Paradise Now

Saw a good movie last night: Paradise Now. I thought it was a great movie for several reasons. First, I found the premise and viewpoint of the story very interesting. Without giving away more than you would get from the outside of your Netflix sleeve, the story centers around two Palestinian men chosen to be suicide bombers in Tel Aviv. As an American, until very recently (I’d say the last few years), we were very rarely exposed to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict from the viewpoint of the Palestinians. All of our media directed our attention towards Israel as the victim, and rarely – as conveyed in the movie – towards Israel as the oppressor. I feel that bias began to shift slightly in recent years, but I don’t remember any reports of the plight of the Palestinians even as recently as 4 or 5 years ago. This movie was captivating partially due to the fact that it was set almost exclusively in the West Bank and the Israeli perspective never once came into play.

The second reason why I thought that this was such a great movie was because it did an excellent job of humanizing the characters. The two men weren’t simply suicide bombers. They were sons, and brothers, and friends, and auto-mechanics, and dreamers, and believers. They hadn’t been captured, brainwashed and coerced into carrying out this mission. They accepted the mission willingly. We saw a glimpse of how their lives are and had been on the West Bank: lives that caused them to believe in the mission they were on the verge of executing.

Furthermore, I felt that there was no judgment made. The film followed two men during the course of two days in their lives. There as no commentary on the paths that each chose. There was merely the depiction of those paths and a look into some of the events that led them to where they ultimately found themselves at the end of the film. Many people on both sides of the conflict feel very passionately about their position, and it was refreshing to see one side of the issue without the usual biased critique built in.

If anyone else has had the opportunity to check out this film, I’d love to read your comments.

Half Moon Bay

My job has been really getting on my nerves the last couple of weeks, so I figured after two weeks of 10.5 hour days, I deserved a break. I decided to call in sick yesterday and go hiking, which was so much better than going to work. I drove down to Half Moon Bay, which is quaint little town on the coast about a 40-minute drive south of San Francisco. I had never been there before, but I figured there would be some good hiking around there. I stopped in the visitor bureau for some advice. The woman behind the desk asked me whether I was looking for some "serious hiking", with much gravity in her voice. Not really knowing how "serious" a hike this would be but also not wanting to look like a punk, I said yes and she directed me to a place about 8 miles north of Half Moon Bay.

The trail basically meandered up the side of a mountain. Well, I don't think it would qualify as a mountain, but it was definitely much bigger than a hill. The visitors’ center lady said it would take about 2 hours to make it to the top. It was awesome. For all of you out there in Northern California, you know that it's been raining pretty much non-stop for the last month, but luckily it was pretty dry the first half of yesterday. When I parked the car at the foot of the trail, I looked up and saw some clouds looming up above, but there was still no rain. About an hour into the hike, I realized that I was actually inside the cloud that I was looking at from down below. It was pretty cool. I hiked onward for another half an hour or so, but as I walked, the conditions were becoming less and less hospitable as the cloud prepared for the torrential downpour that was to take place in about a half an hour's time. I turned around and started my way back down the trail because with all of the wind and hail, the hike wasn't quite as much fun anymore. But I must say, it was very cool being inside a cloud right before it started raining.

Not wanting to drive back to San Francisco in such heavy rain, I stopped at a great restaurant in downtown Half Moon Bay called the Half Moon Bay Inn. Their apple cobbler with butter pecan sorbet was out of control. I definitely recommend it. Then I went to Obester Winery for some wine tasting. This place, however, I do not recommend. The whites were terrible. I actually just skipped two of them because I couldn't handle it. The reds were slightly better, but only slightly. Eventhough you have to drive right past the place on the way back to the 280 back to San Francisco, it's not worth stopping in. It was that bad.

Here are a few shots from my adventure: