Hasta La Gadget!

The Paris-based United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization in June designated an ancient Native American complex known as Poverty Point, east of Monroe, as Louisiana’s first World Heritage site. The state legislature supported that nomination in 2010. Meanwhile, interest in proposing either the French Quarter or the historic core of New Orleans as a UNESCO site has grown. The 1,007 world heritage listings to date have cultural or natural significance, or both, and include a number of urban centers.

The United States has 22 UNESCO heritage sites, weighted toward national parks, notably Yellowstone, the Grand Canyon and Mesa Verde. The agency is considering the Alamo and four other San Antonio, Texas missions for heritage status next year. Also on a proposed list are three African American churches with civil rights histories in Alabama.

The United States is active in UNESCO and was able to get Poverty Point approved even though Washington lost voting rights at the U.N. agency last fall. The United States co-founded UNESCO in 1945 but stopped paying $80 million in annual dues in late 2011 because U.S. laws prohibit funding for any U.N. group that recognizes the Palestinian Authority as a full member. U.S. dues previously financed over 20 percent of UNESCO’s operating budget so that loss has hurt programs.

As for Poverty Point, the Native American site dates back more than 3,500 years and was occupied mainly from 1700 to 1100 BC. During that time, four of the area’s five domed mounds, six earthen ridges and a large plaza were built. Deep depressions at the complex were borrow pits for dirt that residents transported in baskets. Archeologists estimate that 500 to 1,000 hunter-gatherers lived on the ridges at one time. The site, which is next to Harlin Bayou, has gullies, and in pre-farming days it overlooked a swampy Mississippi River floodplain, where food was foraged.

Modern-day excavations at Poverty Point began in 1912 to 1913. But the extent of the site wasn’t apparent until 40 years later in 1953, when archaeologist James Ford examined aerial photos and saw a geometric pattern in the earthworks. The complex was designated a National Historic Landmark in June 1962. Ten years later the state bought the site’s current 400 acres from local landowner R.F. Marsdon, and in 1975 the area was opened to the public. Poverty Point became a National Monument in October 1988.

Just what did it take to get the Point approved by UNESCO? Local archeologists, historians and a “friends” group of residents supported the nomination. Out-of-state experts on cultural heritage explored the site, examined its artifacts, reviewed documents and agreed that the earthworks would make a good world-heritage candidate. In January 2013, the U.S. Interior Department nominated Poverty Point to UNESCO, and the U.N. agency approved it as site number 1,001 at a convention in Doha, Qatar on June 22 of this year.

The complex was hidden from view for centuries. “Mount A or the Bird Mound, was surrounded by cotton fields and repeatedly plowed,” Cleo Crockett, an interpretative ranger employed by the state, said in an early-September tour. “Ridge Four had a farmhouse sitting on it.” A church was on the grounds.

A plantation owner was responsible for the site’s name. “It’s called Poverty Point because planter Phillip Guier, who moved here in the 1830s, didn’t find it as productive as his previous farm” in Kentucky, Crockett said. Fields surrounding the earthworks were tilled until 1972.

Matthew Whitney Day, special projects manager with Louisiana’s Office of Cultural Development, last week said evidence of an ancient civilization was recorded more than a century ago. “A traveler named Jacob Walter visited the property in the early- to mid-1800s and gave the first written description of Poverty Point,” Day said. “He called it an old Indian town, with a mound of colossal size, and saw artifacts scattered over several acres.” Walter had been digging around, looking for ore.

Tulane University architecture professor John Stubbs, who directs the university’s Master of Preservation Studies program, grew up in Monroe, 45 miles southwest of Poverty Point. “When I was in high school in the 1960s, we were surrounded by Indian history and were well aware of it, but we weren’t taught about Poverty Point,” he said last week. Situated to the west of Monroe are the significant Watson Break earthworks, dating to 3300 BC.

In recent years, as many as 15,000 people annually have visited Poverty Point but the state doesn’t have a good cumulative head count site since the complex opened in 1975. “It’s evident that visitation has already increased since Poverty Point became a world heritage site in June,” Day said. Local groups are coordinating services to make sure that visitors enjoy and learn from the area.

Meanwhile, the idea of getting the French Quarter or a larger part of New Orleans designated as a UNESCO site has been tossed around for years and is gathering steam. “We’re in the early stage of forming a committee of historians, architects, officials, business and tourism leaders, and of course citizens,” Stubbs said. “We have lots of research and outreach work to do locally, and we’ll seek assistance from experts outside of New Orleans.” Stubbs said the pre-nomination process alone takes years. He’s been part of a national effort to get eleven buildings by Wisconsin-born architect Frank Lloyd Wright recognized by UNESCO. The Interior Department submitted those examples of “organic architecture” to the U.N. agency in 2008, and they’re under consideration now.

New Orleans is renowned for its cultural heritage without being on the list, Stubbs said. Patty Gay, executive director of Preservation Resource Center on Tchoupitoulas St., agrees. “Everything that we love about our city– jazz, our history, the mix of many nationalities, our architecture, our port–other people value too,” she said last week. Gay supports efforts to make the Quarter or the city a UNESCO heritage site.

The historic centers of Rome, Florence, Mexico City, Cairo and Jeddah are on UNESCO’s heritage list, as are Venice and its lagoon, the banks of the Seine in Paris, Istanbul, China’s ancient city of Ping Yao and Ecuador’s city of Quito. But be careful what you wish for. Stubbs said as New Orleans considers seeking world heritage status, it’s important to ask ourselves whether we really want it. Being named a site will bring more visitors, as it already has to Poverty Point.

“Tourism can cause its share of problems, such as social dislocation, loss of cultural heritage, economic dependence and ecological degradation,” according to a document from UNESCO’s “Teaching and Learning for a Sustainable Future” program. Managing tourism in ways that don’t damage the site or harm the community are key to the survival of both.

New Orleans receives hoards of visitors now, especially downtown, with 9.28 million here last year alone. They spent nearly $6.5 billion in 2013 and supported more than 78,000 jobs, according to the New Orleans Convention and Visitors Bureau. That’s in a city of 379,000 people and a greater metro area of 1.2 million residents. But while growth in tourism has reduced the city’s unemployment, many of these service jobs barely pay enough to support one person, much less a family, according to a 2013 study by Loyola University’s Lindy Boggs National Center for Community Literacy.

The Crescent City grapples with its tourism. Music from Bourbon Street, for example, disturbs French Quarter residents at night. And Canal Street, once the main shopping and theater district, became lined with hotels, curio shops and fast food joints in recent decades. That happened partly because businesses left during white flight in the 1960s. In a post-Katrina rebuild, however, three old theaters have reopened on Canal, and the CBD is catering to locals, along with tourists, now.

Heritage sites, whether they’re cultural or natural, tend to be either old or vulnerable, and they require maintenance. Erosion is a major concern at Poverty Point. Land has be lost to water runoff because of acreage clearance, changes in farming practices and dredging of Bayou Macon. In the state’s FY 2013-2014 budget, $750,000 requested by Lt. Governor Jay Dardenne, head of the Culture, Recreation and Tourism Department, was allocated to combat Poverty Point’s erosion.

Worldwide, Italy, China and Spain have the most UNESCO heritage sites while the United States is tenth on the list. Of the 1,007 sites globally, 779 are cultural, 197 are natural and 31 are mixed in nature. Two of those sites were delisted, however. A degraded sanctuary for antelopes in Oman was removed, and the Dresden Elbe Valley in Germany lost its listing because of bridge construction.

What other spots in Louisiana might be considered for UNESCO designation someday? John Stubbs sees Avery Island in New Iberia as deserving. “It has a beautiful natural setting, marshes and swamps, along with a salt dome, nearly 150 years of tabasco production and the McIlhenny family history,” he said.

This article was published in The Louisiana Weekly in the Sept. 22, 2014 edition.

One of the attributes I want to pass on to my child is gratitude. I believe gratitude is a practice that if incorporated into our daily routine, will lead to brighter and happier lives. With all the challenges that life presents — adversity, difficult relationships, stressful jobs, etc. — it is so important that we learn to focus our attention more on the good things that always surround us, waiting to be noticed. In order to be able to teach my child gratitude, I have to practice it myself. That is easier said than done though.

I am currently seven months pregnant with my first child. From what I’ve heard, I’ve had a pretty easy pregnancy. Has it felt easy? No. Has it been the joyous, fulfilling process that I fantasized about? Definitely not. I had dreams of an unspeakable connection with my unborn child, full of love and excitement. I haven’t really felt that. What I have felt is a lot of discomfort, pain, emotional ups and downs, stress, loneliness and sleepless nights (just to name a few). I have always wanted a big family, however this experience has made me second guess that.

It’s so easy to fall into the negativity that surrounds us. One thing comes down, and all the others seem to pile on. Soon there are so many negative things on top of us that we can’t find a way out. But I’ve learned that gratitude is the way out. Or even better, it’s a way to keep out. When time and focus is spent on finding and seeing the positive events, people, and simplicity around us, less time is spent thinking about and being consumed by negativity. I’m getting better at this, it is still not easy and I have to work on it, every day. It takes practice. However, I now know the benefits from practicing gratitude and I’m willing to do the work.

So, no, I haven’t felt that dreamy connection with my unborn child, but I am grateful that I was able to get pregnant at 34 years old without complications.

No, I haven’t had a good night’s sleep in more than three months because of discomfort, pain and constant kicking inside of me, but I’m grateful that I have a healthy baby who is showing his strength and personality already.

And no, I don’t have any family geographically close to support me and share this process with, but I’m grateful to have a wonderful, supportive husband who helps me as much as he possibly can.

Whether it is pregnancy, relationships, family or work, we all have our struggles that can easily lead us through a dark time. Let’s practice gratitude so we can enjoy life more – and pass it on to our friends, family, and especially our children.

We’d love to hear how gratitude has helped you! Please share your story or questions below, or visit www.KaremEnsley.com to read more.

Karem Ensley is the author and illustrator of I Am Grateful.

Sports fans who tuned in to last Thursday night’s primetime game between the New York Giants and Washington Redskins may have thought they were just watching the latest installment of one of football’s oldest rivalries, one that has seen the Giants pull out a victory nearly 100 times. But the rivalry between the Giants and teams named for Native Americans is older than you might think. And despite the one-sided nature of Thursday’s nationally televised game, the outcome hasn’t always gone the New Yorkers’ way.

The 45-14 shellacking that the Giants put on the Redskins came in the midst of a renewed fervor over the latter’s team name, with everyone from the creators of TV’s South Park to commentator Jon Stewart, to the President of the United States himself (who, by the way, lives in Washington), weighing in on whether the term “Redskins” is culturally insensitive to Native Americans. Team owner Dan Snyder has remained steadfast in his refusal to rename his team. But a new documentary has the potential to be the catalyst for a win-win agreement between both sides.

Filmmaker Celia Xavier’s Playground of the Native Son tells the story of the Hominy Indians, an Oklahoma-based, multi-tribe team of American Indians that took on the world champion New York Giants in 1927, a full decade before the Redskins relocated from Boston to their current home in Washington, DC. The contest was played the day after Christmas, just three weeks after the Giants had won their first NFL title.

The Hominy Indians were financed by a pair of Osage brothers and featured John Levi, the team’s star player and the man Jim Thorpe referred to as the greatest athlete to ever live. The traveling semi-professional squad laid waste to opponents in 26 consecutive games before taking the field against the world champions in a David-versus-Goliath game that no one expected them to win.

Only they did.

Nearly 90 years later, the game remains a watershed moment in Native American history, and is an amazing story of triumph that should be used to celebrate American Indians in football. This, along with the contention of some that the very sport of football was originally derived from the Native American game pahsaheman, is what people like Snyder should be using to support their desire to continue using a Native symbol for Washington’s team.

As it stands, the Redskins’ 1-3 start isn’t even the most painful part of their 2014 season. Instead, the team has been dog-piled by bad publicity – even before the season began, news outlets were reporting that several broadcasters (including Phil Simms, who announced Thursday’s game for CBS) were planning to refuse to use the team’s name. Throughout September, articles have been turned out at a brisk pace, covering everything from the team allegedly selling expired beer at its home games to a movement to boycott FedEx, the company whose name adorns the Redskins’ stadium.

The flimsy case for defending the name can be found on a Snyder-funded web site called Redskins Facts, but let’s get real: much of the owner’s refusal to change likely stems from both personal nostalgia (he grew up in the D.C. area) and business interests (it’s no small task to rebrand an 82-year-old franchise). Many of his supporters may also be holding on for any variety of reasons, ranging from wanting to maintain a personal legacy to not wanting to have to buy new merchandise. Which would be ironic, since the federal government’s recent decision to cancel the team’s trademark registration would make it pretty easy to find unofficial Redskins swag for cheap. But it’s not like Washington teams are any stranger to name changes – anyone know how the Bullets or Senators are doing this season? If anything, name changes are tradition for the city’s teams.

Snyder could simply select a new name for the team that could still be Native American-oriented, which would allow him to make a genuine show of respect to the Native community while saving face with those who want him to remain obstinate. Embracing the story of the Hominy Indians could be the perfect solution for Snyder because it at once recognizes Native history and appeals to the football fanatics who love their team and don’t want to see it lose its identity. This would also allow him to avoid having to admit any wrongdoing in insisting on holding onto something that has clearly offended many.

The timing couldn’t be better, either, as Xavier’s documentary (which features actual footage of the Hominy Indians in action) looks to be picking up steam. As it continues to attract sponsors and be screened nationwide – including an upcoming November showing at the Lincoln Center in New York City – she is planning a feature-film version of the story that is set to start shooting next year. A large-scale celebration of Native Americans’ place in the history of the NFL would be the perfect time for Snyder to re-brand his team.

Rather than defend himself by relying on laughably out-of-date claims such as “Prominent Indian leaders of the 19th century… referred to themselves as ‘Red-Skins,'” as the Redskins Facts site asserts, Snyder should use the Hominy Indians’ story as the jumping-off point for the next chapter in his team’s illustrious history. Either that, or just keep insisting that, no matter how many people he’s offended, he’s not going to budge. Because, hey, that worked out great for Donald Sterling, right?

It’s almost that time of year. I can feel it in the fall air and see it on the faces of parents and seniors everywhere. It’s almost college application time and the race begins, as parents and kids vie for the chance to get into their first choice colleges.

For some parents, college acceptance approaches the culmination of every single parenting choice ever made. It can seem the ultimate goal, the ROI of parenthood, the final gold award and the epitome of a parenting job well done. It feels like the end game for every AP class, honors class, volunteer opportunity, and sports involvement that you required of your child. This college acceptance looms as the justification for the hours upon hours of helping with homework, rewriting their essays, doing most of their science fair projects since sixth grade, hiring the most expensive college counselor, and pushing, pushing, pushing your kids to get the A at any cost. “My child got into his first choice university” will be worn proudly and loudly as a testament to how well you have done as mom and dad.

I’m just being honest. I have been hacking into your lives for the past 25 years as a founder and head of school at a private school in California. If you are finding yourself already getting annoyed or a little angry with me, I ask you to hear me out. I was once where you are now, until my son decided on a much different path and forced me to rethink the whole process and what constituted my achievement as a parent. It was not college acceptance.

What I have found in my 25 years in education is that as parents we are almost forced into this artificial race upon birthing our children. We start with our best intentions, of course. We want the best preschool, the best teachers, the best summer camps. Slowly, without our being aware of it, we are competing with our neighbors, our friends, our families. What started out as just wanting the best for our children, suddenly morphs into my child needs to be the best.

So, what do we do as a result? We DO too much! And, we expect our kids to do too much. We start believing that we need to start the protracted process of getting our kids ready for college in elementary school. We begin having massive anxiety about college acceptance when our kids are in middle school. And by high school, oh boy, we get bat shit crazy! We lose our focus on our children and what’s best for them and instead start seeing them as a reflection of us as parents. They must get into a great college or we have failed miserably at parenthood. What will our neighbors think? What will we say about our kids at dinner parties? Of course, we don’t think we think these things, but I know they exist in some form in our heads! Our societal anxiety about this is, in my humble opinion, at an all-time high!

And it must stop.

We have strangled the creativity out of our children by forcing them to do things they may not want to do, but as good parents we have to check the box that reads competitive sports — check! We have robbed them of their childhood so that we can feel good about their chances at college entrance. Many of our kids don’t even know what it is they like to do because we have been telling them what to like for their whole lives. Our children are riddled with anxiety and we are medicating them more now than ever. Why are we doing this? So that they can get into college and be successful! Let me tell you something — college acceptance does not make a person succeed, nor does it say one thing about your parenting.

You know what does speak volumes about your parenting? Ask yourself the following questions:

• Does your child have a compassionate soul?
• Does your child have a healthy dose of intellectual curiosity?
• Is your child resourceful and independent?
• Is your child happy with who she is?
• Can your child creatively problem-solve?
• Is your child passionate about anything?
• Can your child sit with himself and enjoy his own company?

We must stop the competitive, ridiculous, and oftentimes painful race to college. We must remember that our children come from us but are not a reflection of us. Together, we can stop this madness and allow our children to find their way in this world, prestigious college or not. By embracing what makes THEM happy, and by seeing them as the creative beings that they are, we can stop competing with each other as parents, and they can enjoy, flourish and even love this one life they have.

If you are still a little angry with me, the comment section is just below. Thank you for reading.

TAIPEI, Sept 29 (Reuters) – Taiwan President Ma Ying-jeou has said the Taiwanese people are paying close attention to the events in Hong Kong and hopes Hong Kong and China can come to a mutually acceptable solution on democracy.

Ma said in an interview with Al Jazeera the situation in Hong Kong would affect the world’s perception of China. The interview was posted on the website of the President’s Office at the weekend.

He said Taiwan still maintains it does not accept the “one country, two systems” under which China rules Hong Kong.

Taiwan and China separated in 1949 following a civil war between the Communists and Nationalists, who fled to Taiwan. Taiwan has been self-ruled since then, developing into a vibrant democracy, electing its own president and legislature.

China has never renounced the use of military force to take back Taiwan, which it regards as a renegade province. (Reporting by J.R. Wu; Editing by Paul Tait)