Cultural Divide #130

Sara Corbett:

Survival narratives are part of something that extends way back in time and that people who endure something really have an impulse to record it for whatever reason that might be. You know, whether it's just to dignify what happened, whether it's to sort of assert that very primal thing I made it, I live to tell. And also, I think, to document what the capacity for human cruelty looks like and on the flip side, what the capacity for human strength and resilience looks like.

Eleanor Morse:

When I think of what drives my own writing, the engine is really curiosity. If I weren't curious, I don't know what life would be like. I can't imagine it. But I'm grateful to have grown up with people around me who had curiosity and a kind of native curiosity. So while I'm not a mathematician or scientist or a research person, I do bring that to my world, and it's caused me to choose things that are off the beaten path.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

This is Dr. Lisa Belisle and you are listening to the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour podcast show number 130, Cultural Divide, airing for the first time on Sunday, March 9, 2014. Today's guests include Sarah Corbett, author of House in the sky, and Eleanor Morse, author of White Dog Fell from the Sky. How do we understand those who are different from ourselves, particularly when these are people we may have never met? Main authors of both fiction and nonfiction can help us bridge cultural divides. Today we speak with journalist and Telling Room co founder Sarah Corbett, who writes the true story of Amanda Lindhout, another journalist who is held in captivity for more than a year by Somali extremists. In the book A House in the Sky. We also spend time with Eleanor Morse, who explores her own experience with South African apartheid in the novel White Dog Fell from the Sky. Thank you for joining us.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

As listeners of the program know, I very much enjoy having authors writers in the studio to Talk about the books that I have read because I love reading. It's one of my favorite activities, maybe in the world at least. Favorite solo activities, I guess. But the individual that's come in today is a long time in coming. I read her book last fall, was very excited to speak with her husband, Mike Paternitti, who is also an author.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

This is Sarah Corbett.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

She's a contribut contributing writer to the New York Times Magazine. Her work has appeared in National Geographic, Elle, Outside O, the Oprah Magazine, Esquire, and Mother Jones. She and her husband Mike Paternitti settled in Portland after living in a number

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

of places around the States.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

And she most recently co wrote A House in the Sky, a memoir with Amanda Lindhout, who lived out her dreams to travel the world but was tragically abducted in Somalia.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

The story is about her struggles as

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

she converts to Islam as a survival tactic, receives wife lessons from one of her captors, and risks a daring escape. Thanks so much for coming in, Sarah.

Sara Corbett:

Thanks for having me, Lisa.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Now, you've written for a lot of different magazines, but this book was somehow. Was somehow different for you. I think it was.

Sara Corbett:

I made a choice, you know, I went to meet Amanda Lindhout in 2010. She had been released from captivity in Somalia only a few months earlier. And a colleague of mine at the New York Times had suggested that the two of us meet. He had a connection to her. And I went to meet her thinking that I would do what I always do as a journalist, which is get her to tell me her story so I could then contextualize the story. I could kind of organize it and interpret it for people. And I recognized that she had a great story to tell and it would be a book. I thought it could be a book, but I wanted to write the book. But after spending a few days with Amanda, and again, just even the sight of her, she's a very striking looking young woman, but she had lost teeth while she was held captive. She was malnourished. Even in the comfort of her home in Canada. The effects of captivity on her were evident. And once I heard her story and realized how much she had lost in terms of her freedom, her dignity, her ability to voice herself. She had even lost her name in captivity. Her Somali captors had renamed her Amina. Once I realized how much she had lost, I realized that my job as a journalist had to shift and that really the sort of the greatest service I could give not just her, but to her experience was to let her tell the story and to kind of usher that into the world, using. Using my skills as a writer, but not owning it, you know, not putting my name up top, not trying to put my voice in the book, but really just kind of humble myself to her voice. And so that was. That was the choice we made.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

There was for Amanda, it seems, almost a clinging to self. In the beginning of the book, there's, I guess, a reproduction of notes that she took while she was being held captive in very, very small writing. But this. This effort to kind of, I don't know, normalize or somehow just hold on to who she was as a person.

Sara Corbett:

Right. So she was held hostage for 460 days, and for much of it, she had nothing. I mean, really, she had. Her story is an exercise in the power of the mind, you know, really trying to figure out how to not go insane, for example, how to transcend your circumstances, how to hold on to hope, how to view the people who are harming you. You know, do you hate them? Do you try to find some sort of compassion for them? I think she had a mix of both. But toward the end, she was given, as you mentioned, she had converted to Islam as a survival tactic. And they gave her a qura, a small notebook where she was supposed to keep notes on her studies. But what she did instead was write a letter to her mother that went on for pages and pages and pages. And we have reproduced it at the beginning of the book because to me, it's this incredible document. It's this cramped, cramped handwriting. When I first saw it, it reminded me of. I had seen an art exhibit years ago that was asylum writing, stuff that had come out of asylums in, like, the 1920s. It looks mad. And what you realize is there's like this ferocious and I think deeply human need to give testimony to one's experience. And when I was researching the book, I read a lot of Holocaust literature, and I think survival narratives are part of something that extends way back in time and that people who endure something really have an impulse to record it, you know, for whatever reason that might be. You know, whether it's just to dignify what happened, whether it's to sort of assert, you know, that very primal thing, I made it, I live to tell. And also, I think, to sort of document what the capacity for human cruelty looks like, and on the flip side, what the capacity for human strength and resilience looks like.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

There is something that happens also between people who are held captive and the people who are holding them captive. And there's actually a Shift that happens in the mind. There have been. I think it's called the Stockholm effect, in which there is a sort of a cross identification that happens, and that gets to be very confusing for people. And I think that this did happen with Amanda.

Sara Corbett:

I think so. I mean, if she were here, she would say, you know, Stockholm syndrome is what it's called. It is not a psychological diagnosis. It is not in the dsm. It is not recognized by this psychological profession. It really isn't. It's something that has been sort of lumped on to survivors. However, I do think you're right. I think that when people are put into an extreme environment and forced to live together, as often prisoners and their captors are, you can't help but see them as human beings, you know? And I think Amanda's story is an interesting dance between her captors, who are a group of mostly teenage boys who had never been in close proximity with a woman who was not in their family before, who were intrigued, scared of her, and also had power over her. And on the flip side, she's looking at them and she had to be dependent on them for food, for kindness, which wasn't a given every day. So, yeah, at some point, I think she made a choice, which was. We write about it in the book. She could either swim inside of real hatred or she could try to understand who these people were. And one of the things that she realized was the world that they came from. You know, Somalia hasn't had peace in 30 years. It hasn't had a stable government. The schools don't function. Families are torn apart, people are displaced, neighborhoods are torn apart. And when she was able to communicate with these young men, she heard really devastating stories. Many of them had seen their parents shot and killed in front of them. It doesn't for one second forgive the way they went on to treat her. She suffered all sorts of horrific abuses at their hands. But it did, I think, allow her not to lose faith in humanity in a really utter way, in a deep way, that she might have taken her own life, I think. But I think in seeing them and their circumstances, she was able to kind of hold onto a worldview that made her want to get through.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

You have children yourself. You have two boys and a girl. Your oldest is 14. And that really is right around the age of some of the captors. As you were writing this, how did this make you feel as a parent?

Sara Corbett:

That's a good question. I have to say that I think that the young men in the book, their circumstances and their backgrounds are so vastly different than my three fairly privileged kids growing up in Portland, Maine, are that I didn't. I don't think I was making those connections. However, I think anybody. And I hear this a lot from people who read A House in the Sky. A lot of people watch Amanda's trajectory because the book begins with her childhood and follows her through her teens and into her 20s. And she was raised in a very poor family. She never went to college. She is very intelligent and also has always been very ambitious. And that ambition led her to start saving her money. She was working as a waitress and go off and see the world. So she would waitress for six months, and then she would go off and travel for three months. And she was fearless in that traveling. And I think for me, that was the. That parental wire gets tripped. And it's a really interesting thing. You know, she was backpacking by herself around the world. She crossed Sudan, she crossed Syria, she went into Pakistan, she went to Afghanistan as a tourist. I mean, she was making decisions that I think a lot of people would question, you know. And so for me, as a parent, I think about that a lot because I think it's actually kind of what drew me to Amanda's story, because I really admire risk takers. I want to raise children who question authority, who aren't. They don't live in fear, you know. And Amanda's story, it takes place during the George Bush years, you know, the decade post 9, 11. And I remember so acutely I was a younger woman then, and I. I have, because of my job, traveled quite a bit, and I travel mostly by myself when I'm on assignment. And I hated how the US Was kind of hunched down in fear during that time. And so I look at Amanda's freedom in her travels with some envy, for sure, with some hope, you know, like, oh, I wish. I hope someday my kids are out and they see the world and they meet people in these environments and they take them on their own terms. But there's a big but because that every time something went well for her, it drove her deeper into the world. And eventually she tried to become a journalist. She had sort of mixed success as a journalist, and she landed in Somalia. And as a parent, you can't read what happened to her and think you would ever encourage your child or anybody you love anywhere near that, you know, that situation. So it's complicated, and I think it's provocative, and I think that that is a really great piece of the story, you know, because she's not trying to say what she did was right, but she's trying to help people see how it happened. And for me, as both as a parent who wants to raise exuberant free children and as a journalist who really has appreciated and learned a lot from world travel, I can see how one gets there.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Here on the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and podcast, we've long recognized the link between health and wealth. Here to speak more on the topic is Tom shepherd of Shepherd Financial.

[Unidentified voice]:

Sometimes I meet with married or partnered clients and when we get to talking about their financial lives, a cultural divide bubbles to the surface. One person feels one way about their money and the other seems to be on their own financial island with a set of beliefs and rules that have created unnecessary borders and boundaries. It's not an uncommon thing, and when I hit those situations, I do my best to help both people understand that neither is 100% right or wrong, that they simply have to take a step back and look at their own financial life in a new light. It is also true in politics and economics. What we need to do is see money as a living thing that can be used to grow our lives together without disagreement or so called border issues. It's a great feeling for me. It's like I'm helping people negotiate peace treaties with their money. Be in touch if you want to know more. Tom at Shepherd Financial Maine will help you evolve with your money.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

It is interesting because you have you have two boys and a girl, 14, 11, 9 and I'm wondering how. I mean I have a boy and two girls and I know that the way that I see my children, even though I make an effort not to see things based on gender, I can't really help but do that. My, my older child went to Guatemala and worked in Guatemala City for a year at just the age of 18. My now 18 year old daughter, I worry more about her and I think there was some gender, there were some gender issues that came in when it came to Amanda as well.

Sara Corbett:

Yeah, it's interesting, she says in the book that people would say to her, it must be so hard to travel alone as a woman. And her answer always was, it's actually not. I think it might even be easier because she felt like if she was open to the world, people went out of their way to help her. And really, I mean, the thing to keep in mind is she had many years of really great experiences as a traveler. Again, like when I put on my mom hat, I know exactly what you're talking about. And yeah, I think it's something, I think it's something we need to strive for, is to not worry more about our daughters than we do our sons. Because truly the world's dangers are the world's dangers. And yes, women are more at risk for physical assault, but I just don't think it should stop. I don't think we should keep our girls home. I don't think we should keep ourselves home. I think it's an unfortunate thing. And I also feel like the more women who are out traveling, the more possibilities for understanding culturally come about, you know, and maybe someday that will help, maybe that will change some of the attitudes. I was, Mike and I were reading last night an item in the newspaper about the violence against women in India. And you know, I've traveled by myself through India a few times and I love it there. And had I, had I read the horror stories, I might have stayed home. And I'm so glad I didn't, you know, So I don't know. I don't think there's an easy answer. I totally know what you're voicing and I think it's a real reality and it's, it's. I don't think there's an easy answer to it.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

And that is part of what you and I had talked about before, which is that the further you get into this, the fewer easy answers you find. And this ongoing back and forth and sense that maybe there isn't a right.

Sara Corbett:

Right.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

And even having to live within that yourself and having to live within that and subsequently raise children who are still looking still at this age need easier answers, at least initially.

Sara Corbett:

Yeah, I think the world is a really complex place, you know, and I think that, you know, one interesting vein of Amanda's story for me was her exposure to radical Islam, which is inarguably one of the giant forces shaping our world today. For better or worse? Mostly for worse. But to look at, she had a front row seat on fundamentalism. And to me, I think what she learned from that is really instructive. You know, she was able to see in these young men gradually over the year. Plus she was held hostage the first couple of months. They wanted to ask her questions about where she came from and where she had traveled, and they wanted to practice English and they talked about wanting to study abroad. But what had happened was this was a cell. It was basically a criminal cell. And so they had been isolated from their families. And if they had had any jobs or hope of jobs or schooling, they disappeared as this kidnapping ordeal dragged on. And what they were being fed was this really steady diet, interestingly enough, largely through cell phones, of fundamentalist teachings. And so as time went by, instead of family, instead of community, instead of peace or warmth, they were. They were told that, you know, heaven came in the form of the afterlife and that their devotion now, their devotion to jihad would all pay off someday. And she got to watch them embrace this. And, you know, again, there's no. There's no moral to the story. But I think that I really appreciate people who are out in the world who are bearing witness to this and bring it back and relay it, because there is something helpful and instructive in that. I feel like I understand the world a little bit more. Does that make the world any less complicated, scary, or, you know, mystifying? No, it doesn't. But I'm really glad to know what I know because of it.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

And that brings up another word, which is translator. This is a. You've been a journalist for many years now in many different places, covering many different stories, and the common theme for you is translation.

Sara Corbett:

Yeah, I love my job. I'll start by saying that it never gets old. I have worked for the New York Times for 13, 14 years now, and I work for the magazine. So I do long form stories. They take always months sometimes. I've spent a couple years working on several stories, but, you know, sometimes it takes a long time for them to come to fruition. I never meet somebody once. I always meet somebody several times. I never. I try not to do phone interviews if I can help it. I'm very lucky to work for an organization that will put me on a plane and send me places to meet people. And I really try to listen. I listen and I listen and I listen, and I go in to every story, having done my homework, but without judgment. I think that that's something that I've learned over the years, because when you're a journalist, your job is to translate. It really is. And if you go in with your opinions and your worldview, you're not going to do a good job that way. And so the best thing you can do is try to understand where people are coming from, why they say the things they say, why they do the things they do, and what context they're operating in. And it doesn't always work, but when it works, it's a really great feeling.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

You and Mike were part of a group of people who founded the Telling Room here in Portland, which is, of course, all about stories. We've talked about the Telling Room before on the show, and it remains something that you both are very interested in is the story at a very fundamental level.

Sara Corbett:

We are, again, getting back to being a journalist. You know, my job is to listen to people's stories. And somebody asked me recently, they said, have you ever not liked anybody? You know, when you go out and you're right about them? And I really had to think about it. I was like, I don't think so. You know, I think, like, every. Again, I don't think I would have done my job if I just flat out didn't like somebody, because I feel like everybody has something of real value to say, and it can take a long time to get it out of them. It can be a confusing message or something that maybe I hadn't thought about or maybe wouldn't be inclined to agree with. But here in Portland, when we started the telling room 10 years ago, where this is, we're so excited. This is our 10th. We're about to celebrate the 10th anniversary. We kind of turned that framework onto the kids in the community and this idea that if we can empower them and their voices, we adults, we, you know, we people in Maine can learn a whole lot from the kids here. And so one of our first projects was we worked with immigrant and refugee children in Maine, and they told their Coming to America stories. And we published an anthology containing those stories. And it became a teaching tool around the state of Maine. And one of the most wonderful days was these. This group of kids went to Yarmouth High School and did a reading.

[Unidentified voice]:

And.

Sara Corbett:

And the Yarmouth students asked these Portland students all sorts of questions. And they dignified them as authors. I think everybody learned a lot. And, like, it was just this wonderful day of seeing kids hearing each other and responding to each other in a really genuine, rich way. And I think as adults, anytime we can mediate that without getting in the way. But at creating those opportunities, it's just really fun, and it's really humbling. Anytime I go into the telling room, there's some little experience that makes me walk out sort of an inch taller. Like, look what they're doing. You know, it has nothing to do with us. It has everything to do with. There's a space where these kids can tell stories.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

And I think that's the type of thing that it's so important to hold onto. Because one of the things that struck me the most in the House in the sky was when Amanda was trying to get out of captivity. Everybody had sort of given up. The governments had given up. And it was essentially her family and the family of the man that was also captured with her that were negotiating with these guys on their cell phones. And it just struck me as so lonely, you know, and to be out there and be like, well, who cares about me?

Sara Corbett:

Yeah. Yeah.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

So to on the other side, foster this sense of community and story that the telling room brings up, that must be very important, you to be able to have those sort of counterbalances.

Sara Corbett:

I think that personally, I get a lot out of community. You know, that's why I love Maine. I love living in Portland because it's a small city. And I mean, we all know this. I'm sure all your listeners know this. You know, there's this intimacy that is really special here. Really, really special. And then there's this creativity here that's also special. And much of a time with my job, I have to go away to do it. I go away to do my reporting. And there's nothing that makes me happier when I'm here and I'm writing, which can be very isolating and lonely to be out in the community. Whether it's through working with the telling room, whether it's being on the playground where my kids go to school or walking the dog or, you know, walking up Exchange street, whatever it is. There's this. Or Hannaford, my God. You know, like, there is this sociability and community connection that I think is incredibly sustaining, regardless of what you do for a living. I think it's really, really special in Maine.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

So what's next for you?

Sara Corbett:

Well, I'm back at work at the New York Times Magazine. I'm leaving next week. I'm doing a story now about surveillance. So I'm about to spend a week in the Dominican Republic with a bunch of Russian code breakers. That's my next adventure and it's starting. This is what I love. It's a blank slate every time and I'm about to dive into something that I absolutely nothing about and hopefully will come out the other side. Having learned, how can people find out

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

about the work that may be coming up in the future, the work that you've done in the past, and A House in the Sky?

Sara Corbett:

Most of my work is listed on a website called byliner.com which sort of aggregates long form writers work. I'm also on Twitter and Facebook.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Well Sarah, we've really appreciated your coming in and talking to us today. I I can't recommend more highly the book A House in the sky that you co wrote with Amanda Lindhout. And I also encourage our listeners to go out and spend some time looking at some of the other things that you've written about. Thanks for coming in.

Sara Corbett:

Thanks so much Lisa.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

As a physician and small business owner, I rely on Marcy Booth from Booth Main to help me with my own business and to help me live my own life fully.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Here are a few thoughts from Marcy

[Unidentified voice]:

when was the last time you took a break from what you were doing? From the work that was piled up on your desk and just looked up? I know that during the course of my days I often forget to take a moment or two to just breathe, look up at the sky and dream. Terrible that I have to remind myself to breathe. But when I do, I feel energized because in those moments I'm able to let go of the daily grind and think more about what I want to accomplish, how I want my business to grow. Sometimes those are the aha moments. If we all took a few moments out each day to stop what we are doing and dream a little about our business futures, not only would we feel a great sense of calm, but we may come to realize that these dreams can in fact come true. I'm Marcie Booth. Let's talk about the changes you need. Boothmaine.com

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

eleanor Morse is the author of three novels. Her first, Chopin's Garden, was published in 2006. An Unexpected Forest, her second, won the 2008 Independent Book Publisher's Award for the best regional fiction in the Northeast region and the 2008 Maine Literary Award from the Maine Writers and Publishers alliance for best published fiction. Most recently, Eleanor published White Dog Fell from the sky, her third novel. I'm going to read to you a little bit from Eleanor's book, but first, thanks for coming in and talking with us today.

Eleanor Morse:

Thank you, Lisa.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

The point is, people have lost their courage.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

They've gone for safety. No one wants to be reminded what a tiny speck in the universe we are, but knowing that's the key to everything. We're afraid of big spaces. We herd for safety, and before you know it, you've got civilization. But in the wild, look what happens. Which animals do lions choose to prey upon? Zebra and wildebeest, animals that travel in herds. The herd feels like safety, but it only makes us more vulnerable. That's an interesting commentary based on what I know of your life, because you're actually someone who hasn't really traveled as much with the herd so much as sort of following your own path.

Eleanor Morse:

Yes, that's true. Well, I mean, we are all herd animals to some extent. But at a fairly early age, I met a man who had grown up in Botswana, which is how I happened to be there, and we ended up marrying. But back when I met him, it was still pretty unusual to to travel that far and especially to live in Africa. And it's much less unusual now. But I think it started a lot earlier than that with my family, who I'm thankful that they are in many ways a bunch of oddballs. Not only my family of origin, my most immediate family, but the larger, larger family. There are a lot of scientists and mathematicians and people who are interested in why things happen. And when I think of what drives my own writing, the engine is really curiosity. If I weren't curious, I don't know what life would be like. I can't imagine it. But I I'm grateful to have grown up with people around me who had curiosity and a kind of native curiosity. Why does this happen? And why does it happen the way it is? It does. So while I'm not a mathematician or scientist or a research person. I do bring that to my world, and it's caused me to choose things that are off the beaten path. And it's probably what's caused me to live on Peaks island, which is full of people who have made similar choices in their lives.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

White Dog Fell from the sky is, as you alluded to, based in Botswana, where you were when you were younger. But many years intervene between being in Botswana, actually living there and writing this book.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Why is that?

Eleanor Morse:

Yeah, you're not the first person to ask me. You know, most people say, why did it take you so long to write this book? Because I did leave Botswana when I was in my late 20s, and I'm not anything like that anymore. I think that it's a book that required a particular emotional vocabulary that was pretty deep. And I think that I needed to live and experience life and have my

Sara Corbett:

own

Eleanor Morse:

sorrows and joys and breadth of experience in order to fully embrace what I needed to in this book. I didn't realize that at a conscious level, but at an unconscious level I did. The landscape of Botswana haunted me and stayed with me in a very rich, complex way. And I don't think I fully realized that until I started working on this book. But in the process of writing it, I evoked that landscape in some part of me that had been dormant. And I evoked the language and the people and images. They came back stronger and stronger. And as I wrote. But it was a really interesting book to write because all my memories are those memories from being in my late 20s. And so there was a kind of a double focus, a layering of time as I wrote the book. And I think that at first I didn't know how to handle that. But as the book progressed, it became clear how I was to do that. But it was a really interesting book to write for that reason, and also really interesting to know that there are hidden parts or dormant parts in us. I think all of us have more than one lifetime. And my life's no different than. Than other people's in that way. And that life that I had left behind many years before was still very much alive in me. And this book, even though it's not autobiographical, is as close to historically accurate as I could make it and close to that period of what it was like to be in Botswana in the mid-1970s, with apartheid in South Africa very much a fact of life right next door to this African country, Botswana, which was independent, democratic, multiracial. So it was a fascinating Time to be there.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

The 1970s weren't that long ago for many of us. And it is interesting to think about the notion of apartheid as being something that is real, that actually existed and existed, you know, pretty late into the last century. And it's not as simple as just saying, well, blacks go over here and whites go over here. I mean, there was. There was imprisonment and there was people being treated like animals. And in fact, Isaac, the main character in your book, is one of those individuals. He was a young black man who was actually a medical student who was imprisoned by the South African government. And reading about this was. It was challenging for me because it's hard to believe that this existed and not so long ago.

Eleanor Morse:

Yeah, it was challenging. Parts of it were very challenging to write for that same reason. And. And I was aware in the writing that I couldn't overload the book with that side of it. There's only so much you can expect a reader to tolerate and bear. And apartheid was unbearable for so many people living it. And I wanted to capture that and I also wanted to make it bearable for a reader to apprehend what that was like. So there was more than one storyline during the book, partly for that reason. But I think, you know, as a young woman, I was certainly aware of apartheid next door. I was aware of people being thrown out of 10 story windows as part of police investigation, quote, investigations. But in actually traveling to South Africa, much of that was hidden. And I mostly only rubbed shoulders with white people when I traveled there. And I didn't spend a lot of time in South Africa, but enough to know that whites were anxious to rationalize the system or at least the people that I met. It seemed pointless to argue, but it was terribly upsetting to be there. I was often held up at the border because I had a radio program there and I was an educator and I was an American. And those were three strikes against me. So I often spent time at the border waiting for clearance when I went through one way or the other from Botswana or back into Botswana. But I don't think I was fully aware of. I didn't allow myself to feel right down deep into the fact of apartheid and what it would be like to live within that system. And that's one of the things in the writing of this book that I had to come face to face with through research, through my own imagination. Part of why it was hard to write.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

We live now in a society that is increasingly, I believe, more accepting of people of different skin colors, of different religions, of Different, I don't know, spiritual inclinations. But that's on the surface. There are still some people who have deeply held beliefs about separation and about superiority. What was it like to be in a country or next to a country that was entirely of that belief, or at least the laws were structured in a way so that people were separated and there was a class system and to know that this was so against what you yourself believed in.

Eleanor Morse:

Well, as I said, it was horrifying. And I had, you know, I had the experience of being in a Mafeking train station and dashing up the, quote, black, the knee blanc, the black stairway and being shouted at. If I'd been a black person running up a white staircase, I probably would have been shot or put in prison. Who knows what would have happened to me? So I had those, those small experiences. As I said, I didn't live in South Africa, I was living in Botswana. So my experience day to day was quite the reverse of that. I had the experience of being a white person for the first time, being a minority person, and occasionally felt the brunt of that in my work and outside work. Not strongly because Botswana was a, it felt like a very kind multiracial country at the very top of the country. Tsaretsi Kama was a very enlightened, statesmanlike black president. His wife was white, a white British person. And so that multiracialism filtered down through the country and was a very strong part of what I felt that I belonged to. My husband was white, but he was a citizen of Botswana. But we were a minority. And sometimes that minority felt privileged, but sometimes it felt the reverse. And I feel grateful to be a white person to have had that experience of being sometimes in a very unprivileged position, which is what black people in this country have experienced for hundreds of years now.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

We've been speaking with Eleanor Morse, author of White Dog Fell from the Sky. For more information on Eleanor, visit Eleanor Morse.com thank you for bringing your writing to the world and for speaking with us today.

Eleanor Morse:

Eleanor thank you Lisa.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

The goal of the Dr. Lisa Radio

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Hour is to help make connections between the health of the individual and the health of the community. The goal of Ted Carter Inspired Landscapes is to deepen our appreciation for the natural world.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Here to speak with us today is ted Carter.

[Unidentified voice]:

On April 22, which is Earth Day this year my new book Earth Calling is being released co written by my co author Ellen Gunter and it is really a handbook on climate change for the 21st century. This is something that is going to affect every single one of us. It doesn't matter where you live or what socioeconomic bracket you're in, every single piece of the human spirit will be touched by the changes going on in the environment. This has been something that's been going on a long time and we keep putting solutions off. We keep putting things off to the future and hoping that maybe another generation can handle this. But it's really up to us. We are the stewards. We're the ones that are being called to handle this now. And it's not about giving up everything you have. I think people are terrified thinking that, oh my gosh, you know, I can't have a nice house or drive a nice car or have my things, I guess. But that's not the case at all. I think it's about and in both and about about walking between the worlds and trying to come up with solutions that are really helpful to everybody and get out of ourselves for a minute and start to see the world around us with a much more holistic perspective. I'm Ted Carter and if you'd like to contact me, I can be reached@tedcarterdesign.com

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

understands the importance of the health of

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

the body, mind and spirit.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Here to talk about the health of the body is Travis Boyer of Premier

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Sports, a division of Black Bear Medical.

[Unidentified voice]:

Let's talk about the cultural divide we sometimes have going on in our bodies. Our bodies are wonderful and sometimes unexplainable forms. We often find ourselves overcompensating for our injuries with the strong and healthy parts of our bodies, only to put the balance further out of control. Keeping your body in line always begins with rest and relaxation. Beyond this, there are so many things you can do to keep your body more symmetrical. From the right pillow to the proper shoe orthotics to products that help strength and stability. There are so many things to keep your body in balance. Ask our staff at Black Bear Medical about the things you can do on a daily basis and when injury strikes to keep your body in balance and help bridge the gap of the cultural divide. Visit us@blackbearmedical.com for more

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

now in its 17th year, the Maine Jewish Film Festival has presented over 300 domestic and foreign films and sold over 32,000 tickets to both Jewish and non Jewish attendees. This year, the Maine Jewish Film Festival will be held on March 22nd to 29th in venues throughout Greater Portland as well as selected sites throughout the state. Here is an excerpt from next week's show on the Maine Jewish Film Festival. Today we're speaking with film festival executive director Louise Rosen and filmmaker Richard Kane.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

It is interesting that at the same time you're celebrating diversity, you're also celebrating connection so that people will see films that are put out as Maine Jewish film festival films and yet there's a universality about them. And I know, Richard, this is something that you are very aware of because you've done work not only on artists, but you did work with. One of your pieces was called in these Times and another was called Turning Clothing into Food. Those were two short documentaries on hunger, which is something that impacts all of us in one way or another.

[Unidentified voice]:

Right. I guess I'm very interested in community and in issues that impact people. And it's hard to realize that when you're living in an affluent place that there are people who are falling through the cracks. And we were very interested in and my partner, Melody Lewis Kane was very interested in the local food pantry and how can we help? And so we collaborated with them to create a film that is about hunger and about how food pantries can be of great help in helping those people who do fall through the cracks. I mean, people with two jobs working minimum wage, you know, can't make it with a couple of children, so they need something like a food pantry to be of to supplement their diet. And now the films have been showing in many of the places around many of the theaters around Maine. We had the great fortune of having Noel Paul Stookey contribute the music and the title in these Times to the film. And he's a great member of the community that I live in in Blue Hill. So that film, as well as the film that we made for the Natural Resources Council of Maine, I'm very interested in our environment and I think the NRCM does an amazing job to really protect the nature of Maine. So I became involved in that project. But I'm also doing, you know, commercials and politicals as well as commercials on different products. I just like the to be involved in a visual medium like film and which is what perhaps attracted me to making films about art in Maine. I mean, that really has become my life's work. And for that, I'm very grateful to have that opportunity. And many of the artists happen to be Jewish. And when I started this project on John Ember, it wasn't about a Jewish artist. And it's knowing that the film is part of the Jewish Film Festival, the Maine Jewish film festival, has made me begun to think about my own Judaism. John's wife, Jill Hoy, who's a really accomplished artist herself and has had a long history of being in Maine, she talked about how John's Judaism was really deeply rooted in who he is. So in the film, when they're looking through old family photos, they come across a photograph of John, nine years old, at a family Passover, where there's Uncle Isaac and Uncle Herman and his grandmother, Michael Abbey. And John is like a peacock in a way. He's hamming it up. He's stretching out his neck to be photographed. And hamming it up is who John is, in part. So Jill describes John as his Judaism being deeply rooted in who he is. And let me just quote what she says. John asks, how so? And she says, well, your delivery, your being, your responsibility, your search, your quest for the integrity of what you do. I think there's a very deep root there. And it made me think about, you know, well, who am I as a Jew, or, you know, both of us, John and myself, we always thought about ourselves as being secular Jews. Maybe we were both bar mitzvahed, but it was almost more of a social event than it was a religious event. And so it's something that the film begins to deal with. John actually has some very long history of having a very significant ancestor by the name of Naftali Hertz Imber, who was the author of the Israeli national anthem. He wrote a poem, hatikvah, which means hope, and it became the. The words to the Israeli national anthem.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

And I do think that this is something that I find very interesting and something I think you and I talked about on the phone, Louise. It's this idea of documenting, of really making sure that things are not forgotten. And this is a big piece of what you're doing as you're bringing some of these films, like the John Imber film, to Maine for the Maine Jewish Film Festival. Tell me about some of your favorite films.

[Unidentified voice]:

Well, I think it's important to bear in mind that all of these films come from what I would refer to as independent sources. In other words, these are not being made by a studio system. So they represent a kind of independent spirit. And from a huge range of countries, you know, we've got certainly Israeli films, France, Germany, these countries are represented. We're really curating a collection that reflects an international sensibility. In terms of favorites, it's a tough question. I mean, we've certainly got edgy films, a film called the Gatekeepers, which was nominated for an Oscar last year, which is a very, very tough look at Israeli approach to dealing with terrorism. It features the heads of the Israeli intelligence agency called Shin Bet, and they talk about their careers as the head of that agency and reflecting back on whether their approaches ultimately made sense in terms of peace in the world, peace for Israel. And it's a tough film and very similar in style to Fog of War in as much as it uses interviews combined with archive material. So in relation to what you were just saying. Yes, that's a document. I mean, we have cultural documents. A very indie and very fun film that touches on music called Awake Zion, that makes the connection between reggae and Jewish music and explores the new reggae movement that exists in Israel, where there's a very vibrant reggae scene, but also connects with Crown Heights. And of course, a period of time when the Caribbean community in Crown Heights and the Orthodox community clashed. But then looking at the fact that there's now this kind of inspired fertilization between the two communities, musically speaking. And great film. We've got a German film called An Apartment in Berlin that looks at the emigration of young Israelis to Germany, which for a lot of the older generation is really a bit of a taboo idea. And yet Israelis are drawn, these 20 somethings, 30 somethings, are drawn to a place like Berlin for all the reasons anyone would be. It's a cosmopolitan city. It's got wonderful quality of life, very lively, active place. And dealing with Berlin as having been the center for the extermination programs during the Holocaust, there's a big push pull there. So it's exciting to learn about what are these young people thinking and what are their experiences being there and how are their families responding to them.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

You've been listening to the Dr. Lisa Radio Arum podcast show number 130, Cultural Divide. Our guests have included Eleanor Morse and Sarah Corbett. For more information on our guests and extended interviews, visit Dr. Lisa.org the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast is downloadable for free on itunes. For a preview of each week's show, sign up for our newsletter and like our Dr. Lisa Facebook page. Follow me bountiful1 on Instagram and read my take on health and well being on the Bountiful blog, we love to hear from you. So please let us know what you think of the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour. We welcome your suggestions for future shows. Also let our sponsors know that you have heard about them here. We are privileged that they enable us to bring the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour

Eleanor Morse:

to you each week.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

This is Dr. Lisa Belisle. I hope that you have enjoyed our Cultural Divide show. Thank you for allowing me to be a part of your day. May you have a bountiful life.