This cute little fella is Milos Forman, Academy award-winning director of such films as One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest and Amadeus. We had the opportunity to watch one of his films last night called Taking Off, which he himself introduced, followed by a Q&A. The film was great, and we went with some wonderful friends of ours, but what was exceptionally intriguing is the life story of Milos Forman. Here is a man who makes fantastic movies about human nature, after having lived through both the Nazi and Communist occupations of his native Czechoslavia, now the Czech Republic. Both of his parents died in Auschwitz, becoming an orphan at the age of six. Whenever these atrocities in history are remembered, they often distant and disconnected, but here before us sat a man who lived through it, and now lives a life not so unlike ours. One man during the Q&A even mentioned that he met Milos Forman in a Czech coffee house in 1965; Milos asked the man to borrow a pen, and he lent it. The man, now in 2008, asked for his pen back.
Earlier that day I was listening to NPR and I heard what is now called the earliest sound recording, portions of audio from 1860. Recorded in France before the invention of the phonograph, a man recorded songs by his daughter, and here I was in 2008, listening to a muddy recording of a young girl singing a popular ballad in France before the American Civil War.
This morning I worked a moving job as I often do to make some extra cash, and I happened to move a guy from Nigeria who had been working in Baltimore for fifteen years. His name is Kenny. We spoke about Africa and Christianity and the state of education in America. All told, its been quite a weekend for us. We are learning more about history and cultures of the world. I think it is important to understand how we got here in hopes of better preparing ourselves for where we are going.
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