Subway Poetry

I was in a T stop I frequent regularly the other day, minding my own business, when something caught my eye. I was walking under the staircase/escalators, and carved into the bricks on the floor was a poem!

I'M nobody! Who are you?
Are you nobody, too?
Then there ’s a pair of us—don’t tell!
They’d banish us, you know.

How dreary to be somebody!
How public, like a frog
To tell your name the livelong day
To an admiring bog!

- Emily Dickinson

Wait? Emily Dickinson on the T? What a lovely surprise!

Adventures in Microsoft Land

A while back I went to the computer lab at school, in a rush to print my paper. I opened my document in MS Word, but the application looked totally foreign. Unbeknownst to me they had installed Office 2007! I couldn't figure out where anything was. Like, where did the menus go?! How do I print? Ouch. Luckily, I hit ctrl-p and moved on with my life.

Fast-forward to today. I was again in the computer lab, this time waiting while some research-related articles printed. I had literally nothing to do while I waited. So I opened Word, played around a bit, then went to Help. I figured I might as well learn a bit about how it works since this issue is likely to arise again at some point. I did a few searches, and found the manual for the information I was looking for. So I figured I'd read it. (Aside: What? You don't sit around reading software manuals when you're bored?! Stop laughing!) Anyways, I clicked on the link, but no go. To read the information I want, I need Flash 7.0. And no, I can't install it on a school computer, not being an administrator and all! Foiled again!

My newest hobby...

...calling the management of buildings on my street that have not shoveled their sidewalks to tell them that the icy sidewalks are a public health hazard and criminally negligent.

Seriously, if I'm gonna live in the cold inhospitable northeast, I at least don't want to risk death-by-ice walking to the subway! Is that too much to ask?!

Meet Brijit

I want to introduce you to a friend. Brijit is a new web-based resource, created by a friend of mine in DC.

Basically, the idea is this: we're smart educated people who like to know and read about what’s interesting in the world, but we don’t have time to actually read all those sources that we’d like to. What we need is someone to tell us which stories are most worth reading. Brijit aims to fill this role. This is more than an RSS feed. While it is fully rooted in the age of online media, it is equally based on human input. Real people read a myriad of articles and write qualitative summaries along with rankings to help you choose those articles of most interest. It’s a pretty awesome concept. So, check it out. And tell your friends!

PS. Brijit is still a work in progress; if you have constructive feedback they would very much like to hear from you.

Transcontinental Haftarah

Some 2,990 miles, and three time zones apart, my mother and I read the same haftarah this morning, in shuls with the same name! This is something we are both, separately, learning how to do. It was kind of nice to know that we were both doing this today.

I’ve been leyning for several years, but didn’t learn haftarah trope till recently when I decided to teach myself as a procrastination technique when I was avoiding research papers. Yes, I am decidedly a nerd!

(Okay, so I did read torah and haftarah at my bat mitzvah many moons ago, but at the time I was really not able to learn the trope. Funny how at a later age I learned it effortlessly. I was just ready.)

I think I prefer torah reading to haftarah. As someone commented to me recently, it’s sexier! It’s also easier for me. True, you don’t have the vowels and trope in front of you, so it requires substantially more practice. But the language is easier. And much as I’d love my Hebrew to be so good that I don’t mind the poetic mumbo jumbo – at least it's reassuring to know that it’s good enough that I notice the difference! (Sort of like when I was studying for my Bat Mitzvah and my mother said that she felt good knowing that I was struggling with the words to the kaddish cause it meant I knew the difference between Hebrew and Aramaic!)

Shavuah tov!

Somber Thanks

Each year at Pesach, and to a lesser extent on Thanksgiving, my FOO (family of origin) keeps in mind peoples who are less fortunate than ourselves. Like many people, we have spent quite a bit of time talking about Darfur. But this year I’m thinking about a lesser known but even more dire conflict zone.

In the DRC (Democratic Republic of the Congo), 4 million people have died since the conflict began in 1998. That’s over 1,000 people per day. In addition to that, there are 2.4 million people displaced by the conflict, and 42 million who are suffering from food insecurity (including 17 million who are malnourished).

Despite the presence of a UN mission, this is not truly a post-conflict society. The conflict persists. The scale of the destruction is breathtaking. I know this is depressing. But it is important to know. To recognize what is happening. This is what my FOO taught me: to be grateful for what we have; to understand that there are people out there who have nothing; and to be politicized about it.

I am thankful to know that I have enough food to eat. That I have a place to live. That I am alive. These are not luxuries. Yet, for so many people, even that last and most basic human right is violated. We cannot rewind time and give these people back their lives, and more people are dying every day. Those who are not dying are in precarious situations. Please remember them.

Ode to Cilantro

I love the smell of fresh cilantro. It makes me excited for whatever I’m about to cook, and inspires me to travel more.

Okay, I know some of you have this strange inability to eat cilantro because it tastes weird to you. (So sorry! How much you miss!) But for the rest of us, cilantro is such a beautiful thing. As I was cooking the other day I commented to my roommate that cilantro is really a key ingredient for Mexican cooking; it makes a huge difference in getting an authentic flavor. She understood completely.

When I studied in Mexico some of the students I met had never encountered it before. One conversation about it (translated into English) went like this:

Other Student: What is this green herb I see on everything?
Me: How can you not know what it is?! It’s cilantro, of course.
Other student: Okay… so, what’s it called in English?
Me: Cilantro!

It wasn’t until I moved to the East Coast that I found out that lots of people call cilantro coriander. In fact, if you look up cilantro on dictionary.com the definition says “See coriander.” If you look up coriander there’s an actual definition. Funny, cause in Cali I never heard of coriander except in relation to the ground up powder from the seeds. (Similarly, I discovered that garbanzo beans are called chickpeas here. How very odd!)

The next time you’re trying to cook Mexican food, remember the cilantro. Take it from this Californian – it makes a world of difference.