“And what can I say? I say iv’e heard nothing but the Israeli side all my life, that it’d take a whole another trip to see Israel, that i’d like to meet Israeli’s but that’s not why i was here.”

Talking Point

Here, in this chapter, it is made clear by Sacco that he favors the Palestinian side of the conflict. Over and over again in the chapter through his various arguments with the two Israeli ladies and the American Jew he meets on the bus, this is clearly reflected.

In the above lines though, we see that he assumes the Israeli side of the story from what he’s been hearing through the media and other sources. His perception of the Israeli side can’t entirely be disregarded since the reports and stories out there are more legitimate than the Palestinian portrayal due America’s close ties with Israel. So he is somewhat right in saying that he know’s the Israeli side and waned to know the real Palestinian side.

I like how he ends the novel, leading us into thinking about the future of the two states and how different approaches to it are out there. He highlights the various prospects in the future and what is being weighed and what is not. The bus driver backing up from the Palestinian side and going to an army checkpost to ask for more directions is metaphorical to the instability present between the two states and shows that the situation right now is “direction less”.

Connection

When looking at it in it’s entirety, i can relate to the conflict with the one between India and Pakistan on the issue of Kashmir. Kashmir is an Indian state that historically has been under conflict ever since the division of the country into Pakistan and India. In the entire political drama and military presence, it is the people of Kashmir, who have nothing to do with political administrations and global map drawing that have to deal with the daily problems and hardships. A part of land has been occupied by Pakistan and India won’t let the rest of the state be under the opposition, and hence the conflict continues, pointless and without direction.

(pg229 – pg230)

The girl talking: “What does the water taste like in your country, is it better here or there? Do you have the soldiers and the Jews and Fateh and the popular front in your country? Don’t you have soldiers in your country? Do they shoot people? Iv’e heard Christians eat snails. Do you eat snails? Is the food better here? What about feasts? Do you slaughter lamb and give meat to the poor? What about your mom and Dad? Do you live alone? Do you have brothers and sisters? Just the two of you? Why don’t you have Fateh and Popular front in your country? When will you leave?”

Talking Point

This chapter talks about the writer going around with Sameh and digging deeper into stories in the refugee camps. Here in the lines picked up from the mentioned pages, we see an inquisitive girl. She is ten years old but so aware! The conditions around her only bring her down and limit her very bright and knowledge-seeking mind. When Sameh mentions that the girl needs to be bought a computer, it reflects how there is potential in the country to be led forward if there are steps taken to keep the development of education in Palestine. Another important point is that she was intrigued by the fact that there wasn’t a movement in America, that they didn’t have the popular front or the Fateh.

Connection

Harry Potter! The connection to the above lines can be made to Harry Potter where Harry’s mother protects him, more like helps him go forward in life, sacrificing herself so that he could rise and defeat the evil. Here The girl’s parents should enable her, as Sameh mentions, so that she can grow up and fight against the Isreali movement.

Introduction through personal story

Introducing Pennsylvania with the theme of colours

History reflection

In pages 171 and 172, the author describes the tomato orchards and how they are processed, quality checked and packaged. He mentions that even though the Palestinian workers were very upset with the way their produce was being handled and how much money they lose in comparison to their Israeli counterparts. He also puts it out there that even though the Palestinians live in the worst conditions ever and are very low on standard of living, they are always ready to shield their sense of respect and self-esteem. This is reflected by Ammar’s cousin explaining the excellence in quality of the tomatoes he produces.

Connection

I personally relate to that, because there are times I highlight my country’s positives and keep it in high regard on many instances where it’s negatives are brought out. Take for instance, last evening, I was talking to an engineering team mate of my friend and the first thing he says about India is, “Don’t you guys have the largest slum in the world?” I replied saying,”And the largest democracy!”

Pg. 120: falafel vendor talking to the author,”You see the soldiers? You see the stores are closed? There’s no business. The people from the villages come in to do their shopping, they see all this, they see the soldiers.. they don’t come anymore, or they shop as fast as possible and then leave. They think it’s better to shop from the Israelis with no troubles. I used to have seven people working for me, now only my father!”

Talking Point

In the lines above, a falafel vendor is talking to the author about his woes. He tells the author how the military intervention and occupation is heavily impacting their businesses. I strongly feel that here, the Israeli forces are trying to occupy the territory with a different approach. They already have a military force working from one direction, and here they are on the course of destroying business and livelihood of Palestinian workers and other employed personnel, hence driving them out of the territory. Israeli’s have been using a couple of techniques other than just military power to occupy Palestine. Like we saw in the previous chapter, it is clearly brought out that innocent people were taken in captivity and sometimes made to confess something they haven’t done. This method of overall pressure, emotional, physical and external seems to working well for them.

Connection

I draw a strong connection here with British-India history. When the English were colonizing India, then just a loose conjugation of different states, they used many different approaches to break the  cordiality between these states. From military power to the “divide and rule”. I think there have been numerous instances in history where this has happened. It is more about these side strategies that drive the purpose of the ‘predator’ if you can call it that than any military intervention.

“A Palestinian Joke ” – pg 96

Talking Point

This little joke, strategically put in the story where the writer is in the process of of describing the conditions in captivity of the Palestinian people in Israeli prisons, brings to light the backbone of the Israeli intelligence agency and law enforcement’s way of working. In a humorous tone, the joke shows that Israeli intelligence doesn’t necessarily have any evidence or reason behind taking most of the people it does in captivity. This is their way to justify all their actions against Palestine to the rest of the world. I feel that the donkey here personifies a Palestinian captive who is most probably innocent and knows nothing about the allegations he’s being charged with. He is being forcefully made to come out and say that he’s conspiring against Israel or is a part of an opposing movement/ organisation. The story that follows very beautifully illustrates this point. The lady taken captive had nothing to to with the intifada or a violent opposition, she was merely a part of a politically organised peace movement. The mention of the man after that is an even better example. He is taken captive in the middle of the night from his house. He is repeatedly kept in captivity even though there is no evidence against him and the developments in the jail show that he’s constantly being made to ‘confess’, while putting him through a lot of emotional and physical strain.

I think the writer places this very nicely, complimenting his story through humor making a direct and clear point.

Connection

Given below is an excerpt from an interview some time back during the period of  presidential campaigning. Here, ‘Moses’, an important religious figure is used in a very different context where President Obama is compared to him, insinuating that even though he was a credible figure he wasn’t ready to lead. I’m not credible enough to make comparisons, neither do I know my religious history right, but I think Moses, even though someone to look upto, wasn’t Jesus. Here, a serious religious comparison is made to bring out a humorous political counter-point.

Here’s the excerpt from the interview -

“SEN. LIEBERMAN: I do. First off, you know, we all ought to relax a little bit. It’s, it’s a bit of humor. It’s a way to draw people into the ad. Incidentally, the McCain campaign has another ad up in which they seem to be comparing Obama to Moses. So, in my book, that’s about a good comparison as you can ask for. I should say, in “The Book,” it’s about a good a comparison as you should ask for. But, look, there’s a very serious point to that ad, and it, and it gets rightto it, which is, is, notwithstanding his celebrity status, is Barack Obama ready to lead? And my answer is no, that Barack Obama is a gifted, eloquent, young man who can and I hope will give great leadership to America in the years ahead. But the question is who’s ready to be president on January 20th, 2009 with the economy in a crisis and facing dangerous enemies abroad. It’s clearly John McCain. We only have two choices here: John McCain, Barack Obama. John McCain is ready to lead.”

“And his is just a teardrop in the bucket…six Palestinian trees? 17? 70? pfft! The Israeli’s uprooted 120,000 plus in the intifada’s first four years. “

“And after a day like today, sure it’s too heavy, even for a vulture like me. But- I’LL TAKE IT cause faces are what it’s all about man, and i put the faces way in the bottom of my pack..I mean, who’s to say they’ll be too heavy tomorrow?”

“Did you get a picture of that baby? .. Man, I wish I’d seen the soldiers firing tear gas.. wish I’d seen the baby.”

Talking Point

The lines taken above are direct quotes from the author at different parts of the chapter. When reading through them, I think there is a clear picture that the author is not biased toward the Palestinian people. The indifference shown by the author toward the woes and problems of the people and the fact that he was always focussed on getting the best “story”, the most eventful experience or the most descriptive of pictures adds to my claim. When he saw that Saburo was unwilling to keep the picture of the two cousins shot dead by the settlers, he asked to keep the picture. The sorrowful story of the unfortunate baby who had a bigger head due to gassing, intrigued the author in terms of its journalistic value rather than it’s emotional reflection. Sacco’s firm focus on his story shows his strength as a journalist, but on the other hand, projects him to be indifferent and selfish to some extent.

Connection

In conversation with a friend of mine, Chris, we reached a point in our discussion where we began talking about the most random things each of of us had done. An interesting connection to this story, Chris said, he once really wanted a computer part. An enthusiast and avid gamer, Chris was building his “ultimate” computer. But money was not easy to come by. So at work in Steak n’ Shake, he started “branching out” and “stealing other workers’ tables” hence getting a higher tip percentage at the end of the day. Though frustrating some of his colleagues in the process, he got that computer part! “Focus on the goal baby! Focus on the goal” he said! Though unrelated, today he’s promoted to the position of ‘Manager.’ Guess the focus works!

“You are a person, I am a person, we are all persons. We all come from the dust, the Romans, the Byzantines, the Crusaders, the Turks, the English, they have all been here. Where are they now? They are gone. Where is the Soviet Union now? It’s gone. We all go. It takes god just this much (illustration through hand) to change things.”

Talking Point

Chapter 2 of Palestine basically carries the story on putting forward how the author moves on to collect more information and develop his novel. His travel to a different city and his experiences there are highlighted well through detailed descriptions of incidents that take place. The quotation I picked up is what the “tour guide” outside the Centopah of Isaac says to the author after a quarrel with some unruly settlers that mock the guide and his faith. In this conversation between the author and the guide, another very interesting subject comes up. The guide, on being asked if Jews and Arabs can ever live together, says that the people of Palestine or other Arabs don’t have a problem with Jews, only Israeli Jews. In the above taken lines specifically though, the guide brings out that he feels that this is a temporary issue and the Israeli’s must realize that the situation won’t remain like it is forever. He highlights examples from the past, mentioning the Romans and the English among some and how they rose, but ultimately have now “gone.” He believes that the Israeli’s will be “gone” one day too. It is all up to god and the almighty has the power to change things at absolutely any time.

Connection

This reminds me of something my grandmother always told me. She always said that we must never be arrogant or high-headed about power or money, because these were like water, ever flowing, never stationary. One moment you have them and the other moment they’re gone. A successful man is always virtuous, kind and humble. Relating this to the story, Israel must understand that their dominance will not remain forever, everything has a cycle. Israel is running on a high now, but the chain of events that are to follow may not be in their favor, overturning the power and dominance in the region. It is always best to live in peace and harmony. On a different note though,  a hope of peace even, is considered an ideal thought, something that cannot be achieved.

“It’s Silwan, an all Arab village. A week ago Jewish settlers booted out several Palestinian house-holds, moved in, rolled out the barbed wire, sent up the star of David..and with Uzi’s the Attorney General’s green light, who’s gonna argue?”

Talking point

The first chapter of the graphic novel introduces the situation in Palestine and gives the background of the cause of the instability in the region. A beautiful flow from history integrated into the writer’s personal experiences there, the chapter highlights how the Palestinian people feel about Israel and everyday acts of military abuse on them. The quotation taken above describes a situation where Israeli people, primarily the military barges into a village and force innocent Palestinian civilians out of their homes and take over. They go on to declare the village a part of Israel, putting up the flag and surrounding the area with barbed wire. The last few words also reflect that this is an everyday event and it’s not uncommon for these occurrences to take place.

Connection

I have a friend here at Purdue, Carem. Though born in the US, he is originally from Saudi Arabia. One quite Friday evening, when we got talking, he told me his grandfather owned a lot of land in Palestine that was taken away from him in the same way as in the quotation above. He tells me that basic problems that Palestinians face everyday range from getting thrown out of their homes and towns to dying because of air raids and tanks.

Another interesting connection seen is in the song “Look into my eyes” by Outlandish (Here’s the song: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yfKyZkt4SNs). The verse,

“Ya biggest fear is getting a ticket
As ya cruise your Cadillac
My fear is that the tank that’s just left
Will turn around and come back”

This reflects how we, people in a world so protected and different worry about things as small as getting tickets or bad grades, whereas people living in those areas fear for their life every single moment. Each moment that passes, is a bonus they survived.

Customer’s and Apple enthusiast’s excitement about the launch is subdued to a certain extent with the new Apple iPad not being able to play flash videos and some other popular graphics. Apple’s explanation to this is that the flash technology is “slow and taxes the the netbooks and laptops therefore not being introduced in the iPad.” Apple users are content with the iPad’s new and striking features but would definitely appreciate larger accessibility to online videos and animations that run on flash. This shouldn’t be a problem though as many firms or private programmers have been experimenting and playing around with HTML5, that they believe can directly interact with the web browser and hence could be used as a tool to cover this gap. Corroborating to this, Andrew Pile, vice president for product and development at Vimeo, an online video service says,”We received a tremendous amount of feedback from our users saying that they wanted to have HTML5 as an option for their videos.” On the other hand, Mr.Ludwig, group Manager for Flash platform at Adobe questions Apple’s strategy in doing this, asserting,“I think it’s pretty clear that Apple wants to regain control of the content consumers see online and the content Apple offers for their devices.” Many views have been expressed regarding Apple’s reasons behind restricting the use of flash technology, but things are being worked upon.

THE WASHINGTON POST: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/02/13/AR2010021300014.html

Censorship and France, two words that seem perfectly right together. Clearly highlighting the restriction of the press and other media in the country, the writer complains about the freedom of expression whether in a written form or otherwise. Emphasizing on how these restrictions are misused by celebrities and other influential people to blur out embarrassing, negatively affecting or surprising information in the newspapers and magazines, the writer strongly feels that the iPad will bring a change to this ongoing system. He argues that the iPad with its far reaching accessibility to information freely available on the internet and it’s ability to enable people to go ahead and express themselves on a more open arena will swing things around. “A judge who would easily rule in the favor of an influential person over the press will have to think twice before moving to fine and impose actions on a company such as APPLE.” Acknowledging that this will be a wonderful and welcome change in the publishing society in France, he puts forward that with the iPad, Apple will bring about a system of a protected publishing and expression.

THE WALL STREET JOURNAL: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704194504575031151858008436.html?

KEYWORDS=ipad+apple

With a $499 basic model with Wi-Fi connectivity, the Apple iPad seems perfect, reasonably priced and a gadget that cannot be missed out on! The Wall Street Journal argues that the add on costs are not rightly reflected here, with $30 a month for 3G from AT&T and a higher cost for more memory space, the iPad could easily lead to a $1000. Supporting the argument, the writer asserts, “How often we ignore the monthly bills, or place them in a different mental category than the initial cost. But money is money.”

“There is more to it than just the cost,” insists the writer, “Will the AT&T 3G network, already staggering under the strain of all that iPhone use, really give you the full iPad experience? Streaming HD video for all? Good luck with that.” Though the applications and features the iPad has brought with it are marvelous,  their use is questionable as rightly brought out. Moving on from this, the writer claims that there will be a rise in demand for other mobile carriers such as Verizon due to the shift people would prefer resulting from the slow network and unsatisfactory service predicted.