Post of randomness

[qatarperegrine]

I was going to go straight back to my (sadly wireless-less) hotel right after dinner, but my fortune cookie said "A cheerful letter or message is on its way to you," so I stopped by Starbucks to check e-mail. I have one piece of spam and an invitation to the Renaissance City Choir's Valentine's dance. Although the very existence of a gay Valentine's ball makes me cheerful, it's not what I was hoping for.

At the table behind me a couple are speaking in Arabic. The woman is wearing a headscarf. It feels very homey.

My mother complained the other day that I hadn't posted anything for a few days, despite the fact that I haven't posted because I was trying to limit my laptop usage in order to actually spend time with all the relatives at my sister's wedding. (There's no pleasing some people!! :-) I haven't really known what to write lately, though. This is (obviously) meant to be a weblog about Qatar, and I'm not in Qatar right now. I can post things about my everyday life, like that I'm sitting in Starbucks sipping hot chocolate and listening to an Arabic conversation behind me, but that does not make for scintillating Livejournal posts.

For those who've lost track of my schedule (among whom I count myself) I'm in Pittsburgh for a week on business. I flew in on the redeye last night (thus the borderline stream-of-consciousness) from the Bay Area, where my sister y_pestis got married on Saturday. (Congratulations, y_pestis and Mr. y_pestis!)

I worked for a couple hours today, and attended two of CMU's MLK Day talks. The keynote was Derrick Bell talking about Martin Luther King Jr. as a 20th century Jesus. He was quite good, but rather pro-Gnostic-gospels, which I find oddly tiresome. Am I really the only liberal Christian who doesn't dig Gnosticism? He said that Gnostics were less sexist than orthodox Christians, and I thought of the verse from the Gospel of Thomas where Jesus supposedly says "For every woman who will make herself male will enter the kingdom of heaven.'" Now that's a lot more sexist than "In Christ there is neither male nor female," isn't it? Score one for Paul.

In honor of Martin Luther King and nonviolence, here is a Zen story from a book I'm reading (That's Funny, You Don't Look Buddhist):

"An abbot [was] threatened by a samurai who said, 'I could run you through with my sword without blinking an eye.' The abbot's response was, 'I could be run through with a sword without blinking an eye.'"

It reminds me of Emilia's line to Othello, "Thou hast not half that power to do me harm / As I have to be hurt." That became a mantra for me the first time I'm heard it. I still think it's a lovely line, but am glad I no longer connect with it quite so viscerally these days.

I think it is rather self-evidently past my bedtime, so I will hie me hence to my hotel. If you want coherent ramblings from Starbucks, you'll have to rely on Leland.

Comments

Oooooh!

[shmuelisms.livejournal.com]

Will we be seeing a review like entry, based on that book? The "convergence" (possibly too strong a word) between Jewish and Buddhist Thought (and other Easter Philosophies) has always fascinated me. Another similar book would be - Letters to a Buddhist Jew, which I have also heard good things about. Did you ever read that Khuzari book?

Mazal Tov on the wedding. Family occasions can be lots of fun.

Re: Oooooh!

[qatar.livejournal.com]

I've never heard of Letters to a Buddhist Jew. The You Don't Look Buddhist author talks a lot about how becoming Buddhist made her a better Jew... it's not the best book on Buddhism I've read, but that part of it is interesting.

Never did read the Khuzari book. There are, you can imagine, not a lot of sources for books on Judaism in Qatar. I hoped to have time to go to the library and read on this business trip, but that has not been the case.

And thank you! Yes, it was a lot of fun.