I've been following what is happening in Ukraine over the last 6 months and I see with pain this poor brotherly Slavonic country is being literally destroyed by Radicals. It is obvious that the Revolution in Ukraine looks very similar to Revolution in Egypt, the War in Syria and obviously doesn't happen by itself but was financed by foreign forces to serve someone's interests. I known that in Ukraine people live poor, but even after the change in power it is less likely that they will start living better.
In my view Ukraine's people got infected by European Union's external appearance for prosperity and freedom. Such an outlook is just on the surface and everyone who lives in EU knows that well. It is my understanding that the European Union is based on fairy tales for freedom, friendship of nations based on economy. EU sets itself on rules and regulations and vague words combined with economic factors. With the crisis appearing one after another in country members of EU (Greece, Slovenia, Cyprus, Spain etc.) it is obvious that the EU is artificial union and not working well. Many country who belong to EU for some years already have seen that and even some like England want out of the European Union. With this in mind it is fully unclear to me why Ukrainians want and think that membership in EU will solve there economic problems … on the contrary once they join the EU, they will have to fulfill thousands of rules and regulations which will destroy there local country economy and will make them put out all country money out of the country into the pockets of Western Nations. Same nation genocide scenario was executed in Bulgaria and give "good satisfactory fruits". By the rules and regulations on Bulgaria our local economy was destroyed making our contry market completely dependent on other Western country market for daily products and external Western business investments. The failure of Bulgaria as a concurent on EU marketrun the wheel of EU economy, opening a new space for new investments and trade. Same happened with Romania and most likely will happen also with EU's newest member Croatia very soon.
Ukraine is a brotherly nation to Russia and even historically this two nations share very similar faith. Of course the two nations differ but the similarities and even the language makes them brotherly nations. Ukraine was part of Russian Empire and is called Ukraine (from the word end part of Russia). Historically Ukrainian were known as "MaloRus", Russians were known as "Rus" and Belarusian as (White Rus). Currently in Ukraine live 8,334,100 Ethical Russians (17% of Ukraine's population), the highest density of Russians is in Crimea with 58 % of Ethnic Russians.
Of course the economic crisis in Ukraine as every Crisis is not only a Crisis of material goods but a Crisis of spirituality. Big part of Ukrainian Church separated from Russian Orthodox Church and are not in canonical unity with rest of Orthodox Churches. Besides that the number of Uniats (Orthodox Christian who are under the rule of the Roman Pope) seem to be growing over the last years there. After the fall of USSR, the number of protestants and other Christian sects in Ukraine also has grown. The decay of Russian Orthodox Church diocese in Ukraine set a space for more and more religious spiritual divisions which affected the material country realm. Talking about religion it is worthy to mention a very curious and not much known fact is that current Prime Minister Oleksandr Turchynov (who took place of Viktor Yanukovych) is protestant pastor. The other key actor of the Ukrainian Revolution isArseniy Yatsenyuk who is not even Urainian but Ethic Ukrainian Jew.
Concerning Crimea historically give birth to Kievan Rus (and so to say is like mother land of all Russians as we known them), from year 1783 to 1917 was a territory part of Russian Empire, then from 1922 to 1991 it was part of Soviet Union, from 1991 to 1998, Crimea was autonomous Republic. Crimea is well known from history where Russian Empire fought with French Empire in Crimean War (1853-1856). It is no strange why Russia wants Crimea so hard as they have historically fought for this land and over the last few centuries it was Russian teritory. It will be no strange either if Crimea becomes a reason for another war …
So Who is right Russia or the Western World (European Union / United States)? For me from the facts it is more than clear that neither the Euroepan Union nor United States share a close history / language / culture with Crimea, neither ever this was their territory. Meaning Westerners doesn't have the right to escalate the situation by putting oil in the fire, but should better keep silent and let Ukraine Russia and Crimea solve their problem alone (in a peaceful way). But why Europeans and Americans try to intervene? Well simple economically European Union has more interest to have a new Member country membering ~ 45 millions and a nice tourist destination Crimea than to have a member with 3 million less, and US's influence on world by having a western oriented Ukraine will raise. This is the reason why they make so much noise and don't want to accept the referendum in Crimea for unification with Russia, because they have politic interests there.
Ukrainians was mislead to believe the fight for Ukraine is a nation heroism, where in reality what is happening in Ukraine is just serving biggest countries interests. The bad thing is what is happening there is a good reason for emerge of national war and we know from history such a small conflicts combined with a world economic crisis led to World War I and World War II. I don't say that such a war will emerge but I think Western World should be careful to not provoke a war in Europe through recognizing Crimea's people decision to become part of Russia.
POSITIVE RESULTS FOR RUSSIA DURING REIGN OF VLADIMIR PUTIN
For last 12 years of government Putin increated Russia's budget 22 times.
Increated warfare spendings 30 times.
Increated GDP 12 times (by GDP Russia moved from 36th to 6th place in the World).
Increated Russian golden reserves 48 times.
Returned back 256 oil, petrol and other natural resources sources / mine-yards (under non-Russian government curretnly are only 3 of
Russia's source for natural resources.
Nationalized 65% of oil industry and 95% of gas industry.
For a 5th consequential year 2nd / 3rd place in export of grain (just for a comparison USA is currently ranked 4th largest weed exporter). The avarage sallary of national institution employed increased 18.5 times.
Avarage pension increased 14 times.
Reduce of population decreased from 1.5 million per year in year 1999 to 21 000 in 2011, i.e. 71 times.
Prohibited deputies in Government to have bank accounts in foreign banks.Prevented American attack against Syria.
Put an end to war in Chechnya.
From January y. 2000 to present times Russian ruble rate changed from 28 Rubles per dollar to 29 Rubles per dollar – i.e. severe inflation in Russia ended.Present day Russia is a normal European country not that poor country where approimate pension was 20 dollars and where masters was the financial pyramids and the International Monatery Fund
In 1992 Eltsin cancelled completely export duty of oil products. In 23 January E. Primakov government forced again oil taxes. In export price of 9.5 dollars per barrel custom taxes were 2.5 euro per tone and in price 12,5 dollars per barrel 5 euro / tone.Such a minor increase in taxes produced 14 billion rubles in already empty Russian budget.
In August 1999 Eltsin assigned Putin for prime minister. In just a month later the export taxes Putin increased duty taxes to 7.5 euro/tone and in 8 december to 15 euro/tone. Till then incomes from oil taxes has been steadily increasing and nowadays exporters calculate in national budget half of incomes origin from oil prices and export taxes. From January to November 2007 Russian customs influxed in national budget 2.57 trillion Rubles. Oil export takes has drastically raised incomes of citizens.This had major impact on construction business.All Russia nowadays is in reality enormous "construction yard", to illustrate from January to September 2007 375 009 homes were built occupying 34 million square meters. Cement factories cannot satisfy local market requirements and Russia is forced to import cement from China. Increased incomes of population led to increase in estates search, this increased apartment prices and as a consequence increased incomes from building activies. Result is in consutriction business are invested enormous amounts of capital and a real construction boom is observed. Another consequence of increased income was increase in demand for automobiles. Just for 2006 the quantity of demanded automobiles in Russia increased with 45% and reached 32 billion dollars with a count of sold new cars numbering 2 million. By indicator of sold new cars Russia orders on 5th place after in Europe taking place right after Germany, Great Britain, Italy and France.
Currently are being build a couple of new automobile plants, and existing ones increase production volume. All this is consequence of increase in demand and therefore from increase in citizens income. rn>For 10 years budets expenditure for social politics (pensions and social help) increased with 30%.
Before Putin pensions were under existence-minimum with appr. 25% and in 90th pensions were not paid at all. Now pensions are 50% above existence-minimum and is constantly increasing. In 2000 approximate sallary in Russia was 2223 Rubles (appr. 80 dollars). Now approximate sallary in Russia 19174 rubles (apprx. 660 dollars). Purchase of domestic goods for 10 years increased 10 times. Number of own automobilse increased 3 times. Putin nationalized YUKOS, without 'making nervous' emering Russian busness in a market manner – with bankruptcy and auction. All this happened lawful, following laws adopted by democratic parliament. The president doesn't have the right to use other means. Formal occasion for arest of Hodorkovski were taxation frauds of YUKOS. In such machinations are involved practically all large private companies and this is the reason why nobody believes that excuse. It is unbelievable. However Putin simply defended Russia's interests.
The proof for that is transmission of actives of YUKOS to national corporation "Rosneft". It would have been more righteous if this actives were just confiscated … but there are laws and Putin had just stick to them. After all the President can't go out of framework of his jurisdiction. It can be just added that after Khodorkovsky was injailed, collectivity (incomes)of taxes of ex-actives of YUKOS increased 80 TIMES! In y. 2004 Putin finally removed law "Agreement for Separation of Production (Separation Agreement)". This law was annexed during Eltsin's regime, in order to benefit Oligarchs (Khodorkovsky, Gusinsky, Beresovsky etc.) in order to make possible Russian oil reserves to be possessed by Western (American and British) oil corporations. By the power of this law Russian oil and natural fields went into international jurisdiction, and therefore the money from Russian oil doesn't entered budget of Russia but influxed in Western companies. Money from oil drills went mainly into Dutch "Shell" for covering of corporation expenses. Only after something remained from that they sold it to Russia. In 2006 Putin declared following in that connection "And now we don't get anything from them and if they increase their profit we will not receive it even in 10 years from now." In fact to this moment Russia didn't get any money from their own oil. After the law was removed in 2004, revenues in budeg increased from 3 to 4 times. After cancellation of contracts for oil fields "Sakhalin-1" and "Sakhalin-2" Russia's loans to American company calculated to 700 million dollars, for that time this was too much. The whole Anglo-Saxon world pricked against Putin because of a simple reason: "UK planned to assure its oil reserves for years to come in expense of Russia – only Germany and France who didn't have a direct interest in that process kept neutral … In 1992 – 1995 the head aparatus of Russia formed its view based on foreign advisors. All legislation from 1990's was hence written by them. In Russian country administration was working 10 000 foreign coaches. George Soros was financing writting of student history books where the Battle for Stalingrad was mentioned in only 2 pages and about the meeting between Elbe and Soviet and American soldiers (Elbe Day) in 10 pages.
: In that mournful times on pupils notebook you can see portrainst of 4 American presidents of USA. Until this very day there are left relics from that anti-Russian propaganda but hopefully with time Putin will throw away american propaganda from education system. But why Putin cannot immediately dismiss all this hostile to Russia clerks? The reason is simple: Constitution of Russia written under dictation of Western coaches, does not allow quick changse into it. Nowadays the President is just one of many clerks with resticted power. Yes truly president power is a bit bigger than other clerks, but country head can't influence everything. The president can't even define his ministers, even though by law this is part of his jurisdiction.
Overfulfilment of budet in times of Putin govern allowed craetion of country Stabilization fund. Nowdays is collected huge golden-currency reserve and practically Russia doesn't have external debt.
War in Kavkaz is over, separatists were destroyed. All famous terrorist leaders were liquidated physically. Even Zelimkhan_Yandarbiyev was killed in Qatar, Basaev and Umarov were also destoyed. Putin promised "to drawn them if necessary even in their own toilet dish" and he fulfilled his promise. Of course, separatism is not completely destroyed, such conflicts cannot be quickly solved, but nowadays situation in Kakvaz is the best possible. If Chechnya's elite feels the power of Moscow and benefits of being a surrender – then separatism will fade away. This is exactly what happens. The attempts of western spy centrals to supply terrorists are still leading to separate terr. acts but this is the maximum – there will be no war anymore.
For 10 years Putin increased political influence of Russia in world and lifted its image. Today Russia follows its own interests, and not Western ones. It is not coincidence that Putin was recognized as the most influential world politic of 2013. He prevented Russia's devastation led country out of catastrophe caused by Gorbachov and Eltsin. That's the rason why Western Medias abhor him and compare him with devil. Everyone interested in political life in Russia seems, that the battle against corruption took unforeseen measures. At least 2-3 times weekly on TV are shown arrests of clergy and policeman and news inform about sentences against government employees. Lets not forget Crimea, here is how it was given to Ukraine.
In 1992 on signature of Treaty of Belovesh fordissolution of USSR Ukrainian representative Leonid Kravchuk noticed that Boris Eltsin is "in play with Vodka" and is delaying signature, he urged him with words: –
"Borya if you like take Crimea, please just sign the contract!".
Drunk Eltsin nobly waved hand:
"What for I need Crimea? Here it is your present!"
Few days ago Putin removed consequences of this "joke with history" – and people of Crimea sung and danced on squares, returning to their motherland.
Here is Why Russophobes hates Putin!
Source Materials from http://rublogers.ru Translated by: Georgi Georgiev This translation is copyrighted and copying can only be done with explicit allowance of author Author or link to original translation http://rublogers.ru/
A week passed since we Christian celebrated Resurrection of Christ (Pascha). Each year on first Sunday after Easter in orthodox Church is celebrated the so called Thomas Sunday. So why is it called Thomas Sunday and why it is the day of disbelievers? The root of this ancient Christian feast comes after commemoration of Christ desciple St. Thomas who disbelieved the testimony of ( 10 apostles ) and the Virgin Mary that Jesus Christ is Risen from the Death.
The disbelieve of Thomas was logical and human cause even though Thomas was with the Apostleswith Christ for 3 years, saw all Jesus miracles and shared the Secret Supper (Last Supper), and even knew in advance (heard by Jesus on Last supper) that Jesus will betrayed mocked, hanged on the Cross and Rise from the death on the third day, he disbelieved.
Thomas Sunday (Sundy of Thomas) is "the day of Disbelievers", because all are disbelievers in moments of their life not only those who believe God but all the humanity! Even the most faithful Christian, be it a deacon, monk or priest has difficult moments in life where God's existence or providence for one's faith is seriously questioned. The fallen nature of man is such that the initial belief in God given to man in Eden (Paradise garden) is broken, and only in Jesus's name through the Gift of Faith given by the Holy Spirit, believe in God is restored.
Thomas very much like unto everyone of us doubted the rumors of Christ resurrection and said he would only believe in Resurrected Christ only if he sees his hands nails print and put his fingers into Christ’s wounds to test he is not seeing a Ghost but Christ is alive in a body after his death.
Here is the Gospel reading re-telling the story in short: “Then the same day at evening, being the first day of the week, when the doors were shut where the disciples were assembled for fear of the Jews, came Jesus and stood in the midst, and saith unto them, Peace be unto you.” (John 20:19)
“But Thomas, one of the twelve, called Didymus, was not with them when Jesus came. The other disciples therefore said unto him, We have seen the Lord. But he said unto them, Except I shall see in his hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the print of the nails, and thrust my hand into his side, I will not believe.” (John 20:24-26)
And after eight days again his disciples were within, and Thomas with them: then came Jesus, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst, and said, Peace be unto you. Then he said to Thomas, “Put your finger here; see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it into my side. Stop doubting and believe.” Thomas said to him, “My Lord and my God!” Then Jesus told him, “Because you have seen me, you have believed; blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.” Jesus did many other miraculous signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not recorded in this book. But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.” (John 20:31)
We Christians should be joyful for have not seen Christ in Flesh but have believed for we are blessed for his believe without seeing.
By same faith in God without seeing him even in old times the Jews were led by the Lord God in the desert have won wars by their believing without seeing God, prophets has prophecised, Simeon (The God receiver) hold The Savior (Christ) in his hands, by faith David won the battle with Goliath, by faith we understand the universe was formed at God’s command, by faith we know that the visible came out of the invisible.
o Kyrios mou kai o Theos mou (Greek) – My Lord and my God (Jn. 20:28) this declaration of faith clearly shows an unexpressable excitement of Thomas and his unexpectency to see Christ resurrected. Here it is interesting that here the son of God Jesus Christ is called by Thomas exactly how Jewish used to call God Yahweh (One and Only God) in the Old testament.
Today the evangical story is very accurate for our generation – a generation of disbelievers, even we who say we believe often doesn’t justify our believe with our deeds, we say we believe but we don’t keep God’s commandment “to love God and our neigbor like ourselves.” Often only difference between believers and disbelievers is on Sunday we believers visit Church and “play Christians”, but even but in daily life our deeds are same like unbelievers. Often many are disbelievers not because they reject God but because they never heard the Gospel or misheard it, also we disbelieve because we’re very much like st. Thomas, we often say “I will believe in God if I see him”, but even Thomas who saw God before the Crucifix and knew him disbelieved – a proof that often seing once could still leave space for doubt. The glorious event of Christ showing himself Alive to Thomas was made by Christ to establish the Church and strengthen faith of first Christians in resurrection. Nowadays there are plenty of people who question God’s existence saying that they will believe if they see but they’re not given to see the resurrected Christ because God knows that even if we see the Lord Jesus Christ resurrected we would try to rationally explain the phenomenon with holograms, modern technology or science.
Thomas Sunday is not only a day of Thomas disbelieve it is a day of disbelieve of all humanity. , St. Thomas should be an example even to all of us Christian disbelievers and non-believers that even if we disbelieve and doubt and strive to see God, He is powerful to come and appear Resurrected in His Glory to our souls. Let us therefore have the Wisdom of the Holy Apostles and say together with them “Lord, Increase our faith.” Luke 17:5
If you're working in a middle or big sized IT company or corporation like IBM or HP, you're already sucked into the Outlook "mail whirlwind of corporate world" and daily flooded with tons of corporate spam emails with fuzzy business random terms like taken from Corporate Bullshit Generator
Many corporations, because probably of historic reasons still provide employees with small sized mailboxes half a gigabyte, a gigabyte or even in those with bigger user Mailboxes like in Hewlett Packard, this is usually no more than 2 Gigabytes.
This creates a lot of issues in the long term because usually mail communication in Inbox, Sent Items, Drafts Conversation History, Junk Email and Outbox grows up quickly and for a year or a year and a half, available Mail space fills up and you stop receiving email communication from customers. This is usually not too big problem if your Mailbox gets filled when you're in the Office (in office hours). However it is quite unpleasent and makes very bad impression to customers when you're in a few weeks Summar Holiday with no access to your mailbox and your Mailbox free space depletes, then you don't get any mail from the customer and all the time the customer starts receiving emails disrupting your personal or company image with bouncing messages saying the "INBOX" is full.
To prevent this worst case scenario it is always a good idea to archive old mail communication (Items) to free up space in Outlook 2010 mailbox. Old Outlook Archived mail is (Saved) exported in .PST outlook data file format. Later exported Mail Content and Contacts could be easily (attached) from those .pst file to Outlook Express, leaving you possibility to still have access to your old archived mail keeping the content on your hard drive instead on the Outlook Exchange Mailserver (freeing up space from your Inbox).
Here is how to archive your Outlook mail Calendar and contacts:
1. Click on the "File" tab on the top horizontal bar.Select "Cleanup Tools" from the options.
2. Click "Cleanup Tools" from the options.
3. Click on the "Archive this folder and all subfolders" option.
4. Select what to archive (e.g. Inbox, Drafts, Sent Items, Calendar whatever …)
5. Choose archive items older than (this is quite self-explanatory)
6.Select the location of your archive file (make sure you palce the .PST file into directory you will not forget later)
That's all now you have old mails freed up from Outlook Exchange server. Now make sure you create regular backups ot old-archived-mail.pst file you just created, it is a very good idea to upload this folder to encrypted file system onUSB stick or use something like TrueCrypt to encrypt the file and store it to external hard drive, if you already don't have a complete backup corporate solution backuping up all your Laptop content.
Later Attaching or detaching exported .PST file in Outlook is done from:
File -> Open -> Open Outlook Data File
Once .PST file is opened and attached in Left Inbox pane you will have the Archived old mail folder appear.
You can change Archived name (like I did to some meaningful name) like I've change it to Archives-2013 by right clicking on it (Data File properties -> Advanced)
Budget of European Union for 2011 is 142 billion Euro. Main source of budget income are installments from country members. Installments paid to EU consist about 1 of countries GDP – and approximately this is the amount of money paid per EU country member.
For Bulgaria installment is about 426 million euro. The bigger GDP is the bigger the amount of money the respective country pains to the overall European Union budget. Even though payments of member countries is only 1% of GDP, this is the source for about 70% of income of EU.
Other source of money for European Union community comes from VAT taxes, and countries customs taxes (over import / export goods) collected on external border of EU community. In national budgets. Member countries give out 75% of their quotes over the custom incomes, collected in external borders of EU. In national counry budget only 25% of money made from customs control imports and imports influx. In Bulgaria's case we can be talk about the import crossing borders of Macedonia, Serbia and Turkey. Import from VAT taxes in 2011 are 3 370 billion leva and from customs 131 million leva. What percantage of this money went to European Union knows only experts. For last year the Brussels money for Bulgaria are only 1.33 billion Euro (just to compare Poland received 16 736 billion euro). What is even more sad is that money coming from European union for so called funds influx into the pockets of well known oligarchs.
As it looks even though the glorifications with which Bulgarian government gave to the acquisition of this 1.33 billions eur-obrussel gifts during last year our coutnry still remains net sponsor of European budget. Here are not included the country econonic losses of the membership in EU, for example the closure of reactors of our Nuclear Power Plant in Kozloduy. In mean time about 1% of budget of EU community comes from installments from EU employees, unspent money from EU country members as well as receipts from fines from firms and companies for breachment of laws for protectition of competition and normative acts. Primary supplier in European Union budget is Germany.
In 2011, Germany paid to EU 27 954 billion euro. This is about 19.7 of all the Union incomes.
Second to Germany by paid country member fee to EU is France with 23.273 billion euros, about 16.4% of all EU income.
Third is Italy with 18 447 billion euros or 13% of all EU budget.
As prior mentioned in 2011 direct installment of Bulgaria is 0.426 billion euro (without VAT quotes and incomes from taxation). Less installments paid Esthonia, Lithuania, Malta, Cyprus, Luxemburg (!!!) and Slovenia. Even though all this countries has less teritoriy and less population all this countries are much richer and has ahigher GDP per capita!
Hungary (10 million people)'s installment is 1.135 billions and Romania's installment (Romania – 21.7 million people) was 1.419 billion euro.
Finally – lets take a look of EU country installments per capita of some of member countries.
Last year the avarage european give for Brussels burocracy 0.78 euro a day!
Question is how it is possible for everyone to pay 0.78 euro for European Adminsitration? – if there is high unemployment in Bulgaria and a lot of people doesn't receive even 0.78 a day?
European Union returned money in terms of funds does not create fabrics or industry and therefore doesn't create employment – doesn't reduce unemployment ?
Does really Bulgaria and we Bulgarians advantage of the European Union?
Avarage Bulgarian paid 0.16 euro per day – the lowest individual installment in union.
average Latvian, Romanian and Lithuanian, paid (0.17, 0, 18, 0.24 euro cents a day).
The most paid citizens of the excessively rich principality
Luxemburg – 1.52 euro a day per person, followed by Danes, Belgians, Swedes, Dutch, Irish, French and Austrians (ranging from 1.47 euro to 0.98 euro).
As some of European Union citizens might not known,few million of Euro of this money is spend on a move of European deputies from Brussels to Strasburg every month (money given for travel costs of EU deputies and physical move of resources from Brussels to Strasburg). The exact sum spend per year for this unmeaningful move (in order to fulfil European community old legislation varies from 150 to 200 million a year!)
Every Last Friday of July is System Administrator's day. This relatively new technocrat tradition started as suggested by the system administrator Ted Kekatos in 2000.
SysAdmin Day or (SAD) 🙂 as it is also famous is a day to appreciate the achieviments of anyone seriously involved in IT industry.Now is time to say SAD day is not a day for programmers to celebrate as there is separate Programmer's day / Day of the Programmer feast or (DOP / DOPE ) 🙂 that is celebrated on the 256th (hexadecimal 100th, or the 28th) day of each year (September 13 during common years and on September 12 in leap years).
System Administrator Appreaciation Day – (SAAD) was historically inspired by Hewlett Packardmagazine advertisement in which a system administrator is presented with flowers and fruit-baskets by grateful co-workers as thanks for installing new printers.
DOPE's started as proposed by Valentin Balt and Michael Cherviakov, employees of Parallel Technologies (a software company). In 2002, they tried to gather signatures for a petition to the government of Russia to recognize the day as the official programmers' day.
The modern usual way to celebrate Sysadm day is to get your system administrator a day. If you're at poisition to administrate a couple of hundreds of Windows hosts, you can send a prank message to your colleagues reminding them to buy you a beer or mass mail / set a Outlook Meetingreminder that system administrators – doesn't drink flowers and chocolate 🙂
A Day In The Life Of A SAN Administrator
Since 2000, a lot of UNIX / Linux sysadmins and geeks tend to organize gatherings and Free Software celebration meetings on the SAD day.
SysAdminDay has inspired plenty of other pranky novels and music to glorify the remarkable event 🙂
Here are few to cheer you up.
System Administrator's Day song
Sysadmin day (Karaoke)song
Here are also some PoC for some weird ways to celebrate the day of the system administrator 🙂
On 23 October (10 of October in Julian Calendar every year in Zograph Monastery in Holy Mount Athos is celebrated the martyrdom of the 26 Martyrs who were martyed by Latin crusaders in October 10, 1280. The 26 martyrs were burned alive after refusal to accept Union with the Roman Catholic Church as ordered by Byzantine emperor Michael VIII Paleologos. The then wanting to secure his throne emperor gave allowance for Crusaders together with his mercenaries Tatars and and Turks to go and “convert” the Orthodox Slavs to accept the union with the pope who wanted a primacy in the Church. Mt. Athos stood in firm opposition to the Union. The Athonite monks sent a letter to Michael pointing out that the primacy of the Pope, his commemoration in the churches, celebrating the Eucharist with unleavened bread, the insertion of the “filioque” [“and from the Son”] into the Creed, could not be accepted by Orthodox, and they asked the emperor to change his mind. “We clearly see,” the letter said, “that you are becoming a heretic, but we implore you to forsake all this and abide in the teachings that were handed down to you…. Reject the unholy and novel teachings of a false knowledge, speculations, and additions to the Faith.”
Holy Theotokos – The Virgin Mary icon which spoke with a human voice to a Zographou monk
An icon spoke to an old monk warning that the “enemies of Christ” are coming. The monk went to forewarn the brothers (as he was living 30 minutes afar in a grave-yard), but for his surprise the Holy icon of the Theotokos which spoke to him was found on the monastic entrance. The brother went and told the abbot (Igumen) Thomas who told to the brothers to either flew in the woods if they’re weak in spirit and to the strong he said to stay and cofess the Holy Orthodox faith. Abbot Thomas together with the 23 monks (24 monks including the abbot) toghet with 4 pilgrims decided to stay in the monastery and suffered martyrdom. The Crusaders who were returning from Jerusalem sent by the ungodly emperor tried to convince the 26 confessors to accept Roman Catholic doctrines such as “filioque” (The teaching that the Holy Spirit cames also from the Son) and to celebrate the eucharist with unleavened bread (like the Jewish) and wanted the confessors to accept the papal union accepted also by the emeror Michael. The 26 Martyrs rebuked these heresies and explained that the “filique” is against the decisions of the 7 Church Councils. Also they give the proof that the Holy Spirit doesn’t proceed from the Son by retelling how John The Baptist baptized Christ and how the Holy Spirit descent over the Lord Jesus Christ in form of a dove. This didn’t convince the papists and the truthful words of the Zographus monks rebuked their error the papists were angered and burned the tower with the holy Martyrs alive. One of the monks fall of the burning tower and the latin though he is dead left him behind however he survived more 30 days! – even though he was on a dying bed and later told what happened to the brothers which came from their hiding places to the monastery. The Holy Martyrs prayed from the fire their last prayer to God to save the Holy Mount Athos and every true Christian on earth from heresies. When they ended their prayer they heard a voice from heaven “Rejoice for great is your reward in heaven!”. The Roman Crusaders heard the voice and were scared howeveras their spiritual eyes were darkened by the lack of the Grace of the Holy Spirit, they kept in their heart tightening. The Martyrdom happened according to Greek chronicles on 10 of October 1280.
The names of the Martyrs for Christ were as follows:
Igumen Thomas, and the monks Barsanuphius, Cyril, Michael, Simon, Hilarion, James, Job, Cyprian, Sava, Jacob, Martinian, Cosmas, Sergius, Menas, Joasaph, Joannicius, Paul, Anthony, Euthymius, Dometian, Parthenius, and four laymen.
The tower building where the holy martyrs were burned was partially kept even though the fire until 1874 however the tower was already too old and it was about to ruin – that’s why it hadto be destroyed. To preserve the memory about the martyrdom of 26 martyrs all brothers of the Zographou monastry decided in one spirit to build on its place a monument.
This happened the same year 1873. The monument had to be sanctified on the day when the memory of the martyrs is celebrated at the eve after sunrise began a night vigil. The night was moonless and on the heaven one could see only few stars. All around was silence. During the vigil exactly in midnight, after beginning the living and martyrdom of the the holy Zographos martyrs”, above the church all 600 hundred people saw a fire column. Column lighted up the whole monastery and the whole region with such a bright light, that even the small objects in the monastery could be seen. This divine column stayed over the Church for 3-4 minutes and moved and stayed above the monument for 3-4 minutes more and after that started ascending above and formed a ring like a crown, crowning the place where the holy martyrs suffered.
This unusual event continued for about 15 minutes. An eyesights of the miracle were all the brotherhood, guests and hermits who came from nearby Sketes for the feast.
That’s how the Almight God has shown by this miracle omen showing in front of everybody how Godly was the martyrdom of this great confessors of the true faith and loyalty to the Holy Orthodox Church.
Holy 26 Martyrs and Cofessors of the true faith pray the Lord Jesus Christ to save our souls!
Presentation (Introduction) of the Holy Mother of God (Virgin Mary) to the Solomon's temple (at that time of event the second temple) is celebrated on 21th November each year in the Orthodox Church (some Orthodox Churches like Russian / Serbian Orthodox celebrate the feast 13 days later because still celebrating the feast according to the Julian Calendar). Feast is celebrated also on November 21 in Roman Catholic Church but not celebrated in Protestant Church, because the feast is part of Church's tradition and its source of veneration is not the Holy Bible but the apocryphal book the Infancy Narrative of James (Gospel of James)also known as Protevangelion dated from (~ 147 A.D. – 170 AD)
The feast is one of the Great feasts in the Church part of 12 Central Church Feasts;
September 8, the Nativity of the Theotokos September 14, the Exaltation of the Cross November 21, the Presentation of the Theotokos December 25, the Nativity of Christ/Christmas January 6, the Baptism of Christ – Theophany, also called Epiphany February 2, the Presentation of Jesus at the Temple March 25, the Annunciation The Sunday before Pascha (Easter) – the Entry into Jerusalem or Flowery/Willow/Palm Sunday Forty Days after Pascha (Easter) – the Ascension of Christ Fifty Days after Pascha (Easter) – Pentecost August 6, the Transfiguration August 15, the Dormition (Falling Asleep) of the Theotokos
The feast commemorates the entrance of the Holy Theotokos for a first time into Jerusalem's temple which (for Jewish was the only temple where believed God lived in his full Glory). The Jewish even though gathering in Synagogues to read the Old Testament (Talmud) and pray, does not understand Synagogues in the sense we Christians understand Churches. According to Old Testament given revelation to the Jews, there was one temple holding the (The Ark of the Covenant) nowadays said to be kept in Ethiopian Orthodox Church in the city of Axun. In this temple people went for a special pilgrimage, thanksgiving to God and prayer. The Temple of Jerusalem was a religious site for pilgrimage which is similar to Mecca is for Muslim and as Jerusalem's Tomb of Jesus (The Church of Sepulchre) is for us Christians. The temple was separted in 3 major parts: Porch, Holy Place and Holy of Holies. In the Holy Place only priests and priest helpers could enter to service to God and in the Holy of Holies only the High Priest could enter once a year to sacrificy animal according to Jewish Custom. For us Orthodox Christian the High Priest nowdays is the Bishops, Arch-bishops, Metropolitans and Patriarchs).
All believing members of the Jewish community B.C. had to be presented "officially" in front of God in the Holy Temple. When the Holy Virgin was born from the already aged (around 90 years old) St. Joachim and St. Anna. The parents out of thankfulnes to God for giving them a child dedicated their child Mary to God and when Virgin Mary turned 3 years old, st. Joachim and st. Anna decided the time to fulfill their promise and offer the Holy Theotokos to the Lord has come and after gathering other young neighbor girls (which were to introduce Mary) holding lighted torches walked in front of the young Mary.
Remarkably the Holy Theotokos walked straight without even looking back to their parents weeping (as most children does) or felt regret for being separated with parents. It was remarkable miracle showing she was choosen by God to become the Mother of the Saviour when her parents left her on the first high step (out of 15 big steps) leading to the temple, she could climb freely like a grown person without falling or showing any weakness a usual kid would do. As the young girls were singing from the Holy of Holies the High priest being told in advance by the Holy Spirit came out to receive the young kid which later become the Mother of our Saviour Jesus Christ.
The young Mary run in joy to the hands of the High Priest Zacharias who were waiting her at the gate of the temple with other elders outrunning the other maidens.
Zacharias blessed her saying, "It is in you that He has glorified your name in every generation. It is in you that He will reveal the Redemption that He has prepared for His people in the last days." Then, Zacharias brought the child (being moved by the Holy spirit) into the Holy of Holies place where only the High Priest was permitted to enter once a year on the Day of Atonement. He placed her on the steps of the altar, and the grace of the Lord descended upon her. The Holy Theotokos arose being overfilled by the unspoken joy that only the Spirit of Truth.
The Entrance of the Theotokos into the Temple signifies her total dedication to God and her readiness for her future vocation as the Mother of the Incarnate Lord.
HYMNS OF THE PRESENTATION OF THEOTKOS TO JERUSALEM TEMPLE
Apolytikion (Fourth Tone) Today is the prelude of God's pleasure and the proclamation of man's salvation. The Virgin is clearly made manifest in the temple of God and foretells Christ to all. Let us also cry out to her with mighty voice, "Hail, fulfillment of the Creator's dispensation."
Kontakion (Fourth Tone) Today, the most pure temple of the Savior, the precious bridal chamber and Virgin, the sacred treasure of God, enters the house of the Lord, bringing the grace of the Divine Spirit. The Angels of God praise her. She is the heavenly tabernacle.
Nowadays having a a touch screen mobile phone has become like a standard. I'm not such a big fan of Touch screen technology, thus I've been fighting with the idea to own a touch screen phone for a year or so. Just till recently I happily lived with my old Nokia 9300i with a physical QWERTY keyboard for already 4 years.
Unfortunately lately while talking with my Nokia I started getting frequent voice interruptions missing words in my phone call conversations and need to ask person I'm talking to, to repeat his words / sentence in order to understand what is communicated .. I'm economic person and therefore don't like bying anything new if it is not absolutely necessary so I opened the phone and clean it hoping that this will solve the conversation issues but with no luck. With this half-usable mobile my only option left was to buy a new mobile phone.
I'm not very rigorious on what a mobile phone should be and I'm very much minimalist by heart so I was thinking of bying new cheapest available Nokia phone on the market and solve my "issue" quick and efficient, only problem was I'm quite used already of using my handy QWERTY phone as a note taking device thus I preferred to not buy a keypad mobile phone but get again a smartphone with physical QWERTY.
I have consulted with some friends who are more knowledgable on what's latest on mobile phone market with a question what will be a good substitute for my Nokia Communicator 9300i and heard comments like: 'IPhone is the most functional and superior in interface', while some friends and colleagues adviced me: 'Choose an Android based phone as Android is Linux based and gives more freedom to the user as well as has more free applications to install'
I appreaciated my friends help but I didn't like the idea to buy a Smartphone with a touchscreen display – virtual keyboard is not so confortable as having a physical one and besides this is a very slow interface compared to physical keys. Thus initially strongly rejected the idea of bying a phone without a physical keyboard. After some weeks of pondering and checking in the market – in 3 Major mobile operators shops in Bulgaria MTel, Globul and VIVACOM and HANDY store. I've find out currently on the market there is no good price / quality and functionality ratio (qwerty keyboard mobile) available. My options were limited to either by a Nokia Asha 210 or some variance or a Blackberry mobile.
In first glimpse I liked the Nokia ASHA 210 – QWERTY powered mobile but after noticing the blue Facebook "F" button got quickly jolted. The sales lady offered me a couple of other Nokias with Qwerty keyboard as well as a Blackberry 9320 Curve.
After a quick test of all QWERTY mobiles, found the intertface on both is so inferior to IPhone's IOS and Android based phones. I asked my HP workmates for advice of a good QWERTY bundled mobile phone with Android and was referred to Motorolla Droid 3 – which seems to among the only options on the market for mobile Phone which have both Android Operating System and a Physical QWERTY keyboard. Motorolla Droid 3 seemed to be exactly the mobile I was looking for but unfortunately it is not available in Mobile phones stores in Bulgaria and only in bulgaria is only offered for sale as a second hand and I had to buy it over the Internet (I prefer not to buy on the Internet). Even if I bought it as second hand DROID 3's price is too high for my budget – 250 EUR!
I wanted to buy economic phone and same time to have a good balance between price and phone modernity, same time don't tie myself with mobile operator yearly tax plan thus decided to pay my whole mobile price in cache (no credits, no binding 2 / 3 year conversation plans).
After evaluating the options on Market I stopped on two mobiles identical by price 150 EUR I could choose between Samsung Galaxy Trend Lite or ZTE Blade 3. The sales lady adviced me its better to get the ZTE Blade 3 than Samsung Galaxy Trend Lite (S7350) because ZTE has better Camera (5 Mpixels), a better Display and has much less hardware issues than Samsung Galaxy Lite.
Finally I bought the ZTE Blade 3 and nowdays I'm trying to get used to it and to be honest even with a week passed I still can't get used to the Virtual Keyboard…
Android interface is quite shiny but a little bit chaotic if compared to design use interface I've tested on IPhones. Android OS seems to behave very weird at times but in general is quite easy to use. Managing / installing / Removing applications from Google AppStore is done by only 2 clicks. My major concern on Android is its highly addictive. I've catch myself, since last week I spend much more time using my mobile than before with my Nokia Communicator …
To conclude it I would say living with a smartphone has its advantagous (you can easily check weather prognosis / news) and do a number of things with it, but it is addictive .. obviously its easy to become an Android addict and spend your free time on useless stuff like installing / testing new apps and playing with phone. Having a smartphone just like I priorly suspected is a big time eater and it seems my hypothesis that its better to live without a smart phone is true. But who knows, perhaps its just a moment addictiveness just like with any new thing posession – time will show. In meantime I believe my ZTE Blade III – purchase was a good deal as it gives me opportunity to explore Android OS. I'll stop here with my ranting and excuse myself if the article was too boring …Please drop me a comment with mobile types and names who had QWERTY keyboard and a modern OS. Very sadly it seems the QWERTY hardware keyboard mobiles will soon be dead and gone …
Merry Christmas to all Eastern Orthodox Christians!
I wish to all my Russian blog readers Christ's blessings, Wisdom of the 3 Wise man following the star. Humility of Christ for being born in a Cave and love of Mother of God Virgin Mary and Joseph to the incarnated Lord in flesh, Joy of the universe for the Universe rejoiced seing the birth of the savior of us sinful humans!
The first Church building on top of Nativity Cave begun by Saint Helena, the mother of saint Emperor Constantine.
The Basilica was destroyed a couple of times throughout the 3th, 4th, 5th, 10-th , 14-th and 18-th centuries in attempt to wipe out memory for Christ's birth and futile attempt of early times Roman emperors to destroy christianity. Today Bethlehem Church is situated on Palestinian territories and place for pilgrimage of both Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholic Christians. Its interior is a very interesting mixture of a classic Orthodox Christian and a Roman Catholic basillica.
There is plenty of confusion and misunderstanding on the topic why bigger part of Christians worldwide celebrate Christmas on 24th against 25th of December and why more than half of Eastern Orthodox Christians celebrate on 6th against of 7th of January?
In fact it is interesting fact that in the early Christian one holy apostolic Church, Christmas and Eastern was celebrated many times as this two feasts since beginning of the Church are center of Christian faith. In later times, when Church was already formed as an Eastern and Western Church, there are Church canons on exact date to celebrate Christmas and Eastern following the Julian Calendar (introduced by Julius Caesar in 46 BC). In later times with development of Science it was found that this calendar was not so precise and another Church calendar was introduced in y. 1582 by Roman Catholic pope GregoryXVIII (Gregorian Calendar named after pope). I will not get into details but from modern science Astronomical point of view Gregorian calendar is more scientifically correct. The Gregorian calendar quickly become in secular life because of its mathematical precision. And by Western Roman Catholic church Influence and desire to be more scientifically correct parts of the Eastern Orthodox Church partly accepted use of the Gregorian Calendar for counting the Church feasts. Because of that many of the feasts in those Eastern Orthodox Churches moved in forward with 13 days like the Romanian and Bulgarian Orthodox Church. However due to Church canon part of the feasts in Eastern Church can't be celebrated according to the Gregorian Calendar dates. Most important feast dates is the Resurrection day (Eastern), which according to Orthodox Church rule has always to be one week after the Jewish Pascha. There are plenty of problems that emerged due to change of acceptance of reformed Church calendar in part of the Eastern Orthodox Church, however what is most important is that the difference doesn't separate Orthodox Christian it just gives us reason to celebrate feast twice 🙂
Holy Theotokos – The Virgin Mary icon which spoke with a human voice to a Zographou monk
