Not Apologising

I am not apologising for not blogging. It's my blog and I'll do what I like.

The past 3 weeks have been exceptionally busy and exciting and interesting.

I had a shabbat in the Upper West Side. It was so over whelming, so many people, but I wouldn't say that it was a very nice area, not so friendly.

I went to Beacon in the Hudson Valley for a Channuka party. That was lovely. My friend Naomi there is super interesting and it was really great to be able to talk to intelligent left-learning people.

I had a big meeting about the Al-Shimari case with a big fancy NY law firm. It was above average cool.

I moved out of my apartment and became homeless (but it will end soon) - I'm currently crashing on my friend's futon.

I went to Toronto to visit family. My family there are Haredi but made me feel super welcome. Their kids are friendly and even their teenage boys stayed up late with me on Friday night playing card games.It was great. Over Christmas I was in Montreal visiting my Great Aunt and Uncle. That was harder than I expected. They have aged very much since I last saw them. They are physically very able but mentally they are no longer really lucid. They don't remember very much of what is going on and so they keep asking the same questions, they get confused, they repeat stories over and over and over. It was heartbreaking. I really love them and it's sad to see that they are deteriorating.

Work has gotten really interesting. I've been reading and indexing the documents from the CIA internal investigation about the Abu Ghraib prisoner abuse to collect evidence about the private military contractors role in the events. I'm drafting a report to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights about Gender Based Violence in Iraq and Afghanistan under US occupation. I've been researching for an article about first amendment rights to freedom of religion and litigating churches in sex abuse cases. Work has been hard and I work long hours and often what I'm reading is really sad. Saddest because it's all real and true and happening to people all the time. I don't think that it's too traumatic because unlike my work in Israel or Australia I'm not working with clients on a daily basis so I'm rarely (if ever) face to face with the victims of these injustices. On Monday we go to court in Massachusetts for the SMUG case about GLBTI rights in Uganda.

New Years was great. I was at a friend's party who works for the Gay Men's Health Clinic via Avodah. It was full of interesting and attractive young people who like to do good things with their time.

This shabbat I plan on being at the UWS again but this time I'll be going to egalitarian minyanim, which will be a nice change, hopefully I'll meet various interesting people.

Tomorrow I move into my new apartment which I'm looking forward to.

I suppose that's all.

Did you miss me?

I might never sleep again

This week was delightful.

This week was basically just a big built up to shabbat. But along the way some good things happened.

For one, work became really good. I've been given the tasks of compiling the evidence about church child pornography cases for the past 5 years. It's a huge amount of work. It's sad work but it's quite useful.

I'm also compiling the evidence on the Abu Ghraib torturers, their court martials, their convictions and sentences for another case, which is also great work.

Lastly and this is my favourite, I've been doing some interesting research into the constitutional right to freedom of religion and whether that gives churches immunity from litigation for negligently hiring or failing to supervise paedophile priests. You would think that they would be held accountable but there's a bunch of states (I'm look at you, Utah) that think that to hold churches accountable for that is to encroach on their right to free exercise of their religion. I think I might write up an academia article for this on behalf of the firm, which would be a nice experience. All in all, work has been getting interesting.

On Wednesday night I went to see "Sleep No More" which was an alternative theatre production gifted to me by my boyfriend's family (really just his sister...). It's a huge haunted house play, where you wanted around following various actors do spooky things, like die and come back to life. There was a grave yard in the house. It was amazing and scary. Highly recommended.

Shabbat dinner this week I had 7 friends over, including Erica who slept by me. It was really fun, a good mix of people, except for this one random guy who accosted me at shule and invited himself over. He was a strange character, but he certainly added flavour to the company and it reminded me of my Nachlaot shabbatot where you never know what will happen! Lunch was at a friend of mine's of the Rova. There were a bunch of other HaRova girls there. It was a really nice reunion, I was surprised at how cool and liberal they all were. Who knew?

Saturday night I went to a Channuka part in Brooklyn. It was great. Instead of wearing ugly Christmas jumpers people were wearing ugly channuka sweaters. It was heaps of fun. Though that did mean getting home at about 3.30am again....

Today I got up way too early considering how little i'd slept, but still too late to do anything productive with my morning. I did however run into my neighbour Tal Segal, who also happened to be my madrich in Bnei Akiva. Small world. I ran some errands (more on them later..) and then went out to dinner with my Aunt n Uncle on the upper west side. It was great fun and they are really lovely. After dinner I went to go visit an apartment which I think I will sublet. It's a gorgeous big 1 bedroom apt in Washington Heights.

Now on the the errands. I was quite busy today booking flights and organising visas n the like b/c MY BOYFRIEND IS COMING TO NY! Yay!

And that's all for this week.

First full week in NY

Hello world,

Just so you gauge your expectations appropriately, expect about a post per week while I'm hitting up the city that never sleeps.

So last Monday I returned to work and continued reading fun things such as case law on the Alien Torts Statute and the Palmer inquiry etc. Monday night I went with my friend Erica and two of her friends to Drag Queen Bingo. Surprisingly, I won the first round of bingo, I won myself a small yappy toy puppy. We named her Bertrude.

This week, though was quite quiet socially. I tried generally just to get my life together. I joined the gym near work, I managed to stock my pantry and fridge and to do laundry. But generally, I wasn't really social at all.

At work I've been spending my time going through different sources of evidence and collating them into tables/documents/memos so they can be easily categorized for submission to the court. I've been going through emails that were received as a result of a Free of Information case. The emails are from the state department, they include emails from staffers for significant political and military figures. I've also been going through and extracting evidence from the Abu Ghraib court martial transcripts  It's been really hard/heavy work. At the end of the day I'm quite exhausted from reading about torture and abuses. But at the beginning of the day it's a good feeling to be going to work to do something important and bad-ass.

Shabbat and this weekend, however, was just delightful. My friend Naomi, whose family I stayed with for Thanksgiving came to stay with me. Friday night we went to a new partnership minyan (Shira Chadasha style) in the Heights. That's a big deal for such a conservative community. I was then at dinner with friends of mine from Midreshet Harova. The girl who hosted in now married and has a baby (queue freak out). After that I went to collect Naomi from her meal. There were heaps of people there including a really cool couple, where she was studying to become a Rabbi at JTS. Naomi and I popped our heads into the Mount Sinai Oneg Shabbat on our way home at 11.30 and it was still raging. But, that singles scene seriously intimidates me.

Shabbat morning we went to shule and hung around for shmoozing afterwards. I ran into a bunch of people I know from various travels and adventures. But basically, there were lot's of single religious Jews in their mid-20s. There was a buzz and a tension in the room that was pretty fierce. Lunch was delightful and delicious. There was a potluck lunch at Naomi's friend, Yael's fiance's place (if you can follow that). there were about 8 married couples and 4 unmarrieds there. It was seriously super intense. But there were some interesting people there and a couple of really good sheitels/rings/pregnancy clothes to discuss (err...).

Saturday night I went to Hummous Place on 73rd and Amsterdam with Naomi and her friend. Delicious. I then met up with from friends of mine from sem and we went to a midnight screening of the Rocky Horror Picture Show. It was great fun. They had a cast who dressed up and acted out the show, there were games and dancing. It was awesome. And getting home after 3am was less hard than expected!

Today I got up earlier than I would have liked and I went to visit family friends of ours in NJ. We went out for lunch and then frozen yogurt (I got salted caramel pretzel and cheesecake yogurt = amazing!). It was really nice catching up with them and meeting their kids for the first time! Seriously fat baby (and therefore cute). Tonight I went to a friend's regular movie night. We watched Psycho. It was actually scarier than I expected. But also funny in it's 1960's quaintness.

I'm not sure what to expect this week. I need to sort out my next sublet and confirm where I'm going to be living for the following 2 months. I would like to do more work on the Catholic sex abuse case, though these Iraqi torture cases are also very interesting.

But who knows what this week may bring!? 

On Gratitude

Hello friends,

On Wednesday afternoon I left work early and make my way accross the George Washington Bridge to New Jersey where my friend Naomi (AKA Gnomie) was picking me up. We used to live together in Jerusalem, she recently finished her degree and is now working for a Bio-Ethics think-tank. We then drove to pick up her brother and sister-in-law along with their two adorable dogs (small dogs). We then drove 4ish hours to her parents home in Colombia, Maryland. Her dad is a Mathematician and as a mentioned earlier her mother is a Conservative Rabbi. The family are all super smart. And VEGETARIAN! Yay! We got home quite late and went more-or-less straight to bed. Thursday was Thanksgiving. We went to family friends of theirs who are also mathematicians/computer scientists. The meal was delicious. Vegetarian, so no turkey. We had stuffing, sweet potato crumble, brussle sprouts etc.. and a million different types of pie! It was generally delicious and wonderful. We also played a pre-meal game of croquet, which I was sadly very bad at.

Friday Gnomie and I got up extra early and went to Washington DC for the day. It's only about 40 minutes from her house. We met up with her a friend of hers and went to the Library of Congress (they had a Hebraica exhibit on) and to the Supreme court. We also popped by the Capitol and went for a walk on the very sunny day past all the museums and the giant oblix/phallic. We got home just in time for shabbat. The whole family came together for a delicious dinner and then we played a board game called Dominion. It was a cool game, a bit like Settlers of Catan.

Shabbat morning we walked to the local Conservative shule. It was really like your standard shule fare. Shmoozing and kids running around. Saturday night we went over to family friends of theirs who live in a house from the 1700s and we made Pizza. Then we went to see the new James Bond Movie "Skyfall." It was 2.5 hours but it felt much shorter than that. Having said that, I wouldn't recommend it. It's just another Bond movie.

Today we drove back to NY, I'm slowly getting my life in order. I went to the supermarket, I did laundry, I got myself a gym membership. There seems to be a bit of drama with the apartment that I'm due to move into in a few weeks but I'm sure it will all sort itself out. This week I should get some actual work to do, probably compiling evidence and redrafting submissions.

Lastly, a few reflections on Thanksgiving. Perhaps it's the Jew in me that likes a national festival that's basically just about coming together and eating ritual foods. It's also very nice to have national (not religious) traditions. Further, it's lovely to have the opportunity to sit back and reflect on how lucky you are and to feel gratitude for your fortuitous life. I think it's a pretty good holiday even if it comes from very complicated and maybe unethical origins.

That's all for now folks!

The City That Never Sleeps?

Hi all!

Yup, I’m off gallivanting around the world again. This time I’m spending 3 months interning at the Center for Constitutional Rights in New York via the Castan Centre of Monash University. I’m working in the gender and sexuality international human rights department. The big cases at the moment are against the Vatican for sexual abuse of children and one relating to discrimination of the LGBTI community in Uganda. I started work on Monday and so far not much has happened. I’ve been given a huge amount of cases, documents and academic articles to read so I’ll be briefed and ready to start working next week.

But since my arrival plenty of fun things have happened.

I arrived on Wednesday night and went to stay with my delightful friend Erica. We have a great chat that night, I met all of her housemates (they are awesome) and her apartment was equally impressive (well decorated).  Thursday was not particularly eventful. There were logistics to be sorted out, shopping to do and going to bed early so I could recovered from the jetlag.

Friday however was very special. I met up for cupcakes and cider at the Magnolia bakery (featured in SATC) with my friend Sarah. We met while we were both in a pluralist beit midrash (Havruta) in Jerusalem and she has since made aliya (yay!). She’s in town for such a short time so it was great to hear about her newly Israeli life and such. I then went to meet Erica at her office (the Gay Men’s Health Clinic – so cool!). We made our way to Crown Heights (the non-chabad side) in Brooklyn where we were spending Shabbat with our friend Dasi who has recently started studying at Yeshivat Maharat. We had a delightful dinner where the guests included a yiddishist, a YCT Rabbi and a singer/songwriter. Shabbat morning we went to a great minyan in a thrift store, really small and eclectic. Strangely I met another person that I knew from Jerusalem there, she is now studying at Hadar (more on that later..). Shabbat lunch was similarly delightful with a guest from Canada who had been living in Israel at the same time as me. Saturday night the singer/songwriter and my friend Dasi went to go busk at a subway station so Erica and I went along to support them. They sang really beautifully, great Bon Iver as well as Tegan & Sara covers. Conveniently I also ran into a few Mormon missionaries at the station and I had a brief chat with them, in which I asked them (what I think) were some great questions. They decided with check with the prophets’ writings and get back to me. After watching my friends sing Erica and I went to a fundraiser for victims of hurricane Sandy. It turned out to be a weird Mayan/Aztec event where the end of the world seemed to be pretty imminent. But all in all it was a great night.

Sunday was spent at the Global Day of Jewish learning atDrisha and Hadar. The speakers were generally average, except for the last one, a female rabbi/professor from JTS. During the lunch break however I met two great people, Naphtali and Yisroel whose day-jobs was to run a Yiddish farm in Up-State New York that facilitates Yiddish immersion programs. Sunday night was delightful. I had a pre-thanksgiving dinner with Erica and all of her Avodah colleagues as well as her friends Noam and Avital. Everybody was really friendly and interesting. I had my first taste of stuffing/applesauce and various other traditional foods.

As I already mentioned Monday was my first day of work and it involved a lot of reading. But Monday night involved a trip to The Moth story telling slam. It was awesome, I recommend that you listen to the podcast, there’s a great story about a holocaust necklace. As for tonight (Tuesday), it’s the last of Rabbi Shai Held’s classes on Heshel at Hadar. So I’ll be going to that and then maybe I’ll make it to Salsa dancing too (if I’m not totally exhausted).

As for the holiday, I’ll be in Maryland with my friend Naomi. We were housemates in Jerusalem and her Mum is an awesome conservative rabbi. Shabbat I think I’ll be at my friend Erica’s parents place in Connecticut, but really, anything could happen. Maybe I'll go to Washington DC and explore?

So far NYC has been treating me pretty well. I haven’t gotten lost once and the subway has been easy and punctual. Two complaints though: There are not enough post offices or supermarkets. Also things close. Particularly supermarkets at about 10pm. WHEN DO NEW YORKERS SHOP? Quite honestly after Caulfield I was surprised that supermarkets close at all let alone so early. In any case, due to these two inconveniences I have not yet posted things that I need to post (like in the mail) nor have I managed to make it to a supermarket which has left me a bit hungry but I’ve been managing.

I suppose that’s all for now. I intend to blog more regularly once my life settles down some more.

Thanks for checking in – Ms B

The End: Part II

Friday at work was really average just tying up loose ends and transferring information back to Kate as we finished up.

Friday afternoon Zoe and Kara and I went down to the Katherine River in Knott Crossing and put our feet in the very cooling and refreshing waters. It was a good thing we didn't see the 'Danger: Crocodiles' sign till afterwards.

Friday evening I made roast potatoes, stuffed capsicums a salad and some yummy banana bread. Zoe my housemate was there (John's gone to Melbourne) as well as Kara the American intern and Brent who is a dietician working in community health education in the remote communities. Pretty awesome right?

After dinner we went out walking to the local field watching wallabies jump around. It was dark and hard to see but there were a ton of them.

Shabbat morning I slept in and picked up "The Finkler Question" again. It's an ok book. Zoe went to the local museum but he was disappointed to discover that it was really just about white settlement of the area with no discussion of local indigenous cultures. No surprises there really.

After that we went down to the hot springs and hung out there for a while and then went passed Kara's place on our way to the opening of the local cultural centre. Sadly we'd missed most of the Aboriginal dancing but there was lot's of local art and artists around but sadly not a very big turn out, then again, Katherine isn't exactly 'culturally aware.'

After going home and shabbat going out we went back to the cultural centre to see the Fire B Boys who do indigenous dancing with fire. To 80s music! Seriously, it was awesome, particularly when they danced to MC Hammer's 'Can't touch this.' Pure perfection.

Saturday night we went to a housewarming party for one of the lawyers at NAAJA. It was surprisingly good fun. Kara the American enjoyed the barbequed kangaroo and crocodile and the company of the young lawyers was pleasant. It was nice to social with like-minded lawyers who care about using their powers for good and not evil.

While at the party one of the KWILS (Katherine Women's Information Legal Service) Lawyers, Danielle (coincidentally on my first weekend in Ktown I went to her 30th) offered me a ride to Darwin. Which was beyond brilliant.

I left the party pretty early (11ish) to go home and pack. Responsible aye?

Sunday morning Kara came over and we made a great brunch of fried mushrooms and tomatoes and toast and good coffee. It was delicious.

The ride to Darwin with Danielle and her boss was nice though we had to stop every hour so that her boss Kylie could smoke. I have no idea what that woman does on aeroplanes.

Sunday night I stayed at Jo's place again. We had a great chat about NAAVLS and how it could be improved. She's a really impressive person. Her daughter's wedding had been the day before and the house was still full of family and friends who were staying there for the wedding. But she still made time for me and made me feel super welcome.

That evening I went to the Mindil markets again. There's not really anything to buy there but I did get me some good Indian food (again).

Today (Monday) I went into the NAAFVLS office to have a final chat with Tony the CEO and to tell him how I think the organisation could be improved and about my concerns relating to Kate. There's 2 new lawyers coming in with hopefully a 3rd on the way as well as another intern so hopefully the place should be a bit better.

And now I'm at the airport on my way to Sydney.

I'm probably not going to blog again until my next adventure.

So I suppose my final thoughts on this experience are quite bleak. The problems for indigenous Australians are many. Health problems, social problems, financial, educational, prejudice and discrimination as well as alcoholism, mental illness and homelessness. There were many times on my internship that I felt overwhelmed by the despair in these communities. Sadly, I'd say that by the end I'd developed kind of a new measuring stick for suffering. My threshold for compassion was raised and that disappoints me. I supposed I'm disappointed in myself in my ability to consistently care.

How are we going to fix it?

Straight up - I have no  idea.

Remote communities are hard to service. It's expensive to provide health and educational services to isolated areas. It also requires a very strong cultural change within the communities which can only com from within. Outsides and guide and lead and educate till we're blue in the face (and we haven't been pulling out weight enough on that front) but ultimately the communities can become functional and safe with a good quality of life and life expectancy by the will of the community itself. The communities have to chose that though, outsiders can't choose it for them.

I suppose for my line of work specifically, men need to stop hitting women. But really, don't stab them, don't slap then, don't burn them, don't push them into crocodile infested waters, don't hit them with a metal rod. Women also need to leave those situations. They need to resources and self-belief to pick up and get out and look after themselves. But I suppose that both of those issues are really community cultural issues that can obviously be helped by education but is also manifest in the personal decisions of individuals. And there's only so much control or influence we have over that.

Bleak? Yeah, well, in the most beautiful part of Australia it is pretty bleak. 

Timber Creek

Monday was a good day. I got up early and came into the office to do some more moot research. The client then came in and signed all the affidavits and applications and I lodged them with the court. Kate and I then had a brief negotiation with the police prosecutor who wasn't willing to budge so I went back to the office and researched some issues for the case before we went back to court. Ultimately, though, it was stood down for mention this Wednesday afternoon and then a hearing in August so it wasn't really so exciting.

After that we drove 3 hours to Timber Creek, which was a beautiful drive along the escarpments towards the sunset. That evening I hung out at the town pub with the locals and my housemates who were also in TK for the bush courts. On the wall of the bar was a big board covered in names of the banned drinkers list and another 'shameful behaviour' list which I assumed was the warning list before getting banned. The lists were full of my clients or the defendants in the matters.

Today was the bush courts so bright and early we went to the police station and got a lit of the matters being heard and who the victims in the domestic violence matters were. Then we drove to the town centre and had a chat with the locals trying to find our old clients and the new victims of DV.

There was one women who approached us and said that she had a domestic violence matter on in court today. So I got all her details and had her sign the forms and started to conduct an interview. She told me how she'd been with her husband for 20 years and they have 4 kids together and that this is the first domestic violence issue. I asked where it happened and she said behind the pub. And I asked if her and her husband had been drinking and she said no, neither of them drink. So I asked what had happened. She said, well I noticed my husband hadn't come home by 9pm so I went looking for him. And I saw his car parked and he was sitting in there was another lady. So I grabbed a stick and snuck up behind them very quietly and then struck her husband on the head through the open car window. The other woman ran out and ran away. Her husband leapt out of the car and she hit him some more with the stick. What happened next? I asked. I drove away with the car and left him there, she answered. And then he came home and bashed you? I asked. No. He slept out by the bush and the next day I came and collected him. And then he bashed you? I asked. No, she answered, he never bashed me. But if he ever thinks of cheating on me I'll bash him. And then I realised, the victim of this incident was her husband. We had a big old laugh and I told her that she'll have to peak to a defence lawyer since we only work with victims of domestic violence. I then had an interview with her husband, he was the sweetest guy and seemed really good with the kids and had a good job but he was happy to have a restraining order on her so that she couldn't hit him anymore.

The rest of the day was spent interviewing clients and advising them about domestic violence orders and liaising with police about the terms of these orders and varying them. After lunch we left the court and went to visit the communities themselves. They were small and neat. Though some houses obviously were a bit decrepit and had too many  people living in them. Furthermore there were huge packs o giant dogs roaming the communities. Some of the communities we visited were 'dry' zones under the intervention which meant that no alcohol or drugs or pornography could be brought there. Though ultimately it just means that the alcoholics go into town to drink leaving their children alone or neglected. Though the basics card that quarantines some of their Centrelink payments now limits the amount of money that can be drank away.

After visiting the communities we drove to a number of beautiful lookout points and admired the really stunning scenery. After that I lounged by the pool until it was dark and then I returned to my motel room to research the moot some more.

Tomorrow morning we drive back to Katherine (though I think we should have done it tonight) and tomorrow afternoon we are back in court for that mention that was first heard on Monday.

It's almost the end of my time in Katherine. I'll be sorry to leave.

On that note, g'nite.