I believe...

I am vegan for years and I support this way of thinking with all my heart.  More than half a year ago I bought a book that I was to read and kept postponing as usual.  Its title is "The Liberation of Animals" by Peter Singer.  It helped the animal liberation movement start as the first ring at the domino chain that created a lot of animal right organizations and similar stuff groups and even helped new laws to come up in come countries about animal's fair treatment.  Today I found it in my library and I felt it was waiting for this moment.  Then I fell on a site.  The text below is not mine but I want to share it. :)

I Believe.....

I believe in Ahimsa and that we have no right to harm other animals. I believe in abolitionism and that we have no right to use and enslave any animal; human or nonhuman. I believe in nonspeciesism and that we have no right to unfair and irrelevant prejudice towards a victim based on species membership. I believe in 'Reverence for Life' and that we have no right to disrespect others as in exploiting, assaulting, and killing. I believe in 'Animal Rights' and that we have no right to deny any sentient animal the fundamental right of bodily integrity from human harm or ownership - as we generally give to all human animals, but need to extend to all other species of feeling, breathing, conscious animals, too. 


I believe in picking fresh vegetables or tree-ripened-offered fruit, and that we have no right to steal our food by believing that barbaric slaughterhouse-sourced animal flesh and secretions are food fit for consumption. Animals are not food. I believe in Truth and that we have no right to wrong others or the planet that sustains all life. I believe in the Golden Rule and that we have no right to do to other animals that which we would not want done to us. 


I believe in Love and that we have no right to exemplify such a lack of love towards other creatures; especially those who would never think of harming us. Humans oppress the helpless – because they can - not because they have to. 


I believe in Evolution and that we have no right to hinder its progress of achieving a more civilized way of living on Earth. I believe in Peace and that we have no right to inflict violence on anyone. I believe in the Vegan Ideal and that we have no right to do anything but to try to live up to it as best we can.  I'm a believer.

http://thevegantruth.blogspot.gr/search/label/I%20Believe....

mushrooms

They look so much better than in photo.  I just wonder if there is a chance to learn how to make good photos of my paintings in this lifetime or I will have to wait for the next... 

Yes, they are mushrooms at the basis of a tree in a wonderful green forest.  I wish you could see their real colors.

oil on canvas

butterfly

Color, color and more color... oh, it's never enough.  I wonder what's happening to me, it's not spring or is it? ...  I keep on disobeying a basic painting rule : never your subject at the center... haha!  I love it!

oil on canvas
6" x 6" (or 15 cm x 15 cm)

the drop

It came when I was having a bad migraine and I needed to focus on something.  I also liked the drop.  But it was just a drop.  And I decided to make it a double painting - two paintings that continue and fit to each other. I loved the result and the effect of rusty sheet of metal.  I don't know if the colors fit to the idea but I like them so much that I don't really care.

The double triangle painting...

 The upper triangle and ...

 ...the down triangle.

Oil on canvas

Painted all sides around with the continuance of the painting.

never trapped

I like this fellow.  It's my drawing option of this little bird that it is so small that can't be trapped in a cage.  He/she will be able to escape his/her phenomenal prison and fly to an other better place.  An advantage of being tiny and fluffy and cute.  Who would want to trap this fellow anyway?

oil on canvas

15 cm x 15 cm (6" x 6")

an other lady bug

I like bugs, especially on leaves.  Maybe it is the contrast between these two supplementary colors, the red of the lady and the green of the leaves.  Maybe it is the freedom this bug symbolizes for me, the freedom and the simple stress free life that I would love to live.

oil on canvas

15 cm x 15 cm (6" x 6")

shake or wave?

This is the hand of my younger daughter Katerina-Io.  It was to be a part of a challenge but I finished it too late for this.  So this is it.  Hmmm, I think I will like yellow again...

oil on canvas

15 cm x 15 cm (6" x 6")

Does size matter?

There is a coan, well known to Tao students that is used, like the other coans, to stop the mind and attain meditation state.  In fact, coan is a question that it seems that it has no answer.  The mind trying to solve the riddle reaches the state beyond thoughts, which is the desirable result.  Of course, this kind of desire is beyond desire too but that's an other story.
Back to our specific coan.  Its question says: "If everything is reduced to its unit, then its unit to what is reduced?"  Here, of course, when we say unit, we mean the smallest part of what this everything is consisted of.  So, if everything is reduced to its unit that consists it, this unit to what is reduced?  Hmmm...
I thought about this coan when I recently saw a youtube video that compares the sizes of different masses out there starting from small moons to stars to galaxies to clusters and going beyond our known observable universe of the 93.000.000.000 light years (omg!) to reach at the end the unconfirmed Omniverse, where no man has gone before and etc... This is too huge for a mind to really think about it and remain sober and sane.  But it is also a reality that we, here, take our eyes from in order to concentrate on our small and insignificant everyday trends like fashion, football and gossip.
The point to all this is that when the video reached Omniverse, I realized that it reminded me of something.  And I remembered... omniverse looks like a cell, yes, a human cell, as I had seen it in biology many years ago. And that was the moment that time froze and the objects around me got a new meaning and I was not so sure about anything in particular.  Because I also remembered the answer to our coan.  And it says: "If everything is reduced to its unit, its unit is reduced to everything"...
I call you to realize what this may mean and start counting from now the uncountable worlds above and below us that may exist this very moment according to a thought that can seize the ground where we stand and remind us that life is alive and extraordinary by nature.

my second app!

9 days ago it went out of the shell and into the apple itunes app store: my second app.  I know I am late to show my happiness for my new born baby but it was a tricky period for me and didn't feel like it.  Now some things have gone behind me and I can be myself again for ...well, I hope forever. :P
My first app was "Ελλαδάρα Quiz" and it was made in greek to test our knowledge about greek stuff in a funny and entertaining way (http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/elladara-quiz/id448996047?mt=8).



And now, my second one, "How Greek Are You?" is a hilarious app in english with 100 funny questions and many many funnier answers in our pursue to find each one's percentage of the traditional greek figure.  How Greek Are you? is not to frighten people, some, very few I would say, have no greekness at all and being 100% greek in this app I don't think is the best thing that can happen to a human, but I really love the procedure and it may prove that we have some hidden greekness the way that non greek people, and even greek ones, consider really unacceptable. But we will have fun for sure.



http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/how-greek-are-you/id508367255?mt=8 - this is where my baby born app is about 9 days now and I can't wait now to start my third one.  Sometimes I worry a bit about me, but what the heck: all things are for humans and some of them are excited and interesting and I prefer to jump and swim than sitting at the beach.
Hmm, ok, I may do some break to paint too.  I miss it terribly.

tricky fairytale

Ok, I found it while cleaning... Who said cleaning is not cool!  I am up to new drawings and paintings.  Things started moving up a bit lately and this is surely for good!  I also have some news that kept me busy lately and now will give results at last...  I will keep you wondering for some week more till my news are out and I can talk about it. :P