Je suis Charlie

Wednesday's usually my night to relax and cocoon. Now that Christmas and New Year's have passed, I'm settling back into my cosy old routine, with a twist: instead of tea on my night table, I've brewed myself a cup of delightfully dark decaf, and added a square of Lindt chocolate to complete the experience. A heavenly combination.

What's going down otherwise?

In the world culinary, I've found two recipes to test over the next few days: hunter stew and roasted butternut squash soup, both of which I discovered thanks to Paleo Grubs.

And now for more serious news... On the way home from work today, I saw a group of quiet but determined people, some wearing or bearing white signs, on the steps of the Vancouver Art Gallery and in the square immediately before it. The VAG -- gotta love the acronym -- is often the site of peaceful demonstrations. This time, a sombre atmosphere pervaded the square. There were candles glowing here and there in the small crowd, as if this were a vigil commemorating the victims of a mass murder. The language I heard as I passed by was French. When I came near enough to make out the words on a sign, I saw it read, JE SUIS CHARLIE.

A few hours later, sitting at my computer, I've discovered what the vigil meant. From what I can gather, three Islamic terrorists gunned down 12 employees of a satirical Paris weekly called Charlie Hebdo because... get this: the magazine published cartoons that made fun of the Prophet Muhammad.

I'm not generally a fan of publications that lampoon religion, and definitely not when the motive is malice pure and simple. But I have to hand it to CH, and especially to the cartoonists and journalists who lost their lives because they had the guts to point out what's wrong with fundamentalist Islam. It doesn't strike me as a faith at all, in the positive sense of the word, but rather as a cruel and humorless ideology that needs to be laughed at.

Props to CH and its brave staff, and to the people who assembled the world over to show their support for the freedom of speech.