Turn the camera to you. Thank you for coming. I appreciate it. This is a wonderful place. I hate to admit it 40 years ago ice to come here for lunch. Im going to do a representation about my book that came out. This is almost a memoir. Its a member so some of the dialogue was recreated to give an atmosphere and could not be exactly what was said at the moment. But the name of the book the scent of jasmine, comingofage in jerusalem and damascus jasmine is very indigenous to their board, especially because it has a very nice sent. My mother from damascus, and we lived in many homes, especially be between 40 and 52. And wherever we live she bring plans home when she planted in our home. So for me, every home i lived in has a jasmine. Damascus is a city i spend a lot of time in a my mother has a large extended family. And i think that extended family and many children of my generation. They really have an impact and its really sad to watch whats happening there today. So they mean a lot to me. One of them is i was born in damascus but my family was living in jerusalem before 1948. Minutes like my first three years old and i spend a lot of time. The memoir is like more short stories. I wrote them at one point i was just writing stories and things happen to my life and then i came to realize that my life really if reflects what is happening in the arab world. So i hope when you read this book and i hope you buy it and reading, is that you get a sense of the arab world that you grew up in. So as i mentioned, i was born in 1944. So when cap and i was only three and half years old but you would be amazed at how much i remember of that. The first three to five years the forms a person and has more impact. I think it has the most impact on me and i think my life choices i made has to do with that experience. So i was three and a half years old. My father had a job in jerusalem. It was one city and became known after 40 years with half of them. So we lived in jerusalem and after 40 years my family became refugees and moved to east or west jerusalem. And then ultimately my father because a palestinian grew up with a sad story. They were very affluent and my father from the time i be grew up there was a lot of diversity where i grew up, religiously, ethnically and my grandfather was religious and he prayed five times a day and he would go to the mosque down the street from his house and my father was agnostic at best. We never practiced any religion but i dont ever remember my grandfather or anyone in my mothers side of the family who practice religion said anything bad about my father. They loved him and respected him because they thought he was a good man and had a lot of integrity and was honest. My uncle and my mother side wa was my father was a socialist and they would disagree on politics but they enjoyed each other and they were good friends. The neighborhood i grew up in was called the mingo street which is named after a rich family that had three big villas at the end of the street called the mingo family and they were names for them. They were middleclass, they were poor people and rich people, christians, muslims, they were jordanians and palestinian, lebanese in the neighborhood, armenian, chechnya and and they were all in the same neighborhood and we went to the same school and we played with each other and we never ever thought of us versus them. This was our neighborhood. Now, i also grew up in a muslim country, i know the arab culture and i grew up in theory in a muslim home but i never really knew whether i knew i was muslim and i didnt know whether we were sunni or shiite until i went to high school. This is not a concept i grew up with, sunni or shiite. It also became of age in the 50s and 60s and while america had their own 60s we had our 60s. They were basically much different. In this country, people rebel against the a more, against, you know, this certain dominance that brought them, maledominated society but we were of porter, internationalism inside colonialism in that era also shaped a lot of people of my generation. I also grew up with strong women. The concept of arab women is weak, submissive and they have no voice is a big mess. I tell you its a big mess. I grew up with a strong woman. My mother came from a family that was very rich and she hated housework and she had nothing to do with it. She worked outside the house and she owned her own business and she had a print shop and she managed all of her male staff. Her pride didnt come from. [inaudible] but her business. Many of her friends were professional women. With artist, phds, we had poets and activists and these women did not use concepts like feminism and womens liberation but everything about the told me that the sky is the limit. From seeing these and my mother and this is a friend i knew i could be whatever i wanted to be. This is the arab world i grew up in and if you buy the book, i hope you buy it, i would really suggest that you read the introduction. People dont usually read the introduction but it puts the book in two contexts. My parents came from a different background. My mother came from money, my father came from a middleclass and my father was very neat and clean, very quiet, intellectual. Wanted to read books. My mother was noisy, she loved life, she loved to travel and i dont think she even enjoyed being a mother. It wasnt her. Just to give you a sense, i came home one time and this is a story and they never lived happily ever after. I came home one time from school and we were at lunch you go home, and my father was home and he and my mother were at each others throat and they were yelling at each other and screaming at each other and i stood in the corner not daring to come in the hallway but then my father saw me and when he saw me he went and slammed the door and said this kitchen is a mess, i cant even get my self a glass of water. He walked in and my mother walked into the kitchen and i walked up to her and she stood at the door and shes dressed, her hair cut, high heels and lipstick, red sweater and she looked out of place. She started saying i hate you, praying to her father. May god never forgive you, she said referring to her father. You both talked me into this marriage. Look at me having to deal with all this mess. A servant to the armory, her kids were the armory. Please, mama, dont cry. I will clean the kitchen. [inaudible] she told me she was going to visit her family for a week but shes been gone for almost ten days. [inaudible] had been living with us for four years and she felt pain when she had to felt certain pain when she to do certain chores but she was organized and clean and that made my father happy. She knew how to cook which made my mother happy. She would visit her family with a refugee camp in the west bank and whenever that happened i knew trouble was on the way. Mama, its been only four days since she left. She left on thursday and today is only monday. Dont argue with me my mother said. Sorry, mama. Im sure she will come back soon. Your father is says im responsible for him and he is such a neat freak. I cant handle him, i hate housework, i hate being married. I never did any work at my parents house. We always had help. I will help you, mama, please. I always wondered how my parents ended up with each other. One palestinian, jordanian, the class, rich and very different in personality. I have heard so many stories about how a strange union happened. And i was about 11 my cousin who was four years older than me explained it this way. [inaudible] was in love with someone the family did not like. He was a flamboyant poet and that was in the sort of husband they had in mind for their daughter. They talked her into marrying your father. I dont believe it, i said. No one can make my mama do anything she doesnt want to. No, it is true. I even know they are talking about. Shut up, you swore not to tell, i never tell you anything anymore. My father had a different story of how we ended up marrying my mother. I want to marry an educated woman and my syrian neighbors knew your mothers family and led me to her. My father was working in jordan, at the time, and he was working there and has neighbors and they took him to my mother. My mothers story one like this. When i met your father i sent immediate attraction because he looks like. [inaudible] i was young and foolish. Mike cousin the oldest cousin on my mother side, only 11 years younger than my mother claims to know the ultimate story. Dont listen to any of them. I know the reason story. [inaudible] when your father asked for my mothers hand the lover was living in and they convinced her mother to marry her father so she could visit more often. What do you mean she loves women, i asked . This is a big secret. Dont tell anyone. She made us put our hands on the book of honor and say i will swear to never tell. So, whatever the real story about my parents getting married, i dont know but i do know that my mother wasnt. [inaudible] she said your father expected me to live in the house was smaller and it was smaller than my fathers house. So, she ultimately, my father found a job in jerusalem and he was the head of the arabic station there and my mother was happy. Jerusalem is not not like to my mother damascus but people in jerusalem but life was good and she had a better house and salary and she had two daughters and had two puppies so life was great until 48 happened and and everything was shattered. They had to leave and they became a refugee and they had to restart their life all over again. When 48 happened, my mother said to me and my sister to damascus and they wanted us to be safe so we spent a lot of time in damascus but as it turns out he spent a lot of time later in damascus and when ever summer we would go to damascus so my grandfather house and my mother, you know, every time she wanted to deliver a baby she would go to her family, deliver the baby and spent 14 days, that is the attrition for a woman to regain her full power, full strength and come home and then we go there for summer vacations and holidays and we went there when my mother was tired of her kids and when she had a fight with my dad and he spent a lot of time in damascus. The messias has a lot of impact on me. Damascus also is the city of jasmine but if the city of ritual. This is one of the oldest cultures in the world and its one of the oldest continually inhabited in the world and everything is ritual. If they want to take a bath, its spiritual, if they want to have. [inaudible] on monday, my aunt was the head of a Political Party and all of these people came to my grandmothers house. Then there was the woman day where women would be home and everyone knows if you, on monday to her house she will be there and the only women will get there and thats when you get those were getting married and divorced and everything. Im going to read a little bit about damascus for you. This is about my grandfather and about how desperate to give you an idea its older than america. My grandmother was born in all of his kids were born in the house and most of his grandchildren including myself and my three other siblings were born there. This is in damascus in 1955 and we emerge from the various parts of my grandmothers house and gathered in the courtyard. The day was too bright the sun had softened allowing a gentle breeze to cool the place. The aroma of turkish coffee mixed with cardamom on fill the air, a sign that my two hands were up from their nap. Nice and house is large and grand. Twentyeight rooms occupied two floors. The large courtyard was a colorful tiles, flowing fountains, tinted flowers made the place feel magical. One couldnt but help be mesmerized by the sounds and smells this home had to offer. This elegant town told the story of money and power and, as well, and end of an era. It was built for an extended family with aunts, uncles and lots of children but i only remember my two hands who never got married and my cousin living there. My aunt was a teacher and she loved kids and took the time to explain things to us. When i asked her why do they live in such a big house she said in the old days those born in this house stayed even after they got married and had children. How come they dont live here anymore i asked my aunts. Because they became modern and they wanted to have their own home and didnt want to live with others. I didnt know if modern was good or bad but i figured i didnt want to be modern because we didnt live on her own. My other aunt was queen of education. She was living was living in a finishing school. She was the one who taught us how to dress, how to talk, how to walk, how to set a table, how to welcome guests and how to be respectful of elders and be kind to the younger. She even tried to teach me how to sing but she gave up very soon after. She had instruction for every occasion. Before heading for her afternoon nap she would tell us today i want all of you to have a long nap. I dont want to hear you arguing, talking, playing and i want you to sleep in my room. And the other two girls go with my other aunts. As soon as my aunt fell asleep we would quietly get out and gather in the court with my other cousins. My older cousin would sneak into the kitchen, bring block of ice and tell us how to keep our. [inaudible] i would place cubes on my flat chest only to watch them slide down and melt on my belly. They would run down and get caught in my underpants. Look, i dont have any boobs. Dont worry, you will have some soon. When you grow up your mother and grandmother taught dont talk about sex or love, lust, none of that but you keep it to your older cousin. By the time you hit puberty you know you will learn it all. In my grandmothers house we had a housekeeper and she came to live in my grandmothers house with i was six and she died at age 70 or 80, within the family. My aunts were dead and she came from jordan and she lived there and had her own remedies. She believed that her own remedies were better than my aunts doctors. The doctors tell you this and take your money but my remedy works much better. When i was young i was just like my grandmother used to call me susanna, a term of endearment in reston to suzanne because of my skin was darker than the rest of the family. My greatgrandmother was a turkish blonde and that was my mothers family source of beauty and pride. Even my mother claimed to have married my father because he looked like randy, my father was so beautiful and so are his Seven Sisters and they are all his white with blond hair and blue eyes. They are beautiful. [inaudible] my family seem to talk about beauty. My older sister was beautiful and people used to say she looked like cecile arendt. My two cousins, another blonde with blue hands both won the beauty pageants so between judy queens and sophia karen i never felt that useful. At least, not until i went and i started interacting with boys. One summer i was 12 and i got my period and i did not know exactly what was happening. I started crying and i told him i was bleeding and she was so excited and says oh my god, you are a woman now and i said what do you mean i am a woman now . She said this is a good day. Then she said listen, im going to make you the wisest and tallest girl among your cousins. I was short and dark when i was young and im still short and dark but she said i will make you more useful than all of them. She used to suffer from migraines and her relatives would bring her leeches in a jar of water and when she would get the migraines they would say stick them on your head and they would say to not use leeches. This will be a secret us. Okay. She took me downstairs and she put me in the kitchen and she wrapped me with his heavy, wool blanket. This is damascus in the summer and the temperature must be a hundred. I told her i was hot and she said you shouldnt get your cold when youre having your period. Listen to me. You know i love you. She goes and shes getting hot water and she comes in said drink this. I had a sip and i was about to throw up. She says this is nothing, it will kill you. It was. [inaudible] water. Start. She said this will make you white. After she made me drink it and im about to throw up shes holding me so i dont throw up and after half hour she knows a market that she takes me and she grabbed me, i am small and me up and i told her to put me down and im crying. This will make you taller. I will be white and tall. For a whole week she did this to me. For a whole week she would wait for my mother and aunts to take their afternoon naps and had me drink the starch and swing. By the time the week is over i felt sicker than a dog and my aunt was under arms were so sore i could barely move. I was angry because i suffered for a whole week and i was glad her remedy for. Do not include leeches. On the seven day when everyone went to the afternoon siesta she got the bathroom wood burning stove and she took me in and washed my hair seven times. She scrapped my body seven times and when i was clean enough she started putting warm water on my head from a blessed bowl while reciting verses from the koran and had me repeat after her. For the rest of the summer i would look into the mirror every morning and sit next to her to see if i had gotten wider or taller but nothing changed. Look, you made me suffer for nothing. By next summer you will pay the whitest and tallest girl of all your cousins will be jealous. You would be so happy we did this. For the next summer arrived i was a little taller and a shade lighter but i was always lighter in the beginning of the summer. As i entered my grandmothers house she hugged me tightly and stepped back so she could examine me carefully. I could see this disappointment interface. Im sorry, it didnt work. Give it time. It will work. I know it will. Then she hugged me and we both laughed. Now, he will go into a serious stuff. Jordan in the 50s, where we grow up, damascus was the place where you go and play and get new clothes and a man was cool and politics. There was always something going on in syria and in 1956 that was i was 12 years old and the british ex colonizer wanted to have jordan in certain countries to join in a packed. Some people might remember that packs. The government of jordan wanted to join the pact which is like an alliance between the colonies and they did not want to go in there was demonstration all over the country. The demonstration in jordan and mary arab cities is or well organized. Until now i dont figure out how they organize them. They start and they leave school in the march and they take the middle school and people come from different members of two neighborhoods. [inaudible] the kids come from high school and they start by our school and they chant so, all of us clos close leave our bags in the school and run and join the demonstration. Im going down down with colonialism, down with imperialism and i had a loud voice and one man picked me up and be on the shoulder and im chanting as we get downtown and then when we get to the big mosque and there was the army forces and the leader of the demonstration said we are here for a peaceful march and he said no trouble and then they told the people do not engage in any violence and then all of a sudden the army started shooting. They started shooting and started screaming and i dont know when or how i got off this mans back and i just iran home. I iran home and there were teargas and i was crying from fear but teargas and i get home and my mama said where are you and i said i was the neighbors and where i should be set in your crying and i told her i fell down. She had told me that morning to come and i said okay. At 7 00 oclock there was pleased that our door and they asked about my dad and im the one who opened the door and i freaked out and i was so scared. I would be scared all day. The police come and they go into the room, close the door and my father comes a little bit later and said come here, i want to come and im walking with my father and my legs could hardly move me so my father puts his hand on my shoulder and gently pushed me ahead of him he said this is a man. I looked younger than my real age and she said the police and say this is your daughter, anan . Of course i am sure. What do you think i went to the neighbor and borrowed a kid clearly, there is some misunderstanding. Could this be her sister. Do you have an older daughter . Only one year older. Please accept our apologies. There must be a mixup. The officer looked at his colleague and said patiently. When the Police Officers left our home i was glad to see them go without me. My relief lasted only a few minutes. When my father called me to study and ask me to close the door i knew i was in big trouble. Twentynine, where were you today . I was at the demonstration. Did your mother not tell you to come in medially home in case of trouble. Yes, she did. Then why did you go to demonstration . I thought of a good answer and said because we are against. [inaudible] my father remained quiet and i could see he was trying to hide a smile but i was too scared to shut my eyes. We . Who are we and what do you know about. [inaudible] i am not sure, i said but i know it is a bad thing. Next time dont participate in the demonstration if you dont understand what it is about. Yes, pop. I left my father study and went to my bedroom as we as i could just in case he changed his mind and decided to punish me. For once i felt lucky to be short and skinny and looked younger than my age. My mother walked into the room and asked are you alright i guess, mama. I just want to sleep. Tears started to spell in my eyes and my mother hugged me and said dont be scared. Thank god, this time it turned out okay. Next time you better listen to what i tell you. I will, mama. Come and have dinner with us she said. Im not hungry. Please, mama, can i just go to sleep . She kissed me and said good night and close the door. Fully dressed i lay in my bed looking at the blood and the screams and what came to me. I covered my head and cried like never before. Im going to leave one final thing. This is about jerusalem. If you talk about jerusalem you have to drink or cry. I dont know which so i will. [inaudible] as i mentioned, we lived in jerusalem and then we moved in the early 50s but we continue to go to jerusalem because the distance between is an hour drive. On fridays we would go there and have breakfast and shopping and its like the distance to ann arbor. And thats about the distance but we go to ramallah and we go to jericho but then came in 1967 and the East Jerusalem was occupied and we couldnt go there anymore. I was able to go back in 1980, i became an american citizen and as an american citizen i could go to tucson. That is my city. Thats where i was, you know. Whenever i visit palestine i cannot wait to go to jerusalem. My sister who lives in ramallah and the only connection we have your homeland doesnt understand why i dont want to visit other cities. She keeps telling me there are other beautiful places in palestine. Maybe tomorrow, i reply. Today i want to go to jerusalem. Tomorrow comes i go back to jerusalem. I hurry there as if im going to meet my first. [inaudible] in East Jerusalem i walked the streets, my of my childhood neighborhood. The scent of jasmine told me along always reminded me of the flowers that my mother planted in our front yard. It still holds my earliest memories. The birth of a goat on a warm day that i worked with my mother, the joy of my fathers face giving me a baby lamb as a gift i had been asking for. Being coached by my mother with the boys next door. After i toured my childhood neighborhood i had to the old city. Like a ritual i always enter through damascus gate. There is something majestic about these gates. Although i was almost shot right there. That was in 1989 when i came to participate in an International Sees march. Please, as well as the market shattered as the arab bullets filled the place. I was very frightened. An italian woman lost her i. My heart ached for her. She came all the way from rome chanting piece. She left when i. In the old city i buy gifts. I fight property and i buy. [inaudible] i also by an embroidered peasant dress along with a scarf. Also i bring two pieces of jerusalem its been a full color and smells back to the us, to my home in the us. With each trip i am never able to bring back is the particular scent of jasmine. No matter how much i try it somehow is not adjust to life in the new world. Thank you very much. [applause] now we have some time for question and answer. So, as i said they will move the camera towards you when you ask. Yes. What was your Favorite Foods while you were growing up . It changed as i grow up. As a child i used to love what they call. [inaudible] with meat and nuts but i like cheese and bread and watermelon together. That was a good summer snack you can have anything better than that. I want to know who taught you how to cook so deliciously . I really dont know. People ask me and i think im a good cook and i hope i am but i dont know how i learned to cook. I live on my own and i dont know how i learned to cook but i like to cook think i am a good cook. Yes, here. Would you tell us what motivated you to write this book and how you feel that now it is written . This is what happens. She asked me how did i decide to write this book and in 1993 i took one year sabbatical and i resigned from a job that i was working there for a long time and i said im going to take a year off and not do anything to figure out what i want to do next. Because i like to write and reflect on your life and i was, in a way, at a crossroads. I was working with the palestinian organization, very hard for many years and i didnt see any things and that. [inaudible] it was and i left my job feeling defeated in a way, if you want and i i would write not in a diary but kind of. I would ask questions like who understand what makes us we are and i was thinking about where i was born. I would remember those things that had an impact on my life. Or i would write small episodes and i had to find a job and when i found a job i put this away and i would go back to it one day and that did not come till 20 years later when i retired from my job. Then i sat down and i said my life, as i look both become much more political in the second part of it. My life it reflected the era of what i did like leaving amman and going to work and went to be rude and everyone was off to beirut because thats where the revolution from around the world and i want to cairo because nasir was there and the anti vietnam war and all of these events affected me so i look at my life and every days of the life politically or socially and i talk about the stories together and give a picture about what life looks like for a young woman growing up between damascus and amman, and cairo and what does life look like . Its something very different from what you see. I hope that those come to understand that part of comes from a different perspective. There is a question here. As you look back and reflect on growing up with your mom and dad, it was not traditional compared to what i grew up with. How do you see . Were you thankful for and what did you get out of as you look back on your youth . Do you wish it wouldve done things differently . If i died to be born again i would do everything i have the same parents, to be honest with you. I know you said its different and it was rough and theres a big difference in the arab world between village life and city life. Urban people have a different life between the peasants. The villagers people are more concerned about preserving the family is a lot of marriage happening within the families of the poverty stay in the family. Like being british and the inheritance goes to the biggest boy in cities, people come from all walks of life. As i said, if you go to the village you came from everyone is from. [inaudible] if you go to jerusalem, if you go to theres different and in that sense theres more organizing and the same thing in america if you grow up in a small found that if you grew up in a bigger city. Questions, one into. When you became political did you see any similarities between the Civil Rights Movement that was taking place in the United States and what you are experiencing in your country . Can you stand up and repeat that . When you became political in your country fighting the different things, the sexism and what have you, did you see any similarities what was going on in the 60s and the Civil Rights Movement here in the us . You said that i grow up in the 60s like the similarities in the 60s and do you know feminism, racism and that part of the world. I said the 60s, we were the generation but the issue is always issues look different but in reality, they were different. For example, here you talk about Martin Luther king and the Civil Rights Movement and. [inaudible] if you know who he was he was a hero. Nasser was the president of egypt and was one of the founder of the community. Cairo was where the african leader group. I wanted to read something for you. I skip this because of the time but i will read it. Okay. When i was a child my aunt wanted had a transistor and i wanted one so bad. Many younger on generations its a small, portable radio. I was fascinated by the transistor. I came in i begged my dad for years to give me a transistor and he said it would keep me from studying and you dont need the transistor. Finally i was in a school and he gave it to me as a gift. The transistor it began in the sense that there was id go out in the street and the kids would carry it and i have the volume up and i was very proud because those popular at first my radio was no more that increased popularity in the neighborhood and we would spend looking listening to soap operas and romantic films of beirut. [inaudible] is a famous singer. Although we talked about love and lust with us or around us, love songs were played at home and in taxes. People listen to them day and night. Thanks to my radio we were able to listen to them. Even when we were hanging in the street or in some neighbors backyard, in those times i became the most popular kid in the neighborhood. A few months later after i got my radio they started talking about war and the egyptian leaders and i even heard my parents talking about possible war. Nasser was going to nationalize. [inaudible] he should respond in my mother and the canal belonged to the egyptian people. Not england or france. War dominated the news. Suddenly we were not kids anymore. Thanks to my transistor we started to listen to National Politics and the long speeches into the egyptian commentary. We thought nasser could defeat english. I bet use he can send my friend. As i grew older my radio assumed a new fraction. To separate the neighborhood kids. Those were the nationalist kids or the reactionary who loved the same. We, the good gets, would gather in a balcony or room or backyard, or in a Street Corner to listen to my radio. From that small box i learned about arab nationalism, African Unity and the allied movement. From my radio we learned about revolutions and about the wars and we learned about, until now, about castro and we learned about Martin Luther king and malcolm x. To my radio i felt a bond united meet with these people around the globe. I did not know how that bond worked but i learned it from my radio, my magic box. I hope that answers your question. We were in the era that we were in Martin Luther king, for us, was a hero for my generation and he was that was a time of international and if you remember. Can you hear me . I will project. Looking back at the past region, the progression, 4867, 82, would you characterize your view as being progressively more cynical or do you still have some degree of hope . I really have hope. My heart honest to god, i sometimes feel my heart bleed. I dont watch the news and they talk about. [inaudible] this is an era where civilization started. If you think of syria and i dont know how many of you have been in syria but its a rich country, nice people, fine food, refined everything and you see the way it is but i have no doubt in my mind that this will pass. How long it takes, i really dont know but i know this cannot be our fate as an arab nation because we have given the world a lot. We come from our culture and our humanity and, you know,. [inaudible] i am optimistic. I know this is not our fate, it cant be. It just cant be. [inaudible] i wrote it as a memoir initially for myself but as it evolved i decided i would make it a book because, as i said, people need to know, even our young people need to know about what is happening today is not our fate and cannot be our fate. This is not who we are. We are people, you know, we armenian, chechnya and, do, it doesnt really matter. We are the people who gave civilizations that people mixed together. All religions. I am hoping that erics arabs and non arabs will know that thats a great part of the world and for the young people to know that this is a hard thing but whoever can read it. [inaudible] yes, there is a question here. Did you write this, your notes and things, compiling the book did you start off in arabic, for example or did you feel more comfortable know, i came to this country in 1974 and, you know, i started writing this in the 90s which is almost 20 years later or something. English is easier for me. I wrote it in english. Thank you very much. [applause] thank you very much. I am sorry that the dia was supposed to have the book and they dont have it and i am happy about that but if you order the book, if you want to order the book i know amazon might sell it to you a little cheaper but the publishing, the people who publish my book, they really donate a good portion of it income to the profits to good causes. They had 400,000 for syrian refugees. The few dollars you pay more, think about it as a donation to a good cause. Its a good program and he paid and gives to not only overseas but gives causes here. Interlink is the publisher. If you put my name and go there you will find the publisher and i really hope you buy. If you want to buy from amazon, you can, of course. But lets help people who help other people. That is my theory. Thank you. [applause] there is no book signing. Im really sorry. They promised me they would get the books and they didnt. You can email me and i will sign your book for you. [inaudible conversations] book tv recently visited capitol hill to ask members of congress what they are reading the summer. I just finished the next fight nathan hill. Its an excellent novel, especially for a first novel. Really talented writer. It takes place in many different worlds. I thoroughly enjoyed it. I really like reading novels. On my list now is something that is not a novel but something with a hammer that is a compilation of i really enjoyed the mayor. I read that last. The completion of essays im looking forward to. My beloved world, sonia stoudamires book that im ready to read that because i care a lot about the supreme court. Also, i just picked up hunger by roxanne gates new book. Thats my shortlist