Gung Hay Fat Choy!

When I asked the boys how they wanted to spend their Saturday, Owen announced that it would be fun to have an "Asia" Party.

We decided to head right out to our amazing Asian market - the Hong Kong Market for some supplies for our festivities. The boys LOVE going there! I told them we could spend as much time as they wanted, browsing. There is such an awesome fish market, complete with tanks of live fish - and Hayden literally claps when he sees them.

We picked up some rice paper, clear noodles, some treats (though they were out of my favorite sesame paste filled pastry!) and headed home to make decorations.

The boys made "coolie" hats, painted dragons, made fans - and practiced pretend Chinese calligraphy.

We set up a spring roll station, and the boys went to work -- especially Hayden who decided that his were "summer" rolls. We also made dumplings, and stir fry.

Owen read a poem to us and then he learned to count to ten in Vietnamese, and we listened to Korean Sanjo music.

My wall is covered with Asian art that the boys drew well into the evening. Here are some pictures of my little "Iron Chef" Hayden:

(Gung Hay Fat Choy means "Best wishes and Congratulations. Have a prosperous and good year.")

Dancing

Thanks ERIKA!

It's okay to ask for help . . . or is it?

I'm sure by now that worldwide, everyone knows that we've requested the aid of the National Guard, once again, to fortify our law enforcement. Most of what I've heard from an outsider's perspective has been very negative. Meaning: most of you still don't get it.

Bearing in mind that most of our first responders lost everything they own . . . everything - can you imagine that? Many of them, living in trailors while their families live in another state. Add the emotional toll of post traumatic stress from rescuing the dying, and recovering the dead . . . in a state of medical emergency where we lack the resources to provide these brave men and women with the emotional support they deserve. Figure in that as many as 3-400 officers left their posts, with approximately 130 on indefinite "sick" leave.

Add that until recently there has been no place to detain prisoners, that there still is no juvenile facility to hold curfew offenders, and no court system fit to try anyone yet.

Consider that the teens violently gunned down, were, in fact, thugs with extensive records themselves.

Think about that we waited over 6 months for the federal FEMA rebuilding recommendations/regulations, that are still incomplete or make NO common sense whatsoever. Think about your mortgage company not releasing your insurance settlement (which is probably a pittance of what you deserved) and keeping it in escrow - pending FEMA . . .

How about we add the billions of dollars of oil and gas revenues that have been pilfered from Louisiana over many, many years - money we could use to rebuild our wetlands, so destroyed by offshore drilling that we aren't allowed to profit from.

So we ask for some help from the National Guard. We've been through the worst natural disaster, aided and abetted by the US Corps of Engineers.

It would be worse to not ask for help.

One day at a time.

The 9/11 Project

"2,996 stories…

2,996 voices…

2,996 remembered…

2,996 is a tribute to the victims of 9/11.

On September 11,
2006, 2,996 volunteer bloggers will join together for a tribute to the victims of 9/11. Each person will pay tribute to a single victim.

We will honor them by remembering their lives, and not by remembering their murderers.

If you would like to help out, either by pledging to post a tribute on your own blog, or by offering your services to promote this cause, just leave a comment here and I’ll email you the name of a victim.

Then, on 9/11/2006, you will post a tribute to that victim on your blog.

But, and this is critical, the tributes should celebrate the lives of these people–kind of like a wake. Over the last 5 years we’ve heard the names of the killers, and all about the victim’s deaths. This is a chance to learn about and celebrate those who died. Forget the murderers, they don’t deserve to be remembered. But some people who died that day deserve to be remembered–2,996 people.

Thank you,

D.Challener Roe"

If you are interested in participating, visit http://www.dcroe.com/2996/

I'll be honoring the life of Marni Pont O'Doherty, 31, Armonk, N.Y. who perished in the WTC.

Be heard

"There was this little prince with a magic crown. An evil warlock kidnapped him, locked him in a cell in a huge tower and took away his voice.

There was a window made of bars. The prince would smash his head against the bars hoping that someone would hear the sound and find him.

The crown made the most beautiful sound that anyone ever heard. You could hear the ringing for miles. It was so beautiful, that people wanted to grab the air.

They never found the prince. He never got out of the room. But the sound he made filled everything up with beauty."

~Julian Schnabel from the movie Basquiat

They found another body today

in New Orleans East. Seems someone at the address has been reported missing since Katrina . . . August 29, 2005. Nine and a half months ago.

"See that house? See THAT damage?" my three-year old repeats, as he has heard all of this from adults all around him. "The hurricane didn't mean to do that," he adds, as if hurricanes had souls. So forgiving.

It's hard to continue to write about this. But it's impossible not to. I am compelled, as are so many others.

I know I've lost major blog-audience in the meanwhile . . .

It's a life though. Here I am, home though not quite home. It's like an odd figment to the universe, and if you buy the latest in quantum physics, perhaps its a figment of multi-verse . . . meaning that in an altered state, pre-Katrina New Orleans still exists just a step in time-space away . . . and those of us HERE have just fallen down the Rabbit's hole . . .

Day by day.