The thought-provoking ‘tooth fairy palace’
In the chilly studio of Liverpool-based artist Gina Czarnecki, a fantasy palace has taken shape.
It is a riot of towers and tendrils, resembling something out of Harry Potter or Lord of the Rings.
It has been christened the Tooth Fairy Palace, but like many fairy tales, all is not as it seems as it has been designed to raise awareness about stem cell research and its implications.
The palace will gradually become encrusted with real teeth - the teeth of children.
Amazing! Click the photo to read the rest of the article.
Over the last four years, at least 400 African children have been abducted and trafficked to the UK and rescued by the British authorities, according to figures obtained by the BBC. It is unclear how they are smuggled into the country but a sinister picture is emerging of why.
Whether it is through leaflets handed out in High Streets or small ads in local newspapers, witch-doctors and traditional African spiritual healers are becoming ever more prominent in Britain.
The work many of them do is harmless enough, but there is evidence that some are involved in the abuse of children who have been abducted from their families in Africa, and trafficked to the UK.
According to Christine Beddoe, director of the anti-trafficking charity Ecpat UK, a cultural belief in the power of human blood in so-called juju rituals is playing a part in the demand for African children.
“Our experience tells us that traffickers can be anybody. They can be people with power, people with money or people involved in witchcraft,” she explains.
“Trafficking can involve witch-doctors and other types of professionals in the community who are using those practices.”
Click the link to read more on this disturbing story.
Via the BBC
Mass Grave of Children and Llamas Found in Dune
Seen earlier this month, archaeologist Oscar Gabriel Prieto kneels by the 800-year-old skeleton of a child recently unearthed near a fishing village in Peru. The skeleton was among the bones of 42 children discovered in a shallow grave on a sand dune near the town of Huanchaquito.
Alongside the children were 76 skeletons of camelids—most likely llamas but possibly alpacas—perhaps intended to transport the victims to the afterlife, researchers say.
Prieto’s team suspects the children were killed as part of a religious ceremony by the Chimú culture. Famed for irrigation advances, the Chimú occupied the northern and central coasts of Peru from about A.D. 1100 to 1500, when the culture was conquered by its neighbors, the Inca.
The newfound mass grave is just over half a mile (a kilometer) from the ancient Chimú capital of Chan Chan.
“That’s what makes this so interesting. Up to this point, all the Chimú ritual sacrifices and ceremonies in this area were made within Chan Chan,” said Prieto, an archeology graduate student at Yale University.
“Now it’s clear that they were using the landscape” in their rituals as well. The team thinks the children and animals may have been sacrificed as part of a fertility ritual associated with the ocean.
“In the north coast of Peru, the ocean is very closely tied to agriculture,” Prieto said, “because the temperature of the water can determine whether there will be rain or not.”
(Also see “Ancient Tomb Found in Mexico Reveals Mass Child Sacrifice.”)
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