the zone, making their efforts effortless. Lastly, shooters use breathing cues, relaxing on each expired breath, as they squeeze the trigger.
It's just like yoga, except you don't want to be on the wrong end of a gun. It's not like being on a yoga mat, where any end of the mat is the right end. At least, until recently, when Mattthew Remski observed in "Should Yogis Want Their Guns Back" that his yoga mat "sometimes smells like gunpowder" and that "authentic peace seems to thrive on the juice of authentic violence".
Many gun enthusiasts, firearms industry spokesmen, and the NRA cite the 2nd Amendment as justification for the right everyone has to keep and bear arms. Owning guns is framed as a fundamental human right, although they seem to never defend the merits of gun ownership without referring to the amendment, as though guns in and of themselves are only signifiers, not actual things.
The hue and cry is made despite the wording of the amendment itself. "A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed." What Thomas Jefferson seems to have meant was that the right to possess firearms exists in relation to the militia, not in relation to teenagers possessing Glock 10mm and Sig-Sauer 9mm handguns, Bushmaster semi-automatic rifles, and Izhmash 12-gauge shotguns, and then using them to shoot and kill grade school children and their teachers in Newtown, Connecticut.
Until this century all federal courts, liberal and conservative alike, agreed that the 2nd Amendment does not confer gun rights on individuals. However, in 2010 the Supreme Court ruled otherwise in a 5 – 4 decision, re-affirming a fundamental right to bear arms. Now that many of the arguments about who can have a gun – there are no federal laws requiring a license to own a gun – have been settled, the Supreme Court might in the next few years try resolving the question of who can or can't possess a rocket launcher.
Gun aficionados from Rush Limbaugh to Arnold Schwarzenegger applauded. "I have a love interest in every one of my films – a gun," said the Terminator.
Guns can be testy lovers, however. "The recoil from a .357 Magnum can really do a number on your chakras," said one of the shooting yogis in "Higher Caliber, Higher Mindedness: The Story of YoGun", an award-winning short film from SofaCouch MovieFilms.
As yoga has matured in the United States in the new millennium, it has begun to embrace the notion of gun ownership. "Yoga is starting to become more associated with the cultural right, used to train the military and promote Ayn Rand," said Carol Horton, a former political science professor and certified Forrest Yoga teacher.
"Until all governments disarm, the people have a right to bear arms," argues Avananda, a 'philosopher yogi' and registered Yoga Alliance teacher.
The argument is the same as the photo-shopped shortened 2ndAmendment on the front of NRA headquarters. "The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed." Like the NRA, many prefer the amended fake version of the amendment to the real amendment.
Michelle Comeaux Howard, a yoga teacher and mother of two in Mission Viejo, California, has argued that only by being armed can we successfully defend ourselves from being victimized. "I believe strongly in our Second Amendment rights because there will always be crime and I want to exercise the right to protect myself and my children in the event we were to become victims of a home invasion or if someone ever attacked us in public."
She believes all "law-abiding" citizens, including her, should be allowed to legally carry a concealed weapon. Non-violence is one of yoga's self-restraints, but it is being pushed out the door at the same time as gun control is coming to mean being able to hit your target.
But, maybe old-school peace-and-love your neighbor yogis have it all wrong about ahimsa, and what is really old-school about the practice are yogis tot'n the monkey. Back in the day they apparently believed you could get more with a kind thought and a gun than with just a kind thought.
"From the fifteenth century until the early decades of the nineteenth century, highly organized bands of militarized yogins controlled trade routes across Northern India," wrote Mark Singleton in Yoga Body.
Yoga exercise, or hatha yoga, was a kind of boot camp or military training, keeping them in trim for the wear and tear of guerilla warfare. As Birgette Gorm Hansen pointed out in "Wild Yogis", a recent article in Rebelle Society, yoga back then "was a bad ass practice."
After putting down the infamous 1857 Mutiny, the British colonial government of India began to systematically disarm the sub-continent's population, and in 1878 introduced the Indian Arms Act, forbidding almost all Indians from possessing firearms of any kind. Although not specifically targeting yogis, it effectively ended the marauding of the armed hatha gangs, who threatened both princely states and British economic interests.
They were forced to lay down their guns and turn to yogic showmanship as a livelihood, in the meantime keeping yoga exercise alive into the 20th century. In the 1920s and 30s Krishnamacharya, the father of modern yoga, took up the mantle and revived the practice, crafting it to become the booming posture workout it is today.
Today, modern yoga studios preach breath and exercise to keep us fit and healthy, sprinkling in concepts like Dharana and Dhyana to keep a few of the other limbs of yoga alive. But, back in the day, yogis kept the peace by going heavy.
Nobody goes heavier than the Pentagon. These days the military is hiring 'Yoga Defense Contractors' to deal with changes in basic training, combat readiness, and residual issues like PTSD.
Maybe the yogis packing pistols straight-up today are just getting back to the roots of yoga.
After all, even the Dalai Lama, arguably one of the most peaceable men on the planet, when asked by a schoolchild at the Educating Heart Summit in Oregon what he would do if someone came to his school with a gun, replied without hesitation, "If someone has a gun and is trying to kill you, it would be reasonable to shoot back with your own gun."


text:
Lady Tigers open season with win over Frontier…
Lady Tigers open season with win over Frontier Academy
By Ken McDowell |
Sterling senior Jenna Knudson dishes off a pass to senior Alex Bowey in Sterling's win Tuesday over Frontier Academy. (SPS Photo By Ken McDowell.)
By Ken McDowell
Even though there were no surprises, there were a few questions answered by the Sterling Lady Tigers in their 2015-16 season opening basketball game Tuesday at home against the Frontier Academy Lady Wolverines. Sterling, the runner-up in Class 3A last year and ranked second this season, ran away for a 83-14 win in the Patriot League contest to start the season with a 1-0 mark. It was pretty obvious the Lady Tigers would be quick at the guard positions with senior Jenna Knudson, junior Kylie Chavez and sophomore Brooke Polenz running the show. That was evident from the get-go as the Lady Tigers jumped out to a 15-2 lead by forcing turnovers with that pesky full-court press that has driven Sterling's opponents nuts the last 3 years. When the first quarter, ended Sterling had a 24-8 lead. Another question that was answered was Sterling's inside game, and that came early in the second period when junior Abbey Brower hit back-to-back buckets. Junior post player Taylor Knudson also chipped in a couple of buckets to help the cause. But defense was still the story of the game as the Lady Tigers blanked Frontier Academy in the second period while increasing the lead to 51-8 at halftime. The lead grew to 69-11 at the end of the third quarter and with such a big lead, Sterling Coach Kent Chrisman was able find out just how deep his bench was in the second half. Coming off the bench and playing well were seniors Alex Bowey and Elena Wolfley, junior Jenna Kellogg and sophomore Kyndall Feather. Nearly every Lady Tiger scored as Jenna Knudson led the way with 25 points, followed by Chavez with 15; Brower 13; Polenz and Feather 8 each; Kellogg and Taylor Knudson 6 apiece and Bowey 2. "I think we got a few questions answered tonight," Chrisman said. "We knew that we wanted to get out and run, and I think we are a good step or step-and-a-half faster than we were last year. "I also thought our inside players did an outstanding job offensively. Abbey posted up big and got some good buckets down low. Taylor wasn't in the post a ton, but she still did some good things and I think Alex came in and played well. I know that Frontier Academy is still building its program, but it was a good first game for us." Depth was also something that Chrisman was able to experiment with in the season opener. "I think we also saw some depth, but that will depend on teams we will play from night to night," he said. "Kyndall did a great job and Jenna (Kellogg) did an outstanding job on the boards and Elena did some good things, so I'm looking forward to seeing what these kids can do." The Lady Tigers will have a tough game Thursday as they travel to Yuma in a non-league game. The Lady Indians are ranked number one in Class 2A and were the runners-up in the state last year. The Chrisman family lives in Yuma after Kent's wife Diana, who was principal at Sterling High School, took the superintendent's job at Yuma this year. Last year Sterling hosted Yuma and won 38-29. "Yuma was second in the state last year and I think they brought back 8 seniors this year," Chrisman said. "So it will be a good early test for us and they will bring it." On Tuesday it's back to Patriot League action as Sterling will host fourth-ranked Eaton.
Ken McDowell
Fleming girls basketball stays perfect through the new year
Sterling boys basketball continues to prove its stock
Caliche girls finding ways to win in new year
Merino boys basketball gets first 2022 win


WORCESTER, Mass.—Turkey has continually denied the Armenian Genocide carried out by the Ottoman Government beginning in 1915. Although decades of scholarly research has decisively established the systematic annihilation of Armenians, the relative scarcity of direct evidence has allowed the Turkish government to persist in its denial.
In his groundbreaking new book, Killing Orders: Talat Pasha's Telegrams and the Armenian Genocide, which was published on Jan. 23, Clark University historian Taner Akçam destroys the Turkish government's denial strategy. Akçam includes a recently discovered document, a "smoking gun," which points to the Ottoman government's central role in planning the elimination of its Armenian population. Furthermore, he successfully demonstrates that the killing orders signed by Ottoman Interior Minister Talat Pasha, which the Turkish Government has long discredited, are authentic.
Akçam, described as "the Sherlock Holmes of Armenian Genocide" in an April 2017 New York Times article, made those landmark discoveries in a private archive. He argues that the documents he has uncovered remove a cornerstone from the denialist edifice and definitively prove the historicity of the Armenian Genocide.
Akçam holds the Robert Aram and Marianne Kaloosdian and Stephen and Marian Mugar Chair in Armenian Genocide Studies at Clark's Strassler Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies. An internationally recognized human rights activist, Akçam was one of the first Turkish intellectuals to acknowledge and openly discuss the Armenian Genocide. Akcam has lectured widely and published numerous articles and books, translated into many languages.
Akçam's many honors include the Hrant Dink Spirit of Freedom and Justice Medal from the Organization of Istanbul Armenians and the Hrant Dink Freedom Award from the Armenian Bar Association (both in 2015); and the Heroes of Justice and Truth awarded at the Armenian Genocide Centennial commemoration in May 2015. The Diocese of the Armenian Church of America (Eastern) recognized him as a Friend of the Armenians in 2016. In May, he will receive the 2018 Outstanding Upstander Award from organization World Without Genocide.
Killing Orders is available for purchase from Amazon.
Thank you Professor Akçam for your relentless pursuit of justice, at your own peril. May God give you good health and long life.
Bravo to this Turkish man. Hes a living reminder that not all Turks are bad and that there are truly honorable and noble ones..
The denial continues and that is even with all the evidence. Does that say something about the turkish government and the denialist?????????????
The genocide began in the early 1880s. My family was killed in 1912 and a couple survivors made it here the end of that year.Since we are non-white they were not granted citizenship her which is why the us never intervened in the killing.
Thank you Mr. Akçam for your outstanding work in pursuing justice for the Armenian people. Your persistence to uncover what's been hidden for over a century is remarkable!! Turkey is very aware of their crime of atrocities but continue to deny the Genocide like a coward!!! It takes a BIG MAN like you to admit the killing of innocent people on the hands of his own country. Thank you again for standing up for what's right and for being a Human Rights Activist.
He couldn't "destroy" anything. Many Turkish scholars destroyed Taner Akçam's many false claims, many times. He is not a dependable person.
I doubt about his Turkishness. But I can make you sure he is a fugitive….
Mr. Tan is just like odious Kirlikovali, just less fluent in English.
A senior who appears not to have aged well [remember, that is his best picture], he seems to have set his Google Alerts to "Armenian" and whiles away his golden years spewing ahistorical racist nonsense from somewhere in the Sublime Porte until 4:30 PM, when Sizzler Senior Meals go for 1/2 price.
As for Mr. Akcam's alleged status, anyone who is called a terrorist by the Erdogan regime or a Turkish Nazi likely is in truth a freedom fighter.
Orhan, why don't you deal with the book's merits? Just copy something Kirlikovali has said. By the way, please tell us what Kirlikovali means in English too.
Of course you would doubt his Turkishness. Any Turk, a Turkish intellectual in particular, who speaks the truth about the Armenian Genocide can not be a real Turk, right? Only "fake' Turks would speak the truth and defend the Armenians against their blood-thirsty Turkish mass murderers, right? You…will never change. You have not changed in a thousand years. I guess it is quite easy to institutionally brainwash a nation of racist illiterates…. So, tell us who do you consider as real Turks, those anti-Armenian racists who murdered Hrant Dink with directions from the Turkish government and those police officers taking pictures at the police station with his murderer?
His Turkishness is unquestionable but your response is predictable.
Um, I assume you are a troll who works for (or loves) the Turkish government? Please take your remarks elsewhere.
Are these remarks not moderated???
Because we absolutely don't deserve to hear one more anti-Armenian or anti-genocide remark in this world and certainly not on our own newspaper website!
My paternal grandfather, perished in the genocide against the Greeks of Asia Minor. Mr Akcam's book will be a great gift to all of us.
Mr. Akcam is certainly Turkish. Because he has spoken out on Turkey's denial of the Armenian Genocide, he has been found guilty of Turkey's controversial Article 301, which makes it a crime to "insult Turkishness." In other words, it's a crime to tell the truth in Turkey.
My Grandfather took a Turkish family into our home in the 1960's.
"The relative scarcity of direct evidence has allowed the Turkish government to persist in its denial". This is wrong. There is, and there always has been, plentiful direct evidence. Lack of evidence has never formed the basis of Turkish denials, nor have those denials been based on the serious discrediting of real evidence. Turkish denials always consciously ignore confronting real hard evidence; instead they engage in distraction, deflection, avoidance, side issues, unconnected issues, misrepresentation, and the occasional "discreditation" of obvious Armenian forgeries or exaggerations that only the very foolish or the foolishly complacent ever accepted. Turkish denial is grounded on what amounts to tribal self interest, and the core belief that there was nothing particularly wrong in committing the genocide. That core belief has been sustained by the enabling silence of almost everyone, be they academics or diplomats or writers or industrialists or ordinary tourists, who has engaged with Turkey on any level since the 1920s.
Dear Orhan Tan, If by doubting Prof. Akcam's 'Turkishness' you mean you doubt his 'being a brainwashed puppet of a devious Turkish regime that denies the barbaric acts committed by the bloodthirsty sultan Abdul Hamid followed by the planned genocides committed by the Young Turks', then you would be absolutely correct. For further education, may I suggest that you read 'The Fall of the Ottomans', by the historian Eugene Rogan, especially Chapter Seven. FYI, this author and historian is neither Armenian nor Turkish.
A while back the Holocaust was always presented as if there were no other Genocides, Yet we almost always mention the Armenian Genocide of 1.5 million without saying it was 3 million including Greek Assyrians and other Christians.
He found a smoking gun document in a private archive/collection? A supposed signature by Talat condemns the whole of Turkey – as the heir to the Ottoman Empire – to forever apologise to the CHRISTIAN WEST because it so annoyingly survived the sinister plans by the Christians against the Ottomans! Go read up on the what the Christian-kin of the Armenians did in the Balkans… And get of the Erdogan obsession – this is not about him!


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Gora Moldobasji (ryska: Гора Молдобаши) är ett berg i Kirgizistan. Det ligger i den östra delen av landet,  km sydost om huvudstaden Bisjkek. Toppen på Gora Moldobasji är  meter över havet.

Terrängen runt Gora Moldobasji är bergig åt sydväst, men åt nordost är den kuperad. Gora Moldobasji är den högsta punkten i trakten. Runt Gora Moldobasji är det mycket glesbefolkat, med  invånare per kvadratkilometer. Det finns inga samhällen i närheten. Trakten runt Gora Moldobasji består i huvudsak av gräsmarker.

Årsmedeltemperaturen i trakten är  °C. Den varmaste månaden är juli, då medeltemperaturen är  °C, och den kallaste är januari, med  °C. Genomsnittlig årsnederbörd är  millimeter. Den regnigaste månaden är juni, med i genomsnitt  mm nederbörd, och den torraste är december, med  mm nederbörd.

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Berg i Kirgizistan
Berg i Kirgizistan 4000 meter över havet eller högre

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ROTTERDAM, Netherlands, Sept. 27, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- LyondellBasell (NYSE: LYB) today announced that the sales offering for the 105,000 barrels-per-day refinery in Berre, France has resulted in no offer to purchase the refinery. As a result, Compagnie Petrochimique de Berre S.A.S. (CPB), the refinery operator, intends to initiate consultations with its works councils, as defined under French law, on a project to cease refinery operations.
"After conducting a thorough sales offering that included reaching out to 85 entities throughout the world with the assistance of Barclays Capital and the Invest in France Agency (AFII), unfortunately not a single bid was received for the refinery," said Jean Gadbois, General Manager of the Berre site.
"Despite efforts from employees and management, the refinery continues to suffer severe losses and remains unprofitable," Gadbois said. "With no viable prospects for a buyer of the refinery, we intend to initiate the consultation process regarding the contemplated closure of refinery operations. We intend to focus our resources on the core petrochemical assets at Berre."
Approximately 370 jobs would be impacted by this project to cease refinery operations. The continuation of the petrochemical operations at Berre would preserve approximately 900 jobs at the Berre site.
The petrochemical assets at Berre include a steam cracker and world-scale polypropylene and polyethylene plants owned and operated by another LyondellBasell subsidiary. The potential closure would not affect depot operations or the petrochemical plants and third-party facilities at Berre.
The required consultation with the works councils in France is expected to begin in October.


text:
The Paradoxical Prime Minister
Product description: The Paradoxical Prime Minister is written by Shashi tharoor and published by Aleph book company. Buy The Paradoxical Prime Minister by Shashi tharoor from markmybook.com. An online bokstore for all kind of fiction, non fiction books and novels of English, Hindi & other Indian Languages.
by Shashi tharoor
Home›Reference›Politics & Current Affairs ›The Paradoxical Prime Minister
Publisher: Aleph book company
Category: Politics & Current Affairs
Related Category: Criticism & Interviews
MBIC: MMB29950757863
Shashi Tharoor is the prize-winning author of ten books, both fiction and non-fiction, and a widely published critic, commentator and columnist (including for The Hindu, Times of India and Newsweek). In 2007 he concluded a nearly twenty-nine-year career with the United Nations, including working for refugees in South-East Asia at the peak of the 'boat people' crisis, handling peace-keeping operations in the former Yugoslavia, and culminating as the Under-Secretary-General for Communications and Public Information. In 2006 he was India's candidate to succeed Kofi Annan as UN Secretary-General, and emerged a strong second out of seven contenders. Dr Tharoor earned his PhD at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at the age of twenty-two, and was named by the World Economic Forum in Davos in 1998 as a 'Global Leader of Tomorrow'. He was awarded the Pravasi Bharatiya Samman, India's highest honour for overseas Indians. For more on Shashi Tharoor, please visit www.shashitharoor.com
Narendra Modi is a paradoxical man. He says one thing and does another. He gives voice to a number of liberal ideas (such as the constitution being his holy book and sab ka saath, sab ka vikas), while at the same time pandering to some of the most illiberal elements in Indian society, on whom he depends for political support. Another paradox is how a Prime Minister who prides himself on effective governance has, through his silence, appeared to condone the worst aspects of misgovernance—communal riots, lynching's, the violence of gau-rakshaks and so on. A third paradox is his talk of soaring ambitions for the country when his government's performance is underwhelming. So who is the real Narendra Modi? A noble, selfless leader who acts effectively in the interests of all his countrymen or an autocratic, right-wing bigot who is interested only in power and converting plural India into a Hindu Rashtra? Or something in between? This brilliant study of Modi and the effect he has had on our country answers these and other questions about a leader who is reviled and worshipped in equal measure. The book is divided into five sections comprising fifty chapters. The first section takes a close look at Modi's life and times. The other four sections look at key aspects of the way in which Modi's government functions and the lasting and often deleterious impact it has had on Indian society, major institutions, the economy, foreign policy and our fundamental values. Using years of close observation, personal encounters with Modi, considerable scholarship, a deep understanding of Indian politics and an insider's view of the way in which government functions. Shashi Tharoor has stitched together a compelling portrait of this paradoxical figure. Never before has there been such a superbly written and devastatingly accurate account of the most controversial prime minister India has ever had.
The Great Indian Novel
Nehru: The Invention of India
The Elephant, the Tiger and the Cellphone
Pax Indica
THE SIGN OF THE TIGER
by RUDOLF HARTOG
MA VAISHNO DEVI
by SANJANA MALHOTRA
100 GREAT ADVENTURES
by JOHN CANNING
PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY MADE SIMPLE
by RICHARD H BRYANT
ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL GEOGRAPHY MADE SIMPLE
by R KNOWLES
A CLASSICAL DICTIONARY OF HINDU MYTHOLOGY & RELIGION
by JOHN DOWSON
Shashi Tharoor


Naturalization is the manner in which a person not born in the United States voluntarily becomes a U.S. citizen. In this section, you will find information on eligibility requirements, the naturalization process and test, how to help your students get information about naturalization by attending an information session, and how to contact USCIS.
Prepare Form N-400, Application for Naturalization.
Go to the biometrics (fingerprinting) appointment, if applicable.
Receive a notice to take the Oath of Allegiance.
Please review the USCIS brochure 10 Steps to Naturalization: Understanding the Process of Becoming a U.S. Citizen (PDF, 642 KB). For more detailed information on the naturalization process, please visit Citizenship Through Naturalization and Path to U.S. Citizenship.
During the naturalization interview, a USCIS Officer will ask questions about an applicant's Form N-400, Application for Naturalization, and background. An applicant will also take an English and civics test unless he or she qualifies for an exemption or waiver. The English test has three components: reading, writing, and speaking. The civics test covers important U.S. history and government topics. See below to learn more about the test and the free study tools available to help your students prepare.
An applicant's ability to speak English will be determined by a USCIS Officer during the eligibility interview on Form N-400, Application for Naturalization.
An applicant must read aloud one out of three sentences correctly to demonstrate an ability to read in English. The Reading Test Vocabulary List (PDF, 185 KB) will help your students study for the English reading portion of the naturalization test. The content focuses on civics and history topics.
An applicant must write one out of three sentences correctly to demonstrate an ability to write in English. The Writing Test Vocabulary List (PDF, 181 KB) will help your students study for the English writing portion of the naturalization test. The content focuses on civics and history topics.
There are 100 civics questions on the naturalization test (PDF, 296 KB). During an applicant's naturalization interview, he or she will be asked up to 10 questions from the list of 100 questions. An applicant must answer correctly six of the 10 questions to pass the civics test.
Your students have two opportunities to take the English and civics tests per application. If they fail any portion of the test during their first interview, they will be retested on the portion of the test that they failed between 60 and 90 days from the date of their initial interview.


November 23, 2009 — The excitement of the 2010 Olympic season is cued to crank up a notch Dec. 4-6 when the Audi FIS Alpine World Cup rolls into Beaver Creek for the Audi Birds of Prey Race Week, the lone men's alpine World Cup stop on American snow prior to Vancouver.
Billed as one of the most intense tracks in all of alpine ski racing, fans will flood the Red Tail finish area as reigning Olympic combined gold medalist Ted Ligety (Park City, UT) and two-time World Cup overall champion Bode Miller (Franconia, NH) cross the line to a pulsating roar from the crowd.
"There's nothing like ripping Birds of Prey," said Ligety, a three-time Birds podium finisher. "Beaver Creek is our only home game and the entire Team gets amped to perform in front of our friends and family. It's not that often where the entire finish area is your cheering section."
The International Ski Federation (FIS) Snow Control inspectors Saturday gave organizers the green light for the 2009 races to go ahead.
FIS sends Snow Control inspectors to World Cup sites in advance of the competitions to ensure that racecourse conditions are acceptable. If course conditions and extended forecasts were not conducive to new snow or temperatures cold enough to make snow, the FIS would have the opportunity to move the competitions.
U.S. athletes have excelled on Birds of Prey in years past.
"My sister tells me the 'Marco Rocks' fan club will be rolling pretty deep again this year," said Marco Sullivan (Squaw Valley, CA). "They've rented three condos and will definitely be the 30 to 40 loudest people around that week."
Birds opens with super combined on Friday, Dec. 4, followed by the famed downhill on Saturday before wrapping with Ligety's bread and butter, the GS on Sunday.
The downhill will air Sunday, Dec. 6 at 2 p.m. ET on NBC with replay Sunday, Dec. 13 at 4 p.m. ET on Versus followed by super combined at 5 p.m. ET. Versus will also air GS on Sunday, Dec. 20 at 5 p.m. ET. Additionally Universal Sports will stream the super combined and GS live at www.UniversalSports.com.
"Birds of Prey is the full package," said men's alpine Head Coach Sasha Rearick. "The guys are stoked to race in front of their fans and nobody puts together a World Cup event better than Beaver Creek. Plus the race hill is just awesome and includes every single aspect of modern downhill. From speed to turns to big air, it's all there and is such a fun track for our guys to perform on."
The Team is priming for Birds throughout the Vail Valley and Colorado Rockies taking full advantage of excellent snow conditions at Vail, Copper Mountain and Loveland before moving to Lake Louise, Alberta for the opening men's World Cup speed races over Thanksgiving.
"The training has been awesome," added Sullivan. "By the time we get to Birds, we'll have two solid weeks under our belts in Colorado and a few races from Lake Louise before we crank things up in Beaver Creek."
Longtime Birds of Prey Chief of Course Greg Johnson reports that over 85 percent of snowmaking is completed with crews dozing the Golden Eagle Jump to the Red Tail finish Friday, then moving up to the Pumphouse turn over the weekend. "This is one of our best year-to-date efforts ever," said Johnson from his perch high up on the Birds of Prey race course.
A men's World Cup stop for 13 years, the U.S. Ski Team has a storied record of success in Beaver Creek with 15 podiums, including five wins since 2003. Bode Miller accounts for three of those victories, plus an additional two more top three finishes, while Ligety, Steven Nyman (Sundance, UT) and alpine veteran turned ski cross ace Daron Rahlves (Sugar Bowl, CA) are also Birds podium staples.
"It is the unique combination of amazing terrain, state of the art infrastructure and technology plus a passionate and knowledgeable volunteer race crew that makes the Audi Birds of Prey such a special race," said U.S. Ski and Snowboard Association Vice President Events Calum Clark. "Each year, the race crew takes hill preparation to a new level of excellence which allows the athletes to excel."
It has also been a launching pad for young racers' careers as both Andrew Weibrecht (Lake Placid, NY) and TJ Lanning (Park City, UT) have kicked of solid seasons at Beaver Creek. It was only two years ago when Weibrecht exploded from the 53rd start position in a snowstorm to take 10th in the downhill with one of the most on-edge runs in the race's legendary history.
"It's not often that you can say you have one of the world's best downhill courses in your own backyard," offered Michael Imhof, Vice President of Sales and Operations for the Vail Valley Foundation, "but that's exactly what we have with Birds of Prey. Through the years, this race and course have provided many great moments and memories, from Aksel Lund Svindal's comeback last year to Maier's eight wins to the string of American victories. Birds of Prey is a special course and event, and we are proud to be able to call it our own."
A full slate of off slope activities are planned for the week including autograph signings with the U.S. Ski Team, a public bib presentation and fireworks.
For complete information on the Audi Birds of Prey Race Week, check out www.bcworldcup.com.


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The Dronny Bottom Buskers
In a world full of cool, hip and trendy indie bands - Two drunks who play folk music are sure to fit in
The Dronny Bottom Buskers hail from the rolling hills of Dronfield
About The Dronny Bottom Buskers
In a world full of cool, hip and trendy indie bands - Two drunks who play folk music are sure to fit in...
The Dronny Bottom Buskers hail from the rolling hills of Dronfield.
Formed when two friends discovered they had a few things in common: a love for folk music, and a passion for drinking beer.
Regarding themselves as "Professional Drunks", they've been gigging up and down the UK and Europe singing their songs about people, life, work, drinking and dancing. They're always eager to get the crowd involved with the performance, prepare become the third member of the band!
Recently they've finished work on their first EP "Beer With Straws" featuring fan favourite songs such as Supermarket Cider and The Barley Mow.
If you want a true DIY musical act, you've come to the right place!
Name: The Dronny Bottom Buskers
Genre: Indie


My point was to try as much colour as I could, playing with my favourite techniques in Art Alchemy Impasto and Mettalique Paints, creating the multi-layered, deep and colourful look. I dripped the paint, used stencils for paint and wax, worked with embellishments, paper and photo. So may fields to experiment and get fingers dirty... especially if you love finger-painting as much as I do!
Why "Fireflies"? Well, as you can see I went a bit crazy with splatters and dots - I guess they are my latest obsession - and when you take it all together with the dark blue tones it all brought to my mind the idea of a person surrounded by the group of fireflies... you know, I will always go for a bit of magic in my life!
But the best part of this all is - "Fireflies" is my new collage class!
If you will decide to sign up, you will be able to build the layers with papers, paint and metallic paints, work on building a fantasy character and play with my favourite Art Alchemy products: Impasto and Mettalique Paints, Metallique Waxes... and more! If you are an art journaler - like me - you will be able to easily adapt these techniques to your journal pages - in a smaller scale of course, as this project is one of my bigger longer canvases!
The first chance to book into this class is in UK on 2-3 June - at Art From The Heart in Harrogate. Check the details out below and book your seat!
Here is the schedule for the coming months, all in one place for your convenience.
1-3 May 2018 - Donna Downey Studios, Huntersville, NC, USA - bookings here!
5-6 May 2018 - Cafe Crop, Merrillville, IN, USA - bookings here!
2-3 June 2018 - Classes at AFTH, Harrogate, UK - bookings here!
8-9 September 2018 - Classes at the Skaparlusten, Sjobo, Sweden - bookings soon!
21-23 September 2018 - Classes at De Scrapheap, The Netherlands - bookings soon!
29-30 September 2018 - Classes in Valencia, Spain - bookings soon!
27-28 October 2018 - Classes at The Mad Scrapper, Edinburgh, Scotland - bookings soon!
17-18 November 2018 - Zyneri Event in Auckland, NZ - bookings here!
There will be a lot of things going on this week - IG Live on Prima Marketing profile this Thursday, then on Friday - FB Live again. I had such a great feedback after my Mixed Media Minutes last week I just had to repeat it for you!


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Job Growth Is Likely Next Year. The Question Is: How Much?
Charles Wallace
Unemployment could keep rising next year even as employers add more than 100,000 new jobs per month, economists say.
The last few months have seen a flurry of economic stimulus measures: The Federal Reserve has begun its purchase of $600 billion in bonds, and Congress has passed -- and President Barack Obama has signed -- a broad extension of tax cuts, including a surprise decision to cut the Social Security withholding tax by 2%. But will any of those measures create enough new jobs to finally get the economy moving?
Among economists, the consensus is that the job outlook will improve very slowly in the first half of 2011 -- but that unemployment numbers could keep rising through the summer. If they're right, the jobs conditions could spook consumers, who account for the bulk of economic activity, up to 70% by some measures. Businesses have shown no eagerness to start hiring in such an uncertain environment.
Thousands of New Jobs on the Way
Kenneth Goldstein, a labor economist at the Conference Board, an executives association, expects an average of 125,000 to 150,000 new jobs to be created each month next year. He's raised his forecast from just 30 days ago, when he estimated 100,000 new jobs would be created each month, largely due to the Obama Administration's deal to extend the Bush-era tax cuts and lower the withholding tax.
Still, he warns that long-term interest rates could slow that growth. "The [economic] package is going to help, certainly, but it's offset by the big run-up in long-term interest rates," Goldstein says. The yield on the 10-year Treasury bond rose to 3.48% Tuesday, up about 1 percentage point from a month ago. That means it now costs homebuyers and businesses much more to borrow money than it did even a few weeks ago.
However, Joel Naroff, president of Naroff Economic Advisors, a Holland, Penn.-based forecasting firm, is much more sanguine about the job outlook. "I actually think we're on the cusp of a clear turnaround," Naroff says. He thinks job creation could grow to 150,000 to 200,000 new jobs per month by the summer -- and as many as 250,000 a month by year-end.
Are Buyers Liars?
Where does this difference in opinion come from? Part of it has to do with varying interpretations of recent economic data, especially Tuesday's downbeat report on consumer confidence. The Conference Board's consumer confidence index declined to 23.5 from 25.4 in November, which surprised many economists in light of the relatively positive retail sales numbers for the holiday season.
The declining confidence suggests that consumers were hunting for end-of-the-year bargains during the holidays, which would be a temporary -- not a long-lasting -- phenomenon, Goldstein says. But Naroff says he lends more weight to what consumers are actually doing -- spending more -- than to what they say about their confidence.
"If job growth continues to increase at 10,000 a month, by summer you're looking at 175,000 to 200,000 a month," Naroff says. "That assumes consumers are getting more comfortable." Still, he acknowledges that the private sector added only 50,000 jobs in November, which was substantially below expectations.
With the inflation rate stagnating at only 1.2% and hourly wages rising 1.6%, employers have little incentive now to add jobs, Goldstein says. "If it's going to cost you 1.6% more to hire that person and you're only going to get back 1.2% on whatever you sell, even with a productivity dividend it's awfully hard to see where you're going to make money on the deal," he says.
Some Jobs Are Gone for Good
Uncertainty about the cost of Obama's health care package, adopted earlier this year, also is keeping employers cautious about adding workers, Goldstein adds.
He expects the unemployment rate to grow to 10.2%, from the current 9.8%, in the first few months of the new year. As more long-term jobless workers rejoin the official unemployment numbers, the rate could remain high through the middle of the year, he adds.
Goldstein predicts that unemployment will remain above 6% as late as 2014 or 2015. In fact, employment may never return to earlier levels, he forecasts, because businesses found it was profitable to cut jobs. "Some of those folks in their 40s and 50s may not realize it, but they are not going back to work, period," he says.
While economists disagree about the exact speed of jobs creation next year, most expect at least some growth, however slow. Any number of possible surprises, of course, could change that. For example, if sharply spiking oil prices reduce the amount people drive -- and shop -- the economic outlook and jobs growth could decline.
2011 forecast
economic stimulus
employment forecast
jobless
jobless claims
jobless rate
jobless recovery
joblessness
jobs forecast
jobs outlook
Obama tax cuts
Obama tax deal
unemployment outlook


A travel agency and destination management company.
Felix Group is one of the largest professional recruiting agencies using up-to-date communications and global network of manpower tracking.
Established in 1983, the company's activities include travel ticketing and outgoing tourism.
International Travel Agent, organisation of tagungen, events, congress and hotel rooms for exhibitions, flights, firm services and other services.
Incoming and outgoing tourism, ticketing, bus transportation, reservation of hotels, cruises and organization of conferences.
Established in 1989 as an Egyptian Tour Operator and within few years NTS achieved its great success in the field of tourism.
World Trans Group Co. Ltd.
An international freight forwarding agent, specialized in handling air freight and sea freight consignments to/from Egypt.


Whoa Fran, you are killing me!
I felt like dieing after my Fran on Monday, i still had a lot of PT to do after ward too! and she wiped the floor with me. Those 95lb thrusters are deadly! Well i managed to do it in 6:45, not amazing, i really wanted to break into the 5's. All those under 3 minute Fran killers are just amazing to watch! So fluid. So fast. Something to strive for.
Re: Whoa Fran, you are killing me!


In 2007 I recorded the film Feeders, which depicts a fusion of two worlds. In a pigsty between concrete and steel pipes models walk up the central gangway between the pigs, as if on a catwalk.
Feeders in part plays with boundaries, but above all it deals with the role of the producer. How do you relate to today's rational mass consumption society with its call for low prices, whilst at the same time maintaining all the ethical rules regarding the environment and the living beings affected by production, regardless of whether you are a human or an animal?
Following industrialization there no longer remain such clear bonds with consumers, thus through their lack of knowledge many people lose their understanding of the work that is required and the actual value of the goods they consume.
The work I'm presenting at the spring exhibition is a development of these issues, whereby I've chosen to use to the buffet table as a metaphor for our abundance or freedom of choice.


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Regulation: Regulatory/market assessment
November 1st 2021
In February 2021 the government announced a new strategic disinvestment policy, naming four strategic sectors in which it will maintain a minimal presence: atomic energy, space and defence; transport and telecommunications; power, petroleum, coal and other minerals; and banking, insurance and financial services. Public-sector units in other industries will be gradually privatised or closed.
For fiscal year 2020/21 (ending March 31st), the government raised only Rs328m in privatisation revenues, well below its original Rs2.1trn target and reflecting the effects of the coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic. The government aims to raise Rs1.75trn in 2021/22. In October 2021 the government sold its 100% stake in Air India, the national carrier, after receiving no bids for its offers of a 76% stake.
In June 2021 the government raised the cap on foreign direct investment in insurance companies, from 49% to 74%, on the automatic route, provided that a majority of key personnel, directors, and either the chairperson, managing director or CEO are Indian citizens. The government raised the cap on the telecommunications sector in October 2021.
In early November 2021 the government made a surprise commitment to transform India into a net-zero carbon emitter by 2070. The announcement, made at the 26th UN Climate Change Conference (COP26), sets the target two decades behind developed nations such as the US and the UK. The government has made financial aid from developed nations as a pre‑condition for meeting the target.
In August 2021 the government announced a list of 8,555 tariff lines with reimbursement rates of 0.5% to 4.3% of the free-on-board value of exports, subject to a value cap per unit. The reimbursements are given as freely transferable electronic "scrips", which are incentives that can be used to pay basic customs duties.
The telling case of India's state elections
We expect the BJP to win Uttar Pradesh comfortably and Congress to retain Punjab, with a chance of a hung assembly.


If you are searching for a business analyst training program, I am sure you will get a lot of options to choose from. Selecting the right business analyst training provider can be a daunting task. More so because the courses don't come cheap so you can't use trial and error technique.
Disclaimer: I represent an IT certification training provider, TECHCANVASS and we are into business analyst training courses. However, I have tried to write this article considering myself as someone who is looking to find the right training provider.
So, how do you go about selecting the appropriate business analyst training provider? I have shortlisted the top 7 parameters to select the right training provider for business analyst training.
Even before you start searching for training providers, you must put yourself in an employer shoes and consider the skills you will be expecting for this role. As an entry level business analyst, what is going to be your role and which skills will enable you to perform the role efficiently?
You can use these skills as a benchmark to compare the courses offered by a training provider and shortlisting initial few.
Once you have factored in the course content and shortlisted the training providers, the next step is to evaluate them on their credibility. So, How do you evaluate the credibility of a training provider?
Will you decide based on brand?
or can you decide based on friend's recommendations?
or would you decide based on Internet feedbacks?
In my view, no single factor is dominant in this case. All these factors should be considered in shortlisting a training provider.
A company is known because lot of people like it or is it known because it is visible everywhere? Many brands are well known because they spend a lot of money on advertising and are visible everywhere?
Your friend has recommended a training provider on heresay or he/she has done a course from that particular training provider.
Last few feedbacks for a training provider is negative or positive. That does not make a company good or bad. Look at the percentage of feedbacks over a period of time (at least a year or 2 years).
The next step is to evaluate the depth and skills of their trainers. You can ask for a demo or ask for class recordings. The class recordings are the best representation of trainers teaching style and depth of knowledge.
Most of the training providers should have class recordings available on their Youtube channel or website itself. If you feel comfortable listening to these, it's a big YES.
However, be careful, don't just decide on the basis of one video as that could be the best one and only one.
Which is the most appropriate training mode for you? Would you prefer classroom training or live online training or self-paced training?
It's purely dependent on your availability, work schedule and style of learning. Does the training provider provides training in that particular mode? Please be aware that, there are advantages and disadvantages of each of the approaches.
An important consideration is the availability of recorded sessions in case you miss a class. This is quite common because of work schedule, family commitments etc. If you get access to recorded sessions, that will help you in maintaining continuity.
Does the training provider offers support of any kind? Can you ask questions after the classes? Sometimes you may not feel comfortable asking a question in the class for whatever reasons? Is there any provision for getting answers later? Or is there is any channel for submitting your questions and doubts?
I know a couple of training providers, who have lively discussion forums where students ask questions and these questions are answered by trainers.
Another important criteria is the project or projects? Does the course include projects which will help you in applying all the concepts and processes learnt?
For example, does the course provide you with software projects where you can learn to develop and model requirements in a system requirements specification (SRS) document? Can you do a project to create user story cards or learn to manage product backlogs?
Working on these projects enables you to be confident during the interview (as you have done it yourself). At the same time, it also allows you to showcase in your resume making it more credit worthy.
The training cost is the last but certainly not the least parameter for selecting the training provider and the course. As the course fees is not a small amount, it is certainly a factor in decision making.
Which training provider offers the course at the best price, provided the course meets other criteria? Even though this cost may not be the lowest but a 10-15% premium for the best provider is not a bad deal. Always consider the best value rather than just the cost.
Hope these parameters will be useful in selecting the right training provider for the business analyst training course.