What's the Word?
Oh man - I am trying to write an article for a development magazine, and it just won’t come - my muse is dead. Thom Yorke can’t find it, Tool can’t find it and Damien Rice can’t find it (and I have just tried all three) - maybe I should stick to the tried and true methods and find Placebo. Or ask the guy in the next office to increase the volume on the already ridiculously loud African music he is playing!!
I love to write - almost as much as I love to read. You know that feeling where you know exactly what you want to say? When you have it all in your head and you know it is just right and your fingers are working overtime, trying to get it down on paper before is slips from your mind? I love that feeling - it is like a mini-high and I use it in a variety of means, both professional and personal. I love playing with words for different purposes and different audiences and creating something with them. I love coming up with a means of expressing a new idea - of using words to create a project design, or an email to a friend, or even a commentary on the latest Prison Break episode.
Anyway - that feeling? Is completely eluding me right now. And I have a deadline…
A few months ago, I wrote an article about Afghanistan and I showed it to my Mum. She came to talk to me about it after she read it. She made a bunch of obligatory motherly comments that I won’t bore you with, but she also said something that resonated (and I paraphrase) - “the words flowed so well, it was completely different from your blog. On your blog, you write the same way you talk. But this was so well edited etc etc.” Made me cringe for all the poor souls who plough through my blog (I was pleasantly surprised when I was home to hear how many people actually do read it). The thought of a written expression of the verbal me is a wee bit terrifying…
(Double Hee - the ipod has just landed on Big Audio Dynamite II - anyone remember these guys?!?!)
I have had a fair bit of free time on my hands since I got here, since I don’t really know anyone or places to go, yet! So I have read quite a bit and seen a couple of movies (finally starting to catch up there). I am going to recommend a few things - first of all, the book I just finished, which is Exile, by Richard North Patterson. He is one of my favourite authors and this is one of the best expressions of the Israeli/Palestinian conflict I have ever read, in an incredibly entertaining narrative. And so well researched - from both perspectives. As always, I thoroughly agree with just about everything he has to say.
Similarly, I watched both The Last King of Scotland and Blood Diamond over the past few days. Both are excellent and interesting portrayals of different aspects of African culture and history, and both rang very true for me, for different reasons. Obviously, The Last King of Scotland evokes a bloody and terrible time in Uganda’s history - I kept wondering what the Ugandans sitting in the audience with me thought of the movie - I doubt that was forefront in the movie-makers minds when they made the film, but it adds another level of poignancy. Similarly, I don’t think anyone in the crowd with me as we watched Blood Diamond could have looked at the depiction of the child soldiers in that movie, without thinking of the exact same situation occurring right now in northern Uganda - watching these children being indoctrinated and turned into killing machines was chilling, as I knew it was happening not far from me at this very moment.
On a lighter note, the gentle disparagement of humanitarian workers provoked general amusement, and Jennifer Connolly’s assessment of Leonardo DiCaprio’s character (and goodness - wasn’t that an awful Zimbabwean/South African accent!) as “not really the UNICEF type” caused quite a few chuckles. Good when we can laugh at ourselves.
I suspect there will be many posts about child soldiers, so I won’t harp on about it for the moment - just giving a foretaste of things to come.
In the meantime, I shall occupy myself with what to do tomorrow, during the public holiday…
I love to write - almost as much as I love to read. You know that feeling where you know exactly what you want to say? When you have it all in your head and you know it is just right and your fingers are working overtime, trying to get it down on paper before is slips from your mind? I love that feeling - it is like a mini-high and I use it in a variety of means, both professional and personal. I love playing with words for different purposes and different audiences and creating something with them. I love coming up with a means of expressing a new idea - of using words to create a project design, or an email to a friend, or even a commentary on the latest Prison Break episode.
Anyway - that feeling? Is completely eluding me right now. And I have a deadline…
A few months ago, I wrote an article about Afghanistan and I showed it to my Mum. She came to talk to me about it after she read it. She made a bunch of obligatory motherly comments that I won’t bore you with, but she also said something that resonated (and I paraphrase) - “the words flowed so well, it was completely different from your blog. On your blog, you write the same way you talk. But this was so well edited etc etc.” Made me cringe for all the poor souls who plough through my blog (I was pleasantly surprised when I was home to hear how many people actually do read it). The thought of a written expression of the verbal me is a wee bit terrifying…
(Double Hee - the ipod has just landed on Big Audio Dynamite II - anyone remember these guys?!?!)
I have had a fair bit of free time on my hands since I got here, since I don’t really know anyone or places to go, yet! So I have read quite a bit and seen a couple of movies (finally starting to catch up there). I am going to recommend a few things - first of all, the book I just finished, which is Exile, by Richard North Patterson. He is one of my favourite authors and this is one of the best expressions of the Israeli/Palestinian conflict I have ever read, in an incredibly entertaining narrative. And so well researched - from both perspectives. As always, I thoroughly agree with just about everything he has to say.
Similarly, I watched both The Last King of Scotland and Blood Diamond over the past few days. Both are excellent and interesting portrayals of different aspects of African culture and history, and both rang very true for me, for different reasons. Obviously, The Last King of Scotland evokes a bloody and terrible time in Uganda’s history - I kept wondering what the Ugandans sitting in the audience with me thought of the movie - I doubt that was forefront in the movie-makers minds when they made the film, but it adds another level of poignancy. Similarly, I don’t think anyone in the crowd with me as we watched Blood Diamond could have looked at the depiction of the child soldiers in that movie, without thinking of the exact same situation occurring right now in northern Uganda - watching these children being indoctrinated and turned into killing machines was chilling, as I knew it was happening not far from me at this very moment.
On a lighter note, the gentle disparagement of humanitarian workers provoked general amusement, and Jennifer Connolly’s assessment of Leonardo DiCaprio’s character (and goodness - wasn’t that an awful Zimbabwean/South African accent!) as “not really the UNICEF type” caused quite a few chuckles. Good when we can laugh at ourselves.
I suspect there will be many posts about child soldiers, so I won’t harp on about it for the moment - just giving a foretaste of things to come.
In the meantime, I shall occupy myself with what to do tomorrow, during the public holiday…