I had the privilege of being with the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) team as it talked about and brainstormed ideas for its media efforts with Fahd’s story (over the summer, at the Radical Lawyering conference). I met the attorneys who have traveled back and forth from here to Guantanamo, who have been working with Fahd and other detainees for quite some time. It is an incredible story, and I encourage each of you to get to know his story and help spread awareness about it. Don’t allow him to be forgotten.
I usually try not to put “heavy” things on the blog because I deal with them every day, and this is my little corner of sunshine, but details of the Senate Torture Report have come out. I have only read excerpts reported on by the media, but I have the document saved, waiting for me (it’s about 500-something pages). The details, so far, are heart-breaking. What terrible violations of human rights, international law and humanity are occurring. What kind of a world are we building and allowing, and what will we do about it? If we do nothing, who will be next to suffer these atrocities?
I am going to be taking a break from the city soon. I am going to drain Fifth Avenue from my veins for a bit. Going home is a detox. Slowly, I stop wearing black structured clothes, pretentious city makeup, and I breathe a little more deeply; my adrenaline levels become normal; my phone gets forgotten in random corners; and I learn to sleep again. It’s a process, and always very psychological. I love Christmas break because I truly won’t be checking and doing school work (unlike Thanksgiving break, which is relaxing but filled with anxiety because of the constant workload, but the distance leaves you feeling frantic and distracted). I hope that someday, I can live in a warm place where I can look a bit more bohemian and relaxed. No matter what, I need to be somewhere where there is a body of water. Where there is water, there is life.
But enough about the future and my impending rehab post law school exams (because that is exactly what it is– rehab). I wanted to share some of my most recent winter shots from my little long walks. I love walking with no time constraint and with an open grid of old and new places. So, come along.
Belongs to: Gabriela Yareliz
This was a rainy day in the Village. I went to my favorite and frequented Grace Church to chill in silence, pray and listen to the organ player (who is amazing).
Belongs to: Gabriela YarelizBelongs to: Gabriela Yareliz
At Union Square, the annual Holiday Market is in full swing. Vendors from all over the world come and set-up shop.
Belongs to: Gabriela YarelizBelongs to: Gabriela Yareliz
(Someone is tired of pushing through thousands of people. See girl on the right. Ha. This is what Christmas shopping does to people. The struggle is real.)
Belongs to: Gabriela Yareliz
The Love Man in motion, in the subway station. He was dancing and making faces at me. I just smiled and waved (always the encourager).
Belongs to: Gabriela Yareliz
Me, underground, going to walk Fifth Ave. and Madison, to go window shopping for dresses that costs thousands and millions.
Belongs to: Gabriela Yareliz
Hello Park Avenue!
Belongs to: Gabriela Yareliz
I took a short break at the St. Bart’s Church on Park Avenue. Lovely place; lovely music.
Belongs to: Gabriela YarelizBelongs to: Gabriela Yareliz
Shopping, anyone? Me, looking nouveau riche while knowing that I would have to sell my blood and organs to afford anything from these boutiques; and I like and will be keeping my blood and organs, thank you very much.
Belongs to: Gabriela Yareliz
And below is St. Patrick’s Cathedral. What you don’t see is that around the church, on the sidewalk, there were so many people, the police was crossing people with ropes on the crosswalks. You didn’t have to walk. The people moved you along. I was swept into in the church by like a hundred people. I am pretty sure that the church was beyond fire-hazard capacity. I got slapped in the face repeatedly (at church, how appropriate? Maybe not…*wink*) At one point, I was so overwhelmed by the people inside that I was in a corner, and a woman hit me in the face by accident while walking by (the perils of being short). She apologized and then looked at her friend and said, “Oh my gosh! I hit that girl in the face, and I think she was praying.” This made me laugh.
Belongs to: Gabriela YarelizBelongs to: Gabriela Yareliz
Below is the Tiffany’s building, all decked out. Windows were filled with artistic displays, by theme, with music.
Belongs to: Gabriela YarelizBelongs to: Gabriela Yareliz
This was my favorite display. I loved all of the literary figures’ framed photos in the background. A dream.
Belongs to: Gabriela Yareliz
Oh, New York! You and your magical lights, overpriced food and clothes, flashy advertisements, musical dark churches, frivolous pleasures–ridiculous, lavish, gaudy and overwhelming. Still, somehow you manage to gift each one of us something special, according to our desires. You intoxicate us and turn us into a species that doesn’t sleep, doesn’t stop and doesn’t settle.
“‘I want to write a novel about Silence,’ he said; ‘the things people don’t say.'” Virginia Woolf, The Voyage Out
[If you need to, have a Barbra Streisand moment]
A late-night epiphany brought to you by: Gabriela Yareliz
You are entitled to make decisions in whatever way you decide to do so. Some people mistake wisdom and maturity for uptight and fearful. When I am looked down on for the way I make decisions, usually it just means I am not doing exactly what someone else wants me to do. This is what I do: I just think about how I moved hundreds of miles away from home to a huge city through providence, alone, to pursue my dreams; I think of everything I lived before that, and I smile. Don’t let people tell you who you are. If anyone puts you down for your innocence, your wisdom, your maturity, and simply your way of doing things, just remember that they don’t know half of the strength inside of you. Be like Phoebe:
Oftentimes, doing what is right for you takes more strength and fearlessness than succumbing to what the world wants from you. Enough said.
XOXO–Corporations has me like Carmen Maura in an Almodovar film.
[Images from Tumblr (mostly), all should be linked]
I still find each day too short for all the thoughts I want to think, all the walks I want to take, all the books I want to read, and all the friends I want to see. John Burroughs
[Both screenshots are from the film: La Delicatesse, which is such a treat.]
[Is that the best pick-up line or what? “I could go on holiday in your hair…” Yes.]
[The Theory of Everything]
[Maria Valverde and Marie Claire Spain want you to know, 2015 is going to be your year, and I agree.]
There is no place I would have rather been today, on Human Rights Day, than at the United Nations for the Hague Talks. A big thank you to the Kingdom of the Netherlands, the American Bar Association, the UN, and the International Criminal Court Consortium for being such gracious hosts and for the invitation.
[A snapshot before leaving the house and discovering that my first snowfall of the season was awaiting outside. *Giddy face*]
I met some incredible people tonight, and I ate amazing mushrooms. It was great to be surrounded by inspiring practitioners who are out in the trenches revolutionizing an ever-changing international law sphere.
If you ever doubt that dreams come true, I got some things to say: I met and spoke to Nicolas Sarkozy, I was published in Latina Magazine, and I went to the Hague Talks at the UN on Human Rights Day. Dreams come true; some in unexpected ways, and some are dreams you never dared to ask for because in your own mind they weren’t possible, but anything is possible. God is [too] good.
“Happy Human Rights Day!” From: The snowy, sparkly, magical New York City. I am still giddy about this evening. My own eyes are sparkly and magical, like a NYC snow globe.
“It is a miracle if you can find true friends, and it is a miracle if you have enough food to eat, and it is a miracle if you get to spend your days and evenings doing whatever it is you like to do, and the holiday season – like all the other seasons – is a good time not only to tell stories of miracles, but to think about the miracles in your own life, and to be grateful for them.” Lemony Snicket The Lump of Coal
GABRIELA YARELIZ 