Wednesday, 22 January 2003

Let Palestinian Film Compete for Oscar

The Palestinian film "Divine Intervention" will not be eligible to compete for the Best Foreign Language Film in this year's Oscar race -- despite the fact the film won the international critic's ward at Cannes -- because The Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences does not recognize Palestine as a nation.

Let's be clear on this: the film is not barred from competition because the United States does not recognize Palestine (it does to a certain extent, maintaining diplomatic relations separate from its Israeli ties). The film is barred because The Academy does not recognize Palestine as a nation.

The Academy uses the UN list of recognized nations to determine eligibility, but it also reserves the right to use its own discretion to make exceptions. For example, "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" is a Taiwanese film (it won in 2000), but the UN does not recognize Taiwan as an independent nation. So in other words, you're a country if the Academy says you're a country. That's a pretty big political-cultural stick to wield.

Tell the Academy to use one standard for all films and to stop this unfair discrimination against Palestinian artists.

Go sign it and spread the word. [via Brooke Biggs]

Since Auschwitz we know what man is capable of.
Since Hiroshima we know what is at stake.

~ Viktor Frankl in Man's Search for Meaning

Tuesday, 21 January 2003

A glass or red

Yet another morning epiphany: I’ve been non-alcoholic for a week.

I need to remedy that. Fast.

All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident.

~ Arthur Schopenhauer

Monday, 20 January 2003

Getting on with it

A stunning, rotund, buttermilk moon that contemplatively hovered over the ferris wheel tonight is a good enough reason to simply get on with it.

In the End, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.

~ Martin Luther King Jr.

Friday, 17 January 2003

And that brings the tally to 8

I really didn’t need yet another pair of black heels but some seriously sexy tie-up mules simply screamed out to my Inner Slut.

Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.

~ Albert Einstein

Friday, 10 January 2003

Recipe

Hastily scrawled recipe in my wallet:-

1 bunch tarragon
1 bunch flat leaf parsley
1 shallot peeled and chopped
1 garlic clove crushed
50 gms walnuts
50 gms toasted pine nuts
5 tbsps olive oil

Process or pestle. Enjoy.

And I certainly did.

What do you want to do with your life? [via Roadgirl]

Sunday, 5 January 2003

The Glory of Maturing

Three women in their mid-twenties congregate for a bi-annual bitchfest. Halfway into their meal ...

Girl 1 [noticing the abandoned salad greens]: Oh you really should eat those.
Girl 2: What? Oh. Can’t be bothered.
Girl 1 : But you must.
Girl 2 : Must I, now? I don’t like romaines.
Girl 1 : But they’re good for you.
Girl 3 [formerly watching this exchange with amusement now spews beverage]
Girl 3: Shit, you sound just like your mother.
Girl 1 [emphatically]: Do not.
Girl 2: Oh yes you do. Moreover, you’re a decade earlier.
Girl 1: Yeah, you’re not supposed to sound like your mother until your thirty five.
Girl 2: At least thirty five.

Maybe this world is another planet's Hell.

~ Aldous Huxley

Saturday, 4 January 2003

Morning Epiphanies

More often than not, realizations, like muted epiphanies, dawn on me when I’m driving [I don’t know what it is about the inner recesses of a vehicle]. I could be cussing like a stevedore or nonchalantly humming a tune when a jolt occurs that makes me go, "Oh wow, bloody hell".

Today’s little jolt: I’m incredibly prone to making fiscally devastating decisions.

The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it.

~ Oscar Wilde

Thursday, 2 January 2003

Note to self : the fast lane on a highway is certainly not the best place to extricate a wayward eyelash.