January 24, 2006

Martha was blind until four years ago, when Medicaid paid for her to have a corneal transplant. For the first time in her life she could see. Now she has a job. But with recent cuts in funding, Martha has lost her Medicaid. She can no longer afford the antirejection medicine she must take daily because of her transplant. And without the medicine she will slowly go blind.

Since 1996, nearly 4 million people have died in the Congo as a result of an international war—more than in any other country since World War II. Various militias, and armies from Uganda, Burundi and Rwanda, have perpetrated gruesome atrocities on Congolese people and villages in an effort to claim the Congo’s land and mineral resources.

One of Salman Ahmad’s earliest gigs was a talent show at King Edward Medical College in Lahore, Pakistan, where he was studying to be a doctor. Moments after he strummed his first chords, Islamic fundamentalists barged in, smashed Ahmad’s guitar and drum set, and broke up the show.

Ahmad quipped that he wasn’t scared as much as confused about the incident. “I thought rock musicians were supposed to break their own instruments,” he said with a smile.

In a scene that has been repeatedly played since Operation Enduring Freedom commenced in Afghanistan four years ago, Michelle Naar-Obed left her home in December for a tour of duty. She knew, as did her husband, her 11-year-old daughter and her friends in Duluth, Minnesota, that she might never return.

My class on the Inklings (C. S. Lewis, J. R. R. Tolkien, Charles Williams and their circle) met on Tuesdays and Thursdays last semester, just in time for elevenses. A master baker in the class provided Lembas, which we found remarkably sustaining. Turkish delight was selling out all over the country, but we managed to locate a supply and discovered we were immune to its sticky spell. The class linguist instructed us in Quenya and Sindarin. The class geologist taught us to identify glacial moraines in Middle-earth. We discussed pre-Inklings like Spenser, Milton and Dante.

After the world premiere of Brokeback Mountain at the Venice Film Festival, where it won the award for Best Picture, the publicity machines began referring to it as “the gay cowboy movie.” That tag line changed once people got a chance to see the film. Now it is being called one of the best love stories Hollywood has turned out in a long while.