Coming from Boston, you’d think we’d be used to crazy traffic and pedestrian behavior. Boston is an Eden compared to Vietnamese cities, where the intensity of the traffic takes your breath away. Most people ride motor bikes (due to the high cost of cars and huge taxes imposed on the purchase). Many wear face masks …
Continue reading Vietnam through New Eyes, part 2. A kaleidoscope of images
Thirty years ago, I stood with my husband on the banks of the Mekong River in Thailand, where that country comes together with Burma to the west and Laos to the east, and knew that we had to return someday, somehow, to Southeast Asia, to Vietnam. At the time, the U.S. embargo was still in …
Continue reading Vietnam through New Eyes, pt. 1: why we went
Just when you thought Donald Trump had already taken the Presidency as low as it could go, he asked, "Why are we having all these people from shithole countries coming here?" Our esteemed President, according to credible reports, told a group of bipartisan legislators Thursday he didn't want Haiti, El Salvador and African nations sending …
My New Year's gift to you is a list of headlines. I have precious little expectation that we will see them atop newspapers, magazines, newscasts or on social media in 2018. Please send your own in the comments section below. I won't do something snide like: President receives heart transplant, develops empathy and humility. Perhaps the …
The last inauguration I listened to was a little less than a year ago when the worst President of my lifetime was sworn in. This morning, with former Vice President Joe Biden by his side, Marty Walsh took the oath of office for a second term as mayor of Boston, a stirring reminder of what …
Queen Elizabeth had nothing on us when she declared 1992 an annus horribilis. All she had to endure were the respective marital difficulties of son Andrew and daughter Anne, a tell-all book by Princess Di about Charles and Camilla, and a fire at Windsor Castle. We, on the other hand, in 2017 have had to …
It was a lot easier getting up this morning knowing the headline out of Alabama read: first Democrat elected to the U.S. Senate in a quarter of a century from the state known as “the Heart of Dixie.” Was there finally a candidate so loathsome that voter interest in integrity prevailed over tribal instinct, country over …
Dr. Seuss asked the right question: "Could this go on all day and night? It could you know, and it just might." Every day, another high-visibility man named as having behaved inappropriately toward women. Every day, another sexual creep forced out of a position of power. Every day, another media revelation pulling back the curtain …
Kudos not to Republican Senators John McCain, Lisa Murkowski and Susan Collins. All heroes of last summer's vote barring repeal of Obamacare, all seemingly concerned about normative Senate procedures, all at least minimally sensitive to protecting against societal inequities, all caved early this morning to the first step in a GOP strategy to undo The …
Let me get this right. A so-called tax “reform” bill that could screw up our economy, hurt millions of middle class families and is opposed by a strong majority of the American people is being rushed through the Republican-controlled Congress without serious deliberation simply because fat cat Republican donors have warned legislators that their campaign …
Marjorie Arons-Barron 