Cynthia D. Bertelsen's Gherkins & Tomatoes
A Writer's Musings on Nature and Culture, Since 2008
There comes a day, sometimes, when it seems all that there remains to do is to sit and weep, staring out at the world through tears of salt, gazing through windows of murky glass. Seeing leaves, earth, sky, rain, even the path of the wind in tall grass. But not seeing. No, not really. Where…
Continue reading ➞ Surviving the Whiplashes of History and American Gun-Culture Violence
In 1912, André Joyeux published a most interesting book, La Vie Large des Colonies, filled with satirical caricatures of the the colons, or French colonialists in Vietnam. Some were amusing, others truly horrific. Note: The caption reads - Ce que ça va les faire gueuler à Paris! - Ben, qu'ils viennent bouffer les soupes qu'on…
Continue reading ➞ The French in Indochina: Caricatures and Satire
In the film, "Indochine," you sense the rampant orientalism that made Edward Said one of the most quoted scholars on the subject of colonialism and the creation of the "Other." The heat, the fans, the sweat, the passions, the exoticism and erotocism, all these visual cues recreate the mental picture many of us have regarding…
Continue reading ➞ The Things They Carried*: Brief Glimpses of French Food in Vietnam
