Tag Archives: March 2024

The New York Times — Tuesday, March 26, 2024

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U.N. Security Council Calls for Immediate Cease-Fire in Gaza as U.S. Abstains

The U.S. decision not to vote on the resolution drew criticism from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel, who ordered a delegation to hold back from a planned trip to Washington.

Trump Criminal Trial Is Set for April 15 as His Attempt at Delay Fails

Donald Trump is poised to become the first ex-president to go on trial on criminal charges, in a case related to hush money paid to a porn star.

The First Flight of Their Lives: An Airlift After Agony in Gaza

The evacuees make up only a tiny fraction of the thousands of civilians, including many children, who have suffered grievous injuries over the course of Israel’s monthslong campaign against Hamas and its bombardment of Gaza.

Barcelona: Are Top Sights As Good As On Instagram?

DW Travel (March 24, 2024): Barcelona is one of the most popular Spanish cities for visitors and social media is filled with beautiful pictures of its most popular attractions.

Video timeline: 00:00 Intro 00:41 Sagrada Família 04:22 La Rambla 05:48 Park Güell 07:10 Our conclusion

But are they really that stunning in reality? We take a closer look at the famous La Sagrada Família, the La Rambla Boulevard, and Park Güell.

Previews: The New Yorker Magazine – April 1, 2024

A dog looks out a window.

The New Yorker (March 25, 2024): The new issue‘s cover features Mark Ulriksen’s “Standing Guard” – The artist depicts the tail-wagging occasion of the first signs of spring.

Bryan Stevenson Reclaims the Monument, in the Heart of the Deep South

“The Caring Hand” by Eva Oertli and Beat Huber.
“The Caring Hand,” by Eva Oertli and Beat Huber, is one of more than fifty sculptures at the new Freedom Monument Sculpture Park.Photographs by Kris Graves for The New Yorker

The civil-rights attorney has created a museum, a memorial, and, now, a sculpture park, indicting the city of Montgomery—a former capital of the domestic slave trade and the cradle of the Confederacy.

By Doreen St. Félix

The National Monument to Freedom, in Montgomery, Alabama, is a giant book, standing forty-three feet high and a hundred and fifty feet wide. The book is propped wide open, and engraved on its surface are the names of more than a hundred and twenty thousand Black people, documented in the 1870 census, who were emancipated after the Civil War. On the spine of the book is a credo written for the dead:

A Dutch Architect’s Vision of Cities That Float on Water

The Thâtre LÎle Ô in Lyon seen across the water.

Your children love you.
The country you built must honor you.
We acknowledge the tragedy of your enslavement.
We commit to advancing freedom in your name.

What if building on the water could be safer and sturdier than building on flood-prone land?

By Kyle Chayka

In a corner of the Rijksmuseum hangs a seventeenth-century cityscape by the Dutch Golden Age painter Gerrit Berckheyde, “View of the Golden Bend in the Herengracht,” which depicts the construction of Baroque mansions along one of Amsterdam’s main canals. Handsome double-wide brick buildings line the Herengracht’s banks, their corniced façades reflected on the water’s surface. Interspersed among the new homes are spaces, like gaps in a young child’s smile, where vacant lots have yet to be developed.

News: Violent Chaos In Haiti, Moscow Concert Terror Attack Suspects

The Globalist (March 25, 2024): The crisis in Haiti continues to spiral as political parties edge closer to forming a security council. Will a new government halt the Caribbean nation’s nosedive?

Also, fugitive separatist Carles Puigdemont plans to run in Catalan elections, the latest trade and economy news and a special interview with ambassador Mark Green.

The New York Times — Monday, March 25, 2024

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Screams and Blank Stares of Shock: Horror at a Russian Concert

The violent attack on Moscow’s outskirts on Friday was a scene of chaos and terror. “You’re just running to figure out where else to run,” one attendee said.

Russia’s Battle With Extremists Has Simmered for Years

The Islamic State has long threatened to strike Russia for helping the Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad, stay in control.

How a Pandemic Malaise Is Shaping American Politics

Four years later, the shadow of the pandemic continues to play a profound role in voters’ pessimism and distrust amid a presidential rematch.

Design Tour: Carwoola Residence In Queensland

The Local Project (March 24, 2024) – Located in Mooloolaba on the Sunshine Coast, Carwoola Residence by Reitsma is a super house surrounded by white beaches and deep water access. Delivering a brief to Reitsma, who were in partnership with Clipsal, the clients listed their essential needs for their super house, which included maximum privacy as well as a place to celebrate their interests of boating and automobiles.

Video timeline: 00:00 – Introduction To The Super House 00:25 – The Waterfront Location 00:36 – Client’s intention 00:53 – Walkthrough Of The Super House 01:47 – Electrical Design With Clipsal 02:16 – Designed For Comfort 02:53 – Exploring The Upper Level 03:41 – Features Of The Saturn Zen Range 04:18 – The Moon Circle 04:36 – A Car Enthusiast’s Basement 05:01 – Materials And Highlights Of The Project

As such, the super house has been built and designed with the intention to allow the owners to store multiple cars, entertain and have access to the rear canal system. The angled shroud of the facade adds a depth to the characteristics of the exterior design and architecture. Upon entry, the house tour leads under a concrete portal, which is used to compress the space before opening up into an expansive void that gives views up to the sky. From here, the oversized pivot front door blurs where the inside and outside of the super house meet. Further inside, the house tour reveals another full-height void that tapers to a frameless window that looks out onto the pool and Mooloolaba wharf.

The interior design brings the essence of water right to the front door and immediately ignites the desire to explore what lies beyond. The privacy walls running north and south of the home are used as a buffer to shield the neighbours’ views and give the owners utmost privacy. However, these walls end at the rear of the home where they then open up to the views of the Mooloolaba wharf. In the outdoor living area, the architect has created a cascading effect where the entertaining areas waterfall towards the wharf to create a beach-like element to the super house. This is also done to create more viewing opportunities from inside.

Travel In Greece: Touring The Mountains Of Epirus

TRACKS – Travel Documentaries (March 23, 2024): From mountain ranges with snow dusted peaks and the clear blue sea, the beautiful country of Greece boasts 13,000 km of shoreline.

Today we look at the region of Epirus, starting in the wilderness near the Albanian border, we go through little mountain villages to the historically significant town of Ioannina and then then all the way down to the Ambracian Gulf. Learn about the lives of locals in the area, from shepherds, herb collectors, tavern owners, and the caretaker of a cliffside monastery.

Sunday Morning: Stories And News Analysis From London, Paris And Vienna

Monocle on Sunday, March 24, 2024: Emma Nelson, Nina dos Santos and David Bodanis on the weekend’s biggest talking points.

We also speak to Monocle’s editorial France and North Africa correspondent, Mary Fitzgerald, and our Vienna correspondent, Alexei Korolyov, for the latest on the Slovakia elections.

The New York Times — Sunday, March 24, 2024

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Russia Arrests 4 Suspects in Moscow Attack as Death Toll Climbs to 133

As the Islamic State claimed responsibility, President Vladimir V. Putin vowed to “identify and punish” those responsible and tried to implicate Ukraine.

The Brutality of Sugar: Debt, Child Marriage and Hysterectomies

An investigation into the sugar-cane industry in the Indian state of Maharashtra found workers ensnared by debt and pushed into child marriages and unnecessary hysterectomies.

Inside the Republican Attacks on Electric Vehicles

President Biden’s new rule cutting emissions from vehicle tailpipes has deepened a partisan battle over automotive technology.

The New York Times Book Review – March 24, 2024

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THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW (March 23, 2024): 

In Téa Obreht’s Latest, a Refugee Seeks Home in a Ruined World

An illustrated cross section of a house, showing rooms full of animals, trees, water plants and people.

“The Morningside” reckons with climate change and its fallout while finding hope in the stories we preserve.

By Jessamine Chan

THE MORNINGSIDE, by Téa Obreht


The elegant, effortless world-building in Téa Obreht’s haunting new novel, “The Morningside,” begins with a map. Island City resembles Manhattan, but alarmingly smaller, the borders of the city redrawn by the rising water. There’s the River to the east, the Bay to the west. Here, hurricanes and tides have made building collapse a constant danger, the freeway is visible only on low-tide days, food is government rations, the wealthy have fled “upriver to scattered little freshwater townships,” and gigantic birds called rook cranes are everywhere.

An Exquisite Biography of a Gilded Age Legend

In Natalie Dykstra’s hands, the life of Isabella Stewart Gardner is a tribute to the power of art.

The serpia-toned photograph portrays a woman in a dark taffeta dress wth a bustle. Her hat is adorned with a dark plume.

By Megan O’Grady

CHASING BEAUTY: The Life of Isabella Stewart Gardner, by Natalie Dykstra


Bright, impetuous and obsessed with beautiful things, Isabella Stewart Gardner led a life out of a Gilded Age novel. Born into a wealthy New York family, she married into an even wealthier Boston one when she wed John Lowell Gardner in 1860, only to be ostracized by her adopted city’s more conservative denizens, who found her self-assurance and penchant for “jollification” a bit much.

Luminous Fables in a Land of Loss

The Tiger's Wife: A Novel See more

By Michiko Kakutani

Téa Obreht’s stunning debut novel, “The Tiger’s Wife,” is a hugely ambitious, audaciously written work that provides an indelible picture of life in an unnamed Balkan country still reeling from the fallout of civil war. At the same time it explores the very essence of storytelling and the role it plays in people’s lives, especially when they are “confounded by the extremes” of war and social upheaval and need to somehow “stitch together unconnected events in order to understand” what is happening around them.