Be Inspired...Get Involved....Make a Difference...

Be Thankful...Be Inspired... Get Involved... and MAKE a DIFFERENCE...

Thanksgiving...in Canada...
I will celebrate and be thankful for my retirement from four-walls-teaching...and being with my family...

In North America we have to be thankful for all the liberties and abundance...

We have to thank for ALL that we have and share our blessings...

In schools I promoted food drives...But this year I will donate and be involved in helping others...

All of North America should be thankful for all the blessings and share those blessings with the community...

***

The parade of Nobels Continues...

The late Swedish industrialist Alfred Nobel left the bulk of his fortune to create the Nobel prizes... Today it will be the fourth ....Nobel prize of Literature...

Last year I was still confined to inside-four-walls-teaching...and last year in the morning announcement...TO MY SURPRISE...the Principal announced that the Nobel Prize for Literature has gone to Alice Monroe...a Canadian better known for her short stories... I was very happy and elated...                                       After all, it was the first time that such an announcement was made on the PA during the morning exercises... My last school was horrendous in its non-academic everyday life...! 

So I emailed a huge THANK YOU to the Principal...and later in the day, I made a point to see him and congratulate him personally... He was surprised in my enthusiasm... and that made me skeptical and a bit apprehensive... I debated alone;       1. Did he make the announcement because of a Canadian...? I am not sure...!                                                                                     2. But he was definitely surprised by my enthusiasm...after I was a mathematics teacher...and in his mind...NOTHING TO DO WITH LITERATURE...!

Well, what can I say...North America does not believe in educating the whole person...and the math is not related to literature and literature is not related to sciences...and the sciences are not related to social sciences...and so on... They think if they compartmentalize and subdivide the whole...all will be fine and more comprehensible...

All along, it was a struggle to include literature and music and spirituality in my math classes... I wanted the kids to learn mathematics WITHOUT numbers...the kids and parents and teachers insisted on numbers... It was a clash that was resolved when I retired...ONLY...

Alfred Nobel...Established the Nobel Prize after the invention of dynamite...and when he saw the destruction that it was causing...he was dismayed and wanted to be remembered NOT for the destructive dynamite...but the good that the money earned will promote...
When you share your fortune than you will make more people happy and spread the happiness all over the Global Village...

French author Patrick Modiano wins Nobel Literature prize

                                Patrick Modiano                                      Published his first novel, La Place de l'Etoile, in 1968

The Nobel Academy described the novelist, whose work has often focused on the Nazi occupation of France, as "a Marcel Proust of our time".

Patrick Modiano has written more than 30 novels

The award - presented to a living writer - is worth eight million kronor (£691,000).

Previous winners include literary giants such as Rudyard Kipling, Toni Morrison and Ernest Hemingway and Alice Monroe...

Japanese write Haruki Murakami and Kenyan poet-novelist-playwright Ngugi wa Thiong'o were in contention too but Modiano was selected as the winner...

The academy said the award was "for the art of memory with which he has evoked the most ungraspable human destinies and uncovered the life-world of the occupation".

"This is someone who has written many books that echo off each other... that are about memory, identity and aspiration," Peter Englund, the academy's permanent secretary said.

***

Alyssa Carson ... Just 13 Years Old...

Has BIG Dreams... 

Be INSPIRED and have a BIG DREAM too...

Alyssa...looking into space and dreaming of Mars...She wants to be the first person on Mars...and NASA thinks that she JUST might...

Check below and follow her dream...

Mars mission: Could US girl, 13, be first on red planet?

Alyssa Carson has big dreams. At the age of 13 she is determined to be the first person to land on Mars.

But this is more than wishful thinking - NASA thinks she stands a chance and she is already in training.

Alyssa is studying science and several languages and became the first person to attend all three of NASA's world space camps. 

The teenager from Baton Rouge, Louisiana, says failure is not an option. And her father says he has the next 20 years of work planned out.

Alyssa with her father...

The parents of kids are always crucial in promoting BIG dreams... In my last years in in-school teaching, I met a young man...Abhishek... He was energetic and smart and dedicated to learning like I had not seen for a long time...at least, not in North America... and the driving force of his BIG DREAMS was his parents... He was blessed to have parents like Alyssa...who share every step of the kids and get involved in their vision of the world...

I am sure I will see more Abhisheks and more Alyssas in the future...

***

...And the Blood Moon...

I emailed a friend that since I am retired now I had the luxuray to say up till the wee hours in the morning and observe the enchanting miracle in the sky...

I observed the eclipse of the moon for two whole hours...

I brought my chair out in the front lawn and had cups of coffee with cognac in it...actually it was 50-50 coffee and cognac... and the magic of the lunar eclipse up in the sky... I also had a very low decibel classical music...

I could not ask for more...

Miracle above...and tranquility all around...

The cognac magnified the experience into a magnificently magical moment... 

As it started...

A plane approaching Reagan National Airport in 

Washington DC...and the moon...

This photo was taken by Toshi Nema in Tokyo

Behind a Ferris Wheel in Tokyo

The Moon starts blushing... A Heavenly Blush... 

It's something to SEE....

View from Griffith Park in LA...Where I hike Sunday Mornings...

Close to the Hollywood Sign...

Magnificent...
Magical...
Messaianic
Moon...Blushing...
Morning...Blessed...
***

And back to Earth for ACTION...

The university of Glasgow will withdraw £18 million of investments over the next decade
They are divesting from fossil fuel...
Environment is more precious than the monies they make...
All educational institutions should follow the example and divest from harmful investments...
Be THANKFUL...in this Thanksgiving season and 
Protect the Mother Earth...
That's the ONLY Mother we have...
Students Got Inspired
Students Acted...
Students made a difference...

Glasgow University has become the first in the UK to announce that it will sell off the shares it holds in companies that produce fossil fuels.

A spokesman said the university recognised the "devastating impact" that climate change could have and the "need to reduce the world's dependence on fossil fuels".

The university is withdrawing £18m of investments over the next decade.

It comes after students had mounted a campaign calling for the change.