Toys Are More Than Just Toys

Growing up, we all had a certain toy that we were attached to; a toy that would end any tantrums we threw or make family visits bearable, but in the end it was just a toy, right?
It was just plastic molded into different shapes topped with some sirens or clothes and "hair" to make it more realistic. What's not realistic, however, is how we claim that "toys are just toys". We, as a society, fail to acknowledge and solve that toys instill gender roles in kids' perspectives from a young age. Toys impact the way kids perceive the opposite gender and their own too, watch this for an example. Toys, however, are not to blame entirely; the fault lies in society's expectations, toys are merely just another device that these sexist expectations are transmitted in our lives.
The patriarchal perception of women is amplified through toys that focus on girls' appearances and ability to perform house chores. Most of the toys are either dress-up - that come with a house to manage of course- or baby dolls; we condition girls from a young age to take care of babies as if it is their only potential. In Our Barbies, Ourselves, Prager shows how women are also overly sexualized in kids' toys too, "Why, I wondered, was Barbie designed with such obvious sexual equipment and Ken not?". Girls are taught to care more about how they look than their capabilities.

Boys also experience a similar problem: most "boy" toys aim at macho activities. Toys seem to encourage the violent and overly masculine side of boys; most of them are either superheros or men that have a job. This puts pressure on boys to become the "head of the household" so to speak. These gender roles make it hard for kids to enjoy their childhood and future, this girl understands it. To solve this problem, we must fix our society by breaking those gender roles stereotypes. We should encourage both girls and boys to inspire and become anything they want, be it an astronaut or a chef. Toy manufacturing companies can help with this by creating toys that encourage creativity and inspire children instead of confining them to gender roles. so the next time you see a kid, encourage them to become whatever they want to be !

8 Things You Learn From a War

Whether you've personally endured a war or have/had any loved ones in a war, new customs emerge in your life.
1) Whatever war you're enduring or have endured becomes a time reference in your conversations. In Maus, the Holocaust cuts Vladek's life into 2 parts- before and after the war. It's as if the war restarted his life all over again. Whenever we need to describe objects or events in my family, the Syrian Civil War somehow becomes a referencing point. A very typical conversation can go like this: " Hey mom do you remember that shirt I got?" "Which one?" " The one I bought before the war" or even better "Zaina is celebrating her wedding anniversary today" "How long have they been married for?" "They married before the war" "Dang that's a long time".

2) You figure out who your true friends are during troubling times. In case you were wondering, someone  getting you a pumpkin spice latte does not count as saving your life. Anja and Vladek realize the true value of a friend after they are turned down by Richieu's governess even though she offered help previously, " You'll bring trouble! go away! quickly" (136). If after a war, your religion, race, and political opinions don't scare off your friends, then you got yourself some keepers.

A Syrian Refugee carried his injured friend on a journey across Europe

3) Your daily conversations revolve around the availability and prices of food. At dinner, Vladek and Anja are discussing the food rations that are available with their family, "Each of us gets a coupon for 8 ounces of bread a day..." (75). In Syria, resources have been low; so every phone call, Whatsapp message, or Facebook post with my family back in Syria ended up with bananas. You might ask, why bananas? Perhaps because last summer, 2 pounds of bananas cost about $22. So getting the update of the prices of goods becomes a part of your daily routine.

4) You realize that you take your life for granted and that you should start living life to the fullest. 

Art has an easy life compared to the atrocities his father had to experience in his life; he never has to think twice about the luxuries he enjoys because they were never taken away from him. You start to realize how much you take for granted; failing a test isn't the end of the world. Heck if refugees have the will and effort to continue to seek for education, then why I am complaining about my school? That also pushes you to enjoy life more because you never know when it might be taken away from you.

Makeshift school in a refugee camp

5) You feel guilty. You feel guilty for surviving. You feel guilty for not going through it- like Art does. You feel guilty for abandoning your family. You feel guilty for abandoning the war. You feel guilty for fighting. You feel guilty for not fighting. You feel guilty about everything and anything and you don't know what to do about it.

6) You understand the sadness when families are broken apart. Vladek and Anja not only had to be separated from each other, they had to lose their son too, and Vladek still has to deal with that trauma. The Syrian Jack and Rose:

“My husband and I sold everything we had to afford the journey. We worked 15 hours a day in Turkey until we had enough money to leave. The smuggler put 152 of us on a boat. Once we saw the boat, many of us wanted to go back, but he told us that anyone who turned back would not get a refund. We had no choice. Both the lower compartment and the deck were filled with people. Waves began to come into the boat so the captain told everyone to throw their baggage into the sea. In the ocean we hit a rock, but the captain told us not to worry. Water began to come into the boat, but again he told us not to worry. We were in the lower compartment and it began to fill with water. It was too tight to move. Everyone began to scream. We were the last ones to get out alive. My husband pulled me out of the window. In the ocean, he took off his life jacket and gave it to a woman. We swam for as long as possible. After several hours he told me he that he was too tired to swim and that he was going to float on his back and rest. It was so dark we could not see. The waves were high. I could hear him calling me but he got further and further away. Eventually a boat found me. They never found my husband.” (Kos, Greece)  ( Humans of New York)

7) You start to understand how evil the world can be. But even with that, the extent of evilness in this world surprised you every time. Every news article makes you question humanity, how can humans be that bad to each other? 

“Before leaving for Europe, I went back to Syria to see my family once more. I slept in my uncle’s barn the entire time I was there, because every day the police were knocking on my father’s door. Eventually my father told me: ‘If you stay any longer, they will find you and they will kill you.’ So I contacted a smuggler and made my way to Istanbul. I was just about to leave for Europe when I received a call from my sister. She told me that my father had been very badly beaten by police, and unless I sent 5,000 Euro for an operation, he would die. That was my money to get to Europe. But what could I do? I had no choice. Then two weeks later she called with even worse news. My brother had been killed by ISIS while he was working in an oil field. They found our address on his ID card, and they sent his head to our house, with a message: ‘Kurdish people aren’t Muslims.’ My youngest sister found my brother’s head. This was one year ago. She has not spoken a single word since.” (Kos, Greece) ( Humans of New York)\

8) .... But it still makes you believe in the good of people. If you're on the fence about that, watch this

“After one month, I arrived in Austria. The first day I was there, I walked into a bakery and met a man named Fritz Hummel. He told me that forty years ago he had visited Syria and he’d been treated well. So he gave me clothes, food, everything. He became like a father to me. He took me to the Rotary Club and introduced me to the entire group. He told them my story and asked: ‘How can we help him?’ I found a church, and they gave me a place to live. Right away I committed myself to learning the language. I practiced German for 17 hours a day. I read children’s stories all day long. I watched television. I tried to meet as many Austrians as possible. After seven months, it was time to meet with a judge to determine my status. I could speak so well at this point, that I asked the judge if we could conduct the interview in German. He couldn’t believe it. He was so impressed that I’d already learned German, that he interviewed me for only ten minutes. Then he pointed at my Syrian ID card and said: ‘Muhammad, you will never need this again. You are now an Austrian!’” (Kos, Greece)

Dealing With the Past

A part of what makes us is in the past, and not just in our pasts, but in our parents's and grandparent's pasts too. All the experiences that our parents and grandparents went through play a part in shaping our perspective of the world. We often spend most of our lives trying to understand the experiences that influenced them and tracing their effect on us. Art Spiegelman uses Maus as a way to understand his father's past and to deal with his guilt. Vladek makes Art feel guilty for not experiencing the Holocaust, like he did. On page 51( volume I), Vladek hammers Art for growing up privileged and having delicate hands because he never did manual labor, "LIKE YOU, ARTIE, MY HANDS WERE ALWAYS VERY DELICATE". It is as if Maus is Spiegelman's way of "repaying" his dad for not witnessing the holocaust by sharing Vladek's story with the world. On page 16 ( volume II),  Art admits to the guilt he feels for not experiencing the same trauma his parents did, " I GUESS IT'S SOME KIND OF GUILT ABOUT HAVING HAD AN EASIER LIFE THAN THEY DID". Spiegelman is obviously curious about his father's past and he wants to understand it so he can better understand his father, On page 12 (volume I), Spiegelman emphasizes his desire to hear the story by italicizing the subject I, "I WANT TO HEAR IT". Whether it's our parents' first love or first job, we all want to know more about what shaped our parents' lives, but sometimes there is a barrier we can not overcome. In Jim Powell's book Postmodernism, he discusses, [... Thus, any art attempting to to represent the Holocaust should continue to haunt us with its inability to represent the unrepresentable, to say the unsayable]. The world tries to depict the horrors of the Holocaust in books, movies, and art; however, it was such an atrocity that we will never be able to truly fathom what it was. While Spiegelman works to abridge the gap by presenting Vladek's life, he knows that there are certain things he will never be able to represent, "THERE'S SO MUCH I'LL NEVER BE ABLE TO UNDERSTAND OR VISUALIZE" ( page 16, II). While my grandpa was visiting us last weekend, I had my phone recording while he was telling me the story of how his family was kicked out of Palestine. I did this because I wanted to know more about my grandpa's childhood and so know I understand that the tough circumstances my grandpa went through is what makes him seem tough on the outside. Being aware of the past helps us understand our present and predict our futures/
Watch this for an interesting study.

The Power of Colors

Most of us have come across articles ( like this one) that illustrate the different flower colors, their meanings, and the appropriate flower color to buy for a certain occasion or person. Colors provoke certain emotions because we associate them with objects and events we have experienced before. Anything with a hint of yellow instantly reminds me of the old smiley yellow face (way before emojis existed) that my kindergarten teacher would stamp on my homework ; so for me, yellow is synonymous with happiness. The tranquil consistent rhythm of the waves motions a calmness in me whenever blue crosses my eyes. Kingston uses the power of colors to portray the atmosphere of the setting and characters; since each reader associates color to different things, they will connect more personally to the story. The imagery Kingston employs in the White Tiger such as "the mountains and the pines turned into blue oxen" and "blue dogs" associates these settings to what the reader might associate with blue. For example, I think of the mountains she describes as being really calm, inclusive, and almost boring. The characters seem almost somber and lonely when she depicts them as "blue people". When Kingston is experiencing hunger, she uses the color gold to show how her reality is becoming distorted,  "gold bells" "made of gold" " clothes are golden". Gold is such a powerful color that it immediately distorts your vision when you look at it. The shimmering and sparkle impacts your perception the same way Kingston's vision is changed by her hunger. The color red depicts Kingston's character as being both passionate and powerful ; "the umbilical cord flew with the red flag", giving birth shows her gentler motherhood side while being ready to fight shows her strength - mental and physical- and warrior-like side. Although she is fighting for her people and the "red flag", she is also symbolically breaking stereotypes by fighting for the ability to coexist with her two "red" sides. Colors represent a wide range of ideas and emotions ( check this out), so choose your colors wisely- they have tremendous power.

First World Problems Syndrome

Remember when you had to wait for the water to heat for a minute to take a shower and you complained because you started to get cold? Remember when you criticized America's secret plot to make you obese with its big portions and then you threw the leftover food away? Remember when you had a bad day because you could not find that prefect dress or suit in your size? Remember when you got stuck in traffic and whimpered about missing your favorite show? If you're worried that this is going to be another cliché moral story, then you are absolutely correct. We, as citizens of first world countries, often get consumed in negligible everyday problems that we forget to appreciate the beautiful and facile life we have; something known as First World Problems Syndrome. Every one of us is guilty of it, myself included. Perhaps I am writing this to somehow absolve myself from the times that I did complain or perhaps I am writing this on a gloomy Saturday morning to remind myself of the blessed life I enjoy; it does not matter why I am writing this, all that matters is that I am. We always envision ourselves as being the center of the universe, and that everything and anything anyone or everyone does is to purposely harm. Wallace mentions this idea in his speech," There is no experience you've had that you were not at the absolute center of". We tend to forget that we share this life with each other, that our experiences, problems, and perspectives are interwoven together like a thread ball, and that the person next to us has a different perspective on the same problem (probably one with him or her at the center of the problem). Most of us have had an easy upbringing, one where we worried about what costume we were going to wear for Halloween and not how we were going to get clean water to drink. As a result, it is harder for us to appreciate the luxuries we have and so it takes more will and effort to constantly remind ourselves that we are not the center of things; that our problems are insignificant to other people, or as Wallace once said, "it's a matter of my choosing to do the work of somehow altering or getting free of my natural, hard-wired default-setting, which is to be deeply and literally self-centered, and to see and interpret everything through this lens of self". So the next time you want to complain about your life, look around yourself- make sure to stare directly at any light that is powered by 24/7 electricity, take a hot bath while watching Netflix on your IPad, have some hot chocolate while you watch the snowfall in your warm, cozy house- and appreciate the lifestyle you have.

Check out the links :

First World Problems in Africa
First World Problems