Sunday, August 28, 2011
Tuesday, May 10, 2011
NY Times
This caught my eye. I am always looking for something new and delicious and with summer coming up, this is a good way to eat something sweet without ruining all the work you did to get into your bathing suit!
You might think it bizarre: celery sorbet with a little dressed celery salad; goat-cheese-mousse balls coated with olive-oil-sautéed bread crumbs; macerated figs with balsamic vinegar. And those things go together on a plate.
Related
Mark Bittman Blog: Cooking with Brooks Headley (May 6, 2011)
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Yunhee Kim for The New York Times
Readers' Comments
Readers shared their thoughts on this article.
Read All Comments (13) »
Maybe it is bizarre— but it’s also incredible. (And it’s doable at home, with or without concessions; I’ll get to that.)
It’s not entirely clear where this and the other often vegetable-based desserts by Brooks Headley — the pastry chef whom my colleague Sam Sifton called “brilliant” in his four-star review of Del Posto — come from. Certainly not an articulated philosophy: “I don’t think of myself as a pastry chef, exactly,” the 38-year-old Headley says.“I just make food that happens at the end of the meal.”
Headley was 27 years old and drumming in a punk band in 1999 when he took a job as an assistant at Galileo, a wildly popular Italian restaurant in Washington at the time. His background, however, had primed him for ascension. His family, originally from Calabria, was “completely obsessed with food,” as was his band. They traveled with a milk crate stocked with pantry items and decent cookware and stayed in people’s houses, often sleeping on the floor. “When gigs were over, we’d find a grocery store, buy whatever we could, go back to whoever’s house and cook,” he says.
Thus trained, slaving as an assistant pastry chef must have seemed like a vacation. “When I walked into that kitchen, I remember thinking, This is it,” he says. From Galileo, he eventually moved to Tosca and, later, Komi — and when, in 2008, two pastry chefs left Del Posto in New York, Headley talked his way into the job. “Many of my influences” — the co-owner Mario Batali and the executive chef Mark Ladner — “are people I now work for; it’s like they formed a supergroup and I got asked to join the band.”
But instead of producing, say, bacon ice cream with salted caramel-candied French fries (I made that up, but you watch: someone will claim I stole the idea), Headley is making mind-blowing fruit-and-vegetable-based desserts, like his fantastic version of a classic Neapolitan eggplant-and-chocolate dish. (When I ate this dish in Naples, it was grossly sweet; his version is like a dessert eggplant Parmesan prepared by a wizard.) He also does polenta with oven-roasted rhubarb and tangerine, as well as a wholly un-American carrot cake with a psychedelic carrot purée and sage gelato. When the good peaches are in season, he will concoct “something” with a whole, skin-intact peach roasted with olive oil, honey and basil. (He uses more olive oil in his desserts than some restaurants use in their pastas.)
The celery thing (I don’t know what to call it, really) is, I believe, the best representation of his style. I love the little vinaigrettey strands of celery on the sweet sorbet and the fantastic olive-oil crunch of the slightly sweet goat-cheese balls. (This from a person who doesn’t like goat cheese.) I’ve made only a couple of adaptations in these recipes to make them more accessible for those of us without professional equipment (or assistants). Headley uses a juicer for the celery juice in the sorbet, but if you don’t have one, the blender works, per my method. He melts goat brie for the cheese mixture, but it’s a laborious process, and fresh goat cheese makes things a whole lot easier. (I’ve posted the original method here; if you’re ambitious, go for it.) And if you don’t have an ice cream machine, make a granita instead of sorbet; there is a way in which, texturally, it’s even more successful.
You might think it bizarre: celery sorbet with a little dressed celery salad; goat-cheese-mousse balls coated with olive-oil-sautéed bread crumbs; macerated figs with balsamic vinegar. And those things go together on a plate.
Related
Mark Bittman Blog: Cooking with Brooks Headley (May 6, 2011)
Enlarge This Image
Yunhee Kim for The New York Times
Readers' Comments
Readers shared their thoughts on this article.
Read All Comments (13) »
Maybe it is bizarre— but it’s also incredible. (And it’s doable at home, with or without concessions; I’ll get to that.)
It’s not entirely clear where this and the other often vegetable-based desserts by Brooks Headley — the pastry chef whom my colleague Sam Sifton called “brilliant” in his four-star review of Del Posto — come from. Certainly not an articulated philosophy: “I don’t think of myself as a pastry chef, exactly,” the 38-year-old Headley says.“I just make food that happens at the end of the meal.”
Headley was 27 years old and drumming in a punk band in 1999 when he took a job as an assistant at Galileo, a wildly popular Italian restaurant in Washington at the time. His background, however, had primed him for ascension. His family, originally from Calabria, was “completely obsessed with food,” as was his band. They traveled with a milk crate stocked with pantry items and decent cookware and stayed in people’s houses, often sleeping on the floor. “When gigs were over, we’d find a grocery store, buy whatever we could, go back to whoever’s house and cook,” he says.
Thus trained, slaving as an assistant pastry chef must have seemed like a vacation. “When I walked into that kitchen, I remember thinking, This is it,” he says. From Galileo, he eventually moved to Tosca and, later, Komi — and when, in 2008, two pastry chefs left Del Posto in New York, Headley talked his way into the job. “Many of my influences” — the co-owner Mario Batali and the executive chef Mark Ladner — “are people I now work for; it’s like they formed a supergroup and I got asked to join the band.”
But instead of producing, say, bacon ice cream with salted caramel-candied French fries (I made that up, but you watch: someone will claim I stole the idea), Headley is making mind-blowing fruit-and-vegetable-based desserts, like his fantastic version of a classic Neapolitan eggplant-and-chocolate dish. (When I ate this dish in Naples, it was grossly sweet; his version is like a dessert eggplant Parmesan prepared by a wizard.) He also does polenta with oven-roasted rhubarb and tangerine, as well as a wholly un-American carrot cake with a psychedelic carrot purée and sage gelato. When the good peaches are in season, he will concoct “something” with a whole, skin-intact peach roasted with olive oil, honey and basil. (He uses more olive oil in his desserts than some restaurants use in their pastas.)
The celery thing (I don’t know what to call it, really) is, I believe, the best representation of his style. I love the little vinaigrettey strands of celery on the sweet sorbet and the fantastic olive-oil crunch of the slightly sweet goat-cheese balls. (This from a person who doesn’t like goat cheese.) I’ve made only a couple of adaptations in these recipes to make them more accessible for those of us without professional equipment (or assistants). Headley uses a juicer for the celery juice in the sorbet, but if you don’t have one, the blender works, per my method. He melts goat brie for the cheese mixture, but it’s a laborious process, and fresh goat cheese makes things a whole lot easier. (I’ve posted the original method here; if you’re ambitious, go for it.) And if you don’t have an ice cream machine, make a granita instead of sorbet; there is a way in which, texturally, it’s even more successful.
Project Number 3
Today I made my first paper molds of what could hopefully be my final form. They are currently drying. I added orange to the paper. As a child, my mom decorated the christmas tree with dried fruit and homemade decorations. Also, she is a wonderful cook so I wanted to give the paper a yummy smell.
Final Project: Molds number 3
So far I seem to have gotten a lot of failures at my molds. So fist i made them in clay, then i made oomoo molds so that they would last longer. Also, trish has discovered you can microwave them to speed up the process. I made 3 today and am going too make a forth tomorrow so I have options. I hope they work since the project is due very soon and I am starting to freak out about it.
Wednesday, May 4, 2011
New Samples
Here are my second round of samples for the final project. They are each a different kind of paper. I also put an additive in each one. Since my project is about memory, i was thinking about the smells of my house. My mom is always cooking so I decided to add herbs to each of the papers. In a few I also added orange rind. For some reason, they are still damp even though they have been drying since Monday afternoon. I think I might take the hair dryer to them. My favorite is the pale orangish one that is in the largest container. I think that might be what I end up using for my final project.
Tuesday, May 3, 2011
NY Times
Is it worth it? This is a debate among many people. Should torture be allowed?
WASHINGTON — Did brutal interrogations produce the crucial intelligence that led to the killing of Osama bin Laden?
Multimedia
Video Feature
Reports on the Death of Osama bin Laden
Related
Tensions Rise as U.S. Officials Press Pakistan for Answers (May 4, 2011)
9/11 Inspires Student Patriotism and Celebration (May 4, 2011)
Times Topics: Torture | The Death of Osama bin Laden
Related in Opinion
Friedman: Farewell to Geronimo (May 4, 2011)
Dowd: Cool Hand Barack (May 4, 2011)
Op-Ed: My Sister, My Grief (May 4, 2011)
Home Fires: Veterans Views (May 3, 2011)
Blogs
The Caucus
The latest on President Obama, the new Congress and other news from Washington and around the nation. Join the discussion.
FiveThirtyEight: Nate Silver's Political Calculus
More Politics News
Enlarge This Image
Warrick Page for The New York Times
Osama bin Laden's hiding place in Abbottabad, Pakistan, whose walls dwarfed local residents passing by on Tuesday. Nine children were living in the house.
As intelligence officials disclosed the trail of evidence that led to the compound in Pakistan where Bin Laden was hiding, a chorus of Bush administration officials claimed vindication for their policy of “enhanced interrogation techniques” like waterboarding.
Among them was John Yoo, a former Justice Department official who wrote secret legal memorandums justifying brutal interrogations. “President Obama can take credit, rightfully, for the success today,” Mr. Yoo wrote Monday in National Review, “but he owes it to the tough decisions taken by the Bush administration.”
But a closer look at prisoner interrogations suggests that the harsh techniques played a small role at most in identifying Bin Laden’s trusted courier and exposing his hide-out. One detainee who apparently was subjected to some tough treatment provided a crucial description of the courier, according to current and former officials briefed on the interrogations. But two prisoners who underwent some of the harshest treatment — including Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, who was waterboarded 183 times — repeatedly misled their interrogators about the courier’s identity.
The discussion of what led to Bin Laden’s demise has revived a national debate about torture that raged during the Bush years. The former president and many conservatives argued for years that force was necessary to persuade Qaeda operatives to talk. Human rights advocates, and Mr. Obama as he campaigned for office, said the tactics were torture, betraying American principles for little or nothing of value.
Glenn L. Carle, a retired C.I.A. officer who oversaw the interrogation of a high-level detainee in 2002, said in a phone interview Tuesday, that coercive techniques “didn’t provide useful, meaningful, trustworthy information.” He said that while some of his colleagues defended the measures, “everyone was deeply concerned and most felt it was un-American and did not work.”
Obama administration officials, intent on celebrating Monday’s successful raid, have tried to avoid reigniting a partisan battle over torture.
“The bottom line is this: If we had some kind of smoking-gun intelligence from waterboarding in 2003, we would have taken out Osama bin Laden in 2003,” said Tommy Vietor, spokesman for the National Security Council. “It took years of collection and analysis from many different sources to develop the case that enabled us to identify this compound, and reach a judgment that Bin Laden was likely to be living there.”
From the moment the first Qaeda suspects were captured, interrogators at both the military’s prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, and the C.I.A.’s secret prisons were focused on identifying Qaeda members who served as couriers.
“We knew that it was likely that if we were ever to get Osama bin Laden, it would be because we somehow came upon somebody closely associated with him that he trusted,” said Charles D. Stimson, the top Pentagon official on detainee affairs from 2004 to 2007.
In 2002 and 2003, interrogators first heard about a Qaeda courier who used the nom de guerre Abu Ahmed al-Kuwaiti, but his name was just one tidbit in heaps of uncorroborated claims.
After the capture in March 2003 of Mr. Mohammed, the chief planner of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, he was subjected to the most harrowing set of the so-called enhanced measures, which included slamming prisoners into walls, shackling them in stress positions and keeping them awake for as long as 180 hours. Like two other prisoners, he was subjected to waterboarding.
According to an American official familiar with his interrogation, Mr. Mohammed was first asked about Mr. Kuwaiti in the fall of 2003, months after the waterboarding. He acknowledged having known him but said the courier was “retired” and of little significance.
In 2004, however, a Qaeda operative named Hassan Ghul, captured in Iraq, gave a different account of Mr. Kuwaiti, according to the American official. Mr. Ghul told interrogators that Mr. Kuwaiti was a trusted courier who was close to Bin Laden, as well as to Mr. Mohammed and to Abu Faraj al-Libi, who had become the operational chief of Al Qaeda after Mr. Mohammed’s capture.
Mr. Kuwaiti, Mr. Ghul added, had not been seen in some time — which analysts thought was a possible indication that the courier was hiding out with Bin Laden.
The details of Mr. Ghul’s treatment are unclear, though the C.I.A. says he was not waterboarded. The C.I.A. asked the Justice Department to authorize other harsh methods for use on him, but it is unclear which were used. One official recalled that Mr. Ghul was “quite cooperative,” saying that rough treatment, if any, would have been brief.
Armed with Mr. Ghul’s account of the courier’s significance, interrogators asked Mr. Mohammed again about Mr. Kuwaiti. He stuck to his story, according to the official.
After Mr. Libi was captured in May 2005 and turned over to the C.I.A., he too was asked. He denied knowing Mr. Kuwaiti and gave a different name for Bin Laden’s courier, whom he called Maulawi Jan. C.I.A. analysts would never find such a person and eventually concluded that the name was Mr. Libi’s invention, the official recalled.
Again, the C.I.A. has said Mr. Libi was not waterboarded, and details of his treatment are not known. But anticipating his interrogation, the agency pressured the Justice Department days after his capture for a new set of legal memorandums justifying the most brutal methods.
Because Mr. Mohammed and Mr. Libi had both steered interrogators away from Mr. Kuwaiti, C.I.A. officials concluded that they must be protecting him for an important reason.
“Think about circles of information — there’s an inner circle they would protect with their lives,” said an American official who was briefed on the C.I.A. analysis. “The crown jewels of Al Qaeda were the whereabouts of Bin Laden and his operational security.”
The accumulating intelligence about Mr. Kuwaiti persuaded C.I.A. officials to stay on his trail, leading to the discovery of his real name — which American officials have not disclosed — and whereabouts. He in turn unwittingly led the agency to Bin Laden’s lair, where Mr. Kuwaiti and his brother were among those who died in Monday’s raid.
Before a day had passed, the torture debate had flared. The chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, Representative Peter T. King, Republican of New York, told Fox News that the success of the hunt for Bin Laden was due to waterboarding. The next morning, Senator Dianne Feinstein, Democrat of California and chairwoman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said just as flatly that “none of it came as a result of harsh interrogation practices.”
David Rohde contributed reporting from New York.
WASHINGTON — Did brutal interrogations produce the crucial intelligence that led to the killing of Osama bin Laden?
Multimedia
Video Feature
Reports on the Death of Osama bin Laden
Related
Tensions Rise as U.S. Officials Press Pakistan for Answers (May 4, 2011)
9/11 Inspires Student Patriotism and Celebration (May 4, 2011)
Times Topics: Torture | The Death of Osama bin Laden
Related in Opinion
Friedman: Farewell to Geronimo (May 4, 2011)
Dowd: Cool Hand Barack (May 4, 2011)
Op-Ed: My Sister, My Grief (May 4, 2011)
Home Fires: Veterans Views (May 3, 2011)
Blogs
The Caucus
The latest on President Obama, the new Congress and other news from Washington and around the nation. Join the discussion.
FiveThirtyEight: Nate Silver's Political Calculus
More Politics News
Enlarge This Image
Warrick Page for The New York Times
Osama bin Laden's hiding place in Abbottabad, Pakistan, whose walls dwarfed local residents passing by on Tuesday. Nine children were living in the house.
As intelligence officials disclosed the trail of evidence that led to the compound in Pakistan where Bin Laden was hiding, a chorus of Bush administration officials claimed vindication for their policy of “enhanced interrogation techniques” like waterboarding.
Among them was John Yoo, a former Justice Department official who wrote secret legal memorandums justifying brutal interrogations. “President Obama can take credit, rightfully, for the success today,” Mr. Yoo wrote Monday in National Review, “but he owes it to the tough decisions taken by the Bush administration.”
But a closer look at prisoner interrogations suggests that the harsh techniques played a small role at most in identifying Bin Laden’s trusted courier and exposing his hide-out. One detainee who apparently was subjected to some tough treatment provided a crucial description of the courier, according to current and former officials briefed on the interrogations. But two prisoners who underwent some of the harshest treatment — including Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, who was waterboarded 183 times — repeatedly misled their interrogators about the courier’s identity.
The discussion of what led to Bin Laden’s demise has revived a national debate about torture that raged during the Bush years. The former president and many conservatives argued for years that force was necessary to persuade Qaeda operatives to talk. Human rights advocates, and Mr. Obama as he campaigned for office, said the tactics were torture, betraying American principles for little or nothing of value.
Glenn L. Carle, a retired C.I.A. officer who oversaw the interrogation of a high-level detainee in 2002, said in a phone interview Tuesday, that coercive techniques “didn’t provide useful, meaningful, trustworthy information.” He said that while some of his colleagues defended the measures, “everyone was deeply concerned and most felt it was un-American and did not work.”
Obama administration officials, intent on celebrating Monday’s successful raid, have tried to avoid reigniting a partisan battle over torture.
“The bottom line is this: If we had some kind of smoking-gun intelligence from waterboarding in 2003, we would have taken out Osama bin Laden in 2003,” said Tommy Vietor, spokesman for the National Security Council. “It took years of collection and analysis from many different sources to develop the case that enabled us to identify this compound, and reach a judgment that Bin Laden was likely to be living there.”
From the moment the first Qaeda suspects were captured, interrogators at both the military’s prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, and the C.I.A.’s secret prisons were focused on identifying Qaeda members who served as couriers.
“We knew that it was likely that if we were ever to get Osama bin Laden, it would be because we somehow came upon somebody closely associated with him that he trusted,” said Charles D. Stimson, the top Pentagon official on detainee affairs from 2004 to 2007.
In 2002 and 2003, interrogators first heard about a Qaeda courier who used the nom de guerre Abu Ahmed al-Kuwaiti, but his name was just one tidbit in heaps of uncorroborated claims.
After the capture in March 2003 of Mr. Mohammed, the chief planner of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, he was subjected to the most harrowing set of the so-called enhanced measures, which included slamming prisoners into walls, shackling them in stress positions and keeping them awake for as long as 180 hours. Like two other prisoners, he was subjected to waterboarding.
According to an American official familiar with his interrogation, Mr. Mohammed was first asked about Mr. Kuwaiti in the fall of 2003, months after the waterboarding. He acknowledged having known him but said the courier was “retired” and of little significance.
In 2004, however, a Qaeda operative named Hassan Ghul, captured in Iraq, gave a different account of Mr. Kuwaiti, according to the American official. Mr. Ghul told interrogators that Mr. Kuwaiti was a trusted courier who was close to Bin Laden, as well as to Mr. Mohammed and to Abu Faraj al-Libi, who had become the operational chief of Al Qaeda after Mr. Mohammed’s capture.
Mr. Kuwaiti, Mr. Ghul added, had not been seen in some time — which analysts thought was a possible indication that the courier was hiding out with Bin Laden.
The details of Mr. Ghul’s treatment are unclear, though the C.I.A. says he was not waterboarded. The C.I.A. asked the Justice Department to authorize other harsh methods for use on him, but it is unclear which were used. One official recalled that Mr. Ghul was “quite cooperative,” saying that rough treatment, if any, would have been brief.
Armed with Mr. Ghul’s account of the courier’s significance, interrogators asked Mr. Mohammed again about Mr. Kuwaiti. He stuck to his story, according to the official.
After Mr. Libi was captured in May 2005 and turned over to the C.I.A., he too was asked. He denied knowing Mr. Kuwaiti and gave a different name for Bin Laden’s courier, whom he called Maulawi Jan. C.I.A. analysts would never find such a person and eventually concluded that the name was Mr. Libi’s invention, the official recalled.
Again, the C.I.A. has said Mr. Libi was not waterboarded, and details of his treatment are not known. But anticipating his interrogation, the agency pressured the Justice Department days after his capture for a new set of legal memorandums justifying the most brutal methods.
Because Mr. Mohammed and Mr. Libi had both steered interrogators away from Mr. Kuwaiti, C.I.A. officials concluded that they must be protecting him for an important reason.
“Think about circles of information — there’s an inner circle they would protect with their lives,” said an American official who was briefed on the C.I.A. analysis. “The crown jewels of Al Qaeda were the whereabouts of Bin Laden and his operational security.”
The accumulating intelligence about Mr. Kuwaiti persuaded C.I.A. officials to stay on his trail, leading to the discovery of his real name — which American officials have not disclosed — and whereabouts. He in turn unwittingly led the agency to Bin Laden’s lair, where Mr. Kuwaiti and his brother were among those who died in Monday’s raid.
Before a day had passed, the torture debate had flared. The chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, Representative Peter T. King, Republican of New York, told Fox News that the success of the hunt for Bin Laden was due to waterboarding. The next morning, Senator Dianne Feinstein, Democrat of California and chairwoman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said just as flatly that “none of it came as a result of harsh interrogation practices.”
David Rohde contributed reporting from New York.
Saturday, April 30, 2011
Project Number 3 Samples
Here are my first round of samples. I made them over the weekend. Unfortunately, i let the clay dry that I was using as a mold, but i did not seal it and as an end result, the paper stuck to the clay. They are failures as samples. More to come!
Sunday, April 24, 2011
Blood Diamonds: Progress
Last weekend and this week were all about cleaning everything up and getting it ready to turn in tomorrow morning at 11! We had some setbacks with getting wood to lasercut our board but that has all been fixed and Kelsey and I are meeting back up tonight at 8 in the studio to knock out the rest of our project. Here is an image of the pieces mostly cleaned up. Hopefully we can get a few good shots of the final project before we hand it over to April tomorrow. If not, there is always afterwards.
Saturday, April 23, 2011
Easter Weekend: walk down memory lane.
I went and gathered some images of the house i am creating my project around over easter weekend. I took quite a lot of images. I will post some on here. I had trouble getting shots of different things that I wanted. I suppose the house from my memory is about 17 years older now and it shows in some ways.
Tuesday, April 19, 2011
Sunday, April 17, 2011
NY Times: Three Cups of Tea
Personally, I read and loved this book. I would like to think that everything written was the truth, it makes the story more powerful and uplifting. Of course, as is the way of the world, nothing is what it seems. Here is an article about the validity of the entire story of Three Cups of Tea. I take it with a grain of salt.
‘Three Cups of Tea’ Author Defends Book
By JULIE BOSMAN and STEPHANIE STROM
Published: April 17, 2011
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While the publishing industry waited to see whether it faced the embarrassment of yet another partly fabricated memoir, Greg Mortenson, the co-author of the best-selling “Three Cups of Tea,” a book popular with the Pentagon for its inspirational lessons on Afghanistan and Pakistan, forcefully countered a CBS News report on Sunday that questioned the facts of his book and the management of his charitable organization.
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The report could puncture a hole in the uplifting narrative of “Three Cups of Tea,” which has fed a charity run by Mr. Mortenson, the Central Asia Institute. The institute has built schools, mostly for girls, in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
The report has also revived a chronic concern in the publishing industry over the accuracy of nonfiction memoirs, which are typically only lightly fact-checked by publishers, if at all.
Viking, the imprint of Penguin Group USA that published “Three Cups of Tea,” declined to comment on the book or answer questions about how it was vetted.
The CBS News report questioned, in particular, a central anecdote of the book that was as dramatic as it was inspirational: in 1993, Mr. Mortenson was retreating after failing to reach the summit of K2, the world’s second highest mountain, when, lost and dehydrated, he stumbled across the small village of Korphe in northeast Pakistan. After the villagers there nursed him back to health, he vowed to return and build a school.
The CBS report, broadcast on “60 Minutes” Sunday night and citing sources, said that Mr. Mortenson had actually visited Korphe nearly one year after his K2 attempt. Mr. Mortenson said on Sunday that he did reach Korphe after his climb in 1993, and that he visited again in 1994.
But he added a disclaimer in an interview with The Bozeman Daily Chronicle, saying that while he stood by the information in the book, “the time about our final days on K2 and ongoing journey to Korphe village and Skardu is a compressed version of events that took place in the fall of 1993.”
Viking has maintained near silence since the report trickled out on Friday, saying on Saturday that it relied on its authors “to tell the truth, and they are contractually obligated to do so.”
For the publisher, the situation with Mr. Mortenson was not as clear cut as it was with another of its authors, Margaret Seltzer, who wrote “Love and Consequences,” a memoir discovered to be fraudulent only days after it was published in 2008. Riverhead Books, the unit of Penguin that published “Love and Consequences,” immediately recalled all 19,000 copies, offered refunds to readers who had bought it and canceled Ms. Seltzer’s book tour.
“Three Cups of Tea” had a modest start when it was released in hardcover in 2006 but took off after it was published in paperback.
Set in the remote mountains of Afghanistan and Pakistan, it would be a difficult exercise in fact-checking for any publisher.
“It really is the responsibility of the author to write the truth,” said David Black, a literary agent. “If a publisher were to establish a fact-checking department the way a magazine fact checks, given the length of the works and the number of books they are dealing with, it would become very difficult to publish a lot of nonfiction.”
William Zinsser, who is the author of “Writing About Your Life: A Journey Into the Past,” said on Sunday that publishers have had a “slippery” standard for accuracy in memoirs.
“I don’t think they much care whether it’s true or not,” Mr. Zinsser said. “To me, the essence of memoir writing is absolute truth because I think everybody gains that way.”
Mr. Mortenson declined requests for an interview on Sunday, but he released a memo to several news outlets detailing responses to the “60 Minutes” report. He also forwarded a cheerful e-mail to his staff, sent early Sunday morning, telling them that after suffering from “low oxygen” for 18 months, he had recently been found to have a heart ailment and would be undergoing a surgical procedure on Thursday to correct it.
“Don’t let NYC sensational TV mess with Montana, or the tens of thousands of girls and boys we empower through education, our supporters will rally!” he wrote.
‘Three Cups of Tea’ Author Defends Book
By JULIE BOSMAN and STEPHANIE STROM
Published: April 17, 2011
RECOMMEND
SIGN IN TO E-MAIL
SINGLE PAGE
REPRINTS
SHARE
While the publishing industry waited to see whether it faced the embarrassment of yet another partly fabricated memoir, Greg Mortenson, the co-author of the best-selling “Three Cups of Tea,” a book popular with the Pentagon for its inspirational lessons on Afghanistan and Pakistan, forcefully countered a CBS News report on Sunday that questioned the facts of his book and the management of his charitable organization.
Add to Portfolio
CBS Corp
Go to your Portfolio »
The report could puncture a hole in the uplifting narrative of “Three Cups of Tea,” which has fed a charity run by Mr. Mortenson, the Central Asia Institute. The institute has built schools, mostly for girls, in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
The report has also revived a chronic concern in the publishing industry over the accuracy of nonfiction memoirs, which are typically only lightly fact-checked by publishers, if at all.
Viking, the imprint of Penguin Group USA that published “Three Cups of Tea,” declined to comment on the book or answer questions about how it was vetted.
The CBS News report questioned, in particular, a central anecdote of the book that was as dramatic as it was inspirational: in 1993, Mr. Mortenson was retreating after failing to reach the summit of K2, the world’s second highest mountain, when, lost and dehydrated, he stumbled across the small village of Korphe in northeast Pakistan. After the villagers there nursed him back to health, he vowed to return and build a school.
The CBS report, broadcast on “60 Minutes” Sunday night and citing sources, said that Mr. Mortenson had actually visited Korphe nearly one year after his K2 attempt. Mr. Mortenson said on Sunday that he did reach Korphe after his climb in 1993, and that he visited again in 1994.
But he added a disclaimer in an interview with The Bozeman Daily Chronicle, saying that while he stood by the information in the book, “the time about our final days on K2 and ongoing journey to Korphe village and Skardu is a compressed version of events that took place in the fall of 1993.”
Viking has maintained near silence since the report trickled out on Friday, saying on Saturday that it relied on its authors “to tell the truth, and they are contractually obligated to do so.”
For the publisher, the situation with Mr. Mortenson was not as clear cut as it was with another of its authors, Margaret Seltzer, who wrote “Love and Consequences,” a memoir discovered to be fraudulent only days after it was published in 2008. Riverhead Books, the unit of Penguin that published “Love and Consequences,” immediately recalled all 19,000 copies, offered refunds to readers who had bought it and canceled Ms. Seltzer’s book tour.
“Three Cups of Tea” had a modest start when it was released in hardcover in 2006 but took off after it was published in paperback.
Set in the remote mountains of Afghanistan and Pakistan, it would be a difficult exercise in fact-checking for any publisher.
“It really is the responsibility of the author to write the truth,” said David Black, a literary agent. “If a publisher were to establish a fact-checking department the way a magazine fact checks, given the length of the works and the number of books they are dealing with, it would become very difficult to publish a lot of nonfiction.”
William Zinsser, who is the author of “Writing About Your Life: A Journey Into the Past,” said on Sunday that publishers have had a “slippery” standard for accuracy in memoirs.
“I don’t think they much care whether it’s true or not,” Mr. Zinsser said. “To me, the essence of memoir writing is absolute truth because I think everybody gains that way.”
Mr. Mortenson declined requests for an interview on Sunday, but he released a memo to several news outlets detailing responses to the “60 Minutes” report. He also forwarded a cheerful e-mail to his staff, sent early Sunday morning, telling them that after suffering from “low oxygen” for 18 months, he had recently been found to have a heart ailment and would be undergoing a surgical procedure on Thursday to correct it.
“Don’t let NYC sensational TV mess with Montana, or the tens of thousands of girls and boys we empower through education, our supporters will rally!” he wrote.
Project Number 3
So it is now time to start our 3rd and final project of the semester. This project is a materials project based off of some short stories. Upon first reading the stories, i was at a loss. It took some dissecting and i believe i found the root of each story. They are about nostalgia, impermanence, and what defines what is rare versus common. The story about the impermanence of half of a city struck me as relating very much to the city of Detroit. The Infrastructure (what you would think would be more permanent) actually up and left leaving the people behind. And here is where I have gotten my idea. More details to come!
Progress: Blood Diamonds
So in the past week Kelsey and I have come a long way on our project. Last weekend, we started most of our waxes, by Tuesday the 12th, we had finished them all, sprued them all, and invested them all! We put in some solid work time and really made a dent in the thing. Wednesday night, we cast! Although there were some issues, for example running out of gas!, we made it through and everything cast sucessfully! Thursday, we cut all of our sprues. This past weekend, I put in a few hours each day and have done most of the cleanup on our pieces. All that is left is printing our board and the instruction book! I am excited to see the finished product. Pictures will be coming soon!
Saturday, April 9, 2011
Creative Caffeine! Looking at materials
Here are some images I took while looking around my apartment. The materials I was most interested in were the plant like, as you can see I took quite a few pictures of the different plants we have. I also started looking at some of the beauty materials. The eyeshadow, face powder, lipstick, nail polish, and hair gel. Other than that there are some shells, paint, ceramic pieces we have around, and and interesting basket.
Blood Diamonds: Progress
Today I made lots of progress! I Wish I had made even more but I have been working for the last 10 hours straight and I think I need to take a break. My goal for today was to get as many waxes done for blood diamonds as possible. I did a good bit as well as cleanup on some and spruing for some others. Here are the pictures.
First I made the other two tools that we need for the game pieces. The shovel, and a mallet. The pictures do not show the mallet, it still needs to be cleaned up.
These are two simple x's that I made. The will be used as markers during the game. They are now cleaned up and sprued!
Next I made the 2 dice we need. They still need to be engraved on each side, but other than that they are already all cleaned and ready to be sprued. The picture is pretty bad, sorry.
Lastly, I sprued the gold bars that we made a few weeks ago, along with the x's and the pickaxe. Here are a few images. All in all, I would say it was a pretty successful day. Still a ton of work to go, but we are that much closer.
First I made the other two tools that we need for the game pieces. The shovel, and a mallet. The pictures do not show the mallet, it still needs to be cleaned up.
These are two simple x's that I made. The will be used as markers during the game. They are now cleaned up and sprued!
Next I made the 2 dice we need. They still need to be engraved on each side, but other than that they are already all cleaned and ready to be sprued. The picture is pretty bad, sorry.
Lastly, I sprued the gold bars that we made a few weeks ago, along with the x's and the pickaxe. Here are a few images. All in all, I would say it was a pretty successful day. Still a ton of work to go, but we are that much closer.
Saturday, April 2, 2011
Blood Diamonds: Building a collection of Resin Men
After many failed attempts at trying to create little resin people for the game, we have finally found something that works. I usually pour resin into the mold before I go to bed so that it can harden overnight. At this point I have about 30. Only 10 more to go!
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