Up Too Late: An Endless Search for Mr.Right & Other Important Things in Life

I never thought this could be true, but I googled it and after reading some super-odd articles, i found out that yes, apparently, sex change operations are permitted in Iran and even subsidized by the government.

This is shockingly liberal for a regime nowadays seen as repressive of women's and gay rights. It's incredible, in fact, to know that the government of Iran pays part of the expenses required for sex-change operations for the Iranian transgender community. In most western societies, the government doesn't pay for gender-changing surgeries.

In the 1960s , Khomeini, who overthrew the Shah, took a stance on Iran's transgender community and said that

"if somebody wants to undergo a sex change because he feels trapped inside someone else's body, he has the right to get rid of this body and transform into the other sex, and he is also entitled to new identification documents, in order to put an end to his plight."

Apparently, changing genders does not go against Islam's norms. The sex change is also justified in cases of healthy gay men and women who, in an effort to escape the persecution they face as gays and lesbians in Iran, opt for a change of gender. Going through the operation means relative freedom to have intimate relations with other men or women, within the limits of the rules on public life in Iran.

The other side of the paradox is that if someone is proven to have had homosexual relations (I don't like the word "homosexual", but here, I am forced to use it) and there are three witnesses who can attest to the fact of seeing the person vis-a-vis engaged in gay sex, that is, while the person is having sex, the statements are taken as evidence in a government court and used against them to ultimately result in sentences that start with 100 lashes on the back and, in extreme cases, a public hanging. This process comes from an old, archaic interpretation of Sharia law, the Islamic code and is used for various matters, including punishing acts of extramarital relations, robbery, etc.

Now, CBC Television aired a documentary on February 18th on gay rights in Iran titled Out of Iran: The Persecution of Homosexuals in the Islamic Republic of Iran, which some You Tube fan uploaded immediately after the documentary was shown on TV. The documentary, filmed and produced by Farid Heerinejad and narrated by the CBC TV's Sunday Night host, Evan Solomon, shows some extraordinary men who stand up for their rights in a country where standing up for your rights could pose a life danger, especially if you are a gay man or woman. We see and hear Iranian activists and founding members of IRQO [Iranian Queer Organization, previously known as] the PGLO, the Persian Gay and Lesbian Organization, founded just a couple of years ago to combat homophobia in Iran and to provide gay Iranians with a virtual meeting space, online and in person.

We hear stories of a man and a MTF (male-to-female) transgendered woman who are tortured, physically and psychologically, by their surroundings. The man talks about being gang-raped by the members of Iran's secret service. The woman speaks out on the anger her family feels towards her sexuality, ordering her to stay in her bedroom and never go out.

Sadly, where Out of Iran seems to lack substance is in the narration of the documentary. In fact, Solomon's way of talking is so sensationalist, at one point, you feel like you're watching some reality TV show where someone is about to win something big time ("…and the BIG winner is….!"). In the same pattern, pejorative vocabulary used to portray Iran as hell for gay men and women is a slight bit far-fetched. Of course, as a conservative regime-ruled country, Iran is a dangerous place to be gay in, but it is equally dangerous to be a moderate woman, to walk around in the public without a head covering, to oppose the government, to speak out for secularism, to defend Jews (though, this one, with close to 30.000 Jews in Tehran, is also arguable).

Solomon proves once again his love for anything anti-Islamic and pro-Jewish, and though this documentary has nothing to do with Jews, it indirectly helps further the reasoning used by Israel to prove that Iran is a threat to the world.

Evan Solomon makes reference to two men who were executed in Iran two years ago for allegedly "homosexual activities" and who have caused international uproar in the human rights community worldwide. Official human rights sources say it's unclear whether or not these two men were executed for being gay or for other reasons, including sexually assaulting a 13-year old boy. This has not been proven partly due to closed-door and hidden-evidence court processes, as Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International have repeatedly stated in the past.

A number of primarily North American publications, including Gay City News ran the story as one of a gay execution, which provoked dozens of protests against the executions. Pet Shop Boys apparently dedicated a song to the two executed men on their new album.

Scott Long of the Human Rights Watch says it's hard to prove whether or not the case was that of a gay execution, due to a - the families' feeling humiliated, b - the court process being closed to the public and c - the general public fearing government reaction if they speak out on specific cases. It is not even a question that Iran would execute men for homosexual acts. In fact, according to the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Association, though not proven, it is alleged that 96 men and women have been hanged in 2005 for various reasons that may include sexuality [IGLHRA does not specify]. It's not what I am questioning in this post. What I am wondering about is the sensationalist nature to the media reports that attribute any slight suspicion to a fact and make gossip the truth.

Rather, what CBC TV and Gay City News, among other media outlets, seem to be doing is enforcing the culture of "Iran is bad, we are good". As an Iranian gay activist filmmaker testifies in a video taken at a Human Rights Watch forum in NYC last year, this sort of sensationalist reporting is causing further marginalization of gay rights issues in countries like Iran and Iraq. When Americans urge the US Army, an occupying force, to protect Iraq's gays, they mean well, but what they end up contributing to is an association of Iraq's gays with the occupier, that is, the United States. As a result, Iraqi/Irani gays are seen as products of the American occupation/influence.

Secondly, the reporting clearly aimed at furthering the journalists' careers is another Canadian/American media push for public reactions against Iran's current government. In fact, the documentary is part of the anti-Iran and pro-American republican foreign policy propaganda. Sadly, what is true is hard to distinguish from media bias nowadays, there's that much of it everywhere.

Yes, the government of Iran has many problems and Ahmadinejad is not exactly the smartest person to be in power (whoever denies the Holocaust is missing a few marbles), and no, the mullahs should not have a slight bit of power, but in the end, things are not always so black and white.

We can't continue to impose our way of living on others, but we can support them in doing so and protect them when feel compelled to do it. Iranian/Iraqi/Middle Eastern activists cannot solve the issues on their own, of course they need our help. Perhaps they simply need to know that up until 1970, the Western world thought all gays were literally mad and if it weren't for those who stood up for their own rights, we would still live in a Canada of mental hospitals for curing homosexuality. In fact, we would still live like in parts of the United States, where some of those hospitals still exist. It's inspiring to see young Iranian gay s stand up for their rights, despite the risk involved. Unfortunately, it will take many of those men and women to show Iran that it cannot continue denying the existence of homosexuality within its society.

For that matter, it will take just as many Kosovar gay men and women to prove that being gay is not a western import. Sadly, though free of extrajudicial executions, Kosova is not far from Iran in its treatment of gays and lesbians. To be gay in Kosova means to be branded and peder, the Albanian and Serbian equivalent of faggot, is the worst word you could say to someone. It comes to show the kind of thinking that still exists in today's Kosova.

Sources used:


Biased Reporting - Gay Executions in Iran? - excerpt from a Human Rights Watch panel [YouTube]

Gays feed into Anti-Gay Hysteria - excerpt from a Human Rights Watch panel [YouTube]

Out of Iran - The Persecution of Homosexuals in the Islamic Republic of Iran - CBC Television [You Tube]

Iran - Have a Sex-Change on Us - Report from the "Al-Arabiya" TV network[YouTube]

Reported Executions in Iran
- International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission

Iran Hacks Web Sites to burry anti-gay pogrom - Doug Ireland [reporter for Gay City News]

Transsexuality in Iran - Big Queer Blog

Labels: amnesty international, Canada, gay rights, homophobia, human rights, human rights watch, iran, Kosova, Kosovo

I just got back from Mika's concert. WOW! The guy is AMAZING. He is so energetic, so jumpy, so happy, so...wonderful! He made me so happy with his voice and energy, I kept dancing and singing with people I've never met or seen, and we even hugged and danced with one another! Bliss, I tell you! :) Sadly, Montrealers seem to have found out about him, so my dream of getting his autograph and/or a photo op. did not come true. This didn't stop me from taking photos of him tonight, though apparently he did ask photos not to be taken... They pics I took didn't turn out great, but here they are...

The good thing is, I will forever treasure Mika's new album. It's happy, lively and most of all, a rarity of quality corn pop. It's really a wealth of emotions bundled together in an album to which, once you listen from the beginning to the end, you will become addicted.

I was supposed to meet a few friends at the door, but they went in early to get some good seats and obviously didn't end up with good ones because I combed the place through and couldn't find them anywhere. So I kept walking around like a lost case as all the gay guys and teenage girls with their straight and sexually-confused boyfriends mingled and eye-flirted with fellow Mika maniacs.

Aside from the concert being a great, lovely night, I met a boy! Well, not a boy, more like an analogy for a cute single man who i am going out on a date with on Wednesday night...

It's odd because we had chatted online some time ago, on a day when my only social contact happened to be the cybersphere. I saw him tonight, he waved at me and said hi and I had no idea who he was and why he was saying hi to me, though I thought he was cute. I got back home and I already had a message from him, asking if the person he waved and said hi to was me. I clued in and messaged him back. He replied saying he thought I was cuter in person than in my profile photo. Why, of course... :)

The luck that I have, my three single teenager-looking straight friends were just outside the door as I left Club Soda tonight...Speaking of teenagers, I felt like one, wearing loose Levi's, Converse All Stars and the over-the-shoulder man-purse with a cowboy shirt...

Labels: concert, date, favourite music, men, Mika, Montreal, pop music

Hmmm...I have much to write about, but I choose this precious post to be on three docs I saw in the last two days, courtesy of FIFA (Festival International des Films sur l'Art) in Montreal.

1 - L'art du nu 2: Made by a Quebec filmmaker, Bernar Hebert, this documentary explores the relationship that exists between the painter and his model. Interviews in the documentary are great, ranging from interviews with Maillol to Cezanne's model to insightful stories by contemporary models. The models are mostly female, with the exception of a few men used in the doc. to portray they 70s, the birth of the modern feminist era as we know it, when women began to portray men in the same objectifying method men had been portraying women for centuries. I didn't find the documentary so involving... It was rather dry.

There was, however, a positive side to this, which has to do with the post-screening wine party held to launch the "L'art du nu" calendar. The party was a regular artsy fundraiser with one exception: Nude models posing everywhere while the painters painted them, paying detailed attention to every curve, every turn. This was rather interesting, so I stayed and looked at a nude male model for about, oh, I don't know, 15 minutes. HE DIDN'T MOVE! It was as if he were frozen in time. It was amazing! I mean, they must have some special training for it...As for wine, no, I didn't have it, to the surprise of the waiters who kept going around, offering as much as they could. I am determined not to ever try it... I'm stubborn like that sometimes :)

2 - Sinatra: Dark Star : I absolutely loved this documentary. I learned so much about Frank Sinatra, things I'd never known and would probably never have found out had it not been for this video. For example, did you know that the FBI tried half a dozen times to charge Sinatra for mafia links? Upon his death, the FBI file on Frank Sinatra was 2403 pages. See? Romantic men aren't just romantic. They are also troublemakers :)

3 - Making the Balkans Erotic: Before I tell you how I felt about this documentary, I have to make one thing clear. I have an issue with the title of this video. It is called "Making the Balkans Erotic", yet it only touches on one community out of at least a dozen Balkanic communities that are all so different from one another that it is impossible to include them in the traditions of one of the cultures (Serbian).

Marina Abramovic, a well-known Serbian conceptual artist, prepared an exhibition in NYC in late 2005 on old rituals existent in the Serbian (though she calls it Balkanic) culture, things like women showing genitals to the demons who may endanger the crops, bring drought, etc. or men having sex with the Earth . The documentary Making the Balkans Erotic is a sort of a "The Making of:...", in this case, so-called the Balkan Erotic Epic exhbition, only the making of part is actually a mockery of the work itself, which is a complete paradox.

I mean, she prepared Balkan Erotic Epic as a serious work of art that looks into the culture of eroticism existent in the pagan times of Serbian culture, yet in Making the Balkans Erotic , none of that seriousness and conflict between the honourable tradition and the erotic body zones is existent. Rather, Abramovic makes fun of her own work of art, in a way, mocking the men and women who take part in her piece. What is most remarkable to notice (and this is visible in every documentary involving paid crew members from Southeast Europe), is the poor men and women who, pressured by poverty, are forced to take part in mockeries such as this one.

Miranda B. mentioned it last night and though I had thought of it before, I decided to rationalize by saying that these men and women could have chosen not to expose their bodies. Yet, when you're poor, unemployed and in desperate need of money, do you have a choice? At the beginning of the documentary, the men ask to be paid in advance, as they have heard of porn filmmakers who get their video and disappear the next day.

These are the faces that you see in Making the Balkans Erotic: Men and women who will do anything they are told, as long as they get the money for it. As Abramovic says, you don't actually see eroticism in her work, despite being exposed to men with erections you rarely see in public. Somehow, though, I don't think she empathized with her crew. Instead, in the documentary, she says repeatedly that she thinks the footage looks better when the crew is more tired and when everyone looks exhausted. There is a terrible thing that comes to mind when I think of her words, and it's called slave labour.

What you see, after the layer of humour that you can associate with the image of Serbian men in national costumes jerking off to a porn movie playing on a portable dvd player is the face of those who aren't comfortable in the skin they are in. The humour is biting and the viewing is exploitative ...

I youtube'd Marina Abramovic and found a parody of a part of her collection. Here's the excerpt from Abramovic's exhibition (external link/ You need Real Player to access the video)

The parody, seen below, is actually pretty funny...



P.S: I've been getting hundreds of new visitors. A comment wouldn't hurt when you visit.

Labels: art, Balkans, documentary, film festival, Frank Sinatra, Montreal, Serbia

Before you get any ideas in your minds about the title of this post, it's lyrics from a song I like...and "he" is actually "she" in a song, but today, it's me, being high on coffee this morning, as my only means of trying to stay awake for the day.

I had less than two hours of sleep last night, I mean, this morning and I couldn't feel better. Oddly enough, though I have huge bags under my eyes (I know, so self-conscious of me) and though I did feel slightly hesitant about coming to work this morning (I kinda always do feel hesitant about that), I am doing pretty good for someone who has slept, well, to be exact, 1 hour and 45 minutes. I had a great Saturday night with Miranda Bradshaw and her Kerastase model friend and colleague, V. and their friends, for what was a birthday party for V.

It's funny because I didn't really meet many people. In fact, out of the dozen people that were there, I got to know three very interesting characters, one of whom was Isabella Rosselini, a super-smart Montrealer who speaks and writes Arabic! Can you imagine? She lived in Egypt for two years and studied Arabic and now speaks it perfectly. I was really envious of her as, ultimately, someday, I hope to learn arabic, too, though I think so many of my brain cells are dying at such a high rate, there just won't be any space left for this tough language. Isabella is now researching a doc on dancers in Egypt (I presume, belly dancers...?). She had brought Newfoundland Screech to the party, the typical Newfie drink, a familiar thing from home (home being relative, in this case, Newfoundland) and told me she visited St.John's last fall.

V. is writing her thesis (Masters, I think) on eco-feminism, or at least that's what I got from it. Her research is on the effects of environment on women in Quebec. I thought it was unique, as I hadn't really heard of a special relationship between the environment and women, but after hearing about the work she did in the rural areas, following women's lives and their work in the country, I was convinced. The only thing is, I'd probably have to read her work before I could fully understand the point.

I felt really comfortable hanging out with the always-smiling and in-the-mood V., her super-friendly boyfriend, the future supermodel daughter (she posed for me numerous times when I asked to take a photo of her once) and their friends. Miranda Bradshaw was slightly tired, but that didn't prevent her from dancing to some French rock band tunes (Dead Zone or something like that), just as the presence of people I'd never met didn't prevent me from doing some shake-your-booty Arabic belly-dancing (and to think that that was the first and probably the only time I did belly-dancing in public... rare performance is what I call it).

Miranda B. had once told me about how a friend of hers had mentioned to her that she could be overwhelming to guys who just want a "simple, regular girl". I sort of felt like I overwhelmed a new acquaintance last night when I started telling him about living in war-time Kosova. By the end of the chat, he said, "ummm, I'll go get some more wine," and as he left, I allowed myself to some giggling, as I had just made a guy ponder how he'd spent all his life not thinking about things he sometimes takes for granted.

On the occasion of the special party for V., we had two police visits (V. is THAT popular). The people living on the floor below us apparently called the police and complained about the noise (really, it was just a little music and some walking around). As a result, we had not 1, 2 or 3, but FOUR cops come to the party, to tell us to keep it quiet, otherwise they were going to charge Isabella $150 for the noise. This got Isabella angry, so she put the sound level of the cd player up and continued dancing, which only seems to have further irritated the neighbours because before we knew it, the friendly blue uniforms were back in our door. Ah, how fun...we should have invited them in :)

Hearing about my misadventures must have triggered Miranda B.'s "in-need-of-a-date" alarm, as part of the reason she invited me to V.'s party, aside from meeting her, was to meet V.'s friend Manu Chao, apparently a single gay guy whom she thought (or hoped) was compatible with me. I didn't really talk with Manu Chao, mainly because for most of the evening, I didn't even know which one in the crowd WAS him, and when I did discover, I didn't really talk to him that much, aside from taking pics of him and the future supermodel, jumping around, building little shelters with pillows and umbrellas, etc. It was nice, really. He looked pretty child-friendly, but it was sort of...odd. I felt quite out of place being there and feeling pressured to talk to him, something he probably felt, too. I wonder if he was in on the news that the girls were planning this little scheme. I hope he was, anyway, as I would hate to be the only one aware of it all, aside from the girls.

Miranda asked repeatedly for my opinion on the guy so she could pass on the word to V., the other schemer of this little vendetta (see? V is definitely "V for Vendetta"). I didn't really say anything partly because, well, there wasn't really anything to say. I mean, i hardly talked to the guy, so I couldn't really make up my mind on him judging by his good child-entertaining skills (which I was impressed with, but the future supermodel doesn't count...he knows her who knows how long), his dance moves and the good looks.

My residence soulmate and I got a cab, as we were sort of lazy, and it WAS 3 am. She hailed one in Carrie Bradshaw-in-New-York style, which comes to show how Sex and the City she is. But if she is a combination of Miranda and Carrie, then who am I? I know that by many means (oh, I dunno, relationship status, maybe), I fit the description of her bald-headed, reading-glasses-wearing gay friend (whose name luckily I forget), but I hope that's not where I am when I get bald-headed. I mean, I hope I don't get bald-headed, period. Wow, looking back at this post, this is very narcissistic of me. Then again, this whole blog is a sort of a narcissistic thing. I need to get my frustration and joy out somewhere, and aside from little things I do outside of selfish blog-writing to address those needs, this seems to be it.

After talking for close to an hour with Miranda on various topics ranging from the noise level in our appartments to the culture shock of being in Canada to going through the experience of war, we parted ways for the night. Miranda is going to be reading from her blog next Friday night at an Open Mic event of "feminine reading", where men are not even allowed near the mic, reason being, they "dominate the stage", according to Miranda. M. hasn't chosen the post she'll be reading from yet. I checked out her archives and I find she is pretty funny. I also found out from reading her archives that she went to a local Starbucks in Beirut once...*gasp* what??? How can this be possible??? As for my favourite post of hers, well, I'm still going through the pages and pages of her writing, some of which is extremely funny, especially this one.

Labels: friends, men, Montreal

I have never heard anyone talk about Albanophilia, but somehow, the term makes sense. I mean, if you like this Albanian, you should be called an Albanophile (-phil: Gr. antecedent, "to like").

I know many Albanians who should be called that because they love Albanians to the extreme. And, after all, what's there not to like? Most Albanians are friendly, lively, talkative and quite opinionated, not to mention the natural trait of attraction, something inexplicable (Albanians who may not be that attractive have ways of becoming attractive by using simple words...sound familiar?)...I say Albanians, but these are general terms. I am sure upon reading this you will think of how this applies to most people. Except that today, I want to focus on my Friday night, when, for the first time in a long time, I felt a moment of bliss.

No, it's not men that I wish to write about today. In my blog title, I am searching for "other important things" among Mr.Man, Mr.Right or Mr.Whatever, and this is one of those "other" important things.

Arjana (not her real name) is a mother of two, a woman from Albania who portrays the character of a strong-willed Albanian woman. Here eyebrows are crooked in the middle and, if she didn't smile at times to neutralize the paranoia her onlookers are filled with, you'd think she is angry at you. Five years ago, Arjana sold everything she had in Albania and decided she would come to Canada, the place everyone in Albania dreamt of going. The rumours of good jobs, clean environment, safe surroundings for families with children and inexpensive property had so invaded Arjana's everyday thinking, one day, she and her husband applied to come to Canada through a skilled worker immigration program. The process took close to two years.

When the family arrived in Canada, everything seemed perfect...until they started looking for jobs. Arjana had been a teacher in Albania and now has to retrain. For the last three years, Arjana's self-confidence level has been going lower and lower every year. The more she is learning French, the more she is realizing how far she is from ever living her dream of teaching again, this time in Canada.

I met Arjana in my intensive French grammar course, where a Russian friend sitting next to me introduced us. She is the first Albanian person I met in Montreal and as such, is a treasured friend. There is something to be said about people who speak your mother tongue in a place where everyone else speaks another language. Despite any differences between us, language and culture seems to unify us two and though I've pondered on it and how strange it is, I've concluded that it is a matter of psychology. First point is that Arjana speaks Albanian. The second is that I miss Kosova, where Albanian is spoken. Therefore, speaking with Arjana is like having a taste of Kosova. It is much more complex than this, the relationship between two albanophones (or any -phones, for that matter), but for now, I feel it is the formula that helps me explain my thoughts in the simplest way (perhaps not the clearest, but simplest).

I am invited to Arjana's for a quick get together before we go to the International Women's Day dinner and gala organized by the Albanian Association in Montreal. At Arjana's house, her former French teacher is having Turkish coffee and conversing with Arjana about living in Montreal and Arjana's neighbourhood, near metro Parc. Apparently, some of Arjana's Albanian friends told her she should move, as she lives in a poor area of town. "So what," she says "if I live in a poor area of town? I am not rich. Besides, people here are nice. Everyone seems to speak bad about Pakistani Montrealers, but they, too, came here for the same reason I did. So someday, their offspring may have a future.What do you think, Helene?" ...Helene goes on about something that makes me gasp. She says how Arjana really should consider moving, as her students keep talking about there being "cockroaches" in the houses of this neighbourhood, and sometimes even streets. Arjana is surprised to hear this from her former teacher and quickly changes the subject to "So, Helene, when are you coming to Albania with me?"

Arjana misses Albania, too, just like I miss Kosova at times: "I'm here for my children, so someday, they may have what I did not have," says Arjana, as she shows Helene and I postcards of Durrësi, her hometown in Albania. She says she misses the salty air of Durrës, the warm breeeze coming from the Adriatic sea, the view of palm trees from her home. It's not that she doesn't visit Durrës. Every year, Arjana and her family visit Albania for months, in an attempt to get enough of the air, warmth and scenery to live with for the rest of the year. Yet, as soon as she comes back to her home in Montreal, Arjana knows it is all back to normal again. The months spent in Arbëria were just a dream that she awakens from every fall. Money or not, rich or poor, the family spends thousands on the summer trips to Albania. If it weren't for these months of time spent in Albanian surroundings, they couldn't survive in Montreal.

Arjana's husband, a professor in Albania, took up woodworking and is now working as a carpenter. He looks tired and serious. every now and then, a modest smile comes out of him, as if he, just like his wife, wanted to show that he is not always as solemn as he may appear. The couple's two sons have already achieved a great deal in the few years they've been here. They both speak fluent Albanian and Italian, including English and French. The older son is a 14-year old soccer champion playing in a competitive high school soccer team. The medals he won are showcased near the fireplace in the living room, so everyone knows how good he is and how proud his parents are of him. The younger son wants to follow in his brother's footsteps, but he has his own plans in mind: To become a tennis champion someday. With this kind of thinking, I am confident he will be much more than that... It is inspiring to see how their parents' depression doesn't affect these teenagers. They keep on planning for the future, perhaps because their future is the only thing that now and then makes their parents give off a hint of a smile and warmth.

Now, we have our drinks and we're getting ready to get in the van, when, inside the car, I meet Lana, a woman in her sixties whose primary concern seems to be, well, her well-being and her looks. Lana is also from Albania, though from Korça, a southern Albanian town I would have loved to visit (all these Ottoman-style wooden houses everywhere in town...such a historic city...plus, near the sea!). You know how in every novel, movie and comedy, there is an older woman, who is, at times, too honest, to the point that she offends people, but we forgive her anyway because she is in her sixties? Well, that's Lana. As we introduce ourselves, she says: "You're Kosovar? I love Kosovars. My daughter married one of them. Come have coffee at my house anytime!" Lana sits in front of the van and tells Arjana's husband which direction he should take to get to our destination tonight. At one point, we all get lost because Lana gave us wrong directions (she considers herself all-knowing because she's lived in Montreal for eight years now). Finally, we make it to the Lebanese restaurant we have our banquet in. Once we get to our table, Lana decides it's not up to par with her standards because it puts us at the centre of everyone's attention and view, so we end up in one of the room's corner tables. Great. Thanks, Lana.

At the table (fits 16), I meet another group of people, friends of Arjana's who came to Montreal at the same time as the family. The man sitting opposite me is unshaved, bald and probably in his thirties. I say the latter to emphasize the fact that this man is in his mid-thirties. I notice him playing under the table and I start to wonder why he is wiggling his hands under there...A few seconds later, when he pulls up a bottle of clear brandy, I realize he was opening the bottle. As he looks around for any waiters, he whispers "It's REAL Albanian brandy, REAL ALBANIAN GRAPE brandy. We'll have some fun tonight, eh?" He starts to pour onto glasses and when he reaches mine, I tell him I don't drink. "Why, you Muslim or something?" I tell him that yes, I don't drink. Arjana's husband turns my way and says, as he laughs "hahaha, Muslim? Me, too!" and he drinks the contents of the big glass in one gulp. Many Albanians from Albania, under the influence of 50 years of strict secularist socialism, have never gone back to practicing Islam and though they are aware their parents and grandparents may have been Muslims, for them, it's only a heritage moment, something you mention in passing, or something that comes useful when you need your prayers answered.
This gets me thinking on how in Albanian culture (in Kosova, Macedonia, Montenegro, Albania, parts of Serbia and diaspora), it is the fact that you are Albanian that unites you with another Albanian. What religion you are is often, if not always irrelevant because for many Albanians, being Albanian IS almost a religion.

Lana gets something out of her purse and what strikes me as a water bottle at first is a quick change of mind, as I smell the homemade, 30% alcohol brandy. She passes it on to the others on the table and points at me when she says "try it! I made it! Don't you worry about poisoning! I made it at home"...I won't have her brandy, but is the fact that she made brandy in her own home supposed to make me feel better about drinking it? Who knows what she was doing while prepping it. I smile and wave away, while I pour water from the pitcher. Five minutes away, she will see me and feel amazed, thinking that I drink brandy like water.

A belly dancer is the entertainment of the evening, aside from live Albanian music. Amused by her oriental moves, little children gather around and start imitating her dances. The adults join in and a senior, bearded man looking like Santa, dances with the belly dancer. I laugh and wonder how somehow, silly little things like this man's dancing and those childrens' moves are making this evening uniquely entertaining.

I meet a couple of Kosovar Albanians at the banquet and somehow, it's almost like talking to old friends. We don't have a good discussion or talk long, and I'm sure they were probably surprised why I approached them and asked them "are you from Kosova?", but I don't really care. I get their numbers and promise to call them soon, which I will do. I later keep returning to their table for short, quiet encounters, where they say nothing because they don't know why I just came to their table and I say nothing because really, what COULD I say?I ask them if they keep up with the current situation in Kosova, to which they add that no, they rarely check the news to see what is happening "over there". I am surprised to hear this. They mention how they like Montreal and they enjoy living in the city.

Live music comes on and it's our turn to dance. We dance away to traditional Albanian tunes as we hold hands and spin in a circle. I don't know the steps to the dances, and most of the time, a child is bumping into me as he/she runs around, but suddenly, I feel home. I haven't felt that way in a long long time. I look around the happy people I see and the music I hear and though it's so silly, the dance circle is so uneven, I don't know any of the steps to the dances, the singer sounds terrible, I feel at peace. The hot guy holding my hand is not afraid I'm going to put moves on him (Albanians generally are very physical), the woman right next to me is singing along with the terrible singing done by a drunk Korçan. This is the moment of bliss I've waited for for so long...It's perfect.

I can't say I'm an exclusive Albanophiliac because besides Albanians, I seem to have an affinity with pretty much the world, but there is something closer to my heart and soul when it comes to getting in touch with Albanians.

One of the important things in my search is the feeling of being in a place where I will feel like I belong the way I never did before. Last night was one of those nights....I feel last night, for all it was, so accomplished. I feel complete in a way.

Labels: albanian, Kosova, Montreal

Friday...hmmm, well, it's hard to write about my only day off without calling it "the check out" day, the day when I:

1-...check out from the school/work world and only do things I like doing (though sometimes there are exceptions, like last week, when I taught Albanian on a Friday, or every week, when I reply to e-mails);

2-...check my guilt level out. On Friday, I usually feel guilty because I should be going to the mosque and pray with the ummah, fellow Muslims..funny enough, feeling guilty is not Islamic, but I can't seem to be able to help it;

3-...check out and get checked out by men (and sometimes, women) in coffee shops, preferably of my age, while I do the tedious and extremely un-fun task of correcting quizzes, tests and homework for my TA job;

4-...check out new episodes of Ugly Betty, Little Mosque on the Prairie and Desperate Housewives and

5-...check out music / tech / clothing stores for sales.

Thursday night is the time when I plan ahead for Friday. The plan usually looks like this:

8:30am - get up and shower [in actual fact, I get up at 9:30 - 10:30 am and stay in bed while checking e-mails and reading the news]

9:00am - have breakfast and watch new episodes of Ugly Betty, Little Mosque on the Prairie, etc. [I have breakfast around 11:30 am and at this point, I plan on getting in the shower...but i am watching the latest in Ugly Betty, so I can't]

10:00am - wash dishes, clean up around the studio and organize [at around 12:15, I remember I need to be at a meeting of the university chapter of WUSC, so I hurry into shower, get out, change into clothes and rush out with wet hair]

11:00 am - reply to e-mails sent [i have already checked my e-mails and haven't had time to reply to them...I am at the meeting until 1:30 pm, when I decide I should go do some work at the nearby Starbucks]

12:10 pm - go to weekly WUSC meeting. [I stay at Starbucks until around 4:30 pm, correcting, chatting on msn, eye-flirting, etc.]

1:30 pm - go to Starbucks to do work [yes! see, my logic still works...I still get things done on time!!], work meaning working and eye-flirting with guys and occasional girls who think I am looking at them, when in fact, I am not....but oh, well, it can't hurt :).
This is a funny one because at this particular coffee shop, I run into two McGill Med. students regularly, both of whom try hard to look as if they were studying and in real life, maybe they are, but they don't project that in any way. One of these two young men always carries two coloured markers for easy use on his already over-markered book. The other one always checks out the men coming in, almost like an eye radar thing. As soon as the two see someone they like, they whisper things to one another and voila, a big giggle is produced. I opt for ignoring them, as they don't really seem that interesting, with their carefully chosen tight jeans, marker coloured hands, cell phones on the tables (checked every five minutes) and unpredictable giggling moments. Indeed, they are THE symbol of this Starbuck and I say they shall be called the Starbucks Docs from now.

4:30 pm - I meet a friend/friends for tea/dinner....on anti-social days, I go to the library and check out the headlines on Washington Post, NY Times and the new issue of The New Yorker.

around 9:30 pm - I am in bed, trying to make myself sleep...I need to get up super-early the next day...I have "More Tales from the City" running in the background and am trying to figure out what the characters are talking about, with my eyes shut. Occasionally, and these are exceptional times, I allow myself a "late" outing that can at most last until 11pm. After that, my inner curfew alarm buzzes and I absolutely must return home without losing any glass slippers...All Star sneakers, I mean.

I have no life this year... :(

Labels: coffee shops, Friday, humour, men

Hmm, I'm going through a J withdrawal phase. I have come to realize he is so self-absorbed, he loves talking about himself...Well, no, maybe i'm exaggerating, but the truth is, I am over him. He messaged me on Tuesday and the truth is, I didn't really care about him anymore. It must have been just a crush..(wow, "i'm over him" has become my most used sentence ever on this blog).

I am going through a "dying out of laughter" in my French classes. My super-intelligent and very kind, funny and outgoing French grammar prof (I must write about him and my other profs sometime), has been quoting sentences he comes across in our quizzes and tests, some of which sound like "Je suis très fière que le chien poursuive le lapin" (I am so proud that the dog is chasing the rabbit). Huh? [the original sentence was "Je suis très fière que..." and we were supposed to fill in the blank]. Another funny one was "étant donné que Paul faisait des heures supplementaires, sa femme cherche les enfants à la garderie" (since Paul was doing extra hours (at work), his wife is looking for the children at the daycare)...I wonder when she will be done looking for them.

I am going to an Albanian family party tomorrow night to celebrate the international women's day...that should be interesting.

I wore a Dutchcamp (ironic, I know) zipped sweater today in the design of the funky South African flag (with all the colours, and "South Africa" in the back). I liked it when i first saw it, so I bought it. When I wore it today, I had an awkward experience: People were looking at me oddly. I couldn't wait to get home and change. I realized that when I wore that sweater, I felt like a colonizer...but only after I got the "omg, i can't believe you're wearing that" looks.

Something that has nothing to do with me: After 19 years of being held in detention without ever being tried, Jose Garcia was freed yesterday, after his first hearing in 19 years. poor guy.

Labels: fashion, freedom, men, Montreal

I laughed hard when I saw this as I'm sure you will...

The Israeli Minister of Defence should think about re-training. Or maybe just learning how to use binoculars. On February 21st, an Associated Press photographer took a pic of Amir Peretz as he was looking over Golan Heights, while being told what the troops in the distance were doing by one of his advisors. Apparently, Peretz kept using his binoculars in the directions the advisor would point at numerous times, never actually taking the caps off the lenses. This is the problem Israel needs to solve: It needs to learn how to see the reality.


Change of topic again. FIFA ruled today that Asmahan Mansour, an 11-year old Nepean, ON girl who was refused play on a soccer field in Quebec because she wore a hijab, apparently "dangerous" for the girls safety, has no right to wear a head covering while playing soccer. Oh, yeah? How about hypocrisy? If FIFA itself, on its website, says that you can wear "headgear", and some of its member countries (Iran, as an example) ALWAYS feature the hijab as part of their uniform, then they should probably go over a/their policies b/their press releases. They don't know what they do or don't allow anymore.

Stranger things could NOT have happened...A woman in California gave birth to a 3.18 kg baby without knowing she was pregnant. April Barnum must have gone through quite a shock when the x-rays of her body showed a living baby in her stomach: "ooops,...how could that happen?" *looks around*

Speaking of parently feelings, a mother in England was barely allowed to keep the custody of her son after social services threatened they would take the boy away because she was not doing a good job feeding him (the boy's five times the weight of a boy his age).When asked what his favourite food is, Connor McCreaddie, 8 years old, says: "Bacon. Mmmm… That's my favorite. Um … chicken , steak, sausage,".

Photo credit: Associated Press and My EFx2Blog

Labels: Canada, Islam, Israel, obesity, quebec, soccer, United Kingdom, United States

I am at Starbucks, partly because i'm trying to do something other than just watch old episodes of Mad TV (shhhh, don't tell anyone) and Six Feet Under and partly because i was shaken by something I watched this morning that made me realize how optimistic and naive i am at times.

I'd started watching a documentary called Jesus Camp for weeks now. I couldn't watch it to the end. Somehow, I couldn't accept the reality that in the so-called "secular" world we live in, a religious minority was planning on bringing about a regime of "one nation under God". By the time you will have read the last sentence, you will have figured out I am talking about the Evangelical movement and its influence in American politics. Maybe, just maybe, you didn't get that because you are not aware of the power of the Evangelical Christian movement, which George W.Bush belongs to, as a "born-again" Christian. I won't delve into this issue, as I am sure you can google "evangelical christians & US politics".

I do want to concentrate on how I felt about Jesus Camp.

First of all, kudos to the filmmakers for getting footage of a summer camp that teaches fundamentalism. Most of the time, we see training camp videos with shaky cameras, bad quality images, etc. so it was a break from all that to see this was a good quality doc with some artistic merit.

Second of all, i have to say the music played in this doc is terrible. I understand that the point of the filmmakers was to show the tempting Christian rock music that youth are attracted to, but those youth must really be different from me because I WOULD NEVER, EVER in my life, listen to sad-sounding rock music...ewww...It does go with the doc subject, though.

The doc follows a group of 10-14 year olds who, led by Becky a pastor obviously out of her mind, in a summer camp of "Christian learnings" in Devil's Lake, ND, are filled with hate propaganda. Are you kidding me? DEVIL'S LAKE?? "Hey kids, we met here at Devil's Lake to create an army of God-fearing soldiers who will fight the devil"...you what???

Pastor Becky encourages the parents to send their children to the camp called "Kids on Fire" (oh, God) because, she says, the camp is a camp for training children to sacrifice themselves for God.

(Loosely paraphrased ->) "in Muslim countries, they teach kids from the age of 5 to be ready to sacrifice their lives for God. And they are not afraid to give up their lives for the ultimate reward of serving God. This is how we should be. We should be ready to give up everything we have, including our lives, for God. [This is what the camp is]"

Becky says things like "Take these prophecies and do what Apostle Paul said and make war with them" (them=non-Christians/non-believers) and "This [your dedication to Christianity] means war! This means war! Are you a part of it or not?"

At one point, I expect a break from all the crying and sadness the children are subjected to. The pastor's assistant says he has a fun activity in mind. Instead, fun is a synonym for an activity whereby children are told that abortion has killed 50 million children. To demonstrate this, the organizers tape children's mouths with red tape ,which has "life" written on it. They hear a speaker shout out statistics like "50 million children who were killed" / "one third of your friends won't be with you because they are dead", etc. while these pieces of tape are put on their mouths. Earlier, these poor children are told they will rot in hell if they don't repent for the bad words they use, or for non-Christian shows they watch, including Harry Potter. A boy who looks like Harry Potter is looked down upon. It comes to a point where pastor Becky uses the analogy of little teddy bears as origins of sin. Abortion is quoted often as the evil of all evils, a crime beyond crimes.

In one of the scenes, a patriotic mother invites her children to a meal. As they all gather, she takes out the Bible, they get little flags of North Dakota, US and Israel in their hands and start singing the "Star-spangled Banner".Every now and then, they look at the photo of their father who is serving in the US army Iraq.

At one point, Ted Haggard, an ultra-conservative Bush advisor and Evangelical pastor, most recently implicated in a scandal involving a male prostitute he used drugs with [and apparently had sex with], comes out in front of a huge congregation of passionate Evangelists. He calls on the United States to become one nation under God as it confirms an appointment of the super-conservative judge Samuel Alito to the US Supreme Court.

A desperate radio anchor, the only moderate in the whole documentary, seems to be losing hope. As he ponders on whether the American Evangelist Christian movement is gaining momentum in the United States, which may contribute to the end of the world, I wonder, is the world ignoring the creation of another extremist, fundamentalist force, whose sole aim is furthering its own interests? Is there place for "others" in this kind of a world? What kind of a world will this be, if a summer camp indoctrinates evil and negativity in children's minds, the future politicians, average citizens, etc. of the United States?

Labels: conservatism, documentary, evangelicalism, jesus camp, religion, United States

The id is not the subject of my post this morning. Rather, it was the title of J's short, which I saw last night.

How, where, when, you wonder (I did, too).

Well, I got back from Ottawa, checked my messages, decided I was hungry, wanted to ask J if he wanted to go out for dinner. He wasn't there as usual, so I didn't leave him a message, then quickly called back and left one, telling him that he had one hour to call me back, as I was not going to be here after that...While I did other things, I noticed 8 pm was approaching and pretty soon, I decided I should just leave...Just as I was getting ready to go out, the phone rang...J was wondering if I wanted to go see his short, being shown as part of a Mexican Student Association's sexual diversity night. I said I would.

Half an hour later, I was there. There were six other people, four others came, all girls, each of them giving big hugs to the man of the night.

J's short was very similar to the feature film Secretary, if you've seen it, although he swore he had never heard of the movie. It was done in German expressionist style of the silent film. It had some original features and aside from the similarities with "Secretary", it was a great short.

Followed by this, J decided he'd scoot out, as he had to work on his motivation letter for a transfer to Concordia. I said I had to eat, so he said he'd come with me, although he had already had had supper. Then he invited the three loud, super-hyper and extremely extroverted girls to come with him. He said he'd met one of them at a chinese resto, and then they kept in touch, so now they meet all the time (they, too are Mexican).

We went to Nickel, a sandwich resto on St.Catherine. They didn't order anything big, but rather a coffee and J got an apple pie. I was so hungry, I could have eaten a desk.

I was somehow flattered to meet J's friends, but then, I thought maybe he just brought them along so he wouldn't feel awkward, being alone with me...The girls invited me over for dinner sometime soon and then to a beauty contest they are participating in this weekend. I was going to go until I found out the show was in the morning. See, if I'd gotten fired, I could totally have done this.

It was hilarious to be in the presence of these women. One of them said her dream was to be the first star of J'd porn movies (I wasn't aware he wanted to make porn....uh, this is kinda cheap). i asked J if he really did, and he said "no, no, but she'd really want me to". THEN, at one point, one of the girls shouted out "I'd love to be in a threesome with two hockey players!" and half the people in the resto turned their heads towards our table. J and I died laughing, and the girls tried to look away, while they, too laughed.

They soon went off to their separate directions, meeting boys. As J and I left the resto, I wondered if I should open THE topic up for discussion. Sadly, it was super cold outside and I could barely speak.

I decided it was NOT the right time. So we walked for over twenty minutes, talking about various things, including J's membership in the air cadets at his early age until he became aware of the effects of war on civilians, at the age of 16... :P

I asked him if he wanted to do something the next day, he could call me, as I am relatively free, but he said he had some actors' workshops or something, but that I should call him and if he is free, he'll come....uh, yeah, this guy is kinda getting tired of calling.

I came home and looked at the mirror, only to notice bits of my peel-off mask on my beard. I washed it all off (or I thought I did) when J called, before it had dried. Wow, great...

Labels: friends, men, men problems, Montreal