It’s a good story, with a lovely bit of romance. I have added the movie to my library requests and am really looking forward to seeing Humphrey Bogart play a cockney engineer, and Katherine Hepburn play a minister’s sister. I think it will all come off pretty well.

While I was reading the book, I came across several words that I either didn’t recognize at all, or knew but didn’t fully understand. When this happens once, I just kind of skim over the word, but when it happens several times, as it did with this novel, I think it’s fun to look words up. It’s an opportunity to expand my vocabulary. I know that there is this idea that we are supposed to use the most simplistic form of words available for clarity, etc. but that must be balanced with the opportunity we have to develop nuance in our meaning by using more refined words. That is my justification anyway for trying to expand my vocabulary.

Here are the 5 words that I came across, their sentences to give them context, and their heretofore unknown meanings (from the Pocket Oxford English Dictionary-my copy is from 1996):

1. Surfeit: “Surfeit was yet to come.”

Meaning: an excess,  esp. in eating or drinking

2. Casuistry: “All the same, and in a fashion completely devoid of casuistry, Rose was appreciative of the difference between business and pleasure.”

Meaning: person who uses clever but false reasoning in matters of conscience, etc

3. Uxorious: “As it was, the discussion ended eventually, as was quite inevitable, in Allnutt’s saying that ‘he would see what he could do,’ just as some other uxorious husband in civilization might see what could be done about buying a new drawing-room suite.”

Meaning: greatly or excessively fond of one’s wife

4. Objurgations: “‘Which way are they going?’ asked Rose, cutting through his objurgations.”

Meaning: a harsh rebuke (according to Merriam-Webster as it was not listed in my pocket dictionary)

5. Peroration: “This peroration annoyed the President; it was almost impertinence on the part of a mere lieutenant to tell a commander what was the extent of his powers.”

Meaning: concluding part of a speech

At first, I thought I would never get through the book. After all, how much is there to say about silence? But Francis leads the reader through this extraordinary journey-one where he appears to randomly give up speaking in celebration of his birthday, I mean what the hell, he’s out camping and hiking on his birthday, and he’s alone anyway. But his one day of silence ends up extending into 17 years. And, it really becomes a turning point in his life, his commitment to silence, that is. Of course it leads to a greater communion with God, or the universe, as one would expect, but it also inspires him to look more closely at the meaning of listening. And, he seems to come to a point where he can listen with detachment, that is, he is able to listen to the person speaking, without becoming engaged in his own response. His ability to listen appears to become wholly about listening, instead of the typical back-and-forth nature that two-way communication normally takes on. Think about that for a second.

I wonder if people who experienced his silence would confirm whether they felt more heard by him than by others? That would be interesting to find out.

One thing that Francis doesn’t explain is how he managed financially during his years of silence. He walked a lot and made his way slowly across North America. Along the way, he got an undergraduate and a graduate degree. No small feat. Seriously.

I think the most thought-provoking quote in the book, is the quote that Francis takes from Lynton K. Caldwell in G. Tyler Miller’s  Living in the Environment: “The environmental crisis is an outward manifestation of a crisis of mind and spirit…the crisis is concerned with the kind of creatures we are and what we must become if we are to survive.” Yes. This rings true-at least for me. I believe that we must become more compassionate creatures if we are to survive.

This book is a definite read. It’s easy to follow and interesting. Francis has included, for those interested, a “Lesson in Silence” at the end of each chapter, where he asks the reader to try something a little different, in relation to silence. These are good exercises. And, I’m happy to say that Francis reminded me that I need to pay more attention to listening, instead of forming responses while the other person is still talking. We live in such a crazy hectic world that we often forget what it’s like to be in a conversation where each person is fully listening and not being distracted by anything. And, too often we forget that decisions that we make on a day-to-day basis, such a driving a vehicle, not only impact the environment but represent our non-commitment to resolving environmental issues. Yes, Francis has reinforced my decision to sell my car and to rely on public transport or my own two legs for mobility. Ok, maybe I’ll catch a ride with other people sometimes, too!

I took my mom there right after picking her up from the Tullamarine airport, where, by the way, it cost me $20 for 2hrs of parking (WTF!). Um, Melbourne, it costs me $3-4 an hour to park at the Seattle airport.

Anyway, Las Vegan Bakery is located at 22 Smith St., Collingwood, Melbourne, Australia.

Wow. Was it amazing! One of the owners, Lia, treated us to her personal service and explained the breakfast options, which we were fairly interested in even though it was already 11am. We decided on the fresh and home made rosemary sourdough bread topped with tofu scramble, tempeh bacon, mushrooms and tomatoes. And, we shared the sour cherry and agave pancakes. Yummy. The tempeh bacon, which they flavor themselves, was absolutely delicious and the most reminiscent of anything like bacon that I’ve had in the 3 years since I became a vegan. Oh, and let me not forget the bottomless cup of chai that we both ordered, though we were completely unable to drink more than one cup each due to the massive size of our breakfasts. We absolutely loved the one cup we had. And, just because we loved the place so much, I took home a slice of their jaffa chocolate baci cake, which was very good.

See a photo here of jaffa chocolate baci cake:

(Apologies for the blurriness of the photo.)

Anyway, my mom decided then and there that this place was so amazing (and she is not a vegan), that she would make a special trip back to Collingwood, just to eat at the bakery. This place deserves applause, as one of the only completely vegan places to eat in Melbourne! Please try it, even if you are not vegan. You are going to love it if you let yourself experiment just a bit, with flavor and substance!

When attention is paid to commercial sexual exploitation, law enforcement and public rhetoric focus their outrage on the pimps, rarely mentioning the johns, the buyers who fuel the industry…To ignore the demand side of the issue makes no sense and trivializes the harm done by the buyers…If asked who’s worse, pimps or johns, most [girls] would not be able to choose.

This really shocked me.

Before I read this part of the book, I’d been a bit fuzzy on what my preconceptions were because I haven’t spent any real time thinking about the sex industry. I don’t know about any of this first-hand. I do know that I would do anything I could to avoid selling my body for any reason. I’m guessing that most people feel the same. I think most people who sell their bodies, don’t have a choice. Certainly, the children out there being sold, don’t have a choice. It’s not like a 13 year-old wakes up one day and decides to make money by selling her body…it’s a series of events that conspire to leave a child with no alternative.

Rachel Lloyd agrees with me: “It is presumed somewhere along the line they [the girls] “chose” this life, and this damns them to be seen as willing participants in their own abuse.”

According to Rachel Lloyd, most don’t intend to sell their bodies, they take up with a guy who becomes a substitute parent “daddy” or boyfriend, and then they are forced (beaten) or coerced into the industry.

The problem with believing that girls “choose” to go into the sexual industry, is that it presumes that these girls actually have a choice.

The sex industry isn’t about choice, it’s about lack of choices.

….the issue of choice must be carefully framed and understood in the context of the individual and cultural factors facing girls at risk. The sex industry may initially appear to provide a life of economic freedom, independence, and a secure future with someone who loves them, in contrast to the bleak futures that they may believe are their only alternatives. Selling sex may seem like a small price to pay, particularly for girls who have been abused and raped. Combine the power of media images of young women as sexual objects with the girls’ familial and environmental situations and the trap is set.

Many girls, even in this country, are growing up in a society that does not provide real and viable opportunities for the future. At the same time, they’re living in a culture that increasingly teaches them that their self worth and value are defined by their sexuality…

If fact, Lloyd goes on to say that girls today might consider that their sexuality or body is their most precious possession and that if they feel as though they have nothing else to offer, they might as well sell it to the highest bidder.

As if being sexually exploited weren’t bad enough, these children are then mistreated by the authorities, often being picked up by police for prostitution and then blamed for not wanting to be helped:

The absurdity of having an explicit sexual conversation with a girl who is being abused by adult men every day, then arresting her and expecting her to talk to or “snitch” on the man she loves to the same male officers who had treated her both as a sexual object and as a criminal, is startling.

I watched sexually exploited girl after girl arrested and charged with an act of prostitution and struggled with getting the cops, the courts, the families, event the girls themselves to believe that they were truly victims…

Ironically, the pimps tend to get out of the system much faster than the children that are being abused by them, setting up a difficult dichotomy where even if the girls want to speak out against their pimps, they can’t because their pimps are threatening to hurt their loved ones. Llyod gives the example of Keisha who was picked up for prostitution (she was 13 at the time of her arrest). Her pimp was released the next morning on $20,000 bail while Keisha remained, four months later, in a juvenile detention center charged with an act of prostitution. She was unwilling to say anything against her pimp as he was now free to have his friends make threatening phone calls to her auntie’s house.

If you think that’s bad, wait, it gets worse:

In 2003, Gary Ridgway, the notorious “Green River Killer,” who for over two decades had preyed upon women in the sex industry, finally pled guilty to 48 counts of first-degree murder, although police suspected him of many more…27 of his known victims were under the age of 18 making him one of the most prolific child serial killers in the United States, yet all of the media accounts of the victims called them women, not children.

Why don’t these girls just leave? It’s not that simple (duh). Ever heard of Stockholm Syndrome?

When someone has the power to take your life but doesn’t, you feel grateful. It may not make logical sense, but it makes psychological sense…bonding with the abuser, makes sense because after all, he’s the one with the power to take your life…

As weird as that sounds, it is likely too that the relationships are not all bad — at least in the eyes of the children who have mostly come from abusive backgrounds. Llyod makes this point by explaining her relationship with her abuser:

Very few bad relationships are all bad. The same man who used to both physically and emotionally abuse me was the same man who would give me a pedicure and carefully paint my toenails, the same man who would make me the most elaborate breakfasts in bed, clean the house, make me laugh harder than anyone else could. If there had been nothing good, I wouldn’t have stayed.

This doesn’t change the fact, however, that Lloyd cannot count the number of times that this man tried to kill her or physically abused her so much that she often lost consciousness.

Also, we get back to the whole question of choice. If a girl doesn’t feel as though she had choices to begin with, what has changed to make that any different? In fact, she is now barred from leaving by her feelings of shame and even further lack of self-worth. She may be physically barred too, either by the control of her pimp, and/or physical damage to her body. If anything, she feels responsible for being in the situation she is in (even though, she still hasn’t reached the age of majority). She feels even more trapped than when she got into this situation. People this is a wake up call here. These are children with nowhere to turn.

…what makes the most different in whether a girl leaves or not when that door opens up is if she believes that she has options, resources, somewhere to go, and the support she’ll need once she’s out. Wihtout that glimmer of hope…it’s unlikely that she’ll leave.

So let’s see, we’ve got a child without choices, definite physical and likely emotional abuse, probably affected by Stockholm Syndrome and last but not least, experiencing PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder).

Traumatic responses can look different for different people. Some girls are numb, so accustomed to pushing down feelings and ignoring their own needs that it’s hard for them to feel anything at all. Others are consumed with anger that’s built up over time, a rage that’s directed at no one and everyone. Some girls struggle with trauma reenactment, a compulsion to re-create the same situations over and over, continually putting themselves in danger, trying to have a different outcome this time. Other girls crave some level of danger just to feel “alive”…In dangerous and traumatic situations, our bodies are in a fight-or-flight response, physiologically. Once the immediate danger has passed, we can begin to truly feel all of the pain and trauma that our minds and bodies have suppressed in order to function. For commercially sexually exploited girls who’ve experienced constant trauma, constant danger, their bodies and minds have been in a continual high alert with little respite to process the experiences they’ve had to suppress. It’s not until things calm down that their feelings surface, and it can be overwhelming, especially if you’re not expecting them or don’t understand why they’re happening to you.

Trafficked and sexually exploited girls and young women need a place to hide and heal, but it is not enough to solely provide for their basic needs of food, shelter, and clothing…they also need a place where they feel like they belong, where they feel strong and empowered, a place where they feel loved and valued, even as the struggles remain right outside the door.

The power of this book, besides the factual data that Lloyd shares with the reader, is in the personal stories that she shares of girls she has connected with and her own story. Kudos to Lloyd for the courage it took to share her story, and for founding the nonprofit organization GEMS: Girls Educational and Mentoring Services, which helps girls and young women who have experienced commercial sexual exploitation and domestic trafficking.

N.B. All quotes are taken from Rachel Lloyd’s book and in some cases I have modified the verb tense.

We began our foray with a trip to Gawler. According to Wikipedia, it is the first country town in South Australia. Um, boring. We did stop at the office of tourism to pick up the guided tour: “Gawler’s Historic drive,” which showed some interesting architecture, including the Town Hall and mostly houses with histories.

The bakeries in Gawler are supposed to be very good, but the one that was recommended to us, by the office of tourism, was just so-so.

St. Hallett’s winery in Tanunda, was AWESOME! We went there because it was recommended by Lonely Planet. Thank you so much Lonely Planet. It ended up being the best winery we visited. There, a young English woman helped us try several delicious, robust red wines. Yum. I bought two bottles hoping there would be a way to get them home. For anyone who is interested, my daughter said that the restroom was lovely (N.B. I was told at U.S. Customs in Seattle that I was only allowed to bring 1 bottle into the country, but they allowed the 2 just this one time. Yay.)

Nosh, which is on the main road in Tanunda, was recommended to us for lunch, by the English woman at St. Hallet’s. The food was delicious, even if the wait-staff seemed very confused about which order went where—it’s one of those places where you order and pay at the counter, then they bring the food to you—They brought out my daughter’s meal a full 20 minutes before mine then confessed that her sandwich was actually meant for someone else and they had accidentally given it to my daughter instead of the other person. Oops.

We moved on to other small towns in the B. Valley via the scenic route, but it really wasn’t that scenic. If you’ve been to Napa Valley, Italy, or the south of France, the B. Valley just doesn’t compare…not in winter anyway.

Our last winery visit (ok, I admit, we only visited two—what can I say, I’m a lightweight) was at Bethany winery, which is historically interesting because it has been around for five generations, but their wine was a bit weird. Everything was unusual. One Riesling smelt like fish, I just couldn’t get the smell of fish out of my nostrils. Being a vegan, I don’t want to drink wine tasting of fish, even if most wines are strained through fish guts:

Isinglass is a substance obtained from the dried swim bladders of fish. It is a form of collagen used mainly for the clarification of wine and beer. (Thanks to Wikipedia for this definition).

One suggestion, if traveling to the Barossa Valley: maybe hit it in spring or summer, it might be more appealing in that light.

Amazingly, there are still so many things that I don’t know about food and how our lives correspond with it. Here are the top 6 that really got to me:

1) Did you know that there are on average 47,000 items in a supermarket? No wonder I feel overwhelmed when I walk into one, and that explains why, once I’m familiar with a supermarket, I tend to return to it over and over – who wants to re-learn where 1000′s of products are stocked and whether your particular items are stocked at that particular supermarket.

2) The reason tomatoes taste so crappy in the U.S. is because they are grown in other countries, picked green and ripened with ethylene gas. Hello? Does ripening anything with gas sound like a good idea? Check out Wikipedia’s description of ethylene if you want to learn more about what other scary things it is used for.

3) McDonald’s is one of the largest purchasers of potatoes, pork, chicken, tomatoes and lettuce – duh, it controls the market for these products, basically. This isn’t new information – just a reminder of how bad McDonald’s really is.

4) The following products are made from corn, a product that because of ginormous subsidies means that even though it costs more to produce than farmer’s would earn, it continues to cover 30% of the land-base in the U.S. Corn is actually sold for less than it costs to produce. Um, U.S. government, how can you be so stupid to continue to subsidize this product?

• High fructose corn syrup
• Di-glycerides
• Ascorbic acid
• Xanthum gum
• Calcium stearate (that’s in gum)
• Caltodextrin
• Citrus cloud emulsion
• Sucrose
• Fructose
• Saccharin
• Sorbital
• Baking powder
• Starch
• Vanilla extract
• Sorbic acid
• Cellulose
• Xylitol
• Alpha tocopherol
• Ethyl lactate
• Polydextrose
• White vinegar
• Ethel acetate
• Semolina

If you really want to scare yourself – check out each of these corn derived products and how we use them.

5) When you slaughter 400 cows an hour, that have been standing in ankle-deep manure with their hides caked in manure, you’d have to be an utter moron to think that e.coli doesn’t mix in with the meat. (NB: Feeding cattle grass (instead of corn) for 5 days will cause them to shed 80% of e.coli in their gut).

6) Why is it, that in 1972, the FDA conducted 50,000 safety inspections and in 2006, they conducted 9,164? Could it have something to do with the fact that lobbyists began filling government positions, so that now the people who are supposed to be protecting our food supply are actually the people who worked for the companies they’re supposedly regulating…no surprises there. And, doesn’t this pose a conflict of interest? Why do we never hear about that?

So what’s my big message here? Keep yourself informed. Try to do the best you can with the information you have—it’s easily accessible if you can get over the disgust factor.

Sometimes, a song says it all:

Free download of the song:
I Am Troy Davis (T.R.O.Y.) by Jasiri X

Lyrics:
Does the court system employ racists?
Then why are so many black boys in cages?
Why shouldn’t I be paranoid of hatred?
Just look at the curious case of Troy Davis
Let’s travel on down to Savannah
In the state of Georgia just south of Atlanta
Where they wave the rebel flag like a bandanna
Hung our ancestors then posed for the camera
A white police officer was shot and killed
Over an argument he tried stop and heal
And here’s where the plot gets real
The main suspect blamed Troy went to the cops and squealed
And with no physical evidence or weapon
Troy was arrested for a 187
He said he was an innocent man when he was questioned
But they said that he did it who needs a damn confession
They just need a witness they can press to cry
Tell em what to say or they arrest the guy
Then Put em on the stand and make em testify
Swear to god to tell the truth and do they best to lie
And they did so troy was found guilty
Sent to death row by a scheme so filthy
Even though his innocence is true
We pray they don’t reminisce over you

But the truth always comes to light
And Troy Davis didn’t give up the fight
He kept filing appeals until it was revealed
The state of Georgia wants an an innocent man killed
That’s why a who’s who wants him out
cause there’s just too much doubt
And witness after witness came forward and admitted
the only reason they did it cause the police insisted
so wicked so vicious
The system’s broke so fixed
2 decades no Christmas
Execution dates 4 listed
get organized show resistance
go online sign those petitions
Black Americans know the difference
It’s a new day but the same old lynchings
I am Troy Davis
families destroyed by cases
why can’t we avoid the Matrix
instead of giving his children toys to play with
he’s waiting his execution hoping the court stays it
I’m praying and doing
we need action we need movement
cause his innocence is true
I pray they don’t reminisce over you

released 16 September 2011
Produced by Pete Rock

How do they figure out which stories to put into a book like this?

The story of Rappaccini’s Daughter is pretty intriguing. It starts with a young science student, Giovanni Guasconti, who comes to Padua to study but becomes entranced by the daughter of his neighbor, Rappaccini. He observes her by chance through his open window, and despite being warned by a friend of his father’s, Professor Pietro Baglioni, who is acting as a mentor of sorts, he pursues Beatrice.

He is somewhat concerned when he notices that living things seem to die in her presence—well most living things, there is one flower in her garden that doesn’t. She calls it her ‘sister’.

As the story progresses, Hawthorne proscribes the too-familiar storyline where the love-lorne young man (Giovanni) ignores his purpose for being in Padua and devotes himself entirely to thoughts and moments with Beatrice. Until suddenly, it dawns on him that she is poisonous – well, it dawns on him with the help of Professor Baglioni: Rappaccini has, according to Baglioni, put science above all else and brought up his daughter on poison so that her very essence is poison.  On reflection, Giovanni knows this to be true. He recognizes that he has also become poisonous merely through his contact with her. So he takes a draft (antidote) to her that will supposedly cure her. Instead, in a dramatic scene where Giovanni confronts Rappaccini and Beatrice drinks the draft, she dies, abruptly. The story ends there.

You are left wondering what happened to Giovanni and his love? Yes, Nathaniel, you left me hanging.

I visited there a few months ago, with my then 16-year old daughter. We hoofed it around this small city (population around one million) in one day, which is about the right amount of time, when you’re with a teenager, unless there are specific purposes for being there.

Tourist Information
The people at the information center on Rundle Street were extremely friendly and helpful, giving us great ideas for our Barossa Valley excursion (planned for the next day). And, they confirmed that the Central Market, in Adelaide’s city center, is a good place to eat. Yum. My daughter had potato piroshki (pirogi) and I had a chickpea salad and fresh beetroot, carrot, apple and ginger juice. Later, we bought fresh feta, bread, goat’s cheese, a banana, and one slice of banana bread. I’m confident you can find just about anything you want to eat at this market.

Rundle street itself is a pedestrian only thoroughfare. Though there’s quite a bit of hype about it, isn’t anything special, in my opinion. It has what seem like the normative arcades that exist in other Australian cities, but is mostly compromised of modern shops, such as Myers and The Body Shop. If you’ve been to Melbourne, Perth, or Sydney, it’s just not as interesting. We did make a special effort to stop at Haigh’s Chocolate shop—there are two on Rundle Street—they are one of the only chocolate maker’s in Australia that still makes their own chocolate (they don’t source the chocolate from other places). I especially recommend a visit to their factory for a very quick and interesting tour!

We spent about 30 minutes at a café looking over our maps and planning the Barossa Valley trip, without being able to get a cup of coffee. I don’t know if the waiters thought they were being kind in letting us use a table or they just couldn’t be bothered to serve us—there were only 2-3 other tables with people at them…who knows? Whatever it was, we were simply ignored:-(

Accommodation
We stayed at the Hotel Minima, which was underwhelming to say the least. I thought it would be a cool place to stay with my teen, because it is touted as being modern and chic and it’s located in North Adelaide, which is a great area for shopping and eating. However, I would NOT (repeat NOT) recommend this hotel. When we arrived, to this supposedly self-service hotel, we found that the check-in kiosk was down and we had to walk to another hotel to check-in. So we put all of our bags back in the car and headed over to the other hotel and checked in. Then, we found the elevator wasn’t working. So we diligently looked around for the stairs to walk up two-flights to our room. A man in a suit was looking for the stairwell too. We finally found the back emergency stairs and lugged all of our stuff up the two flights of stairs only to find that the door was locked, so then went back to the front of the hotel where we found another business man also looking for a way up. Luckily, he’d parked his car in the garage, so knew the stairwell was accessible via the garage—yep, we walked down the ramp to get to the stairwell and finally found our way up three flights of stairs—the doors were all propped open and the top floor had a chair holding that door open. Classy (not).

Dinner
We ate at Bocca the first night in Adelaide, and we really enjoyed it. The wine was excellent too. Although I can’t remember exactly what I had, the dessert stands out in my mind: some moussy-chocolate thing…and presentation was great!

Architecture
I noticed that the buildings in Adelaide were quite different from buildings in other Australian cities that I’ve been too. The predominant difference, from what I’ve seen, is the abundant use of stone, combined with the Victorian style of architecture created something quite unique and pleasing to the eye.
Click to view slideshow.

Travel Recommendation?
Definitely see Adelaide, and prepare to spend some time visiting the surrounding area. This is not a place for high activity in terms of masses of sight-seeing, but it’s great if you want to meander around on foot. The many parks and interesting architecture will stimulate your aesthetics and make you wonder why there is such a dearth of these features in modern American cities.

Recognition and compassion. We all suffer in some way. We all find happiness in some way. In this we are all alike, all connected…and I suppose in a strange way that is what I am thankful for; that I have made it this far, that others are making it and most people I know are trying to make things better…