11/23/09 - Charleston Wang & Mary Joan Reutter Review President Obama's Trip to Asia with Emphasis on China. THE ASIAN AMERICAN HOUR has gotten bigger - we are now on the air weekly on public radio WAIF-CINCINNATI 88.3 FM and our broadcast time has moved to prime-time Monday evenings, 5 - 6 PM. THE ASIAN AMERICAN HOUR will continue to feature talk, and music, and other good things with a discernable slant towards Asian American affairs, immigration, and many other issues of interest to our community-at-large. THE ASIAN AMERICAN HOUR is produced and hosted by Charleston Wang with Mary Joan Reutter as co-host, together with our distinguished guests. So, tune in to THE ASIAN AMERICAN HOUR on WAIF-CINCINNATI 88.3 FM. every Monday 5-6 PM. Get the latest on the Asian American community in Cincinnati, the fast growing & mobile community in the Tri-state. After listening to the THE ASIAN AMERICAN HOUR, e-mail us direct feedback and thoughts by clicking here. If you or a friend wish to be a guest on THE ASIAN AMERICAN HOUR, please let us know. Tune in to THE ASIAN AMERICAN HOUR every Monday 5 - 6 PM on WAIF 88.3 FM Cincinnati on the air or on the internet streaming audio by clicking here, |
| THE ASIAN AMERICAN HOUR on WAIF 88.3 FM Cincinnati IS NOW A WEEKLY PRIME-TIME SHOW EVERY MONDAY EVENING 5 - 6 P.M. Informing the People of Cincinnati (and Beyond) since 6/7/2001. asianamericanhour@wangnews.net |
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Imagine. Again.
November 21, 2009
It feels like I live in three parallel universes. One is “regular”, the middle of the three, where I know
where everything is and how it works.
Then there’s the layer above where people shop at our new Nordstrom’s and live like Ina Garten
– where their main concern (and apparent joy) seems to be the centerpiece for the table; who shop
at boutiques and leave the store with only a breezy ‘Thanks Tom’. In this universe the price of
cheese is never considered, nor is paying for it. On the Food Network show, Barefoot Contessa,
Ina never does.
The growing third universe more and more makes the front pages of my newspaper.** The
latest headline warned that by 2018 “Kentucky headed for 50% obesity”. Today it was 11.2%
unemployment. Earlier it was a survey that concluded that Kentuckians rank 49th in “happiness”;
only West Virginians were more unhappy. Gallup-Healthways Well-being Index.
I realize these are economic layers – but I’m learning that our American experience seems to spring
from that framework. To me that’s the most disturbing thing of all – that our lives seem to be lived
and categorized only by the state of our material wealth.
If our current recession experience is any teacher, our material wealth seems to flow from the
governing and economic systems we have. It might follow, then, that in order for these three
universes to contract and come closer together, we would need to look issues of governance and
economics square in the eye. I guess our current awkward, nit-picking political fight is how we
avoid doing that.
But this way seems designed to push us further and further away from solving the fundamental
three tiered problems. From my observations it seems we’ve become so accustomed to this
system of nit-picking and fighting that we’re adopting it as a model in other areas of our lives.
Rather than more statistics and louder, finger-pointing blame, I propose that we engage our right
brain hemispheres – where we can imagine, gain insight, see bigger pictures and head for one
universe, which is really all we have. John Lennon had that idea in 1971 and a whole generation
joined the Beatles to “Imagine”:
“No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood
of man
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world...
You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will live as one.”
My imagination was sparked this week by some reported memories of the 20th anniversary of the
Velvet Revolution in East Germany and Czechoslovakia.* That’s when totalitarian, communist
governments fell because hundreds of thousands of people no longer cooperated with that
system. They were dreamers who hoped others would join them, and they did!
I’ve been particularly moved by the stories of St. Nikolai Lutheran Church in Leipzig, Germany.
“In the GDR (East Germany), the church provided the only free space," ...Everything that could not
be discussed in public could be discussed in church, and in this way the church represented a
unique spiritual and physical space in which people were free.
In the early 1980s, Rev. Christian Fuhrer (Pastor of St. Nikolai) began holding weekly non-political
prayers for peace.
“In church," Rev. Fuhrer said, "people had learned to turn fear into courage, to overcome the fear
and to hope, to have strength. They came to church and then started walking, and since they did
not do anything violent, the police were not allowed to take action.
"(East German officials) said, 'We were ready for anything, except for candles and prayer.'"
Deborah Potter, Religion & Ethics NewsWeekly, USA Today, 11-5-09.
Jesus and the Sermon on the Mount were Rev. Fuhrer's primary motivations, but he also drew
inspiration from German pastor and Nazi martyr Dietrich Bonhoffer, Ghandi and Martin Luther King,
Jr.
Rev. Fuhrer said he and his fellow worshippers didn't do what they did back then to draw people
to the church.
"We did it," he said, "because the church has to do it."
Just imagine!!
I am. I do. I imagine a regularly scheduled prayer service where the unemployed, the poor, the sick
and uninsured, the frightened and disheartened would come together to “overcome the fear and to
hope, to have strength” and to find they are not alone. A service in a church that does what the
“church has to do.” Where might that be, I wonder.
We might learn to say to our Empiric friends, what Desmond Tutu said during the apartheid
struggle – and the Velvet Revolution marchers said to their Emperors: We’ve already won, come
and join us. Candles and prayers, indeed!
© Beverly Jones 2009 - Doing Good. Together.
* BBC Special Report Europe’s Revolution 1989: [This is a particularly moving audio report]. http://www.bbc.co.
uk/worldservice/specialreports/1989.shtml
** The following excerpts are from the testimony of Lisa Hamler-Fugitt, Executive Director, Ohio Association of
Second Harvest Foodbanks before Senate Finance and Financial Appropriations Committee on Nov. 10, 2009
I have much to report about the impact of the declining economy on Ohio's most vulnerable citizens, the
skyrocketing demand for more food and groceries in the “worst economy in our lifetimes” and the results of HB 1
and HB 66 on the state's inability to provide a safety net for more Ohioans who are unemployed, underemployed,
poor children, seniors and the disabled.
The cold hard facts are simple - Poverty and hunger are increasing at alarming rates in Ohio:
o In 2008, 13.4% of Ohioans lived in poverty (US Census),
o Of America's top 10 poorest cities, three are in Ohio, Cleveland ranked 2nd with a poverty rate of 30.5%,
Cincinnati ranked 7th with 25.1% and Toledo ranked 8th with 24.7% of its residents living at or below the poverty
level. No other state had more than one city in the top 10. (US Census),
o 1 in 4 Ohioans over the age of 18 earn $10 or less an hour (Community Research Partners),
o 1 in 8 Ohioans are receiving Food Stamps (Ohio Dept. Job & Family Services - ODJFS),
o 1 in 6 Ohioans are on the Medicaid/SCHIP (ODJFS),
o 1 in 4 Ohio children under age 5 are hungry or at significant risk of hunger, ranking Ohio 3rd in the nation,
behind LA and NC (USDA),
o 1 out of every 2 children born in our state are eligible for WIC the Women, Infants and Children's Supplemental
Nutrition Assistance Program (USDA/ODH),
o 40% of Ohio's students are eligible for free and/or reduced price school meals (Ohio Dept. of Education).
November 21, 2009
It feels like I live in three parallel universes. One is “regular”, the middle of the three, where I know
where everything is and how it works.
Then there’s the layer above where people shop at our new Nordstrom’s and live like Ina Garten
– where their main concern (and apparent joy) seems to be the centerpiece for the table; who shop
at boutiques and leave the store with only a breezy ‘Thanks Tom’. In this universe the price of
cheese is never considered, nor is paying for it. On the Food Network show, Barefoot Contessa,
Ina never does.
The growing third universe more and more makes the front pages of my newspaper.** The
latest headline warned that by 2018 “Kentucky headed for 50% obesity”. Today it was 11.2%
unemployment. Earlier it was a survey that concluded that Kentuckians rank 49th in “happiness”;
only West Virginians were more unhappy. Gallup-Healthways Well-being Index.
I realize these are economic layers – but I’m learning that our American experience seems to spring
from that framework. To me that’s the most disturbing thing of all – that our lives seem to be lived
and categorized only by the state of our material wealth.
If our current recession experience is any teacher, our material wealth seems to flow from the
governing and economic systems we have. It might follow, then, that in order for these three
universes to contract and come closer together, we would need to look issues of governance and
economics square in the eye. I guess our current awkward, nit-picking political fight is how we
avoid doing that.
But this way seems designed to push us further and further away from solving the fundamental
three tiered problems. From my observations it seems we’ve become so accustomed to this
system of nit-picking and fighting that we’re adopting it as a model in other areas of our lives.
Rather than more statistics and louder, finger-pointing blame, I propose that we engage our right
brain hemispheres – where we can imagine, gain insight, see bigger pictures and head for one
universe, which is really all we have. John Lennon had that idea in 1971 and a whole generation
joined the Beatles to “Imagine”:
“No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood
of man
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world...
You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will live as one.”
My imagination was sparked this week by some reported memories of the 20th anniversary of the
Velvet Revolution in East Germany and Czechoslovakia.* That’s when totalitarian, communist
governments fell because hundreds of thousands of people no longer cooperated with that
system. They were dreamers who hoped others would join them, and they did!
I’ve been particularly moved by the stories of St. Nikolai Lutheran Church in Leipzig, Germany.
“In the GDR (East Germany), the church provided the only free space," ...Everything that could not
be discussed in public could be discussed in church, and in this way the church represented a
unique spiritual and physical space in which people were free.
In the early 1980s, Rev. Christian Fuhrer (Pastor of St. Nikolai) began holding weekly non-political
prayers for peace.
“In church," Rev. Fuhrer said, "people had learned to turn fear into courage, to overcome the fear
and to hope, to have strength. They came to church and then started walking, and since they did
not do anything violent, the police were not allowed to take action.
"(East German officials) said, 'We were ready for anything, except for candles and prayer.'"
Deborah Potter, Religion & Ethics NewsWeekly, USA Today, 11-5-09.
Jesus and the Sermon on the Mount were Rev. Fuhrer's primary motivations, but he also drew
inspiration from German pastor and Nazi martyr Dietrich Bonhoffer, Ghandi and Martin Luther King,
Jr.
Rev. Fuhrer said he and his fellow worshippers didn't do what they did back then to draw people
to the church.
"We did it," he said, "because the church has to do it."
Just imagine!!
I am. I do. I imagine a regularly scheduled prayer service where the unemployed, the poor, the sick
and uninsured, the frightened and disheartened would come together to “overcome the fear and to
hope, to have strength” and to find they are not alone. A service in a church that does what the
“church has to do.” Where might that be, I wonder.
We might learn to say to our Empiric friends, what Desmond Tutu said during the apartheid
struggle – and the Velvet Revolution marchers said to their Emperors: We’ve already won, come
and join us. Candles and prayers, indeed!
© Beverly Jones 2009 - Doing Good. Together.
* BBC Special Report Europe’s Revolution 1989: [This is a particularly moving audio report]. http://www.bbc.co.
uk/worldservice/specialreports/1989.shtml
** The following excerpts are from the testimony of Lisa Hamler-Fugitt, Executive Director, Ohio Association of
Second Harvest Foodbanks before Senate Finance and Financial Appropriations Committee on Nov. 10, 2009
I have much to report about the impact of the declining economy on Ohio's most vulnerable citizens, the
skyrocketing demand for more food and groceries in the “worst economy in our lifetimes” and the results of HB 1
and HB 66 on the state's inability to provide a safety net for more Ohioans who are unemployed, underemployed,
poor children, seniors and the disabled.
The cold hard facts are simple - Poverty and hunger are increasing at alarming rates in Ohio:
o In 2008, 13.4% of Ohioans lived in poverty (US Census),
o Of America's top 10 poorest cities, three are in Ohio, Cleveland ranked 2nd with a poverty rate of 30.5%,
Cincinnati ranked 7th with 25.1% and Toledo ranked 8th with 24.7% of its residents living at or below the poverty
level. No other state had more than one city in the top 10. (US Census),
o 1 in 4 Ohioans over the age of 18 earn $10 or less an hour (Community Research Partners),
o 1 in 8 Ohioans are receiving Food Stamps (Ohio Dept. Job & Family Services - ODJFS),
o 1 in 6 Ohioans are on the Medicaid/SCHIP (ODJFS),
o 1 in 4 Ohio children under age 5 are hungry or at significant risk of hunger, ranking Ohio 3rd in the nation,
behind LA and NC (USDA),
o 1 out of every 2 children born in our state are eligible for WIC the Women, Infants and Children's Supplemental
Nutrition Assistance Program (USDA/ODH),
o 40% of Ohio's students are eligible for free and/or reduced price school meals (Ohio Dept. of Education).
| Roaring Tigers, Leaping Carp Decoding the Symbolic Language of Chinese Animal Painting Cincinnati Art Museum 10/09/09 to 01/03/10 For more information, click here |
| LOBSANG DORJE EXPLAINS THE BUDDHIST TRADITION - 11/22/09 AT CHRIST CHURCH CATHEDRAL |
| From Left to Right - Charleston C. K. Wang, Lobsang Dorje, Ron Turner |
| HISPANIC CHAMBER CINCINNATI USA PUBLISHES TEACHING BOOKLET ON IMMIGRATION HISTORY OF CINCINNATI |
For copies and more information click here
| GREAT YOUTH DEBATE OF 2009 11/07/2009 COUNCIL CHAMBERS CINCINNATI CITY HALL 1st Place: Summit County Day School - James McLean, Tommy Kereynehagen, Max Williams 2nd Place Walnut Hills High School - Ciara Williams, Marshalla Eves-Kirkland, Madisynn Beckett 3rd Place: Western Hills University High School - Brenae Lyday, Deandra Moorman, Dominique Collins |
| THE CINCINNATI HUMAN RELATIONS COMMISSION PRESENTS |
| VOLUNTEER PHYSICIANS OF MERCY CARE CLINIC: From Left to Right: DR. TARIQ SULTAN, DR. NEMAT MOUSSAVIAN, DR. DAN ROTH |
| CHORISTERS OF CHRIST CHURCH CATHEDRAL IN THE CITY OF CINCINNATI |
| From Left to Right - Charleston C. K. Wang, Esq., Professor Mary Ellen O'Connell & Dean Gordon A. Christenson, Emeritus |
Mary Ellen O'Connell
| PRESIDENT OBAMA WALKS THE WALK ON THE GREAT WALL OF CHINA. The last thing that President Barack Obama did during his first visit to China was to take a solitary stroll on the ramparts of the Great Wall of China. During those precious quiet minutes alone, what thoughts could have crossed his mind? Earlier, many hefty issues were raised with Hu Jintao, President of China and General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party. Trade and currency, censorship, human rights, global warning, military cooperation, – these and others were broached and none conclusively resolved. Our president must have sensed a more muscular China, flexing and pushing harder against a United States still struggling at home with high unemployment and a high federal deficit. Could his mind’s eye wander back to that oversized portrait of Mao ZeDong still framing Tian An Men? If he did, he must have recalled the most famous, indeed, infamous dicta of China’s Great Dictator – “Political Power Grows Out of the Barrel of the Gun.” If he did, he could have taken genuine comfort and even inspiration knowing that by his initiative and display of humility, he has taken great steps towards disarming the dead hand of the Chairman. When two mighty nuclear armed nations engage in dialogue, however chilly and seemingly unproductive, they are unlikely to resort to armed conflict, however great the differences. And the dialogue must and will continue. Did Obama think of another wall of recent memory – the Berlin Wall? If he did, he must have recalled the clarion challenge issued by President Ronald Reagan: “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall.” If he did, our President must have smiled to himself and said very quietly “Mr. Hu, I shall be back.” And the World will be a better place for it. An Opinion by Charleston C. K. Wang, November 23, 2009 |
| HAPPY THANKSGIVING 2009 |