From: owner-chakram-refugees-digest@smoe.org (chakram-refugees-digest) To: chakram-refugees-digest@smoe.org Subject: chakram-refugees-digest V3 #244 Reply-To: chakram-refugees@smoe.org Sender: owner-chakram-refugees-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-chakram-refugees-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk chakram-refugees-digest Sunday, August 24 2003 Volume 03 : Number 244 Today's Subjects: ----------------- Re: [chakram-refugees] Re: ITADITH [IfeRae@aol.com] [chakram-refugees] Black Diamond and Liberia's women's artillery commandos ["mirrordrum" ] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Sat, 23 Aug 2003 14:04:11 EDT From: IfeRae@aol.com Subject: Re: [chakram-refugees] Re: ITADITH In a message dated 8/23/2003 1:24:07 AM Central Daylight Time, cr@orcon.net.nz writes: > Don't let it bother you, lfe keeps telling me what *I* mean too and getting > > it totally wrong ;) > At least I give you the chance to get it right. Bwhahahahahaha! - -- Ife ========================================================= This has been a message to the chakram-refugees list. To unsubscribe, send a message to majordomo@smoe.org with "unsubscribe chakram-refugees" in the message body. Contact meth@smoe.org with any questions or problems. ========================================================= ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 23 Aug 2003 22:41:37 -0400 From: "mirrordrum" Subject: [chakram-refugees] Black Diamond and Liberia's women's artillery commandos we've been talking about emotion, sentiment, and so forth in relation to xena. i came across this piece today in the local paper and i find it rather heartbreaking. for me the link that makes it relevant is, first of all, the "women warrior" connection. but also, i was interested that the reporter presents, whether accurately or not, the black diamond's fierceness and strength along with her vulnerability and emotion. also how, by saying very little, she leaves us to imagine a great deal. and this is *real* life. sometimes i get so caught up in the play of xena i forget that for women like these, the real warrior women, violence springs from unimaginable violation. and behind their violence and toughness is a lot of pain and a desire for a normal life and peace. md Liberia's women warriors fight for rebels - and revenge By GLENN MCKENZIE, Associated Press August 23, 2003 TUBMANBURG, Liberia - Her uniform is a red beret, spaghetti-strap halter top and black jeans. Her weapons are Kalashnikovs and mortars. Black Diamond, 22, is a Liberian rebel commander - known by her nom de guerre and feared by friends and foes alike. Whether blasting mortars at enemy troops or slapping down armed looters, she and her all-female Womens' Artillery Commandos fight for revenge, they say, against wrongs by Liberia's brutal government forces. They don't have to fight for respect; they've already got it. "Fire you! Fire you!" Black Diamond snarled one day this month at armed men lugging sacks of grain in a looting spree she and her fighters, many in earrings and lipstick, had been ordered to stop. She blasted her rifle inches over the head of a muscular looter who was slow to drop his weapon, then struck him in the chest with a lightning-fast fist and screamed in his face. The man - nearly twice her size - fell backward, astonished and cowering. "Women can fight the same as men. Some women more than men," Black Diamond said at the rebel stronghold of Tubmanburg, 40 miles from Monrovia. Liberia has a history of women in arms in its 14 years of conflict under Charles Taylor. In the 1989-96 civil war, which Taylor launched, his own faction had female artillery units renowned for their bravery and accuracy. Some senior female commanders took posts in Liberia's armed forces when Taylor won the presidency in 1997. When Liberia's main rebel movement took up arms four years ago, Black Diamond and many other women were among the first to join. Their mission was to unseat Taylor, whose unsalaried, undisciplined fighters made raping and looting a perk of service in Liberia's armed forces. Black Diamond's mother was killed in the civil war, though she refuses to say how or when. "Yes," Black Diamond said when asked if she had suffered at the hands of Taylor's vicious troops. "No," she said, looking down, when asked to elaborate. "If I explain all that, I will cry," she growled, her lower lip trembling slightly. "No more raping," Black Diamond added, in a mumble. When Taylor fell, forced out by the rebels and international pressure, Black Diamond and her unit "celebrated with many mortars" - the shells they had lobbed during sieges of government-held neighborhoods. After West African peacekeepers and U.S. Marines deployed to secure Monrovia's port, Black Diamond and her unit withdrew to their headquarters in a ramshackle cement-block, tin-roof house in Tubmanburg. She said she hopes peace will hold so she and her commandoes can return to civilian life - "something even better" than what they left behind. Copyright 2003, KnoxNews. All Rights Reserved. http://knoxnews.com/kns/world/article/0,1406,KNS_351_2203819,00.html ========================================================= This has been a message to the chakram-refugees list. To unsubscribe, send a message to majordomo@smoe.org with "unsubscribe chakram-refugees" in the message body. Contact meth@smoe.org with any questions or problems. ========================================================= ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 23 Aug 2003 22:35:35 -0500 From: "H.J.J. Hewitt" Subject: [chakram-refugees] Re: ITADITH = Gabrielle >is there anybody besides me on this list who gives a >hoot about gab, btw? i fell like i'm on the xena version of flawless. *sigh* There sure IS! Unfortunately, however, the character was evidently felt to be expendable, so was 'manipulated' to fit whatever the plot of any particular ep needed. (The most egregious instance was her wildly out-of-character narcissism in "The Play's the Thing"-- I \think/ that's the title... it's the one where Gab gets conned when trying to put on a play about her & Xena.) Because of this, far more than Xena there is basis for many a discussion here about discrepancies in the character and her actions. But because of the many ways she is portrayed by different writers and in different eps, even our most astute gotta-figger-a-way-out-of-THAT analysts are stymied. But like the little girl in the rhyme, when she was good, she was very, very good. And I cherish Renee for it. TEXena ========================================================= This has been a message to the chakram-refugees list. To unsubscribe, send a message to majordomo@smoe.org with "unsubscribe chakram-refugees" in the message body. Contact meth@smoe.org with any questions or problems. ========================================================= ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 24 Aug 2003 00:11:32 -0400 From: "Cheryl Ande" Subject: [chakram-refugees] For Whom The Bells Tolls This is my favorite Xenalite episode and my favorite Joxer and Gabrielle episode. It is of course a homage to the great Danny Kaye move the Court Jester, if you get the chance watch this film it is a classic and Danny Kaye is just wonderful. Anyway back to Xena. Ted Raimi is very good in this episode. He is of course the doofus Joxer but at this point in the series Joxer is still a rather endearing bumbler and hasn't become tiresome as he does later on. Of course Joxer here has two personalities because of Aphrodite's spell. When Joxer hears a bell ring he becomes a dashing swashbuckler who enchants a betrothed princess whose marriage Dite wants to prevent. Bell rings again he back to doofus Joxer and it rings again - hero. So we have Joxer shuttling between coward and hero at a moments notice. TR pulls it off. TR is actually very nice looking man and so he plays the hero well - he is handsome and dashing. He doesn't have the natural elegance and grace of Danny Kaye but he does convince in the role of master swordsman. I also like the way Gabrielle is portrayed here. In many of the subsequent Xenalite comedies much of the humor come from making Gabrielle into a fool. I never liked that. Gabrielle is not an idiot - if she were she wouldn't have lasted ten minutes with Xena either some thug would have killed her or Xena would have. Gabrielle is in an absurd situation but she faces it with intelligence. She figures out what is happening and uses a clever bit of extortion to get Aphrodite to take the spell of Joxer. She also shows that she has been watching Xena very closely when she expertly slings a rock around a court yard to save Joxer's life. This episode also has one of my favorite comic moments in it. Hero Joxer and the princess are in heat and Gabrielle must play chaperone. Gabrielle is very funny as she tries to douse the flames of lust with water and by physically inserting herself between the two passionate would be lovers. I love Gabrielle's tenacity and exasperation as she deals with two people who just can't keep their hands off of one another. This also the episode that introduced Aphrodite into the Xena series. It's fun to watch her work. I loved watching Gabrielle's first encounter with the goddess of love. It quickly goes from awe to disappointment when she discovers how self-centered Aphrodite is. Gabrielle and Aphrodite don't appear to like each other much at first meeting. Of course we all know by know that these two will become friends and Aphrodite isn't quite as self-centered as she first appears and will eventually exhibit great nobility and courage. It is a testament to AT that although Aphrodite is acting like a godly bitch in this episode she still makes the goddess likable. Carl Urban is Cupid, Aphrodite's more romantic son. While mom represents love in all it's selfish aspects, Cupid is the representation of love as pure and unselfish. Of course these two very different views of love come into conflict and it's fun to watch the two love gods battle it out. Not much fun for the human's involved in the war but then the gods really don't care that much about their subjects anyway. It is always a recurring theme in Xena that gods, any gods, only care about their followers when it suits there purposes. (Of course Krishna was the only really unselfish god presented in the series and oddly enough the series got in trouble for that.) Any way I like this episode. There were quibbles. I find it highly unlikely Xena would simply drop Gabrielle off in the middle of a forest and ride off. I think she would have at least left her in a village. The bell that kept changing Joxer would often jingle accidentally in a scene but Joxer didn't change simply because it wasn't necessary for the plot. It also introduced Joxer's theme song which no one on the Xena staff ever seemed tired of. The only solace I have is that Ted will have be haunted by it for the rest of his life. Revenge is sweet. One other thing I liked was that the attractive ladies in waiting for the princess were not your typical Hollywood types. There were had a nice assortment of girls of all shape and sizes and they were all treated as desirable young women. CherylA ========================================================= This has been a message to the chakram-refugees list. To unsubscribe, send a message to majordomo@smoe.org with "unsubscribe chakram-refugees" in the message body. Contact meth@smoe.org with any questions or problems. ========================================================= ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 24 Aug 2003 00:18:19 -0400 From: "Cheryl Ande" Subject: [chakram-refugees] Whoosh article There's a very good article in Whoosh this month that is about how certain scenes in Xena emulate Renaissance pictures. It covers such things as composition and lightening. The use of shadow and perspective to highlight the characters emotions and to symbolically represent what is going on in a particular scene. If you read it then watch a Xena episode you do begin to notice how certain scenes do look like paintings. For example in For Whom The Bell Tolls, there is a scene where the two lovers' fathers are discussing their kingdoms. The fathers' stand in front of a miniature of their kingdoms. They are dressed in vaguely Turkish fashion. There is a lot of amber light in the scene and it looks quit a bit like a Rembrandt painting. It's an interesting way at looking at an episode. CherylA ========================================================= This has been a message to the chakram-refugees list. To unsubscribe, send a message to majordomo@smoe.org with "unsubscribe chakram-refugees" in the message body. Contact meth@smoe.org with any questions or problems. ========================================================= ------------------------------ End of chakram-refugees-digest V3 #244 **************************************