Ramadhan mubarak everyone!

I know I talked about weaning in the last post, but Mahmoud Darwish's "Identity Card" is important and I feel like posting it.

"Record! I am an Arab/I work with my comrades toiling in the quarry/I have eight children/For whom I eke out a loaf of bread, clothes and notebooks from the rock/I don't seek charities from your door/And I do not belittle myself before your court doorsteps/Are you angry?

"Record! I am an Arab/I am a name without a surname/Patience in a country in which everyone lives in anger/My roots...Anchored before the birth of time/Before the opening of the epochs/Before the cypress and the olives/Before the sprouting of the grass/My father is from a family of plowers, not from the noble lords/My grandfather was a fella of no worth/My house, a watchman's hut of branches and reeds/Are you satisfied with my status? I am a name without a surname!

"Record! I am an Arab/Hair color: charcoal/Eye color: brown/And my distinguishing features: On my head a band on top of a kuffiyeh/Callouses on my palm like the rock/It scars that which molests it/The tastiest that I like by way of food, the olive and the zatar/My address: I am from a forgotten village...desolate/Its streets nameless/All its men in the field and the quarry...

"Are you angry? Record, I am an Arab/You have stolen the orchards of my ancestors/A land I used to cultivate/Normal children and I/You didn't leave it to us/Except these rocks/Will your government take them?

"So! Record...at the head of the first page/I do not hate anybody/Nor do I attack anyone/But when I am hungry I eat the flesh of my violence/Beware...beware...of my hunger and my anger."

MEXICAN HOME COOKING

On a different note, I was talking to Francisco today and somehow we got on the topic of food. He told me he grows nopales (cactus) in his yard, and how you can put nopales in salad or cook them with chorizo. And how he boils cow lips with garlic until they're tender and the skin comes right off, then eats them with steamed tortillas and a salsa of tomatillos and cilantro. I'm not used to eating animal organs and innards, but for some reason it sounds reeeeeeeally good. And it's ecological, because you make the fullest use of the cow.

Currently Listening Baghdad Blues By Various Artists see related

I've decided to wean myself from Xanga. Not totally stop it...just not write in it as often. I-House is friggin' awesome, I love it here, but honestly do I need to write about it in an online journal? In my heart, I will always treasure the memories of Emilia, Josephine, Shani, Kirubi, Marloes, Bilal, Michael, Kenneth, Michelle, Yui, Raymond, 'Ads, Faruq, Rajni, Alex, Tate, Catalina, Hormozd, Rachel, La, Royceleen, Julian, Aiwa, Alessandro, and everyone else I'll come across in this old Moorish building.

Like Sadaf...when I feel like it's REALLY important, I'll write. I just don't feel the need to record every microsecond of life. That's what griots and oral history are for. I'm not trying to be judgmental, because if other people want to write nonstop in their lj's then why not? It's their business, their right. I just think I've been caught up in the lj phenomenon for too long. And Facebook, and Myspace...lordy it's addictive.

Until next time, inshallah!

Currently Listening Dirty Dancing: Original Soundtrack From The Vestron Motion Picture By Various Artists see related

I don't like interviews  I talked out of my ass today at Glide, completely botched the meaning of "civil society" (don't ask).  I don't really care at this point...they're gonna let me know on Friday if I'm hired or not.

So...Hurricane Katrina. Should I donate blood in Oakland this weekend? I think I will. I don't watch TV at I-House, but my dad says they keep saying the same shit over and over on the news, repeating words like "looting" and "anarchy" and "missing". Cripes. Even Peggy Noonan, a conservative columnist (I think for Wall Street Journal) thinks Bush fucked up, that he should be helping his fellow Americans instead of deploying all these troops to Mesopotamia.

I like the way one guy at the I-House described Katrina: "America likes to put on this facade that we're a rich first-world country, where nobody goes to bed hungry and epidemics of cholera simply don't happen. The hurricane simply washed that facade away and exposed what's really wrong with this country." Right on!

I-House is so much fun that Kshama (my roommate from last year) visited and now wants to live here! It's been a good senior year so far, WAY better than last year (knock on wood, knock on wood). Well, it's been good for some people. This woman that I've known for 15+ years, apparently she had a breakdown and is in a mental hospital . I hope she's okay.

I've been busy but not too stressed...Econ and Arabic, tobacco prevention, applying for an internship at Glide (the director told me to come down for an interview on Tuesday ). Making time for friends and family of course...

Okay I'm just rambling now. Rambling about ambitions and aspirations and it's already 6:42 pm. Now it's 6:44. Where did all the time go? See, senior year is literally going by before my eyes. 6:45. Must get off, get off...(ew, not like that).

I'm at the International House...it's great. My roommate's from Sweden, we met a grad student from Kenya at dinner tonight, and this week I'm gonna show them around Berkeley. And this weekend we're going on a retreat in Sonoma

Man, I need to get a job lined up after I graduate! Something in the non-profit sector...the pay isn't great but supposedly the benefits are better than a job in the private sector...I guess that's the trade-off. I'm gonna need that medical coverage for my Paxil  

Ooooooooooooooh, speaking of the private sector has anyone seen that Frontline special on private warriors in Iraq? Dude, this war in Iraq is OUTSOURCED and PRIVATISED! Those four soldiers who were charred beyond recognition and strung up on a bridge in Fallujah were mercenaries from Halliburton or somewhere. These corporations are making $$$$$$$ off of "rebuilding" the Fertile Crescent (yeah right) and they have their own private armies. The US military contracts out to catering companies and shit...like these army bases in Iraq have fast food chains, etc. It's so fucking unbelievable!!!!!!!!!

If you're not outraged by this, you need to be strung up on a bridge.