THE CORNER WITH GARRY CHITTICK

Syria, Afghanistan, Yemen, Ukraine, Libya, Myanmar, Israel, Iraq, The Republic of Congo, Central African Republic, Colombia, Ethiopia, South Sudan, Somalia, China, North Korea and so on.

You know what the above have in common? They are all involved in some form of conflict, by that, I mean direct involvement in the armed conflict, some, killing relatives. You will also note that of the sixteen listed, thirteen are disputes about religious values. Unfortunately, the Muslim faith has the lion’s share of these disputes. Now the above are not the only areas of dissent, they are the countries that I am aware of open violent confrontation, there are many countries where crime and lack of respect for each other’s values have not yet descended into open conflict. 

Surprisingly, since I was at school, the number Countries of seems to have increased by quite a number, we were educated when there was still the remnants of the British Empire, now according to the United Nations, there are 195 independent countries, of which roughly half are considered to be democratically elected so you see despite our news being waterlogged with world conflagrations there are three-quarters of the world getting on with life.

What I have found for many years is with our modern communications, how disappointing it is that we don’t seem to learn. If you think about the Boer War, the only informed would have been those who read the newspaper of the time, this would have been very few as most were illiterate. Now we watch daily man’s inhumanity to man regarding the viewing as just about entertainment. There are 7.9 billion populating the world, 2.4 billion Christian, 1.9 Muslim, and 1.2 Hindu. It would seem if we believe what is reported the Muslim faith has little regard for the others and aspires to dominate the world. We think of all the history of BC then we have the teachings of the Bible that was composed by many creating the so-named AD period, some 600 odd years later, the Prophet Mohammad over a 23 year period recorded his spiritual revelations to create the Koran. Now I would not question those who are believers of any of the various beliefs except to say it seems a remarkable waste of life, energy, friendships, to be forever in conflict over a couple of documents that are not remarkably different. Perhaps it’s more about power, amazing how so many fall for it.

Enough, this is being written before Saturday, no ordinary Saturday, we may or may not have a new Government, the Australians may have a new Constitution, the All Blacks will have knocked the stuffing out of Ireland, and we may have climbed Everest.

So life can still provide those pleasant surprises, we will gather with 50 thousand others and sing Sweet Caroline, Waikato is lucky enough to have three runners on this exciting day, you eleven may be reading this after the event, either way you will share in the joy of such an exciting 68 seconds. Nothing stirs the emotion more than a horse. There are those who never set foot on a racecourse, unlike the believers of above, they mostly avoid conflict with us believers, not all but most, however we are proud to be involved, more importantly, we are equally moved by the many of you who win lose or draw are joining us in following I Wish I Win’s remarkable story.

Have a great day, only watch the racing channel, for a day forget the War and election, not the All Blacks, Monday will be the same as the week before, but next Saturday will be nothing like this.

Cheers

G