After 11 episodes, the most wins and being the second most popular all season, Rebecca finally says goodbye to Mission Catwalk. We, at Twocanview, want to congratulate you, Rebecca, for all your hard work and for bringing recognition to Belize. It is just the beginning girl! Congrats to Ryan on his win.
One of the three designs Rebecca created.
The look says it all.
We cut off the hand the could have fed us.
England is celebrating Queen Elizabeth’s 60 years of rule with a grand show of pageantry and seemingly genuine sentiments of gratitude and pride. I’m going to say something that is NOT going to be popular but I have long held this opinion, even as a child. One could accuse me of being influenced by my father who opposed independence in 1981. While his son, Henry Jr., was meeting the Duke, my dad was at the cayes building his house, refusing to be a part of what he saw as a premature move on George Price’s part.
However, I am unwilling to say that it is his influence which makes me have this very strong conclusion still to this day: we should not have asked for independence when we did. I really believe that we were unprepared as a people to take over the role of leadership. I believe that it was a very self serving agenda upon which George Price embarked. He cared more about his legacy than the shambles in which his decision would leave us.
See, what we refuse to admit is that we did not have the tools for rule. Not yet. We are a small nation with a small population with little and poor infrastructure. Old George asked us to enter the game very late and compete globally with economic giants. We didn’t have roads; functioning medical clinics; developed industries; an educated and experienced pool of people from which to chose our new government; an army; a proper airport….and the list goes on. You can say to me now: “Well we have all of that now.”
Really? At what cost? Our crime rate is ASTRONOMICAL! We owe sooooooo much money and our people are suffering with a truly disgraceful number of 50% BELOW the poverty level. Our justice system is a JOKE. Yeah. I said it. There is NO justice when lawyers run our country into the ground, using their knowledge to intimidate and STEAL from our people.
We should have prepared ourselves BEFORE jumping up and down like impatient children waiting for the ice cream truck. We did not need to get independence in order to develop as a nation. We should have made the British Empire develop allllll that stuff for us first. After all they owed us. They took all of our resources and left us with nothing. And we let them because we had stupid, blind, false pride. We were gonna show them we didn’t need ’em. So we kicked them out and left ourselves stranded and struggling. Nowhere is safe in Belize anymore. Is this what we imagined? Was our precious independence worth all this killing and strife?
Our best minds keep leaving, never to return, afraid, because the risk hardly seems worth it. Our children are raped and murdered with no recourse. Our people are dying in record numbers from all kinds of diseases and cancer is ravaging our population. Guatemala is still claiming us and forcing us to have a referendum over something that should be moot by now. Our citizens are having to fight ignorance and archaic laws to just establish basic rights. Children are going to school hungry or none at all. Our land is soon to be ours no longer since the only way to make money is to sell the one asset we do have to the Americans or the Chinese.
Don’t get it twisted people. I have no love for colonialism nor any allegiance to royalty but I sure as shit would have preferred making them give us what we deserved as their subjects before kicking their asses out because now we sure are in the crapper and I don’t know how we are going to get out of shit hole we dug ourselves into.
The following statement was released by the Belize Press Office stating that Kim is out of the hospital:
Yesterday, we finally got to hear from the First Lady herself, expressing gratitude to all those who sent her messages of encouragement:
My fright and panic after being admitted to the Intensive Care Unit and learning of the severe heart damage that the chemotherapy drugs have caused me, were greatly relieved by the knowledge that so many of you were praying for me, and willing me to survive this. I am truly grateful and it is impossible to properly describe the comfort that your outpouring of support has brought me. I thank each of you and want you to know that you motivate me to keep on fighting. It has been a draining, wrenching past few days. But while my heart will continue to be literally weak, it and my spirit are strengthened by your emails, texts and FB messages. The journey continues and I and my family will always be grateful. With God, your support and my determination, I look forward to the future. I ask all of you to continue to pray for all those on the battlefield of diseases. Thank you ALL!!
-Kim Simplis Barrow on her Facebook page 06-01-12
First Lady, Kim Simplis Barrow
Belmopan. Thursday, 31st May, 2012.
UPDATE ON MRS. KIM SIMPLIS-BARROW
Mrs. Barrow remains in the Intensive Care Unit at a Miami hospital receiving treatment for complications with her heart and fluid in her lungs. She is showing signs of improvement and is strengthening. It is expected that Mrs. Barrow will be transferred from the Intensive Care Unit to a regular hospital room in the next couple days. Prime Minister Dean Barrow remains by her side in Miami and is scheduled to return to Belize over the weekend.
The Prime Minister and his wife thank everyone for the continued prayers and support.
From: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Office-of-the-Prime-Minister-Belize/317057388365804
She is someone’s child
This picture is going around ..not sure who she is or even if she is Belizean, American or what. Most people are sympathetic but many myths and simply wrong information is being perpetuated as well. One person said that the reason it keeps happening is because the women tolerate it and don’t press charges….
I have serious beef with this one.
There is a psychological process going on here that is being willingly ignored. A woman doesn’t grow up thinking “I’m going to marry an abuser when I grow up.” Even if she is in a home where she witnesses violence, she is hoping for someone who loves her and will care for her. So when this person, in whom she has placed her trust, to whom she has made a commitment, pledged her love, starts to hurt her, she is confused, betrayed and embarrassed. She is ashamed because she believed that she was a smart person who “knows better” and makes good decisions. So at first she may hide it and not tell anyone because she hopes it is just a one time thing….a phase, it will go away.
And then she has children with him and they can have a decent life with Christenings and Easter vacations, Christmas gifts and Valentine dinners. All the while, she is being beaten and told she is worthless. He isolates her from her friends, calls her a whore if she wants to go out with them. He tells her she can’t talk to so and so because she is a bad influence. Before you know it, she doesn’t even go to visit her mother because he accuses her of neglecting her duties as a wife. Soon, she doesn’t have time anyway because he expects a clean house, three meals a day and the kids must be clean and in bed on time.
He monitors everything…her cell phone…who is she talking to? who is she texting? why shi di waste time pan facebook? Even if she works, he might confiscate her paycheck or make it impossible for her to save anything because he spends it on liquor, electronics, gambling, friends.
Everything about her is attacked: her independence, her intelligence, her capabilities, her security, her mental and emotional well being, her identity. This is the woman you want to go to the police station and tell her story to a bunch of untrained bullies? When they arrest the abuser, he threatens her in front of them but they do nothing? She is frightened that he will come after her and her children. He promises to kill her when he is released on bail. Where is she supposed to go? How is she supposed to feed her children? Pay the mortgage?
Everyone has a lot to say. I will help you. You need to leave him. Have some pride. How can you let someone do this to you?
The problem is who will be there in the wee hours of the night when every creak and whisper makes her jump? afraid he has come to make good on his promise?
My aunt-in-law went to live with my uncle and aunt in the hopes that they could protect her. She left her son with the man who married her at 14, raped her everyday and punished her by making her sit on a hot comal, bare assed. He came for her in the middle of the day when my aunt and uncle had gone to run some errands. He slit her throat and sliced her belly open in front of his 4 year old son and his two nieces. They watched as my mother scooped up my aunt’s guts and press them back into her abdomen until they could get her to the hospital. She lived but only because my uncle could afford to send her to Jamaica to recover and also make sure that my other uncle was prosecuted and sent to jail….
Most people don’t have that and still…she almost died anyway.
We just don’t have the proper supports set up to protect those who need it most. The most we can do is help each other on a one on one level. Don’t hang with people you know are abusive…shun them…make them know you disapprove. You men who like to say that the women deserve it because they stay…go yell at the guy beating her…tell him you are watching him and that YOU won’t tolerate HIM. You women who sleep with them knowing what they do to their wives, just don’t…tell them you deserve better. Raise sons to respect people. Raise daughters to fight for themselves. Be part of a community movement to address and confront this issue because in the end…it will affect all of us in some way. And stop blaming the victim. Please.
Rebecca Stirm has made it to the Final Five! This Belizean girl has won four episodes, been in the top for two, and safe for three…NEVER has she been in the bottom! The closest designer in ranking has two wins to Rebecca’s four. GOOD LUCK REBECCA!!!!! We are prouda you gial!!!!
First Lady, Kim Simplis Barrow
Please join us here at Twocanview in somber meditation for our First Lady, Kim Simplis Barrow. She continues to fight for her life in a Miami hospital.
–Anonymous
Have you ever watched kids
On a merry-go-round?
Or listened to the rain
Slapping on the ground?
Ever followed a butterfly’s erratic flight?
Or gazed at the sun into the fading night?
You better slow down.
Don’t dance so fast.
Time is short.
The music won’t last.
Do you run through each day
On the fly?
When you ask “How are you?”
Do you hear the reply?
When the day is done
Do you lie in your bed
With the next hundred chores
Running through your head?
You’d better slow down
Don’t dance so fast.
Time is short.
The music won’t last.
Ever told your child,
We’ll do it tomorrow?
And in your haste,
Not see his sorrow?
Ever lost touch,
Let a good friendship die
Cause you never had time
To call and say “Hi”?
You’d better slow down.
Don’t dance so fast.
Time is short.
The music won’t last.
When you run so fast to get somewhere
You miss half the fun of getting there.
When you worry and hurry through your day,
It is like an unopened gift….
Thrown away.
Life is not a race.
Do take it slower
Hear the music
Before the song is over.
John McAfee
So I wasnt going to update you all about McAfee ’cause seriously…don’t we have a good picture by now that he is just out and out nuts? But several people sent me new articles, including my husband and my brother, so ARIA made me update you all! LOL
In the first one, he tries to appeal to our sympathies but really…it just comes across as a desperate ploy. Still, did you know that there are no toilets in the jail cells in Belize? Who knew you had to use a cut up milk jug???? That needs to change….and no beds? What the hell? Sux for you!
The second one explores his background a little more…I had no idea he was British! From Gloucestershire! Can you even pronounce that???
Happy reading lovers! AND pretty please, go tell those very concerned ladies who were so ashamed of backwards Belize and who thought we should APPOINT McAfee to discuss the Superbond ALLLLLLL about these articles….pleease? They are so concerned and realllllly should know how he is doing. LMAO OMG SMH I would put more acronyms but you get the point…wait…one more: ROTFLMAO
We just started our blog a mere 5 months ago and so much has happened! To Aria and me…to Belize…none of it could have anticipated. BUT Aria seems to have assessed the political climate accurately at least. Check out one of her first pieces: Tell me what you think!
Reflection
by Aria Lightfoot
“If we could first know where we are, and whither we are tending, we could then better judge what to do, and how to do it.”
Abraham Lincoln
In the ad lib words of President Lincoln, to get to where we are going, we must know where we are. 2011 is fading; 2012 is approaching fast and Belize faces municipal, city council and general elections. The implications are for a positive financial outlook for the Belize voter. The money for votes exchange is off to a head start and the political warriors are gearing up for battle. At this juncture it is difficult to determine what the future leadership of Belize will look like, I have my own speculations, however in politics, the only certainty is uncertainty. Voters are fickle and needy; political parties’ popularity fluctuates between love and hate. Hate while in government and love while in opposition.
I predict in 2012 that it really doesn’t matter which party holds the majority in the House and municipal elections. Crime, poverty, corruption, inefficiency, apathy of leadership, politics of patronage, special interest politics, the growing divide between rich and poor will remain constant. Are the major political parties reluctant, stubborn and arrogant? Or are politicians merely a reflection of our corrupted society? The voting patterns in Belize suggests a yearn for change; however the inability to articulate it has resulted in major changes at the polls with little changes to much else. What does corruption even mean to the average citizen? Does the average citizen know that hustling on the side, hooking up family members and friends, pushing friends to the front line, erasing the professional and personal line, selective enforcement, turning a blind eye, paying tax paid government officials to complete work, accepting money for votes, buying anything on the black market, inflating contracts to benefit friends and family, hiring and promoting due to relationship rather than skill; educating friends and family and supporters, denying access to qualified citizens, special favors of any kind…equals corruption? Lets us begin the arduous journey of reflection on the impact we make on the society.
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