Escape from boredom

Floyd Landis, last years winner of Tour de France, the guy who was doped like h¤”#¤”#¤ is finally found guilty as charged http://www.aftenposten.no/nyheter/sport/tourdefrance/article2006231.ece and he looses the title as well – at least one good thing today 🙂

In my series of books I have bought to maybe get to understand Islam better I found this book. Some time ago I thought that I should read more about Islam to get a better understanding and then maybe respect the religion more than before. The paradox is that the more I read, the more I disagree with Islam. There are several issues with Islam that you don’t find in other religions, the most important thing is the Sharia, where the religion influences directly into the public life of the state – read more at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sharia.

There is also several other issues such as the way women are treated according to Sharia, female genital cutting http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Female_genital_cutting, marriage between relatives, family planned marriages where the female might be very young.

There is also a big issue regarding how well integrated non western inhabitants are here in Europe. There are ghettos like Rosengård in Malmø, Sweden http://www.aftenposten.no/nyheter/uriks/article929662.ece, many unemployed leading to a big cost for the welfare system in each country.

The book has been criticized, found this article at Dagbladet. Quite funny though, the female interviewed have not read the book. Read, then disagree, before…shut up! http://www.dagbladet.no/nyheter/2006/09/13/476655.html

An interview with Hege Storhaug http://www.dagbladet.no/magasinet/2006/10/30/481245.html

I won’t tell you all that is written in the book, read it…then we can discuss it. Whether or not if it correct what she writes, I agree with Harald Stanghelle’s words at the beginning of the book

Det (finnes) øyeblikk i historien da konfrontasjon er en nødvendig forutsetning for en ærlig dialog

Got two tickets to La Boheme http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_boh%C3%A8me for the show tonight so I invited Elin. It was my first opera ever.

I must admit that it is a good thing that they have translated what they sing and showing it above the stage. Gave me the possibility to understand what was going on.

On my way to work today, waiting for the subway I first heard a loud noice, first I thought it was the subway coming way to early, but then I realized that it was two guys delivering an ice cream box, or new freezer to the candy store. Not something you see each day…

Referring to my post about one year ago http://www.hellem.org/blog/index.php/new/2006/08/13/blackwater the company Blackwater is not thrown out of Iraq due to an episode where Blackwater employees killed eight people yesterday http://www.aftenposten.no/nyheter/uriks/irak/article1999145.ece.

A bit strange anyhow, that this episode have banned Blackwater from all of Iraq. My guess is that this is not the first episode, so why all of a sudden throw them out now? A bit more to be found on the CNN web page http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/meast/09/17/iraq.main/index.html I guess the most important thing to notice is that it is not yet confirmed by the Iraq government.

Have been listening to K.D Lang “Hymns of the 49th Parallel” today. It is a cd in Elins collection, I guess I would never had bought it, but now I would, but don’t need. She sings very beautiful covers of well known songs of among others Neil Young and Leonard Cohen. The Cohen cover is Hallelujah, a version sung much, much better than the Norwegian “Gitarkameratene”. Unlike them she does not try to imitate Cohen, but make her own version of the song. Just like Johnny Cash doing a cover of Hurt by Nine Inch Nails, it still Hurts…but it ain’t NIN’s version…

http://www.kdlang.com/discography/2005.htm

Gitarkameratene sucks, or sucked…

Today I have hang out with Kent, Loy, Alf, Espen and Simen. First I stopped by Loy who is making a potato cannon, so far it blows, but soon it will blow the potatoes far, far away http://glassx.googlepages.com/. Then we went to Espen , ate a lot of pizza, drank wine and flew his new mosquito helicopter http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9IKTfe5TBmY

Loy waiting for the blast

Simen behind the helicopter, only showing by its green light…

Roy (Instagram @royzvoice)

Kent was out on the balcony when he shouted to me “Rune, come here and see…” So I went out to see this big truck with a trailer mounted going in reverse the whole length of Haugerudhagan. I guess due to the construction of new houses at the end of the road the turn spot had no place for him to turn on.

The project started last year at Vestreng, cutting down trees to get back the cultural landscape from Gaya which tries her best to concur it back. So this year we have managed to finish one third of it, there is now an electrical fence around it where two horses have spent the last two months.

But, still two thirds left, the following pictures from last weekend showing the work being done and most important of all – how much work still left

First, me in the big 4WD towing Anders up the hill while he uses the backhoe loader to get rid of all the roots

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Still a lot more to be done before horses can walk here next year

Old, but still working

My friend Simen now has his own blog as well – keep the good things coming…

http://www.klavenes.dk