The Guardian for this meeting was Bruce Mowbray. The comments are by Bruce Mowbray.

The session began with Bruce sitting alone for almost half an hour - watching the movie "Life of Pi."  

An hour later, folks from Italy, Seattle, and Iceland (recently returned from Moroco) had joined in.  

Qt Core: Hi Bruce.
Bruce Mowbray: Hello, Qt!
Bruce Mowbray: What's up?
Qt Core: nothing new, a thunderstorm approaching
Bruce Mowbray: ahhh!
Qt Core: you ?
Bruce Mowbray: That reminds me of last week... only here instead of in Italy.
Bruce Mowbray: nothing much, really ... I just started watching the movie "Life of Pi."
Bruce Mowbray: I've seen it a few times before but it's a wonderful movie.
Qt Core: haven't seen it, it is not about 3.14.... right ?
Bruce Mowbray: I wish we had a thunderstorm approaching here.... my typist's corn needs it desperately
Bruce Mowbray: actually, it is and it is not about 3.14 ....
Bruce Mowbray: I have also seen that movie called "Pi", though.
Bruce Mowbray: The title of the movie I'm watching today comes from the boy's name . . . "Picine."
Bruce Mowbray: And all of his elementary school classmates called him, "pissing."
Bruce Mowbray: so he changed his name to PI.
Bruce Mowbray: And he convinced them he was for real by reciting pi to hundreds of decimal places....
Bruce Mowbray: from then on he was known as "PI"!
Bruce Mowbray: and the movie goes on from there...
Bruce Mowbray: you've probably seen it or heard about it.
Qt Core: my attention span lessened in past years, between being a channel surfer and youtube videos i rarely watch an entire movie lately
Bruce Mowbray: Remember the tiger in the boat?
Bruce Mowbray: I will find it for you just a sec.....
Qt Core: just as a poster, haven't seen it
Bruce Mowbray: https://www.google.com/search?q=life...w=1431&bih=747
Bruce Mowbray: Yes, the image has a way of implanting itself....
Bruce Mowbray: It is an absolutely wonderful movie, though, and although your attention span is waning (as is my own), I highly recommend it.
Qt Core: the beauty of tigers
Bruce Mowbray: yes.... and as the movie demonstrates, ultimately the beauty of everything.
Bruce Mowbray: Even without a storyline or words, the movie is absolutely beautiful.... but the storyline is also beautiful.
Bruce Mowbray: Hello, Cal!
Qt Core: Hi Calvino
Calvino Rabeni: waves hello
Bruce Mowbray: I was just talking about the movie " Life of Pi" with Qt.
Bruce Mowbray: Have you seen it, Cal?
Bruce Mowbray: https://www.google.com/search?q=life...w=1431&bih=747

--BELL--

Calvino Rabeni: no, is it about mathematics or a Tyger?
Bruce Mowbray: My typist feels that it is one of the most beautiful movies he's ever seen -- in his entire life. . . and that's a lot of movies!
Bruce Mowbray: Well, it's about a lot of things, actually....
Calvino Rabeni: listens
Bruce Mowbray: The one I'm referring to is about a tiger....
Bruce Mowbray: But it is also about life, religion, the world, animals, beliefs,... and I could go on and on - but won't.
Bruce Mowbray: Although my typist has watched the movie at least three or four times all the way through, he is looking forward to watching it again tonight.
Bruce Mowbray: It's one of those movies like "Zorba the Greek" -- One feels compelled to watch it again and again....
Bruce Mowbray: Maybe " Casablanca" would have been a better example, or "Citizen Kane" or another one like that.
Calvino Rabeni: I can't think of a movie I've seen more than once ... I might try it some time
Bruce Mowbray: really?
Calvino Rabeni: yes
Calvino Rabeni: prob. have seen "Wizard of Oz" a couple of times though :)
Bruce Mowbray: My typist feels about watching movies again and again a bit the same way he feels about reading wonderful books again and again...
Bruce Mowbray: He has books on his shelves that he's read maybe four or five times.
Qt Core: for me one is "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner"
Qt Core: another is Frankeinstein Jr ;-)
Bruce Mowbray: Oh, yes! "The Wizard of Oz" is a wonderful example. As are the other ones that QT is now mentioning.
Bruce Mowbray: although I never did see "Guess Whose Coming to Dinner"
Bruce Mowbray: I think that one starred Sidney Poitier, right?
Calvino Rabeni: Movies become like rituals I think
Qt Core: and others ;-)
Bruce Mowbray: Oh yes.
Calvino Rabeni: I do listen to music more than once :)
Bruce Mowbray: for sure!
Qt Core: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0061735/
Bruce Mowbray: ty, Qt.
Bruce Mowbray: You know, Qt, that movie came out in America just about the same time that the civil rights movement was gaining momentum....
Bruce Mowbray: so, it was quite controversial at the time -- inasmuch as it featured a black man and a white woman in a relationship.
Qt Core: one wonders why ;-)
Bruce Mowbray: Well, it probably has deep roots in American history.
Bruce Mowbray: some of the sadder chapters.
Bruce Mowbray: I personally feel that we've moved quite far beyond that.... but my typist has misgivings.... He still feels that racial prejudice is alive and well in this fair country.
Bruce Mowbray: alas.
Bruce Mowbray: We seem to take two steps forward and one step back....
Bruce Mowbray: We elect a black president, and then polls are taken that indicate people feel he is the worst president since the second world war...

Bruce Mowbray: which, in my opinion, is absurd.
Qt Core: that would still be good one forward all in all, maybe slower but still forward
 Bruce Mowbray: well the steps may be forward but are so long in coming.
Bruce Mowbray wonders if Cal saw the Quinnipiac University poll regarding Obama....
Bruce Mowbray: I will pull it up.... ( absurd as it is!) . . . it is probably an accurate account, sadly.
Calvino Rabeni: no I haven't
Qt Core: just this afternoon i was wondering if the USA is going to have a series of the first president... female, of Asian descent, homosexual, and so on...
Calvino Rabeni: such things are about public opinion, which is cheap .. people like to spout off without thinking
Bruce Mowbray: http://www.politico.com/story/2014/0...ii-108507.html
Bruce Mowbray: (drop approaches rapidly....)

--BELL--

Calvino Rabeni: frankly, it doesn't bother me compared to abusive practices, exploitation of the poor in private debtors prisons, corruption of police, human trafficking the US is participating in, and that ... meanwhile people can speak in ways the reveal their unethical thinking, that seems relatively okay
Bruce Mowbray: Nods, and agrees entirely with Cal's statement.
Bruce Mowbray: Public opinion changes like the wind....
Bruce Mowbray: It is hardly based on serious ethics.... ever.
Bruce Mowbray: But, you know, some of these things have a way of coming back into biting us in the rear end....
Bruce Mowbray: there are so many examples!
Bruce Mowbray: one of which is the immigrants from Central America pouring across the southern border....
Calvino Rabeni: nods
Bruce Mowbray: maybe we should have thought more carefully about our policies with regard to those countries decades ago.
Bruce Mowbray: likewise in Iraq....
Calvino Rabeni: Or be aware of the vicious cycles involved in situations like the immigration issue
Bruce Mowbray: Here we go again?
Calvino Rabeni: yes or iraq
Bruce Mowbray: nods. snap!
Bruce Mowbray: It seems a bit ironic that in American schools, American history is taught three times: in the fifth grade, in the eighth grade, and in the 11th grade . . . but we still don't learn it!
Bruce Mowbray: I'm guessing that most Europeans know more about American history than many Americans do.
Qt Core: the three round happens here too and the same non-learning happens
Bruce Mowbray: really, Qt?
Bruce Mowbray: Perhaps those adolescents have other things on their minds.  (!!)
Calvino Rabeni: the border children trace back to the crime gangs in Honduras which trace back to the street gangs in Los Angeles which trace back to the civil war in Central America which trace back to US intervention which trace back to ... generations of vicious cycles
Calvino Rabeni: something seems missing with historical awareness
Bruce Mowbray: nods and nods and nods....
Bruce Mowbray: Hey, Vorder!
Qt Core: yes, as we have three level of schooling 6-10, 11-13 and 14-18 years every one reteaches the same thing we may say, one would hope in deeper level each time
Bruce Mowbray: Welcome back, Vorder!
Qt Core: Hi Vorder
Vorder Forder: thank you nice to see you all
Bruce Mowbray: (from ICELAND!)
Qt Core: !
Bruce Mowbray: !!
Vorder Forder: I was coming home from Sahara:-)
Bruce Mowbray: WOW!
Bruce Mowbray: the desert!???
Bruce Mowbray: in RL?
Vorder Forder: in rl
Bruce Mowbray: WOWOWOWOWOW!
Vorder Forder: Morocco
Bruce Mowbray: Amazing. Small world, indeed.
Bruce Mowbray: What were your impressions, Vorder?
Bruce Mowbray: Welcome, Kendust!
Vorder Forder: I found the Berber culture very interesting
Bruce Mowbray: hmmmmm.
Qt Core: hello Kendust
Bruce Mowbray: Heya, Kendust. . . Are you aware that our chats are posted in an online wiki?
Bruce Mowbray: and that I need your permission to post anything that you might say in chat?
Bruce Mowbray: but please join us and join in!
Bruce Mowbray: I can delete anything that you do not want in the wiki.
Bruce Mowbray: no problem.
Bruce Mowbray: Please do sit in and listen!
Vorder Forder: Bruce what did you mean by small world you were in Sahara?
Bruce Mowbray: We have been discussing several topics -- from beautiful movies, to the civil rights movement in America, to public education, to the immigration problem....
Bruce Mowbray: so, anywhere that you'd care to jump into the chat would be good!
Bruce Mowbray: "small world"?

--BELL--

Bruce Mowbray: Well, that is an expression we use......
Bruce Mowbray: "Small world" is an expression of amazement at how connected we are.
Bruce Mowbray: ... and how coincidences seem to appear in myriad "far-away" places that we'd least expect them.
Qt Core: just to add another -  next year a couple friend will visit Iceland (and there is a small probability i will too)
Vorder Forder: yes exactly.   as we travel around the world we get to know that people are the same were every we go .....just in the lyric by MJ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M9BNoNFKCBI

Bruce Mowbray: nods and nods.
Vorder Forder: and when we come home we find it
Bruce Mowbray: You know, in a strange way, this seems to come full circle from where Qt and I began our conversation almost an hour ago....
Bruce Mowbray: I was watching the movie "Life of Pi" and I had commented on how beautiful it was... and it is very much a movie for the entire world.
Bruce Mowbray: I love that, Vorder.
Qt Core: When i visited China i ended up making a blunt observation about that ... "we all use the same toilet paper"
Bruce Mowbray: ponders "When we come home...."
Bruce Mowbray: We also all use many other things besides toilet paper.....
Bruce Mowbray: and maybe one day will come to recognize that.
Qt Core: sometimes (one may say on a lesser degree) a thing called brain ;-)
Bruce Mowbray: nods.
Bruce Mowbray: Good people, my typist is telling me that he needs to get dinner ready....
Bruce Mowbray: Apparently, we also all use stomachs!
Bruce Mowbray: Thank you all for being here today.
Calvino Rabeni: my pleasure Bruce
Qt Core: ty Bruce and enjoy
Bruce Mowbray: May your weekend be safe and happy.
Calvino Rabeni: full belly, empty head, as they say
Calvino Rabeni: thanks
Vorder Forder: take care
Calvino Rabeni: and I shall go empty my head now that I've filled belly
Vorder Forder: thank you all
Calvino Rabeni: goodbye Vorder and Qt
Qt Core: Bye Calvino
Qt Core: I need to go too, Vorder, a couple chore to do and then a bed awaits me
Qt Core: bye Vorder