Thursday, August 10, 2006

Afghanistan, Take One!



Today I met an actress whose latest gig is to run around the desert with 150 other actors and actresses, playing the role of a Muslim woman, burka and all. This isn’t the set for Hollywood’s latest politically incorrect terrorist movie, but a role play used by the US military.

She told me how she does this once a month. She gets to live in a shack without electricity, sleep in the cold night, get harassed and accosted by military men (in a pretend way, I guess), and even receives Arabic lessons and cultural pointers from actual Afghan and Iraqi refugees, all while participating in these reenactments on an old native American burial ground.

Hmmm… Other than the ancient burial ground, this sounds a bit familiar. I’m in L.A., but there are many vortices about. The world is a funny place, no?

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