Day 1: Tolo, Greece

Nine hour flight  out of Philadelphia and 3 hour bus ride from Athens to our sea-side hotel. Felt like forever. I guess that doesn't compare to that 23 hour drive to Florida last year...

Stopped at the isthmus in Corinth for bit to take some fun pictures and tried Soblaki (essentiallt Greek steak on a stick). Quite delicious. Food here quite like which we had that night in Pittsburgh the night we visited the symphony: Rice, tomato sauce, beef, etc.

Warm and in 70s (Fahrenheit that is). Tomorrow will involve Mycenae and trekking to the Acro-Corinth the day after.

About 10:30 pm I'm sitting in a quaint little café, overlooking the Aegean Sea, enjoying some rather dry red wine and extremely salty peanuts with some friends. Life is good. And legal.

 I'll keep you posted.

Abroad

Friends,

As I write this, I tell you that I have a swirling torrent of thoughts and feelings running through my mind:

-Excitement for these coming two weeks in Europe!
-Bittersweet sentiment that my sophomore year of college is ended.
-Great pleasure that some of my closest friends are coming with me on this expedition!
-Eagerness for Camp Judson.
- Eagerness for August and the return to Grove City, a place which I regard with supreme fondness.
-A sadness that comes with lengthy separation from friends and companions--missing some especially.
-Excitement for these coming two weeks in Europe!

I will be traveling abroad in Greece and Italy for 2 weeks (returning to the USA on May 31). I will have occasional access to the Internet, so feel free to email me anything you desire, and I trust you will forgive my delayed responses. I would offer you the option to call my cell phone, but it is useless overseas.

As well, I hope to keep a travel journal/blog of our escapades and upload pictures to the Book of Faces as often as time and Internet access allows, so feel free to check back and see what international escapades and mischief I have stirred up, if you feel so inclined.

I look forward to hearing and sharing with you all.

Ridiculously yours,

Sean

No Girls Allowed: Sweden Okays Gender Eugenic Abortion

by Wesley J. Smith

Abortion was supposed to liberate women and protect them from unwanted pregnancies. But with prenatal testing and all, it is increasingly being used as a eugenic search and destroy tool to eliminate unwanted types of children prior to birth. In other words, eugenic abortion mixed with pre-implantation genetic diagnosis in IVF—and I believe, eventually infanticide—is transforming procreation from being about having children to about having only the kind of children we want.

One targeted class of this eugenic technique is girls. In India and China, ultrasound is used to identify female fetuses for elimination—a practice so ubiquitous that a huge disparity now exists between male and female demographics. Now, gender abortion has been approved in, of all places, Sweden. From the story:

Swedish health authorities have ruled that gender-based abortion is not illegal according to current law and cannot therefore be stopped, according to a report by Sveriges Television. The Local reported in February that a woman from Eskilstuna in southern Sweden had twice had abortions after finding out the gender of the child.

The woman, who already had two daughters, requested an amniocentesis in order to allay concerns about possible chromosome abnormalities. At the same time, she also asked to know the foetus’s gender.

Doctors at Malaren Hospital expressed concern and asked Sweden’s National Board of Health and Welfare (Socialstyrelsen) to draw up guidelines on how to handle requests in the future in which they “feel pressured to examine the foetus’s gender” without having a medically compelling reason to do so. The board has now responded that such requests and thus abortions cannot be refused and that it is not possible to deny a woman an abortion up to the 18th week of pregnancy, even if the foetus’s gender is the basis for the request.

How ironic: In the name of freeing women, Sweden allows open season to be declared on female fetuses (who, let’s face it, will be the usual targets of gender selection). India and China have at least outlawed this eugenic cleansing, making those countries more advanced in protecting against gender based eugenics than “enlightened” Sweden.

And in the US? A bill has been introduced in Congress (H.B. 1822) to prevent gender and racially based abortions: It has no chance of passage.

No, Mr. President.

Into the Twittersphere

This video clip (link below) is an excellent satire of Twitter and the general narcissm of our generation. I found hysterical, yet probing.

http://www.web-strategist.com/blog/2009/03/20/video-into-the-twittersphere/

Note: there is unfortunately one blip of minor vulgarity at 3:21 into the video. Skipping over it will not adversely affect your understanding or appreciation of the clip.

Prolific Quote of the Day

From a couple days ago...

Friday, May 8, 2009

Nietzsche Friday #9

Plato is boring.

-Friedrich Nietzsche

Sorry, Al...

The world in 2008 has been cooler than at any time since the turn of the century, scientists say.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7786060.stm