Canada 150 DOs and DON'Ts

Hi there guys! Sorry I haven't updated the blog much recently. Sorry that all my posts begin with "Sorry I haven't updated the blog much recently". Well now that the summer vacation is almost here, I'm making plans of what to do with my life when there is no school to look forward to (ye so I'm lowkey a nerd). My grandparents have also recently come to visit from India. I really want to show them what Canada is all about by taking them to some iconic historical sites and all, and of course a huge part of that will be telling them stuff about Canada's indigenous people. 

Alright so it just so happens that Canada's 150th anniversary of confederation is coming up. I'm probably the least patriotic person you will ever meet and I actually hate the governments of all countries (though I love all their cultures but more on that later), but even I couldn't help but feel a little excited. I mean, it's a once in a lifetime event. The federal government is going to spend half a billion dollars on it and there will be discounts everywhere to visit museums, historic sites, etc. For a Seeker of High Culture like me, that sounds pretty terrific. It would just be such a waste to stay at home and rant on my blog about how Canada is guilty of genocide and should be using all that money to pay reparations while it is instead flaunting everything it stole from indigenous people. So I just wanted to say that there's a good and a bad way to approach this dilemma. I bet you no one who follows this blog likes the idea of Canada 150, but my disciples please remember that we must learn to make the most of even the worst situations. So, read on. 

DO:

• Get educated on what this celebration is all about if you don't know much about the history of confederation already. Yes I'm talking about grade 7 history when you learned all about John A. MacDonald's vision of uniting British North American colonies a mari usque ad mare. Please don't be one of those people who are like all into the celebration but don't know what the Charlottetown Conference was. Please. We need to be better than some Americans are on July 4th. 

• View the day not as a measure of how far we've come as a nation, but how far we still have to go. 

• Remember that patriotism is stupid. No exceptions. Not even Mexican patriotism even though Mexico>Life. Oops. 

• Remember that Canada is what it is because of the genocide of First Nations people.

• Take advantage of the discounts to popular tourist attractions. See if you qualify for a FREE Discovery Pass http://www.commandesparcs-parksorders.ca/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ProductDisplay?storeId=22953&urlLangId=-1&productId=524528 . 

DON'T:

• Skip reading this brilliant article by Pamela Palmeter, Chair in Indigenous Governance at Ryerson university: 

Canada 150 is a celebration of Indigenous genocide

This year, the federal government plans to spend half a billion dollars on events marking Canada's 150th anniversary, prompting a great deal of debate about its historical treatment of Indigenous peoples. The majority of Canadians don't have all the facts about that, while First Nations continue to live the crisis-level effects of that legacy. Perhaps Canada should cancel its celebrations and undertake the hard work necessary to make amends.

BY PAMELA PALMATER 

MARCH 29, 2017

 

5:43 PM

CLICK HERE TO READ FULL ARTICLE

• Say anything that would imply you think Canada is in any way "better" than other countries. 
• Do anything degenerate. Like actually, I think you know what I mean by now and I can trust you now, right? I can unleash you upon the world now with no regrets. 

Alright so now that that's out of the way I want to take a few more moments to just talk about my life and what my plans are for the summer. I want to talk about some novels I will be working on. You may have heard a bit about them if you've been checking out my writing page which u can click here to see. One of them is about two communists who time travel back to the Aztec civilization and try to introduce their ideals to the MexiCa WorLd. It also doubles as a bildungsroman tale of a Mexica teenager who is trying to discover her views on politics, love, and all the rest of that sort of stuff that we try to figure out at this age. The other one I'll be working on is a sequel to the book I wrote that won NaNoWriMo 2016. If you want to read that award winning book, go to the writing page of this blog or click here. It's about a huge cultural revolution that occurs and basically, I don't want to spoil it. But the sequel I will be writing will be on what happens after the revolution. The protagonists are trying to establish a World Government, kinda like the United Nations except that it actually has power. This way leaders will make decisions keeping the good of the citizens of the whole world in mind instead of just of their nation. I'm an anarchist as far as I don't believe in countries, but the world is my country and I would be patriotic to a government that actually benefits the world. 

Other random af stuff I'll be doing over the summer: 

• Learning to play the harmonica so that I can perform a duet with Vickyish. 

• Learning to play the bansuri (Indian bamboo flute) 

• Practicing playing the regular flute 

• Practicing playing the recorder even though recorders are gross 

• Practicing playing the trumpet 

• Making lots of art, possibly even venture into making a comic book. Who knows? 

• Celebrating my birthday

• Writing novels

• "celebrating" Canada 150 ;D 

• some activism related to aboriginal rights (I'll keep you posted on this for sure so that you know I'm being legit.) 

• updating this blog regularly 

• Working at a summer job which will be tutoring people who are learning English O_o 

• Studying math, physics, chemistry and biology in advance so that I don't die in grade 11

• Possibly studying history and philosophy for the fun of it 
• Reading a bunch of random af books. Possibly just anything I can get my hands on, including everything from degenerate YA fiction to "The Republic" by Plato. I'm not picky when it comes to books and I'll post some of my Goodreads reviews if any of you are interested. Ideally I would want to finish reading the Mexica Movement's recommended book list, but they are a bit hard to find. It doesn't help that a few of the books on that list are out of print. About time they wrote a compact manifesto, not that I wouldn't want to read everything else as well. 

Alright well that's it. 

have an awesome summer, everyone!

The Black Hand Fox Webcomic attempt #2

Forgive me, please. I know it's really dumb. For those of you who don't get it, the strategy that the Allies, in particular, the Canadians, used to seize Ortona in Sicily was called "mouseholding". It's supposed to be funny because in the webcomic, a mouse says it. Not laughing? It's okay. I know I suck. It's not even sticking to the original theme of the webcomic, which was supposed to be WW1 not WW2.  

The drawing program is excellent, no installations were necessary. You should really check it out: https://sketch.io/sketchpad/ 

It is almost as good as DeviantArt Muro! Okay but DA muro will always be the best just because it is made by DeviantArt. 

So what else is new? Well, I got into Spyglass, which is like a magazine/newspaper/news website thing at my school. I'm probably going to be writing an article about the Dakota Access Pipeline protests. I also really want to make a magazine quiz called "what ancient civilization are you?" which will be like one of those really lame Buzzfeed quizzes like "which flavor of potato chip are you?" but better because it will be about ancient civilizations not potato chips. 

That reminds me of this poll that one of my DeviantArt friends made: 

What do you think of when someone says potatoes? chips, food, Incas, Ireland, "whats wrong with this question" or "no"? 

Here is the DA page of the person: http://bigsleeves-arts.deviantart.com/ 

Other Random Things

Is this font legible, BTW? I hope it is. I know my blog uses colors and fonts that can be eye-raping at times. 

Okay so, do you guys know what MONTH it is? That's right everyone, it's: 

Every writer's favourite month is N A N O V E M B E R. Let me explain, every November, there is a a writing contest called "NaNoWriMo". They have a cool crest with a stereotypical historically inaccurate triggering Viking helmet! See?! :

Visit nanowrimo.org to learn more

The rules are that you have to write a minimum of 50,000 words within the month of November. You can upload a cover and write a synopsis and excerpt too. If you get stuck along the way, there is a forum where you can talk to other writers for ideas. If you win you get bragging rights and discounts on a bunch of self publishing and editing softwares.

The last time I entered was in 2013, when I won. Now that I am participating again after 3 years, I feel so nostalgic talking to my old internet friends from 3 years ago including this one girl in the Netherlands who always writes crazily over the minimum 50,000 every year. I think she does like 100,000 words at least or something. The year I won, I wrote 61,000. For reference, 50,000 is around the length of "the Catcher in the Rye". My first published novel, "Misplaced", was 48,000 words. 

So you are probably wondering what my story is about, right? Well, it is currently at 42,000 words and is basically in a futuristic setting where indigenous people are trying to overthrow the government! Beware! And they are basically saving the whole world from a sp00ky tyrant who has come into power. I know that is a very vague plot description. If you have a NaNoWriMo account, you can find me. My username is aztecatl13, and you can read my actual plot synopsis and excerpt. I'm too embarrassed to post it here. 

Also, if you're reading this, chances are you're one of my internet friends or acquaintances and I've used you as a character in my ginormous cast of characters. I have most likely changed your name out of respect for your privacy. Some of my IRL friends such as Vickyish have also been included. Even if you think I hate you, I've probably still used you as a character, probably as a villain or something. For example, a sp00ky white supremacist once added me to a really sketchy Facebook group where a bunch of racists who fancy themselves "theologians" discuss Catholicism. Many of them seem to be homosexuals in denial as well, because they will condemn gay behavior and call Justin Bieber sexy (even though most of them are men) in the same breath. I have used many of their personalities to inspire the villains in my story. That is the only reason why I let white supremacists stick around for some time before I block them. 

Anyway, so when the novel is done I will probably gather up the courage to post the synopsis and everything here and then ask who wants to help proofread the first draft. I'll probably make a public Google Doc and ask my Frypanian fanbase to leave comments on it as they read the unruly manuscript. Perhaps I will illustrate it like I did with my first novel. My art has definitely improved since then, gawd. 

Like seriously. This is something I made in 2012. It is a random Mexican thing: 

Look how much I improved in just 2 years. This was one of my very first acrylic paintings during my nascent Norse mythology obsession phase. There's a Valkyrie:

Now this is my art in 2016. I made this a few days ago. It a random Hetalia-styled Indian thing: 

Please watch me on DeviantArt and I will love you: http://aztecatl13.deviantart.com/ 

PS: I have joined the slam poetry club at my school, so I will probably be posting some poems or something soon. That is all!

PSS: Legend has it that Tlacaelel Quetzalcoatl from the Mexica Movement has changed the layout of his blog! http://americanlatinomusuemisracist.blogspot.ca/ no more "Dynamic Views" ! 

Bye, fam! 

The Fall of Tenochtitlan :'(

^Do you think the Mexica Movement would 

mind if I stole one of their pictures lowkey like that? D:

Well, hello everyone. Sorry that I haven't touched this blog all summer. My 

friends Aspen and Vickyish have been writing guestposts in the meantime to 

keep you entertained.

 I hope you had fun listening to the Alexander Hamilton musical songs. 

Murica's dankest founding father, amirite? Remember if you want to check 

out more stuff written by Aspen and Vickyish then you can read their blogs,

 which are definitely better than mine because they don't make their posts 

all 

AnnnOYINGLy 

Colourful 

and they actually stick to one topic for the duration of their posts. They 

also don't begin every post with "sorry for not updating for so long" like

 I do. Well, Vickyish apologizes for her procrastination, but Vickyish put 

the pro in procrastination, so it's okay. 

Aspen's blog

Vickyish's blog

^ links

Supporting them supports me too, as they are my best IRL friends after all. Actually they are my ONLY IRL friends :/ . 

It's kind of like the triple alliance between Texcoco, Tlacopan and Tenochtitlan.

Okay no, that was a really lame attempt at referencing the Aztecs.

Speaking of the Aztecs/Mexica, this day in history marks the fall of the Mexica empire. 

This means that throughout this whole day I looked like this:

Because obviously the fall of the Mexica empire was the worst thing that ever happened in history. In my opinion? no actually... really... I'm not even being biased.  

August 12th and 13th of 1521 were the final days of the battles between the Aztecs and the Spaniards. The Aztecs were pretty much screwed at that point, as the water supply had been cut from Tenochtitlan, and smallpox killed almost everyone. Most of the people who were left to fight weren't even supposed to be warriors. Emperor Cuauhtemoc, the last Aztec ruler, challenged Hernan Cortes, the leader of the Spanish army. 

Do you think the Mexica Movement would mind if I copypasta Olin Tezcatlipoca's quote on the topic? 

"August 13, 1521 Marks The Fall of Tenochtitlan
Tenochtitlan fell to the Europeans because of their use of smallpox as a biological weapon. It also fell because we had too many traitors amongst our people, proving we were not a perfect people.
Today it is not so much the Europeans who hold us back from liberation. They have the traitors holding our people down for them.
Treason and cowardice, fear and ignorance, are all holding us back from our full humanity, from liberation from Europeans.
There are traitors all around us: in our homes, in our families, in those we trust. They are selfish egotistical opportunists looking out only for themselves.
We will eventually be liberated from Europeans, but first we will have to deal with all of the traitors amongst our people."

Olin Tezcatlipoca
Mexica Movement Director
Nican Tlaca Nation


It is such a R.I.P thing seriously.

Shall I copy Vickyish's signature sign off now as I really do not know how to

 end this on a positive note? Alright here it is:

"Welp."

.

Help Me Out

Hey guys, like Vickyish, I too, have a new blog. I made a deal with her that if she starts a blog, I'll make one as well, so here it is: http://help-im-stuck-in-a-blog.blogspot.ca/ It's not much at the moment, but I promise it will have much future success. Please give it a follow, you won't regret it. To make up for this advertisment, take these dank memes: 

They are the dankest of memes.

I'm Blind And That Makes Me Sad (#clickbait)

GREETINGS FRYPANIANS.

I will attempt to make this post interesting, but now that 'Aspen' has posted her post, mine is just gonna suck in comparison. Oh well. I think I'll just complain about stuff. In particular, about how I can't mentally visualize things.

Okay, so you know how books and media and school always tell you to visualize stuff as a kid? Like when you're reading, they tell you to picture the events happening in your mind. As a kid, I always tried to do this, but it never really worked. When I try to picture things, I don't really see anything... it's hard to describe, but my mind is sort of blank/just black. When I think of an object (say, a car), I sort of think about it's qualities and what it would look like, but I can't see anything. I know what it is, I know what it looks like, I just can't see it. It doesn't appear in my mind as a clear, fully formed image. But apparently, most people visualize things like this. I.e. Freya. Supposedly she can actually see the things right in front of her, like a hallucination. And the same goes for dreams, except Freya tells me it's even more detailed. To the point where you're not sure if it's reality or a dream, and all your senses are active and working, and it's like you're there, fully experiencing everything. When I dream, I don't really dream. It's more like when I wake up, a memory of a story/experience is in my mind, but I can never manage to see it happen in real time.

So when I heard other people have those sort of visualization capabilities, I was sort of... mind-blown, to put it lightly. Like, for them this is all normal. Probably for you, the reader right now, this is a normal thing. So now I feel like I've been visually handicapped my entire life. Kinda like how a colorblind person would probably feel towards people with normal colour vision. I really, REALLY wish I could be able to have a more detailed visual mind. I literally feel like a blind person. Okay, so it's not that bad. But when I do think about it, I feel like I'm that unlucky 1% (2% at most apparently) that was born somehow without being able to see images in my brain.

I tried Googling for more information on this subject, but couldn't find much. What I did find is that it's called Aphantasia. I really wish there was more info... I guess the phenomenon in itself is kinda hard to describe. It's super frustrating, especially since I love to read, and also consider myself reasonably imaginative and a visual thinker. It really sucks. Try reading up on it more yourself. Hopefully it makes you realize how being mind-blind sucks and then you'll all feel bad for me. That's basically my goal here.

Anyways. Freya's mind must be awesome to experience... just like her blog! :D Okay, that was bad. But guys, check out my blog too! It sucks right now, and only has 2 posts, but give it a chance! I mean, at least I won't spam you with posts or anything. ...I've convinced you, haven't I? Oh, you want to know the address? Well, if you insist! It's called A Lonely Potato. And yes, I am the potato. But as a newbie at blogging, I literally have like 4 views. So even a single click on that link will help me feel prouder of myself. C'mon, you're not that lazy, are you? And if you follow me, I'll, like, love you. Plez. Plez help me I'm poor.

And on that note, ADIOS.