Pho Keene Great – Opens Tomorrow March 8th at 3pm!
With less than one day before it opens its doors to the public, Pho Keene Great, the new Keene Vietnamese restaurant in the heart of downtown, has become a viral international news story after the new city manager, Elizabeth Dragon targeted the restaurant during the holidays for its “offensive and not appropriate” name.
Owner Isabelle Rose didn’t back down in the face of the city’s attempt to intimidate her and the media coverage quickly spread across the globe, with readers and viewers outraged at the oppressive, humorless “City of Keene”. Though the city manager had originally demanded Rose meet with her about the sign, the meeting never happened. Within three weeks of the original story breaking, the city people backed down and the “offensive” sign was approved and installed.
Thanks to the viral story, Pho Keene Great t-shirts, hats and bumper stickers have been selling fast at official vendor Route 101 Local Goods as people who do have a sense of humor wanted to show their support of the as-yet-unopened Vietnamese restaurant, from as far away as Australia and Afghanistan. Even celebrities like magician and comedian Penn Jillette got in on the fun.
Isabelle Rose, at her food truck in 2016.
All of this with most people never having had the food itself! I say most because many in the Keene area know exactly what to expect from Pho Keene Great when they open their doors to the public for the first time at 3pm tomorrow afternoon (Friday March 8th). Rose had in the last few years run her own Vietnamese pho food truck which had been located outside Route 101 Local Goods in Keene. The pho noodle soup was delicious and she accepted cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin as payment!
Now with a newly renovated kitchen, stocked bar, and full staff behind her, Rose is ready to graduate from her successful dream of running her own food truck to the next level – running a sit-down restaurant. I’m excited to see this all coming together for her, and a lot of it is thanks to the bumbling City of Keene making itself look like petty tyrants on the world stage (again).
Shortly thereafter, imam Will Coley was interviewed by WKBK‘s morning talk show host, Dan Mitchell. The interview is very good and you can listen to it here:
As of last week, Coley has launched a weekday afternoon drive talk radio show, “Call to Freedom” on Keene-based LRN.FM – the Liberty Radio Network. LRN.FM is a 24/7 streaming audio network heard online and on free-to-air satellite internationally. Coley’s new weekday show along with longtime nighttime show “Free Talk Live“, (on which Coley is a frequent co-host) are also both simulcast in HD video via the brand new LRN.FM Twitch channel.
Join our new Discord at http://discord.lrn.fm!
Call to Freedom features a daily Crypto Hour, where all the conversation is focused on the world of cryptocurrency. Also, throughout the full three hour show per day, listeners have a chance to win cryptocurrency giveaways if they hear either a faucet sound effect, or a satellite targeting sound effect. You can listen live to LRN.FM from 4-7pm Eastern, Monday through Friday and call in to win free internet money at 603-283-6160. The show also features plenty of libertarian opinions on the issues with a rotating set of co-hosts including several area libertarian personalities as well as remote hosts including crypto-expert Aria DiMezzo aka, “the Anarchist Shemale” and attorney/wrestling manager Thom Gray.
The rapport between the hosts of the show is excellent and Coley’s sense of humor and energy is outstanding. Be sure to listen live on LRN.FM, or later on via their podcast.
Also, LRN.FM recently launched a Discord where you can text or voice chat with other listeners and hosts, so be sure to join us on the new Discord at Discord.LRN.FM!
The doors were finally opened at 659 Marlboro Rd in Keene to the Masjid al Latiff and Interfaith Community Center (MALIC Center) this Friday afternoon for Prayer of Jummah, Islam’s congregational Friday prayer. As the first full-time Masjid in NH, the MALIC Center is open for all five prayers per day including Fajr (dawn), Zuhr (midday), Asr (afternoon), Maghrib (sunset), and Isha (night).
For those unfamiliar with the Quran, in one memorable part Muhammad successfully negotiated with God, at Moses’ insistence, the number of daily prayers from fifty down to five.
Should they wish to pray at the Keene Masjid, Muslims of all denominations are welcome, so long as they remain at peace towards the others. In addition, non-Muslims are welcome to attend. All attendees will be required to remove their shoes before entering the Masjid. Prayer times adjust based on the sun throughout the year and will be updated on the Masjid’s facebook page and also on a poster on-site.
Dr. Ahmad Alabaddi delivers the inaugural khutbah (sermon) at the MALIC Center.
At Friday’s Jummah, the khutbah (sermon) was given by Dr.
Ahmad Alabaddi, a local dentist. Dr. Alabaddi expressed much gratitude for the new location and opportunity:
“I can’t explain how much happiness, in my heart, and for our community. Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta’ala (The most glorified, the most high.) sent us brother Will and the people who gave us this very generous gift… This is all qadar. It’s fate from Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta’ala. I would like to thank everyone who contributed to this facility. I will mention something that might make some of you mad, but I have to say it… Most of the donation for this facility came from a non-Muslim. We respect that. We thank them very much and we will extend our hands, our hearts, our arms out for them if they need any help. And this is what Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta’ala and Islam told us and indicated to us what to do. I mean, we have to treat everyone in a nice way, Muslims and non-Muslims. (Muhammad) is a big example of that. He never mistreated anyone regardless of his religion, beliefs, color, race, or whatsoever. And this is what Islam is about.”
Will Coley, Imam of the soon-to-open MALIC Center in Keene, NH recently made the mistake of asking permission to put up a sign for the mosque he’s opening in Keene. Realizing that asking for permission only gives bureaucrats reasons to create hoops to jump and fees to pay, Will went in to inform them he intends to move ahead with or without their permission slip, per the freedom of speech and religion.
During the interaction one particularly rude bureaucrat insults me and then issues an even bigger insult to Will, as a Muslim. She actually asserts that he smells of alcohol, a ridiculous claim, given it’s been over a decade since he’s drank any. Here’s the full video of his interactions with authoritarian bureaucrats on Thursday afternoon:
With the story already hitting the one of the Sentinel’s front pages yesterday, it’s already looking like the people calling themselves the “City of Keene” are going to be an international laughingstock again! With such insulting and threatening behavior not long after suffering defeat after defeat, all the way to the NH Supreme Court in the Robin Hood case where they tried and failed to crush the free speech of activists who have rescued thousands of motorists from parking tickets.
Enjoy the video and subscribe to FreeKeene.com for the latest on the MALIC Center and any further threats or aggression from the city gang.
I’m happy to announce that in the last two weeks not only did we exceed the goal, but also the total number of contributors increased over 40% to over 130. The repairs and upgrades of the house in question that will become the Masjid al Latiff and Interfaith Community Center are ongoing and being covered by both the Shire Free Church and the MALIC Center together. Due to the additional work required, Will has bumped up the goal of his fundraiser to $15,000. While he’ll certainly accept donations in US Dollars, he’s hoping to finish out the fundraiser with cryptocurrencies and become the first mosque in the world to open with half their budget consisting of cryptocurrencies like bitcoin. Based on our research, it may be the first publicly known bitcoin-accepting mosque in the world. If you know of another, please post in the comments.
Keene’s Bitcoin Community is Front Page News!
“We don’t want to feed the war machine in any way” – Will Coley
Will explained in an interview for Free Keene, that as a peace-oriented religion, using bitcoin is a great way to avoid feeding the violent federal government, since cryptocurrencies decentralize the power of money into the people’s hands. Current bitcoin donations to the fundraiser have gone towards electronics purchases for running live video from the mosque. Soon, bitcoin will be spent on contractors for upcoming improvements to the property. Will describes Keene as a “bitcoin community” and says that he loves how easy it is to spend bitcoin in Keene. (Keene is the as-yet-undisputed number one city in the world for bitcoin-accepting businesses per capita.)
Thus far in the fundraiser Will has received over one bitcoin and some DASH and ether, totaling around $5,000 in cryptocurrencies. Should you wish to give, the bitcoin donation address is 14eFNWDcAhNeT4HPwd7ps2CcAAz7u68ABP
Stay tuned here to Free Keene for more on the MALIC Center’s upcoming launch. There’s no date set at the moment.
