#5SmartReads - June 16, 2023
Hitha on encouraging news and the representation I've always needed
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It's the end of the tightening cycle as we know it (Axios)
In promising economic news, it may be the end of interest rate hikes.
Inflation is well below the 9% level it was when these hikes began. Costs of common goods are beginning to fall (though some remain stubbornly high), and unemployment numbers have lowered and are steady.
Could this be the beginning of the end of inflation in the United States? Certainly, there are some macroeconomic issues out of our control (the ongoing invasion of Ukraine, manufacturing in China still ramping back up, resolving COVID-induced supply chain issues).
I want to be sure that nothing is certain or has been announced, but it’s refreshing that we haven’t seen a new hike this quarter. Let’s hope things continue to trend in the right direction.
This TV mom changed everything (CNN)
Never have I ever been able to relate to a television mom the way I do Nalini Vishwakumar. It’s not that I also call my children “kannama” or tell them to not waste their prayers (things I learned from my own mom, who was raised in neighboring Andhra Pradesh).
Nalini (played by the phenomenal Poorna Jagannathan) shattered the narratives of motherhood that our society has upheld - the so-called perfect mom who’s leaned fully into family life, the haggered working mom, the immigrant mom with impossibly high expectations. Nalini certainly has elements of the last two archetypes, but shattered them in her own way as she showed us the agony and ecstasy of raising a teenager amidst her own grief.
My brilliant friend Raakhee’s words summed up my feelings of the final season of Never Have I Ever, and of Nalini in particular.
“Nalini is the disciplinarian but also an object of desire. She serves looks and lewks. (And anyone with a Brown mom knows the eyes; one look is all it takes.) She’s not Devi’s best friend but she’s in her corner. She doesn’t throw around “I love you” — the way I do — but the love is very real.
The immigrant parent, first-generation child relationship is a nuanced blend of history and hope. It’s an uncharted pathway we pioneered together. There were wedding dances and senior dances, though I was only allowed to do the former. There were fits and fights, a deep desire to break free and settle in a dorm 200 miles from home. And then, there was the journey back. I suppose that’s the thing about roots, they, like a strong mother, are a powerful anchor.”
And to my own mother - thank you for everything. I love you so much, and I hope I’m even 1% of the mother to my sons that you were to me.
Russia will lose the war if Ukraine's counteroffensive succeeds, Zelenskyy tells (NBC News)
In “glimmers of hope” news, I give you another story - Ukrainian forces mounting a counteroffensive that could turn the tide of this war.
And he credited the ongoing supply of weapons and aid from Western allies as a factor in said offensive.
“The counteroffensive could prove crucial not just to Zelenskyy's hopes of retaking seized land, but also to maintaining allied support, which could be strained by the complexities of the battlefield and domestic politics.
Training for Ukrainian pilots to fly American-made F-16 fighter jets has already begun, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said Thursday, a potentially powerful tool in defending the country's skies that has long been desired by Zelenskyy. But this will be no quick fix, with any training likely to take many months and come too late to blunt Russian dominance of the skies in the counteroffensive.”
This article is well worth the time to read up on the latest in the war, including the impact of the Kakhovka dam’s destruction just last week.
Ashley Park’s Main Character Energy From ‘Joy Ride’ Is Here To Stay: ‘I’m Treating Myself Like A Lead Now’ (Women’s Health)
I won’t lie - the only reason I watch Emily in Paris is because of Ashley Park.
Watching her character grow and evolve and shine has been a very real light in a show I enjoy incessantly mocking (you do it too if you watch it), and I’m especially excited to see Ashley step into the leading role of Joy Ride - exactly where she belongs.
I also am just a nosy person and love learning about someone’s habits and rituals that keep them grounded, which Women’s Health does such a fantastic job of.
And also, there’s this line that just has me counting down until Joy Ride is available to stream:
“Joy Ride is groundbreaking because it shows Asian women in their complex glory—horny side included. “Asian women on-screen, especially in America and Hollywood, have been so sexualized and fetishized for the benefit of other people’s stories or jokes,” Ashley says. “And we’re like, ‘We’re gonna go balls to the wall, further than anyone’s gone with Asian women.’””
We can’t be what we can’t see - and as an Asian-American woman, I would like the permission to be messy at times.
Can a playlist of fish music save the world's coral reefs? (NPR)
I love, love, LOVE it when solutions for sustainability can be the most simple ones.
Take coral reefs and music.
“Compared to a degraded reef where they're not playing sounds, says Mooney, "the reef that we're acoustically enhancing, we get more coral settlement." Specifically, about two to three times as much settlement.
It will take a few more years to see if, as the coral gets re-established, more fish return as well. But Mooney says the results so far suggest an encouraging possibility: All these recordings that the scientists are making don't have to be one more memento of a vanishing world. They could be a key to restoring it.”
Time will tell, but this is such a simple, accessible solution that could very well work. And to use the history of these reefs to restore them? There’s something so beautiful and hopeful about that.