Merry Wanderer of the Night [Search results for Germany] 

The artifacts, which had been shown in a mass exhibition in Berlin, may stay in Germany for some repairs in cooperation with the Egyptian Museum in Berlin before their return to Egypt, Hegazy said.

The Egyptian Embassy will host a concert April 2 to declare the receipt of the artifacts, and express thanks to German authorities and the Egyptian Museum in Berlin for their effort, he added.

The iconic bust of Queen Nefertiti, currently on display at Berlin’s Neues Museum, remains one of Egypt’s top artifacts the country has said should return. The bust was obtained in 1912 by German archaeologist Ludwig Borchardt, who Egypt claims misled authorities regarding to the value of the bust to be allowed to take it out of the country; Germany claims the ownership of the artifact is not in question.

Political turmoil in Egypt since the January 25 Revolution in 2011 and the subsequent security lapse left the country’s cultural heritage vulnerable to looting. In spite of the efforts of the Egyptian government in tracking artifacts smuggled outside Egypt and in auction houses abroad, the issue is still unsettled.

In July 2014, 24 ancient Egyptian artifacts were returned from the Egyptian Museum of Leipzig University in Germany. Minister of Antiquities Mamdouh el-Damaty traveled to Germany to supervise the administrative procedures accompanying the repatriation of the artifacts, ONA reported.

The artifacts spanned several eras of ancient Egyptian civilization and were likely stolen from the west bank of Luxor, the head of the Antiquities Ministry’s Restored Artifacts Department Ali Ahmed told The Cairo Post.

Source: The Cairo Post [March 25, 2015]

Liesel Meminger steals books. It's hard to really classify her as a thief though, because she steals books from Nazi book-burnings-- and I could totally understand the desire to steal a book in a world where everything is censored. Liesel wants to know more about the world and what is happening, and she is experiencing the war unlike others her age because she is friends with a Jewish man who her family hides in their basement. All of these things are happening while Liesel learns how to read in The Book Thief

. Even though I know how to read, I was once again reminded how powerful books are and how important they are. After reading The Book Thief I wanted to see two things during my time in Germany. The book burning memorial in Berlin and Dachau concentration camp in Munich, the latter is strongly related to this book because Dachau is mentioned pretty frequently. Reading The Book Thief gave those things an added weight because I could imagine the characters from the book while I was looking at those sights.

The book is narrated by Death, which as you might guess makes it extremely bizarre. You actually sympathize with Death because you can tell he isn't choosing to take these people's lives, he is just doing as he is ordered. You can tell he is upset about what is happening, and he is tired from all the taking he has to do. In some ways I think this shows how people in Nazi Germany felt at the time-- like they were somehow forced to act in a way to support the Nazi party even if they didn't agree with it (possibly because they felt their lives would be taken from them).

Entrance to Dachau Concentration Camp.

I feel like this book has been widely read and discussed, but I'd like to talk about a personal experience with it. When I went to Dachau I expected to be overcome by emotion, but I wasn't. I don't know what other schools are like, but I have a difficult time remembering a year of elementary and high school where I did not learn about the Holocaust in an English or history class. Our education makes us deeply aware of what happened-- to the point where it becomes to difficult to look at the place where it happened and not be a little immune to it all. I did not feel unemotional or immune during The Book Thief. I was upset, crying, could not believe that this happened. I connected much better with this story than I did with any memorial I saw in Germany. I think that is a great testament to the power of books, which is what this book is all about. Going to the place where it happened, walking through a museum, they are important and wonderful things to do, but nothing makes me understand the Holocaust better than reading stories about it.

"I wanted to tell the book thief many things, about beauty and brutality. But what could I tell her about those things that she didn't already know? I wanted to explain that I am constantly overestimating and underestimating the human race-that rarely do I ever simply estimate it. I wanted to ask her how the same thing could be so ugly and so glorious, and its words and stories so damning and brilliant."

I am an Amazon Affiliate. If you make a purchase using one of my links I will earn a small percentage which will then go back into this blog.

According to an announcement of the Culture Ministry, the coins were found in the luggage of a Greek citizen travelling by car to Munich and seized by the German police.

Most of them are made of copper and date back to the Classical, Hellenistic, Roman and post-Roman eras.

It should be noted that several members of an antiquities smuggling ring that was dismantled in March 2012 were involved in the case.

Source: Protothema [January 24, 2015]

Copyright by Sleek | Phootgraphy Daniel Schröder | Styling Isabelle Thiry | Hair & Make Up Gregor Makris at Bigoudi | Models Val at AM, Erik Andersson at Mega Models, Hampus Ahlqvist at Unique & Maximilian / Photography Assistance Christian Schildmacher | Styling Assistance Josepha Rodriguez | Production Nu Projects Germany | Support Paris Uli Semmler | Retouching Primate Postproduction | Via Steelmachines
SLEEK MAGAZINE

VIA Men and Women

VIA An Evening with Amon Amarth in Times Square

Copyright by Svenja Knoppik | Photography Michael Kohls & Cathleen Falkenhayn | Models Leon & Christine S.
Why is the third dimension so fascinating? A further dimension gives more information and space for opportunities, allows a higher scope for communication and visual experiences. James Cameron’s 3D science fiction adventure Avatar (2009) started a whole new era in form modeling. the influence of the third dimension was felt not only in fashion but also in film, architecture, photography and more. This hype, however, was not entirely new. the swedish artist Oscar Reutersvärd (*1915 in Stockholm, 2. Febuary 2002) and the english mathematician Roger Penrose devised the so called ›Impossible Object‹ - a two dimensional triangle that appears to be closed from a certain perspective, however its three dimensional form is entirely different. the effect is realised by tricking our visionary senses. And here, a master of this discipline, one must mention M.C. Escher.
This collection is inspired by impossible constructions, multiple dimensions and the art of tricking our visionary senses.
Svenja Knoppik (27) recently graduated in Fashion Design at the University of Applied Sciences Bielefeld in Germany and now finally presents her diploma collection. In the past she worked for Gareth Pugh as an intern. During this internship Svenja worked on Pitti Menswear and on Autumn/Winter 2011/12 films directed by Ruth Hogben.

VIA Svenja Knoppik Collection

I moved into my townhouse with three bookshelves and they were completely full right away, so I knew a new bookshelf was in my future eventually. I finally got sick of all the random stacks of books around the house towards the end of last semester and yesterday I bought the bookshelf. It's the biggest bookshelf I've got so far. Apparently I've become more realistic about my growing library. I'm amazed by how many of the books I own I've purchased since I started blogging. Apparently I just didn't know what books to buy before my blog and now I'm constantly bombarded with books I want to read plus I find ones on my own. Book blogging has definitely changed the way I approach shopping in a bookstore-- but that is a post for a different day.

The bottom shelf is games and children's books, two things that didn't really have a home in my house so it makes sense for them to go on a fairly empty bookshelf. Above that is about two shelves of unread books. Just by looking at my bookshelves it seems like I'm finishing one shelf of books for every shelf of new books, which means I'll never get past that one bookshelf worth of books I haven't read. I'm pretty okay with this ratio right now, obviously I would like to read more books than I'm taking in. The worst part is that I have two shelves of books that I've owned for a long time but still haven't read. When I look at the books I think I want to get to them someday, but I don't want to read them as much as the new books I bought in the last year. I should probably get rid of some of the books I haven't read but I honestly think getting rid of books is a humongous pain in the butt.

The second shelf from the top houses literary magazines which were previously under my coffee table. This collection is only going to get bigger in 2011 because I not only have a subscription to The Believer (my second year with it) but I have one to McSweeney's as well. The very top shelf has some beer bottles from Germany on it. Not much to do with books, I just thought they were pretty.

Have any of you gotten a new bookshelf recently? Do you need one? Are the stacks of books taking over your house?

I am an Amazon Affiliate. If you make a purchase using one of my links I will earn a small percentage which will then go back into this blog.

The BBC has been investigating the trade, and the routes from Syria through Turkey and Lebanon to Europe.

The Smuggler

It has taken many calls and a lot of coaxing to get a man we are calling "Mohammed" to meet us. He is originally from Damascus but now plies his trade in the Bekaa valley on the border between Syria and Lebanon. He's 21 but looks much younger in his T-shirt, skinny jeans and black suede shoes. As we sit in an apartment in central Beirut I have to lean forward to hear the softly spoken young man describe how he began smuggling looted antiquities from Syria. "There's three friends in Aleppo we deal with, these people move from Aleppo all the way to the border here and pay a taxi driver to sneak it in." He specialised in smaller items which would be easier to move on - but he says even that has become too risky. "We tried our best to get the items which had most value, earrings, rings, small statues, stone heads," he says.

He made a good profit but bigger players with better connections "sold pieces worth $500,000, some for $1m", he says. When I ask who's making the money and controlling the trade in Syria his gentle voice takes on a flinty tone: "IS are the main people doing it. They are the ones in control of this business, they stole from the museums especially in Aleppo," he says. "I know for a fact these militants had connections overseas and they talked ahead of time and they shipped overseas using their connections abroad." Mohammed is still involved in cross-border trade, but no longer in antiquities. "Anyone caught with it gets severe punishment," he says. "They accuse you of being IS."

The Go-between

To sell looted antiquities you need a middle-man, like "Ahmed". Originally from eastern Syria, he is based in a town in southern Turkey - he doesn't want me to specify which one as he doesn't want the police to know. As a Turkish-speaker he is popular with Syrian smugglers, who ask if he can move goods on to local dealers. When I speak to him via Skype he shows me a blanket next to him filled with artefacts - statues of animals and human figures, glasses, vases and coins. They were dug up in the last few months. "They come from the east of Syria, from Raqqa, all the areas controlled by ISIS (Islamic State)," he says. Islamic State plays an active part in controlling the trade, he tells me. Anyone wanting to excavate has to get permission from IS inspectors, who monitor the finds and destroy any human figures, which are seen as idolatrous (those Ahmed is showing me have slipped through the net). IS takes 20% as tax. "They tax everything," he says.

The main trade is in stoneworks, statues and gold, and it can be extremely lucrative. "I have seen one piece sold for $1.1m," he says. "It was a piece from the year 8500BC." He gently handles each artefact as he brings it closer to the webcam to give me a better view. He has had to pay a sizeable bond to the smugglers to get this material and he doesn't want to lose any of it. The final destination is Western Europe, he says. "Turkish merchants sell it to dealers in Europe. They call them, send pictures... people from Europe come to check the goods and take them away." Ahmed will have to return the looted artefacts to his Syrian contacts, as I am clearly not buying them, but he won't be returning to his homeland. "If I went back I'd be killed," he says.

The Dealer

It's an unremarkable tourist shop in the centre of Beirut. Inside the glass cases are ancient oil lamps, rings and glassware but the shop owner, a laconic man in his late 40s, has an unusual selling tactic - he says much of it is fake. However, he assures me he does have genuine pieces from the Hellenic and Byzantine periods, around 1,000 years old. I'm interested what other items he can get, mosaics for example? I had been advised by archaeologists that mosaics would almost certainly be looted - at the moment, that would mean most likely from Syria. He asks which kind I want. Faces, animals, geometric designs? "If you're serious we can have a serious negotiation... there is always a way," he promises. When I ask if it's legal he smiles as he tells me the only way to legally ship these items is with official documentation from a museum saying they have been cleared for export.

If it was only a small mosaic I wanted, I could take the chance and try to smuggle it out myself but he warns it's a serious decision, as I could get caught. For a fee he can have them shipped to the UK but it will cost me many thousands of pounds. We shake hands as I leave and he gives me his business card. It has only taken 10 minutes to be offered illicit antiquities. Arthur Brand, an investigator who helps recover stolen antiquities isn't surprised, it chimes with his experience in Lebanon. "I've been there several times and at times and it really is amazing," he tells me from his base in Amsterdam. "The illicit trade is run as a professional business with offices and business cards and you can buy antiquities from Lebanon, but also from countries like Syria, Iraq." The link between smugglers and dealers is the dirty secret the art world doesn't want to admit to, he says.

The Cop

He could easily pass for the star of an Arabic cop show but Lt Col Nicholas Saad is a real policeman, head of Lebanon's bureau of international theft. In his office, filled with certificates from the FBI and Scotland Yard, he shows me photos of huge Roman busts seized in a recent raid in Lebanon. We go up to the roof of his police station, where out to the east, beyond the mountains, is the border with Syria. This is where refugees pour into the country and are exploited by the smuggling gangs.

"The refugees come in big numbers and the gangs put things between the belongings of the refugees," he explains. Since the conflict in Syria he has noticed a significant increase in the smuggling of looted artefacts, "especially from the Islamic parts, Raqqa (the base) of the Islamic State", he adds. His team has seized hundreds of Syrian artefacts. "We have the archaeology expert that said they're very valuable from the Roman period, from the Greek period, years before Christ," he says. But there isn't a market for them in Lebanon. "Lebanon is a transit station, it's one of the the doors that goes to Europe. The real money is made in Europe."

The Treasure

Inside the Beirut National museum are treasures from the cradle of civilisation - Hellenic, Roman and Byzantine statues, busts and sarcophagi 3,000 years old. Hidden away from the public in a store room below the main galleries, seized looted antiquities wait to be returned to Syria. My guide is Dr Assaad Seif, an archaeologist and head of excavations at the directorate general of antiquities in Beirut. He rings a bell and a wrought iron door is unlocked. Inside are scores of items - pottery, stonework - but the most valuable items are sealed away in a warehouse. "We have huge funeral sculptures, representing men and women used to seal the tombs, from Palmyra," he says.

Most of the seized items are from excavations rather than thefts from museums. The looters target warehouses at ancient sites like Palmyra, a Unesco world heritage site. "The warehouses at archaeological sites have objects they know are not listed or catalogued yet, and they think it could be easier to sell them," he says. "The Palmyra objects had value for people in Syria... it gives a kind of identity," he says. Although reluctant to put a price on any of the bigger items, after some coaxing he relents. "We have a dozen objects that would sell for $1m each on the open market." I understand why they keep them out of sight of curious foreign visitors.

The Destination 

It has taken days to get through to Dr Maamoun Abdulkarim, the archaeologist in charge of Syria's dept of antiquities in Damascus. When I do reach him, he's angry. "The sites under the control of ISIS, in these areas we have a disaster, a lot of problems. IS attack all things just for the money," he says. "It is our memory, our identity, for the government, the opposition, for all Syria." It's impossible to stop the looting but he is adamant more could be done to crack down on the trade. "We are sure through all the sources a lot of objects go from Syria to Europe, in Switzerland, in Germany, in UK - and Gulf countries like Dubai and Qatar," he says.

It was a common refrain. Everyone from the Lebanese police to Mohammed the smuggler and Ahmed the go-between said the main market was Europe. In the UK there have been no prosecutions or arrests for selling looted Syrian artefacts but Vernon Rapley, who ran the Metropolitan Police's art and antiquities squad for almost a decade, says too much shouldn't be read into this. "I'm quite confident that there have been seizures of material like this," he confidently states, as we stroll around his new workplace, the Victoria and Albert museum, where he is director of security.

Rapley still liaises closely with his former police unit and he is certain that artefacts from Syria are being sold here. He wants the trade in these antiquities to become "socially repugnant and unacceptable" so that in the future, he says, "we don't have interior decorators looking for these things to decorate people's houses".

Author: Simon Cox | Source: BBC News Website [February 17, 2015]

Copyright by AKOG
THE KILIM PROJECT
About 2 years ago we made a trip to the middle east. We bought used carpets from almost every counrty located around the persian gulf. Every carpet is hand knitted and a few of them are from the beginning of the 19th century. Over the years we´ve collected more than 50 carpets to make a limited collection of 100 bags. Every piece is unique and handmade in Germany.
A KIND OF GUISE (AKOG ) was born by a common interest in creating. We met in Munich in the summer of 2009 working on various creative projects. AKOG is an expression of ourselves and our influences. Basically, what we are is what we create.
AKOG POP UP STORE
8th–10th December 2011 | 11am–7pm
Corneliusstraße 2 | 81312 Munich
A KIND OF GUISE

VIA Limited Bag Collection Made Of Hand Knitted Carpets

Copyright by Oliver Fritze | Images from series ›Lea, Clémence, Knut, Petra und Hartmut‹, ›Kino‹ & ›Jahrmarkt‹

Oliver Fritze is a fashion photographer. He lives in Paris, having relocated from his native Germany. (...) He learned much from artists like Ruven Afanador, Dimitri Daniloff and Nick Knight, to whom he owes one of his favorite memories in the studio: shooting an album cover for the Rolling Stones. Fritze considers light an essential part of photography, and he has developed a style tinged with emotion and spirit. Oliver Fritze has won the top prize – the  Prix Picto 2012  as part of this years Prix Picto de la Jeune Photographie de Mode.
OLIVER FRITZE

VIA The Beautiful Artwork Of Photographer Oliver Fritze

Copyright by Lara Kazis | Via LesMads/OK Cool
VISION
Lara Kazis is feminin.
Plain and modern.
Pure and in love with detail.
Unique and wearable.
PRODUCTION
Each of Lara Kazis’s creations is developed and manufactured personally by the designer in Munich, Germany. It's important to us to bring uniqueness, individuality and personality into our designs.
HISTORY
The fashion label Lara Kazis was founded by the swiss fashion designer Larissa M. Ziegler in 2009.
LARA KAZIS

VIA Lara Kazis Women’s Bag Collection

Since his 2012 appointment as head of antiquities in the midst of Syria s civil war, Maamoun Abdulkarim says just one thing has been on his mind -- avoiding a repeat of the kind of looting that ravaged Iraq s heritage after the 2003 invasion.

"The images of the looting of the museum in Baghdad and other Iraqi sites are always on my mind, and I told myself that everything must be done to avoid a repeat of that here," he told AFP.

Widespread illegal excavation and the destruction of artefacts and religious sites by jihadists from the Islamic State (IS) group have only added to the sense of urgency.

Before the Syrian conflict began in 2011, Abdulkarim was co-director of a French-Syrian mission working excavating the 700 so-called Dead Cities of northern Syria, which date back to Roman and Byzantine times.

Syria has been the home of many civilisations over the millennia, from the Canaanites to the Ottomans, and is rich in both artistic and architectural treasures.

Since his appointment, Abdulkarim and his colleagues have worked to protect Syria s heritage from a conflict that has killed more than 215,000 people.

So far, they have wrapped and stored some 300,000 items and thousands of manuscripts in secret locations protected from fires, shelling and floods.

The pieces come from 34 museums, including 80,000 items from Damascus alone.

Perhaps the most dramatic rescue yet was from the eastern city of Deir Ezzor last August.

After Mosul in neighbouring Iraq fell to IS in June, and the destruction began there, a decision was taken to evacuate the 13,000 artefacts remaining in Deir Ezzor.

Large parts of the city were in IS hands, but the airport and some districts remained under government control.

Yaarub al-Abdullah, the former director of antiquities for Deir Ezzor, said: "I worked for a week with two colleagues to wrap everything. We put it into a truck that came under heavy machinegun fire.

"We put the boxes on a military plane among dead and injured soldiers. It was terrible, but we managed it," added Abdullah, who now heads the National Museum.

Back in Damascus, Abdulkarim followed the operation with trepidation.

"I didn t sleep for a week after I took the decision to evacuate the artefacts," he said.

"If the plane had crashed, I would have lost three friends and gone to prison for losing 13,000 items," he said, with a smile.

He said an estimated 99 percent of Syria s museum collections had been preserved, thanks to his 2,500 employees, including those in opposition-held areas.

"They feel that protecting our heritage is a question of honour, like defending the honour of their mothers," Abdulkarim said.

But their work has come with a price: around a dozen of them have been killed in the conflict, including five during the course of their work.

Despite their best efforts, Abdulkarim fears thousands of artefacts have already been stolen across the country.

Even worse is the damage that has been done to 300 sites and 445 historic buildings.

In some cases the damage came in fighting. In others, it has come from illegal excavation, even with bulldozers, in places like Mari, Doura Europos, Apamee and Ajaja in the northeast, the Yarmuk valley in southern Daraa, and Hamam near Raqa in the north.

Ayham al-Fakhry, 39, fled his post as director of antiquities in Raqa in 2012, and laments the irreversible losses to Syria s rich heritage.

"Not only do you have the barbarity of the IS jihadists who destroy any representation of humans and Muslim mausoleums, but also the greed of mafia groups coming from Lebanon, Iraq and Turkey to buy pieces found by local residents," he said.

"They pay IS 20 percent of the estimated value and then the mafias take the objects to be sold in Europe or the Gulf," he said.

Despite international action to prevent smuggling antiquities from Syria, Abdulkarim and his colleagues say sanctions on Damascus have left them isolated.

"We felt like we had the plague," he said."Can there be an embargo on heritage? It belongs to the whole world."

Recently though, there have been signs of change, with invitations to Germany and France for directorate staff and an award in Venice for their work.

Abdulkarim urged the international community to rally around those in Syria trying to save their heritage.

"There must be a international mobilisation to save culture and civilisation. It s not just our responsibility, but a collective one," he said.

Author: Sammy Ketz | Source: AFP [March 27, 2015]

Please help us welcome back Mette Ivie Harrison! She wrote us a phenomenal guest post last week that also includes a giveaway of The Princess and the Hound. Make sure you check it out!
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Although your Princess books may not be a direct retelling of any one fairy tale fairy tale, there is a distinct fairy tale feeling to each of them, which is different from the way a traditional fantasy reads. Was this intentional, or just something that happened as you wrote?

I studied German literature in college, and I have always loved fairy tales. I wanted very much to get the feel of a fairy tale in these novels. It's part never-never land and part Germany in the Middle Ages and part my idea of the perfect romance world all combined. I think I still imagine that the world is full of people who are trying to be heroes, wherever and whenever they live.

As to intention, I wonder sometimes how much of any creative endeavor is really intentional and how much of it is simply the unconscious being let out freely. I don't outline my novels and I just have an idea of where the story might go, then let things play out on the page. My characters don't seem to be the kind who do what I tell them to do. Or maybe my unconscious just has better ideas than my conscious mind has. I think that I may be one of those people who is often thinking about how the world used to be and comparing it to the way it is now. I don't wish for that back, but I believe that people have not changed much over the centuries. Evolution just doesn't work that fast. So my characters are people in the same way that a contemporary novel's characters would be. I probably have lots of anachronisms, though I try not to write modern people back in time. I try to think how modern people would act if raised in the past and given the limited choices that existed in the past. How would they grow up? How would they think? How would they find a way to be heroic?

There were moments in each of the 3 Princess books where each of our heroines feel uncomfortable in their skin. Is this an idea you included in the books intentionally?

I don't know that I thought of it quite like that, but I suppose the teen experience is very much about figuring out how to feel comfortable in your skin. I know I felt very uncomfortable in my skin as a teen. Physically, I always felt like I was that fat kid in high school who couldn't run a mile and felt ridiculously self-conscious in a swim suit, despite the fact that I was on the swim team. Psychically, I was trying to figure out who my "group" was, who I belonged to tribally. I think I eventually found a circle of friends who remain friends of mine to this day, but it was a long road and it took the courage of refusing to be false to myself. I showed who I was and that was the only way I could find my real people.

This story of figuring out who you are is a pretty universal one, and it's not just for teens, though maybe that's the first time it happens. In fact, The Princess and the Hound wasn't originally meant to be YA. I didn't know what it was, to be honest, and at least one editor rejected it because George was simply too old and he got married at the end of the book, which some YA novels shy away from. I think I write on the seam of YA and adult, which is why a lot of adults like my books, too. And really, aren't adults constantly reinventing themselves? I think if we aren't, we are stagnant. I have been taking adult piano lessons for the last four years, trying to reimagine myself as a musician (still not working). I also discovered triathlon competitions about 7 years ago and it turns out I'm really good at them. One of the things I do every day is yoga and I spend at least a minute trying to accept myself in the skin I am in, my body as it is, with all its flaws and its power.

You have a new book coming out, Tris and Izzie (that I'm crazy excited about), a retelling of the the German story, Tristan and Isolde. Is there anything about your new book that you can share with us?

Tris and Izzie is about a teen girl who doesn't know that she has magic. She has a boyfriend Mark King who is the basketball star and she thinks she is happy. But she tries to figure out how to make a love potion for her friend Brangane who obviously is in love with a guy who doesn't notice her. But it all goes wrong. She ends up falling in love at first sight with Tristan, the guy who was supposed to be Brangane's, and then she has to figure out how to be true to herself while the world around her is changing. There's a hidden magical world and lots of danger and a past she has forgotten and well, lots of other cool stuff.

I've been thinking a lot about what I hate about romance lately, and there's a certain irony in the fact that I hate love triangles and I hate love at first sight romances and I hate it when girlfriends compete for the same guy. But those are all important parts of this story. I hope that I use those old ideas in a new way that makes this story feel very contemporary. I spent many years reading only literary novels for grad school, and I read fantasy on the weekends, on the sly. I didn't dare to even check the books out of the library for fear my professors would find out. I have a bit of a chip on my shoulder about the distinction between literary novels and genre novels. But I think I have finally become comfortable with the reality that I like my stories to have magic in them of some kind. It's not just that the stakes are higher. It's that I feel like there are certain experiences in life that are magical, and we don't have the right language to describe those experiences unless we turn to the supernatural. Romance is one of those experiences. It feels like it is part of another world, like we become different when we experience it.

None of your characters have the traditional 'Happily Ever After'. Although the books may end mostly happy, or hopeful, that semi-generic 'Happily Ever After' feeling is missing. I've read some of your posts and discussions about romance in stories, and I have a pretty strong hunch that this was intentional. Care to expound?

You should have read the first drafts. These are actually much happier endings than the versions I originally wrote. My editor convinced me to be slightly more optimistic. For example, at the end of The Princess and the Bear, I originally wrote that the bear gives up the ability to be human and she has to live as a bear the rest of her life. It made for a very odd wedding scene. I guess I don't much believe in HEA of the kind where they ride off into the sunset. The funny thing is, I consider myself to be a fierce feminist and yet a failry traditional wife and mom. I stayed home with the kids, but I have a PhD. So there's lots of weird combinations in my stories.

I love romance and I write romance. I am a romantic. I love romance movies. I love Jane Austen. But I think the punch of the romance is taken away if it's too easy, if that makes any sense. Real romance is about choosing to be with the person you are with, not events overtaking you and you having no other choice. That's my opinion, anyway. The best romance is when both sides are strong characters who have important things to do in their lives unrelated to the romance. I didn't give up who I was when I got married and had kids. It can be tempting to let go of yourself, but I have trained my kids that I am a writer as well as a mom. Since they were babies, there was a strict nap time rule. If they weren't sleepy, didn't matter, I got some time to myself. I think the same goes for real-life romance. It is desperately important, but it's not the only thing that's important in the world.

Although the story is very much your own, Mira, Mirror is a retelling, of sorts, of Snow White. How did you decide to tell the story of the mirror and the Queen rather than have Snow White be your main character?

Mira, Mirror began as a sort of experiment. A friend of mine said that you can't write a novel with an inanimate object as the viewpoint character. I took it as a challenge and tried to think of the most interesting inanimate object I could. The mirror in the Snow White fairy tale came to mind fairy soon, and I knew there would be magic in it. It was one of my first attempts to write YA fantasy, and when I brought it to my group, they all said that I had finally found what I should spend my life writing. They felt like it was just so unique and no one else could tell a fairy tale like that. It's not a retelling really and it's not a twisted fairy tale. I don't know quite what to call it. But in this case, I never intended for Snow White or the Queen to be main characters. It was always about the set up to the fairy tale and then the aftermath. In the original version, however, the mirror had never been human. It had a face and could talk, but it had learned everything it knew about humanity from the evil Queen. To make her more relatable, I gave her a backstory and then a quest to be human again.

Having written both a retelling and a fairy tale-esque story, which do you prefer? What are the limitations and benefits of each telling? What are your thoughts about writing for each of these very closely related genres?
One of the advantages of a retelling is that there is already a certain shape to the story, almost as if you had a first draft written for you by someone else, and you only had to fix it up as a second draft. There is less fear of the blank page, if that makes sense. The blank page is always a terrible thing to face. Where does the story go? What happens next? No one knows except you, the author. This probably tells you way too much about what my first drafts look like. They are often not a lot like what the second draft is like. Maybe I should call those first drafts "exploratory" drafts. I get to know the general world and characters, but all of the events change and often not one word remains the same. Well, maybe one or two.

Ironically, I spent about four years writing stories largely in first person, some in present tense. The Princess and the Hound was the first story I wrote where I tried to do a third person point of view. I had no idea if it was working or not, but it has been really successful. There's a certain fairy tale style in my writing that has a distance and an elevated language that is natural to me after years in grad school in German literature. It's updated, though, with a really intense psychological depth that you often get only in first person YA narratives. I am trying to combine the two. My readers will have to say if I've done it successfully.

Silly/Random

~ Rapunzel is named after lettuce; what odd thing would you be named after if you were in a fairy tale?
The number seven. I am obsessed with numbers and that is my favorite one. ~ Using that name, give us a line from your life as a fairy tale:
"Once upon a time there was a girl named Seven. She lived with her mother and father, One and Two, and her older sisters, Three, Four, Five, and Six."

~ Best fairy tale villain and why?
It's always been the stepmother from Cinderella, because she has no magic and she still has all this power. I love the idea of writing a novel someday about the stepmother who refuses to even see the magic when it's right in front of her face.

~ Favorite tale from childhood? Favorite tale as an adult? Least favorites?
I loved Hansel and Gretel as a kid. I think the idea of a gingerbread house really appealed to me. I liked to eat. A lot. I think I hate that fairy tale now because the parents are so disturbing. I like what Adam Gidwitz does to the story in A Tale Dark and Grimm.

As an adult, my idea of "fairy tale" has expanded. Right now, I'm quite taken with the idea of retelling The Happy Prince by Oscar Wilde. Also, An Ideal Husband as An Ideal Boyfriend. I love Oscar Wilde. In fact, whoever is my favorite author at the moment is the author I want to do a retelling of. Oh, yes, Jane Austen is on the list, too. And Shakespeare's A Winter's Tale. And Goethe's Faust.

~ If you could be any fairy tale character, or live through any fairy tale "happening," who/what would it be?
I think I'd like to be Jack the Giant Killer. It's interesting how girl-centered fairy tales are always about getting married and boy-centered fairy tales are always about adventures and killing people. But maybe Jack could meet a lady giant and fall in love with her? And that find out that if they kiss, she turns evil? Wait, that's Buffy, isn't it?

~ Would you rather:
- — eat magic beans or golden eggs?
As a vegan, I suppose I'll have to pick magic beans.

--style 50ft long hair or polish 100 pairs of glass slippers?
Long hair isn't so bad. You just keep it in a braid all the time. And I hate high heels. I own a couple of pairs for weddings, but almost all my shoes are flats. I think I have a strangely unfeminine dislike of shoes.

- — have a fairy godmother or a Prince Charming?
I guess I'll say Prince Charming, because I think every girl should be her own fairy godmother, in the end.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
What a wonderful interview! It's always great to hear the stories behind the books! It makes for truly fascinating reading! Thank you again Mette, so very much for being a part of Fairy Tale Fortnight!

The narrator is a gorgeous porno actor that crashes his car while driving on a winding mountainous road. He wakes up in a burn unit with third degree burns over most of his body. To make things worse, if that is even possible, he spilled a bottle of bourbon in his lap right before his accident, and his “livelihood” is burnt beyond repair and has been removed. He wants his life to end. Throughout his recovery, rather than planning what he will do once he is released from the hospital, he plans his suicide. And then a beautiful ,but visibly disturbed, gargoyle sculptress appears in his room and is certain that they were lovers in medieval Germany. He is released into her care and he is ultimately convinced that the story she tells of their history must be true. This second chance at love is completely implausible, but I was drawn in from the beginning. Davidson’s tale of love is strange yet mesmerizing. This debut author has immense talent and I look forward to reading more of his work!

I'm approaching week ten of the semester and I honestly have never felt this burnt out before. I really don't have that heavy of course load this semester, but I feel exhausted. It might partially be living off campus for the first time, or maybe I'm just feeling burnt out because I'm a junior and feel like being done. Or maybe I'm just looking forward to winter break more than I have before because I'm going on an awesome vacation. My boyfriend and I are going backpacking through Amsterdam, Berlin, and Munich and I am so excited. I've never been to the Netherlands or Germany before so I'm sure there will be a lot for us to see and do. Have any of you been to any of these places? What would you suggest for us?

As for reading I've been working diligently on The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay

for the readalong next week, Eaarth: Making a Life on a Tough New Planet

for a new feature I'm going to start, and The Book Thief

simply because it is awesome. I have a lot of plans for the week I do The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay readathon, and I'm really excited to see what all of you think about the posts. The book has made me remember my own comic drawing I did when I was in high school and I was inspired to start up again. I was really into art in high school but kind of quit when I got to college. My comic drawing style isn't very complex and obviously relies on words a lot more because I'm a better storyteller than artist, but it's something I enjoy working on. I'm thinking about posting some of these comics on here once I get back into the hang of it.

This week I reviewed Slouching Towards Bethlehem and Splendor. I celebrated my one year blogiversary, talked about my recent struggles with writing, and talked about an Awesome Essay: How to Write About Africa.

I am an Amazon Affiliate. If you make a purchase using one of my links I will earn a small percentage which will then go back into this blog.

This week Caribousmom asked us to discuss our countries' search for independence or national holidays. In addition, we could talk about our summer reading lists. Here's what participants came up with.

*Sheri from A Novel Menagerie and Jason from Moored at Sea discussed what America means to them.

*Pussreboots talked about her memories of the Bicentennial in 1976. Very cool!

*Rikki educated us on Reunification Day in Germany. Thank you, Rikki.

*Crime fiction fan The Unfinished Person from Just a Reading Fool provided us with a summer reading list and Icedream from Reading In Appalachia gave us a list of books that make her think of freedom and summer.

*Canadians Bookworm Kristen and Chris from book-a-rama discussed Canada Day and Canadian books.

*Finally, Diane from The Book Resort joined us for the first time this week. She gave us a list of the books she was looking forward to reading this summer.

Thanks to all the participants this week. Can't wait to see what the topic will be for next week!

Copyright by H&M
The H&M x VERSACE collection 2011 will be available in Germany next week (from November 17th 2011 ) ! Head over to H&M’s website for the full collection or go to VOGUE for a review of the presentation taken place yesterday in New York.
H&M

VIA Versace Collection 2011/12

The Best American 2009 series just came out this month, so in honor of that I thought I would say a bit about The Best American Travel Writing 2009 and in contrast The Best Travel Writing 2009. It's getting a bit cold in Iowa so I have travel on the brain right now anyway, although I do like the cold weather.

The Best American Travel Writing 2009
Edited by Simon Winchester

This is one of the better essay collections I have read. The transitions between the essays are quite good, I never felt like anything was out of place. There is a negative said that though, sometimes a few essays seemed like one really long boring essay just because I was disinterested. The best thing about essay collections though: you can pick and choose what you want to read.

My top three favorite pieces from this book were:
1. The Mecca of the Mouse by Seth Stevenson. The narrator traps himself on Disney property for five days and analyzes everything from Disney to American culture to architecture. It is quite funny, especially in regards to animatronics. "I'm sure 'audio-animatronic' creatures were nifty when Disney pioneered them in the 1960s."
2. A Mind Dismembered by Frank Bures. The piece takes place in Africa and is all about penis snatching. For those of you who don't know what that is (I sure didn't before I read this), there is an epidemic in Nigeria and other parts of Africa where men believe that people on the street, witches of some kind, steal their penises, but then when they go to the doctor the penis is still there. It's a really fascinating example of regional illness.
3. Who is America? by Chuck Klosterman. I am probably choosing this one out of bias, but this is generally the type of essay that I like. I am fairly certain that I would like this piece even if I hadn't know it was written by Klosterman (who I saw speak at my campus last year, he is even funnier in person). Klosterman was teaching a seminar on U.S. consumer culture in Germany. To get into the class he required the students to write about the most interesting 20th Century American. I won't give away who was chosen, but if you've read Klosterman before you know exactly how this is essay if functioning. (And if you haven't read him before, I suggest Killing Yourself to Live)

The Best Travel Writing 2009
Eidited by James O'Reilly, Larry Habegger, and Sean O'Reilly

While it is a less popular series I will admit that I enjoyed this essay collection more than The Best American one. These essays are less research essays and more travel narratives which was more enjoyable. If you're only going to read one of these books, I would suggest The Best Travel Writing.

My top three favorite pieces from this book were:
1. The Bamenda Syndrome by David Torrey Peters. This essay is a really fascinating account about psychological syndromes that travelers get. It questions if we can really trust what we see when we are traveling. Two such syndromes are the Florence Syndrome and The Jerusalem Syndrome. To find out more about the three syndromes mentioned in the piece, you should read the piece.
2. Officially a Woman by Stephanie Elizondo Griest. This takes place in Mexico and is a really honest account of quinceaneras, or a sort of coming of age party. My favorite part is when the daughter who is having the party is getting her nails done even though she has to take an exam the next day. "Yet her new nails are so unwieldy, she can barely grasp a pencil. No one seems to fret about this except me. What is an exam compared to womanhood?"
3. A Vast Difference by Deborah Fryer. The subtitle to his essay is, "Summer Camp is the first adventure for many a traveler" which kind of turned me off at first. Believe me, after you read the first paragraph you will not be able to stop. Deborah's summer camp experience is like no other, she is at a Jewish summer camp and her camp counselor has the children perform a pretend burial. If that isn't a hook, I don't know what is.

I have returned to Iowa City, which is awesome and crappy at the same time. I have two and a half weeks between me and winter break and those weeks are full of papers and exams. Luckily, I'll definitely blog more because I won't be at my parents' house where it is quite difficult for me to blog. This is why I really sucked at blogging last week. I did some Black Friday shopping over the weekend (I shopped for five hours!) and got the backpack I will take with me to the Netherlands and Germany over winter break. I can't believe how close this trip is now, it doesn't even feel real.

Remember a month ago when I was all excited about recording a podcast with my boyfriend? It was called Green Reads and we were going to talk about books and the environment. Well it's back! We posted a new episode over the last week and you can read about it on our Green Reads blog and listen to the episode there. Please follow us and leave us comments! You can also subscribe to our podcast on iTunes and every episode will show up automatically for you. The road is a little bumpy right now, but we have another podcast in the works and it will get published very soon. We're working to make this the best we can.

Now I'm off to go for a walk and think about an essay I'm working on today. How were your Thanksgivings if you are in the States, and how were your weekends if you are not? Did you get any reading done? I, for one, did not.

I am an Amazon Affiliate. If you make a purchase using one of my links I will earn a small percentage which will then go back into this blog.

It is always a shock reaching Bamiyan, coming face to face with the two huge cavities in the cliff face. The upright tombs stare out over the valley, a splash of vegetation surrounded by wild mountains. The town straddles the Silk Road, close to the point where it used to enter Persia, dwarfed by two massive mountain ranges, the Koh-i-Baba and Hindu Kush. The void left by the two destroyed Buddha figures is appalling, it rouses an emotion almost more powerful than their once tranquil presence did for centuries.

To understand what happened you must go back to the beginning of 2001. The Taliban-led regime was on very poor terms with the international community and increasingly tempted by radical gestures. The decision to destroy the two monumental Buddha figures at Bamiyan was just part of the drive to destroy all the country’s pre-Islamic “icons”, an act of defiance to the outside world.

Demolition work at Bamiyan started at the beginning of March 2001 and lasted several weeks, the two figures – 58 and 38 metres tall – proved remarkably solid. Anti-aircraft guns had little effect, so the engineers placed anti-tank mines between their feet, then bored holes into their heads and packed them with dynamite. The world watched this symbolic violence in impotent horror.

Now almost 14 years on, reconstruction work has yet to start as archaeologists and UNESCO policy-makers argue.

The two cavities resemble open wounds, a blemish on the long history of Afghanistan, which experienced the fervour of Buddhism long before the arrival of Islam. For 15 centuries the two mystic colossi gazed down as the trading caravans and warring armies streamed past. Monks came from China to worship here. Others meditated in nearby caves.

The two Buddhas, draped in stucco robes, are testimony to a unique case of cross-breeding, which flourished in the early years of the first century AD, drawing on Buddhist influences from India and Greek aesthetics left behind by Alexander the Great. It gave rise to the kingdom of Gandhara and made a mark so deep that even the disciples of Allah, who reached here in the ninth century, made no attempt to disturb it.

Today the site has recovered a certain serenity. Children play volleyball below the cliffs and archaeologists work unhindered. Whereas a low-intensity war is still rumbling on elsewhere in Afghanistan, the central Hazarajat region and its capital Bamiyan (population circa 60,000) has been relatively spared. Most of the inhabitants are Shia Muslims and they had little sympathy with the Sunni Taliban from the Pashtun south. In the 1990s there was fierce fighting between the two sides. In Bamiyan there is a fairly enlightened view of Islam, and few women wear burqas. They proudly explain that 40% of girls in the province are in education, the highest proportion in Afghanistan.

So the outrage perpetrated by the Taliban came as a huge shock, a blow against a tolerant community that sees itself as unusual in the country as a whole. “The statues symbolised Bamiyan,” says mullah Sayed Ahmed-Hussein Hanif. Bamiyan had adopted and integrated the statues, making them a part of local legend. They had become an allegory for unhappy love, a foreshadow of Romeo and Juliet set in the Hindu Kush. He was Salsal, prince of Bamiyan; she was Shamana, a princess from another kingdom. Their love affair was impossible so, rather than live apart, they turned into stone, beside each other for all eternity.

“Local people had completely forgotten they were figures of the Buddha,” says Hamid Jalya, head of historical monuments in Bamiyan province. The Taliban and their dynamite reminded them of the original story. Ever since, people here have been unsure what to do about them.

An incident in 2013 demonstrated the sensitivity of the subject. A decade ago UNESCO authorised archaeologists and engineers to consolidate the two niches, with props and grouting. But nothing else. Almost two years ago someone noticed that, on the site of the small Buddha, a team from the German branch of the International Council on Monuments and Sites (Icomos) was beginning to rebuild the feet. This was contrary to UNESCO policy, based on the 1964 Venice charter for the conservation and restoration of monuments and sites, which requires the use of “original material”. If work on the Bamiyan remains disregarded this rule, then the site would be struck off the World Heritage list. The Afghan authorities ordered the Icomos team to down tools, leaving the remains even less sightly than they were before.

The incident highlights the lack of a clear consensus on the future of Bamiyan both internally and among the international community. “Bamiyan seems emblematic of the way international aid has treated Afghanistan,” says Philippe Marquis, former head of the French Archaeological Delegation in Afghanistan (Dafa). There has been endless dithering, underhand rivalry, pointless discord and mistakes.

The Buddhas are a powerful symbol – of confessional tolerance, Buddhism in a Muslim country and the remains of the Silk Road – with scope for considerable political kudos, so academic quarrels have been diverted to serve strategic aims. The Afghans have watched this spectacle with growing amazement: Germany and its experience of post-war reconstruction; France and its archaeological exploits in Afghanistan; Japan and Korea, with their interest in the origins of Buddhism; UNESCO and its byzantine bureaucracy. The various parties have sometimes cooperated with one another, but more frequently waged secret wars. “All these endless discussions among experts are pitiful, yielding no positive results,” says Zamaryalai Tarzi, a Franco-Afghan archaeologist who has been in charge of the French dig at the foot of the Bamiyan cliff for many years.

Behind the squabbling there is, however, a very real controversy as to how best to honour the fallen Buddhas. How should we go about making sense of an obscurantist crime the better to vanquish it? Or, in other terms, how should we mourn the martyrs? There are two opposing schools of thought: complete reconstruction or keeping the status quo. For now, the latter camp have the upper hand. “The two niches should be left empty, like two pages in Afghan history, so that subsequent generations can see how ignorance once prevailed in our country,” Tarzi asserts. Many other sites have adopted this approach, in particular the Genbaku dome in Hiroshima and the former summer palace in Beijing.

There is also a practical side: any attempt at reconstruction would be extremely complex. The original material, as required by the Venice charter, would be a major obstacle. The 2001 demolition left a heap of scattered fragments. Barely a third of the smaller Buddha has been saved, consisting of a pile of rock behind a wire fence. Furthermore, some of what does remain is from more recent additions. Over the centuries, long before the coming of the Taliban, the two figures were damaged and defaced. In the 1970s Indian archaeologists rebuilt the feet of the smaller Buddha using new material. Given this, how can the Venice charter rules be applied?

The final objection is that it may be a mistake to focus so much attention on the two Buddhas, given that the Bamiyan valley boasts many other exceptional sites, as yet little known. The ruins of the Shahr-e-Gholghola fortress, and probably monastery, perched on a hillock across the valley from the Buddhas, and the fortified town of Shahr-i-Zohak are both at risk, worn down by weather and earthquakes. “The priority is to save all the endangered sites around Bamiyan,” says Amir Fouladi, of the Aga Khan Trust. “There is no urgency about rebuilding the Buddhas.” The economic development of Bamiyan, due to gather speed with the projected launch of the Hajigak iron ore mines, makes it all the more important to adopt an overall strategy.

Meanwhile, the advocates of reconstruction have not wasted their time. Although the current mood is hardly in their favour, the small structure resting on the remains of the small Buddha’s feet suggests that the German branch of Icomos has not given up hope. Its president, Michael Petzet, a professor at the Technical University of Munich, has made many statements in favour of at least rebuilding the smaller of the two figures. The local representative of Icomos Germany, Bert Praxenthaler, sees the controversy about the small Buddha’s feet as salutary in that it “stirred debate about what should be done with the Buddhas”. “We must be ready the day a decision is taken,” he adds. He is referring to the possibility that an ad hoc UNESCO group may give the go-ahead for “partial re-assembly of the fragments”. His organisation sees this as an opportunity to demonstrate the quality of its restoration work in combining old and new materials.

Local residents are in favour. The idea of leaving the larger niche empty but rebuilding the smaller Buddha appeals to them, particularly as they take little interest in quarrels about original material. They are more concerned about boosting tourism in a relatively isolated area in desperate need of revenue. But there is symbolic value too. “By rebuilding a Buddha we could regain possession of our history and send a message to the whole world in favour of reconciliation between religions,” says Shukrya Neda, who campaigns for a local NGO. “By leaving the other niche empty we leave a testimony to the damage done by the Taliban.” Kabul has officially approved this approach, but some in Bamiyan feel its support is rather timid, for ethnic reasons. The Hazara population of Bamiyan distrust the Pashtun leaders in Kabul. “The government doesn’t want Bamiyan to develop its identity and economy,” says Riza Ibrahim, head of the city’s tourist board. “It’s discrimination.”

UNESCO has tried to steer a cautious middle course on the issue of reconstruction. Its ad hoc expert committee has warned against rushing to make a decision. “It is neither for nor against reconstruction,” says Masanori Nagaoka, head of UNESCO’s culture unit in Kabul. The committee has ruled that before considering partial reassembly of the small Buddha, a thorough technical and scientific study would be required. All of which favours keeping the status quo. Will the reconstruction lobby finally succeed in resurrecting Shamana (the small Buddha)? Perhaps, by dint of patience, but everyone seems to have overlooked an essential detail: the legendary prince and princess wanted to stay together forever. If Shamana rises again, but without Salsal, it would break their oath.

Author: Frédéric Bobin | Source: Guardian Weekly [January 10, 2015]