Daily Archive for May 15th, 2008

Quote of the Day

Published
by
Paulo Coelho
on May 15, 2008
in Quotes
. 6 Comments

The future belongs to God
and he will reveal it only in extraordinary circumstances.
(The Alchemist)

Google Banned by Myanmar Govt., Still Donates $1 Million to Cyclone Relief

Published
by
Paulo Coelho
on May 15, 2008
in News
. 4 Comments

Today, while browsing Digg, I found the following article by Gavin Hudson for the EcoWordly site:



Despite being banned by the government of Burma (also Myanmar), Google has said that it will donate up to $1 million USD to assist victims of Cyclone Nargis.

Google has offered to match donations made to UNICEF and Direct Relief International for all donations made at Google’s Support disaster relief in Myanmar page, up to one million dollars.

Internet users in Burma reported that access to Google and Gmail had been blocked by the strict military junta governing the country in the summer of 2006. By this time, Yahoo and Hotmail had already made the censored IT blacklist.

Go to Google in Burma and you’ll get: “Error Number 1045 Access Denied.”

The ban, of course, was put in place before the government crackdowns on popular uprisings that left many dead or imprisoned. Some of the last words to leave Burma were from observers there who described nighttime kidnapping raids on the homes of Buddhist monks. The monks were involved in the popular uprisings against the government. On mornings after a raid, only blood would be found in the empty house.

Since the crackdowns, the flow of photos and information from Burma has all but completely stopped. No information gets in. None gets out. A political black hole where a country used to be.

(…)

To read the rest of this article, please go here.

Fragments of a non-existent diary III - Brissac, France

Published
by
Paulo Coelho
on May 15, 2008
in Stories
. 6 Comments

During my stay at a castle rented by a Brazilian magazine, a local journalist came to interview me. During the conversation, which was being watched by other people, he wanted to know:

- What is the best question a reporter has ever asked you?

The best question? I thought I’d been asked just about EVERY question, except for the one he just put. I asked for a moment to reflect, to study the many things I wanted to say but was never asked. But in the end I had to confess:

- I think it was yours. I’ve had questions I’ve refused to answer, others which allowed me to talk about interesting subjects, but yours was the only one I cannot possibly answer sincerely.

The journalist made a note, then said:

- I’ll tell you an interesting story. Once, I went to interview Jean Cocteau. His house was piled high with bibelots, paintings, drawings by famous artists, books, Cocteau kept everything, and felt a deep love for all those things. So anyway, during the interview, I decided to ask him: “if the house caught fire right now, and you could only take one thing with you, what would you choose?”

- And what did Cocteau say? - asked Alvaro Teixeira, who was in charge of the castle, and a great follower of the life of the French artist.

- Cocteau said: “I’d take the fire”.

And we sat there in silence, applauding deep down in the most intimate corners of our hearts, the brilliant reply.

Today’s Question by Aart Hilal

Published
by
Paulo Coelho
on May 15, 2008
in Q&A
. 9 Comments

How much will the value the manuscript change for you after it becomes a book. I’m not meaning money but meaning the value for you.Is the word more powerful when its printed in thousands of copies than when it is present only in you mind?

Alchemy is the art of projecting in this world what you have in the non-material world. Therefore, when you are able to manifest physically something, you get a better picture of your feelings. In the case of a book, most of the time I have a subconscious understanding, but I need to write and concentrate it. I would suggest everybody to write diaries, it helps a lot to solve our own conflicts.