Welcome to Spotlight. I'm Colin Louther and I'm Liz Wade. Spotlight uses a special English method of broadcasting. It is easier for people to understand, no matter where in the world they live. Think of an event in your life that you remember very well. You can think of any memory as long as it is clear. Think back. Where were you? Who were you with? What time was it? Can you smell anything? Taste anything? Why do you think you remember this event so well? Memory is strange. Sometimes a person might remember something that is extremely important to them. At other times, she may remember a fact that does not matter at all. It may be difficult to learn something she wants to remember, like an English vocabulary word. But this does not always have to be the case. There are actually special methods that you can use to improve your memory. Today's Spotlight is on. How to use your memory to remember anything. No one's memory is perfect. What a person remembers can be unreliable. Even the most intelligent people forget things. This does not mean a person has a bad memory. It means he is not using his mind to his advantage. The brain has two kinds of memory. The first is short term or working memory. This kind of memory is useful for a very short time. Experts say you can store four sets of information in your short term memory at the same time. Information in short term memory will last about 20 to 30 seconds or less. Then it disappears. The second kind of memory is long term memory. Long term memory is what people usually think of when they say they have memorized something. Memories in the long term memory stay. A person can remember them again and again. These are memories like the names of people you know, how to do a task, or memories from a special event from a long time ago. The trick of remembering is moving information from short term to long term memory. No one knows exactly how this happens, but scientists do have theories. Richard Mose is a writer at HowStuffWorks.com. He writes that going from one kind of memory to the other is all about attention. You must focus on particular things. To properly create a memory, you must first be paying attention. You cannot pay attention to everything all the time, so most of what you see every day is filtered out. Only some information passes into your conscious awareness.  People also remember things that are similar to what they already know. This is because of the structure of the brain. Most of the brain is made of cells called neurons. When we learn something, different neurons connect to each other. When these neurons stay connected, it forms a memory. The more connections a memory has, the stronger it will be. For example, think of a person you know. When you think of that person, the same neurons become active in your brain every time. Memories can also link to other memories, making them stronger still. This is why memories with multiple senses last longer. For example, a memory where you experienced something by hearing, tasting, and smelling may be very strong because you used more senses in the experience. These memories connect different parts of the brain. Think of the person you just remembered. Do you remember what their laugh sounds like? Do you remember the sound of their voice? Finally, we make memories when we have repeated experiences. Each time we do the same thing, our brains make new connections. Scientists say our neurons activate or fire. Richard Mose uses practicing music as an example.  This makes it easier to repeat this firing later on. The result? You get better at playing music. You can play it faster with fewer mistakes. Practice it long enough and you will play it perfectly. Practicing or repeating information is one of the most popular methods of remembering. If a person has vocabulary cards, they are usually using this method. But this is not always the best way to memorize. There are many methods which use the other ways we remember or combine them. Another memorization method is called a pneumonic device. One well-known pneumonic device is called an acronym. Acronyms are helpful in memorizing words. To create an acronym, find a list of words you would like to memorize. It is usually helpful if there is something similar about them. Then take the first letter from each word. Organize those letters into a word or phrase. You have now made an acronym. Each letter in the final word stands in for another word. So, to memorize many words, you only have to remember one. One famous acronym for learning English conjunctions is fanboys. The F stands in for the word for. A stands for and. The rest stands for nor, but, or, yet, and so. Acronyms work because they make the information simple. Another memorization method is visualization. In visualization, you think of an image or picture that represents the thing you are trying to remember. For example, imagine a person is trying to remember the name Melanie. He might think of a picture. In the picture, a woman is holding a melon fruit. She is crushing the melon with her knee. The sound of the two images will remind him of the name Melanie. The image is also very strange. It is easier for the mind to remember unusual things. Visualization works because it makes the foreign information into something familiar. One of the most interesting mnemonic devices is called the method of loci. It is also called a memory palace. To create a memory palace, a person must think of a familiar area like a house or a street. Then she must imagine a journey through that space. In the journey, she stops at different familiar areas. In each of these areas, she places an item. The item must have something to do with the thing she is trying to remember. Melanie Pinola is a writer and mental athlete. She competes with others to remember long lists of numbers or words. She wrote about the memory palace technique for lifehacker.com. For everyday use, the memory palace is helpful for remembering a list of things. Start a journey beginning at a place you know very well like your home. Begin at your door. If you want to remember a grocery list, imagine the items you need. Imagine a container of milk overflowing on your doorstep. When you get inside, perhaps two giant stakes attack you in your doorway. Continue to your living room to find pretzels dancing on the rug. Again, the more movement, strange experiences, and senses you put into your memory palace, the better for your memorization. This may seem like a lot of work. Creating more information than the person needs to memorize. But the method of loci is actually a way of hacking the brain. To remember something, the brain needs a network of information. Without this network, the memory will fade quickly. The method of loci creates a new network. It uses multiple senses. And then it attaches the network to something familiar. This way, what you are trying to remember enters the long-term memory. There are many more mnemonic devices, but most memory methods involve one of these three steps. Make it simple. Visualize it. That is, imagine you can see it in your mind. Connect the information to something you already know. If you can master these simple tips, you will be able to remember huge amounts of information. What will you memorize now? Do you have any special ways you remember things? What are they? Will you try a new method? You can leave a comment on our website at www.spotlightenglish.com. You can also find us on YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. The writer of this program was Dan Christman. The producer was Michio Ozaki. The voices you heard were from the United Kingdom and the United States. All quotes were adapted for this program and voiced by Spotlight. This program is called How to Memorize Anything. Visit our website to download our free official app for Android and Apple devices. We hope you can join us again for the next Spotlight program. Goodbye.


What's going on guys got Kyle here relating sports cards, and we are ripping 2022 Bowman chrome baseball sapphire edition 10 box full case number 11 random teams We did a randomizer before the break here Here is your results we had JM with the Mets down to Will W with the Astros can always find those results on our website late in sports cards at the very bottom have the results section Good luck here guys 2020 Bowman chrome sapphire. Let's see some nice autos some nice color Nice a choreo for Alvin there That brewer spot righty. Good luck guys. This is Donnie's favorite product to top load here Every single car from this will be top-loaded guys 22 Bowman chrome sapphire Good luck You should see Donnie's face right now guys. I was staring at you for 45 seconds. You should see it man. He's staring daggers at me I Understand we got orange to start would have words it is gonna be rookie orange Spencer Torkelson to 25 Nice start there tigers nice Alexandros with the rookie orange to 25 Very nice start there for you. Got a Marcello and a Bobby Whit rookie Really great start here got a rookie of Josh Lowe for the race Curtis mead insert and Corey Siga. Yeah, I'm not really sure on that Jose Rodriguez got Matt Olson got a first of Alexis Hernandez and Jared Kelnick got a first junior Perez for the eights We've got Sammy Munoz nice one there for the Dodgers on the first Hope everyone's having a good Thursday night out there. Really appreciate everybody helping us fill up some breaks tonight There's ever Cabrera Rossman vertigo and Christian posh shate a 99 on the lime or the aqua and Jarenda ran rookie I Agree David. I really like the sapphire. It's a really clean design man. Really really nice. I Like the sapphire a lot of things they had sapphire Star Wars. They've had an F1. I think they're all really nice There's a yinji Rojas Joey Bart Contreras. Yeti cappy. I really like the start of sapphire Star Wars when it was Like a year ago when it came out Hernandez first Lubeb Starling Marta and a Colton Couser prospect they first Ryan Reckley and Cal Raleigh rookie Anna Ellie on the prospect there for the Reds There's box one go box two guys For some autos here, maybe some nice low numbers again had a nice torque within the 25 first box Let's keep it going on the low numbers though Keep it going Yeah, guys just three spots left for tonight full case divisions 2022 select football Just three spots left for the whole night. Appreciate everybody helping us get some get some breaks filled. There's a Nick York Acunia Alvarez and a first Luis Mesa blue jays Marco Luciano Royce Lewis rookie Aaron Ashby and a Willie Vasquez first for the race There's a first trace Sweeney got an aqua coming It is gonna be Joe Ryan on the rookie aqua number. It's a 99 nice one there for the twins rookie John Kinsey Noel Maxim oncey Alec Bohm Carson Williams won. Yep as rookie Come on. Let's see some low number first here Jose Ramos Volpe and Melinda is on the rookie Royals. That's red. Wow. That's a first bowman red. Come on now It is Roderick Arias nice one there Yankees That's gonna be Landon G with the Roderick Arias first bowman red three of five We'll mag this one for you Landon Great hit there on the red to five That is awesome. Great looking card two man Beautiful hit there We got a hulu hulio there on the rookie great pack hulio rookie on Bryson Stott rookie as well Really good pack of chrome there. Let's keep it going guys. Holy cow. Very nice red there. Very nice red Got a Jeremy Paine your rookie silver or sapphire Dominguez Mackenzie Gore and a South Relic. There's another hulio there for Seattle on the rookie Garrett Mitchell Boba Shett and Lou Rod Yeah, the reds are very very nice Dean very nice man. They look so clean I like the orange, but the red just pops so much more. I feel like I want to say that's tops, but they might they might have a purple to ten Find out. Yeah The other piguero Ladola we have a Kunya there number 250 nice hit for the Braves Kunya to 50 Jose Miranda rookie say Hendry Mendez Wilson Contreras elio Ramos arrow Vera Quintana But I'll brew Han rookie got Vladdy and a will Monday as Donnie is a machine over here guys. He is a top-loading machine Yeah, Donnier Cueva on the first trade Turner Simeon and Jordan Loller prospect. So I get paid to do so First of James Triantos Jordan Walker insert Donnie and the stash There is a purple there we go, okay 25 it seems It is gonna be Rafi devours on the purple veteran there 11 of 25 nice hit Red Sox on the Rafi Oh, that's what was throwing me off Scott me 75 I think an orange is a 25. Yeah, that's what we're on another orange Got Simon one for the Mets and orange is gonna be rookie to 75 Gabriel Arias for the Guardians It's funny Vaughn because that was what Lane was calling us earlier. I was about to say on us Donnie and the stash I was about to say. Oh, you just thought about that. I prefer the stash and Donnie. Maybe you know doesn't have the same ring No, it doesn't Ricardo Cabrera Madrigal Jay Ram and a Sammy Zavala for the Padres Yeah, it also sounds like a All right guys, we are almost full for the night. Let me check how many we got left on that last of visions Three left on the last of visions last break of the night here guys With spots left box for it does sound a little bit like a morning radio show Joe Adele got Hernandez Calrally Ellie on the prospect Yeah, of course Landon appreciates you getting in the break man Awesome hit there on the red. I knew we were gonna hit a red. I'm glad it was a first got Ryan Wreckley Blue holes a poo holes and Bacchazar blue holes. I'm glad we could get a rookie red for you There's a Vado more ball could tell Marta and Andre first orange Brian De La Cruz rookie it's gonna be Alec Thomas nice one here rookie orange number to 75 they go D-backs on The Alec Thomas that's Seth Yes, sir Aqua now It's gonna be Luis on Hella Cunha at a 99 on the aqua for the Rangers nice one there are Rangers Vasquez on the first color Definitely Louise Heal got a Weimar John India Yankee Fernandez Javi Baez Brian Hayes Marta and Chisholm already guys box five That was a funny Javi didn't know how many outs were left There's a Jason Churio first Detmer's confidant or Dolpho Castro rookie Yeah, kind of feels like Javi took his money and ran for with the Tigers There's a Andrew Vaughan we have for the Red Sox number 250. That's gonna be gold Nick York Yellowish on the 250 there for the Red Sox. There's a Christian Vecchero first nice one for the Nats See some color of Vecchero Eloy Jimenez got a Alex De Jesus Jonathan may he a posh a Aaron Judge Jackson Job JD Martinez They'd be pretty hard to forget what Yeah, right with like a scoreboard and stuff. Yeah, there's a lot going on like you could definitely a couple places You could find out Colson Montgomery. There is Pedro Pineda there to 99. I thought that was Poisson About a good going to 99 there on the aqua for the ace Kyle Lewis. Well, you missed your chance at coffee gone I know Alex Thomas rookie the freezing colding alarm as well John Carlo Khalil Watson. You don't need to bring Sam's stuff over the dine in stash. You don't need to do that Pepper Perez we got Royals It's gonna be Daniel Vasquez on the purple to 25 nice hit KC on the first bowman Vasquez Christian Hernandez Got some spots coming in for three and two baseball release day tomorrow guys That's great breaking with Sam in the morning. Then we have revolution WWE as well releasing tomorrow. That will be with Matt. I Say a rookie for the Cubs Chase some Kaboom WWE's there man some rock kabooms Steve Austin Kaboom need some sick ones there That's right illegal Probably it's probably right. I'd have to imagine. I don't know from personal experience No idea. All right, though George Kirby rookie Pete Crowe Landoor Ezekiel Tovar. I think cheddar and sour cream. You didn't ask me, but Victor Costa Bryce Harper James Wood.  I like the original base like probably if I had to choose cheddar bars and then sour cream But About you, what about you? About you illegal. Oh Neil Cruz rookie. That's one there. Nice one here It is number 299 gonna be aqua first of Christian Vakero Nice one there for the Nats Very nice one there actually um I'm blind Scott B with the Vakero nice one. We'll make this one the 99 on the Vakero Zach V Barbecue solid barbecue solid Any of the ones in the variety pack really are pretty good like the chives and whatever sour cream and chives or whatever it is Cheddar is good. Sorry. We've got a Zach V number to 75. Yeah, that's anything place Jordan and Hunter Green I think it's just driving. I think it's chives on the I Will bet Matt McLean first there Jay Allen want so to that's right. You do eat a lot of those Pringles. They do I would know It's a Pringles That's where that came from gotcha. Oh, I just agreed with you there. I was okay. Yeah, when you don't know just agree So yeah, sure especially with the legal. Yeah, there's a first Brian Acuna twins Buxton compost Dylan Carlson also go birds box for Don't think chives is a thing. Okay. I trust I believe it Well, you believe him, but you don't believe me I see how it is Dying the stash got some confrontations. Yeah, this is I don't know if we can keep this duo going Yeah, Rizzo big Riz Harry Ford Wander on the rookie Eddie's Leonard. Oh boy, what a chat chat is devolved Just into go birds. There's a first Roger Arias and orange to 75. That's gonna be Hedbert Perez for the brew crew brew crew trotties Guzman It's sour cream and onion gotcha. I thought it was chives, but you know There's a Gutierrez my trout of tiny one been chill first. I mean if chives and onions then technically you're right What's a chive? Chive isn't type in onion.  Oh, yeah, that's a child There's George Springer on the aqua number to 99 for the blue Jace William Bergola first give you half Come on. Let's see another huge color here. Let's see a big color first rained on cone Yeah, only the only the most intriguing here at LSE Donnie and the stash man, you never know what you're gonna get over here. We know there's a preto Salvy Perez another goal It is gonna be MJ Melendez on the rookie goal for the Royals nice hit their Royals MJ Melendez. Let's go into Rolando Alaska Here again, I've said it way more than I've ever said it probably my life honestly CJ Abrams rookie Chives chives chives chives chives chives There's a nice one here rookie CJ Abrams on the aqua to 99 Very nice one there for the Padres CJ Abrams got a cow Tucker In three boxes left guys good luck 22 bone chrome sapphire. We got five boxes of 22 tops chrome sapphire coming up next chasing some big rookies there Get as many sapphires as Donnie can handle we're gonna have like five personal boxes We're trying to get some garbage pail. Oh, no, it is more about devours who holds and Balcazar Donnie loves tapline some garbage pail kids There's a Wilfred Mara skates El Marte a first of day on Drake twins Brass Brass rookie Brian De La Cruz. We've got Anthony Volpe. Nice one here on the goal to 50 for the Yankees prospect Another hit there for Yankees Nice one. I'm landing Volpe there Sheets. Yes, sir orange It is hunter green on the rookie orange for the reds orange for the reds the 75 nice one there on the green Dude throws some heat William getting the hunter green next of the green orange Orange green green orange.  They do like seven randoms for it though There's a freezing holding alarm Cabrion Hayes no elvie marté jazz chism like that one a freezing holding alarm Yeah, but I Like that one layover Pagaro Lodolo arovera and Jose Miranda on the rookie for the twins Two boxes left. Come on. Come on. Let's see some huge color here. Let's see another red Or a Papadasha make it pack based We'll see I think that's above my pay grade a little bit there. Um, we don't have to keep throwing out this hypothetical Great Donnie hates this idea. We can do it though. We can Henry Mendes one case of Contreras Um, Elio Ramos rookie Cantana brujan jordan lawlor and of lati Come on. Let's see some low numbers daniel quavo first Jordan walker prospect marcus simian Sam stole that from you I don't think so sam wouldn't do that Should be cooling freezing alarm Yeah, yeah, I got yeah You're Donnie I am He's Donnie de los Santos Got a first moment on the aqua And it's going to be jonathan may he a nice one there for the cardinals prospect number to 99 On the aqua first Simi Zavala on the first It's going to be Pedro panada on the orange to 75 for the a's Pedro panada got jram One more packed in one more box Royce lewis rookie Go birds first. Uh louise maza In box 10 guys 2022 bowman chrome sapphire. Good luck. Good luck Got 22 um tops chrome sapphire coming up next five box mixer I have to type in the random for that one. So it'll be just a minute here No, I haven't been sleeping good the last couple of nights, but I think tonight's going to be the night You feeling it just using all my energy You are kind of moving over there. Got to keep it up pretty well There's a gold smith luciano Uh, willy vasquez first I'm going a little bit faster on a Had some time back up, but There's a alec boom Trace sweeney yep has first and a john kinsley. No, well a great product to go to go faster There's a chris brunt max See j melinda's rookie karson williams Oh, man There's a jose ramos we've got gold royce louis double uh double color pack here Royce louis the 50 nice rookie for the twins And we've got orange rookie to 75. That's going to be bryce and stott for the fillies Really nice pack there orange and a uh yellow or gold both uh rookies Vulpie, but there's never two colored cards in a in a pack. Yeah, no, it's rare. It's definitely rare Dominguez got a natto salfreilich bryce and stott. What's the night Steve? What? Tonight's what night? Do I like any other teams of the magic? Yeah, I like um, I like the bucks and the race I'm more of like a tampa if not orlando because magic are the only team from actually orlando So I grew up more of a magic fan than any of the others There's jeremy painia houston marcello louis rodriguez mckenzie gore Oh, marcello got promoted david. He's not there tonight. Got a rookie uh julio rodriguez. Maybe you got some inside information And wilford veras on the uh aqua first bowman for the white socks number to 99 nice hit white socks Danny getting a first bowman to 99 bogey shet Do we have an insider now? Yeah, he should for sure david uh rizzo harry fort a wander rookie and eddie's Leonard on the back for the dodgers Alrighty guys that will do it for the 2022 bowman chrome baseball sapphire edition 10 box full case number 11 random teams um Do a quick hit recap of a little bit the color um everything under 50 So we got a yellow rookie number 250 rois louis got volpi to 50 um melendez um Royals rookie to 50 got a nick york and ronald acunia number 250 We had purples to 25 daniel vasquez for the royals on the first bowman and raffi to 25 And max we had to 99 christian vecaro um first bowman uh aqua and we had rogerick arias on the first bowman red to five Really nice one there for the yankees. That's landing Appreciate you guys. Um, we'll get tops chrome sapphire coming up next


Welcome, quick way, my name is Crystal and I'm here to welcome you all to a virtual book launch for Nina Lacanis who killed Berta Casares, dams, death squads and an indigenous defenders battle for the planet. I'd like to open this book launch, this virtual space by asking you all to take a quick moment with me and ground yourself in your location. For myself, my land acknowledgement will be reflective of my O'Mami Wenini Aki, the Algonquins of Pukwaknagon First Nations territory, which is just a small part of the Algonquin territory, unceded Algonquin territory. And again, thank you all for joining us today.  Berta is one of the countless women who courageously protect Mother Earth in the face of resource extraction. Since 2014, Kairos Canadian Ecumenical Justice initiatives has had a programmatic focus on the gendered impacts of resource extraction in Canada and the global South. Kairos works in partnership with women land and water defenders, primarily indigenous women and organizations, to make visible the impacts of resource extraction on women, to draw attention to women's work in the defense of community rights and the environment, to press for indigenous women's recognition as key policy stakeholders and decision makers through mechanisms just free, prior, and informed consent and is stipulated by the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. We also advocate at Kairos for corporate accountability of the Canadian extractive sector operating abroad. In November 2019, Kairos launched the first phase of the living digital hub Mother Earth and Resource Extracting Women Defending Land and Water, which brings together original and existing material to support research, advocacy, information sharing and movement building on the gendered impacts of resource extraction. So this first phase focused almost exclusively on Latin America. The next phase, which highlights land defense in Canada, will launch this Sunday on June 21st. So we're very, very honored, again, to have you all here and to have all this interest and reflection of the need for this space. And so now I'm going to just shift and honor and introduce someone, Nina Lakhani, who reports on Central America for the Guardian, BBC, Al Jazeera, Global Post, The Daily Beast and elsewhere. She previously worked for The Independent and her book Who Killed Berta Carceras, Dams, Death Squads and Indigenous Defenders Battle for the Planet was just published this month by Verso Books. And before getting to the discussion portion of the event, Nina will be reading a brief excerpt from her book. Nina Miguic, welcome. Thank you so much for joining us. Thank you very much. Thanks everyone for coming. Here's the book, you can see. I was going to speak in Spanish, but I can just see from that survey that almost everybody is from Canada. So I'm going to speak, I'm going to go ahead and speak in English. Yes, I'm going to read a short extract from the book, which is the subtitle to that is Threats Weather Norm. Copin was founded in 1993, and from the very beginning, upset powerful people. Military officers into contraband, logging, landowners, farming, Indigenous ancestral land, always local elites hated us because we made a difference, said Salvador Zuniga, Berta Carceras's husband at the time. In the early days, Copin business was mainly conducted at Berta's family home. And the children remember hush discussions between their parents after yet another menacing note was delivered by an unknown hand. In my earliest memories, I remember threats and insults against my parents, said Olivia Zuniga Carceras, the eldest daughter. At school, there were children and teachers who said our parents were thieves, millionaires with houses in Miami. But Berta remembers, Berta of a second eldest daughter remembers her siblings were playing in the garden once, when she was nine or 10 years old. And she and Olivia saw an unknown man outside the house with a gun. On another occasion, their dog, chocolate, saved the nanny who was being attacked by someone from the nut with a knife. After that, chocolate was our hero, said Berta. The fact is, there was so many incidents that threats seem normal to us. Maybe that's why we believe that she would never really be killed. Threats were nothing new, but everything changed in 2013. Berta placebo dangers connected to Aguazalca, the Aguazalca dam is something more serious. The company's first security chief Douglas Giovanni Bustillo, an ex army lieutenant, didn't bother to contain his disdain for Berta and Copin. He was rude and aggressive to people in Rio Blanco, harassing community leaders like Chico Sanchez, who got so tired of the constant calls and offers a bribe that he changed his telephone number. Bustillo also sexually harassed Berta. My life doesn't make sense without you. He wrote in a text message on 20th of September 2013, just a week after testifying against her in court. The company president was different. David Castillo was a privately educated bilingual, charismatic, retired military intelligence officer who never directly threatened Berta. He was much too clever for that. And that's why she was afraid of him. In July 2013, a couple of days before Thomas Garcia was killed in Rio Blanco, Castillo and Sergio Rodriguez, Deso's community and environment manager, went to the Copin Training Center in Laisparanza expecting a private sit down with Berta. But she wasn't alone. Representatives from Rio Blanco and Copin leadership were also there. I don't make the decision said Berta. I do what the community wants. Castillo offered numerous social projects in exchange for ending the roadblock. But the community said no. Rodriguez complained that while the company was trying to find a solution to the conflict, Copin didn't really care about the communities. It just wanted the project gone. Berta and the local leaders viewed the offer of community projects in exchange for supporting the dam as nothing more than a bribe. Not long after Thomas Garcia was killed, Berta asked the upper Martinez, director of the Feminist Center for Women's Studies for permission to meet with Castillo in the office. That maldito is promising stuff we don't agree with. But things are heavy. I have to talk to him, she said. The meeting didn't last long. After he left, Berta confided in Ciapa. That one scares me. He's a military man. A few weeks later, the court issued the arrest warrant against Berta. You see, this is different, she told her daughters. She did warn us, said Berta. She often mentioned Bustillo, Jorge Avila, David Castillo, and an unscrupulous family of Sicarios who operated around Rio Blanco. I documented the threats, I put out press releases, but honestly, I never thought anything would happen to her. Laura, the youngest daughter agreed. We knew that she would be monitored and of course we were worried. But this was normal. Or maybe we just didn't want to believe it. Hindsight can be agonizing. Have I run out of time or should I keep going? Sorry. I'm going to read a bit more. Berta had begun as a junior party in Copin, but over time, her confidence and standing increased as her vision and analysis evolved. She came to understand capitalism as not only an economic model, but a patriarchal one, which dominated women in different ways. That's why she understood that combating patriarchal capitalism had to start with acknowledging and tackling taboo topics like gender violence, sexual harassment, homophobia and inequality within her own organization.  I am your right-hand manna, but I'm trying to change. They were best of friends and even serious talk like that ended in laughter. In every space that every opportunity, Berta tackled gender violence and discrimination head on. It's us women that wash that wash clothes and cook. We need to protect our rivers. We are the heart of our families and the struggle. Cabrones, you need to change.  She tell her listeners at workshops in far from raw communities. It was uncomfortable and sometimes the men stormed out. Others insulted her, but this motivated her to do more. In March 2011, Berta convoked a women only weekend assembly during which she tackled big issues like patriarchy, machismo, feminism, racism, sexual diversity and sexual pleasure, encouraging participants to share personal experiences of violence, discrimination and resistance. We have to respect differences. We women can cannot stay quiet anymore. It doesn't matter if you can't read or write.  Your experiences matter. This is how we change things, she said. That weekend, the women did not cook or clean or even make coffee. Instead, they were served by male copines members, including Salvador. This made both men and women easy and uneasy at first, but it generated debate and helped change norms within copines. It illustrated Berta's political clarity and conviction and a radical vision that no other organisation has, not even today. Thank you. Thank you, Nina, for that powerful reading. Thank you for writing this book. I had the opportunity to read it over the weekend and it's a story that needs to be told and needs to be heard, far and wide, worldwide. Your writing is captivating and you managed to capture Berta. I remember at the World Social Forum in 2016, Honduran journalist and friend of Berta, Felix Molina, said that Berta had three qualities that made her such a powerful advocate and a defender.  And all that was very clear from your your your readings just now. And you've also, in your book, you capture and in the reading as well the context, the history, the systems in Honduras, including colonisation, appropriation of land, discrimination, economic policy, neoliberal policies, free trade agreements, U.S. intervention, patriarchy, all these systems that led to Berta's murder. And ultimately, I think, make it so difficult to answer that question, who killed Berta? Who has an individual? Because this is web of systems and policies. Anyway, I'm Rachel Warden. I work at Kairos as manager of partnerships. And it's a real privilege to moderate this book launch and this discussion. And I'm joined here with Nina Lacani and two other amazing land defenders from Latin America, who I have the pleasure of introducing. Primero, quiero presentar a first of all, I would like to present Abidalina Morales, Abidalina Morales. She is a key figure in El Salvador. During the past 12 years after the law was approved in 2018, she is a community leader and activist. And now she is president of the Economic, Social Development Association in Santa Marta. Abidalina has also visited Canada on various occasions. And she has spoken about the injustice of mining activities in El Salvador. And she was also a friend of Berta's. I would also like to present another land defender, Ibon Ramos. Ibon Ramos is from Ecuador. And she works for Acción Ecológica. And she has been working with them for 27 years now. Acción Ecológica or ecological action is a partner of guide us for more than 20 years. And she is the coordinator of a women's organization, Saramanta, Promecuna, Daughters of Maíz. And it is a coalition of defenders, women, defenders of human rights and defenders of nature in Ecuador. Welcome. Welcome, Bidalina. And welcome, Ibon. I'm going to ask a question to each of the panelists. I'm going to start with a question for you, Nina. And you have about seven minutes to answer the question. And for all of you, you will be given sort of a five minute warning. And then at six and a half minutes I'll appear. But I wanted to ask you, Nina, around the book, as I said, you do this amazing job of tracing and outlining all the actors and policies and institutions and systems that led to the focus and the aggressive resource extraction in Honduras, the increased need for land defense and the increase of tax and criminalization of land defenders. I was wondering, based on all these interviews that you did and the research you did for this book and your work as a journalist in Central America more generally, what concerns you and what inspires you about the defensive territory, especially when it comes to women, land defenders. Hi. Yeah, I mean, I guess just to start to say that, you know, you know, what I try to do in the book and is, is, you know, I tell the story of the life and death of both the casales because you can't understand, you can't begin to understand why she was murdered without understanding who she was and where she came from.  That's absolutely right. And I think as well, you can't understand the life and death of both the casales without understanding the context in which she lived and died. And by context, I mean political, historical, geopolitical, military, social and economic, you know, and all of those different whole push factors, they, they work together. Right. And so I think that's just the basis of understanding the defense of land generally, you know, the defense of natural resources generally and, and, you know, and specifically in the case of BALTA. I mean, the, the, the, the battle for land and natural resources or the, I put it this way, the exploitation of natural resources in land is not a new story in Central America or Latin America. You know, I say this in the book and it's a sweep in generalisation, but I think it pretty much is true. Every battle has always been about land and it still continues to be so.  A lot of that, a lot of the, a lot of the warring, a lot of the bloodshed that came before Anduin was about a battle for the land and a battle for the riches and natural resources in each of these territories. And, and I mean, I guess what we've seen since the peace accords, and I would argue that a motivation for the peace accords, for all of the peace accords in Central America and, and even recently in, in Colombia has been partly at least motivated by the desire of national and international investors to exploit land, you know, for, for, for minerals, for energy, for cash quarks, for, yeah, for dams, for, you know, for rivers, for, you know, for what, for all of those different elements that we, you know, together make up the extractive industry. And we've really seen this roll out in a, you know, without cessation, really since the, since the, you know, since the peace accords were signed across the region, you know, so really since the early 90s. And, and, and, and that's, you know, and during that same period, we've seen, you know, repression, the use of force, the use of state, of, you know, of state resources to repress and to, you know, violently repress, to crack down on those engaged in the defense of land and territory and water and natural resources also isn't new. There are new things that have evolved, you know, these, these, these struggles and the, and the crackdowns have evolved and we saw that in the case of Bertha, which I'll come on to talk about now.  We're the ones that are using water. We need the land, you know, to feed our children. That has always been true, you know, and I think women have always been involved in the defense of their territories because land rights are human rights, you know, water rights are human rights, land rights are indigenous rights. You, you can't separate these different things.  I mean, what I've, you know, I think what, you know, what I've seen, and Bertha in a way slightly an exception with this in some ways, you know, but generally speaking, when all the women that I've met across the region involved, people like Vidalina, you know, and many others involved in the, in the, in the, in the struggle and the, you know, to defend land and that resources is that they do that on top of all of the other responsibilities they have, which are given to them for being a woman, you know. So on top of all of their responsibilities in the home with their children, with their grandchildren, you know, cooking, cleaning, washing clothes, all of those things are on top of, you know, those, those responsibilities very rarely go away. In the, in the case of Bertha, it was slightly different that she became the international face of Copin and from the beginning was doing lots of sort of traveling, making connections, making alliances and learning from Indigenous struggles and other rural communities, not just across Mesoamerica or across the world, you know, and that in itself, you know, opened her and it happens to many women who were involved in social struggles and land, you know, the defensive land, is that they just by being daring to be present in that public sphere, they are subjected to, you know, intense criticism, you know, I write about this in the book that it hurt Bertha terribly to be considered and called a bad mother, but included by those in her own family, that people that, somebody that killed, who cared more about the Indigenous people than that she cared about her own children, you know, that criticism of, you know, labelling somebody a bad mother and a bad woman because you're, you know, you're not fulfilling those roles that patriarchal, you know, society demands of you, I think is something that all women involved in any type of struggle and any type of sort of political or public life face continue to face today, and then, you know, they also face the same and different attacks, you know, I think the sexual harassment, you know, is obviously an obvious and key way of trying to threaten and intimidate women involved in different struggles, you know, and I think, you know, we've seen there's been, you know, I remember in Honduras jazz did a study saying actually when you looked at defend, you know, defensores and defensores, you know, that actually a number of threats wasn't different in terms of men and women, but what was different is that those threats were more likely to turn into physical attacks against women and against men, and, you know, and I think that, yes, I think that these same sort of tools are used, whether they be threats, bribes, attacks, sexual harassment, they're all used in different, in slightly different ways, you know, and this sort of, I think this real attempt to discredit women and to try and intimidate them out of these very macho stuff spaces, you know, like in the case of she was dealing with a damn company where, you know, several, they were all, you know, almost all men, you know, including the security to chief, the managers, many of them had military backgrounds, you know, and she was often in these spaces fighting herself, and so I think it, you know, it's, it's incredible, and it's meant to be that way, you know, and I think part of the reason that they was killed was because she was a woman and was because she was an indigenous woman, I think in this machista, sort of patriarchal, economic and political model in which she existed and we exist, that the idea that an indigenous woman could interrupt, could stop them, was just intolerable, you know, and it was unacceptable and she was a bad example to others and that, that's, you know, and that they couldn't have it and, and they tried to neutralise her, tried to silence her in using many different tactics and these tactics will be familiar to people like Vidalina who was, you know, there in active during the El Salvador, you know, civil war, these counter-insurgency tactics, you know, the whole gamut of drives and threats and intimidation and, you know, defamation campaigns, criminalisation, all of that saying, sort of, range of tactics we're used against, but, and they used against women and male defendants today and in the end we're but there because they couldn't stop her, they killed her. I mean, I think it is a, I think it's being a defending land, you know, Latin America is the most dangerous place, region in the world, to defend land and natural resources and part of it is, part of that reason is also because people, people like, people defend their land and natural resources, you know, they know their rights and they organise and they group together and they, and many of the, in fact, many of these community struggles are led or co-led by women. I think to see women, the way women manage those spaces and communicate and have them have their voices and who they represent and how they represent, different perspectives is so important and it's really inspiring, I think, you know, I think in any workspace, in any arena, whether it's political, social, labour, having a diversity of voices, gender, sexuality, ethnicity, age is vitally important, you know, and oh yeah, I think just to finish that women are in these spaces, they've always been leaders in the region, in terms of, in struggles and movements, Indigenous and rural, for the defence of land and territories and for the defence of natural resources and they do that under particularly harsh conditions and in Conservative, Manchester, patriarchal sort of context and they do that on top of all the other responsibilities that are, that I've expected of them just for being a woman, you know, for being women and so there is very much a lot to be inspired by and to admire and you know, I think that the response in terms of the support and encouragement and yeah, that international community needs to be given to women, to female defenders is huge but also quite particular in the support and resources that they may need to stay safe and to keep their families safe and to be able to continue in the struggles that they're involved in. Thank you Nina, thank you for your clarity on I think the critical role of women, particularly Indigenous women, in defending the environment and the spending land and territory but as well the struggles and the particular struggles of women, the particular struggles of Indigenous women and that this struggle is a feminist struggle, I thank you, thank you so much for your clarity. I want to turn now to Vidalina Morales. I'm going to ask this question in Spanish. Vidalina, welcome. Vidalina is a friend and was a friend of Bertha's and I would like to ask you Vidalina. Bertha has almost become a mythical figure. What would you like the world to know about her? Vidalina says hello, hello sister, friends, everyone who's connected. I would like to say hello to each and every one of you. Every time I'm invited to speak about Bertha I always feel nervous because I knew her during very difficult times of the armed conflict here in El Salvador and even at that time I firmly believed in the courage, the strength of Bertha and throughout the years she continued to work on behalf of Coppín which she loved so much and she fought on behalf of her communities and I met her in in those large events organized by Coppín. For example, there was a big event in 2013. It was an event of militarization and when we talked about the issues and the situations that Honduras was going through because it had just come out of a coup d'etat. Bertha, for me and for the world as Rachel was saying it in the beginning Bertha has become an emblematic figure. I remember three four years ago I traveled to Denver, Colorado and I remember in the botanical garden I saw Bertha's face. It was beautifully decorated with botanical plants. I never would imagine that I was going to see her face in a place in a botanical garden with such beautiful plants. It was such a surprise to me to see that and Bertha was also an international person and I had the opportunity to get to know her in this struggle but in the past decade has become an incredibly necessary and urgent struggle to defend the environment, to defend life, to defend our natural resources. That's where I met Bertha and as I said in the book Bertha would criticize the behavior of male members who were of the opium who were very machista and she had a strong character and she was very courageous and she peeked out about the way they behaved. A friend of mine would say that Bertha didn't fit in any of the the boxes or the models that society had for us. She was greater than that. The society would like to see women as being submissive. Society would like women to always say that everything is good, everything is all right but Bertha wouldn't do that. She would fight against machismo. She would fight against patriarchy. She would fight against this system and this neoliberal model. She stood up against this capitalist patriarchal model and her criticisms were so relevant and of course certain people didn't like what she had to say. They didn't want to listen to these kinds of truths and her truth was seen as a threat to the transnational and economic power and it eventually led to Bertha's murder. We know that Bertha fought hand in hand with Copin, with her communities so that a dam would not be constructed in that river and she fought in every way possible that project in Rio Blanco and that led to her death. Her strength and her courage inspired us and we continue to be inspired by her legacy, by her struggle, by the strength of Bertha for her courageousness, for her commitment. She's an example to follow. Bertha has always been an inspiration. When I began my remarks I was saying that she and I met when we were very young. I was only 21 years old at the time. I think she was 19 or 20 because we were almost the same age and when I met her she inspired me so much. She was also a humble woman. She was able to tolerate and put up with a lot of difficulty and conflict and I remember when we lived in the same house. Bertha was so humble. Rachel says, Vidalina, we're having difficulty listening to you. Your audio is breaking up. Rachel asks, Vidalina, Vidalina, can you hear me? Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you so much Vidalina for sharing your words and your comments about your friend. I know it's very difficult to only speak for five minutes about a friend and a woman that is so important and a woman like Bertha and I think you and Vidalina, you Vidalina are also breaking barriers and breaking norms. It's something that I can also see in you. Now I'm going to ask a question to Yvonne Ramos from Ecological Action, Ección Ecológica. Yvonne, maybe you could speak to us about Bertha's legacy, specifically her legacy for women land defenders and for women in Latin America. What is Bertha's legacy? Yvonne, thank you so much, Kratos, for the invitation to participate in this event. I would like to start by sharing a reflection based on a phrase that's from an Indigenous woman and Ecuador, the leader of the Indigenous movement. Her name is Dolores Capaudi and she would say, we are like a plant that these are these plants that protect and generate, help water to regenerate itself. It's a sacred place for the Indigenous movement and that's what happened to Bertha and that's what happens with a lot of women like land defenders. They are like these plants that are pulled out of their roots but continue to grow and Bertha is in the spirit of all women land defenders. Bertha Cáceres has been an inspiration and she has been an inspiration for organization and collaboration in women land defender movements. She has been an inspiration for women human rights defenders, all of Latin America. I am part of the Latin American network of women rights and as a member of Acción Ecológica and as well as a member of women defenders and which is a group of Indigenous and non-Indigenous women in Ecuador. The Latin American network is an organization of women that has presence in 11 countries and it participates in projects and initiatives that protect women rights and rights of the environment and social and cultural rights which are threatened by extractive projects such as mining companies and that affect women in El Salvador, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, Uruguay, Chile, Argentina, Brazil and Guatemala and it's important to understand why women are considered enemy number one of extractive industries and I think it has to do with the fact that women it has to do with their identity and our cultural diversity and the fact that we are women and it allows us to prioritize the sacredness of life and nature and it's our responsibility, the responsibility that we've inherited to take care of the land and Mother Earth and it's something that we have to pass on to future generations. We know that the balance of Mother Earth and of human between human beings is absolutely necessary especially now when the pandemic has shown us that if the balance of nature is disordered that humans are very vulnerable and the possibility of the extinction of human beings is something that comes to the service. We're witnessing natural disasters and that that is a result of global warming and that global warming is a result of extractive industries. There's a link between land and women it's a link that cannot be broken and it's a space where life is reproduced and this is a much stronger bond than the economy. It's a symbolic bond and it's historical belonging and this perspective of women and of indigenous cultures that way of looking at life does not fit with the capitalist model which accumulates power and money which sees nature, human beings, women and indigenous communities as something that should be exploited. The colonialist power still reproduces these traditional practices and uses violence in all its dimensions and also the supposed economic stimuli to absorb those logics and those purposes of the and it's the men who have carried this out and who have imposed this model. Then is why women as leaders and land defenders as of the 1990s is a position that threatens that power patriarchal power and extractive power and it's antagonistic to that model and it's founded in the exploitation of natural resources and that is the very reason why this patriarchal model which is violent generates more violence and this violence characteristic of this model and its violence against women in order to control and to discriminate and to break the social fabric and the strength of the communities indigenous and rural communities in Latin America and this is the benefit of economic groups national governments that work with transnational corporations so that use of violence that violence includes stigmatization, harassment and the use of criminal activity to threaten women the use of state violence, gender violence and sexual violence and these patterns are used all over Latin America what Bertha experienced has happened to many other women throughout Latin America and this is related to gender because resource extraction affects women even more because food security the survival of the communities depends on the well-being and the health of Mother Earth and extractive industries also rely on violence Rachel says thank you Ivan I'm so sorry to cut you off we just don't have much more time and we need some time to see the video thank you so much for your clarity and thank you so much for the connections you made between extractive industries and violence and specifically violence against women thank you so much for sharing your insights with us before finishing and before giving thanks we're going to show a video and this is a video and it includes some words from Bertha when she received the goldman prize or the goldman award in our community we are people that have come from the earth the water and the maize from the rivers are the ones that we must protect and the lenta community they're also protected by the spirit of the we defend the rivers and give life to protect humans and we must wake up wake up humans there's no more time the Guacarque river is calling us and just like other rivers that are threatened we have to respond we have to wake up wake up there's no more time Mother Earth militarized poisons where rights are systematically violated Mother Earth needs us humanity there's no more time we need to build societies that are able to coexist injustice in a dignified way but protect life let's work together in hope defending and taking care of Mother Earth let's wake up let's be more aware based on racism on capitalism we need to wake up we need to wake up humanity there's no more time we must wake up let's wake up humanity there's no more time thank you that that was that was beautiful well many times it said about Berta that she no moreio it's a multi-peak hole she didn't die she was multiplied and and you see that in the voices of of of of women and women defenders throughout Latin America and throughout the the world I I want to thank uh I want to thank everyone I want to thank you for being part of this discussion I want to encourage everyone to to read the book we've had we've been given a taste of it we know who Berta is how how she how she lived who her friends were how she defended her territory how she was an Indigenous woman how she was an activist and we've heard from her friends and and and people in her networks we want these discussions to continue so we're encouraging you to to buy buy the book and if possible by supporting your your favorite independent independent bookstore we would be interested as Kyros to continue these discussions and and to facilitate kind of a book club or a book discussion on on this book so please let us know if you're interested in in doing that and being part of that those that those book clubs um and Gabriele Jimenez who is our Latin America partnerships coordinator will send you information about that as well we'll have information on on our our website um as well um I wanted to uh I wanted to let you know that they're um as part of Indigenous Women's Month which is is is June for for Kyros this Indigenous Women's Month we have a number of other events including on Thursday we have another webinar called Stories of Change Women Defending Land and Water in Canada and Brazil so that will be Thursday afternoon and there's information on our our website about that as well on on Sunday um June 21st we will be launching the the Canadian content of the the the mayor hub so this is the digital hub on Mother Earth and Resource Extraction that that Crystal mentioned so stay tuned for more information about that on on on on Sunday um but I really wanted to take some time to thank everybody who was involved in this and so uh I think everybody's going to come up on the screen now so we can see everybody including including the translators so I want to I want to thank uh Nina Lacani thank you for for being here thank you for writing the book uh I want to thank Videlina Morales uh I want to thank Yvonne Ramos I want to thank the red the Latin Americana the mujeres defensores um I want to thank Crystal uh Desalé for opening I want to thank Gabriela Jimenez who is uh been behind the scene she is responsible for bringing us all together and making this happen and yes she is there so thank you Gabriela um thank you Paulina Baez and Kate Stubbs for interpretation um please uh please remember to to uh to follow the the mayor hub on Facebook and Instagram uh look look to our website for upcoming webinars uh please buy the book and please participate in our our discussions about this book and uh keep uh keep Bertha Caceres multiplying um Bertha Caceres uh present


Oh, yeah, you know what the sort of thumbnail?  Wait wait till he gets into it. I can't wait I am I'm actually gonna try to start out calm to bring my rage levels down a bit because I'm I am Yeah What rage is time by the way? I'll just well, we'll briefly touch on it because I can't stop and Well, you know what you first of all This episode of vlog Thursday brought to you by Lawrence technology services We're technology services and LTS creative and all the fun things we do and we have a patreon if you want to throw money at us And all that so that's all in the you do below. Let's get on with it so the This morning is me reading up on one of the Softwares out there. That's for managers riders Getting hacked and I'm going to do I'm not gonna get deep into it because I don't like to just say this or say that but I want to give you a deeper video and talk about how the heck happened and how it could have been prevented or how it wasn't prevented and what what the challenges were in preventing it and Not go off the rails in this video on it because it'll take up an entire time and I wanted to be its own video for discussion and It's just one of those annoyances I have in the IT industry where so many people are so focused on product sales as if it will protect them and then of Course the systems evolve so you really have to come down to Quality of software and user trading Will always be better than any of these other magic tools and it almost feels occasionally like selling snake oil And that's the part that gets me really fired up because so many people are like, oh, you need this thing Yes, I'm like why they don't protect you and they're like time. You're just you're wrong and I'm like Okay, here's it. Here's a perfect prime example company getting hacked who had everything in place That they should have that the snake oil salesman Maybe it is snake oil. It's not I mean it does protect against other stuff, but hackers just evolved to use it They're like, oh, yeah, we already know everyone has this.  This is so we have definitely in general I see IT people like this who get into this for the money and That bothers me as well if you just think I'm getting in this because I there's a lot of money in it their computer tech stuff and They're not wrong There's good money be made in this and that's sometimes where they go wrong is they just focus on the dollars and not considered Actually into the security of it. So I'm a business owner an entrepreneur But I'm also I don't know if you want to say geek and computer guy first and then who runs a business Versus people who focus on it only on the business side of it and look at products that sell the best Commissions as opposed to offer the best value and security for the client Was it every stream providing good service to your client making money providing good service to your client and just making money from your client? Right. There's a there's a difference. Um You know and we we like to make money providing good service to our clients. That's that's that's why you care Yeah, that's why you know Many clients they don't have an understanding of all this stuff So it would be really easy for us to sell them things that either they don't need or maybe is overkill You know that they you know, they don't need quite the level that you know But so we could oversell them on all that stuff, right? We don't and there's a heavy you have to make money or I won't be able to keep the lights on and turn the camera on Each time we record so there is there's a level of money that doesn't need to be made in the business I guess it's just figuring out where that happy middle is of Providing good service and making good living and providing people good pay versus that I mean obviously we can all cut our pay and be cheaper for the clients, but at some point you have to pay yourself And it's figuring out that net goes into deep. Let's not even discuss that. Yeah, that's a whole deeper part Yeah, Marvin's like no, let's I don't I like what I make. I don't want to make I don't agree with that at all So back to saving money though We will talk about that because this is this is fun and I used to I used to work with a guy in his department He he managed the transportation repairs. I was I worked for transportation rider and his task I was IT a big transportation rider for the Ford Motor Company was our primary client and we physically move things around But anyways, the point is he's to say please save me from people who try to save me money Yes, and so I we just had two wonderful examples of people saving money hmm, and Okay, so I'm gonna save money and Okay, this is how Tom saves money. I know what things that are Convenient and do not take this is where they make the mistake on saving money If you have no value to your time you can save in bin amounts of money because you're gonna drive It's like people who drive 20 minutes to go to a gas station to save one penny per gallon when you're like You saved all of you if you have it put 10 gallons in the car and it was three cents less But you waited they queue up in line at the one down the street because it gets a few pennies less I'm like my time is more valuable than the 90 cents or one dollar I save filling up when there's a gas station directly across the street who doesn't do that no line Three cents more. Yeah. I'm not being said. I I one of the policies We have here at Lawrence system as I feed all my employees For better or worse. Well, yeah For better or worse. Yeah, I weighed a buck 80 when I started That being said, I'm a frugal shopper to accommodate the volume and caloric intake of my staff I know what you're saying Yes So I stopped by in Kroger's which I'm really happy I used to not go to Kroger's a lot because they were inconvenient and my time is very available now Kroger's My morning ritual is taking my kids to school on the way back Kroger's is directly between the office and my path. So it works out perfectly So it does not have to go out of my way that being said I also get to know people at Kroger's and they know me as the guy who picks up all the clearance chicken These guys love chicken. I don't care for it that much, but it's okay.  I also like just to walk through Kroger's I grabbed some fresh fruit for me. I grab a pile of chickens for everybody else and Clearance chicken means it's one quarter of the price and it's pre-cooked Chicken meals that they have the chicken balls that you see all the time and chicken nuggets that they see what The mystery chicken that is deep-fried and that they love we're trying to think about it too much I buy this and there's a couple of clear sections, but I walk through I go in and I timed it today I was curious because I want to talk about this night from from the time I pulled in the parking lot to the time I walked back into my car Was 14 minutes because I know where it is I hit all the discount spotters to discount spots really pile discount foods I grabbed the discount fruits for myself because I'm gonna eat them all same day Yep, and then I grabbed all the chickens and they're gonna eat them all same day And they're good for two days according to the expiration date on them and now I have saved money I spent very little a matter of fact. It's amazing. I'm going to feed all these people here today and Between my food and what I'll have for dinner. I spent $15 and 78 cents So there and there's a lot of chicken. I think there's six six boxes chicken. I bought like that's yeah Anyways, this is saving money being efficient my time and following my fruitfulness when it comes to other things I bought an expensive phone because it matters to me a lot about clients So I spend a lot of money on this phone in order to have a very efficient phone process and things like that Or when I buy higher quality things because I don't want them to break down And that's fine. I spend money on that or when I know that something breaks at my house Like my plumbing which they're like oh the plumber is super nice guy friend of mine He's like, you know, you could probably have fixed this little pipe It's you seem like a smart guy and you could do it. I'm like I probably could I have sweated pipes before But I'd rather pay you to do it because I'm afraid it'll turn into a bigger project It'll cost me your money and it turns out there was actually a perforation He found when he did it so it actually turned into a little bigger project And he started to apologize going to charge the Morris is other pipe when we bet this one I'm like, no dude. I see it. It's old. Go ahead. Here's the extra money But here's where our clients trying to save money for unmanaged clients and unmanaged clients I love stories that start like that. Yeah, now we are a hybrid shop You have two types of clients for those you know managed service provider or MSP Managed service providers is a proactive approach to IT where you tell us just to handle it And this is kind of our motto we focus on technology so you could focus on your business So if your business is providing amazing transportation services and we have lots of transportation providers And they focus on our transportation and we make sure all their technology works so they can do their jobs We do this for lots of other industries as well But we also don't mind the break fix clients which are they don't pay us any monthly fees or anything like that They call us as needed or when they want to want something done and they also don't call ahead So they said what kind of computers would we buy? We know they want to buy them not through us because they want the best deal which is fine matter of fact I even took the time to send them a couple Amazon links and this has been my strategy for a little while like hey Cool. Here's a couple Amazon links if you want these and we send them a couple business class Lenovo's We even put all the cart form and sent them the thing and said here you go If you order these and you can pass this and I'm up. It's a really easy procedure It doesn't take much of my time and by the way, we're not hiding this we send them Amazon affiliate links I get a commission on it They have to deal directly with warranties and things like that with company so first step of saving money They bought it direct Next part of saving money. I don't trust the deal Tom sent me So they found a better deal Big air quotes around that big air quotes about the better deal and they found something without warranty apparently Oh, yeah, so and they mismatched all the parts So when we get there to set it up, we can't set it up because we need this so long story short of this Particular person was ordered different thing that we put in the cart for them because they thought something was better than what we said It was not as fast. It has problems that only come with 90 warranty They clearly said they did not see that the other one was refurbished That's why it was different than the one we sent them a new link And they say only we sent them links to new machines and they found the refurbished Refurbished ones cheaper. Okay, so we get there and because they don't want us to leave any so they really need the project done No problem. We charged them for all the time It took to go drive from their place to another place to go buy the different adapters and cables for the mismatched stuff because they had Display ports on one and they got different screens It didn't have the right adapters or the right cables. Like I said, they just changed up the order If they didn't match everything Then because it was slower it took longer and everything else ain't upspending Four hours as opposed to the two hours predicted. So yeah at our rate per hour. They didn't save anything No, but we made more money. So we're actually fine. We're we told them We're like it's a love hate with people who do that we expected this but hey, whatever We got four billable hours on it plus we marked up the stuff we got from there Oh, by the way, the adapters because we couldn't order them off Amazon as they wanted on the same day We paid eight times because small adapters are like three dollars on Amazon and 2295 at Best Buy So going over there to get yeah, it just turns into that. So there's for problem one Did they save money in the end to Ching? No, just I mean come on you asked me for the cart I put it in the cart for you and said get this and we'll come out and set it up And it should take us about two hours But we have to charge for the drive time leaving back and forth that interested and they paid it and they said Okay, we'll think about it next time. By the way, we'll they've done that twice now. So yeah, we'll know no No, this is the second time this has happened This is this time was two more hours versus last time was like one of our second person to save money Same exact serious sent the Amazon cart. They went and chose a different one. Good news is they chose new so it had a warranty and They did not want us to deal with getting the warranty done on it because they didn't want to pay us for it I said, that's fine.  We just like a little those but Dell's fine, too For what they wanted they just they want to tell because they want they had Dell monitors That was the reasoning for changing it up. I know it wasn't even a money thing I'm like, whatever but now this is where they were gonna save money instead of having us fix it They're like, oh, no, we're gonna call and we're gonna get them to get us a new hard drive and whatever is a hard drive died after Like two months it just went bad whatever that happens not blaming Dell. They'll didn't make the hard drive anyways Yeah, so they they get on the phone They then this is this cost them so much money. They think they called L. We told her the number for Dell They apparently decided to Google it because apparently, you know No, it's a set of hold with whatever number Tom gave them So they get on the phone with someone else who decides to do diagnostics on that computer Not well the computer that they were sitting in front of when they called not the one there Not the one that won't turn on because it's dead as a doornail because it won't turn on it hard drives bad It doesn't put up. You can't do diagnostics on a computer. That's not on so they did Then they took her email address and her login and then he started sending emails out to everyone because they needed more money And yeah, she let the hackers in That's right. I didn't mean to say she was too late. I'm not gonna go out or he could have been he And I would not aim at client names But this has now turned into a bigger mess for this company now It's much more work for us, which is fine because it's all billable and we're fine with that The owners of the company are like, yeah, she should have done that I'm like we and we by the way if you're an IT company all we send everything and follow up with an email So even if I say something on the phone just to reiterate what we said on the phone here is the instructions And here's the thing I told you on the phone that we would do this and here's a budget for it Like constant communication in a documented way if it wasn't an email it didn't happen So they followed the paper trail But they know us already so you didn't have to do it in this time because it's not the first time We've had an incident with this exact company the same thing where their office manager just knows better than us And we're not sure why we have no but it's it's cost them a bunch of money We've now had to reformat other computers at the office and reset them because once the hackers get in there You let them do things to your computer and they change we had a change of month password So there was at least part of the fun because oh by the way, she was the admin accounts We had to double check to make sure they didn't create new admin account Login to their office 365 account. It has been I mean, this is the love hate we have with break fix This has turned into quite quite about a billable hours Sorting all this out and the company wants to be protected and you know owners are perfectly They know where the blame lies is not with us and we did everything we could we told them what to do We told them we would do it we gave them a price to do it They decided to save money and do it themselves and not even use the phone number that we had in there. I'm I I And that's the thing right it is kind of like I don't even use the number that you sent You have to have the right attitude because this is where you get very agitated in IT because you're doing a lot of just kind of dumb Work sometimes and it's like, you know, this was 100% Absolutely avoidable from top to bottom at a lesser cost that you quoted then the all the billable hours now that go into this client And this is also what happens a lot of times We have managed clients that we that were break fix for a while and it just took a few of these incidents They go wow, you know, if we just let these guys on a monthly retainer just handle it all Life is good. We can just call them when we want We can just do that thing that we do is our business because we're good at it We're successful and we just give these guys this approach and we have a very you know Our approach of answers Friday is is really what I call a hybrid approach where we have a lower rate We charge but we charge for projects and we charge for you know, exchanging was things that are done So we make a very reasonable price for them is generally the package we sell and yeah I mean, they didn't save any money. We use it doesn't take much to show their invoice is going here's bill Yeah, yeah, we started with a bit. Oh by the way They had hard drive shows and solve because he never actually called out hard drive, right? So hard drive still bad. We had everything else took priority them besides that So now we're back to fixing the hard drive so that cost still is being heard and we still are gonna get the same That's still a thing that we're still fixing it now now. We actually called down that I'm gonna replace it now That's back to that just there I think there's like six additional bill of hours, maybe seven Wow, I mean our rates Yeah, it's enough that we're happy because we're making money, but it's the love hate We have with some of these things like it and I never try say I told you so and I'm not trying me And I don't mind if the client watches this video. We don't want to drop their name because it's it's more of an embarrassing thing But I understand it's not I told you so it's a it's a kind of a warning to other people. I mean, yeah, don't I mean Here's the other side of that coin. There is a another client We really enjoy working with who is a manager is probably but do save some of his own money And I literally with the CEO of that company can have a conversation about virtualization systems They are extremely tech savvy and I'll make those decisions and we don't have a problem They're actually very easy to work with they've taken the time to Learn and have a deep understanding of how their entire virtualization system is set up and how everything works Great people to work with we don't mind and there are other times when they're right They save money So you have to just decide if you have the competency and have taken a time to understand You know what to buy for computers and be able to call Dell and recognize that you just don't let some random person on your computer So it's not that you can't save money this way That if it's whether or not you have to make a decision Do you have the discipline and knowledge and understanding of what you're doing to do that? Well goes back to what you said earlier. Do I want to take the time? How valuable is my time? Do I take the time to learn and research the you know the things I need or do I just trust somebody who already knows it? To give me the recommendation. Yeah, and we'll come back to my plumbing story. Yeah, exactly sweating pipes Oh, yeah, I there play people who've had a YouTube video. I could find and how to do it I actually did it when I was younger You know I saved money right doing some of that But I my time is very valuable to me And so I it's easier for me to outsource it like dude did here you go this pipe broke Let's fix it and the same thing with and you're still in the economy similarly the economy You know, but I did fix my I did fix my faucet though But that's easy because all I do is take off the little faucet thing and I put a little rubber thing in there And put it back down So that was like a few minutes and that I felt like a tackle and I did and my stuff my faucet doesn't drip anymore I'm still in the middle of my faucet fixing project He's got one too now. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, so he is not decided This has been going on for almost how many days? Oh, just couple sense last Friday Friday Is Friday? Yeah, it was yeah as you missed in the chamber event for this. Yeah, that's right. Yeah Well, at least I found out that it wasn't like a pipe breaking or leaking all of a sudden water stop coming out But yeah, this is the opposite. It's not leaking at all It's a problem that can be delayed and it's only one of his sinks. Yeah. Yeah, it does water don't come out Yeah, don't turn don't use that one. Yes and I will touch on this for those of you that are seen in the forums on Facebook that I Asked the question and I plan to do a series of videos on this So one of them is going to be knowledge management because I think that was the top requested thing and I Really been focusing on I so before I do some of those type of videos People say hey time you do good job here in depth. I'm like, well, it's thank you But it's also not by accident. It's because I put a lot of time and research into it thinking about how to explain it I know how we do it, but there also has to be how to explain it and this is we've been calling them professor Tony So Tony who co-host the Sunday morning lecture podcast? I mean he's worked in firewalls and security for a long time He works for a large company doing that exact work He also I think one or two nights a week teaches at University of Michigan The same thing teaches some of the I think it's he's teaching Cisco and firewall design and Architecture and some of that but it's funny because he's like, you know, you know this stuff like you do it every day but teaching it Requires and and I'm like, yeah, it's how I felt about the YouTube videos That's why it takes a while sometimes to build it because you want to make sure you give the clearest understanding and You care about the content production of it. Also, so I had Phil on and we also may even have Tony on at some point About the same thing Tony's he knows the security very high. He teaches at a college and works in the industry Which I think is the best combination because there's some people I'm not knocking teachers at all who don't work in the industry, but I think you're especially when it comes to tech I think you get a lot better from teachers who work in the industry. Oh, I mean coming out of academia I can tell you that there are professors that they they haven't learned a new thing in 20 years Yeah, and so they're still teaching the thing from 20 years ago and times have changed there are other ones Yes, if you're in the industry They're they're up to date. They I much preferred to have an instructor that was you know that had a day job Yeah, and it's and this is a entrepreneurial business owner argument So you will read plenty of books What is one of them? I think this popular is called the cash flow quadrant the popular among entrepreneurs And they try to tell you to not be in your business to to be the investor in your business And I mean there's there's some very good points to that But the other side and this is a lot of times where big companies fails They don't have a beginner's mind anymore and what the the concept of the beginner's mind is is Constantly looking at new ways to do it and new ways innovate and when you become disconnected from what your company does You can also become disconnected from that innovation That being said I found this fascinating I'll send it to you because you may like this So we're way too small of a company for this to really be an issue because we all work kind of hands-on on a company But it's also not on accident. So Kawasaki great documentary. I think it was on History channel. Anyways, if I don't on YouTube, okay, and it didn't get taken down. So I watched it Because I don't have cable TV and you I don't know whole other story, but Oh a Kawasaki and I don't know if this was actually a couple years old I imagine it's still true, and I really hope it and I want it to be true You cannot work at any position at Kawasaki motorcycles Unless you spend a minimum of three months on the production line Because you must know why you work there and what our company produces that does include executive level positions And I there there's been stories a lot of times I think jet blue still participates in this where they take in the high level executives of the company Do a daily rotation like once a month they spend answering phone calls and support desk I know sprint and did that for a little while I don't know if they still do but they would actually you could call and get the CEO of the company He wouldn't know but randomly would they had to work the support desk for so many hours a month like really one day Your job is just there and working the lines. Did you say that like the physical you're gonna put Is it like do they have to like do that is it like three months like over the course of no Like is a repeatable thing. No. No, it's before you can actually take your position in okay So you work this so they don't make you go back like every couple of years You got to go back to work on that because I think that would be a good idea, too I mean like we said times change things change Yeah, and maybe you need a reminder they weren't as clear on that part Because it wasn't it wasn't obviously the focus of it. Yeah, it was about the Kawasaki and history of the motorcycle Very interesting, but that piece of it the fact that they mentioned it That's the part I took was a big takeaway Kawasaki's great motorcycles. So that was why I watched it I like how sake motorcycles, but the deeper thing was when they just covered that in the beginning and the history of the company I'm like that's really interesting. I imagine it probably is if they go that far they probably do there But they were really talking about all that they were really talking about the history of the motorcycle But my little takeaway was that if I can find the documentary outside it But that being said, I think that's important where you keep your hands Somewhat level it's kind of fun and I had this conversation off Mike So if you don't know who Jeffery Snowver is he's inventor of PowerShell. He's a twice distinguished engineer at Microsoft just an amazing guy and it's kind of interesting and he has a lot of hands on his code and things like that But it's so I get to do an interview with Jeffery Snowver and that's I was Blessed and humble and I got to be on stage over the you know It's a Microsoft conference and have conversation with these people But part of what I could talk about was how things are being deployed in the field because I work hands-on with this And this is where some of your pundits and I really like a lot of them that I listen to other Podcasts and other tech reporters and things like that But having my hands on actually running a business and seeing how something's used on any product level is Wonderful to then then be a reporter or a interviewer and have that position like we did on Sunday morning I saw you that's what that was related to and have a conversation with them because I'm not just like reading some news Article no no we literally have used the product not like tested it in a lab Like no we've used a script that we wrote for a client to do a thing And that hands-on nature of things which I'm not the biggest PowerShell user But the concept is still there where I'm I discuss products I actually use in the field so I get to see the results not just a lab Results or something so I think it's an important connection to being able to do all that And in keeping yourself relevant and everything else agreed. Yeah, I think that's where we're gonna end vlog Thursday Yeah, let's see. Yeah, we're at like yeah, 25 minutes 25 minutes. We've been trying to keep this show about a half hour, so But this when we started it was like, oh, let's do like a 10-minute vlog every But all that all that information and knowledge and everything else Where I started with this and where I went are two different places But yes, there's gonna be a series of videos I'm going to do directly on some of the inside business talk of how we do things that we want to be as absolutely open as possible And I this this is something I think is very relevant. I get a lot of thank-yous and I love it. I love all the feedback Thank you very much everyone Who sends feedback of you know, just that they're happy with it We see a lot in the comments and things like that. I read as many of them as possible It's it's an obsessive habit of I spent a lot of time as my wife knows just reading and trying to reply to everyone I can besides the YouTube comment system sucking and replying to emails I just say thank you too because sometimes it's all the hours of email if I help someone do this or help someone do that And I thought about it a lot because I was chatting with another IT guy that also used the solar winds product Like we do at one time I said so you still using so it wins this one I can't resist well just the balls of vague answers When it comes to any of the software stack they use because he's kind of a competitor and I'm like really guys I mean It's a secret what software using what advantage are you're gonna gain from knowing that he uses solar winds? Yeah, I don't understand it because I'm like if you use the same product I have some knowledge I plan to share with you But she told me you're not using your products I this knowledge becomes irrelevant of a way we might do something. I literally just want to help people even though They're my competitors. I think there's this weird thing of you I shouldn't share my secrets because my competitors will take one do better me if I tell you how I do something You can do it better than I do it and I'm going to came up with a method Good job. Yeah, I mean I'm clearly not on the ball then Right, I I should do better. Yeah, I'm competitive in that way I don't mind sharing and this is where like Elon Musk and I love the guy by the way love putting a damn car Just launches car into space for crying out loud and they've asked him about this about his competitive thing And it's such a dynamic change To be able to have someone out there who who says I don't care if I give my secrets away here Here you go. Oh by the way, here's the formula for the batteries and things like that It's it's make it better. Yeah, if you can do better than me and I'm going to develop it And he'll it welcomes competition in a marketplace for he's like great They're like, what do you think of this and he's like great He's not like I'm going to destroy them And I love that as an attitude of a CEO of a company and I think that's more modern approach things It's a very open approach of yeah, and I don't mind This is why the Linux community has done so well Oh, it takes longer on that methodology, but I think that whole openness of yeah, we don't we made this product great You're doing a competing thing or you want to fork the product because you can do it better awesome Sometimes it works. Maybe you're right and we've seen projects abandon where the people go this way That is a better attitude and that's kind of the attitude I have I don't mind sharing all the details of the business and how we do things with you so Ask away what you've asked away now. I just got to put it together Yeah, this whole work thing because there is actually this thing I do that has interfered with the videos lately Because I actually do work Terrible work in the way of his fun, you know, and then people create unexpected amounts of fun So fun like fixing this entire network problem because they thought they caught Dell So unexpected fun Yeah, that happens we will leave you with this Tom's tea wisdom tag Oh, that's just some of my tea may this day bring you peace tranquility and harmony No, the next video is not peaceful tranquil or harmonious So I'm gonna rip video process and start working on the next one while that one's rendering And then I got to get back to work and doing stuff. Yeah, maybe maybe I have a lot of products to research So that's that's on my list as I have a couple people that want to do some interviews with me And we're gonna be interviewing them. There's some projects in the works. It's not anything. That's really secret I honestly just can't put his name right now. Hope he's not watching. Yeah He just messes me and his name is on the toes first name. You'll find out about it when the video comes out Yeah, or whatever it's going to be executive editor company. We've done reviews in our product And we that's something we're working on we want to do with some interviews with some of these people and share it with you So we you know and not in a salesy webinar type of way We just talk about the product talk about the industry and things like that So I also got some other security people I want to reach out to to get them on here To do some roundtables about it I want them to unleash a little bit without PR telling them not to eat so they can rant because I know how we are in Private we're like I was security so bad and release the nerds release the nerds In the meantime like and subscribe clickety-click like and subscribe clickety-click if you want to throw money It's just patreon if you don't have money don't throw money at us. Well, I mean just a smaller percentage of what you have We need money Because we do have the goal of hiring some more people so that's That's who think the more the more people we hire the more videos Oh, and I forgot to ask no one seemed is interested I guess that's fine because I don't have to do as much of a disclaimer I did ask if anyone's interested in us talking more about financials and how we do them That's a really boring topic. By the way, we did the numbers. We lost money again. Yeah, not as much So we're progressing well as I recall there are still some things that Yeah Maybe we'll even cover it sometime if people are if you're interested knowing about the financials and how much we lost Which was about two grand? That's so weird because there's about three grand that Tom hasn't built up yet. I'm four But I know of I haven't built out four thousand dollars. I know We're how that works We do the math on it we would have profited this month, but we did not That happens and that's the ebb and flow of it, you know You lose a little each month and you make it up in quantity or something Tom likes it to be a like a bigger windfall like lose a couple of months and then oh we gained so much That's that happens to sometimes You know really it fires you up and gets you going Yeah, so I mean someone sweet will lose a couple grand here a couple grand there to boom We make we profited 10,000 that month is over 20,000 that month It's supposed to who's losing a few thousand each month. That's it's really how some of the projects go and especially when time doesn't Oh, yeah, yeah, so to sustain us better We're gonna stop talking so Tom can go do some things and build some things out. I should really build these things We'll see you next week. Yeah, that's where's they tell us we should never say Thank you. You guys are great. But are you gonna send the bill? We're just we're wondering because we we know what you quoted Everything seemed to go. Well, will you send the bills or is there anything? Yeah, that's why I have Marvin here. I don't think about these things sometimes So no money to make for all the checks to clear. All right. I'll make a youtube video Thanks