The blog of noam

books+visual culture+travel+radical politics+history+cities

[keimandpunishment]

I left America on January 30th 2013 with a one-way ticket to Bangkok, a boy, and two school backpacks as luggage. We were stopped by the airline company crew who asked us a bunch of questions, because of course we looked extremely suspicious.

For a while, we settled in Vietnam, after having visited Cambodia. I hated Vietnam with all my heart, probably because I didn't give it a chance, mostly because I was extremely depressed and definitely because I was suffering from culture shock and didn't do anything to address it.

I don't have much recollection of that time of my life and it's better this way. Well, if I really wanted to revisit I could probably dig out emails, chat logs from that time, but I'd rather keep that part of my life behind the closed of door of suppressed memories. It will have some solid company and I get to move on.

From there, we visited Hong Kong, Malaysia, and finally took a plane from Kuala Lumpur to Kathmandu. Oh Nepal. I've been living here for 6 months and will probably be staying for a little bit longer. The first days in Kathmandu were strange and made stranger by all that mud brought by the monsoon. Everything was chaotic, dirty, foreign. And now it all feels so familiar; I don't sweat the open meat stalls, the buzzing cars who don't follow any rules, the “ten rupees, chocolate, pen” screams from children, the constant haggling and the omnipresent rice and lentils.  

[keimandpunishment]

#begnastal #nepal #pokhara

[keimandpunishment]

I foresee many awkward conversations with the bathroom attendant #pissorlong #toilet #pokhara #nepal

[keimandpunishment]

This, my friends, is the biggest university outside of Kathmandu #pastoral #nepal #pnc #pokhara #isanybodyhere?

[keimandpunishment]

Amiri Baraka, 1934-2014 - COLORLINES

I don't like waking up to the news of good people dying.

Rest in power

[wespendief]

Happy 123rd birthday, Zora Neale Hurston! 

[citylandscapes]

Blue city of Jodhpur, India and Mehrangahr Fort

Source: Phil Marion (flickr)

[keimandpunishment]

beats my crappy pics of India.

[j-popsicles]

Go Forth and Educate Yourselves!

http://thesocietypages.org/

http://www.ensemble-rd.com/en

http://www.everyday-democracy.org/en/index.aspx

http://www.stophate.us/racism/

http://www.victimsofcrime.org/home

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racism

http://www.communitychangeinc.org/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_privilege

http://ted.coe.wayne.edu/ele3600/mcintosh.html

http://www.whiteprivilegeconference.com/white_privilege.html

I’d also highly recommend watching the Jane Elliot Brown-eye/Blue-eye experiments, which can be found here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VeK759FF84s

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-pv8mCHbOrs (Part 1)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=neEVoFODQOE (Part 2 - Has very important points on Reverse Racism and how it doesn’t exist, and it also dismantles the “We All Bleed Red” mentality.)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6MYHBrJIIFU

[keimandpunishment]

Read of the day

[guernicamag]

She is all bling: a sparkling crown sits on her head, with a necklace and earrings to match. The picture is not even interesting, and she is not even crazy beautiful, but we all stand there and lift our eyes to her like maybe we are looking at a flag.

Blak Power by NoViolet Bulawayo - Guernica / A Magazine of Art & Politics (via guernicamag)

I read a LOT in 2013. That's what you get when you live in a country where all life stops after 7pm. I read about We Need New Names in the New York Times, cause I am that kind of person now. It was good and reminded me the harsh truth: I don't know shit about Zimbabwe.

Spending my last year in Asia has allowed me to learn so much about the history of different countries, and I feel a little bit less dumb now that I've brushed up on my world history and geography. But still, I'm aware and ashamed of my ignorance about one entire continent.

IT's not like I don't know a little bit, but it's just not enough. So that's one of my resolutions for 2014, learn more about countries I don't know shit about.

ANYWAY

We Need New Names is the story of kids, who at some point in the story talk about those NGO workers that come regularly in their village:

" After we sit, the man start taking pictures with his big camera. They just like taking pictures these NGO people, like maybe we are their real friends and relatives and they will look at the pictures later and point us out by name to other friends and relatives once they get back to their homes. They don't care that we are embarrassed by our dirt and torn clothing, that we would prefer they didn't do it; they just take the pictures anyway, take and take. We don't complain because we know that after the picture-taking comes the giving of gifts." 

This passage resonated so much that I highlighted it and bookmarked it on my tablet. If that's not dedication.

[iloveyouthisisarobbery]

Could you please recommend some other bands/musicians committed to being allies to feminism, equality, LGBTQ rights, etc?

wow, well this is kind of a huge question.  even if we just limit the question to punk, i could literally make a list of hundreds of bands/musicians dedicated to queer and feminist issues.  one resource you might be interested is the “queer to the core" oral history of queer hardcore.  there’s also a good list of current qpoc bands floating around on tumblr but now i can’t find it.  does anyone know where that is?maybe we could crowdsource this one?  i’ll post a few of my favorites and maybe other people can reblog this post and add a few favorites and so on?  let’s try it.BLACK EYES

black eyes were this incredible dischord records queer post punk band in the early 00’s who i used to go see ALL the time in dc.  their lyrics weren’t overtly political but i remember being excited about the things they’d say occasionally between songs and seeing the band members at rallies.THE SISSIES

one of the early plan-it-x records pop punk bands.  great catchy empowering twee punk anthems from the late 90’s.DEVIL’s COACHWHIP

hyper personal folk punk songs from nick berger of fridge scum/ramshackle glory/savage wasteland music collective from tucson, az.DICK BINGE

raging queer hardcore from olympia, wa.OK, yeah so reblog this with a few bands/videos/descriptions if you’re feeling it.

[deathrates-deactivated20140125]

this is fab. here are some of my faves, I tried embedding videos but it wouldn’t work Warpath (thanks Joe for this one) Carnist ONSIND (of course :3) Limp Wrist Body Betrayal Eekum Seekum  just saw anon was asking for ‘allies’, idk if they meant people who aren’t LGBTQ but still support their activism, most of these bands have members who are LGBTQ. idk. 

[keimandpunishment]

For your dance party needs, I recommend Gravy Train!!!

Le Tigre

To keep up with the oldies, I love Team Dresch, Bratmobile etc...

Closet burner is a good fastcore band from Bloomington and they have a great name

[youthofnepal]

The situation of women in Nepal

“There is not  any need to read for  you. So, handle your work.”— one of the mother said to her daughter in our society.

I was reading the book about gender discrimination. In that book there was  the data of gender discrimination, which shows that in developing countries females are being dominated before birth and after the birth also. In that data, there was written, in developed countries  there are 1029 women for per 1000 men in North America, 1076 women for per 1000 men in Europe but in developing countries, there are only 927 women for per 1000 men in Nepal. These number tells us quite a harsh story about neglect & mistreatment of females in developing countries. So, I really felt unhappy when I heard this type of issue but I knew that both our country & society are illiterate.

Read More

[keimandpunishment]

I've been living in Nepal for the last 6 months, teaching journalism and media to a bunch of really fantastic kids (well, most of them). Nepal is quite the sexist country, unsurprisingly patriarchal (except for some people up there in the mountains). So, of course, the girls that are part of the program I teach at, are very used to being in the background, and not really heard over the noise of the boys. But if you ask them, they wouldn't acknowledge it, since they've internalized their role in this society. I want these to be heard in a classroom, and I don't want it to be the boys' show 24/7. Sometimes I feel at loss and I am not sure what to do.

As a foreigner, I am usually not put in the category of women, I am just labeled as "white", which gives me more freedom (if you ignore the staring that accompanies every single one of my moves in this country). But it also means that a lot of the things I do or I say register as "exotic".

Anyway, one of my student, who is usually on the quiet side of things, wrote this great piece about her parents and the way the treat her as a girl. I'm proud of her for writing this.

[keimandpunishment]

Celebrated NYE by finishing the first season of the Wire. Yeah, I'm late in the game.