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Well the title says it all, is-sena t-tajba..  literally ‘Year good’ .. but in reality the equivalent of Happy New Year..

Last year I posted this and went into my own little thing, this year, I have not written until today.  I messaged it to a few friends, and I saw lots of posts on Facebook .. then I saw a post by a friend saying he wasn’t going to conform or post as so many say it without any conviction or meaning.  So I thought I wouldn’t either, because he was right, what is different about this time of year from any other?  Why should be say we are going to do a good thing as a New Year resolution?  I mean for f**ks sake, we’re intelligent beings (well that’s what most think) so why do we have to have an excuse to decide to do something good?  Why don’t we just do it?  Why do some people change their attitude at Christmas in an attempt to placate people?  Seriously, if you want to be a good person, be a good person all year!  Change your life, and really change yourself and those around you!

So why has this come up.. why am I preaching again?  Well 3 adverts on TV in a row, and a friend’s status did it..  The status in question:

I have always stated that for alot of people, wishing the best during the festive season is a massive sign of hypocrisy…this was confirmed by none other than Malta’s fave comedian, Wayne Hewitt, with his status;

‘nawgura s-Sena t-Tajba lil kulħadd bla ebda distinzzjoni ta’ kulur politiku, ġilda, orjentazzjoni sesswali jew reliġjon. Awguri mill-qalb.’

This coming from a racist who constantly attempts to belittle and hurt Labourites throughout the year..

L auguri mhux reciprokati Hewitt!

Which for the non-Maltese speakers, basically he (the Comedian) said: “happy festivities, irrispective of skin colour, sexual orientation or political ideology to all”

Now, I thought this was all good, I see it every year, and as a comedian it’s not uncommon for him to make jokes, racist or against the ‘in power’ government for laughs.  I even laugh myself.. (and I laugh just as hard if it’s a joke about being Gay or Transgender, providing it is a joke and not just something in bad taste.)   But, it was then pointed out this guy is a bit of a douche… he doesn’t mean it, he just jumps on the bandwagon for Christmas to be popular..  Now I do not know the truth of that statement (but I have no reason to doubt it either) and so it started me thinking..

If this guy is really sending his best, why do people not just accept it, why do people question his sincerity?  Well it could be because they know this person (I don’t) they could know that he doesn’t actually mean it, but thinking further many people do it, then after Christmas they go back to the same old stuff, making jokes about the less fortunate, making racist comments and explaining them away as ‘comedic’…  Well I think we should really practice what we preach…  Seriously, if we want the world to be a happier place, why do we not just make it such?  It’s in our power, each individual, we just need to make it happen!

So enough of that for a minute.. lets get on to the adverts…

First one was this, it’s been around for a while and I have seen it many times…

The advert has many, many facets and always gets me thinking, it’s very much a car advert, but if you watch it from a point of interest instead of yet another advert, it shows technology at it’s best.  It shows this beautiful world we live in in such a clean and friendly light, then shows the smog and 1930’s mechanical engineering as a contrast.  The advert is no doubt designed to show extremes, but if you look through the marketing bulls**t (the bit that we’re using 1930’s technology and should be switching to 21st century electric hybrid vehicles) and you realize as a race how far we have come..  What power we have at our disposal, and yet how we wield it….

The second advert, by the company I love to hate .. Coke which is here:

Now this is a classic New Year advert, it’s using all the things that good people associate with and then discard to associate a product in an attempt to gain sales.  Well as much as i despise the company for it’s shameless ‘on the band wagon’ advertising, I actually appreciate this one, and it’s very much like the previous Toyota advert in the messages.  We are intelligent people, there are bad things going on around the world, and for every bad thing there is many more examples of the good we have in ourselves.

Now here’s the thing, I like jokes about the Irish, and about New Zealanders (not the Māori but anyone from New Zealand)  I love jokes about politicians, I love jokes about people that are not white in colour…  I get a great laugh out of it, but at the same time, and unlike a few, I also love jokes about the English, about white people (especially ‘White Trash’), about Transgender people, about Gays, about Australians, and about Techies…  I guess that what makes me a person that is not racist… because I appreciate a joke, no matter what the target, whether some consider it racist, discriminatory or not…  This is not something I can say about everyone, and unfortunately this brings me to the last thing I have seen in this new year…   Yet another round of the ‘do gooders’ that do nothing…

It’s true, sort of..

Here’s the problem, while people have religious beliefs that state, “eradicate all those who don’t believe” or “all those who don’t believe are evil” we will never have world peace… no matter how much you spend on it.  Wars will go on in the name of the righteous and just..  People, innocent people, will be slaughtered for the profit and beliefs of but a few.  Corruption in the world will go on, some will live the ‘high life’ some will be kept in poverty…  We will never achieve true enlightenment and we will never be truly good people.

So back to my title, ‘is-sena t-tajba’..  I do wish all people a Happy New Year, and I do so in the language of the people whom have hosted me and who have (mostly) made me feel at home despite that I am very different from the ‘normal’.. and so I say it in Maltese!.. and I have this thought for you all…

If you have to conform and create New Years resolutions, if you feel you have to wish everyone a Happy Christmas even if you hate all blacks, whites, gays, non-locals, but *truly* want to be a good person, and make the world a better place.  Put your hatred aside all year, and…

Help the person next to you, your neighbor because they are old and can’t mow their lawn.

Help the Somalian boy in the middle of the road bleeding because some racist, fascist idiot kicked the living daylights out of him just because of where he was born.

Help the young man that you see at your bar that loves another man, but is too afraid to show his feelings because some say it’s bad to be gay.

Help the young mother who was raped which resulted in a child but everyone shuns her because they think she’s just a slut that sleeps around because no-one knows her story.

Be good to people.. make it a point to help someone, just one person if you want, less fortunate than yourself every day of 2014.

.. and if someone else doesn’t agree with your faith, your religion, say to them, that’s good, I don’t mind, I have my own beliefs and I respect that you have yours…!

Happy New Year everyone, please make it so… BECAUSE ONLY *YOU* CAN!

 

 

This is a little of an odd post, and I think you’ll understand why.  I also need your (you, the reader) help so please read on…

A friend of mine is mortally allergic to fish, and as such I have an ‘EpiPen’ in my first aid kit especially for her in the event of accidental contamination of any of the food I make.

So what’s the title about?  Well most people (including me before I met my friend) don’t know many drinks (eg Coca-Cola), particularly alcohols (eg Wine and Beer) are made using fish or egg products, so one sip of such a product by my friend could potentially kill her.  What makes it worse, is that food allergy laws exempt listing ‘fining’ agents as ‘ingredients’ therefore there is no way to tell if a drink has been contaminated.  This is where I want your help… more on that later.

So here’s the thing, ‘isinglass’ is a product that is derived from the bladders of fish, it’s used for clarifying alcoholic products, notably Wine (including Sherry) which is then used in other products (such as cooking, and cheap brandy)…  Other ‘fining’ products include egg etc a good information source on what fining products are used is here: The Vegan Society Further research and checking of laws show that there is no requirement for a producer to list fining agents on their products as technically the agent is not an ingredient..  (it’s like requiring them to say stainless steal is used to store the product during manufacture.)  However, here lies the problem, because it’s used as a fining agent there is a possibility that some of it is left in the finished product and whilst that doesn’t matter to many of us it is possibly lethal to people like my friend…!

So here’s where I need your help, spread this blog post to as many places as you can (legally, DO NOT SPAM!)..  We need people to be aware, and if you work at a plant that creates drinks and/or alcoholic products or uses isinglass, please ask the management to consider putting a specific label on the product to indicate it’s use or the fact is is not used.  Better still if the product is vegan (ie if the product doesn’t use any animal derived fining agents, including isinglass or egg etc) have the product labelled ‘suitable for vegans’…

To be clear I am not asking for people to go down the ‘may contain nuts’ path…  what a mess that is (packets of peanuts labelled ‘may contain nuts’ … no SHIT! 😛 ) but if you make a product that can kill people because of a mortal allergic reaction, it would be good to let people know…!  It’d be better for people like me, who care, to know if your product is safe so that I can choose it instead of a non-safe variant/brand.

For those with the allergy that don’t know how to tell the difference, currently Google is a good source of information and the best way I have found is search for ‘vegan-alcohol‘, or ‘isinglass-brandy‘, or ‘isinglass-vodka‘, or ‘isinglass-smirnoff‘ etc  Results that state ‘this brand/product does not contain’ are safe products.

No information is just that.. unknown – DO NOT ASSUME SAFE!

 

Well there have been a number of issues recently and as I have been away it’s probably better to write a single post for updates on the last issues:

First, the Election in Malta…

Following my post and a number of complaints by others, the police did indeed question a number of people regarding their political campaigning, though I am not aware of any more arrests.  Also at the same time it was pointed out to me that the advertising that was posted to me was for the PL candidates and none for the PN candidates (even though they were as guilty) … I was not given any screenshots for the PN campaign, and whilst the time has been an gone if anyone wants to give me screenshots I will add them even now.

Second the Air Malta issue...

Following my post Air Malta have upped their advertising campaigns, including discounted flights, I suspect they are seeing sales being lower than planned.  Whether that is anything to do with my post I have no idea, but one thing is for sure they have no intention of refunding me or any other person for flights when they automatically cancel return tickets and/or make mistakes.  Since posting I have received a number of complaints from others regarding AirMalta including one lady that indicated that she suffered financial losses because of them on at least 2 occasions…. One which was some €1200.00… they even refused to play the tape of the recording where the person at Air Malta clearly says €60.00 per person and then they charged her €1200.00…

Third and finally, ARMS…

ARMS should have received service from the courts by now (though I haven’t been notified) following my registration of the Judicial Protest regarding their over charging me and incorrect billing of my Electricity, despite them being informed by my lawyers of their mistake in Law.  I expect the next step will be to actually take them to court over the issue…

 

So this entry is taken from the blog of someone I love and care about, I’m posting it because I have suffered depression and I know all too well it’s the silent killer that kills more people every year than any other disease.  I am posting it because it talks about how free are we really?  And in truth, the words are so well written that I thought it must be from a world renowned writer..  Well I was wrong, it is written by someone who’s first language is not even English…  This shows (in my opinion) how intelligent this person is, she is a total genius, and with it the same things I suffered, the ability to see how everyone is in it for themselves, how we are slaves to money, possessions and the way society expects us to be.

With no further ado:

As I sit here and ponder with tears about to rupture from my eyes, the phrase “I want to die, I want to die…” echoes in my head and drives me bonkers. Death must be so beautiful. No yesterday, no tomorrow, forget time, just plain silence and peace. How wonderful it must be to die and not have to worry about a thing… to be free! I can’t handle this much longer; life is too much of a heavy burden on my shoulders drowning me deeper and deeper into profound despair. I am sick and tired of everything… such a vile world we live in. The mere thought of being brought up to believe that as humans we are free, incredibly baffles and disgusts me, because, how free are we actually? We are puppets on a string, slaves of our own society and of those who rule it – we are captives of the law, religion, education, work, the economy, media, people’s judgment. Freedom is being able to do or say whatever you want without fear of the consequences – given that no one around you gets hurt; so no, I strongly disagree with the statement that as human beings we are free, and having said so, this absolutely infuriates and distresses me, seeing as, from a realistic point of view, no matter how many causes and rights are fought for, we will never be truly free – that is the painful truth about life.

You call this a life? No one will ever understand how every breath feels heavy in your lungs, how painful it is just to wake up in the morning and force yourself out of bed just to do every-day tasks like every other ‘normal’ person, how disgustingly gratifying it is to drag a blade across your wrist and wait for the courage to thrust it into your flesh.. and at that moment a rush of mixed emotions surface, between rage, helplessness, feeling ashamed, yet also, control and relief. You cannot explain the knot you feel in your chest and the lump in your throat which disables you to voice out what you’re thinking.

I cannot find the strength to wake up in the morning, go to school and face society. I’ve spent so many days locked inside just lying in bed feeling depressed, helpless and suicidal… how can I explain to my teachers that I find it extremely difficult to go to school, not because I don’t want to, but because I’m losing the battle? They won’t understand…. to them I’m just another lazy student who doesn’t give a shit about her education and thus I’ll probably soon be kicked out of there too, and yet again the word FAILURE comes to mind! How can I explain to my loved ones that I don’t want to live anymore? Would they believe me or would they assume that I’m just having a bad day or going through a rough phase?

Is there any solution, any cure, any hope? I’m afraid I’m not capable of answering that question… so instead let’s drink another glass of alcohol to suppress the pain, light another cigarette to feel a certain calmness, roll another joint to feel liberated and at peace, and have sex with another stranger to feel alive for a very short while, let’s swallow another pill because those were the doctors’ orders and supposedly ‘feel better’.

Truth is, I feel empty, miserable, lost, alone, disgusting, hopeless and depersonalized…. these thoughts won’t shut the f*ck up!

Have I perhaps gone mad?

No hunnie, you haven’t gone mad, you have just expressed in words something I could never, my depth of expression, my ability to put into words my true feelings about life in this world of today.  We are all slaves to those who want power and money, even I as an evangelist, as a vigilantly as a person pushing as hard as I can to get society going in the right direction still suffer at their hands.

Chin up hun, I love you and so do all those around you.  You have the power to change the world, let me show you how. <3

So today have been a really interesting day, not one but two issues came up to talk about, today I’m only going to blog about the latter of the two are it’s certainly considered controvercial, but its also an ongoing ‘current affairs’ issue… “Gay marriage”

Before I start, I will say this blog is not intended to offend anyone and I apologise in advance if you are offended.  My point is to inform, not offend.

I have seen the arguments going on around the world for some time, both sides have valid points, but I think both sides are not focussing on the actual issue.

• First you have the Church (and church going people).. their argument is marriage is a sacred thing and only something that can be regconised before God.
• Second you have the Gay people of the world, they want the rights of anyone married. They don’t want to be discrimated against, they want any benefits of a married person, so they want to “get married”.

Now there are clearly at least two seperate reasons to it.

• First, Gay people want the rights of a married person, this is not a marriage issue, this is an issue in law.
• Second, Gay people want to have their partnership union recognised as the same as a non Gay couple, ie they want to be married.

So now we have the main issues lets look at the history. Marriage is a word that belongs to the church, anyone fighting for ‘gay marriage’ is trying to change history, and in most cases they have not considered that by calling it ‘gay marriage’ they have already created a distinction that makes it different from ‘marriage’… so that is not the answer.

So why does the word marriage belong to the church you ask next…? Well lets look at the history of the word itself. Back before laws on marriage to get married you went to the church, there was no register of Births, Marriages and Deaths outside of the Church. The laws came later and the governments of the world used the church term in their documentation, so it became part of society. However, partnerships have existed for long before the church, people lived together as families without ever being married, without ever being legally joined. In fact if we look at nature (Gods other creations) we see these partnerships, this coupling of two animals even today. Many birds, will partner for life (certain types of duck for example)… they will only couple with one partner ever. This is nature, this is the way God created the world. The are many examples in the world where animals other than homosapiens (us humans) partner and/or have casual sex with same sex partners.. again another of Gods creations, so any man or woman that says that being Gay is not Gods way is telling you that they don’t know the real teachings of God. The Church I have said (and I mean all churches/religions) are “mans” creation, they are “mans” interpretation of what God wants, these are not the word of God. We can see the word of God in what God created for us to see in the world, what we see in nature… So that in mind, the word “marriage” is a man-made creation that defines the partnership of a man and a woman. Live with it, accept it, deal with it.

Now.. laws are also man-made, and define how we live our lives whether we are part of the church or not. They define how legal benefits and rights may be obtained or are enforced. They define the law in which we live… So what’s the point…? Well it’s simple, stop arguing about the word ‘marriage’ stop trying to make ‘marriage’ legal between a man and a man or a woman and a woman, you won’t win the argument and you won’t win with good reason. Instead as for the laws to be changed to recognise a ‘civil union’ a union of two people that confirms in law that they are partners, that they have the rights and restrictions of anyone who up to now is ‘married’. Same thing isn’t it? Well not quite because recognising a civil union in law may give Gay people the rights of someone married but it’s still called something else. So what’s the answer, well read on…

The church (and some governments of the world) state clearly that marriage is creating a family, it’s about family values. So why don’t we create families instead of getting married, well some do. In the UK (and other countries) where ‘civil union’ laws exist, a person gets ‘married’ or ‘joined’ in a registry office, and finialise it with a signing of the Register of Births, Deaths and Marriages. People (heterosexual couples) can get married in church, some do, some don’t. At sea, anyone who wishes to get married may ask the captain of the ship to marry them…. There is no church involved, there is however a ceremony, which at the end of it, when the ship reaches shore, the happy couple must regularise by signing the register of Births, Deaths and Marriages. So really what are we doing by requiring people to sign the Register is getting them to sign a register of “Births, Deaths, and Partners” or a register of “Births, Deaths and Families”. So, lets change the name of the register, lets forget the word Marriage, lets change the laws and the register to indicate what it really is, a register of Births, Deaths and Couples, take away the ‘Marriage’ component.

Next what do we need to do, well simply we need to replace the word marriage in the relevant laws and replace it with something that means the joining of two people in the same way marriage is the joining of a man and a woman. A conversation I had earlier suggested ‘unionized’ (I disagree with this as it has other connotations in other countries. I suggested ‘lawful partnership’ and it was suggested that would devalue the union below marriage. Suggestions obviously needed here, another conversation suggested a, ‘spousalisation’ .. wow what a mouthful! 😉 Other suggestions I have seen are ‘amarriage’ and ‘monasticism’ (another mouthful there, but technically accurate)… Either way, lets stop fighting between the church and the non church people, stop fighting between homosexual and hetrosexual people about it. Lets come together as God wishes and let people live their lives as they wish as *family*, for it is God’s wish (regardless of the name of your God) for people to live as families, be good to others and lead a productive life.

Now I am not suggesting at any point that people no longer get ‘married’, if a man and woman wish to go to church and get ‘married’ allow them that right, allow the church the right to say marriage is the joining of a man and a woman – only. Instead in regular society, change how we define the joining of two people as legal and life partners call it something else for *everyone*, allow people to say for instance, we are in a legal partnership, and for those men and women who choose to do so say “we also got married”. Lets legislate that forms may not ask if you are married, but instead if you are in a legal partnership (or any other name that is used legally.) Lets make both sides happy, lets join people, allow the church to keep their definition of marriage, and change the word used in regular society for the joining of *any* couple whether both male, both female or a man and a woman. Stop the arguments and work together for families as this is what the world is in desperate need of affirming.

Notes:

• References taken from: Marriage Watch on Major World Religions on the Question of Marriage
• I am a transsexual (male to female) that is Gay – I only date women (legally I am a woman, I date women, therefore I am legally gay. The church defines me as a man and therefore will allow me to ‘marry’ a woman.. go figure!)
• I am not a believer in the church (any church/religion) I am agnostic, i.e. I believe in a higher power that people refer to as their God, I do not know it’s name, I do not care or need to know it’s name, I believe it is there, and it will judge me on my passing from this realm.