Book Review: The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery

Many of the reviews for this book have been glowing, with the minor caveat that the book is for "intellectuals" with its philosophical interludes. In truth, the book isn't an action book - it's about an internal journey. Barbery's prose, which is quirky and enchanting (although, keep a dictionary nearby as you beef up your vocabulary), immediately draws the reader into the world of Paloma and Renee Michel at 7, rue de Grenelle (beware the use of commas!). The two unlikely soulmates are drawn together despite their class and age differences when another building resident passes away and a new, mysterious gentleman buys his apartment.

Elegance is about those beautiful rare moments in life that get us through: a genuine connection with another person, the glorious beauty of a tree or a camellia, the delicate enjoyment of a good cup of tea or pastry - and the restorative, necessary, urgent nature of these small things on the human spirit. There are reports that French therapists have been prescribing this book for their patients, and I understand why. This is a book that makes you believe in life, in its complexity and tragedy, its beauty and its ravaged-ness...the thinking person survives by holding these fragile moments, searching for them in the midst of the utter crap we plow through. Elegance inspired me, and at the instant, surprising climax of the book, I found genuine tears on my cheeks and an overflowing heart.

Caveats: there is philosophy, it is very French (in good and bad ways, some critics have commented that the critique of French class systems doesn't translate to American audiences), and some find it implausible that Paloma is really 12 years old.

Highlights: it's funny, sarcastic, beautiful, sad, and one of the best books I've read in years (and I was a lit major in undergrad, if that pushes you either way).



"what to do
faced with never
but look
for always
in a few stolen strains"

- M. Barbery

Seen in New York: How do I find Harlem?

Restaurant Review: Eclipse Restaurant, Sunset Park

Tonight, we tried a new Mexican restaurant in Sunset Park. Eclipse is located right on 4th Avenue, and easy to miss. Eclipse is a happy blend of delicious and relatively healthy "real" Mexican food and good decor and service. Unlike our other hotspots, who haven't invested in appearances, Eclipse has savvy decor to attract all sorts of clientele while keeping prices low. Also differentiating themselves from other hole-in-the-wall neighborhood places, they have a full bar (rather, than, say, Matamoros, where the situation is BYO).

I tried my favorite kind of tacos, carne enchilada (spicy grilled pork), 3 for $6. They weren't as spicy as other joints in the neighborhood, but they were rich in flavor and cooked cleanly, without a lot of grease. The ingredients in our pico de gallo salsa were incredibly fresh - you could taste it - and E practically huffed his bistec burrito.






In short, Eclipse is a great place to take people who enjoy lots of different kinds of food, but are afraid of places with tacky decor, menus in other languages if they exist at all, and waitstaff who don't speak English. The courtyard is lovely, the staff courteous, and it's the perfect place to take my parents when they're in town for some delicious food.

Eclipse Restaurant
4314 4th Avenue
Brooklyn NY 11232

Book Review: Cultural Democracy by James Bau Graves

I picked this book up off the shelf at my work's library, intrigued by the title and its promise to discuss arts, community and culture in America. Bau Graves lives and works in Maine and has a long career in running arts and cultural programs there. With his experience attempting to integrate and bring into dialogue diverse immigrant and foreign cultures with "mainstream" American culture, Bau Graves brings a voice of experience to the narrative even if that voice is not an academic voice. He falls prey to a few dangerous binaries that trouble his attempt to call for increased cooperation and a more representative cultural scene, which is a laudable goal and critical if the arts are to serve a larger social purpose.

As Bau Graves discovered and relates in Chapter 1, the dynamics of communities are complicated. It was not clear to me whether Bau Graves understood the danger of applying terms like "insider," "outsider," and "authentic." There isn't one Asian community that is monolithic here in Brooklyn's Chinatown, but many communities. While Bau Graves pays surface homage to this, it isn't clear that this understanding has deeply penetrated his thinking. He seems to think that there is a way to infiltrate the secrets of authentic (or authentic-enough?) culture, which is perhaps reflective of his work which is practically oriented (and my issue reflective of my academic training).

Sentences like "the attending outsiders miss out on the ambiance of ethnicity, the feeling of being presence of the Other" or "we're still a lot better at putting ethnics on stage than at getting them in our seats" (both p.71) are offensive in their presumption that "the Other" or "the ethnics" aren't involved in the cultural scene except as potential spectators, and in the automatic homogenizing of a white, upper middle class audience in a position of power and creation in the arts. Careless word choice here reaffirms divisions and simplistic and insulting binaries, inherited from colonialist thought, rather than undermining them. The arts are a place for Americans to break down barriers and encourage diversity that reflects our society. My academic training rigorously stressed the thoughtlessness and idiocy of Orientalizing those different from myself (which, if you think about it, includes everyone else), and I think it is necessary to deconstruct this line of thinking about ambiance, authenticity, and ethnicity and the American arts scene. It's completely unacceptable because of its sheer hypocrisy: putting "Others" on display for their novelty or considering "them" exterior to "us" reinforces preexisting notions of difference and harkens back to the late 1800s concepts of Worlds Fairs, where people of different ethnicities were put in cages for "we the civilized" to observe. I would hope that by 2010 we could think outside the cage.

Bau Graves does address deconstructing accepted norms of time and structure in America's attempt to democratize the arts,an important call to collaboration and acceptance of other world-views. Constructions of authority, time, and power structure shift across our blue planet and it is key for arts leaders to recognize and be sensitive to working with others (not "Others"!). After my experience working abroad, I can definitely attest that this is a key and necessary learning if one is to be truly collaborative. It is also noteworthy that Bau Graves articulates how precarious the cultural mediator position is, and interrogates the power of the arts administrator.

Bau Graves cites Martin Luther King, who said, "I doubt if the teeming problems of our ghettos will have a great chance to be solved until the white majority, in genuine empathy, comes to feel the ache and anguish of the Negro's daily life" (197). It is this spirit of openness and empathy which I believe Bau Graves wants to encourage, and which I applaud and join my voice to the call for an American arts and cultural scene (as well as political, while we're at it) that truly reflects who we have become as one nation of many gorgeous and unique pieces. Part of that openness and empathy comes in dropping Orientalist ideas, removing our blinders, and questioning all our assumptions to come to a place of more considered sharing and learning.

Coney Island's Mermaid Parade 2010

I think these speak for themselves.
The parade is basically an excuse for people to walk around in public in New York City wearing even less than normal.

Dispatches from the Road: Ithaca & Delaware Water Gap

This past weekend, E and I went upstate. We had never been "upstate" since we moved to New York, and I think we had totally different expectations. Having been to Rochester before, I imagined aging hippies with gardens and lots of rolling hills with farmland. E started playing 70s R&B.

It took us about five hours to get up to Ithaca from the city, given the crappy tolls and the roads. Most of the way, we were on the freeway, but those last 31 miles off the main freeway into Ithaca are a killer, especially during a blinding steamy midsummer storm. With my trusty copilot snoozing away in the passenger seat, I drove around a corner and right into a sunny downpour, completely enfolding me in gray golden light and humid rain, slowing me from 60 to 30 in 3 seconds flat. By the time we rounded the next hill, the rain had moved on, and the world was a hazy glow by the time we hit Ithaca's picturesque downtown. We had been racing the clock to try to make Moosewood Restaurant before the legendary vegetarian mecca closed its lunch service, but we had to settle for the Ithaca Bakery instead. My friend Vanessa had recommended it to me, and we were very pleased to find that we shared her food taste!

Once inside, we then had to decide from a plethora of offerings, including fresh sandwiches, deli offerings, and salad. They also do their own baking and have a coffee bar, as well as selling gourmet packaged specialties. I tried the Flat Rock sandwich, which was turkey, goat cheese, sundried tomatoes, basil and balsamic vinegar on fresh baguette and E tried the Willow, which was barbequed pork. I didn't manage to get a taste of his, but mine was delicious and I assume that given the speed E ate his, it was scrumptious too.


After lunch, we stopped by the Ithaca Falls. It was a random, GPS-scrolling trip ("Hey! Falls!"). We eagerly followed our GPS, only to wind up in a condo parking lot. Confused, we thought maybe the condo had demolished the falls. Coming back down the hill, I missed the turn down Lincoln. As we kept driving, we crossed a small bridge and looked to the right. Falls! Our GPS had directed us to vaguely the source of the Falls, but not their access point. Flipping a quick U-ie, we parked and walked into the falls. It's a gorgeous spot, easily accessible from downtown Ithaca and we were envious of those without prior engagements who were bathing in the warm, sticky afternoon.




After our Ithaca visit, we drove through the stormy night to Scranton, where we had reserved a Sleep Inn. Basic, sure, but it had a pool and a hot tub!

The next morning, after a refreshing pre-breakfast swim, we headed out to find some coffee and find the Pack Shack. Our GPS listed a place called Sacred Grounds, so in a quest to support local business, we embarked on a tour of Scranton's Dunmore neighborhood, which was far swankier than I expected from Scranton. Our GPS was off by about 500 yards, so we arrived at an empty lot, shouted at the GPS, and proceeded to the next intersection to turn around and then arrived at Sacred Grounds (our bored-and-therefore-too-attentive barista got both our orders wrong). Served us right for going so far out of our way for a coffee!

We made it to the Pack Shack, where we had reserved kayaks. They were really sweet and accommodating, and we were the only customers there due to the predicted rain. They drove us upriver about 7 miles and then we came back down, more slowly, enjoying the views of the Delaware.




It was beautiful, pleasant, and silent...blessedly silent, with no music pumping from cars, children screaming on the street at 11pm, car alarms, and all other Sunset Park soundtracks.

We did get rained on, but after we came around a bend of the river, furiously paddling with rivulets of rain in our eyes, the rain suddenly stopped.
After our river cruise, we went for some lunch at Minisink hotel, which was recommended by our kayak hauler. It was the perfect small town bar: the menu's on the wall, everyone knows each other and look at you because they don't know you, and the beer is cheap. All the ball players came in after their games. We enjoyed our food; it was delicious and well-earned.



Afterwards, we drove back into NYC...with full stomachs and tired, sunburnt arms.


Ithaca Bakery
400 N. Meadow
Ithaca NY

Minisink Hotel
Take 80 East to Route 611 Delaware Water Gap (exit No. 310) Turn left at the traffic light onto River Road. At the stop sign by the bend in the road, look to your left. The Minisink is an old red clapboard building by the stream.
Read more about the bar here.

Experiments in Cooking: Warm Sausage & Lentil Salad / Curried Chicken Salad

I'm going to double up on these recipes, which are both great for warm summer nights and a quick after-work dinner in terms of prep.
Warm lentil & sausage salad: this is a quick combination of white wine vinegar, lentils and tomatoes along with some surefire favorites: sauteed onions and sausage!



Inspired by a recent work lunch, I decided to try to make curried chicken salad using a recipe from Epicurious. It went fairly well. The chicken definitely absorbs a moist flavor which is delicious but also eases cutting it up for the curry salad. Recommendations from my tasting panel (of one + me) were to definitely include those grapes to offset the deep tangy spice of the curry.

Review: the Studio Museum of Harlem

Given that I work 3 blocks from the Studio Museum and had never been, I decided to use my lunch break creatively and go visit. The SMH has a glass facade looking out over the intersection of Lenox and 125th Street, one block down from the Apollo Theater and the Lenox Lounge.

I really didn't have an idea of what to expect: I have visited many museums here in New York as a nerdy personal visitor but also through my training as a museum studies scholar. The fact that the SMH had been left out of our curriculum puzzled me, as we did make an attempt to visit other small community museums like El Museo del Barrio, the MocA: Museum of Chinese in America, and the Lower East Side Tenement Museum. (The other noteworthy exception was the Museum of the City of New York.)

As the museum opens at noon, I was one of the first visitors. The entry into the exhibition part of the museum is through unmarked white doors leading out of the lobby which was a little confusing but the staff pointed me in the right direction. The name of the museum aptly describes the exhibition space: a large white room, with a open central part and two open levels nearby. There were also works down a short flight of stairs in the basement.

Other than Chris Ofili and James VanderZee, I didn't recognize any of the artists, which made me a little ashamed: the two artists I did know were part of major exhibitionary controversies, Ofili for his depiction of the Virgin Mary in Sensation at the Brooklyn a few years back with its legendary elephant dung and the ensuing religious fracas and VanderZee for his documentary photographs of Harlem in the Met's catastrophic entry into race politics with its 1969 Harlem on My Mind.

I was intrigued by the work of Saya Woolfalk, whose drawings are inspired, human, creative, fun, and nonlinear - including "No Placean Anatomy." I also appreciated Frederick Brown's "Stagger Lee in Concert," a painting with the words "I am not from Brooklyn" carved into its thick paint. Ellen Gallagher's installation "DeLuxe," which also reappears on the front of the current museum catalog, is at once playful and sinister with its multiplicity of textures and gouged out eyes, white almonds (see below). I also appreciated the local highlight area in the foyer, which showcases artists photographs of Harlem and their interpretations thereof. Visitors are even invited to take a free souvenir postcard.



The work that most resonated with me was Howardena Pindell's video, "Free, White & 21." I am not sure if I can accurately articulate how deeply this work spoke to me, and made me want to literally sit on the wooden floor in front of the video and just stay and weep. Pindell talks to the camera directly, relating her experiences of discrimination: a teacher who wouldn't put the A student Pindell into an honors class because a less deserving white student might benefit more, a job interview where Pindell witnessed white candidates being given clear and respectful instructions about what positions were actually available and the candidates of color being told nothing was available, a pastor who made sexual advances at a wedding, a Maine woman who stared at Pindell while eating...she intersperses these accounts with footage of a woman with strikingly white makeup, black sunglasses, and a blonde wig (presumably Pindell, according to the museum label) commenting back, "You must be paranoid. No one I know has had this happen to them...you really must be paranoid," and "You need to do things our way, with our symbols, or we simply won't validate them."

There was a feeling in my stomach akin to the feeling I got when I read Native Son for the first time and then looked at the copyright information, nauseous and humiliated that our country, so prideful of our freedom and our ability to lead the world's democracies, had changed so little in 60 years that Wright's words in 1940 were fully believable today. The work (works! both Wright's and Pindell's) are honest in their simplicity and factual nature, but ferocious and heart-rending in the depiction of how pervasive and shameless white privilege is. Pindell broke my heart. My only hope is that other hearts will be broken in going to the museum and seeing this, and from our brokenness we could, as a community - or a nation - or at least person-to-person - build a new, respectful, open, equal place, together.


The Studio Museum's website is here. They are open Wednesday - Sunday.


Some other resources that I know about, but by no means an exhaustive list:
Patricia Raybon My First White Friend
Paula Rothenberg White Privilege: Essential Readings on the Other Side of Racism
Richard Wright Native Son

Film Review: Let's Talk about Sex

Well, Sex and the City 2, that is.

There has been much written about this film - denigrating it as yet another blithering Hollywood sequel, a trashy chick flick, and a neoliberal (oh my god, more about neoliberalism? I thought I was done with my thesis) plot to rake in the bucks and exploit women's buying power. At the risk of adding to establishing social commentary and believing I have something unique to say, I'll keep going.

My major qualm with the film is its representation of the Middle East. First, that it was filmed in Morocco but claims to be Abu Dhabi: these are two opposite ends of the Middle East with very little in common other than (different strains) of a religion. Moroccans and Emiratis speak different languages, too - the Emirati Arabic far more mainstream Arabic, and the Moroccan a hybrid of Spanish, French, Arabic, and Berber. Not all Arabs are crazy conservative, as the film would suggest (and I can think of plenty of regular old white-bread Americans who would be horrified at Samantha's public sexual antics, not just the sheikhs in keffiyehs and robes). While Carrie and co stumble onto a group of women who wear very trendy fashion under their hijab and niqab - perhaps a cinemographic attempt to hint at the diversity and forward-thinking of Muslim/Arab women - for me, it fell flat. From my time in Syria, I know that Syrian women are encouraged to be uber-sexy for their husbands and there is a bustling very naughty lingerie trade. Sexuality isn't seen as incongruous or dangerous with womanhood - just that it should be constrained within marriage (much like in the other Big 3 religions). I don't think Muslim women would see being trendy as incongruous or shocking; after all, women do not veil in their homes and socialize with other women uncovered as well. Additionally, the Middle East takes a lot of crap for laws perceived to be heinous. But the truth is that PDA is illegal in the Emirates - so if you go there, you should obey. You can't say anything against the government in many states, including Turkey. Violators pay a $600 fine for throwing bubble gum on the sidewalk in Thailand, and anyone pretending to conduct sorcery goes to jail for a year in Ireland. In Sweden, prostitution is legal but it's illegal to solicit or use a prostitute. Countries the world over, "developed" or not, have rules that don't quite make sense. For some reason, though, Americans and Westerners chafe under the laws of Middle Eastern countries and feign that they are more strict than elsewhere. Truth is, Americans could work on their cultural sensitivity anyway - being respectful and polite in another country is just the same as being respectful and polite to your in-laws. Most of the time you don't quite get it, but you just keep your mouth shut and appreciate it for what it is. So, on the whole, I didn't feel that the movie fairly represented the Middle East, Arabs or Muslims, lumping them all together in a homogenous grouping that would horrify my NYU professors.
(Also Miranda's Arabic was atrocious, but that's beside the point).

On the other hand...
SATC2 validated women's choices, in the larger tradition of the series which blazed a trail in that regard. In particular, the film validates the choice not to have children. Carrie and Mr Big, I mean - the Prestons, choose not to have children and have difficulty conveying their choice to unbelieving acquaintances ("We love kids, but that's just not for us"). American society expects us to grow up and get married, have 2.5 children, a Golden Retriever, and a house in the 'burbs with a white picket fence. There aren't really a lot of women out there, on the big screen or otherwise, who stand up and say it's ok not to have children if you don't want them. If you don't want kids, you really shouldn't have them - it's a recipe for disaster, and I know plenty of unwanted kids who grew up angry and mistreated because their parents didn't have enough discernment or wisdom to understand the burdens and responsibilities (and the honors of) parenthood. I remember telling my therapist during college that I didn't want kids, to which she responded, "Well that's abnormal." (I'm pretty sure her job was to tell me exactly the opposite, and help me deal with why I thought I'd be a poor mother rather than offer judgment.) Statistically, people are happier married than single, but that happiness quotient doesn't increase with having kids. Marrieds without kids are happier than marrieds with kids. So, for those of us waiting for our biological clock to kick in but perfectly happy every year that it doesn't, thank you, Carrie - again you're leading the way to help us express ourselves better, and free up our discussions.

Unsolicited Advice: How to Get a Job Interview (or Not)

Recently, I was hired at a company and their first agenda item for me was to craft and send out the rejection email to the people they didn't pick. Having been on the receiving end of these rejection emails lately, I was a little uncomfortable with this assignment. Having read through all the applications, I offer here a list of comments (many of them basic) in the hopes that this advice will save my dear (four) readers from receiving more rejection emails.

1. Greetings: Ok, first, have a greeting line. Don't leave it out, don't say "hi."

2. E-tiquette: If you are emailing your resume (as we all are), it's good to put the cover letter in the body of the email (unless otherwise instructed). Do not put the resume in th eemail body - you lose all the formatting. Also, you might be surprised how many people attached a cover letter and resume but put absolutely nothing in the body of the email. If you got an email with nothing in the body, would you respond? Me neither. So if you are attaching both, put something, even if it's "Dear X, Thank you for your consideration of the attached materials for the position of X at X. Sincerely, contact information." You're trying to get the reader's attention, not make them work to find out who you are (cause...they won't!).

3. Diction: You would not believe the grandiose and overused adjectives I read in these letters. Make your cover letter concise and confident but not ridiculous. Examples include "I'm depositing my resume for your review" (depositing?), "my wonderful work," "my enriching career," "I am just that nifty." WHAT? This careless word choices make you sound arrogant and moronic, not nifty.

4. Grammar: Of course this comes after diction. I read a sentence: "I am a worldly, sophisticated, articulate professional who isn't afraid to venture out of their comfort zone." I would never hire this person to do any kind of communication: "I" and "their" do not agree. "My" comfort zone would have been grammatically correct, although still a violation of rule #3 above.

5. Presentation: As with ensuring formatting (I'd recommend saving as a PDF), please realize your email address says a lot about you. Also note how your email displays - does it display your full name, just the email handle, or just your first name. Be aware of who you are saying you are to the potential employer. No one is really going to hire 'bsmooth69@whatever.com' for a responsible position - maybe for a position in a bar. If your subject line reads: "*sparkling* support available," you aren't conveying a very professional image. Also, make sure your fonts and colors are consistent with your professional image.

6. Inclusions: If you're applying for jobs in academia, use a 6 page C.V. by all means. If you're not, keep it to a page or two MAX. You can cut publications, conferences, and irrelevant positions and academic awards. Spend some time honing your language on your resume.

7. Explanations: If you're coming from a different field, explain why. Use your cover letter to explain how your skills transfer or how you are prepared for the new job. Don't make the reader guess. Also, don't beg. "I ask you to please consider me" isn't the way to begin a cover letter. On the other side, don't just dive in - find the happy medium and ease your reader in. Additionally, it can never hurt you to do some research on the organization. Thanks to Google, this is a piece of cake these days.

On the whole, don't give your reader any chance to dismiss you - grammar errors, or even worse - getting the name of the contact or organization wrong, make you an easy way to cull from the glut of applications the crappy economy has generated. Be confident and spend some time making a clear case for yourself, and remember what it's like to be in the reader's shoes. Good luck!