davenport, calif.

I am embarrassed, ok

On a recent morning television panel, former Swedish Green Party leader Birger Schlaug said that all Chinese look alike. In particular he was talking about the young women who, dressed in uniforms and in identical hairdos, carried the signs bearing the names of the different countries during the opening ceremony.

I've seen similar comments made on Swedish blogs.

Intercultural research states that it's easier for us to recognize and remember faces within our own race. But I would guess that tendency decreases when, or if, we are actually exposed to people of other races.

It may be that the China Olympics is the first opportunity many Swedish people have had to see large numbers of Asians. Because obviously Asians don't look any more alike than Swedes do.

So, yeah, look a little closer everybody.

no a sports fanatic I am not

I just watched my first ten seconds of Olympic coverage, and I got all confused. It was an underwater shot and it seemed to me everything was upside down. I almost got a little sick.

Backstroke.

italian flair: the fiat 500 interior

happy friday

Remember these?

what the guy outside safeway was singing

let's talk about the fiat 500 (I am getting a black one to match the iphone dan is getting me for christmas)

This is an old Fiat 500. Those are small Italian cars, and they were made between 1957-1975. Super cute if you ask me.
This is a new Fiat 500. It was first presented in 2007. Cool, huh? It's super popular in Italy, and it's won a bunch of awards. I want one pretty bad.

Here is a British TV road test where they are comparing it favorably to their own new Mini:

o people are funny

Somebody's Facebook status line: If Michael Phelps were a country (Phelpsylvania, perhaps), he'd be tied for third overall in gold medals won.

Edit: Guess the someone had borrowed the joke.

Thanks Mayka.

from the atlantic.com

Here is an article I'll read tonight when I have more time.

being offended

When I first moved to the US there were certain American words and expressions I hadn't heard before, and that I had to learn. The reason I didn't understand them was usually that the word or expression referred to a phenomenon that was new to me. In those cases guessing doesn't help. Otherwise North American and Northern European cultures are similar, and most things seem familiar.

The concept I struggled with the longest was to be 'offended'. I asked dozens of classes to explain the word to me, but I still wasn't sure. We don't use that idea in that way in Sweden, I kept thinking to myself.

But, actually, from what I read, now they do. The word 'kränkt' in Swedish seems to be used in a similar way nowadays.

When I finally got the American concept of 'being offended' I thought it was dumb. To me it sounded as if people assume they have a God given right not ever to step in dog poop in their lives, and if it happens anyway, they are offended. That's unrealistic, and dumb. Whenever I come across the word 'kränkt' in Swedish I think the same thing. Too much emotion in the wrong place, self centeredly directed at the world in general. Wipe the poop off your shoes and move on already.

well well well

What Maureen Dowd has to say.

man on wire

This is one of the most amazing films I have ever seen. It tells the story of how, in 1974, Frenchman Philippe Petit managed to walk a tightrope between the Twin Towers. That's him in the photo there.

I don't know what to say. Just go see it already. You won't regret it.

green of envy

Dan bought an iphone.

All I hear is Look! and there we go again showing me another cool application. Grrrrr.

I like my people

I watched the 'Parade of Nations' part of the opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympics.

It was a long winded affair. There are a lot of nations in the world.

I was waiting for my people, who came in 20th from the bottom. That took a while, but then I got to see them for about five seconds. Yay!

Obviously the parade of nations was a highly symbolic affair. Most nations chose to wear outfits that were nationalistic, or at least showed off the design talents of the country.

The Swedes? Not so much. The women wore Chinese inspired tunics, and it looked like the men's sports jackets had Chinese collars. Not very stylish, and not very Swedish.

Still those outfits struck me as very Swedish choices. In their quiet ways Swedes are cultural extroverts. We might come across as shy, but we like to try new things, travel, and be changed.

However many political interpretations can be made of those Chinese collars, to me they are endearing. Wearing those frumpy tunics the Swedish women attempted to do one thing no other nation did: communicate with the Chinese in their own language.

someone else is furious

If you read Swedish, read the entry "Den stora bron".

monterey, calif.

carmel mission basilica

redwoods

date my ex: the dumbest show ever

Someone at LA Times had a good time writing this.

so I am furious again

One of my students this summer commented that it is hard to know how to deal with members of underrepresented groups because on the one hand they want to be treated like everybody else, and on the other hand they want respect for who they are and their unique experiences.

I think that's very well put, because I think from his perspective, that's exactly it.

What I try to teach my white students is to come up with a practical solution to that dilemma, for themselves. They need to figure out how to act to both ends of the spectrum, at the same time.

And so does the rest of society.

I am not saying it's easy. But who said life was going to be easy?

Right now Barack Obama is being criticized for injecting race into the presidential campaign, and for playing the race card from the bottom of the deck. Things are fine as long as we pretend no one has color, right?

In a hierarchical society, pretending that race, gender, sexual orientation, or class does not matter always benefits those on top. The experiences connected with being oppressed are silenced. That's how it works.

In a political campaign an African American candidate interested in winning cannot talk about race, or how race comes into the race. He cannot speak the truth because the truth would upset the white majority, and he would loose.

One lesson I try to give my white students is that you can show respect by shutting up and listen when members of underrepresented groups speak of their experiences.

That's easy.

As a society we need to do the same, and fast. What we have now is a situation where the first African American candidate for president cannot talk about his race. It' s a disgrace.