text:
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Players will be traveling to the Victorian era for the newest entry in the Assassin's Creed series, managing a gang and taking London back from the Templars. Those are the broad strokes, but we spoke with Assassin's Creed Syndicate's creative director, Marc-Alexis Côté, to get more info about the characters, setting, and improvements in this year's installment.

These question delve into the details, so make sure you have the basics covered by reading about the 5 Things You Should Know About Assassin's Creed Syndicate.

UNLIKE SOME PREVIOUS AC SETTINGS, VICTORIAN LONDON IS WELL-REPRESENTED IN ENTERTAINMENT MEDIA. HOW DO YOU APPROACH MAKING SOMETHING FAMILIAR FEEL UNIQUE TO PLAYERS?
It’s really easy to fall into the clichés of the era, and this is why it requires a lot of thought and a lot of research…For the first time in the history of the brand, we are tackling an era where we have photographs. We have videos. Just a bit later, like the 1880s, but that’s what gave us inspiration for things like building the traffic system – seeing the streets of London being so filled with people.

One of the keys to tackling this is era is that it’s an era of peace. Over the last few years, we’ve been covering periods of war. [Syndicate] brings us back to the magic of Assassin’s Creed II, the Renaissance, which was an era of peace, progress, and transformation for humanity. That’s the magic I want to capture – the magic of innovation, of change, and to make our players feel that.

People think about the Victorian era, sometimes they think about the darker aspects. But there was so much more to it; it’s the era of Charles Darwin, it’s the era of Charles Dickens – and other characters that I cannot name. So many things were invented during that era, and it will be great to share with our players.

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SO, WE’LL BE SEEING MORE FAMOUS FIGURES JUMPING IN AND OUT OF THE STORY?
Yeah, absolutely. One of the things that’s so different about this game is that it all occurs in 1868. This being an era of peace, we don’t have to take the player from battle to battle and constantly move the clocks. The game starts in 1868, it ends in 1868. We’re really focusing on immersing the player – for example, we’re bringing back the day and night cycle. We really want players to feel like part of this environment. We’re also making it about our two characters – about their stories and development. About meeting people and being influenced by them. So, you meet those historical characters in the main storyline, and then it will open up threads you can follow to learn more about Charles Darwin, for example.

IT’S ALL SET IN 1868 – IS IT ALL SET IN LONDON?
What we’re revealing today is that Assassin’s Creed Syndicate takes place in London.

DO THE TWO MAIN CHARACTERS – JACOB AND EVIE – HAVE DIFFERENT ABILITIES? OR DO PLAYERS JUST APPLY UPGRADES INDEPENDENTLY?
Both characters have different skill trees and playstyles that reflect their personalities.

ARE YOU TAKING A SIMILAR APPROACH TO UNITY REGARDING THE MODERN-DAY STORYLINE?
Yes, we are following in the footsteps of Unity, and we’ll be talking more throughout the summer about exactly what we are doing with the present-day storyline.

BY ADDING VEHICLES, ARE YOU WORRIED ABOUT PLAYERS LOSING INTEREST IN CLIMBING AROUND THE WORLD?
That’s not what I’m seeing right now when I see people play the game. We’re introducing a lot of player choice; we see players doing things differently than before, but parkour stays an integral part of the gameplay. Recall all of the facades that you see in the trailer; we’ve got some of the most amazing parkour elements. You need to stalk your targets, follow them, and you can’t do that from the middle of a rooftop. So parkour is absolutely an integral part of the experience.

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SPEAKING OF YOUR TARGETS – IN THE EARLIER ASSASSIN’S CREED GAMES, PLAYERS HAD A CLEARER IDEA OF WHO THEY WERE GOING AFTER AND WHY. HOW ARE THE TARGETS PRESENTED IN SYNDICATE?
What I can tell you is that we’re returning to an approach that is closer to the roots of the franchise. You know from the start who your target is and what the organization is. Our two heroes give themselves the mission of taking the organization down. And they know what it is; there’s no mystery about who you are going to kill. You know from the start. And what I like about this is that it’s an open-world set-up – you know your targets are there, you know they’re in the world, and you have to go after them.

CAN YOU GIVE A LITTLE MORE DETAIL ABOUT HOW ALL OF YOUR ACTIVITIES CONTRIBUTE TO THE ROOKS’ TAKEOVER?
Absolutely. Each borough has a series of activities related to it, and your goal is take control of the city, borough after borough. In each of those, you’ll have gang strongholds. You’ll be able to liberate children from Templar factories. You’ll have fight clubs… Once you’ve done enough of those activities, you’ll draw the attention of the Templars. Like we saw in the demo, the City of London area was under the control of Bloody Nora, and she came out and challenged you to a gang war. The gang war is pretty much the capper to conquering the borough. Once you’ve won the gang war, it’s under your control. What this changes is the ecosystem of the borough. The more you shift the power, the more the Rooks will be present and available to recruit, so that they come and move around the city with you.

One of the things that’s cool with that is that they are aware. Say you’ve got five Rooks with you, and you move onto a growler. A growler has four seats, including the driver’s seat – so there’s only space for three Rooks. One goes into the passenger seat, two come into the carriage, and the other two will actually steal another cart and join you. So you really have the impression that you are moving with your gang and that you can use them to attack your target, invade another borough, even in the main missions.

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WITH THE FOCUS ON THE GANG, DO YOU HAVE ANY PLANS FOR MULTIPLAYER?
One of the things that’s happening this year is that there will be no co-op and no multiplayer. We’re focusing on the single-player experience, and we’ve got all of our nine studios working on that experience to deliver something that’s very polished to our players this holiday season.

It’s really about returning to our roots. Returning to what made this series such a success. For us, it’s truly the single-player experience, and investing in that that’s going to make Assassin’s Creed feel more modern and fresh for our players.

PREVIOUS INSTALLMENTS HAVE LET PLAYERS CUSTOMIZE A BASE OF OPERATIONS, LIKE MONTERIGGIONI AND THE JACKDAW. DOES SYNDICATE HAVE ANYTHING ALONG THOSE LINES?
Like in Assassin’s Creed Unity, the players are one of the customizable aspects. London is something they can invest in as well and we’ll get into the details of how this will work over the summer. As for the player’s base of operation, we’ll reveal more about that over the summer as we have something cool and new in store for our players.

WHAT CAN YOU TELL US ABOUT THAT SWORD CANE AND HOW THAT’S USED?
The sword cane is something that we’re going to talk more about later on. Sorry! It’s there to tease you…so it worked!

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IT SEEMS LIKE YOU’RE MAKING SEVERAL IMPROVEMENTS OVER UNITY, BUT WHAT ELEMENTS OF THAT GAME DO YOU WANT TO MAKE SURE CARRY OVER INTO SYNDICATE?
Assassin’s Creed Unity made huge investments in the crowds and the crowd ecosystem. This is something we’re bringing to the next level with the police, but it is enabled by the technology from Assassin’s Creed Unity.

FROM A COMBAT PERSPECTIVE, WHAT ARE THE MAIN DIFFERENCES PLAYERS WILL NOTICE BETWEEN UNITY AND SYNDICATE?
In Assassin’s Creed Syndicate, we’re keeping the same philosophy as Assassin’s Creed Unity. The combat will be challenging for the player. In my opinion, if combat is too easy, there’s no point in having stealth. You’ll just mow through everybody and it unbalances the game, so we’re keeping the philosophy of making fights harder. What people will find is that the fights are more responsive. We’ve cut the latency in half, so you can quickly jump from one target to another. We’ve shifted the initiative to the player away from the A.I. – we’re still working on it – but making sure the A.I. doesn’t wait for their turn, and that you have to stun your enemy and do crowd control.

CONSIDERING UNITY’S TECHNICAL ISSUES AT LAUNCH, WHAT IS THE TEAM DOING TO AVOID ANOTHER SITUATION LIKE THAT?
I think we’ve talked a lot about it as a company over the last year. This year, we’re focusing on the single-player experience. I’m sure you don’t recall seeing Assassin’s Creed [at this stage] this early in the cycle; we’re showing it on console today. We’re doing playtests earlier than we’ve ever done them and integrating the feedback into the experience. Not to say we weren’t doing playtests in the past, but we’re doing them much earlier and play-testing the entire experience. This is all stuff we’re doing to ensure that players can be happy on day one, and say how great a game this is.

question: Describe the setting of the new Assassin's Creed game.

answer: Players of the game travel to the Victorian era of London where they manage a gang to take back the city from the Templars. The story takes place in 1868 which is an era of peace, instead of the game's traditional setting of war. Players are tasked with a goal of saving children from the control of Bloody Nora and conquering the boroughs of the city.


split: test

text:
If you play by the rules, it will only keep you out of trouble. I am in trouble. Tonight is my last night working for Multiple Services. I have not been fired yet, but when my supervisor reads the email I sent her in the morning, I will be fired for sure – I am sure of it.

I used to do security at the Pearl district but I was recently transferred to American Plaza Towers. My new manager has a different set of standards. My dark brown boots being one of them – security 'officers' are supposed to wear black boots. But that's not the problem.

Tonight I am on shift with Emily, the graveyard guard. I am working the D shift, which intersects with her shift. I am not with her right now. Her shift has a lot more responsibilities than mine. I am in the lounge room, lounging. I don't need to worry about doing any checks because she has the 'snitch stick' – it's a little stick we poke into little tags that prove that we are working.  I am at low risk of being caught in here, the lounge room is closed during this time of night. It doesn't matter what I do. I will be fired in the morning anyway.

Currently Emily is doing some tower checks. She is only required to do one tower check a night, but she does multiple for 'brownie points'. No one ever gets promoted. Well, unless someone gets fired or dies or quits. A lot of people recently got fired because... 'they are not with us anymore' says Gerry, the supervisor at APC. Emily was not at liberty to tell me why, but it has something to do with 'vices'.

I needed to take a shit. I was already in the lounge room so the bathroom was so close I basically just took my pants down. My ass wouldn’t cooperate with me —the last little bit hung in between my butt cheeks like a hand trying to catch a dollar bill falling to the ground. I hate this, being forced into vulgarity; I want to let go of the turd. My butt thinks the turd is valuable, I guess.

 The women's bathroom next to me started making noise. Emily must be relieving herself as well. I finished long after she did. I left the bathroom unclean because the toilet finally clogged.  Maintenance can handle it in the morning, fuck it. When I left, I saw Emily at the exit of the room, holding the door open waiting for me to leave. I walked out, uncomfortably — I didn't wipe enough. She locked the door behind us.

I entered the elevator. She joined me. I pressed the button to the basement with plans to hang out in a storage room and read. She pressed the button to the 26th floor and I got caught into doing a tower check with her. She invited me to smoke some cigarettes on the roof and talk. I don't smoke, but it sounded like a good offer.

“So how do you like it so far?” She asked.

“The elevator ride?”

“The job.”

“oh... uh, well...” I stalled, “APC lives up to it's reputation.”

“Ah, yes. You need not say more.”

There was a long silence that was only broken with a 'ding' each time we passed a floor.

“So,” I finally said, “What do the people in these condominiums do for a living?”

“Most of them are retired. That's why there are so many care givers here. But one of them I know sells stuff on Ebay. The guy never went to college and he quit his job to start up a business."

Some nerve, I thought.

"These people are all rich," she said, "somehow or another. Each time you hear that ding, the price of a room goes up."

There was a small stair case past the breezeway on the top floor that led to a freshly painted door that was bent out of shape. This door led to the roof.  She told me the correct key was the square key. I fumbled with my set for a while and found it. I attempted to open the door and she told me the key to opening the door is to shout the correct sequence of curse words. After a few moments, I understood what she meant. I was not saying the right words. She got her key out and did it in a snap.

“I've been here a while,” she said, “you get used to it.”

I wasn't used to smoking but  I really like the motions it conduces with my hand. I told her that's the only thing I like about smoking. She said that's what got her into it.

I stared out at the skyline of the city, at the skyscrapers that reach so high into society – to heights I admit I will never achieve. The view was almost worth it. I won't be able to pay for college after tonight.

“Gerry is probably going to fire me tomorrow.”

“Why?”

“She wants my DPSST card number, but I don't have it... I... lost it....”

“Well, you can just call in to get the number, right? It's in the system."

“I don't have my card.”

“Huh... I'll just go ahead and say I didn't hear you say that when she brings it up.” We took some drags. “I don't want to be here forever, you know," she said finally.

“You don't say.”

“Yeah, some people stay here for years. This job is perfect for people like you... who want to get through college. But after two or three years, it's like, what are you doing with your life?”

“What do you want to do with your life?”

“I used to go to college, but I stopped taking courses because I didn't feel like they were taking me anywhere. The guy down at Plaid Pantry has a masters degree in engineering. Right now I try to come up with something new every night and research if it's been done before. It usually has.  Basically, the way I look at it, entrepreneurism is the only way to make it in this world now. My dad has this business, it's pretty successful. Basically, he helps other people be successful.”

“Nice. Why don't you get him to help you?”

“We're not on good terms... he just wants me to successful... I'm just a security guard..." We took some drags. "The choice here is you can do a side project and hope it turns into something... or, what else are you going to do?”

“We should probably finish this tower check.”

“Right.”

We started down the tower, checking every floor. I shifted my underwear around, but it was no use. I walked uncomfortably the whole way down. Just gotta pull through.

Half way down the tower, there was a place to tag the snitch stick. Emily brought up some statistic that the vast majority of Americans all believe that some day they will all be rich, that's why they all don't support the dynasty tax. I said that was nice and waited for the chance to lounge in the lounge room again.

It was the end of my shift — the last few minutes of my having a job. As I left, I said, “see ya”. I didn't look back and would probably never see her again, but I heard Emily say “have fun”.

title: What Else Are You Going To Do?

question: What does the text say about the narrator's relationship with Emily?

answer: The narrator is coworkers with Emily at American Plaza Towers. He does security and she's the graveyard guard. On this particular night, their shifts intersect. When they do a tower check together, they share a conversation about the narrator's fear he will be fired, and what they want to do with their lives. When the narrator leaves work for what he believes is the last time, he realizes he will probably never see Emily again.

question: Summarize the narrator's internal tension throughout the story.

answer:
Throughout his whole shift, the narrator has the internal tension of believing he will be fired from his job. At the start of his shift, he realizes he is in trouble because he broke the rules of the job. His boss Gerry wants his DPSST card number, but he's lost the card. His coworker Emily acknowledges that that is not a good thing. He spends the rest of his time talking about what he wants to do with
his life to Emily, still feeling that he will be fired and not be able to afford college. When he ends his shift, he realizes that it's probably the last time he will be there due to his mistake.

question: What does the text say about tower checks?

answer: The narrator does security at American Plaza Towers along with Emily, the graveyard guard. Emily has to do one tower check a night, but she does multiple for "brownie points". The narrator goes along with her to the roof to start the tower check. They finish the tower check by checking every floor of the tower.

question: Summarize what the narrator says he will miss about Emily.


text:
I saw the exact moment in which the cashier started pretending to scrutinize my driver’s license in the hope that this contrived act showed some kind of polite forethought delaying the rejection soon to come. Knowing beforehand that her next words would be “I’m sorry…”, the license felt flimsier than usual as she spoke them and returned it to me. Yet I didn’t take it from her completely, and for a few seconds we were grasping the card together.

“We don’t take vertical ID’s.”

Blinking with registration but still composed, I rotated the license upon the axis formed by her thumb-and-fingertip pinch on the card, turning it to a landscape orientation and hoping that my mouth was shaped less sarcastically than I imagined it to be.

“There we go,” I managed to say. “Horizontal ID right there.”

A brief sense of genuine amusement soon dissolved into defensive indignation, partially activated by the adolescentizing embarrassment of being turned down at a liquor store, but also by the Reader's Digest-educated “knowing glances” directed at me and my friend by some harried mother waiting to buy bad wine behind us.

During my feeble attempt at levity, my friend was already returning his own vertical ID to his wallet, doing this with a laughable appearance of duty.

“Ok.” He said this with an eager friendliness that I found repulsive and unsettling.

“Ok.” The second utterance of the inanity struggled to sound laid-back, but was just as uninquisitively obedient as the first.

I sincerely liked this guy, but the flaccid dumbness of his reaction disgusted me utterly. Pathetically, this wine store cashier was some kind of authority figure to him, before whom you were entitled to meekly bare your humble head, shifting unconfidently your weight between equally weak legs, performing your best accidental Jack Lemmon impression and saying with cheery strain “ok ok” like some obsequious eunuch.

I could tell that the presence of the bad wine mom, whose final object of lust before menopause I idly predicted would be some fantasy combination of Michael Buble and Ryan Seacrest, had pressured him into making his act of deference as obvious as possible. I cross-referenced this with another look at the woman, who was now just apathetically texting.

Attempting to divert my growing irritation into something inconsequential, I rather forcefully checked my watch without actually looking at the time, but my wrist was bent in an undesirable position with my fingers curled into an incomplete fist which only further upset me. Meanwhile, the cashier had been ignoring my joke and calling over her manager, an ex-mechanic looking guy who had probably dropped acid at a Grateful Dead concert about a half-century ago, and from whom I had quite legally bought alcohol before.

He recognized me but pretended not to, likely preferring to keep the premise of this encounter as single-minded as possible.

The cashier debriefed him with useless jargon. “We’ve got two verticals.”

“State law, fellas. We can’t take ‘em.” This was spoken with some sympathy, so I tried to avoid being an ass right away. “Came into effect this month.”

“Well, my ID is from another state. How can state legislation here apply to documentation issued outside of state jurisdiction?”

“This store is in the state jurisdiction; the law applies to this store.” He seemed mildly put off by the semi-intelligence of my question.

“Ok.” Not me. “Ok.” Not me.

“But what does this law even accomplish? What…”

The manager emitted a sigh which was belatedly masked as a cough, his stance directed in a manner which suggested an intention to walk away within the next half minute.

“IDs issued before age 21 are oriented vertically; the law stops these IDs from being handed down to underagers and used when the original holder gets their first horizontal.”

Basically, think of the children: that chief concern of farm-league politicians being rectally pegged by church ladies everywhere.

“But you acknowledge that this card correctly states my age?”

“Look.” He winged his arms out gently, as one pressing through an airplane aisle, slipping through the invisible gaps in my question. “What can I do? It’s just the law.”

He had just admitted that he was powerless, that he wasn’t really denying me anything, indeed that he couldn't, that he had no say in this decision he was previously pretending to make, that his Grateful Ass was being transitively fucked by remote church ladies with telekinetic town hall strap-ons.

I made some kind of mixed noise that expressed both my listless desire to prolong this futile discourse and my frantic urge to end it immediately, my detachable middle fingers and erect penis pyrotechnically launching upward like Saturn V rockets while my hair is ejected from its follicles as a defense mechanism against the now-menopausal mom, who has long since drunk her entire bottle of horrible moscato and is sexting me uncontrollably with gratuitous emoticons and dick pics of her husband who she wants me to hear her complain about but my hair attack repels her sparing me from having unwanted but amazing in-store sex with her surprisingly good body which was probably out of my league at one point but it’s too late because I’ve already begun rapidly waving neon glow sticks at the manager giving him an acid flashback as the cashier girl hisses through the spitting image of her father's mouth causing him to punch my friend impressively hard in a gratifying location and allowing me to escape with my tonic water out the door labeled *enter* which they would never predict making me practically untraceable.

title: [HM] [SP] Your Time Matters To Us And We Appreciate Your Patience In Regards To This Shit

question: Who are the main characters of the story?

answer: The narrator, his friend, the wine mom behind them, the girl cashier, the manager

question: Where does the story take place?

answer: A liquor store

question: What is a vertical ID?

answer: It is a Driver’s license oriented vertically because it was issued to the holder before age 21. The law stops these IDs from being handed down to underage kids and used when the original holder gets their first horizontal ID.

question: Why is the narrator irritated?

answer: Because he and his friend were trying to score booze but got denied by the cashier and manager due to their vertically oriented driver's licenses.

question: Write a ~3 sentence summary.

answer: The narrator and his friend are underage teens in a liquor store, trying to buy alcohol using vertical IDs, (a driver's license oriented vertically to show the holder is under 21) but they get shut down by the cashier. When the narrator complains, the cashier calls in her manager, who explains the new state law about not selling alcohol to people with vertical IDs. Something weird happens after this exchange, and the narrator escapes with his tonic water using the entrance door while the manager hits his friend in a gratifying spot.


text:
The internet is a wonderful and horrible thing. Just about any question you have can be answered with a few clicks of a keyboard and mouse. Granted, you will almost definitely get conflicting information, and you are never are 100% certain that what you are reading is the truth, but the advice is usually pretty good once you learn to separate the obvious BS from the plausible.

For some reason, yesterday was the day that I decided to find out just exactly what has been going on in my body for approximately the last 30 years. Apparently, a large number of males get the pee shiver. Not every one of them, but a fairly sizable sample. If you don't know, a pee shiver is an involuntary shiver that runs through your entire body usually right at the end of a pee. It's like a body quake - some sort of urine-induced seismic event. You don't have any control over it and you aren't really cold, it just happens. Until yesterday, I had no idea why. For years I theorized. I drew diagrams. I conducted interviews with the best minds in the scientific community. All to no avail. The pee shiver remained a mystery.

My own personal theory had to do with a drop in body temperature due to losing that large, liquid heat sink. Plus, everyone knows you lose something like 80% of your body heat through your head, and I figured just the act of hanging it out there could drop your core body temperature like 10 degrees, minimum.

So long story short, I never even thought to look it up. I was happy with my hypothesis, and it wasn't really a topic that came up in casual conversation on a regular basis. I didn't have to worry that someone would come up to me at a party and say, "That taco dip is great, isn't it? So. What's up with the pee shiver?" and then think I was ignorant when I had no good answer for them.

I resolved to get to the bottom of this mystery. I got back to my desk, and I didn't want to use my work PC to look up "pee shiver" on google (spies are everywhere) so I dropped myself an email to my home address to remind me to do the research when I got home, which I did.

Are you ready?

Nobody has ever studied it.

There are some theories, yes. But nobody has ever conducted an actual scientific study. Amazingly enough, the pee shiver -- this mystery that transcends time and space -- is not considered important enough to warrant an actual scientist doing any actual research.

So basically what I'm saying here is that my hypothesis holds as much water (so to speak) as anyone else's. If you're curious, here's the most plausible explanation I could find*:

  The autonomic nervous system controls the body's involuntary muscles, including the digestive tract, heart, and bladder muscles. It also regulates your body's temperature control, making you sweat to cool off and shiver to warm up.

  During urination, the autonomic system can get overstimulated. "In addition to the messages the system is sending to your bladder, it may also communicate with other areas," Cross notes. Hence the shiver.

  This phenomenon can be a real health problem for some men: They can pass out at the urinal when their autonomic system cues a drop in blood pressure!

I can tell you this. I would not want to be the poor bastard that passes out in front of the urinal in our men's room. He would have to burn his clothes. Plus, people would be stepping over him to relieve themselves, because it's every man for himself in there. Nobody is about to spend any extra time in that hell hole just to pick up some pee-covered unconscious guy with his crank hanging out and drag him out of the way. Trust me, he will be peed over.

Something else just occurred to me. That new guy, the one who pisses with his legs spread and both hands placed high on the wall like he's being busted for possession? He might do that because he has really bad pee shivers, and he's afraid of passing out.

I won't judge him. I won't pee next to him, but I won't judge him.

* With a single Google search. In five minutes.

question: What does the text say about social media?

question: Describe the main problem the author is trying to answer.

answer: The author is trying to solve the mystery of why a large number of males get the pee shiver. It has been going on in his body for the last 30 years, and he theorized for years why this happened to him. The narrator even drew diagrams and conducted interviews with the best scientific minds in the scientific community to no avail. The pee shiver remained a mystery. He resolves to get to the bottom of the pee shiver by looking it up on Google.

question: What does the text say about pee shiver?

answer: Pee shiver is an involuntary shiver that runs through the entire body of a man, usually right at the end of urinating. It's like a urine-induced seismic event or a body quake. Men don't have any control over pee shivers and they aren't really cold, it just happens. The author's personal theory has to do with a drop in body temperature due to losing large amounts of hot urine. After conducting online research on the matter, he found out there are no scientific studies on pee shiver. The most plausible explanation he could find was the autonomic nervous system controls the body's involuntary muscles, including the digestive tract, heart, and bladder muscles. It also regulates the body's temperature control, making one sweat to cool off and shiver to warm up. During urination, the autonomic system can get overstimulated, whereas, in addition to sending messages to the bladder, it may also communicate with other areas, hence the shiver. A large number of men get pee shiver, and they can pass out when their autonomic system cues a drop in blood pressure.

question: Summarize the author's thoughts on the internet.

answer: The author thinks the internet is a wonderful and horrible thing at the same time. Any question can be answered with a few clicks of keyboard and mouse. This comes with the caveat of getting conflicting information where the person doing the search is never 100% sure that what they are reading is the truth. The advice is pretty good once one learns to separate the obvious BS from the plausible.


text:
Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas, along with 18 members of the House of Representatives—15 Republicans and three Democrats—has sent a letter to Attorney General Jeff Sessions demanding that the Qatari-run Al-Jazeera television network register as a foreign agent under the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA). The letter was issued after Al-Jazeera said it planned to air a documentary by a reporter who went undercover to look into the Israel lobby in the United States. The action by the senator and the House members follows the decision by the Justice Department to force RT America to register as a foreign agent and the imposition of algorithms by Facebook, Google and Twitter that steer traffic away from left-wing, anti-war and progressive websites, including Truthdig. It also follows December’s abolition of net neutrality.

The letter asks the Justice Department to investigate “reports that Al Jazeera infiltrated American non-profit organizations.” It says that the “content produced by this network often directly undermines American interests with favorable coverage of U.S. State Department-designated Foreign Terrorist Organizations, including Hamas, Hezbollah, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and Jabhat al-Nusra, al-Qaeda’s branch in Syria.”

“American citizens deserve to know whether the information and news media they consume is impartial, or if it is deceptive propaganda pushed by foreign nations,” the letter reads.

The ominous assault on the final redoubts of a free press, through an attempt to brand dissidents, independent journalists and critics of corporate power and imperialism as agents of a foreign power, has begun. FARA, until recently, was a little-used regulation, passed in 1938 to combat Nazi propaganda. The journalists Max Blumenthal and Ali Abunimah do a good job of addressing the issue in this clip on The Real News Network.

Those who challenge the dominant corporate narrative already struggle on the margins of the media landscape. The handful of independent websites and news outlets, including this one, and a few foreign-run networks such as Al-Jazeera and RT America, on which I host a show, “On Contact,” are the few platforms left that examine corporate power and empire, the curtailment of our civil liberties, lethal police violence and the ecocide carried out by the fossil fuel and animal agriculture industries, as well as cover the war crimes committed by Israel and the U.S. military in the Middle East. Shutting down these venues would ensure that the critics who speak through them, and oppressed peoples such as the Palestinians, have no voice left.

I witnessed and was at times the victim of black propaganda campaigns when I was a foreign correspondent. False accusations are made anonymously and then amplified by a compliant press. The anonymous site PropOrNot, replicating this tactic, in 2016 published a blacklist of 199 sites that it alleged, with no evidence, “reliably echo Russian propaganda.” More than half of those sites were far-right, conspiracy-driven ones. But about 20 of the sites were progressive, anti-war and left-wing. They included AlterNet, Black Agenda Report, Democracy Now!, Naked Capitalism, Truthdig, Truthout, CounterPunch and the World Socialist Web Site. PropOrNot charged that these sites disseminated “fake news” on behalf of Russia, and the allegations became front-page news in The Washington Post in a story headlined “Russian propaganda effort helped spread ‘fake news’ during the election, experts say.” Washington Post reporter Craig Timberg wrote in that article that the goal of “a sophisticated Russian propaganda effort,” according to “independent researchers who have tracked the operation,” was “punishing Democrat Hillary Clinton, helping Republican Donald Trump and undermining faith in American democracy.”

To date, no one has exposed who operates PropOrNot or who is behind the website. But the damage done by this black propaganda campaign and the subsequent announcement by Google and other organizations such as Facebook last April that they had put in filters to elevate “more authoritative content” and marginalize “blatantly misleading, low quality, offensive or downright false information” have steadily diverted readers away from some sites. The Marxist World Socialist Web Site, for example, has seen its traffic decline by 75 percent. AlterNet’s search traffic is down 71 percent, Consortium News is down 72 percent, and Global Research and Truthdig have seen declines. And the situation appears to be growing worse as the algorithms are refined.

Jeff Bezos, the owner of The Washington Post and the founder and CEO of Amazon, has, like Google and some other major Silicon Valley corporations, close ties with the federal security and surveillance apparatus. Bezos has a $600 million contract with the CIA. The lines separating technology-based entities such as Google and Amazon and the government’s security and surveillance apparatus are often nonexistent. The goal of corporations such as Google and Facebook is profit, not the dissemination of truth. And when truth gets in the way of profit, truth is sacrificed.

Google, Facebook, Twitter, The New York Times, The Washington Post, BuzzFeed News, Agence France-Presse and CNN have all imposed or benefited from the algorithms or filters—overseen by human “evaluators.” When an internet user types a word in a Google search it is called an “impression” by the industry. These impressions direct the persons making the searches to websites that use the words or address the issues associated with them. Before the algorithms were put in place last April, searches for terms such as “imperialism” or “inequality” directed internet users mostly to left-wing, progressive and anti-war sites. Now they are directed primarily to mainstream sites such as The Washington Post. If you type in “World Socialist Web Site,” which has been hit especially hard by the algorithms, you will be directed to the site—but you have to ask for it by name. Searches for associated words such as “socialist” or “socialism” are unlikely to bring up a list in which the World Socialist Web Site appears near the top.

There are 10,000 “evaluators” at Google, many of them former employees at counterterrorism agencies, who determine the “quality” and veracity of websites. They have downgraded sites such as Truthdig, and with the abolition of net neutrality can further isolate those sites on the internet. The news organizations and corporations imposing and benefiting from this censorship have strong links to the corporate establishment and the Democratic Party. They do not question corporate capitalism, American imperialism or rising social inequality. They dutifully feed the anti-Russia hysteria. An Al-Jazeera report on this censorship begins at 14:07 in this link.

The corporate oligarchs, lacking a valid response to the discrediting of their policies of economic pillage and endless war, have turned to the blunt instrument of censorship and to a new version of red baiting. They do not intend to institute reforms or restore an open society. They do not intend to address the social inequality behind the political insurgencies in the two major political parties and the hatred of the corporate state that spans the political spectrum. They intend to impose a cone of silence and the state-sanctioned uniformity of opinion that characterizes all totalitarian regimes. This is what the use of FARA, the imposition of algorithms and the attempt to blame Trump’s election on Russian interference is about. Critics and investigative journalists who expose the inner workings of corporate power are branded enemies of the state in the service of a foreign power. The corporate-controlled media, meanwhile, presents the salacious, the trivial and the absurd as news while fanning the obsession over Russia. This is one of the most ominous moments in American history. The complicity in this witch hunt by self-identified liberal organizations, including The New York Times and MSNBC, will come back to haunt them. When the voices for truth are erased, they will be next.

The steps to tyranny are always small, incremental and often barely noticed, as Milton Mayer wrote in “They Thought They Were Free: The Germans 1933-1945.” By the time a population wakes up, it is too late. He noted:

  But the one great shocking occasion, when tens or hundreds or thousands will join you, never comes. That’s the difficulty. If the last and the worst act of the whole regime had come immediately after the first and the smallest, thousands, yes, millions would have been sufficiently shocked. If, let us say, the gassing of the Jews in ’43 had come immediately after the “German Firm” stickers on the windows of non-Jewish shops in ’33. But of course this isn’t the way it happens. In between come all the hundreds of little steps, some of them imperceptible, each of them preparing you not to be shocked by the next. Step C is not so much worse than Step B, and if you did not make a stand at Step B, why should you at Step C? And so on to Step D.

  And one day, too late, your principles, if you were ever sensible of them, all rush in upon you. The burden of self-deception has grown too heavy, and some minor incident, in my case my little boy, hardly more than a baby, saying “Jew swine,” collapses it all at once, and you see that everything, everything has changed and changed completely under your nose. The world you lived in—your nation, your people—is not the world you were born in at all. The forms are all there, all untouched, all reassuring, the houses, the shops, the jobs, the mealtimes, the visits, the concerts, the cinema, the holidays. But the spirit, which you never noticed because you made the lifelong mistake of identifying it with the forms, is changed. Now you live in a world of hate and fear, and the people who hate and fear do not even know it themselves; when everyone is transformed no one is transformed. Now you live in a system which rules without responsibility even to God. The system itself could not have intended this in the beginning, but in order to sustain itself it was compelled to go all the way.

Despots, despite their proclaimed ideological, national and religious differences, speak the same language. Amoral, devoid of empathy and addicted to power and personal enrichment, they are building a world where all who criticize them are silenced, where their populations are rendered compliant by fear, constant surveillance and the loss of basic liberties and where they and their corporate enablers are the undisputed masters.

The Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported that the Qatari government is seeking to improve relations with the Trump administration by forging alliances with right-wing Jewish organizations in the United States. It has promised Jewish leaders, the paper reported, not to air the Al-Jazeera documentary about the Israel lobby. Al-Jazeera in 2016 shut down Al-Jazeera America, which broadcast to U.S. audiences. With no broadcaster in the U.S., the program would have reached few American viewers even if Al-Jazeera had put it on the air.

Haaretz reported that Jewish organizational leaders who have visited Qatar in recent months include Mort Klein of the Zionist Organization of America; Malcolm Hoenlein, the executive vice chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations; Jack Rosen of the American Jewish Congress; Rabbi Menachem Genack of the Orthodox Union; Martin Oliner of the Religious Zionists of America; and attorney Alan Dershowitz.

“What these leaders share is that none of them are considered critics of the right-wing Netanyahu government in Israel or the Trump administration in Washington,” Haaretz correspondent Amir Tibon wrote in the newspaper.

The despotism of the United States and the despotism of Israel have found an ally in the despotism of Qatar. Professed beliefs are meaningless. Israel is bonded with the regime in Saudi Arabia and the Christian right in the United States, each of which is virulently anti-Semitic. Dissidents, including Jewish and Israeli dissidents, are attacked as “self-hating Jews” or anti-Semites _only_ because they are dissidents. The word “traitor” or “anti-Semite” has no real meaning. It is used not to describe a reality but to turn someone into a pariah. The iron wall is rising. It will cement into place a global system of corporate totalitarianism, one in which the old vocabulary of human rights and democracy is empty and where any form of defiance means you are an enemy of the state. This totalitarianism is being formed incrementally. It begins by silencing the demonized. It ends by silencing everyo

question: When was the article written?

answer: Sometime after 2017

question: Who published the article?

answer: That information can't be found

question: What news service does the letter call on the Justice Department to investigate?

answer: Al-Jazeera

question: When was FARA passed?

answer: 1938

question: Write a ~2 sentence summary.

answer: A letter signed by 19 members of Congress calls on the Justice Department to investigate Al-Jazeera and have them register under the Foreign Agents Registration Act, which RT America recently had to register under. The author decries this as a threat to democracy.


text:
ASTRONOMICAL IMAGE PROCESSING SYSTEM _++_ is a software package whose development was started in the early nineties, written almost entirely in C++, and which initial goal was to replace the by then already aging AIPS software. It has now been reborn as CASA and is the basis of the image processing systems for several next-generation radio telescopes including ALMA, eVLA, and ASKAP.

Early history

In 1988-89, the Director of National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO), Paul Vanden Bout, convened an independent review panel, the Software Advisory Group (SWAG) to produce recommendations for the future of processing software for NRAO. SWAG was chaired by Tim Cornwell, and its members included Geoff Croes, Gareth Hunt, Jan Noordam, and Ray Norris. SWAG recommendations were that:

-   All data processing in NRAO should be coordinated by a new Assistant Director for Computing
-   AIPS should be re-designed and re-implemented following certain general guidelines
-   An equal amount of attention should be devoted to single-dish software.

In late 1990 the NRAO Director accepted the recommendations, and the task of defining the new package began.

The project was originally an effort by several astronomical institutes together in a consortium, the Australia Telescope National Facility (ATNF), the Jodrell Bank Observatory (JBO) and the MERLIN/VLBI National Facility (MERLIN/VLBI), the Berkeley-Illinois-Maryland Association (BIMA), the National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO) and the Netherlands Foundation for Research in Astronomy ASTRON.

Features

AIPS++ provides facilities for calibration, editing, image formation, image enhancement, and analysis of images and other astronomical data. A major focus is on reduction of data from both single-dish and aperture synthesis radio telescopes. Although the tools provided in AIPS++ are mainly designed for processing data from varieties of radio telescopes, the package is expected to also be useful for processing other types of astronomical data and images. However, the reduction of most data from imaging array detectors is performed using IRAF instead.

AIPS++ is structured as a library of tools at the lower levels, designed to replace AIPS of more monolithic applications. In general, the counterpart of an AIPS task is an AIPS++ tool function, although the toolkit structure of AIPS++ will generally mean that these functions are more fine-grained, except for the more integrated tools at the higher levels (such as map). The counterparts of AIPS adverbs are the parameters of AIPS++tool functions. The command-line interpreter in AIPS is POPS, while the counterpart in AIPS++ is Glish. The code used as standard in most astronomical institutes is still AIPS, as AIPS++ is usually not yet considered sufficiently reliable and usable.

Like most research astronomy software, it is available for all major operating systems except Microsoft Windows.

AIPS++/CASA

On August 25, 2004 the AIPS++ code base was re-organized to a more modular structure; since then it is referred to as CASA (“Common Astronomy Software Applications”). CASA consists of a suite of C++ libraries derived from the original AIPS++ tasks. The Glish scripting system is being replaced by Python bindings, a system known as “CASApy”. The CASA software is no longer developed by the consortium, but mainly within NRAO for use on the Atacama Large Millimeter Array.

The core of the old AIPS++ libraries, now known as CasaCore are still being maintained and developed by the original consortium members. A separate Python interface is available known as python-casacore (formerly “Pyrap”). Python-casacore is mainly developed within ATNF and ASTRON for replacing Glish for the Australia Telescope Compact Array, WSRT and LOFAR. CASA also uses these core libraries but not python-casacore.

title: AIPS++

question: How was the Astronomical Image Processing System invented?

answer: In the 1980s, the director of the National Radio Astronomy Observatory created an independent review panel to create recommendations for software for the observatory. The panel recommended there should be a new Assistant Director for Computing, that there should be new guidelines for software, and that an equal amount of attention should be devoted to single dish software. In 1990 the recommendations were accepted and the task of defining the new package began.


text:
Me, My Mum and I

I’ve never had a very good memory. Not really. People always say things like “do you remember when…?” And I always say:

“No? When was that?”

 It’s not embarrassing or anything. Just a pain. It’s just like a blank. I mean – God, I cant even remember where I was when I remembered this…but I'm pretty sure its my first memory. I don’t even know what I was doing. Maybe having coffee, or watching TV but it struck me – like I just got winded…Yeah…it was just like that…just like ‘doof.’

Wait, now I remember. I was on a bus coming home from the supermarket. There was this little boy who got on. He had this big bag on and her was wearing this puffy jacket. He was also wearing this beanie that was miles too big for his head. It was funny how it kept falling over his eyes. He waded up the aisle as the bus rocked from side to side. He was all by himself, and I thought I bet his mum gave him heaps of instructions for the ride… ‘sit at the front,’ ‘say thank you’ ‘remember to get off at the pools’, and then, there she was, my mum, just like doof.

At first I remembered, well had this image of my toes, teeny and tiny, and how I could only see peaks of the hard wood floor underneath. It was varnished and had all these holes from people wearing heels at dinner parties and stuff. Mum, well I'm not sure ok? But in my head, my Mum was wearing these violet blue heels. They were her favorite pair. They had this big thick heel with like a silver broach thing on at the front. My feet were so soft and pudgy and I always remember thinking that her feet, in those heels, looked old, ugly and thin.

I was looking down because she was above me, giving me instructions on how to get to the diary.

“You go down…Grace, are you paying attention?” She paused and coughed into her fist. She had her eyes closed and when she opened them again, catching her breathe, she continued. “See this shape, this L – that your hand makes when you hold it up like this?” She grabbed my hand in her cold thin one and traced the lines from the tip of my small index finger to the end of my thumb. I looked at my hand, they same way I stared at the glass wind chime that hung from our doorway or bugs in the dirt…I had no idea what she was talking about. “You see this L?” She asked. “That’s left; you take a big L, a big left, at the end of the street. Then you just keep going to you see the place with the big ice cream on top.  You know, the diary?”

Of course I knew. Its where I use to get pies with dad on Sundays, its where I got lollies with Joan. It was the place I stared at from the car window as we drove past. That big plastic Ice Cream cone on top was so cool. Sometimes it  lit up at night, it glowed like the moon. I use to stare at for hours.

“Take this money and get me some milk please and if you want you can get a mix while there. We can share the lollies ok?”

I smiled. “I’m not going to share any with you.”

She put her hands on her hips and stuck her tongue out at me. I copied her and then we both laughed.

I can see myself. Brown eyes, hair pulled back in a loose plait, two strands falling over my face. But I can see her more clearly. She stood tall over me, with her peach dress. It looked like the smell of peach lollies, or maybe, peach lollies reminded me of the dress. Both are sweet I guess. She was always in that dress. If I think about it, I doubt she was wearing that peach dress with those violet heels that would’ve been ghastly. But as I say, in my head that’s what she was wearing.

She wore her hair like mine, hazel brown, loose plait. Except her eyes were cloudy blue. She had thin lips and small teeth. She was my Mum and despite her hands and feet, I though she was pretty.

I remember walking out the door and I knew that the world was too big for me. Not consciously, like I didn’t think that, but I knew that the world was too big – it was way too far to go. But Mum was sick, even then and that was greater than the size of the world. I squinted down the street. I was determined to get that milk.

It was a really hot day. The kind of hot you only remember when your little, like when you stare mesmerized, by the heat waves radiating off the cars or you have to lick your hand cause there’s melted ice cream all over it. It was that hot, cicadas blasting away hot, old men fanning their faces with their hats hot. I wiped my brow with the back of my arm and walked out, trying to remember what Mum said. I kept holding up my hands up in front of the sky, but they both made L’s if you turned them around, and I suppose I confused myself. By the time I reached the end of our street, I had no clue where to go.

Fuck it was scary, I stood on the street for ages looking both ways, my little ponytail wiping back and fourth and I needed to pee so bad. I was getting so worried. I kept imaging mum in her peach dress coughing over the sink or on her knees leaning over the toilet. My lips began to tremble. Luckily this old guy in a hat ended up coming along. He had a moustache that reminded me of polar bears and snow. He was real nice. He asked me where I wanted to go then walked me to the store.

When we arrived at the store he let go of my hand and asked if I was going to be ok. I pulled at my dress and looked around the store, it looked huge. Even if I stood on tiptoes I couldn’t reach the shelves and everything was so bright and confusing.

“Um yup I think so.” I said. He smiled at me, and then I remembered, “thank you for helping me.”

“You’re welcome little lady” and then off he went, out of the doorway. I never saw him again, I never found out who he was.

Inside it was cool, all the drinks were so colorful in the fridge, they glistened behind the glass. I couldn’t see above the counter, but I could feel Eric’s (that’s the guy who owned the dairy), I could feel his eyes on me. I tried to act all grown up so I walked past all the lollies and junk, pushing my hair out of my eyes and went straight to the milk. The big bottles where up top and they were really hard to reach.

“Do you want a hand?” Eric called out

“No thanks” I called back and I grabbed the biggest one I could.

It was so slippery, I remember it just falling to the ground and plopping open. Milk went everywhere. Eric came over and I was just standing there watching the milk move slowly across the floor, like it was invading the shop. I looked up at Eric with my mouth open, my eyes big like circles.

He said, “Now what has happened here?”

It was then, that I burst into tears.

Eric must have come over mopping up the white milk as it seeped into the store, but I can’t remember any of that. The next thing I remember was Mum. She was there in her peach dress. She stood flushed in the face. She looked round the store then down at me, and gave me the best smile in the world. For most of the journey home, I had my face buried in her shoulder. I could smell her skin. It smelt just like powdered peaches.

 “Ssssshhhhh” she said. “ssssh sssssh its ok, its ok, Mummy’s here now, everything’s going to be ok, I promise” Her words tickled my ear, they were soft and flawless.

I raised my head, wiped at my eyes with my fist, and licked the ice cream she bought me, before it melted all onto my hand. The last thing I remember about that day, was that her promise came true and everything was ok.

*

Later, I remembered, I was holding her much older, much thinner and much more spotty hand. She lay on her side and breathed in slowly, they spaces in between filled only with my heartbeat. She stared at me with her big blue cloudy eyes. I looked back; my brown eyes were red and wet. Mum was waiting to die.

Her mouth was open and she had no more of her little pretty teeth. Just a black hole. Her long hazel hair had turned white and curly.

She continued to breathe slowly…slowly, slowly. She never blinked. She never took her eyes off me. There was no one else in that room. Just me and Mum. Outside, everything carried on as usual but inside my Mum was dying and there was nothing I could do.

I squeezed her hand and said to her “Mum, its ok, I'm here now, you can go, don’t be scared, everything is going to be ok”

She looked back at me until something inside disappeared. My mum had continued to breathe, until she stopped. Her old, thin, spotty hand, cold already, grew colder. I realized I was no longer holding a hand. Now it just felt like a cold thing. She no longer moved. Not even a flutter. The little that was left behind those blue eyes had gone. I continued to stare at her only now there was no one looking back.

I breathed in as my eyes grew wet and said, “Its ok, its ok, you’re alright now mum, I promise, everything’s going to be alright now.”

And as I breathed out, I hoped that it was.

title: Short Story i wrote for a competition, theme was full circle - any critique would be great!!

question: Why was the narrator going to the dairy alone?

answer: The narrator's mother is sick and they are out of milk, hence the narrator goes to the dairy to buy milk.

question: What could have happened had the man not helped the narrator get to the store?

answer: It may be implied that the narrator could have gotten lost since she is a child and was out alone for the first time.

question: What may be the reason behind not asking Eric to help her?

answer: It may be implied that the narrator wanted to show that she is independent and old enough to buy groceries all by herself, which is why she refused to take Eric's help.

question: What emotions does the narrator go through watching her mother die?

answer: It may be implied that she recollects how her mother assured her everything would be alright the day she took her first trip to the dairy, and now she was reassuring the same to her mother on her deathbed. The narrator may have been in pain.


text:
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The LONDON BOROUGH OF EALING () is a London borough in West London. It comprises seven major towns: Acton (W3), Ealing (W5, W13), Greenford (UB6), Hanwell (W7), Northolt (UB5), Perivale (UB6) and Southall (UB1, UB2).[1][2] With a population of 341,806 inhabitants, it is the fourth most populous London borough.

Ealing is the third largest London borough in population and eleventh largest in area, covering part of West London and a small part of Northwest London. It bridges Inner and Outer London.[3] Ealing's administrative centre is in Ealing Broadway. Ealing London Borough Council is the local authority. Ealing is the only London Borough to have adopted a flag. Ealing has long been known as the “Queen of the Suburbs” due to its many parks and tree-lined streets; the term was coined in 1902 by Ealing's borough surveyor, Charles Jones.[4] This is reflected by the tree emblem seen on the Ealing Council logo and Ealing's coat of arms.[5][6]

Location

The London Borough of Ealing borders the London Borough of Hillingdon to the west, the London Borough of Harrow and London Borough of Brent to the north, the London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham to the east and the London Borough of Hounslow to the south.

The modern London borough was formed in 1965 by the merging the area of the Municipal Borough of Ealing (which included Ealing, Greenford, Hanwell, Perivale, Tyford Abbey and Northolt), the Municipal Borough of Southall and the Municipal Borough of Acton.

Ealing is also the primary setting for _The Sarah Jane Adventures_, being the location of Sarah Jane Smith's home.

Within the borough are two garden suburbs, Brentham Garden Suburb and Bedford Park.

330 hectares within the borough are designated as part of the Metropolitan Green Belt.

Districts

[Map of the London Borough of Ealing showing the seven major towns within it] [A map showing the wards of Ealing since 2002] Ealing borough is made up of seven major towns:

-   Acton (W3)
-   Ealing (W5, W13)
-   Greenford (UB6)
-   Hanwell (W7)
-   Northolt (UB5)
-   Perivale (UB6)
-   Southall (UB1, UB2).

Parliamentary constituencies in Ealing

The London Borough of Ealing is represented by three Members of Parliament (MPs), elected in the following constituencies:

-   Ealing Central and Acton
-   Ealing North
-   Ealing Southall

London Fire Brigade

There are four fire stations within the London Borough of Ealing. Southall and Northolt have similar-sized station grounds and both house two pumping appliances. Southall attended some 700 incidents more than their Northolt counterparts in 2006/07. Ealing, with two pumping appliances, and Acton, one pump and two fire investigation units, are the other two appliances in the area. The ward of Northfield had over forty malicious calls made from it, more than twice as any other ward within Ealing.[7]

Education

Ealing has a total of 91 state-run schools and nurseries. There are 13 high schools under the domain of the local education authority, 12 of which are either comprehensive, foundation or voluntary-aided, and one city academy.

A number of successful independent schools, including St Benedict's School (co-ed), the Barbara Speake Stage School (co-ed, ages 4–16), St Augustine's Priory (girls) and Notting Hill & Ealing High School (girls), are also located within the borough. The King Fahad Academy is an independent Saudi funded school within the borough.

The Japanese School in London is a Japanese international school in Acton.[8]

Demographics

The borough of Ealing is ethnically diverse. In 2011, 49% gave their ethnicity as white, 30% as Asian, 15% as Black and 4.5% as of mixed or multiple ethnicity, the remaining identifying as Arab or other ethnicity.[9] The main religions of the borough's population in 2011 were Christianity (44%), Islam (16%) Hinduism (9%) and Sikhism (8%); 15% stated they had no religion and a further 7% did not state any religion.[10]

Ethnicity

  Ethnic Group                               2001[11]   2011[12]
  ------------------------------------------ ---------- ---------- --------- ---------- -------------- ------- ------ -------- ------
  Number                                     %          Number
  White: British                             135,139    44.9%
  White: Irish                               14,285     4.7%
  White: Gypsy or Irish Traveller
  White: Other                               27,317     9%
  WHITE: TOTAL                               176,741    58.8%
  Asian or Asian British: Indian             49,734     16.4%
  Asian or Asian British: Pakistani          11,271     3.7%
  Asian or Asian British: Bangladeshi        1,077      0.3%
  Asian or Asian British: Chinese            3,596      1.1%
  Asian or Asian British: Other Asian        11,769     3.9%
  ASIAN OR ASIAN BRITISH: TOTAL              73,851     24.5%
  Black or Black British: African            11,075     3.6%
  Black or Black British: Caribbean          13,507     4.4%
  Black or Black British: Other Black        1,874      0.6%
  BLACK OR BLACK BRITISH: TOTAL              26,456     8.7%
  Mixed: White and Black Caribbean           3,022      1%
  Mixed: White and Black African             1,353      0.4%
  Mixed: White and Asian                     3,629      1.2%
  Mixed: Other Mixed                         2,876      0.9%
  MIXED: TOTAL                               10,880     3.6%
  Other: Arab
  Other: Any other ethnic group              9,424      3.1%
  BLACK, ASIAN, AND MINORITY ETHNIC: TOTAL   124,207    41.2%
  TOTAL                                      300,948    100.00%

Ethnicity-based communities

The borough has a long-standing Irish community which is particularly visible through the number of established Irish pubs in the borough and the popularity of Gaelic games in the community. Country flags for example can be seen flown on the outside or hung inside of various pubs in the area, especially on St Patrick's Day. St Benedict's School has also had a long term affiliation with the Irish community in Ealing, as it is a Catholic school. Many Irish members of the Ealing borough attend Ealing Abbey which is linked to St Benedict's School.

Ealing has a large British-Polish community that owes its origins to the World War II refugees and Polish armed forces finding both cheap accommodation and work in the Acton area, which then had a high proportion of London's light engineering companies involved with government war contracts. This community has grown considerably including more shops with authentic Polish food since Poland joined the European Union and its migrant workers have been able to come to the UK freely; in 2011 the borough had the UK's highest proportion of Polish speakers at 6% of the population.[13] This has also led to an increase in Polish social centres in the borough. The population is highly concentrated in Acton, Greenford and Perivale.

Southall in the west of the borough is home to one of the largest South Asian communities in the UK, the majority of whom are Sikhs.[14][15][16][17][18] The community first developed in the 1950s. The Asian population makes up 80% of Southall Broadway ward as of 2011, a contrast compared to the 8% of Southfield ward in the borough's east.

In a speech to mark the 70th anniversary of the Indian Journalists' Association and of Indian independence on 15 August 1947 North Ealing MP Stephen Pound said: “There is North Ealing, South Ealing and Darjeeling” referring to the relatively large Asian population.[19]

There are also churches and centres for London's Hungarian[20] and Assyrian communities in South Ealing.

Other demographics

As of the 2011 census, Hanger Hill had, at 13%, the largest proportion of people aged 65 and over. The lowest were East Acton and Southall Green, at 8% each.[21]

Sport and leisure

Ealing is home to Ealing Studios, and was a major centre of the UK film industry. Brentford F.C. draw a large amount of local support from the borough, although Griffin Park is situated just outside the borough, in the neighbouring London Borough of Hounslow.

The borough is represented in Rugby Union by Ealing Trailfinders and in Rugby league by the London Broncos.

The borough has four non-League football clubs Hanwell Town F.C. and Southall F.C. which both play at Reynolds Field in Perivale. the other two clubs are London Tigers F.C., which plays at the Avenue Park Stadium in Greenford and North Greenford United F.C., which plays at Berkeley Fields.

The borough is also home to one of the country's top athletics clubs, with Ealing Southall & Middlesex AC being based at Perivale Athletics Track. The club has a successful history, with many national and international honours, including the double Olympic gold medallist, Kelly Holmes. This year the club will be celebrating their 100th anniversary.

Transport

Rail and London Underground

The numerous National Rail and London Underground stations in the borough are:

-   Acton Central railway station
-   Acton Main Line railway station
-   Acton Town tube station
-   Boston Manor tube station
-   Castle Bar Park railway station
-   Chiswick Park tube station
-   Drayton Green railway station
-   Ealing Broadway station
-   Ealing Common tube station
-   Greenford station
-   Hanger Lane tube station
-   Hanwell railway station
-   North Acton tube station
-   North Ealing tube station
-   Northfields tube station
-   Northolt Park railway station
-   Northolt tube station
-   Park Royal tube station
-   Perivale tube station
-   Sudbury Hill underground station
-   Sudbury Hill underground and railway station
-   South Acton railway station
-   South Ealing tube station
-   South Greenford railway station
-   Southall railway station
-   West Acton tube station
-   West Ealing railway station

Travel to work

In March 2011, the main forms of transport that residents used to travel to work were: driving a car or van, 21.8% of all residents aged 16–74; underground, metro, light rail, tram, 9.2%; bus, minibus or coach, 9.2%; on foot, 4.7%; train, 4.0%; work mainly at or from home, 3.0%; bicycle, 2.0%.[22]

Transport development

In April 2009 the council voted to call on Transport for London to look into the proposal for a North and West London Light Railway.[23]

Town twinning

Ealing is twinned with:

-   The district of Bielany, Warsaw, Masovian Voivodeship, Poland;

-   The town of Marcq-en-Barœul, Nord, Hauts-de-France, France;

-   The district of Steinfurt, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany[24]

[1]

[2]

[3]

[4]

[5]

[6]

[7] London-fire.gov.uk

[8] “Home .” Japanese School in London. Retrieved on 1 January 2014. “所在地：87 CREFFIELD ROAD, ACTON, LONDON, W3 9PU, U.K.”

[9]

[10] _2011 Census: KS209EW Religion, local authorities in England and Wales_, Office for National Statistics (2012).

[11]

[12]

[13] England's second language is Polish | UK | Express.co.uk - Home of the Daily and Sunday Express

[14]

[15]

[16]

[17]

[18]

[19]

[20]

[21] 1

[22]  Percentages are of all residents aged 16-74 including those not in employment. Respondents could only pick one mode, specified as the journey’s longest part by distance.

[23]

[24] Ealing Council.Twinning. Accessed 2008-09-19

title: London Borough of Ealing

question: What does the text say about the London Borough of Ealing?

answer: London Borough of Ealing is a West London borough that comprises seven major towns: Acton, Ealing, Greenford, Hanwell, Northolt, Perivale, and Southall. The borough has a population of 341,806 inhabitants, making it the fourth most populous London borough. Ealing is the third largest London borough in population and is the eleventh largest area covering part of West London and a small part of Northwest London. Its administrative center is in Ealing Broadway, and the Ealing London Borough Council is the local authority. In 1902, Ealing's surveyor, Charles Jones, coined "Queen of the Suburbs" due to its many parks and tree-lined streets. The tree emblem can be seen on the Ealing Council logo and coat of arms.

question: Discuss everything about the fire brigade of London Borough of Ealing.

answer: London Borough of Ealing has four fire stations. Southall and Northolt have similar-sized station grounds and house two pumping appliances. In 2006/07, Southall attended to about 700 incidents more than Northolt. The other two appliances in the area are Ealing, two pumping appliances, Acton, one pump, and two fire investigations units. The Northfield ward had over forty malicious calls made from it, more than twice than any other ward within Ealing.

question: What does the text say about education in the London borough of Ealing?

answer: There are a total of 91 state-run schools and nurseries in Ealing. The borough also has 13 high schools under the domain of the local education authority, 12 of which are comprehensive, foundation or voluntary-aided, and one city academy. Examples of successful independent schools within the borough are St. Benedict's School (co-ed), Barbara Speake Stage School (co-ed), Notting Hill & Ealing High School for girls, and St. Augustine's Priory for girls. There is also a Japanese international school in Acton.

question: Summarize what the text says about ethnicity-based communities of the Ealing Borough.

answer:
There are three major communities in the borough. First, the Irish community has the longest history in the borough and is particularly obvious through the number of established Irish pubs and how popular the Gaelic games in the community are. Country flags can be seen flown on the outside or hung inside various pubs in the area, especially on St. Patrick's Day. Several members of the Irish community attend Ealing Abbey, which is connected to St. Benedict's School.
Then, the borough has a large British-Polish community that originated from World War II refugees and Polish armed forces. The place was created when these refugees needed cheap accommodation and job opportunities in the Acton area because of its high proportion of London's light engineering companies involved with government war contracts. Since then, this community has grown and consists of more shops with authentic Polish food ever since Poland joined the European Union, and its migrant workers can freely visit the UK.
Finally, Southall, west of the borough, is home to the largest South Asian communities in the UK, most of whom are Sikhs. This community was first developed in the 1950s, and the Asian population make up 80% of Southall Broadway ward as of 2011.

question: What does the text say about the history of the London Borough of Ealing?


text:
Home Television Association Presents: The Marquis Show: Episode 416: Rapist Frank [season Finale] (Inspired by Daft Punk's Da Funk)-

"Ladies and Gentleman. We have a special episode of The Marquis Show for you tonight. For the 20th season finale, The Marquis is going to mutilate convicted Rapist Frank Lohan on live television! Thats right, you heard me! Frank Lohan! Convicted of 8 rapes, 2 being children ages 10 and 16, and the murder of 28 year old Denise Shelton, Frank was sentenced to death shortly after his trial had begun. And tonight, you will all be a witness to the consequences of his crimes! As always,here is DeVon Martin introducing tonights entertainment!"- Announcer.

"Ladies and Gentleman, boys and girls. Tonight is the 416th episode of The Marquis Show, the show that started the Death-Reality genre almost 16 years ago. And since then, we have gained a loyal audience and passionate fans and tonight, the Marquis is going to reward one lucky fan in an unimaginable way. Lets get the show started, shall we? Without further adeu, here... is... The Marquis!"

The Marquis steps from behind the stage and into the spotlight. The crowed goes wild. He waves to fans and steps off the stage and runs through the audience. A group of young girls holding up a sign 'We Lovvvve U Marquis!' are shown on a jumbo screen. They notice themselves and wave to Mom and Pop. The Marquis high fives a row as he runs back and forth through the aisles. He returns back on stage and continues to bow and blow kisses before signaling the audience to settle down. They gradually calm down and he fixes his bowtie.

"My friends... my dearest patrons. I love you"-The Marquis.
They scream in excitement.
"I love you all."-The Marquis.
He smiles and looks towards the left and right, appreciating his guests.
"You have brought me such joy this past decade. And tonight, i am giving America's most hated criminal, Frank Lohan, the Marquis Treatment. All for you. You have voted from the palm of your hands. It was a unanimous. 99% of you wanted to see this man tortured to the point of utter horror. And so it is with my great pleasure that I do this for you."

The Marquis grabs a chain from the edge of the stage and yanks on it. Frank is pulled onto stage with a collar around his neck. A heavy set man, Frank wears nothing but a steel collar around his neck with a 20 foot chain welded on. The crowed begins to boo hysterically. One man even throws a large stone but misses Frank. The Marquis smiles and walks over towards the stone. He looks at the audience then points at the rock. He looks for the audiences approval. They cheer.

The Marquis grabs the stone and looks at Frank. Frank is terrified. The Marquis walks over to Frank, calmly. Completely unsympathetic to the man, The Marquis swings the rock in his hand across Franks right jaw. Frank falls to the ground but holds himself up with his hands. He spits out a tooth and a decent amount of blood. The Marquis looks at his audience and smiles. He walks off stage and hands the rock to a "lucky guest". They begin to cry. The Marquis runs back on stage and begins his own torture on Frank.

The Marquis walks over to a bench and gazes at it for a second before he decides to use a torch and brand. He begins lighting the brand with the torch until the steele turns red. He walks over to the chains and fastens it to the floor so Frank cant run too far. He then presumes to throw the key into the audience.

The Marquis pokes Frank on his left buttcheek. Frank screams as the skin begins to boil. The audience cheers. The Marquis begins poking at random parts of Franks body. Frank flips around trying to hide each point burnt, leaving The Marquis more and more spots to burn. After 3 boils on his legs, 1 on his face, 4 on his back and 1 on the neck, The Marquis swings the brand like a bat into Frank's arm, breaking it. The bone splits in two and sticks out of his arm. Frank screams hysterically. His cries are silenced by the croweds cheering and applause. The Marquis walks over and gazes at another tool. This time, he picks up a surenge filled with bee venom extract. He walks to Frank and sits down next to his head. He begins to brush Franks hair.

"Shhh, shhhh... this is the easy part, Frank."-The Marquis.

He sticks the surenge through one side of Frank's lips and out the other. Frank wiggles his head in pain, trying to stop the Marquis from inflicting any further pain. A little aggrevated, the Marquis begins jamming the surenge anywhere near Frank's mouth, scraping his teeth, gums and tongue while trying to aim for his lips. Eventually, he sticks the surenge in and unleashes the bee venom. Frank's lip begins to swell. The Marquis stands on his feet and walks over to the table and grabs a pocket knife. He kneels down and slides the knife smoothly around Franks lips twice before stopping at the huge swell. He then proceeds to cut it off with the knife. When it doesnt neccesarilly work, The Marquis jabs the sharpened point into Franks lip and tears half of it off. With half a lip hanging off his face, Frank gibberishly begs for The Marquis to show him mercy and end his life. The blood rushes out of his lips like a mini waterfall. The Marquis backs away from Frank and watches him struggle for a moment.

The audience eats it up. The Marquis stares at the pathetic Frank Lohan. A miserable creature.

"Whats that Frank?"-The Marquis
"..lea... urcy.. urcy.."-Frank
"M-Mercy?"-The Marquis
"...urcy"-Frank

The Marquis looks at the audience.

"Should I show him mercy?"-The Marquis
the audience laughs hysterically
"You heard them Frank. They came for a show. Youre out of luck..."-The Marquis

The Marquis walks over to his table and looks at the arrangement. He decides on a turkey bastor and insecticide. He pours the liquid carefully inside the bastor, using a funnel and walks over to Frank. Frank, who is laying on his side in a mixture of his own urine, puss and blood is barely abled to move himself.

"On your stomach Frank."-The Marquis.

Frank jjust lays there, sobbing and petrified.

"On your stomach now, Frank"-The Marquis.

Frank ignores The Marquis's command. The Marquis lays a forceful kick into Frank's back. He screams more. The audience cheers more. The Marquis deals blow after blow into Franks back until he has no choice but to flop on his stomach to stop the kicking.

"Good boy, Frank. Not sure youll like this any better though."

The Marquis shoves the turkey bastor into Frank's rectum and pushes the liquid into his ass. The immediate feeling was a likeness to acid being poured in your ass. But without the boring reprecussions of skin deterioration. Frank flops around like a fish, puking on himself and screaming. The audience gives a standing novation, signaling the near end of Frank's life. They cheer, they cry, they praise The Marquis. The Marquis smiles and bows like a gentleman while Frank suffers unimaginably. Everything is perfect.

The Marquis walks over to the table, grabs a .45 and shoots Frank in the head, blowing out half his skull in the process, killing him immediatly.

"Who wants next?"-The Marquis.

the end.

title: The Marquis Show: Episode 416: Rapist Frank. (introducing The Marquis. Half-hostel, Half-Pee Wee's Playhouse

question: What does the text say about Episode 415?

question: What does the story say about Frank Lohan?

answer: Frank Lohan is a heavyset man convicted rapist and murderer. Lohan appears on Episode 416 of The Marquis Show, which is the season finale. On the show, he's wearing nothing but a steel collar around his neck with a 20-foot chain welded on. He is guilty of eight rapes, two of which are children ages 10 and 16 years old. He is also responsible for the murder of 28-year-old Denise Shelton. Lohan was sentenced to death shortly after his trial started.

question: What does the story say about The Marquis Show?

answer: The Marquis Show has been running for 16 years and is the show that started the Death-Reality genre. Hosted by the Marquis, the show is all about torture and mutilation done on live TV. It appears that the Marquis only tortures and kills convicted felons as a consequence of their actions. The show has gained loyal and passionate fans who are crazy about the host and the horrific violence he inflicts on people. Episode 416: Rapist Frank, is the show's 20th season finale and features convicted rapist and murderer, Frank Lohan. The Marquis Show is presented by the Home Television Association and relies on audience input (via voting) on what punishment the criminals receive.

question: Summarize the plot of the story.

answer: Episode 416 of "The Marquis Show" features the convicted rapist and murderer, Frank Lohan, who comes out only wearing a steel collar on his neck welded to a 20-foot chain. He is guilty of raping eight people, two of them children aged 10 and 16. He also murdered 28-year old Denise Shelton. The show has gained a loyal and passionate fanbase, 99% of whom voted to see Lohan tortured to the point of utter horror. The host, The Marquis, seems to be a sadist and is unaffected by the torture he inflicts on Lohan. The show is equipped with all manner of torture tools for the Marquis to use on Lohan, including a branding iron he heats up, a syringe filled with bee venom (injected in Lohan's lips), a knife that sliced the swollen lips, and a turkey baster The Marquis fills with insecticide and shoves up Lohan's ass. At this point, Lohan was begging for death. Finally, The Marquis ends Lohan's life by shooting half his face off with a .45 caliber pistol.


text:
THE DISCOVERY OF FAKE AND FORGED WORKS HAS BEEN SOMETHING THAT HAS PLAGUED THE ART MARKET FOR CENTURIES. THERE HAVE BEEN A NUMBER OF FAMOUS CASES, INCLUDING THE FAKE FRANS HALS THAT SOTHEBY’S RECENTLY SOLD FOR TEN MILLION DOLLARS, ONLY TO HAVE TO REVOKE THE SALE AFTER THE WORK WAS REVEALED AS A FORGERY. ON THE CONTRARY, THERE IS VERY LITTLE WRITTEN ON THE RISE OF FORGERY IN NON-WESTERN ARTISTIC TRADITION. I HAVE RECENTLY BECOME INCREDIBLY FASCINATED BY THE RISE OF FAKE AND FORGED WORKS IN EGYPTIAN MODERNIST ART, WHICH WAS SPARKED BY THE INCREDIBLE STORY OF MY FRIEND AHMED KHEDR’S FAMILY.

I am very lucky to have access to such a personal account of forgery and the Khedrs very graciously provided me with a firsthand explanation of their case. The Khedrs were the first individuals to ever bring to court the issue of fake and forged works in Egypt. The family’s story, as well as the general rise of forged works in Egypt’s art market, bring up a multitude of the issues surrounding copies and fakes in the better known cases. In my interviews with both Ahmed and his mother, May Zeid, we examined the complex psychology behind the forgery and the many motivations behind forging and faking famous works of art. Their story is also an example of a forger who took advantage of the ideal situation and time to create these forged works, in this case a rise in market value and a desire to celebrate Egyptian culture and art. Lastly, Egypt is a country in which laws protecting collectors against frauds barely exist. This, along with a general lack of knowledge of Egyptian modern painting, makes Egypt a unique example in terms of contemplating innovative solutions to thwart the production of fake and forged works.

  THE MAIN ARTIST THAT AYOUB AND HASSAN FORGED WAS A PAINTER NAMED ABDEL HADI EL-GAZZAR

In 2005, Adel Youssry Khedr and May Zeid charged Ayda Ayoub and Youssry Hassan with forgery in the first legal case against the production and sale of forged works in Egypt. Ayoub and Hassan, through the course of two years, sold Zeid and Khedr eighteen forged works. As Zeid said herself, “It was a con played to perfection by the very people who introduced us to collecting”.1 Ayoub was a well-respected figure in the arts who dealt works and served on the board of both the Ministry of Culture and the Mahmoud Khali Museum and Hassan was a lesser-known painter. Ayoub was the mastermind behind the forgeries and Hassan carried out the deeds with his hand. Ayoub used her strong reputation and connections in the arts to gain the trust of her victims. As an adviser for the Ministry of Culture, she was even hired to authenticate works, and her opinions were unquestionably trusted. Hassan had the right amount of skill and loyalty towards Ayoub to make him the perfect accomplice.

The main artist that Ayoub and Hassan forged was a painter named Abdel Hadi El-Gazzar, although they also forged works by Mahmoud Said, Hamed Nada, Tahia Halim, and Hassan Soliman. Ayoub was able to get her hands on a large sum of El-Gazzar works after his death by promising his family to promote and exhibit him. El-Gazzar is now one of Egypt’s most celebrated artists and because he painted relatively few works during his lifetime, his work has been victim to a number of forgeries.

May Zeid met Ayda Ayoub at her daughter’s dance class, and the two quickly became close friends. Around this time same, Hassan befriended Zeid’s husband Adel Youssry Khedr. Zeid and Khedr were encouraged to buy Hassan’s work, but they were additionally offered many works by Egypt’s most impressive modernist painters. Every single work offered and sold to Zeid and Khedr were later to be deemed fake. Ayoub and Hassan would dissuade Zeid and Khedr from purchasing works from other dealers or galleries by insisting that it was disloyal. In reality, Ayoub and Hassan wanted to both keep selling Zeid and Khedr as many forged works as they could as well as keep them in the dark about their shady business. At one point Zeid and Khedr purchased two Effat Nagui works from a different dealer and Hassan and Ayoub quickly offered to repair the works. Instead of repairing, Hassan made copies of the works and swapped the originals with fakes. There were also instances in which other dealers warned Zeid and Khedr that Ayoub and Hassan were known to forge paintings. Because of their unquestionable loyalty, Zeid and Khedr always interpreted this as dealers attempting to steal them as clients.

[Fake El Gazzar Painting]

Fake El Gazzar Painting

The forgeries came to light with the opening of an exhibition of Samir Rafi, an important artist that Zeid and Khedr had been interested in. Ayoub and Hassan previously tried to sell to them works by Rafi but Zeid and Khedr had never been interested in those specific works, which is fortunate for Zeid and Khedr as they were undoubtedly fake. Zeid and Khedr brought Hassan with them to the exhibition as an adviser and decided to purchase a couple works from the show. The dealer came to Zeid and Khedr’s house to finalize the payment and see their collection. At the time, Darwish did not make any comments on their collection, which Zeid and Khedr thought to be very odd. Shortly after the payments were completed, Darwish sent Zeid and Khedr a book on Abdel Hadi El-Gazzar and Said El Farsi’s collection, which were both not available for purchase. When Zeid and Khedr opened the catalogues, they were shocked to find the same paintings hanging on their walls, with slight variations. In El-Gazzar’s catalogue, they saw parts of separate paintings all combined in one of the works they owned. At the sight of this, Zeid and Khedr invited a different dealer over, who notified them that three-quarters of their collection was likely to be inauthentic. Zeid set up a meeting with El-Gazzar’s wife and brought the El-Gazzar works Ayoub had sold her. El-Gazzar’s wife knew immediately that the works were not only fake, but the products of Ayoub and Hassan. She told Zeid that Ayoub and Hassan had been forging El- Gazzar’s work for a long time and she had tried to get them arrested on several occasions but was never successful. El-Gazzar’s wife had seen many of the same works circulate throughout the years and had spoken to many of the victims of Ayoub’s con. Unfortunately, prior to Zeid and Khedr, these victims would make deals with Ayoub, who would return their money in exchange for the fake paintings, which she’d quickly resell to others.

Because of this, Ayoub’s con business was kept relatively under wraps and she was never faced with legal repercussions. As Zeid said herself, “It was a structured plan where they would keep selling fake paintings, make a large profit and if they were ever caught, they would silently return all the money, regain back the forgeries and move on to the next victim”.2 Zeid and Khedr were the first to ever challenge this. When Zeid and Khedr first approached Ayoub and Hassan about the forgeries, they offered to not press legal charges if their money was returned and the forged works were destroyed in front of them. They made it clear that they would not accept any deal that did not include the destruction of the fakes. Not only did Ayoub and Hassan decline this offer, they began to spread rumors that Zeid and Khedr were actually the ones who were forging works.

At this offense, Zeid and Khedr decided to take the forged works to the police. No member of the police department had any knowledge of the art market and was in fact shocked at the amount of money that these works sold for. Because many of the transactions were without invoices and receipts, Zeid and Khedr’s only evidence were the paintings themselves and the witnesses they were able to collect to testify. Fortunately, they managed to bring together an impressive number of individuals that were willing to testify on their behalf in court. On top of this, they embarked on collecting documentation and reports signed by experts in the art world that would attest to the works being fake. Their witnesses included members of the Conservation Department at the Egyptian Museum of Modern art, other collectors who had been victim to Ayoub’s con, the artists’ relatives, and one living artist that Ayoub had forged named Hassan Soliman. Soliman recalled Ayoub and Hassan meeting at his studio several decades back. He also testified that at this same time, Hassan, who was hired to clean his studio, must have started collecting unfinished works that Soliman would toss aside. Hassan finished these

works and later on, with Ayoub’s direction, sold them as original works. On the defense, Hassan claimed that the works were indeed real and that he had only sold Zeid and Khedr three out of the eighteen works on trial. Ayoub denied involvement altogether and maintained the argument that Zeid and Khedr had forged the works themselves. The premise of her argument was that Zeid’s aunt was a painter and had painted Zeid a fake Monet, which Zeid had hanging on her wall. Although Zeid’s aunt signed her own name and was quite obviously not attempting to trick or con anyone, Ayoub argued that Zeid’s aunt had forged the eighteen works.

[Fake Mahmoud Said Watercolour]

Fake Mahmoud Said Watercolour

After the testimonies, the court called upon a committee of experts to examine the paintings, who gave a unanimous decision that the works were fake. The court declared Ayoub guilty as the main offender and Hassan as her accomplice. Because the court has no specific laws against art forgery, Ayoub and Hassan were charged more generally with embezzlement and fraud. She was sentenced to a year in prison and Hassan was sentenced to three. Ayoub and Hassan appealed the court’s decision and a new panel of judges were appointed to look over the case. After the surprising new decision that Ayoub and Hassan were innocent, it came out that Ayoub had bribed one of the judges to produce a verdict in her favor. Zeid and Khedr rightfully appealed and the case was taken to the Supreme Court. Ayoub was charged with a year in prison in May of 2006 and passed away in December 2006 from heart failure, before her sentenced started. Although she did not live to serve her sentence, the last couple months of Ayoub’s life were filled with shame and her reputation, both professional and personal, was completely destroyed. Hassan also passed away before his sentence of three years began. Zeid and Khedr, although not fully satisfied with the country’s lack of legal protection against art forgery, raised significant public awareness on the issue of forgery and were able to stop Ayoub from selling another fake work ever again. They continued to collect Egyptian art and have since built one of the most impressive collections in the country. Furthermore, they are very proud to have taken the moral route, even though the legal system, among other issues, seemed to be against them.

Forged works by Ayoub and Hassan circulated the art market in Egypt for thirty years. Ayoub took advantage of the country’s lack of knowledge on Egyptian modernist painters as well as the the absence of laws to protect against the purchase of forged works. She struck at the ideal time, as many forgers do, when demand for Egyptian modernist works was high. Ayoub, who was also an aspiring painter herself, shared with Hassan a sense of satisfaction each time they got away with their con. She would frequently tell Zeid that she longed to be “a famous artist one day, even if it ends up being the death of me”.3 The fact that people paid high sums of money and believed their creations to be real boosted their egos and justified their own belief in their artistic skills. Each time they would sell a work, they were able to internally prove themselves as equals to some of the biggest Egyptian artists in the 20th century. Ayoub enjoyed in particular that she was able to con and make fools of some of the most intelligent and cultured people in Egypt. It seems evident that for Ayoub her success was not only in terms of monetary value, but served a psychological purpose, as is the case with many other studied forgers.

WORDS BY GRACIE BRAHIMY © ARTLYST 2017

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Related Posts

question: Explain how forged works of art have been able to circulate the art market in Egypt for so many years.

answer: Egypt is a country which laws protecting art collectors against fraud barely exist. Egypt is also a place where there is a general lack of knowledge of Egyptian modern painting. This paves the way for forgers to thwart the production of fake works. Many forgers like Ayoub and Hassan struck at an ideal time when demand for Egyptian modernist works was high. Their forged works circulated the art market for thirty years. They kept their con business under wraps and never faced legal repercussions. Ayoub, for example, was able to con and make fools of some of the most intelligent and cultured people in Egypt, using her strong reputation and connections in the arts to gain the trust of victims. Her reputation consisted of being an adviser for the Ministry of Culture and being hired to authenticate works. Therefore her opinions were unquestionably trusted.