food for thought

I have made progress with food negotiations: she'll eat what I feed her as long as I eat what she's feeding me. Which makes complete sense, in fact: if I'm already feeding her, then why would she need to be feeding herself as well?

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We're back in the land of food complexities.
Where the bread is low-carb and the ice-cream low-fat, the chocolate syrup is no-fat & no-sugar, the eggs are fake egg-whites in a carboard box, the butter a cancer-causing no-stick spray, where (low-fat) peanut butter and (low sugar) jelly is a popular choice for lunch for adults, and the soda plentiful but diet and caffeine-free.
And the mediterranean diet hailed as most healthy.

holiday surprises

Lil one was crying. It was 7 o'clock at night, and who could blame her, really?

Maybe it was waiting in the car with P as I, completely frazzled and hopeless, was manoeuvring the over sized giant WalMart in hope of diapers and formula and wipes and baby food, only to be brought to a complete stop repeatedly: "Pardon me, sir (aren't I ever the polite kind?, running on no sleep and mucho jetlag), but I don't see any carts". "Oh, well, the store is full, you know." (A giantissimo wal-mart? full?) "Mmh... baskets then". "We don't do baskets". I guess not. moving on. Only to be confused and frustrated by the assinine layout of the store).

Or maybe it had started all earlier, much earlier, at 4:30 in the morning (french time, make time 10:30pm the previous day), when we had tenderly awoken her for a quick change and a hop into the taxi.

The day was eventful: the airline had not registered her on the first flight. Why, I do not know as we had the ticket in hand. Why it mattered, I know even less, as she was sitting on my lap and did not require a seat of her own.

The second flight tested our resilience. Our cushiony B class seat, meant to rejuvenate the one not currently on lil-one-duty, was given away in front of our very own eyes in exchange for a very sizable wad of cash (which was not registered into the system but pocketed by the manager), after which we were informed that they thought we were a no-show. There was no B seat for us. P was fu-rious: they were not compensating us in any way, as they blamed it on the other airline. HELLO?!?? How is this our fault? can you spell airline co-chairs? Arg. Aaaooommmhhh -think yoga, unity, self-preservation.
Not only that, but they did not give us the bassinet we'd requested. Worst of all: they didn't give it to anyone. It sat there, unused, for the 10+ hours we were on that airplane, daunting us.

Returning to the little one: she was an angel: played with the little boy occupying the seat behind her, trying to climb her way over the top of our seats to go bearhug him. dutifully falling asleep after only about 30 back and forth pacings in the coach cabin. , but also always waking up on time to check every single movie, sitcom and commercial displayed on the few tv's in the cabin. flipping through or teething her way through every toy we'd packed so that none would be jealous. she even thought the flight would be a great time to demand that she and she only be allowed to hold the spoon to feed herself (i usually use multiple spoons to win at that game, but she would not eat from any I was proposing), so we quickly reverted back to milk.

and then we landed. you know the drill. crowd stampede to exit the airplane. cattle lines to pass through immigration. fake smiles. near comatose wait in front of the baggage carousels. 1,2,3 bags. wait in front of the oversize bags for car seat. wait, wait, wait.

3 (three, iii, trois!) hours after we landed, i left the lost luggage line. i had no car seat. i had not filled a claim form as that would have required another hour and a half wait. the kind lady in front of me thought I should jump the whole line (A was in bjorn, I was obviously beyond worn out), so I politely (no good) asked the guy in front of her, would he mind if i quickly handed my lost luggage form and address.
"Yes, I do mind." (I was going to write, "as only overly-assertive Americans do", but that's not kind. And I don't know if that's even true.)

There went my hope with humanity. System problems and obstacles and mess-ups, I could handle. But such a personal, contempt-filled remark, did it. I left the line, defeated. And tried to contain myself long enough to make it through the basics of Walmart.

But then, after 22 hours of travel, she didn't sleep that night nor the following one.

baby bonuses and Annan

Bonuses for having babies in France (though it's a bit more complicated if you work for your very own self)

Annan's 5 lessons: on Truman, American leadership, and multi-lateralism

"We all have to recognize, no matter how great our strength, that we must deny ourselves the license to do always as we please."
“The responsibility of the great states is to serve and not dominate the peoples of the world."
Harry Truman

The five lessons:

First, we are all responsible for each other's security.

Second, we can and must give everyone the chance to benefit from global prosperity.

Third, both security and prosperity depend on human rights and the rule of law.

Fourth, states must be accountable to each other, and to a broad range of non-state actors, in their international conduct.

My fifth and final lesson derives inescapably from those other four. We can only do all these things by working together through a multilateral system, and by making the best possible use of the unique instrument bequeathed to us by Harry Truman and his contemporaries, namely the United Nations.

Excerpts:

(N)o nation can make itself secure by seeking supremacy over all others. We all share responsibility for each other's security, and only by working to make each other secure can we hope to achieve lasting security for ourselves. And I would add that this responsibility is not simply a matter of states being ready to come to each other's aid when attacked – important though that is. It also includes our shared responsibility to protect populations from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity – a responsibility solemnly accepted by all nations at last year's UN summit . That means that respect for national sovereignty can no longer be used as a shield by governments intent on massacring their own people, or as an excuse for the rest of us to do nothing when such heinous crimes are committed......

And states need to play by the rules towards each other, as well as towards their own citizens. That can sometimes be inconvenient, but ultimately what matters is not convenience. It is doing the right thing. No state can make its own actions legitimate in the eyes of others. When power, especially military force, is used, the world will consider it legitimate only when convinced that it is being used for the right purpose – for broadly shared aims – in accordance with broadly accepted norms......

Accountability between states is highly skewed. Poor and weak states are easily held to account, because they need foreign assistance. But large and powerful states, whose actions have the greatest impact on others, can be constrained only by their own people, working through their domestic institutions. That gives the people and institutions of such powerful states a special responsibility to take account of global views and interests, as well as national ones.......

I have continued to press for Security Council reform. But reform involves two separate issues. One is that new members should be added, on a permanent or long-term basis, to give greater representation to parts of the world which have limited voice today. The other, perhaps even more important, is that all Council members, and especially the major powers who are permanent members, must accept the special responsibility that comes with their privilege. The Security Council is not just another stage on which to act out national interests. It is the management committee, if you will, of our fledgling collective security system.

As President Truman said, “the responsibility of the great states is to serve and not dominate the peoples of the world." He showed what can be achieved when the US assumes that responsibility. And still today, none of our global institutions can accomplish much when the US remains aloof. But when it is fully engaged, the sky's the limit.......

You Americans did so much, in the last century, to build an effective multilateral system, with the United Nations at its heart. Do you need it less today, and does it need you less, than 60 years ago?

Surely not. More than ever today Americans, like the rest of humanity, need a functioning global system through which the world's peoples can face global challenges together. And in order to function, the system still cries out for far-sighted American leadership, in the Truman tradition.

Relocation

Our house got relocated over the last 12 months. A year ago, when we moved in fresh from our 9 months in Cambridge (England), we found ourselves in a lovely, warm and sunny place. Fast-forward a year (of riviera weather), and we're now finding ourselves living in a cold, damp, and dark cave, which could desperately use some Southern exposure.
Of course we haven't moved at all. It's amazing what context/perspective (the weather of the previous few months) can do to one's perception.

A kind soul suggested my blues from the past post were probably caused by the weather, but I do doubt it: it's mostly gorgeous here this time of year with beautiful, awe-striking colors. Do come in the winter or spring if you ever want to visit...

... Not that I would know if we'd still be here or not. The vulnerability I mentioned in the past post is simply living on the razor-thin edge where to the left, ladies and gentlemen, is routine in this neck of the woods with predictable daycare and mommy+me and yoga; and if you look over to your right is the green pastures (or abyss?) of relocating completely again to a whole new place. If you would like to suggest that for my sanity a decision rather a razor-thin edge of indecision would be preferable, you do not need to bother, but thanks for the suggestion.

Nothing like a post on weight issues to attract no comments at all!

The little one is cracking me up. She climbs up the tiles on the side of our bathtub to get to the soapdish (carved into the wall), using only a fraction of her tiny toes on the smallest of reliefs on tiles and grouting for adherence. We catch her lugging around her diaper bag (bigger than her, same weight as her), her lego truck (on wheels, but definitely bigger), full-size chairs, or doing side bicep curls with her child-size chair. I may have to break it to her that miss Universe does not allow contestants below 1 year of age, and that her extra girth at the waist-line wouldn't fare too well anyway.

She's got her own dance steps, bending at the knees with butt nicely sticking out. She hikes up the stairs with the gait of a soldier in some totalitarian army (you know the look: leg straight up, foot at hip-height). She talks up a storm, especially with other kids. She would eat all the christmas decorations, but especially the glittery christmas balls and lights, if we let her. She's decided mashed up food is for babies and is much more interested in chunks of bread/pasta/fruit/veggie. And I've given in to the national obsession with sturdy ankle-bracing shoes: (US advocate soft-soled shoes, France goes for clunky heavy hard-soled ankle-covering ugly boots), simply because she walks better with those. For now at least.

This week will be one of packing for the trip. I have sneakily purchased a new toy (something I thought I'd never do), a bubbles container, and (holy moly) a little spinny thing like they sell at fairs (where you blow air and the thing spins; there must be a better name for this). She's captivated by the spinning vent in our kitchen, and I'm hoping between those three and my usual bag of tricks that the two of us (and our 150 fellow passengers) will survive the trip in economy class on our single seat while P lives it up in b class! Spare us a thought next weekend.

Thinking of you, friends, around the world. The world always seems a smaller place to me this time of year.

Manufacturer's stamp

The "no meds" plan lasted all of two hours: she had a fever when I picked her up from daycare that day, started pulling on both ears by Saturday so we visited a doctor and were handed another cocktail of prescriptions, and came home early to avoid another sleepless night in Montpellier in our portapotty (but very friendly) hotel. Thankfully the 7th tooth came out and we may be in the clear now - until the 8th and 9th tooth and on it goes.

If I do therapy one day, instead of discussing dreams, I think I'll discuss the tunes I hum. I hum to the little one in the evenings to get her to fall asleep, and while it always starts inconspicuously as a random set of notes, it generally unconsciously evolves into a well known tune. Care to guess which has been recurrently hummed in this household recently? Anyone put their money on

"There's a place for us,
Somewhere a place for us" (West Side Story)?

My brain's got a pretty good sense of humour.

Recently the odds of life have been unkind to friends and family, with broken hearts and deaths. I accept the oppportunity to focus on something else besides my own little universe, and to be there for others. I don't know how to explain though while keeping the right perspective that although it is nothing as dramatic, I am feeling very vulnerable at the moment. But my thoughts are muddled so no more on this at this time.

Among my very greatest of friends is a particularly striking woman whose beauty has driven young boys and grown men silly. But this friend is suffering from poor body image at the present - convinced that she needs to lose many pounds. I know that our appreciation for our bodies is all internal-based and cannot be gathered from externally looking at us. There is little (no?) correlation between appearance and body confidence.
I look at a picture of the finish line of the Danskin triathlon, and all I can think of is "my thighs look fat, especially compared to my friend's".
Actually I thought I'd resolved all my issues with the birth of the little one - I was reconciled with my body now that I'd seen it function so beautifully and bring life.
But I was getting winter clothes out of their hideaway spot on Monday, and came upon a very old pair of jeans - bleached, too short, pretty ugly and with a tumultuous history. I rarely wear them except to paint, but they've been my reference pair. (I'm sure you've got one too - the one that tells you which size you are currently.) They were big on me. I should've rejoiced - yay, postpartum and extra room in my reference jeans. Instead I thought "oh I should wash them, they must've been stretched out over time", closely followed by "but I have no muscle, it's all fat right now; I need to start working out again".

I look at the little one's body. I take fake bites out of her Buddha belly, I massage her legs gently, I bury my nose in the folds of her neck. I even marvel at the preciousness of the tiny birthmark on top of her right foot - the one her pediatrician calls her "manufacturer's stamp". Her body is perfect. I only hope she'll know it too.

Montpellier

The week off is over. I feel like I've crawled out of a cave. Better able to focus now that I'm rested, that's for sure.

I've almost completed my first scrapbook for a longtime friend, which has immunized me for some time against the notion of doing another - too damn much work.

We're setting off tomorrow for a four-day weekend to Montpellier. We'll be checking out an international school, the real estate market, and assessing the like-mindedness of folks - in short we're out to find out in under 96 hours whether we click or not with that city.

Ironically in the last two weeks we have just started meeting friendly internationals here. Who knows what will happen; for once I'm not planning ahead.

The little one's cold and cough and runny nose have not ended. We've tried a variety of drugs and sleep positions, and at this point we're going to try no meds at all.

Dare I say she's at the top of her game in charmingness? She's venturing with many a drunken steps on her own and air kisses. Rumor has it, there's even a video of her first steps posted on the web somewhere, but email me to find out whether that's true or not.

Till next week then.

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In the news recently: mamas on the effect of blogging on their identity as mothers, their need(?) for alcohol, and another award of sorts for the US.

Until it's here, you really don't know how dehumanizing and ugly parenting can be sometimes. The blog's a place where all that stuff can go. If you only went by what the magazines and parenting books said or what your relatives told you, you'd think you were a neurotic freak who was doing everything wrong. Blogging makes parents more relaxed.

They love their children, they're happy to be mothers, but they would like their world to be larger than a Little Tikes mini-kitchen... They are looking for a small break from the conventions of mommy-hood — a way to hold on to a part of their lives that existed before they had children and to bond over a shared disdain for the almost sadistically stressful world of modern parenting.

Of 168 countries surveyed in the world, only four offer no national maternity-leave program: Lesotho, Swaziland, Papua New Guinea, and the United States of America.

Also, not surprisingly harsher measures don't cut crime, but have the opposite impact. The causes of crime ought to be taken into account - what a concept.

Yeehaay :)

Of course I'm over the moon about the recent political news - not just for women's political participation, not just for dems (or anti-reps), not just for what it could mean for a change in foreign policy, and not even just elated about Rumsfeld: I thought my day could not possibly get any better till I read that Guatemalans may be starting to see some semblance of justice re: the civil war and genocide years: genocide suspects arrested, and Mexico signing the extradition of ex-Prez Portillo - protege and political successor of genocidal monster Rios Montt.

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Lil one had what we refer to here as a pooplosion or massive poopalation (yes we do get creative), and I was pouring her a bath while making sure she wasn't crashing her skull on the cold bathroom tiles, pulled the toothbrush out of her grip (she does love to chew it), put it in the toothbrush-holding glass, and WHAM! Got hit in the face unexpectantly with this image of three toothbrushes: we're a family of three. I don't know what I was thinking before: A family of 2 and a 1/2? Two parents under the careful control of a 9-month old charmer? Three toothbrushes to mean a family of three. It reminded me of one of the pictures shown as evidence in a mormon polygamy trial: 27 toothbrushes lined up.

Motherhood has a certain way of sneaking up on you like that, like it's just a gradual change, part of a gradient of life. Which it's not. It's a rite of passage, a complete metamorphosis, a jump into a new universe. I realized that recently when I was pondering our organization of our digital pictures. Inside the 2006 folder, next to folders for pics from Cam, and a trip to Rome, was a folder with the lil one's name. Like "hey, we're OOF at the moment, we're taking a short trip to parenthood, but no worries, we'll be back in no time.". Hahahah. Of course, our entire life is in that folder these days.

And I'm enjoying it. She's a real charmer. Learning to dance (well, bend at the knees repeatedly), sing-hum, and gracefully sink to the grounds when she's scared to take one more step on her own. Smiling the whole time. And even batting her eyelashes when the doc was examining her throat last week. (verdict: big bad cold hasn't gone away, has spread to the throat, may turn into an ear infection).

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I am re-reading the Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood, in anticipation of a weekend with close girlfriends. The paragraphs on motherhood left me speechless. They had not registered when I read the book years ago. The insanity of Vivi had, but not her depiction of the relentless love-you-my-child/your-relentless-needs-are-driving-me-nuts. How many books ought I to be re-reading, me wonders?

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And this would not be a normal post if it weren't for me getting on my soap box about the danger of exposure to (barely tested or not tested at all) industrial chemicals to children's brain development.

"In an essay published online in the journal The Lancet, the researchers identified 202 potentially harmful industrial chemicals that may be contributing to dramatic increases in autism, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), and other brain disorders among children.

Roughly half of the chemicals are in common use, but very few have been tested to determine their impact on brain development.

"The bottom line is you only get one chance to develop a brain," Philippe Grandjean, M.D., of the Harvard School of Public Health, tells WebMD. "We have to protect children against chemical pollution because damage to a developing brain is irreversible."

The few substances proven to be toxic to human neurodevelopment should be viewed as the tip of a very large iceberg," they wrote.

Now, go ahead, yawn, while I entertain you with my wild fantasy of one day inhabiting a petroleum-free kitchen. I'll wait.

... And this gives us a perfect opportunity to plug in a book that comes highly recommended on less toxic home cleaning, which I'm looking forward to purchasing on our next venture into the mighty United States.

Africa

Nicaragua: abortion-ban extended to cover all cases (including rape, incest, life-threatening situation to mother), and also US meddled with elections by threatening to block all remittances from Nicaraguans working in the US. "In a last-ditch effort to undermine Ortega, Cong. Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA), chairman of the House's International Relations Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigation, sent a letter on October 27 to Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff. Rohrabacher enjoined Chertoff “to prepare in accordance with U.S. law, contingency plans to block any further money remittances from being sent to Nicaragua in the event that the FSLN enters government.”"

Speaking of remittances, World Bank reminds "In 2005 migrant workers from Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) sent a total of $48.3 billion back to their home countries. In 2004, remittances represented about 70 percent of foreign direct investment (FDI) in LAC and were 500 percent larger than Official Development Assistance to the region."

Now that the Bush administration has made the US safer since Sept 11, 2001 , it's time to focus on weaponizing space. "October 2006 saw a near-unanimous vote at the General Assembly when 166 nations voted for a resolution to prevent an arms race in outer space. Only one country abstrained, Israel, while only one voted against such a resolution, the United States of America."

Before classes started in Cambridge, our cohort visited the British Parliament. The system had recently been turned on its head as the right of peerage which had been a right inherited from father-on-down for generations, had been swiftly and peacefully replaced by a more meritocratic system. Asked about this, our class director simply answered "it was no longer justifiable".
I was struck by those words. How many things after all do we encounter which are no longer tenable, but only survive as proof of corruption, nefarious heritage, or social injustice?
Somehow these same words came back to mind when I read "Will our system of constitutional democracy survive?" - Fear and Voting in the USA.

AFRICA.
Worldbank's financial Development Indicators show improvement.
Leila Ahmed's biography speaks movingly of the Islam she knows - a women's Islam far different from and holding contempt for the official Islam of the clerics. She also goes back repeatedly over the history of Egypt - when did it become Arab, she asks; why and for which political purposes, she uncovers.

I've been thinking about that wrt Africa. We don't think of Asia as a homogeneous group, nor of any other continent. Then why the liberty to group "Africa" so commonly together?

I am moved by accounts of US descendants of slaves who proudly wear a bracelet in the shape of the African continent, because they know not which region to zoom into to locate their ancestors.
Wikipedia tells me etymologically it shares its root with Nefertiti, and means "good", "beautiful", "perfection" or "noble".
But I cannot shake the thought that the "Africa" grouping is too convenient, and too accepted to be free of political intent. Is it to better cast it aside, and say with ease, "It's all messed up; it's full of corruption; it's AIDS-ridden; there's no hope in Africa"? Who coined the term Africa, and why are we so keen on using it so profusely to refer to realities so dramatically different from one another?

fairly robust waistline

Cheney tries hard, but he can't seem to get off my top 10 list of most love-to-hate people: waterboarding, although even the US Army forbids it (not to mention several international treaties and all sorts of reasonable folks), is of course practiced on suspect detainees, and endorsed by Dick who decided that oh no, it's not torture, it's "a fairly robust interrogation program".

Heard about the insane leap backwards to the 14th century with the pope going for pre-Vatican II Pie I masses in Latin? My favourite commentary is by L'Humanité (in French): afraid of opening up to the world.

The key to a leaner waist: sticking to comedies, single-color M&Ms, and proclaiming your wine to be from South Dakota - duh.

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The little one was a Queen-to-Bee for Halloween. (Princess is one of her numerous nicknames.)

I have to write these down because I'm sure next week we'll be on to something else: she's been taking a few heedless steps on her own. She continues to point to lights, cats, dogs, people she likes (sometimes, so cute, with both hands). And she's clearly starting to understand a few bilingual words. Fun times, I tell you... Oh and the fact that we can now leave her on her own again in her playpen because although she gets herself up to standing and cruises around, her balance is now good enough that she no longer crashes all the time? fun times too.

My time-off has been postponed by another week and a day, but I'm cool with it. I'll be at home, not knowing what to do with myself after I've caught up on the laundry and vaccuuming and gone swimming and to yoga, and caught up on emails and bills and visits to the local tax office, and doing my accounting, and searching for a good new computer (suggestions?), and a B&B around Montpellier for thanksgiving, and dropping by an orthodontist and getting the car's front airbag checked.

I woke up with a stark realization a few weeks ago - my time off wouldn't be leisurely I realized. Translate that to mean, I would still have a full time job of caring for the little one, while on vacation. I've been meaning to write about this, but have found a much better post than I could put into words here.

chronology

According to the calendar, it was two years ago already that we left Seattle to set up camp in Cambridge, and I started posting on this blog. When Americans ask us where we're from, we still say Seattle though. Will it ever change? I was in such a hurry to leave the evil empire, but we've left so many friends behind.

One year ago, I cancelled my business trip to a terrific conference in Bangkok due to an OB's fear that my ongoing contractions would cause me to give birth way too early, and perhaps even in mid-flight. Then we moved into the current little home we rent. And made a weekend trip to Ikea, coming back with a car bursting with packages - launching my ongoing amazement at P's packing abilities.

And here we are today, with nothing much to report other than two things you don't want to hear from your pediatrician. (Let's not be mistaken: I adore our pediatrician).

- Wow, that is a bizzaroid tooth.

In response to her inspection of the lil one's denture. It may be that two teeth have gelled together; we'll just have to wait and see.

- Weren't you very worried?

I happily reported that all TB tests came back negative. And that's what she had to say. Which got me thinking: I hadn't been that worried mostly because there was nothing I could do about the three-month old exposure - and because I'd forbidden myself to Google the ins and outs of tb treatment for an 8-month old. But with her response, clearly, I should've been. Funny, ha ha, me not worried enough! Someone up there has a sense of humour.

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Data management gone wrong - or how there's a No Fly list , and a Please Take Me Off The No Fly List List, and a Too Sensitive For The No Fly List List, and a Fly But Be Interrogated First List.
I used to be on that last one - courtesy of being on an international flight during September 11 2001, no doubt. Boy am I glad I'm off the list, flying with baby food, beverages, medication, and white powder.

Unhappy kids better at math - or why we should keep the little one in the French education system ;)

1, 2, 3, ... 10 000

After a few long days of nothing but rain and cold - enough time to realize again just how odd this houselet design is: it's designed in fact to minimize the heat in the summer; thus we kindly refer to it as 'the cave' in the winter months - it's full glory Riviera weather again. The light is incredible in the fall and winter months: warm, luscious, lazy, optimistic... I realized with fright that I had taken it for granted. Just a short year ago, we were moving in, and waking each other up every morning to the sound of "oh my, check this out - it's another gorgeous day!". Instead now we are much like Californians - despised by Seattle-ites for their inability to notice a bright and sunny day. Food for thought that was.

So I looked around for other areas where I might take things for granted. And you're probably rushing ahead of me to the topic of the lil one. Well, no. I don't take her for granted. Not a day. I am very aware of the pain of those who cannot have one or do not have one or have lost one, and I count my luck every day.

she's alive
she's healthy
although she comes home with some infection or other every single week from daycare, it's never been anything serious
she eats well
she sleeps ok (oh there is much room for improvement, but i'm looking at the silver lining)
she's fun
she's pudgy enough
she still tolerates my kisses
she laughs and giggles
i even think she's pretty adorable

but i have a long way to go... my older brother and his girlfriend came to visit us this past week-end. I've been angry at him for not coming sooner - she's almost 9 months old! It's not like her birth date was a big surprise ! I should stop using exclamation marks when I talk about him but I can't! Because he drove me nuts! Yes he's known worldwide for living in a parallel universe, with only loose and infrequent connections to planet Earth, and yes she was coming down with a fever and I was tired and a little concerned. But I should have found it in me to display my gratitude for his visit in a way other than to snap at him a 1000 times.

the tunnel

When lil A was very lil A, we'd often drive through a tunnel. And I would always wonder how kids make sense of the world. I mean, people think French is hard with its long list of rules and longer list of exceptions, but think about this: it's light in daytime and dark at night - except if the shutters or blinds are closed, except except if the lights are on, or you're in a tunnel, or underground, or playing peakaboo, or witnessing a sun eclipse - see what i mean? how do they make sense of it all?

but that's not the tunnel that's been most of my mind lately. I spent the summer looking forward to settling into an easier routine in September. that routine was postponed repeatedly - trip to dc, bumpy daycare start, TB tests (we're in the clear), and now, NOW, I think we're finally good even if the drama princess was somewhat opposed to eating oh and sleeping as well at daycare on thursday.

what does that mean? it means it's almost november and almost almost time to head over to FL for Xmas for 3 weeks (hate me) and really really mess up our good routine again.

ps: we've got tooth #4 out - it's the top left lateral front tooth, giving A the slightest bit of a Dracula look.

the right spot

Tired of the old heavy design, so trying this harbor look - but no worries, you're in the right spot.

What skin cream do *you* use?

What skin cream do you use?? Ahhh... freak out... and I was just starting to relax and consider buying non-organic AND pre-made baby food. mmh. back to freak mode.

Public thanks to zenscribe for the Morality-based politics quizz, among other excellent ones, such as the FindYourSpot.com .
Conclusion of the politics survey: me, yoga non-profit worker me, am totally predictable, falling right smack in activism and inches away from Buddhism. So much for smug thinking of maybe me not so easily cubbyholed. am just in a different cubby.
And conclusions of the findyourspot survey, for you (empty) adoring crowds who asked? well, we'll update you soon, but we will be moving. ha. who's surprised?

Voices in my head continued

There's a voice in my life at the moment that sings da-da-daaa-dadada, and occasionally ma-ma. She's the voice I am trying to cherish and listen to above all others.

Voices in my head

How do you translate "timeout" or "let's use our inside voices now" into French? Or "un gamin bien eleve" (sort of a well-raised kid, but also implies well-mannered, polite)?
The balance-beam of dual identity or dual cultures is taking on an interesting turn through mothering. And my French style is all about unconsciously mimicking and passing on how I have seen my mother and other relatives relate to kids; while my American style is all about what-the-books-say. But I only speak to the lil one in French, so she hears none of the fancy professional sounding American stuff from me.
Is it then easier to find equilibrium? Is it a luck or not to have such separation between the practical and the theoretical? I really wonder sometimes.
I used to think I didn't know how to be a mother in French - it'd been years since I'd been in the country and hadn't seen French friends become mothers. I was starting to think I could understand what it felt like for mothers who no longer had a mother. Yet suddenly I'd blurt out a rhyme or a lullaby I did not even know I knew. Memory is pretty cool. And just as well I could now diaper her in my sleep (have I?), tell you in an instant whether she's hungry, tired, excited, and whether it's a good time to try trimming her nails (not is the usual answer). And that's not memory at all.

We did some medical tests on Friday morning. Came home, and found out over lunch that both P and I had noticed that the nurses were normal. Not gawdy, not aggressive, just normal. Noticing normality, isn't that scary? Isn't that a sure sign that it's high time to pack and go??

Note to self

I am worn out. How boring. About as exciting as dust accumulating on lamp shades.

Had dinner with friends of my parents this past weekend - the same people who had us over when we were looking for a home. Made me feel crummy by suggesting that a) natural timeline before meeting folks in an area is 3 years b) that to shorten the timeline I should throw myself into settings where I am giving instead of taking, such as charities, church that sort of stuff - well, up until then i didn't consider myself as selfish; am I? I also have about as much time and energy for giving as a marathon runner who's crossed the finish line and is laying down on the side of the road weeping. total sum of selfishness in the last 8 months: 3 swim sessions of less than 30 minutes each, 1 depressing yoga class, 1 body scrub to accompany my mother who needed it as much as I, and an infinite amount of time reading through online mom journals because it makes me feel the slightest bit sane and part of a community of sorts.

I feel like I need to walk through the oft-mentioned tunnel before I get to the light, that I am only starting to cross my desert; and I'm usually fine with a good challenge, a fun triathlon with friends, an enriching experience, but I fear I do not have the energy needed right now.

My grandfather has been in the hospital - again (after two of my grandparents died in the last year; can I call a time out?). We feared a come-back of the lung cancer that's cost him a lung already. Instead it's TB. Which means P, A and self are heading over to the hospital day after tomorrow for some tests, and again next week. which also means I've had to pull out the lil one out of daycare until the results come back negative. which also means with the manual due in two days and still 60 pages of editing on my plate and no daycare, i'm pulling my hair out. And spending way too much time on the momjournal pages to muster up some sense of humour about the whole thing.

Hypothesis of the day: the antidote to sleep deprivation is laughter. Thoughts?

Gerrymandering Oaf Pandemonium

Sometimes I know I don't know something and I'm fine with it. Sometimes time has come to look it up. Like GOP.
Well, GOP = Grand Old Party. I'm not even kidding. How conceited is that?
(Apparently I'm not the only one who didn't know.)

On related political news, read read read this Was The 2004 Election Stolen and don't stop (thx dan).

Also a fascinatingly well-structured site at exxonsecrets.org on Exxon's funding of global warming naysayers.

Which brings us to the two women stepping up to share the realm of Mother Jones; the same women who did a ton of the investigative work behind the Exxon fundings. It's a small world.

stalking and other good manners

You know how sometimes things are there for seemingly odd reasons? like taking a class because it fit nicely into your student schedule, or ordering a particular flavor of ice-cream because that elegant lady in front of you did? Or still breastfeeding not because it's cheaper or less work (which it is, both), but due to complete disgust at the smell of warm milk - a la formula?

Well if I told you "child-stalker", what image would come to mind? That of a certain adorable not-quite-walking not-quite-8 months old? I think not. (I realize this is similar to a great scene in A Time To Kill where Matthew McConaughey asks the jury members to close their eyes, and tells them a story, then says "Can you see her? I want you to picture that little girl. Now imagine she's white.") So, yes, lil one is a child stalker. And her heart breaks every time a child walks away from her.

She's so utterly fascinated by babies, older children (and dogs), that it makes leaving her at daycare a tad bit easier on my guilty conscience. And reassures me a little bit that her daycare hunger strike might end one day. The drama-princess!

I completely resent one of the daycare ladies, in particular her not-so-subtle insinuations that if lil one's upset when I leave, then I must be raising her wrong. AAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHH does not quite begin to describe how I feel. First of all, isn't it part of her job to make it easier on the parents to leave their kids there, not harder? Second of all, A is precious and perfect in my eyes and anyone failing to see that is clearly demented and should not be put in charge of little bundles of joy (and energy). Third of all, seems entirely reasonable to me (even reassuring as to her emotional sanity) that A'd be a little fazed when I disappear. Fourth of all, who the hell is she to judge that A's mostly angelic but sometimes feisty temperament is the result of me doing something as opposed to who A is. So there. Resentment vented.

And the drama princess' mother (me) was under some drama of her own recently. Woke up whimpering with pain at 2:30am with a boob hotter than the Death Valley at noon in August. mastitis with infection, from trying to introduce formula in the afternoon. yikes.

So that's the land I inhabit - hot, adventuresome, and full of drama. Wouldn't have it any other way. Although feel free to come visit that land, there's plenty of room for company.

coiffes, glides and great apes

Picture walking through an old dusty museum with a curator who's been giving the same tour for 40 years. Can you feel the excitement? That's pretty much what the yoga class I attended this morning was. Despite frequent admonishings to close my eyes, I stared at the gray depressing ceiling trying not to fall asleep. I chatted with the nice (yawn) teacher afterwards who asked where I used to do yoga previously. "The US?", she asked. "Mmmh... chez eux le yoga ca decoiffe, non?" - figuratively, yoga there is more active; literally, yoga over there messes up your hair. In fact I think if it's an hour and a half of yoga while keeping on a perfect coiffe and fancy earrings, it's not my style. Am a bit nonplussed - this class came with such high recommendations. I've looked at others; I even drove half an hour. Am giving up. So I'll just save my 170euros and do yoga with me ownself.

Life's been interesting. We created a room for the little one out of the back end of our living room/dining room area. Surprisingly, she loves it. Can she already sense that it's all her own space, the playpen, the dresser, the little chair and toys and books and crib? Sometimes I feel like a twisted kind of scientist - the type that runs experiments on the great apes with a big mental checklist. Lil One able to recognize self in mirror? Check. Lil One able to recognize own name and parents' name? Check. Lil One able to feed self? Messily. When does it end? Are we a culture of such developmental checklist and experts and comparisons that there's no such thing as living, only living self-consciously anymore?

Speaking of self-consciousness, or rather self-analysis, I realized that sometimes a little bit of something is in fact worse than none of something. Take rain for instance. Or human company.
We were invited for drinks at 1 of the only 2 families we know in the area. (Their little one is 15 days younger than ours and I met the mom at a pregnant swim class.) I came back lonelier than before. As long as I was heads down in our hermits routine, I wasn't even aware of our isolation; and then the bubble burst. Oh achiness. The discussions on next steps and potential relocations are going at full speed again. Especially since the world ended last week. Well, almost. P was told he would not be allowed to fly in France. Or rather I took the call while he was out on a walk. World came tumbling down, I was pretty much ready to start packing that instant. He's taken it lightly (right... he stayed up thinking about it until 2am...)

Ach. What's one to do? What's one to do?

3 "mistake" years

Excerpts from a recent article from the Human Rights blog on US illegal detentions:

Seventy to 90 percent of the Iraq detentions in 2003 were "mistakes," U.S. officers once told the international Red Cross.

Yet they say,

Every U.S. detainee in Iraq "is detained because he poses a security threat to the government of Iraq, the people of Iraq or coalition forces," said U.S. Army Lt. Col. Keir-Kevin Curry, a spokesman for U.S.-led military detainee operations in Iraq.


But dozens of ex-detainees, government ministers, lawmakers, human rights activists, lawyers and scholars in Iraq, Afghanistan and the United States said the detention system often is unjust and hurts the war on terror by inflaming anti-Americanism in Iraq and elsewhere.

Duh.

And thousands of people still languish in a limbo, deprived of one of common law's oldest rights, habeas corpus, the right to know why you are imprisoned.

Back to the middle ages.

In Iraq, Army jailers are a step ahead. Last month they opened a $60-million, state-of-the-art detention center at Camp Cropper, near Baghdad's airport.


Questions of Law, Sovereignty
Meanwhile, officials of Nouri al-Maliki's 4-month-old Iraqi government say the U.S. detention system violates Iraq's national rights.
"As long as sovereignty has transferred to Iraqi hands, the Americans have no right to detain any Iraqi person," said Fadhil al-Sharaa, an aide to the prime minister. "The detention should be conducted only with the permission of the Iraqi judiciary."

Imperialism? Colonialism? Contempt and racism? Moral superiority?

out

super active and alert baby + sleepless long flights + jetlag + new tooth + grocery delivery at 7am (8 hours ahead of eta) = one conked out (sp?) maman

the little one got sick for the first time (a mere cold) two days before our flight to the US - while the pediatrician was on vacation... she got sick the second time while in the US (while I was working very long days)... and got sick for the third time the day before we had to leave the US. that's three times in 2 weeks. 0 times in the previous 7 months.

we've been back for ten rough days. her sleeping is erratic to err on the gentle side. brutal and hellish comes a bit closer to reality. I feel pulled back to 5 months ago. ouch.
i'd attribute it to jetlag if it weren't for the fact that she's like clockwork, waking up and going to bed at the same time every day. but she won't stay down.
so the doc thinks it's teeth. i was thinking "teeth, schmeeth", you know; she's got three already, what's another gonna do to her? well, apparently i should've been asking "what's four simultaneous ones gonna do to her". all top four teeth seem to be coming in at once. yikes.
right now, i wish she'd been born with a full set of teeth.

i'm having a blast though, mostly watching her.
for instance, she meticulously picks up every dry leaf she comes across, crumbles it between her fingers and looks on ecstatically, then spots another, squats down, picks it up, crumbles, ad vitam aeternam.
so instead of playing with her, i'm filling the role of bodyguard/bystander. i've stocked up on bump and bruise medication. we're set for a whole new set of adventures.

work was awesome. the conference was beyond inspiring. it was grounding, uplifting, heart-wrenching, eye-opening. wow. i am in awe of these women. and it's my job to work with them. wow.
but i'm tired of the manual. tired of working on it on my own. tired of too little sleep and too little feedback on it.

i need a vacation.

the little one's started daycare - sort of. she got kicked out of it - sort of: last week was 'adaptation' week. went in with her for a half hour the first day. then subsequently she spent 1/2 hour, 1 hour, 2 hours, 5 hours on her own there. did splendidly well (except for the eating). she's so social and excited to have new faces and new toys, i knew it wouldn't be a problem. so monday off we go for the first full day. she'd done one of her wake-up-every-2-hours the night before stint followed by a refuse-to-take-a-morning-nap routine. we were all a little pooped. i got a call from the daycare two hours after i dropped her off asking me to come pick her up. that she'd spent the time screaming (except for a brief nap). wouldn't even drink expressed milk. a disaster.

stay tuned as tomorrow's attempt #2 at a full day at daycare.

i already feel immensely guilty at leaving her there in great (2 adults + a supervisor for 5 babies) but not oustanding care. please let me have a few hours before she's sent home so i can make progress on the darn manual at times other than 11pm at night.

i must sound pretty down, which really i'm not. i've had a fabulous day - we went to the park to look at ducks and horses and dogs (love of her life), and dry leaves and wood sticks of course (love of life #2). the metamorphosis between the mostly-horizontal baby to the now mostly-vertical pre-toddler is absolutely fantastic and fun and cute and endearing.

and i wish you were all much closer so you could come see it.

we're on NPR !

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6044642, click the "Listen" button.

PS: I'll post more later, it's been crazy busy.

Best thing since (sliced) cardboard

I took the little one toy shopping (because we're here for two weeks with no appointed babysitter and I desperately need to get a ton of work done before the conference next week-end).

I strategically placed here in front of a whole lot of toys to see which would catch her attention (I do that with clothes too!). Well, what do you know? best toy #1: an empty clothes hanger... best toy #2: a piece of cardboard.

I still came away with an armful of toys (to take back since they were super cheap). Of course she's been mostly playing with the wrappers so far!

And in other news, she's toddling her way towards toddlerhood: more insistently having us help her walk around everywhere, and less and less enjoying sitting and watching.

Groceries

Reese's pieces... oreos... turkey jerkey, butter fingers, twizzlers, tortilla chips and salsa, bisquick, donuts, huge steaks, and soft shell crabs... that's what happens to our grocery cart when we show up in the US after a year long absence!

You know what else sprung at me? The lawn campaign signs, the flags everywhere, the large size ribbon bumper stickers (to support the troops, support ovarian cancer, but mostly to proclaim that the driver's son (sometimes daughter) is somewhere far away risking his (her) life), the police sirens, the lazy and incompetent drivers and the bigger people - yup.

But I am also eternally grateful for the multi ethnicity of the population, lest little A was going to be growing up thinking everyone in the whole world was white with only different shades of tanning.

more lil updates

After a whilrwind week with the visit of a great friend (thanks again for coming!), it's time to post a couple of updates.

I am impressed by the little one. In fact, I was telling this friend that I often feel as if I've inherited this great gift (the lil one); but that I'm always wondering if someone else may not show up and claim more custody rights to her than us; as if we didn't deserve her (well, at least on the nights when she sleeps, that's how I feel :) Or maybe it's the sleeplessness that's causing such crazy talk).

In any case, she's on FIRE! She just tried two free dives off of her changing table today. Thankfully we caught her in mid air. Phew. My heart skipped a few beats. We're going to be changing the table setup. Real soon. As in, right now.

She's walking everywhere, with help. I'm ignoring all the well-meaning people who say she shouldn't until she's a year old. They obviously have not met her determination to walk - it's so much simpler to hold her hands and give in to her exploring demands than to try and sit her down. Which will prove fun on the 15 hour travel journey we'll be taking in two days. And with the restricted carry-ons allowed (no toy? no book? no music box?). And she just came down with her first ever illness - well, only a cold and sore throat, but still, congestion for a little one during airplane takeoff and landing? party on!

She's a catholic: up, down, stand, sit, stand, kneel, stand, lay down (?? some fanatic catholic sect maybe??).

She's "a-da-da-da-da-da"-ing to P's greatest delight. I'm a teeny bit jealous. But patient.

She's figured out that big people water bottles hold water. If she ever wants water, she just stretches her hands towards one of those and if we hover in the neighborhood, she'll actually pick it up and put her mouth to it. hilarious. thank god she hasn't figured out what's in the limoncello bottle ;0.

And her latest game is with her pacifier (i know, i know, she's not supposed to have one by this age, we're working on it, ok, but she's a teether and a sucking soother, and, well, judge me): she can play with it, but she can't figure out how to put it back in her mouth properly - and she knows that. She was playing in her crib yesterday and I was nearby, so she reached for her pacifier which was laying on the mat next to her, and handed it for me to put into her mouth. cute.

otherwise, the general game these days is "drop". as in, drop anything from the high chair. drop anything from the change table (including self, as mentioned above). but also drop also-above-mentioned pacifier in between crib bars - always on the side of the wall to make more noise and see princess' parents crawl to fetch it. ha ha ha - the fun a lil one can conjure!

Finally here's a very recent pic:

revue de presse

"Peace, Propaganda and the Promised Land": Noam Chomsky, rabbis, israelis, and media watchgroups debunk the US media's gross misrepresentation of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Paradise Lost on US Territory : Greed, Sex Slavery, Forced Abortions and Right-Wing Moralists

Academics barred from US for ideology? The 'Espoused Terrorism' visa exclusion
"It is not just the people who are turned down," said obert M. O'Neil, director of the Thomas Jefferson Center for the Protection of Free Expression. "If there are a number of sensitive and conscientious people who decide it is not worth coming at all and decide to go to another country, then we in the U.S. are the losers."

The Senate continues to pick on climatologists.
Also, hilarious, Will Ferrel's Bush on Global Warming.

males as modified females

An almost non-sexist article from The (infamous) Economis on gender differences, including debunking reported behavioural differences between the sexes:

In the past, it was assumed that a female was simply a male with hormones, says Tracey Shors, a professor of neuroscience at Rutgers University. The truth is the exact opposite. Female is the default brain setting. Until the eighth week of gestation every human fetal brain looks female. The brain, like the rest of the human body, becomes male as a result of surges of testosterone—one during gestation and one shortly after birth.

broken teddy

Picture this mommy moment: I am sitting down during the lil one's afternoon nap to saw up the iconic teddy.

Now awake from the reverie: Teddy (who is the little one of a pair; the big one is Ted of course) was not worn down by overuse ; he had been torn to pieces by a mouse.

A mouse? A rat maybe, in fact, given the size of the thing. But in this household we choose to refer to it as Henrietta the mouse - that lets me sleep better at night. Henrietta sure partied it up while we were away: in less than a week she stashed a nice little pile of 4 dozen walnuts, 3 dozen rigatoni pasta tubes, a few swedish bread rolls, 2 sponges; she chewed on our wooden dish rack, ate a few limbs of stuffed animals, crawled all over the place and uh marked her territory every where. Yuck. Arg. Icky. Was I ever so unpleased to be coming home. The worst offense? She grabbed the afore-mentioned teddy off of the little one's crib (I still don't let myself dwell on this image - too scary) and dragged it for a meal underneath our bed. I am not too weak of heart, but I didn't sleep well until Henrietta the mega-mouse was taken care of.

Henrietta was American. Or British. Clearly. She chose the peanut butter trap over the French cheese trap.

Now in addition to the glaring nightlight, we sleep with a electric mechanism that supposedly keeps rodents away and sounds maddeningly like a leaking faucet.

The things we adjust too...

jerk

- "Sidewalk!"
- "Jerk!"
- "What did you say??" . The beamer stops and the grayback reverses to halt next to me, the stroller, and the lil one in there, dozing off.
I reply that he shouldn't be screaming out his window as he passes me, and that I need to go left - whereas the sidewalk was going right only and therefore clearly unhelpful.
Yes, he and his wifey retort, but I have a baby.
Well, I am well aware of that, and if they really want to help, why don't they step out of their tank and give me a hand to carry the stroller down the 15 steps that force me to make an unsafe detour.
They don't step out of their car, which by the way, means they're polluting in the lil one's vulnerable lungs whereas me, environmental conscious that I am, am sweating the 30 minute walk in the blistering heat to preserve a bit of this planet.
- "Well, at least you should be polite!" and they're off.
Excuse me???

I'm having difficulties with the local 3Rs: rich, retired, self-righteous.

the tooth

it has come out!

diapers and water for Lebanon

You're no doubt aware of the situation in Lebanon.

Our partner in Lebanon is taking responsibility to provide supplies and coordinate relief activities to the Zicco House Relief Center in Hamra, Beirut - specifically focusing on the needs of women and children, such as diapers, which are not covered by relief kits.
They're asking for 1000 times $62.50 to provide health and sanitation kits to 1000 female-headed households.

It is now estimated that 10 000 are displaced in Beirut.

lil updates

Voila. With the blink of an eye, the lil one is sitting up on her own, eating applesauce, trying to crawl (but struggling to lift her buddha belly off the floor), singing along, staring at her books and chewing their corners, and mostly trying to run around everywhere (you have read correctly: not walk, but run). pity our lumbar vertebraes as this means much time spent bent over with our hands below our knees.

In a week she'll be six months old, and i might allow myself to feel a great sense of accomplishment. i meant to nurse her for a long time; it has been a real test of my resolve at times, but I feel I've made it and I'm so darn glad. i also wanted to follow her lead, so when she was imitating us with her plastic spoon and cup and desperately trying to stick her fingers into our food, we introduced applesauce (the standard French first food. no rice cereal. contact me if you care to know why). I dare think of this as resolve with flexibility ;)

By the way, and I won't dwell on the subject any longer: although i'm convinced of the health benefits of breastfeeding (to the child, but certainly not to the mother!), and although all kinds of research points to how great it is (latest: natural painkiller), and although it is the single most convenient way to soothe a baby, I have vowed never to judge a woman's choice in that regard. Every situation and every child is different.

What next? I think another tooth may reveal itself in the coming couple of days.

coming up short

I fail.

Every day, I fail. And yet I keep on trying.

Trying to focus at work while my little one is crying - I end up running to her rescue or crying myself. Or both.
I had always thought of working from home as the ability to minimize travel time, the ability to maximize time with her, and have lunch and dinner with P and so on. I had never thought of it as the supplice of hearing my child cry while I'm at work.

Trying to soak in every day with the afore-mentioned lil one, and give her love and attention.

Trying to get through a couple of chores and bills and correspondence.

Trying to have some time with P.

I have so far failed to have much time to myself since the birth: one swim session with my sister. Zilch for yoga. I do steal some time to read a page here or there while I nurse.

I don't feel sorry for myself.

It just occurred to me today that instead of wondering where we are failing, and why this is so challenging, I should be amazed at the fact that we are both still working, and have no babysitter (not that I haven't tried. This may be a topic for another post.), and have plenty of visitors and distractions. So there, I'm finding the silver lining!


Two excellent books I highly recommend:
- Suite Francaise by Irène Némirovsky : a novel relating the French debacle of 1940-41 - the exodus, the German soldiers living in the homes of widows, of mothers of prisoners of war, of women falling in love with them, etc. written during the war without the luxury of hindsight. In fact the author died in Auschwitz and never wrote the last part she intended to her novel. An incredible portrait of French people and their failings.
- Africa Trek (I and II) by Sonia and Alexandre Poussin : the unbelievable story of a couple walking 14 000 kilometers (9 000 miles) from South Africa to Israel with the theme of walking in the footsteps of early humanity. No logistical plans, no car, no safety net. Just African generosity, wildlife and thirst and incredible portraits of countries and people.

US links

In random news:
US: selling to the worried well - aka drugs for healthy people - aka the medicalisation of our bodies

US's supposed high energy weapons

KKK: is Kinder Kirche Küche the right's agenda? Unwanted pregnancies delined for upper socio-eco but rose for the lower; now want to make abortion, contraception and sex ed taboo. mmh.

More women worldwide smoking


In a single article on mother murderers and rigid Christian sex roles:

Any church that forbids contraception must be told: "This woman may die. Her children's lives are at stake."

Sarah contacted me because of an article I wrote four years ago pointing out the role of conservative Christian churches in empowering abusive husbands.

Doctors and mental health agencies need to move from a hands-off stance that stresses patient rights to a position of engagement with the community surrounding a patient.

As her second trial plays out, it's clear that there were three steps in [Andrea Yates'] metamorphosis [from a seemingly happy bride in published photos to a killer]: an oppressive marriage, repeated childbirths and mismanagement of mental illness.

Web users urged on China policy: telling Yahoo, Microsoft and Google not to censure; are those companies there to provide freedom to the Chinese as they claim or to make a profit? I won't bother polling for opinion ;)

And a fascinating look at Tutunkhamen's space gem

to DDT or not to DDT

Thanks Dan - I always enjoy your dissent. Katya was spot on in what I meant. And for once I'm not taking issue with the Bush administration per say, but more widely with the media coverage of the event and the public's expectations and response. I agree with you that in war people die without due process. But it hadn't even occurred to me that he was a soldier at war (despite all the rhetoric about the war on terrorism); and nowhere in the coverage did I see "this is ok to do only because we're at war, remember, and we would normally give this guy a fair trial".
Side comment: if only one side were to declare war (the other were silent), and use this state of one-sided war as an excuse for killing without due process, what then?
Further side comment: is it ok to use war to excuse this killing, and yet to consider prisoners not prisoners of war, and the geneva convention optional?

In misc news:
- Volunteer rates hit record numbers

- An Iranian friend of a relative went back to Iran for tourism. Her family had left after the revolution and she was the first to step foot in the country. naively. She was detained for a couple days upon leaving: she did not carry with her authorization from her male guardian for travel (husband/father/brother). interestingly enough this is one of the issues our partners are working on. stay tuned for campaign details relating to this and citizenship rights. Oh and she made it out ok; something about divorce and such.

- Every year hair worth about $136 million is shipped from India; mostly hair donated in temples, intended as devotion, not commerce.

- women push for seats at climate policy table because they are disproportionally hit by climate change consequences

- to DDT or not to DDT; in other words malayria vs. developmental harm to children

- and here's what French supporters have to say - or show - about Materazzi! No comment about anything else ;)

the bad guys

Something's beeen bugging me: everyone seemeed so excited about Al Zarqawi's death. But the man was never tried. Of course we just know he was a bad guy; it's totally different from the Guantanamo guys; or the people whose bank accounts are being spied on by the Bush administration. It is totally different; or is it?

In other news, the Senate continued to fund the existence of the deathly School of the Americas and ILEAs (International Law Enforcement Academies) in Latin America. How do they think Latin Americans are feeling? Something like after a good beating? You gotta wonder: where in the world is the US making friends these days? Saudi Arabia?
If you simply google "School of the Americas", the top pages (except for the US military's site) all mention human rights abuses. Excerpts: "Training manuals used at the SOA and elsewhere from the early 1980s through 1991 promoted techniques that violated human rights and democratic standards. SOA graduates continue to surface in news reports regarding both current human rights cases and new reports on past cases.
Another way to look at it: is it worth spending the many (7.5) millions required to keep the SOA open? Or should we rather not cut budget on items like shelters domestic violence victims (35).

An interesting report on "the great divide: how westerners and muslims view each other"; includes European muslims' views as well.

A rare point of agreement between Westerners and Muslims is that both believe that Muslim nations should be more economically prosperous than they are today. But they gauge the problem quite differently. Muslim publics have an aggrieved view of the West - they are much more likely than Americans or Western Europeans to blame Western policies for their own lack of prosperity. For their part, Western publics instead point to government corruption, lack of education and Islamic fundamentalism as the biggest obstacles to Muslim prosperity.

The chasm between Muslims and the West is also seen in judgments about how the other civilization treats women. Western publics, by lopsided margins, do not think of Muslims as "respectful of women." But half or more in four of the five Muslim publics surveyed say the same thing about people in the West.

Concerns over Islamic extremism are widely shared in Western publics and Muslim publics alike. But an exception is China, where 59% express little or no concern over Islamic extremism.

Nearly four-in-ten Germans (37%), and 29% of Americans, say there is a natural conflict between being a devout Christian and living in a modern society.

location, location, location... which location?

If you could live anywhere in the world, where would you live?

Which continent? which timezone? which language?
Which culture? Which educational system? Political reality? Cost of living? Cultural events?

What weather?
What vistas?

Which set of friends and family would you choose to be close to? or far from?

Which running trail would you have in your back yard? Which bakery down the road?

Iranian women's fight for equal rights

I have the privilege of working with women's rights organizations and advocates in several countries around the world. On most days I feel pretty giddy about my job, on some downright humbled...

Our partners in Iran recently demonstrated for an end to legal discrimination against women. The peaceful demonstration was answered with violence.

Updates on the demonstration and arrests ; photos; as well as specific legal changes sought.

terrifying responsibilities

Terrifying responsibility: Trimming the little one's littlest toe nail (it was also sort of falling back; scary) - surface before trimmage: 1.5 mm2; after trimmage: puny.

The word is out: she is precocious... in teething. Has started teething at the bright young age of three months and a few weeks. Ouch. The funny part is it's added a whole new dimension to her vocabulary: a whole set of oooh ooh ahh uuuuh uuuuuuuuumh. She's become very vocal. The not so funny part is it means a little fever, and some aches that keep her up and keep her howling, and there's not much we can do after we've done the homeopathic sugar pills (which she adores) and the frozen teething devices (which she adores less). So we're expanding: we've added car rides to our bag of teething tips, and in the mail we've got ... some natural iris root and an amber necklace on the way. I'm not kidding! Wait till you have a little one in pain and you'll fall for all kinds of crazy stuff :).

I'm writing a manual for work... to be published and all that serious stuff.
Does anyone beside me find this amusing and scary? I generally feel like they're putting a lot of faith in my abilities (good); but perhaps more faith than I have in my abilities (frightening).

Regarding Guantanamo detainees, Bush has said: "We're now in the process of working with countries to repatriate people, but there are some that - if put out on the streets - could create grave harm to American citizens and other citizens of the world." If the others were of no grave harm to citizens, why were they being detained, with no due process at that?

I'm also having a hard time swallowing the framing of the 3 Guantanamo suicides as an "act of warfare", or "a smart PR move" on the suicidees' part. It looks more like an act of desperation to me.

Finally this week is bringing a new challenge to my doorstep. In general I work 4 hours in the late afternoon/early evening, while P babysits the lil one. At times it's the best setup; at other times it feels like a rare form of torture to hear my crying baby while I'm "at work". This week though I get to experiment with a different setup: P's away at a conference, and the babysitter's AWOL. So I juggle.

My mother's mother passed away this week-end.

plastic contaminants

Many blogs ago, I shared my, well, hatred of the chemical industry and my anger at the huge number of chemicals out there which are untested even though we have reason to believe they are causing us and the rest of the planet much harm.

Women's eNews and Greenpeace provide us a follow-up to that story today - focused on reproductive health:

Greenpeace, the Netherlands-based environmental group, has surveyed 50 years of scientific studies indicating that tens of thousands of poorly-regulated chemicals used in household products may contribute to reproductive disorders in Europe, the Associated Press reported May 3. Timing its report to the European Union's debate over a new law that will regulate the chemical industry, Greenpeace warned that the European Parliament had watered down the proposed law in discussions. A decision on the law will be made by the end of 2007.

"Right now the burden is on the governments to do the research. This law would help shift the burden to industry," said Helen Perivier, who heads the Greenpeace campaign against toxic materials. Perivier also said that of the 70,000 to 100,000 human-made chemicals in use in Europe today, only 150 have been evaluated for health risks.

Chemicals believed to damage female hormones and alter their production are found in food wrappings, plastic goods and perfumes. Some can contaminate blood in the umbilical cord of a pregnant woman, and others, such as polycarbonate plastic--found in baby bottles and CDs--can decrease the amount of breast milk a woman produces. Insulation used in electronic devices can leak into household dust and has caused birth defects in rats in laboratory experiments.

See the full report at http://www.greenpeace.org/raw/content/international/press/reports/fragile-our-reproductive-heal.pdf

servers on strike

Miscellaneous thoughts today:

Even the servers are not allowed to work for the vatican on Sundays: they go offline. Who doesn't think this is insane??

There's been too much going on, and too little time to report it if I want to pay attention on the motherhood front. I also don't know how much to include here - it could easily be the sole content of this blog, but it wasn't meant to be when I started this - time will tell what the right balance is. It's also my second week back at work (albeit remotely and part-time), which has somewhat brought me back to reality.

Our partner in Uzbekistan has closed shop as the government closed all NGO's. Jordan and Egypt are facing restrictions on NGO activities as well. Iran is no better. And on much sadder personal news, one of African partners was taken by the police and harassed for several hours. She miscarried two days later.

Closer to home, televangelist and political power broker Rev. Pat Robertson calls feminism a "socialist, anti-family, political movement that encourages women to leave their husbands, kill their children, practice witchcraft, destroy capitalism and become lesbians." - that's a tall order... as mentioned in http://www.womensenews.org/article.cfm?aid=2663.

While on the topic of Women's eNews, I cannot recommend their Comentoon strongly enough. It is hilarious, always on point, never disappointing: http://www.womensenews.org/article.cfm/dyn/context/commentoon for the latest and all archives at http://www.womensenews.org/archive_results.cfm/dyn/cat/19. Enjoy!

... and that'll be all for this week as I start my work day. Be well.

worthiness

Parenting is one big question: are you worthy?


... and sometimes I want to say, "Maybe not; can I take a five minute break?"

Baby A

Dear all,

40 days ago I gave birth to a little girl. 40 days is the traditional period of rest for new moms, so here I am after 40 days... Not quite 40 nuggets of wisdom I want to share today, but some random thoughts.

She was gorgeous from the start (no bias there) - I had read all about ugly newborns and tried to get myself ready for a purple wrinkled misshaped baby, but there she was, incredibly alert with her eyes wide open taking it all in from the start.

She's got great muscle tone (dixit the pediatrician, not just the crazy parents) - practising against my ribs for months did help, I suppose.

Labour was no fun at all, birth was incredibly hard work, yet I did forget about it all as soon as she was born. The hard part is the aftermath. To go back to the marathon and sprint image, the postpartum period is like running an ironman after having completed the marathon of labour and the sprint of birth. Ouch. Incredibly aching and sleep deprived and clueless. Vulnerable.

Every day is different. Not only does her 'schedule' change as soon as we can figure out what it is (every couple of days at least), but we can almost feel the intense brain development happening. The new sounds she's making, the smiles, the staring at and then reaching for her little mobile animals. It's crazy to watch. Miraculous.

The cliches are true. It is a life changing event.

She's named after a wind. and after one of her great grand aunts.

She loves her baths. Almost as much as she loves eating. It's so much fun to watch her play in the water and do her frog kicks and big smiles, it's a privilege to give her bath. For me it was almost too much to watch her coming out of her bath during the first couple of weeks: with her hair all messed up she looked so much like she did on her birth day. Now she's all grown up (relatively speaking) and I don't have that flashback anymore, unless I look at pictures taken right after the birth.

We celebrated her first month with a homemade chocolate cake.

She wears some washable diapers (but not exclusively; maybe one day when I have it all figured out). Everyone thinks I'm crazy to add to the laundry load, but I strongly believe that if we don't follow our vision and principles for the things that matter the most (e.g. my own child), then those visions and principles are really meaningless.

Breastfeeding is a full time job. Over 8 hours a day at first in between feeding, burping, changing, more feeding, more burping, holding her for a while before setting her down to sleep. Full time job.

Someone (anyone) should've told me I'd get hungrier, incredibly hungrier after the birth. I eat my dear husband under the table at every meal ("what do you mean you don't want a third dessert?!?"). I read somewhere it takes about an additional 1000 calories a day for me to produce her milk.

People are surprising me - in positive ways. Our tax advisor was totally cool about her presence in his office during our meeting with him, and starting talking about how children are a way to reach eternity... Our car salesman was goo-goo-gaa-gaa'ing over her and reminding us all that we had all looked like that one day... The owner of a cute little cafe in Mougins whipped out a table, put it right in front of the heater so she wouldn't get cold and told us to go right ahead and change her diaper right smack in the middle of his cafe and not to worry one bit about anyone else who might walk in and want, say, a hot chocolate rather than a whiff of her fresh poo.

I haven't had a full night sleep in 10 weeks (the last month of pregnancy I was up at all hours of the night). A friend, a mother of 2 set 2 years apart, had once told me that after the birth of her eldest she hadn't had a good night sleep in 4 years. I didn't believe her, and was dead certain that she was hugely exaggerating. I do believe her now.
At the same time it's not the same tiredness as staying up late for an assignment or a party. It's more manageable. Or I'm too zombie-like to realize that it's not.

A birth has a funny way of bringing out old wounds but also lots of joy from people we barely know who are so happy to be sending her a gift or a welcome card, as if her birth is a renewed assertion that there is hope and good in the world. It's intense.

It is intense.

a new mom

you just keep me hanging on

Good morning one and all,
I've said in the past (I do repeat myself) that it is within anyone's grasp to get stressed out under challenging circumstances. Similarly it's within anyone's capabilities to get highly impatient at this point of the waiting game. So I try to see it as a similar challenge for both situations: to outshine the average person and find some patience and relaxation ;).

After all, she *will* be born some day. And then things will just fly.

I've just stopped work. Last week was insane by any standards, but particularly by the standards of a 9-month pregnant me. 15 hour work days (it helped that I generally couldn't sleep past 5am) to wrap up two massive projects at work. Now I'm off for 3 months - although they did suggest I feel free to keep working if the waiting game was getting to me ;).

But 'off' doesn't quite capture the essence of my days. 'off' should read : sorting through paperwork and files and accounting. I'm really trying to do the right thing. And that is so hard sometimes. Why is it so much easier to lie and cheat the system than do the right thing sometimes?
ex: We arrive in France. Everyone tells me 'claim that you don't have a job, they'll give you the whole medical insurance for free'. Of course, i've inherited my dad's sense of integrity (the man would not do a single photocopy at work for his kids, since he didn't believe in using work resources for personal purposes), so I couldn't do that. Had to jump through hoops and hoops and more hoops. and pay a bunch too. Now I'm set up as a self-employed worker (individual entreprise is what they call it) - tons more hoops and organizations to coordinate with, and still trouble. I signed up with a local professional association cuz that's what they want you to do - damned if you, damned if you don't: now I'm no longer allowed to submit the simple accounting procedures - I really wish they'd've warned me ahead of time. So now I gotta learn how to do the full blown fancy accounting with separate bank accounts and all. I also gotta learn about VAT procedures which are incredibly tricky - I'm sitting next to the 250 page book on VAT procedures for self-employed in France - ouch. And we gotta figure out how to pay the right amount of taxes in the US and in France, but not double pay cuz that would just suck. Yikes. So, like I was saying I'm 'off' at the moment ;) ...

... and still trying to finish that "Heresies" book by John Gray.

In most of the world, Bush's mix of realpolitik and evangelical uplift evokes mere contempt. In the Middle East, it spells disaster. For much of the region, the choice is not between tyranny and freedom; it is between theocratic democracy and secular dictatorship.

haiku too

The maternity t-shirt
Covers the belly no more;
It is time to give birth.

Torture: A modest proposal

A brief intro first, then a summary of the Gray article, then the Amnesty report...

The title and excerpts are, again, from John Gray's Heresies. I had to go to the end of the article and check whether it had been written on April Fools' Day, but no. Tighten your seat belts, it's going to be a bumpy ride. Choice quotes:

We need to view the reintroduction of judicial torture as the next step in human progress.

We need to shed the belief that human rights are violated when a terrorist is tortured.

[how do you know he's a terrorist before you torture him/her?]

In a truly liberal society, terrorists have an inalienable right to be tortured. This is what demonstrates the moral superiority of liberal societies over others, past and present.

[again, written on Feb. 17, 2003 - not April 1]

In this article, Gray argues that torture warrants, like search warrants, should be legal (he also points out that technically torture is not unconstitutional in the US; I wonder if the white house administration reads this UK guy.) He claims that the abolition of torture made sense back in the days, but that it no longer does because, whereas back in the days torture was used to uphold arbitrary power,

today torture is used to defend free societies from attack by their enemies

[mmh...].

The scary part is that he goes on to say "The US will not rest until other states have have also adopted [this new regime of human rights]. " This was 2003, it's now 2006 and lots of stories are emerging regarding the outsourcing of terror onto other states, including the willful cooperation of certain European law enforcement agencies. Gray claims that since the US was able to convince the world of the new "pre-emptive strike" doctrine, that it can also pull this off. Think Rice.

The article ends with the following:

The world's finest liberal thinkers are applying themselves to the design of a modern regime of judicial torture. At a time when civilization is under daily threat, there can be no more hopeful sign.

We have different hopes, John, very different hopes.

There are generally-speaking three types of arguments against torture - (and for the most part they're the same variety as applies to anti-death penalty argumentation); and Gray doesn't convince me on either one of them.
A) It is immoral
B) It doesn't work (torture: the results are unreliable; death penalty: it does not act as a deterrent)
C) The process by which people are picked to whom it applies (the tortured, the killed by the penal system), is deeply flawed.

On any given day I probably would've just dismissed this article, said "Codswallop" as says the author of my current baby book, and moved on to prettier topics. But you see, I happen to work for an organization that fights for human rights. And I like to keep informed of things like Amnesty Intl's latest report on the use of torture by the US.

So should you have any time, even just time enough to read this blog, you should seriously skim through this well-crafted, humourous report. Humourous because cynical and smart. Also much better written than the Gray article.
Guantanamo and beyond: The continuing pursuit of unchecked executive power. It's magnificently researched. It points out the hilarious discrepancies between the State Department reports and the same government's doings. It is well worth it.

Keep your seat belts on for the read though, it is after all about abuse of executive power and humiliations and torture.

is it possible to eradicate evil?

[note: I am not recommending John Gray's Heresies from which passages are excerpted below. I've been struggling with it for months, but mostly as I might post later about, it condones torture. Plus he's very pro-Bush, I mean who can forgive that?!?]

In Europe, we see terrorism as one of several threats to the world. They include poverty and climate change, and each has causes that can be alleviated. In America, by contrast, terrorism is seen as supremely evil, the work of dark forces that must be defeated and eliminated.

Dividing the world into goodies and baddies is a recurrent feature of American thinking. (Reagan, Wilson). Today, the idea that the US embodies all that is good in the world is an article of faith in the 'new strategic doctrine' presented to the US Congress in September 2002, in which President Bush declared that there is 'a single sustainable model for national success': American democracy and free entreprise.[...] It is at the bottom an indigenously American creed, rooted in the belief that the United States has been chosen by God to bring freedom and virtue into a benighted world.

It is disbelief in evil that is today peculiarly American. Contemporary American culture is founded on the Pelagian faith that evil can be defeated and eradicated from the world. In contrast, Europeans see the choices that have to be made in international relations as being unavoidably among evils. No doubt they continue to hope for a better world, but they are always conscious of the danger of too much enthusiasm.

The risks of imagining evil can be conjured away are many, and they are nowhere more evident than in US policy on Iraq. [...] far reaching lack of realism in US thinking. The relentlessly upbeat moral outlook that underpins American foreign policy prevents a clear assessment of these risks. It also inhibits honesty about more mundate interests, such as secure oil prospects and Bush's re-election prospects. The belief that evil can be driven from the world nourishes a false sense of moral purity. US policy, like that of any imperial power, is dictated largely by realpolitik. Morality, though it may constrain foreign policy, can never be the chief force in shaping it.

America's critics condemn Bush's call to take up arms against evil as an expression of religious fundamentalism. And it is true that fundamentalism has an alarming hold on US government. But if Bush talks so insistently of evil (...) it is because he does not doubt that once the world has accepted American values, it will enjoy everlasting peace and prosperity. THis has not always been the American view. For the founding fathers, human beings were flawed creatures that no change in institutions could improve fundamentally. The purpose of government was not to conduct us to the Promised Land but to stave off the recurrent evils to which human life is naturally prone.

The revival of the language of evil in the speeches of American leaders does not mean that the ancient truth [of the doctrine of original sin] has been rediscovered. On the contrary, it is a sign that we are in for another grandiose experiment in remaking the world, with all the force and horror than invariably entails.

basketball en corte

Girls playing basketball in long skirts.

I always use my computer's background image as a source of inspiration or escape. Just last week I changed it to a picture my sister took in Guatemala. Four girls are standing on a basketball court; they're facing the basket. The ball is close to the basket and going in - we think, we hope. One of them is barefoot, the others in sandals. They all have long dark hair tied in a ponytail.

They wear the traditional corte: a long skirt that wraps around the body, whose pattern is dictated by the village the girls come from; and a huipil, same story but it's a top. theirs is an embroidered mauve huipil on a gorgeous dark red corte. They're mayans, their language is cakchiquel and their backyard is the gorgeous Lake Atitlan and its surrounding volcanoes. In fact in the picture you can see lush incredible greenery - coffee fields? (note last year a very deadly mudslide crippled the area. the politicians didn't bother showing up - same old contempt for 'indios').

It really speaks to me at the moment. Girls doing sports. girls doing things they're not expected or supposed to do. title 9. decalage. empowerment of women.

I have few regrets in life (what's the point of them?), but one is linked to Guatemala. I went with an Mayan activist, an older friend of my sister's, to Livingston on the atlantic side where we stayed at a long-time friend of hers. I should have taught this woman how to ride a bicycle, it would've made such a difference in her life. The reasons not to were numerous: no time, no money, no bicycle, and who was i to intrude? But I sincerely believe that sometimes it's the most mundane things that can turn a life around. Will I dare next time?

false and tired

I am tired of false labour (contractions but no real progress). Damn it, give me the real thing or leave me in peace. I am tired already. Tired of being tired. Tired of waiting. Tired of reading pregnancy websites for information. Tired of reviewing the suitcase for the hospital. Tired of wondering whether we've picked the right name. Tired of being primarily defined by the protrusion that is my belly. Tired of the sleepless nights and the digestion issues and the 5 pillows that allow me some semblance of rest. Tired. Tired. TIRED.


... I am also an emotional mess. Two nights ago I cried for a good hour - and the reason I was crying doesn't actually really matter. Music of all variety brought me to the verge of tears three times today.

Is it honest in my state to ask for compensation for the hours of work I put in? I wonder. But I do my best.

I still found the energy to laugh when I stumbled upon this site: http://www.askdrsears.com/html/1/T010900.asp (note: I don't actually recommend you visit this page if you're not familiar with pregnancy sites; don't jump in at the ninth month or you might get scared away; ease into the first trimester first). They kindly term the whole last month "the labor month", and add

Take all the emotions you've felt over the past eight months, intensify them, and you've got an idea of what you can expect emotionally during month nine.

I'm liking this validation.

Even getting up off the sofa can leave you out of breath.

I should come back to this site frequently.

You may not be able to get comfortable – anywhere.

I feel normal again. Back to work.