Radio Curious

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Story teller, writer, publicist and editor Roberta Werdinger is our guest once again.

In the course of our November 21, 2016, visit when Roberta Werdinger when her personal story Barbwire and Flowers, it was clear that she had more to say. Werdinger is a woman of words, who studies the origin of words and the way in which their meanings have changed throughout history. Fascism is one of those words.

How to recognize and respond to fascism, work with fear and go beyond trauma, is part of our conversation in this program. When Roberta Werdinger and I met in the Radio Curious studios November 26, 2016, she commented that she sees herself as having a hybrid life and modus operandi. We began when I asked to describe her hybrid life and modus operandi.

The book Roberta Werdinger recommends is “The Unconquerable World: Power, Non-Violence and the Will of the People,” by Jonathan Schell

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“Barbed Wire and Flowers”: A daughter’s story of her perception and relationship with her father. He, a survivor of the holocaust, and she, his adult child describes the strength of his life incumbent on her youth, and their visit to one of the two concentration camps where he was interned by the Nazis in World War Two.

Roberta Werdinger, a storyteller, writer, publicist, editor, is our guest in this edition of Radio Curious. Raised as a non-secular Jew and ordained as a Buddhist Monk, plans to include “Barbed Wire and Flowers” in the memoir she is currently writing. I heard her public reading of “Barbed Wire and Flowers” here in Ukiah in June, 2016 I invited her to visit Radio Curious. She did on November 21, 2016. Our visit begins with her reading “Barbed Wire and Flowers,” and I invite you listen for the next 17 minutes. Our conversation follows.
This program was recorded on November 21, 2016.

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The lack of pure water was one of the several things that resulted in the development of wine as a source of potable liquid for human intake.  Putting that aspect of human history in a time and place in relation to social and political events, and the tracing of the different varietals of wine is the topic of this edition of Radio Curious.

Our guest is Glenn McGourty, the Winegrowing and Plant Science Advisor at the University of California, Division of Agriculture and Natural Resources (http://cemendocino.ucanr.edu) located in the hills a few miles northeast of Hopland, in rural Mendocino County, California. This locale has been called the university of our back yard by many of us who live nearby.

Glenn McGourty’s specialty is the history of wine and it’s evolution–how so many varietals came to be and were further developed.  When Glenn McGourty visited the Radio Curious studios on October 18, 2016, we began our conversation with his reflections on the history wine making.

The book Glenn McGourty recommends is “Cold Mountain,” by Charles Frazier.

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It is said that in the early part of World War II, it took 500,000 Italian soldiers to occupy Ethiopia, and one Ethiopian soldier to conquer Rome.

19 years later, this one Ethiopian solder, Abebe Bikila competed barefoot in the 1960 Olympiad marathon foot race in Rome, Italy, leaving all other runners in the dust. Winning the 42 kms, 195 meter race, Abebe Bikila became the first African to win an Olympic Gold Medal. Abebe Bikila, a shepherd from the plains of Abyssinia in rural Ethiopia, had never been away from his family and stunned the world with his extraordinary victory. He became the hero of Rome Olympiad and for years to come a national hero in Ethiopia. Four years later he won the Marathon at the Tokyo Olympiad becoming the first person to win two Olympic Marathon Gold Medals.

In this edition of Radio Curious we visited by phone with the Davey Frankel, from his home in Berlin, Germany and Rasselas Lakew, from his home in New York City. They are the writers, directors and producers of the movie “The Athlete.” the story of Abebe Bikila. Rasselas Lakew portrays Abebe Bikila in the lead role of The Athlete, and was born and grew up in Addis Abbaba, Ethiopia.

“The Athlete” tells the powerful and tragic story Abebe Bikila, a quiet man, who in many ways meets the Homer s description in the Odyssey: ” the distant Ethiopians, the father outposts of mankind, half of whom live where the sun goes down and half where the rises.”

Beyond igniting East Africa s dominance in long distance running, Abebe Bikila became a quiet champion of hope for a continent that was in the midst of its struggle for self-determination. During his career Bikila won 12 of the 15 marathons he entered. Abebe Bikila died of a brain hemorrhage on October 23rd, 1972, two and a half years after his final race and victory in Norway. He was 41 years old.

This interview with Davey Frankel and Rasselas Lakew, which was recorded on May 9, 2011, began when I asked them explain what prompted them to write and produce “The Athlete.”

The movie that Davey Frankel recommends is “My Life Without Me,” directed by Isabel Coixet. The movie that Rasselas La Lakew recommends is “Living Russian, Man With A Movie Camera,” directed by Dziga Vertov.

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What would it be like for you if you were deaf? If you could not speak your first word until you were six? If you had three years of education, your first language was German, and you later emigrated to another country where they speak English?

Ingelore is the first name of a woman who was born in Germany in 1934, and came to America in 1940 at the beginning of the Third Reich, right after Kristallnacht. The film “Ingelore” was made by Inglelore’s son Frank Stiefel, and it tells his mother’s story.

In this edition of Radio Curious, we begin with Ingelore in her own words from the documentary “Ingelore.” As you hear her ability to articulate words in English it’s important to remember she cannot hear.

This interview was recorded on May 29th, 2010 with Frank Stiefel from his home in Santa Monica, California.

The books that Frank Stiefel recommends are “Hand Of My Father,” by Myron Uhlberg, and “The Road,” by Cormac McCarthy.

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Peru is a county about which I’ve been curious for over 60 years, beginning when I first learned of the Inca Empire.  Ten years later the Peace Corps sent me to Peru as volunteer for two years in 1964.

Peru’s current societies are windows into a world in which many Andean people live in the three adjoining countries of Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia.   The complex societies which flourished in this region, centuries before the Inca Empire was destroyed by the Spanish invaders in the 16^th century are still very much a part of the lives of people whose homes and communities are located high in the Andes between 10,000 and 14,000 feet above sea level.  Many still enjoy and celebrate the traditions rooted in the ancient cultures of their land.

When Radio Curious visited Peru and Bolivia in the fall of 2015 we engaged in several conversations about ancient and current times in Peru. Edith Zapata, an independent licensed Peruvian tour guide, based in Cusco, Peru, is our guest in this edition of Radio Curious.

Edith Zapata and I visited in the court yard of a somewhat noisy guest hostal in Cusco, Peru, on November 10, 2015.  We began our conversation with her description of the geological history of the Cusco valley, and moved forward in time to how some of the current leaders of the Catholic Church and some of the people of the greater Cusco area related to each other.

Edith Zapata, a licensed independent Peruvian tour guide, based in Cusco, Peru.  You may contact her by email at ezv27@hotmail.com.  The movie she recommends is “In Search of Happyness,” starring Will Smith.

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In this program we visit Brussels, Belgium, to discuss the effects of the November 13, 2015, Islamic extremist terrorist attacks in Paris, France. 

Our guest is Jean-Jacques Jespers, who recently retired as the anchor for the television news broadcast aired nightly in French on the Belgium National Television Network.  While the terrorist attacks occurred in Paris, France, investigations led authorities to neighboring Belgium in search for the suspects-causing a state of emergency in the country’s capital city, Brussels.

Currently Jean-Jacques Jespers is a journalism professor and a member of the Belgian Journalist’s Committee on Human Rights.  Jean-Jacques Jespers and I first met here in Mendocino County, California, in 1977, when he was the leader of a television news magazine team reporting on California. 

When Jean-Jacques Jespers and I visited by phone from his home in Brussels on November 28, 2015, we began when I asked him to describe what occurred and what the Belgian people’s reactions were to the November 13, 2015, terrorist attacks in Paris and the lock-down in Brussels.

The books Jean-Jacques Jespers recommends are the three volume “Century Trilogy” by Ken Follette. Click here to listen or on the media player below.

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In this 1997 edition of Radio Curious, we visited with Bob Blincoe, a Presbyterian minister, who lived and worked among the Kurds in the Zagros Mountains from 1990 to 1996.  

The Kurdish people have long been aptly referred to as a “millet.”  This is a Turkish term that originated in the Ottoman Empire when it ruled parts of central Europe to the near east from 1430 to 1921.  It means “any ethnic group.” Until the 20th century millets, were able to control their way of life and effectively rule themselves.  Now approximately 25 million Kurdish people live in the Zagros Mountains, where the borders of eastern Turkey, northern Iraq, and northwestern Iran converge.  These Kurdish people live stateless and many homeless in their ancestral homeland.  Currently they have been able to successfully defend themselves from brutal ISIS attacks. 

When Bob Blincoe lived among the Kurds and worked as a community organizer in their ancestral homeland he first spoke Arabic, so he wouldn’t stand out.  He quickly learned Kurdish which he spoke only with great discretion. His stories of the Kurdish people are important to consider now in light of terrorism and other dangers inflicted against them.

When Bob Blincoe and I visited in the studios of Radio Curious in the spring of 1997, we began our conversation when I asked him to describe the Zagros Mountains where so many Kurdish people live.

The book Bob Blincoe recommends is “A Peace to End All Peace,” by David Fromkin.

This program was originally broadcast in May 1997.

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Imagine the human habitat in which we all live changing so rapidly that life as we know it is extinguished. Temperatures that are getting hotter than ever, decades long droughts, catastrophic fires, melting polar ice, rising sea levels, and unprecedented winter storms are expected to radically limit food production and availability of potable water. 

In this, the first of a series on near term extinction of the human species, we visit with Dr. Guy R. McPherson, Professor Emeritus of Natural Resources, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Arizona. Professor McPherson is co-author with Carolyn Baker of “Extinction Dialogs:  How to Live With Death in Mind.”  Together they present what appears to be overwhelming scientific evidence that our environment is headed for swift apocalyptic collapse.  Not only is this extinction likely, it is occurring every day. “How to live with death in mind” is the goal; living with urgency is the practice. 

The point from which average global temperature rise is measured dates back to 1750, the beginning of the industrial revolution–the time at which the ever increasing use of fossil fuels began. Since 1750, the planet has warmed by more than 1 degree centigrade.  McPherson’s book “Extinction Dialogs:  How to Live With Death in Mind,” explains how this small global rise in temperature is leading to a large scale mass extinction on the planet.

When Guy McPherson and I visited by phone on September 14, 2015, while he was traveling near New York, we began our conversation when I asked him to describe the indicators that reveal we’re in an era of unstoppable climate change.

Click here to listen to the program or on the media player below.

Click here to listen to part two and here to listen to part three–a conversation with “Extinction Dialogues” coauthor Carolyn Baker.

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