This week Congo "welcomed" back the body of Mobutu. I say, "welcomed" because I heard exactly zero people mention this news.
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| "The Leopard's Last Monument." But does anyone really know of a monument to Mobutu? |
by Julien Harneis In other news, Congo got its name ranked pretty high on the Global Slavery Index. (As you can imagine, a high ranking on this list a not a good thing.)
The New York Times had an article this week on A Reason for Hope in Congo's Perpetual War. Really. Can there be hope in a perpetual war? I guess you take what you can get.
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| Can't we just all get along in Congo? |
If you've got a kid who can read and you live in the States (or even abroad) chances are at one point or another their reading level has been assessed. I was tipped off to Lexile.com during a little teacher PD this week and mind. blown. You can find out exactly which books are on their reading level and perfect for them.
I can't wait until Charlotte can read more than the letter "C." (Turns out it's really hard to assign a reading level to a kid who can only recognize one letter.)
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| Mademoiselle Nancy. (Or Fancy Nancy, for the less fancy.) |
The Touch-Screen Generation. Sigh. And an interesting theory to just put the iPad in the toy basket with everything else and see what happens.
Want to see an exasperated American expat? Ask them what they do about their taxes. Some say it takes us 40 hours to do our taxes and then we still don't get them right.
Oh man. HonestSlogans.com. So, so true.
Still in a Halloween mood? Here's the recipe for movie blood. And I've always wondered what's wrong with people who like being scared. Turns out they are different.
Jill's List:
I loved this Cup of Jo list about the not-so-good things about living in NYC. Though, I refuse to believe that the pizza tastes like cardboard. I started thinking of a similar list for Kinshasa...and then stopped. Better to focus on the positive.
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| I took these with the Hipstamatic IncrediBooth App against our NYC cityscape photo after Elias declared that he "really wanted to move to New York City...because it's so close to New Jersey." |
One of my
favorite ways to practice my French literacy is by reading Garance Doré's blog.
I force myself to ignore Google's kind offer to "translate this
blog" and hit "Nope." Not only do we share the same frizz-prone hair, but Garance's French lessons involve makeup and beautiful
photography. Magnifique.
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| Read in English here. |
Did you see this article? What do you think? I was surprised to feel conflicted about it. Even though it doesn't quite address the issue (artist friends, I know!) I thought Swiss Miss's quote for the day summed up some of my pensiveness:
“Be generous with your time and your resources and with giving credit and, especially, with your words. It’s so much easier to be a critic than a celebrator. Always remember there is a human being on the other end of every exchange and behind every cultural artifact being critiqued. To understand and be understood, those are among life’s greatest gifts, and every interaction is an opportunity to exchange them.”- Maria Popova
I've been thinking about rugs. We actually bought a huge sisal rug at Ikea after our first year, rolled it up, and brought it with us on the airplane as oversize luggage. The airport people thought we were fools. Rightfully so. I like them that much. I've been perusing this site with love.
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| Go! Check out this gorgeous store here. |
One of my favorite things about looking at Africa is the signs. Advertisements, store names, and traffic directions are all painstakingly painted by artists all over the city surfaces.
Check out this video demonstrating a more Western-hipster hand-lettering technique:
My 7th graders are working on a mini-development lesson where they are researching, developing, and implementing a plan to get middle schoolers to wash their hands more often. We're using Graham Wallas' 1926 theory of the Four Stages of Creativity as our guide. I'm sold!
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| See. Look how creative he was. |
On Sunday November 3rd, Christy Turlington Burns will run the ING New York City marathon to raise money and awareness for her non-profit organization, Every Mother Counts (EMC). Those who have been reading for awhile know how much we appreciate the mission of EMC to make motherhood safer all over the world. Watch this to understand a little more:
And. Our kiddos in all their costumed glory. Spaceman Spiff thrilled with his pagne lightening bolt and the batik alien princess kept her wire crown on for 80% of the Trick-of-Treat trek.
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| We forgot the Chocolate Frosted Sugar Bombs. |
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| New fake smile. Seems Loulou has been an alien princess before. Look: |
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| Circa Halloween 2010. |
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| The girls. 2013. |
Plus. Had to tack this one on to the end. (Thanks, Anne Callie!) Favorite line:
Twentysomething party: Food is a couple of bags of random tortilla chips.
Thirtysomething party: Someone brought something homemade and uber-fancy to show off how good they are at cooking.
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| This might be a photo of a party in which I participated a few years ago. Dead give away for thirtysomethings party? The LAMP on an outdoor table. No twentysomething would ever be caught dead with such a set up. |
I used to read Garance's blog for French practice too! Such lovely photography. sadly, I've forgotten 90% of my French these days, thanks to all the med school facts in my brain. c'est une crime :(
ReplyDeleteI hear you! All of my Spanish seems to have crawled into the forgotten parts of my brain after two years of intensive French practice. Oh, to be a 5 year old language learner again! Sigh.
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