The ZIMBABWE Situation | Our
thoughts and prayers are with Zimbabwe - may peace, truth and justice prevail. |
MULTIMEDIA Slideshow
A chain of events depleted Zimbabwe’s thriving economy, and Bruce Lombardo of
Triangle believes only a chain of events can get it back on its feet.
But
it’s going to take a pack mentality: teamwork, dedication and
loyalty.
Political unrest led to a declining economy in what was once
Africa’s breadbasket. The tourism industry that upheld a nation the size of
Connecticut has dwindled, leaving many without jobs. To eat, people have turned
to poaching animals in the park, including painted hunting dogs, an endangered
species.
Lombardo, 48, a biologist and educator, saw the dogs as the
scapegoat to save the community.
For more information... |
www.painteddogconservation.iinet.net.au |
For the second year, sixth- graders from all the neighboring communities go
through Bush Camp at the center and learn about the dogs, conservation and the
park in their backyards. They also get to meet the painted dogs in
rehabilitation.
“If you’re trying to save a species, education has to be
part of the solution,” Lombardo said.
Lombardo moved his biology
classroom from a high school in Harare, the country’s capital, to the national
park border, where he developed the curriculum for Bush Camp, a three-day
overnight camp free to the students.
Suzie Gilley, wildlife education
coordinator for Virginia’s Department of Game and Inland Fisheries, said
starting conservation with children is natural because children love
animals.
“Children have a natural interest in wildlife,” she said. “If
you get children interested in wildlife and what their needs are … then they
care about it.”
Lombardo is convinced that the more children who go
through the program means a better chance of survival for the painted hunting
dogs and the conservation center as a teaching tool and tourist
destination.
“When the economy improves, there will be a generation of
people who will make wiser choices for the sake of the people,” Lombardo
said.
The dogs once covered much of Africa south of the Sahara Desert,
but now are limited to four countries and 3,000 individuals. They are in the dog
family, but are their own genus.
Painted dogs are the size of a wolf,
Lombardo said, but thinner. Dogs have a different coat pattern of tan, gold,
black and white - a fingerprint to tell them apart. Large Mickey-Mouse ears
amplify their hearing for hunting.
They move in packs of two to 30 and
swarm antelopes to eat, but there are no records of them attacking or killing a
human. Within the pack, the dogs all take care of the alpha male and alpha
female’s pups.
When adults leave for a hunt, they always bring back food
for the baby sitter and pups, Lombardo said. They’re also known to stay with
sick or wounded pack members and nurse them to health, instead of leaving them
on their own, he said.
“These dogs are endearing,” said Lombardo, who
returned from Africa for a month with his wife, Miriam Litchfield, a Triangle
native.
The couple went to Africa in 1997 to teach science at
international schools. Previously, they were both teachers in Columbia, South
America. They met in Georgia when Lombardo was an ecological tour guide and park
ranger and Litchfield was an outdoor educator for the Savannah school
system.
“There is so much suffering in the human population, you ask
yourself ‘why am I working with animals?’” Lombardo said. “But it’s so critical.
Extinction is forever.”
With the help of his pack, Lombardo is confident
they can make a difference.
Staff writer Emily Brown can be reached
at (703) 878-4650.
MULTIMEDIA Slideshow
A letter from
Zimbabwe
On the occasion of the Tenth
Anniversary
of the discovery of Comet
Hale-Bopp
“How vast those Orbs must
be, and how inconsiderable this Earth, the Theatre upon which all our mighty
Designs, all our Navigations, and all our Wars are transacted, is when compared
to them. A very fit consideration, and
matter of Reflection, for those Kings and Princes who sacrifice the Lives of so
many People, only to flatter their Ambition in being Masters of some pitiful
corner of this small Spot.”
-
Christiaan Huygens “New
Conjectures Concerning the Planetary Worlds, Their Inhabitants and
Productions” circa
1690
“… A day will come, one
day in the unending succession of days, when beings, beings who are now latent
in our thoughts and hidden in our loins, shall stand upon this earth as one
stands upon a footstool, and shall laugh and reach out their hands amidst the
stars.”
-
H.G. Wells, “The Discovery of the Future” Nature
65, 326 (1902)
Although circumstances beyond my control do not allow me to be with
you all on this auspicious occasion, I am honoured that Alan has allowed me to
take the podium in spirit.
Sixty years and one week ago, an event of enormous significance to
humanity occurred very close to where you all are right now. This was the first detonation of a nuclear
device, which was the culmination of the Manhatten Project. It strikes me that it is most appropriate
that another project, called Earthrise, which endeavours to bring people
together in peace and harmony, should be launched from this same spot on our
planet.
On June 21st this year, exactly four years after the Total
Solar Eclipse in 2001, I sat in my observatory and nostalgically opened a book
called “Everybody’s Comet: A Layman’s Guide to Comet Hale-Bopp.” The book was autographed on the inside page
by Alan Hale.
The inscription read:
“To Mike
Partners in “Comet Crime”!
Keep Looking Up!”
This book was presented to me by Alan Hale shortly after the eclipse
(in fact the Sun was still partially obscured by the Moon when he wrote those
words). I have been involved in the
study of comets for over twenty years, so I know a fair deal of what there is
currently to know of comets.
When I first read the book however, it struck me that although the
style and language of the volume was aimed at the layman, easy-going and often
humorous and highly entertaining, there was a deeper message that kept asserting
itself throughout the volume. There was
a message of profound importance to the human race. The entire book could be summed up in that
simple message to me at the beginning…”Keep Looking
Up!”
I “cut my teeth” so to speak, at an early age, in astronomy with the
books of Patrick Moore. But it was from,
in my opinion, the greatest astronomy and science educator of the twentieth
century, that I derived my particular conceptualisation of what the Cosmos is
really all about. That man was Carl
Sagan. Sagan had an exquisite view of
the universe, of science and its role, and of humanity and the human
potential. Most importantly he was a
true educator in his ability to communicate his views and knowledge and capture
the imagination of minds young and old around the world. I see these same qualities in Alan
Hale.
In the early months of 1997, Comet Hale-Bopp was at its brightest,
and it was seen by more people than any other comet in recorded history. For a while, millions of people around the
world from every possible background were united in that they were all sharing
the wonder and beauty of this object.
But it was really the discovery of the comet that was truly
important. That’s because when it was
realised shortly after discovery that it would indeed very likely become a
spectacle in the sky two and a half years later, the names “Hale” and “Bopp”
became household names very quickly and it afforded Alan a voice and a platform
that had not existed previously.
The first part of his message is simple really, we have heard it
before, and generally, thinking people know the truth of it. The whole world and mankind are in a
mess. The second part of his message is
a lot more difficult. We have to clean
up the mess and we all have to do it ourselves, and not leave it to the few who
are creating the mess in the first place.
Every human embryo during the first days and weeks of its existence
goes through successive stages of development, appearing as a single cell, then
as a group of cells, then fish-like, amphibian-like, and reptilian appearances
before it begins to resemble a human being.
This is a “play-out” of the long period of evolution that has resulted in
the diversity of life on our planet.
It’s a lot more complex then I have time or frankly the knowledge in
this field to describe here, but basically the human brain reflects this evolution too, being composed of
“old” and relatively “new” parts. The
old part of our brain that is most dominant in reptiles, called the R-complex,
is the part that is responsible for territorialism, lust for power and
domination, fear, anger, superstition, and phenomena such as religious
fanaticism and mass hysteria. Most of
the more positive emotions such as love and compassion are seated in the limbic
region and are expressed as concepts and thoughts via the cerebral cortex, the
seat of intellect. In mankind, the
cerebral hemispheres allow us to translate our feelings into thought and
concepts and appreciate our surroundings.
These latter are more apparent in mammals and reach their highest
development in primates and man. They
are responsible for self-awareness and our ability to manipulate our environment
in a way that no other species on this planet
can.
Each and every one of us unfortunately has the original reptilian
evolutionary baggage in our heads that comes along with our higher
capacities. We needed it a long time ago
to survive, but it is now very much at the point where it could destroy us, and
it must be overcome. When I look at what
is happening in the world five years into the twenty-first century, I have the
feeling that if humanity does not take stock of itself now, it will
self-destruct, taking the whole habitable planet with
it.
In my own country,
In December 2002 we had a second Total Solar Eclipse in this
country. Alan Hale sent a message of
hope to the people of
Thousands heard that message, and took hope. On the 7th of March this year the government
started jamming SW Radio
Just over eight weeks ago, the government unleashed what it calls
“Operation Restore Order” on the populace.
This is a thinly disguised excuse for genocide. In the cities and towns all over the country
the police and army using bulldozers have destroyed over 300,000 homes and
displaced 1.5 million people, who have been either placed into holding camps
with no shelter or food, or are sleeping out in the open in the cold southern
hemisphere winter. There is no fuel, and
the economy is imploding.
But there is hope in a profound story that was related to me: A lady went to her regular till operator in a
shop recently and noticed that he was looking fairly dishevelled and very
tired. When asked what was wrong, she
was told that his house had been razed to the ground and he was in the open at
night with his family. He suddenly asked
her, “Do you know anything about astronomy?”
Surprised at this apparent change of direction in the conversation, she
replied “Not much, why?” The answer came
back at her: “Well, most nights it’s too cold to
sleep, so I’ve been looking at the stars.
Trouble is, I am not sure what I’m looking at, so I want to try and find
some books that will help me to learn the sky.”
This conversation restored my optimism and contention that the human
spirit cannot ever be totally repressed and that peace, truth and justice will
prevail again in my country.
Astronomy, unlike any other science, is accessible to every human
being. All you need are your eyes. It
can help us to realise now that each of us is unique as an individual and
yet a small but important part of a much bigger picture, and we occupy only this
one small planet.
“National boundaries are
not evident when we view the Earth from space.
Fanatical ethnic or religious or national chauvinisms are a little
difficult to maintain when we see our planet as a fragile blue crescent fading
to become an inconspicuous point of light against the bastion and citadel of the
stars…we are a rare as well as an endangered species. Every one of us is, in the cosmic
perspective, precious. If a human
disagrees with you, let him live. In a
hundred billion galaxies, you will not find another.”
The “War on Terror” is doomed to failure as long as one reciprocates
hatred with hatred. Instead, every world
leader, every dictator, every terrorist or potential suicide bomber should know
the following:
That to kill yourself and others is not only a crime against
humanity, it is a crime against the Cosmos that spawned you over a period of
three and a half billion years of evolution.
No Cause inspired by petty differences in perception of our supposed
ownership of parts of the world or religious, class or ethnic differences gives
us the right to kill and destroy each other.
We are a collective consciousness, a way for the Cosmos to explore
itself, and we are all in this together.
This is the light of hope that Project Earthrise would offer. I’d like to close this letter with the lyrics of a song by Jackson Browne that I feel to be particularly in line with the whole concept of Project Earthrise:
Jackson Browne
The moon and stars became his bed
He saw the sun rise seven
times
And when he came back down he said
It is one, it is one
One
world spinning 'round the sun
Wherever it is you call home
Whatever
country you come from
It is one, it is one, it is one, it is one
They shot a man in
At a time of rivalry and war
He had some
dreams of a good life
But dreams aren't what they killed him for
Now people stand themselves
next to the righteous
And they believe the things they say are true
They
speak in terms of what divides us
To justify the violence they do
But
it is one, it is one
One world spinning 'round the sun
Wherever it is you
call home
Whatever country you come from
It is one, it is one, it is one,
it is one
One -- the deep blue ocean
One -- the endless sky
One -- the
purple mountains
One -- you and I
It's not a world of our own
choosing
We don't decide where we are born
This life is a battleground
between right and wrong
One way or other we are torn
And people stand
themselves next to the righteous
And they believe the things they say are
true
And speak in terms of what divides us
To justify the violence they
do
But it is one, it is one
One world spinning 'round the
sun
Wherever it is you call home
Whatever country you come from
It is
one, it is one, it is one, it is one
It is one, it is one, it is one, it is
one
One -- the deep blue ocean
One -- the endless sky
One -- the purple
mountains
One -- you and I
It is my fervent hope that one day in the not too distant future,
there will be an Earthrise installation in my country, and that the people of my
country together with the rest of the human species will be able to look up at
the night sky with a new-found sense of pride and freedom in the precious world
that is under our tenure. Until that day, I think that I for one will “Keep
Looking Up!”
M. B.
23rd July 2005