A Chicago Water-Taxi on Madison Street…

Right by the Ogilvie Transportation Center on Madison Street, you can hail a cab or take a CTA bus, even the Union Pacific Railroad…But, “Where is the Chicago Water Taxi?” Commuters looking for a Chicago River water-ride have to wait for the Water Taxi, starting at 6:45 a.m. by the Madison Street Bridge. A Chicago Water Taxi takes you down the steps into the Boarding Pier and the Ticket Booth where you can purchase a One-Way Water Ride for $3.00 to Michigan Avenue, LaSalle/Clark or all the way to Chinatown. If you have All Day, you can spend $7.00 for an All-Day Pass provided by the Chicago Water Taxi. The Schedule is posted on the wall…in small print. After you have purchased your Chicago Water-Taxi Pass, you have to wait for the water-ride pick-up to come along the Chicago River… Commuters may stand waiting in line or sit down a long-time waiting for a ride on a Chicago Water-Taxi. “Where is the Attendant?” “ Is Anybody There?”

The Pearl of the Antilles: Cuba

Long before the arrival of the Spaniards to the Caribbean, the island of Cuba was populated by Native American Indian tribes, that is to say, “siboneyes“, who lived in the caves and lived from hunting and fishing; “taínos” who excelled in clay pottery and practiced agriculture; and “guanajatebeyes” who were nomads and populated the western coasts.

On October 27, 1492, Christopher Columbus sighted Cuba on his first voyage.  The next day, Columbus landed, christening the port with the Christian name of “San Salvador“, “Savior”, where he touched land and, naming “Juana“, the island which he thought to be a continent.  Between 1508 and 1509, Sebastián de Ocampo navigated around the island and in 1511, Don Diego Velázquez de Cuéllar initiated the conquest of the same land.  In 1512, the city of Baracoa, at the northern tip of Cuba was founded; in 1513, Bayamo on the southwestern side; and in 1514, Trinidad in the southern middle, Sancti Spiritus, Santa María del Puerto Príncipe, Santiago de Cuba, and La Habana were established as the first seven (7) cities in the New World for the Americas.

 

The indigenous population was divided out to the entrusted and appointed landholders, “encomendaderos“.  However, abusive work, hard labor, and disease from the Old World, dominated the Native American population which motivated the introduction of African black slave labor on the island of Cuba.

The Christian Catholic King of Spain, Don Fernando II, ruler of Aragón, became married to Doña Isabel of Castilla, with equity in the exercise of power.  In the 15th century, at the beginning of 1482, the King and Queen of Spain developed military campaigns for the Reconquest of the Moorish lands which escalated to the seize of Granada, in Andalusía, Spain, circa 1492.  During the same year, the Muslim Arabs surrendered in Granada and Seville to end eight (8) centuries of Islamic control which sealed the Christian conquest for the Spanish territories.  Simultaneously, the discovery and exploration of the New World in the Americas by Don Christopher Columbus, occurred during the same times, in 1492. 

 

Christopher Columbus was a Spanish-Italian sea explorer and navigator (who was probably a native of Genoa, born in 1451 and lived until 1506, in Valladolid, Spain).  At the time, Columbus believed that in order to arrive at the East of the world, there was a route by sea to the West.  With the protection of Don Juan Pérez, Prior of La Rabida, Christopher Columbus was granted the signature for Capitulations of the Holy Faith, according to which, Columbus received the title of Admiral, Viceroy, and Governor of the lands he discovered in the New World.

 

On the first voyage, Columbus sailed from Puerto de Palos on August 3rd, at the command of the Spanish galleons “carabelas“, la Pinta, la Niña y la Santa María, and arrived to the island of Guanahaní, “San Salvador“, on October 12, 1492.

 

Christopher Columbus discovered Cuba on October 27, 1492, five hundred and twenty (520) years ago, and the island christened “La Española“, Hispaniola, also known by the Amerindian name of “Quisqueya” or Haití, where he established the Spanish fort Nativity.  On December 5, 1492, Columbus discovered the island known today as the Dominican Republic and Haití.  Afterwards, he returned to Palos and was received with triumph in Barcelona, Spain.

 

Upon the return to Spain from the discovery of the New World in the Americas by Christopher Columbus, the Spanish Catholic monarchs arranged before Pope Alexander VI the concession of the ecclesiastical Alexandrian edicts which assigned to the Spain the new territories in the New World. Since Portugal had closed the route to the spices for Castilla, Spain, Christopher Columbus had a projected mission to reach the Orient, in the East, by way of the Western (Occident) which was accepted and sponsored by the Catholic King and Queen, reigning monarchs of Spain.

 

Columbus’ accounts of his voyages in the New World remain in the Archives of the Indies as the documented description of an ethnographer, ethnologist, and ethnolinguist in the Americas.  Christopher Columbus provided and recorded news and first impressions about the native indigenous inhabitants in the Caribbean and of the lands he discovered along the way.

 

The Republic of Cuba is an insular state of Central America.  Cuba represents the island known for the same name of the country, in addition to the island of Youth or Isla de Pinos, other smaller islands in its surroundings, and some 1,600 adjoining islets known as keys or “cayos”, such as Key West, also known as Cayo Hueso.

 

Cuba can be found in the middle of the Caribbean, between the Strait of Florida and the old Channel of the Bahamas to the North; the eastern section of Cuba faces the Windward Channel; the southern littoral looks upon the Caribbean Sea or the Antilles; west of the Yucatán Peninsula and northwest toward the Gulf of México–only 99 miles from the United States of America, close to the states of Florida, Texas, Louisiana, and Alabama in the south.

 

Geographically, the island of Cuba extends in the shape of an arc from the northwest to the southeast with a longitude of 1,255 kilometers, from the tip of Cabo San Antonio to the point of Maisí.  

 

The topography of Cuba is made of predominant plains or hills, with the exception of the mountain ranges of the Sierra Maestra to the southeast, which features the elevation called Pico Turquino, the highest point of view in Cuba, at 1,974 meters in altitude, and other smaller mountainous extensions, such as the Sierra del Escambray at the center of Cuba with the Pico San Juan at 1,056 meters in altitude, and the mountain chain known as “cordilleras de los Organos”, which hardly rise above 690 meters in contrast to the elevation for the Pan de Guajabón.

 

The Cuban seacoasts are flanked by a great number of islands and islets.  These maritime keys emerge up to considerable distances from the Cuban littoral in the Caribbean.

 

Cuba has more than 200 rivers, generally not long enough, but with impetuous currents.  Among the major Cuban rivers is El Cauto which floods the surroundings areas of Santiago de Cuba during tropical storms, hurricanes, and cyclones, that is to say “maritime twisters”, and is required to be controlled by a river dam, “la represa del Cauto”.  In addition, there are the rivers called Cuyaguateje, Sagua La Grande, Sagua La Chica, Aguabama, etc.

 

The Cuban climate is softened by tropical and maritime breezes.  

The Spanish colonial city of Santiago de Cuba was founded in 1514, nestled among a series of hills near the mountain range of the Sierra Maestra, in the heart of the eastern municipal district of Oriente.

 

The architectural design of the building constructions have been adapted typically over time to the mountainous topography and frequently, the lower back rooms of the houses are found at a lower level than the front upper rooms of the same houses in Cuba.       

 

Spain called Cuba “the Pearl of the Antilles”.      

 

Original Translation into English from Spanish Source:  2000 Nuevo Espasa Ilustrado.  Diccionario Enciclopédico.  Espasa Calpe, S.A. (1999), España

Consulting Media Arts Communications©2012 Gardenia Hung. 

All Rights Reserved.

Santiago de Cuba: City of Pilgrimages and Pilgrims

1607-2012: 405th Anniversary for the Municipality of Santiago de Cuba—“Heroic City of the Republic of Cuba”, “City of Pilgrimages and Pilgrims”, Santiago de Cuba, UNESCO World Heritage

The  Municipality of Santiago de Cuba was founded by the Spanish conquistador Diego Velázquez de Cuéllar, as one of the first seven cities in the Republic of Cuba during the year 1514 Anno Domini. The City of Santiago was the first official capital of Cuba until 1550. Since its foundation, this historical colonial town has had a Municipal City Hall and was granted the title status of city in the year 1522 A.D., on the same date in which the Cathedral of Santiago de Cuba was built by order of Pope Adrian VI of Utrecht, Regent of Spain, at the Vatican in Rome for the Catholic Church.

During the 16th and 17th centuries, Cuba suffered from the siege of pirates, corsairs, and buccaneers in the Caribbean, the Greater Antilles, the Gulf of Mexico, to include those from Central and South America, as well as North America and Europe.

The city of Santiago de Cuba is privileged for its geographical location and central Caribbean placement. Consequently, Santiago de Cuba became a haven for the French colonists, settlers who emigrated to the nearest town across the waters from Haiti to escape the consequences of the Haitian Revolution. These French settlers developed within their surrounding area vast coffee plantations and other agricultural staples, while sponsoring interaction and integration of Spaniards, French, and African slaves, as well as defining the socio-economic and political profile of Santiago de Cuba and the cross-cultural identity of its inhabitants and native residents.

During the 19th century, with the heat of the independent struggles for nationalism throughout the Americas, the rebellious heart of the city Santiago de Cuba became exalted. Thus, Santiago has given to history many immortal patriots to the independent struggle against the Spanish colonial bond at the time, such as the descendants of Maceo, Lora, and other Cuban heroes, like Frank País, in the revolutionary strife during this century and beyond… Hence, it is with justice, fairness, and equity that Santiago de Cuba has been granted the honorary title of “Heroic City of the Republic of Cuba–Ciudad Héroe de la República de Cuba.”

Not only is Santiago de Cuba a vintage city full of historical legacy, but it is also the cradle of poets, writers, musicians, minstrels, and artists, painters, from Heredia to Soler Puig.

Santiago de Cuba is considered to be the Cuban capital of the world since its beginnings, in the measure of its efforts which this Cuban regional area invests to develop and expand its markets; thus increasing its word-wide investements–given its privileged geographical location and importance as the second city in the Republic of Cuba.

Santiago is complemented by an international seaport and adjoining industrial sector, which includes a thermoelectrical plant, oil refinery, cement manufacturing, and other industrial facilities.

The economy of Santiago de Cuba is distinguished by its diversified agriculture in the sugar industry and in the development of the agrarian sector for such important staples as coffee, dairy products, produce, and fruit harvests, particularly for citrus.

This Cuban city also relies on important natural resources in forestry and environmental vegetation, rich in species of flora and fauna, which have promoted Santiago de Cuba to become one of the principal forestry regions in the Republic of Cuba. These ecological assets combined with hydraulic resources and the variety of landscapes and seascapes Cuba has reserved in Santiago, allows the City of Pilgrimages and Pilgrims to have an enormous potential for tourism from around the world.

Source: Brochure for “Santiago de Cuba”, published by the Banco Internacional de Comercio, S.A., Sede Central, 20 de Mayo y Ayesterán, Apartado 6113, La Habana 6 , Cuba.

Spanish to English Translation by Gardenia C. Hung Fong, M.A., B.A., from a brochure pamphlet given by my Aunt Xiomara Fong Ramos

For reference, the city of Santiago de Cuba was named after the biblical evangelist and apostle Saint James who preached the gospels of Jesus Christ in Spain as Santiago de Compostela, during the 9th century through the 11th century on behalf of Christianity. During the Middle Ages, Santiago was the patron saint of pilgrims, pilgrimages, and the knights. Santiago was represented as one of the apostles of Jesus Christ.

Source:
Spanish to English translation by Gardenia C. Hung Fong, M.A., B.A.
La Biblia y los Santos. Guía iconográfica. Alianza Editorial, Madrid, Spain, 1996,pages 347-348. Authors Gastón Duchet-Suchaux and Michel Pastoreau. Versión española de César Vidal.

Consulting Media Arts Communications©2012 Gardenia Hung.  All Rights Reserved.

How Are Languages Used As Communications Tools in the 21st Century?

As we move through the new millennium, we need to focus on how languages are used as communication tools in the 21^st century to promote understanding, listening, cooperation, trade, military security, and peace in the world to become more effective and efficient communicators. 

Technology, research, and developments in communications for the 21^st century will regulate how languages will be used as tools in diverse professional fields and disciplines.  In addition, the application of languages as communication tools in the 21^st century is subject to the existing influence of political and socio-economic developments in the world.

According to Philip Howard in his Foreword for The World of Words.  An Illustrated History of Western Languages, new revised edition, I quote, “we can only guess that hundreds of thousands of languages have been spoken since the beginning of the world, from the fact that 2,769 languages are spoken around the world today (the figure depends a bit on what one counts as a language)”.   

Human communication is defined as the process by which people exchange information.  Languages are forms of communication in our everyday world.  We use languages to communicate on a daily basis at home, work, with friends, at leisure.  Languages are an indispensable way to function, interact, and exchange information, especially as our world becomes closer.  Thus, languages become communication tools in the 21^st century as work issues, military protection, and concerns in the world evolve from local to global to become “glocal” in the international arena. 

Given the multilingual population in our planet Earth, there is a need to communicate and listen in more than one language in the U.S.A. and around the world.  The process of active listening is an essential and important factor in communication because it allows us to perceive selectively what the information exchange entails, without overlooking details and steps to follow directions. 

The need to communicate effectively and efficiently in the 21^st century requires a mandatory acquisition of another language, in addition to English, which fulfills an educational requirement in the our country and overseas.  Thus, in the same way that “Education is a tool for success”, languages are used as tools in the 21^st century because these facilitate the process of communication around the world.

Tools are means by which we ease our interaction in a work environment and around us.

The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language defines a tool as anything regarded as necessary to implement one’s occupation or profession.  Since languages in the 21^st century are used to perform one’s job, as the work force travels and relocates around the world, in response to employment and military deployment, labor supply and demand, then languages become communication tools in the 21^st century. 

International companies in the United States and around the world require personnel to travel on demand where employee skills are needed.  Consequently, employment relocation and logistics are common factors for global work in the 21^st century.  An awareness and knowledge of languages is an underlying pre-requisite to international employment, deployment, and travel.  So, if one knows two or more languages in the world, chances are that one will travel for work or leisure and become more effective and efficient as a communicator and an employee…

We need to discuss how languages are used as communication tools in the 21^st century to promote understanding, cooperation, trade, and peace in the world. 

Technology, Research and Development: 

                      Videophone,  Videoconferencing, Global Positioning

                      Systems World-Wide Assistance with Satellites,

                      Student Centered Distance Learning for Remote Rural Areas, 

                      Internet Delivery of Instruction On-line, Email Tutorials,

                      Intranet Web-Based Educational Environments
                     Audio Computer-Based Test for ESL Listening Skills

Understanding:   Interpersonal, one-to-one basis, people-to-people;

Interpreting—Consular, Commercial, Legal, Medical, Technical, On-line; Translation—Electronic, Commercial, Legal, Medical, Technical

Listening:               The process of active listening is an essential and important factor in communication because it allows us to perceive selectively what the information exchange entails, without overlooking details and steps to follow directions.        

 Cause and Effect:  The application of languages as communication tools in the 21^stcentury is  subject to the influence of political and socio-economic developments in the world.  

We need to foster the use and application of languages in education to facilitate communication in a global and local sense, around the world  and in our own communities to become effective and efficient communicators. 

The application of languages as communication tools in the 21^st century is subject to the influence of political and socio-economic developments in the world.

©2012 Communications, Languages & Culture, Inc.  All Rights Reserved.

Certified Legal Interpreting and Translation in Illinois, USA

I started language interpreting for Action Translation with the Illinois Industrial Commission in Chicago at the James R. Thompson Illinois Government Center when Joseph Raudonis used to live in Palos Heights, Illinois—I found a job wanted ad in the newspaper and telephoned Action Translation for assignments translating legal documents for Spanish into English.

Then,   I met Carmen Kenny, a legal interpreter at the Arbitration Center in Chicago, who was looking for a freelance interpreter and translator who could share legal interpreting assignments in the Chicagoland area, travel on-site to judicial hearings, arbitrations, depositions, and translate legal documents upon assignment for Carmen Kenny & Associates based in Arlington Heights, Illinois.

A colleague referred me to Arroyave Academy of Languages managed by Guillermo Arroyave himself in Highland Park and Arlington Heights, who was looking for a communications cross-cultural consultant who could teach foreign languages, interpret, and translate from English into Spanish, French, and/or Portuguese, available for travelling around the Chicagoland area—throughout the counties of Cook, Lake, Will, DuPage, Kane, Grundy, LaSalle, etc.

I had been working for Berlitz Schools of Languages in Chicago, Hinsdale, Oak Brook, and Schaumburg as a language cross-cultural consultant. 

By professional referral and networking, I was contacted by Inlingua Schools in Chicago to work as a professional cross-cultural consultant, language interpreter and translator on-site, in the Chicagoland area.

In addition, I was a member of the American Translators Association and Chicago Area Translators and Interpreters Association.In 1990, I found a newspaper job ad from Diplomatic Languages Service, Inc. , based in Virginia, looking for language interpreters and translators in Chicago, Illinois.

During the 1990’s I interpreted and translated for several Translation Agencies:  Burg Translation, Palencia Language Services,  Interlate Systems, Inc., Linguistic Systems, Inc. in Boston, Massachusetts, Access Translation managed by Rosa Ridderbusch in Lake Zurich, AIM Translations in Bloomingdale, Illinois. 

Professional Certified Translator, Interpreter for Communications, Languages & Culture, Inc., Consulting Media Arts Communications

©Copyright 2012 Communications, Languages & Culture, Inc.  All Rights Reserved.

Tiffany Rotunda Mosaic: Jacques Marquette and Louis Jolliet with Native American Indians

A National Historic Landmark at the Marquette Building illustrating the history of Chicago and the Illinois country.

Owen F. Aldis was a real estate developer, fanatic historian, and one of the building’s original owners, who translated Jesuit Father Jacques Marquette’s original journal in 1891, thus christening the structure with his name and inspiring artists to illustrate the explorers’ journeys with their Native American companions at the Marquette Building, a national historic landmark honoring the history of Chicago’s expedition by Marquette and Jolliet.
Courtesy Photo: GHung

Mural Art: City of Dreams

“City of Dreams Come True Chicago!”
Excursion Travels

A Winter Solstice Sunrise

Sunrise by Lake Michigan, Illinois USA

Confirma Ecuador asistencia a Feria del Libro el 19 de febrero 2012

http://www.ain.cu/2012/enero/10aem-confirma_ecuador.htm?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

Watch “One Day on Earth: 11.11.2011 Lombard Victims of Crimes on Veterans’ Day” on YouTube