Mine-golia

Happy Victory Day

Happy International Women's Day

"Besides, it happens fast for some people and slow for some, accidents or gravity, but we all end up mutilated. Most women know this feeling of being more and more invisible everyday."

--Chuck Palahniuk, Invisible Monsters, 1999

Center for Central Asian Literatures in Translation

“CCALT, the Center for Central Asian Literatures in Translation, aims to provide high-quality English translations of various forms of literature from throughout the Central Asian region. In an effort to promote the availability and understanding of what has thus far been an underrepresented region, CCALT aims to make English editions of works from Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Mongolia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Tuva, Uzbekistan and Xinjiang available online.”

War on Terror: The Boardgame

"Wage War on the Most Dangerous Abstract Noun Known to Man"

"The actual War on Terror is offensive. This is just a board game."

Just released last month; already banned at several toy fairs.

Clearly designed lovingly by people who enjoy critical thinking, this thing looks smart (stylish) and smart (intelligent). Check out a couple "Empire Cards" from the Card Appendix:

"Weapons Inspector - You need to make sure they haven't got anything that might trouble your liberating forces."

"Terrorist Upsurge - Seems like not everyone wants to be liberated. Ungrateful swines."

As a cartophile and sometime fan of Risk and Axis and Allies, I can't help but pore over the gameboard: New Zealand and the Philippines are apparently planned for the "Southeast Corner of the Map" expansion pack, Alaska is exhibiting symptoms of palsy, and - betraying the game's British origins - the Falklands are way prominent. (Only British folk could design a game of world domination in which the Falklands receive the high-profile treatment. Maybe also Argentinians.) More than offsetting this, however, is the inclusion of Antarctica, which is crazy cool. Antarctica is labeled as "Nowhere."


And Mongolia is on there! It has powdered off to the west and borders Afghanistan, but it's still nice to see it. Kazakhstan didn't make the cut.

Our friend Lajos commented on the game at BoardGameGeek.com:
"Ooooh, I can't wait to read more about this game (preferably the rules). The theme is absolutely brilliant and so are some of the card texts. How can anyone with at least some sense of humour be offended by this?"

For more info from BoardGameGeek, here's a shining review and a play session.

In closing, from the creators:
"The dialogue has effectively been closed. If you think terrorism is a symptom of a wider problem, rather than an inexplicable phenomenon, then you must be a terrorist. We hope this boardgame might play its humble part in opening up that dialogue."

Today

This post has moved to Adventuria - Travels of Radigan Neuhalfen.