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March 24
“…as many people will die in Argentina as is necessary to restore order.”
– Jorge Rafael Videla, October 1975
The Disappeared
The film opens in the 1990′s with a teenage girl being called to the school office; there, Christina is essentially kidnapped by the government, taken away from her parents without even a phone call home, and forced to live with total strangers. Cautiva is a real-life horror story, where at …Read more
March 23
You know you’re in trouble when your last best hope for justice are lawyers.
But thousands of lawyers and judges in Pakistan put their careers, their reputations, and possibly their lives on the line in the nearly two-year struggle to pressure the government to reinstate a judge.
That judge was Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry, whom then-President Pervez Musharraf removed from office in 2007.
As the head of the Pakistan Army, Musharraf came …Read more
March 22
If you thought the American Civil War ended slavery in North America, you’re half right.
Cuba didn’t abolish slavery until 1869, and did so almost at the very moment of its independence from Spain.
Puerto Rico, also a colony of Spain, had to wait even longer.
On September 24, 1868, about 500 Puerto Rican rebels had led an uprising against the Spanish government in the town of Lares. The Grito de Lares (Shout of Lares) …Read more
March 18-24
…when the night and day are equally divided, Buddha appears on earth for a week to save stray souls and lead them to Nirvana.”
http://mothra.rerf.or.jp/ENG/Hiroshima/Festivals/35.html
Thus, in Japan the Sundays prior to the spring equinox (shuubun no hi) and the fall equinox (shunbun no hi) are known as O-higan. Days on which families visit and honor the graves of the departed. Ancestors are said to watch over the family like tutelary, …Read more
March 21
March 21, the birth of spring, is also the birth of Mexico’s greatest leader, Benito Juarez.
On this day in 1806 Benito was born to poor Amerindian peasants in the mountains of Oaxaca. His parents died when he was three and Benito spent his youth working the corn fields and shepherding local flocks.
At age 12 he left the mountain village for the city of Oaxaca to live with a sister and work …Read more
March 20 or 21. Falls precisely on spring equinox.
Spring is here, friends. Let’s stay in the garden, and be guests to the strangers of the green…
— Rumi
Norooz is known by dozens of names across the many countries where it’s celebrated. Nowruz, Norouz, Noruz, Noroz, Nowroz, Nauryz, Navruz, Novroze, and more.
Now comes from the same root as “new”, and ruz means both “day” and “time”.
But however you spell it, the Persian …Read more
March 19
Las Fallas has been described as a “pyromaniac’s dream” and a cross between “a bawdy Disneyland, the Fourth of July and the end of the world.”
Mascleta, March 2004
So how did the next-best-thing to the Apocalypse come to be celebrated on the feast day of Saint Joseph, adoptive father of Jesus?
Well, though St. Joseph’s Day is celebrated as Father’s Day across Italy, Spain, and Portugal, the Valencians chose to celebrate another calling of …Read more
March 19
St. Joseph
In New Orleans, Carnival season doesn’t end with Mardi Gras, it just gets going. On the heels of the Mardi Gras and St. Patrick’s Day comes St. Joseph’s Day, one of the biggest celebrations of the year.
Saint Joseph is the Patron Saint of Italy; he’s particularly revered in Sicily, where prayers to the saint are believed to have ended a deadly drought in the Middle Ages. His Feast Day is celebrated by …Read more
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