tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-147661352024-03-07T11:33:17.614-08:00Everybody I Love You<p></p>Stephan Clarkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18216622950263482703noreply@blogger.comBlogger244125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14766135.post-16265216868131385482016-11-29T15:12:00.001-08:002016-11-29T15:12:44.147-08:00Internet Archive Request<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Please remove this blog, in its entirety, from the Internet Archive.</div>
Stephan Clarkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18216622950263482703noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14766135.post-49750090016911297172012-02-21T10:25:00.002-08:002012-02-21T11:09:53.580-08:00Vladimir's MustacheAn introduction to Vladimir's Mustache, a short story collection by Stephan Eirik Clark that is set against the backdrop of Russian history from the time of Peter the Great through the purges of Stalin and on into the mail-order bride agencies of the present day. With stories published in such magazines as Witness, Ninth Letter, Salt Hill, and the Cincinnati Review, this collection is available now through Amazon and other book sellers. <br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="300" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/iChHRJi6Pjg" width="480"></iframe><br />
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by<span class="long-title" dir="ltr" id="eow-title" title="Vladimir's Mustache - Stephan Eirik Clark - Book Trailer"> Stephan Eirik Clark</span><br />
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<a href="http://youtu.be/iChHRJi6Pjg">Youtube link</a><br />
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For more information, visit the website of the author at http://www.stephanclark.net or the publisher at http://www.russianlife.com/store/index.cfm/product/215_30/vladimirs-mustache.cfmUnknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14766135.post-58714935688907917522010-01-25T16:23:00.000-08:002010-01-26T23:15:07.139-08:00New Blog<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_e1laZobVaGc/S1412r5TsEI/AAAAAAAACfM/LiwKY8g74zg/s1600-h/soviet1.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="167" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_e1laZobVaGc/S1412r5TsEI/AAAAAAAACfM/LiwKY8g74zg/s200/soviet1.JPG" width="200" /></a><br />
</div>I kept this blog to document the year I lived in Kharkov, Ukraine as a Fulbright Fellow. It concerned itself with the so-called mail-order bride trade, the struggles facing couples brought together through it, as well as a variety of things slavic, soviet or post-soviet. <br />
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Because this site isn't representative of the full range of my writing, I've created a new website, more general in nature. Find it at www.stephanclark.net or <a href="http://www.stephanclark.net">just click here</a>. <br />
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For those who enjoyed this blog, thanks for reading. And keep in touch.<br />
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Finally, special thanks to Snowy for all the work he put into the redesign.Stephan Clarkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18216622950263482703noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14766135.post-83702936575122586132009-05-21T09:58:00.002-07:002009-05-21T10:02:06.113-07:00The Emperor of Scent by Chandler BurrOne percent of our genes is devoted to the sense of smell (only the immune system rivals this) and yet still we can't say how the nose works. When we talk of the nose, we might as well be talking of the soul.<br /><br />These thoughts and more are explored in this wonderful book, The Emperor of Scent, by Chandler Burr, which I find myself returning to again and again. It explores the perfume trade in France and a man with an unorthodox view of the sense of smell. Highly recommended: <iframe src="http://rcm.amazon.com/e/cm?t=eviloyo-20&o=1&p=8&l=as1&asins=0375759816&fc1=000000&IS2=1<1=_blank&m=amazon&lc1=0000FF&bc1=000000&bg1=FFFFFF&f=ifr" style="width:120px;height:240px;" scrolling="no" marginwidth="0" marginheight="0" frameborder="0"></iframe>Stephan Clarkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18216622950263482703noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14766135.post-28536002498306648362009-05-21T09:58:00.001-07:002009-05-21T09:58:49.613-07:00Great Book<a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0375759816?ie=UTF8&tag=eviloyo-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=0375759816">The Emperor of Scent: A True Story of Perfume and Obsession</a><img src="http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=eviloyo-20&l=as2&o=1&a=0375759816" width="1" height="1" border="0" alt="" style="border:none !important; margin:0px !important;" />Stephan Clarkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18216622950263482703noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14766135.post-68896069828596140362008-12-19T14:01:00.000-08:002008-12-19T14:26:01.067-08:00Notes From an Underground (a recording)In Ukraine, all of the smaller, corner stores work much like markets did in the United States fifty or one-hundred years ago. You'll go in and see that all of the goods are on shelves or in cold cases only employees can reach or access. Consequently, if you want some cheese, you'll have to go up to the dairy counter and speak with a blue-aproned продавщица (prodavschitsa/saleswoman) who will call out, Я слушаю! (ya slushayu!/I'm listening!) and take your order. If you want some meat, or some dry goods, you'll have to repeat the process, seeing two more Blue Aprons. <br /><br />There is certainly a benefit to this system: a drastic reduction in theft. But the problem is, if you don't speak Russian, or if you speak a little Russian but are too shy to test it in public, you will likely starve, especially if you haven't yet discovered one of the western-style supermarkets, of which there were <a href="http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/travel_information.php?wgInfo=Ukraine%3AKharkiv_oblast%3AKharkiv%3A%40%3AFood_and_Drinks_and_Local_Specialties">several in Kharkov</a>. <br /><br />Anyway, all of this is a long introduction to the fact that I wrote an essay about my experiences trying to scrape together a few good meals in Ukraine during my first couple of weeks in-country back in the fall of 2005. A while back I pointed you to the journal that published it, <a href="http://www.noojournal.com/view.php?mode=1&issue=eight&id=147">NOÖ Journal</a>, which subsequently nominated the essay for inclusion in the Best of the Web 2009 anthology. <br /><br />Now I'm writing to say you can find an audio recording of the essay below. Fourteen minutes long, it should prepare any traveler for a trip to the Former Soviet Union. Tell me what you think. And Приятного аппетита! <br /><br /><iframe src="http://dublit.com/widget/dubplayer.php?q=2273" width="92" height="92" frameborder="0" scrolling="no"></iframe>Stephan Clarkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18216622950263482703noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14766135.post-69583755674408326732008-11-25T21:54:00.000-08:002010-01-18T12:50:29.456-08:00ManureJust discovered this website that allows you to view magazines online -- and I found the second story I published had already been uploaded by Dave Housley, one of the editors of Barrelhouse. My story, "Manure," about my trouble with credit cards, begins on page 19.<br /><br /><div><embed src="http://static.issuu.com/webembed/viewers/style1/v1/IssuuViewer.swf" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" quality="high" scale="noscale" salign="l" flashvars="mode=preview&previewLayout=white&username=davehousley&docName=barrelhouseone&documentId=080801141212-57c0356cc2cc4b1a8ffa827c9db845eb&autoFlip=true&backgroundColor=000000&layout=grey" style="width:281px;height:230px" name="flashticker" align="middle"></embed><div style="width:281px;text-align:left;"><a href="http://issuu.com" target="_blank">Get your own</a> - <a href="http://issuu.com/davehousley/docs/barrelhouseone?mode=embed&documentId=080801141212-57c0356cc2cc4b1a8ffa827c9db845eb&layout=grey" target="_blank">Open publication</a><a href="http://issuu.com/embed/guide?documentId=080801141212-57c0356cc2cc4b1a8ffa827c9db845eb&width=425&height=301" target="_blank"><img src="http://static.issuu.com/webembed/previewers/style1/v1/m3.gif" border="0" /></a></div></div>Stephan Clarkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18216622950263482703noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14766135.post-77041491081078751472008-10-30T09:40:00.000-07:002008-10-30T09:51:51.279-07:00Great blog<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.transparent.com/russian/files/2008/09/dog12.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 480px; height: 360px;" src="http://www.transparent.com/russian/files/2008/09/dog12.jpg" border="0" alt="" /></a><br />If, like me, you're learning -- or, more honestly, trying to learn -- to speak Russian, you'd be well-served by visiting <a href="http://www.transparent.com/russian/">this blog</a>, which is written by a Swedish literature student living in Russia. I love <a href="http://www.transparent.com/russian/word-of-the-week-%D0%BF%D0%B8%D1%82%D1%8C-to-drink/">the word of the week</a> feature, as well as the type of <a href="http://www.transparent.com/russian/%D0%9D%D0%B5%D1%87%D1%82%D0%BE-%D0%BE-%D0%92%D0%98%D0%A7-%D0%B2-%D0%A0%D0%BE%D1%81%D1%81%D0%B8%D0%B8-something-about-hiv-in-russia/">travel reportage</a> that I enjoyed posting here. The title of the blog, Russian Blog, sounds like the result of a brainstorming session that lasted all of five seconds. But each post is obviously the work of a good deal of effort. I'm certainly reading and hoping for more.Stephan Clarkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18216622950263482703noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14766135.post-47423035642301389662008-10-29T16:37:00.000-07:002008-10-29T16:40:42.289-07:00The Greatest Gift.This should be of interest to many readers of this blog: a memoir of survival and Siberia. Get an introduction to the book here:<br /><object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/sKZ02JLeODQ&hl=en&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/sKZ02JLeODQ&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object>Stephan Clarkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18216622950263482703noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14766135.post-6250073394629936302008-08-31T16:36:00.000-07:002008-08-31T16:49:14.932-07:00The Cost of Marriage (Part Two)<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.valucreation.com/VC_PICS.HTG/I_Want_Your_Money_UncleSam.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px;" src="http://www.valucreation.com/VC_PICS.HTG/I_Want_Your_Money_UncleSam.jpg" border="0" alt="" /></a><br /><br /><br />Two years after receiving your conditional Green Card card -- the first you will receive after marrying a U.S. citizen -- you must apply to have its conditions removed, using <a href="http://www.uscis.gov/files/form/I-751.pdf">form I-751</a>. If you do not do this, you will not be allowed to live legally in the United States. If you do, and you're successful in your application -- meaning, your marriage is not ruled to be a fraud, entered into only to circumvent immigration laws -- you will be rewarded with a 10 year Green Card. <br /><br />Can you guess how much it costs to file the I-751?<br /><br />$545.<br /><br />That includes $80 for a biometric finger-print.<br /><br />Please, do not write USDHS on your personal check or money order. Write it out in full: The U.S. Department of Homeland Security.<br /><br />Some of you may say this is perfectly fine. You choose to marry a foreigner, you pay the price. But we do not parse out the costs of the nation in this way with other things. We all pay for the military. We all contribute to Social Security, MediCare, etcetera. Yes, homeowners support education. But do only drivers support the cost of building and maintaining new roads? Etcetera, etcetera.<br /><br />For a previous entry on the Foreigner Tax see <a href="http://everybodyiloveyou.blogspot.com/2006/08/cost-of-marriage-homeland-security.html">here</a>.Stephan Clarkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18216622950263482703noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14766135.post-15322905883012655862008-05-26T21:32:00.000-07:002008-05-26T21:59:42.453-07:00How to Make Chicken Kharkiv<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.texashillcountrybarbecue.com/Merchant2/graphics/00000001/chickenlarge.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px;" src="http://www.texashillcountrybarbecue.com/Merchant2/graphics/00000001/chickenlarge.jpg" border="0" alt="" /></a><br />During my first month or two in Kharkov, I reported that I <a href="http://everybodyiloveyou.blogspot.com/2005/10/how-to-make-chicken-kharkiv.html">wasn't eating so well</a>. Now the full story can be found in the latest issue of <a href="http://www.noojournal.com/view.php?mode=1&issue=eight&id=147">NOÖ</a>.Stephan Clarkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18216622950263482703noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14766135.post-56260806762100719152008-05-17T20:22:00.000-07:002008-05-17T20:28:43.550-07:00Moloko<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://bp3.blogger.com/_e1laZobVaGc/SC-h7fB9aDI/AAAAAAAAApE/3cEVWxh5Scs/s1600-h/DSC00117.JPG"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://bp3.blogger.com/_e1laZobVaGc/SC-h7fB9aDI/AAAAAAAAApE/3cEVWxh5Scs/s320/DSC00117.JPG" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5201554137950283826" /></a><br />It's not exactly writer's block -- I just can't get going.<br /><br />Consequently, I've spent much of the last two days on Flickr, securing my photos for posterity. The end result of all this is my forming a new group on that photo-sharing site devoted entirely to pictures of Soviet-era milk stores.<br /><br />I'm not sure what the laws are for committing someone against their own will in the State of California, but that may be something the judge would look at unfavorably. "Milk stores, you say? Photographs of?"<br /><br />"Yes, your honor."<br /><br />By all means, join and <a href="http://www.flickr.com/groups/788117@N22/">post away.</a>Stephan Clarkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18216622950263482703noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14766135.post-85569537204328940692008-03-23T12:35:00.000-07:002008-03-23T12:38:54.132-07:00Scamski City<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://bp2.blogger.com/_e1laZobVaGc/R-axvDh64XI/AAAAAAAAAok/0L0zZ6J1xfA/s1600-h/alsou.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://bp2.blogger.com/_e1laZobVaGc/R-axvDh64XI/AAAAAAAAAok/0L0zZ6J1xfA/s320/alsou.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5181023843295879538" /></a><br /><blockquote>People are fools if they want to find a wife on the internet.<br /><br />It is not real. I correspond with a whole division of Westerners - and they are all idiots.</blockquote><br /><br />From <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/femail/article.html?in_article_id=542276&in_page_id=1879">an article in the Daily Mail</a>.Stephan Clarkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18216622950263482703noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14766135.post-27227958433527486352008-02-11T19:03:00.000-08:002008-05-14T22:18:11.385-07:00From the About Time DepartmentGreen Card rules relaxed. Now those lengthy FBI clearances -- detailed in <a href="http://everybodyiloveyou.blogspot.com/2007/10/geography-of-heart.html">my recent investigative piece</a> -- will be reduced.<br /> See <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/12/washington/12checks.html?hp">The New York Times</a> for more.Stephan Clarkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18216622950263482703noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14766135.post-24018047641250227942008-01-09T08:29:00.000-08:002008-07-24T19:12:50.071-07:00Democratic Party, Putin-Style<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://bp3.blogger.com/_e1laZobVaGc/R4T9dkdX9OI/AAAAAAAAAoU/gCNRQudiVOE/s1600-h/clintons.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://bp3.blogger.com/_e1laZobVaGc/R4T9dkdX9OI/AAAAAAAAAoU/gCNRQudiVOE/s320/clintons.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5153522558063604962" /></a><br />The more I learn about the American voting system -- and it takes several election cycles to cut through the murk -- the less "democratic" it seems.<br /><br />Get this, forty-percent of the delegates currently at stake for Democratic presidential contenders are "super-delegates." The voters don't vote for these 842 people; they're high-ranking Democratic Party members: governors, leaders of the Democratic National Committee, former Presidents, like Bill Clinton. And they all go to the National Convention, just like the delegates the voters send, and pledge their vote to a candidate during the nominating stage.<br /><br />This came as a surprise this morning, when I went to go check the delegate count, and, instead of seeing a field just now getting started, discovered <a href="http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/primaries/results/scorecard/#D">Clinton way out ahead</a>.<br /><br />She has 159 "super-delegates," dwarfing the number she's received in Iowa and New Hampshire so far, and more than 100 more than the next candidate, Barack Obama.<br /><br />Apparently, this isn't a centuries-old tradition in the Party either. As this <a href="http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18277678/">MSNBC report</a> states, it just a generation ago, when grass-roots movements, including those calling for women's rights, began to shake up the old Guard. The Democratic Party needed something to keep it stabilized through this volatile time, so the system was born.<br /><br /><blockquote>“There was a belief that they would not want candidates who were dramatically out of sync with the rest of the party — particularly if these were people who were going to have to run on the same ticket with them,” says Northeastern University political scientist William Mayer, who has written extensively on the nomination process.<br /><br />There were, Mayer says, two motives in giving elected officials a big voice in the nomination.<br /><br />“One was not to get (ideologically) extreme candidates; the other was to avoid the Jimmy Carter phenomenon — where you had a guy who was not very experienced and not very well regarded by most of his fellow governors, but nevertheless managed to win the party’s nomination,” Mayer said.</blockquote><br /><br />Now, one of my favorite hobbies is questioning the American press' demonization of Russian President Vladimir Putin. This is not because I'm a Putin man. It's because I don't know why the American Press refuses to question anything in its own country, from the faulty intelligence and fear-mongering of the Bush Administration in the lead-up to the war in Iraq to the very things the press sees as problematic abroad. Such as President Putin's decision, in 2004, to directly name his country's regional governors, rather than leave this to the voting public.<br /><br />Now, if it's undemocratic for him to do this -- something I constantly am told in the slicks and dailies -- isn't it also undemocratic for the Democratic party to give itself 4 out of every ten votes in the nominating process for its candidate for the President of the United States? The Republican Party doesn't do it. And the blessed Greens would sooner cut down a tree.<br /><br />But I suppose Putin, Time Magazine's Man of the Year, would be proud. <br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://bp2.blogger.com/_e1laZobVaGc/R4T-KUdX9PI/AAAAAAAAAoc/dW6dOsL-haI/s1600-h/putin.jpg"><img style="cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://bp2.blogger.com/_e1laZobVaGc/R4T-KUdX9PI/AAAAAAAAAoc/dW6dOsL-haI/s320/putin.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5153523326862750962" /></a><br /><a href="http://www.time.com/time/specials/2007/personoftheyear/article/0,28804,1690753_1690757_1690766-5,00.html">A Tsar is Born</a> indeed.<br /></span>Stephan Clarkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18216622950263482703noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14766135.post-19567055015953975222007-10-23T04:36:00.001-07:002010-01-22T20:55:04.507-08:00Geography of the Heart<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://southtexastourism.com/sitebuilder/images/Pharr_International_Bridge-216x501.png"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px;" src="http://southtexastourism.com/sitebuilder/images/Pharr_International_Bridge-216x501.png" border="0" alt="" /></a><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">The Geography of the Heart</span><br /><span style="font-style:italic;">How US immigration law divides families</span><br />By Stephan Clark<br /><br />One Sunday almost four years ago, Thomas Carson, a 50-year old electrical engineer with corporate commendations from Nabisco and General Electric, parked his KIA Sportsman near the US-Mexico border and waited. <br /><br />It was after dark in <a href="http://www.tsha.utexas.edu/handbook/online/articles/LL/hrlez.html">Las Milpas</a>, once the largest colonia – or border settlement – in South Texas. Since being absorbed by the <a href="http://www.cityofpharr.com/">City of Pharr</a> to the north in the late-eighties, this community of low- and very low-income Hispanics had almost doubled in size, reaching a population of 17,000. It had also received the type of things most Americans believe lacking in only the third world: running water and electricity, sewer service and paved roads. With such improvements, the community no longer laid claim to the state’s highest incidence of tuberculosis, Hepatitis A and leprosy, and it had even attracted the development of a Jack in the Box.<br /><br />But one thing about Las Milpas remained unchanged in July 2003: its close proximity to the border. It was that which brought people like Carson here, just as the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_American_Free_Trade_Agreement">North American Free Trade Act</a> (<a href="http://www.epinet.org/content.cfm/bp173">NAFTA</a>) had brought business to the Pharr-Reynosa International Bridge, then not quite ten years old.<br /><br />Carson parked near the intersection of Highway 281 and East Dicker Road. Beside him in his SUV was his son, 11-month-old Thomas Alexander, secure in his baby-seat. Further south was the boy’s mother, Carson’s girlfriend of five years, one Lucia Ramirez Hernandez. This night, she wouldn’t be traveling over Pharr’s celebrated bridge. <br /><br />Hernandez had attempted that crossing in Jan. 1999, just a few months before a fire at a maquiladora in Reynosa would send Carson south of the border on work. Her crime that day was simple: after being stopped in a car with Texas plates, she made a false claim of U.S. citizenship. <br /><br />Since 1996, when Congress last <a href="http://library.findlaw.com/1996/Dec/1/126303.html">overhauled immigration law</a>, this act has drawn a punishment as severe – a lifetime ban on entering the United States – as it is permanent. Hernandez cannot appeal or seek a waiver. She is no different than the terrorists, communists and practicing polygamists also singled out by law. She has no means of appeal.<br /><br />“It wouldn’t matter if someone had a pistol to your side and you drove up to the border crossing and said, ‘I’m a US citizen,’” said Carson. “That’s it. You’re inadmissible. You don’t have a case.”<br /><br />And so that night four years ago, while Carson and Thomas Alexander waited in the dark, Hernandez stepped into the river that runs along the Texas border between the Gulf of Mexico and El Paso. It is a tributary President Bush knows well. Going back to his days as Governor of Texas, he has frequently said <a href="http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2001/05/20010505-1.html">family values do not end at the Rio Grande</a>. <br /><br />After emerging on the other side, Hernandez got into a car and continued toward her family. Carson spotted her passing the little strip plaza where they’d agreed to meet. He followed her to an area home, where Hernandez changed clothes and got into Carson’s SUV. The three then drove north – father, son and mother – toward the secondary inspection point at Falfurrias.<br /><br />Eight months previous, Carson, a US Navy veteran, had imagined a reunion of another sort, petitioning for an immigrant’s visa on behalf of Hernandez and her two children from a previous relationship. But the false claim of U.S. citizenship derailed that effort, and so the descendant of five American veterans of five different foreign wars had been left with only what he’d been taught in the military: if you are captured, you must try to escape.<br /><br />“We were desperate,” he said. “I don’t know what else to tell you.“<br /><br />Parts 2-8 of this story can be purchased at <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Geography-of-the-Heart-ebook/dp/B0034KYRLG/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&s=digital-text&qid=1264222319&sr=8-5">Amazon</a>.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14766135.post-8599551222700472592007-10-20T09:33:00.000-07:002007-10-20T20:20:03.582-07:00Immigration on YouTube<div id="_ytplayer_vjVQa1PpcFPV7rvQY4WOilBnY26O-a_vTyrnQwJx7J8="><a href="http://www.youtube.com/browse">Watch the latest videos on YouTube.com </a></div><script src="http://www.youtube.com/cp/vjVQa1PpcFPV7rvQY4WOilBnY26O-a_vTyrnQwJx7J8=" type="text/javascript"></script>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14766135.post-81203597795943350432007-10-17T23:28:00.000-07:002007-10-17T23:33:43.205-07:00The Sovietization of American MediaIs <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/18/business/media/18broadcast.html?hp">coming</a> to a city near you. <a href="http://english.pravda.ru/">Pravda</a>.<br /><br />The freedom of the press starts with freeing up the printing presses, no? Yet we keep on selling them off and bundling them up and giving them to one man, oftentimes a man in Australia.Stephan Clarkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18216622950263482703noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14766135.post-21767222987751106862007-08-10T09:43:00.000-07:002007-08-10T10:05:48.803-07:00Battle Continues<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://bp2.blogger.com/_e1laZobVaGc/RryWQnTWaqI/AAAAAAAAAYY/jdmVWrRkLQs/s1600-h/DSC01750.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://bp2.blogger.com/_e1laZobVaGc/RryWQnTWaqI/AAAAAAAAAYY/jdmVWrRkLQs/s400/DSC01750.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5097114090448775842" /></a><br />I was mistaken in my last post. Two people died, in separate incidents, owing to bombs planted or dropped during the Great Patriotic War.<br /><br />The first death was July 29, a village woman burning trash in what had been a mine field. The second, cited below, happened on the evening of Aug. 4, behind the airport in Belgorod. <br /><br />I would've expected this to be big news, the stuff of sad stories in national papers. But it seems it may be all too commonplace. Here's the brief write-up in the <a href="http://www.bel.ru/news/2007/08/08/25651.html#">Belgorod paper</a> (Russian).<br /><br />The picture above is the soviet memorial of Prokhorovkoe Field, nearer to Kursk than Belgorod, where the largest tank battle took place during the Second World War. The newpaper headline references it, saying the battle continues.<br /><br />The picture below is the Yelstin-era memorial, a few kilometers down the road from the Soviet structure.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://bp1.blogger.com/_e1laZobVaGc/RryafXTWarI/AAAAAAAAAYg/1zol467qJWs/s1600-h/DSC01768.jpg"><img style="cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://bp1.blogger.com/_e1laZobVaGc/RryafXTWarI/AAAAAAAAAYg/1zol467qJWs/s400/DSC01768.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5097118741898357426" /></a>Stephan Clarkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18216622950263482703noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14766135.post-8246113889800215242007-08-07T21:24:00.000-07:002007-08-07T21:34:43.241-07:0062 Years Later, WWII Finds Another VictimI couldn't believe what I heard just yesterday, when my wife told me how a 25 year-old father -- and the friend of her girilfriend's husband -- died in the woods behind her parents' dacha. He was doing something so Russian -- cooking shashlik, skewered meat, over an open flame. Barbecuing, if you will. And in an area I've been before myself. But there was something else there, waiting for him since well before he was born, since before his father was born, most likely, a bomb that had been put there by the German some sixty-two years ago this day. It seems implausible, but this is what I'm told. He selected a spot that was charred, darkened by a fire already, but while building his flame, the heat of the soil ignited the bomb that was juch an inch or two below -- shrapnel cut his cheek, he was dead inside of ten minutes. So young, married, with a child. There's a reason Russia still celebrates Victory Day every year, and you see signs commemorating how many years it's been since the fascists were driven off their land. It's a war that's still killing.Stephan Clarkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18216622950263482703noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14766135.post-72054534495257405552007-05-22T11:02:00.000-07:002007-05-22T11:29:02.989-07:00Vladimir's Mustache (and an electrocuted elephant)Not much to report around here. Though I hope to be posting more frequently in the future, more than likely at a different url (can you believe someone's already bought StephanClark.com?), and probably in a more general way (though with continued interest shown to all things Former Soviet Union). <br /><br />For the time being, I'll leave you -- if there is any "you" left, and not just the occasional passer-by from an obscure Google search -- with links to two stories of mine, both recently released.<br /><br />The first, <span style="font-style:italic;">Vladimir's Mustache</span>, tells the story of an actor during the run-up to the Great Patriotic War. Tired of playing peasants and factory workers -- the conventions of socialist realism -- this actor learns the dangers of Method Acting -- of following the teachings of Stanislavski rather than Stalin -- when he's cast as Hitler in a propaganda film.<br /><br />The story, a companion piece to <span style="font-style:italic;">Kamkov the Astronomer</span>, published in Vol 3.1 of <a href="http://www.cincinnatireview.com/">The Cincinnati Review</a> and excerpted in that magazine's archives, can be found in <a href="http://www.ninthletter.com/printed_journal/issue/7">Ninth Letter</a>, which mixes great design with a cast of contributors I'm more than happy to join. The publication was recently named <a href="http://www.news.uiuc.edu/NEWS/06/0125literaryaward.html">best new literary magazine</a> in these United States. <br /><br />The second story, <span style="font-style:italic;">Topsy the Elephant</span>, was published in this week's <a href="http://www.laweekly.com/art+books/wls/topsy-the-elephant/16401/">LA Weekly</a>. Dushan Milic contributed some great artwork to the story, but you'll have to follow the link to see it because it apparently can't be downloaded to your hard-drive -- at least, I can't figure out how to do that.Stephan Clarkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18216622950263482703noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14766135.post-82721586958566023252007-04-11T10:28:00.001-07:002007-04-11T11:12:35.118-07:00New FeatureCheck out the videos in the side-bar. I've currently got it configured to show a documentary shot in Odessa. It's a very well-done film, and especially interesting because it gets the female perspective as well. Not a polemic, more a mirror. Highly recommended. <br /><br />If you'd like to see more from this Russian-speaking English filmmaker, check out <a href="http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=VanishingWorld">his page of videos</a> on You Tube. There's <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T4oeePRNwoc">an entertaining two-minute video</a> of his drinking <span style="font-style:italic;">chisty</span> spirit with two pickle-juice drinking fisherman.Stephan Clarkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18216622950263482703noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14766135.post-20564069578704416412007-03-28T17:29:00.000-07:002007-03-28T17:39:02.178-07:00Spam I amIf you've tried to visit here for any of the last several days, you probably weren't able to pull anything up. One day, you could only access the site at everybodyiloveyou5.blogspot.com. Another day, a 1 went where the 5 was. Both days, the true address, lacking any numbers, drew a blank. Code 404. Error.<br /><br />Best I could figure it is that Blogger's automated "robots," things that scan Blogger's many blogs, found too many suspicious keywords here (Ukraine, women, girls girls girls!) and decided this was your run of the mill spam-blog, filled with links to Viagra and Cialis and only the occasional quote from Russian literature -- I am an angry, a bitter man -- to try to appear otherwise.<br /><br />God, I'm not really helping my case, am I?<br /><br />Anyways, the long and short of it is my blog was <a href="http://groups.google.com/group/blogger-help-troubleshoot/browse_thread/thread/bce954ad4a59e7f2/463f6ecbcad9f69d?lnk=gst&q=everybodyiloveyou&rnum=1#463f6ecbcad9f69d">deleted</a>. Again and again. With no warning, no due process. Such is life in post 9/11-America.<br /><br />One thing it did do was inspire me to do the one thing I haven't been doing much of these last few weeks -- posting. What's up with that? I don't know. <br /><br />Maybe I'll move to a new site, with a new address, just to shake things up, just to live with the promise of a more stable future. <br /><br />We'll see.Stephan Clarkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18216622950263482703noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14766135.post-10708353888952659592007-02-22T08:28:00.000-08:002007-02-22T08:48:21.125-08:00Mail-Order Integration<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://bp3.blogger.com/_e1laZobVaGc/Rd3JETLjuyI/AAAAAAAAAQA/2mnEgvEXa9w/s1600-h/moonies.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://bp3.blogger.com/_e1laZobVaGc/Rd3JETLjuyI/AAAAAAAAAQA/2mnEgvEXa9w/s400/moonies.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5034401034175494946" /></a><br />Seems marriage tours are "fueling an explosive growth in marriages to foreigners in South Korea, a country whose ethnic homogeneity lies at the core of its self-identity."<br /><br />From the <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/22/world/asia/22brides.html?em&ex=1172293200&en=326f603e97150bc5&ei=5087%0A">NY Times</a>:<br /><br /><blockquote>More and more South Korean men are finding wives outside of South Korea, where a surplus of bachelors, a lack of marriageable Korean partners and the rising social status of women have combined to shrink the domestic market for the marriage-minded male. Bachelors in China, India and other Asian nations, where the traditional preference for sons has created a disproportionate number of men now fighting over a smaller pool of women, are facing the same problem.</blockquote><br /><br />The article says that marriages to foreigners accounted for 4 percent of all South Korean marriages in 2000. In 2005, that figure was up to 14 percent.<br /><br />Also interesting:<br /><br /><blockquote>In South Korea, billboards advertising marriages to foreigners dot the countryside, and fliers are scattered on the Seoul subway. Many rural governments, faced with declining populations, subsidize the marriage tours, which typically cost $10,000.<br /></blockquote><br /><br />The article also said gender-screening technology may play a part in all this, as it allows for a disproportionate number of male babies in a culture that values them over females.Stephan Clarkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18216622950263482703noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14766135.post-46293557250009366532007-02-20T21:31:00.000-08:002007-02-22T08:46:39.129-08:00Celebrities My Wife Doesn't KnowAfter about two months of living in here, my Russian wife still hadn't seen her first celebrity. "What are people going to think?" she said of her Russian friends. "I'm living in Los Angeles!" <br /><br />I don't know if it was her desperation, or my eagerness to solve her problem, but in the next couple weeks we saw a rash of celebrities.<br /><br />Unfortunately, they were celebrities she didn't know.<br /><br />First came a guy passing us at the Sherman Oaks Whole Foods Market, a guy who inspired us to take a needless journey to the fancy cheese section so I could point him out crouching down in the frozen food aisle.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://bp0.blogger.com/_e1laZobVaGc/RdvbCDLjuuI/AAAAAAAAAPQ/K1ObYxLTugQ/s1600-h/ed_begley_rav.jpg"><img style="cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://bp0.blogger.com/_e1laZobVaGc/RdvbCDLjuuI/AAAAAAAAAPQ/K1ObYxLTugQ/s200/ed_begley_rav.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5033857836776667874" /></a><br /><br />"What's he been in?" she asked, very skeptical. "I don't know him."<br /><br />I tried to think of something. St. Elsewhere? Lots of television, I was sure. But movies? "Well, he's a very big environmentalist," I said. "Rides the bus. To meetings. A celebrity in LA does this. You know, I think <span style="font-style:italic;">I'm</span> going to shake his hand." <br /><br />That was well and good, but wife just reminded me we didn't need any cheese, and so the search continued. Who came next?<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://bp1.blogger.com/_e1laZobVaGc/RdvbdTLjuvI/AAAAAAAAAPY/CyV9K6tKkyE/s1600-h/kennedy.jpg"><img style="cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://bp1.blogger.com/_e1laZobVaGc/RdvbdTLjuvI/AAAAAAAAAPY/CyV9K6tKkyE/s200/kennedy.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5033858304928103154" /></a><br /><br />Kevin Kennedy. But while he stood in line behind us at the Circuit City in Warner Center, I couldn't even remember if he was the one who bored me to tears or was biased toward the St. Louis Cardinals. "I didn't even bother pointing him out," I said as we left. "But that guy in there, two places behind us, the one in the shiny sweatsuit with the word 'Fox' written all over it? Big baseball announcer. Definitely a celebrity."<br /><br />My wife didn't even look at me as we walked to the car. "Baby," she said. "That doesn't count."<br /><br />So that brought us to The Arclight Cinema in Hollywood this last Sunday, where I just sort of shrugged my shoulders when I saw some guy come schlepping up the stairs with a cohort only to be turned away by the usher and pointed back to one of the multi-plex's screens on the first floor.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://bp0.blogger.com/_e1laZobVaGc/RdvcnDLjuwI/AAAAAAAAAPg/gZgLWYhDPLc/s1600-h/adamcarolla_manshow_240.jpg"><img style="cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://bp0.blogger.com/_e1laZobVaGc/RdvcnDLjuwI/AAAAAAAAAPg/gZgLWYhDPLc/s200/adamcarolla_manshow_240.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5033859571943455490" /></a><br /><br />"I'm sure you don't know him," I said. "The guy in the baseball hat? Adam Carolla. Some kind of funny man. Probably stoned. Look at him. I think he's gonna trip."<br /><br />So the search continues, though in truth there does remain one sighting that's scored big, off the charts, in fact. It happened a few weeks ago now, and can be summed up with one word.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://bp1.blogger.com/_e1laZobVaGc/RdveGTLjuxI/AAAAAAAAAPo/jO43ekoqah4/s1600-h/jack116_ipkku1kn.jpg"><img style="cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://bp1.blogger.com/_e1laZobVaGc/RdveGTLjuxI/AAAAAAAAAPo/jO43ekoqah4/s200/jack116_ipkku1kn.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5033861208325995282" /></a><br /><br />Jack. <br /><br />Problem is, it was at a Laker's game, we were in a luxury box, and after his smiling face appeared on the video screen hanging high over the court, I had to point to a small little dot of a man sitting in a chair court-side. "That's him," I said. <br /><br />"There?"<br /><br />"To the left," I said. "That's Rob Reiner. Remember <span style="font-style:italic;">When Harry Met Sally</span>? He directed that. Good actor in his own right."<br /><br />It was celebrity overload. She was trying to focus on the one and only. "In the black?"<br /><br />I nodded.<br /><br />"Wow," she said. "Jack Nicholson. Wait till I tell everyone."<br /><br />Indeed.Stephan Clarkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18216622950263482703noreply@blogger.com1