LUMBINI PARK at the Sedona International Native American Film Festival!

My short film "Lumbini Park" will screen at the Sedona International Film Festival SRMG Native American Film Festival on June 5th! More info about the festival here:

http://www.nafestival.com/films.htm

morning on the hill

Coastal House

Sunday Afternoon Poolside

March morning, things growing.

Hello blog.

It's been a while. I've been bustling about the Echo Park Film Center, and keeping very up to date with that blog while slightly ignoring my own. I plan to update more often in the near future. Stories, photos, maybe even films. There's inspiration stirring in the air.

This morning I hopped on the EPFC Filmmobile for my first class. We went to Venice YouthBuild and taught seven students, including their teacher, how to edit the video they shot all week. They'll be finishing up those projects tomorrow. It really is an amazing thing that we have going on here. The bus is beautiful, runs on recycled vegetable oil, and goes all over teaching people how to make films and showing great films too. Waking up to the early Los Angeles sunlight and heading out to teach video making is quite unlike any other experience. The directors envision a whole brigade of buses and I'm completely into the idea. We can start a veg powered filmmobile revolution!

Happy Holidays from Leonard Peltier

Forwarded on behalf of the Leonard Peltier Defense Offense Committee
www.whoisleonardpeltier.info

Greetings and happy holidays. I hope this letter finds you all
enjoying the spirit of the season with family and friends.

My August parole denial was appealed in short order. We are expecting
a response to that appeal sometime very soon. It has occurred to
me that the viciousness of this system knows no bounds, and so I
believe strongly in the coming days we will hear of another loss,
another denial. This one will be timed and intended specifically
as a twisted Christmas present for me, such is the nature of those
in charge. With no sense of balance, fairness, or decency, I await
my own personal stocking stuffer.

We all know the so-called justice system of this country is
more about revenge and retribution than finding true and just
resolution. It doesn't take into account the plight of the wrongfully
convicted, nor does it allow flexibility as human endeavors always
require. This system has always been about making money at the top,
furthering careers in the middle, and forgetting those at the bottom.

Their reason for denying my parole is that I refuse to admit guilt
and show remorse for the deaths of two FBI agents. I know the
righteousness of my situation. I know what I did and didn't do. I
will never yield.

I also know what this country did and continues to do to me and many
others. While they demand I make a false confession for the sake of
my freedom, they show no remorse for the loss of much of my life,
or the lives of Joe Stuntz and countless others they have murdered
over the generations simply for being who they were. Those lives
are meaningless when compared to their precious FBI, I guess. And
now, some of the very ones responsible for the deaths and suffering
of so many of my people, are peddling books and claiming to be a
friend of the Indian. We've seen this before, and I'll speak more
about this soon.

I remain proud of what I have stood for and mindful of what real
justice is. In this season of love and forgiveness, please say a
prayer for all of those who never knew justice and others who have
such difficulty in finding it still today.

My love and my prayers go out to all of you.

Happy Holidays.

In the Spirit of Crazy Horse,


Leonard Peltier
Time to set him free... Because it is the RIGHT thing to do.

Friends of Peltier
http://www.FreePeltierNow.org

Akshay is visiting from India, he's a really good photographer!

http://www.akshayphoto.com/c/akshaymahajan

Reconsider Columbus Day

A chain letter from my Jewish Mother

THINGS I DIDN'T LEARN IN HEBREW SCHOOL

1. The High Holidays have absolutely nothing to do with marijuana.



2. Where there's smoke, there may be salmon.



3. No meal is complete without leftovers.



4. According to Jewish dietary law, pork and shellfish may be eaten only in Chinese restaurants.



5. A shmata is a dress that your husband's ex is wearing.



6. You need ten men for a minion, but only four in polyester pants and white shoes for pinochle.



7. One mitzvah can change the world; two will just make you tired.



8. After the destruction of the Second temple, God created Nordstroms.



9. Anything worth saying is worth repeating a thousand times.



10. Never take a front row seat at a Bris..



11. Next year in Jerusalem. The year after that, how about a nice cruise?



12. Never leave a restaurant empty handed.



13. Spring ahead, fall back, winters in Boca.



14. WASP's leave and never say good bye; Jews say good bye and never leave.



15. Always whisper the names of diseases.



16.. If it tastes good, it's probably not kosher.



17. The important Jewish holidays are the ones on which alternate side of the street parking is suspended



18. Without Jewish mothers, who would need therapy?



19. If you have to ask the price, you can't afford it. But if you can afford it, make sure to tell everybody what you paid.



20. Laugh now, but one day you'll be driving a Lexus and eating dinner at 4:00 PM in Florida ..

SIGNS ON SYNAGOGUE
BULLETIN BOARDS



1. Under same management for over 5763 years.



2. Don't give up. Moses was once a basket case.



3. What part of "Thou shalt not" don't you understand?



4. Shul committees should be made up of three members, two of whom should be absent at every meeting.



5. Sign over the urinal in a bathroom at Hebrew University : "The future of the Jewish people is in your hands."




More Jewish Stuff

6. My mother is a typical Jewish mother. Once she was on jury duty They sent her home. She insisted SHE was guilty.



7. Any time a person goes into a delicatessen and orders a pastrami on white bread, somewhere a Jew dies.



8. It was mealtime during a flight on El Al. "Would you like dinner?," the flight attendant asked Moshe, seated in front. "What are my choices?," Moshe asked. "Yes or no," she replied.



9. An elderly Jewish man is knocked down by a car and is brought to the local hospital. A pretty nurse tucks him into bed and says, "Mr. Gevarter, are you comfortable?" Gevarter replies, "I make a nice living ....."



10. A rabbi was opening his mail one morning. Taking a single sheet of paper from an envelope he found on it only one word: "shmuck." At the next Friday night service, the Rabbi announced, "I have known many people who have written letters and forgot to sign their names, but this week I received a letter from someone who signed his name...and forgot to write a letter.



11. Three Jewish women get together for lunch. As they are being seated in the restaurant, one takes a deep breath and gives a long, slow "oy." The second takes a deep breath as well and lets out a long, slow "oy" The third takes a deep breath and says impatiently, "Girls, I thought we agreed that we weren't going to talk about our children."



12. And one final favorite: A waiter comes over to a table full of Jewish women and asks, "Is anything right?