Posts Tagged ‘politics’

Advice For Fishing With A Bow and Arrow

Wednesday, February 1st, 2012

Archery fishing is also called bow fishing and it is as ancient as the bow and arrow themselves. We in the West tend to think that only poorer tribesmen in Third World countries go bow fishing, but that is not quite true.

These days the hunting of mammals is strictly controlled and so some people who like to hunt with a bow will switch to bow fishing if the animals that they like to pursue, say deer, are out of season. Some other people, who would not hunt a deer or bear are quite happy to hunt fish in this fashion.

Bow fishing is a skilled sport, but the paraphernalia need not of necessity be hi-tech. The fact is that you can use whatever bow you have or you can just make one. It does not have to be powerful, because the quarry is seldom more than ten feet away. You categorically do not have to have a 100 lbf longbow to kill a trout.

Having said that, any bow used for fishing will need to be adapted slightly - you will need to attach a reel to it, but it does not have to be anything fancy. There are three principal types of reel for use in bow fishing: hand-wrap, spincast and retriever and the line is usually braided nylon of approximately eighty pounds although you might require six hundred pound breaking strain line for alligators or sharks.

It is worth checking out the regulations with regard to bow fishing in your country or state, because sometimes bow fishermen have to be licensed and sometimes getting that license involves having attended a safety course.

Some regions will even have by-laws regarding the kind of equipment you can use in bow fishing and of course, some fish have seasonal restrictions.

Bow fishing is a mixture of fishing and hunting, so you could have to learn some new skills like tying knots for example. You will need to be able to tie the line to the reel and the arrow and those knots will need to be able to put up with the tremendous acceleration that an arrow leaving a bow goes through without failing.

The bow may not be different much from a normal bow, but the arrows certainly do. Arrows for bow fishing are usually a lot more substantial that air-flight arrows. They also have barbed tips to stop the fish escaping or just dropping off when you reel it in. The arrows do not have fletching either because flights are apt to deflect the true course of the arrow in water - the opposite of in the air.

There are three main techniques used in bow fishing: 1] you can put down ground bait and lie in wait. - an over hanging tree or high rock is good for this; 2] you can float down stream in a dinghy while sitting or standing in the prow; 3] you can walk into the river like a salmon fisherman.

Compensating for the refraction of the water is the most difficult ability to learn and that means knowing the water well too.

Owen Jones, the writer of this piece writes on several topics, but is presently involved with archery recurve bows. If you would like to know more or for special offers, please go to our website at Kids Archery Set.

The Best Way to Grow into a Great United Nations Interpreter

Tuesday, January 24th, 2012

UN is arguably probably the most distinguished group to dedicate yourself as a professional person who translates. When you think about how our own planet is governed, we now have local government as well as national government and your local government/municipality answers towards central government which is where our laws are generally passed.

But think about the laws each of our government accepts? Well that’s where the United Nations will come in due to the fact the big part of its job is to draw jointly countries in addition to regions and consent International Trade Regulations, human rights as well as international protection. The UN Charter sets out the foundations regarding membership:

1. Membership in the UN is available to all other peace-loving countries that recognize obligations included in the existing Charter and, from the judgment of the Institution, are able and also happy to handle all these commitments.

2. Admission of such country to being a member within the United Nations will be effected by the judgment of the General Assembly with the recommendation from the Security Council.

UN interpreters experience an interesting career mixing international relations together with international speaking skills along with diplomacy. Being one of the small number of UN interpreters calls for leading-edge vocabulary skills plus lots of training. Here is how to do it.

*. Graduate from university. A qualification is necessary to be a UN interpreter. Specialising in one or more of the established US languages is vital for acquiring and maintaining the required fluency and foreign vocabulary expertise essential for the job.

*. Get required experience. United Nations interpreters often have many years of interpreting knowledge. Develop ones language skills through working for the government and different industries that require interpreters and translators to develop up your cv ahead of applying to the United Nations.

*. Develop fluency. It’s obvious that to become a United Nations interpreter, you have to be smooth with languages. For anyone who is not naturally smooth by birth or surroundings think about intensive vocabulary courses supplied by an international language training institute. Needless to say, one of the best ways to obtain fluency in a language is to live in the country and immerse yourself in the culture.

* When you have achieved all the requirements for turning into a United Nations interpreter, speak to UN recruitment office in New York and ask for information on how to fill out an application. The United Nations recruits interpreters via a competing evaluation that will carefully try out your speaking skills.

You might not get to work with the U.N. if you were charged with this crime, but it may not stop you and your spouse from this.

The Land Of Song - Wales

Thursday, July 7th, 2011

Wales has a long tradition of music and has been called the ‘land of song’ since at least the Nineteenth Century. This reference to Wales as the land of song, almost certainly comes from the passionate singing in Welsh churches and at Welsh sports meetings, particularly at rugby matches. However, Wales’ links with music go much further back than that.

Wales has a tradition of folk music which is closely associated with Scottish and Irish folk music. There are several forms of musical gathering that resemble those in other Celtic countries in the United Kingdom. For example there is the twmpath (folk dance session), g?yl werin (folk festival) and noson lawen (a traditional party comparable to the Gaelic “C?ilidh”).

Modern Welsh folk musicians have often resurrected traditions which had been suppressed or forgotten, and have competed with imported and indigenous rock and pop trends. This has been especially true since the 1990’s.

Despite modern Welsh trends in music, Wales will always be connected with Male Voice Choirs such as the Morriston Orpheus Choir and Treorchy Male Voice Choir which enjoy world wide fame.

These choirs were frequently made up of workers from one village or one coal mine and so it was quite natural for men to sing when one town played against another, particularly when that game was Wales’ national sport of rugby. The first time the Welsh National Anthem, ‘Yr Hen Wlad Fy Nhadau’ (’The Old Country of my Fathers’, usually translated as ‘Land of My Fathers’), was sung at an International sporting event was in 1905

Along side the choirs, brass bands sprang up in villages, working men’s clubs, churches and at work especially in South Wales where brass bands are still very popular. In fact, the Cory Band is one of the most best brass bands in the world.

There were quite a few world famous Welsh singers in the Twentieth Century and some of them are still singing to jam-packed audiences worldwide. Ivor Novello was one of the first who became famous during the First World War as a singer songwriter. Then there was Geraint Evans and Delme Bryn-Jones during the Second World War.

After that, Tom Jones and Shirley Bassey began their singing careers in the 1950’s and are still singing fifty years later. There were also popular bands during the Seventies and Eighties such as Man and Budgie and solo singers such as Shakin’ Stevens, nnie Tyler and John Cale (Velvet Underground).

In more recent times, we have seen the Manic Street Preachers, Catatonia, Super Furry Animals and Gorky’s Zygotic Mynci; the latter two bands being notable for lots of their songs’ lyrics being in Welsh.

There have always been operatic singers as well such as Rebecca Evans, Aled Jones, Bryn Tervel and Charlotte Church. Cardiff hosts the ‘Singer of the World’ competition but the Wales also has its very own Eisteddfod, where Pavarotti sang for years. It was because of Wales tradition as a nation of singers that Paul Robeson sang in Wales in the Fifties

If you are interested in a Welsh gold wedding ring, or Wales in general, go to our web site at Welsh Products Online

Here’s The Strangest Political Party - The Pirates Are Coming To Massachusetts

Friday, May 20th, 2011

The “Pirates” are finally taking their position in Massachusetts. Yes, the Massachusetts Election Division has accepted the Massachusetts Pirate Party as a political designation. With this development, a voter in the state can now register as a “Pirate”. It could be recalled that the United States Pirate Party was founded in 2006. However, time passed without the party being registered or officially recognized in any state.

Having been given the official endorsement, the party can already begin working toward its vision and mission. The party has always openly expressed its ideals and tried to live up to them. They make an effort to “increase government transparency, promote personal privacy, reinforce the spread of knowledge through copyright reform, and abolish patents.”

One of the key reforms that the party strives to maintain is personal privacy. They have criticized the government’s use of the 9/11 incident to boost its surveillance and regulation over citizens. They have cited the PATRIOT ACT, wiretapping, surveillance cameras as some of the government’s ways of curtailing privacy of people. They have also mentioned how corporations intensify their spying in order to get more effort out of their employees.

The party is also trying to look at the question of government transparency. The party believes that citizens should have more control of their democratic destiny. This can be achieved if people have understanding about what the government does. The government has reduced its dedication to abiding by open meeting laws. They have also amplified closed door deals that support mostly corporations. Furthermore, they enter into deals involving public information being sold to private interests. These are damaging to democracy and privacy.

The Massachusetts Pirate Party has issued a statement, stressing that the government no longer gives people the chance to live up to the old values. There is no focus on the ideals of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. They also commented about how corporations have overcome the people, with the government increasing their power. The party hopes that these ideals should be lived once more and be real for all.

Currently the party’s organizer said that the party is in the process of training activists. These are the ones who will work for coordinating and building local chapters. They are actively trying to kill the Combating Online Infringements and Counterfeits Act (COICA). Approval of this bill would empower government to “take down any web domain found to host copyrighted material without permission”. They are also looking for legislation before the Massachusetts General Court that they can support or should dispute. The party’s organizer is hopeful and confident that the party will find its future in Massachusetts.

We’ve been saying this for a long time, privacy is not given, it is taken. You have to defend your own privacy. One way to do that is to use an anonymous Proxy to mask your IP address. For other ways to defend your Internet Privacy, please visit our site.

Archery Equipment

Sunday, May 15th, 2011

Archery has been practiced for a long time. Bows have been found from at least 2,500 years before Christ, so 4,500 years ago. It is also likely that archery goes back several thousand years before that, but because most bows were made solely of wood, they have not lasted.

In the early days, bows were utilized for hunting and keeping raiders away. Nowadays, there are still some cultures that rely on hunting with bows and arrows to put meat on the table and there are also people who decide to do it that way for sport.

The equipment involved in archery is essentially a bow and an arrow, but it goes deeper than that. If you genuinely want to get into archery, you might want to think about making your own bow, your own arrows and your own practice targets.

There are superb kits for making your own bows, but there are too many varieties of bows for us to go into all of them in this article. However, be assured that if you do want to make your own bow, you will find a description of the materials and the techniques on the Internet.

You can also make your own arrows and that is an easier subject to deal with. If you begin with the shaft, it can be made of wood, aluminium alloy or carbon fibre, all of which can be bought easily. Then, at the sharp end, you can choose your tip or point.

The arrow head should match the job that the arrow is meant for. If it is meant to kill, then a broadhead, if it is meant to make a hole in a piece of paper, then a simple brass tip.

The flights can be bought separately too. You can feathers or plastic and with a little experience, you can use feathers that you have acquired yourself. Goose feathers were traditionally the ones preferred.

Finally there is the nock, which is the part of the arrow that connects with the string. The nock can be as simple as a ‘v’ or a ‘u’ cut in the arrow, or it can be a plastic or metal casting that is fitted over the end of the arrow.

The bow string is too hard to make oneself, unless you really want to go into that technology. The bow string is more easily bought.

Archery targets, the round ones, you connect with target archery are a different kettle of fish, because you definitely can assemble them yourself. You first have to get hold of a pile of straw and then grab handfuls of it. Truss these handfuls of straw into ‘ropes’ and make a circle like a Catherine Wheel out of them.

Stitch these together until they form the size target you require. Place this on an easel or nail it to a tree and then pin the traditional archery target to the front of it.

You can paint the traditional concentric circles on cloth, canvas or paper. It does not have to cost a lot to take part in archery. Remember that 5,000 or 500 years ago, people did not have much, yet they still enjoyed their sport or hobby of archery.

Owen Jones, the writer of this article writes on various subjects, but is currently involved with archery bows for sale. If you would like to know more or for special deals, please go to our website at Kids Archery Set.

Gettysburg, Pennsylvania

Wednesday, April 27th, 2011

If you are at all interested in either Pennsylvania or American history, you will surely have heard of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania and the historic activities that took place there for the period of the American Civil War. The three day long battle that took place there in July 1863 was cruel and bloody, but was hailed as a victory for the Unionist North.

However, one quick look in the Union Army burial ground in the Gettysburg National Cemetery on Cemetery Hill will persuade you that the victory came at a very high price. The cost in human life and human suffering was enormous on both sides. Later on in the same year, Abraham Lincoln gave a discourse which was to become renowned throughout the world as the Gettysburg Address.

These days, the Gettysburg National Military Park is a tranquil place, but it acts as a moving reminder of the battle that was fought, the strategies employed, the heroism of the combatants and the readiness of military leaders to sacrifice the common soldier for political objectives.

If you go to the Gettysburg National Military Park, you would do well to begin your trip in the visitors’ centre. There you will be able to pick up books, pamphlets and leaflets to help you orientate yourself when you are on the battlefield, even if you are familiar with how and where the genuine battle was fought.

If you think that it would be too much for you to work things out for yourself or if you do not have a lot of time, you could join one of the frequent guided tours. If you are somewhere in between these two positions, you could first watch a film in the Cycloarma Center, where there are also historical items recovered from the battleground on the numerous excavations that have taken place over the nearly 150 years since the battle at Gettysburg took place. If you do not look around the museum before you go on to the battleground, you should look later.

If you are going to Gettysburg to enlighten your children about that most important era of American history, you should first check out the special interest programmes available to 7-12 year olds in the warmer summer months. One programme allows children to enlist in the army of 1863 for an hour in order to get a sense for what it was like for soldiers of the day and what it was like for the children that helped them go into battle.

Another programme consists of a story-teller telling stories of what it was like to be a youngster in the days of the Civil War and the role that kids played both in the war and in civilian life back then.

Gettysburg is a spellbinding place to go to whether your family was embroiled in the battle there or not. Many of the combatants’ names and place names like Devil’s Den and Cemetery Hill will already be familiar to you and a visit to the Gettysburg National Military Park will bring them back to life for you.

Owen Jones, the author of this article writes on quite a few topics, but is currently involved with thinking about the Poconos International Raceway in Pennsylvania. If you would like to know more or check out some great offers, please go to our website at Poconos Vacations.

Berkhamsted Castle, Cornwall

Tuesday, April 26th, 2011

The exact origin of Berkhamsted Castle is unclear. It was almost certainly built by Robert, Count of Mortain and Earl of Cornwall, who was the half-brother of King William I. Robert prospered from the Norman Conquest in 1066 and grew even more rich during the following years.

However, his son made a big mistake by backing Robert of Normandy against King Henry I. Henry confiscated the castle and its grounds and put it up for rent. A number of wealthy families rented it from time to time, one of whom was Thomas Becket.

Berkhamsted Castle is of the classic style for its age in that it is a motte and bailey castle. The motte is a tall conical mound of earth on which would stand the last line of defence, the keep. Two ditches surround the bailey with a rampart in between. The ditches may or may not have been full of water.

The motte and bailey and its keep were the ancient equivalent of a modern strong or safe room. If the outer concentric walls of the castle were breached, the family occupying the castle and their most trusted soldiers would flee into the keep and raise the drawbridge. Any would-be attackers now had to advance across open ground, in effect a killing field.

Then the invaders would have to traverse a ditch or a moat under heavy fire, climb across a rampart and swim another moat. If they got that far they would face a sheer keep wall with no windows doors or toe-holds whilst a withering shower of rocks and arrows showered down upon them from a vast height.

The keep at Berkhamsted Castle has been taken away quite some time ago. It has to be kept in mind that castles were symbols of foreign oppression and were fiercely hated by the indigenous locals. The first castles or forts really were Roman; then came, Saxon forts and castles and finally Norman castles - all owned by invading foreigners.

So once a castle was destroyed or badly damaged, it was not unusual for the locals to pillage the ruins in order to build a new cottage for their family or a new cowshed for their livestock. It was easier to steal the rocks from the rundown castle than quarry them themselves. So, the original rocks that made up Berkhamsted Castle are almost certainly to be discovered under centuries of plaster in the near-by local farmhouses.

Having said that, there are still sections of the original flint wall from the era of Thomas Becket’s occupancy of the castle. The bits of stone were almost certainly too small to be worth pinching.

The remains of three semi-circular towers flank this wall which ran from the motte to the bailey. They too lie in ruins although the foundations show what they were. There are also the ruins of a barbican at the north end of the bailey.

There are hundreds, if not thousands of castles in the United Kingdom. Most of them are in ruins but some are very well conserved and some are even still lived in, like Windsor Castle for instance.

Owen Jones, the writer of this piece, writes on a variety topics, but is now concerned with the bouncy castles for sale. If you would like to know more, please visit our web site at Bouncy House Rentals

Archery As A Hobby

Monday, April 25th, 2011

We are all being encouraged to get out more frequently, so many people are looking for a reason for doing it. You could choose a spectator sport like football, but that is not really going to do your body much good, you should be looking for a participation sport.

If you are younger, then play football by all means, but if you are getting on a little, you will most likely be looking for a sport that is not quite so strenuous. Men like to take aim and shoot things even if not kill them. Golf is an option, but I want to recommend that you give archery a try.

Archery has the advantage over shooting a gun because it requires some physical fitness. It is not just a question of pulling, sorry, squeezing a trigger. If you take up archery, you will most likely want to acquire some more upper-body strength, especially if the most strenuous work you have done for the last twenty years is pick up a pen.

Archery is an all-round sport in many ways, depending on how much you get into it. The majority of novices will start out by going to an archery club and joining in for the day. People will lend them a bow and teach them the safety aspects and the correct way to hold a bow and shoot an arrow. This should give you a good notion of which kind of bow you would like.

After a week or two, you might buy your own bow and you may move from indoor target archery to outdoor target archery or even field archery, which is virtual hunting. From there, you will almost definitely meet people who take archery a stage further. You will meet competition archers, bow hunters and people who assemble their own equipment.

You may find one of these aspects of archery fascinating. You may take up bow hunting or even bow fishing. This will lead you off at a tangent, because you will have to learn about the animals that you stalk. You will have to learn where they live and what their habits are. This means research.

Or you can take up the archery equivalent of clay pigeon shooting, which is known as field archery. In field archery, the archers walk around a course and replica animals or standard targets will become visible at different distances. This is enjoyable.

You will also meet people who like to make their own arrows and even their own bows. This is another interesting feature of archery. You can purchase the different components that go to make up an arrow and you can buy a kit to assemble a bow or you can start from scratch with an axe, a knife and a lathe. Again you will need to do a lot of research, in order to get your archery equipment just the way you want it.

This will lead you down yet another tangent to archery, but it will enhance your understanding of archery, increase your enjoyment of the sport and, as they say, add another string to your bow.

Owen Jones, the author of this piece writes on various topics, but is presently involved with longbows for sale. If you would like to know more or for special deals, please go to our website at Kids Archery Set.

Targets In Field And Target Archery

Saturday, November 6th, 2010

Archery can be classed as a sport or a hobby and it has its own class at the Olympic Games. Archers either hunt wild game animals or aim at targets or both. If you aim at targets in a competition, it is the collective score of all your arrows that determines your position in that competition. The nearer the centre of the target that the arrow hits, the higher the tally.

Target archery can also be sub-divided into two classes: field archery and target archery. In target archery, the archer stands in a preset spot. If there are a number of archers, they can stand in a row and all aim together on command from the person in charge of enforcing the rules and safety. Any type of bow can usually be used in target archery, although only compound bows may be used in the Olympic Games.

In field archery, the targets are of different sizes and are placed at different distances. The archer moves around the course, so there is no one set shooting spot. The targets may be the well-known round targets with concentric rings or they may be life-size effiges of wild animals like mountain lions, deer and rabbits.

The bows used in field archery are more often than not traditional style bows: longbows, flat bows and recurves, although archers may use any bow that they like. When stalking live animals, compound bows are usually used because they are smaller, so more manoeuvrable, yet they are still very powerful.

Archery targets are traditionally made from straw bundled and tied together to make ropes. These ropes of straw are then wrapped around themselves like a Catherine Wheel and sewn together. The cloth or paper target is pinned to the face of it.

The other name for these targets is ‘butts’ and many old towns and villages in Britain still have a recreational area called ‘The Butts’. Nowadays they play football or cricket on it, but Henry VIII decreed that all males must practice his archery skills every Sunday at the butts using a longbow, so that there would be a lavish supply of archers for his army.

In competition archery, every archer shoots at his or her own target, but every archer is expected to have uniquely coloured flights, so that if there is a problem an archer and the arrow can be identified. This is useful for retrieving arrows that have missed the target altogether.

There are usually six arrows shot by each competitor in a series and if they are to be shot from a variety of distances, it is usual to shoot from the furthest distance first. Men normally shoot from 90, 70, 50 and 30 metres, while women customarily shoot from 70, 60, 50 and 30 metres.

Archery as a sport appears to be growing in popularity, especially as there is a tendency in some countries, like the UK, to make it more difficult to get a gun license. They say that fashion goes around and comes back again, well British men are back at the butts practicing their archery skills again in greater numbers than there have been since perhaps the sixteenth century.

Owen Jones, the writer of this piece writes on several subjects, but is currently involved with archery bows for sale. If you would like to know more or for special deals, please go to our website at Kids Archery Set.

Archery Dealers On And Off Line

Thursday, November 4th, 2010

Do you have a leisure pursuit that you like to carry out out of doors or are you permanently glued to the seat in front of your computer? If you never get out, then that is a shame and you ought to take that common piece of guidance and get out more often .

And do what? - you may inquire. Yes, well that is your concern, is it not? But there are hundreds if not thousands of things that you can do in the open air and they are all healthier than sitting down in front of your computer no matter what you are doing with your PC.

I will confess that I spend too much time at my desk, although, in my defense, I will say that that is how I make my living. However, I do like to get out-of-doors sometimes too. I live in a country where foreigners, such as myself, are not permitted to own or carry anything that might be construed as a weapon. This includes penknives as well.

When I go out into the glorious countryside it is only to stroll with my wife and look for animals - mostly snakes and birds.. However, I have had a lifelong fascination for archery.

Something inside me desires to be able to hit a target from a long distance. I do not want to kill anything, but I am OK with people who do so long as it is for a good reason.

It would be fantastic to make a bow and the arrows to accompany it. I am Welsh and have always wanted a Welsh longbow, although it requires a great deal of strength to pull a longbow. The minimum draw weight in medieval times used to be 160 lbs for a war bow, for hunting it was 100 lbs, but these days it is more like 60 lbs.

However, this is still pretty heavy for contemporary man, who does not often pick up anything weightier than a pint of beer.

There are some fantastic archery dealers, but if you do not live near one, you ought to go on line and either order from there or get a catalogue sent to you. Two good places to start are ‘Footed Shaft’ and ‘Three Rivers’ archery suppliers.

Both of these companies will send you your desired items through the post and they have any kind of archery supplies that you may need. For example, they have finished goods such as bows and arrows, but they also supply nocks, feathers, arrow shafts and points so that you can make your own arrows.

Do you want to manufacture your own bow as well? No problem. You can either buy a kit with all the bits and directions or you can buy a book or DVD and buy the components yourself.

These and other on line archery equipment dealers provide good value for money and have very comprehensive stocks of archery products. Their catalogues and web sites are easy to navigate and use as well.

Owen Jones, the author of this piece writes on various topics, but is presently concerned with archery recurve bows. If you would like to know more or for special offers, please go to our website at Kids Archery Set.