September 30th is
Chewing Gum Day
Fall Astronomy Day
Ghost Hunting Day
Mulled Cider Day
National Public Lands Day
International Translation Day *
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MORE! Hans Geiger, Julie Andrews and James Dean, click
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WORLD FESTIVALS AND NATIONAL HOLIDAYS
Judaism – Yom Kippur (Day of Atonement) – ends at sundown
Shi’a and Sunni Muslims – Ashura/Tabuik – mourning for Husayn ibn Ali and remembrance if Myharram
Abkhazia – National Liberation Day
Bhutan – Dassain
Botswana – Botswana Day
India – Durga Puja
(Festival of Hindu goddess Durga)
Lesotho – General Elections Holiday
Marshall Islands – Manit Day
(Culture Day)
Nepal – Vjaya Dashimi
(Part of Dashain Festival)
Sao Tome and Principe –
Agricultural Reform Day
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On This Day in HISTORY
737 – Battle of the Baggage: The Turgesh tribe drives back the Umayyad invasion of Khuttal (now part of Tajikistan), then follow them south of the Oxus River and capture their baggage train
1207 – Rumi, Persian mystic and poet, is born
1530 – Girolamo Mercuriale born, Italian philologist and physician, noted for his work De Arte Gymnastica
1541 – Spanish conquistador Hernando de Soto and his forces enter the territory of the Tula (or Tulia) people in present-day western Arkansas, encountering fierce resistance
1788 – The Pennsylvania Legislature elects the first two members of the U.S. Senate: William Maclay of Harrisburg and Robert Morris of Philadelphia
1791 – Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart opera The Magic Flute (Die Zauberflote) premiered at ‘Theater auf der Wieden’ in Vienna, Austria
1801 – Zacharias Frankel born, Bohemian rabbi and theologian; founder of Conservative Judaism
1802 – Antoine-Jerome Balard born, French chemist; discovered the element bromine
1814 – Lucinda Hinsdale Stone born, educator, feminist, club organizer, Michigan Women’s Hall of Fame inductee
1832 – Ann Jarvis, American activist, the mother who inspired Mother’s Day; activist for public health education for women to reduce infant mortality and death from disease; her daughter, Anna Marie Jarvis, is the founder of the Mother’s Day holiday in the U.S.
1846 – Dr. William Morton performs a painless tooth extraction using ether
1852 – Sir Charles Stanford born in Ireland, English composer and conductor
1860 – Britain’s first tram service begins in Birkenhead, Merseyside
1875 – Anne Henrietta Martin born, suffragist, author, first woman to run for US Senate in 1918
1882 – Hans Geiger born, German physicist; introduced the Geiger Counter
1882 – First hydroelectric power plant begins operation in Appleton WI
1883 – Nora Stanton Blatch Barney born in England, American civil engineer, architect, suffragist and peace activist; one of the first women to graduate with an engineering degree; granddaughter of Elizabeth Cady Stanton. While she was the first woman admitted as a member of the American Society of Civil Engineers in 1906, their “liberal-minded generosity” balked at making her a full Fellow when she applied in 1916. It was not until 99 years later, in 2015, that her “significant contributions” were finally honored with a posthumous Fellowship
1895 – Madagascar becomes a French protectorate
1897 – Charlotte Wolff born in Prussia, British physician and psychotherapist; her writings on sexology, especially lesbianism and bisexuality, are influential early works in the field
1901 – Thelma Terry born, American bassist, first woman instrumentalist to lead a notable jazz band, Thelma Terry and Her Play Boys, in the 1920s and 30s; a young Gene Krupa was one of her Play Boys early in his career
1906 – The Royal Galician Academy, Galician language’s biggest linguistic authority, starts working in Havana Cuba
1907 – McKinley National Memorial for the president dedicated in Canton, OH
1915 – A Serbian Army private becomes the first soldier in history to shoot down an enemy aircraft with ground-to-air fire
1924 – Truman Capote born, American author; Breakfast at Tiffany’s and In Cold Blood
1935 – Porgy and Bess premieres in Boston MA, then goes on to Broadway
1935 – Boulder Dam (later renamed Hoover Dam), on the border between Arizona and Nevada, is dedicated by President Franklin Roosevelt; it will begin operations in 1936
1938 –League of Nations outlaws “intentional bombings of civilian populations” but has no power to enforce it
1938 – British, French, German and Italian leaders agreed at a meeting in Munich that Nazi Germany would be allowed to annex Czechoslovakia’s Sudetenland
1943 – The U.S. Merchant Marine Academy (USMMA) at Kings Point NY is dedicated
1946 – Nuremberg International Tribunal finds 22 top Nazis guilty of war crimes
1949 – After delivering 2.3 million tons of food to West Berlin despite the Soviet blockade, the Berlin Airlift ends
1951 – The Red Skelton Show first airs on NBC-TV
1953 – The International Federation of Translators claims September 30 as International Translation Day * to pay tribute to the work of translators
1954 – The U.S. Navy submarine USS Nautilus is commissioned as the world’s first nuclear reactor powered vessel
1954 – Julie Andrews makes her Broadway debut in The Boy Friend
1955 – Actor James Dean, age 24, is killed in a car crash in California
1962 – Black student James Meredith succeeds on his fourth try to register for classes at the University of Mississippi
1962 – The National Farm Workers Association, founded by Cesar Chavez, a forerunner of the United Farm Workers, holds its first meeting in Fresno CA
1965 – The 30 September Movement: an attempted coup against the Indonesian government, which is crushed by the military under Suharto and leads to a mass anti-communist purge, killing over 500,000 people
1966 – Albert Speer, Nazi armaments minister, and Baldur Von Schirach, Hitler Youth founder, are released from Spandau prison after completing 20-year sentences
1966 – Cat Stevens releases his first single “I Love My Dog”
1966 – The British protectorate of Bechuanaland declares its independence, and becomes the Republic of Botswana; Seretse Khama takes office as the first President.
1968 – The first public showing of the Boeing 747 at the Boeing Everett Factory
1971 – Soviet Union and U.S. sign pacts to prevent accidental nuclear war
1976 – California enacts Natural Death Act, first U.S. right-to-die legislation
1977 – Because of budget cuts and dwindling power reserves, NASA’s Apollo program’s ALSEP experiment packages left on the Moon are shut down
1980 – Israel issues new currency, the shekel, to replace the pound
1982 – First episode of Cheers airs on NBC-TV
1989 – Thousands of East Germans emigrate under NATO-Soviet Union accord
1990 – The Dalai Lama unveils the Canadian Tribute to Human Rights, a monumental sculpture, in Canada’s capital city of Ottawa – ‘All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights’
1991 – The Haitian military overthrows Jean-Bertrand Aristide, the country’s first freely-elected president
1997 – Bob Dylan releases his album Time Out of Mind
1997 – France’s Roman Catholic Church apologizes for keeping silent during persecution and deportation of Jews under pro-Nazi Vichy regime
2004 – Merck & Co. pulls Vioxx, its heavily promoted arthritis drug, from the market after a study finds it doubles the risk of heart attacks and strokes
2005 – Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten prints controversial Muhammad drawings
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Nicole Plyler Fisk
Gene Howington
FFS Guest Blogger
Joy of Fishes
Chuck Stanley
shortfinals
Terry Welshans
ann li-summers
wordcloud9
Flowers For Socrates 
I first read Gregory Rabassa’s translation of Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s Hundred Years of Solitude in 1971 and I was stricken, mesmerized, overtaken. Phrases kept playing in my mind, over and over. The word “irremediable” used to click on and off in my subvocal soundtrack. I was in love.
Later, I re-read his translation more than a dozen times and then I recorded my own reading of it on a CD because some people to whom I recommended the book didn’t read it, for one reason or another. I would re-read passages 10, 12, even 15 times until I felt I had them right. I once met GABO and once he inscribed a book to me. Were it not for Rabassa, I would never have learned about this because I don’t speak Spanish. Yet a friend of mine (who is a native Spanish speaker) told me that the Spanish original was not as fine as the translation. And I understand that GABO himself agreed with this assessment. What a feat it is, to translate faithfully to an original. WOW!
Good Morning Malisha –
Rare and wonderful to find such a translation. Books take us on such amazing journeys.
I saw a 747 for the first time at San Francisco. I was on a 707, which was a great airplane, especially in the days when there was leg room and they actually served decent meals. As our 707 taxied up to the gate, we pulled in next to a brand new 747. It looked like the box our 707 came in. I was stunned at the sheer size of the beast.
As of this date, I have never flown in one, or even been aboard for a walk-through. Given the sardine-can seating these days, I may never fly commercial again.
Many people have Microsoft Flight Simulator installed on their home computer. There is another program; X-Plane, which has continued developing the graphics and physics of realistic flight simulation. One can now buy the various panels, switches, and controls for everything from a little Cessna up to a 747. One fellow has gone all out building a 747 flight simulator in his home. Lots of money, effort and time, and it takes more than one computer to make it work. The monitor screen wraps around the cockpit, and is about 24′ long.
This is the “first flight” of his 747-400 home flight simulator. They take off and land on Runway 10L at Portland International Airport (PDX). His friend Ryan is a real airline captain who agreed to do the first test flight. I want one.
LOL – That “home version” would never fit in my house, even it we took every stick of furniture out of our living room and dining room!