May this year give you the opportunity to follow your dreams, love like there is no tomorrow and smile unconditionally.
As we celebrate the New Year, we wish everyone success, a healthy long life and a fresh new start.
We are lucky that we get to have a new chance and a new beginning, so be grateful and live life to the fullest.
Have a joyous New Year!
On February 24, 2022, Russian troops invaded the territory of independent and free Ukraine and began bombing its cities. The attack took place in the early morning, when the civilian population was still sleeping. Millions of Ukrainians woke up to the sound of air raid sirens and explosions.
Fierce fighting in Ukraine has been going on for a week already, but the Russian invaders do not think to stop continuing to kill Ukrainian people. According to the Ministry of Health of Ukraine, more than 2,000 civilians have died over the past seven endless days of the war, 21 of them are children and teens. Unfortunately, the number of victims of the Russian aggression is growing every minute.
The Ukrainian nation is forced to fight with one of the strongest and largest armies in the world. Today Ukraine is a shield for all European territories, their inhabitants and their children. It is important for us to understand that the Kremlin will not stop on Ukraine as he aims to expand his war further west. Now it is our direct duty to stop his atrocity.
How can we do this?
At this very moment, the people of Ukraine need help of any kind, especially financial help.
Please visit here to see the list of official organizations involved in raising funds for Ukraine.
Donations go directly to relief organizations that deliver medical care to the wounded and humanitarian support for people, who have lost their homes and families. Also, money is needed to replenish the military reserves of the Ukrainian army and give it resources to protect the Ukrainian people from Russian invaders.
Another way to help is joining the International Legion for the Territorial Defense of Ukraine for the period of martial law.
On March 01, 2022, President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky introduced a temporary visa-free regime for foreigners, who would like to repel the attack of Russian invaders, take care of international security, and protect the values of civilization.
More than 16,000 people have already entered the International Legion for the Territorial Defense of Ukrain. Among them are former soldiers, rescuers, military doctors and ordinary civilians from the Netherlands, the UK, Canada, the USA, Sweden, Japan, etc.
Volunteers from all over the globe are coming to stand side by side with Ukrainian soldiers against the war criminals of the 21st century.
Below are the steps you can take to get enrolled in the International Legion for the Territorial Defense of Ukraine on a volunteer basis:
Please visit here for more information on how to join the fight for Ukrainian freedom.
God bless Ukraine!
July 04, 1776
Independence Day in America
We celebrate the day we declared independence from Britain, long preceding the day we actually attained it.
That’s badass.
Neil deGrasse Tyson
Get ready for green lights, green hats, even green beer! St. Patrick’s Day is on March 17th. Why is Ireland’s national day such a worldwide party?
In the 1971 film The Flight of the Doves, an Irish policeman lifts up a little English girl so that she can see the nearby parade for Saint Patrick’s Day. He tells her, “It’s a great day for the Irish.” The little girl exclaims, ‘I’m not Irish!’, to which the policeman replies, “You don’t have to be Irish to be Irish!” St. Patrick’s Day is the national day of Ireland. Every March 17th, the day is celebrated around the globe by millions of people, Irish and not-so-Irish.
Patrick, the man
Did you know that St. Patrick himself was not actually Irish? It is thought that he was either Scottish or Welsh, coming from a wealthy Christian family. Ancient documents suggest that, as a teenager, he was taken by Irish pirates to work as a slave in Ireland. Once in his new country, he began to talk to Irish people about God, introducing his Christian beliefs to the country.
Patrick and the snakes
Old legends say that, years ago, Ireland had a lot of snakes and that St. Patrick used his powers to chase them all into the sea. To this day, Ireland has many old statues of St. Patrick, often with snakes at his feet. Apparently, this is why Ireland has no native species of snakes (though most scientists suggest that this fact could be more related to geographical reasons).
International popularity
March 17th is a day for huge celebrations in Ireland. However, due to Ireland’s history of emigration, many people around the world consider themselves to be partly Irish because of their ancestral connections. This means that St. Patrick’s Day parties take place around the world, from Boston to Tokyo, Sydney to Buenos Aires. In fact, Saint Patrick’s Day is celebrated in more countries than any other national festival.
Big parades
The most famous celebrations on St. Patrick’s Day are the parades. These are carnival-like events, where people dress up and walk along the street, dancing or playing music. Often the parades include big lorries, specially decorated in green. Many of the world’s major cities have enormous parades. The largest is in New York, where 150,000 people participate in the parade and millions of people watch. The second largest is in Dublin, Ireland’s capital city.
More “modest” parades
Ireland itself is a relatively small country with few cities. However, most of its towns and villages have their own “mini” parades. Sometimes, these simply include a few tractors and the children from the local school. The shortest known parade used to take place in the village of Dripsey, in southern Ireland. The length of the parade was just 23 metres, between the village’s two pubs. However, the Dripsey parade came to an end when one of the two pubs sadly closed down!
A day for green
Another well-known aspect of St. Patrick’s Day is the colour green. Around the world, many people wear green clothes as a way of marking the day. In major cities, green lights illuminate famous global landmarks such as the Colosseum in Rome or the Christ The Redeemer statue in Rio de Janeiro. In Chicago, thousands of people watch as special boats dye the river a bright green colour. Students at Miami University in Ohio, USA, even have a 70-year-old tradition of drinking special green St. Patrick’s beer!
Wherever you are from, make sure you celebrate this March 17th by watching your local parade, drinking some Irish beer or perhaps just by wearing a silly green hat. And do not forget to wish your friends a wonderful St. Patrick’s Day, or, as they say in Ireland, “Happy Paddy’s Day!”
International Holocaust Commemoration Day is an international memorial day on January 27 commemorating the tragedy of the Holocaust that occurred during the Second World War. It commemorates the genocide that resulted in the deaths of some 6 million Jews and 11 million others, by the Nazi regime and its collaborators.
It was designated by the United Nations General Assembly resolution 60/7 on November 01, 2005 during the 42nd plenary session. The resolution came after a special session was held earlier that year on January 24, 2005 during which the United Nations General Assembly marked the 60th anniversary of the liberation of the Nazi concentration camps and the end of the Holocaust.
On January 27, 1945, Auschwitz-Birkenau, the largest Nazi concentration and death camp, was liberated by the Red Army.
Prior to the 60/7 resolution, there had been national days of commemoration, such as Germany’s Tag des Gedenkens an die Opfer des Nationalsozialismus (The Day of Remembrance for the victims of National Socialism), established in a proclamation issued by Federal President Roman Herzog on January 03, 1996; and the Holocaust memorial day observed every January 27th since 2001 in the UK.
The Holocaust Remembrance Day is also a national event in the United Kingdom and in Italy.
The General Assembly Resolution 60/7
Resolution 60/7 establishing January 27th as International Holocaust Remembrance Day urges every member nation of the U.N. to honor the memory of Holocaust victims, and encourages the development of educational programs about Holocaust history to help prevent future acts of genocide. It rejects any denial of the Holocaust as an event and condemns all manifestations of religious intolerance, incitement, harassment or violence against persons or communities based on ethnic origin or religious belief. It also calls for actively preserving the Holocaust sites that served as Nazi death camps, concentration camps, forced labor camps and prisons, as well as for establishing a U.N. programme of outreach and mobilization of society for Holocaust remembrance and education.
Resolution 60/7 and the International Holocaust Day was an initiative of the State of Israel. Minister of Foreign Affairs of the State of Israel Silvan Shalom, was the head of the delegation of Israel to the United Nations.
The essence of the text lies in its twofold approach: one that deals with the memory and remembrance of those who were massacred during the Holocaust, and the other with educating future generations of its horrors.
As we celebrate the life and achievements of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. today, let us remember the speech, which delivered on August 28, 1963, at the Lincoln Memorial, Washington, DC, still echoes with its power today.
Today, the U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI) announced three new actions by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service an the National Park Service to aggressively increase broadband internet access in rural communities and reduce wildfire risks. Deputy Secretary Katharine MacGregor made the announcement at the Bureau of Land Management headquarters in Grand Junction, Colorado.
“High-speed internet connectivity is essential for education, economic opportunity, health and public safety – especially as we continue to respond to the challenges of CoViD-19,” said Deputy Secretary MacGregor. “Facilitating greater broadband access and reducing wildfire risks for the benefit of rural and underserved communities is truly a bipartisan issue, and I hope these commonsense rules are carried forward by the incoming administration.”
The BLM has issued a proposed rule that would make it easier for industry to co-locate infrastructure, manage trees to enhance electric reliability, promote public safety and avoid fire hazards. The proposal also seeks to update the BLM’s cost recovery fee schedule for rights-of-way activities and includes definitions of hazard trees and emergency conditions, limits on liability, and agency requirements for reviewing and approving maintenance plans submitted by right-of-way holders. The proposed regulatory amendments complement ongoing efforts to reduce the vulnerability of public lands to wildfires and make it easier for firefighters to access and contain wildfires when they do break out.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s proposed rule will streamline its regulations (50 CFR 29. 21) for permitting of rights-of-way. It will implement the use of a common application form, reduce the amount of documentation required for many types of requests and provide the Service with more flexibility to determine a right-of-way’s fair market value or fair market rental value, thereby reducing an applicant’s time and cost to obtain a right-of-way permit. The bulk of the Service’s right-of-way regulations are more than 40 years old, and these proposed changes would streamline the process.
The National Park Service has amended section 8.6.4.3, “Telecommunication Sites,” of Management Policies (2006), and section 10.2.2 of Director’s Order #53: Special Park Uses, which require superintendents to only accept applications for telecommunications sites from Federal Communications Commission licensees or agencies regulated by the Department of Commerce through the National Telecommunications and Information Administration. The change amends this requirement, allowing the NPS to accept applications for communications sites from additional applicants, such as companies who own and operate telecommunications towers. These updates will allow the NPS to work more efficiently in processing rights-of-way permits for telecommunications infrastructure in national parks while continuing to ensure park resources are protected.
The BLM and FWS proposed rules were both delivered to the Federal Register today. Publication in the Federal Register will open a 60-day comment period for each rule, and the respective notice will include information on how to comment.
Background
The proposed changes by Interior align with Executive Order 13821, Streamlining and Expediting Requests To Locate Broadband Facilities in Rural America, which includes direction for relevant federal agencies to increase access to tower facilities and related infrastructure, and to identify assets that can be used to support rural broadband deployment and adoption. The proposed changes also conform to Executive Order 13855, Promoting Active Management of America’s Forests, Rangelands, and Other Federal Lands To Improve Conditions and Reduce Wildfire Risk and Executive Order 13868, Promoting Energy Infrastructure and Economic Growth.
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) signed a new memorandum of understanding (MOU) to support commercial space activities related to the transport of government and non-government passengers, cargo, and payloads for both orbital and suborbital missions.
“This FAA-NASA collaboration at the Administrator level will advance America’s commercial space sector, aid science and technology, and help coordinate U.S. national space policies,” said U.S. Transportation Secretary Elaine L. Chao.
The FAA and NASA have shared interests in creating a robust commercial space industry to achieve safe, reliable, and cost-effective access to space, and enhancing the competitiveness, safety and affordability of American aerospace capabilities. In addition, the partnership is critical to achieving the goals and objectives of multiple U.S. national space policies.
“The partnership between the FAA and NASA is vital to continue the growth, innovation and safety of commercial space operations, and maintain the pre-eminence of U.S. leadership in the aerospace sector,” said FAA Administrator Steve Dickson.
Under the MOU, the FAA and NASA will build a stable launch and reentry framework for the U.S. space industry that is transparent, and avoids conflicting requirements and multiple sets of standards. The two agencies will also advance a point-to-point commercial suborbital pilot program with designated spaceports and airspace designs among other elements to support this revolutionary form of long-distance air transportation.
“NASA is now flying commercial cargo and crew missions to the International Space Station, and soon we will send more people and science to space on new suborbital flights,” said NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine. “Our partnership with the FAA will support the growth of American commercial aerospace capabilities that will benefit NASA, the nation, and the entire world.”
The MOU will also aid the FAA and NASA in advancing public safety, facilitate new space technologies and areas for research opportunities, and share medical data on the effects of spaceflight among occupants of space vehicles and space habitats.
The ongoing cooperation between the two agencies was highlighted by the first-ever FAA-licensed NASA crew launch – the successful NASA Commercial Crew Program (CCP) mission to the International Space Station in November 2020.
Other existing collaboration between the FAA and NASA includes the Flight Opportunities Program that helped develop a framework for flying researchers from industry and academia on commercial suborbital flights and the CCP’s Suborbital Crew (SubC) efforts to extend suborbital space transportation capabilities for NASA astronauts and other NASA personnel.
An FAA license is required to conduct any commercial space launch or reentry, the operation of any launch or reentry site by U.S. citizens anywhere in the world, or by any individual or entity within the United States.
Happy new year, everyone! We wish you all a wonderful new year, filled with joy, happiness and prosperity!
Let us take a moment to appreciate life and good health.
Good health is the greatest gift that we tend to overlook. Everything else in life comes after it. Love, career, ambitions and future plans. They are all hard to enjoy or accomplish without a healthy body and and a healthy mind, that enable us to do so.
The year 2020 was a very challenging one, but it taught us great lessons. On top of these lessons, it taught us the value of time and… good health.
We wish you all a very happy and healthy new year ahead.
