O, Star Wars, I need an Armenian bracelet! FAIL!

so i'm watching this Star Wars themed episode of deal or no deal. and carrie fisher is there to support the contestant. and the cigarette-ravaged man voice and plastic surgery and delusional pink lipstick is making it really weird to watch her as she totally cougars it up, rubbing on the contestant's husband and man-friend. very creeptacular. per usual on deal or no deal, they gave this awesome sob story about how the contestant was a vietnam war refugee child and how princess leia, also a war refugee, gave her the strength to go on and be strong because she was such a strong gun-wielding woman (probably like her own lethal commie-general grandma, frankly. i'm imagining that scene in the joy luck club where the woman hears her mom's story and discovers her own hidden strength...only in this vietnamese version the girl see leia in Star Wars pick up the gun and suddenly decides to join her badass gun-wielding female forbears...you know how they said the female generals were crueler than the males in vietnam...you don't? i lost you, didnt i? i digress. back to deal or no deal). so the girl is all crying because she is *so* moved by carriefisher/ leia and the star wars theme and how inspirational it was to her. yeah, really she should have been crying cuz she left with nothing. nada.

in other news. I am such an effing hippy. i drive a prius. and i'm buying fair trade gifts. i decided that when i need to buy gifts that i will try to be socially conscious, and i really have like a hundred to buy in the next few months --could more of you have milestone birthdays, babies, and marriages in the next 6 months? no really, i might be able to get a deal from a village in BFE Bali on papooses and jewelry. so here's a run down of websites i've found--please add your faves if you know good ones:

Global Exchange ;
10,000 Villages ;
No Sweat Apparel

this all started because i got very concerned for the little girl i support in kenya after reading an article in O magazine about Umoja village, this all-female village where women refuge when their rights are violated and they are forced to be 4th wife to some nastacular 60 year old in exchange for some cows and/or are severely beaten and/or forced to undergo **circumcision!!**. and some of these girls are incredibly young. 9 years old. 12 years old. and they get raped on their way to school if the walk is too long. and my sharon is like 10. anyway, the village makes money by creating jewelry. and O magazine found them and they of course had only had a pair of plastic scissors and their bravery and supernatural joy to make said jewelry with, but O got a grant for some shiny tools and had them make bracelets that they now sell on macys.com. and i'm like oh my gosh, first, i have to write world vision and hope sharon doesnt get totally violated. and second, i should buy a bracelet and then maybe the umoja village will take sharon and protect her. and why am i buying anything that doesnt benefit the oppressed?!, i mean damn if these little junior high girl scouts can boycott girl scout cookies to save orangutans, and i freakin hate orangutans and monkeys and gorillas, then i can at least check out my socially conscious options. that said, i have to buy tickets for my grandmother to see phantom of the opera for her 75th birthday and there is really nothing i can do to make that more enviro or socially friendly.

am i being braggy about my charitableness? if so, let me brag a little more and tell you how i got a card from my other little girl, Astghik, in armenia and she's so effing cute and she was writing because she was soooo excited about the birthday party i sponsored for her (back in january--guess the despot wouldnt let the card out the country, eh?--we have the same birthday...that's actually how i choose my little war-torn and/or screwed-by-the-soviets-and-then-by-our-own-oppressive-regime charity cases.) and she wants to know why i chose her. anyway i got all misty eyed because she is getting excellent grades in math and languages (i always choose girls who like math--i want to build an international army of rocket scientists) and she's happy and wants to see pictures of my family, and the card had a little sunshine and was two sided in armenian. i am already formulating a response. i will definitely tell her that her love for math was a deciding factor. and her curly hair. i will likely not tell her that another deciding factor was that I had just done a final paper on former soviet republics and that armenia was one of the most screwed, and that it's outrageous that anyone questions the genocide perpetrated by the turks. that would not return the heart hug, i'm thinking.

armenian writing, by the way, is very cool looking.



supposedly that says: All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood(or sisterhood).
(Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights) (that is not what astghik wrote...just in case you wondered. she just turned 9.)


nonsequitur to end: thanks to jon for finding an awesome site to make me/you laugh and laugh and laugh: http://failblog.wordpress.com/ it's a blog with pictures of things that FAIL. and it does not fail at being hilarious. much like my personal favorite for time wastage: www.despair.com.