Month: May 2008

Alimjan Yimit

Alimjan Yimit
Alimjan Yimit

Compass Direct News is reporting:

Court officials in Kashgar, Xinjiang province may soon decide the fate of Uyghur Christian Alimjan Yimit, arrested on January 12 and accused of “endangering national security.”

Alimjan’s trial, delayed in April, should be underway by early June, according to Compass sources. In Chinese documents, his name appears as Ahlimujiang Yimit.

Family members still fear that, in the wake of recent unrest in the autonomous regions of Tibet and Xinjiang, Alimjan may be branded a separatist – a crime punishable by death.

Also blogging about this is Impala Publishers:

A Chinese court will today begin proceedings against an Uyghur Christian who faces a possible death sentence for ‘endangering national security’.

For an early April report, click here.

Sad Memorial Day Lesson

That is, for the living.

Like me.

Driver Had Been Warned

Gig Harbor police say a woman who died in a crash on State Route 16 had been asked not to drive after an earlier crash.

[…]

Schierman said she was only tired, so Busey says she was advised to call someone for a ride and she said that’s what she would do.

Eight minutes later, Schierman was fatally injured. Her 1996 Ford Explorer veered across the westbound lanes of State Route 16, went through a cable barrier, overturned several times and wound up in the eastbound lanes.

Memorial Day, Part 1

I drive by two roadside memorials quite often. (Well, more than two, but I’m thinking of two in particular.)

The first one is about two miles from our place — where Hwy 211 and Canby-Marquam Hwy cross. Over the years it’s been a bad, bad intersection — many wrecks, many injuries; many lives changed, many lives ended here on planet Earth. Interestingly, though, only one memorial remains:

Mercedes F. Ramirez-Flores
Mercedes F. Ramirez-Flores

Cut off at age 15. Eleven years ago. People still remember Mercedes. I know, because I’ve seen some of them there. In their hearts, there’s more left of Mercedes than this roadside memorial.

But there’s another memorial that has often produced fleeting melancholy in me.

It’s also by Hwy 211, about 5.8 miles east of Hwy 99E in Woodburn.

It just sits there year after year. Untended. Perpetually almost to fall over. Forgotten?

Not by me!

And to my knowledge, I don’t even know this Peter:

Peter, that's all

What compelled someone to put up so simple a memorial?

Is it somehow indicative of a wasted life? of a forgotten person? of an insignificant other?

Peter. Mercedes. Sometimes I wish I knew more about them both. And about their families.

And about their relationship with God.

Uncle. Again.

As of sometime this morning, I am an uncle again.

Interestingly, my new nephew isn’t thirty-some minutes old.

Not even close.

Gary is more like thirty-some years old.

My niece Carol Used-2b-Nelson has become Mrs. Martin.

Congratulations, Gary and Carol!

And welcome to the extended family, Gary.

Be fruitful in God’s kingdom.

Wishing you the best,
Uncle Mark

PS: I was going to include a wedding photo, but I don’t have one to include.

PS, Jr: Come to think of it, Gary is thirty-some minutes old…quite a few minutes in that some, though. 🙂

OK, Mark

“OK, Mark,” he whispered intracranially, “you should quit for the day. Just go to bed now.”

“Just let me do a little bit more,” he muttered back.

Now you know the rest more of the story.

I read this somewhere:

“Late to bed and early to rise,
Makes a man baggy under the eyes.”

Fine.

Polygamists Have Rights, Too?

Breaking news (I guess):

Court: Texas had no right to take polygamists’ kids

A state appellate court has ruled that child welfare officials had no right to seize more than 400 children living at a polygamist sect’s ranch.

The Third Court of Appeals in Austin ruled that the grounds for removing the children were “legally and factually insufficient” under Texas law. They did not immediately order the return of the children.

Child welfare officials removed the children on the grounds that the sect pushed underage girls into marriage and sex and trained boys to become future perpetrators.

The appellate court ruled the chaotic hearing held last month did not demonstrate the children were in any immediate danger, the only measure of taking children from their homes without court proceedings.

Then why did they “not immediately order the return of the children”?

I smell a lawsuit in the making.

Above all, love God!
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