This week, I've realised something huge - the old South Africa and (some of) the USA are very much alike; which is why so much of the USA stuff triggers me. It brings back a lot of bad memories. Maybe I've just been exceptionally unlucky, or maybe I've just been more aware. Either way, it was often nothing huge, just constant small slap downs. Slap... slap... slap... until you either break and

   

The recent news that the USA Supreme court has overturned Roe vs Wade is a dark day for women living there. For all women, really. To have 50 years of bodily autonomy declared irrelevant overnight impacts  all of us. I'm tired now. I'm tired of having to explain why a foetus (no matter whether it is loved or wanted, or feared and not wanted) is not a person. A foetus may be the potential to

   

Endometriosis showed up in my 20s, although I did not know that then. I had bad menstrual pain, heavy bleeding and hormone imbalance. All which were ignored by my male doctor and male gynaecologists. My doctor (later admitted) thought I was a hypochondriac. The first gynae was just horrible. He seemed to hate me from the moment I entered the room, so my mind boggles at what my doctor had

   

 From the New York Herald, October 15, 1900:"I left these shores, at Vancouver, a red-hot imperialist. I wanted the American eagle to go screaming into the Pacific. It seemed tiresome and tame for it to content itself with the Rockies. Why not spread its wings over the Philippines, I asked myself? And I thought it would be a real good thing to do.I said to myself, here are a people who have

   

 For this special edition of Blogblast for Peace, I'd like to focus on one question: Are you part of the solution or part of the problem? For me, the conflict in Ukraine is shining a huge spotlight on all the things that need to change before humans can ever hope to have world peace. It's impressive how many countries are offering homes to Ukrainian refugees, but also completely  hypocritical.