More travel blogging

Near the end of our interminable trips through the Middle East, I stopped providing a day-by-day blog. One, because we did not get great internet. That's not entirely true because our last hotel had great internet and I could have blogged then. Two, and mostly, I was sick of travel blogging. It's not very satisfying, waiting for pictures to upload and trying to remember what you did when everything is running together. So, here's a few highlights, and maybe one day I'll go back and do a day-by-day.

On Day 12, at the (fake) baptismal site, we encountered this hilarious rendition:



Here's the Amir sitting in the cart while we cross the Jordanian border (don't show this to the authorities, it's an illegal picture):



A family photo somewhere in Jordan - I vaguely remember this large barren land has something to do with Abraham:



There was also a dungeon in a Crusader castle, where we condemned Tim and Amir to fifty years isolation:



And Amir climbed some stairs:






And alas, I've discovered the real reason I failed to blog that last week: we hardly have any pictures of it! I think we must've gotten sick of lugging our DSLR around, and with the point-and-shoot broken, there is only video of some of the bigger sites like Petra. Oh well.

Farewell, travelogue.

No creepos please

This post contains the Atticus naked and no further explanation. (this is a regular occurrence, not a photo shoot)

New baby stuff, finally

Amir, our son, has his birthday post up at here. If you wish to be added to this private blog and haven't yet, just leave your email in the comments.

Atticus's Birthday Numero Uno

We finally figured out the camera, so here are the pictures of the big 0001.

Our first big stop was IKEA, looking for toys and some fun

Atticus is a fan of HD, especially if it's "Nightmare Before Christmas"

Atticus meets his future: Ancient math

Atticus travels to the party in style

This is Eliza, Atticus's birthday twin, Atticus wants her toys

Action shot, except for Eliza, who is too cool for action

And then the cake. Act 1: Approach

Act 2: Contemplation

Act 3: The Plate

Act 4: Patriotic destruction

A good birthday always ends the same, no more cake

Response to Devin

Devin posted this in response to Cait's post about the never-to-happen Quran burning in Florida. I have refrained from commenting on this event and the so-called Ground Zero Mosque because I think most people have a good idea of what I would say, and because I think they might be talked about too much already. However, Devin's response was good enough and made me think enough that I thought I would respond to it here. He said:

"I agree with you that the guy that wants to burn the Quran is a nut, but nauseated? No. However, I do feel nauseated when I hear about a husband raping his wife and being ruled innocent by a judge because he was just obeying sharia law (luckily it was overturned), or a woman being stoned to death because of sharia law, or non-Muslims not being permitted in Mecca being they are unclean.

"It's funny though because there is a double standard. If a Muslim were to burn Bibles everyone would be like "well that's okay, at least they are not hurting anyone this time." So true"

This is a nuanced issue and I wanted to get my thoughts out about it, so here's what I think:

There will always be a double-standard in the majority vs. the minority. When a perceived attack is made on a minority it should always get a lot more of a response than an attack on a majority.  Majorities almost always oppress minorities, whether consciously or not, and so the minorities should be extra protected. That's why we don't talk about the "white civil rights movement" or have a "white history month" and why we don't have "straight pride parades." Our rights as white, middle-class, heterosexual, Christians in the US are about as unassailable as any rights in the world. The only minority we worry about oppressing us are the super-rich and the super-powerful because they are a majority when it comes to resources or influence. We have no need to fear systematic oppression by Muslim-Americans. But they have a very legitimate fear of systematic oppression by us.

This holds the world over. Women in all of the world are a minority when it comes to resources and political influence, and so we should work to uphold their rights at the cost of men. Wealthy Jews oppress the poorer Muslims in Israel, numerically superior Muslims oppress all non-Muslims throughout the Middle East and in some parts of South-East Asia. In my view it is always ethical to demand equal rights for minorities, whether we agree with them or not. Human rights are measured by comparing what the majority has to what the minority doesn't.

The only minority I belong to is Mormons so I'll get upset when my rights as a Mormon are oppressed, which they almost never are. But, for the most part, I and almost everyone who reads this blog are the majority and that's why it's our obligation to stand up for the minority and not the other way around.

Happy September 11th

We celebrated by reading the Q'uran. We would have found some service to be done and we actually had plans to hike as well, but alas the sickness and the teething and the not sleeping (exacerbated by the lack of a bed now).

We are worthless Americans.

Blogging stupor

Yes, I realize I should have blogged for my baby's first birthday. And yes, I realize that we haven't put pictures up in a while. And yes, I realize I have devoted readers that hang on to my. every. word.

Not really.

But actually, one: I'm not too busy but think I am, and two: I can't get our camera to connect to our iMac. Three: Theodore has been sick/teething this week and so I don't want to blog about how great he is when he is driving me nuts and not sleeping at night and making me walk around all zombie-like.

But, here's two funny stories for you:

1) Tim's church leader emailed him the "home-teaching" list for this month. I happened to just look at it, mostly curious who OUR home-teachers were. Well, on the list, all the couples were listed as "Smith, Bobby and Sarah" and "Jones, Theophilus and Barbara", etc. EXCEPT for us!!! In fact, I wasn't even on the list. It only had "Last name, Tim" and no wife. I think the ward has finally decided I'm too feminist to be home-taught**.

2) We sold our/our friends' king mattress this week to a boy I had a crush on freshman year (all coincidence, he just responded to a KSL ad). Talk about strange when a boy you were all obsessed with five years ago comes into your house and lays on your bed with you. Awkward.


** Home-teaching is a system in our Church in which pairs of men visit every family once a month and then take care of their needs accordingly. It's KIND of sexist because there is also something called visiting-teaching, but that's pairs of women and they only visit the other women. So men can be women's home-teachers and women are home-taught and visit-taught, but women can only be women's visiting-teachers and men are never visit-taught. Hence.

Rejecting

As part of series on "what am I doing with my life" I give you part 1: rejecting.

We want to live a simple life. A life centered on our family and our peace. To do this we'll have to reject several worldly norms, including but not limited to:

Rejecting the idea that a husbands main purpose is to make the most money he can without killing himself.

Rejecting the need for entertainment outside of what nature and the library offers us.

Rejecting the need for daily car usage.

Rejecting the idea that love must be shown through spending money (that means at Christmas too).

Rejecting the need to impress others with our stuff (house, car, movie collection).

Rejecting stuff (including stuff lovingly gifted that is simply not needed).

Rejecting the need to eat out.

Rejecting the need to live other people's ideal.

Rejecting others ideas of "success" for us that is not our Success.

Bigotry and hate

Does anyone else feel particularly nauseated when they hear about Q'uran burnings?

Tim shared this venn diagram with me on Google Reader the other day. The extremist Muslims are less of a percentage of Muslims as a whole than the fundamentalist Mormons of the LDS religion. And like the author of the venn diagram says.... if all Muslims hated us, they could have taken us out YEARS ago.




It makes me wonder how horrible it must be for Muslims to be associated with extremists... maybe it's a little how I feel as a Christian to be associated with this "Dove World Outreach Center".

Wish list

I've been feeling very materially-posessionly deprived lately. I don't know why, and I'm usually not so materialistic about things. And it's very silly to even think of buying things because we really can't afford to spend any more money, especially since our SMART grant is being revoked by the DOE, though we still can't figure out why. And what with the unemployment and the return to US food prices and our over-priced basement apartment, we really do not have the means at the moment to buy anything.

But, if there happens to be wealthy people who read our blog who have more money than they know what to do with and want to be our benefactors, here is my recent wish list:

1. Ikea bed frame with drawers: Since we only have one smallish bedroom and little room, this bed frame with drawers would give us a little extra storage space with easy access to pajamas or blankets. I also love the simplicity of it. And our current mattress that was generously bequeathed to us from our dear friends hurts my back like no other bed ever has. I'm just not meant for pillowtop mattresses. I need something FIRM to sleep on, and our Egypt beds solidified this in my mind.


2. Bikes: I would love some nice road bikes for the two of us, and maybe a Chariot trailer to carry the guy in.


3. BOB Jogger Stroller: If we received wish list item #2 with a Chariot trailer to be converted into a jogger, we would not need an upscale jogger stroller. But just in case, I'm including it. Tim has been running with our crappy Instep stroller for a year now, and I think it's time he were allowed an upgrade. He usually doesn't complain about it because he's not like that, but the other day he was saying how hard it was to push.


4. Sandbox, etc: As we have a birthday coming up tomorrow, I would love to buy Theodore a nice sandbox to play in. He loves him some dirt. He could stay entertained for hours in a sandbox. Also, maybe some nice wooden toys and one of those rad Ikea tunnel things. A lot of kids in Egypt had the Ikea tunnels, they are great for small spaces because they store so small, and Theodore loved crawling through it.



But for his birthday he'll probably have to settle for a free cake from the bakery at Macey's and the public playground. And the nice crib his Grammy purchased for him (more on the BIG move. later).