Rachel Corrie

Back after a long time.

Had meant to write about the play we had seen a while back - My Name is Rachel Corrie. Of course, everyone probably knows what it is all about. Rachel Corrie, a native of Olympia, Washington, who went as a peace worker to Israel-occupied Gaza, and was run over and killed by an Israeli bulldozer as it demolished yet another Palestinian house. The play is a one-woman performance by Marla Sea Kaminski, a very expressive young actor, who obviously put her heart and soul into her work.

The play was pieced together from Corrie's own personal journal, and gives a wonderful insight into her coming-of-age thought process. Obviously, the play recounted Corrie's experiences in Gaza. But, heart-wrenching as it was, it was not the only interesting thing about the play. What was pleasantly surprising were Corrie's general observations on life in Olympia. She comes across as a sensitive and perspicacious individual.

A voice over at the end informed us that by all reliable accounts, Corrie was intentionally, not accidentally, plowed over by the Israeli bulldozer.

Vusi Mahlasela in Seattle

Vusi Mahlasela, the legendary South African musician, singer-songwriter, performed at The Triple Door a few weeks ago. Vusi, who was one of the voices for the non-violent struggle against apartheid in South Africa, showed a glimpse of the powerful magic that he has been weaving the last three decades. He is a master on the guitar, and his music is so lovely that one forgets that some of the songs were in unfamiliar South African languages. He also had a very talented band, who seemed somewhat shy with all the attention, which was quite charming.

Vusi's earthy poetry brought to life the beauty of the African continent, beauty that would surely make one breathless - if one were fortunate enough to see it. Predictably, a lot of the songs he performed were rooted in the apartheid-era struggles. But, he did not, by any means, imply that the struggle for justice in the world was a thing of the past. On the contrary, he spent several minutes talking about the poverty and injustice that remains entrenched, particularly in Africa, and he dedicated a lovely song to the bush people of the Kalahari in Botswana, who are now being driven out of the land they have lived on since humans first walked on the earth.

His music and life has been shaped by, among other things, strong women of character. He recounted an incident from his youth, when as black-listed college activists, he and his friends were routinely hounded and harassed by the apartheid-era police. One evening, tiring of her grandson's brushes with the police state, his grandmother asked the young Vusi to sleep inside her house, as she stood guarding the doorstep. When the police arrived, the dauntless woman yelled at them - look, I have a big pot of boiling water here, the first one of you to come near Vusi gets it. And the cops slinked away. Vusi also sang of an unknown pregnant woman who jumped over a barbed-wire fence so her baby could be born in safety.

After over an hour of great beauty, Vusi and the band did their final bows to the audience, who were loath to let them go.

I couldn't help thinking that it seemed a little incongruous and paradoxical that Vusi's audience that evening was an all-white (with only a handful of exceptions), visibly privileged crowd. I wish we could have sponsored a performance of his at a less-privileged and racially diverse neighborhood of the city. Everyone should have a chance to hear his music. In Vusi's own words: "I know that I have something that is like a borrowed fire from God. And I have to use it in a very positive way."

Democracy Now! on TV

Seattleites and Eastsiders:

Democracy Now!, the award-winning daily news program that has spearheaded the largest public television collaboration, is accessible to us on Channel 77 on Comcast cable. Has been for some time.

Infrastructure for the local public access television is provided by SCAN. The channel also broadcasts several other public interest programs, including programming from FreeSpeech TV, ACLU Freedom Files, independent films on issues of local and broader relevance, and recordings of local community events.

Democracy Now! is always accessible on the web, of course.

Yessler Terrace Public Housing

Yessler Terrace, the last public housing location in Seattle, was the subject of a local documentary film recently screened on the SCAN television station. The film featured the viewpoints of Yessler's low-income residents, activists from the Community Coalition of Environmental Justice (CCEJ), and the Seattle Housing Authority (SHA). Plans are about to begin for the conversion of the site into a mixed housing community, as previously in Holly Park, High Point, and Rainier Vista.

Logically, mixed housing seems a wise and humane choice for the sustenance of urban communities that are welcoming of ethnically diverse people with low and moderate incomes. However, according to public housing advocacy groups, the conversion to mixed housing in the other neighborhoods, while including units for low income people, has resulted in the overall displacement of 1000+ former public housing residents.

Check out a Pepperspray video for a short online version of the film.

Talking of the Yoni [2]

[Continued from the previous post in this thread.]

I was a little puzzled by the fact that the performance was in English, despite the play's title. As a South Asian, seeing "Yoni Ki Baat" written on the Aaina flyer naturally led me to believe that the performance would be in Hindi. So when the actors started in English, I could not help feeling just a bit disappointed. I was so pumped up thinking I would see an edgy play about the yoni in Hindi.... Yes, I do speak Hindi.

On the other hand, there are several very compelling reasons for having it in English - a) keeping it accessible to all Seattleites, b) who in the hell came up with this fallacious notion that Hindi is some sort of universal South Asian language, anyway (did you know that Hindi is the native tongue of less than half of India, and we aren't even talking about the rest of the sub-continent, with its rich linguistic diversity)?

The performance was fabulous in English, but it would also be thrilling to have it in a language from the South Asian sub-continent. Contrary to what is often believed, there are examples (despite the sexually repressive culture) of excellent literature in Indian languages that openly deal with sexuality.

See Part 1 of this post.

Talking of the Yoni

The highlight of Aaina's first evening was a stage performance entitled"Yoni Ki Baat", a South Asian rendition of the famed "Vagina Monologues", created by Eve Ensler, the objective of which has been to exhort women to shed self and societally imposed inihibitive notions about their own sexuality, and to speak out against sexual and gender-based violence. For those of you to whom the monologues are news (are you kidding me, guy?!), read about Eve Ensler, and the monologues. "Yoni" means "vagina" in the ancient Indian language of Sanskrit, and in Hindi. "Yoni Ki Baat" means "Talks of the" Yoni in Hindi.

The actors, all women of South Asian heritage and none of them professional performers, gave an intensely provocative and electric presentation to a completely sold-out cinema hall. And the actors could not have asked for a more supportive crowd. In response to Farah Nousheen's (Tasveer's co-founder and one of the Yoni actors) very endearing appeal to the audience to "please send some love our way, we are all doing this for the first time", everyone responded with animation, and cheered and applauded all through the performance. And the post-play discussion revealed the depths to which everyone, especially the men, was stirred.

The writing, which was pivotal, was great. Some of it was from the original, some from the South Asian sisters, and two or three self-written by the actors. It was edgy, irreverent, humorous, searing, and tragic. The story of the woman in a stark and loveless marriage, with the nightly sex as romantic as a surgical procedure, was very sensitively and poignantly performed by Farah. The piece entitled "Egosexual", with its "me and my vagina living it up", was deliciously droll. The piece recollected the momentous discovery by a young Indian woman that the Shiv Ling portrays the inside view of the male organ in the female, and that the ancient South Asians worshipped this symbol as the eternal source of life in the universe. And the humorous essay juxtaposed the yucky experience of being rubbed against by sweaty, horny jerks in the DTC buses with this moment of discovery of sensual and cosmic beauty.

Uma Rao presented a mesmeric self-written piece centered around her intimate and powerful relationship with her mother. Being fortunate enough to have strong emotional and intellectual bonds with my own mother, Uma's piece touched me to the point of tears. The performance was a winning combination of beautiful writing, and a bold yet soft and sensitive presentation. Gita Mehrotra performed another self-written piece, "For all of Us". In my opinion, she has the makings of a sensitive writer. Her piece was an extremely moving account of different women, ranging from her own grandmother who was widowed early to South Asian lesbians known only via newspaper clippings. It talked about the heartbreaking realization that South Asian lesbian histories (like the histories of so many oppressed groups in the world) are virtually non-existent, lost forever. The beauty of the essay was in the seamless collecting together of the sadness across generations and across sexual orientations, and an understanding that women share a collective past, present, and future.

Above all, the performances were honest and courageous. I cannot imagine too many women (let alone Eastern women) having the spunk to do it. So, my gratitude to all who made the performance possible.

Also check out Uprising Radio's Sonali Kolhatkar's interview of the South Asian Sisters.

See part 2 of this post.

Windpocalypse Aftermath: Saturday

The day started with another round of wood-smoked tea, and a breakfast of bread and jam. (The fireplace has doubled as stove and room heater.)

We started calling around friends. Being new in the area, we don't know a lot of people yet. Those we do know were pretty much in the same boat. The news about the power outage and repairs was not too encouraging. PSE service area was hit pretty hard. The outages affecting more people were going get repaired first... which meant we were going to need more wood.

We set out to see what the scene was like and, of course, to find some lunch. The power was still out of work. So, no Internet. Internet withdrawl was adding to the power withdrawl ;-)

We decided to checkout Redmond Town Center. Matt's was open and packed with windstorm refugees. We finally found a seat at the bar. The bartender was extremely busy. Another guy was supposed to join him a while ago. He hadn't been able make it. You saw several staff members without uniform. Look's like the owner's family had come out. The owner was taking orders at the bar. Even on this busy day, when they were barely keeping the place running due to staff shortage, Matt's delivered, both on the food and the service.

We felt a little better equipped for the rest of the day ahead, although still fearful of the inevitable, impending cold night.

Getting over the Snowstorm

Things are getting back to normal with side streets beginning to clear up. The snowstorm did give us a forced break for a day, after the exhausting Thanksgiving break. It was looking quite beautiful outside with all the snow and ice.

Raining in Seattle

I do believe that it has rained every single day in November here in the Seattle area. Most Americans hate (or at least profess to hate) the rain. But I love it when it rains. Sure, you can have too much of any good thing, and it can be dreary if you don't see the sun in days. But a rainy day has its own special charms. I am looking out the window of a coffee shop in Seattle right now. The city looks so nice and cosy the through the rain-drenched window panes. The scene reminds me of Paris, and Dublin, and Mumbai - three cities I love - after Seattle, obviously. I am glad to have met several Seattleites and Eastsiders who say they love the rain.

July 4th 2006

By the 4th of July, we had been here a couple of weeks. And just getting to know the place. We had, of course, visited Pike Place market, and it had already become our ritualistic Saturday haunt. We had temporary housing in Kirkland.

Our usual feelings on July 4th can best be described, depending on how energetic we feel on the day, as either completely indifferent and "couldn't care less", or something that provokes a bevy of philosophical questions - about the concept of a (ANY) nation state, and the acts that were committed in different parts of the world to make ordinary people believe in an artificial notion of allegiance and shared destinies, while really getting pushed into a homogenized and controlled version of their real communities and culture.

Not surprisingly, we were unsure about what to do that weekend. We finally decided to take in the atmosphere, since this was our first fourth of July here. So we headed to the Kirkland Marina, where there was going to be a parade. The only really interesting performance was by the Seahawks band, which was pretty good. The rest of the program was lacklustre. The sidewalks were filled with mostly very affluent-looking women of all ethnicities, wearing huge diamond rings and thick gold bands, clothing from the GAP, and pushing strollers with babies who were equally expensively outfitted, and who clutched tiny American flags in their fists.

In the evening, as we looked out the large windows of our apartment, we realized suddenly that we had a virtually undisturbed, though distant, view of the Kirkland Marina, Washington lake and the other side, Seattle city. Unbelievable! We were able to see the entire fireworks display on both the Eastside and in Seattle. And it was spectacular. That was unadulterated joy.

Lo Priore Brothers Pasta Bar

We were wandering aimlessly around Pike Place on one of these delicious, lazy Saturday mornings in late summer. Walking on Post Alley, and looking at the lunch crowd, we realized we were hungry, and walked inside the building. Immediately indoors is this unassuming little place called simply "Pasta Bar".

Never shy, we scanned the plates of the other customers, and everything looked appetizing. We ordered a ravioli and a fettuccine in alfredo and pesto, and joined the hungry summer throngs in tucking away the pasta. The flavors were so earthy and satisfying. We walked away with a lovely, warm sensation inside our tummies. We know we will keep coming back here.

So-Called Moderate Summers of Seattle

So one of the first things Seattle locals told us on our weeklong apartment-hunting trip in early June was about the Puget Sound summers. They raved about the glorious summer months of the Seattle area, when the sun always shines, and the long days are mild under azure skies.

Well, they were certainly right about the sun always shining, but I am not so sure about the 'mild' part. We moved here in mid-June, and several of the days here reminded us of the dog days of summer where we lived earlier. Seattle and the Eastside are having sweltering days of 95-100 degrees - and guess what, folks, the apartments here do not have airconditioning! Maybe I should applaud this as a much-needed act (on the part of us consumption-crazy Americans) of energy conservation.

Most of the locals have assured us that what just ended was a very unusual summer. We fervently hope they are right.

Welcome to Seattle(-Schmeattle)!

In the spring of this year, we found out that we will be relocating to the Seattle area from another state. When we announced this to our friends and family, we got a lot of excited reactions. Yes, a lot of them were about the rain. (A friend 'kindly' reminded us more than once: "Don't forget your umbrellas!".) But, mostly, the reactions were positive. Many of our friends thought Seattle was a cool and hip place to move to. One mentioned that Seattleites "were totally the pioneers in the urban environmental movement". Another mentioned the famed natural beauty of the Pacific Northwest. And several were thrilled (really) to hear that we were moving to "Frazier-land".

We were quite excited ourselves about moving to the Seattle area. Despite our excitement, though, we could not avoid the transition phase the first couple of months, during which one gets some unexpected (and not very pleasing) surprises from the new place. We found ourselves experiencing such moments not so infrequently...and then often we would end it by exclaiming: Seattle-Schmeattle!

At the same time, we were enjoying and beginning to love so many of the new things we were discovering about this place. The natural beauty is breathtaking, and has to be seen to be believed. Mount Rainier unfailingly sends a thrill of exhilaration down my spine everytime I look up at it on a clear day. The people at the local PCC organic store make us feel like family.

On one of the late and bright summer evenings, we looked at each other and said, "hey, why not capture this experience...in all of its contrast." And this blog was born.

This is a space for our comunity to capture experiences and perceptions about Seattle and the Eastside. We hope that the locals reading this blog will enjoy looking at their neighborhood through new eyes, will educate us about the neighborhood, and help us have a continued rich experience of this place - the place that we are looking to make our home for years to come.

Alongside, the blog may also make interesting reading for people who want to know about the Seattle area, want to visit the area or are considering relocating here.

Let's see how it goes. Stay tuned!