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compasslandgroup · 7 months

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Exploring Private Tracts of Land for Sale in North Carolina

In the sprawling landscapes of North Carolina, hidden gems await those seeking a retreat from the hustle and bustle of city life. Private tracts of land offer a unique opportunity for individuals looking to invest in rural real estate. From picturesque mountain hideaways to serene countryside parcels, North Carolina boasts a diverse range of properties for sale, each with its own charm and potential. In this comprehensive guide, we'll delve into the allure of private tracts of land in North Carolina and provide valuable insights for prospective buyers.

The Appeal of Private Tracts of Land

North Carolina's natural beauty is unparalleled, with its lush forests, rolling hills, and breathtaking vistas attracting outdoor enthusiasts and nature lovers alike. Private tracts of land for sale in North Carolina offer an opportunity to immerse oneself in this pristine environment, providing a sense of seclusion and tranquility that is hard to find elsewhere. Whether you're interested in building a dream home, establishing a recreational retreat, or simply investing in land for future use, North Carolina's private tracts offer endless possibilities.

Factors to Consider When Purchasing Land

Before diving into the world of rural real estate, it's essential to consider several factors to ensure you make a sound investment decision. Location plays a crucial role, with proximity to amenities, access to utilities, and zoning regulations all impacting the desirability and value of a property. Additionally, factors such as topography, soil quality, and natural features should be carefully evaluated to determine the land's suitability for your intended use.

Exploring North Carolina's Regions

North Carolina is home to a diverse array of landscapes, each offering its own unique charm and opportunities for outdoor recreation. From the majestic peaks of the Blue Ridge Mountains to the tranquil shores of the Outer Banks, there's something for everyone in the Tar Heel State. Let's take a closer look at some of the regions where private tracts of land are available for sale:

Mountains

The mountainous region of western North Carolina is renowned for its stunning scenery, vibrant communities, and abundant recreational opportunities. Whether you're interested in hiking, fishing, or simply taking in the views, this region offers an unparalleled lifestyle amidst the beauty of the Appalachian Mountains.

Piedmont

The Piedmont region, located between the mountains and the coast, boasts a blend of rolling hills, fertile farmland, and vibrant urban centers. With easy access to major cities such as Charlotte, Raleigh, and Greensboro, this area is ideal for those seeking a balance between rural tranquility and urban convenience.

Coastal Plain

Stretching from the sandy beaches of the Outer Banks to the lush swamplands of the Inner Coastal Plain, this region offers a diverse range of landscapes and ecosystems. Whether you're interested in waterfront property, farmland, or timberland, the Coastal Plain has plenty to offer discerning buyers.

Tips for Finding the Perfect Property

Finding the perfect tract of land requires careful research, patience, and a clear understanding of your goals and budget. Consider working with a reputable real estate agent or land broker who specializes in rural properties, as they can provide valuable insights and guidance throughout the buying process. Additionally, be sure to thoroughly inspect any property you're considering, paying close attention to factors such as accessibility, water sources, and potential environmental concerns.

Investing in Your Future

Private tracts of land for sale in North Carolina is not just a financial investment – it's an investment in your lifestyle, well-being, and future. Whether you're looking to build a vacation home, start a hobby farm, or simply escape the stresses of modern life, owning land in North Carolina offers endless possibilities for personal fulfillment and enjoyment.

Conclusion

With its stunning natural beauty, diverse landscapes, and abundant recreational opportunities, North Carolina is an ideal destination for those seeking to invest in rural real estate. Private tracts of land offer a unique opportunity to create your own slice of paradise amidst the Tar Heel State's picturesque scenery. By considering factors such as location, topography, and intended use, you can find the perfect property to suit your lifestyle and goals. So why wait? Start exploring North Carolina's private tracts of land today and embark on a journey to rural bliss.

#mountain land for sale north carolina

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remaxelitejm · 1 year

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Top 10 Amazing Places To Live In Jamaica

The Caribbean paradise of Jamaica, often referred to as the "Land of Wood and Water," is known for its breathtaking natural beauty, vibrant culture, and gracious people. Why so many people want to live on this beautiful island makes sense. The Jamaican real estate market is a captivating blend of natural beauty, cultural diversity, and investment potential. This guide is here to provide insights and information about beautiful places where you will get homes for sale in Jamaica, the process of house selling in Jamaica, and amazing places to Live in Jamaica, whether you're looking for your dream home, considering selling a property, or simply interested in buying a house in Jamaica. Suppose you are considering moving to Jamaica because there are so many properties for sale in Jamaica. You're in for a treat. In this article, we'll look at the top 10 amazing places to live in Jamaica, each with unique attractions and charms.

10 Amazing Places To Live In Jamaica

1. Kingston

Kingston, the capital of Jamaica, offers a dynamic urban lifestyle along with a deep heritage of culture. It has flourishing music and cultural communities and is home to historic locations, including Devon House and the Bob Marley Museum. From the busy streets of downtown Kingston to the peaceful residential regions like Barbican and Jack's Hill, the city's numerous neighborhoods cater to various tastes.

2. Montego Bay

The top tourist attraction in Jamaica is Montego Bay, or "MoBay." It's the ideal spot to live for those who value luxury, with its stunning beaches, outstanding resorts, and exciting nightlife. While downtown MoBay is bustling with local flair, the wealthy neighborhoods of Ironshore and Spring Farm offer lavish living.

3. Negril

Negril is the perfect spot if you want to live near the beach in an atmosphere of comfort. Negril is famous for its seven miles of pristine sand and amazing sunsets, and it offers a laid-back atmosphere perfect for beach lovers. Consider relocating to the West End Cliffs area for breathtaking seaside views and a hippie atmosphere.

4. Ocho Rios

On the northern coast of Jamaica, Ocho Rios is well-known for its lush surroundings and exciting activities. Living here puts you close to famous sights like Mystic Mountain and Dunn's River Falls. The gated communities in nearby Mammee Bay offer a balance of peace and convenience.

5. Port Antonio

Port Antonio on the island's eastern side is a hidden gem for a more off-the-beaten-path adventure. It's a haven for nature lovers, surrounded by rivers, rainforests, and the Blue Mountains. A look into Jamaica's colonial past can be had by visiting the famed Titchfield Hill neighborhood.

6. Mandeville

Mandeville is a picturesque and peaceful town situated in the interior of Jamaica, which is mountainous and cool. It's a fantastic option for individuals who want a more temperate atmosphere due to its cooler climate and lush flora. The town is well-known for its medical facilities and educational institutions.

7. Treasure Beach

Treasure Beach on the south coast of Jamaica is a peaceful fishing village with a strong sense of community. You may enjoy the relaxed atmosphere while tasting natural Jamaican living here. For people who want a slower pace of life, it is perfect.

8. Falmouth

Another old town on the north coast is Falmouth, which has a lot of nautical history and beautifully maintained Georgian architecture. It's a peaceful, historically significant, and culturally significant place to live.

9. Spanish Town

Spanish Town, one of the oldest cities in Jamaica, offers a unique combination of culture and history. Explore historic sites like the Old Courthouse and Spanish Town Cathedral to understand the island's heritage.

10. Saint Ann's Bay

In addition to being the hometown of national hero Marcus Garvey, Saint Ann's Bay is a lovely beachfront community. It's an excellent place for individuals who wish to be near nature as it's close to places like Dolphin Cove and Dunn's River Falls.

Wrap Up-

From Kingston's vibrant urban life to Negril's peaceful beaches, Jamaica provides various living experiences. Whatever your preferences, Jamaica has a place that will make you feel at home. The comfort of these attractive places is the reason to relocate there. Plenty of property for sale in Kingston, Jamaica, will undoubtedly make you want to settle permanently by buying a house in Jamaica or visiting as a holiday rental. If you embrace the island's beauty, culture, and friendliness, you'll quickly realize why it's a popular choice for people looking to live in the Caribbean.

#remax elite realty #property for sale #real estate agent jamaica #house in jamaica west indies for sale #house for sale in jamaica #property for sale in jamaica

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vsdkguc · 1 year

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kammartinez · 1 year

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In 1956 Juan Goytisolo, one of Spain’s most influential contemporary writers, took a bus to the eastern part of Almería, a province in Andalusia. Under Franco, this was one of the country’s most impoverished regions, exploited by mining companies and neglected by the government. Goytisolo had come to tell the stories of the people who lived in its slums. “I remember clearly the impression of poverty and violence provoked so dramatically by Almería when I first took route 340 into the province a few years ago,” he wrote in Níjar Country, which was published in 1960 and subsequently banned, like many of his books. At the time he was living in Paris; three decades later he moved to Marrakech. He never again lived in his place of birth.

I read his book on a terrace with a view of the Alcazaba Moorish fortress one warm Saturday morning this April. I too had arrived in Almería by bus. I had come from Málaga and traveled along the southern coast, passing through lush fields and stunning scenery overlooking the Mediterranean Sea. As green valleys gave way to rocky land, especially dry this year, I could see why locals so often call Almería the “door to the desert.” Spaghetti Westerns were shot here.

As you get closer to Almería, you leave behind the olive and almond trees and enter an expanse of plastic greenhouses. According to governmental data, Almería yields about 54 percent of Andalusia’s fruit and vegetable exports—chiefly tomatoes, cucumbers, and peppers—amounting to €3.7 billion in sales last year. They boost the country’s economy and allow Europeans to eat fresh salads year-round. Satellite images show a sea of plastic that extends from the foot of the mountains to the shores of the sea.

Níjar is a small, sleepy town perched on a green hill by the Huebro Valley, overlooking the farm country. On a breezy weekend, tourists walked along the quiet streets, visiting the Memory of Water Museum—a showcase of the centuries-long struggle to find and preserve water in this region—and eating ice cream at a helateria on the town’s main square. When Goytisolo wrote Níjar Country, Almería had yet to be known for its national parks and beaches, some of the most beautiful in Spain. (Tourism has grown in recent decades, although the region sees many fewer visitors than the Costa del Sol to the west.) Instead the book evokes “settlements of a dozen isolated hovels” where Goytisolo saw families living in extreme poverty, hoping to leave this dry, overexploited land for places of greater opportunity.

In the 1950s and 1960s the state implemented the Plan General de Colonización—plan of settlement—to attract people from neighboring areas.1 It gave families land and, with the promise of industrial agriculture, the prospect of profit. Many farms in the region are still owned by the descendants of these settlers. The first landowners worked the fields themselves, but by the 1980s and 1990s farms were seeking foreign laborers to produce on a larger scale.

Migration to the region has been increasing ever since. African workers first arrived in El Ejido, a town on the other side of Almería. As intensive farming grew exponentially, the region transformed. Today shantytowns adjacent to the fields house thousands of migrants from North and West Africa, most of them undocumented. They provide cheap labor for the companies, small and large, that sustain the region’s economy and generate a huge portion of the country’s economic growth. Agriculture’s share of Spain’s GDP is one of the highest in Western Europe.

According to a recent report by the Jesuit Migrant Service, which provides Spanish lessons and legal support to undocumented migrants, greenhouses cover 32,827 hectares of the land in the province of Almería. They produce more than 3.5 million tons of fruit and vegetables, about 75 to 80 percent of which are exported. While it’s hard to find reliable data, the report estimates that 69 percent of agricultural workers are foreigners, half of them Moroccan.

Most of the laborers I spoke to told me they earn four or five euros an hour, considerably less than the legal minimum wage. They work in the sweltering heat under the greenhouses’ plastic coverings. Sometimes they put in full days, but often they are only needed for a couple of hours, if at all. Workers advertise their services by painting notes on the white plastic that covers the greenhouses—blanqueo (painting the plastic white to maximize light exposure and retain heat) or montaje (assembling the structure)—along with a phone number. Farm owners have absolute power and control over hiring and firing: several labor unions and rights groups allege that they can pay workers for fewer hours than they worked, simply let them go without compensation, and avoid responsibility if they get injured. (The company Grupo Godoy, one of Níjar’s large agricultural producers, did not respond to questions about the allegations that their treatment of foreign workers violates labor laws.)

Over the last two decades, the migrant population has increased but the availability of housing has not. Workers told me that renting in the city and villages surrounding the field is nearly impossible, either because housing is too expensive or because landlords refuse to rent to them. At night they sleep in chabolas, simple dwellings made of wood, plastic, or whatever else they can find. Some use small solar panels or plug illegally into the grid and tap local water sources, but most lack electricity and running water. Blue pesticide containers are recycled into water tanks. In some of the camps I visited, people charge their phones at shops in the nearest village and walk or bike the many kilometers home carrying big bottles of water. The chabolas are unbearably hot in the summer and cold during winter. The slums can barely be seen from the main roads; it is common, however, to see workers on bikes or scooters emerging from them early in the morning or disappearing into them at the end of a workday.

Pablo Pumares directs the Center of Migration Studies at the University of Almería, where he has lived for more than thirty-five years. He estimates that the majority of workers in the region are documented but that for the most part those who live in the shantytowns aren’t. Spain, he says, cannot offer them an easier path to residency within the terms of the European Union’s restrictive migration policy. “It’s quite complicated,” he said. Most services, such as public transportation and healthcare, don’t reach Níjar’s undocumented workers, but they prefer to stay close to the greenhouses because it increases their odds of finding work each day. Even documented workers, Pumares adds, have to contend with a nationwide housing shortage: “They could afford the rent, but there is no housing available. It’s an immense problem.”

These low-paid workers dynamize the region’s economy, but many Spaniards resent their presence. In late January the Níjar City Council oversaw the destruction of a camp called El Walili, which housed hundreds of agricultural migrants. The council said they were doing so for humanitarian reasons. The former mayor of Níjar, Esperanza Pérez, defended the decision by claiming that it was the first time there was any proactive effort to address the unsanitary conditions under which so many migrants lived. Labor rights groups have speculated that the socialists then in power wanted to appeal to populist sentiment by showing that they were taking a tough line on illegal settlements. In place of the chabolas, the city provided temporary housing: 140 bunk beds inside an industrial warehouse, with outdoor showers and bathrooms. Only about fifty migrants from El Walili accepted the invitation to move in.

In April Pérez announced that the government planned to demolish all the region’s shantytowns. She insisted that the eviction would be “professional, firm,” and that they would offer new apartments to those displaced. Yet hundreds of people in the remaining shantytowns have not been approached with housing alternatives. In last month’s regional elections the socialists won ten of the city council’s twenty-one seats; ten more went to the center-right Popular Party and one to the far-right Vox. Last week Vox and the Popular Party formed an alliance to gain a majority on the council. Spain’s general elections are approaching in late July, and Vox has been gaining ground both in the region and in the country. Whoever is in power, the migrant workers in Níjar’s remaining shantytowns live in fear that their camps will be demolished next.

In Almería I found people who were tired of the media, politicians, and nongovernmental workers. They were fed up with repeating the same stories about their wretched conditions without seeing anything change. But I was there during Ramadan, and many migrants still opened their homes to me and shared their stories. The few women I met were Moroccan. They had first come to the Huelva province, in the western part of Andalusia, to work on strawberry farms.2 I met Laila, a forty-one-year-old from Beni Mellal, in the hour before she broke her fast one day in April. (Some names in this article have been changed, and many of the workers I spoke to didn’t share a last name out of fear of the Spanish authorities.) We were in Don Domingo de Arriba, a camp built on an abandoned farm near Atochares, just south of Níjar. Several people told me it was likely to be the next demolished.

Laila moved to Spain five years ago for a temporary job, but after ten days of arduous work on a farm in Almonte, she couldn’t do it anymore. More experienced women were working faster, the jefe—the boss, one of the first words workers learn in Spanish—was unkind to her, and she felt ill and couldn’t stand the heat, so she ran away with six other women. She lived for a time in the El Walili camp but left before its demolition. A fire in the unsafe dwellings destroyed everything she owned. Houseguests woke her up at 4 AM; they evacuated in their pajamas, barefoot.

Now she lives with her cousin, who had arrived eight months earlier after surviving the treacherous crossing through the waters of the Canary Islands. They share what looked like a living room and a bedroom under a large plastic tent. That day, Laila was preparing fresh juice for Iftar, the meal to break the fast after sunset during Ramadan. She told me about her three children, who live in Morocco: “Even when I make €50, I send it to my daughters,” she said. She can’t afford a trip home to visit them. “I just hope I see them again,” she said. “I could beg just to have them next to me.”

Some days earlier I had gone to see the El Walili camp, or what remained of it: a clay oven and some trash in a bare field. The camp had been around for a couple of decades. It lay on property that belongs to a few small landowners, who were not involved in the establishment of the settlement. Many told me that it had been by far the most visible migrant camp, since it was right on the road that tourists take from Níjar to San José, the main sea resort in the Cabo de Gata National Park. (Its prominence might have been one reason the authorities were so keen to get rid of it.) Witnesses reported that hours of chaos followed the legal decision to demolish the camp. People carrying their microwaves, tables, and clothes watched their homes razed to the ground. The Interior Ministry runs the police force that oversaw the dismantlement of the camp, but a spokesperson told me to talk to the Ministry of Migration, which declined to comment.

I tried to enter the warehouse where some migrants were being sheltered by the government, but I wasn’t allowed in. Two Romanian guards stood in front—Eastern Europeans often get better treatment and better jobs here—waiting for a food delivery that comes a few times a day. The migrants from El Walili were only supposed to stay fifteen days, then only two months. Some blocks away, the permanent apartments the government promised them aren’t ready yet.

In the months leading up to the destruction of the camp, the city council delivered several eviction notices; eventually a judge issued orders of expulsion. Local union activists protested, demanding that the authorities respect due process by notifying people individually or providing alternative housing before the demolition. A worker with the Union of Agricultural and Rural Workers of Andalusia (SOC-SAT), who didn’t want me to use his name or initials to avoid jeopardizing his current job search, has worked tirelessly to stop the evictions. “There are serious problems of human rights and noncompliance with labor laws and rights,” he said. “For example, when a migrant worker says he doesn’t want to work on a holiday, he loses his job.”

In February the European Coordination Via Campesina, a confederation of peasant farmers and agricultural workers, joined with eight other rights groups to issue a press release drawing attention to the destruction of El Walili and the living conditions of migrant workers in Níjar. They also highlighted the environmental impact of intensive farming, including “plastic contamination on a large scale.” The dispossession of the region’s migrant workers, they write, “is a shame for Spain, a shame for Andalucia, a shame for an agricultural system based on the exploitation of migrants.”

About a year and a half ago Father Daniel Izuzquiza, a Jesuit priest, moved to Almería to help the nationwide Jesuit Migrant Service expand its operations there. He considers it morally impossible to reconcile Spain’s lack of concern for the wellbeing of African workers with its economic reliance on their cheap labor. “They only want workers, not persons or families,” he told me. Locals seem to understand little about the ordeals workers undergo in the valley. “People do not know, do not want to know, do not really care.”

Father Daniel took me on a tour to meet with some of the people his organization helps. At a camp just outside a town called El Barranquete we met people who had moved from El Walili. Three young Moroccan men hadn’t found work that day. One of them told us that it was incredibly hard to do so without the right connections, often facilitated by shared nationality. Most arrived here on their own, and so they often find work through someone who knows a farm owner or manager well.

n Don Domingo de Arriba, on the abandoned farm, residents live in crumbling buildings or homes made out of plastic sheeting. There is a makeshift mosque, and on some days women sell clothes by one of its entrances. After fires destroyed some of the neighborhood a couple years ago, people rebuilt their chabolas with concrete, cement, and bricks. Father Daniel teaches a Spanish lesson here under a plastic tarp, writing basic words on a whiteboard: poco, mas, mucho, tan simpatico. At tan guapo (“so handsome”) the classroom fell into laughter.

Down a dirt road I met two brothers, Omar, twenty-six, and Yassine, twenty-eight. They shared one of the nicest chabolas in the camp, a one-bedroom cement home their father had bought for €1,200. It has a bathroom and a shower, a fully equipped kitchen, a new fridge and appliances, and a small couch and chairs. Back in Morocco, Omar had worked in retail. Yassine was in the army. Their father had come to Spain in 2005, and for five years sent money home to the family. He learned some Spanish but didn’t fully integrate; now he likes to split his time between Morocco and Spain.

Yassine joined the army mainly because he had few other prospects. After spending five years enlisted in the desert, he couldn’t take it anymore and longed for retirement. Two and a half years ago he asked a psychiatrist for a note saying that the state of his mental health would be in jeopardy if he kept working for the army, and so he was excused from the force. “I felt that I was wasting my life,” he told me. He loved his country but decided he had to pursue better opportunities. “You look for a life with dignity.”

Yassine had initially tried to enter Spain legally, but his visa application was denied. Omar’s savings were depleted by scammers who had promised a crossing by boat. It was Yassine’s plan that eventually got them to the EU by way of Turkey and Hungary, traveling by plane, train, car, and foot. Once in Spain, Yassine told me, he felt suffocated inside the greenhouses and quickly stopped working. He jokes about his hipster look—he wears glasses and a beard—and tells me not to be fooled by appearances. His army life taught him how to survive anywhere.

The brothers insisted that I have Iftar with them that day. Omar made spiced chicken and onions and soup with shrimp. Their father was watching a soccer game on TV and proudly served me his version of Moroccan green mint tea. I can appreciate how hard it is to get it right—I never do. Yassine is learning Spanish and trying to get a certificate that would allow him to work in restaurants. He and his brother hope to move to Germany. They dislike living in Spain. “They hate us,” Omar tells me while cutting fruit, which he covers with yogurt and sugar for dessert.

Adama Sangare Diarra, fifty, is from Daloa, in the Ivory Coast. In 1995 he became one of the first West African migrants to make it to Andalusia to work in the fields, and he watched as more arrived after him. In many cases, he told me in his living room in Almería one Sunday afternoon, the Guardia Civil, one of Spain’s national police forces, sent migrants to Spain after intercepting them in Ceuta and Melilla, Spanish enclaves in North Africa. To Sangare Diarra and several people I interviewed, there is little doubt that the authorities were keen on using undocumented migrants to fill the need for cheap agricultural labor. “It was catastrophic,” he said. “It is not Europe as we imagined it. There are no rights.” A picture of him protesting Spanish labor conditions hangs on the wall in the home he shares with his wife, whom he met in the Ivory Coast twenty-five years ago, and four children.

Sangare Diarra is a rare success story. He studied Islamic Law in Rabat, Morocco’s capital, but felt that his work prospects were limited; back home he could become either an imam or a teacher in a madrassa. His father, an imam who had worked in agriculture back in the Ivory Coast, had spent €300 a month for his son’s education, but Diarra left without completing his schooling. After arriving in Almería by boat he settled in El Ejido and started working in tomato, pepper, and eggplant fields during the day and taking Spanish lessons at night.

He learned Spanish quickly and speaks many other languages, including Arabic, French, and a few West African dialects. Soon he was serving as a translator for organizations that worked with migrants. He became a legal resident in 1997, and eventually a citizen. In the last two decades he’s worked for Almería Acoge, an association partly funded by the Spanish state that helps migrants obtain residency and provides them with food, shelter, and other support.

Sangare Diarra says he tries to soothe the lives of others who, like him, only came to the country to give themselves a chance at a better life. It is challenging work. There is, he tells me, a strong political will to harass and intimidate migrants, and the destruction of El Walili confirmed for him that their community is constantly vulnerable. “Migrants are not integrated…. Many as a result have huge psychological issues,” he said. “Sometimes worse conditions than in Africa. It is not easy to see people live like this.”

Back in Don Domingo de Arriba I met Ahmed, twenty-two, from Kelaat Sraghna, near Marrakech, my hometown. He left two and a half years ago and traveled by sea; he had to sell his car to fund the $2,000 trip. Finally he made it to the Canary Islands. It wasn’t his first attempt. On a previous crossing he had almost drowned and was rescued by the Moroccan Royal Marines.

“When I left I had prepared myself for everything…. I lived better in Morocco but also I had no health care. Some aspects of life were just too hard,” he told me after cooking me my second Iftar of the day. We were in his current home, which belonged to a friend who had left to pick strawberries in Huelva. “When you decide to go into the water, you know there is a 90 percent chance you will drown,” he said. “I was ready for it.”

Ahmed learned to speak Spanish well. He sends money home whenever he can and hopes one day to move back and marry a Moroccan woman. Meanwhile, he is about to get his Spanish residency. In a notebook he keeps under his pillow, he writes his thoughts in Spanish, a way to practice the language but also to write down unfiltered meditations. “Mom, I left home and I didn’t tell you I was going to cross the sea,” he wrote on one page. “I didn’t tell you because I didn’t know where I was going.” The note ends with an emotional wish. “I will be back one day if God wants,” it reads. “I know it’s not possible now but there is nothing I long for more than hugging you.”

#politics #xenophobia #racism #agriculture #economics #immigration

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kamreadsandrecs · 1 year

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#xenophobia #racism #politics #agriculture #economics #immigration

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conceptproperties · 1 year

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#Mountain View #Mountain View Development Company #“north coast”#for sale in Sidi Abd El Rahman #Mountain View Developments #Mountain View North Coast #mountain view ras el hikma #Mountain View Sidi Abd El Rahman #Mountain View Sidi Abdel Rahman #Mountain view Sidi Adelrahman #properties for sale in Sidi Abd El Rahman #Sidi Abdel Rahman #Sidi Adelrahman

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realestatecalendars101 · 2 years

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Calendar 2023 Vector Artwork, Icons, And Graphics For Free Obtain

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fernreads · 2 years

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Since the Mountain Valley pipeline was announced eight years ago, the proposal to transport fracked natural gas from West Virginia to export terminals in southern Virginia has faced regulatory hurdles and local opposition. The main concern is that the project runs through environmentally sensitive waterways and farmlands, putting them at risk of spills — while further promoting the development of fracking throughout West Virginia.

Now, after nearly a decade of lobbying, the energy crisis sparked by Russia’s war in Ukraine appears to have turned the tide, with federal regulators supporting a construction route that could bring the pipeline into service as early as next year.

Filings show that the pipeline’s boosters were quick to capitalize on the Ukraine crisis to sway policymakers. In federal appellate courts last month, attorneys for the pipeline project argued that with the U.S. ban on imports of Russian natural gas, “domestic supplies will become all the more important to the nation’s energy needs.” Completing the pipeline, the attorneys wrote, “indisputably would provide a meaningful step toward building out U.S. oil and gas infrastructure, freeing up additional natural gas for domestic consumption and export to Europe.” Other pipeline supporters, including Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., heavily cited the war in Ukraine to press administration officials to swiftly approve the project as a matter of national security.

Soon after, on April 8, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission unanimously approved the plans to build the pipeline across 180 bodies of water and wetlands, a decision that analysts view as the final step in overcoming the hurdles that had placed the project in jeopardy for years.

The progression of the West Virginia pipeline project is one of many fossil fuel priorities now reshaped by the devastation wrought by the war in Ukraine. In the first days of the war, the American Petroleum Institute, which represents industry giants such as Exxon Mobil and Chevron, argued that it heightened the need for greater development of U.S. oil and gas reserves and for expedited approval of pipelines and other infrastructure.

“As crisis looms in Ukraine, U.S. energy leadership is more important than ever,” API tweeted at the outset of Russia’s incursion into Ukraine. Soon after, other oil and gas companies joined the fray. In early March, the chief executives of TC Energy, Enbridge, the Williams Companies, and Kinder Morgan cited the war to call for the rapid approval of natural gas pipelines that have faced opposition from activists and regulators.

Critics of the industry immediately countered that more fossil fuel development would take too long to provide any short-term relief. Gas and oil are global commodities, and small increases in U.S. production won’t have any immediate impact on domestic energy prices.

But rising utility and gas prices have rattled policymakers. Last month, following pressure from industry sources, including natural gas exporters, the Biden administration rolled back plans to evaluate natural gas pipelines on climate and environmental justice grounds. The Interior Department also announced a plan on April 15 to resume the sale of leases to drill on federal lands for oil and gas.

In recent weeks, more and more fossil fuel interests have piled on. This month, lawyers for Sempra Energy filed a letter to FERC urging approval of the North Baja pipeline, a project to transport liquified natural gas to export terminals on Mexico’s western coast. The project, the attorneys said, carried additional urgency “in light of the recent Russian invasion of Ukraine” and “concerns about energy security for Europe and Central Asia.”

TC Energy, formerly known as TransCanada, filed an amended request for approval of its Alberta XPress project, which would expand an existing natural gas pipeline system. The “beneficial domestic and international end uses” of the project, the company said, have “recently grown exponentially” with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the need for oil and gas exports to the global market.

K&L Gates, a law firm that represents Rio Grande LNG, a project to construct a site with five liquified natural gas trains in Texas, similarly petitioned FERC, calling for quick approval action given “Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the stranglehold Russia has on Europe’s energy supply.”

Fossil fuel-backed interests are also attempting to use the Ukraine war to shape the Biden administration’s proposed rules around carbon capture and sequestration. Harry MacDougald, an attorney who has led industry-backed lawsuits to overturn the Environmental Protection Agency’s endangerment finding on greenhouse gas emissions, filed comments to the White House Council on Environmental Quality arguing that any carbon capture rules should not limit the potential for greater oil and gas development. “With Russia’s criminal invasion of Ukraine, the national imperative of increasing U.S. petroleum production is readily apparent,” MacDougald wrote.

Lobbyists for a range of other industries — including power plants, refrigerator manufacturers, software developers, and telecommunications providers — have also wasted no time in using Russia’s invasion of Ukraine as a talking point to influence decisions on a wide array of policies, from tariffs to environmental rules. The comments range from urgent calls to action on vital economic issues to precarious arguments that stretch the imagination to fit the Ukraine crisis into a domestic U.S. context.

The Competitive Enterprise Institute, a libertarian think tank backed by business interests including Google, filed a document with the Federal Trade Commission opposing new guidelines for enforcement against business mergers that pose monopolization risks. The think tank argued that a transparent process for such a potentially costly new enforcement regime was important to consider, particularly given the “geopolitical uncertainty surrounding Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.”

The American Public Power Association, the lobby group that represents electric utilities around the country, including a large number of coal-burning power plants, in March submitted comments to the EPA opposing new limits on wastewater pollution, in part by pointing to the “immense pressure on fuel and energy prices” caused by “the recent war in Ukraine.”

Microsoft and the U.S. Telecom Association have filed letters with the Commerce Department urging greater government investments in semiconductor development by pointing to the supply chain problems worsened by the war in Ukraine. “The shortage has been further exacerbated by Russia’s war with Ukraine, which has strained the supply chain for critical minerals and other raw materials and exposed further vulnerabilities in the semiconductor supply chain,” wrote Sarah O’Neal, an attorney with Microsoft.

Ukraine provided about half of the global supply of semiconductor-grade neon, a colorless and odorless gas used to control lasers for the production of specialized computer chips. The shortage from the war, with plants in eastern Ukraine under occupation, has alarmed automotive manufacturers. The Motor & Equipment Manufacturers Association, the automotive parts trade group, called attention to the potential global shortage in a letter urging the Biden administration to take rapid action to bolster the domestic semiconductor supply.

And the Air-Conditioning, Heating, and Refrigeration Institute and the North American Association of Food Equipment Manufacturers are among the lobby groups pushing for a relaxation of U.S. tariffs on steel by citing the crisis in Ukraine.

Other petitioners urging relaxed U.S. government interference in the market are less persuasive. Mike Schafer, the head of a fish processing plant, petitioned the Biden administration for “laws changed to bring fish products to humanitarian use and K through 12 school lunch programs.” Schafer asked for a range of government support for the fishing industry, including grants for international marketing to feed “all the refugees from Ukraine” who “could really use fish protein.”

#article #excerpt #full article under the cut #environmental justice #ukraine #russia #oil #gas #fracking #climate change #fossil fuel

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st-just · 4 years

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Cities, Conquests and Tributaries of the Federal Republic

Because I already did one for the Empire, and world-building continues to be at least mildly engaging/keeps me writing, anyway.

The Free Cities: The core of the Federal Republic, and the beating hearts of cultural, economic, and political power. Beautiful and rapturous parasites, which trade ephemera and mesmerizing baubles for all the treasures of the world. Unending and many-coloured chaos, joyous festival turning to bloody riot in the blink of an eye. Without censor or police-spy, they are the generous refuge to every heretic and dissident in need of one, provided they bring a sharp knife and a friend to watch their back.

Quepta, Chirtial and Celmy itself all share a coastline, though travel by land is rendered deeply impractical by steep hills and the lack of convenient rivers. Inara totally dominates the island on which it sits, and Khasal sits on the opposite coast of its sister cities, but shares an easily navigable river route with Celmy. In all cases the cities’ hinterlands have been thoroughly mastered, but each has grown to the point where only daily shipments of grain and rice can sustain their populations.

The Broken Coast: The core of the Republic’s mercantile empire isn’t particularly impressive at a glance – vast stretches of rocky islands and small coastal planes, isolated from their hinterlands by mountains or plateaus. Its trade winds do, however, ensure safe and easy shipping up and down its lengths – ensuring that the small trading ports that dot every viable harbour capable of supporting a population can trust that ships will arrive regularly to buy everything worthwhile they can transport from further inland, and provide everything they lack. Formally, the vast majority are ruled by boqors or rajahs – whether extracting tribute from distant inland principalities, governing a federation of coastal towns, or ruling an independent city-state – but in every real sense power is held by the merchant factors and trading captains, and their Celmean friends and partners.

The Piper’s Wake: Before they were free, the cities were the troublesome and distant trading ports of an ancient empire. The specifics have long since been lost under the weight of a thousand different dramatizations, but what was once the empire’s rich and fertile core bears witness to how the matter was finally decided. Burned and brutalized (so they say), the fleshweavers and skinchangers of Khasal made common cause with the ecstatics and mad mystics or Chirtial and conducted one of the grander rituals of the age. A Caller of the Host, grander than any who have walked before or since, was made from the sacrificial flesh, and life rebelled as she played. The demon herself was slain by the crown prince as his empire tore itself apart around him (as the tale goes), but regular expeditions are still launched into the region – both to cull the goblin population, and entice or bind more advanced specimens for use or sale.

The Spine of the World: A range of inhospitable and imposing mountains that would be difficult to cross even if they weren’t Drake-infested, mainly notable as serving as a hard northern border for the Republic’s influence for cartographers, with its few major passes serving as something of a trade artery for luxury exports to the Illyrin empire. More recently, mining prospectors have begun swarming the area like flies after the discovery of major silver deposits – and, with the increasing ease of transit, certain thrill-seekers and would-be dragonslayers have taken to braving the peaks. Being fair, they still have a high survival rate that the particularly zealous devotees of Askopar, who attempt to convince the wyrms to accept their inheritance as a Prince of Demons – something they are rarely amenable to, as they’re happy to quite lethally explain.

The New Cities/The Colonies: Past the farthest edges of the Broken Coast, and weeks of open ocean beyond that, lays the most remote real centre of the Federation’s power. Acquired through a (by now thoroughly mythologized) mixture of trade, fraud and force, the islands and coastline the dozen cities (glorified town, in most cases. Only barely glorified, in a few) are scattered across are a the source of untold fortunes for many back in the Inner World. Each city sends a steady stream of extraordinarily valuable imports back to its parent – rare furs, plantation crops, precious metals and jewels – and in exchange receives the weapons, tools, and especially people they need to sustain and expand their dominions. Enticing new colonists with land grants or the chance for riches is entirely commonplace, which does require regular low-level warfare with each other and the native populations to make good on them. And, although no upstanding citizen of the metropolises can be known to take part in it, the colonies lack both the freedom loving mobs and temperamental patrons of their parents, and so quite a few interests wasted no time at all making a fortune in the trade of indentured labour.

The Shipbreaker Isles: Given its utter dependence on maritime trade, as a general rule the great and the good of the Free Cities have a decidedly draconian view of piracy (the mob’s opinion may differ, given how popular epic and romantic tales of their exploits can be). But, in the final analysis, this really amounts to taking offence at pirates targeting their ships (the existence of a ‘Federal Navy’, the only officially existing common institution of the Republic, can be largely attributed to no one trusting their rivals to stop attacking their ships the moment they were out of sight of port without a sword hanging over their heads). Hence, the Isles, where pirate queens and kings can repair and recruit in safety, merchant factors on hand to buy any and all loot they can carry, their ships returning with a steady supply of gifts, luxuries, and fresh meat (naive young things with a penchant for violence, or people who have burnt every possible bridge but still have debts to run away from, generally). All with the tactic understanding that they only target Esheri or Illyric shipping, of course. Every settlement on the isles has been destroyed at least three or four times from punitive expiditions, and the Celmean willing to cut them loose without raising a finger is the only reason a general war has not yet resulted.

The Ashen Steppe: Only slightly more habitable a place than the name implies, this vast and lightly populated expanse has mostly served as a hard border for the Federal Republic’s influence, rapidly consuming all effort and attention paid to it buying off various nomad tribes rather than dealing with their raids, paying tribute to the appropriate leaders along the major caravan routes to the Commonwealth, and suffering the occasional invasion searching for land or treasure. In recent years, Esheri expansion has seen some growing hostility form the nomads, which Celmean agents have been more than happy to help arm and organize, culminating in two cities officially recognizing their chosen candidate as Khagan of the whole steppe – an entirely aspirational claim, at least for the moment.

The Kayal Empires: Conquest states in the purest form, this region represents the other major bridgehead of Celmean influence in the outer world. ‘Influence’ rather than ‘power’ or ‘rule’, as this is a region that makes cartographers weep and war profiteers grin. The result of a particularly ruthless and ingenious mercenary-adventurer who parlayed a civil war in one the continent’s more impressive empires into employment, power, and eventually a chance to claim the throne himself. It was quite possibly the most lucrative mercenary contract in history for his soldiers, as grand estates and piles of gold were freely distributed as reward for their loyalty. That was just under fifty years ago. Technically speaking his granddaughter is still empress, largely because she married a prince of the old ruling house and used the residual legitimacy of both names to rally an army to retake the old capital. Of course, there are a dozen other would-be emperors – both newly arrived and well armed adventurers, the now partially assimilated conquerors, or various flavors of native rebellion - and all manner of small principalities and over-mighty pirate chiefs in between. If it wasn’t for how rich the land was, they might just be left to it – instead, the supply of over-ambitious and ruthless new arrivals hasn’t slowed once.

The Soya Principalities: The most powerful and organized states which lay inland of the Broken Coast trading network, the principalities – which really have rather less in common then the Celmean travel guides imply, and in many cases would take great offence at being lumped together – are, officially speaking and as far as their rulers are concerned, entirely free of foreign control. While this is entirely true as far as your average peasant is concerned, in practice a few rather fundamental transactions have been made – Khasali court mystics and physicians, a particularly dashing trader from Chiritial who won the princesses’ hand, Celmean mediation over the succession ensuring the more pliable child inherits – and, in all cases, the most important of all – foreign control over ports and tarrifs, and free navigation of rivers and coasts, in exchange for generous gifts to sustain the royal court without resort to taxation.

The Paramountcy of Joyi: The other major outgrowth of Celmean power inland form the Broken Coast, the Paramountcy is a new and intentional creation – stabilizing trade routs upriver and overland to the increasingly valuable mountains to the north. Originally the scheme was to subsidize and glorify some chieftains near the waystations and trading posts on the route – but, in the sort of luck that you usually get for praying to archdemons, one of the chiefs chosen had ambitions of his own, and has used the sponsorship and support to conquer vast swathes of the region, and been recognized as ‘paramount chief’ by his allies for his efforts. The partnership is undeniably mutually profitable, though both parties are certain the other will betray them at a moment’s notice.

#writing #worldbuilding #abhari #this is theoretically a writing blog

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thewanderers-world · 3 years

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Nicaragua vs. South Korea: Which is Better?

By: Lilyan Sanchez Silva

Many just want to explore, some may feel the need to escape their reality. Here, I’ll be breaking down two touristic countries. Comparing and contrasting, while also going in depth with their economic systems. At the end, you will choose which you’d make an escape to and which will remain unchecked on your travel list.

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NICARAGUA

This Central American country, neighboring Honduras and Costa Rica, holds a number of titles, and you can add the largest lake in Central America to the list. With a view to both the Pacific Ocean and Caribbean Sea on opposite ends of the country, it’s no wonder Nicaragua means “here united with the water”. Imagine a nice walk down the beach, doesn’t it sound amazing?!

----------------------------The Culture----------------------------

The merging of different cultures within Nicaragua has caused the dawn of a creative, lively and blissful culture. Rhythmic marimbas and folkloric dances give vibrancy to fiestas across the country and the beautiful works of skilled artists spread an understanding of their history and nature.

The culture of Nicaragua reflects the mixed Ibero-European and Indian ancestry of the majority of its people. Diversity, I love it!

---------------------------The Weather---------------------------

Nicaragua has a tropical climate, hot all year round.

Temperatures are quite stable; however, there is a relatively cool winter from November to January, a hot spring from March to May, and a sultry and rainy summer from May to October. On the west coast, it's hot all year round, but there are the sea breezes. However, you may notice a certain temperature increase in the spring. On the Caribbean coast, there is no real dry month; owing to both the rains and the trade winds, the temperatures are a bit lower than on the west coast, but relative humidity is consistently high.

What’s a little rain to this magnificent view?

----------------------The Economic System-------------------

Nicaragua's economy is very active and has experienced great changes during the past decade or so. Its economy was truly a phoenix emerging from the ashes. The cause behind Nicaragua’s past economic problems stemmed from the earthquake of 1972 as well as the rule of the Sandinista regime. Nicaragua’s economic situation improved dramatically with the 1990 election of Violeta Chamorro and the establishment of a democracy. Nicaragua has a mixed economic system which includes a variety of private freedom, combined with centralized economic planning and government regulation.

Despite the expansive growth in Nicaragua’s economy that took place after the new form of government came in, Nicaragua remains one of the poorest countries in the region and faces issues such as unemployment, low per capita income and great foreign debt. Nicaragua’s economy is working towards improvement in the future, focusing on potential growth in the agricultural sector, energy generation, tourism, export manufacturing, mining and construction, as well as the sale of consumer goods.

With all this budding potential, Nicaragua is the perfect place to invest in, especially in the tourism aspect.

---------------Where to go & What to do---------------

Fun activities to do in Nicaragua include, but are not limited to: Eco-tourism; adventure and sports activities, including surfing, deep-sea fishing, swimming, snorkeling, kayaking, diving, volcano sand-boarding; historical and agricultural sites; cultural activities; agritourism; volunteerism; nightlife. Just enjoying the sun and all the different smells wile walking down the market would be wonderful. Nicaragua has lots to offer.

Towns like San Juan Del Sur on the Pacific Ocean's Emerald Coast near Costa Rica are top places to visit, famous for their colorful architecture and surf scene. Many things to do really lie in the smaller cities, like Leon and Granada, which are known for their colorful architecture and churches, and natural attractions such as Lake Nicaragua. It is the largest freshwater lake in Central America and home to hundreds upon hundreds of islands, including some with amazing ecolodges. Here are the Top 5 places to visit while exploring Nicaragua!

1. Islets of Granada

2. Corn Island

3. Masaya Volcano

4. El Cerro Negro

5. Mombacho Volcano Natural Preserve

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SOUTH KOREA

South Korea is a country in Eastern Asia occupying the southern half of the Korean Peninsula. It borders the Sea of Japan, the Yellow Sea, and North Korea. In the year 1934, Korea was given the title "Chaohsien" which meant morning freshness. The title was well suited to South Korea because of its natural beauty of stunning mountains, clear waters and splendid peacefulness – particularly in the morning. Because of this, Korea was also called "Land of Morning Calm."

In a country filled with city lights and multitudes of people, a little calmness in the morning is just what you need to start the day out right!

------------------------The Culture-------------------------------

Korea is all about education, constantly ranked world-best in terms of education system and the knowledge of students as studies such as the PISA and the World Top 20 Poll suggests. They’re also quite unique when it comes to asking their age. In Korea, everyone is already one year old at birth. And not only that: on New Year’s, everyone simultaneously turns a year older! That means, in turn, that in Korean age, you could already be two years older than you are in an international age. In Korea, people love to have a good time and they also love entertainment. But they are not crossing the line—pun intended. Even in bustling Seoul, you will rarely see non-tourists jaywalking or misbehaving. It’s part of the identity and the culture to not cause too much trouble or problems for others.

The Korean entertainment industry is also becoming one of the biggest in the world. K-pop, k-movies, k-drama, k-beauty… the K’s all around! The catchy beats, colorful soap operas and gripping dramas are invading countries around the world with a massive force, and they are here to stay. No genre of media is excluded: Film, literature, graphic novels, language, food, fashion…you name it. But arguably the genre with the biggest global impact is the new wave of Korean pop music, commonly referred to as K-pop, with its addicting melodies and innovative choreographies. You know BTS?

----------------------------The Weather---------------------

South Korea has a temperate climate with four distinct seasons. Winter, from late November to mid-March, is freezing in the north and in the interior, while it’s milder, but still with night frosts, along the southern coast. Spring, from mid-March to May, is initially cool, and gradually becomes milder, but the rains become more frequent because of the formation of low pressure systems. Summer, from June to August, is hot, humid, and rainy. Autumn, from September to late November, is a pleasant season, especially in the month of October, when it’s not too cold or too hot.

Serious droughts occur about once every eight years. About two-thirds of the annual precipitation occurs between June and September. South Korea is less vulnerable to typhoons than neighboring countries. Typhoons usually pass over South Korea in late summer, especially in August and bring torrential rains.

The weather may be crazy, but the sights are worth it, rain or shine!

-------------------The Economic System------------------

South Korea’s economy continues to maintain its ranking among the mostly free countries. It has a mixed economic system in which the economy includes a variety of private freedom, combined with centralized economic planning and government regulation. South Korea has achieved rapid growth in a short period. The country has displayed global competitiveness in various fields such as mobile phones, semiconductors, automobiles, chemicals, and steel making. In recent years, its cultural content, including music, gaming, and webtoons, is emerging as an essential industry in itself, taking the lead in the Korean economy.

South Korea's rigorous education system and the establishment of a highly motivated and educated populace is largely responsible for spurring the country's high technology boom and rapid economic development.

-------------------Where to go & What to do---------------

Travelers will want to indulge in all that South Korea has to offer like: Enjoy delicious Korean food, Explore Seoul on foot, Witness the grandeur of Changdeokgung and Gyeongbokgung Palaces, Learn about traditional Hanok architecture, Be a street artist, Check out free museums, Glide down the ski slopes from the 2018 Winter Olympics, Visit the temples, Take a trip to Busan, Experience a botanical garden island, and visiting Jeju-Si Island. The different architecture between residential places and the city alone is astonishing!

South Korea offers everything a traveler could want in a destination. It has a long and fascinating history, a wonderful culture, amazing food, friendly people, and an excellent tourism infrastructure. Here are the Top 5 places you must absolutely think back on when planning your trip:

1. Changdeokgung Palace

2. Gamecheon

3. Jeonju

4. Seoul Tower

5. Bukchon Hanok Village

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So Which One?

This may be a very biased answer, but being from Nicaragua, I’d say take an off-grid vacation. Although known for its tourism, you don’t loose the quiet peaceful atmosphere. Its rural landscape extends even to the most populated cities, adorning the country in a cloud of green and crystal blue waters everywhere you look. The gates are open, which life-thrilling destination will you choose?

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processproductionsophielindsay · 3 years

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CHRISTO AND JEANNE CLAUDE

Wall of Oil Barrels - Rideau de Fer (The Iron Curtain) (1961-62)

https://doyle.com/auctions/13dd02-n-a/catalogue/133-christo-iron-curtain-wall-of-oil-barrels-color-offset-lithograph

Christo and Jeanne-Claude's first collaborations involved wrapping dozens of oil barrels with cloth and rope, and stacking them in layers across public spaces to partially or completely block access. Earlier iterations of this site-specific work on Rue Visconti in Paris included a version in the courtyard of Christo's studio, as well as 1961's Stacked Oil Barrels and Dockside Packages, both of which were installed for two weeks on the harbor in Cologne, Germany. Particularly in Wall of Oil Barrels, the artists expanded the scope and scale of the previous works, creating a larger and more impenetrable wall of both wrapped and unwrapped barrels that blockaded a section of a city street. Christo was propelled by the idea of spatially reconfiguring a specific outdoor location with a common, contextually misplaced object, a notion that would play a role in many of his future creations and collaborations with Jeanne-Claude. The piece used 89 barrels, and measured 13.2 feet wide, 2.7 feet deep, and 13.7 feet tall. It took eight hours to assemble. An expression of the artists' views on the disruptive nature of the Cold War and the Berlin Wall, which was then being built, Wall of Oil Barrels commented on the politics of space, freedom, and mobility under increasingly conservative and divisive governmental policies throughout Europe. Since they installed it without permission, Parisian authorities demanded that the piece be dismantled, but Jeanne-Claude could persuade them to allow the work to remain in place for several hours. This monumental work and its brief celebrity as a public nuisance helped Christo and Jeanne-Claude gain early notoriety in Paris. Oil barrels became an important medium for Christo in 1958. He had been using smaller, every day, affordable objects like beer cans, but the barrels started a significant shift towards larger works, while still adhering to a distinct type of sculptural form. Wall of Oil Barrels was Christo's first large-scale work, and marked the beginning of the collaborative, massively scaled, site-specific works for which he and Jeanne-Claude would become famous.

Wrapped Coast (1968-69)

http://www.panthalassa.org/wrapped-coast-by-christo-jeanne-claude/

Using one million square feet of erosion-control synthetic fabric, 35 miles of polypropylene rope, 25,000 fasteners, threaded studs, and clips, Jeanne-Claude and Christo wrapped 1.5 miles of rocky coast off Little Bay in Sydney, Australia to create Wrapped Coast in the late 1960s. This method of wrapping was something that Christo had experimented with previously, using smaller objects, but this monumental effort became the largest single artwork ever created surpassing Mount Rushmore. It remained wrapped for ten weeks, beginning October 28, 1969. The draping of the fabric over the coast helped to re-contextualize and de-familiarize a well-known natural setting, and revealed the essential form and shape of the coast as a discrete object. Passersby experienced a shift in their commonplace perspective of the landscape by having limitations - both visual and physical - imposed upon the viewing process. This selective imposition also brought about new and unexpected revelations about the coastline, particularly its formal and structural qualities as a cohesive object with a distinct shape, substance, and volume.

Valley Curtain (1975)

https://www.theartstory.org/artist/christo/artworks/

In the Spring of 1970, Christo and Jeanne-Claude began work on Valley, a 200,200 square foot section of orange, woven nylon fabric that stretched across an entire Colorado valley. The gigantic, crescent-shaped fabric was suspended on a steel cable and anchored to two mountain tops, between Grand Junction and Glenwood Springs in the Hogback Mountain Range. They tied it down with 27 ropes and spread across the valley at a maximum measurement of 1,250 feet wide and 365 feet high. Valley Curtain was a tremendous feat of engineering and coordination that experienced significant and expensive setbacks. Christo and his team first attempted to install the curtain on October 9, 1971, but a gust of wind caught the fabric and it flew away, ripping on the surrounding rocks and construction equipment. On August 19, 1972, it was at last erected successfully, but it remained intact for only 28 hours, until a wind at over 60 miles per hour threatened to tear through it once more. Workers dismantled the piece shortly thereafter. For the brief time that it was in place, the bright orange drape slung between the craggy mountains reinvigorated the valley's contours, highlighting its natural flow, rhythm, and volume. Like many of the duo's large-scale environmental works, it brought new perspective to a familiar landscape, and encouraged a refreshed appreciation of the natural world. The bold color of the fabric popped against the bright sky, the muted blue mountains in the distance, and the greenery covering the nearby hills. Few viewers could see it live in its short, 28-hour existence, which added to the work's sense of fragility, vulnerability, and urgency, while also stimulating an awareness of the emptiness that accompanied its eventual dismantling. The work was documented extensively in photographs: ultimately, the most prolific medium of earthworks, these types of works which are purposely subjected to environmental change, impermanence, and decay.

The Umbrellas (1984-91)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Umbrellas_(Christo_and_Jeanne-Claude)

This piece took place simultaneously in two different rural locations, one in Japan outside the city of Tokyo, and the other in California north of Los Angeles. The umbrellas were assembled in California and composed of fabric, aluminum, steel, wooden supports, bags, and molded base covers. Each umbrella was 19 feet high and 28 feet wide. 1,340 blue umbrellas were installed in Japan, a color chosen to evoke the rich vegetation and water resources of the area, and 1,760 yellow umbrellas were placed in California, reflecting the golden grass that covers the nearby grazing hills. In Japan, the umbrellas were placed closer together following the geometry of the rice fields, and they were spread further out in California, where vast expanses of agricultural land dominate much of the Central Valley. The usage of umbrellas in each location symbolizes the similarities, and the differences associated with the ways of life and the land usage in each area. They represented the varied availability and character of the land, and the temporary cycles of cultivation wrought by human industry. After years of preparation and planning, environmental studies, wind tests, and negotiations, the first steel bases went down December 1990. The exhibit was finally unveiled on October 9, 1991, and received about 3 million visitors. It became a huge tourist attraction and a popular site for picnics and weddings. The work quickly turned controversial, however, when one umbrella caught a strong wind and pinned a woman against a rock, ultimately killing her and injuring three others. The project was cited for removal and during the dismantling process, a Japanese worker was electrocuted when an umbrella he was holding hit an electrical wire. Some critics responded to these tragic accidents by taking umbrage with the egocentrism of Christo's spectacle-oriented, massively scaled visual productions, and subsequent projects became more difficult for the artists to find financial and governmental backing.

Christo's early education in Soviet Socialist Realism, and his experience fleeing his home as a refugee of political revolution, informed his career's many forays into real-world politics as a primary subject and source of his art making. His 35-year collaboration with the artist Jeanne-Claude, and the large-scale site-specific works they co-authored, stand out as his career's greatest achievements. Together, the duo created monumentally scaled sculptures and installations which often used the technique of draping or wrapping large portions of existent landscapes, buildings, and industrial objects with specially engineered fabric. Christo and Jeanne-Claude made works that stand out as some of the most grandiose, site-specific artworks ever. While they often insisted that the aesthetic properties of their art made up its primary value, reactions from audiences and critics worldwide have long recognized a broader commentary operating across their work, and themes ranging from environmental degradation, to the vexed history of the 20th century and the Cold War, to the perseverance of democratic and humanist ideals.

· Christo and Jeanne-Claude's interventions in the natural world and the built environment altered both the physical form and the visual experience of the sites, allowing viewers to perceive and understand the locations with a new appreciation of their formal, energetic, and volumetric qualities.

· The artists' choice to remain intermittently inside and outside the frameworks of legality lends much of their work a built-in aspect of dissent and resistance. It also expands upon and emboldens a long legacy of quasi-legality in art, where art exists in a realm somewhere between the "real" world and fantasy, and affords the art world with distinct privileges and restrictions.

· Christo and Jeanne-Claude often worked outside the gallery system, refusing to negotiate sales of drawings and commissions through an art dealer. In this respect, they took a definitive stance on the political and economic infrastructure of the global art market, and set a precedent for artists working outside the system who still cultivated an international level of success.

· Whereas Land Artists usually made a point of blurring the lines of distinction between the artwork itself and its natural setting and/or materials, Christo and Jeanne-Claude's art relied on developing a high contrast between the engineered, man-made elements and the site's organic characteristics. Their work therefore pushes the envelope of what makes up site-specific, large-scale installation art, and expands the genre discourse to incorporate controversial themes of industrialization, bureaucratization, and late capitalism.

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memorylang · 3 years

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Easter: Redwoods, Light | #52 | April 2021

I write from Vegas, having returned after spending most of this spring in Reno. Life has been well. I feel adjusted to being back in the States a year. Every so often, objects and settings still remind me of last year’s evacuation from Mongolia. I still have the interest I’d had in trying to improve the lives of those around me. I still plan to return to Mongolia as soon as pandemic conditions permit.

This month’s blog story reminds me of cycles. Attending a virtual Open Mic Night at the conclusion to this month's “Culture of Creativity Workshops” featuring overseas alumni, I felt called to tell our folks there about this very blog story that I hadn't yet finished. A fellow participant suggested my theme of cycles. I'd spoken of how events that happen throughout time, how our feelings come and go. So here it is—My Easter 2O2I tales of cycles, light and renewal!

Back to Vegas

I returned to Vegas tasked by my father to continue to sort my belongings, tend to the yard and help my older brother and his girlfriend clean the kitchen since their recent move back to the house. Early in March, I’d visited the house with my siblings, and I’d intended originally to spend Holy Week here, too. But my college parish had many functions, including a friend’s baptism, Knights’ service events and opportunities for me to continue to help with the recordings of Sunday Proclamations of the Word. Palm Sunday’s and Good Friday’s were special highlights. Anyway, I'd opted to stay in Reno for Lent’s remainder into Easter’s first weeks.

Easter in Reno

Being in Reno for most of this April instead of in Vegas like last year, I enjoyed seeing trees blossom. A highlight of this Easter season has been its many serendipitous moments. This is also noteworthy because I'd listened to the "Tao of Pooh,” which noted spontaneity as among the good spiritual life’s fruits. A spiritual director had told me something similar not long before I'd graduated college.

Days before Easter Sunday itself (U.S. Year 2, Week 5; April 2–8, 2O2I), I enjoyed getting the opportunity to lector at that Mass. It was a small Mass, but I felt glad to be in person for the greatest celebration of the Christian year since all had shut down last year. Later this Easter Octave, I’d gotten to both lector and serve at a family's confirmation Mass. That too felt lovely.

Serendipity hadn’t stopped there! I’d caught up with an ol’ friend at Rancho San Rafael Park not far from the Uni and later biked with another friend at North Valleys Regional. My bike itself I’d bought from a rummage sale the day before on an unexpected adventure in a U-Haul truck to help our student coordinators collect furniture in the morning after they’d asked whoever could help. Thus, that Wednesday night they’d requested help, Thursday morning I’d joined them to Gardnerville and the rectory, and Friday night I was biking with a friend. The last time I recall riding in a U-Haul was over a dozen years ago when I was 11, my family moved from Indiana to Vegas.

My youngest sister has also been encouraging me to practice my licensed driving by borrowing her vehicle to and from our parish. I’d visited so often that staff offered me a key to simplify visits to my "home away from home away from home." I’d felt touched because I could go on walks around our pretty campus without worrying about getting locked out when I was alone. The flexibility gave me peace recently on my U.S. Year 2, Week 8 (April 23–29, 2O2I), when midday I’d needed to drop by my Honors College alma mater’s office to help print a letter I’d written to graduating seniors for our Honors Alumni Task Force.

Also at church, I’d gotten to participate in a few of our Alpha sessions hosted by a diaconate candidate whom I’d interviewed back in 2OI8 on my diocesan public relations internship. I'd heard about Alpha first back in Mongolia from a kind Evangelical Mongol. Anyway, the diaconate candidate, student coordinators and Alpha participants have been great conversation partners.

Beyond these, our pastor had driven me to my first Pfizer vaccine dose, lent me films and advised my reading! On one occasion, he even let me bring Holy Communion to a friend of mine. Such activities have kept me from feeling too distressed amid research writing and revisions. Parish support has made my “happy contentment” quest kinder.

Redwoods National and State Parks

This year’s Easter Octave concluded for me with another trip with my national parks friends (U.S. Year 2, Week 6; April 9–I5, 2O2I). This trip, I’d anticipated especially. As a young lad in Indiana, I’d felt mesmerized by the photos of massively tall California trees noted in our science textbooks. Thus, from an early age, Redwoods imprinted themselves in me.

At these national and state parks, epic scenery of old-growth forests, mountainous hills and valleys beside the coast astounded me. I hadn’t seen the Pacific Ocean since January 2O2O when I’d flown back to Mongolia from Vegas via San Francisco. I felt surprised by how many months had passed since my last overseas adventure.

At the loop completing the Tall Trees Grove trail, I found a special place. My peers had gone ahead while I stayed behind to take photos, record videos and capture audio. I hadn’t expected to find at the trail’s end a creek filled with still other trees—vast ones, like those that I’d seen in subtropical Asia but different.

I basked in these trees. While taking photos, I also discovered my phone has a virtual reality setting. I tried it out, remembering undergrad extra credit VR photography projects. I’d wanted to journal at least something.

“Daniel!” my peers called from some distance down the path. I couldn’t see them, but their voices echoed well enough. I called back something to the effect of, “I’m here!” I still wanted to get a good fill of this park. Here’s what I journaled:

[11:45 a.m.] Redwood, National Park, end of Tall Tree Grove along the creek zone is this phenomenal section of mossy trees with winding branches. Here I discovered my VR. [A woman paused, passing me, “You must be Daniel.”] 19IO–I96O, so many of these trees that used to be across Humboldt, Eureka, Arcata were cut down. The smells… the scents, the mosses, the ferns, the light. Beyond.

Mid-journaling, I paused because a mid-aged woman who was passing by smiled and acknowledged that I must be the "Daniel" she'd overheard about. I smiled yes and reveled in the gorgeousness that surrounded us. She affirmed and mused how this park’s name should be changed like, “Redwoods and Other Trees and Lose-Your-Brother-in-the-Forest National Park.” She added how in the early half of last century, these very types of trees once blanketed far more Northern California, across the very counties through which my friends and I traveled to get here.

I later journaled again after sprinting much of the uphill trail back to my friends. We then saw the “Lady Bird” Johnson trail, then a confluence of the Klamath River and Pacific Ocean (where there were seals!) and finally Trillium Falls. I’d written this about the final hike:

So hypnotic. [...] Dodona’s Grove* vibes from the Trillium hike after the Falls. Whispers from God. Endlessness.

*The Grove of Dodona is a prophetic forest from “The Hidden Oracle,” a book to which I’d listened amid the pandemic by an author I used to read in junior high and high school, Rick Riordan. While I wasn’t a huge fan of where he’d taken “The Heroes of Olympus” series’ finale, I'd often admired his picturesque locales.

My peers and I left the park by 6:45 p.m. The view from the road on which we departed reminded me of the bamboo forest in 安吉 Ānjí near 杭州 Hángzhōu. I’d seen it in 2OI7 during my first summer overseas and have rarely found comparable places.

Of Redwoods, I journaled too of how gleeful I’d felt to have hugged so many trees. A friend had complimented my writing when he mentioned that I don’t need to take so many photos. I added how photos help me remember what to write. I'll probably share my Redwoods photoset in May.

A carpet of moist, fallen leaves along the paved trails had reminded me of a Sunday morning path that my dad would take my siblings and me through for years at Spring Mill State Park in Mitchell, Ind.

Spring Retreat: Recognizing God’s Light

Beyond Redwoods, I'd stayed behind in Reno chiefly to participate in my college parish's Spring Retreat. This spring the student coordinators held it in Gardnerville, the same location where I'd enjoyed it my senior spring. However, I'd had to leave early from it that year. It was my first and only of the eight semesterly retreats from which I'd left early.

That year, I'd left in order to co-emcee the Diocesan Youth Rally 2OI9. To my surprise, the youngest member on this year’s student coordinator team was likely at that same event when she was a high school student. Similarities like these gladdened me.

I felt renewed. This year’s theme, "Light in the Darkness" (Spring 2O2I), reminded me of "Ignite the Light," (Spring 2OI8), the year after my mother died. This time, however, I’d had more years to reflect and feel greater peace. Similarly, I've felt more peace being back in the States even though I'd prefer to be abroad. God’s light shines every day, in every moment of every person. I can see it.

Writing of seeing things, I’d also seen "WandaVision" and "The Falcon and the Winter Soldier" while up in Reno. I’d reconnected too with a Disney-loving college friend to get more Disney+ watchlist ideas. I’d seriously enjoyed the “Into the Unknown: Making Frozen II” docuseries. Both she and my college pastor led me to witness iconic performances by Julie Andrews in both "The Sound of Music" and "Mary Poppins."

Justice

April felt refreshing for a more challenging reason as well. Much of the month had featured on many channels coverage from the trial over the killing of George Floyd. I imagined that this would be a trial that my generation remembers for years.

I’d watched live various testimonies and even the closing arguments. Then, on that Tuesday, April 2O, 2O2I, afternoon, our nation heard the verdict—My pastor called it among the fastest traveling news.

I've been on the Social Justice Task Force of the American Psychological Association’s Society for the Psychology of Religion and Spirituality since last summer. Our Task Force had come together in response to the killing of George Floyd and subsequent renewed pushes across our nation for social justice.

Our task force has been meeting every other Tuesday night, after weekly fed Zoom fatigue. Our meeting that Tuesday fell on the night of the guilty verdict. But, this justice felt cathartic only somewhat. More shootings filled the media. Our task was far from over.

Still, I’d another reason to celebrate. That Tuesday marked my last advocacy meeting on behalf of the National Peace Corps Association to offices of Nevada’s lawmakers this March–April. All told, I’d coordinated and met virtually with offices of the U.S. Congresspeople Horsford, Titus and Lee as well as Senator Rosen. And Representative Titus herself attended our meeting! She was very kind. So, I felt relieved to have finished those duties for now.

Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month

Next month (May) begins Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month. I've decided to tell a #StopAsianHate story. Given America's centuries of racism toward Asians, I don't enjoy the subject. But, I’d had an experience on my Week 5I (Feb. 19–25, 2O2I). It reminded me the importance of continuing to tell stories so that we can promote diversity and inclusion.

I was on one of my Reno walks that cold winter. As usual, I'd pass by the local elementary school. I'd paused to check my phone. The time was while children were at recess. They played opposite a chain-link fence a few yards down a hill from where I stood.

At first, I didn't think that the kids were talking to me. So, I paid them little attention. Then their voices sounded closer, in greater numbers.

I hadn't decided whether to acknowledge the children but decided to finish my walk. My walk brought me along the fence. From my right periphery, I saw a clump of children gathering, following. They certainly addressed me.

I heard what sounded like slurs against Asians that I won't repeat here but also questions that I will repeat here.

The kids asked if I was homeless, whether I'm an orphan, whether I speak English. I reflected on these. I was wearing a big scarf from Mongolia, a hefty hand-me-down winter coat and wide, secondhand jeans, frayed at my ankles. But I hadn't spoken a word to the kids.

Their questions themselves weren't offensive. Yet, the children’s tones reminded me of the mocking ones I'd heard in middle school when boys made fun of me for caring more about good grades than getting girlfriends. (Little did the boys know, girls I liked tended toward good grades.)

Anyway, these kids seemed to have negative implications behind positive responses to their questions. This upset me. After all, homelessness, being an orphan and not knowing English are not inherently bad things. For, often, people do not choose to go without a home, parents or American English. So why might these children ask these degradingly?

I felt perturbed by the realization that these children would find pleasure in mocking people who they suspect are without homes, parents or English skills. Yet, from this, I felt a glimmer of solidarity. I'd heard directed toward me what seemed unkind speech. This may help me relate to Asians who hear slurs, to those without homes, to those without parents and to those perhaps struggling with English.

My parents tend to insist too that I buy new clothes, though. Given our world's rampant consumerism, I find second-hand ones quite fine. "Form follows function." I wish that more folks would appreciate hand-me-downs and thrifting.

Nuance

Curiously, as I continued past this chain-link fence, a somewhat pudgy boy of color asked with a wide grin for money for Taco Bell. Truthfully, I didn't have money on me. I calmly answered the questions, not pausing from my walk. I guessed the kids dismissed the homeless guess/joke. I noticed thankfully that they wore face masks. We’re still in a pandemic, after all.

The boy's questions made me wonder about his family life. True, he could have been joking. But I remembered, many of the boys who'd picked on me in middle school had been living in a neighborhood that many people called not a “good” part of town.

In light of the visibility that Black Lives Matter has had in the past year, I've tried to grow more aware of how cruel predominantly White societies can be toward Black, indigenous and other peoples of color. I recalled learning when I was little that, often those who bully had been bullied themselves. Sociology interests me.

Thus, when these playground children said potentially questionable things to me, I wasn't sure whether to intervene about the slurs or micro-aggressions or what I'd say.

As I neared the fence’s edge to complete my pass by the school, I overheard a girl's or maybe a woman's voice call the kids to stop wasting their free time. I'm glad that someone spoke up. Compassion is the answer, especially in light of hurtful things.

I’m still unsure whether my general silence was helpful or problematic. But the experience caused me to think. For, children learn fast. Innocence is invaluable. My generation's problems and those of that above ours replicate in youths the longer we fail to act.

I’m glad that folks are speaking up these days in hopes to #StopAsianHate. Social justice mustn't sleep.

Language Six

On April 2O2I’s last day, I hit my 365-day streak on Duolingo!

Over the past year, I’d focused on Latin, Spanish and Chinese. Having finished every lesson and level Duolingo had for Latin, I started dabbling in German. While I’ve no intention to extensively pursue German (yet, at least), I’ve enjoyed how its lessons help me see from where many non-Latin roots reach English.

I’ve been dipping into my Germanic heritage on Dad’s side again lately. This began about when I’d seen “The Sound of Music” then reconnected with my distant relative who’s researched more of our shared Austrian and Volga German forefathers and mothers. Turns out that my relative had personally written to and received a postcard from the real Maria von Trapp!

I've grown to like more German language. "The Sound of Music" and how Spotify has Disney soundtracks in German help. Besides listening to vocalists like Namika, I’ve also gotten into LEA, Manuel Straube, Julia Scheeser and even Willemijn Verkaik! This is probably just a phase, but it’s certainly fun.

Every language I’ve sought to learn has at least one Spotify playlist. For recent films I’ve seen, like "Mary Poppins" and "Mary Poppins Returns," I’ve cherry-picked tracks in German, Spanish and English. Though I don’t catch most words, I like to consider translators’ decision-making.

Summer Fun

I get my second Pfizer dose on Cinco de Mayo. By then, I hope to have channeled my Julie Andrews-inspired service of making things better than how I've found them. Later that vaccine week, on Mother’s Day, I’ll return to Reno with Tita and Papa.

May 14 will celebrate the Baccalaureate Mass of lovely student coordinators and friends from undergrad. Then comes the 2Ist birthday of my youngest sister and will also mark when I’m fully inoculated, May 19! Pentecost comes May 23. Then will be May 3O, the wedding of two of my undergrad coworkers, including a fraternity brother. We'll have a mini staff and fraternal reunion!

After that, I look forward most to a Seattle trip at my 24th birthday. National parks friends and I are flying up to see Olympic National Park. It’ll be my first time to see further into the Pacific Northwest than Ashland, Ore. My younger (not youngest) sister got a job in Seattle, so I’ll be surfing her couch for part of my visit. Super stoked to reconnect with friends from high school, college and Peace Corps in the city! Even my married friends with whom I'd spent New Year's Eve the past couple years plan to visit me there.

This April my siblings and I reviewed our first scholarship applications for a Foundation that we’d founded to honor our late mother, who was Chinese. So, with next month and the fourth anniversary of her passing, I’ll share Foundation experiences, I think. Along with those, graduations and celebrations await!

You can read more from me here at DanielLang.me :)

#Peace Corps #Mongolia #redwoods #WithMe #Easter #memoir #story #Catholic #God #memoryLang #USA #Coronavirus #COVID-19 #Nevada #California #travel #spring #church #UNR #StopAsianHate

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