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"... almost the whole world is asleep - everybody you know, everybody you see, everybody you talk to. Only a few people are awake...and they live in a state of constant, total amazement."
- Joe vs the Volcano
My observations...and excerpts from books, stories, articles, travelogues, & speeches



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Joshua chapter 14..... its a great great scene: Joshua has just led the Israelites (God's chosen people) into the promised land and have defeated the major enemy stronghold, Jericho, by the hand of God.
So here I am today…...85 years old, I’m still as strong today as the day Moses sent me out, I’m just as vigorous to go out to battle now, as I was then. Now give me this hill country that the LORD promised me that day. You yourselves heard that the Annakites were there, and their cities are large and fortified….but the LORD helping me, I will drive them out just as He said.” 
take action against a Norman noble who raped a farmer's wife, a band of peasants assassinated him. When a police chief tortured some petty thief with the dreaded cassetta, that police chief was killed. Gradually the strongest-willed of the peasants and the poor formed themselves into an organized society which had the support of the people and in effect became a second and more powerful government. When there was a wrong to be redressed, no one ever went to the official police, they went to the leader of the local Mafia, who mediated the problem.
In the Italian culture, the family is a crucial and fundamental element of society. Its importance probably goes beyond other Western cultures today. The family is always a source of protection and support for the individual.







