Disaster

The other day I was saying something about how my favorite kind of music is really sugary, bubblegummy, poppy punk rock, and Alexis replie with something like "I don't believe you. Every time I hear you listening to music, it's that folk metal or whatever."
And I realized she was right. I'd been listening to so much metal that bubblegum punk was slowly taking the backburner, and this saddened me.
So since then, I've been rocking out to the awesomeness of bands like the 20 Belows, the Yum Yums, the Riverdales, the Queers, the Ergs!, Screeching Weasel, etc. . . And not to be forgotten, of course, the Unlovables.
And I was reminded that, like there is a Southpark episode for every life circumstance, there is an Unlovables song for every Audrey life circumstance.

And right now, the song that describes my life is Disaster, even though, for me, my life is totally not a disaster.
Go here and listen to it, and I assure you, you will be rocked.

Anyhow, things have been fairly uneventful since the last time I wrote.
On Wednesday, we had a big test that was the same as the placement test that we took when we first got here.
We got the results back on Friday.



That orange circle that you see is where I was when I first got here. The pink circle is where I am now. I feel happy because I super advanced a lot (more than the other people in my class, as their original circles were all way bigger than mine). I missed one question from the things that we did this qusarter, and I feel really stupid about having missed it. Immediately after turning in the test, I rethought about it and knew I got it wrong. As for the things I wasn't supposed to know (i.e. that we didn't cover this quarter), well, no shocker, I didn't know them.

Wednesday, after the test, I had dinner at the student village (that's, like, the real Yamasa dorms) with some people I know over there. Laura made the most scrumptions vegan spinach quiche, and I wanted to eat ALL of it, but unfortunately I had to be nice and share. Also unfortunately, the last one got burned to a char. :-(


Laura with delish quiche!


On Friday night, I went over to Lyn's again, and she made a delicious cabbage potato stew, and it was DELICIOUS. I seriously love having people cook for me. We watched Naussica in the valley of the wind, and it was fabulous! It's one of my favorite Miyazaki movies (maybe they all are one of my favorites?), and I was happy to watch it again. Especially as it was super rad to understand some of it.

Saturday, I skipped French teaching (I know, I know, I am horrible) and instead went shopping with Martin for a bday gift for his lady friend. And then we took pictures of us jumping around in the rain.



Apparently Martin and I love taking pictures of ourselves. It reminds me of hanging out with Josh back at NYU, and it is fabulous fun!

Saturday night, Alexis, Jenny-Lyn, Lauren, and some others went over to Aoi Hall/Zig Zag (the school bar to which I can't really go because you're allowed to smoke inside), where they had screens set up and were playing the Japan/Netherlands World Cup game. The game was pretty much boring and actionless, and Japan lost (::sob::) but good times were nonetheless had.


Jenny-Lyn, Lars, Laura
I know, I know, I suck at taking night pictures!

It was weird to ENJOY going out and being out and talking to people I don't know again. I feel like I turned into this weird anti-social hermit while I was living in France, and living here is turning me back to myself, when I had previously just thought I was getting old.

And that is all.
(Except that I also apologize for the ridiculous size of these photos. Picasa is STILL not working with my connection, which is ridiculously annoying, and photobucket is screwy. Can anyone think of a better photo hosting site?)

Review: Eating Animals by Jonathan Safran Foer

If you haven't entered my Moving Away International Mini-Giveaway, you can do so here. Open until March 27!!

Title: Eating Animals

Author: Jonathan Safran Foer

Rating:

Who Should Read It? EVERYONE! And when I say everyone, I mean everyone. Well, maybe parents shouldn't read it to their young children, but they should certainly summarize it for them as they are reading it.

What I Have to Say:
Jonathan Safran Foer - the boy knows how to write! For serious! I'm sometimes skeptical when fiction authors I love wander into the realm of non-fiction, but with Foer's literary talent (Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close AND Everything Is Illuminated = pure brilliance!) and subject matter, I didn't hesitate for a second to pick up (and then devour) "Eating Animals." I wasn't disappointed. Foer presented the truth of the horrors of the farming industry in the US (I don't even need to put factory beforehand, because I now know that factory farms are pretty much ALL there is) in such a way that is was actually ENJOYABLE to read. Sure, I was repulsed, I was disgusted, I had to stop several times to dry heave or to tell my boyfriend yet another horrifying fact, but it was still GOOD.

Early on, Foer states that he didn't set out to write a book trying to convince people to go vegetarian. And I believe him. Because that's not what this book was about. It was about his quest for himself to see what meat was all about. And the fact is, the facts he found are all he needs to try to convince people to become vegetarian. He showed absolutely EVERY possible side of the story, including from interviews with ranching vegetarians and slaughterhouse workers to sections written by hardcore vegans and slaughterhouse owners and factory farm owners, etc. . . If there is another side to the story, I haven't found it - what Foer gives are the cold, hard facts. And the facts are so horrible that, no matter how you present them, it sounds like you're trying to convince. And what can I say, if you know the facts, you're probably wanting to convince people to go veggie.

So even though he didn't "set out" to write a book trying to convince people to go vegetarian, this book tries to convince people to go vegetarian. Which is a GOOD THING! It makes the convincing all that much more real.

Honestly, I am a vegan. And this book made me gladder than ever to be a vegan. At the same time, in a weird way, it makes me wish that I hadn't been a vegan beforehand and that the book had turned me. Because it would make my pleadings for you to go out and read it hold so much more weight. I want to go out and buy a copy for every single person I know and sit with them and make them read it. But then, I'm afraid. Because what if they didn't stop eating animals afterward? How could I respect them then?

In the meantime, I can only hope that I remember all of the facts he has presented, and that, when discussing veganism, I find a way to present said facts in such a succint, interesting, knowledgable way as Foer has in this brilliant memoir. I can only hope that people will choose to stop living in denial and start learning the facts, even though they know that what they learn will be horrifying.

Summary: Jonathan Safran Foer spent much of his teenage and college years oscillating between carnivore and vegetarian. As he became a husband and a father, he kept returning to two questions: Why do we eat animals? And would we eat them if we knew how they got on our dinner plates?
Brilliantly synthesizing philosophy, literature, science, and his own undercover detective work, Eating Animals explores the many fictions we use to justify our eating habits-from folklore to pop culture to family traditions and national myth-and how such tales justify a brutal ignorance. Marked by Foer's profound moral ferocity and unvarying generosity, as well as the vibrant style and creativity that made his previous books, Everything is Illuminated and Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, huge bestsellers, Eating Animals is a celebration and a reckoning, a story about the stories we've told--and the stories we now need to tell.

Cover Story: I love the vibrant green of the cover, and I love the way the font invokes images of animals. I think there are several different covers that would have done this book justice better than this one, but at the same time, I find it oddly appropriate. It's not too overwhelming and yet, it does make you interested. It makes you wonder what this is all about.

Disclosure: This book was sent to me by review from the publisher. This in no way affected my review.