Ahhhh! Romanians attack!

So I'm sitting at this very computer about 25 hours ago (1am) and I hear a scream coming from Stick's room followed by a thud that was obviously the sound of her leaping from her bed. Once Stick's asleep, she sleeps deeply, so I was worried thinking maybe she was sick or something. Then I hear her door open. I honestly thought that she was going to puke--why else would she be out of bed--so I went to go check on her and stop at the entryway of the hallway because she's sorta doubled over standing by her door. Great, she's sleepwalking. I know that sleepwalkers can be dangerous and extra strong, so I scream Stick's name. She looked up at me and I could tell that she was sort of asleep still because her eyes were glassy. Then she looked right at me and let out a blood-curdling scream like you've never heard before. I called for Newt just in case Stick attacked me b/c it looked like she was going to at first. As Newt comes out of her room I see that Stick's finally totally awake. Newt forcefully asked her if she was alright and she responded with mumbling. I asked her what on earth she was dreaming about and she said something about Romania...mumble...mumble...Attack... I tried hard not to laugh. But I am right now. In fact I've continued laughing since she went to bed (for the 2nd time). When I laid down to go to sleep at 5ish, I started laughing again. I woke up and I was laughing.
Newt told me today that when she woke up the Stick, she saw that she'd slept with her light on she was so freaked out. I'm laughing again. I really do feel bad for the poor kid, but my gosh it was funny. She doesn't remember her dream anymore, but all she knows is that she had to get out of her bed and room immediately. Those must have been some bad Romanians, hating on her hard core.
Now she's trying to blame it on the Blueberry Pie that she ate. I find that foul and mean. I know that she's doing it to hate on me. And that's seriously vitriolic hating on me.
But I'm going to be laughing about this until I day. Then I'm going to watch it again and again in the Big DVD in Heaven.

a great cover of a song

Sometimes the things you find on YouTube are golden. The song is actually by Mason Jennings (plug for an awesome musician), but this version of "If you ain't got love" just might be better.

SGAT Outreach Doc for Chamizal

Thanks to tons of footage taken by lots of people and Sarah Butler's help making the documentary look cool and professional, here's the 7 1/2 minute doc that we make for the Chamizal performance. They ran it before the Narciso Wednesday, Feb 28.

Este brasil brasileiro

Este brasil brasileiro
é extraordinário
“Nós somos um povo alegre.”
“O brasileiro é bom,

tão amoroso
achegado
amigo.”

Mas a verdade do meu brasil brasileiro
é supremamente ordinária
“Uma moça tão bonita

Pele clara
Olhos claros
Rica
Inteligente”

“Mas por que este menino?

Moreno,
Mas moreninho!
Pobre,
Mas pobrinho!”

Juntos são meu brasil brasileiro
Mas o brasileiro xinga,
é óbvio! O brasil não é racista!
(Mas é claro)
O brasil brasileiro
é socialista
seu status social é tudo

O que faz o meu brasil brasileiro
é o que desfaz o brasil pro brasileiro

Claro
Moreno
Rico
Pobre
Inteligente
Sem-educação

Se juntarmos todos, saem

Patrão
e
servo

Este é meu brasil brasileiro

Que é claro que já preconceberam

Shhh ... é segredo


July 21, ‘06

Meu brasil brasileiro

Meu brasil brasileiro
Dicotomia és tu
Minha percepção flutua
Entre uma veracidade bela tua
E outra, óbvia, dolorosa
Saio na orla exclamando
“Este! Este é meu brasil brasileiro.”
Saio da orla triste e ando
Gritando dum canto interior do coração
“Este. Mas este é meu brasil brasileiro.”
“Ó moça, dá um real.”
“Tácum fome, menino?
.........Vâmo pegar salgadinho.”
Chocolate e guaraná não bastam
Aqui em meu brasil brasileiro.
Nos States um guaraná me sacia
Da saudade do meu brasil brasileiro.
Mas este mesmo guaraná não satisfez
Meu brasileiro

July 21, ‘06

What's up with the respect problem??

I'm from uber-conservative Utah County. The very air we breathe is steeped in GOP-tainted gas (which might actually be leftover Geneva pollutants). The first president that I remember was Reagan and I liked him because I was a kid and he was the president. Then there was the election in '88 that really left no good option, just one okay choice, George H. W. Bush. Then came Operation Desert Storm. I actually remember President Bush discussing how we needed to protect our oil interests in the Gulf as we were so dependent on oil. Well no one wanted to send their sons and brothers to die because of crude oil, "No blood for oil." Under H. W. Bush there was the famous recession that probably wasn't really his fault, it was just the left over economic mess of Reaganomics. Ross Perot got involved in the next election and Bill Clinton was elected.
Anyway, I'm blabbing on about all of this because I'm frustrated about the hypocritical attitudes around me. After the First Gulf War and the supposed reasons for it (those poor Kuwaitis), I really had a hard time trusting H. W. I remembered how he first said that we needed to protect oil, then backed away saying that Saddam, our former friend, was a bad guy (he was) doing bad things to his own people and now the Kuwaitis. Some stories were trumped up ( Citizens_for_a_Free_Kuwait ), but whatever.

I liked Bill Clinton, even though a lot of people around here vilified him, just because he was a democrat. He was elected and was never treated with respect around here. Way before any Lewinsky anything happened, I got a three-dollar bill with Clinton's face on it ( see here ). It was okay to mock Clinton because he was who he was, at least in their eyes. I didn't fight very much on this, there wasn't really any reason to because I wouldn't have changed anyone's mind.

George W. Bush was elected and people in Utah County were giddy. It's fine, he's who they wanted. But it's a funny thing that now we're not allowed to mock--or even question!!--the president because he's our elected official and we must respect the office he holds at all costs.
Am I the only one that sees the hypocrisy in this? I respect the office of the president and that is why I question the moves the president makes (Bush, Clinton, Bush, Reagan, Carter...).
Now somehow it's a sin for me to question any move that W. makes based on the simple fact that he's in office. What would these same people have done if I'd used this argument against them 10-15 years ago? Hypocrisy, yes.
But I think it goes even deeper than that. Many people around here equate W. with Captain Moroni. Whether or not the belief is true, the result holds: they grasp onto President Bush with religious zeal. Thus they are afraid to look at facts thinking that somehow it could cause their world to fall down. Even if you believe something to be true, you can be very afraid of asking questions and finding facts because it could lead to something that's rocks your foundation. I ask questions and present doubts that rock the foundation.
Zeal can be a very scary thing indeed, especially when accompanied by a fear of learning truths and facts, and most especially a lack of desire or guts to change. A huge problem here lies in the fact that this is not about absolute truth at all, but about something as fallible as politics and politicians.

Mexico and Jail

When I got back to Provo, Kathy, Gretchen and I were talking about my trip to Mexico. I mentioned that I had been in Juárez. They looked at each other to confirm and then Kathy said that Juárez was where their dad had been put in prison at the border. There had been a confusion at the border because of the number of cars that he and his friends were taking back because one had broken down. So he got put in jail for a few days or something. This was propitious because he met his wife as they had changed the cubicle assignments in his absence and he was sitting in the wrong seat.
This reminds me of the man who was in the seat in the front of us on the airplane. Once we'd landed in SLC from Phoenix, he proceeded to talk way to loudly to his unfortunate neighbor in the row about how he should never go to Mexico. It was something about the Mexican cops wanting to put him into prison because he was simply sitting down. They were waiting to pounce on him, he insisted. What an idiot. He never wanted to visit that "dirty place again." I say that Mexico is all the better for it. Emily leaned over and said that he'd probably sat someplace marked "NO SE PUEDE SENTAR" or something, like on railroad tracks. My guess is that he was simply dumb and didn't understand what was going on. Whatever it was, I hope this man doesn't travel outside of the country again for his own protection, wouldn't want him ending up in jail. He just plays on too many stereotypes of Americans traveling abroad.

racism vs. ignorance

Today lots of crazy things have been happening with the play. I wasn't there for a large portion of it, so maybe i don't know what I'm saying. But it seems like there were a lot of hurt feelings and a lot of misunderstood intentions. The thing that i found most crazy was the fact that people were claiming racism, and not just the people who'd supposedly been on the receiving end of the perceived--or denominated--bigotry, but others who called the acts racist. Looking back on all of it, and although (thankfully) in the middle of it, the situation to me seemed to be a lot of miscommunication and confusion. A few girls were, according to the story, allowing the guys to use their make-up, but two of the actresses seemed to be on the outside looking in, both españolas. I have my doubts about this in general just because one of the guys who had make-up on is from Peru and I haven't heard any complaints from him. Could this whole situation simply be confusion that happened to fall to these two actresses?
Tonight one of the girls who has a bag of the make-up told another girl that she was sorry that there was confusion and that she was free to use the make-up whenever. It wasn't contrived either--I think. But whatever it was the most plausible answer in this situation was ignorance that there was a problem, ignorance about what the problem was and ignorance about what racism really is. Were the two girls with make-up both choosing not to let the españolas use the kit? Why? One had served in Spain on her mission! She was shocked about the accusations that were thrown back at her, the racism seemed out in left field, but what was funny about what happened was that supposedly make-up girl had told other people and that is what ticked off one of the españolas the most, the loss of face.
Ahh, so what does this come down to? Short fuses when everyone was stressed, ignorance about what people were understanding about the other person's comprehension of phrases, notions and whether it was okay to use make-up, pride about losing face and talking behind each others' backs and blaming the wrong people.
So why was the racist card claimed? Because it's the easiest. It's a marked word. i.e. it's biting; it cuts to the quick. But this time it missed the target. It's easier to say that someone hates someone else because he/she treats the other differently based on race or heritage. But it's harder, especially in this situation where we're doing a Spanish play, to say that we were all freaked out because we were feeling inadequate in our jobs and didn't know how the play and scenes were going to come off. **And a girl with a make-up bag didn't know where her stuff was and an española had left hers on the bus (conveniently glossed over or unknown by most). So why was it okay for her to claim that she was being slammed, but then it wasn't for the other girl who'd lost her stuff to get frustrated with the fact that she couldn't find her bag. We'd all be freaked out in a similar situation. I would.
Maybe, then, it's possible that racism wasn't really a factor in this as much as a cop-out. So what do we say that one of the actresses snapped at the director for talking to the actors about the set and the wet paint where it was touched up? White on White hatred? Come on; we know that's hogwash.
It is ignorance. We don't know what the other person knows or doesn't know. It was really obvious today, and no one took the time to say anything or ask anything. It seems pretty mean to claim bigotry when we just didn't have enough guts to step outside of ourselves and ask a question. What was everyone afraid of. And what's with all of this pride from the lowly and depraved looking up at the big boss man/woman above? Because there's no one up there. It's yet another false perception, and it bugs.