#miss grand dominican republic

[themakeupbrush]

Miss Grand Dominican Republic

"El Barrancolf" This wonderful work of art is inspired by the Barrancoli, an endemic bird of Quisqueya la Bella. The green suit with small red parts represents its plumage, an inhabitant of the humid forests of the Dominican Republic. Its beak is narrow with a red underside and a black tip. With this suit we call on everyone to preserve our endemic birds and continue caring for the flora of our country.

[lindensea]

What was your problem with the In the Heights movie ?

I am just curious.

I have only seen the movie and not the stage musical.

You said Jon M Cho didn’t understand the Central them.

please explain ?

Hello! Sorry this has been languishing in my asks for a few weeks. Honestly, it's been about two years since I saw the In the Heights movie, so i won't have as detailed of an answer as I want. And also, I wanna be clear that I don't hate the movie. There are a lot of things i like about it, although ultimately it's just not as good to me. There's something intangible about Broadway ITH that i love but can't quite explain. But i'll try!

First of all, cutting down Nina's family drama wasn't the right move. But that's probably not what i was referring to in the post you found, and this response is gonna get long, so we won't even talk about the Nina's parents of it all in discussion.

I think what i was referring to is the change in the movie's timeline and how that undercuts one of the central themes. On stage, In the Heights on stage takes place over the course of 2 days and nights (plus the next dawn). It's a small and contained story, just a glimpse into the lives of community for a couple days (which it literally states in the first song). The story ends when Usnavi decides to stay. Will the bodega be successful? Will Vanessa be happy away from Washington Heights? Will Usnavi and Vanessa actually go on a second date? Will Nina do well at school? Will she and Benny stay together? Will Usnavi ever go back to the Dominican Republic? How will Benny fare with no job? What will Kevin do now? Listen, we just don't know. AND THAT'S THE POINT. It's a contained little slice of life in a neighborhood. It's a small story! It's not a grand story of people achieving the American dream (a fashion line, market, and children, citizenship, etc.). It's people struggling through the present and not knowing if it will all pan out. In the Heights says the future is uncertain but we're not giving up and we're living our lives NOW. It's literally Right There in the songs.

"Everybody's stressed, yes! But they press through the mess Bounce checks and wonder what's next"

In the Heights I've got today! And today's all we got, so we cannot stop This is our block!

So turn up the stage lights We're takin' a flight To a couple of days in the life of what it's like En Washington Heights!

Keep scraping by!

"In five years when this whole city's rich folks and hipsters Who's gonna miss this raggedy little business?"

We pass the test and we keep pressin'"

Where it's a hundred in the shade But with patience and faith We remain unafraid

The movie is framed through the eyes of older Usnavi, an Usnavi who has already achieved his dreams (whether it's the copout bar it seems like he's at or the bodega he's actually sitting in), and it robs the narrative and songs of a lot of their power. We all know where the story will end. Sure it ends a little different but we know it works out. In addition to the older Usnavi narration, there are two flashforwards--one for Nina and Benny before she goes back to school, and one IN THE MIDDLE of the finale. That last one is my least favorite. How can you have lyrics asking if this place will still be around in five years WHILE having the characters there at least five years later?? It's...tone deaf. Giving the movie a typical flashforward to a Hollywood ending, it directly contradicts the uncertainty that pervades the whole story. It kind of changes the genre too. It makes In the Heights into a bigger story of achieving the American Dream, when all it really is supposed to be about is making it through the day through the power of community.

[conandaily2022]

Maria Felix biography: 22 things about Miss Grand International 2024 fifth runner-up from Dominican Republic

View this post on Instagram A post shared by 𝗠𝗶𝘀𝘀 𝗚𝗿𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗜𝗻𝘁𝗲𝗿𝗻𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝗮𝗹 (@missgrandinternational) Who is Maria Felix? Maria Eugenia Felix Paredes is a Dominican real estate agent, dancer, dance teacher, model and beauty queen born in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, she represented the Dominican Republic in Miss Model of the Universe, Miss Intercontinental and Miss Grand…

[evikdpriagung]

20231025 #4 23.02 WIB

298/365 Days

Luciana Fuster @lucianafusterg of Peru 🇵🇪 is the winner of Miss Grand International 2023 in Vietnam tonight. With Myanmar 🇲🇲, Colombia 🇨🇴, USA 🇺🇸 and Vietnam 🇻🇳 as her runners up. Ini sayang banget kenapa Colombia cuma 3rd place ya, she is more than that. The top 10 are Angola 🇦🇴, Dominican Republic 🇩🇴, Indonesia 🇮🇩, Netherlands 🇳🇱 and Thailand 🇹🇭. The top 20 are Czech Republic 🇨🇿, France 🇫🇷, Honduras 🇭🇳, India 🇮🇳, Laos 🇱🇦, Nigeria 🇳🇬, Puerto Rico 🇵🇷, Spain 🇪🇸, Ukraine 🇺🇦 and Uzbekistan 🇺🇿. Stage y keren y, apalagi pas opening number, ada gambar bendera dalam bentuk kipas dan itu keren.

Here is my score

Semifinalist: 8.5

Finalist: 8.5

Stage: 9.5

Music: 8

MC: 8.5

Entertainment: 8

Flow of Programme: 9

Average: 8.57/10

Source: @missgrandinternational

#Pageant #Beauty #MissGrandInternational2023 #Review #Opinion #LucianaFuster #Peru #Youtube #Wednesday #October #25th #2023

[doanhnhantre]

Để tham gia phần thi trang phục dạ hội trong đêm bán kết Miss Grand International 2023, 12 nàng hậu đại diện của các quốc gia và vùng lãnh thổ như: Australia,Canada,Dominican Republic, Cu Ba,Guatemala, Ireland, Germany, Panama, Netherland, Nicaragu... đã tìm đến Nguyễn Minh Tuấn đặt hàng thiết kế trang phục.

[usasportsworld]

Fernandez de Oliveira builds lead at Latin America Amateur

Fernandez de Oliveira builds lead at Latin America Amateur

RIO GRANDE, Puerto Rico — Mateo Fernandez de Oliveira of Argentina had a record day at Grand Reserve to build a 4-shot lead Saturday in the Latin America Amateur Championship, leaving him one round away from a spot in the Masters and U.S. Open. Fernandez de Oliveira, who missed a playoff by 1 shot last year in the Dominican Republic, tied the tournament record with a 9-under 63. The senior at…

[hermajestyimher]

Miss Grand International has ended and as promised I bring you my favorite, who didn't win but deserved to. Miss Grand Dominican Republic Stephanie Medina. Her whole swimsuit performance was decadent, the perfect balance of sensuality and class, her whole presence is great Afro-latina representation.

[marcholasmoth]

OSRR: 2740

today we went to the beach!!

in the dominican republic!!

it was amazing. and beautiful.

but the drive was heartbreaking. seeing the abject poverty we passed by in our air-conditioned charter bus to a private beach while being on an excursion on a cruise, all of which cost an absurd amount of money, just. it hurt, yknow? seeing the difference, even in the bahamas, and i assume we'll see in grand turk, the environment and the lifestyles of people who live there is incredible to me, and it hurts to see and watch that, yknow?

but despite that, it was amazing.

and it didn't start raining until later, like 2. they had a table of souvenirs and gifts there, and i got myself a pair of larimar and amber and sterling silver earrings. they're beautiful. i have to straighten the posts when i get home, sure, but that's a small price to pay for some of the most beautiful earrings i've ever seen.

after heading back to the tiny carnival "town" of amber cove, joel and i went into a few shops so i could find a snow globe and pick up a free charm from one of the jewelry stores there.

i found a snow globe with no issues. it's got a colorful house in it, and it reminds me of the bright house i saw on the way there.

joel went to the cafe for the wifi while i went into the jewelry store for the charm. i plopped my stuff out of the way so i didn't need to get the floor wetter than it was already. i walked around the shop happily with a lady who worked there, and she grabbed me a sand dollar charm and a pair of alexandrite studs, and as we looked toward another display, there was a definite crash. i didn't want to look at it because the stones were so pretty, but i looked up anyway.

it was joel.

joel's flip flops and the rain combined with the fuckin' marble flooring and a glass table was a bad time.

he didn't break the table, but he did definitely fall on it. he flipped it up on end, but people there helped him up and onto a little sofa there and got him water and i was glad they got to him first. he's so sweet and sensitive and i just didn't want him to be hurt, and thankfully they were able to provide him with the comfort he needed in that moment before i got to him. i love him. (the lady i was with thought he was my son at first.) (she also ended up getting me a second bracelet and charmn

we got back on the boat with no other problems, thankfully.

i showered and got dressed properly and hung out for a while after also rinsing my suit out. joel had gone to find foods, so when he came back he also showered. long day in beautiful salty water and in the sun = exhaustion. we're both a little burned.

after a bit i went off to dinner, coming back to the room after stuffing myself with more food than i've had all week. it was all really good, though.

around 7:30 or 8 joel and i went to meet his dad at one of the bars, where we each got one drink and then decided we needed food and a quieter area, so we went upstairs. i knew i wasn't going to be able to finish my drink because it was already upsetting my stomach like a third of the way in. i left it there. john left his there, too, because he'd been drinking all day at the beach thing where there was unlimited free rum drinks. joel had also had a bunch, so when we went up for food, he didn't drink much more of his either. rum doesn't like me much.

we all ate food while up on deck 16, but the ice cream machine was shut down for cleaning before john or i got to it, so not long after we all just went back to our rooms.

after putting laundry together into the bag i'd requested from our head cabin dude who is very cool whose name also sounds like "ninja" and who knows us all by name, i crawled into bed with joel as the boat swayed. we watched hgtv or whatever it is for like house hunters and property brothers and stuff like that. it's nice watching stuff with joel. i'm gonna miss just laying in bed with the tv going and joel and i being ridiculous together and criticizing the houses people choose. god i love him so much.

tomorrow is grand turk and snorkeling. fuck yeah.

[sunmoonandeddie]

a vision in white

pairing: bucky barnes x reader

word count: 3,441

summary: Fucking Chad and fake champagne.

prompt: “And our love story? I know it may not feel like it right now, baby, but I promise you, it’s just getting started.” (This is Us)

warnings: swearing, angst with a fluffy ending

a/n: This is my first successful attempt to getting back into writing long form.  It’s also my entry for @softhairbarnes‘s challenge that was due, like September 18th.  I’m so sorry it took so long, and the prompt is bolded in the fic!

Bucky Barnes hated weddings.

Actually, no.  That’s not quite accurate because he loved Sam and Natasha’s wedding.  When Sam had asked him to be a groomsman, he’d actually cried.  In fact, he cried at least four times that day: watching Tony walk Natasha down the aisle, during the vows and the first dance, and then when he’d watched his girl catch the bouquet.

His girl.

No.

He needed to stop that.  You’re not his girl anymore.

It was that stupid bouquet toss that had caused him to panic.  It had sent him into a downward spiral as his anxiety reared its ugly head, telling him that he’d never have this with you.

It didn’t matter what the stupid tradition said.

Steve was standing near the front with Tony and Sam, mingling with your parents and having a grand old time.  He must’ve said something at least a little funny with the way that your mom had her head thrown back in a laugh.

That used to be him.  He used to be the one chatting with your family at events, his arm around your waist.  Your dad always called him ‘son’ and your mom fretted over whether he was eating enough while your older siblings gave him hell for keeping you away from them in New York City for too long.  He’d never thought he’d have a family in the twenty-first century, but yours had welcomed him with open arms.  Your brothers had become his brothers, your sister became his sister.

And then he’d fucked it all up.

And because of his fuck up, he was sitting in the back pew of a church, watching some asshole named Chad chat with one of his groomsmen while waiting for the ceremony to start.

The worst part was that it was all wrong.  This wasn’t the wedding you wanted.  He knew that for a fact.

First off, the church.  You never wanted a church wedding in the middle of August, damn it.  Everyone was sticky with sweat, even with the air conditioning on full blast, and more than a little miserable.

And there wasn’t…  There wasn’t enough flowers.  The only flowers present were two bunches of white tulips on either side of the altar.

Fucking tulips.  In white.  It was like you’d had zero hand in planning your own wedding.

Which, from the look of things, you probably didn’t.

There just wasn’t enough color.  It was all pristine white, as though trying to create some image of purity that he knew you didn’t have.  You weren’t some kind of innocent virgin like the whole church thing suggested.

The trip you two had taken to the Dominican Republic a few years ago had made sure of that.

You’d told him about the wedding you dreamed about in the middle of the night, between sleepy kisses and wandering hands.  The sheets had been kicked off at some point.  You’d tangled your legs with his, soft fingers brushing his hair back away from his face as you murmured into the crook of his neck, “I want a small wedding outside.  Just you and me and our family.”

“Yeah, baby?” He’d chuckled, drawing you even closer, if it were possible.  “Just us and our family?”

“Mmhm.  Don’t need anyone else.”

He’d hummed his agreement as he rolled the two of you over, leaning over you.  His forehead pressed against yours, your legs wrapped around his waist.  “What else?  Hm?”

“What do you mean, ‘What else?’” You had asked, his t-shirt riding up your torso.  You’d stolen it at some point, almost permanently becoming one of your so-called ‘sleep shirts.’

“Tell me about our wedding.”

Your bright eyes crinkled as you giggled, your fingers toying with the hair at the nape of his neck.  “Our wedding, huh?”

His fingers attacked your sides in retaliation, sending you into a fit of laughter.

“Okay!  Okay!”  You had allowed him to lie on your chest, his head resting right above your racing heart.  His weight was a welcome one, grounding you and keeping you in the present.  Just as Bucky had his demons, you had yours, too.  Your voice was soft and sweet, barely audible, as you continued, “It’ll be outside… in June…  And there’ll be flowers.  We’ll have so many flowers that no one will know what our color scheme is supposed to be.”

A laugh from your fiancé, your soon-to-be husband, pulled him out of his memories.  God, the smug bastard.

Part of him wondered if he even knew about your past relationship.  Granted, he had to.  You were together for so long, it would be strange to not at least mention him to your new lover.  Your fiancé.

Right?

Without a second thought, he stood up from the cold, hard pew and went through the double doors that people were still filing in from.  He didn’t care that he received more than a few dirty looks after bumping shoulders with a few people.  He didn’t recognize more than half of them.  Some of them he can vaguely remember from one of your family reunions.

He had so many questions that he needed to ask you.  He needed answers.

His invitation was crumpled in his hand as he searched the church, looking for any hint that might lead him to where the bridal party was getting ready.  He knew that he’d find you wherever that was.  Wanda and Natasha, too.

“Bucky?”

The familiar voice stopped him in his tracks, and he turned to see your older sister standing standing behind him.  Josephine, or Jo, as she preferred, was your only sister, the second born of five.  He had no doubt in his mind that she’d bawled when you’d asked her to be your maid-of-honor.

“Hi,” he said with a bit of a wince.  He knew how he looked right now.  Crazed.  Desperate.

She had a glass of what appeared to be water in her hand, but he could smell the vodka from where he stood.

Some liquid courage for the bride?

“She doesn’t like vodka,” he said, his voice barely audible.

Jo rolled her eyes, crossing her arms and crinkling the silky gray material of her bridesmaid’s dress.  “Yeah, well, she used to not like guys named Chad either, but here we are.”

He wasn’t quite sure what to say or how to respond at all, and just stood there with his mouth hanging open like a codfish.

“Come on,” she said, nodding further down the hall.  The first few feet were completely silent, their footsteps muffled by the old carpet covering the floor.  There was no way this church had been renovated since the seventies.

“She misses you, you know.”  She kept her eyes forward, refusing to look at him as she admitted things she’d sworn secrecy to.  “She won’t admit it to anyone but me, but she does.  We all do.”

His blue eyes drifted down to the cardstock in his hand.  It was white, just like the rest of your wedding, with you and your fiancé’s names embossed on it.  It was worn from the amount of times he’d folded and unfolded it in his anxious state.  “I didn’t expect to get an invitation.”

“She didn’t send it.  I did.”

It was said so matter-of-fact that he didn’t even register her words at first.  But the second he did, he tripped and almost fell flat on his face.  “You what?!”

“Oh, come on, Bucky,” she said, stopping in front of him.  “This…  This whole thing isn’t right.  I know you feel it, too.”  She motioned back down the way they came.  “This isn’t her.  She’s settling for someone that isn’t right for her because she thinks you don’t want her.  And I…”  Her eyes, the same brilliant shade as yours, drifted to the ground.  “I knew that if you came, it would mean that you still love her.”

“I—”  He ran his hand over his face.  “Of course I do.  But she deserves more than me.”

If Jo’s eyes could’ve rolled to the back to her head, then they would’ve.  “You’re both absolute idiots.”  She grabbed his hand and set the glass of vodka in his hand before pushing him towards a closed door.  “This is your chance to fix it.”

He looked at her once more before turning back to the door, knocking once.

“Come in.”

God, just hearing your voice in person for the first time in three years sent waves of affection through him.

The first thing he saw when he opened the door was your back.  You were sitting at the vanity in the room, toying with one of the pins your hair.

“Jo, can you help me?  This just… isn’t right.”

But Bucky was frozen by the door.  His mouth was suddenly dry and he had to fight the urge to down the entire glass of vodka in his hand.

“Jo, really—”  You turned in your chair, freezing when you saw him standing there instead of your sister.  “Jamie?”

You looked so… so shocked.  Hesitant.  Maybe even a little scared?

“Uh…  Hey, sweetheart,” he said, swallowing down the lump in his throat.  “It’s, uh…  It’s been a while.”  When you just stared at him, he held out the glass.  “Jo gave me this to, uh, to give to you.”

But you didn’t take it.  Your fingers were white from how hard you were gripping the back of the chair.  “What are you doing here?”

His heart was beating so hard he was sure his ribs were going to break like glass.  “You…  You look beautiful.”

And he wasn’t lying.  You were truly a vision in white.  The veil covering your hair was trimmed in delicate lace, framing your features in a way that made you appear almost angelic.

Your fingernails were digging into the palms of your hands as you finally stood up.  “James, what the hell are you doing here?”

“Jo invited me.”

You cursed under your breath, your eyes drifting up towards the ceiling.  “Fucking Jo.”

He took a step forward, a little scared of how you’d react.  His hands were trembling.  “I…  I…”  He cleared his throat as he desperately tried to gather his thoughts.  Rolling his shoulders back, he willed himself to have some fucking courage, damn it.  After what must’ve been an eternity, he finally allowed himself to meet your gaze.  “Listen, I could say a lot of shit right now about how sorry I am, and it’d be true.  Because I am sorry.  I was stupid and dumb and, and a lot of other words that I can’t think of right now because fuck, you’re right here and I…  I miss you.  I miss you more than anything in the world, and if I could take it back, I would.”  When you didn’t retreat, he took a few more steps towards you.  “I love you.  I love you so god damn much, and I never should’ve pushed you away.”  The vodka was rippling, his hand was shaking so much.  “You’re the love of my life, and I’d be willing to bet anything—in fact, I’d bet Steve’s life—that I’m the love of yours.”

“James—”

“Tell me that you love him,” he said, now standing just mere inches from you.  He set the glass on the vanity without breaking eye contact.  You could feel his breath gently fanning across your face.  “Tell me you love him and I’ll leave.  I won’t ever bother you again.  But, sweetheart, there’s no way he can ever love you how much I love you.”  His hand, calloused and rough, tenderly cupped your cheek.  “I don’t have any right to you, I know.  But I couldn’t live with myself if I didn’t even try to make things right.  And our love story?  I know it may not feel like it right now, baby, but I promise you, it’s just getting started.”

Even though your eyes were watering, you didn’t step away from him.  Your cheeks had just gotten hotter and hotter the closer he’d gotten to you.  “What are you asking me, James?”

“Come with me,” he whispered, leaning his forehead against yours.  His voice sounded pained, his metal hand grasping yours.  “We can get out of here, go home.  Please.”

You took in a shaky breath, a million thoughts running through your mind.

“Say you’ll run away with me, sweetheart.”

“I…  I can’t.”

Bucky jerked away from you, feeling like a pot of boiling water had been tossed onto him.  “What do you mean?”

Nose scrunching as you sniffled, you reached out to him.  “Jamie, please…”

He backed towards the door, shaking his head.  “Don’t ‘Jamie’ me.”

Wiping at your eyes, you rushed to explain.  “I can’t just… just leave him at the altar, Jamie!  I can’t hurt him like that!”

“Why not?!”

You looked at him like he’d grown a second head.  “What the hell do you mean, ‘Why not?’  I’m engaged to him.  I promised to spend the rest of my life with him, and—”

“You don’t love him!”

The words died in your throat.  Your chest was heaving against the confines of your dress.  “I’m engaged to him.”

“That doesn’t mean shit,” he said bitingly.  His arms waved around dramatically as he spoke.  “You’re sitting here in a dress, about to give the rest of your life to an asshole—Which, by the way, really?  Chad?  You decided to marry an asshole named Chad of all things?—because you can’t hurt his feelings?”  He really wished he’d downed some of that vodka right about now, even though it wouldn’t really do much for him.  “Are you really going to throw your life away like that?”

You narrowed your eyes at him, trying to keep yourself from crying.  You were supposed to walk down the aisle in less than thirty minutes, and your makeup artist would kill you if you’d ruined her hard work.  “I…  I love him.”

Bucky stared at you for a long moment, hoping that you would realize what a mistake you were making.  But when it didn’t come, he let out a huff of air.  “You keep telling yourself that.”  He took one last look at you as he opened up the door, ready to leave.  “Have a happy life, sweetheart.  I’ll…  I’ll see you around.”

He allowed the door to shut behind him before the waterworks started, forcing himself to not go back in when he heard you crying.

Stupid super soldier hearing.

“Bucky?”

He looked up to see Jo standing there, the hopeful look in her eyes quickly diminishing.  “She, um…  She says she loves him.”

He knew that she could hear you crying even without a super soldier serum coursing through her veins.  Without even giving him a second look, she slipped into the room and out of his sight.  Your sobs seemed to get even louder when she entered.

Not able to withstand the torture that was being so close to you without being able to call you his, Bucky ran.

He left the church, grabbing a bottle of champagne that was sitting on the catering truck outside.

It would seem that your reception was to be in the basement of the church, of all places.

He didn’t even bother to tell anyone he was leaving.  After all, he’d ridden with the team to the church, and he didn’t want to have to beg one to drive him back to the Tower and miss the ceremony.  They’d actually been invited.

You wanted them there.  But not him.  Not after how badly he’d fucked up.

It wasn’t like any of them actually expected him to be able to make it through the vows, or even into the sanctuary.

He aggressively wiped at his eyes as he walked down the crowded streets of New York City.  “Don’t you have places to be?” He wondered aloud as yet another person bumped into him.

His feet knew where to take him before his mind did.

The 50 Street Station on Broadway.

The night you first met, you’d just finished a shift at Ellen’s Stardust Diner.  Your roller skates were sitting by your feet as you waited for the subway.  Bucky had just been wandering around the city and had somehow ended up across Manhattan.

He’d instantly been smitten with the girl working her way through university, and it had been history from there.

He sat on one of the benches, uncorking the bottle with little difficulty.

If anyone was curious as to why an Avenger was drinking in a subway station at noon on a Saturday, no one asked.

And in his nice suit, too.

“Oh, buddy, how the hell did you end up here?” He asked himself before taking a long swig from the bottle.  Some of the bubbling liquid dribbled down his chin and he wiped it on his jacket sleeve that definitely cost more than his childhood home back in the twenties.

He would kill for some of Thor’s Asgardian mead at the moment.

But he’d just have to settle for some second rate champagne that, honestly, probably wasn’t even real champagne.

“Probably made in America,” he muttered to himself as he inspected the bottle.

Sure enough, right there on the back under all the nutritional information, it said Made in California.

“Can’t even get real champagne for her,” he said to no one in particular.  No one in the station was paying him any mind, choosing to let him wallow in misery on his own.

Seven trains had passed by before he heard it.

“James?!  Jamie?!”

He imagined that right?  The wind from the trains was playing tricks on him.  Making him hear your voice.

An exquisite form of torture, really.

“Jamie!”

But it sounded so real.

Curiously, he lifted his head, the almost empty bottle dangling from his fingers.

And there you were.

Still a vision in white in your wedding dress.  Your veil was half torn off, your hair falling.  The hem of your skirts was dirty from the muck that covered the streets of New York City.  You held a suitcase in your hand, rolling your shoulder back to accommodate the weight and pressure of carrying it through the city.

“What are you doing here?” He asked as he got to his feet, the champagne forgotten.  He wiped at his eyes, desperately trying to appear more put together than he felt.  “You…  You are here right?  I’m not hallucinating or anything?”

“No, you’re not hallucinating,” you said as you set the suitcase down with a huff.

He blinked slowly at you, almost afraid that you’d disappear if he closed his eyes.  “I mean, you never know with fake champagne.”

“Shut up.”

He watched as you sat down on the bench he’d been occupying for a little over an hour and a half, crossing your arms over your chest.  “What are you doing here?”

“What do you mean, what am I doing here?”

“You’re getting married to Chad.”

With an eye roll that reminded him a lot of Jo, you kept your eyes on the approaching subway.  “Clearly not.”

He snuck a peek at your left hand, heart pounding when he realized that you didn’t even have your engagement ring on.  “Oh.”

You two sat in silence for a few minutes, not speaking.  It was so peculiar to be in the exact spot that you two had met seven years before.  So much had changed but at the same time, so much was the same.

He was still crazy about you, for one, and it would appear that you felt the same.

“I hate that you’re right all the fucking time.”

His heart skipped a beat and he finally turned to look at you.  “What was that?”

And despite how much you fought it, a small smile was tugging at your lips.  “Shut up.  You know what I said.”

“I’m not right all the time,” he said slowly, inching his pinky closer and closer to yours.  “I wasn’t right to leave you.”

“No, you weren’t.”

“I should’ve just told you that my anxiety was getting the better of me like you told me to.”

“Yes, you should’ve.”

He inhaled sharply as his finger finally brushed yours, and you allowed his fingers to intertwine with yours.

“Better late than never, I suppose,” you whispered, your eyes meeting his.

The silence between you was loaded with tension.  And the both of you knew that you had a lot of things to discuss, things to figure out if you were going to work in the long run.

But you were here and he loved you and you loved him.

And that was enough.

[transtranscendence]

2011 - We will not be silenced. We must fight back against transphobia.

For the unknown person murdered on June 1, 2011, in Goiandia, Goiás, Brazil.

For Matilde, murdered on June 2, 2011, in Ampliación Las Bajadas, Veracruz, Mexico.

For the unknown person murdered on June 3, 2011, in Poncitlan, Jalisco, Mexico.

For Mailda dos Santos (Maria do Bairro), murdered on June 8, 2011 in Lagoa Encantada, Cuiaba, Mato Grosso, Brazil.

For Carla Tovar Cardenas, murdered on June 12, 2011, in Tala, Jalisco, Mexico.

For “Nathan Eugene Davis”, murdered on June 13, 2011, in Northborough Drive, Houston, TX.

For Kenia Silva Nascimento, murdered on June 18, 2011, in Natal, Rio Grande do Norte, Brazil.

For the unknown person murdered on June 19, 2011, in Sabaneta, Maracaibo, Zulia, Venezuela. 

For the 2 unknown people murdered on June 21, 2011, in Natal, Rio Grande do Norte, Brazil.

For Karla, murdered on June 27, 2011, in Juarez, Nuevo Leon, Mexico.

For Casandra Hernández, murdered on June 30, 2011, in Calarca, Quindio, Colombia.

For the unknown person murdered on July 6, 2011, in Vilhena, Rondônia, Brazil.

For Thalia, murdered on July 6, 2011, in Chihuahua, Mexico.

For the unknown person murdered on July 12, 2011, in Tegucigalpa, Distrito Central, Honduras.

For Cinthia Gonzalez Garrido Rodriguez, murdered on July 14, 2011, in Calama, El Loa, Chile

For Shayara Soares Santana Pereira, murdered on July 16, 2011, in Belford Roxo, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

For Val de Souza, murdered on July 17, 2011, in Ariquemes, Rondônia, Brazil.

For the unknown person murdered on July 18, 2011, in Zona 5, Ciudad de Guatemala, Guatemala.

For Samantha, murdered on July 22, 2011, in Caracas, Distrito Capital, Venezuela.

For the unknown person murdered on August 6, 2011, in Piedade, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

For Gaby, murdered on August 6, 2011, in Tlajomulco de Zúñiga, Jalisco, Mexico.

For the unknown person murdered on August 11, 2011, in Tlalpan, Distrito Federal, Mexico.

For Wajahat, murdered on August 14, 2011, in Karachi, Sindh, Pakistan.

For Baby Lourenço Gonçalves, murdered on August 17, 2011, in São José, João Pessoa, Paraíba, Brazil.

For the unknown person murdered on August 20, 2011, in Tiquisate, Escuintla, Guatemala.

For Roberta Machado Amorim, murdered on August 20, 2011, in Santa Luzia, Minas Gerais, Brazil.

For La Frutera, murdered on August 21, 2011, in Libertador, Mérida, Venezuela.

For the unknown person murdered on August 24, 2011, in Paris, France.

For the unknown person murdered on August 25, 2011, in Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India.

For “Victor Manuel” Ulloa Morales, murdered on August 31, 2011, in Santa Cruz de Yojoa, Cortés, Honduras.

For Adriana, murdered on September 5, 2011, in Luis Eduardo Magalhaes, Bahia, Brazil.

For the unknown person murdered on September 7, 2011, in Santa Branca, Belo Horizonte, Minas Gerais, Brazil.

For the unknown person murdered on September 8, 2011, in São Raimundo Nonato, Piauí, Brazil.

For Suzi Divino da Silva, murdered on September 8, 2011, in Nova Fatima, Paraná, Brazil.

For Luana de Oliveira Batista, murdered on September 8, 2011, in Rondonpolis, Mato Grosso, Brazil. 

For Simone Santos Rodrigues, murdered on September 9, 2011, in Eunapolis, Bahia, Brazil.

For Gaurav Gopalan, murdered on September 10, 2011, in Washington, D.C.

For “Carlos Eduardo” Ferreira de Oliveira, murdered on September 12, 2011, in Nova Iguacu, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

For “Jorge Alexis” Ortiz Hernández, murdered on September 17, 2011, in San Cristobal, Chiapas, Venezuela.

For La Denisse, murdered on September 19, 2011, in Galeana, Zacatepec, Morelos, Mexico.

For the unknown person murdered on September 20, 2011, in Boa Viagem, Recife, Pernambuco, Brazil.

For Lucie Parkin, murdered on September 20, 2011, in Hayward, CA, USA.

For the unknown person murdered on September 22, 2011, in Manguinhos, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

For the unknown person murdered on September 25, 2011, in Basaksehir, Istanbul, Turkey.

For the unknown person murdered on September 28, 2011, in Nova Serrana, Minas Gerais, Brazil.

For the unknown person murdered on October 3, 2011, in Maracaibo, Zulia, Venezuela.

For Paloma Perez, murdered on October 3, 2011, in San Juan de Miraflores, Lima, Peru.

For Tierrita, murdered on October 4, 2011, in Santo Domingo, Distrito Nacional, Dominican Republic.

For Paloma Rodrigues da Cunha, murdered on October 5, 2011, in Rua Perimetral, Fortaleza, Ceará, Brazil.

For Ramazan Cetin, murdered on October 6, 2011, in Gaziantep, Turkey.

For “Jefferson” Diogo de Cezaro, murdered on October 10, 2011, in Caxias do Sul, Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil.

For Joana Faria, murdered on October 10, 2011, in Curitiba, Paraná, Brazil.

For the unknown person murdered on October 10, 2011, in General Paz, Córdoba, Argentina.

For Sandy, murdered on October 13, 2011, in Vila Velha, Espírito Santo, Brazil.

For “Maicon Michel” Cardoso da Silva Westenhofen, murdered on October 15, 2011, in Lajeado, Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil.

For Elisa Sabatella Brasil, murdered on October 15, 2011, in Cacoal, Rondônia, Brazil.

For the unknown person murdered on October 17, 2011, in Buner, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan.

For Lulu, murdered on October 18, 2011, in Medellin, Antioquia, Columbia.

For Talha, murdered on October 22, 2011, in Karachi, Sindh, Pakistan.

For the 2 unknown people murdered on October 23, 2011, in Sao Paulo, São Paulo, Brazil.

For Dudu Paixão de Jesus, murdered on October 23, 2011, in Camaçari, Bahia, Brazil.

For Fogao Ferreira Rodrigues, murdered on October 24, 2011, in Carmo da Mata, Minas Gerais, Brazil.

For “The Key”, murdered on October 24, 2011, in Berisso, Buenos Aires, Argentina.

For Malu dos Santos Moraes, murdered on October 24, 2011, in Porto Velho, Rondônia, Brazil.

For Gabi Pereira Dantas, murdered on October 27, 2011, in Lagarto, Sergipe, Brazil.

For Jessica Rollon, murdered on November 1, 2011, in Ciserano, Lombardy, Italy.

For Luana de Oliveira Moreira, murdered on November 2, 2011, in Rio Verde, Goiás, Brazil.

For Muneer, murdered on November 4, 2011, in Bhati Gate, Lahore, Punjab, Pakistan.

For the unknown person murdered on November 8, 2011, in Formosa, Argentina.

For Y.M.A. Zambrano, murdered on November 10, 2011, in Venezuela.

For Angela, murdered on November 17, 2011, in Arroyo Pantanoso, Montevideo, Uruguay.

For Samira dos Santos, murdered on November 17, 2011, in Boca do Rio, Salvador, Bahia, Brazil. 

For the unknown person murdered on November 18, 2011, in Prado de Maria, Caracas, Distrito Capital, Venezuela.

For the unknown person murdered on November 18, 2011, in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

For Shakira Quinonez Ortega, murdered on November 25, 2011, in Montería, Córdoba, Colombia.

For Brenting Dolliole, murdered on November 26, 2011, in New Orleans, LA.

For the unknown person murdered on November 26, 2011, in Chihuahua, Mexico.

For Gardenia, murdered on November 26, 2011, in Campinas, São Paulo, Brazil.

For Carol, murdered on November 29, 2011, in Jardin Boa Esperanca, Sinop, Mato Grosso, Brazil.

For Sarita da Costa Rodrigues, murdered on November 29, 2011, in Jacaranda, Camocim, Ceará, Brazil.

For Suely Scalla Melo Oliveira, murdered on December 3, 2011, in Campinas, São Paulo, Brazil.

For “Pascual Ake Beh”, murdered on December 4, 2011, in Playa del Carmen, Quintana Roo, Mexico.

For C.P. Juarez Quiroz, murdered on December 4, 2011, in Tegucigalpa, Distrito Central, Honduras.

For Ursula, murdered on December 4, 2011, in Alvorada, Manaus, Amazonas, Brazil.

For Esmeralda Severino da Silva, murdered on December 7, 2011, in Lagoa Mundau, Alagoas, Brazil.

For the unknown person murdered on December 8, 2011, in Patos, Paraíba, Brazil.

For Luningning Alsade, murdered on December 9, 2011, in Cebu City, Philippines.

For La Loba Fonseca, murdered on December 11, 2011, in Maracaibo, Zulia, Venezuela.

For the unknown person murdered on December 13, 2011, in Chihuahua, Mexico.

For Perla Mora, murdered on December 13, 2011, in Chimbas, San Juan, Argentina.

For Erica Hernandez, murdered on December 17, 2011, in Detroit, MI, USA.

For “Frederico” Claret dos Santos, murdered on December 19, 2011, in Pouso Alegre, Minas Gerais, Brazil.

For “Marvin Geovany” Ramos Miranda, murdered on December 20, 2011, in San Pedro Sula, Cortés, Honduras.

For Patricia Costa Alves, murdered on December 20, 2011, in Posto Horizonte, Rio Verde, Goiás, Brazil.

For the unknown person murdered on December 23, 2011, in Cesteros, Chimalhuacan, Estado de México, Mexico.

For Natalia Ferreira, murdered on December 23, 2011, in Jardim Paraiso, São José do Rio Preto, São Paulo, Brazil.

For Fabiola, murdered on December 24, 2011, in Chihuahua, Mexico.

For Bruninha dos Santos Lima, murdered on December 24, 2011, in Apucarana, Paraná, Brazil.

For Mona, murdered on December 27, 2011, in R. Japura, Belo Horizonte, Minas Gerais, Brazil.

For Githe Goines, murdered on December 29, 2011, in New Orleans, LA.

For Magnolia Barbosa da Silva, murdered on December 29, 2011, in Centro, Maringa, Paraná, Brazil.

For Dee Dee Pearson, murdered on December 31, 2011, in Kansas City, MO.

For all the other trans siblings who were murdered or went missing.

[themakeupbrush]

Miss Grand Dominican Republic 2022 National Costume- ¡Arriba República Dominicana!

My country is not only known for beautiful beaches and good people. It’s also recognized by major league ballers, victorious athletes and our Caribbean Queens. Who have won 22 gold, 14 silver and 12 bronze medals. All of them make us proud in each of their performances! The feeling that Marileidy Paulino is reaching the finish line is an indescribable feeling...  Seeing David Ortiz in the Hall of Fame is a pride Albert Pujols and his 700 homeruns watching Niverka Marte give his finishes in the last points is complete adrenaline. Today, I not only represent Dominican Republic but all the athletes who due to their effort must be more supported in their athletic discipline. I use my social networks and participation as a platform and promote support to our athletes who require medical insurance, studies, with a quality of life, because they represent us day after day in each of their practices that require constant discipline. Today I am you, on a stage where thousands more people, will know that on the same trajectory of the sun exists a cradle of stars. 

[worlld]

Cathedral of Seville and the Giralda Bell Tower

As churches go, the Cathedral of Seville ranks right up there with the grandest of them all. A worthy rival to the grand cathedrals of Italy, the Cathedral of Seville has the distinction of being the largest cathedral, and the third-largest church, in the world behind St. Peter’s Basilica in Vatican City and the Basilica of Our Lady of Aparecida in Brazil.

The Seville Cathedral is considered the largest cathedral in the world, as both St. Peters and Our Lady of Aparecida are not seats of bishops and therefore do not qualify as cathedrals. 

Along with many other historical buildings in southern Spain, the Cathedral of Seville was constructed during the time of the Moorish occupation and was originally a mosque. In 1248, after the Christian conquest of Seville, the mosque was transformed into a cathedral. Early in the 15th century during a time of great prosperity for Seville, the decision was made to build a new cathedral that would rival any in the world.

After over 100 years of construction, the final result was pretty much the cathedral we see today, massive in size and with a more Gothic look. Despite a new cathedral being built, some elements of the original mosque were retained including the courtyard and the minaret, which was later modified into the current Giralda Bell Tower.

As large as the cathedral is you really don’t get a sense for the magnitude of this church until you enter. Once inside, its massive columns and 80 separate chapels will leave you in awe. When visiting these grand cathedrals I am always struck by not just the enormity of the building itself, but also the intricate detail work that must have taken skilled craftsmen years to perfect. These cathedrals really are works of art, and thankfully have been well preserved for generations to enjoy.

Once you get over the sheer size of the interior it’s time to explore the treasures within. Most visitors will, of course, want to see the tomb of Christopher Columbus. His tomb is located not far from the entrance and it is hard to miss, prominently perched atop the shoulders of four knights. The Knights represent the four regions of Spain during the time of Columbus: Castile, Leon, Aragon, and Navarro.

Years of debate over whether the remains here are indeed those of Columbus were seemingly put to rest when DNA tests conducted in 2006 on the remains matched DNA from Columbus’s brother, who is also buried in Seville. Skeptics, however, point to the fact that Columbus’s body was moved many times after his death and prefer to believe his remains are still buried in the Dominican Republic.

Of the 80 Chapels in the cathedral, the most opulent is certainly the Capilla Mayor or the Great Chapel. Carved from wood and covered with gold, it is the largest altarpiece in the world at over 20 meters in height, and also the most expensive.

This incredible work of art was done by a single craftsman, Flemish artist Pieter Dancart, who hand-carved each of the 45 scenes representing the life of Christ. Dancart spent 44 years working on this single work of art. Absolutely incredible!

As you roam the cavernous interior don’t miss visiting the Great Sacristy, which houses the cathedral’s museum and is somewhat hidden. The treasury of the cathedral is also located here and contains a number of works of art by Spanish artists including Goya and Murillo. Also here are the “Keys to Seville”, presented to Castilian King Fernando by the Moors upon the surrender of the city in 1248.

Before you exit the cathedral be sure to walk the ramps to the top of the Giralda Tower. Built during the late 12th century as a minaret during the Moorish period, it was converted into a bell tower after the Christian conquest. At 104 meters (342 feet), the tower dominates the skyline of historic Seville.

From the tower you can now head to the large courtyard, called the Patio de los Naranjos (patio of the oranges). The courtyard remains from the days when this was a mosque, and its fountain was used by worshippers to wash their hands and feet prior to their daily prayer. Today it’s a wonderful spot to sit and relax after touring the cathedral. The orange trees provide ample shade and the view of the tower and cathedral is beautiful.

[newstfionline]

Headlines

‘Sobering’ report shows hardening attitudes against media (AP) The distrust many Americans feel toward the news media, caught up like much of the nation’s problems in the partisan divide, only seems to be getting worse. That was the conclusion of a “sobering” study of attitudes toward the press conducted by Knight Foundation and Gallup and released Tuesday. Nearly half of all Americans describe the news media as “very biased,” the survey found. “That’s a bad thing for democracy,” said John Sands, director of learning and impact at the Knight Foundation. “Our concern is that when half of Americans have some sort of doubt about the veracity of the news they consume, it’s going to be impossible for our democracy to function.” The study was conducted before the coronavirus lockdown and nationwide protests over the death of George Floyd. The study found that 71% of Republicans have a “very” or “somewhat” unfavorable opinion of the news media, while 22% of Democrats feel the same way. Switch it around, and 54% of Democrats have a very favorable view of the media, and only 13% of Republicans feel the same way. Eight percent of respondents—the preponderance of them politically conservative—think that news media that they distrust are trying to ruin the country.

Deaths pile up on Texas border (AP) RIO GRANDE CITY, Texas—When labor pains signaled that Clarissa Muñoz was at last going to be a mom, she jumped in a car and headed two hours down the Texas border into one of the nation’s most dire coronavirus hot spots. She went first to a hospital so desperate for help that nurses recently made 49 phone calls to find a bed 700 miles away to airlift a dying man with the virus. From there, she was taken to a bigger hospital by ambulance. Along the way, she passed a funeral home that typically handles 10 services a month but is up to nine a week. And when she finally arrived to give birth, she was blindsided by another complication: A test revealed that she too was infected. Hours later, Muñoz was granted just a few seconds to lay eyes, but no hands, on her first born, who was quickly whisked away. On America’s southern doorstep, the Rio Grande Valley, the U.S. failure to contain the pandemic has been laid bare. For nearly a month, this borderland of 2 million people in South Texas pleaded for a field hospital, but not until Tuesday was one ready and accepting patients. In July alone, Hidalgo County reported more than 600 deaths—more than the Houston area, which is five times larger.

Former Spanish king heading for the hills (Foreign Policy) Controversy continues to grip Spain after former King Juan Carlos, who abdicated the throne in 2014 amid a series of scandals, reportedly fled the country amid a new spate of legal troubles. Spanish media initially reported that he went to the Dominican Republic, but the Dominican government claimed there was no record of the former king entering the country, fuelling widespread speculation over his whereabouts. Leftist politicians have used the occasion to question the future of the monarchy in Spain. Juan Carlos is credited with spearheading Spain’s transition to democracy after the end of former dictator Francisco Franco’s reign in 1975. But his reputation took a hit toward the end of his rule as he became embroiled in several controversies relating to his personal wealth.

Spain’s Canaries to cover all COVID-related costs for tourists (Reuters) All Spanish and foreign tourists visiting the Canary Islands will have any potential coronavirus-related costs covered by the regional government, it said on Wednesday, in an attempt to rescue the tourist season after a new spike in infections in Spain. The move will take effect this week and is the first of its kind in Spain as the tourism-dependent nation seeks to reassure visitors after Britain dealt a blow to the sector by imposing a compulsory quarantine for anyone coming from Spain.

China won’t go quietly over TikTok (Foreign Policy) Chinese media outlets have responded to the United States in the ongoing dispute over the popular Chinese social networking giant TikTok, leveling sharp criticism at the Trump administration over its recent attempt to pressure U.S. companies to buy TikTok’s operations in the United States. In an editorial on Tuesday, the China Daily newspaper accused Washington of “bullying” Chinese tech companies and warned that there were “plenty of ways to respond if the administration carries out its planned smash and grab.” The editor-in-chief of the Global Times newspaper called the move “open robbery,” and accused Trump of “turning the once great America into a rogue country.”

Chinese summer leadership vacation (Foreign Policy) Chinese President Xi Jinping and other top leaders are likely to vanish from public view in the next few days for the annual retreat at Beidaihe, a seaside town where the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) leadership engages in a combination of vacation and Machiavellian plotting. The retreat has often provided a chance for retired leaders to shape the party’s direction, but with Xi’s seeming ascent to absolute power, their role has been reduced. But any opportunity for a significant number of power brokers to physically spend time together is also an opportunity to plot. If the whispers of discontent with Xi’s leadership ever coalesce into action, it will be after one such event.

U.S. health chief to be highest-ranking official in decades to visit Taiwan, angering China (Reuters) U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Alex Azar will visit Taiwan in coming days, his office said on Tuesday, making the highest-level visit by a U.S. official in four decades—a move that angered China, which claims the island as its own. Azar’s visit will worsen already poor Beijing-Washington relations, inflamed over trade, the pandemic and human rights, even as democratic Taiwan has welcomed the show of support in the face of unrelenting Chinese pressure. China denounced the trip, saying it opposed any official interactions between the United States and Taiwan and had lodged “stern representations” with Washington.

What Lockdown 2.0 Looks Like: Harsher Rules, Deeper Confusion (NYT) Australia’s second-largest city, Melbourne, is grappling with a spiraling coronavirus outbreak that has led to a lockdown with some of the toughest restrictions in the world—offering a preview of what many urban dwellers elsewhere could confront in coming weeks and months. The new lockdown is the product of early success; the country thought it had the virus beat in June. But there was a breakdown in the quarantine program for hotels. Returning travelers passed the virus to hotel security guards in Melbourne, who carried the contagion home. Even after masks became mandatory in the city two weeks ago, the spread continued. And now, as officials try to break the chain of infections, Melbourne is being reshaped by sweeping enforcement and fine print. A confounding matrix of hefty fines for disobedience to the lockdown and minor exceptions for everything from romantic partners to home building has led to silenced streets and endless versions of the question: So, wait, can I ____? Restaurant owners are wondering about food delivery after an 8 p.m. curfew began on Sunday night. Teenagers are asking if their boyfriends and girlfriends count as essential partners. Can animal shelter volunteers walk dogs at night? Are house cleaners essential for those struggling with their mental health? Can people who have been tested exercise outside?

Beirut reels from huge blast as death toll climbs to at least 135 (Reuters) Lebanese rescue teams pulled out bodies and hunted for missing in the wreckage of buildings on Wednesday as investigations blamed negligence for a massive warehouse explosion that sent a devastating blast wave across Beirut, killing at least 135. More than 5,000 people were injured in Tuesday’s explosion at Beirut port, Health Minister Hamad Hassan said, and up to 250,000 were left without homes fit to live in after shockwaves smashed building facades, sucked furniture out into streets and shattered windows miles inland. The death toll was expected to rise from the blast, which officials blamed on a huge stockpile of highly explosive material stored for years in unsafe conditions at the port.

Fireworks, ammonium nitrate likely fueled Beirut explosion (AP) Fireworks and ammonium nitrate appear to have been the fuel that ignited a massive explosion that rocked the Lebanese capital of Beirut, experts and videos of the blast suggest. The scale of the damage—from the epicenter of the explosion at the port of Beirut to the windows blown out kilometers (miles) away—resembles other blasts involving the chemical compound commonly used as an agricultural fertilizer. But the compound itself typically doesn’t detonate on its own and requires another ignition source. That likely came from a fire that engulfed what initially appeared to be fireworks that were stored at the port. Online videos of the disaster’s initial moments show sparks and lights inside the smoke rising from the blaze, just prior to the massive blast. That likely indicates that fireworks were involved, said Boaz Hayoun, owner of the Tamar Group, an Israeli firm that works closely with the Israeli government on safety and certification issues involving explosives.

Uganda’s tough approach curbs COVID, even as Africa nears 1 million cases (Reuters) Uganda’s crumbling public hospitals, doctors’ strikes and corruption scandals make its success in the fight against the new coronavirus all the more unlikely. But the nation of 42 million people has recorded just over 1,200 cases and five deaths since March, a strikingly low total for such a large country. As the number of cases in Africa approaches one million, Uganda’s experience shows what can be accomplished when a government with a firm grip on power acts quickly and enforces a strict lockdown. But its success came at a cost, critics say. Jobs were lost, and economic growth is set to plunge to as low as 0.4% in 2020, from 5.6% last year, according to the World Bank.

[evikdpriagung]

20230218 #5 23.23 WIB

49/365 Days 11,994

Just watched the first Miss Charm International. Ho Chi Min City, Vietnam was the host country of this magical event. I was so enjoyed the show even it was more than 2 hours. Gildaaa bangeet waktu liat jugdes ya. Nathalie Glebova, Miss Universe 2005, Maria Lalaguna Miss World 2015, Ikumi Yoshimatsu Miss International 2012. Pecaah siih. The semifinalist has a great catwalk and of course, most of them are well spoken. Something that can be improved are the MC, should be more relax, the audio, the music and the smooth of the show. Tapi utk edisi pertama ini udah keren siih. Kalau d maintain bisa jadi Grand Slam ini. Grande banget. Btw congrats to @russoluma of Brazil 🇧🇷 from winning the title of Miss Charm 2023, as the first winner ever. Her runners up are Philippines 🇵🇭 and Indonesia 🇮🇩. The top 6 are Colombia 🇨🇴, South Africa 🇿🇦 and Venezuela 🇻🇪. The top 10 are Argentina 🇦🇷, Costa Rica 🇨🇷, Dominican Republic 🇩🇴 (i love her, she could be go further, her walk is fabulous) and Puerto Rico 🇵🇷. Catwalk y top 10 sumpah kece aduhai bangeet. The top 20 are Chile 🇨🇱, China 🇨🇳, South Korea 🇰🇷, Malaysia 🇲🇾, Mexico 🇲🇽, Poland 🇵🇱, Russia 🇷🇺, Thailand 🇹🇭, Ukraine 🇺🇦 and Vietnam 🇻🇳. Here is my score of the show

Finalist: 8

Semifinalist: 9.5

Stage: 8.5

Music: 7

Quarantine Activity: 7.5

Entertainment: 7

MC: 7.5

Flow of the Show: 7

Average Score: 7.75/10

Source Picture: @misscharm.tv

#Pageant #Beauty #MissCharm #MissCharm2023 #LumaRusso #Brazil #Youtube #Opinion #Review #KalibataCity #Kalibata #Jakarta #Indonesia #Saturday #February #18th #2023

[bountyofbeads]

I Felt Safe in America. Until El Paso. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/10/opinion/sunday/el-paso-shooting-immigrants.html

Below are two editorial pieces written by Hispanic AMERICANS and their thoughts on America after the El Paso shooting. We CANNOT LET HATE WIN. WE MUST STAND WITH OUR BROTHERS AND SISTERS.

I Felt Safe in America. Until El Paso.

It is because of people like me and my daughter that a gunman did what he did.

By Fernanda Santos, Ms. Santos, a former national correspondent for The Times, teaches journalism at Arizona State University. | Published Aug. 10, 2019 | New York Times | Posted August 10, 2019 |

PHOENIX — A good friend who is moving to Chicago had a going-away party at a downtown brewery recently and I stopped by to say goodbye. He is an artist from Iraq who escaped to the United States in 2013 to save his life. In Iraq, Mahdi Army loyalists had chased, beaten and threatened him because he had dared to sketch nude pictures — practice for his entrance exam at Baghdad University’s College of Fine Arts. Here, he is free.

I wasn’t running from anyone when I settled in the United States 21 years ago, but I understand the idea of being free in America: For me, it has meant being free from the senseless violence of everyday life in Rio de Janeiro, from where I came. Since moving to the United States, I’ve married a white man, given birth to our daughter and moved to Arizona, where I’ve written about immigrants and the border and gotten to know both well.

I blend in seamlessly in Arizona, where about one in three residents is Latino. As a naturalized citizen, I felt safe here even when a campaign against illegal immigrants led by the infamous former sheriff, Joe Arpaio, targeted Latinos. One day after Donald Trump’s election, a man approached me while I spoke Spanish on the phone outside a coffee shop and screamed, “Speak English.” The experience rattled me, but still I felt safe. I did, however, start carrying my passport card in my wallet, just in case.

That sense of safety changed when a young white man opened fire in a Walmart in El Paso last Saturday, making targets out of brown-skinned people. I read the suspect’s manifesto  Sunday morning and, for the first time, I did not feel just like an immigrant. I felt like a target. I looked at my 10-year-old daughter eating the chocolate-chip pancakes I’d made and realized that she could be a target too. Citizenship, it turns out, is an illusory shield. In the eyes of that gunman, I am not American but an invader, an instigator. It is because of people like me that he did what he did.

Segregation was codified in this country in the days after Emancipation, when Southern states enacted laws that clamped down on African-Americans’ newly found freedom to vote, own property or attend public schools. But Jim Crow extended beyond the South: It took the Supreme Court to force Arizona to stop requiring voters to take English literacy tests, and that was years after the Voting Rights Act had already banned such tests.

But if legal segregation has largely fallen before court rulings, anti-minority and anti-immigrant attitudes have not. Last month, at a Republican event in Phoenix, State Senator Sylvia Allen, who is white, said, “We’re going to look like South American countries very quickly.” Ms. Allen, who later apologized, blamed it on the fact that white women are not reproducing fast enough and on the immigrants who are “flooding us and flooding us and flooding us and overwhelming us so we don’t have time to teach them the principles of our country.”

Last week, a fund-raising email by the Arizona Republican Party called the arrival of Central Americans at the border to assert their legal right for asylum “an invasion,” echoing language commonly employed by President Trump.

This is the language of white supremacy today: that we must stop immigration because Latinos will distort American culture and replace “real Americans.” But by “American culture” they really mean white culture, a definition that, to them, doesn’t apply to people like me. Or to black people, Muslims, Asian-Americans and many others, including mixed-race Americans like my daughter.

In his manifesto, the El Paso suspect employs this narrow definition to justify the unjustifiable. He says much more in that screed, most of it vile. Some, though, reminded me, in a good way, of the young undocumented immigrants I’ve met in Arizona. “Inaction is not a choice,” he wrote, reminding me that before elections, many young immigrants, including so-called Dreamers, knock on doors and share their stories, hoping to persuade their neighbors to do what they cannot, which is to vote. For those Dreamers, inaction is indeed not a choice.

There are Walmart stores all along the southern border. If you visit one of them on a weekend, you’ll see a parking lot full of cars with Mexican license plates. In Douglas, Ariz., a city whose mayor was born in the Dominican Republic, Mexicans who cross into the United States on foot to buy discounted clothing and housewares leave their Walmart shopping carts at the border crossing.

While I was at a Walmart in Phoenix shopping for school supplies the other day, I could see the kinds of people who make up this state. There were mothers speaking Spanish to children who spoke to one another in English, Muslim refugees from Africa in brightly colored hijabs, black families and white families too.

When school starts later this month in Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, one school will be missing its principal, Elsa Mendoza Marquez. She was among the 22 people killed in the El Paso Walmart, just across the Rio Grande from Juarez. A dual Mexican-American citizen, she too was shopping and was gunned down while her husband waited for her outside, in the parking lot.

What the El Paso gunman failed to realize is that the immigrants he so hates are, like him, struggling to make sense of a changing country and claim their rightful place in it. He chose a rifle to claim his place. My Iraqi friend, who is off to pursue a master’s degree in art in Chicago, chose a brush.

The Dreamers I’ve met have chosen the power of civic engagement to fight their fight. And that, to me, makes them better citizens than plenty of the people who call themselves “real Americans” these days.

El Paso Was a Massacre Foretold

Those who are set on killing minorities are aided by the fact that they can easily obtain assault weapons in this country.

By Jorge Ramos, Mr. Ramos is a contributing Opinion writer. | Published Aug. 10, 2019 | New York Times | Posted August 10, 2019 |

Leer en español

EL PASO ­— “I don’t know why he took my boy’s life,” Dora Lizarde said. Her grandson Javier, 15, was the youngest victim of last weekend’s massacre, killed by a bullet to the head. “Fifteen years old; he still had so much time to live,” Ms. Lizarde told me in an interview this week. “I don’t know why he took him away, I don’t understand. He is young, too.”

Patrick Crusius is young, too.

Police have charged Mr. Crusius, 21, in the mass shooting that killed 22 people at a crowded Walmart here on Aug. 3. Nineteen of the victims had Spanish surnames, making this the worst attack on Latinos in modern American history. The Mexican government has labeled the killings a terrorist act, given that eight Mexican citizens were among the dead. And, yes, it is a hate crime.

The massacre of Latinos in El Paso is the latest and most brutal reaction by a young, white American against a future that might be dominated by minorities. The fact that this attack happened is unsurprising: What else can we expect when racism and hatred of others is promoted from the top down in a country where there are more guns than people?

Authorities have said that Mr. Crusius posted a 2,300-word manifesto online minutes before the attack. In it, he said the attack was in response to a “Hispanic invasion of Texas.” “It makes no sense to keep letting millions of illegal or legal immigrants flood into the United States,” Mr. Crusius supposedly wrote, “and to keep the tens of millions that are already here.” Those words startled me — not only because they were so hateful, but because they could seamlessly fit into speeches given by President Trump, by some members of his cabinet and by many right-wing politicians.

While Mr. Trump insists that he does not have “a racist bone” in his body, his history of making racist remarks says otherwise. After years of suggesting that President Barack Obama had not been born in the United States, Mr. Trump launched his presidential campaign in 2015 by likening Mexican immigrants to criminals and rapists. He recently said that four congresswomen of color should “go back” to the countries from which they came. The list goes on. When the most powerful man in the world uses such toxic rhetoric, we should not be surprised when others mimic him.

Beto O’Rourke, the former congressman from El Paso and a Democratic presidential candidate, recently told me that he is convinced Mr. Trump influenced the attack. Mr. O’Rourke — who along with Senator Elizabeth Warren, another Democratic candidate for the presidency, has said in recent days that Mr. Trump is a “white supremacist” — responded to a tweet from the president by writing: “22 people in my hometown are dead after an act of terror inspired by your racism.” Other leaders and politicians, including Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, have also lost their patience with Mr. Trump. “I don’t want to hear the question ‘Is this president racist?’ anymore. He is,” Ms. Ocasio-Cortez said recently.

The president’s xenophobia, and that of many of his supporters and enablers, is rooted in a dread that the day is soon coming when they will be a minority in their country. While non-Hispanic whites remain a majority of the population in the United States, in less than 30 years that may no longer be the case, according to projections. This sort of demographic revolution is putting Americans’ tolerance to the test. Most of us welcome an increasingly diverse country, but many, like Mr. Trump, resist the country’s multiethnic, multicultural future. Some react by walking into a store and murdering innocent people.

The most racist Americans who are set on killing minorities are aided by the fact that they can easily obtain assault weapons in this country. I’ve lost count of all the massacres I’ve covered as a journalist. After each shooting — Columbine, Sandy Hook, Las Vegas, Parkland — I thought we might have reached the limit of Americans’ tolerance for such horror. But it wasn’t so. I fear that the killings in El Paso won’t change anything, and that I soon will be back on another flight headed to cover the next massacre. And then another. And another after that.

I have lost hope that the United States will ever pass laws that limit access to firearms. Like many parents around the country, I’ve had difficult conversations with my children in case they find themselves in a situation where someone is shooting at them. “Try to escape, hide or fight,” I tell them. “But don’t stay still. Gunmen have a lot of bullets, but not patience.”

Still, even if we could somehow solve our gun problem in America, our racism problem would be far more difficult to eradicate. Hate-group activity is on the rise, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center. And anti-immigrant rhetoric has already appeared in slogans shouted during the 2020 presidential campaign.

I crossed the border from El Paso to Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, one morning this week. For many years, Juárez was considered one of the most dangerous cities in Mexico because of the presence of drug cartels. Yet on this visit some people I spoke with told me that they didn’t dare cross into El Paso with their families. When I asked why, some said that they feared being hunted for being Mexican, and all said that racism was a factor.

Nobody should live in fear because they are Mexican nationals in the United States or members of the Latino community. But that’s where we are now in this United States of Trump. The abundance of weapons of war on the streets and Mr. Trump’s unending racist rhetoric are indisputably connected to the massacre in El Paso. What happened in this city was a massacre foretold. Words matter. When they are filled with hate, they cause great damage.

Mr. Ramos is an anchor for the Univision network and the author of “Stranger: The Challenge of a Latino Immigrant in the Trump Era.”

[newlettersradio]

In this public reading at The Writer's Place in Kansas City, poets Mia Leonin and Gustavo Adolfo Aybar celebrate Hispanic island cultures. Aybar, a native of the Dominican Republic, is a Cave Canem Fellow who shares poems from his 2017 debut collection, We Seek Asylum, winner of Willow Books Literature Awards Grand Prize. Leonin, who has explored her Cuban-American heritage in her memoir Havana and Other Missing Fathers, reads from her International Latino Book Award-winning collection from BkMk Press called Fable of the Pack-Saddle Child. Find us on Apple Podcasts and Stitcher or stream the full show on our website.