Wed, May 8, 12:30-3pm
275 S. Wilson Rd.Join us in celebrating the reveal of the cross-country, preferred route of the Great American Rail-Trail in Columbus! A signature project of Rails-to-Trails Conservancy, the Great American Rail-Trail will connect nearly 4,000 miles of rail-trails and other multiuse trails across 12 states and Washington, D.C.—including Ohio!

When: Wednesday, May 8, 2019 | 12:30 p.m. to 3 p.m.; program starts at 1 p.m.

Where: Camp Chase Rail-Trail at Wilson Road Park
| 275 South Wilson Road, Columbus, OH 43204 (or watch the event on Facebook Live)

This event will be featured in a cascading cross-country live broadcast on RTC’s Facebook Page. If you can’t be there in person, tune in on Facebook to experience the celebration on the Camp Chase Trail.

The event will be an opportunity to:

• Celebrate decades of trail-building success by the Central Ohio community.

• Hear about the ambitious plans to continue providing trail opportunities for all Ohioans.

Some who don’t actually attend opera may be under the false impression that it is a stuffy art form. In fact, with its emphasis on music, lyrics, acting and more, opera is often an extremely emotional mode of expression. And Manuel Penella’s 1916 El Gato Montés (The Wildcat) is arguably one of the most passionate works ever created for the operatic medium. Consider its sizzling plot (which could provide the storyline for a telenovela):

Soleá (soprano Ana María Martínez) is a young “Gypsy” (now called Roma) romancing the matador Rafael Ruiz (tenor Arturo Chacón-Cruz). However, to make a long story short, like in Mary MacGregor’s 1976 song “Torn Between Two Lovers”, Soleá has also been involved with the title character, an outlaw known as the Wildcat and depicted by baritone Placido Domingo in his 151st stage role (but, for the first time ever, playing the title role of El Gato Montés - aka Juanillo - although in 1994 our beloved Placido portrayed the bullfighter Rafael when LA Opera first presented this three act opera, which is here presented with only one intermission).

By David Swanson, Executive Director, World BEYOND War, May 6, 2019

World BEYOND War has just released an updated 2019 mapping of militarism in the world.

Open the mapping system, check out, and customize the maps here.

Here are some examples of what the map system can show. (You’ll find detailed numbers and sources and dislpay options at the link above.)

Where wars are present that directly and violently killed over 1,000 people in 2018:

… we’re the party of love, we’re the party of compassion, we’re the party of inclusiveness. What we are fighting for is not for the few, but for the many. Every single one, just this week, when we’ve had the attack in California on a synagogue, it’s the same person who’s accused of attempting to bomb a mosque. So I can’t ever speak of Islamophobia and fight for Muslims, if I am not willing to fight against anti-Semitism. We collectively must make sure that we are dismantling all systems of oppression.

– Rep. Ilhan Omar, Minnesota Democrat, April 30, 2019

The 35th Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival, which runs from May 2-10 mostly at Downtown L.A. venues, focuses on features, shorts and documentaries from and about Asia and the Pacific Islands. LAAPFF is presented by Visual Communications, which, according to VC’s mission statement “is the first non-profit organization in the nation dedicated to the honest and accurate portrayals of the Asian Pacific American peoples, communities, and heritage through the media arts… Our mission is to develop and support the voices of Asian American and Pacific Islander filmmakers and media artists who empower communities and challenge perspectives. ” (See: https://vcmedia.org/.)

Since I specialize in the screen image of Polynesians, Micronesians and Melanesians and have co-authored three movie history books about Pacific Islanders in the cinema and on TV, my LAAPFF coverage zooms in productions made by and/or about Oceania and its people.