Raymon spokesman is interviewed by Maja:

– The park’s homeless are moving towards a new cold winter while the house is only until maturity. We want to focus on this and will see that justice triumphs, „said Raymon.

– How long will you go on?

– We are here as long as we can. The plans are to start up a cafe and have opportunities for sleeping upstairs, „he says.

– What about the ownership of the municipality?
– What we are doing is illegal but not immoral. The question is rather whether it is right for them to just let the house deteriorate. Is profit more important than human rights, he asks?

Earlier this morning we saw the police several times outside the building.

-Do you think they ‚ll come back?

– We hope not, but we will be here until we get thrown out!

As you have seen in the park and in the news, the House is occupied by 10-15 youngsters who claim that their main goal is to give shelter to the homeless of the park. Later tonight I will make an interview with Raymon, the spokesman of the occupants.

I met these four women with their pranks, heading for the park. This is how we want to use our park, one of the women tells me. They all have friends or neighbours who have had bad experiences in the park the last month. -„What is going on and where is the police“? they ask.

Photo: Skeddy_in_NYC

As you´ve probably read in the newspapers the last months, several companies are investing and building new businesses north of Green Park. Now the City Council wants to solve some of the traffic problems by building a parking area which will extend into the Green Park area. See an extract from the City Council web page below. And give us your opinion!!

– Maja

NEXT CITY COUNCIL:
Will assign 30 000 € to new car park by Green Park

In its next meeting the City Council will discuss an advancement in the proposal of assigning 30 000 € to the planning of a new parking by Green Park.

Sam Williams 
Published: 22.07.2009
 Updated: 23.07.2009

In its next meeting Wednesday 29th of July at 09.00 the City Council will discuss the following matter:

The assignment of 30 000 € to the planning of a new parking by Green Park.

The business area north of Green Park will in the next ten years grow with 3000 m2. The traffic and parking situation in the area is bad and creates dangerous situations daily. To prevent problems in the coming construction work in the area, this situation needs to be solved before the works start.

The City Council will discuss a proposal of assigning 30 000 € to the planning, purchasing of land, soil tests and preparative work for the car park. The proposal suggests that 250 m2 of Green Park is given to the project. The preparative work shall due to the plan be finished by November 2009.

See the documents of the case 


(link)

I have made a copy of a feature in the City West Magazine about security in the park.

We are two female immigrants educated as an economist and a lawyer respectively, in our home countries. Maja has encouraged us to identify the difficulties for immigrant women with foreign education to get the jobs we are qualified for in our town.

We have applied for jobs over a long period of time. First we tried in the fields in which we are educated, economy and law, but without success. Afterwards we have tried almost everything. We read the advertisements in the papers and send our CVs and applications weekly.

Some of the obstacles we meet are:

– Some employers say that language is crucial: they only want employers who speak the native language fluently.

– Others refer to cultural difficulties, and implies that we havent got the right background to understand and handle different challenges in the job.

– One employer was interested, but as he got to know that Leylah insisted on using her hijab at work, she got a turndown.

;

Do you readers have any comments and advice?

Leylah and Carissa

Photo: Chrisschuepp

On the 6.th of October there will be a party for our seniors in the park. We will give you more information later on. Stay tuned and clean your dancing shoes, or at least your picnic basket : )

The lonely death of Ms. Smith has shocked a lot of people in our neighbourhood, and today three elderly ladies, Ms. Schneider, Ms. Rivera and Ms. Kleiber, came to me with this letter in which they want to share their thoughts. – Maja

Dear park visitors,

Yesterday´s news has made a deep impact on us as members of the older generation in our park. We therefore want to share some of our thoughts on this tragedy that happened to poor Ms. Smith. Our hope is that we can prevent this from ever happening again.

We are three elderly ladies who all live close to the park and meet here every day to chat and enjoy its beautiful environment. Two of us are widows, so we feel very lucky to know each other and share many interests. If one of us does not turn up we contact her to hear if there is something wrong.

Ms. Smith did not come to the park every day, but always brought bread for the ducks or used to sit by the fountain reading her book. She was always friendly, but kept to herself, and the last months we have seen little of her. She aged a lot this last year and did not look very well. We often mentioned this between us, but never went over to ask how she really was. Now this makes us terribly sad, and we realise that even though we must have known to ourselves that she was very lonely, we were not willing to let this concern us.

There are other people like Ms. Smith in our local society, young and old people who don´t have friends and family around them. We feel it´s important to remind all of us that we as individuals have a responsibility towards our fellow human beings. Let´s do our share to take care of the less fortunate amongst us.

Last but not least we want to give our thanks to this charming, young lady, Maja, who has started this initiative.

With kind regards,

Ms. Schneider, Ms. Rivera and Ms. Kleiber

Have a look at this, girls! – Maja

Ayanna Abdi will hold a creative writing course for girls in the Civic Center throughout the autumn. You need no previous experience with creative writing, and the course addresses all levels.

Ayanna Abdi is a 25- year old writer living in our neighborhood, of Somali background. In September she published her first book, “My Soul`s Home”, which has received very good critics nationally. Abdi also writes for the Independent News.

You need to register in the Civic Center by 23. September. The course is free.
Age group: 12 – 16 years old.