Travels with my beard

After the 7 July London bombings could growing a beard completely change the way people treated a British Asian? There was only one way to find out. It was a week after 7 July and I'd just got on an east London bus. I was on my way to buy razors as I hadn't shaved for days.

A couple of stops later a middle-aged Rasta guy got on, sat down next to me and asked: "So how's it feel brethren?" "Erm, how's what feel?" I replied. "How's it feel now it's your turn to be bottom of the pile?" he said.
More From the BBC

General Idi Amin Dada

The documentary, General Idi Amin Dada was directed by Barbet Schroeder who also directed Koko. Idi Amin, this hefty Ugandan tyrant is certainly a charismatic and talkative fellow. At times he talks and talks and put the rope around his very neck, saying some very strange and stilly things to accommodate his appetite for power and attention.

More on Idi Amin and Barbet Schroeder from Criterion Collection.

THE TRIALS OF HENRY KISSINGER

Synopsis:
THE TRIALS OF HENRY KISSINGER, a documentary based on the book by British journalist Christopher Hitchens, argues that Kissinger, the former U.S. Secretary of State and the recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, was a power-hungry warmonger responsible for massive military cover-ups in Vietnam, Cambodia, and East Timor in the 1960s, as well as the assassination of a Chilean leader in 1970. The film includes interviews with historians, political analysts, and such notable journalists as the New York Times' William Safire--a former speech writer for Richard Nixon. In addition, it uses archival footage from the Nixon era, including coverage of events both in Washington and in Vietnam. With narrator Brian Cox guiding the flow of the film and keeping it tightly focused on its arguments, THE TRIALS OF HENRY KISSINGER is shocking in its political revelations and fascinating in its portrait of Kissinger. It was directed by Eugene Jarecki and written by Alex Gibney. Synopsis from Rottentomatoes

Check out:
Road to Guantanamo
Arundhati Roy's Come September

Mumia Abu-jamal: A Case for Reasonable Doubt?

A Case for Reasonable Doubt?
A Journalist / Cab Driver serving time on death row,
a dead Police Officer and the city of Philadelphia.

The documentary looks at both sides of the case, but lean towards one more than the other. In 1981, Mumia Abu Jamal was convicted for the murder of a white police officer in the city of Philadelphia. The officer's name is Daniel Faulkner. Jamal is now serving time on death row. He always claimed his innocence yet never offered an explanation/statement of what exactly occurred on that deadly night. One of the many problems facing the case against Jamal are his witnesses, more that half of the eyewitnesses that night are dubious characters changing their stories along the way as a life lay in wait. Another part of the puzzle is Jamal's brother who was involved in the incident yet is missing altogether from the documentary.

The documentary makes a very convincing case against the evidence of the prosecution, the story brought forth by the prosecution were either coerced or thin air creation of the officers involved with the investigation. One of the officers said Abu Jamal made an open confession while in the hospital on the night in question, yet the attending physician said no such confession took place while he was present.

Mumia certainly has a lot to say, and a number of people seems to think what is on his mind is harmful and risky. However, he is the author of a few books and a journalist for NRP. A lot of his work is very accessible and can be found online.

If you have some more time:
Live from Death Row
All Things Censored with Alice Walker
Death Blossoms: Reflections from a Prisoner of Conscience

Audio:
MUMIA ABU-JAMAL
All Things Censored Volume 1
Appearing on the disc also: Howard Zinn and Alice Walker among others.

Coolies - How Britain Reinvented Slavery

Another exceptional documentary from the BBC. The documentary follow the recruitment of Collies (Indians) from Calcutta India to the Caribbean (Guyana and Fiji) and then to South Africa. Slavery was officially abolished, yet the Empire where the sun never sets found a way to work around the horrors of Slavery with another shameful practice, Indentured Servants.

Over a million Indians were taken from their homes and spread across the British Empire to work on the sugar plantations.

There are highlights of Gandhi and the work he began in South Africa as a young lawyer. The documentary also include and interview with Gandhi's great grand daughter, Dhupelia Mesthrie and David Dabydeen whose grandfather was recruited to work on the plantations.