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Inferno

If you depicted ANI as Inferno in your essay, why go comment there? BTW, I like your last image of cherry. It reminds me sculptures from A Clockwork Orange (film) (if you remember the scene)... Hodja Nasreddin (talk) 01:51, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

Yes I know, what you mean. It is one funny cherry. I like taking pictures of the shapes found in nature. Sometimes they are quite amazing. For example this one that I found in a bell pepper. Cheers.--Mbz1 (talk) 01:57, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

Yes, this is not a coincidence, but result of symmetry rules and embryology. Cheers. Hodja Nasreddin (talk) 02:30, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

Yes, the nature is perfect, is it not?

And about AN/I, if I were only able to behave like this:

If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken

Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,

BTW isn't this interesting how Rudyard Kipling said it, and how we say it now. He said:

If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken

Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,

And we say: Don't take the bait and Do not feed the trolls. The meaning is the same, but how different it is expressed. I wonder how people would address this issue in a hundred years or so? BTW here's Russian translation of the poem

Cheers.--Mbz1 (talk) 18:19, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

И если ты готов к тому, что слово

Твое в ловушку превращает плут,

Yes, it is exactly what we have here. But it is even more important not to become "плут" yourself. Seriously, I became worse person after editing here. The cure is known: "love your enemy" and "love is patient" (compare with WP:ENEMY and WP:FORGIVE, still far short of the biblical version). Hodja Nasreddin (talk) 19:45, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

I will never go down to the level of my personal wikihounds.

I would never make a false accusation. I could make an accusation by mistake, but as soon as I realize it was a mistake, I apologize like I did here and here just to name the two. False accusations are the worst case of harassment. Users that make such accusations are doing character assassination, and I cannot find a better word to describe it. On the other hand "Until you've lost your reputation, you never realize what a burden it really was or what freedom really is" :-) I do need to take it easy.--Mbz1 (talk) 20:29, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

Great quote from Mitchell. Sorry, but I did not mean to blame anyone. Quite the opposite. Christian concepts are deeper than that. It's not about making only fair accusations. And it's not about not making any accusations. It is about loving poor guys who attack you as your brothers and sisters. But it does not seem to be very realistic ... Hodja Nasreddin (talk) 22:01, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

I hope you did not come here to convert me to Christianity :-)

The question you posting is too complex to discuss it at my talk page. Cheers.--Mbz1 (talk) 15:30, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

Not sure if I actually believe in anything. I just read once good Russian translation of Bible (Geneva edition) with comments by theologians. The only way I could rationally understand a thing (including Hell and Heaven) was only in terms of computer/programming analogies. Hodja Nasreddin (talk) 16:00, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

I am not sure I believe anything either. Hardly anybody did in Soviet Union. Being Jewish for me is more like a state of mind. I was growing up in anti-Semitic country. When I was first called "kike", I was 5 years old. You know in Russian it is a different word. To me it sounded like a girl that called me "жидовка" was saying I was fat. I came home and asked my mom: "Mommie, am I fat?", and she said: "No, why?", and I told her about "жидовка". My parents tried to explain to me what it was, but I could not understand. I cried, I kept asking my father: "Daddy, why are you a Jew? Were you born in Jewiya?" As so many Jewish children in Ukraine I was ashamed of being a Jewess. When I was 7 years old, I came to a library, and a librarian was filling my library card. She asked me what nationality I was, and I whispered I was Jewish, and she said why are you whispering, there is nothing to be ashamed of. That librarian, she was a Jewish herself. And then one day I realized how lucky I really am to be Jewish, and how proud I should be of my people and my people's history. BTW I just looked up google translate for "жидовка". The translation is "Jewess", OMG! When I emigrated to USA, and went to study English, a teacher asked me what was my nationality, and I said I was Jewish. The teacher said, no, you are not, you were born in Ukraine. You are Ukrainian. That poor American, was not able to understand that in Ukraine I was Jewish, it was written in my birth certificate, in my passport, in my library card, in my hospital record, in my school records, everywhere! There were no self-hating Jews in Ukraine, there are many here in the West, the ones who know nothing about lives behind the iron curtain. It is sickening.I lived 20 minutes bus ride from Babi Yar, but, if I am to write an article about this place, I would be told I am demonizing nazi, and I should be more neutral. Anyway...Nadson expressed my feelings better (his poem starting with "я рос тебе чужим отверженный народ" is in a middle of the page.--Mbz1 (talk) 16:34, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

There are many ironies in this crazy world. Russian-born Israelis say that in Russia they were Jews and in Israel they are Russians. - BorisG (talk) 13:56, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

Wow, that is a really incredible story. The concept of "Jewish" as a nationality does sound strange to Americans, when I was younger I always thought that being "Jewish" referred solely to one's religious beliefs. A lot of Americans from a Christian background initially think a term like "Atheist Jew" is a contradiction. Qrsdogg (talk) 17:17, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

Oh,Qrsdogg, I thought that after our little AN/I adventure, you will never again come back to my talk page :-)

In Soviet Union Jew was a nationality not a religion. Every Soviet citizen got a passport, when he/she was 16 years old. It was not like a foreign passport here in US, it was a passport to use everywhere in Soviet Union. One comes to doctor, one is asked for a passport, one comes to a library, one is asked for a passport, it was more like a driver license here in US. There were lots of info in passports, and nationality was one of those. In my passport my nationality was listed "Jewish". A few times I was refused employment because of that. One story was really funny. I came to an office after I read an advertisement in a newspaper, and went to a personal department to ask for the application. The head of the department requested my passport, and said they do not need a person with my qualifications. I decided to go directly to the head of the department that was hiring. She asked me a few questions, and said: "You are exactly what I am looking for, let's go to the personal department." I said: "I just went there, they said they do not need me.", and she said: "He does not know, I need you, let's go." So we went,and she asked the man to give me an application, and he said they do not need me, he said they hired a person for this position, he said they have another applications for this position and so on, and so on. Eventually the woman who brought me there understood that something was wrong. She took me out, and said:"I cannot understand why he is so against you." and I said: "I know why, because I am Jewish", and she said:"You are right, sorry I cannot help you in this case."

Another story: As I mentioned earlier many Jewish kids were ashamed to be Jewish. My co-worker told me a story about his son. The boy came home from the the very first day in school and asked: "Mommie, am I looking as a Jew?", and she said, "No". The boy asked: "Mommie, may I please do not tell my classmates that I am a Jew?" She responded: "Sure, sweetheart, but here's the problem, your daddy and me, we look as Jewish, so when we come to pick you up from school, you should tell your classmates we are not your parents." The boy thought for a moment, and said: "I will tell them the truth". Those stories still bring back painful memories. --Mbz1 (talk) 18:01, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

Yes, I imagine that it must have been quite difficult to face that kind of discrimination. Growing up I was always taught about discrimination against Jews in Germany, but I didn't realize what it was like in the Soviet Union. It's interesting, I work with a Jewish man who was raised in the Soviet Union and became an officer in the military there. He eventually renounced his citizenship and emigrated to Israel and enlisted in the military there. He says that he enjoyed being at the bottom rank as an enlisted soldier in Israel more than being an officer in the Soviet Union. (He now has U.S. citizenship as well, the man collects passports!) Qrsdogg (talk) 18:35, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

That was not uncommon. A lot of people were traumatized in childhood by the system, one way or another... "Strangely" enough, the Soviet internal passport indicated ethnicity of a person, even though the "social engineers" struggled to mold all ethnicities together and create the New Soviet man/Soviet people/Sovok (and even Humanzee). The "ethnicity" in the passport had an important purpose. How else the authorities would be able to conduct their famous deportations? And we know what was planned for Soviet Jews in 1953 (do we have an article about this?). P.S. I choose my ethnicity in old Soviet passport as "Armenian" because if I have chosen "Russian" with my distinctly non-Russian family name, I would be interpreted as a "hidden Jew" and possibly treated as described above. Hodja Nasreddin (talk) 18:39, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

I was kindly given permission to respond

Qrsdogg, thank you for you message. It is an interesting one. My friend wrote me from Israel that she is a special country, and even kids decide their problems with no fighting with each other. In Ukraine kids often fought in schools.

Hodja Nasreddin, we have a section about planned deportation of Jews in this article. As I understand one of your parent is Russian and another is Armenian, because it is the only way you could have chosen nationality. I had no such choice because both my parents were Jewish. BTW, do you know a joke about the will a dying old Armenian man expressed to his children and grandchildren? --Mbz1 (talk) 04:16, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

No, I do not know the joke. BTW, my grandmother was from a famous Jewish family. Hodja Nasreddin (talk) 12:40, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

Your grandmother was from a famous Jewish family? Now I know why you are so smart :-) Here is the joke: An old Armenian is on his deathbed: "My children, remember to protect the Jews." "Why Jews?" "Because once they are dealt with, we will be next."--Mbz1 (talk) 13:35, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

DYK for Bolo Pasha

On 4 June 2011, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article Bolo Pasha, which you created or substantially expanded. The fact was ... that Bolo Pasha, a Frenchman with an Egyptian title, was convicted and executed in France in 1918 for being a German spy using evidence collected by the New York Attorney General? You are welcome to check how many hits the article got while on the front page (here's how, quick check) and add it to DYKSTATS if it got over 5,000. If you know of another interesting fact from a recently created article, then please suggest it on the Did you know? talk page.

Materialscientist (talk) 16:03, 4 June 2011 (UTC)