Note of the Living Deb

In my quest to read books from all the countries, ideally for each country I'd find a good general book, at least one good book on a narrow issue, and at least one fun book, plus learn a bit about the country. I feel like I have succeeded with Finland.

Before starting, I knew that Finland was one of the Scandinavian countries. That's actually wrong (only Norway, Sweden, and Denmark are considered Scandinavian), but it is one of the Nordic countries (along with Iceland and the Scandinavian countries).

Finnish Lessons

Several years ago I read Pasi Sahlberg's Finnish Lessons: What Can the World Learn from Educational Change in Finland? (2011). Finland found that its students weren't doing well compared to those of other western nations, so they looked up research on good teaching methods. Most of what they found was in the US, but unlike US teachers, they tried out the ideas in schools. Then they continued the research themselves. And they decided their teachers should also be researchers. So now teachers are well-paid and they have post-doctorate (research) degrees and they have ways to mentor each other and otherwise share ideas.

I don't remember the actual changes to teaching except they went with a lot more learning-by-doing and lot less learning by reading or listening and a lot less memorization.

Cold Victory

The Book Girls recommend Karl Marlantes's Cold Victory (2024). This book features two diplomats (one a Finnish-American, one a Russian) and their wives, posted in Finland. It turns out the two diplomats had met when they were soldiers near the end of World War II (when the US finally sent the USSR the help they'd promised) and they still considered themselves good friends. Their wives get to know each other and eventually also become friends.

Then a bunch of stressful, exciting, tragic stuff happens because of saving face, too much alcohol, and supreme naivete.

This is not the ideal book on Finland because few of the characters were Finnish, but that says a little something in itself about how Finland has to deal with bigger powers.

I never knew Findland's sad WWII history. First Finland was invaded by the USSR, which was an ally of Germany. Germany turned on USSR in 1941, so the Finns joined them to take back the territory they'd lost. They continued to Leningrad. 'Leningrad never fell, and Stalin never forgot.' The US allied with the USSR to fight Germany and drove the Finns back. Afterwards, reparations of 60% of Finland's prewar GDP were imposed (payable in 'hard currency and dismantled industrial plant being shipped to Russia'), but they were still free. (I'd thought people had learned their lesson about reparations after WWI, but I guess not?)

I was intrigued about one character's description of politics: It's all about preventing war. Yes, countries are still jostling for power, but 'You, above all, should know that no matter how dirty politics gets, it's never as dirty as war.'

On dictatorships: The Germans 'weren't all Nazis. … That's the point. Dictatorships need just a few ardent supporters. Democracies need everyone. That's harder to do.' And 'Punishing an innocent man is as effective as punishing a guilty one when the goal is scaring people to keep them in line.'

The Moomins

Tove Jansson's Moomins series was recommended by an ambassador: “The Moomin books were originally written as fairy tales for children. Their philosophic nature is universal and makes the books enjoyable for people of all ages and from all backgrounds. The carefree and friendly Moomins provide a warm-hearted reading experience, and are also an essential part of the childhood of every Finnish kid."

I checked the Central library branch, and they only had Moominvalley in November (The Moomins #8) (1970), the last book in the series.

In this volume, various people who know the Moomins converge on their house as fall sets in, with its rain, wind, and cold. The Moomins are not in, but they make themselves at home. The Moomins' presence is still felt; the characters find comfort here, even with the Moomins gone.

The characters are all different sizes and shapes, and they have different hobbies: cooking and cleaning, playing the harmonica, organizing people, wandering, hiding, imagining things into existence. They don't always get along perfectly, but they try. Often characters fear that the others don't like them or are angry with them. Some have downright suicidal fantasies. And yet sometimes other characters know their secrets and still accept them. And they never try to change each other, except in an effort to respect that other people shouldn't have to change.

' "So this is how it feels," he thought. "This is what sailing is like. The world turns upside down and you hang on for dear life to the edge of the yawning abyss, you freeze and feel ashamed and when it's too late you wish you'd never come. Let's hope and pray he doesn't notice how scared I am." '

It's in the fantasy genre, not my favorite, and the characters have silly, sometimes dangerous adventures, also not really my thing.

A lot of reviewers were disappointed in the book because there were no Moomins and they found it depressing. It turned out the author's mother had recently died, and that spilled over into the book. It feels to me like she was trying to teach us and herself how to go on without someone we love and how we can still benefit from the parts of them that we love.

Still, it turned out the first book in the series was at my local branch, so I read that one, too, Comet in Moominland (Moomins #1) (1946). Two friends go on an adventure and then run home to prepare for an upcoming disaster. Along the way, they meet and help other interesting characters.

A lot of irrational stuff drove me nutso, so that will be my last Moomin book. It's too bad: the author is also the illustrator and I just love her line drawings. I like holding the paperbacks in my hands and looking at the pictures. But they are not for me.

After the first full-length book was published, a theatrical version followed. There is a related comic strip. And TV series with puppets. And an animated series (Japan). And a museum exhibit. And a theme park. And a song collection. And décor for the Finnair planes. And a Finnish coin. It got popular throughout Europe, but not the US.

Finland

I wasn't able to find a book in my favorite children's series on different countries, but I did find Alicia Z. Klepeis's Finland (Country Profiles) (2023) for a younger audience.

I learned that Finland is "the land of a thousand lakes," though really they have around 188,000. And wolverines scavenge in the Arctic Circle. And reindeer graze on lichen and berries in the tundra (how do they find enough food?).

Finns are big coffee drinkers (20 lbs/year/person; 2 coffee breaks/day are required for workers). They have many kinds of porridge. Most city dwellers live in apartments; houses in the country are usually wooden. Many homes and even some employers have saunas. Finns invented saunas as well as ice skates, the rescue toboggan, the first wireless heart rate monitor, and "Angry Birds."

Rare Exports

I should also mention that a friend showed a bunch of us the movie "Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale" (2010). I barely remember it now; it's a suspense horror movie where something horrible has been unearthed, and the one to figure out the problem first is a kid who must get the adults to understand.

Summary - Ben H. Winter's The Last Policeman is about a young police detective (Henry Palace) in Concord, New Hampshire, investigating whether an apparent suicide is really a murder. And also doing a favor for his exasperating sister.

Characters - I really like Palace. He’ll make one or more observations about a person, then often tell you whether he likes the person. And normally he does, which often is better than my first impression and so is fun. And even when he doesn't like the person, he stays on task about figuring out the reality of whether this unlikable guy is the bad guy he's looking for. Some reviewers find him boring, and he probably is one of the more boring characters in the book, but I like characters who are decent and competent and self-aware.

Writing – I quite like some of the writing. Here's an example of a character description:

'Zell, it seems, was a kind of wizard at actuarial math, had a nearly supernatural ability to sort through long columns of demographic data and draw precise conclusions about risk and reward. He was also almost pathologically shy, is what it sounds like: walked around with his eyes on the floor, muttered "hello" and "I'm fine" when pressed, sat in the back of the room at staff meetings, looking at his hands.

"And, boy, when those meetings ended he would always be the first guy out the door," Gombers says. "You got the feeling he was a lot happier at his desk, doing his thing with his calculator and his statistics binders, than he was with the rest of us humans."

I'm scratching away [taking notes], nodding encouragingly and empathetically to keep Gompers talking, and I'm thinking how much I'm starting to like this guy, this Peter Anthony Zell. I like a guy who likes to get his work done.'

My favorite writing is when Palace tells waitress Ruth-Ann, “I’ve got a question for you.” And Ruth-Ann responds, “I have an answer. You go first.” (Will I be able to copy this in real life? I think in real life, people are more likely to say, "Can I ask you a question?")

Genres – It's a police procedural and a mystery, though the type where solving the mystery is not necessarily satisfying. Sometimes things are just sad or tragic all the way around. But (and this is a little bit of a spoiler, but so is the cover illustration) I'd mainly call the genre of this book pre-apocalyptic fiction. There is a very bad thing definitely happening in several months' time. This is the first book of a trilogy, and the bad thing happens a few minutes after the end of the last book.

I have to say it was hard to read this at the same time as I was reading books about pre-apocalyptic Hong Kong (Hong Kong from the Enchantment of the World series and Karen Cheung's memoir The Impossible City). Hong Kong was colonized back when China was probably the most advanced civilization in the world, so advanced that they considered Europeans to be barbarians. Europe wanted to trade with them, hoping to get silk, spices, etc., but the Chinese were not interested in the Europeans' wool, steel, etc. So the English smuggled in opium. As you might guess, trading silk and spices for opium is not great for your economy. China continued resisting, but somehow England kept defeating them at war and colonized Hong Kong, which eventually ended up in the position where it was to be released back to China in 99 years.

A lot can happen in 99 years. During these 99 years, mainland China changed into a Communist dictatorship that Hong Kongers did not want to be a part of. So the last of those 99 years could be called pre-apocalyptic. If you're one of those people who mourns people and places that no longer exist in your city, just know that trend is much worse in Hong Kong. (I also learned there was actually supposed to be a 50-year period after England left and before China took over, but China jumped the gun.)

It's also hard the read this during the current presidential administration. The scene in the book when the bad news comes out hit me hard in the gut. The closest thing I’ve experienced to that feeling was the two times Trump won an election. (Also pre-apocalyptic, but not as bad as in the book. And I like to think there’s still more hope for us than for Hong Kongers as well—we have a larger majority and are still technically a democratic republic.) I had nightmares.

In the book, there is no hope. I mean, brains are creative and so some people found hope, but no.

The publisher solicited essays, short stories, and poetry from their readers about what they would do if they'd found themselves in this pre-apocalyptic situation, but that page appears to no longer exist. As for me: I've no idea. I suspect I'm a head-in-the sand sort. Thinking about it more could yield ideas for how to deal with a mid-life crisis, I mean find meaning in life, but I'm not up for that right now.

I did not enjoy the other two books in the trilogy as much as this first one. The setting gets a lot darker in Countdown City (book 2). The new mystery is interesting, but Palace takes a weirdly long time to get started on it. And there's a deus-ex-machina moment, which I don't enjoy.

In World of Trouble (book 3), the plot revolves around the annoying sister, and Palace keeps ignoring warnings to stay away from various situations, which I didn't like. His obsessions are less cute when they’re 90% of his motivation instead of 50%. Virtually nothing happens in the first half of the book, where he ends up wandering around almost randomly (which turns out to let us see how two new-to-us families are dealing with reality, so that's interesting). But then finally he gets back to his investigation and it's an exciting plot-twist city.

There are books I love and want to read over and over, and there are books that stick with you, and sometimes they're not the same. This is mostly the latter, though I might re-read the first book a few times.

The Rebel Badge Club has monthly challenges, which are fun because everyone's working on them at the same time and so you can get plenty of ideas. The challenges don't all interest me, but March's Challenge for World Book Day sounded fun. It's not all about reading but touches on all kinds of aspects of books, which is fun.

There are 28 requirements of which at least six must be completed.

The first thing I learned is that I tend to lose motivation between when I learn about a new challenge and when I'm officially allowed to start it. I appreciate the lead time for planning, but in reality, instead of waiting a few days, I wait a couple of weeks, and then it feels like stress. In the future I'll start whenever I feel like, though I won't post anything until the first day.

Even with only 6 things required, I didn't finish by the end of the month, having done only 5. That's okay; the mantra around there is how badges are self-assessed, so you can do them however you like. And it's all about fun and personal growth, and there's more of that to be squeezed out of this challenge, so I'll keep going. But I'm posting now so I can link from the group's page during the proper month.

I'd already done many of the requirements in the past. Those aren't supposed to count. But there are also plenty of requirements for things I've never done. And there's room to do old things in new ways. And of course any excuse for more charity, even if it's just repeating something that's been done in the past, is good. It's the last day today, so I'll post now, but I plan to do a few extra things as well.

Here are my notes (crazy long, so behind a cut).

( Read more... )

I found Kathryn Stockett's The Help in a little free library. It's about three people in 1962 Jackson, Mississippi. One (Aibileen) is a Black maid who is really also a nanny, but she moves on whenever her young charge becomes racist. She's on her 17th white child. One (Minny) is a Black maid who keeps getting fired for speaking her mind. And one (Skeeter) is a white woman who wants to become a journalist.

I liked that it showed many different situations. We get lots of looks at situations where the maids have to just nod and say yes to all kinds of crazy things. We also see situations where the maids really like parts of their jobs (Aibileen loves the kids she works with; Minny loves cooking). We see a couple of very violent situations. And, fascinatingly, the idea that although white men will physically attack Blacks, the women are more subtle. They will get you blacklisted from jobs, from getting justice, from being allowed to keep living in the same house. So, horrifying and terrifying. And of course the Black maids have to deal with ordinary non-racism problems like abusive husbands, sickness, feet hurting.

There were a couple of fascinating situations showing how people dealt with their lack of power. One pregnant lady moved in with her mother to get her husband to do what she wanted. And in Skeeter's book, they include a secret about one of the most powerful white ladies as "insurance." That white lady would now be motivated to say that the book wasn't set in their city at all, and therefore that embarrassing thing that happened did not happen to her. Mostly people just kept quiet or gave the lying answers their questioners wanted to hear and did what they were told to the best of their ability, even if it was impossible and/or not appreciated.

Another interesting thing is that being too friendly to the maids was not helpful. For example, the maids were used to having a certain amount of privacy from being forced to eat in the kitchen instead of the dining room. A time when they didn't have to be "on" and could just relax and eat.

Reviewers either like the book or feel that it is whitewashed. We see the viewpoint of all three major characters, but in the end, it's still a book by a white lady trying to understand as best she can.

And the privilege. Skeeter gets advised to take any journalism job she can, and replaces a housekeeping hints writer. She knows nothing about housekeeping and has to get all her knowledge from Aibileen. Worse, she then steals an idea for a book from Aibileen's deceased son, to write about what it's really like being black in the south at that time. Even her editor warns her it would be crazy for any Black folks to talk to her about this topic. (To be fair, coming from a fellow white person, it might have more impact among whites than a more authentic book by a Black person, as we learned in history class about Uncle Tom's Cabin.) Of course writing this novel in 2009 is much less dangerous. Though it still makes me cry and want to shout "Never again!"

Was this Jim Crow garbage better than slavery? I'm going to say in most cases yes. These maids actually got to go home at night, which surprised me. They were more likely to be able to keep in touch with friends and family. But it wasn't nearly as much better as it should have been. And modern times aren't nearly as much better than the situations in this book as they should be.

Since it's a novel, things have to happen. Skeeter reminds me a bit of Mary in the movie "Saved!" who is one of the cool kids in high school and tries to be a good Christian, which gets her pregnant (it all makes perfect sense in the movie!) and then she's kicked out of the popular girl's clique. Skeeter is trying to be sneaky, but her liberal ideas leak through, and she is also kicked out of her clique of popular ladies.

Skeeter's book of interviews is published with changed names and with the author listed as anonymous, but it's not enough and then the novel gets more and more terrifying. But then the novel has a very fake happy ending--all three of our main characters end up managing okay. I seriously doubt that could have happened in real life. Some reviewers complained there was too much of a white savior theme going on, but Skeeter only took some small initiative in giving some people the credit (and money) they deserved.

I did like the author's afterward, especially the part where she has mixed feelings about growing up in Mississippi. When she tells people where she's from, some express condolences, and she'd say, "What do you know? It's beautiful down there." Or one time, "I informed him that Mississippi hosted the first lung transplant and the first heart transplant and that the basis of the United States legal system was developed at the University of Mississippi." And also that it's where William Faulkner, Eudora Welty, Tennessee Williams, Elvis Presley, B.B. King, Oprah Winfrey, Jim Henson, Faith Hill, James Earl Jones, and Craig Claiborne were from. But then if people responded that they'd heard it was beautiful down there, she'd inform them that "My hometown is number three in the nation for gang-related murders."

I've heard a movie was made of this. Looking at the trailers, it might be good. But it looks too happy. Too heartwarming. Also, Skeeter should be way taller and skinnier and her hair should never be in ringlets (except maybe in one scene) but a giant pile of frizz. Also it has the title of the book of interviews wrong--it's real title was much better, just Help.

Despite the title, Meik Wiking's Little Book of Hygge is really about three things: hygge, happiness, and Denmark. (Oh, I guess that shows up in the subtitle: Danish Secrets to Happy Living!)

Hygge (pronounced HOO-gah, like an old-timey car horn)

It's fun, if your language has a good word that's not perfectly translatable into another language, to write an entire book about what it means. Because although you can roughly translate hygge as coziness it really means a lot of things. For example:
* the art of creating intimacy
* coziness of the soul
* the absence of annoyance
* taking pleasure from the presence of soothing things
* cozy togetherness
* cocoa by candlelight
* hominess

The word comes from a Norwegian word meaning well-being, which might have come from the word for hug.

He made up a hygge manifesto to explain better. Hygge involves: 1) atmosphere, 2) presence (no phones), 3) pleasure (edible treats), 4) equality (we, not me; sharing tasks and conversation), 5) gratitude, 6) harmony (vs. competition and bragging), 7) comfort (relaxation), 8) truce (no drama), 9) togetherness, and 10) shelter (peace, security).

(I found a fun blog post on taking these principles to heart, Cup of Jo's I'm Swearing by the Hygge Manifesto. The comments are fun, too.)

And then, to make it even more clear, he goes into detail about what it means, how it's created, what it looks like, etc. So here are some elements of hygge:
* soft lighting - candles, fireplaces, campfires
* slow food - stews, jams, yeast breads
* hot drinks - coffee, hot chocolate, tea, mulled cider
* sweets - cake, Danishes [which are called Wienerbrød (literally Vienna bread) there] (Exception: cake man - make a human-shaped cake to resemble the birthday person, then cut off its head first while everyone screams in horror)
* clothing - casual, with a lot of black, scarves, and sweaters
* home - smooth and soft things like wood furniture, ceramics, fur, blankets, and cushions

Denmark

One reason hygge seems to mean so much more than just coziness is that it's actually a much more important concept in Denmark than in the US. Like, when I enjoy an activity, I might call it fun or interesting or just some general awesome. I would never call it cozy. When I'm looking for a restaurant, I care most about the food and prices, less about service and atmosphere, and when people talk about atmosphere, they mostly just say the restaurant has atmosphere or doesn't. Not whether the atmosphere is cozy, luxurious, elegant, or whatever.

In Denmark, they will deliberately plan events and go to places that are hyggelig (hygge-like). They regularly discuss how hygglig various situations are. And since the language is full of compound words, a bunch of them have "hygge" as part of the word.

And this is where things get a bit alien. So much so that he feels he has to give many examples of activities that are hygge, because they are generally not the kinds of activities we focus on in the US, especially grown-ups. Basically, they are small get-togethers where people socialize. I mean, I guess we try to do that in bars? Here are some of the activities:
* picnics
* movie nights (classics everyone's seen so you can chat)
* foreign country theme parties (movies, food, vocabulary post-it notes)
* weekends in a cabin (board games and grill)
* board game nights
* TV nights (watch a series with friends every week or 2 episodes every other week)
* croquet games
* little free libraries (especially in your apartment building)
* campfire cooking
* outdoor movies
* swap parties

Living in the present also means seasonal ideas:
* picking produce from farms, then coming home to can it
* ski trips (especially the part where you relax afterwards with friends)
* sledding (you can use a plastic bag if you don't have a sled)
* solstice picnics and elderflower cooking
* watching the Perseid meteor shower (and reading Greek mythology stories)
* foraging for mushrooms
* hunting and roasting chestnuts
* barbecues
* community gardening

My sister also points out that errand-hanging (taking a friend with you while you do errands--kind of like an urban form of barn-raising) is hyggelig.

Another idea is from the guy who wrote No Impact Man - he started having an open house once a week on the same weekday night where people could drop in and out whenever for home-cooked food (cabbage soup in the winter, because he was trying to buy only locally-produced food), play charades, and just hang out.

Two examples the author gives are sort of like potlucks, but instead of bringing things that are already cooked, you just bring the ingredients and everyone helps each other. I can't even imagine coordinating with several people cooking several dishes--each person in charge of a different one--in one kitchen.
* soup cook-off - Everyone brings ingredients for soup for one, you work together to make them, everyone tastes everything, and you also have bread.
* pantry party - Everyone brings ingredients for a jarred good such as jam, relish, or stock, you work together to make them, and each person leaves with 1 jar of each.

Here's the closest I've come to that:
* potlucks - You cook your own dish at home and bring it already prepared or mostly prepared.
* chili cook-offs, pie contests - This workplace activity let everyone taste all the chilis or pies but again involved making the food at home.
* cookie exchanges - This workplace activity let you sign up to make several dozen of one kind of cookie at home, then bring them to work and go home with multiple varieties. But the cooking was not together.
* My sister had a party where we made multiple flavors of hamentaschen (filled cookies). We all helped roll out the dough and form the cookies, and maybe some guests brought their own filling, but I think only one or two people made the dough(s) and my sister had to be in charge of most of it, so it still wasn't quite the same.

And both of those also involved a lot of people. The most hyggelig activities usually involve very small groups of people. So it's perfect for introverts!

I also learned that Danish workplaces have hygge with plants, couches, office gardens, pets, and potluck Fridays.

And I learned or was reminded about a few other things about Denmark: Apparently they are into bicycling like the Dutch. Hans Christian Anderson is from there, and so are Lego and Danish furniture design.

Happiness

The author is actually the CEO of the Happiness Research Institute in Copenhagen, so of course he wants to talk about happiness. Denmark regularly makes the top of various happiness lists, and he's biased to think that hygge is a big part of raising Denmark's happiness above that of other Nordic countries, though he admits that many things help with happiness.

He says everyday happiness has three dimensions: 1) life satisfaction (compared to the best and worst possible life you could lead, where do you stand?), 2) emotions (are they mostly positive or negative?), and 3) sense of purpose.

'Several factors influence why some people and countries are happier than others - genetics, our relationships, health, income, job, sense of purpose and freedom.' The welfare state 'reduces uncertainty, worries, and stress.' Specifically, he supports Denmark's 'Universal and free health care, free university education, and relatively generous unemployment benefits.'

'Furthermore there is a high level of trust in Denmark (notice all the strollers parked outside cafes when the parents are inside, drinking coffee). There is a high level of freedom (Danes report really high levels in terms of feeling in control over their lives), of wealth and good governance, and a well-functioning civil society,' just like other Nordic countries.

Social support is also important (do you have someone you can rely on in times of need?). A good work-life balance leaves you time for family and friends. The language and culture also support prioritizing time with family and friends. Also happiness and good relationships are a feedback loop--each helps the other.

Savoring and gratitude are important. Gratefulness improves happiness and also makes people 'more helpful and forgiving and less materialistic.' Even just writing in a gratitude journal once a week can increase alertness and enthusiasm, improve sleep and health, and help one be 'more mindful of situations where they could be helpful,' and more resilient (recover more quickly).

Hygge is all about savoring simple pleasures, planning for them, and later reminiscing about them. One study showed 'nostalgia produces positive feelings, reinforces old memories and sense of being loved, and boosts self-esteem.'

Take-Aways

What do you think? First, I think that in Austin in the summer, hygge is going to look a bit different than in Denmark in the dead of winter. You're going to want cold foods and drinks and ceiling fans (or other sources of breezes), though comfortable clothes are still good, and avoiding plastic/vinyl furniture is still good.

I do like the idea of hygge activities. Currently I have a weekly online craft night and an every-other-week VR golf game with friends that qualifies, though if they were in-person that would have an extra element of hygge. I also go to book clubs and a craft meeting at the library, but those are a bit large for ideal hyygelig. It's possible to do hygge alone, and I do plenty of that--reading books, doing projects, playing video games, eating comfort food.

I finally bought a copy of Douglas Adams's Mostly Harmless, the fifth (and final) book in his Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy trilogy. My short, Adams-style review: Pretty fun. Until it wasn't.

I already had the other four books, so this completes my set. I got a volume with the first three books in it back in 1985 as a gift from one of the teachers in one of the junior high gifted-and-talented programs for which I was a teacher's aide. She got it signed by several of the students in her main gifted-and-talented class who loved the book and were always talking about it. Hanging out with those students were a fun way to learn about the book. And just fun in general.

Mrs. Bambino: "What have I been emphasizing all year?"
John: "Shut up, John."

(That was another point for John--Mrs. Bambino kept track of good comebacks on the chalkboard.)

Anyway, I enjoyed reading the book, full of interesting thoughts and witty ways of saying things, though with way too much coincidence, but was surprised by the not-happy ending, though there were hints all along. Because of that ending, some reviewers get very angry and say to stop at the previous book.

In other news, I planted the two bits of basil I'd cut before the most recent near-freeze and propagated in a glass of water. Last time I tried this, the soil was too dry and wouldn't absorb the water very well and the plants died. This time I started watering the soil two days before I planted. The plants still wilted a bit, so I've been watering daily for a few days. One friend said the only time he's been able to get basil to grow was when he was watering it daily, but the main basil plant survives while getting watered only once or twice a week. Then I remembered that plants may need more help while getting established, and these plants have gotten used to being in a cup of water.

We also went to Aldi for affordable turkey. In the past, the cashier just tossed your purchases in your cart and you had to wheel it over to a counter to sack your own groceries. Since we last went to Aldi, they seem to have switched to self-checking (though they still have regular registers and that counter).

I have been enjoying several cheesy and chocolaty purchases from there (not to mention the turkey). They have several kinds of chocolate that are Rainforest certified (they used to use UTZ, which has since merged with the Rainforest Alliance).

I'm using our public library's Keep Austin Reading challenge as an excuse to finally read books I've been wanting to read for a while, but haven't for some reason.

Each month, there is a different topic. I already have ideas for seven of them! Below, I list the topics and the ideas I have. For the topics where I don't have ideas, do you have a recommendation? (Actually, I will happily hear recommendations from any category listed or any other category.) I'd also like to hear why you recommend it, but that is optional.

I don't have a favorite genre. I prefer books with decent characters and/or good writing, but also sometimes other excellent books. In this year's book categories, it looks like something educational would generally be appropriate. I prefer no torture, but alas.

January - Literary Award Month - Read a literary award nominated book. (It's not too late--we can read the books at any time during 2023.)
* I'm thinking of Adrian Tchaikovsky's Children of Time (Arthur C. Clarke Award for best science fiction of the year in August 2016). It was recently recommended and has sociology and biology themes (humans meet intelligent alien spiders).

February - Black History Month - Read a book written by a Black author.
* Frederick Douglass's Narrative of the life of Frederick Douglass: An American Slave: Written by Himself - I've already read this one--I'd heard good things about it. Since he was under several different masters, you get several views of slavery from one book, plus the author was decent, honest, smart, brave, and wise.
* I've also been wanting to learn more about Harriet Tubman, one of my two childhood heros (along with Martin Luther King). Yes, I do know more information could be disillusioning. In fact, Frederick Douglass didn't like how the Underground Railroad was actually quite well-known and not really underground at all.

March - Women's History Month - Read a book written by a female-identifying author.
* Stacey Abram's Our Time is Now - I've been wanting to read this book on how to protect voting rights. I've already read this book and I do like it, though it's a little repetitive. It's a tiny bit memoir, which is fascinating, a lot history, and a lot activism. I plan to publish a review of this in the future.
* I might also want to look into something about the history of women's rights in the US - like when we were allowed to own property and write checks.

April - El Día de los niños(as)/El día de los libros - Read a book in Spanish or a bilingual book.
* I've been wanting to try to read Roald Dahl's Charlie y la Fabrica de Chocolate again. I think it might not be crazy hard for me anymore.
* Of course, ideally I'd choose a book originally written in Spanish, but I have not enjoyed (translations of) any of the Spanish-speaking writers I've tried so far. A book has to be really good to be worth looking up all those words, and I have good memories from last time I tried this book.

May - Asian Pacific American Heritage Month - Read a book written by an AAPI author.

June - Pride Month - Read a book written by an LGBTQIA+ author.

July - Disability Pride Month - Read a book written by an author with a disability or neurodiversity.

August - Audiobook Month - Listen to an audio book using the library's online audiobook collection or audiobook CD collection.
* One of Kwei Quartey's Inspector Darko books (set in Ghana). I recently read somewhere that hearing the book is very nice for getting to know how things are pronounced and getting a better feel for the flow of language than just reading the print and decided I wanted to do that.

September - Banned Books Week - Read a banned book.
* Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale (#37 on the American Library Association's list of the "100 Most Frequently Challenged Books of 1990–2000") - I feel like this is a part of modern culture I should experience. I've already read 1984 and Fahrenheit 451.

October - Hispanic Heritage Month - Read a book written by a Hispanic/Latinx author.

November - National Native American Heritage Month - Read a book written by a Native American author.

December - Graphic Novel Month - Read a comic or graphic novel.
* Kōhei Horikoshi's My Hero Academia - One of my nieces absolutely loves these books.

Decades ago I went to a conference in Albuquerque that was held on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. So I took the whole week off, flew in early, rented a car, and drove all around northwestern New Mexico, checking out the sites.

There was one place, advertised on many billboards (that should have been a sign, I mean a figurative sign), that sounded really interesting. It was called volcano and ice cave or something. Eh, it was mildly interesting. The volcano looked like a human-sized ant mound. The ice cave was a cave with a frozen pond in it.

Then there was another place I was going to stop at only because it was on my route, even though it sounded kind of boring: El Morro, a rock famous for its graffiti. But it was pretty cool. The land around the rock kept eroding, so the vertical dimension is like a timeline. The eye-level graffiti is kind of boring, but above that is a signature from one of the guys from the Army's camel experiment portrayed in the movie "Hawmps!" that my mom liked. Above that is fancy Spanish script from the 1600s. And above that are petroglyphs.

So it's hard to know ahead of time which things are going to be the most fun.

I just had a similar experience while decluttering books. I had thought re-reading Edgar Allen Poe's "Eight Tales of Terror" would be fun and bring me back to my early grad school years when, in certain situations, it was exciting for my friends to find excuses to use the word "putrescence" or the phrase "yellow ichor." Well, those words were not in this particular collection. And in fact, getting into the sixth story, I found myself thinking, "wow, what a drama queen!" I did used to like swimming in the creepiness. And I do like that he can do terror without gore. But this book is not my thing so I will not be keeping it.

I also pulled out a paperback called "The Mathematician's Delight" from 1943. Clearly I found this as a used book back when I thought I was going to be a math teacher some day. No longer relevant. But I opened it and started reading it anyway, just to make sure. And now I'm writing a book review of it!

This is the second book I have from the 1940s where they actually know how to teach. He talked about how many people hate and fear math, and mostly that's due to bad teaching. He opposes "parrot learning," comparing it to teaching a deaf person to play the piano. Maybe they can learn, but they'll get no fun out of it at all.

He said there were "imitation courses" in all kinds of subjects, not just math (where people may be taught to memorize formulas without understanding them). 'One can learn imitation history--kings and dates, but not the slightest idea of the motives behind it all; imitation literature--stacks of notes on Shakespeare's phrases, and a complete destruction of the power to enjoy Shakespeare.' Sounds all-too-familiar! The poor guy actually thought we would get better at teaching.

I kept the book mostly for his ideas on how people should go about learning in general. One strategy he recommends is having specific goals for your learning. "Two students of law once provided a good illustration: one learnt by heart long lists of clauses; the other imagined himself to be a farmer, with wife and children, and he related everything to this farm. If he had to draw up a will, he would say, 'I must not forget to provide for Minnie's education, and something will have to be arranged about that mortgage.' One moved in a world of half-meaningless words; the other lived in the world of real things.'

Even better: 'If you want to remember a subject and enjoy it, you must somehow find a way of linking it up with something in which you are really interested. It is very unlikely that you will find much entertainment in text-books. If you read only the text-books, you will find the subject dull. Text-books are written for people who already possess a strong desire to study mathematics: they are not written to create such a desire. Do not begin by reading the subject: begin by reading round the subject--books about real life, which somehow bring in the subject, which show how the subject came to be needed.' He even thinks reading about the history of mathematics, including biographies of the discoverers, will give you good insights into what's going on.

Strangely, he admits that it's possible for calculus that you might have no interest in any of the topics for which calculus is helpful, in which case you shouldn't worry about learning it. (He does not admit any such thing for any other normal math topic, including logarithms and trigonometry, though.)

I remember deciding something similar about college courses versus high school courses--they no longer try to be interesting. But my conclusion was that you were supposed to be able to just be mature and suck it up! (Wrong answer! Thank you for playing!) Although I did start looking at the recommended reading at the ends of chapters, and now during my books-from-other-countries project, I will usually follow up with some online research of some aspect of the book that interested me.

Another strategy he recommends is just messing around with things, trying to see patterns yourself. And he gives lots of exercises to help you do this efficiently for math topics.

But first, "It is essential, if you are trying to overcome your dread of a subject, to realize what is your first objective. Your first job is not to learn any particular result. It is to get rid of fear. You must go back a certain way, and start with work which you are absolutely sure you can do. In learning a foreign language, for instance, it is helpful to get a book written in that language for children just learning to read. However badly you have been taught, you will amost certainly be able to read it. This is your first victory--you have read a book genuinely written for the use of someone speaking a foreign language.'

Okay, last time I checked, I couldn't actually read kids' books because of the imperative, etc. but I get his point. He continues that every time you come to something you don't understand, go back to the prerequisite skills.

I'm not going to say I learned a lot of math reading the book. I already knew most of it, and my eyes glazed at most of the parts I didn't know. He did get me with a math puzzle, though. Awesome!

Then, terrifyingly, he says there are some subjects 'on which everybody disagrees. These are the subjects which do not depend on evidence at all--what you like, what you think ought to be done, the kind of person you admire, the political party you vote for; these are things for which you yourself take responsibility, they show what sort of person you are. You may be ready to fight to secure the type of world you think best; indeed, you should be. But you do not change your basic ideas of what is desirable as the result of argument and evidence.'

No! I don't want politics to not be based on rationality! But research supports him in general. (It's about emotion; when people hear things that disprove their beliefs, they discount them somehow and even end up even more entrenched in their beliefs.) Which makes me even angrier when people politicize things, because it pulls those things into the land of emotion.

(I'm still processing that idea. I don't like it. It's definitely not true for me. Or at least not totally true. I've changed several of my political opinions after learning more fects. [For example I changed from pro-life to pro-choice and, in the other direction, I became pro-concealed-carry (in the US, anyway).])

Finally, I even enjoyed the mini-biography of author, W.W. Sawyer, on the back of the book. In college he specialized in quantum theory and relativity. Then he swerved into researching applications of math to industry and strategies for teaching math to "industrial students." Then he taught college math in the Gold Coast (now called Ghana) to help Africans in their quest "master modern knowledge and achieve self government." Several years before Ghana gained independence! Then he moved to New Zealand to help them reduce their shortage of math teachers by organizing student groups sort of like Dead Poets Societies but about math. And during all this, he managed to get a wife and a kid. And he looks like a total dork. (He's in a respectable suit and tie, with respectably short hair--that will not do what it's told.)

In other silliness, apparently children do not have gender. They are referred to as "it/its."

So it turns out I'll be keeping that book.

Without my usual sources, I still read more things about and set in other countries than I would have without this goal. Below are the books I read and movies I watched (the ones I plan to own are asterisked) plus my favorite articles and videos.


Africa

Nigeria
* fiction - Children of Blood and Bone - Three teenagers in an epic fight between those who want to bring back magic and those who want to kill it forever. The magic is fun, but there's too much torture, fantasy, and stupidity for my taste.

Tanzania
* fiction - Hard Rain - Guy who doesn't believe in love falls for a totally hot woman with a mysterious past. Has she killed a bunch of exes? Is he in danger? Can he trust her yet? And somehow she falls for him, magically "knowing" he is decent when he is always angry with her for being late, lying, and refusing to tell him things that she feels are none of his business. The mystery sucked me in; the ending made me angry--basically one character disappears so that this can be the first story in a series.


Americas

Bolivia
* nonfiction - Bolivia in Pictures - A landlocked country twice as big as Texas, Bolivia borders Lake Titicaca and its ancient ruins, and has llamas and all kinds of minerals, but government is by coup.
* article - "In World's Highest Capital, Breathing is Main Challenge" (1992)

Canada
* movie - "Disappearance at Clifton Hill" - Seven year old witnesses a kidnapping near the Canadian side of Niagara Falls where she lived. As an adult, she returns in order to deal with the sale of the hotel of her recently deceased mother, but she also investigates the disappearance. It's hard to keep track of what's happening and what's real. "The haunted houses aren't really haunted. The fun houses aren't really fun."

Mexico
* fiction - Murmur of Bees - Man describes life in Mexico during the Mexican Revolution and Spanish flu epidemic, which they survived partly because of his brother who could talk to bees and see some of the future. I kind of love it until the terrible thing happens and it's nothing but mourning, grudge holding, and not telling me what happened for eighty years.


Asia

Bhutan
* article - "Bhutan PM Asks All Citizens to Adopt a Stray Dog or Plant a Tree for King’s Birthday"

China
* fiction - The Last Chinese Chef* - A widow is recovering from her grief by moving to ever tinier homes. A Chinese American opens a traditional Chinese restaurant in China. Fascinating look at Chinese food, and many of the characters are likeable, but I don't quite love the ending.
* video - "Can China go net-zero? Two charts show just how ambitious Xi Jinping’s goal is"
* article - "Tibetan altitude gene came from extinct human species"

Israel
* movie - "The Band's Visit" - An Egyptian band arrives in Israel for a performance at the new Arabic cultural center, but they end up in Beit Hatikva instead of Petah Tiqva (Arabic has no "p" sound), where, according to one character, there is no Arabic culture, no Israeli culture, no culture. Some humor, but also very slow paced and lonely, and all the marriages have gone bad. It's trying to be arty--it looks like people are set up for art photos.

Japan
* fiction - Go* - A Japanese boy with North Korean citizenship finds love and prejudice. Shocking but fascinating.
* fiction - Convenience Store Woman - A woman with a mental disorder tries to find a place in society and learns to love the convenience store where she works. Being set in Japan is not what feels alien about this setting. It's the part about how people have all these expectations and demands and expect you to fit into various molds; the same molds that humans have had since caveman times.

Russia
* fiction - A Gentleman in Moscow* - Set during the Russian Revolution, there's a lot of depressing stuff, but the protagonist is super charming, and even when there's no one there to talk to, he talks anyway, to the cat, to the bird, to himself, and he's okay. This book also made me cry about wine (which I don't care about at all in real life).


Europe

Belarus
* article - "Belarus poll workers describe fraud in Aug. 9 election"

Denmark
* movie - "Checkered Ninja" - Doll made in sweatshop comes to life and with his owner seeks revenge on the guy who killed his maker. Disturbing lessons, but great contraption built in preparation for a fight.
* article - "Denmark apologizes to children taken from Greenland in a 1950s social experiment"

Germany
* movie - "Jojo Rabbit" - Ten-year-old in Nazi Germany has Hitler as an imaginary friend to help him get through life. He also has a real life best friend. And, it turns out, a Jew in the attic. There were many creative, fun, and touching scenes, but of course many horrors. It still feels too soon.

Greece
* fiction - This Rough Magic (also partly set in Albania) - Actress visits her sister on a Greek island (Corfu, off the coast at the Greek/Albanian border, theorized to be the setting of "The Tempest") to recover from the failure of her first play. Mystery, adventure, dolphin stories, and too much happening all at once in the last few pages.
* fiction - The Moon-Spinners - Gal arrives in vacation spot in Crete one day early. So before checking into the hotel, where she's not expected, she goes for a little walk and ends up embroiled in a plot to kill murder witnesses. Too much trickery on who's dead and who isn't, and there is a very heroic character that our protagonist abuses, endangers, and doesn't even apologize to or anything.

Norway
* fiction - Bear Island - A doctor takes a converted trawler toward Bear Island in the Arctic with filmmakers, and then characters are dying left and right. Some of the writing is insightful and some is fun, but mostly we have a lot of characters and no clue what's going on.

Sweden
* nonfiction - No One Is Too Small To Make a Difference - A collection of Greta Thunburg's speeches against the climate crisis. Too repetitive for fun reading unless you read only one speech a day, but a beautiful, well-made, if poorly named book. (It should be called House on Fire! or something.)
* fiction - Samurai Summer - A boy in a terrible summer camp for poor people tries to become a samurai and build a castle. It's sad and slow for a while, but then gets exciting.

United Kingdom, England
* nonfiction - Outposts: Journeys to the surviving relics of the British Empire - The author looked up how much of the British Empire remained and decided to visit all these outposts. He sort of got it that colonialism is sucky but sort of also liked the idea of the sun never setting on the British Empire. I forgot that I don't generally like travelogues.


Oceana

Australia
* nonfiction - Uluru: Australia's Aboriginal Heart - Find out about the biggest rock in the world. It's red sandstone, it's in the middle of the desert in Australia, and it's part of a National Park managed by the local Aborigines who find it sacred and won't quite let you do everything you want or quite tell you all their stories.

Tonga
* article - "The Real Lord of the Flies: What Happened When Six Boys Were Shipwrecked for 15 Months"

I also read a couple of books set in multiple countries:
* nonfiction - Rascals in Paradise (Easter Island, Chile; Taiwan, China; Tahiti, France; Papua New Guinea; Philippines; Tonga) - a collection of true-life stories of people who looked for paradise in the South Seas. A lot of them are scumbags, wanting to unite many of the islands so they can rule them all.
* fiction - QB VII (Czech Republic; Malaysia; Poland; England, UK) - Guy escapes false accusations of criminal Nazi behavior in Malaysia, but then goes back anyway, and the narrator lied or cheated and then we have to read about a whole bunch of Nazi horrors.

Quote of the Day - "I am full up on sordid truths right now." - me

Marie Kondo's tidying method is getting so popular that people are starting to hate it. I finally read the (first) book last year, and although I don't think it's the final word in all things tidying, I do quite like many of the ideas. My favorite part of the decluttering step is the controversial notion of keeping only those things that "spark joy."

This is nothing short of revolutionary, because everything else I've ever heard focuses on whether you are actually using something. If you haven't used something in X amount of time, then get rid of it. But with the KonMarie method you get to keep anything you want, no matter how stupid, even if you never use it, just because you love it.

For me, what comes to mind is my Girl Scout badge vest. I do actually use it as part of a Halloween costume sometimes, but really, I just like looking at it.

I read a blog where someone explained that her can opener did not spark joy, but she was keeping it anyway. One of her commenters said that after a move she had lost her can opener and spent a very long time working to get a can open anyway. I have personal experience opening a can with a knife. So for people like us, can openers do spark joy. So one problem is that when you take something for granted, it doesn't spark joy in you; it's just ho hum.

Kondo does mention keeping things that are just useful. Once. But I propose broadening your perspective. Imagining your life without the item can help you find the joy.

And sometimes the item itself isn't what sparks joy, but rather something else associated with the item. For example, a second-favorite pair of jeans that I rarely wear because I will always choose my favorite jeans instead, still sparks joy for me because I like a low-stress life. A back-up pair means that I always have a pair available to me even if I don't keep up with the laundry, even if I want to wear jeans many days in a row, and even if my favorite jeans wear out or otherwise get destroyed. I have the luxury to take my time in catching up on laundry or shopping for another pair. Of course, you could be keeping things as spares that in fact you would never use even if your primary item broke or was lost, so that's different.

For another example, I often have an ordinary rather than exciting version of something, but it's good for what I use it for, and I like the things I use it for and I like that I already own one that works. So being able to keep certain things together and handy sparks joy even if my purse doesn't.

And despite what some people say, she does not go for one-fits-all solutions. For example, Kondo discusses old clothes in a size that you used to be and hope to one day be again. Most advice says to dump all these clothes: you'll probably never fit in them anyway, even if you do get back to the same size you'll probably be a different shape, plus those clothes will all be out of style by then anyway. Kondo adds that if owning these clothes helps encourage you to exercise and eat right, that's good. But if they spark guilt or shame, dump them.

Similarly, my sister has been going through what she calls "aspirational cookbooks." Again, if it's exciting to think of trying the recipes, she's keeping them, but if they just make her feel inferior, she's getting rid of them.

A related and even more controversial issue is thanking the items that you are letting go of. I think this makes more sense to people who practice Shinto and others who feel that inanimate objects have some kind of life force. I am not one of those people. (To the point that "Toy Story" squicks me out. Even "Coco." I like not feeling responsible for all those other possible life forces.) But I am used to translating religious terms into language that makes sense to me, and I can see this as a way to help you develop your decision-making skills. That's because Kondo encourages you to thank the item for a specific reason. Here are some reasons to be thankful for an item that no longer sparks joy:
* It was a symbol of caring from the person who gave it to me.
* It was great back when I first got it, and I enjoyed it for a while back then.
* It was fun to fantasize about using this for a while.
* I enjoyed being able to bring it home from the store.
* It helped me learn that I don't like this style/color/etc.
Plus research has shown that gratefulness helps you be happy and healthy.