How would you like to make better returns than 99% of individual investors and 85% of hedge fund managers? Well, there's actually a way to do this while paying almost nothing in fees, having zero investment knowledge and spending almost zero time researching the stocks. And the way that you do that is index funds. And I've said this since the beginning of my channel, index funds are some of my favorite investments. I love it! And I would argue that if you're a beginner or you're somebody who doesn't really want to spend much time researching stocks or you have no passion for it or you just wanna get a decent return on your money without spending any time on that, index funds might be the best possible investment for you. And at the very least, I think index funds should be a significant amount of every investor's portfolio. And in this video, I'm gonna break down in plain English everything you need to know about index funds. And at the end of the video, I'm gonna do a tutorial on two different stock brokerages where I invest in index funds live. All right, so super excited about this one and I'm gonna try to keep the video as short as possible but for if whatever reason you don't have enough time, there are going to be timestamps down in the description below. So gently tap that like button if you appreciate my hard work and let's get into it. All right, so index fund investing for beginners. Let's get started. All right, so in this video, this is what we're gonna cover in order. So we're gonna start off with what is an index fund? I'm gonna go over a short history of index funds. Then we're gonna talk about John Bogle and why he's so important. Then I'm gonna cover why you should invest in index funds. Then we're gonna talk about the difference between index funds, ETFs and mutual funds. Next, how to invest in index funds. Then we're gonna talk about different types of index funds and I'm gonna give you some examples.  So stay tuned for that. I'm gonna talk about why index funds are not boring and how you can use index funds to invest in a niche, invest in an industry, a group of companies, a country or invest worldwide. And then I'm gonna give you index funds that correspond to each of those. Then I'm gonna go over some housekeeping tips on what you should do before you start investing in index funds. Then I'm gonna give my recommendations on the best brokerages, specifically for index funds. And lastly, I'm gonna go over an investing and automation tutorial on two different brokerages. One of them is gonna be more of an advanced brokerage and the other one is gonna be more of a beginner friendly, super easy one that you can just get on with your phone. All right, so first thing we need to do is answer the question, what is an index fund? Well, this probably doesn't help, but index funds are investment funds that follow an index. An indexes track a group of predetermined companies and on the top right, you see the S&P 500 index and that's basically tracking the 500 largest companies in the United States. And basically what that means is if you invest in an S&P 500 index funds, you invest a little bit in each of those companies. And if you tried to do this manually, first of all, it would probably take you an entire week to invest in 500 different companies. And second of all, it would be extremely costly from the brokerage fees. And then when you went to sell that would be even more of a nightmare. Imagine a market crash happens and you're trying to sell your stocks and it takes you an entire week to sell them. So I think everybody has heard that diversification is incredibly important when it comes to investing and an index fund automatically diversifies for you. And on top of that, index funds are passively managed.  All they're doing is simply tracking an index. And because of that, the fees are incredibly low on index funds, sometimes it's even 0%. So now that you know what an index fund is, you're probably asking yourself, why should you invest in it? And to be honest with you, index funds don't get all that much attention on YouTube because they're pretty boring. I mean, why invest in an index fund and get an average return of maybe 7% per year for the rest of your life when you could invest in Dogecoin and potentially become a millionaire? Now, other investments are just a lot more exciting than index funds. But there's a few things that are great about these. For one, you save fees. There are some actively managed funds that will charge people 2% in fees. And over a 30 or 40 year period, this would cost them hundreds of thousands of dollars. They're also very tax efficient. Index funds are designed for you to invest over the long term. And that means you're not gonna be paying very much in short-term capital gains tax. Because when you invest for more than one year, you pay what's known as long-term capital gains tax. And of course, this is gonna vary depending on where you live, but usually this is gonna save you somewhere between 10 and 17% on taxes. And again, over the long run, that can make a difference of hundreds of thousands or maybe even millions. Index funds are also incredibly beginner friendly. You know, one of the reasons you don't see a lot of these gurus talking about index funds is because it would be very difficult for them to sell a course to you. The course would be like five videos long max and you would never have to get any more investing advice again. Whereas something that's incredibly complicated and difficult like options trading or day trading, you can make hundreds of videos on that and put it into a course. Now, my favorite part about index funds is they are incredibly time efficient. You can invest in index funds very easily. And once you invest in it, you pretty much just keep it there and forget it. You don't even think about selling it for 20, 30, 40 years. Whereas if you invest in a stock, you're gonna be monitoring that stock on a day-to-day basis to make sure that the company didn't do something crazy. Because if they did, the stock could potentially go to zero. That is virtually impossible for an index fund. On top of that, many brokerages will allow you to set up automatic investing. So it's very easy to just do $500 a month, for instance. So you could hypothetically log onto your brokerage like one time and set yourself up for life. Now, on top of that, index funds outperform approximately 98% of retail investors. And a lot of people would argue it's more like 99%. And on top of that, depending on the study you look at, they also outperform between 85 and 95% of the professional funds. So there are many good reasons for you to invest in index funds. Now, I'm personally a huge fan of history. I know some people aren't really into it, but I think there's a reason to go over the history of index funds because it's really gonna hammer in a lot of the points on why you should invest in them. So the first idea for index funds, as far as we know, came from two students at the University of Chicago. This was back in 1960 and the two students' names were Paul Feldstein and Edward Renshaw. And their idea was to basically create unmanaged investment funds. Now, of course, at first, their idea was absolutely laughed at and it had little support. Like many different types of investments that have done incredibly well over the years, when it first came out, it was ridiculed. Now, in the early 1970s, John McCown was working at Wells Fargo and he came out with the first index fund type investment. And again, this was basically just an idea for an unmanaged fund. And one great quote I read from an institutional investor was, I wouldn't even buy it for my mother-in-law. So again, it was receiving a ton of ridicule. Now, the first index fund that was available for everyday people, aka retail investors, was put out in 1976 by John Bogle. And if you're interested in the history of finance, I highly recommend reading up on John Bogle.  But again, everybody laughed and ridiculed his ideas for an index fund. And one way of putting this is he was basically the one honest person and an entire sea of sharks that were working in the financial industry. And he actually passed away in 2019. So rest in peace. This guy is known as the father of index fund investing and he is a true legend. And I decided to add this part in there as well because the first ETF was created in 1992 by Nate Most and it was the SPDR or SPI. And ETFs are very similar to index funds. We're gonna go over the differences here in a moment. Now, index funds trade once a day versus ETFs can trade at any time during the day. Index funds, you can automatically reinvest your dividends whereas ETFs, some do, some don't. With index funds, there is usually a minimum investment. So they might say that you have to invest at least $1,000, for instance. Whereas with ETFs, you have to buy one full share. So if the share of the ETF is $225, then you have to spend $225. If it's $22, you have to spend at least 22. Index funds are known for having very low costs. For instance, VT Saks is about 0.04% per year. ETFs are also known for having very low costs. For instance, VTI is 0.03%. Now, you do have to be very careful with ETFs. Always make sure to check the expense ratios no matter what because some of them, they try to pull a fast one on you and they'll actually have a relatively high expense ratio. And when it comes to ETFs, always make sure to check which companies they invest in and whether it's actively managed or passively managed. Because if it's actively managed, the expense ratio is gonna be higher and you're probably not gonna get as good of a return. And make sure to always do your research before you invest in anything, whether it's an ETF or an index fund. No index funds are easier to automate. It's really easy to set that up on a brokerage. However, ETFs are slightly more accessible. It's easier to get started investing in ETFs than it is an index funds. And index funds returns are tracked monthly, whereas ETF returns are tracked daily. Now I'm gonna talk about index funds versus mutual funds. Index funds are technically a type of mutual fund. However, index funds are passively managed. Most of the time when you hear the term mutual fund, that means it's going to be actively managed and that means it's gonna have higher fees. And in my opinion, index funds are the best type of mutual fund for you to invest in. But this is not financial advice, always do your own research. Next, we're gonna talk about different types of investing that you can do with index funds. So for instance, you can use index funds to invest in a niche, an industry, a group of successful companies, an entire country, or you can use index funds to invest in entrepreneurship across the world. So first I'll go over an example of investing in a niche. And this is a niche that's so new that I decided to actually just include an ETF. So if you are an expert on a certain niche and you think that it's undervalued, you might consider investing in an index fund or an ETF that has to do with that niche. So for instance, the roundhill ball metaverse ETF has a bunch of investments in companies that are related to the metaverse. Now I'm gonna say right away, the expense ratio on this one is 0.75%. So it's not ideal, but this is such a new niche that you don't really have too many options out there. So for example, if you're somebody who knows a lot about the metaverse, you think it's gonna take over the world in a similar way that smartphones, the internet, social media, et cetera took over the world, then this might be a good option for you. Next one on the list is going to be investing in an industry or sector that you really believe in. So one great example of this is a lot of people are extremely bullish on technology related stocks. So you could invest in the Vanguard Information Technology Index Fund, Admiral shares or VITAX, or you could invest in VGT, which is the corresponding ETF that goes along with that. And this basically just tracks the performance of information technology related stocks. Now there's a little bit of a problem here. We see that the minimum investment is $100,000 and I don't know about you, but I don't have $100,000 just laying around. However, the ETF is only about $430 to invest in. So a lot more accessible and that's one of the points that I made earlier on in the video. Another way you could do it is investing in a group of successful companies. So this is actually Warren Buffett's favorite way to invest in index funds and that is investing in the S&P 500. That's the 500 largest companies in the United States because maybe you believe that large companies can't fail in the current system because they're just too powerful and the government will not let them fail. They're always gonna bail them out. Kind of like what happened in the 2008 financial crisis. And so maybe after understanding that, you might think, okay, I'm gonna invest in the S&P 500. Now the S&P 500 itself actually has a little bit higher expense ratio because the name is copyrighted, it's branded. And so one that's cheaper is the Fidelity 500 index fund which is very similar and that's FX-AIX. And it has a 0.02% expense ratio. So that's a little bit better.  Or maybe you think large companies aren't equipped to respond to the rapidly changing environment. Instead, you think mid cap companies are gonna do better. Well, you could invest in the Vanguard Mid Cap Index or VO and it has an expense ratio of 0.04%. Maybe you think that stocks in the United States are overvalued and there's some other countries that could be a lot better in the next 10 years. Well, then you could possibly invest in the Vanguard FTSE Japan UCITS ETF which is VJPN. And this one basically invests in large and mid cap companies within Japan. Now this one does have a higher expense ratio, 0.15%. So just keep that in mind. Let's say you think investing in just United States companies is risky and you wanna diversify your investments even further.  Well, you could try the Vanguard Total World Stock Index Fund Admiral shares or VTWAX. And this has an expense ratio of 0.04%, so very nice. And this will give you exposure to lots of different companies in many different foreign markets. Or let's say you don't wanna invest in stocks, right? You are just about to retire and you want to invest in a security that's a little bit safer. Well, then you could invest in an index fund that is full of diversified bonds. And that one has an expense ratio of 0.025%. And if you didn't know bonds are basically where you invest a certain amount of money and you're pretty much guaranteed to get whatever they tell you you're gonna get back at the end of one year or 10 years or whatever the time period is. Another example is let's say you only want to invest in companies that are environmentally responsible. Well, you could invest in the Vanguard FTSE Social Index Fund or VFTAX. Now this one is getting a little bit high. It's about 0.14% expense ratio, but definitely a lot lower than what you'd see with many different hedge funds. All right, so what should you do before you start investing in index funds? In my opinion, the first thing you should invest in is tax-advantaged accounts like the 401k Roth IRA and HSA. And you can often invest in index funds inside of these accounts, which is highly, highly recommended. You also wanna make sure to have an emergency fund that covers at least three months of your expenses in case something happens, like for instance, a global pandemic or you lose your job and only invest what you don't need in the short term. The reason for this is because if the market goes down and then you need money, what you're gonna do is you're gonna sell your investment at a huge loss. So you're gonna be selling when that's probably the best time for you to buy. And so you definitely don't wanna do that. So never invest more than you can afford to lose in the short term. And remember, index fund is long-term investing. They're designed to be held for 20, 30, 40 years. Now let's talk about the best brokerages for index fund investing. And the three big ones, the three heavyweights are gonna be Vanguard, Fidelity and Charles Schwab. So Vanguard, they were the first ones to do it. They're the OGs of index fund investing. They are probably the most trustworthy and reliable company out of the three. And the reason for that is because they have a history of being trustworthy from the very beginning. Now the Vanguard website and app, super, super simple. No bells or whistles. So I think some of the other websites and apps are definitely more user friendly, but some people like that simple interface. There's no trading platform, no physical branches, no credit cards, no checking accounts.  Now Fidelity is more similar to Charles Schwab than it is to Vanguard. They do have physical branches. One thing that really makes Fidelity stand out in my opinion is how user friendly they are. There's so many different services that they offer and they're trying to seamlessly fit all of them together. So you don't have to be with like 10 different companies just to use all the different financial related services. Now they do offer lower interest rates on margin loans, but I don't recommend taking out margin loans. So just don't do it. They also do have access to international trading and fractional shares. Charles Schwab, very similar to Fidelity, definitely more user friendly than Vanguard. Also way more features than Vanguard. They have lots of different options, credit cards, checking accounts, trading platform, et cetera. They also have an amazing international bank account that anybody who travels internationally raves about. And the reason for that is because you get all of your ATM fees reimbursed. And they also do have some physical branches. Now I'm gonna go over a few of the easiest brokerages to use in order to purchase ETFs. So we've got Robinhood, first app to make investing super easy and super accessible to the average everyday Joe. They also have really great sign up bonus incentives. Robinhood is ridiculously easy to use. Like it's so easy, a caveman could do it, right? That was like the Geico commercial. Well, that applies to Robinhood. And it's designed to be used on your phone. They do have a web app, but it's just super basic. It's really just a phone trading app. Webull is also very easy to use. I'd say it's almost as easy to use as Robinhood, but it has way more features. So in my opinion, Webull is good for beginners, but it's also good for intermediates. I love their app on the phone. I use it all the time. They also have a really nice user friendly web app that does have some good advanced features as well. You do have access to a limited amount of cryptocurrency trades, so something like seven of them. They do have pretty good customer service for an app and I have tested that out myself. Now they do have amazing sign up bonus incentives. And if you appreciate my hard work and you're planning on investing anyways using Webull, consider using my links down in the description below. And at the time of recording this video, you could win three stocks up to $1,800. So definitely check that out if you wanna support the channel, I really appreciate it. Another one, this is kind of the new kid on the block is going to be Moomoo. Now Moomoo is very similar to Webull. I would say that they're a little bit more of an advanced trading platform and they do offer free level two market data. And they also have more exposure to different Asian markets, which is something that a lot of people are getting very interested in investing in. All right, so a quick overview on how to invest in index funds. First, you want to choose a brokerage. Then you want to create your account. Sometimes it will take a little bit of time for them to create the account. It might take a few hours or a few days. Then you want to fund your account. Now again, depending on the brokerage you use, this could take anywhere from a few hours up to five days. Many brokerages will allow you to have partial access to some of your money. So for instance, if you put $5,000 on there, they'll give you partial access within a few hours to a thousand.  So maybe you wanna invest in the S&P 500, for instance, and you want to invest $300 a month. So you'd choose the corresponding index fund or ETF that matches your plan. And then you would start investing and the very last step is optional, but I recommend it and that is automate. Now again, much easier to automate index funds than it is to automate ETF investing. Now a quick note, I did mention this before, but alternatively you can invest in index funds within retirement accounts or tax advantage accounts like the 401k Roth IRA or HSA. Now this process is very similar, but it does take a little bit more research online. Many videos out there, for instance, on how to start a Roth IRA. I believe I made one like two years ago, but yeah, definitely look into that. Highly recommend tax advantaged accounts. All right, so I actually made a tutorial on investing in index funds on Fidelity just a few weeks ago. So I'm gonna jump to that tutorial right now.  So I'm just gonna play that tutorial really quickly and I'll be right back. All right, hey guys. So I created a Fidelity account here. This is actually an account that I used a while back for my Roth IRA before I actually transferred it off of Fidelity. But anyways, I'm gonna be showing you exactly how to transfer money onto Fidelity and then buy a stock. So what you wanna do here is go up to the top left and you are gonna click on the transfer button.   All right, so on this part you have a few different options. You've got the electronic funds transfer option. That's kind of just your standard option. Unfortunately, it does take a little bit of time but it's free. And then you've got bank wire which is much faster but you can only withdraw money from Fidelity. Okay, so they tell you kind of the downsides to that. So in this particular case I'm just gonna do an electronic funds transfer and then I'm gonna select my individual account and then I am going to link my bank account.  So there's many different ways you can find this information. When you started the bank account you were probably given this info. You can also log into your bank account online and it should be there but you can also look at the bottom of checks. That's another place where you can find those numbers. After you have entered that information in you just go ahead and click agree and continue. All right, so as it says at the top of the banner success, your bank account has been linked. Now you click on the bottom left here, transfer money now and then you click on your bank account. You wanna then click on your individual account. The frequency here is just gonna be just once and the amount I'm gonna do is $1,000 this time. So go continue. Just wanna review the transfer details one last time and submit. So at this point you just have to wait a little bit for your funds to get into your account and then after that you will be able to purchase stocks and actually Fidelity makes it to where there is a certain amount of money that's available right away. So it looks like in this case the cash available to trade is about $1,000 right now. So there's sort of just trusting that that money is actually going to get into your account more or less. If you ever have any issues with your bank they may not have that as an available option. All right, so that did not take very much time at all to fund the Fidelity account. The funds were pretty much available right away. Unfortunately it was after market hours so it is the next day. But this is the main page of Fidelity. You might find yourself on this one. You would just want to go to accounts and trade. Go up to trade here. Select which account you want to do. Your individual account go. And then here you can look up different stocks, ETFs, et cetera. The Fidelity zero total market index fund. So we're going to click on that one. Going to click buy. All right, we're going to end up buying about 62 shares or so. So it's going to be around $1,000. Preview the order.  And there you go, order is executed. So really easy one. That Fidelity index fund is great because it basically just tracks the entire market. So however the entire market does, which historically speaking it's done extremely well, you are going to increase your earnings on par with that. Definitely one of the safest investments you can possibly make. All right guys, back to future Shane. So what you want to do in order to set up automatic investments is you go to accounts and trade on the homepage. And then you go down to account features and click on that. Then you click on payments and transfers and then go to automatic transfers and investments and click on that. You want to go down here and set up an automatic investment. And keep in mind this is after you've already purchased an index fund, right? So you've already purchased an index fund. You've already linked your bank account to it. You've already funded your account, et cetera. They won't let you do this until you've made at least one purchase. So there's several different ways to do this, but you could just do this accounts core position after you've already made a purchase. You go to continue. This is where you would choose the fund. You would say what amount you want to do. Down here you would choose the frequency. So you could do it monthly, you could do it quarterly. You can also set a stop date if you'd like. So you can stop making investments at a certain date. For instance, if you're going to retire at a certain date you might stop making investments because you don't have a steady income. And then you would scroll down to the bottom here once you're done setting all that up and you click next and you're pretty much good to go. So that's how easy it is to set up automatic investments on Fidelity. All right, so now I'm going to go back in time very quickly and show you how I funded the Webull account and I made a purchase as well. So say hi again to past Shane and I will see you here in a few minutes. Hey guys, so I'm going to be funding my Webull account with $9,000 in order to buy some stocks. This is Webull, you know, it's not that hard to create the account. It's got some options here. You can go markets, look up some cool information, cryptos, global, explore, et cetera. Go to community, there's some cool stuff there.  And basically the one we're going to be going to is this middle one here. And on here, what you want to do is click detail and then go down a little bit, click buying power or on buying power to the right, you'll click deposit. It's going to have on the very top here, it's going to have you sign up to your bank account. So you want to link your bank account. Most common is an ACH transfer, it does take a few days. However, you will usually, depending on the brokerage you're using, get access to your funds pretty much right away. So basically you just need your routing number, your account number, some basic bank information, pretty easy to do.  And it's that easy. Hey guys, Future Shane back again. So we're going to go ahead and make that purchase on Webull. So the easiest way to do it is to just go ahead and click the markets tab at the bottom. And then it should automatically set to the United States if you're watching this from the US, but you have options to do crypto, global, explore. There's a lot of good stuff you can see there. And the one that I'm interested in buying is going to be VGT. Now this is basically an index fund. Now VGT is basically an index fund that has a little bit more exposure to technology related stocks. And one thing about technology related stocks is they did incredibly well during the pandemic. Everybody knows that, but even before the pandemic, they still did extremely well. They outperformed other types of stocks. And another thing about technology related stocks is they tend to be very scalable. So with some types of companies, they run into issues at some point because they simply cannot scale the company and make more money. Whereas with technology related companies, that's not nearly as much of an issue. You know, you don't have to have a lot of inventory to sell more software or digital products. So for that reason, and many more, I did a lot more research than that. I am going to invest some money into VGT because I think it is an index fund where you're going to have really diversified stocks, but at the same time, you have more exposure to technology related investments. So I'm going to type in VGT here and you want to always make sure that it's the right one, but this is going to be an ETF and you can look at all this.  It had that dip when the pandemic started, just like everything else. And then it went up a ridiculous amount since then. So very nice, steady growth. That's what you would expect to see from an ETF. So on the bottom left, I'm going to tap trade. Going to set the quantity to, looks like I can do 21 without running out of money. Going to make it a market order. And then I'm going to click buy and confirm. And my order was filled almost immediately. So we're good to go. All right, so now we're going to talk about how to sell your stock on Webull. And this is the part where my accountant is going to hate me because I'm basically buying and selling stocks within a few minutes. So there's several different ways you can get to your stocks. You can look at the main page, the middle one on the bottom, look at what stocks you own, or you can just go to markets and then search the stocks as well. That's another way to get to it. But I'm going to go ahead and click trade on the bottom left. And I'm only going to sell one of them because I just think it would be so wasteful just to buy and sell all of them. But I'm going to go ahead and just set a market order here. I'm going to sell and just sell one of them and confirm. And it sold it pretty much immediately as well. So as you all saw, incredibly easy, super straightforward. For people who have used other investing apps, you see how super easy this is. Some of the other ones actually make it incredibly complicated. It's almost like as if you had to learn a new software at work or something and it takes a long time just to be able to do the basics.  All right, so future Shane here again. Unfortunately, Webull does not have the ability for you to set up automatic investments. They've been talking about setting this up and I really hope they do because that's one of the biggest downsides to Webull. Although to be fair, most of the other investment apps don't offer that either. Check out this other video right here. I think you'd really enjoy it if you made it to the end of this one and go ahead, gently tap that like button, hit the subscribe button, ring the notification bell and comment down below any thoughts, comments, criticisms, et cetera that you have on the video and I will see you next time.


Residents of Mina, the Niger state capital, have blocked major roads in protest against the high cost of leaving. The protest is including women in youth demanding better government efforts to address the rising food costs and poor arrests. Deputy Governor Jacob Garber has expressed his understanding of the hardship faced by families and stated that the government is working to reduce leaving costs and address the consequences of the removal of petrol subsidies. Youth and women in Ba Kungu and this was unfortunate. They were yearning and clamoring for reduction in price of food. However, since that time we've been in series of meetings and we have discovered a latest happening in town in Nigeria. So we have been talking to the Union of Road Transport Workers to take caution. A group of syndicates follow truck or food traveling from Lagos mostly to the North and they cause great luck of traffic in the name of devastation in locations like ours today in an attempt to cause heavy traffic while items of those trucks are looted. But thank God for the men of our security forces. That was avatared trucks that were heading towards this location where a stop to Papua before the University in Guido, Mongolia and security men came and dispersed these rioting people. However, the federal government has shown interest, has spoken to the vice president, has spoken to the NSA on the current situation and we are on top of it.


The Boys Training Center has received a timely donation from CIBC First Caribbean International Bank. We get the details in this report. CIBC First Caribbean International Bank is exercising their corporate social responsibility through a donation to the Boys Training Center. The financial institution is donating 30 lifetime shares and a kitchen stove to assist with the facility's daily operations. CIBC's country head for St. Lucia and director for corporate business development in the OECS, Victor Boyce says, through this donation they are demonstrating their appreciation for the work of the Boys Training Center, providing a family environment, care and safety for the wards. Your work is bridging critical gaps in the fundamental needs of your wards. In addition to the rehabilitation aspect of the work of the BTC, the institution brings forcefully to mind the saying that it takes a village to raise a child. For we know that in every village there are those who have more and there are those who have less. Some homes can offer an environment that is more enabling of balanced growth and development than others can. It therefore befalls institutions and civil society at large to help narrow the gap of need and to link hands to provide that safety net before or you fall through the cracks into deviance and destitution. Kashama Shigoshi guidance counselor at the Boys Training Center expressed her gratitude for the generous gift and says it is a learning opportunity for the wards at the center. Your donation is quite timely as it solidifies some of the work we have been doing in the life skills program where social responsibility is concerned. Last week we had a debate on social responsibility but even before that we did corporate social responsibility. So today the boys are seeing firsthand an experience in what it is for the corporate world to say yes I want to volunteer, yes I want to donate. So it's not just talk for them but they are seeing it come to play. Shigoshi says one more need of the facility is met. This donation allows their meeting areas to be fully stocked and the wards will no longer have to carry chairs from one classroom to another. She hopes for further collaboration with the financial institution on other projects targeted towards the rehabilitation of the young men of Sintusha. From the Government Information Service, Lamadi Mark reporting.


Oh! It's time! Kick this man away! How's it going everybody? Dot today here and we are once again back with the week of Super Saiyan 4 Gojina and this time we are specifically playing a team looking for some dramatic finishes. Unfortunately in this first match here we don't really have a chance to get the dramatic finish but still the double Gojina team is still going to be a lot of fun to play. Man, this intro is still so sick to me. The glare dude. I'm also going to let Beerus' intro rock. Who knows? Maybe Beerus has a voice line. For GT Super Saiyan 4 Gojina that would be kind of sick. Ah, well, no unique voice line so we'll just go ahead and skip past the very ending of that part. But it's on! Oh, nice beginning. Command grab! It's a command grab! You got to be ready for that! Well, I thought about building up the stacks. Oh, nice. We still have a Super Dash. Go ahead and spend it. Get a little finish line going there. Oh! Gojina Super Saiyan 4! Again, I am having an absolute blast with this character. Obviously he has pretty much everything I... Counter! Counter Part 2! Counter Part 3! I knew it would work if I just kept giving it new parts! Oh! Auto Kava still looks pretty sick into the Yamcha. Oh wait, we smashed him down. Counter! Oh! Try something dude! Go ahead! Do me a favor and try something for me. Oh, that was beautiful. Counter! Oh! It's not getting any better! Oh, beautiful. Another character down. Gojina is just absolutely tearing through this team. We're only on stack number 3 so we don't really have access to the, you know, finishing move of our choice but still good enough to continue on in my book. Still have a Super Dash. Might as well spend it. And of course, we might as well go for the stacks dude. 4, 5. We're almost on 7. This way we won't have to deal with the sparking blast. Wait, this is bad. Level 3 might kill us here. 1. Alright, that's it. We built it up. Oh! I didn't land in time. I wasted the level 7. Jump up. Ah! It lasts for so long. If you whiff that move it lasts for so long. Oh! Why not? I'm just gonna go ahead and finish up the classic way. Flip.  The Shadow Clones. Where we at? Go! Speed up, speed up, speed up. The speed's too good. Oh, beautiful. Is that gonna be game? Shadow Clones! Get him! Take this man! Let's go! Man, I love... A lot of people said they're not a fan of the Super, the animation for Super Level 1. I actually really like it dude. It reminds me of what... If Naruto Fighters existed, that would be a Super in the game and I would love it. The Naruto Barrage, that was a great start for us. This time around, obviously I'm hoping we can build up those stacks a little faster. No 2H, that was huge! Super Saiyan 4 Gojira in a bad way right now. Oh! I just snapped back. 1? He's got a Super Dash? No, he didn't. DP! Why did I DP? Why did I do that? Why did I do that? What possessed me to do that? Oh no! We should probably switch out. We could build the stacks that way as well. So that's fine with me, Gojira. Super Saiyan Gods and Super Saiyan 4 working together. I was gonna say Dragon Ball Super and GT working together. But once I stuttered, I had a EX cancel out of the sentence. Beerus putting up a lot of good damage. The knockdown is what I'm more afraid of though. Oh! The 2H was nice. At least we did build up one stack for Gojira. That was quite tricky! Is that... No, that's only level 3. Okay, we gotta keep an eye on that meter too. Beerus is gone! 3! 3 Apartments he crashed through. Alright, so we're on level 3. This next one will be 4. No 2H, so we're living fine there. Turn around jumper! That was clean! Dive kick! One more and then we could get ready to move on to 21 and just call it a day. 4! Alright, 4 is built up. I mean 5 is built up. Yeah. Alright, we have 5. Oh! The heavy slash was so good! I think Gojira might be dead. I'm actually more worried about him switching out here. Oh no! Please kill! Oh! He didn't switch! He got greedy! Oh, but I did and I was dumb for it. Alright, well we kind of lived. We got lucky. Why did I dash? Alright, beautiful. Just put the game away. Alright, beautiful. We just need 2 more stacks. Again, we can vanish out of it. And we're in spark, so it's pretty safe. I did it though. I did it. I got hit. I'm still alive. Oh! It was too scary! Don't level 3! Oh! Drop it! Oh! The drop actually saved us. I hope you know what you're doing, dude. If you don't kill- Go! Let's go! It's over! TOD!  Oh my God, I got tears in my eyes! I'm actually crying. Oh my God, that was unfortunate. They're the only way to describe that is unfortunate. Wow, that was crazy! Beautiful! The reason I'm so excited is because it's the dramatic finish attempt. 2M, beautiful. Alright, let's get Gojina nice and low. This Gojina needs to be weak. Alright, that's weak enough. Weak enough for me anyway. Now you might be thinking, what are you talking about? Gojina Super Saiyan 4K dramatic finish. That's what we brought Blue Gojina for! He is here for explicitly that reason. Beautiful. Go for it. Keep it standard, keep it standard. No reason to get fancy now. Beautiful. Tell me that wasn't sick!  Did I scare you? Level 1! Behind the back! I'm too fast! Speed up, speed up, speed up! Wow, that killed! What the- I just think that would kill. I guess I just underestimate that damage. Oh, nice. Beautiful. Beautiful as well. There's no reason to switch them out just yet. But now there is. Again, we just want to keep them low enough that it's going to be stress-free trying to actually get the TOD. I'll take a level 3. Why? It might as well. Animations a little bit different. Yell at this man! That was sick. Alright, we're going to do this combo again. Alright, beautiful. Why do I keep dropping that against Broly? Level 3! Hopefully this kills. It might not. Command rep will have to see yell at him. It does more than enough damage. And now it's time. This is where it will be decided. GT or Super. Who's going to win? Let's go! It's time! Take this man away! Look at me, Gojina.  He skipped it! You skipped it! You- What?! No! My apologies. You better- Did you mean to do that? You better rematch. Yeah, that was a mistake. Okay, I need to see some proof. I need to see some evidence. I'm kidding. It probably was a mistake. But that doesn't matter. You better not do it a second time. Because you know I'm coming for it again.  Drag your rush. Go ahead. Snap out for me. I need you to clock out for me. It's time, dude. Gojina's angry. Take this man! Beautiful. Beautiful. One, two, three. I'm not even using my hands. Can I get a TOD here? I could have, maybe. Maybe if I really tried, I might have been able to- Oh! Why did that not hit? Counter! It didn't work. Also, Gojina's normals have very deceptive range. If you haven't played the character yet, he is very deceptive with how good he is in terms of those normals. They hit differently. Oh, I wanted to level three there so bad. Unfortunately, Gojina taking another big W there. Oh! Run up with him. Run up with him. Don't let him get away. Don't let him get away. I don't know if that hit. The timing's got to be there. The timing wasn't there that time. Again, that's pretty hard to- The timing there is pretty awkward. I'm dead for that, which I can't disagree with. I do deserve this. Unless you drop it, you didn't. Unless you drop it- No, you didn't. Oh, don't switch out now, dude. Don't switch out now. You know I'm coming for that guy anyway. I'm coming for that guy. Oh, we'll see. We'll see if he can escape fate, dude. We'll see. Everything's on the line now. Oh, beautiful. He's moving now. Can he escape? Just get 21 back out here. I don't want to even fight Gojina until it's time. It's not time for Gojina to fight yet. He'll know when it's his time. When everything's on the line, that's when Gojina could come out. I need to stop dropping stuff, dude. Beautiful. Now we're going to get Gojina a little low before we can come in here with our Gojina. That's the plan anyway. Beautiful. Good damage. It's all adding up. It's all coming up now. You better not skip it this time. Look me in the eye, Super Saiyan 4. You know what I want to do. Yeah, he knows. He's a player, dude. Come here. Ha! Let's just let it play. Thank you so much for watching this one, and I will see you in the next video.


Sometimes we're digesting food, pulling what's important and life sustaining. Sometimes we're digesting news, removing bits and pieces that change our life. Sometimes we're digesting our days with their routines and their movements. And often we digest online. We take our daily life, mundane moments and environments and we consume them. Spill them out in our online spaces in an attempt to create energy from them for you.


Hello everyone and welcome to a special edition of TV 30. Today, we will be speaking about the institution that has served our nation island for the longest, an institution that is 170 years this year. My name is Natalie Jolie-Fannes and I'll be your host for today and I'm proud to say I'm also an alumna of the St. Joseph's Convent. And with me today is the principal of St. Joseph's Convent, Sister Rufina Donat, as well as one of the members of the board of SJC, Mrs. Michelle Anthony Daisy. Welcome, welcome. Thank you. And thank you so much for sharing information with the nation on an institution that has served for so long and done so much. Let's start, Sister. I'm going to start with you. Give context for those who don't know about St. Joseph's Convent. Tell us a little bit about the history of this institution. When we speak about St. Joseph's Convent, we talk about 170 years. We cannot speak about St. Joseph's Convent without speaking about the sisters of St. Joseph of Clooney. Yes. And they're the ones who came to St. Lucia. It was established, they had written agreement by the administrator, the church administrator at the time, to run the schools. So that was established in 1854 and the location, the first location, was the Ave Maria grounds, where the Ave Maria grounds are located. In 1859, a fire destroyed the building. And so the sisters had to relocate to Monfortune in an apartment given to them there. And then the site we are on presently. That site was already being looked at for relocation. So it just hastened the process. So in 1961, through the assistance of the students themselves, that time was Pickabrick. Pickabrick, the assistant and the sisters themselves, they were able to erect the site that we use right now. Wow. Even then, in 1984, as yes, one year, in 1984, the sisters looking at education, wanting to extend again for more students to attend the St. Joseph's Convent in 1984, they built their own home, the lower down and so allowed for more students to enter the school by extending to additional form because it used to be a three-form school. So now we are four forms. So when we look at, as I say, when we look at the history, when we talk about SGC, we must talk about the sisters of St. Joseph of Clooney. Because of the sisters of St. Joseph of Clooney, we have St. Joseph's Convent. And St. Joseph's Convent is, for many people, it's not just St. Lucia. We belong, we are part of a province of the West Indies. So we have schools in Grenada, in Trinidad and St. Vincent. Are these schools all around the same age? No. Trinidad will be one of the oldest schools. Trinidad would be about a hundred and eighty. About two years ago, Potterspoon Convent celebrated 175 years. Okay. And I know you're building up to that. We are building to 175. So we're starting with 170. We wanted to, by the time we get to 175, it's going to be an overflow. And you speak of locating at Cedars Road, where you now are. Yes. You say about 1960, roughly? About 1961. Yes, 1961. You know, we don't want to show our age, but I think Michelle and I would remember that what we call the new block, maybe where the sisters lived before. Yes. Because we probably entered around that time. I remember. That is correct. Yeah, just that AV room. The 84 right. Being added at that time. She don't say that, don't repeat that year. The AV room was added in 84, naturally. You know, and look at how far ahead that you are. Look where we are with technology for you to recognize the importance of having an audiovisual room at that time, where it could be used in instruction for other activities. That is quite significant. Yes. The sisters always had a vision, because when the school was built, it was built with three labs. Wow. Three labs, biology, chemistry and physics. And you're looking at the six seasons when you're looking at education. We're talking about STEM education now. But from then they had that vision. And it was not just the academics. It was holistic development. So the arts were introduced. From the time they were at the Ave Maria location, Sister Colombo. Sister Colombo introduced theater arts to the school. Music. It was at that time, it was at a level where they were able to raise funds. In one of the history writings by Claudia Thomas, they were able to raise funds for hurricane victims in Jamaica. So it was Sister Colombo, she was an arts person, the music, everything. So the school was always known, not just for academics, but for the arts. The sports came in a little later. Okay. And as you speak of that, I really want to bring Michelle in here to speak to the significance, given, you know, that you probably understand the generations that have gone through SGC and the kind of impact. Speak to the significance to St. Lucia and the wider world of SGC. We're speaking about 170 years of educating women in St. Lucia.  I mean, now with the advent of social media, we're able to follow the adventures of a lot of our girls as they move out into the wider world. And you see the impact that they're making on the world stage. You know, in terms of science, math and a number of other areas. So the impact of St. Joseph's Convent cannot be understated. It is really a legacy that has been built. And one of the aims of this year's 170th celebrations is to continue building on that legacy as we move towards 175. Because St. Joseph's Convent has become established as a forerunner in the education of women on the island. Certainly, certainly. And that speaks to, I want to bring that up, the number of generations that 170 years can cover. And I think possibly with your family. Well, in my case, it's three generations. My mother, who is a former chief education officer, attended St. Joseph's Convent as did I. And now my daughter is in fourth form at St. Joseph's Convent. And I'm sure that we have other families where we probably have more generations who've gone through the doors of the school. Yes. So, so significant in so many different ways. And sister, I hope as we come out with this, I mean, we alluded to our year. We recognize that just recently in a virtual space, how we were able to bring so many girls from across the world together. And we had the house rivalry. But I think we're looking to, yes, I heard you mentioned your historian Claudia Thomas. Dare I say that she's also from our year group. So just for this, we are dominating class of 89. So yes, we want to see what each year group can bring to this. Oh, yes. So sister, I want to engage you in terms of leading up the plans leading up to this. I know you have alumni involved. You have your board involved. You have the current crop of students. Tell us what the process has been this far. Okay. One of the things we're looking at because as this is also part of the spiritual also look at the spiritual aspect and always begin with with church, prayers, mass. So looking at this act, the activities, the school has decided and we're starting off although there's a group made up of a number of past people from different year groups. And Michelle is part of that group also. But I want to speak from SJC. We are looking at the big opening with a mass at the Cathedral on the 24th at 10 a.m. Why 10 a.m? We want to get the students, we want the students to be part of it, very much a part of it, as much as we'd like to have the past people there, their parents, the wider society. So we're looking at this time and so that it can be effective. We can have an impact on on on persons at that time of day. So we're looking at the various groups, uniform groups at the school. We want to come down. We want to match down to the Cathedral. Wow. With our flags. And we want it to be a great event. So the past people are going to be part, are going to form the choir for the day. They had rehearsals last evening on Sunday via Zoom. Well, that is another story. It can happen. But we're going to have the face to face tomorrow Tuesday, Tuesday, that's the 16th, tomorrow at 5.30 p.m. at the school. And we want to invite all singers. I don't want to call names right now, but they are there. They know they're singing there in the spotlight. And we want them to also be part of that choir. So we want the choir to be part of the different years. Not those who have been in the choir, but those who are not in the choir and can sing. Oh, I thought you were talking about those in the choir. Because we have a rich tradition of an S.G.C. choir. Yes. You had to be, for my time, it was Sister Claire. Yes. I understand that you took over the choir. Yes, as a challenger as well. I'm under being petrified during singing, class singing, and being graded by Sister Claire. Oh mind. You had to do the solo. She'll call upon you on the inside. I was part of the choir. So the intimidation was a little bit less because we interacted with her on that level. But the choir has had a significant impact at S.G.C. as well. So it's really great to see. So you're bringing in alumni to be the choir for the service. To be the choir for the opening, the opening mass. Okay, that is very, very significant. Yes. So I understand we're going to go back to the activities. But just in terms of that kind of involvement mission, maybe you can come in in terms of the kinds of contributions that you're having from alumni, from parents, from the board itself in terms of the planning. The PR committee which has been established is a committee with alumni from various year groups. The entire planning of the activities for the 170th is under the chairmanship of Pauline Wolfe, who is from class of 1979. They, that particular class of 79 have been very, very active. They have events on a regular basis. They organize cruises. So one of the things that they're doing for this year, for this year's celebration is they're organizing a cruise from Florida down to St. Lucia. And I understand it's already heavily subscribed. Wow. They do have a bit of a cruising attachment to cruising. And so Pauline has put this committee together and they have been working hard behind the scenes. They've launched Instagram accounts. They've launched us on Facebook and they are pushing some of the activities and we're going to see in the coming weeks more and more of those activities in the social media forum. And obviously we have all of the other social media accounts which are affiliated to the school. So I think we're looking to see how we can bring all of these together with the same material. We want to get the SJC girls, the small pets, as they call themselves, excited, as excited as they were when we did virtual sports. And when I say we, you know, they were core group of ladies who were involved in that. And some of them are also involved in the PR aspect. So they've been working very hard and diligently behind the scenes. And we will be adding to the roster of activities that the school has planned. And some of these activities will perhaps come on later in the year. We do have a proposed gala plan for the month of July. And there will be more information given about that in due course. Okay, great. So you started with the key to get the word out that we are celebrating. So the PR committee is functioning and you're saying that it is from different year groups. And we're now trying to encourage each year group to appoint someone who be their spokesperson, who we can liaise with. So if that hasn't already been done, we're hoping that from this activity that we will be able to encourage them and get the excitement going because there's so much more that we can do. In addition to some of the other activities, some of the activities have been planned, a very heavy component of that is going to be given back. So these activities are being put together as we speak and we're hoping that I think in the next month or so that we can indicate what some of these additional activities will be. Okay, great. So we have to take a quick break, but when we come back we're going to speak about each of the activities, give it some focus, give it some hype so we get people ready for the celebration of 170 years of the St. Joseph's convent. You are watching TV 30 with SJC principal, board member and alumna. Please stay with us. We will be right back. Suicidal thoughts like other mental health challenges can affect anyone. It can be you, your colleague, family member, or neighbor. Everyone has a role to play in preventing suicide. Know the warning signs. If you or someone you know is in crisis or emotional distress, call the suicide hotline at 203. Remember, help is available. This is a message from the Employee Assistance Program, Department of the Public Service. Contact us at 468-2269 or 468-2260. Welcome back to a special edition of TV 30. We are here speaking about the St. Joseph's convent and institution that has been around for 170 years and joining me, an alumna, Natalie Julie Fannes, is Sister Rufina Dunat who's the principal and Mrs. Michelle Anthony Daisy who is a board member of the SJC. And in our first segment we ran through a little bit of the background, gave you a little history of the convent and what has led up to the planning of the activities and now we're going to hit the ground running to engage you and ensure the participation because this is not just for current students, it's for everyone who has been impacted by SJC. So we're going to start talking about our activities. Now Sister I know you gave us a sense of you have to start with prayer, we know that but once again let us talk about the opening activity for the celebration of 170 years. Okay, so we spoke about the opening mass which takes place on the 24th of January at 10 a.m. We want to begin with the students marching down to the cathedral and we're seeking, we have already written for permission for the route. We are looking at the police band, we also wrote for permission so that the band could lead the students into... We wanted a grand affair, we wanted to be big extra. So we want everybody to be there, use your lunch hour, use your lunch hour to be there. You know the same time yesterday Father said people take time off for funerals. You just got every possible spot to be there. So we want to encourage everybody to be there.  It's a sea of blue on that day. So all the uniform crews will be coming down with their banners. So we want it to be grand, it's a grand opening and in the middle of the day everything is going to be grand. And that is at the mine of a silica. The mine of a silica, the massive conception at 10 a.m. on the 25th. I am wondering if there'll be space for what the population of SGC is about 500, no? Roughly estimate. That is not good, we will find space there. We will find space for hotels. Yes, and I can already feel the excitement and just with the talk of the choir, I can hear the Husanas going up in praise of 170 years. Yes. That is is the first activity. And I heard you mentioned Parba, will he be officiating? The bishop will be the one officiating. It's in ground up. Parba will be there. Yes, yes. So you see the significance. We have the head of our church in St. Lucia officiating as well as a priest who has been affiliated with the convent for very long time. Yes. When I went back for my daughters, I think, was it graduation or something? It was with the mines. And Parba was there and I'm like Parba is still with SJC. So that too is significant. And you see there's always a connection with SJC and St. Mary's College because Parba relates that in his time they did some, St. Mary's College did some classes at St. Joseph's convent. They had a debate in club and they also had the Legion of Mary. So they all, we're the ones who broken that connection. I'm just hoping that with the 170, they did it to 175, we can reignite that connection. And the boys are always asking you know for them to be connected. Yes. Let me try to reunion. They were like, but you're left this autumn. Correct. But you can go to the convent. So yes, so that is important. Especially as an all-girls school, the connection is always good for them to understand that you have pairs that you know are of yours. So I'm hoping to see that happen. And it's important for the students to see the past students involvement and see them giving back and seeing the pride that they feel being part of the SJC family. So we want them to experience that. That sounds good. So that is how we open. Yes. What is the next grand activity on the agenda? The battle relay. The battle relay is going to it is we want to look at it from the Ave Maria school where we're looking at generations. We're looking at the decades of past pupils. So we are looking at that battle relay coming from starting with Ave Maria, looking at different year groups carrying that battle. So we are asking the different year groups to send in their representatives to call the school and give the name of their representative who they want to carry to represent them. They can have their chair leaders. So it is a house thing. It's going to be a house activity. Oh, you love that rivalry. Oh, yes. Oh, yes. That's where the energy comes naturally. That's when you feel the energy. So we are looking at it and all the way people will have their house colors. We're going to have the flags and house colors and we are going to get up to the school where it's going to be that is going to be the big thing. Celebration. The big celebration where we're going to have our we're going to have our formal speeches, formal lunches. Launch. Yes, great. The activity. Great. What has that been dated? It is. It is the 15th of February. 15th of February. So we are hyping so that's our sports. So it is on the 15th and we have our school sports on the 23rd. So the energy will be there. Transfer. Yes. So you're giving people sufficient time to get the day off. Yes. We can plan and see the day off from our employers. So the battle relay. The battle relay is at 3.30. At 3.30. So we're not going to take too much time from work. So from the Avamiria grounds to the SJC grounds. To the SJC grounds. Yes. That's a nice little distance and covering the decades. The decades. We're looking at the decades. Well as many decades as I guess we can get. Yes, we can get. So we look at house captains too. Games captains, you know, let them come show their faces. Yes. All right. So battle relay to officially launch the activities. Right. What do we move to next? Michelle, I don't know if you want to jump in here. Let's see. I think on March 8th we planned SJC in the city. And that is supposed to be a showcase of the students, artwork, culinary arts, all of their various clubs and other activities along with cultural performances. The plan is to use the Derek Walters Square to have parents and students and obviously any member of the public or past students who want to participate and be involved. And that is an activity which would start at about 9 30. I think 10 a.m. in the morning down to the end of the school day at 2 30. So it's a whole day activity and students and teachers would walk from SJC down to the Derek Walters Square to commence the day's activities. That is also International Women's Day. Right. So the significance of that day. Every year for the past five years we have been marking International Women's Day. Students, entrepreneurs, we give them that opportunity to showcase their work and it's getting bigger every year. The students, they do their cakes decorating, they do crochet, they do jewelry. So it's always an opportunity for them to showcase what they do. In the past we invited women in in the industry, entrepreneurs, but we are realizing that our students are just they are big on it. So what the counselor did was to get them trained by bell fund by, um, they would they were trained and into how to budget, how to prepare, how to present and it went very well last year. So we said no, we're going to bring it down to town. Going to be SJC in the city. Oh wow. Would, would, um, alumni who are entrepreneurs get an opportunity to exhibit as well? Oh sure. I guess in the space as we get as we get through, um, I don't want the time to pass upon us. So that's three activities down thus far and very, very significant and really bringing out the, the talents and just the very, um, engine of the, of the, the institution. So I think that's important. What, what else do we have that we need? It's an entire year of activities. Yes, looking at the service pattern and Michelle mentioned it that we want to give service. So under 18, there's a day before the feast. We want to have our school mass as we normally do. That would be at the school itself. But afterwards we want, um, with the assistance of parents to go out and feed and feed the homeless on the streets of Castering's Constitution Park, the markets. We're looking at schools also that need that assistance and this is what we want to do to give back in that way. Yeah. So that has always been one of one of the the school has a very rich tradition of giving back. We have the Christmas good tune and during the year there are a number of other activities which are always, always geared at giving back because that is something that is really, I think, you know, brought home and that we encourage with the students. Okay, excellent, excellent. So activity number four? Activity number four is the crazy one. It's called a motorcade, island wide motorcade we're looking at the entire school. We have not received permission so it is excellent for the plan. Yes, it's part of the plan would like so the children don't get that opportunity. Normally there is a holiday for us on the 19th to mark the feast but we won because of the 17th anniversary we want to take the children out. So we want parents, we want past students to all be part of that motorcade. Natalie this is going to, if it's happening that's going to, that's going to be great. You know what I like about this? That is the students who, people who attend SJC come from all around the island. Right, excellent. And I think that motorcade will be an ideal opportunity to reach out to all of these communities and allow them to represent as SJC goes through. So what we're looking at where you have an SJC child or past student you put a flag in your window. And you will get, as we go along, we're going to chair you on as we go along. Oh I love that. Yes, you put a flag in your window. I think you need to work to get permission for this system. Yes, they need to see the importance of it too. Right, because SJC although it is situated physically located in the capital its impact is island wide. And I think it would be a great thing to be able to take SJC out to all communities. Excellent. Our time is going quickly. Any other significant activity we want you to discuss? May 4th, 7 a.m. There's a proposed family for walking sports. Walking from, I think, Quartz Marisol to Pigeon Island. And once again I think sister would be encouraging the house spirit there wearing your house colors. Bringing family, bringing friends. So that's one of the other things that have been planned. Parents, staff, students, past students. And in July we also have proposed proposal for the school gala which I mentioned earlier. And more details will follow on that because that is still obviously in the works. Okay, so great. So one of the things I want to ensure that we do as we leave is if an SJC student is watching this broadcast and they want to know how to reach out, how can they contribute to, how do they contact either the planning committee or the school? Call the school. And we have the 4-5-2-2-7-7-8 is always available. Call the school. We have the Instagram page. We have the Facebook page. Reach out through your year group. You know, we really want the year groups to come on board because I think there's so much more that we can do with those kind of numbers. Do you know the Instagram handle of hand? Oh boy. Or if they search. If they search. What is SJC 170? SJC 170. And it's also on at the school's Instagram page. Okay. But we want to remind them of rehearsal on Tuesday. Check the pages. All past few minutes. If you have a voice, come on and sing. It's SJC 170. All right. SJC 170 legacy. Like and follow. Correct. All alumnus of SJC. So great. So this is how they reach out. We have just about one minute left. And I know we said about reaching out. Is there any opportunity or are there any opportunities for new ideas to come in from possibly different year groups? Absolutely. We know that there are a number of year groups who may be celebrating anniversaries in 2024. So we're also asking them to notify us of what their activities are and whether you know these activities could form part of the agenda for this year. The great celebration. Inclusion of all year groups. You have been watching TV 30 as we begin the celebrations for 170 years of St. Joseph's Convent. I thank the principal, Sister Rufina Donat and member of the board, Michelle Desi Anthony Desi for joining us here with all of that information. And like we said, get on the social media pages like and follow and keep in touch. We at the service January 24th which is a short time from now 10 a.m. See you then.


We send our heartfelt condolences to you all on this night, the eve of Ashura'a, where we are broadcasting from the holy city of Karabala, the land where the sky wept blood and where blood could be found underneath every rock after the tragedy of Imam Hussain's massacre. After the heart of Sayyid Zaynab A.S. was broken, watching her beloved brother, she grew up with all her life after losing her mother, after losing her father, seeing her brother, not just killed, but seeing his heart break when he held Ali Azgar and Ali Azgar met his death, seeing his back break when Abu Fadr al-Abbas fell and the flag of Abu Fadr al-Abbas fell and seeing his soul almost leave his body when his son, Ali Akbar A.S., met his death and finally seeing him there on the plains of Karabala, thirsty, a stranger with no one to help him and his body covered with spears and shimmering sitting upon his chest. It is truly a feeling I cannot describe being here in the holy city of Karabala, knowing that in just a few mere hours this tragedy will fall upon us once again as it does every year. And with all the tears that we cry, with all the lamenting that we do, as you can see behind us the processions, there are so many processions going on in Karabala right now, so many millions here in Karabala. It's absolutely packed to the rim of people mostly from within Iraq who have come to pay their respects to Imam Hussain and his brother Abu Fadr al-Abbas. Amongst all this lamentation, we also need to ask ourselves what lesson are we taking today from the story of Imam Hussain, and as I mentioned in the first episode, one thing that I've tried to put on myself and one thing that I've advised all the viewers through and my guests are doing as well, inshallah, is find something in our life that we need to work on, a value that we need to work on, something, a lesson that we need to take on board in our lives and try and act out in these four to days that we have, beginning with the first of Muharram and ending with the Al-Ba'een of Imam Hussain, as we know, tomorrow is the day of Ashura but the morning does not end there, in fact it continues and intensifies until the day of Al-Ba'een, inshallah, when the millions and millions of pilgrims shall return to the holy grave of Imam Hussain to pay their respects, and today inshallah we shall be looking at how Sayyid al-Zaynab, Imam Hussain and the family of the Prophet dealt with tragedies in their lives and how we too should be dealing with tragedies in our lives, it's no secrets that especially for the lovers of Ahlul Bayt, especially for the believers of Allah, tragedy befalls us every day, every day we hear people that are losing family members, going through hard times, going through divorces, going through their business closing down or losing money becoming poor, these are things that affect us on a daily basis and if there's anything that Imam Hussain and Sayyid al-Zaynab taught us, it's how to deal with these tragedies that we face every day. So inshallah today I'll be joined by Sayyid al-Ainawab once again, where we shall be tackling this. As-salamu alaykum Sayyidina, As-salamu alaykum wa rahmatullahi wa barakil ajal, and may Allah allow for my condolences to you on this solemn and heartbreaking night, the eve of Ashura. If you can begin, not just the discussion but also lead into the mosaib and tragedy of Imam Hussain, As-salam, in the context of how we too should deal with such tragedies in our life. Bismillah ar-Rahman ar-Rahim, first of all I would like to offer my deepest condolences to our awaited Imam and Saviour, Sahib al-Asr al-Zaman, Adjara Allah Ta'ala Farajah al-Sharif, as he is the immediate person affected by this tragedy. I offer my condolences to Lady Fatima al-Zahra, As-salamu alayhi alayhi, the mother of Abiy Abdullahi al-Hussain, to the grandfather of Abiy Abdullahi al-Hussain, to the father of Sayyid al-Shuhada, As-salamu alayhi, and to the brother of Imam Hussain, As-salam, to the ulama, to the mu'mineen and mu'minat, wherever they may be, I ask Allah SWT to accept our mourning in this morning season and our lamentation, our cries, and our azadari, and that insha'Allah we are given another opportunity very soon insha'Allah to serve Ahlul Bayt al-Alihim, As-salam, to the best of our abilities. No doubt we as human beings Allah SWT has brought us to this world and as we discussed in the previous nights, this life that we are living now and those who have lived life before us and those who will live this life on this world after us in the next generations, they would live life as a means of test and life on this earth is not meant to be easy, is not meant to be happy and all-rosy. As it is a life full of tests and calamities and problems, we tend to face tragedies either from our own immediate circles or the circles around us and we always learn from Ahlul Bayt al-Alihim, As-salam and this should be the case in all situations, in happy days, in sad occasions, in the morning, at night, whatever you will go through make sure that you bring Ahlul Bayt al-Alihim, As-salam into your life and you join Ahlul Bayt al-Alihim, As-salam in whatever they went through because at the end of the day the whole purpose that we are living on the face of this earth is to be able to leave this world with a clean page, with a page, or with a book full of good deeds and especially the love of Ahlul Bayt al-Alihim, As-salam, we educate ourselves with the education of Ahlul Bayt so we are eventually resurrected on the day of judgment and we would be from amongst those who will receive the intercession of Ahlul Bayt al-Alihim, As-salam and specifically the master of martyrs, Abi Abdullah al-Hussein, insha'Allah. In the Ziyara of Amirul Mu'mineen, As-salam, or amongst the Ziyarat that Imam Ali, As-salam, is visited on, when you visit the shrine of Amirul Mu'mineen, one of the Ziyarat tells you to face towards Karbala and visit Abi Abdullah al-Hussein and one segment of that Ziyara whilst you are in Najaf visiting Amirul Mu'mineen, you say to Abi Abdullah al-Hussein, As-salamu alayka, Ya Sahb al-Museeba al-Ratiba. Now, we might question what is the connection between Amirul Mu'mineen, As-salam and Abi Abdullah al-Hussein. We are visiting Amirul Mu'mineen, we are in the land of Najaf. Why does the Imam, the Ma'soom, the infallible ask us to visit Imam Hussain, As-salam. And as we discussed from the beginning, and we mentioned that Abi Abdullah al-Hussein is the inheritor of the prophets and messengers. And he is most obviously the inheritor of all of the attributes and the characteristics of Rasulullah, As-salam and his father, Amirul Mu'mineen. And here the Ma'soom, the Imam, wants us to visit Abi Abdullah al-Hussein and mention the tragedies that Abi Abdullah al-Hussein went through amongst the Ziyara of Amirul Mu'mineen to say that Abi Abdullah al-Hussein is a continuation of the work started by the Holy Prophet and Amirul Mu'mineen, As-salamu alayka. And if it wasn't for the sacrifice of Abi Abdullah al-Hussein, the message of Rasulullah and the hard work of Amirul Mu'mineen, As-salamu alayka, would have, God forbid, gone astray or just gone haba' and manthura. So the Ziyara says, peace be upon you, O possessor of the perfected calamity. The everlasting and renewing tragedy and calamity throughout time. One of the brothers today was asking, why do we, every year, we mourn Abi Abdullah al-Hussein. We sit down and cry for the same masa'ib, the same tragedy is mentioned year after year in the same Majalis. As if we have memorized, we know the tragedy of Imam Hussein by heart. But why is there that feeling that, for example, in an eve like this, the eve of Ashura, Leila to Al-Ashir, Min Muharram, we feel as if the tragedy is going to actually happen tomorrow. Insha'Allah when you come to the land of Karbala one year and you happen to be here on the eve of Ashura, you will be able to feel the feeling that me, myself, and brother Nuri and the thousands of those who are rotating around the burial site of Abi Abdullah al-Hussein are feeling. It's as if the tragedy is going to fall upon Islam tomorrow. What is it? Why is that feeling there? And that is the heat that Rasulullah sallallahu alayhi wa alayhi wasallam spoke about. This heat and this love in the hearts of Mu'mineen will never die down, will never cool down, and it will extinguish and it will reach its ultimate heat on the eve of Ashura, Leila to Al-Ashir, Min Muharram. Let's try to imagine the environment or the atmosphere in the camp of Abi Abdullah al-Hussein in this very night, where the companions of Abi Abdullah al-Hussein, Bani Hashim, Ahlu al-Bayt, and specifically Abi Abdullah al-Hussein spent this night reciting and reading the Holy Qur'an and praying towards Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. The narration narrates, they had this buzzing sound like the sound of a bee flying around one room because they were busy facing towards Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, focusing all of their attention and concentration towards Allah in this very night. They did not give any regards to the thousands of the members of the army of Yazid ibn Mu'awiya, who was surrounding the campsite of Abi Abdullah al-Hussein, that heat existed in their hearts and did not allow any fear to enter the hearts and the camps of Abi Abdullah al-Hussein. But Lady Zainab wanted to ask a question, wanted to make sure that the companions in the camp of Abi Abdullah al-Hussein are genuine in their belief and their sacrifice and their promise to Abi Abdullah.  And as you can hear the beating of the drums and the mu'mineen and the mu'minat chanting the slogan Haider Haider Haider. Similarly, when the companions found out that Lady Zainab is still unsure of their loyalty, Habib ibn Muzaher came to the camp and the feima and the tent of the Ansar. He went around one by one telling them get ready and come out and stand in one line. Why Habib? What has happened? Habib told them the daughter of Ali ibn Abi Talib is still unsure of our loyalty. She believes or she thinks that there might be people amongst us that will leave about Abdullah al-Hussein tomorrow when the fighting gets heated. Here the companions of Abi Abdullah al-Hussein in the cross proximity of the shrine of Abi Abdullah in the muqayyim, they came out and they started chanting with slogans to make sure that they make the enemies of Ahl al-Bayt hear them and shiver from that roaring sound. Here Abi Abdullah al-Abbas bani Hashim, they came out from the tents. They wanted to know what's happening. What is happening? Here Habib says, oh bani Hashim go back to your khyam. It's just that we are practicing our stand for tomorrow. Here Lady Zainab was assured that yabnat-e-ameer al-mu'mineen.  These tragedies started in the camp of Abi Abdullah al-Hussein in the morning of the 10th of Muharram when the enemies of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala specifically Omar ibn Sa'ad he brought an bow and an arrow and he directed it towards the khyma of Abi Abdullah al-Hussein and he shot that arrow and he started saying to his people bear witness and take that message to the amir, meaning Yazid, that I was the first person that shot an arrow towards the camp of Abi Abdullah al-Hussein and they followed course. They all, thousands of those who carried bows and arrows, they directed and they shot their arrows towards the camp of Abi Abdullah al-Hussein. Try and imagine, started raining arrows upon the khyam of Abi Abdullah al-Hussein. Arrows entered the khyam, the women, the children, the little girls and boys in the camp of Abi Abdullah al-Hussein. They weren't ready for this kind of situation so the women and children came out crying and shouting because they clearly were afraid of that situation. So this was a glimpse of the situation and the atmosphere in the camp and amongst the camp of Abi Abdullah al-Hussein, the eve of Ashura, an evening like this and in the morning of Ashura. In the ziyar as we said, we read, we say, peace be upon you forever as long as I am existent and there is day and night.  And we say, Ya Aba Abdullah, the fact that I wasn't present, I was not present in Karbala to sacrifice my life for your sake, Ya Aba Abdullah. We will follow and we will continue your morning day and night. We shall mourn you, Ya Aba Abdullah from the morning until the night and we shall cry for you so much until our cries, our tears turn into blood. This is the cries of Imam Al-Mahdi in the evening of Ashura. How are we going to give back the love and the emotion and the sacrifice that Abi Abdullah al-Hussein sacrificed for our sake on the day of Ashura? Sayyid Zainab, the sister of Abi Abdullah Al-Hussein says, to Imam Zain Al-Aabideen, once they were ready to leave Karbala, Here, Lady Zainab promises to Imam Zain Al-Aabideen, Ya Zain Al-Aabideen, do not get worried, do not be worried.  You see brothers and sisters on your screens, images and footage of those who have dressed in black as if to say, Ya Abi Abdullah, this is our kafan. These are our shrouds and these are our swords and weapons. We have carried them and we have come out on the streets and in the vicinity of your shrine and Bainul Haramain to show and to prove not only to the world but also to you Ya Abi Abdullah that we are ready to sacrifice our lives for your sake Ya Abi Abdullah. And this Lady Zainab continues in saying and the leaders of apostasy and their promoters of misguidance shall try their best to obliterate and face it yet it shall get more lofty and sad. What were the reasons? What were the reasons that the message of Abi Abdullah al-Hussein lived on and continued days after days, nights after nights, years after years, centuries after centuries and today after 1300 and so years lovers and muhabbeen and followers and companions of Abi Abdullah al-Hussein are coming out in their hundreds and thousands renewing their allegiance to Abi Abdullah al-Hussein. What is it in this history of Abi Abdullah that renews itself year by year? It is the fact that there was a connection in this movement in this reform. There was a connection of this revolution with Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala from the day that Abi Abdullah came out from Medina and moved towards Makkan Karbala. His intention, his sole intention was that this reform and this movement was for the sake of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala and only Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. There was no room for worldly desires to affect the hearts of the sole companions of Abi Abdullah al-Hussein. There were exceptional circumstances surrounding this revolution because there were women and children who joined in in the revolution of Abi Abdullah al-Hussein. These are exceptional situations. If you go and research and read the books of history about previous revolutions, any individual, any commander, any leader that started a revolution and revolted against any group or any community or any government, note that they did not and I repeat, any commander in historical revolutions did not bring out his women and children to be amongst his camp and caravan.  Abi Abdullah al-Hussein, the only leader that came out and brought his family and children to join him in his revolution and in his reform. Did he not know that his revolution, his reform, this movement is going to end with the tragic death and martyrdom of himself and his family and companions? Yes, he knew. But he still moved on because he said, We shall remember a short scenario of what happened on the day of Ashura after everyone, in the camp, all the soldiers in the Qiyam of Abi Abdullah al-Hussein went to the battlefield and fought bravely. But unfortunately, they all were killed and martyred on the planes and fell on the planes of Karbala. The only living soldier in the camp of Abi Abdullah al-Hussein in the afternoon of the 10th of Muharram in Karbala was Abi Abdullah al-Hussein himself, only. Imam Hussein came, stood by the Qiyam by the tents of the women and the children. He started calling, One of the names of this very night is Laylatul Wida. Why? Because of the 10th of Muharram and children in the camp sitting inside the tents. They were advised, do not come out. Why? Because there is a battle going on and we fear Fiola. Every time anyone wanted to leave the sons of these women, Ali al-Akbar, the brothers of Qasim, Abul Fadl al-Abbas and his brothers, every time anyone of them wanted to go to the battlefield, they would have individually come and stand by the tent of their sister or their mother or their wives and bid farewell to these women and children. But it was time for Abi Abdullah to come one more time, one last time to bid farewell to these women and children. Rushed out, they surrounded Abi Abdullah al-Hussein. One of them came, she took the cloak of Abi Abdullah and started smelling the scent of Abi Abdullah. One of them beat of Abi Abdullah and started kissing the feet of Imam Hussein, alayhi salam. One of them was saying, I'm called Abbas went to the battlefield, Qasim went and never came back, never came back, that you will go and never come back. Imam Hussein, alayhi salam, wiped upon their hearts and their heads and advised them, told them be patient, alaykum bursa, alaykum bid dua. There was one little daughter of Hussein. One little daughter of Abi Abdullah never came out to say goodbye to her father.  Abi Abdullah asked Zaynab, sister Zaynab, where is my little daughter, where is my little daughter Sufkayna? Sister Zaynab said, brother Hussein, she is inside her khayma. Imam went and sat inside the khayma of Sufkayna. He saw Sufkayna sitting in a position and she's put her head between her arms and her leg. Sufkayna, why didn't you come out? I want to go to the battlefield. Sufkayna said, oh father, my heart is aching. I cannot bear to see you go and never came back and never come back, oh father Hussein. In this midst, little Rukkaya came in and she saw that Sufkayna was sitting in the lap of her father Hussein. Rukkaya said to her father, Abaya Hussein, promise me we'll come back. Imam Hussein, alayhis salam, promised Rukkaya, I will see you and you will see me once again. Imam Hussein kissed them both, wiped upon their heads. The way they treat orphans is as if to say, when I am going to be killed, there will be no one to wipe their hands over your heads, my daughters. Imam Hussein came out and said, who is going to give me and bring me my horse? Here, Lady Zaynab says, I saw two sisters in front of her, she is pulling the horse. Abaya Hussein pushed his hand on the hat of Lady Zaynab and he says, Allah, my sister, to be patient when she faces calamity is on the side after me. Abaya Hussein rides upon his horse as if he wants to go to the battlefield. He hears the cries of Abdullah He says, bring me Abdullah, they bring Abdullah. He takes Abdullah to the battlefield. He says, Abdullah was facing the enemies and speaking to the enemies. Suddenly, I took out one of my three-headed arrows. I positioned it in the heart of the bow. I shot the arrow towards the neck of Abdullah. The Imam noticed the head of Abdullah till to one side and the blood is gushing out from the throat of Abdullah. He noticed the little Abdullah took out his arms and hugged Abdullah as if to say, Abaya Hussein, these people have given me the words that I was looking for. Abay Abdullah in a very, very sad and tragic way came behind the tent and dug a trench, a little grave and buried Abdullah in that grave. And he started making his way towards the battlefield. I will not read the Maqtel. I will not read the Masaib. My last is as he was going to the battlefield. He heard the sound of ladies and I'm crying out. Imam Hussein came back. He said, what is this, my sister? I am going to go to the battlefield. Ladies and gentlemen, my brother Hussein came back. Abay Abdullah, come down from your horse. Abay Abdullah, come down. Ladies and gentlemen, Abay Abdullah, Abay Abdullah, open the door for me. Oh brother, open your shirt. What do you want to do, oh sister Zainab? Ladies Zainab said, Abay Abdullah, open your shirt. Imam Hussein opened his shirt. Ladies Zainab came. She kissed the chest of Abay Abdullah. Just try and imagine the scenario. She kissed the chest of Abay Abdullah. She kissed the chest of Abay Abdullah. She kissed the chest of Abay Abdullah. This this that she gave me I have written. She says The day that our mother Fatima passed away moments before she gave me this amana. She said, I will not be present on the day of Ashura.  Why the chest and why the throat? Because Lady Fatima knew that on the afternoon of Ashura, horses will trample upon the chest of Hussein and Shamr will sit on the chest of Hussein with his sword. He will behead Aba Abdullah. Labbaika Ya Hussein. Labbaika Da'i Allah. Labbaika Ya At-Shah. I waited on time, but there was a poem that I wanted to recite, inshallah. And I'd like to, before I recite this, I'd like to send my condolences and apologies to our master, Sahih Rasul Zaman, for reciting what is known as the Maqtah or the killing of Mahmoud Sayyidin Islam and the proceeding of what happened after that. As you go well aware, Sayyid Ali recited some of the most saddest moments so far. Is that this time I want you to picture? This is the poem that I want you to recite on the day of Ashura. Is that this time where everyone is gone? Mahmoud Sayyidin looks at the battlefield, Ali Akbar is gone, Al-Azib is gone, Ali Aziz is gone, Al-Bahash is gone, everyone is gone. And the Mahmoud Sayyidin Islam heads out to the battlefield, as I was narrated. They say when he fell, there were so many spears in his chest, the hadiths said, you look at all the people. They say there were about 1,700 wounds upon the body of Mahmoud Sayyidin Islam. 1,700 wounds. After all this, after all the calamity he's faced, shimmer comes and it is upon the chest of Abad Al-Azib. Sayyid Azizin stands on the tail, the hill overlooking where Mahmoud Sayyidin is, and she sees this shaitan sitting on the chest of her brother.  Bring yours. He sits on his chest and he watches Zainab run beside her brother. No brothers and no one. Is there any to help me? No, there is none in her hopelessness to her brother. She fled. She screams to shimmer.   His eyes watch Zainab by her grief stricken and he watches her as he severs her same chest. She sits by her brother, massacred by his absence. His body is here, but where is his presence? Everything is broken, except his silence and nothing was left of him unless it blurted. She screams. She screams so loud. It's like her soul from her body leaps. She says my brother in the river of his own blood sleeps.   Oh, head that once embarrassed the moon's night.  It's as if my recurring you wasn't enough and neither was tearing these girls' hearts in half. We watched the spear that holds your holy head laugh. So today's grief would match yesterday's bloodshed.  The tears I cry out blood and torches me every tear. I see the lion, the other lion's fear, with a severed neck into a spear in bed. If you don't care for him, at least care for his children.  You torment little hearts of every orphan, telling them that to shimmer's sword, Hussain was fed. They killed her brother and they left him with no shroud. They raised his head and they raised as if they're proud, taking his woman captive before a crowd and they cursed his father as to your zeed they had. Zaynep says, Ya Rasoolallah. Oh, my grandfather, two of him were torn apart. Oh, my grandfather, his head from his body they part.  Oh, grandfather, he was killed with no one beside him. He looked to the distance and he saw only them. The silence of the wind, it sang a painful hymn telling them that you're alone and alone you tread. If my father knows this how we are treated, then how is a spear with my brother's head weighted? Indeed the sword, my brother's blood defeated, but we are left to fight this sword vengeance on dread. Oh, lion of battle, she says, oh, Ababdillah. Oh, lion of battle, to which battle crawls. Oh, lion of battle, to which battle crawls. Oh, catcher of the flag, it's ever it falls. We are left paraded in Yazid's courts and halls through torture, death, and pain these women I've led after they steal his head. As they wail, they take her captive and his zaynab they steal leaving in her a wound only he could heal after they killed him, her brother they'd behead. After they'd killed him, her brother they'd behead. As-salamu alaikum wa rahmatullahi wa rahmatullahi. Insha'Allah we'll be joined after the break for some lamentation by Sayyid al-Hakeem. Insha'Allah we'll see you then. Ya Hussain, Ya Hussain, Ya Hussain. Ya Hussain, Ya Hussain, Ya Hussain.