Smoking Radishes

So, I've been trying to write about my experiences of the last 24 hours of my time in New Zealand as if it were fiction, but I just can't do it. The story keeps coming out sounding so trite. It's either too long or leaves out too many important details, and the attempts to strip my personality and my identity out of the mother character just make the whole thing thin and uninteresting. I desperately want to write about the events, but it feels wrong just blogging about it all in a straight first person account.

( I give up trying to make it poetic... Here's the basic story )

I don't expect to fly Air New Zealand again for many, many years, since I have no intention of returning to that country at least until Andrew is in his mid to late teens. However, I am SO thankful for their handling of this particularly difficult incident, that I urge any of you considering a trip down to Australia or New Zealand to give them your custom. And if you weren't thinking about going down there, you should. New Zealand is gorgeous and there is SO much to do there. So go, and fly Air New Zealand. Thank you.

Roo and I got onto the plane with much elation and sighs of relief. There were high fives, low fives, in the sky fives, and some general silliness.

As I write this now, I'm somewhere over the Pacific on my way to Los Angeles. It's going to take me a while to integrate this whole experience. I went down to New Zealand expecting some sort of major shift in me personally and in my life. I think I see where this shift has taken me, but I'm not sure how I feel about the shift, so I have a lot of work ahead. The results of that work will be blogged for sure, but not publicly. Some may make it into friend readable posts, but a lot of it will just be for me.

On a completely side note, when I sat down in the airplane seat today I thought to myself, "Wow! These seats are much wider than the ones on my flight here." and then I realized that it was not the seats that were wider at all. My pants are falling off, too. I'm going to need to do some shopping pretty soon here! (Maybe I should take a special trip up to Idaho so that Matt can pick out clothes for me the way he used to. That way I can get new clothes without actually having to shop for them. hehehe)

Today, Roo beat me at chess. I didn't let him win. I didn't even see it coming until just before it happened. He strategized. He plotted. His first plan was foiled, and so he aggressively went for a plan B, and then he informed me proudly that he got me by a "corridor or back ranks checkmate". Of course I took a picture.

I should mention that he has been studying very hard, and practicing and practicing. Over the last few days it has gotten harder and harder to beat him, even as my own skills have been improving by working with him through different chess strategies and things. I'm sure it helps that he loves chess, and I'm not all that interested in it except as a way to spend some quality time with my kid. But, you know how it is, when you love someone and you spend time doing something they love with them, sometimes some of the joy of the thing rubs off on you.

So, yay Roo!

Yeah, I know, it's sad when all you can blog about is another blog you've found, but, what can I say. I like it when other people write about all the joy and weirdness that is my Home. (No, not Berkeley, silly... the other Home.)

Check out Isrealli. There were lots of posts that I enjoyed, but of course, when I got to the post about Idan Raichel, while listening to the album I got last week for the millionth time, well, I knew I just had to give them a nod. *grin* Don't miss their discussions of gay culture in Israel, or Israeli taxi cabs or Israeli artists who are making it elsewhere... Oh, just read the whole thing, OK?

But don't forget to come back to me, or I'll cry.

It's because I am a PS3. "Haven't you heard of the Blue Ray?!" hehehehehe...

If you've never seen the Land Before Time, then you won't know the title's reference, but trust me, it fits tonight.

My son's dad currently has my son's US passport in his possession, and he doesn't want to hand it over. He also hasn't paid for my son's ticket back to the US. This is unacceptable. He claims that I don't need either until the day before I leave. But reasonably, I can't wait that long. I'm not going to wait until the day before I'm supposed to leave only to find then that he's not going to give it to me or claims to have "lost" it, thereby stranding me in this country for even longer.

I told him to bring the passport and proof that he'd paid the ticket when he came to pick up Roo today. I messaged him twice more to remind him to bring the passport (I would have been flexible if he'd done one or the other, honestly). He didn't bring the passport and he hasn't paid the ticket, still. So, I told him that he'd could go home, get the passport and then he could pick Roo up.

He got mad, so I explained why it is that I have good reason to be like this. He was supposed to hand over Roo's New Zealand passport years ago. He was ordered by the courts not once, but over and over again. He never did it. He refused to give me a copy of Roo's medical immunization records, which included shots on four different schedules in four different countries by the time he was 18 months old. (You can see why knowing exactly which shots he'd gotten by that time might be a little important...) Eventually, I had to subpoena those records from the doctor's office in New Zealand. So, now, of course I'm not sitting here all calm and reassured that he's going to give me the passport on the day before I go. Give it to me now. Period.

He left. He didn't come back. He didn't call back. Didn't message back. I don't know what he is thinking now, or planning. I'm planning my next move. At this moment, I can't imagine letting Roo travel down here to New Zealand alone again before he's at least 16 or so, when he can get his own bee-hind over to the US Embassy if necessary and get himself home.

As I finished up the conversation with Adam, and turned to head upstairs to my apartment, Roo was standing at the elevator. He said, "Wow, mum. Remind me never to get you mad."

Here are some cool things to look at on Google Maps. Can you figure out what they are? (The answers are in the tool tips.)

42.701936359N, 115.993694935E

48.85818600 2.29419000

51.50113559719755 -0.1236487948684726

37.81704600 -122.47487300

We hope you enjoy the tour!!!

- Lisha and Roo

Today at dinner Roo and I got into another interesting conversation. He was going on and on about military things, blending reality with video game militarism. He talked about wanting to go into the Marines and about why his uncle Wade thinks he should try to be in Special Forces ( (they get the really cool weapons). )

Then he went back to his talk about video game weapons and dropped the stuff about the real military. This kept up, and I patiently listened to him, hoping he'd switch topics soon. We finished dinner and left the food court where we were eating. He started discussing some of the specifics of Halo on the XBox. He kept with that as we walked home. Finally, as we reached the last intersection before home I finally had enough.

"Hun," I started, "You know what? I'm trying to act interested because I love you, but I'm really pretty tired of this topic. I'm not interested in these games and I don't want to hear about them any more right now."

He paused. And then he responded, "They're fun. Don't you like blowing things up?"

"Well, yeah, sure. I like to blow things up in controlled situations... but not people, and not nice things. I mean, like an old building that needs to be demolished? That's fun to watch get blown up. Or a model rocket that explodes instead of launching. That's pretty cool, too. But no one is getting hurt, and no one's stuff is being destroyed. I don't like that stuff."

And here's where my son said something a little too insightful for a seven year old, "But, you like Lord of the Rings. Lots of people got killed in Lord of the Rings. So you DO like death and destruction!"

( Oo, he got me there. )

We were both left with some things to think about.

If there was one thing I could change about myself, I'd be quieter. I'd laugh just as much, but I wouldn't be so loud about it, and when I talked I would be the sort of person that people lean in to listen to, because whatever I was saying would be interesting enough on it's own, so I shouldn't have to shout it. This seems like an easy concept, but I've never managed it. I'm really much too loud. (Proof positive I'm American, I guess.)

This morning I had coffee and a muffin at my favorite little organic, fair trade cafe just down the street from the apartment where I'm staying here in Auckland. They usually play music from the Putumayo collection (http://www.putumayo.com), but there was something different on the speakers today. I turned off my MP3 player and listened to their music. Wait, wait... that's Arabic. No, wait, that's Hebrew. Amharic? Hebrew again. I don't remember any Putumayo CD with music like this!! I sat there for a really long time after I finished my coffee and muffin.

The music inspired a poem, scribbled in the journal that I carry in my bag for just such moments. I finished the poem and listened to the music a bit longer, feeling torn between the idea that I should go do something with my day and the wish to stay put until the music was done. I decided to just buy that CD and go.

I walked up to the Putumayo display and looked for the CD there. Nothing. So I asked at the cafe counter. The lady came over, looked over the available CD's and suggested it might be the Italian one. "Nope. The music that is playing is Israeli," I told her. "Mmm.. Maybe the Turkish one?" she suggested. "No. The Turkish CD would be in Turkish, not Hebrew, Amharic and Arabic." She was stumped. She offered to run back to the CD player and find out what it was. She came back a moment later with the CD in her hand. "It's none of those. I don't know who put this on." She apologized.

The CD was brown and said, "The Idan Raichel Project." I thanked the lady and headed straight over to Borders Books. This album must be popular because I found it easily in the World Music section under Israel. Or maybe it was just meant to be.

Of course, I was in Borders, so I couldn't just pick up a single CD and leave. I browsed the books, and what did I find? A new collection of short stories by Neil Gaiman.

Now, I'm certain that someone told me about this book. I thought that it was Noé, but he says it wasn't him. Who it was, I cannot recall, and I guess it doesn't matter so much. What I do know is that Gaiman always inspires me to write more. So, of course, I had to buy a copy of Fragile Things.

The first thing I read was the poem "The Fairy Reel". I read it again and again. And when Roo showed up at the house, I read it aloud to him, partly because he's a Gaiman fan, too, and partly just so I'd have an excuse to read it again.

And before I left Borders, I made one other stop at the card display. I've been feeling like writing old-fashioned snail mail. I love snail mail. It's different than email. You write it differently, and it's different when you get an envelope in a real mailbox than when you see the bold number of unread messages in your electronic inbox. I picked out three cards with photos from different parts of New Zealand, and thought about who would receive each one. Then, I payed for everything and wandered out to Aotea Square to sit under a tree and write a note to some friends.

Back home, now, Roo is running around the common room playing and I'm listening to the Idan Raichel Project and letting stories tell themselves in magical rearrangements of 26 and 22 letters... This is the life.

I would write you a million stories,
You should know that by now.
I would bring you tales and dreams
From the farthest reaches of the multiverse.
Within each story would hide a shining gem
To wear on any day,
To show all those who meet you
That the stories are yours to stay.

I would scribble a million stories
On the back of napkins for you.
With pen and ink and paper, too,
I'd write each one in blue.
Within the lines of the tale you'd find,
A little piece of what's on my mind.
You could take it
Wherever you go
To remember my thoughts are yours.

I would write a million songs
In the sand of the longest beach.
I would ask the waves to read them,
And sing them back to you.

Here it is, one hour into 2007 and I feel quite optimistic about the future. I hope that you and yours have a wonderful and safe holiday, and that the new year brings you peace, health, love, and all sorts of happiness.

Today I did some searching for references regarding Yahoo! helping the Chinese government to prosecute dissidents who post things to the Web. Here is an article in the BBC, here is one at Boing Boing, and another at The Next Net.

I'm having a bit of a think about this, as to whether or not it is warranted to boycott Yahoo! entirely.

The first problem is the fact that their privacy statement and terms of service both say right on them that they will cooperate with government officials to the degree required by law, including handing over your information and the data that you posted through them. This would be reasonable, albeit uncomfortable, if each of the cases are of people who posted information THROUGH Yahoo!, whether via their webmail services, Yahoo!Groups or other Yahoo! services. I don't like that it can happen, but if you are using the services of a Web company, you'd better know what their policies are before you start doing things that your local government calls illegal. And if you are standing up against your government despite the risks, then you know what you've bought into. You read the terms when you signed up, right?

Dissidents have always known that they had to be careful about their words and their actions in public. The fact that activists today use public companies such as Yahoo! to post information that they think is anonymous is a sign of their ignorance. You wouldn't sit in just any ol' cafe and talk loudly about your anti-government opinions in China -- even wearing a mask on your face. Well, posting to newsgroups while using a Yahoo! email address is about the same thing.

Remember also that these business are trying to cover their backside as they do business in any country. We're talking about Yahoo! giving information about Chinese dissidents, but don't they also help the US government track down terrorists? And, for that matter, don't they help local police track down stalkers who use Yahoo! email address? Who gets to say when they should cooperate with a government and when they shouldn't?

Use the Internet to educate yourself first. Find out about anonymous remailers and other identity hiding techniques on the Net. Avoid handing your true contact information to any company that you may have to use for posting information that may later be used to incriminate you. Finally, if you are going to be an activist, you cannot forget that it is always inherently dangerous to stand up against the status quo.

Now, if facts are that Yahoo! gave information that was simply taken from anywhere on the Web, well, that's a different story entirely. That's not just the uncomfortable reality of talking about politics in an unfriendly cafe. That would be like a coffee shop owner hunting for political activists on the coffee plantations, and that's just nuts.

The second question I have regarding a total boycott of Yahoo! is what the alternatives are. I have seen news about Yahoo! helping the Chinese government, but what about Google or Microsoft? Are they also handing over information? I didn't find anything that said that they are, but the suggestion that they might be is out there, and of course, they both have the same "will hand over info to the government" clauses in their terms of service. If they are handing over information, and I boycott Yahoo!, then I need to boycott the others as well. Who can I not boycott? Is there anyone?

edit: Here is an interesting bit... Chinese pro-democracy activist Zhao Jing ranks Google as the least evil and Yahoo! as the worst in a quote at the end of this article on Google Mexico.

He thinks that no one wants him,
But little does he know,
The whole wide world is waiting,
With baited breath to show,
How big a heart is holding
His heart inside itself.

So, I stopped eating meat a little over two months ago. It started out as an experiment, but by the time I cooked Turkey for thanksgiving, the idea of meat had become well and truly disgusting to me. (I can't imagine taking tofurky to the homeless on Thanksgiving, though. That's just seems a bit self-righteous.) So, here I am in New Zealand and as I sit down to dinner with my youngest, the reasons for my recent change in diet become the topic of conversation.

"So, why are you an herbivore now?"

"Because I don't want to eat anything that had to be killed. I mean, they have moms, too."

"I don't get it."

"Well, OK, think about it this way, Roo. What if a tiger ate me. How would that make you feel?"

"Ummmm..." He pondered this for a while, and then said, "Well, good and bad."

I was a bit surprised by this response, but figured that I ought to hear out his reasons. Maybe he feels empathy for the tiger and figures that I'd make a tasty meal, "OK, what's the good and what's the bad?"

"Well, the good is that I could spend more time with my dad, and he let's me play action video games. The bad is that, even though you don't let me play violent games, you're still a really great mum, and I'd miss you!"

I was going to use a phone that Rutie leant to me, but it was locked to TMobile. T-Mobile refused to unlock it and the local cell phone companies said that it was illegal from them to unlock it. I need a phone, though, for organizing pick up and drop off of the boy child, and other things like that.

Since I had been wanting to buy a digital camera, I decided that it was worthwhile to buy myself a phone with a megapixel camera on it. Enter the new Razr. I hate the comercials for this phone, but I love the camera on it. And the price was good. NZ$345 (about US$240) You can see more pictures over at my flickr account.

Oh! Speaking of Flickr... and Yahoo!... I heard recently that Yahoo! cooperates with the Chinese government to ferret out dissidents with blogs or other Websites that speak out against the governement. I don't know if this is true or not, and I'd like to find out. Anyone have any knowledge of this? Citations? Anything?

And if it is true, I need to take my stuff of of Flickr, because I don't want to support a company that does business like that. So, does anyone know of a good Flickr alternative?

"The birth of every infant is the ultimate prayer for peace."

- Bradley Burston
in "Jews aren't supposed to love Christmas", Haaretz.com, 25 Dec 2006

So, the Ministry of the Interior (משרד הפנים) in Israel is advertising in English on the English version of HaAretz, an Israeli news source, that if you are an Israeli citizen you need an Israeli passport or travel document to enter or exit Israel. The link then takes you to a page in Hebrew. All in Hebrew. With no "English version" link anywhere. Do they really think that Israeli citizens who prefer reading in Hebrew make a huge habit of reading the news about Israel in English?

As if that's not stupid enough, the page that the ad takes you to doesn't actually have any information for Israelis abroad. It tells you how to get your passport at the offices in Israel or to go to the post office, but it doesn't have any links to the embassies' and consulates' pages. The advertisement did say that you need an Israeli passport or travel document to get INTO as well as out of Israel. Clearly, they should have links for those Olim who bailed out of Israel before their Hebrew got very good, who are going back to Israel now for some trip or whatever and need a new travel document. Right?

OK, OK, I'm not done. Instead of having proper href links on the page, they have some stupid JavaScripting that doesn't even work right. It throws errors galore and sends you to a bad search page for every single thing you click. Then, I go to the main website for the Ministry of the Interior and it doesn't work right, either. There is a frameset that doesn't display properly in Firefox at all, and it's set to"no resize" so you can't even manually fix the problem. (OK, hullo?? Why the heck are you using FRAMES, people? Have you heard of CSS? ) The page also has numerous broken images and is just generally poor in it's User Interface Design.

Central Israel is the "Silicon Wadi", right? How many high-tech start ups? How many programmers and engineers? How many PHP gurus per square foot? Couldn't they do better?

Do I complain too much? Yeah, well, suck it up and get over it. That's just proof of my Israeliness.

I have a problem with the idea that one sort of family grouping should have different rights and responsibilities than another sort of family grouping. This issue has been a very big one here in the US, with most laws going towards the most closed-minded attitudes about sex and marriage and what it means to be a family.

Let me clue you in, folks:
There is not enough love and joy in the world. We should do everything we can to support and uphold the love and strength of all families, whatever configuration they may come in.

In that vein, it always makes me happy to see when a court "gets it right", as the Tel Aviv Family Court did yesterday. Yay Judge Paul Stark! You go on my hero list for today.

Wow! I just made my very first Wikipedia edit!!! I never have anything to add to Wikipedia.

It was in the human sexuality article. I added the link to polygynandry. And then I went over to the polygynandry page and noticed that it's a stub. I'm going to have to fix that.

There is some interesting stuff about polygynandry discussed in the book Coevolution by William H. Durham. I'll have to look that stuff up again and write something intelligent into the stub. ;)