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4. PRISON MADE ME DO IT 8. VIVA CUBA LIBRE 12. MANDATORY REPORTING BIANCA BARSAN
SHARON TIRADO
MADISON MELTON
16. ITALY; IL PAESE DEI BALOCCHI 20. TRIADS, TATTOOS EDGARDO SCHIENA
AND TRICKY LOCAL LAWS ZAREEN CHIBA
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Prison made me do it:
The curious case of Romania’s elite who turned scientific geniuses behind bars
When I was told to write about a law that I find funny, or even odd, I admit I was a little bit lost. Not because I did not know of any, but because there were so many out there that deserved recognition, so to speak, that it was actually hard to just choose one. Oh, and also because laws are generally complicated and easily misinterpreted, at least where I come from - so maybe I was more than just ‘a little lost’. And then it hit me, there was one law in my country that was so incredibly appalling and mindblowingly strange, that it actually made the headlines for a good few months and trust me, it is worth talking about! But let me give you some background information first and then hopefully you will find it as funny and yet as saddening at the same time as I did; just bear with me.
BARSAN, BIANCA @biancaomikami
PRISON MADE ME DO IT |
BARSAN BIANCA
The year 2014 was, at least in my humble opinion, a turning point for postcommunist Romania, and by that I mean it was a really, really good year for our justice and judiciary system. It was the year Romania elected a new president, protested against the PM - who had, by then, already lost a significant number of supporters and was, for some reason, running for presidency -, which led to his resignation a year later, and the year we witnessed the beginning of some longawaited and oh-so-refreshing efforts to crack down on corruption, fraud and tax evasion among the country’s richest. Soon enough, arrests were being made and TV moguls, businessmen and politicians alike were settling in in their new homes, behind some cozy metal bars and under some warm, heavily stained prison sheets. At the time, every single one of these new inmates seemed to be doomed and had years to spend in prison, let alone having their accounts frozen and their assets confiscated. Those were really dark times for people who were used to living in what could literally be referred to as a palace and who were used to being able to pay for anything. Turns out, their freedom was not so easy to buy.
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... and then, all of a sudden, a law enforced back in 2013 shed light on one easy way out for the hopeless businessmen of Romania. Their future started to look bright again. The law I am talking abut refers their penalties being reduced, provided they wrote academic papers that would then be published nationwide. Such a book would shorten an inmate’s time in prison by 30 days. For instance, if someone were to write 12 of these books, they would get out a year earlier than the initial set date; and well..., many did. And now the funny part: it turned out that all the above mentioned politicians and businessmen were indeed very talented and had a gift for writing, some of whom even wrote a book per
week, and others who wrote up to ten or more books. I will give you my favourite examples. George Becali, owner of Steaua Bucharest Football Club, was imprisoned in 2013 under charges of kidnapping, after having been acquitted of bribing accusations in the previous year (a bribe of 1.7 million euros, which he claimed to be ‘money for buying candy’ - now this is one man with a really sweet tooth!). He was sentenced to 3 years, but only served 2 and a half, due to five ‘scientific’ works he had published whilst in prison. Among them, “Becali and politics”, “Becali and Steaua” and “Becali: The European Parliament and the Romanian Parliament”. Whilst I do
PRISON MADE ME DO IT |
appreciate his desire to enlighten us on his clearly self-centred knowledge, there is one problem with his books: they do not qualify as academic or scientific in any way. As many of the other books written in prison, they have been shown to be plagiarized, some even with the help of known higher education lecturers, or not even remotely related to scientific advance or academic development, other than the inclusion of the word ‘scientific’ every here and there. There is even one book that is 80% photos, and many that are autobiographic. Cristi Borcea and Mihai Stoica are two more names that come from the Romanian football enterprise, and who have also written scientific papers such as “UEFA Europe League. Finding our identity” or “I was the president of a dream, Dinamo Bucharest” - notice the deep and meaningful, not to mention pseudointellectual and reflective, implications of all these titles; it kind of makes you wonder why they even got into business and football in the first place, given all this talent, right?
BARSAN BIANCA
Back to this poorly written law, which does not establish which authority is to declare a paper scientific or not, in February 2016 there has been a decision to suspend it until September of this year, in order to make some important amendments; however, it was utterly overdue and already a very large number of taxevading public people have taken advantage of it. So far, 188 authors have had their works published, totaling a good few years in reduced penalties. Yes, that is correct: years! Funny, had it not been such a defiant practice to the rest of the citizens (think underprivileged people who are forced to steal a loaf of bread to feed their families and end up in prison for years). Maybe my comment about the judiciary and justice system working properly was, after all, misguided and I did speak too soon. We will try again next year.
BARSAN, BIANCA @biancaomikami
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VIVA CUBA LIBRE | TRIADO SHARON
Cuba, my home country is one of the most amazing countries I have ever seen. And I do not say it because it is the country where I was born. It goes far beyond that. Our food, our nature, our people‌ everything influences Cuba to be the most beautiful island in the Caribbean.
TIRADO, SHARON @shatirado
However, our government has set up many laws onto our society in what is known today as dictatorship. These laws are mainly prohibition of a set of things to Cubans that in other words, are things that we are not allowed to do or (sometimes) not even see. These laws are extremely enforced by the government and if someone does not want to follow them, harsh penalties are delivered.
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I do not want to discuss how sad dictatorship can be, but rather investigate some of the most stupid laws created by the Government of Cuba. 1. If you are not born in Havana, you are not allowed to live in the capital. Sorry what? Exactly. Imagine you are born in Manchester but you are not allowed to live in London. Cubans need to get a permit that allows them to do this. This “law” is less strict than it used to be, but it still valid.
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3. Are you a Cuban looking forward to rent a hotel room to swim in the pool and survive the hot temperatures? Seems that this is not allowed either! No Cuban is allowed to visit any “touristic” place such as hotels where only foreigners can rent themselves.
4. Want to increase your worldwide culture by reading foreign books or magazines? Cuban education is highly recognized in the world as well as the medicine, however it focuses mainly on the history of Cuba, 2. Want to create your geography of Cuba, heroes own political party? of Cuba and how bad the Sorry you can’t. You just United States are. No cannot create any other magazine or newspaper political party apart from is allowed inside the the Communist party of country for Cubans to Cuba that already exists. enjoy. We only have two Deal with it. newspapers and both of them are owned by the
government. So much freedom, you might think. 5. You want to be an entrepreneur in Cuba? This is one of the few things you can do in my home country. However, if you “own” a company (you never fully own something but is shared with the government) a small corporation, you must pay and “donate” extremely generous taxes to the government, some of them, for no reason at all. 6. You cannot criticize the Castro regime. Seriously, just don’t. I have seen people criticize the government and disappearing one day after. Forever.
VIVA CUBA LIBRE | TRIADO SHARON
Other funny jokes created by the Castro brothers: • Cubans cannot travel abroad without permission of government. • Cubans cannot change jobs without permission of government. • Cubans cannot eat red meat. (I am still wondering about the reason behind this one) • Cubans cannot enjoy internet. Well, technically you do since few years ago. However, you must pay a monthly fee of 100$ and the average salary is 25$. And to finish, this is not a law from the government but a social one: • Always be happy. The government is upset that after all the efforts they put in order to set their 60-year-old dictatorship, Cubans are still happily fighting everyday the challenges of the government.
TIRADO, SHARON @shatirado
P.S: I named this article “Viva Cuba Libre” because after all these laws (together with many others) the government of Cuba still want us Cubans to believe that we live in a free country by creating propaganda around the island. This article is the explanation that we are not as free as they say we are.
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In sex education classes at school and on the sexual health websites I’d clandestinely scroll through at late hours of the night in my early teens, the topic of sexual assault loomed large. Alarming “did you know…” statistics prefacing more personal stories. I’d read the “1/3 women” factoid over and over, counting off friends and classmates and wondering if it could possibly be true. It was strange that this fear seemed so implausible as I entered adolescence, something I somehow maintained control over, while others that were similarly dangled over the heads of young girls felt so urgent. For years there was a persistent worry in the back of my mind that I would simply wake up one morning and find myself anorexic, pregnant, with herpes—any of these new adult concerns that sounded so inevitable and uncontrollable, despite the fact that they couldn’t boast anywhere close to the probability of rape or sexual assault.
MELTON, MADISON @nomad_melton
Mandatory Reporting
MANDATORY REPORTING |
I should begin by saying that I have so far never been sexually assaulted myself, but in just several years those statistics transitioned from a distant horror-film plot point, something that scares you when you see it, but that you can easily dismiss as a genuine concern in the rest of your life, to something that’s prevalence feels eerily mundane in its pervasiveness. I was fifteen the first time a friend told me they had been sexually assaulted. The “to do” lists from those sexual health websites kept flashing through my mind, and I dialled the local rape crisis hotline. A young woman picked up and asked why I was calling. I explained the situation and said that I really just needed suggestions for how best to support and advise her, and if there was anything I should do to make sure she was alright. Before offering so much as a word of understanding, the crisis counsellor asked if the assault had happened in the District of Columbia, because if it had she was legally obliged to report it. The advice most often found online takes a similar tone to the words of warning from my childhood, “if you swallow cleaning fluid, don’t eat or drink anything else, call poison control and tell your parents.”
MELTON MADISON
“If you fall and break your leg, try not to move if possible, just call 911 and tell your parents.” “If you’re sexually assaulted, don’t shower or wash your clothes, call 911 or the rape crisis hotline and tell your parents.” If a problem has occurred, don’t worry. Surrender yourself to the professionals. You can trust them, and they will fix it. Yet in the years following that first phone call, many, if not most, of my female friends, and many male friends, have spoken to me about experiences of assault. Their stories cover every spectrum of age, relationship, circumstance, and gender. None of them have taken a perpetrator to court, and few of them have involved professionals or parents in any capacity. Instead, close friends become the port of call. There are numerous reasons for this, and many dreadful laws around sexual assault that vary in nightmarish inadequacy by country and, in the U.S., by state as well. Yet to focus specifically on my own example, categorising people who work for rape crisis hotlines as counsellors and therefore, at least in the District of Columbia, mandatory reporters, is to undermine the trust and confidentiality they seek to provide. When I called in that night, I could honestly tell her no, the assault hadn’t happened in the
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Mandatory Reporting
MANDATORY REPORTING |
District of Columbia, but if it had I would have lied or hung up the phone. I knew it was not my place to report on my friend’s behalf. I wasn’t even completely clear about what reporting actually meant in this context, and what the consequences might be. This opening cast a shadow over the rest of our conversation, I suddenly felt like I was ‘telling.’ The illusion that I could be any girl anywhere in the world, calling out from the abyss, was broken. The reasoning behind mandatory reporting is clear. It holds relevant individuals accountable to crimes committed within their jurisdictions, and tries to eliminate the possibility of a cover-up. Yet what’s missing is that it doesn’t seem to fit together with other systems in a meaningful way. Legal requirements to report overshadow the trust that is necessary to provide real support, the process of evidence collection is said to often be as traumatising as the assault itself, and in my U.S. states these rape kits are only held for a period of six months, even though the statute of limitations on sexual assault cases is usually much, much longer. Few perpetrators are found guilty, even if forensic evidence is collected and makes it to trial. I do not deny that the nature of these crimes make them more legally challenging
MELTON MADISON
than other kinds of assault and violence, but it seems that, in a moment of need, anyone should be able to shout anonymously into the void and find something meaningful that bounces back. And so it continues. Phones will keep ringing and friends of all ages will do what they can to support each other. They will offer words and silence and tea and showers and fresh clothes and hands to hold and nervous attempts at advice and tears and phone numbers for counsellors, doctors, lawyers, family members that may or may not be used, and if used, may or may not be effective. I don’t think I will ever ‘know’ how to best be there in these kinds of conversations, but I do know that I don’t follow the lists. Don’t insist that someone doesn’t shower, don’t call hotlines, don’t tell parents and loved ones. What the counsellor on the phone probably should have done was listen, and that’s probably what she should have told me to do, too.
MELTON, MADISON @nomad_melton
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Italy; Il paese dei Balocchi.
SCHIENAS, EDGARDO @Eschienas
ITALY; IL PAESE DEI BALOCCHI. | SCHIENAS EDGARDO
Every country in the world has its own laws, and each government applies them in the way they think is beneficial for the people. European countries more
or less tend to follow a very similar scheme of laws, even though of course every country has its own differences and uniqueness. Italy, where I am from, is a country where people tend to follow the laws that the government applies very little. It is well known throughout the world that in Italy we have the mafia, politicians like to steal public money for their benefit and that the wealthiest Italian have the bad habit to evade taxes, escape from the authorities and hide their wealth somewhere else. These are just very few examples of what people do in Italy in order to escape from the law, it would take me forever to describe to you of what we are capable of. As many other countries around the world, Italy is made up of some crazy and weird people. Due to this, our government is forced to create laws in order to protect the country from those people and preserve our wealth. As many other countries, Italy has its own weird laws too. Sometimes I cannot even believe them myself that I grew up my entire life there, and I have to be honest by saying that my country never stops to surprise me.
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Let’s talk about superstition. Italy is a very superstitious country. We used little models of red peppers to keep bad luck away, we kiss crosses and many other incredible acts. But there is one that made me laugh since I was a kid; it was always thought by my people and myself (especially for males) that by keeping bad luck away you could just touch your own genitals. Even though the clear vulgarity of the act, since I was a kid I was “taught” that this was a very effective way to keep away bad luck. So every time somebody would talk about something bad with a negative connotation or something bad would happen to someone that clearly I didn’t want to happen to me, I would go somewhere else private and do the act. This is part of our tradition, of our culture, something that has been clearly present in our society since centuries. If you go to Italy and ask about this people would be really welcome to teach you and explain to you the real meaning of such an act. Well just a couple of years ago, an Italian court declared that men are not allowed to touch their genitals in public. Due to the vulgarity of such act, people are not anymore
allowed to touch their own genitals for superstition. This law clearly made people very angry, because they saw it as an attack to their own tradition and their own culture. Despite the ferocity of the law and the iron fist with which the Italian court established this law, I can assure you that nobody in Italy follows it, as usual. It is very common to walk around Italian streets and see men (especially old ones) touching their own genitals in public. For some people, this law is an attack to our culture and our tradition, for how vulgar it can be. Despite this, this act will always remain in our culture, and for how vulgar it can be, the future generations will for sure know the importance of this act in our society. Italians are the proudest people I know, and I am proud of being one, too. This act will never disappear and like the pasta, the pizza and the mandolin, it will live in the future generations. Forever. coffee with them and have a chat with them, so they can see my true nature, and that my way of putting jeans it’s something I do just because it is my style, a style that I hold and protect firmly from critics and judgments.
ITALY; IL PAESE DEI BALOCCHI. | SCHIENAS EDGARDO
SCHIENAS, EDGARDO @Eschienas
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Triads, Tattoos and Tricky Local Laws Japanese Yakuza Tattoos (Photo Source: The Daily Beast)
TRIADS, TATTOOS AND TRICKY LOCAL LAWS | CHIBA ZAREEN
Context on our judicial system and the little absurdities embedded within Context on our judicial system and
the little absurdities embedded within Hong Kong’s constitution, the Basic Law, which is founded on the British legal system, is unique in that it is both independent of and answerable to the Chinese government (wrap your head around that Doublespeak, amirite). We pride ourselves over our judicial autonomy, but under special situations where the city is under duress or going in a political direction that is contrary to the wishes of the communist party (as in the Umbrella Movement and the more recent “Fishball Riot” and crackdown on “political deviants” within more politicized local universities), China has final ruling on a judicial issue.
CHIBA, ZAREEN @Zarcchi
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Despite the ever watchful presence of the Motherland on our law-abiding backs, strange laws seem to have seeped into our constitution that few have bothered to review because of how plainly absurd some are. One cannot swear at pandas at our local amusement park because god forbid our national fluffies understand Cantonese (and even if they did, what could they really do but chew their bamboos passive-aggressively at you?); transgender individuals may marry as long they undergo the relevant sex change (this one blows my mind personally—does possessing a uterus really make you a more lawabiding husband/wife?); it is also apparently illegal to be drunk whilst riding a horse in the city, a by-product of our colonial era, but I am of the opinion that infringing upon that one and not dying is an admirable but really very dumb trait. There is one law, however, which is culturally
rooted and very clandestine, and this is: That one particular law concerning triads and how if you have a tattoo or a T-shirt that resembles a triad logo, or you’re trying to imitate a triad member, whoosh you’re off to jail Like many successful and generational organized societies, triads have existed due to a fine balance of cultural appropriateness and operational versatility to keep up with new social fashions or addictions. The Hollywood machine has always been minting revenue for years by romanticising mafia operations through movies such as Scorsese’s The Departed and The Godfather trilogies (and it is hypothesized that Sun Yee Ong, a prominent gang member, invested heavily in the local film industry for the express purpose of repainting local
TRIADS, TATTOOS AND TRICKY LOCAL LAWS | CHIBA ZAREEN
A still from a local gang movie (Photo Credits: SCMP)
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perceptions on gang activity). Triad tattoos have also made a big splash in high fashion with the Japanese Yakuza’s intricate irezumi designs which engulf the contours of one’s scapulae, shoulders and back with images of dragons and other beings of traditional Japanese folklore, and a fascination for triad branding has emerged as a result in tattoo parlours and runways as far as Barcelona. Such designs have been so characteristic that T-shirts bearing a local triad logo (with ironic intent) have been produced en masse for sale in Chinese New Year fairs, and for years now the tattooed triad teen has been deemed the Brando of a younger Hong Kong generation, the bad boy you love and your parents can’t bear to see you with. With the persistent presence of triad related operations in Hong Kong, the local government decided to experiment with laws that prevent
Directing obscenities at these pieces of national pride is prosecutable by Hong Kong Law
TRIADS, TATTOOS AND TRICKY LOCAL LAWS | CHIBA ZAREEN
citizens from displaying triad logos on their bodies or apparel, or imitating a triad member. The intention behind this law is perhaps justified; in September of last year, a whopping 51000 suspected triad members were rounded up in Hong Kong, Macau and Mainland China in a massive operation, a figure that shocked the unsuspecting masses when released. This is because the Hong Kong mafia uniquely rarely meddles in the affairs of local citizens—it is only when one has a wish to gamble, take a loan or engage in prostitution that they approach the relevant triad-operated joints, which makes their presence all the more insidious. Everyone knows these joints are there, and I’ve personally passed by quite a few in my exploration of the city, but aside from the rare knife fight between one faction head and the other, citizens may experience life in Hong Kong without ever crossing paths with triad operations.
So that’s a wrap for the weird and wacky laws my little city has managed to collect over the years. For those of you who have a dragon or two swirling around your vertebrae, and wish to visit Hong Kong though, don’t worry. Firstly, the aforementioned triad-related law is rarely enforced, and secondly, it’s highly unlikely that your Dragon or Smaug-lookalikes resemble specific triad designs in any way. Thirdly, if on the off chance they do, cover up, but know that that’s going to be tough in our humid seasons (which is really 3 seasons out of a possible 4). But don’t you dare swear at our pandas while you’re here—or God help you as Chinese wrath descends in full force upon your unsuspecting soul.
CHIBA, ZAREEN @Zarcchi
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