This blog expresses my views on life as a Jewish college student who is learning how to adjust to a secular world. Please feel free to express your opinion on my posts. Constructive criticism never hurts.
The Blindman's Meal, Pablo Picasso,1903
Oil on canvas
My sketch
My art history class was given a writing assignment which involved, going to to a museum, sketching the artwork (hope you guys like my sketch I went a little crazy with the shading) that I want to write on and finding at least one scholarly source. I found "The Blindman's Meal", by Pablo Picasso to be a very striking work of art. One reason being is the coloring which is very dark on the most part with little contrast. Seeing as this is from Picasso's "Blue Period" the dominant color of the painting is obviously, blue.
Another reason that this painting grabbed my attentions is how different it was from most of the other works of art.The other painting were abstract and not realistic as this one however, this painting was dark yet, easy to.relate to. It provokes strong emotions. The question is, which emotions does it provoke? The "Blue Period was inspired by his trip through Spain and the suicide of a friend and, his journey through Spain. In my opinion it provokes the emotions of the imperfect person who struggles with daily life, which is pretty much every person on the planet. I guess that is what the "Blue Period" was about. Another thing about the "Blue Period is that Picasso focused a lot on the blind during that particular period. I guess that although most of us are not blind we in a way are blinded by our emotions.
Now the reason why this post is called "Struggles with Writing" is because, 1-I have problem with making citations, 2-because I am having problems finding a scholarly art history source that covers this particular artwork. I have always had my share of difficulties with writing and this assignment is no different. I have always had a problem with writing down my thoughts and the fact that I am having a problem finding a single scholarly source does not help. Luckily this assignment is not due until May 4th hopefully I will have enough time after Passover and spring break, which end at the same time, to find something on this artwork before then.
Ah, no! That time of the year has come again and no, I am not talking about Easter. I am talking about Passover. The holiday where we Jews work like slaves to rid our houses, stores and, offices of products made from leaven grains. Passover cleaning for Orthodox Jews is not a joke in any manner. We cannot even use our ovens unless they are self cleaning, have the broil cycle turned on for over an hour, or we use a blow torch on it. We have to either blowtorch our utensils and cookware, or replace them with Passover cookware and utensils. We have to replace the dishes because they are not made of metal and cannot be koshered.We have to remove all leavened products from our house or ownership by selling them. Passover can be quite a burden without all the extra cleaning that many people incorporate into their Passover cleaning. What makes this holiday even worse is that the Passover food is twice the calories and not even as nutritious or tasty.
What I always found ironic about Passover is that the Jewish people celebrate their exodus from Egypt yet, we work like slaves in order to celebrate Passover. The Jews were slaves in Egypt and were forced to work like slaves. That was until God sent Moses to be an intermediary between him and Pharoh. Moses with the help of God unleashed Ten Plagues on Egypt. At the seder we talk about how we were slaves and now we are free, but if you looked at what it takes for one to prepare for Passover would you say that we are free?
The woman in the video, Rebbetzin Rivka Leah Zelwig, is a parody of how intensely one can overdo Passover cleaning. This woman dismantles her kitchen by using heavy power tools in order to make her kitchen free of leavened products. She even tells her daughter to remove the toilet. I find that funny because since when do people bring food into the bathroom? She even says to remove the sink, toilet, kitchen tiles and, every single feather from a down blanket. We even see her remove an electrical outlet from the wall and use power tools. One can make their sink kosher for Passover by pouring hot water over it so and we normally say a blessing after checking for leavened products that nullifies all the leavened products that were not found during the search, so that does not make sense. Also I found it funny when she told her daughter to remove to toilet, because we are not allowed to eat in the bathroom so why would the toilet have leavened products and, if so we could flush is or bleach, which is still over the top but not unusual to do, not remove the toilet.
Another example of how people overdo Passover cleaning is this article on Failed Messiah.This is something that many can relate to. I know someone who said that his stepmother's family was similar to the woman in the video. Instead of trying to clean every single electrical outlet we should be focusing on the basics to make this already strenuous holiday the simplest one can possibly make it.Instead of treating it like spring cleaning we should focus on literally following the Jewish law. By simply doing that we are already doing backbreaking labor. I guess this goes to show that too many restrictions can lead to destroying children's toys, your property, your clothes, and many other things. This however does give everyone a good laugh about the lengths one goes to properly clean for Passover.
I found out on Failed Messiah that Sholom Rubashkin former CEO of Agriprocessors, a kosher slaughter house, who was found guilty of 86 counts of bank fraud and sentenced to 27 year in jail, was having a Purim essay contest for "the Yiddishe Kinderlach across the world" about what they learned from the Book of Esther. I am a bit too old to enter seeing, as I am 18 and have graduated high school. However, I decided that I would write a satirical essay as a joke for my own amusement (and maybe even your amusement).
Hadasah Chaya Schneebalg
What I Learned from the Book of Esther
I learned from the Book of Esther is that all goyim are evil. The goyim are our yetzer hara trying to turn us away from frumkeit. Haman is a symbol of what the goyim, even today, think about doing to us Yidden.
Mordecai HaTzadik is an example of what we should be. We should separate ourselves from goyim because the goyim are our enemies. Mordecai was the one who would not bow down to Haman, which caused the Jews to undergo the threat of extermination in the first place. Haman also is in the soul of every goy, because he is a descendent of Amalek. In order the Jews to defeat Amalek, we must steal from goyim whenever possible, claim anti-Semitism whenever possible, and disregard any goyish law whenever possible. The reason we must steal is because “Uni chashuv k’meis”, by stealing from Amalek, we are killing them thereby erasing their memory from the world, because we are making them poor.
Another way that we can overcome our yetzer hara, is to corrupt innocent Jewish children with the idea that boys should not work when they grow up, and spend the whole day learning, and that the girls should not go to a decent college and have many children. This social structure will lead to stealing from the goyishe government and more Jews on welfare which is an even greater mitzvah because of the kavanah to steal. From here we see that, since so many Jewish children are corrupting themselves with a college education that Chabad has not yet achieved its goal and needs to do more kiruv and spread its practices. You saved us from the triefe meat of Achasverosh. It is Haman who went after you and we will do whatever we can to have you set free, because of this you are under threat like Mordecai HaTzadik. Another thing that I would like to add, is that you are obviously a reincarnation of Mordecai HaTzadik because, your middle name is Mordecai and, you are a tzadik will save us from this golus. Another sign that you are here to redeem us is that, you had a multi-million dollar fraud going on and you showed no remorse, exactly how a true yid should react whenever he is caught.May Moshiach come soon and redeem you from prison since you are such a tzadik.
At the beginning of this month, Rebecca Black's Friday music video (above) went viral. On the most part it received negative reviews, yet it was still popular. I see people posting this video to their Facebook profiles, yet they write how awful the song is and how it makes them want to vomit. What is ironic is that since this video, Rebecca Black has made it big. She appeared on MTV for an interview and Jay Leno. If the song is so bad, then why give her so much publicity, or even make a parodies of her song?
After all "imitation is the greatest form of flattery". I am saying this as a person who is addicted to spoofs and even tends memorize and sing them on a daily basis. I believe that parodies are an artistic form of pointing out different ideas and even making fun of songs. Sometimes the parodies are even better than the originals but the second video, which is the parody, is in my opinion atrocious. I found the video above on my Facebook updates one friend posted it on another mutual friend's profile. I thought that this parody was even worse than the original song. My theory on why this parody is so bad is because the original song was so horrible that is did not form the strong foundation that is needed to form a decent parody.
Think of all the energy wasted making this parody, that energy could have been used to spoof the incompetence of the Japanese Government with the accident at Fukishima Nuclear Power Plant after the tsunami, or even Gaddafi's refusal to back down after the Libyans revolt. I think that those topics would have made excellent parodies. I could imagine a Gadaffi, ranting and raving and dodging bullets every second, as Obama and the U.N. offer him millions and billions of dollars to just back down and check himself into Bellvue for a month. He would then refuse the offer and go on a rampage, until Sarah Palin shoots him because she thought that he was a caribou. (The story would work just as well with Dick Cheney shooting him by "accident".)
Now back to the publicity part. What I do not get about people is the fact that they focus on thing that they hate. A few examples I have are, Charlie Sheen, the Westboro Baptist Church, Paris Hilton, Lindsay Lohan, etc .Human behavior always baffles me, especially when it comes to how they react to different things. Whether it is the media or the average person I will never understand why they are interested in the Charlie Sheens and Lindsay Lohans since their behaviors in my opinion is static, failing drug tests breaking the law and acting like lunatics, how predictable. Why is the media actually interested in something that is so constant. Charlie Sheen will always be crazy, same with Lindsay Lohan and, the Westboro Baptist Church will always tell people that they are going to hell and protest funerals. We seem to dislike these things yet we give them attention. What I find really annoying is that I cannot turn on the news, or, open a newspaper without hearing something about the three things that I have mentioned before. Everybody seems sick and tired of them yet everyone seems to talk about them.
As for the Westboro Baptist Church the only reason that I interested in it was because, as a person interest in American Government, I was curious about whether Snyder v. Phelps would get a writ of certiorari. The case did go to the U.S. Supreme court, which decided in the favor of the Phelps party, which means that they are allowed to protest at funerals. Now that we have established taht established we should simply ignore them. After all if we get angry and counter-protest, then we are playing into their game. They want attention, if we do not give them attention then things will not seem as bad as they are, and they will just blend back into nothingness. Maybe we will even realize how few people are protesting from the Westboro Baptist Church. I find it ironic that a few noise makers can incite hundreds of counter protesters.
The Rebecca Black video was abysmal at best. However if we keep giving her attention and making parodies of her that will just increase her notoriety. She has every right to record a video, but if you think it is so bad then, do not watch the video and then share it with your friends. Attention gives positive reinforcement, if we ignore her maybe the record companies and/Rebecca Black will get the message. After all as the saying goes "any publicity is good publicity". We are giving these celebrities and Rebecca Black exactly what they want and, we do not realize it.
PS. I am only posting this not out of my interest in Rebecca Black's video, but out of my frustration with people who keep giving misbehavior and mediocrity undeserved attention. The reason that I have mentioned the public figures like Charlie Sheen, Lindsay Lohan, Westboro Baptist Church and, Paris Hilton, is not because I care about them or even intentionally follow their lives. It is because their lives are all you hear about. We know that they will get into trouble, spew invectives and do erratic things, so why are we interested in something so predictable?
Today in macroeconomics class, my professor was discussing unemployment. He mentioned that discrimination increases during times of high unemployment because, many more people are applying for that job and it is easier to get away with discrimination. The example my professor used was that a man was not hired because he had green skin. He probably used this skin color because, he wanted to avoid using a real minority, so he would not offend anybody in the class by singling out a real minority. The problem is that, he offended me. As a Martian, I am offended that I was singled out like that.
I know many people will ask why I am calling myself a Martian, the answer is because I am one. As a kid I was always different. I did not think like everyone else. There were many reasons for including that facts that I, did not understand the social rules, always got into trouble, was in my own world, was hyperactive, was defiant, and, could not understand why thing were the way they were. I did not understand why I was so different. In seventh grade I finally learned what made me so different. My teacher was "kind" enough to point it out to me, by calling me a Martian every day in front of the class. Growing up as a Martian (or Alien American to cover all groups of space aliens) was awkward especially, when trying to blend into an Earthling run society where there was no Alien Awareness. I was forced to hide my true "skin color", with little success. If my professor was aware of the existence of Alien Americans, he probably would not have used a person with green skin as an example, so as not to offend me as part of a minority group.
As a result of the offensive comments made by my professor, I am joining the NAACP. I know that most people will say that the NAACP is an organization for African Americans but, isn't green a color? If the NAACP will not let me join then, I can say that the NAACP discriminates against, Martians and other space aliens, and form my own special interest group for fellow Aliens, the Alien Awareness League (AAL). We will first fight for recognition because, most people do not know that Martians, along with other species of space aliens exist. We will then fight for civil rights and awareness, such as Alien Awareness Month. The month of awareness will be dedicated to how Martians and other Aliens were mistreated and, had to live in and fight an unjust world that was run by Earthlings, without Alien Americans having a say in it. Since I am planning to be an Alien rights leader, I plan to make July Alien Awareness Month because, I was born in July. I plan to fight for affirmative action and be a representative of the Alien American community in a way that is similar to Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton for the African American community. I will even lobby on Washington for Alien rights. I will preach about every hint of racism against Alien Americans. I will use the guilt of the Earthlings to my advantage.
I will make sure that Alien Americans as a special interest group get their slice of the pie, just as any other minority group would. After all, "All's fair and love and war". This is how Alien Americans are planning to take over the world.
PS. To all you Earthlings out there this post was just a joke to make a political point. I seriously was different as a kid and my teacher did call me a Martian. I am not a Martian but, I am sometimes on my own planet.
I was always awkward when it came to Purim. I was never invited to a Purim party outside of school. This year I was invited to two Purim parties, yet I choose to be alienated. In short I skipped both parties.
For those who do not know what Purim is, I will explain it to you. Purim is a result of how the Jews were not killed in the Persian Empire despite the fact that Haman, the king's advisor had the king sign a declaration saying that on the 13th of Adar the Jews will be killed. Queen Esther was kidnapped forcibly married to the king and revealed that she was Jewish, and that Haman wanted to kill her people. The king signed a declaration saying that the citizens of his 127 countries can try to kill the Jews, but the Jews had the right to defend themselves. Haman was hanged on the gallows that he wanted to hang his Jewish nemesis Mordechai along with his ten sons. Because of this today Jews celebrate, dress up, and drink. For those who are interested you can probably find an English translation of the Book of Esther.
I wonder why I choose to seclude myself from everyone. I think that one reason is that, I am scared of making a fool out of myself. Another reason I think is because whenever I go to a party I tend to, pig out on the food, hang out in a more secluded part of the premises (like the back room, or if it was a party by my school my school auditorium rather than the gym where the party is going on), or as I said before make a fool out of myself in general. I thought that this year I would be more outgoing, but I was so busy with school and working on my philosophy and history papers. I know that I am the way I am, but I should stop making excuses for myself and attend more parties and events. I should open myself up to new experiences, I might even enjoy some of them. I also should be more prepared and actually buy a costume for Purim next year.
However this year I decided to dress up as something that I have been scared of for a long time. I am dressing up as myself. This Purim I will not hide behind masks and costumes and pretend to be something I'm not, like other people. I am going to be myself and happy with that.
I have always had problems in the classroom and today was no exception. I tend to have problems with classroom etiquette, when it comes to raising your hand, the tone of voice I speak in (I tend to speak in a very loud voice), and dominating the class discussion. However, what made today different was that, instead of being told off by the professor, I was told off by a fellow student. She said that I needed to tone it down and that I was degrading the professor. However, what upset me most, was that I never even spoke to this student before, it would have been one thing if she was a friend, or even an acquaintance, but she was not. My initial thought was that she was just plain rude.
It all started today in art history class we were discussing Greek and Roman art. People were allowed to give input their observations on the artworks. When it came to discussing the busts of Julius Caesar (the top picture ) and Pompey the Great (the bottom picture) which were both made made in the 1st century BCE . Class discussion was open and I decided to voice my observations along with everybody else dd.
While everybody else said that Pompey looked younger than Caesar, I disagreed. I noticed that Pompey had wrinkles. The only thing that made Pompey seem younger was his hair. He did not have the facial expression that one normally sees on competent leaders. He looked as if he was a lazy person who did nothing all day. The way I described it was that he was not better looking than Caesar and not idealized because, he had a big nose with worry lines, he did not seem to be relating to everyone but had a spaced-out look on his face. To me Caesar seemed more alert and engaged than Pompey. I guess the reason that I found Caesar to be more relatable is because I am not used relating to normal people but rather to politician-types.When I gave my input on both the statues someone did interrupt me to counteract my input on the size of Pompey's nose, which was also not perfect classroom etiquette on her part. I might have called out a few times when it came to the statue of Augustus 14 AD which was when he died. How we supposedly knew it was after his death was because he was not wearing shoes. When a person asked if Greek had shoes (Augustus was Roman, and yes ever heard of gladiator sandals?) I said that gladiators (who were Roman) had sandals, and yes the Greeks also did and asked if the person ever heard of gladiator sandals. I was not degrading the professor but, maybe I should not have called out and let the professor respond to that one.
I acknowledge the fact that I am not the perfect student. If I forget to raise my hand or offend the professor. I do expect the professor to give me some constructive criticism in response to my transgressions. One such example is, when last semester when my Classics professor professor was discussing the midterm I called out when he said that the lecture on The Odyssey was his favorite lecture. I called out to ask why. What I did not get was that when he said that it was his favorite lecture, he meant that a huge portion of the midterm would be on The Odyssey. The next lecture the professor called me up to discuss my calling out. Yes I was angry, however, he had every right to do so.
I do not mean to be disrespectful, but I just do not understand what is appropriate speech. To me appropriate speech means that it lacks hate. I also tend to go too far when joking. Such and incident happened last semester when I made a stupid joke at a fellow Brooklyn College student. I just thought that it was a harmless joke. However, I was wrong because it turns out he told his mother. When his mother started being hostile towards me I just commented my observation that she did not seem in the mood to talk. She then said that I was not so nice to her son. Forget the fact that we are college students and he had his mother intervene, why could he not just tell me himself that he was offended by my harmless joke?
Now back to what happened after the art history lecture. After the lecture, as I was leaving a fellow student came up to me and told me to tone it down. She also said that I was degrading the professor. My thoughts at that moment were, "that if the professor has a problem with me he can tell me himself.", that she is a fellow student and not the professor's assistant so who was she to tell me off like that?", and that I just thought that I was giving my intellectual input. I even spoke to someone I knew from elementary school about this and she agreed with me.My point is that I feel that students should not try to intervene in the student-teacher relationship the same with that parents should not intervene in peer relations.
PS. Although I thought that it was wrong for a fellow student to tell me off, I will take what she said into account. I will continue to work on my calling out and how I tend to take over a discussion (in and out of the classroom), along with my social skills.
