Global Voices Online

The Golden Road to Samarqand reports on university students' opinions on the current political situation in Kyrgyzstan.

Christian Garbis writes that Armenians are blinded by their past and do not appreciate that their current problems deserve their full attention. The Basturma Chronicles responds.

Tom Terry also comments on the protests in Mongolia, calling on protesters to show a little more wisdom and restraint and warning them that Eagle TV, which he manages, will hand over any tapes of illegal acts by protesters in accordance with Mongol law.

Luke Distelhorst of neweurasia has more updates on the escalating protests in Mongolia at his site including news of clashes between police and protesters and the Democratic Party showing signs of solidarity with the protesters.

Oneworld Multimedia notes that Azeri military officer Ramil Safarov has been sentenced to life in prison by a Hungarian court for the murder of an Armenian counterpart at a NATO Partnership for Peace training program two years ago. It is not clear whether or not he will serve his sentence in Hungary or Azerbaijan, where many consider him a hero.

In a pattern that surely many across the world can relate to, Don Ray and Bob Glass both mention the rising gas prices in Panama and Costa Rica respectively. It seems the gentlemen also have similar thoughts regarding blog templates.

The Guatemala Solidarity Network is distributing a declaration, which demands that the Marlin Mine of San Marcos be closed.

Over at the Caribbean Beat weblog JT waxes poetic, defining genius and describing the view from his office window.

It's iguana season in Belize, writes Simone Engeln: “If you were to drive though Belize these days, you would notice people standing by the side of the road holding up Iguanas. These are not their pets. They are offering them to you to buy. Again, not to keep as a pet….but to have for lunch.”

Tim Muth links to photos and videos of Semana Santa (Holy Week) in El Salvador.

Linda Thompkins reports that the maritime boundary dispute between Barbados and Trinidad has been settled by a tribunal convened under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea.

Sir Arthur Foulkes assesses tolerance levels in the Bahamas in light of reactions to the docking of a gay cruise ship and the banning of the film “Brokeback Mountain”.

Seeing it as evidence that the Caribbean has begun to resist the overtures of Venezuela's Hugo Chávez, A. M. Mora y Leon links gleefully to a Miami Herald article which states that CARICOM is exploring the possibility of holding free trade talks with the US.

The death of an actor has had the Indian state of Karnataka in the middle of violence and outpouring on the streets. Dateline Bombay comments on the state of Bangalore.

Windy Skies explores at a languid pace life in some streets of South Mumbai. “On most days after getting out of Victoria Terminus (renamed CST) in Bombay (renamed Mumbai), I walk down the DN Road in the direction of Flora Fountain.”

Cartoonist Bob Row uses his artistic pen to honor the Argentine humanist, Ernesto Sábato. You can learn more about Sábato on Wikipedia.

Bahas comments on Nepal's move from Monarchy to democracy - “King Gyanendra has called upon all political parties to join in a dialogue, which the King has always advocated, to bear the responsibility of and contribute towards activating the multiparty democratic polity.”

Crow's nest on a motley bunch of developments in Pakistan - from party politics to the recently held World Social Forum in Karachi.

The ethnic conflict, while still not covered by the Mainstream Media, appears to be a part of everyday life. Transcurrents.com on “Trincomalee saw large scale violence being unleashed against Tamils following a series of claymore mine explosions directed against security personnel deployed in the district.”

MMM writes that Tunis is ranked 94th in the world wide index for quality of life. The only Arab cities ahead of Tunis are Dubai at the 85th place and Abu Dhabi at the 92nd. The lowest ranking city is Baghdad at the 215th spot.

Looks like the issue of the Nigerian citizens living in the Saudi Arabia illegally is increasingly becoming a chronic problem, Prometheus said.

“I do not sell books, magazines, and newspapers, I provide books, magazines, and newspapers because I am a link in a long chain of support for readership and learning,” states Abu Ali firmly. Lina writes about the 64-year-old man bookshop owner since 1970.

What is the second hardest to find in Iraq after the “prime minister”? It is a “Beauty Queen,” Sabbah said. On April 9, Tamar Goregian, a Christian woman, made history as the first Armenian Iraqi to be crowned Miss Iraq. Few days later, Miss Iraq announced her resignation after receiving threats by a group of extremists.

Last night it was left to the fourth-placed contestant, Silva Sahagian, 23, another Christian, to assume the mantle.

What do you know about the only 7 star hotel in the world? NZM writes all what you need to know about Burj Al Arab Hotel, the very distinctive landmark on Jumeirah Beach, Dubai.

As handy and effective as the text-based Internet is, it sure doesn't communicate emotions well. Not like film. Which is why I wholeheartedly recommend that everyone watches Guillermo Zapata's short film, Lo que tú quieras oír (What you want to hear). Licensed with Creative Commons, even if you don't understand Spanish, you'll still get the allusion to today's “remix culture” in a heartfelt portrayal of post-breakup healing. You can also watch the film via YouTube on Fernando Casale's ZonaIndie.

Wormie wants a recently excavated colonial fort in Singapore to be turned into a national monument. The authorities are planning to re-bury the fort as they don't expect the restoration to be economically viable.

tumbleweed in timor lorosae writes about some of the attractions in East Timor.

villageidiotsavant goes Dolphin watching near Cebu in the Philippines.

Mady June in Yangoon is saddened by the death of her favourite Myanmar rapper.

Today is the first day of the year 2549 in some South East Asian countries. Lao ocean girl describes the calendar system used in these countries.

Toe, a Filipino blogger now living in Cambodia tries to figure out why the holy week, the Cambodian new year and several other events from different cultures coincide around the same time of the year.

Jojo points to a page with lots of Cambodian recipes.

A. Fatih Syuhud looks at the protests aimed at the recently launched Indonesian edition of Playboy.

RegioBlogs observes (ES) that May 17th will be “Internet Day” in Mexico, celebrating the 20th year of World Wide Web in the country. Some statistics about internet use in Mexico are listed.

Have you heard of the leather-clad hip-thrusting Japanese celebrity Razor Ramon Hard Gay? A post on the Gen Kanai blog gives a thorough introduction:

“A group of fansubbers have started to do fansubs of Razor Ramon's Hard Gay comedy sketches. They have a wiki, and a forum and put their translations onto YouTube and Google Video. The one where Hard Gay visits Yahoo! Japan is just pure comedy gold, and the ramen shop one is good too, especially with the translators' notes.”

The Taiwan Blogger BoF conference opens this Friday in Taipei. Here's their blog [zh].

The Useless Tree blogger posts a pacifist poem from the ancient Taoist scripture Tao Te Ching and dedicates it to Iranian and American presidents Ahmadinejad and Bush.

The chinablawger looks at a law recently passed in China which will see the country's use of renewable energy rise from the current one percent of total energy usage to ten percent by 2010, a move which brought praise from Greenpeace.

The Bingfeng Teahouse blogger uses subway passengers in Shanghai as a case study on the difference between generations in China:

“As you might find when you live here, the younger generations of china is quite different from the older ones and sometimes regarded as a new ‘race.' Generally speaking, they are more individualist, independent and hedonistic, have less sense of hierarchy, work ethics and zero-sum mentality. I tend to avoid cooperating with middle-aged partners in business because from my experiences, many of them lack the qualities that are critical to business successes, like a win-win mentality, trust for others, respect for ‘game rules,' tolerant for different opinions, etc.”

In ‘Entertaining or subverting?: Chinese television tries to go global,' the Angry Chinese Blogger looks at the possibility of nine mainland television stations being offered in Canada.

“In a move that is sure to please Canada's sizable Overseas-Chinese community, the country's largest basic cable provider, Rogers Cable, has announced that it is to push forward with a deal that could bring some of China's best known television stations to North American cable for the first time,” he writes.

Blog.bossanova.fm introduces Normando Santos, one of the many giants of Brazilian bossa nova.

Fojrega provides (FR) an update on plans to privatize certain state-owned enterprises, some of which should be completed as early as June of this year.

Black Star Journal has a post on the political situation in Guinea where the reformist Prime Minister was recently sacked and trade unions have been on strike over low wages.

AfroMusing continues with explanations on the Solo project (design of a solar powered computer). Part III
“What next, what now - which style of IT implementation is more appropriate to users in - A major city like Nairobi and Kisumu or - Rural town/village? “

Reflections of a gay Nigerian wonders whether anyone is reading his blog? and is contemplating coming “out” in his own name.

Musings of a Naijaman publishes a list of new Nigerian must reads - Chris Abani “Becomming Abigail” Segun Afolab “A Life Elsewhere” and Chimamanda Adichie ” Half of a Yellow Sun“.

Adefunke on Adefunke posts on a new Nigerian talent show called Star Factor - auditions are now being held in Lagos, Abuja, Kaduna, Enugu, Jos, Makurdi and for some reason London.

Neither Here nor There publishes a list of commonly used tags which he then translates into Twi - one of Ghana's main languages.

The Trials & Tribulations of a Freshly-Arrived Denizen...of Ghana - posts on the “Spintex Road” which is the “fastest growing traffic inducing road” complexes in Accra. “From that road, you reach the famous (or should that be infamous?) Tetteh-Quarshie Interchange, where you either get confused by the structure or follow the automobile crowd.”

Mshairi: All the nominations are now out for the Kaybee Awards (Kenyan blog awards) the winners will be announced on April 19th

weichegud! ET Politics comments that there may just be some “palpable change in the US’ talking points about Ethiopia” and on the progress of HR4423 - the bill being presented to the US House of Representatives that condems Zenawi's government and calls on the US President to change US foreign policy with regard Ethiopia.

Transitional institutions stop being constitutional after June 30, 2006, writes (FR) blogger Mafelly-Makombo at Prince du Fleuve du Congo. He suggests that if elections should take place past that date, all of Congolese civil society including political parties and religious groups aided by the international community should be called on to negociate a new electoral calendar. Barring that kind of consensus the blogger suggests the Congolese people might “take to the streets.”

Michael of The Glory of Carniola writes that although Slovenia, Croatia and Italy have agreed to cooperate in making the Adriatic Sea cleaner, their efforts are unlikely to produce any results because of plans to build two gas terminals in the area of the Gulf of Trieste. Nearly 22,500 have already signed an online petition to protest the construction.

David McDuff A Step At A Time posts his translation of an article by Umalt Chadayev on a rally that took place in Grozny to protest against poor quality of local mobile network.

Tim Newman of White Sun of the Desert writes about an obstacle on the route of Karl Bushby, a British explorer in his eighth year of walking around the world: he has been detained in Russia for entering the country without an entry visa.

As a Russian news agency reports desecration of a Holocaust memorial in Kalevi Liyva, Giustino of Itching for Eestimaa bemoans the fact that “such a small country” as Estonia “should find itself a graveyard of monuments for lost causes.”

Aussiegirl of Ultima Thule writes about her maternal great-grandfather's extraordinary reverence for Taras Shevchenko, Ukrainian national poet, the man who “was born a serf” and whose “freedom was purchased by the sale of an auctioned portrait by some noblemen and artists who recognized his talent.”

Bob Granico of Publius Pundit highlights the persona of Aivars Lembergs and his political background and aspirations: mayor of a Latvian port city Ventspils for 18 (!) years, he is sometimes likened to Aleksandr Lukashenko, but is actually very popular with the residents of the city he's managed to keep in order for so long. Right now, “Lembergs is said to be considering running for the parliament in the October elections, and could possibly become the Prime Minister.”

Etienne Tshisekedi's political career is not dead and UDPS has not imploded, says (FR) UDPS Liege. “UDPS has become a spirit and conscience spread among the people. […] UDPS will never die” writes the blog which also reminds readers that the electoral commission stayed open until midnight on the last day of candidate registration, allegedly hoping Tshisekedi would not boycott the election after all and register.