Happy Celtic New Year. Today is the point when the light days are gone and the dark ones begin.As the Celtic Wheel of the Year turns, November 1st or Samhain (pronounced Sow-in) is a pivotal point of the Celtic year, a time of birth, death, reflection and regeneration. In the tradition of our ancestors, we descend into the darkness of Winter only to emerge on Brigid's Day, the 1st of Spring and the ancient Celtic Festival of Imbolc.
Close to mid-way between the autumn equinox and the winter solstice, Samhain is an ancient celebration, and one of the four major festivals in the Celtic calendar. Along with Imbolc (Spring), Lá Bealtaine (Summer), and Lúnasa (Autumn) these festivals split the year into quarters. Known today as "cross quarter days," together with the winter and summer solstice and the autumn and spring equinox they were the most important days in the Celtic calendar for an ancient people directly reliant on the land for their survival.
A time for remembrance, contemplation. Samhain teaches us to embrace the darkness, welcome the unknown, and celebrate the eternal dance between life and death, reminding us of the beauty within the cycle of existence.
It is a fire festival that celebrates renewal and re-connection. It is believed that, at this time, the veil between our physical world and the ‘Alltar’ (Otherworld) was at its thinnest. This allowed the spirits of the ancestors to cross the plain and wander the earth for a day. Food, drink and a seat would likely be put at the fireplace so that the souls of those who had passed may feel welcome in the family homes. These offerings were made in hopes that the spirits would be satisfied and bless the homes they frequented, giving a protection of sorts to the family. As Christianity arrived and adapted old rituals into their own, Samhain became All Hallow’s Eve and All Souls in practice.
The Celts, who lived about 3,000 years ago in an area which is now Gaul (France), Ireland, Wales, Scotland, England and Brittany, celebrated their new year during the Lunar calendar, around the 1st week of November, but it is now generally known as the eve of November 1.
This day marked the end of summer and the harvest and the beginning of winter, a time associated with the end of the agricultural year and the falling leaves of autumn. On the night before the new year (Samhain), the boundary between the worlds of the living and the dead became blurred. It became a liminal, thin time between the two worlds.
To commemorate Samhain, vast bonfires were prepared, especially at this “fire festival” day, where the people gathered to burn detritus left over from crops and celebrated the end of harvest-time. Offerings were made to agricultural deities. Costumes were worn consisting of straw or animal skins . When the celebrations were over, hearth fires, which had been extinguished earlier in the day, were re-lit from a central bonfire, This act renewed the connectedness of the village people.
As a tree of both death and rebirth the Yew ushers in the first Lunar Month of the year. Towering in cemeteries and churchyards the Yew seems dark and imposing yet on closer inspection (the females at least) are cloaked in beautiful red berries.
These berries sustain birds in the cold whilst it's thick foliage of the tree provides sanctuary against the elements. The berries themselves reflect the two face of the Yew. The flesh is sweet and delightful yet the seeds will bring your heart (and life) to a stop.
In the ancient village of Nevern in Pembrokeshire. It has a 6th century church (St Brynach's Church) and in the churchyard there are a number of ancient yew trees (Taxus baccata). One of these yews near to the gate is called the "Bleeding Yew" which is about 700 years old.. It has a blood-red sap running out of it which has the consistency of blood - though it dries pink rather than brown.Nobody seems to be able to explain the phenomenon of this yew nor does anyone seem to know why this is happening. But it has been “bleeding” for as long as anyone can remember.
The energy on this auspicious day is powerful indeed. A time to set new intentions. A time to rest , a time to sleep. A time to take stock.A time to prepare.A time to heal and embrace the magic of new beginnings. As the Celtic Wheel turns and we welcome a New Year, may your home be filled with love, peace, good health and happiness,unexpected blessings, and reasons to smile. Let's set our intentions for a future of unity and positive change.
Far-right anti-Islam, anti-migrant agitator Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, otherwise known as Tiny Tommy Ten Names Robinson faces up to 10 years in jail after being found guilty of harassing journalists. Judge says he will consider all options to sentence him who trial heard deployed ‘bullyboy, intimidatory tactics’
Robinson, a former member of the British National party and co-founder of the English Defence League, had said before the trial that his legal bills were being paid for by the billionaire tech mogul and owner of X, Elon Musk. Musk also last year paid for Robinson's defence when he was charged with failing to provide his phone PIN to police, for which he was cleared by a judge, and Musk virtually attended a rally in London organised by Robinson last year.
Anyone defending Robinson, needs to explain exactly what they think he should be allowed to get away with. A man who claims to be a great British patriot, lives in Spain and spends the majority of the year on holiday at the expense of his “donors” was sitting in a holiday resort in Cyprus while stirring up civil unrest in Britain. Journalists reported on it. That is their job. It was a legitimate national story.
And because Robinson didn’t like the scrutiny, he sent private investigators after the journalists, had them tracked and photographed, exposed their home addresses and their families, and threatened to turn up at their homes, saying “I’m coming to get you”. One journalist needed personal security. Another had to remove his family from their home.
Here’s what the jury actually heard. In August 2024, while England was rioting, Robinson was on holiday in Cyprus, posting about the riots to his followers. The Mail found him there and ran a story: “Stoking riots from his sunbed.”
Over the next three days he went after the two reporters, Jacob Dirnhuber and Andrew Young.
5 August: a direct message to Dirnhuber. “I’ll be knocking at your door.”
5 August: a phone call to Young. Robinson told him he’d be coming to his home and that he’d “have to move house.”
6 August: a post naming Dirnhuber, saying he and the other Mail journalists had “today been located.” 7 August: a video to around a million followers. He said he had details of where they and their families lived. He told them to abide by “men’s rules.”
Then: “The men, on the other hand, I will find you.”
He also hired private investigators to photograph their homes. He admitted it in court.
The result: Dirnhuber moved house. Young was given a close protection officer.
The charge was harassment causing fear of violence. The prosecution had to prove a course of conduct that made each man fear violence on at least two occasions, and that Robinson knew or ought to have known it would.
That last part is an objective test. What Robinson says he meant doesn’t decide it. What decides it is what a reasonable person would expect a million followers to do with “I will find you.”
In defence he said he was protecting his family. That is a real defence in law, if the conduct is reasonable for protecting someone. Police had given him four threat-to-life warnings. The jury heard all of it.
He admitted the aim was pressure. Telling a million people where journalists live doesn’t protect your children. It endangers theirs. He didn’t dispute that they were frightened. Asked in evidence, he said no. He never complained to the press regulator. He never asked the Mail to change or remove the story. The legal route was there. He skipped it. His own words. “Men’s rules” is not the language of protection. One is journalism, however much you dislike it. The other is a threat.
If you believe that is acceptable behaviour, that a man can threaten journalists and expose their families to intimidation simply because he dislikes their reporting, then you aren’t defending free speech. You’re defending intimidation. It's not Tommy's job to hand out punishment for supposed wrongdoing, to teach people lessons, or settle scores. Tommy is not a gangland enforcer. He isn't Judge Dredd. He's not even the police. He's a civilian. Saying, "I'm not fretnin' ya or nuffin'", isn't a legal shield against being prosecuted when you launch a campaign of intimidation against someone.
This is Tommy's M.O. Unfortunately for him, he's a violent thug with a history of abuse, violence and intimidation with no impulse control who still thinks he's a top boy in a football firm. He certainly has a varied rap sheet! Assault, mortgage fraud, passport fraud, contempt of court.
I will never understand how a violent, grifting criminal like Robinson has been able to illicit such ridiculous devotion from his army of followers, guess it's just because he spouts the racist guff they all like to hear.
At the magistrates’ court he was offered a trial there. He opted for a jury instead, saying he wanted 12 members of the British public to hear the evidence. They did. A jury of his peers at Southwark Crown Court heard the evidence and convicted him by an almost unanimous jury verdict of 10 to 2. The 43 year old was found guilty of two counts of harassment and causing fear of violence, because normal people see his behaviour as thuggish, inappropriate, and illegal.
Robinson , who shook his head quietly after the verdicts were given and stared at the jury, took to social media and called the verdicts “insane.” And after he was found guilty, the Crown Prosecution Service said Robinson had “weaponised social media”.
Frank Ferguson, the head of the CPS’s special crime and counter-terrorism division, said: “Nobody should be made to fear violence because of the work they do. Journalists play an important role in a democratic society and should be able to carry out their professional duties without being subjected to harassment."
However sentence is not until 16 December when I guess it will be the judge's call. But given the number of priors, it should be a lengthy sentence. This isn’t after all his first rodeo.He has though managed to get bail.Hope they took away his passport.
Saddened to hear of the loss of the incomparable Walter Koenig who died of natural causes at his home in North Hollywood on Sunday, October 25.aged 90.
His death was confirmed by his representative, with a statement from Galactic Productions revealing that he was surrounded by his daughter and niece in his final moments.
Fans around the world will forever remember him as the brilliant and beloved Ensign Pavel Chekov, whose wit, charm, and heart helped define the original Star Trek and brought the final frontier into the homes of millions.
Koenig played the Russian navigator Chekov in second and third seasons of NBC’s Star Trek series from 1967-69 and reprised the role in the first seven Star Trek films from 1979-94. His impact on "Star Trek" was politically symbolic his character’s introduction for Season 2 during the height of the U.S.-USSR Cold War was no small deal for U.S. television to have a hero with a Russian accent like Chekov did.
The news of his passing comes as the original hugely popular, influential and low-budget Star Trek series created by Gene Roddenberry is marking its 60th anniversary. The show also was notable for its iconoclastic diversity for a mid-century TV series.
The statement from his agency read “Walter’s legacy extends far beyond the screen,” “Through countless convention appearances and interactions with fans, he shared his kindness, wit, and appreciation with everyone fortunate enough to meet him.” “He understood what ‘Star Trek’ meant to people and embraced the community that grew around it,” the agency continued. “Thank you, Walter, for the memories, the inspiration, and for boldly going where few have gone before.”
Koenig was mourned by his “Star Trek” co-star George Takei, who played the role of Sulu.
“My heart is heavy,” the fellow actor wrote in a heartfelt Facebook statement, explaining he and Koenig first crossed paths in 1960 and stayed friends ever since. “Walter was more than Chekov,” Takei added. “He was a writer, a teacher, a thoughtful man, and a loyal friend. To the fans who loved him for so many years, thank you. He loved you too.”
Like so many people of my generation, I grew up with Star Trek. It was a universe that promised humanity could overcome its differences, explore the unknown and perhaps become something better than it was
Born on September 14, 1936, in Chicago, to Russian Jewish immigrant parents, Koenig initially had no plans to pursue a career in showbusiness.
He studied psychology at UCLA before discovering a passion for acting, eventually training at New York’s prestigious Neighborhood Playhouse alongside future Hollywood stars James Caan and Christopher Lloyd.
His earliest roles including guest spots on such 1960s TV series as Combat!, The Untouchables, Ben Casey, Gidget, I Spy, The Alfred Hitchcock Hour and Jericho.
He also appeared in the 1963 pilot episode of what would become one of TV’s most popular soap operas, ABC’s General Hospital.
But his big break would come with Star Trek in 1967, the start of a 25-year journey as navigator of the starship USS Enterprise. The original series launched a universe that has kept tens of millions of Earthlings, known as Trekkies or Trekkers, enthralled for six decades.
Beyond his adventures aboard the Enterprise, Koenig earned further acclaim playing the sinister telepath Alfred Bester in the science-fiction drama Babylon 5.. In an interview with the Archive of American Television, Koenig, who called playing Bester "one of the best, most satisfying experiences he ever had" and explicitly compared playing Bester to playing Chekov, noting that "Babylon 5" demanded more of him as an actor than "Star Trek" often did:
"In each episode, I was critical to the story. It wasn't like [Chekov voice]: 'Captain I don't know what's out there,' and then let Captain Kirk tell you all about what's going on. Here was a character who moved the story along, not just articulated the circumstances but actually was involved in the story itself, who had his own belief system, his own internal life, his own personal problems and conflicts, and we got to investigate those over the course of 12 episodes."
"Babylon 5" is easily one of the best sci-fi shows of the 1990s, and Walter Koenig as Alfred Bester is a crucial piece of the show's legacy.
While his long and distinguished career showcased his versatility as an actor and his genuine love for his craft. His remarkable talent continued to shine in his later years.
In 2013, Koenig ventured into the steampunk genre, starring in the short film Cowboys and Engines alongside Malcolm McDowell and Richard Hatch.In 2017, Koenig appeared in the 1980s throwback Neil Stryker and the Tyrant of Time from director Rob Taylor, battling puppet goblins as science officer Ray Nabroski.
In 2018, he again appeared opposite Richard Hatch in the science-fiction drama Diminuendo, which was Hatch's last performance before his death.Koenig's final role was in the 2024 film Raging Midlife, where he played Otis.[
Koenig was also someone with strong political convictions, a progressive with liberal views who was an ardent advocate for democracy and a man unafraid to speak about the importance of freedom, human rights and political accountability. He actively mobilized people who enjoyed his work toward important issues surfacing in the real world. This step took his long established fame far beyond simple make-believe sci-fi fantasy.
Koenig was also prominent and vocal advocate for actors' rights and fair compensation throughout his decades-long career. His advocacy was born out of personal experience with the financial hardships faced by supporting actors in the 1960s.
He frequently spoke out about how little the supporting cast was paid during the original run of Star Trek, the lack of character development, and the strict caste system that favored primary leads over supporting performers.
Koenig, alongside Star Trek co-stars James Doohan, Nichelle Nichols, and George Takei, successfully settled a high-profile dispute with Paramount Pictures. The actors fought for and won a settlement regarding their contractual entitlement to 2.5% of the revenue Paramount generated from marketing their names and likenesses.
In interviews and public appearances, Koenig was candid about the financial realities of the industry, shedding light on how difficult it was for recognizable actors to find steady work or secure fair residuals after a major series concluded. His activism ensured that future actors would be protected.
Beyond legal battles, Koenig dedicated much of his life to preparing the next generation of talent by teaching acting classes at UCLA and other institutions, emphasizing the realities of the craft and industry standards.
His character Chekov represented a positive vision for the future in many minds for a long time. Koenig chose to use that lasting familiarity to draw eyes toward serious humanitarian crises involving people in Burma. In 2007, he journeyed to refugee camps on the Burma–Thailand border, lending his voice to those unheard.
Focusing on humanitarian topics changed how his presence felt to those who followed the series. Serious political problems received fresh notice through his vocal commitment to aiding a group suffering in another country.
Koenig publicly criticized Donald Trump and his administration, describing the era in a 2020 interview with Salon as a "particularly heinous moment in American history". He expressed concern over political vitriol and stated that supporters of the administration were "willing to sacrifice the good things in our culture and in our life to support evil things".
He frequently connected his real-world political outlook to the progressive, inclusive philosophies of Star Trek, believing the franchise championed a better moral society, racial and social inclusion, and the peaceful resolution of conflict. Life outside the final frontier proved that meaningful choices extend much past any futuristic ship.
His however, did have its shadows. His marriage to actress Judy Levitt, beginning in 1965, was a partnership enduring decades, marked by love and tragedy. Their son Andrew, an actor like his father, died by suicide in 2010, and his wife died in 2022, losses that no spotlight can soften.
Yet, family remained a cornerstone; daughter Danielle’s laughter as a comedienne and writer, married to fellow comedian Jimmy Pardo, is a testament to resilience. In 2012, the Hollywood Walk of Fame finally granted Walter Koenig his star. I pray that on his final journey towards the stars he boldly goes where no man has gone before. R.I. P .
Octobers Full Moon is known as the "Hunter's Moon" because before industrialism, people focused on harvesting and preparing for the coming of Winter. Failure to do so meant facing one’s own mortality. The moons bright light historically aided hunters tracking game through newly cleared autumn fields.
After the harvest, cleared fields could make animals easier to spot, while moonlight provided additional illumination for nighttime activities.
The Hunter’s Moon is one of the few traditional moon names that isn’t associated with the month itself, but rather with the timing of the autumnal equinox. While the full moon closest to the autumnal equinox is always the Harvest Moon, the moon that follows is referred to as the Hunter’s Moon, and it makes its first appearance in either October or November.
Many cultures have celebrated the Hunter’s Moon, including the Celts, Native American peoples, and rural tribes of the British Isles and different cultures have also used other names for the October full Moon, reflecting local seasons, agricultural activities, and wildlife behavior.
It is also known as the Sanguine or Blood Moon (referring to the red-orange hue of low-hanging moons or the blood of the hunt), as well as the Travel Moon or Dying Grass Moon.
The first recorded mentions of a "Hunter's Moon" began in the early 18th century. The entry in the Oxford English Dictionary for "Hunter's Moon" cites a 1710 edition of The British Apollo, where the term is attributed to "the country people". The names are now referred to regularly by American sources, where they are often popularly attributed to "the Native Americans".
The Hunter’s Moon is also associated with feasting. In the Northern Hemisphere, some Native American tribes and some places in Western Europe held a feast day. This feast day, the Feast of the Hunter’s Moon, was not been held since the 1700’s.
Somewhere between the trees and the stars, Samhein begins to stir… As the veil grows thin before Samhain, the Hunter’s Moon affects people spiritually — as do all Full Moons in the cycle of the seasons but with a greater intensity.
It’s a strengthening Full Moon, awakening people’s inner willingness to fight and bringing an opportunity to grow your capacity for patience, courage, and power.
The spiritual themes are protection, preparation, focus and remembrance. This is a strong full moon for warding your home, for gathering what you need before winter, and for honoring your ancestors and the beloved dead.
Most full moons are associated with release, and the Hunter’s Moon is no different. Just as the trees shed their dead leaves during this month, you too must let go of what no longer serves you. Use this moon to sharpen your focus on what truly matters. Set aside what is wasteful, and prepare with care for the quiet months ahead. It’s also a wonderful time for gratitude and appreciation for what Nature has given us.
As we pass through the autumnal equinox, the days get shorter and the nights get longer. The temperatures cool down, and there is that particular earthy scent in the air as leaves begin to change color and fall.
As night comes earlier and earlier, the moon is much more present in the sky for longer periods of time. We shift from the bright half to the dark half of the year. All these changes turn our attention inside, away from the physical pursuits and sunny activities of summer, and toward internal reflection.
Autumn is associated with both endings and beginnings, and many view October as a time to take action on your goals. If you feel inspired during the Hunter’s Moon, allow that energy to guide your progress.
Many people engage in releasing rituals during the Hunter’s Moon, writing down their insecurities or fears and safely burning or ripping up the paper. Follow what feels right to you.
The Hunter’s Moon reminds us that even in the darkest nights, there’s a quiet kind of magic in the sky. A little mystery, a little nostalgia, and a thousand unspoken feelings wrapped in moonlight. Some nights aren’t meant to be explained, just felt. Get out and look up she really looks beautiful tonight, shining bright and luminous. The peak of illumination will be Sunday into Monday at 12:12 am.
21st October marks the anniversary of the opening of the controversial resevoir in the Tryweryn valley near Bala, to supply drinking water to the residents of the city of Liverpool, the day still marks a grave injustice and raw wound.
Tryweryn was an idyllic village set deep in the Welsh valleys where the chapel and post office were the epicentre of community life. In all 800 acres of land was drowned, as well as the school, the post office, the chapel and the cemetery, in order to create the reservoir. Twelve complete farms and land belonging to four other farms were drowned.
Shortly after the flooding a piece of graffiti appeared on a piece of wall, just outside the village of Llanrhysted, on the way to Aberystwyth. The graffiti read "Cofiwch Drwyweryn " "Remember Tryweryn" it is still to be seen, many years later.
The wall itself was never intended to be more than a bold gesture, but over time it grew into a powerful cultural landmark. Generations of travellers on the road to Aberystwyth have seen it as a reminder of lost communities and as a symbol of resistance.
Despite being vandalised, repainted, and even partly demolished on several occasions, it has always been quickly restored by local people determined to preserve its message. In recent years, its influence has spread well beyond its original location.
Today, the wall near Aberystwyth is both a physical landmark and a rallying point in the story of Wales’s fight to protect its language, land, and communites. The message of 'Cofiwch Dryweryn' is such an important one to Welsh people, and it should never be forgotten, a poignant symbol of when overwhelming voices were ignored by Westminster.
The battle began in 1955 when the City of Liverpool were seeking a new water supply. In the summer of that year Liverpool's Water Committee announced its intention to drown the valley of Dolaneg, where the shrine of Ann Griffiths, the Welsh saint and hymn writer, stands.
This of course, provoked uproar. Magnaminously Liverpool bowed to Welsh demands and said they would flood the Tryweryn valley instead. This proved to be a carefully planned scheme to hoodwink the Welsh into thinking they were dictating where a resevoir could be built.
In 1956, a private members bill was put before parliament seeking to create this folly. The bill was bought forth by Liverpool City Council, which allowed them to by-pass the usual criteria for planning permission to the relevant landowners in the area. It would involve disrupting railway lines and road links, and at the heart of it, the flooding of the village of Capel Celyn.
This one of the last bastions of Welsh speaking settlements, which had its own school, the site of Wales first Sunday school post office, a chapel, cemetery and a number of farms and homesteads, it was a community in every sense of the word.
Feelings were naturally instantly aroused to fever pitch as the notion of the English drowning out the Welsh, made the symbolism of the creation of the resevoir even more potent. But to members of Liverpool council, the farms that they were drowning were no more than convenient stretches of land along a remote valley floor that could be put to a more convenient and productive use to supply its own citizens with water, but to many was just an arrogant misuse of power, a flooding used primarily as a way of boosting profits.
Capel Celyn
MPs were powerless to stop the development because the government was determined to push the Bill through Parliament. It would be fiercely opposed, such was the passion aroused.
The political parties in Wales were united in their opposition to the scheme because it was considered an affront to Wales that valuable resources were being taken away from the country. There was a feeling of sadness because a community was being shattered and families who had lived in the area for generations were forced to leave their homes.
Locals were determined to oppose the scheme to the bitter end and demonstrations, petitions and marches were organised. The Tryweryn Defence Committee was formed in 1956 and included some of Wales’ most prominent and revered personalities, including Ifan ab Owen Edwards and Megan Lloyd George,.
Although opposition to the scheme did not come only from Welsh nationalists, the Tryweryn cause inspired Plaid Cymru, and provided an impetus to its campaigns. The party won its first elected political representation soon after.
In September 1956 Plaid Cymru held a Save Tryweryn Rally, leading a procession of protesters through the centre of Bala. The following month the Lord Mayor of Cardiff, Alderman J H Morgan, called a Save Tryweryn meeting in the city. Attended by 300 representatives from local government and trade unions and 10 MPs, the meeting decided to send a delegation to Liverpool to appeal for a change of heart.
In November 1956 a procession, led by Gwynfor Evans and including 70 villagers, was held in Liverpool to oppose the reservoir, but the Liverpool councillors voted to go ahead with the proposed scheme by 94 votes to one.
During the summer of 1957 Gwynfor Evans proposed Meirionnydd County Council could build a reservoir in Cwm Croes, where only one farm would be affected, and sell the water from the reservoir to Liverpool Corporation.
It would also see a number of individuals being compelled to take direct action against the plan, between 1962 and 1963 there were attempts to sabotage the building of the resevoir, in acts of desperation, since previous passive demonstrations had failed.
On three occasions between 1962 and 1963 there were attempts to sabotage the building of the reservoir. The first explosion, on February 10, led to Aberystwyth University student Emyr Llywelyn Jones, being sentenced to prison for 12 months for his part in the offence.
On the day of his sentence, two other members of Mudiad Amddiffyn Cymru ('movement for the defence of Wales'; MAC)Owain Williams and John Albert Jones, blew up a pylon at Gellilydan near Blaenau Ffestiniog. But by then work was already well underway and Llyn Celyn was officially opened on October 28, 1965.
At the opening ceremony, where the Lord Mayor of Liverpool was present, a protest was held, including the appearance in military uniforms of the Free Wales Army. The ceremony was stopped when protestors climbed over the dam.
MPs were powerless to stop the development because the government was determined to push the Bill through Parliament. The local authorities did not have a voice in the decision either and this caused great resentment.
It remains to this day, the greatest symbol of the struggle of the Welsh language, a way of life destroyed on the whims of Conservative Government without consultation by Welsh authorities, its people, or the support from Welsh M.Ps, who were to wage an 8 year battle against it. Opposition to the scheme received the backing of the vast majority of the Welsh people, with the backing of trade unionists, and cultural and religious groups.
Control over its own water became and has remained an inflammatory issue here in Wales. The political parties were to be united in their opposition to the scheme because it was considered such an affront to the people of Wales, because such valuable resources were being stolen away from the country. The agricultural value of the land was rich compared to some land that could have been considered. A feeling of great sadness because a community was being shattered and families who had lived in the area for generations were being forced to lose their homes.
When on Thursday, October 21st, 1965, the Lord Mayor of Liverpool came to open Tryweryn dam ( built at a cost of £20 million) where every house and tree had disappeared, he was to be met by a vast crowd of protesters, in 19 October 2005 Liverpool City Council finally issued an apology, but many thought it was just a worthless political gesture that had arrived far too late.
I hope that we have by now learnt the tragic lessons of Tryweryn and the reverberations that are still felt to this day. The place names like bells still ring out- Hafod Fadog, Y Ganedd Lyd, Cae Fado, Y Gelli, Pen Y Bryn Mawr, Gwerndelw, Tyncerrig, Maesydail.
These bells now ring underwater and are heard by no one. An evocative image, forever stitched in time, which remembers the bells of Cantre'r Gwaelod and the loss associated with inundation. It would also feed the flames of a resurgent nationalism, re-igniting the imagination, peoples identity and defence of the language? Y iath, and would pave the way for devolution, and the strengthening and protection of the Welsh Language alongside the growth of Cymdeithas Y Iaith /The Welsh Language Society. Some would argue though that the Welsh nation is still being fobbed off, since the assembly that has been granted to them, has no real political power.
There is now a memorial on the side of the lake and a memorial garden and the grave stones from Capel Cemetry have been moved here. At the end of the day it was not just a stretch of land that was flooded against the people of Wales's will, but a whole community of people, a culture and a language because of colonial arrogance and misuse of power. Tryweryn remains as a byword for shame and a grave injustice. Years later it would inspire the Manic Street Preachers to ask " Where are we going"?" in their song " Ready for Drowning, "
and the following much anthologised poem by R.S Thomas. A tragic story that we must continue to share.
The remnants of Capel Celyn still remain visible to visitors to the lake at certain times of the year, when water levels reduce. A powerful reminder of our history and our land, and how it has been exploited to serve the interests of others.
Cofiwch Dryweryn. Drowned against the wishes of all Welsh MPs, the water of this reservoir still supplies Liverpool with drinking water, with no benefit to Wales. A powerful reminder that a English government very rarely has Wales' best interests at heart.
R.S Thomas - Resevoirs
There are places in Wales I don't go:
Resevoirs that are the subconscious
Of a people, troubled far down
with gravestones, chapels, villages even:
The serenity of their expression
Revolts me, it is a pose
for strangers, a watercolour's appeal
To the mass, instead of the poem's
Harsher conditions. There are the hills
Too; gardens under the scum
Of the forests, and the smashed faces
Of the farms with the stone trickle
Of their tears down the hills' side.
Where can I go, then, from the smell
Of decay, from the putrefying of a dead
Nation? I have walked the shore
For an hour and seen the English
Scavenging among the remains
Of our culture, covering the sand
Like the tide and, with the roughness
Of the tide, elbowing our language
Into the grave that we have dug for it.
Huw Jones - Dwr ( inspired by Tryweryn) Capel Celyn - The drowning of a village
Olive cultivation is ancient across the Mediterranean, but in Palestine, the olive tree transcends agriculture. It is a living record of memory, continuity, and an enduring historical presence. For generations, these groves have been venerated and passed down, sustaining tens of thousands of Palestinian families.
The olive harvest in the occupied West Bank officially began on October 15. A time when families gather in groves passed down through centuries, picking fruit from trees that symbolize a powerful rootedness, resilience, and their deep connection to the land and a refusal to abandon their heritage.
They would help bring in the crops, eat breakfast together in the shade of the trees, and listen to stories and jokes. In the evenings they would bring the harvest back to the villages and directly to the olive press, watching it being processed into oil. The gleaming green and spicy taste of the first bit of freshly pressed oil would be a source of pride and celebration.
As farmers gather their olives currently there's a bittersweet undertone to the usual joy. Under Israeli occupation, the harvest has become a time of violence, fear, destruction, and dispossession as escalating Israeli settler violence, military raids, access restrictions and settlement expansion, including the rapid establishment of dozens of outposts, increasingly prevent Palestinians from reaching their farms and severing their ties to their land.
Out of roughly 2 million olive trees in Gaza before October 2023, only 150,000 trees remain standing. This is a loss of roughly 85% to 90% of the region's olive groves.
There has been a record-breaking Israeli settler attacks on Palestinian olive harvest in West Bank.
Israeli settlers have carried out more than 200 attacks against Palestinians during the current olive harvest season in the occupied West Bank, surpassing the 185 recorded in the 2025 season, the UN said on Thursday.
Ecocide is the deliberate, widespread destruction of natural ecosystems necessary to sustain human life. Many experts would agree that Israel's systematic destruction of Palestinian farmlands, aquifers, and trees would qualify as ecocide.
Under international humanitarian law including the Geneva Conventions, any objects indispensable to the survival of the civilian population like agricultural areas are granted special protections during conflict.
Olive oil and table olives are crucial to Gaza's local agricultural economy, but in Palestinian culture, olive trees are much more than just a commodity. They are symbols of continuity, resilience, and attachment to the soil.
Many groves are hundreds of years old and passed down through generations.Unlike annual crops like tomatoes or cucumbers that can be replanted and harvested in a single season, mature olive trees represent decades of invested capital. Losing them wipes out a reliable source of income for thousands of families, leaving them dependent on foreign aid.
Seasons may change, villages may lose their familiar features, and people may be forcibly separated from their homes, but the olive tree remains a witness to the story of the land and to their right to their homeland, their memories, and their future.
Notwithstanding all obstacles, the olive harvest remains a key economic, social and cultural event for Palestinians. In a way the occupation has even strengthened the connection between the Palestinian people and their trees, and the annual harvest is seen by many as an act of defiance and a symbol of “summoud”, the Arabic term for steadfastness.
The destruction of a tree however is cruelty, it is not "self-defense". Settlers and the military destroying trees just shows they have no true respect for the land and what is growing on it. No matter the historical narratives claimed, the very ideology of uprooting ancient, life-giving groves exposes a colonizing force that fundamentally fails to grasp the sacred, symbolic pulse of the region.
To destroy an olive tree is to wage war on memory; to defend it is to defend the right to exist.The Palestinian people remain as deeply anchored as the trees they plant and protect with their lives,bound by a history that refuses to be uprooted. No matter what the criminals do, this land will not forget the olive trees; or the blood of its children shed upon it.
The following poem by Mahmoud Darwish, details the importance of the Olive Tree as a symbol for peace in Palestine.
The Second Olive Tree - Mahmoud Darwish
Translated by Marilyn Hacker
The olive tree does not weep and does not laugh. The olive tree
Is the hillside’s modest lady. Shadow
Covers her single leg, and she will not take her leaves off in front of the storm.
Standing, she is seated, and seated, standing.
She lives as a friendly sister of eternity, neighbour of time
That helps her stock her luminous oil and
Forget the invaders’ names, except the Romans, who
Coexisted with her, and borrowed some of her branches
To weave wreaths.They did not treat her as a prisoner of war
But as a venerable grandmother, before whose calm dignity
Swords shatter. In her reticent silver-green
Colour hesitates to say what it thinks, and to look at what is behind
The portrait, for the olive tree is neither green nor silver.
The olive tree is the colour of peace, if peace needed
A colour. No one says to the olive tree: How beautiful you are!
But: How noble and how splendid! And she,
She who teaches soldiers to lay down their rifles
And re-educates them in tenderness and humility:
Go home And light your lamps with my oil!But
These soldiers, these modern soldiers
Besiege her with bulldozers and uproot her from her lineage
Of earth. They vanquished our grandmother who foundered,
Her branches on the ground, her roots in the sky.
She did not weep or cry out. But one of her grandsons
Who witnessed the execution threw a stone
At a soldier, and he was martyred with her.
After the victorious soldiers
Had gone on their way,
we buried him there, in that deep
Pit – the grandmother’s cradle.
And that is why we were
Sure that he would become, in a little while, an olive
Poet and Peace Activist Thích Nhất Hạnh was born on October 11, 1926 in Huế, Central Vietnam. Born as Nguyen Xuan Bao, his father, Nguyễn Đình Phúc, from Thành Trung village in Thừa Thiên, Huế, was an official with the French administration. His mother, Trần Thị Dĩ, was a homemaker from Gio Linh district.
Nhất Hạnh was the fifth of their six children. Until he was five, he lived with his large extended family at his grandmother's home. He recalled feeling joy at age seven or eight after he saw a drawing of a peaceful Buddha, sitting on the grass. On a school trip, he visited a mountain where a hermit lived who was said to sit quietly day and night to become peaceful like the Buddha. They explored the area, and he found a natural well, which he drank from and felt completely satisfied. It was this experience that led him to want to become a Buddhist monk.
At age 12, he expressed an interest in training to become a monk, which his parents, cautious at first, eventually let him pursue at age 16 and he joined the Từ Hiếu Temple at age 16 and took the name Thích Nhất Hạnh when he was ordained in 1949 as modern Vietnam's founding revolutionary Ho Chi Minh led efforts to liberate the Southeast Asian country from its French colonial rulers.
Thích Nhất Hạnh (affectionately known as Thầy, which means “teacher”) is deservedly recognized not only as one of the great Buddhists of our time, but also as one of the great contemplatives of any spiritual tradition. Thầy, distilled Buddhist teachings on compassion and suffering into easily grasped guidance over a lifetime dedicated to working for peace.
From the early days of his monastic life, Thích Nhất Hạnh believed that spirituality must be actively engaged in relieving suffering in society. In the 1960s, as war raged in Vietnam, he founded youth relief teams, schools, and a new Buddhist order dedicated to social service.
Thầy, who spoke seven languages in1961 went to the United States to study, teaching comparative religion for a time at Princeton and Columbia universities.
Thầy,plunged into anti-war activism after his return to his homeland in 1964 as the Vietnam War was escalating.As the suffering caused by the war between communist North Vietnam and US-supported South Vietnam intensified, Thay and other Buddhist clergy looked for ways to alleviate suffering and find a way to peace. In Vietnam, Thay established the School of Youth for Social Services (SYSS), a training program for young social workers wishing to bring practical aid and social support to war-torn villages.
Realizing that the roots of the war were outside Vietnam as well as inside it, Thay agreed to come to the U.S. to represent the Buddhist clergy’s understanding of the war and its causes and consequences
In June 1965 he wrote a letter to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. to explain why monks were setting themselves on fire. He stated that it was very difficult to make their voices heard against the war, and burning oneself was done out of a deep desire to help others notice their suffering.
He emphasized that self-immolation in this context was rooted in love and the wish to protect people, differentiating it completely from personal despair or suicide. During a famous interview with Oprah Winfrey, Thầy explained that the self-immolation of monks during the Vietnam War was not an act of suicide, but an act of love and compassion.
In 1966, he met the U.S. civil rights leader in what was a remarkable encounter for both. Thầy told King he was a “Bodhisattva,” or enlightened being, for his efforts to promote social justice and famously persuaded Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. to oppose the Vietnam War by sharing a simple truth: “Men are not our enemies. If we kill men, with whom shall we live?”.
In 1967, King gave a famous speech at Riverside Church boldly articulating his opposition to the Vietnam War.
Thích Nhất Hạnh taught that working for peace is not a matter of anger or blame, but of love in action. “We should not walk ‘for’ peace. We should be peace as we walk,”
The monk’s efforts to promote reconciliation between the U.S.-backed South and communist North Vietnam so impressed King that a year later he nominated Thầy for the Nobel Peace Prize saying "I do not personally know of anyone more worthy of the Nobel Peace Prize than this gentle Buddhist monk from Vietnam," His ideas for peace, if applied, would build a monument to ecumenism, to world brotherhood, to humanity.”“However, no prize would be awarded that year.
Thay’s peace plan urging America to stop bombing and to offer reconstruction aid without ideological strings, resulted in the government of South Vietnam declaring him a traitor and banned him from returning. After the Communists seized control of the South in 1975, he was again refused permission to enter Vietnam. His principled anti-war stance had made him an enemy of both sides, leaving him, he said, “like a bee without a beehive.”
In exile, Thay settled in the south of France and established the Plum Village Monastery, which would be his new home for decades, and remains the largest Buddhist monastery in Europe and America.
.There and in talks and retreats around the world he introduced Zen Buddhism, at its essence, as peace through compassionate listening.There, he also founded the Order of Inter-being, which espouses “engaged Buddhism” grounded in the insight that mindfulness and compassion should translate into concrete action to build peace and well-being in the world.
I happen to share this ethos of compassionate engagement: which emphasizes “social cohesion and collective action” to address challenges and “building the new world within the shell of the old” through cooperation.
Thầy showed that true happiness requires us not only to be peaceful within, but also to act peacefully without – to serve others, promote justice, and heal the wounds of society.
Thay spoke out against the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, saying, “We know very well that airplanes, guns and bombs cannot remove wrong perceptions. Only loving speech and compassionate listening can help people correct wrong perceptions. But our leaders are not trained in that discipline, and they rely only on the armed forces to remove terrorism.”
He encouraged us to address the root causes of violence and cultivate peace in our hearts. Thay brought together Israelis and Palestinians for peacebuilding retreats at Plum Village, continuing his lifelong commitment to ending conflict. Throughout his writings, interviews, and speeches he continued to draw connections between the personal and the collective, promoting mindfulness not merely as a tool for self-help but as a necessary precondition for avoiding war and climate catastrophe.
Thay also spoke out about the urgency of addressing climate change, writing, “There’s a revolution that needs to happen and it starts from inside each one of us. We need to wake up and fall in love with Earth. Our personal and collective happiness and survival depends on it.”
Thay wrote over a 100 books on peace. Some of his best-known are "Peace is in Every Step," "Being Peace," "The Miracle of Mindfulness," and "Living Buddha, Living Christ" In a majestic body of works and public appearances spanning decades, Thầy spoke in gentle yet powerful tones of the need to "walk as if you are kissing the earth with your feet."
Thay is also remembered as being the father of mindfulness which has been hugely successful in the West.The energy of being fully present and aware in each moment. He often guided people in the simple practice of mindful breathing to return to the “here and now,” where life is actually available. “Breathing in, I calm my body and mind. Breathing out, I smile. Dwelling in the present moment, I know this is the only moment,” he wrote. This gentle exercise encapsulates an entire philosophy: through conscious breathing and smiling to life, we generate peace within ourselves. Thay promoted mindfulness not merely as a tool for self-help but as a necessary precondition for avoiding war and climate catastrophe.
In his book, “Living Buddha, Living Christ”, Thay wrote that “mindfulness, the capacity to be here, to witness deeply everything that happens in the present moment, is the beginning of enlightenment”. He also described practices of mindfulness as lighting the “lamps with us” to gain a deeper understanding of our worlds so that we can work towards enlightenment.
Thay wrote that the seeds of mindfulness are in all of us, just as “Buddha nature” described in Buddhism or “Kingdom of God within our hearts” in Christianity.
In the book, “Vietnam: Lotus in a Sea of Fire”, one chapter contains a letter that Thay wrote to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in 1965. Thay pointed to “intolerance, fanaticism, dictatorship, …hatred and discrimination which lie in the heart of” people, as the real enemies ".
Thay was referring to the notion that people have parts which may be marked by intolerance and discrimination against others, which are the enemies, not the individual human beings. Thay highlighted that we need to look at parts of ourselves that are intolerant of others and attempt to heal these parts.
"You learn how to suffer. If you know how to suffer, you suffer much, much less. And then you know how to make good use of suffering to create joy and happiness," he said in a 2013 lecture. "The art of happiness and the art of suffering always go together."
Sadly capitalism has quickly appropriated the practice of mindfulness this technique of meditation, converting it into another instrument of multiplying profits.
This suggests that meditation techniques in themselves do not automatically entail developing more ethical or empathetic attitudes. To my mind, in contemporary Western culture, where almost everyone practices this or that, it needs to be repeated ad nauseam that without deep, hard and continuous work on one’s egotistical limitations, spiritual practices can only be superficial.
Thay was only allowed back into the country in 2005, when the communist-ruled government welcomed him back in the first of several visits. Nhat Hanh remained based in southern France.
The dramatic homecoming seemed to signal an easing of controls on religion. Thầy's followers were invited by the abbot of Bat Nha to settle at his mountain monastery, where they remained for several years until relations with the authorities began to sour over Thầy's calls for an end to government control over religion. By late 2009 to early 2010, Thầy's followers were evicted from the monastery and from another temple where they had taken refuge.
Thầy suffered a stroke in 2014 that left him unable to speak and returned to Vietnam to live out his final days in the central city of Hue, the ancient capital and his place of birth, after spending much of his adult life in exile.
Thầy passed away peacefully at Tu Hieu Temple on 22nd January, 2022, at the age of 95, surrounded by his followers. Per his wishes, his funeral was a silent one, with solemn guests following his teachings of quiet reflection.His five-day funeral, which began on the day of his death, had a seven-day wake that culminated with his cremation on 29 January.
Born in the throes of colonialism and war, Thích Nhất Hạnh was extraordinary in his insight and ability to bring the dharma to the modern world. He showed us how to live with clarity of purpose even when all seems lost.
Thầy’s life was a testament to the power of consciousness: even after a severe stroke late in life, he continued to emanate peaceful presence in his silence, teaching by example that being is sometimes more powerful than words or action. Visionary yet practical, compassionate yet bold, the spirit of Thích Nhất Hạnh lives on in every initiative for peace and well-being. Happy 100th Birthday Thích Nhất Hạn.
"Hope is important, because it can make the present moment less difficult to bear," "If we believe that tomorrow will be better, we can bear a hardship today. "If you can refrain from hoping, you can bring yourself entirely into the present moment and discover the joy that is already here."
-Thich Nhat Hanh
"Peace is present right here and now, in ourselves and in everything we do and see."
On this day in 1967, Argentine revolutionary socialist, Ernesto Rafael Guevara de la Serna,
familiarly known by the Argentinian slang word “Che", was executed on the orders of the CIA after he had been captured by the Bolivian Army in Vallegrande, Bolivia.
The hunt for Che in Bolivia was led by CIA agent Felix Rodriguez. A informant told the Bolivian Special Forces about the location of Guevara's guerrilla unit, and on October 8, 1967, the unit's camp was surrounded, and Guevara himself was captured in the Quebrada del Yuro ravine.
Che was wounded in the leg, and another bullet pierced the magazine of his rifle so that he was unable to fire back. Rodriguez, upon hearing of Guevara's capture, immediately reported it to CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia.
Che Guevara spent the night of October 8-9 in captivity on the floor of the village school of La Higuera, with the bodies of his two murdered comrades lying next to him.
On October 9 at 12:30 a radio order came from the high command in La Paz. The message said: "Proceed with the elimination of Señor Guevara." The order, signed by the president of the military government of Bolivia, Rene Barrientes Ortuño, was transmitted in encrypted form to CIA agent Felix Rodriguez.
The executioner was Bolivian army sergeant Mario Teran, who drew the short straw in a dispute between soldiers over the right to kill Guevara. When Terán, the soldier who would execute him, entered the room, Guevara reportedly said “I know you’ve come to kill me. Shoot, coward! You are only going to kill a man.”
Guevara’s body was strapped to the skids of a helicopter and flown to Vallegrande, a small town 65 kilometres away, before being moved to an open-air laundry in the grounds of a hospital. It was here that the international press was summoned and the famous Christ-like photograph of his lifeless bearded corpse taken by Bolivian photojournalist Freddy Alborta.
Alborta's post mortem photo of Guevara, 1967
It is probable that Che would have been compared to Christ being taken down from the cross in any case. He was in his 30s when he died, he had long hair and a beard, and he gave his life for the cause of the working class and the peasants in a deeply Catholic country. And probably his image would only grown in its inspiration – that change would arrive in Bolivia and that the poor could eventually live in dignity. But the photograph that emerged seems to me to be a powerful visual and artistic reminder of Che’s redemptive powers.
Fearing that it might become a place of pilgrimage, the authorities decided not to bury the revolutionaries in the local cemetery. Instead, they were concealed in a mass grave in the corner of an airfield.
A mural dedicated to Che Guevara in Vallegrande, where his body was taken and displayed to the international press. This is now part of the Che Route, sponsored by the Bolivian government and foreign solidarity groups.
On October 15, Fidel Castro announced Guevara's death to the public. Guevara's death was considered a severe blow to the socialist revolutionary movement in Latin America and around the world.
In his last letter to his children, Guevara wrote “Above all, always be capable of feeling deeply any injustice committed against anyone, anywhere in the world. This is the most beautiful quality in a revolutionary.”
Ernesto Rafael Guevara de la Serna was born to a well-off family in Argentina in 1928. While studying medicine at the University of Buenos Aires, he took time off to travel around South America on a motorcycle; during this time, he witnessed the poverty and oppression of the lower classes. He received a medical degree in 1953 and continued his travels around Latin America, becoming involved with left-wing organizations.
In the mid 1950s, Guevara met up with Fidel Castro and his group of exiled revolutionaries in Mexico. Guevara played a key role in Castro’s seizure of power from Cuban dictator Fulgencio Batista in 1959 and later served as Castro’s right-hand man and minister of industry. Guevara strongly opposed U.S. domination in Latin America and advocated peasant-based revolutions to combat social injustice in Third World countries.
Guevara resigned from his Cuban government post in April 1965, then disappeared from Cuba, traveled to Africa and eventually resurfaced in Bolivia, where he was killed.
The legacy of Che Guevara is constantly evolving in the collective imagination. As a symbol of counterculture worldwide, Guevara is one of the most recognizable and influential revolutionary figures of the twentieth century. An icon of global popular culture, as well as a hero of Third World communist revolutionary movements and a symbol of the Western Leftist Movement. He remains a monumental figure in Latin American history, influencing a half-century of political ideals and movements.
In Cuba, an economic blockade led the island to act in defiance of U.S. power, creating in its wake an internationalist foreign policy. Guevara played a key role in the ideology and action needed to carry out these policies.
Today, despite a 66-year-long US blockade of Cuba and the current intensified blockade that has caused a humanitarian disaster, the country allocates about 14% of its national budget to education. According to the World Bank, Cuba had a 98% literacy rate as of 2021, and UNICEF reports a 100% primary school completion rate.
Education has long been a cornerstone of the Cuban Revolution, and universal education is one of its greatest successes. In 1961, Cuba launched a mass literacy campaign targeting rural areas. Illiteracy declined from 23% to 3.9% that year alone.
Education is completely free in Cuba, even at the highest level. This means that, in addition to primary and secondary school, Cubans can access university education, postgraduate studies, medical school, and all other fields of study at no charge.
According to the U.S. Department of Education, 79 per cent of adults in the United States had sufficient English literacy skills as of 2019. This means that one in five adults in the United States lacks these skills.In September 2025, the Nation’s Report Card revealed that high school seniors' reading scores dropped to their lowest average since 1992, signalling falling literacy rates.
Professors at the University of California system are expressing frustration that their students also lack basic middle-school math skills.
While the United States has long targeted Cuba and its socialist system, it seems that the island country's dedication to investing in accessible educational opportunities for every citizen has generated results superior to those of the capitalist United States, even though the latter has a much larger economy and more global power.
The following photo was taken on March 5, 1960, seven years before Guevara’s death, at a funeral for workers killed in an explosion in a Cuban port that Fidel Castro’s revolutionary government blamed on the Americans.
Guevara, looked on as Castro delivered a fiery funeral oration. For about thirty seconds, he stepped to the front of a crowd near Castro’s rostrum, into the view of newspaper photographer Alberto Díaz Gutiérrez, also known as Alberto Korda. Korda snapped two shots of Guevara, his face resolute and his long hair flowing from under his trademark beret, before Guevara retreated back into the crowd. Perhaps due to his background as a fashion photographer, Korda took a liking to one of the images and cropped it into a portrait, even though the newspaper La Revolución declined to use it.
For several years, the now-iconic photo remained nothing more than a personal favorite of the man who took it. Korda named the picture Guerrillero Heroico—“Heroic Guerrilla Warrior”—and hung it on his wall, occasionally handing out copies to guests. It was not until 1967 that the public would first see the image, which appeared in the magazine Paris Match alongside an article about Latin American guerrilla movements.
During Guevara's, memorial service in Havana, an enormous print of Guerrillero Heroico was hung over the façade of the Ministry of the Interior. The service marked Che’s canonization as a martyr of global revolution, as well as the ascendance of Korda’s image as an icon of rebellion.
The following year the image of Guevara went viral. It appeared on the cover of a copy of Guevara's memoirs, published in Italy. It was also used as the cover of a literary journal advertised on the New York City subway.
In the same year, Irish artist Jim Fitzpatrick created a stylized version of the image, setting a black-and-white Guevara against a red background, and distributed it as widely as he could to honor Guevara’s legacy. The poster bearing this image was shown at the Arts Laboratory in London. It quickly became the image used prominently in the student riots that swept across France in May 1968.
Since then, Che’s face has been commodified, merchandised and objectified, appearing on T-shirts, ice cream wrappers, posters and mural art. His life is told in films, such as The Motorcycle Diaries (2004), in documentaries, plays, and in songs.
Yet the rights to Che’s face are not owned by the Guevara family, but by the photographer and artist who created the image. The famous photograph of Guevara in a beret was taken by Alberto Korda (Alberto Díaz Gutiérrez) in 1960, titled Guerrillero Heroico (Heroic Guerrilla Warrior). British pop artist Sir Peter Blake regarded it as ‘one of the great icons of the 20th century.’
This photograph was the beginning of the commodification of the image of Che. Che’s image is an ever-present political and social emblem that has been morphed in popular culture. It operates as ‘both a fashionable de-politicized logo, as well as a potent anti-establishment symbol used by a wide spectrum of human rights movements and individuals affirming their own liberation.’
Che’s image has become a counter-cultural symbol that operates independent of who he was as a person, metamorphosed from his life as a revolutionary appropriated into a work of art. Hannah Charlton writes in The Sunday Times (2006) that ‘Possibly more than the Mona Lisa, more than images of Christ, more than comparable icons such as the Beatles or Monroe, Che’s image has continued to hold the imagination of generation after generation.’
Che's short life reveals Cuba’s resilience in the struggle to provide the needs of the people through the Cuban Revolution, especially those whose ethnic identity and race are factors in their economic and political oppression.Time magazine selected him as one of the 100 Most Influential People of the 20th Century.
Che remains a polarizing figure; admired by some as a symbol of idealism and revolutionary dedication, a heroic defender of the oppressed and poor,while others criticize him as a violent adventurer, an executioner and the "Butcher Of la Cabaña" while Jean Paul-Sartre, Susan Sontag, Nelson Mandela and many others have regarded him as a hero and an inspiration, a man who was prepared to die for his beliefs.
What made Che unique was the unorthodox current of Marxism-Leninism he represented. Unlike those who believed revolution had to wait until all the perfect material conditions emerged, Che argued that revolutionaries had a duty to create those conditions through struggle itself. His theory of guerrilla warfare held that even a small group of committed revolutionaries could spark broader popular movements rather than waiting indefinitely for history to move on its own.
He believed that revolution was not just an external process, but an internal, almost spiritual, struggle to develop new values, ethics, and forms of consciousness: the creation of a “New Man.”
Che also rejected the idea that socialism could be built in one state and survive indefinitely in isolation, and his life reflected the belief that the struggle for socialism had to be global or risk total defeat.
Che understood the centrality of ethics in politics, the centrality of subjective factors in revolution, leading to the rapid transformation of Cuban society into a giant school of reclaiming Cuban culture and ethical values.
Hence, the literacy and “voluntary labour” campaigns, the advances in education and medicine, and the large scale involvement of people in movements for agrarian reform, housing reform, and so on. These movements and campaigns converted idealistic goals into on-the-ground realities that have continued to evolve, making possible what one could have never imagined even in one’s wildest dreams.
Rejecting the use of capitalist methods to fight capitalism, Che alongside Fidel Castro used the methods of socialist praxis to transform what began as a national liberation struggle into a socialist revolution that would transform institutions and social and human relations through an organised and conscious “praxis” that—despite errors recognised publicly by both of them and their successors—continues till today.
Che also repeatedly warned about the dangers of not seeing the deficiencies of “existing socialism” and of mechanically copying Soviet manuals and methods. He had spoken about this often, and this is also explicitly stated in his writings preserved in Cuba and available around the world. He observed that the “intransigent dogmatism of the Stalin era has been succeeded by an inconsistent pragmatism . . . returning to capitalism.”
He saw the actions and programmes of the Cuban Revolution as “clashing with what one reads in the (Soviet) textbooks” and contributed insightful socialist critiques of both capitalist and socialist societies and their theories.
History has never agreed on what to make of him. His story resists simplicity. What remains certain is that he lived—and died—according to absolute conviction. In the final hours before leaving for a war he would not survive, he was thinking about his children. Not about fame. Not about legacy. But about what values he hoped they would carry forward. “Study and read diligently,” he wrote. “Remember that an individual has no value alone.” Stand for something. Learn everything you can. Never be indifferent to suffering."
In death, Che Guevara would become the iconic symbol of revolutionary martyrdom; giving up his own life with no fear, for the cause of fighting oppression and liberating others. His ideas and actions inspired many leftist movements across Latin America and beyond, particularly among youth and radical groups in the 1960s.Murals, paintings and pictures of Che Guevara can be found all over the world in the poorest areas.
Che went down in history as a man who devoted himself entirely, without reserve, to the noble and difficult struggle for the liberation of man, for the triumph of communist ideals. Che Guevara's life today is an inspiring symbol of heroism and devotion to the ideals of revolution and socialism and he remains a global symbol of hope, resistance, and fighting oppression. Martyrs don't die, they live through us.
In July 1997, his remains were discovered; and sent back to Cuba, where they were reburied in a ceremony attended by President Fidel Castro and thousands of Cubans.In October, the Council of State of Cuba issued a notice designating the period from the 11th to the 17th of that month as a national period of mourning, and his remains were interred at the Che Guevara Square in Santa Clara.
Comrade Che dedicated his life to the struggle against the imperialist bandits who oppress and exploit the world's peoples, chief among them the greatest enemy of the human race, the USA.
“At the risk of seeming ridiculous, let me say that the true revolutionary is guided by a great feeling of love. It is impossible to think of a genuine revolutionary lacking this quality. If you tremble with indignation at every injustice, then you are a comrade of mine. ” -Ernesto 'Che' Guevara
"Above all, always be capable of feeling deeply any injustice committed against anyone, anywhere in the world. This is the most beautiful quality in a revolutionary"- .Ernesto 'Che' Guevara
"Wherever death may surprise us, let it be welcome, provided that this our battle cry may have reached some receptive ear and another hand may be extended to wield our weapons." -Ernesto "Che" Guevara.
Salute . Comrade Che is immortal! Patria o muerte y venceremos! Hasta la victoria siempre!
Photo: an activist paints a mural honouring Che on the apartheid wall in the occupied West Bank.
