Etchings {A Bigger Picture Moment}

Children's Barracks, Auschwitz-Birkenau

Sunday, May 13.
Oświęcim, Poland.

Excerpt from my journal:

I pulled my cold fingers out of my coat pocket to touch the outlines of children’s names and the etchings of their imaginations that lined the stone walls and wooden bedboards. I traced my fingertips and felt the jolt of their cries, their fright, their hope and despair. I touched it again and again, and it was as if I touched their fingertips to mine.

My fingers, still useless to help them, these children who could not be saved.

“Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take,
but by the moments that take our breath away.”
- Author Unknown

What moments stole your breath away this week?

Each Thursday, we come together to celebrate living life with intention by capturing a glimmer of the bigger picture through a simple moment. Have you found yourself in such a moment lately? Share it with us!

Live. Capture. Share. Encourage.

This week we’re linking up at Alita’s!

As Spotted on the Polish Side

Journalling Life Abroad
(I’m writing this on Monday morning, as on Tuesday we’ll be driving from Krakow to Prague!)

Did you all have a nice Mother’s Day? I was afraid we wouldn’t get a chance to say hello to our mothers, but thankfully we wrangled a quick bit of wi-fi on the iPhone, and with the help of Skype, managed to say a quick hello to our mothers…from Poland!

But, I’m getting ahead of myself. A bit of a recap: After I last posted, we got to see Toby’s cousins, a couple of whom I’d never met before, and they showed us Berlin’s youth culture. We went bar hopping and indulged in thick, tasty beers and great cocktails – including an accidental stop in what we soon realized was a lesbian bar, as evidenced by the signs that read: Ich liebe meine vagina, and You are leaving the hetero-normative sektor, and the cocktail special “pussylove”: gin, lemon juice, and blackberry liqueur. What can I say? It was yummy.

We have since moved on, however, and now we are in the former capitol of Poland.

Krakow is a gorgeous city. We drove here from Berlin on Saturday, admiring the wide spring countryside dotted with flowers, while cursing the torn up roads, most of the whole way. But we’ve been nothing but enchanted since we got to Krakow. There are still horse-drawn carriages…and the odd bottle of beer (costumed person) strolling down the street. And there is a large market square, much like the piazzas in Italy, where we go in the evenings to drink some beer and indulge in pierogis, or a fresh-grilled sausage, or pork cutlets in a honey-wine sauce as we listen to live music. So far, we’ve been most drawn to the live jazz and the lone trumpet player, but I’ve seen some advertisements for Chopin in the evenings. I couldn’t think of a better place to listen to a Nocturne or Polonaise, so that’s our plan for tonight.

It is pretty freaking cold though, here. For transplants from Thailand, the 50*F (or less) weather and rain in May is a bit of a shock. We go out in layers, tucked up in our thickest coats and caps.

But we still haven’t had much chance to wander the city in the daytime. We spent all day Sunday at an altogether different place. We drove an hour and a half out of the city, to Oświęcim – otherwise known as Auschwitz-Birkenau.

(If you want to skip over this portion of the coffee chat, I wouldn’t blame you.)

We went to two sites. First, Auschwitz I, which was originally a prison before the Nazis took it over. It’s smaller and houses most of the museum information, pictures, and memorabilia. Then we went to Auschwitz II-Birkenau, which is vast and immense. It’s the concentration camp the Nazis created. It’s the one in all the pictures you see, and it’s the one that truly gives you the sense of scale of what happened there.

I thought I would be sad to go there, that it would be depressing and make me tearful. But truthfully, the primary emotion I felt when I was there was: revolted. It was sickening to hear again and anew what people can do to each other, the evil ways the Nazis tricked and lied to people, and the sick ways they took from people and redistributed to others.

There was one point we walked into a large room, and a glass case lined one side of the room, wall to wall, from floor to ceiling. Inside the glass case was the lopped off bunches of women’s hair. I couldn’t look. I spent that portion staring at my sneakers because I couldn’t handle the sight as I listened to how the Nazis took these women’s hair and sent it to Germany to use a stuffing in mattresses, or to weave into fabric for blankets and soldiers’ uniforms, and redistribute to the (unknowing, I’m sure) German public.

I’ve spent a fair amount of time in Germany, and the sense I’ve gotten there is the remaining weight of guilt of the nation, from it’s history, even among those who were not alive at the time and could not bear responsibility for it.

On the Polish side, it’s easy to sense the weight of blame: for invading, for doing what they did to so many people. The blame is directed at the Nazis, but there is an undercurrent towards the Germans who profited (however, unknowingly) from the loss of others.

The history there is complicated. It’s more than war, it reaches to the depths of humanity and evil alike. You still feel it, and it’s nothing that movies and history books can ever really convey.

Anyway, we spent a day there, and as awful as it was to see, I think it was important that we made the effort. And thankfully, we’ll move on to more pleasurable aspects of our trip. We’re certainly lucky to have that choice.

Today, we both need to get some work done, but then we’ll grab some food and wander around the city some more, and catch our evening concert before we leave for Prague.

Thanks for the coffee and the chat! Tell me, what’s going on in your pocket of the world?

also linking up with:

A New Way of Seeing

Around the dinner table, during coffee breaks, on long garden walks, and over hot kitchen stoves, we’ve been talking. Here we meet in Berlin, Toby and I and his parents, all transplants from sunny southern California, now living in Asia and Europe. And repeatedly the conversation turns back to comparisons: how convenient life was in the States while here it takes hours to get any errand accomplished; the greater access to culture and history and ease of travel in Europe; the unparalleled food and low cost of living in Thailand; transparency on one side, polarized politics on the other; to-die-for fashions and dreamy weather juxtaposed against injustices and stilted freedoms.

We see America differently from having lived abroad, now appreciating some things we used to take for granted, yet also taking taking advantage of other things we previously could not access.

This trip to Germany is not my first, but I’m getting the sense it will be a first. It’s my first time coming here after living in Asia. Where once, from the perspective of a flight from LAX to Tegelhof, stepping on German soil felt exotic and foreign, now it feels comfortingly familiar – so much so I’m often caught by surprise by the fact that I don’t speak the language and that I have to re-learn basic things like how much to tip and to stop smiling so much at strangers.

And this trip to Europe will actually be my longest stay in Europe yet. Instead of just popping by, I’m getting an opportunity to truly immerse. You orient yourself differently when you know you will be in a place for just a few days versus several weeks. It’s a different way of traveling; a different way to be.

Henry Miller once said, “One’s destination is never a place, but a new way of seeing things.”

I wonder whether and how a month in Eastern Europe will change my way of seeing. Already I begin to sense the addition of more cultural milieus into my thoughts, awareness, and orientation. I begin to sense that the more you’ve been everywhere, the less you begin to fit in anywhere.

But that’s okay. If the world is a book, I’d prefer to read the whole story, not just one page.

“Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take,
but by the moments that take our breath away.”
- Author Unknown

What moments stole your breath away this week?

Live. Capture. Share. Encourage.

This week we’re linking up at Sarah’s!

As Spotted en Route to Berlin

Journalling Life Abroad

Is it true that travel vacations are kind of like dreams in the sense that we are never so interested in other people’s as we are in our own? Well I’ll try to make this interesting anyway. That photo up there was taken as we were flying over Kabul. As soon as I saw it on the flight monitor that we were flying over the capitol of Afghanistan, I whipped out my phone camera, because hey…we were over Afghanistan. How often does one get a chance to say they’re flying over a freakin’ war zone – and, you know, not be dodging bullets?

Most of the country looked like an endless sea of brown, but right there? It was gorgeous with the Hindu Kush mountain range (a subrange of the Himalayas) extending out into the horizon, dotted by white clouds.

Now, I say it’s the Hindu Kush mountain range as if I know what I’m talking about, but I totally had to wikipedia that. My knowledge of world geography is shameful and humiliating. There were two whole countries (Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan) between Afghanistan and Russia that I could not recall the names of – other than to say they were a couple of “Stans.” And as we flew over Khazakstan, I thought it was Mongolia.

But, after a 10-hour flight, we landed in Moscow, which incidentally is remarkably swampy and flat (who knew?)…

…and, desperate for drinks, we grabbed some sodas and a beer at…TGI Friday’s.

The world is strange. But thankfully they took credit because we didn’t pack any rubles.

Anyway, after a 4-hour layover and another 2-hour jaunt, we made it to Berlin – another home away from home. Berlin is just so comfortably western and familiar to me that sometimes I totally forget I’m in a foreign country until I remember that I can’t speak the language and there’s that awkward moment where a salesclerk is looking at me expecting me to say something to them and I give them a feeble smile and they wonder who this dope is that’s just staring and smiling at them. Yeah, that happens often.

Lucky for me, Toby can do the talking.

So far, it’s been a busy vacation though, because every day we’ve gotten up, grabbed some coffee and croissants (with prosciutto and gruyere, or liverwurst, or fresh jam) and hit up at least two museums in one portion of the day, took a break for lunch (asparagus soup is my favorite), and then taken long walks around lakes, or in vast, cultivated castle gardens.

There was one day though, where Toby and his younger sister wanted to go to the computer game history museum. I took the opportunity to go shopping instead.

And oh, the fashion in Berlin is awesome. I could easily spend all my money there.

(I discovered a new photo filter, so please pardon my excitement as I overuse it.)

I’ve been very glad for the long walks, though, because it gives me a chance to work off the prosciutto and gruyere (and marzipan). And yesterday, we went to one castle garden modeled after English gardens, so I spend the afternoon pretending quite convincingly that I was in a Jane Austen novel.

But Toby can always be counted upon to bring things closer to home.

All right, I’m sure I’ve long abused my visit by now. Thanks for stopping by for coffee and a chat. There’s a cappuccino with my name on it. What are you drinking? Tell me what’s going on in your part of the world!

Also linking up with:

Tropical Rain

If all goes to plan, by the time you read this, I’ll be safely enveloped in the arms of family – in Berlin!

By all that was well-advised, I shouldn’t have gone there. I should have just walked across the street to our friendly neighborhood restaurant for lunch, so I could be in and out and back home tackling my to-do list in less than 45 minutes.

But instead, I followed craving and curiosity, and drove twenty minutes towards the busy end of town, through lunch traffic, hunted for parking, and walked the extra blocks to get to the ramen restaurant I’ve been meaning to try.

And by the time I parked, a hot day and turned into a rainy day, and just as I pulled my key from the ignition and opened my door, torrential rain began to pour.

{Lucky for me, I keep no less than 4 umbrellas in my car.}

{That’s a sign of experience.}

It was a good lunch, even if my sandle-clad feet were a bit dirty and wet. But, if I hadn’t have gone all the way there, to that restaurant, and sat in that table, and got the bright idea to try to catch the above photo out the window behind me…

…I also wouldn’t have caught this photo, one of my favorite reminders that I live in Thailand.

Yes, that is a truck bed full of passengers bearing umbrellas in an optimistic, if futile attempt to stay dry. Second only to the passengers bearing umbrellas on motorcycles in the rain.

Such a simple thing really. A tiny, insignificant moment. But it makes me smile.

“Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take,
but by the moments that take our breath away.”
- Author Unknown

What moments stole your breath away this week?

Live. Capture. Share. Encourage.

This week we’re linking up at Melissa’s!

As Spotted on the Thai Side

Journaling Life in Thailand

I’m clinging to my coffee today like it’s a lifeline, my one-way ticket to salvation. If we were really meeting over coffee today, I’d have the french press filled up to the brim and I’d set it right between us so we wouldn’t even have to get up for a second cup.

But before I get ahead of myself, I should relay the news that the lovely Amy of Lucky Number 13 is no longer hosting Virtual Coffee chats, at least for the next undetermined length of time. I wish her well on her break, but me? I love these coffee chats. I NEED these coffee chats. A little breathe of peace in between here and there. So I’m a gonna’ hold on to my coffee, and if y’all want to join me, there’s a seat here just waiting for you.

So how’ve you been? Last week was stressful at work, the kind of stress that just isn’t worth talking about because I’m just going to get all worked up again and say things I probably shouldn’t. It was HOT, too. The kind of heat where fans do nothing more than just push around the steaming air. One of my coworkers was explaining to me how silkworms produce less in the cold season; as it gets colder they work slower and slower. And I was thinking, I’m just the opposite. The hotter it gets, the slower my brain functions. In the dead of those afternoons, I’d literally feel my brain cells come to a full and complete stop. Please exit the vehicle to your left, and thank you for the ride.

We were hoping for rain to cool things down. Well, we got rain and storms enough to put out the electricity and bend trees over. But it was still hot. I was taking cold showers up to three times a day just to cool down my body temperature. Doing that always reminds me of being a kid and being sick with fever and my parents having to put me in a cold bath to get the fever down. I still remember how much that seemed to hurt, and how sorry my parents seemed to have to do that. I’m sure it probably hurt them more than me.

However, the good news this week is: WE’RE GOING TO EUROPE! We’re heading out for a month to go visit Toby’s family in Berlin. We’ll be there most of the time seeing loved ones we haven’t seen in a year and a half. Plus it’s Toby’s dad’s birthday, so we’ll get in some extra celebrations. But we’re also taking a side trip to Krakow and Prague. It’ll be our first time exploring bits of Eastern Europe.

Part of the reason we want to go to Krakow is because we’d like to see Auschwitz. Well, I don’t know if one can say one would like to see Auschwitz. It’s more like we feel it’s important to see Auschwitz, given the opportunity. Such history sometimes seems so long ago, and yet it isn’t really. Toby’s grandfathers, one German, one American, fought on opposite sides of the war. And the nanny who helped take care of Toby’s father and his brothers, when she was just fifteen WALKED from Poland to Germany, in an effort to survive through the war.

But we’ve also been hearing good things about visiting Krakow. Several friends who have traveled there have really enjoyed the city so I’m excited to see what’s happening there.

Truth be told, though, I haven’t even looked up the slightest thing about Krakow or Prague. We totally do not plan in advance when we travel. We get the basic things down (like flights)…and then pretty much just wing it. Do you wing it when you travel, or do you plan out detailed itineraries? When I arrive, I might put together a list of things I’d like to see and do (and places I might want to eat) while I’m there – and if I’m really organized, I’ll mark out what’s in the same general area to be somewhat efficient about travel time from place to place. But the rest of it is subject to time, energy, mood, and whatever else comes along that sounds interesting.

Even on our honeymoon in Costa Rica, we just booked our flights and our hotel for the first two nights so we didn’t have to be harried and rushed finding a place upon arrival. The rest of the nights in various cities, we just called around when we arrived to see what was available and left things flexible for recommendations from fellow travelers when we were actually there.

But as excited as I am to jetset it to Europe, there’s one thing that makes me sad: leaving Dot for a month! I’m sure gonna’ miss this puppy face.

We’ll leave her at a kennel for the month (which is actually more like this elderly British gentleman’s yard that has a bunch of dogs running around than a kennel), and I know she’ll be fine, she’s not going to die or get lost. But I still feel a wallop of sad and a thwack of guilt every time I think about it. A WHOLE MONTH. {ugh}

But she’ll be fine.

{…right?}

Anyway, I’d better get going. Lots of loose ends to tie up still before we leave tomorrow night. Oh yeah, did I mention we leave tomorrow? Because yeah, we leave tomorrow! Have a great week everyone and the next coffee chat will be in Berlin!

Also linking up with:

Embrace

“’Member that time we went swimming with them girls up from the North Shore? You and me stripped down to our bare ass and that one girl – Mary Ann, Mary Lynn something – almost did too, except ol’ Mr. Wickman saw us and chased us on up out of the lake with that fucking…fucking blowtorch.”

“Mmph.” Snap grunted with a grimace. If he remembered correctly, Mary Lynn was wearing a particularly enticing lace top he’d been real interested to see her get out of. He wanted to catch Joe’s eye with a wink, but he couldn’t open his own just yet. He enjoyed the breeze too much, feeling the comforting whoosh across his face and down his left arm.

“Good times.” Snap could hear Joe’s smile, could practically see the slash of his salty grin.

* * *

When he came to again, his friend was asking him a question. “Hey, Snap. You know what I miss most? Bacon. Crispy, fatty bacon. And my mama’s cornbread. These gooks do up a mean rice, but don’t nobody beat my mama’s bacon and cornbread.”

“Mama Dee sure could cook it good.” His own mother, God bless her, couldn’t tell a skillet from a stick.

“When I get home, that’s the first thing I’m gonna’ do. Ask mama to make me some bacon and cornbread. And you know what she’d say?”

Snap grinned. Mimicking a throaty, Southern woman’s voice, he said, “Boy, you got some brass on them balls.” They both laughed. Snap tasted blood on its way up.

“And she’d do it anyway,” reminisced Joe.

“Yeah. She’d do it anyway.”

He tried to sit up, but it damn near made him pass out again. He cursed under his breath. Taking a few steadying breaths, he pushed himself up on his left elbow. Searing pain shot up from his right arm, straight to his spine, on up into the space behind his eyes. The movement caused Joe to groan.

Looking around he saw they lay in a ditch several paces wide. The lifeless faces of four other troop members greeted him. Johnny T’s eyes were still open. Snap looked away. He turned his attention instead to the gaping wound in his arm. It seeped blood from his bicep onto his sleeve and ran down to the soil below. Gingerly, he tried to move it and intense pain shot up again, making Joe cry out. That’s when he realized his maimed arm was trapped underneath something metallic pinned down by Joe’s chest. Joe, his best friend since the squashed toad incident in the third grade, lay on his left side facing him. He had no arm at all. His entire right side had been sheared off by blast burns, both his legs turned at wrong angles. Snap struggled, pulled, and strained, trying to get his arm out, but each tug aggravated his friend’s open wounds and exacerbated his pain. He lay back down, assessing the situation through dim, hazy awareness. He used the dirty fingers of his left hand to investigate the wound, nearly fainting again when he caught a glimpse of bone.

He remembered an explosion about thirty paces off. They had all turned to see five of their squad go down in a landmine blast. There was a voice in his ear, crackling, issuing commands…then all he remembered was waking up. The air was silent, save for the wind brushing the trees. He strained to hear a helicopter, voices, anything. None came.

Panic set in, and with it, came clarity of purpose. He tried to move his legs. His right ankle hurt like a mother, but he could move it a little. He didn’t think it was broken. “Joe,” he urged. “Joe. We gotta’ get outta’ here.”

“Tour’s almost over,” came his friend’s muffled voice. “Two more months. We can hang in two more months.”

He frowned at his friend. By the looks of it, he wasn’t gonna’ last another two hours. He’d already lost too much blood. Joe’s voice cracked and groaned with every word yet he seemed not to have any idea of the state he was in. Snap looked at his own arm. Gruesome, but they could fix it if he just got help. There was a camp not three miles away, if he remembered right. But every move he made only caused Joe more pain.

Life flowed out of Joe, seeping into the ground like liquid rust. The color of his face turned unnatural.

Snap felt the beginnings of fever. If he was going to make it, he had to move fast. But he couldn’t, not with Joe on top of him. Pushing him off to free his arm would surely kill him, pain the last thing he would know as he went.

A surge of anger coursed through him. He pounded the earth repeatedly with his one good fist.

“Snap?”

He gritted his teeth. He ached to yell and scream. The only thing preventing him was the desire not to disturb his friend. “Yeah,” he said, at length.

“I love you, man. I just…you’re my best friend.”

A chasm opened up beneath him and he fell into flames. That was how Snap felt to hear those words. He bit his cheek, willing himself not to lose it. “Love you too, man.”

Renewed pain coursed through his arm. A sense of urgency filled him; his instincts for self-preservation had woken up. He had to move – and soon – or he, too, would die.

“Snap?” said Joe. This time his voice had grown undeniably weak; it was almost inaudible. “I still owe you a bottle of whiskey.”

Snap heaved a breath, finally gaining the courage to look at the mess of his friend’s body. He had three options. One, he could send Joe into a final spasm of pain and death as he wrenched himself free. Two, he could lay back down and die with him. Tempting. That option was tempting. Or three, he could reach over and quietly end his friend’s misery and life, free himself, and run for help.

They looked at each other in the eye, though Snap couldn’t tell that Joe saw much of anything at all. He could have been staring at a pile of bricks for all the expression left in his face. He thought of how many times they must have looked at each other, knowing just what the other was thinking without saying a word.

“You don’t owe me nothing, man. Not a goddamn thing.”

He rolled over closer to the only person he’d loved as a brother, and passed his hand over Joe’s eyes to close them. With his good arm, he reached across his friend, enveloping him in a final embrace.

This piece is a product of a Bigger Picture Blogs Writing Circle, where writers come together virtually to share their writing. In each Writing Circle, three to five writers are called together by a moderator who sets a prompt. Each person writes in response to the prompt and shares it online via a Skype conference call, wherein the other writers listen to their words, reflect on them, and offer praise, encouragement, constructive criticism and feedback to help us stretch and grow. The prompt for this Writing Circle was “Embrace,” in the genre of Fiction/Short Story, with a 1000-word limit.

linking up with just write

Age {A Bigger Picture Moment}

This week, we’re joining the party at Momalom, where they are hosting a 5 for 5 party. Five topics, for five days. The prompt for today is AGE. So please feel free to set your ruminations this week on “age,” link up here, and then link up at 5 for 5!

In a little over a month, I turn 32. What does this mean? Scientifically speaking, I suppose it means I’ve hit my sexual peak and am moving towards an age marked by reduced fertility. Gray hairs have started to weave their way through my tresses, which are not as thick as they once were. My skin is not as vibrant or taut, my ability to shed weight even less remarkable. Where I might have once enjoyed a few nights on the town, drinking with large groups of friends in loud bars, I now drink in the joy of a smooth cocktail sipped in a quiet lounge, or even a night in.

I remember when life in high school was my frame of reference for most any topic of conversation. Then it became college. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen myself in the faces of college undergrads. They all seem so young to me now.

I recently read David Sedaris’s memoir, Me Talk Pretty One Day, and spent most of it wondering how the hell he remembers all that crap from childhood. Most of my memories have long since faded. Years gained, people and moments lost.

BUT.

At 32, I’ve grown comfortable in my own skin. I know what’s important to me (family, words, travel, creativity, food, new and enriching experiences), and I know what is not (convention, status symbols, money for its own sake). I revel in simple joys more, and more often. I know I have a lot of opinions and ideas and I don’t hesitate to voice them. I know I have the right to be heard and, after many silent years, I’ve now found my voice and I intend to use it. I encourage others to shed their own barriers preventing them from the full realization of self. I know, too, that my opinions are nothing more than that. In fact the older I get, the more I know I don’t know. But I’m okay with ambiguity.

I have a loving husband, a sweet dog, and a large, caring family that extends in many directions. I have a life in which I’ve insisted on pursuing my dreams – even as they and I have changed.

I have many miles left to walk yet and many more destinations to reach, but I’ve never been more comfortable, ready, happy, fulfilled, and proud to be me.

Don’t forget to link up at Momalom’s Five for Five too!

“Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take,
but by the moments that take our breath away.”
- Author Unknown

What moments stole your breath away this week?

Live. Capture. Share. Encourage.

This week we’re linking up HERE!

Click here to enter your link and view this Linky Tools list…

A Hunger Games Pow Wow

It is time!! Time for our Hunger Games Pow Wow! Are you ready? I can’t emphasize enough how excited I’ve been to hear what you all thought of the books and what they made you think about. Any reactions, impressions, kvetches, complaints, and celebrations welcome!

Last week, I posted a series of questions that I had in my mind as I was reading the books. Feel free to respond to them if you like, or pose questions of your own. And do check back for responses, as I’ll be conversing with everyone in the comments section as well.

Here are the questions I posed last week, for convenient reference:

* All right, up front: Team Peeta or Team Gale?

* How did you read the very end of the book, as depicted in the Epilogue? Hopeful? Bleak? Dubious?

* Do you think it matters that the main character is a girl? How do you think the books might have been different if told from a male perspective (i.e. Peeta’s or Gale’s – or even Haymitch)?

* I’ve seen that these books have been added to Christian high school and bible study reading lists, citing sacrifice as a major theme. Do you see Katniss as a Christ figure? Do you think the books are Christian in nature?

* How do you read her “yes” vote at the end? What do you think was her motivation?

* Did you find the violence of the Games or the violence of the war harder to read? Why?

* Who were your favorite characters and why? Are there any characters you wish had been more fully fleshed out?

* For me, the evolution (or devolution) of character from victim to perpetrator and blurring of lines between the two categories is a really interesting theme in the books. Others have talked about the issues raised regarding classicism and feminism. Were these important themes to you? Did anything else stand out?

* There is a scene about 40% of the way through the third book, where Katniss is playing with the cat, Buttercup, making him chase a flashlight and she has a realization about Snow. Here is the excerpt:

You simply wiggle a flashlight beam around on the floor, and Buttercup tries to catch it. I’m petty enough to enjoy it because I think it makes him look stupid. Inexplicably, everyone here thinks he’s clever and delightful…It’s on the third night, during our game, that I answer the question eating away at me. Crazy Cat becomes a metaphor for my situation. I am Buttercup. Peeta, the thing I want so badly to secure, is the light. As long as Buttercup feels he has the chance of catching the elusive light under his paws, he’s bristling with aggression…When the light goes out completely, Buttercup’s temporarily distraught and confused, but he recovers and moves on to other things. (That’s what would happen if Peeta died.) But the one thing that sends Buttercup into a tailspin is when I leave the light on but put it hopelessly out of his reach, high on the wall, beyond even his jumping skills. He paces below the wall, wails, and can’t be comforted or distracted. He’s useless until I shut the light off. (That’s what Snow is trying to do to me now, only I don’t know what form his game takes.)

Katniss believes this is what Snow is doing to her: dangling bait in a way precisely calculated to drive her crazy and get what he wants. But is Snow the only one to do this? Are there ways in which Katniss does it too?

* And finally, what do you think of Katniss’ decision to assassinate Coin? Was it expedient? Do the “ends justify the means”? What do you think it suggests about her views on power and the role of government? Do you think she believes in democracy, or is she essentially an anarchist?

So tell me: what did you get from the books?

As Spotted on the Thai Side

Journaling Life in Thailand

Happy Tuesday everyone! This week, I’m posting from Chiang Rai, the area in northern Thailand where my NGO work is located. It’s hot here. Freaking hot. I miss A/C. I really do. Occasionally we catch a breeze, or cool off in a cold shower, but mostly we’re just languishing in heat.

I’m here for the week, instead of just the weekend, because it’s summer vacation for the kids and we have a bunch of camp activities planned for them. Did you know in Thailand there’s only three seasons each year? Hot, hotter, and hottest is a good guess, but here, they’re delineated as: hot season, cold season, and rainy season. We seem to be at the peak of hot season right about now. (God, I hope it’s the peak. Please let it not get any hotter.)

So are you Hunger Games fans all ready for our discussion forum tomorrow? I’m super excited! Come back here Wednesday, April 25 to share your thoughts and impressions and see how others reacted to various aspects of the trilogy. If you missed the discussion questions I posted last week, you can see them here.

I also wanted to extend a thank you to all your support and kind words last Thursday on my post about that thing I wasn’t sure I even wanted to talk about. Your words were truly a comfort and reassurance and it was really special to know so many people are out there rooting for us. So thank you.

Anyway, I’m going to have to cut this coffee chat short because the heat makes my aluminum covered laptop burn my hands (ok, not quite, but almost – it sure does fry my brains). I also want to let you know I might be scarce around these parts over the next week or two because I’ll be busy with the kidlets and then next week, I’m jetting down to Chiang Mai, doing a quick bit of laundry and packing, and then we’re heading to Europe for a month (SQUEE!!). I’ll try to post as I normally do…but in case I’m absent…that’s what I’m up to. In the meantime, because I love seeing her sleep with her tongue out….I give you: Dot’s tongue.

Ciao for now!