Word: ancient
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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Tabas, an ancient oasis located between Iran's vast salt desert of Dasht-i-Kavir and the more forbidding Dasht-i-Lut (Naked Desert) to the south, never had a chance. When the tremors began, most residents were at home, eating or enjoying the cool desert breeze that had begun to blow after torrid daytime temperatures. Once the shaking subsided, only six buildings in the town were still recognizable. Even the few newer buildings of steel-beam construction had collapsed...
...rescue workers faced up to the grim, ultimate task in such disasters: bulldozing the ruins to prevent epidemic?even though there might still be survivors too deep to find, too weak to call out. Well diggers known as moqanis were flown in from Kerman and Yazd to repair the ancient qanats, the giant underground system of wells and canals around the Kavir desert that for centuries have brought water to Tabas and greened its pools, palms and citrus trees. After slithering 180 ft. down into the canals to repair connections, they reported nervously that "the earth is growling down there...
...Rhodesian grant raises an ancient and troubling question: Just how deeply should the church get involved in violent political disputes? The W.C.C. staff, headed by General Secretary Philip Potter, a West Indian activist who refuses to answer questions on Rhodesia, believes that Christian justice demands the "liberation" of oppressed peoples, a program that includes an end to white minority governments. And in that process, violence may be necessary. The Rhodesian grant, in fact, is popular among most Third World churches, and was approved by Canada's Anglican Primate E.W. Scott and other officers. The overall antiracist grants program survived unscathed...
Last week, almost exactly two thousand years later, the temple so built stood beneath a gleaming, towering, glassy pavilion newly erected at the north end of Manhattan's Metropolitan Museum of Art overlooking Central Park. Dendur's ancient stones glow softly orange as it stands on a wide granite platform skirted by a moat of lapping water, designed to evoke its old site on the west bank of the Nile. Even the rocky escarpment against which it stood has been simulated. The huge skylight and glass north wall set off its looming 26-ft.-high gateway and the squat bulk...
With his stark, honest irony, Carlin has shown countless audiences how silly and obsolete America's taboos and social inventions really are, especially in the age of the city.. "Cultures have to have some things they consider unthinkable, and in ancient times, health or survival reasons entered this," he says. But it would be really nice to channel some of the things going on today that are really unspeakable--like severe deprivation--and make them the focus of our attention...