Thursday, November 30, 2017

Carpatho-Rusyn Day in Cleveland

On October 26, 2017 the Cleveland Chapter of the Carpatho-Rusyn Society celebrated Carpatho-Rusyn Day in North America by having the Rusyn flag flown over Cleveland City Hall for the entire day.






In the evening there were speeches, entertainment and celebrating.





If you don't know, the Rusyns are a people without a country.  They are from the  Carpathian Mountains region in Ukraine, Poland and Slovakia.

More on Carpatho-Rusyn Day in Cleveland

Saturday, November 25, 2017

Doing Business with and in Asia

The Ohio Asian American Economic Summit took place November 14, 2017 at Ariel International Center in Cleveland. Ariel International and Margaret Wong & Associates LLC were the event sponsors. ClevelandPeople.com was honored to be a supporting organization.

Ariel CEO Radhika Reddy had worked toward this event for years and with the support of Margaret Wong was able to fill the room with people interested in doing business in and with Asia and a stellar group of speakers and panelists including the Consul General of India who flew in from New York and the Consul General of Japan who came in from Detroit.



Honorable Sandeep Chakravorty, 
Consul General of India



Radhika Reddy and Consul General of Japan in Detroit Mitsuhiro Wada


I recorded the entire day -all the info panels, the keynotes and the dignitaries.  Take a look at our Ohio Asian American Economic Summit  page.


Wednesday, November 22, 2017

Lebanon Day in Cleveland 2017

The American Lebanese Community Council presented the 7th annual celebration of Lebanon Day in the City of Cleveland celebrating the 74th independence of Lebanon. The ceremony was in the Rotunda of Cleveland City Hall.




More Photos and videos of 2017 Lebanon Day


The Ajyal Lebanese dancers performed.

Photos and video of Ajyal





Wednesday, November 15, 2017

Planting Tulips in the Turkish Cultural Garden

The Republic of Turkey was founded on October 29, 1923 - 94 years ago. Last year in 2016 the Cleveland Turkish community dedicated the new Turkish Cultural Garden.

They gathered again one year later on Sunday October 29, 2017 to plant tulip bulbs in the Turkish Garden.

Though many think of the Dutch when they discuss tulips, tulips are actually native to Turkey. Tulips are the national flower of the Republic of Turkey with a history going back to its Ottoman roots.
Many cultivated varieties of tulips were widely grown in Turkey long before they were brought to Holland from Turkey In the 16th Century.

The time between 1718-1730 is called the "Tulip Era of Turkey". It was under the reign of sultan Ahmed III and tulips became an important style of life within the arts, folklore and the daily life during this peaceful time.

The botanical name for tulips, Tulipa, is derived from the Turkish word "tulbend" or "turban", which the flower resembles. It's considered as the King of Bulbs.

See more from the tulip planting in the Turkish Cultural Garden






Monday, November 13, 2017

Ethiopian Food - You have entered a Fork Free Zone

As youmay  know, the ClevelandPeople.Com Food Adventurers travel to authentic ethnic restaurants in the Cleveland area and, besides enjoying a special traditional menu, learn about the culture of the country.

Zoma Ethiopian Restaurant is run by Zeleke Belete and the evening included many glimpses into the geography, history and culture of Ethiopia.

Zeleke told the Food Adventurers that they had entered a Fork Free Zone and explained that Ethiopian food is eaten with the spongy injera bread instead of silverware.

Zeleke prepared a special menu for the Adventurers including:

  • Mild Chicken Stew
  • Mild Beef Stew
  • Spicy Beef Stew
  • Beef tips
  • Red Lentil stew
  • Split Yellow Peas
  • Chick Pea stew with beef
  • Cabbage and Carrots
  • Kale and collard Greens
  • Green Beans and carrots
  • House Salad
  • Fresh made cottage cheese




In this short video, Zeleke explains the foods.  






Where in the world is Ethiopia?

When I spoke at the ClevelandPeople.Com Food Adventurers event at the Ethiopian Restaurant Zoma in Cleveland Heights Ohio  several people asked "Where in the world is Ethiopia?"

I showed that Ethiopia is in the Horn of Africa (East Africa about 2/3rds of the way up) and how the geography is important to the politics and history.




I also told of how the Nile River flows South to North and is split, how Ethiopia is the originator of coffee and about the languages (Amharic and others) and religions (Orthodox Christian and Muslim) of Ethiopia.

Watch this short video of Dan's answers about Ethiopia.








Bob Marley, Reggae and the Ethiopian connection

I am a big fans of reggae music especially Bob Marley and Peter Tosh.

They were both followers of Rastafarianism.  Both a religious movement and social movement, it developed in Jamaica during the 1930s. Practitioners are known as Rastafari, Rastafarians, or Rastas.

Many Rastas call for the resettlement of the African diaspora in either Ethiopia or Africa more widely, referring to this continent as the Promised Land of "Zion.”  Western society is considered to be the oppressive "Babylon".

The smoking of cannabis is regarded as a sacrament with beneficial properties. Rastas place emphasis on what they regard as living 'naturally', adhering to ital (take the v off of vital) diets, allowing their hair to form into dreadlocks, and following patriarchal gender roles.

It was influenced by the Back-to-Africa movement promoted by black nationalist figures like Marcus Garvey.

Rastafarianism is an Abrahamic religion. Rastafari believe in a single God—referred to as Jah—who partially resides within each individual.

Meanwhile, Haile Selassie I ruled as Emperor of Ethiopia from 1930 to 1974.  Many Rastas regard him as an incarnation of Jah on Earth and as the Second Coming of Christ. Others regard him as a human prophet who fully recognized the inner divinity within every individual. During his life, Selassie described himself as a devout Christian.

The 1974 overthrow of Haile Selassie by the military Derg and his death in 1975 resulted in a crisis of faith for many Rastas.  Enthusiasm for Rastafari declined in the 1980s, following the deaths of Haile Selassie and Bob Marley.

But the music is still great.

Watch this short video telling the story of reggae and Rastas.





More from the Ethiopian Passport Adventure


Why the 3.2 million year old female skeleton was called Lucy

When I spoke recently at the ClevelandPeople.Com Food Adventurers event at the Ethiopian Restaurant Zoma in Cleveland Heights I  told how several important finds have propelled Ethiopia to the forefront of palaeontology.

This included the several hundred pieces of bone fossils representing 40 percent of the skeleton of a female of the hominin species estimated to have lived 3.2 million years ago that is called Lucy.

Lucy is probably the most well-known hominid discovery. It's offical name is Australopithecus afarensis. Known locally as Dinkinesh, the specimen was found in the Awash Valley of Ethiopia's Afar Region in 1974 by paleoanthropologist Donald Johanson of the Cleveland Museum of Natural History.  It is one of the most complete and best preserved adult Australopithecine fossils ever uncovered.

There is a cool story how they came up with the name Lucy.  Watch the short video to hear it.




Photos, videos and more from the Ethiopia adventure to Zoma


Sunday, November 05, 2017

Top 5 groups

It's always interesting to see which of the 100+ ethnic groups will attract the most visitors in a month.

October's results were fairly predictable though that is not always the case.

The Top 5 groups with the most visitors in October 2017 on ClevelandPeople.Com were: Italian, Indian, Irish, Polish and Slovak.

Lithuanian was a close #6

Wednesday, November 01, 2017

Privacy and Cybersecurity – Mike Stovsky of Benesch Law

Mike Stovsky is a Partner and Chair of one of Benesch’s core practice groups, Innovations, Information Technology & Intellectual Property (3iP).

Benesch is a business law firm with offices in Cleveland, Columbus, Chicago, Hackensack, Indianapolis, Shanghai and Wilmington. The firm serves national and international clients that include public and private, middle market and emerging companies as well as private equity funds, entrepreneurs, not-for-profit organizations, trusts and estates.

Mike was a speaker at the 15th annual Information Security Summit at the IX Center in Cleveland.

In this interview Mike spoke about Data breaches, Cyber Security, Preventing and reacting and even Quantum Computing.



Yahoo Data Breach

The 15th annual Information Security Summit was held at the IX Center in Cleveland.  ISS is the largest gathering of information security professionals in the Midwest.

The 2nd day focused on Law and one of the speakers was Mehmet Munur, a Partner at Tsibouris & Associates, LLC. He concentrates his practice in the areas of technology, information privacy and security, and financial services regulation.

 His topic, presented with partner Dino Tsibouris, was ‘Recent Trends in Information Security and Privacy Laws for 2017.’ This part of the presentation deals with the Yahoo breach.




Information Security Summit

80% of businesses believe they will be hit by a cyber-attack within this year according to a June 2017 study. That's not news to Gary Sheehan and Glenn Brzuziewski.

For the last 30 years, Gary Sheehan has been working in information technology and in the last 20 years he has focused on information security, specializing in security management, assessments, policy and awareness development, compliance and security project management. Currently Gary is the Director of GRC Services and Solutions for Advanced Server Management Group, Inc. (ASMGi).

Glenn Brzuziewski is an attorney with an emphasis on technology law. For the last 13 years he has served as Owner/managing Partner of Hurricane Labs providing and managing companies' security services, including Security Monitoring, Network Monitoring and Vulnerability management.


Glenn Brzuziewski amd Gary Sheehan

In 2002 Gary and Glenn decided to create an all-volunteer security conference for professionals right in their own backyard to eliminate the time and costs of travelling to out-of-state conferences. They formed the Information Security Summit (ISS) and 150 professional attended the first fall ISS in 2002 on the campus of Tri-C East.

With support and participation from the top IT security companies in the region, ISS took off. It has become the largest gathering of security professionals in the Midwest and has outgrown several spaces, now meeting at the huge IX Center to accommodate the crowds.

More about the 2017 Information Security Summit