Ever get the feeling that if The Graduate were remade in 2013, instead of “plastics,” Benjamin would be told to get into “infographics.” (And Benjamin would be played by Zach Braff, Zachary Levi or the guy from the Office.) The dialogue would go something like this: Continue reading “Speak (or Tweet) Only If It Improves On The Silence – Gandhi”
Category: Media
Media and Grief
Last week, on the same day, bombings occurred in Boston, Ma and across Iraq– 5,808 miles apart, but for one day they were tragically right next door to each other. The lives of three people were claimed in Boston and hundreds of others were injured; in Iraq over 50 people were killed with more than 100 wounded.
In response to the Marathon Bombing, the President interrupted his schedule to travel to Boston, attend a nationally broadcast inter/multifaith service and to speak about the event and subsequent investigation. Iraqi president Jalal Talabani would have to have had the sum of all the powers of the Avengers to attend a service at the site of every attack in his country last week – bombs went off in 8 to 10 cities (reports varied). In the US, there was a national moment of silence; the last moment of silence I could find in Iraq happened in 2005, for victims of car bombings. Continue reading “Media and Grief”
A Glimpse of the Journos Life Abroad
In December, bunch of journos in Cairo had security training. Not a bad idea for people who have spent months on end as guests of Qaddafi, and have phone conversations along the lines of “No, the flack jackets should go to Syria and the armor cars should go to Libya,” while teaching their sons to ride bicycles. (The next statement was, “Alexander, pedal with both feet – it works better.”) Continue reading “A Glimpse of the Journos Life Abroad”
Watching Sesame Street in Egypt
I had been trying to find a way to express the coolness of Sesame Street – the Workshop has released both Sesame Street episodes and Electric Company episodes (complete with Bill Cosby and sweaters!) basically from inception to current episodes. While in Egypt last year, we were able to watch a lot of both. It was an incredible experience to watch Emmett, then not quite 3, connect with something so wholeheartedly American and be able to find also episodes of the Arabic broadcast Alam Simsim and Shara’a SimSim (the Palestinian broadcast) on YouTube. The Sesame Street Workshop produces versions of the show that are broadcast in over 140 countries around the world. Continue reading “Watching Sesame Street in Egypt”
azimuths compass 