all the world’s a stage!

All for one and one for all!

Appalled the world watches while children burn!

Horrified the spectators stare!  So many maimed.

This is not a Virtual Reality show!

This is real! in living rooms everywhere!

Now!  Do something! and act decisively!

But how?

Albi cathedral The Last Judgement.

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No quiz show with the answer there!

Real people dying on-screen now!

Death is no bluff to be postponed!

Or a political position

Taken at one’s choice!

It is there! Inevitable! For us all.

But now?

Standing over Syria

Syrian traditional costume.   traveladventures.org

Details on Syria and an interactive map..

http://www.traveladventures.org/continents/asia/syrian-people12.html

Is there no other way but force?

So many have died already.

Use our imagination and humanity.

Syria is a country of the bible,

Proud peoples with an ancient history.

The world wishes that no more should die.

Gassed in their sleep like rats.

A dirty deed that no one claims.

Women and children are fleeing

Leaving their men behind to fight and die.

Let us think. There are other ways.

Who is standing for what over Syria?

Stand up! Stand up and be counted!

Geoff Clements

perseid meteor shower- the video

Star Wars: Images of the Perseid Meteor Shower

A beautiful series of photographs of the tracks of the meteors as they burn up high in the atmosphere.

diana-the price of fame

Thanks to http://www.turboimagehost.com

The death of Diana remains controversial and many of those involved wish to keep it so.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-485294/Published-time-Coroner-releases-amazing-pictures-Diana-car-took-death.html

Is it possible that the truth will ever be known?

 

past and present-base sous-marine bordeaux(bordeaux submarine base)

The submarine base being built;

The Submarine Base Bordeaux now (Google)

Present and past are mixing now.

The veil of present sifting

Always sifting through the past.

xxx

Isn’t she like her mother!

Such a joker, always laughing!

Blonde hair and so keen on the boys!

Hope she doesn’t end up in trouble!

I remember being stuck in a tram

Stuck in a tram during an air raid

On the Pont de Pierre

Nothing to be done but sit and hope.

The RAF was bombing the Nazi submarine base.

Two kilometers away down the river.

If they missed French lives were lost.

It is still there built by slave labour.

Impossible to destroy even now!

Thousands of tons of concrete reinforced

With railway lines. The bombs bounced

Off the roof when they hit directly.

Now a marine base and exhibition centre

With many coloured flags, modern art

And children playing. So different

From that dark night many years ago.

That I remember and  which colours the present.

So when I am gone, who will remember?

Will some one carry the flame of that night

For those who died for us to be free.

Text Geoff Clements

 

French translation,:  thanks, Anne Marie Clements

some parts of france carry many links to the past-beaumont de lomange

The huge old market hall at Beaumont de Lomange is going to have the cobblestone floor restored. The details of the project are posted publicly.

Pierre Fermat (1601/7 to 1665) was born here and there is a statue in the town square erected to his memory. It gives some detail of his life and mathematical work.  It is no understatement to say that he founded the development of modern mathematics  and statistics.  Though a lawyer and remaining an ‘amateur’ mathematician throughout his life, he corresponded with the major people active in the field at the time: Pascal,  Descartes, Huygens and  Wallace among others.  Issac Newton said that with  the help of Fermat’s writings  he was able to develop the use of  calculus.  Fermat’s  last  theorem famously  found by chance by his son, pencilled in the margin of a page of  a copy of Diophantus   was not proved until 1994   by Sir Andrew Wiles  .  Fermat did not have space to write his proof apparently but he was always an intuitive worker and never bothered much about the niceties of mathematical proofs.  What would he have thought of the stone statue of him in the square, replacing the earlier bronze taken by the German army during the war to melt down for weapons?

The walls of the buildings around the square retaining the traces of past advertisements: Note that the usage of the buildings has not changed much with time.

sunset and saturn 14 august 2013

Thank you NASA

There have been some beautiful sunsets recently as the weather has been settled and clear here in France. A marvellous feature has been Saturn brilliant in the sunset if you know where to look.  After the sun has set it is no longer necessary to search to find Saturn, setting an hour or so after the sun. Its wonderfully beautiful ring system visible even with a small hand held camera.

This is the converse of the view of the Earth from Saturn taken from the Cassini probe a few weeks ago!

A photo from NASA’s archives followed by a series of four photographs of the sunset taken by me.  Saturn becomes increasingly visible as the light fades.  A fifth photo taken at full magnification by me allows the impression of the ring system to be seen.  Finally a picture taken by Anthony Wesley in March earlier this year shows the rings as they are now as viewed from Earth.  Remember the rings of Saturn change position relative to the Earth as the planets orbit the Sun.

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Planet-Saturn/262302543861673

kon tiki expedition 1947

The visit of the whale shark

Running with the wind and currents of the Pacific Ocean

At rest in Oslo

The Kon Tiki expedition was an epic voyage taking 101 days to cross 4300 miles (6900KM) of the Pacific in 1947. Built to a traditional design using freshly cut balsa logs the raft set off from Peru catching the Humboldt Current that propelled them westward, intending to prove Thor Heyerdahl’s theory that the islands of the Pacific could have been colonized from South America. Though using modern navigating equipment and carrying a radio, the techniques used for building and navigating the raft were traditional as recorded by the first Spanish conquistadors.

Te expedition was a success hitting the reef of Raroia one of the Tuamotu islands with all six crew surviving. The theory that there was significant colonization of the Pacific islands from South America remains unaccepted however. Nonetheless the expedition created huge interest. The raft going with the wind and current became part of the natural world and was in a superb position to observe the creatures living in their natural habitat, from flying fish to the huge whale shark. Though the raft could be directed, to an extent, by its oar used as a rudder (and also by the centreboards as they found out by trial and error), there was no going back. Once in the current and with the wind behind it the raft moved inexorably westward. Anyone who fell off and was not tied on would have been left behind.

The expedition was well documented, a best selling book, The Kon Tiki Expedition and a film called the Kon Tiki made from records of the expedition won an Academy Award in 1952 directed by Thor Heyerdahl and edited by Olle Nodemar.

The film has recently been remade: http://kontikifilm.com/home.html

http://www.trilulilu.ro/video-calatorii/kon-tiki

The Kon Tiki expedition played an important role in stimulating interest in the natural world at a crucial time when people were still recovering from the Second Wold War, and when filming wild life was in its infancy. The actual raft is on exhibition in Oslo.

Kon Tiki is an old name of the Inca Sun God Viracocha

Traditional Polynesian navigation skills have been preserved
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mau_Piailug

Carl Sagan and the Human Presence on Earth

What a magnficent contribution to our understanding of ourselves and our part in the Universe Carl Sagan made. Transformational!