THE NEW JIM CROW

THE NEW JIM CROW by Michelle Alexander is a very good book.  It explores and examines the US criminal "justice" system and,the impact of the inherent racism on the African American communities. 

My only criticism of this book is that Alexander did not cite Angela Y. Davis.  This is hard to fathom because of the lifetime of work Angela has done to confront racism, especially in prisons
. She has dedicated her life to exposing and opposing the US penal system
 This one omission causes me to withhold an unequivocal recommendation of this book.  But then I am so very much a fan of Angela Y. Davis, not to be confused with Angela J. Davis, also an advocate of prison reform
.

I'M NO HERO

Last week I went to hear Henry Friedman talk about his experiences as a Holocaust survivor.  I have heard Henry speak many times before and worked with him when he established the Washington State Holocaust Education and Resource Center.  We have had as many disagreements as agreements but we always had productive discussions and I continue to respect him.

I'M NO HERO is as uplifting as it is difficult.  In this book, as in his talks, Henry is unflinchingly honest when he talks about the extents humans will go to in order to survive unimaginable conditions and racist oppression.

While he offers no excuses for discisions made, he does, at the same time, offer hope to all those who have survived the unimaginable.

I recommend  anyone interested in the Holocaust read Henry's wonderful book.

THE PAINTED BIRD

Sorry for the delay.  Reviews come tomorrow. 

I am reviewing  I'M NO HERO by Henry Friedman, a Jewish Holocaust Survivor and founder of the Washington State Holocaust Education and Resource Center in Seattle.

Also THE NEW JIM CROW by Michelle Alexander.

I got sidetracked by a reference to THE PAINTED BIRD, a brilliant if painful book about the Holocaust.  The reference is on the http://www.lolodiklo.blogspot.com/ blog.

Tomorrow I hope to review all three.

NOT A REFUGEE

NOT A REFUGEE
The Plight of the Kosovo Roma After the 1999 War

Poems and Photos by Paul Polansky

This another great book by Paul Polansky.  It seems impossible to not be moved by Paul's poems.  The book was published in 2000, and I'm very sad to say that conditions are still very bad for the Gypsies of  Kosovo.  The Romani are still forced to live on a lead mine.
I'm going to reprint the Forward to NOT A REFUGEE, which was written by Sani Rifati, the president of Voice of Roma. The details have changed a bit since this was written, but the oppression of, and indifference to, the situation of the Romani has not changed at all.

Then I am going to let Paul speak for himself and reprint the title poem.
                                                                            
                                                                         FORWARD

By Sani Rifati, President, Voice of Roma
Sebastopol, California

I am a Rom from Kosovo, a place we Roma long for, but can no longer call home. Paul Polansky's poems in Not A Refugee vividly capture the Romani tight-wire act of trying to survive the crossfire between:

- Serbian and Albanian prejudice

- NATO's horrific bombing campaign

- the violent repression by state authorities in the countries where Roma have sought refuge

- purposeful indifference to their plight by the United Nations and humanitarian organizations

This collection is a rare work of art in which the Romani daily struggle for survival and dignity is uniquely depicted and brought to life. These poems give to the reader a window onto the real situation in Kosovo.

During NATO's "humanitarian" bombings and the aftermath, thousands of Roma lost their jobs, property, possessions and loved ones. Under the eyes of the occupying UN troops, Kosovo Liberation Army forces and triumphant Albanians exacted a vengeful campaign of abduction, torture, rape and assassination against the Roma. After the war, more than 14,000 Romani homes were burned by Albanians and hundreds more occupied. The consummation of this campaign was the accelerated expulsion of the Roma from Kosovo.

Today, thousands of Roma languish in squalid displaced persons camps in the very Western European nations that imposed sanctions against Yugoslavia and supported the NATO war effort. After having exacerbated the hostile environment in Kosovo, Western European countries are denying them visas, permanent refugee status and/or political asylum. Worst of all, many Roma are being deported to Kosovo where they face the possibility of kidnapping, torture and death.

During my recent visit to displaced persons camps in Skopje, Macedonia, I found myself less than an hour away from the border with Kosovo--my home--and yet I could not even consider going there. I felt further from home than ever before. I had hoped to recover a portrait of my dead older sister, but that was impossible. Had I stepped foot inside Kosovo, my dark skin color could have been a death sentence.

As I write this, I find it difficult to articulate the overwhelming shock and horror of what I witnessed of my people imprisoned in UNHCR camps. Paul Polansky's work gives voice to that which is impossible for me to express. His courage and dedication to the Roma of Kosovo is immeasurable. When a board member of Voice of Roma recently delivered humanitarian aid to Romani exiles in Macedonia, the people chanted, "Polansky, Polansky"! Let this stand as a testimonial to what Paul's voice and poetry means to the Roma of Kosovo.

                                           Not A Refugee  by Paul Polansky

"I have a Yugoslav passport,"
a Gypsy told me, "but Serbs
won't let me cross the border.
They say I have an Albanian surname.

The Albanians say
I can't stay, only Albanians
can live in Kosovo.

The UN says
I am not a refugee
because I am still
in Kosovo
where I was born.

NATO says
I can't leave,
can't seek political asylum,
because no countries
want Gypsies.

During World War II
in Europe, in Germany,
Jews weren't allowed to stay,
nor allowed to leave.

Is that what the world
has planned for us?"
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
To purchase NOT A REFUGEE (highly recommended), please contact
Voice of Roma,
PO Box 514
Sebastopol,
CA   95473
http://www.voiceofroma.org/
voiceofroma@gmail.com

ESMA REDZEPOVA

FROM THE GUARDIAN UK
guardian.co.uk Music Web

Guardian Weekly, Tuesday 17 August 2010
Esma Redzepova was in Paris for a concert at the Cabaret Sauvage last month. The Macedonian singer was taking part in Gypsy Queens and Kings, a show staged by the Sin Fronteras festival. Now 64, her career started at the age of 11. "I owe everything to my father," she says. "He kindled my passion for singing." A shoe-shiner, he loved music more than anything else and played percussion at Jewish and Roma weddings. As a young girl she was enchanted by the joyful poetry of folk songs, a repository of traditional lore and fairytales.

Lending her lively, expressive voice to these songs, an ambition that seemed out of reach gradually came true. In 1956, Redzepova took part in a talent-spotting programme on Macedonian radio. "It was the first time national radio had broadcast a Roma song," she says. She thus earned her first fee at the age of 11: "Three times as much as my mother was paid as a cleaner."

The composer and producer Stevo Teodosievski spotted her, enrolling her at the Academy of Music in Belgrade (then capital of the former Yugoslavia). She left her family and set to work for two years, four hours a day, five days a week. "Stevo took charge of me. I was his pupil," she explains. In 1965, she was rewarded with her first hit, Caje Sukarije (A Pretty Young Roma Woman). Three years later the singer married Teodosievski, joining the group for which he composed and played the accordion. She went on to establish her reputation as one of the leading Romany singers, with tales of the happiness and woes of nomadic life, the atmosphere of weddings and the endless wandering of exile.

Redzepova travelled all over the world: New York, London, Sydney, Paris (appearing for the first time at Olympia in 1962), Mexico, India (where she was acclaimed as the Queen of Romany Songs at the first world festival of Romany music in 1976). With obvious pride she claims to have performed at more than 22,000 concerts, with a repertoire of over 800 songs. There is no way of checking such figures, but whatever their veracity they are on a par with the legend she has created. At her home in Skopje, capital of the republic of Macedonia, there is no doubt about her standing as a star in the Roma community.

In addition to her work as a singer, Redzepova has become an ambassador for Roma culture. In the course of her travels in and around the Balkans, she has adopted 47 children who were living on the street and introduced them to the joys of music. The musicians who now accompany her at concert performances and on recordings belong to this extended family. For several years she has been actively involved in the management of Rom-Esma, a non-governmental organisation she set up to uphold the rights of Roma women and more largely the community worldwide. When asked about disparaging remarks about travellers by the French president, Nicolas Sarkozy, she cited the example set by Macedonia.

"It is the only country where the Roma are recognised," Redzepova says. They enjoy access to education, culture (with two privately owned Roma television channels) and civic life (as the leader of a local council or MP). She is proud to have been born in Macedonia, because in other countries "the Roma are not respected and must endure humiliation and persecution", she says. When she performed the following evening she made a point of reasserting the cosmopolitan values and traditions of pacifism and freedom upheld by Travellers.

This article originally appeared in Le Monde
---------------------------------------------
Esma has many albums available.  This is just one of my favorites.  They're all great.
If there was a Queen of the Gypsies, Esma would be it.

OUR FORGOTTEN YEARS

Below is a link to the article I posted on the Lolo Diklo blog
http://www.lolodiklo.blogspot.com/

Lolo Diklo : Rromani Against Racism: MAGGIE SMITH-BENDELL: "Maggie Smith-Bendell was born on the edge of a pea field, the second of eight children in a family of old-fashioned Romany Gypsies. It was ..."

I've almost finished reading Our Forgotten Years and I'm finding myself stretching out the time till I've finished.  Maggie Smith-Bendell has become a friend I don't want to part with.
We've all read those kind of books.

Our Forgotten Years is a memoir which flows like the best crafted fiction.
Smith-Bendell relates the most horrific occurances in her everyday manner.  This emphasizes the insidiousness of the oppression of the Romani people.

Many people have asked me to recommend an introductory book for themselves and or book groups.  This is the book.  The fact that Smith-Bendell is a Romani woman in England makes it especially accessible to those here in the United States.

Our Forgotten Years is published by University of Herfordshire Press, an unfailing supporter of the Romani people and their literary contributions.

LIVING THROUGH IT TWICE

LIVING THROUGH IT TWICE
(Poems of the Romany Holocaust)
By Paul Polansky

LIVING THROUGH IT TWICE is a book I find myself carrying around with me and taking out to read at every opportunity.  It is always heart wrenching to read tales of the Porraimos, it is especially painful in its relevance to conditions of the Romani in Europe today.
If we really believe it when we say 'NEVER AGAIN', we must speak out against the current genocide against the Romani people.

Paul Polansky is an untiring friend to the Roma/Sinti.  He has spent the past years writing, speaking, advocating for the Romani living on the lead mines in Kosovo.
Nais tukay
We thank you phral Paul.

Now, I quote two reviews of Living Through It Twice.

"Paul Polansky's chilling testimony of the concentration camp in Lety by Pisek is all the more frightening since it's presented in such a conversational tone.  It records the testimonies of those Romanies who survived the Lety camp or the recollections of their children....hold onto your hats, this ride'll freeze you to the bone."
Ivan M. Jirous

"Paul Polansky's spare, stark renderings of Romany survivors' voices have the hardness of memorial stone.  But in reading them, the stone dissolves and something infinitely tender and unspeakable takes its place.  The restraint and hardness hold in the tears-just barely.  The Romany Holocaust, the Czech Romany Holocaust, the denial of it by the Havel government, the repetition of history today-these unknowns are thrown into sharp relief by Polansky's unblinking gaze.  When we see what he sees, we no longer have an excuse to avert our eyes."
Andrei Codrescu

UPDATE

I received, what is so far, an excellent book to review. 
DOSTA flight of the Rusian Gypsies
BY Sonia Meyer.

I was anxious to receive this book because Ms Meyer has been a long time and consistent advocate for the Romani people.  The book is not available for purchase until Nov. 2010 so I'm going to hold off on the review.

For this week, I'd like to review LIVING THROUGH IT TWICE Poems of the Romani Holocaust
BY Paul Polansky, another untiring advocate for the Romani. (later this week)

I am also reading  OUR FORGOTTEN YEARS A Gypsy Woman's Life on the Road
BY Maggie Smith-Bendell.

I also was reminded today of the book HASTENED TO THE GRAVE
BY Jack Olson.
I read this book several years ago, and it is so blatantly racist that members of Lolo Diklo stormed a local TV station where he was being interviewed.  I think I'll review that book also.