Icon by @ThatSpookyAgent. Call me Tir or Julian. 37. He/They. Queer. Twitter: @tirlaeyn. ao3: tirlaeyn. 18+ Only. Star Trek. The X-Files. Sandman. IwtV. OMFD. Definitionless in this Strict Atmosphere.
Matcha is a powdered green tea from Japan using finely ground, high-quality green tea leaves. It’s traditionally used in Japanese tea ceremonies.
India
India has a rich and diverse tea history, with traditional masala chai tea being served through South Asia for thousands of years before the tea industry exploded during the British colonial era. Pictured above is the white leaf Darjeeling tea, which grows wild in India.
Britain
Black tea in the UK can be served on its own or with milk and/or sugar and is taken several times a day. Aim for a golden colour when pouring you milk, and for the love of god, brew the tea first.
Turkey
Turkish coffee may be the country’s most famous warm drink, but cay tea is its most popular, served with every meal, and often in between. The black tea doesn’t take milk, but can be served with or without sugar and is usually brewed in a really confusing two-chamber pot.
Tibet
Tibetan po cha, or butter tea, combines tea, salt, and yak butter. The tea is brewed for several hours to get a bitter taste, then churned with butter and salt directly before serving. Try it yourself with this recipe.
Morocco
Spearmint is steeped in green tea for this drink, popular in Morocco and across much of North Africa. Learn how to brew your own here.
Hong Kong
Famous in Hong Kong is iced milk tea known as pantyhose tea or silk stocking tea because it’s similar in colour to nude stockings, no joke. To make, combine strong chilled black tea with evaporated or condensed milk and serve over ice.
Taiwan
Pearl milk tea, aka bubble tea, has become a worldwide phenomenon, but it has its roots in Taiwan. It can be served hot or cold, and typically over tapioca pearls cooked in sugar syrup. Basically once you’ve had bubble tea, you’ll never need a Frappuccino again. Use this recipe to make your own.
Ok. I’m tired of the typical vampire, werewolf and fairy.I’m also tired of the occidental-centrism in mythology. Hence, this list.
I tried to included as many cultural variants as I could find and think of. (Unfortunately, I was restricted by language. Some Russian creatures looked very interesting but I don’t speak Russian…) Please, add creatures from your culture when reblogging (if not already present). It took me a while to gather all those sites but I know it could be more expansive. I intend on periodically editing this list.
Of note: I did not include specific legendary creatures (Merlin, Pegasus, etc), gods/goddesses/deities and heroes.
(I have stumbled upon web sites that believed some of these mythical creatures exist today… Especially dragons, in fact. I just had to share the love and scepticism.)
Dokkaebi/도깨비 in Korea are common creatures that come up in stories that don’t seem to be on the list of tiny creatures… They may be in the goblin lists though
K
For those looking for something(s) outside the ‘standard creatures’ used in literature.
I spent years wholeheartedly believing these four words.
This phrase consumed my thoughts to the point where I never thought I would be good enough until I could stop eating for good.
And I know I am not the only one.
If you have ever felt this way - or you feel that way now - just take a moment to remind yourself of two things:
1. PRETTY GIRLS DO EAT.
2. BEING PRETTY IS NOT THE ONLY VALUE YOU HAVE AS A WOMAN
Im not the first person to point these things out. And I sure as hell hope I am not the last. But I hope one day when you google “pretty girls eat” that you see something different.
One day I want little girls to google “pretty girls eat” and see pictures of beautiful women like this.
Women who are not only beautiful, but so much more. (and if you follow them you KNOW that they all eat!)
Fuck “pretty girls don’t eat” Because we do. And we should remind each other of that until every lost girl who has had the misfortune of believing such a terrible lie can be shown the truth:
PRETTY GIRLS EAT.
HEALTHY girls eat.
STRONG girls eat.
DETERMINED girls eat.
CONFIDENT girls eat.
SMART girls eat.
HAPPY girls eat.
PRETTY. GIRLS. EAT.
OMG I NEVER SAW THIS WTF THIS IS BEAUTIFUL
Brb crying. I wish something like this would have been around when I was dealing with eating disorders. This is beautiful.
riviere-libre: Do you have any basic knowledge of economics? How the hell would a basic income to everyone help anyone? They wouldn't be able to afford anything because it would just cause inflation, which means they would be in the same boat in which they started. If you think I'm wrong please enlighten me on how this wouldn't cause inflation to go through the roof.
But the short answer is: NO. Basic universal income is not the same as “printing money” so to speak, and inflation is not guaranteed. It simply redistributes money that is already in circulation more evenly. In fact, we have REAL WORLD EXAMPLES of places that have Basic Income systems or partial basic income systems that have seen very little, or NO increases in inflation as a result!
In that link I provided, for example, it cites two examples: “In 1982, Alaska began providing a partial basic income annually to all its residents. Until the first dividend, Alaska had a higher rate of inflation than the rest of the United States. But ever since the dividend was introduced, Alaska has had a lower rate of inflation than the rest of the United States. A partial basic income was also provided in Kuwait in 2011, when every citizen was given $4,000. Fears of increasing inflation were rampant, as Kuwait already had high inflation. Instead of bad inflation getting worse, it actually got better, decreasing from record highs to under 4 percent.”
This doesn’t make any sense to me honestly, first off where are you getting this money from. Secondly how can you sit there and hand money to people even if they don’t do anything. And finally wouldn’t that drastically affect the loanable funds market causing weird shit to happen to our banks?
It seems like you don’t know a lot about this. Here are some helpful links!
1) Where does the money come from? The money already exists. It comes from a number of places. Firstly, by discontinuing many current welfare systems that would no longer be needed under the new Universal Income System, you could redistribute that revenue into the Basic income fund. Also, taxes.
2) How can we give people money for doing nothing? By just….doing it? Like, just…giving people money. It’s not really a hard concept. Alaska already does it. And in fact, with growing automation in the labor force, human unemployment is going to be an increasing problem without a Basic Income system, so just giving people money is a great way to keep our economy from completely tanking. This video called “Humans Need not Apply” goes into a lot of detail about the future of labor with automation, actually.
3) I’m not an expert on how this would directly impact loanable funds, or if it would have any specific impact on loanable funding. I don’t see a direct correlation there, but it’s possible one of the links I provided can help you answer that question. As I said in my first reply, this system and systems similar to it have been put in place already in some areas with great success. It’s very viable, and in MANY cases it is MORE efficient than the labyrinth of welfare services we have in place now.
When this was tried in a small town in Canada - look up Mincome - it resulted in:
1. An increase in high school graduation rates.
2. A significant decrease in domestic violence.
3. A significant decrease in, believe it or not, traffic accidents.
Only two groups of people left the workforce to “laze around” on basic income. The first group was high school students - see point one - nope, not lazing around. Studying.
And the second was women in their third trimester or within six months of giving birth - they were not lazing around either, but using the system for paid maternity leave.
While there is enough work for people to do, they won’t laze around.
As the labor surplus increases and there ceases to be enough work to go around?
People will find other stuff to do.
As for how you fund it?
Here’s how:
1. It replaces all existing welfare programs except for Medicare/Medicaid (which should also ideally be expanded to cover everyone). This would save tremendous amounts of money currently spent on, for example, denying somebody disability and forcing them to appeal in the court system multiple times. Or establishing who deserves food stamps.
2. Instead of taxing the income of workers, you tax the income of corporations. Remember that as technology replaces more humans, corporate profits will increase. Corporations that have employees will be obliged to pay a basic income tax that essentially covers the basic income paid out to those employees.
And, I firmly believe that we will be looking at a disaster if we do not implement basic income.
The truth is that the amount of labor needed to be done by humans, as opposed to robots, is dropping all the time. The population is stable or rising slightly in the developed world (The rest of the world is rapidly catching up with us). The truth is that a lot of people are already being paid to do makework.
A basic income that is set to ensure survival (food, clothing, shelter, communications) and just a little more will establish a society in which having a job is not required to stay alive. Sure, that’s paying people for “doing nothing.”
Really?
It’s paying them for raising children. It’s paying them for educating themselves. For writing books. For drawing. For, heck, streaming themselves playing video games.
When the robots do all the work, one of two things will happen:
1. We’ll try to continue with capitalism, and end up with a disenfranchised underclass, bound up in hideous restrictions to earn their welfare (or simply allowed to starve). (I touched on this in Saturday Night At The Wonderland Club).
2. We’ll switch to a new system that works on the assumption that robots will be doing most of the work, and that system will free human beings to play.
But, uh, play?
Yes, play.
Play develops intelligence. Human beings freed to play, study, and discover may just discover things that will send us to the next level. Did you know that being broke drops 10 to 20 points off of your effective IQ? Imagine what not having to worry about money for survival does?
Yes, I feel strongly about this. But I’m also afraid that if we do not move to BI or some similar system our world will go down in flames.
Oh, and let me address the last complaint, not mentioned, but often aimed at Basic Income: It’s communism.
Nope.
Basic Income is very much not communism. It is socialistic at some levels, but communism and systemic socialism both involve central planning. If somebody wants to screw their life up by buying booze instead of paying the rent under this system? Their problem. Basic income actually frees people to be closer to the sovereign individuals of libertarianism.
So…yeah.
Well said.
I like this idea
I’ve talked to a few libertarian-leaning friends of mine about this, and they’ve all sort of come around to the idea. By providing everyone with this basic safety net rather than parceling it out only to those who are in need, it eliminates the need for a bureaucracy to establish and investigate who needs it. It also removes the stigma that many people feel - and some states actively enforce - of needing public assistance.
In the libertarian-actually-libertarian circles I follow (as opposed to corporatists, and yes, there really is a difference, guess which one is the smaller group :( ), this idea has gained a lot of currency. As in, they really seem to get it. As in, if even they’re onboard, this might actually be a way forward.
Social conservatives (who mostly rely on “I’m not happy unless someone else is suffering” types) will, as always, be a huge roadblock. That can be leavened with, “Since everyone will get it, you’ll still have exactly as much more money than they do as you have now.” Just not put that bluntly, because they don’t like their motivations being thrown into their faces. (To be fair, that’s true for a lot of people.)
because i’m really tired of rhetoric regarding egypt on this website, and because i’m tired of repeating the same things over and over, here’s a post of things every person who posts something about egypt should be aware of before opening their big fat mouths:
egyptians do not ascribe to western racial constructs. repeat this several times. egyptians aren’t white, or black, or white-passing, or brown until they’re forced to identify under these by westerners. like “poc” these terms are meaningless without something to compare it to. when you call people living in their own country “poc,” you sound like an idiot.
before mouthing off about “ancient/real egyptians” and “modern coloniser egyptians,” this is what egyptians look like:
but they also look like this:
and this:
none of these are considered “more egyptian” than the other, and if we don’t do it, frankly you shouldn’t.
(i had to take some of these off a government propaganda video, i hope you’re happy. also watch it, it’s pretty catchy.)
here is egypt on a map: (x) as you can see, egypt is located in northern africa. this makes egypt an african country. it is also usually included in the politically vague “middle east,” or more accurately the Middle East and North African (MENA) region. egypt is a culturally arab country. this makes it african and arab. egyptians identify as both without issue. it is not a big deal, nor is it up to you to tell us what to identify as.
egypt has also had the same borders for around 5000 years, give or take, due to the nile being a major factor in where the concentration of populations are. therefore ancient egyptians were also north african, with close interactions with the kushite kingdom in the south, where Sudan is now. got it? ancient egypt, geographically = egypt + sudan. we know exactly where ancient egypt was located. they were nice enough to write everything down.
egyptians were never enslaved by americans or taken to america. while the egyptian diaspora is large, most egyptian immigrants are recent first or second generation. this means that egyptians have no claim to african american history, and vice versa.
nubian egyptians still exist. they are a minority in upper (southern) egypt that faces erasure, oppression and discrimination.
the Egyptians have been in place since back in the Pleistocene and have been largely unaffected by either invasions or migrations. As others have noted, Egyptians are Egyptians, and they were so in the past as well. (x)
for reference, this is what egyptian traditional dress looks like:
(not super accurate because it differs in different parts of egypt, but you get the idea. surprise, it’s not cleopatra outfits after all!)
here is a list of the absolute stupidest (and most popular) posts regarding egypt i’ve seen on my dash that you should absolutely 100% not reblog ever:
and my personal favorite:
(please do not reblog any of these they have caused more pain and grief to egyptians on this website than exodus ever will.)
so to sum up: don’t tell egyptians what to identify as, don’t tell egyptians what they’re supposed to look like, don’t force egyptians into stupid western racial classifications and don’t talk about egypt unless you have basic knowledge of egypt.
* links with (*) on them lead to posts on my own blog that clarify each point or explain it further, not outside sources. i only have basic knowledge of most issues from an egyptian point of view, but that’s still more than 99% of the people on this website so you might as well listen to me instead of giving the fucking indo-aryan post 75k notes.
If you have ever reblogged anything about Egypt you better read this so help me
Sometimes I think that maybe Harry naming his children after two of the most flawed and morally dubious characters in the whole series was meant as an indicator of Harry’s own flaws — outrageous loyalty and black and white morality.
Harry has the most fucked up childhood yo. And due to that childhood, the expectations placed upon him by pretty much everyone, and Dumbledore’s interference, Harry develops his “hero complex.” Harry learns to identify morality in terms of heroics — a true Gryffindor indeed. Harry wants so much to believe that what he did was right, that the sacrifices others made for him were valid, that he cocoons himself in a fantasy world where the smallest of good deeds can redeem you.
Maybe JK Rowling didn’t fuck up as bad as we like to think.
Maybe Harry naming his kid after two corrupted puppet masters was absolutely and utterly in character.
Maybe Harry is so desperate to not hate himself for anything less than true-red-and-gold brave he ever did that he’s convinced himself heroism is the ultimate good. And by extension he is the ultimate good. And Dumbledore and Snape were the ultimate good. Because the died in grand flourishes and left behind mysteries. Just like his parents did.
Harry isn’t ungrateful to Hagrid or Remus or Tonks or Molly or Arthur or Fred. They simply don’t fit the showy model Harry was conditioned to accept in terms of greatness.
Because there is a little truth to Harry’s insolence. To his belief that he is an exception to the rule. And it’s not his fault. It never was. He was groomed and led down a path of exceptionalism. So he rewards the exceptional. the exceptions. Snape. And Dumbledore. And James. And Lily. And Luna. And Sirius. The outlandish and the bold and sentimentally heroic.
What Harry forgets is that the ordinary can be just as exceptional. Just as heroic. Just as good.
yes! we always thought this too. the name jokes are funny and all, but it made total sense in context of Harry’s character to us.
I agree with this. (And I’d even add that, with Snape especially, he is blinded by his love for his parents that anyone connected to Lily is immediately in his good books.) But I ALSO think that Albus Severus (obligatory lol) is the name that matters so much because it represents the end of Harry’s story.
Harry is the victim of a lot of mistreatment and hatred from the very first chapter to the end, and even at Hogwarts, the hero-worshipping comes at a price. His foils—Voldemort and Snape—spend their time at Hogwarts loved by all or hated by all, while Harry gets both the love and the hate. Voldemort manipulates, he’s selfish. Snape bullies, he’s spiteful. Harry is defined by how much he diverges from these two paths, though he could easily have become either of his enemies. Unlike Voldemort, he’s selfless, and unlike Snape, he forgives.
Athough he and Harry have very little in common, Dumbledore is another foil. They are both the Heroes. But Dumbledore’s heroism is cold and calculating, he sacrifices others—even in death, he sacrifices Snape’s “soul.” If Dumbledore is “God” then Harry is the martyr.
What does this mean for Harry’s character development, though? DH is punctuated with turning points, moments of forgiveness. PS/SS begins with Harry being abused by the Dursleys, and DH begins with Harry forgiving Dudley. He says goodbye to his cupboard, he’s not angry when he gets the Dursleys to safety, he doesn’t look back. He lets go. This is how Harry moves on.
Harry obsesses over Dumbledore’s dirty secrets in DH, but in choosing to go after the Horcruxes instead of the Hallows, he moves past his feelings of betrayal.
Before Voldemort’s death, he sees him for what he is and doesn’t feel hatred, but pity. He shows him compassion.
I think that, while there is definitely some hero-worshiping happening, Harry does realize that Snape and Dumbledore were wrong. But he’s spent so much of his youth angry and mistrustful. Honoring these two, his bully and his puppeteer, represents not only Harry’s forgiveness, but that he’s made peace with his suffering. He’s made peace with his doubts about his father and Sirius being bullies, too. (Lily Luna is different—while James Sirius is named after Harry’s father figures, and Albus Severus after his heroes, Lily is named after the two characters in the books who represent Harry’s ideal of selfless love.)
Thematically, naming his son after these two characters who were so stuck living in the past, implies a future where Harry’s learned from their mistakes. Unlike Dumbledore or Snape, Harry really lives.
But at the same time, you don’t see Ron or Hermione worshiping Snape or Dumbledore’s —this is all Harry, and this is how he’s always been. He doesn’t HAVE to forgive or admire them—but of course he does because he’s Harry. The names are SO not saying “THESE are the most important characters to Harry Potter and also the best people in the book fuck you Remus.” The names reveal all those things OP said about Harry’s flawed views of heroism, and more they represent a scar that’s fading, the resolution to a life of pain for the hero whose only superpower was living and forgiving.
when i was 5 years old my best friend was a boy named kyle who didn’t know how to knock on doors so he made dinosaur noises outside my window to wake me up in the summer until i demonstrated how to ball his fists and slam them against my doors. we collected caterpillars in my trailer park and built them houses while we traded pokemon cards. he wasn’t the only one. there was ben, and mitch, and noah—but kyle’s the only one who hurt me, because when he tried to kiss me and i asked him why, he told me “because you’re a girl and i’m a boy, shouldn’t we like each other?”
i missed him so much and i wondered why he couldn’t just be my friend like he always was
in the first grade there was rich and joseph and i got sent to detention with them almost every day with a smile on my face. we built block towers and sang to my teacher’s lion king soundtracks when she’d turn the lights off during lunch time. one day they got in a fist fight over me at recess, and i wondered why they felt they needed to share my friendship, like it was something they owned.
in the second grade zach and i played yu gi oh under our desks during free time and i got moved for talking to him constantly. everyone in the class would tease him and i for talking, asking when we were going to date already, asking him if he’d kissed me, and he stopped being my
friend.
when i was 11 i met a chubby boy with the name of a colour who wore
puffy vests and unwashed t-shirts, with greasy hair and bright blue eyes
and a smile that hid hurt behind it. people didn’t like him because he
was silly, but i liked him, because i was also silly. he became my
friend the day he bought me 5 giant roses and asked me to be his
girlfriend, and i politely declined but promised him i’d be his best
friend because i’d always wanted a best guy friend that stuck around.
we burnt our feet on the concrete during the summer and walked home
with the sunset silhouetting us. he talked often about how he loved me,
but never blamed me for being me, even though he refused to move on.
that boy dyed his hair jet black and sat on the end of my bed playing
songs to me on guitar, and all that pent up rage from before didn’t show
until the first time he slapped me across the face and called me a dumb
cunt.
in the 7th grade there was a boy named ryan who sat next to me on the
bus and talked to me about manga. he’d ask me personal invasive
questions but i didn’t mind because it was attention and i liked
attention. i was dating another guitarist with curly brown hair, one
who was much more kind-tempered than the other, and ryan mentioned how
much of an asshole he was every day. i wondered, why, why does he think
the love of my life is an asshole? but whenever i asked him, he just
told me, “girls only date assholes. there’s no room for nice guys like
me.”
i wondered, if he was so nice, why did he say such mean things?
he never stopped with me, taking me to movies, hanging out with me,
you know. being friendly. i thought we were friends. but then, how
many times had i thought that before?
how many times had i bonded with a boy, thought they got me, only for them to ask me if i wanted to make out?
how come when i told ryan i was coming out as a lesbian, he stopped
being my friend, and said “damnit, the one girl i really want to pound
into a mattress, and she’s only interested in chicks!”
there was a boy my junior year who stayed up all night with me until
the sun rose, talking about life, past loves, hopes, dreams. beneath a
million twinkling stars spanning forever, he brushed long brown hair out
of his eyes and listened to me talk about the history that made me.
then he asked me if i’d ever consider dating a guy, and complained
about how he’d never get laid.
when i told him no a couple hundred times, he found new girls to listen to.
i would sit on the couch and play zelda with dakota, and he’d talk
about all my favourite games with me. he was the closest thing to
support i had, and the letters and poems he wrote me were always so kind
and friendly. but he’d put his arms around me on the couch, and no
matter how many times i told him i was uncomfortable, he’d still come
over every day and do it.
“don’t you know how it feels to love someone and not have them love
you back? don’t you know what it feels like to be friendzoned?”
when i meet guys who talk about the friendzone, who talk about the
girls who don’t give “nice guys” like them i chance, i always want to
just say
when i was 10 years old i met a girl whose brown hair fell across her
shoulders and whos eyes sparkled when the sunlight hit them, whose
voice was like velvet and whose scent was like mountain smoke, who made
me dizzier than a fly climbing a sugar hill. and i’m 18 years old, and i
still love her, and she knows, and she doesn’t love me.
but my first thoughts upon hearing her rejection were not “what a
bitch,” were not “she just wants a douchebag and not a nice girl like
me!” were not “im going to keep pushing her until she dates me,”
they were
“she is the best friend i have ever had, and i am the best she’s ever had, and i would hate to take that away from her.”
so before you play the victim, mr. Nice Guy, before you angrily throw
your fedora on the ground and blame the girl you claim to adore so
much:
put yourself in the shoes of a girl who thought she made a wonderful
friend, only to find out that he just wanted her for sex. that he just
wanted her for a relationship. a girl who was just an object to win, a
prize. a girl who’s trust you’ve just shattered.
maybe she friendzoned you. but you girlfriendzoned her, first.
So the only all-bird rehab center in North Texas is about to shut down…
I can’t even put into words how upset I am about this. Rogers Wildlife Rehabilitation has been open for almost twenty years, and is the only place in North Texas that takes in literally any type of bird if it’s been injured, orphaned, or otherwise incapacitated. They’re finally out of funds, and if they can’t come up with anything by April 2nd, they’re going to be forced to close their doors.
They’ve never turned away birds. Not when it’s a surprise 200 baby cattle egrets that’ve been orphaned because city planners thought they could cut down their homes and no one would notice. Not when it’s raptors with one good eye and in need of seven different antibiotics. Not even when it’s ducks that irresponsible parents won’t let their kids keep after easter. This is where anyone let me first get up close to birds. I mean, I’ve known I wanted to work with birds and wildlife since I was seven- I’m twenty four now, and halfway through an environmental science master’s and it’s a big reason I kept going.
I’ve been going to this place on and off for ten years, I was THIRTEEN when I started volunteering and seeing all the terrible things that happen to the birds that come in. Not just…hit by trucks, or caught in a hailstorm but parrots that have been left in foreclosed houses for weeks, and roosters that have come out of cock fighting rings and would otherwise be put down because the SPCA and humane societies don’t think they’re salvageable. There’s an emu that was raised there as a baby because no one wanted her. Her name’s Riley and I can’t even begin to comprehend what shutting the doors to the center would mean?
They don’t get government aid. They’ve been funded by the public donating and Kathy, the lady who owns the place, going through her retirement funds and savings and her social security to keep it running. She’s finally run out of money. Please, just reblog? Even if you can’t donate anything- and I know it’s a lot to ask for poor teenage/college kids to donate money that they don’t have, or struggling artists I know but maybe someone who can spare something will see it eventually? They need $200,000 to keep open for a year, if they stop paying workers. And they’re all willing to not get paid if it means these birds will have somewhere to go, somewhere to stay if they need it.
Please consider donating—even just $5. Even if you can just reblog it, perhaps one of your followers can help. A cause like this is very near and dear to my heart. I volunteer at International Bird Rescue in Los Angeles and places like these are run on a shoestring budget and rely almost completely from volunteer help.
Just some pretty pictures form the center! The screech owls are amazing omg. Please donate a dollar or two.
This is losing steam, guys. Please reblog more than once, so that all your followers can see it.