BODY OF WATER TIRED OF NAME-CALLING

Iran has issued an ultimatum about its feelings over the naming of the waterway that lies between it and the Gulf States. The aggressive demand stipulates that no airline calls this body of water the Arabian Gulf. If it does, then airplanes are banned from flying over the country.

After hearing the news Body of water herself has decided to make her first ever public appearance. Speaking to reporters who gathered uniformly along its shoreline, she explained that for as long as she can remember she has felt tension among her neighbours. The neighbours that she has come to consider her family. She sensed extreme pressure closing in from both sides for her to pick one over the other. When she remained silent, her family members took it upon themselves to name her, so some called her Arabian Gulf and others named her Persian.

Body of water did not mind having two names, it made her feel unique, special even. After all, no other body of water or ocean for that matter had two names. It shifted, tossed and turned as reporters threw questions at her anxious to hear where she felt she truly belonged.

Body of water spoke softly, reminding the world that in the 80s her issue caused a stir between her neighbours. After much deliberation no official naming had been agreed upon. She kept silent then simply because everyone seemed happy with naming her what they felt she represented to them.

She wondered aloud what difference her name really made? She heard Shakespeare’s Juliet answer her saying “That which we call a rose, by any other name would smell as sweet.” And she would be right because her name would not change the fact that she is as old as time, or that she has been the connector who enhanced trade and allowed for the intermingling of cultures. How did she now become a separator? It was definitely not her own ego that caused it.

Feeling uneasy, Body of water rested her palms on the shore in hopes of gaining some balance.  She expressed her fear and sadness at the situation of the world. Her largest family member is facing the United States head on and is suffering from political turmoil. Another is surrounded by political and media attention because a shocking assassination has come to upset its otherwise peaceful climate. Amidst all this, Body of water believes her name is of least importance.  She demanded to just let her be.

As the press conference came to a close Body of water breathed heavily with every ebb and flow and addressed her family directly:

I have been here long before you named me, and will be here long after I have been named. I shall never leave any of you. I remain for no other reason than my love for all of you. Do not let me be the reason you confront each other. After all, I am what I am, just a body of water.

Published in The Gulf Today on the 28th Feb, 2010.

NOTHING PRETTY ABOUT THIS WOMAN

Thanks to the master playwright Shakespeare, today’s cinema world has acquired some formulas that are sure-fire winners. In the romantic genre or what we have come to dub the ‘chick flick,’ as if there is no need for romance in a man’s life, the age-old story of the damsel in distress being rescued by a knight in shining armour is a no brainer.

But after Hollywood was done with it, it managed to replace the damsel in distress to suit the modern, independent woman who is not a doctor, an architect or a CEO but a prostitute who is rescued by a high-flier wealthy man in a white limousine. Queue tissue boxes everywhere for the movie Pretty Woman was re-released this year after twenty years of being the best-selling romantic movie to date.

Who of us hasn’t watched Pretty Woman? For me the sole reason that movie was even watchable is Julia Roberts. She is one actress that can make any character a lovable one.  As for the plot, to this day I cannot for the life of me see the romance in such a world no matter how hard Tinseltown tries.

The Academy has long rewarded such roles. Julia Roberts herself was nominated for playing Vivian Ward in Pretty Woman, so was Jodie Foster for playing a teenage hooker in Taxi Driver. Elizabeth Shue also received an Oscar nomination for her role as a Las Vegas prostitute in Leaving Las Vegas.

Kim Basinger won one for her role as a high-class call girl in L.A. Confidential and so did Mira Sorvino for her role as a prostitute opposite Woody Allen in Mighty Aphrodite. Names like Jane Fonda, Elizabeth Taylor, Natalie Portman, and Nicole Kidman also have a place in this list. 

In fact, the very first woman to win an Oscar was Janet Gaynor who played, you guessed it, a streetwalker in 1928’s Street Angel.

One other thing in common with all these movies apart from the words prostitute and Oscar, is the fact that they were all written by men. Which makes us wonder is this the man’s romantic formula?

The betterment of a tainted woman, and her redemption by the hands of a man that was caring enough to show her the way, seems to the writers and directors of Hollywood to be the new romantic story. Jane Austen’s romance no longer makes any sense or has any sensibility.

Taking cue from Hollywood, both Arabic cinema and Bollywood followed suit. Egyptian adaptations of such storylines sprouted everywhere. From the movie Khamsa Bab (The Five Doors Bar), where the lead actress Nadia El Guindy played a prostitute based on Billy Wilder’s 1963 film Irma La Douce starring Shirley McLaine, up to the movie Al Jeans (The Jeans) played by Jala Fahmi which is an exact copy of Pretty Woman. In Bollywood, Kareena Kapoor’s Chameli is one of the many movies casting the lead as a call girl.

This formula is so popular that it has seeped into television with shows like Secret Diary of a Call Girl. The show, based on a high-end escort/blogger’s life, remains on air despite the huge amount of criticism it has faced. Belle lives a stable life, wears designer clothes, has a personal assistant, high-end clientele, and maintains healthy relationships. Why then won’t young girls find this a possible career choice?

This issue is no longer restricted to females either. Recently a show called Hung (yes the pun is painfully obvious) has been aired. It tells the story of a high school football coach, who finds himself struggling to make ends meet, so naturally he chooses to become a prostitute. 

Seriously, why are they trying so hard to keep this so-called profession alive?

Hollywood’s stereotypical prostitute proliferates a false myth about prostitution and casts an invisibility cloak on its harm. As the world gets more cultured and aims for better education why are we still expected to sit through a two-hour long movie or follow a TV show season after season to watch a call girl’s frivolous escapades? Why is that entertaining?

Women today are making money and gaining power through all sorts of interesting professions, so why does Hollywood insist on the glamourising the flesh trade?

There is no mystery or glamour in walking seedy streets at night. The threat of physical and psychological harm to both the person and society as a whole is imminent. Just ask Jack The Ripper.

This article was published in The Gulf Today newspaper on 21st Feb, 2010.

TO BURN A BOOK ALL IT TAKES IS A KINDLE

Steve Jobs, the man behind Apple’s innovation train has yet again revealed to the rest of us a glimpse of the future. This month Jobs introduced Apple’s latest product the iPad. Putting the iPad’s ton of technology in a nutshell, it is basically a touch screen tablet computer crammed into a device the size and thickness of a notepad. Being a technology enthusiast myself this piece of plastic had me highly excited, I mean anytime Jobs is set to reveal a product it is big news. Like it or not he has changed the way we listen to music after all.

The reveal was impressive and the features of the iPad superb, but is it just me or did anyone else feel a slight pang of concern when the eBook reader application was presented?

The eBook, the digital book, the book of the future made up of compressed and digitalised words reduced to bits and bytes of memory. A technology allowing us to carry thousands of books in one device. Not a fairly new technology, in the sense that eBook readers have been around for a couple of years now but haven’t proved to be very popular until Amazon introduced its Kindle.

Kindle is an eBook reader that is equipped with an Internet connection allowing you to access the book selling Goliath’s website and download any book you desire in mere seconds.

Following in Amazon’s footsteps Jobs has created his own version, fit it snuggly in the iPad and sprinkled some Apple magic on it (the magic being his wondrous marketing and advertising techniques).

This is all and well, I mean we have all heard the list of benefits. It starts with the space factor and ends with saving the planet yet after going through them I still feel anxious. What happens to the book? Should we give it a new name? The ‘original book’ or the ‘paper book’ maybe? If Jobs is to do to the book what he did to the CD then my anxiety is justified.

Sometimes technology makes us believe that we cannot live without the features it provides. That we absolutely need it. Amazon’s data suggest that Kindle users buy more books than they did before owning the device, but does that necessarily mean they are reading more? It is true we can carry thousands of books in one device but while we can listen to hundreds of songs in an hour we cannot do the same with reading, so why the need to carry them all? Efficient yes, but a complete replacement? I find that hard to imagine.

The image of reading in bed does not conjure up myself curled up with a Kindle or an iPad. And although the sound of pages being turned is an option on your device it remains a simulation. And what of the smell of paper that wafts as you feel the texture of the pages being turned in anticipation of reaching the end? I am sure Jobs will soon think of something to shut me up. Yet the fact remains the way we read, the act of reading will be changed forever.

I am a collector of rare books but in the near future I will be a collector of books for all of them will at one point become rare. As for Kindle and iPad helping save the planet, buying used books could too, there is no shame in that.

Yes I dread living in a paperless world. I do not harbour the fear of a publisher that spurs from profit and copywriting concerns. My fear is that of a reader that has held a book in her hands throughout her life and cannot fathom ever saying goodbye.


This article was published in The Gulf Today on 14th Feb, 2010.