Geek By Proxy

I haven’t written for a while. This may happen at some time or another, because life tends to get in the way of our best intentions and my blog has been low on my priority list for some time. However, one of the advantages of our righteous indignation is that it might prompt us to action

The dogmatic use of labels in american culture to define and classify people always seemed to me a funny quirk that only added to the amused acceptance of the tough negotiation between different ethnicities the USA were forced to make. Today, they seem to me just dangerous.

I’ve been reading about a story of a New Jersey Med School student who got into trouble and was suspended because he defined himself as a white african american. Paulo Serôdio is a 45 year-old student, born and raised in Mozambique,  now a naturalized USA citizen. For all intents and purposes, and forgetting the color of his skin, he is an african who acquired american citizenship. And he happens to be white (or at least more white than black).

In a cultural exercise in class, when asked to define himself, he said he was a white african american. Some of his black colleagues took offense in this and the case found its way to the dean’s office and eventually to his suspension from school. In an attempt to explain his position, Serôdio wrote an article in the school’s newspaper. The comments I have seen label this article as racist and stereotyped. And I don’t get it.

I read the article and the positions Serôdio defends seem everything but racist. No matter how wide the range of skin color among the so called “latinos” in the US, the fact is that most of time, I would be classified as one, even before I opened my mouth and spoke. By the way, my native language is latin based, just like the spanish most central and southern americans speak. For most portuguese native speakers, the accent is much the same as a “latino”, when they speak english. Just ask Joaquim de Almeida who doesn’t seem to get any other roles than those of a “latino”.

I live in Portugal. From a very early age, I remember listening to racist comments from random people around me and not getting it. I was fortunate enough to be born to an extremely tolerant set of parents and the rest of my environment was also conducive to that tolerance. So when I heard a racist comment made around me, it felt alien and wrong. Furthermore, as I studied Portugal’s history, it dawned on me that the portuguese were extremely good at two things: sailing from one place to another and making babies with whomever.

Today I know that between the people who came and settled in Portugal (Celts, Phoenician, Goths, Greeks, Romans and Moors) and the places the portuguese sailed to and settled in (Ceuta, Cape Verde, Guinea, St. Thomas and Prince, Angola, Mozambique, Brazil, India, Malasia, Timor, Macao, etc.), defining ourselves as white, black, brown or yellow, is a visual artifice. It is known today that northern africa is in our blood, in our words and in our music. In at least 10% of us there are sub-saharian DNA markers. Without excusing the abuses that did took place during the portuguese colonization process, not forgetting that the portuguese were the first to capture and sell african slaves, the fact is that I am descended from both opressors and opressed. Although I would be classified as caucasian, mainly because of my immediate family, the fact is that my skin is darker than that. There is a hint of India and Northern Africa in my facial features and tone of skin. I have two sisters, one of which is even darker than me, while the other might almost be considered milk skinned. And I love it that it is so.

I love the fact that the mix of cultures that permeated my own is fully expressed not only in my language (there are a lot of arabic words in portuguese, and some celtic and gothic based too) and in the traditional music of my country (fado being the best known but not the only example), but also in the miriad variations of skin color and facial features around me. Labels don’t make much sense to me. Dogmatic separation of people by groups, be either by race, language, ethnicity, or any other criteria seems to me stupid and senseless. It is an artificial crutch for our fears, a prop to inflate our own ego or exarcebated sense of self. It is not real and tends to crumble in face of true and genuine human relations.

I hope that the New Jersey courts have enough sense to understand this. I hope that racism and self-righteous indignation don’t prevail ever, no matter where they come from.

“I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. ” (Martin Luther King)

December 10th, 1948 marks one of the most inspired moments of Mankind as a whole. The UN General Assembly proclaimed the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, stating in its preamble its most ambitious affirmation: “the recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world.”

It wasn’t the first text in the genre. In 1789, on both sides of the Atlantic, two different charters were created, both with the goal of establishing a set of inalienable rights of man: the American Bill of Rights and the French Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen. Even before that, as early as the 13th century,  the Magna Carta already established a set of rights that every subject to the British Crown would have assured, effectively binding the decision and power of the monarch.

In 1948, however, the universal scope of these rights reached its peak. Every single member of Mankind, regardless of gender, race, culture, religion, economic conditions, nationality or any other differenciating factor was recognized these rights, above any creed, government or any other decision power in their lifes.

For all due purposes, being part of Mankind took precedence over any other bond to any other social institution. Discrimination was condemned in all its forms, the right to property, privacy, freedom of association, religion, opinion and thought consecrated as paramount to the full development of the human condition.

Yet, sixty years later, the situation is only marginally better. Human Rights ONG’s are still profusely busy, having ample ground to dennounce abuse. In some cases, the situation has worsen rather than improved. And it’s our fault, our collective fault that it is so.

Whenever a political, economic or diplomatic decision has to be made, human rights are constantly shoved to the bottom of the priority list. They’re still looked upon as an utopic ideal, good for show, but totally impractical. They’re the first to be trampled, because they’re never part of a quick fix or an easy solution. Short term solutions never care for the whole picture and governments and corporations tend to go for short term fixes. Or, worse, they look at human rights as a huge threat to their power, since it inhibits them from the use blind force. And, in most of the western world, they’re the governments we choose and the corporations we support.

Even in our daily lifes, we look at human rights as something remote and detached from ourselves, something that has no bearing in our private lives. But every single time we shun somebody, because he looks, thinks or believes different, we’re trampling human rights. Every single time we label someone, based on a differenciating characteristic, as a person of “non-interest”, every time we refuse to know someone based on a superficial evaluation, everytime we let our own selfish interests be more important than someone’s suffering or discomfort, we’re trampling human rights. Everytime we refuse to listen to an opinion, merely because of who the person is, everytime we feel we have the right of feeling superior to anyone else, we are disrespecting human rights.

I said before that I really believe that we can only change the world one person at a time. It is true in this case also. Starting with ourselves, we can build a personal code of ethics that never falls second to any decision in our lives. We limit ourselves to the that framework and never surrender it and we demand to be governed by those who feel the same way. Ever respecting, though, the right of others to feel differently…

A couple of friends of mine got awful news about their son, today. I´ve been thinking about what to say or do, since I heard about it, so that I could somehow ease their pain. And I can’t.

I know I can’t even begin to imagine the intensity of their suffering. There’s nothing I can say that will even begin to adress that much pain. All I can do is offer my shoulder and my arms, live through this horrendous time with them, if they want me to. Help with the little things that have to be done, when they think that even that is too much for them. Let them curl up in my arms and cry with them, if they don’t want to cry alone. Be at arm’s length, without imposing myself on them, and their need to grieve alone, if that’s what they want.

I wish I could offer them hope, at a time like this, but every word rehearsed in my head seems void and superficial. Most of all I don’t want to say anything that will only appease my own grief, and will do nothing for them.  

So I want to say I’m sorry. I’m sorry you have to go through this. I’m sorry about my ineptitude to help you through it. I’m sorry if even this carefully chosen words, with only you in mind, will never be enough to help you and soothe you.

Most of all, I want to say I’m here. Whenever, wherever and however you need me, I’m here. For as long as you need, my body, my heart and my soul are yours. I’m here.

This blog is a direct product of the revolution that comemorates today its 34th anniversary. April 25th 1974 marks the end of almost fifty-year long dictatorship that sought relentlessly to mold an entire society to a rigid and paternalist way of seeing the world. Having an opinion was a crime, and every political dissent was to be squashed beyond all existence. The individual had no rights, nothing should exist beyond the model of society and morality that the gentlemen in power saw as the right one. There was a special branch of police to round up everyone that didn’t fall in line. There were family members, co-workers and neighbours ready to denounce anyone that didn’t conform. There were concentration camps, torture and death in prisons and previous censorship of every public manifestation of media reports or cultural production. There was a 13 year-long Colonial War that wiped out the better part of a generation, killing them or leaving them physically and psychologically maimed for life.

Yet, there was never a time without opposition. There was never a time without someone willing to speak out against the regime, at the cost of their own lives. No matter how many books made the forbidden list, there was always someone willing to risk everything to distribute them.

I don’t really care what ideology those men and women professed. I know there were a lot of communists risking their lives in clandestinity, as there were socialists and anarchists. But there were many who weren’t communists, socialists or anarchists, who also risked their lives, who also stood up for their democratic beliefs in the face of impossible odds. No matter what ideological background they had, they all had in common the dream of a better society, a better country, where learning, talking and discussing were possible. A country where art and literature were seen as more than a propaganda tool, where every individual spirit could grow and search for knowledge.

My generation was born immediately before or after the revolution. We never knew what it was to live in a non-democratic society. Though we can understand and relate to a degree, we have no personal experience of those times and our feelings aren’t half as strong about the revolution, as are our parents’ and grandparents’. The younger generations are even more distant from it and seem to have some difficulty, at times, to understand the full consequences of living under such a regime. To them, I propose some reflexion on the following:

If the regime would have been able to perpetuate itself, there would be no free and open internet services in Portugal. Writing a blog like this would be consider subversive. Role-playing games would probably be forbbiden and considered morally corruptive. So would computer games. The remarkable command of English that my generation seems to have would have never come to be. All the music we’ve been hearing for the last three decades would probably never reach us. The technological gadgets we love so much and can now order from anywhere in the world would be dificult to get and expensive beyond all limits. The rampant poverty in which more than half the population lived in those days would be our reality today. Our literacy rate would be laughable and those few that would be able to rise above this limitations would probably flee the country or end up in jail. The European Union would be a distant dream for us. Brand name products would be a mirage.

For all those reasons and many more we cannot afford to forget what this date means. Every new generation should be made aware of what transpired that day and why. Again, I don’t care what was the starting point of every individual group that fought the regime and ultimately brought the revolution into existence. I don’t care about the different agendas. I don’t care about petty political differences. What I do care is that the collective result of all that courage was the dream of a better Portugal, where I’m able to write without fear. A country where I know my 4 month-old nephew will have the opportunity to be the best he can be, and where his voice will be heard, no matter what he choses to say.

Madrugada

Dos que morreram sem saber porquê
Dos que teimaram em silêncio e frio
Da força nascida do medo
Da raiva à solta manhã cedo
Fazem-se as margens do meu rio.

Das cicatrizes do meu chão antigo
E da memória do meu sangue em fogo
Da escuridão a abrir em cor
De braço dado e a arma flor
Fazem-se as margens do meu povo

Canta-se a gente que a si mesma se descobre
E acordem luzes arraiais
Canta-se a terra que a si mesma se devolve
Que o canto assim nunca é demais

Em cada veia o sangue espera a vez
Em cada fala se persegue o dia
E assim se aprendem as marés
Assim se cresce e ganha pé
Rompe a canção que não havia

Acordem luzes nos umbrais que a tarde cega
Acordem vozes, arraiais
Cantam despertos na manhã que a noite entrega
Que o canto assim nunca é demais

Cantem marés por essas praias de sargaços
Acordem vozes, arraiais
Corram descalços rente ao cais, abram abraços
Que o canto assim nunca é demais
O canto assim nunca é demais

José Luís Tinoco

My first real experience with RPG came from playing an AD&D campaign with my husband, almost 15 years ago. I’ve played many RPG’s since, in different systems with different premisses, but that tingling feeling of discovering a new world and a new way to have fun with my brain will never be the same. Role-playing has become a very important part of my life, and an important chunk of the shared experiences between me and my husband. I long for the day when we both sit down with our children around a table and show them what sheer imagination can do.

I confess I don’t know much about Gary Gygax or his life. However, I know he changed my life deeply with the game he co-created. I think I’m a better person and a more creative one for having played his game. For that, my gratitude will never be fully expressed.

I’m not the traditional RPG geek. I came in touch with the game relatively late in my life. Most of the players around me have been playing since their teens. I started playing when I was already in my twenties, mainly because my husband asked me to check it out and see if I would like to play with him. My group of friends grew, as I discovered more co-players and attended RPG meetups.

But it all started with that AD&D campaign. So, thank you Gary, and may we meet again in whatever plane you dwell in now.

I’ve been without a single RPG session for more than a month now and I’m going crazy for it. I’ve got at least four active campaigns, in as many different systems, and, although some overlap occurs with some players, in as many different groups. Still, I don’t seem to be able to play. Between the flu, friends going to work abroad, and a miriad of other insignificant little things, we don’t seem to be able to get together and play.

I can tell that I’m turning into a complete and utter game geek, when I get so frustrated that life gets in the way of my gaming. I know that all the things that are going on are important, and have to be adressed responsibly. My days and nights won’t be empty if I don’t play at all. But they will be such a drag…

It gives me no comfort to know that Christmas is coming (well, only as far as gaming is concerns… ). When I was a kid, Christmas was something that I waited for. I had no responsabilities, nothing to get ready. All I had to do was wait for the presents and those special treats my mother and grandmother only made at Christmas. Old family recipes, closely guarded, only handed down from mother to daughter. Yummy recipes of cookies and cakes made from scratch, with a kitchen full of smells and my mother plunged elbow-deep in dough, with a ridiculous orange scarf in her head. She still does that part, but everything else, she passed on to me and my sisters. So, now, I have to literally get my hands dirty.

An then there’s the presents. I love to give presents. I even love to take the time to choose each one with special care, thinking of each person and what they like. I love gift-wrapping them individually and finding some nice little touch to top them off.

But all of this takes time and, since all the people I play with are within my age group, all of us need that time. I predict that in about three weeks, playing is going to get scarce again. The only advantage is that after Christmas, we normally come back with a vengeance. I hope we can keep our tradition of playing a session on the evening of the 25th…

The Dalai Lama has come on a four-day visit Lisbon and I’ve been lucky enough to be one of the 1200 people who attended his three-day teachings on Shantideva’s The Way of the Bodhisattva. The text itself is a wonderful poem about generating compassion and fighting off negative emotions and about taking the Bodhisattva’s Vows. The Dalai Lama knows it extremely well and has stated several times how important this text is in his own life. So it was wonderful to be able to listen to his teachings on the different chapters of the poem, watching his enthusiasm and feeling his own personal conviction about compassion and loving-kindness.

But the most important day, im my opinion, was the fourth. In the morning, the Dalai Lama attended an inter-religious conference, with representatives of the major religions present in Portuguese society. The meeting itself is nothing new to the Dalai Lama, since promoting inter-religious tolerance is one of his self-declared main goals and he attends them wherever he goes. This was the first time, however, that such an encounter of the differents visions of the divine was held in a mosque. Islam has been taking a beating from a lot of quadrants around the world, for the last several years. It has largely been held responsible, as a whole, for the actions of a few deranged fanatics. It is seen, unjustely in my opinion, as a particularly intolerant religion. The fact that the muslim community commited to host such an event on their place of worship validates and encourages the hope that someday we may look first at our similarities rather than at our differences.

In the afternoon of that same day, the Dalai Lama held a public conference for about 10000 people, which I was fortunate to attend too. On a much more secular note, His Holiness talked about the need to develop a good heart and compassion on all aspects of human life. Compassion, in Buddhism, has a very clear meaning, as does loving-kindness. The Dalai Lama used the example of the relationship between mother and child, the closeness, the self-sacrifice, the unconditional love and acceptance that, in its higher form, that relationship ensues. Compassion means taking that unconditional, fully accepting love, that expects nothing in return and extended it to the whole of Mankind and to all living beings. It means being left without a single enemy, in a world full of brothers and sisters, without having to depend on the actions and words of anyone to feel it. And you don’t have to be a buddhist to pursue it. You don’t even have to be religious. Because, although every major religion has this concept at the core of its doctrine, the beauty of his notion is that it focus on us humans, on the respect and care we all should have for each other, no matter who we are or where we come from.

Asking for world peace has been banalized to the point of being turn into a caricature of empty speech (after all every Miss Universe candidate is supposed to ask for it in her interview, right? ). The difference of generating compassion is that it comes from inside out. You don’t ask for world peace, you make it. You build it every day of your life, in every interaction with others and the world, no matter how short or distanced it may seem. You build it at home first and then translate it to the outside world. You make it a core value in your life and measure every single thing you think, say, feel or do against it.

As with any other path, chosen or not, you’ll trip or even fall along the way. There are times in any of our lives when anger or sadness or pain seem to be overwhelmingly strong, when patience is the last thing on our minds, when nothing seems to matter more than being right and standing our ground no matter what. The beautiful thing about compassion, is that we can extend it to ourselves, and ask forgiveness from ourselves and others and get up and get back on the path. As with any trained habit, each step becomes easier, after you’ve taken the first stride.

Six years have passed since the 9/11 attacks and my memories don’t seem to fade. I didn’t know any of the victims personally. I have never been to New York or Washington. I can only empathize and sympathize from afar with the survivors and victims’ family members. So I’m quite amazed at the pain I still feel, when remembering the events. True, genuine, personal pain.

I was in college back then, studying to be a journalist. I had a report to do about TV media coverage on different events,throughout the week, so I had been watching news reports continuously, from the moment I woke up until I went to bed. That day, when I woke up, the first thing I did was to turn on the TV. The first image I saw was the the second plane hitting the towers. There was no comment, no reporter speaking, just that one image. For a moment I almost dismissed it as a commercial for a new movie. I didn’t want to believe that it could be anything but that. And for about two seconds I manage to stay in that mental comfort zone. Then tears started to roll down my cheeks.

I always kept myself emotionally distant from the news reports I watched on TV, no matter how gruesome and horrifying they were. After all, I was studying them. That day, however, I couldn’t stay dettached. If there is one place I think of as the capital of the world, it’s New York City. For me, it has always been the crossroads of the world, transcending its own nationality, welcoming every single nationality, race or creed. It can’t be a coincidence that it houses the UN headquarters. The WTC towers were a part of that image, the place where everybody from everywhere came to do business with everybody from everywhere. So, to me, it wouldn’t have hurt deeper, if the attacks had defaced my hometown.

In the days immediately after, new dimensions of pain were etched in my heart, as the total number of victims was beggining to come to light. Not only that, but also the number of different nationalities touched by the tragedy. That one single event put the entire world in mourning. East and West, North and South, christians, jews, muslims, hindus, buddhists, agnotiscs, atheists and everyone else in between, no one was left unscathed. Globalization had a new meaning that day.

Then, inspiration ensued. The stories of courage and sacrifice of people turned into heroes as they helped others, with total disregard for their own lives, were the first to touch us all. Then, the story of Flight 93 was the most inspiring tale of colective sacrifice for the good of others.

September 11 is the one day in the whole year when I don’t feel a Lisboner, Portuguese, European, or anything else but a citizen of the world, a member of the immense colective miracle we call Humankind, and of life itself. It took an immense tragedy to make me truly understand what that feeling is and how no matter where we are, where we come from or what we believe, we are all brothers and sisters. Nothing else could make me feel so deeply about another human being, that I don’t know and is an ocean away. Nothing else can explain that I’m so touched by this.

To all survivors and victims family members, to all new-yorkers, know that my heart weeps with yours. I want to say thank you to all of you. Thank you for the inspiration, thank you for the unity and the feelings of global brotherhood that six years later still overwhelm me on this day.