How can you trip up a man running, carrying his child?

How can you trip up a man running, carrying his child? Refugee or not. How can one do that?
I don't know... I can't watch these videos and images. I mean, I can, of course; but I break inside, really! I see their faces - and I see myself instead experiencing it! How can people in some countries forget that not long ago, so many of their own, would run away and look for refuge elsewhere?
I am nowhere near the situation in which these people find themselves. I have never been. But I could have, in some way; if communism hadn't fallen, I would most likely have tried to flee. I remember speaking, when I was 16, with a Romanian actor, who tried to flee, during those bad times, but got caught and imprisoned for it. I remember him saying how hard prison was! So cold! (And that reminds me of that letter I saw this summer in Sighet again, from a poor political prisoner. who kept begging his family to send him something for the terrible cold!) But it made me wonder even then, and ever since, what would I have done? Would I risk it? I am almost sure I would.
So many just don't understand what it takes for somebody to abandon everything, and embark on this crazy journey. Sometimes with young kids. Only the dream can keep you going. Blind hope. But you have no certainty, really, of where you are heading to, what you are going to do, what you are going to find. And you go through hell, hungry, thirsty, tired with the exhaustion of 1000 people! And again. And again. And you find yourself in danger more than once, no doubt. And sometimes you run - and you try to protect your kid.
And then someone trips you up - just like that, for their own pleasure! - and you fall... on top of your child!
Think about it! In the 1930s, when so many people were trying to flee Germany and other countries, even well known personalities found it extremely hard to be accepted abroad. Never mind the "non-famous" ... Schoenberg, for example, tried to move to the UK - but he couldn't find a job or at least a publisher, despite the efforts of a British friend. He applied for a job in Australia, at the Sydney Conservatory but was rejected. The application marked with the words "dangerous ideas" and "Jewish" ...
And what was happening to some others not so "famous"?
Look:
"MS St. Louis was a German ocean liner most notable for a single voyage in 1939, in which her captain, Gustav Schröder, tried to find homes for 908 Jewish refugees from Germany, after they were denied entry to Cuba, the United States and Canada, until finally accepted in various European countries, which were later engulfed in World War II. Historians have estimated that, after their return to Europe, approximately a quarter of the ship's passengers died in concentration camps."
"America not only refused their entry but even fired a warning shot to keep them away from Florida's shores".
It is always monumentally hard being a refugee.
And today Hungary fire their own "warning shots", while other states are willing to accept only Christian refugees.
Anyway ... Enough.... Whatever...
I am one third through something for orchestra now. I call it "Refugee". It doesn't matter if it means nothing. It doesn't help with anything. But it is my way to try to ... "understand".

Rimsky-Korsakov and his beard ;)

I like Rimsky-Korsakov because:

- he had a great beard :D
- he taught his composition classes wearing military uniform (which was compulsory, for an officer)
- he became a composition teacher (and a famous orchestration master) despite not having any musical academic training. He barely knew music theory! But then, unlike the other "five", he decided to learn! And for a few years he worked really hard to prepare his lessons, while learning himself harmony, counterpoint, etc! In the end he became one of the best, most inspiring teachers there - and among his students were Prokofiev, Stravinsky Respighi, Lyadov, Glazunov, etc.
- in some ways he is one of the first "modern orchestrators". His book "Principles of Orchestration" was one of the main orchestration books for a long time. Even today I think it is one of the most inspiring books. In my opinion, nobody describes the sound, the characteristics and the potential of an instrument, better or more colorfully than he does there! It was the first orchestration book I read. I was not allowed to take it home, I remember!. I was going to the lecture hall of the city library in Brasov, for my daily meeting with ... Rimsky Korsakov. I almost copied all the book, in my notebooks, ha! I had no other option, there was no copy machine, during those times, there... And I remember those afternoons with great pleasure. It felt like I was listening to some grandfather speak about the orchestra. Not like some of the "normal" teachers at my school.

(And by the way, that music conservatory where he taught, the Saint Petersburg State Conservatory - and where so many Russian musicians studied - Tchaikovsky, Prokofiev, Shostakovich, Heifetz, Milstein, Gergiev, Mariss Jansons, etc - is called "The N. A. Rimsky-Korsakov Saint Petersburg State Conservatory"; and for good reasons!)

"El Lector"

Quite amazing this:

"Because the job of rolling cigar after cigar could become monotonous, the workers wanted something to occupy and stimulate the mind. Thus arose the tradition of "lectors", who sat perched on an elevated platform in the cigar factory, reading to the workers.
Typically, the lector would start the day reading local Spanish newspapers and some fiction, such as a romance or adventure novel. Since most residents of Ybor were very interested in politics, the lector would then usually move on to political treatises or writings about the current events in Cuba or Spain or other countries. In the afternoon, the selection was often a literary novel, such as Don Quixote or other works of classic literature. (In Nilo Cruz's Pulitzer Prize-winning play Anna in the Tropics set in Ybor City, Tolstoy's Anna Karenina is read.) Because of the lector system, even cigar workers who could not read were exposed to classic literature and were conversant on political philosophy and current events both in Ybor City and around the world.
Lectors were well respected and often highly educated. Most could look at text written in English or Italian and read it aloud in Spanish, the language of the factories." (Wikipedia)

Beethoven 4th piano concerto

So Mark Elder sees the second movement of Beethoven 4th piano concerto as Christ in front of Pontius Pilate. I just can't. I think it is much more like the old testament! Those string unisons seem to me more like the chorus in a Greek tragedy! Or like an old testament crowd, pointing accusingly to the outcast, the "sinner": the piano!
Anyway, the little piano cadenza, and those last few phrases are to me some of the most desolate music Beethoven wrote. Is there any understanding for the piano, from the strings? Any compassion? I don't think so. The piano is all alone really. Misunderstood and desolate. And it gives me the shivers!