Tag Archives: tourists

HOW TO ASK FOR HELP IN A FOREIGN COUNTRY

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NOTE TO IGNORANT AMERICANS:  CUT and PASTE ONE OF THE FOLLOWING PHRASES INTO THIS HANDY GOOGLE TRANSLATOR LINK TO COVERT THE TEXT TO ENGLISH)

Like most Americans your probably don’t speak “foreign” languages.  To help you identify yourself to the “natives” in a foreign country you will find the following phrase useful while travelling abroad.  Just speak the phrase S..L…O…W…L…Y in the appropriate language from the following list.  The “natives” will understand that you are an American and will render the appropriate assistance to you:

SPANISH:  Soy un ávido, sediento de sangre, santurrón hipócrita.

FRENCH:  Je suis un avide, sanguinaire, bien-pensants hypocrites.

GERMAN:  Ich bin ein gieriger, blutrünstig, selbstgerechten Heuchler.

DUTCH:  Ik ben een gulzig, bloeddorstige, zelfingenomen hypocriet.

RUSSIAN:   Я жадный, кровожадные, самодовольные лицемером.

CHINESE:  我是一個貪婪,嗜血,自以為是的偽君子。

POLISH:  Jestem chciwy, żądny krwi, obłudny hipokryta.

GREEK:   Είμαι άπληστος, αιμοδιψής, φαρισαϊκή υποκριτής.

SWAHILI:  Mimi ni tamaa, simba, self-haki mnafiki.

HINDI:   मैं एक लालची, जालिम, पाखंडी पाखंडी हूँ.

WHAT IF ALIENS BEHAVE LIKE US?

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Once in awhile I read some cutesy, Pollyanna-ish story about how wonderful it will be when we finally make contact with an “alien intelligence” or “extraterrestrial visitors” from another star system.  Wouldn’t that be lovely?  We could all sit down and have a nice chat about our respective cultures.  Or, perhaps we can invite them over for tea and show them our photo albums of our vacations and the grandkids.  Lovely, just lovely.  Right?

Well, let’s just hope they don’t look like the photos below!  Furthermore, let’s hope they don’t treat us like we’ve treated each other during the history of Earth.  Take Columbus, for example: he and his men raped, murdered and enslaved every native citizen they found in Haiti when they landed in the “New World”.  The British Empire massacred and enslaved millions of Africans.  The Romans Emperors invaded, stole, raped, pillages, plundered and massacred millions of Europeans.  The Catholic Church murdered millions of “infidels” just because they didn’t share the same philosophy of “love and understanding” as the Pope.  International oil companies (using their government armies) invade, murder and steal land to secure gas and oil rights all over the world.  International Bankers force millions into poverty and starvation to personal financial gain.  It never stops.

So, the question is this:  What if aliens turn out to behave like us?  (It’s a rhetorical question…).

ALIEN TAKING A LUNCH BREAK AT THE “EARTH CAFE”.  WHO’S FOR LUNCH?

A TYPICAL EXTRATERRESTRIAL “EXPLORER”

TOURISTS AT A CRUCIFICXION

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POSTCARD FROM 37 BCE

Crucifixion was often performed to terrorize and dissuade its witnesses from perpetrating particularly heinous crimes. Victims were left on display after death as warnings to others who might attempt dissent. Crucifixion was usually intended to provide a death that was particularly slow, painful (hence the term excruciating, literally “out of crucifying”), gruesome, humiliating, and public, using whatever means were most expedient for that goal. Crucifixion methods varied considerably with location and time period.

The Greek and Latin words corresponding to “crucifixion” applied to many different forms of painful execution, from impaling on a stake to affixing to a tree, to an upright pole (a crux simplex) or to a combination of an upright (in Latin, stipes) and a crossbeam (in Latin,patibulum).

In some cases, the condemned was forced to carry the crossbeam on his shoulders to the place of execution. A whole cross would weigh well over 300 pounds (135 kg), but the crossbeam would not be quite as burdensome, weighing around 100 pounds. The Roman historian Tacitus records that the city of Rome had a specific place for carrying out executions, situated outside the Esquiline Gate, and had a specific area reserved for the execution of slaves by crucifixion. Upright posts would presumably be fixed permanently in that place, and the crossbeam, with the condemned person perhaps already nailed to it, would then be attached to the post.

While a crucifixion was an execution, it was also a humiliation, by making the condemned as vulnerable as possible. Although artists have depicted the figure on a cross with a loin cloth or a covering of the genitals, writings by Seneca the Younger suggest that victims were crucified completely naked.  When the victim had to urinate or defecate, they had to do so in the open, in view of passers-by, resulting in discomfort and the attraction of insects. Despite its frequent use by the Romans, the horrors of crucifixion did not escape mention by some of their eminent orators. Cicero for example, described crucifixion as “a most cruel and disgusting punishment”, and suggested that “the very mention of the cross should be far removed not only from a Roman citizen’s body, but from his mind, his eyes, his ears.”

Frequently, the legs of the person executed were broken or shattered with an iron club, an act called crurifragium, which was also frequently applied without crucifixion to slaves. This act hastened the death of the person but was also meant to deter those who observed the crucifixion from committing offenses.  — REFERENCE SOURCE:  Wikipedia.org