The woman who filmed, produced and edited this film, Yasmin Moll, was a protester in Tahrir, Egypt earlier this year. We were lucky enough to be able to skype her in my class last evening and ask her questions about what led up to, happened during, and has happened since the revolution that got Hosni Mubarack to step down from leadership. She was amazing. She talked to us about how women across generations and classes banded together for this to happen. She also talked about the ongoing concerns of the Egyptian people like how the military is now in power, how women's issues have been pushed to the side after solidarity between men and women for women's rights during the revolution because they feel that bigger problems need to be dealt with. She also talked about media's role in portraying the revolution in Western countries. Wow, wow, wow. She was great.
Today in my resource wars class, my teacher's good friend, Ricardo, sat in on our class. He is currently at Northwestern working on his Ph.D. thesis in sociology. He is from Ecuador and specializes in Latin American studies and social movements. He was really insightful and had some great things to say. After class my teacher, Dr. Fabricant, Ricardo, a few of my classmates and I went to Starbucks to talk to him more and ask any questions we still had. It was my last class, so I figured 'what the hell! I'll just hit traffic on the way back.' I talked to him about the pros and cons of being in a policy-making position and how there are too few people in policy that will listen to what all groups of people have to say. We compared the benefits of policy and social movements. Very interesting. I also talked a lot to Dr. Fabricant. She's great too. Needless to say, we were there from 3:30-5:45!! It was well worth the rush hour traffic.
Had a great time last night with all my friends who have been in the majority of my classes these past two years after our African Film class. Laura and I sang 'I Just Can't Wait to be King' from The Lion King. It was a big crowd pleaser, even if Nick said we sounded miserable (swine). Then this old man came over and started to talking to me and Laura. And of course, Laura dipped and I felt bad so I ended up talking to the 76 year-old Korean War, Marine Veteran about his life and his family for at least a half hour. I always get roped into these things. My friends told me I need to learn to say 'no' and stop trying to be friendly to everyone I meet. But, I think that makes me who I am. However, they're probably a little bit right. Moral of the story...it has been a GREAT two days!!
Happy Cinco de Mayo!!
