I've been home for a few weeks now, and I've been compiling a list in my head of all the things that remind me of Palestine.
-Going to the grocery store (which is massive) and seeing large, perfect produce.
-Driving on bumpy streets in New Orleans and thinking we're going over the little speed bumps before a checkpoint.
-Seeing earth-tone jeeps and assuming they're full of armed soldiers
-Giving in to all the Arabic words that still falling off my tongue....tayeb, ok, bas...insh'allah, wallahi, yalla!
-That's all I can think of right now.
This song-posting thing has been good. The quality of my posts have gone down (can I blame the change in location?) but I'm taking pride in being consistant.
Today's song was going to be Keane-This is the Last Time, which I listened to on the way to have coffee with Ed. We talked about the soccer team film I'm going to start tomorrow, and the website I'm starting. He advised me not to get sucked into two tendancies, 1) to normalize the relationship between Palestinians and Israelis, i.e. portray them on equal footing, and 2) to throw too much praise on the international or Israeli activists and ignore the Palestinians. He likened that to Avatar. I likened it to The Help, because a lot of people criticized it for fawning over a white heroine during the Civil Rights era. Then I asked if there's enough value to that, to portraying a member of the priviliged society changing sides. Is that more inspiring to the privileged and humanizing to the Other than a story told purely about the Other?
There is value in both. There is also value in recycling formulas because that's where the money and the attention is.....
Anyway, he recommend Dances with Wolves, which my dad has always been telling me to see. It's in our cabinet.
Today I saw two new movies, Moonrise Kingdom and Brave. Moonrise Kingdom was great. What was the gist? Questioning who is sane and who is insane? The second half was pretty surreal (as Wed Ansderson is known to make it) so the answer would be.....who cares?
Brave was cute. Not very memorable, though. And I love Emma Thompson to death, but a British voice as the Scottish mother? I do respect the hell out of whoever animated that red hair....
At 10 I came home and grouted the bathroom floor. Rather, I tested the new grout color and my mom encouraged me to finish it all tonight. It took about three hours. It would've taken way longer if my mom and dad hadn't helped me rotate clean sponges. Toward the end we got to singing show tunes.
It was quarter to two when we finished. I went outside to help my dad rinse the buckets and tools. It was raining.
My hands feel like clay. I'm so excited to seal that grout and be done! And start the soccer film tomorrow. Which I'll be waking up for in four hours. Hopefully that'll kickstart me out of this nocturnal life...
-Going to the grocery store (which is massive) and seeing large, perfect produce.
-Driving on bumpy streets in New Orleans and thinking we're going over the little speed bumps before a checkpoint.
-Seeing earth-tone jeeps and assuming they're full of armed soldiers
-Giving in to all the Arabic words that still falling off my tongue....tayeb, ok, bas...insh'allah, wallahi, yalla!
-That's all I can think of right now.
This song-posting thing has been good. The quality of my posts have gone down (can I blame the change in location?) but I'm taking pride in being consistant.
Today's song was going to be Keane-This is the Last Time, which I listened to on the way to have coffee with Ed. We talked about the soccer team film I'm going to start tomorrow, and the website I'm starting. He advised me not to get sucked into two tendancies, 1) to normalize the relationship between Palestinians and Israelis, i.e. portray them on equal footing, and 2) to throw too much praise on the international or Israeli activists and ignore the Palestinians. He likened that to Avatar. I likened it to The Help, because a lot of people criticized it for fawning over a white heroine during the Civil Rights era. Then I asked if there's enough value to that, to portraying a member of the priviliged society changing sides. Is that more inspiring to the privileged and humanizing to the Other than a story told purely about the Other?
There is value in both. There is also value in recycling formulas because that's where the money and the attention is.....
Anyway, he recommend Dances with Wolves, which my dad has always been telling me to see. It's in our cabinet.
Today I saw two new movies, Moonrise Kingdom and Brave. Moonrise Kingdom was great. What was the gist? Questioning who is sane and who is insane? The second half was pretty surreal (as Wed Ansderson is known to make it) so the answer would be.....who cares?
Brave was cute. Not very memorable, though. And I love Emma Thompson to death, but a British voice as the Scottish mother? I do respect the hell out of whoever animated that red hair....
At 10 I came home and grouted the bathroom floor. Rather, I tested the new grout color and my mom encouraged me to finish it all tonight. It took about three hours. It would've taken way longer if my mom and dad hadn't helped me rotate clean sponges. Toward the end we got to singing show tunes.
It was quarter to two when we finished. I went outside to help my dad rinse the buckets and tools. It was raining.
My hands feel like clay. I'm so excited to seal that grout and be done! And start the soccer film tomorrow. Which I'll be waking up for in four hours. Hopefully that'll kickstart me out of this nocturnal life...
