CLOSE UP by Brian Rudnick

Studies Tajweed, taking family to Mecca

Rashid Abdul/Majid, a practicing Muslim, turns to his Arabic language books during breaks in his substitute-teaching class schedule on a recent day at Parkway Northwest High School in Mount Airy. He is currently studying Arabic, taking one class on the Arabic language- grammar and sentence structure, and another, called Tajweed, on how to recite from the Koran. A recently retired driver of 38 years with SEPTA who has been simultaneously substituting for many years, he loves to travel around the world and has visited China and many countries in Africa. During the upcoming March spring break, with his wife and son, he is taking a return trip to the holy cities of Mecca and Medina in Saudi Arabia. Watch video interview here.

Why Thoreau went to the woods

On a walk around Walden Pond in Concord, Massachusetts we stopped at the site where Thoreau had built his cabin. I asked another tourist if she might not read aloud the quote from Thoreau carved on a sign. "I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived." Watch video here.

Playing bluegrass, watching raptor migration

Kate Somerville was a long time birder before banjo playing took over and decided to combine her two interests by bringing some musician and bird loving pals from the Mermaid Inn to jam at the Militia Hill Hawk Watch. This is the 25^th year of the hawk watch. Volunteers count raptors, by species, migrating south for the winter. According to Marylea Klauder, they had already counted nearly one hundred bald eagles and a record-breaking twenty plus thousand migrating raptors by the time this video was taken in late September. Counting continues until the end of October, along with impromptu concerts, weather permitting.  Fort Washington State Park. Watch video here.

Argentine bases Philly visit from Chamonix Mansion

Alejandro Martinez, an Argentine who works in the agricultural field, was staying in the American Youth Hostel Chamonix Mansion in Fairmount Park while taking in the historical sites of Philadelphia. Watch video interview here.

Gypsy jazz writer skirmishes

Sherry Canary, of the musical group “Hot Club Canaries” takes DJango Reinhardt songs and puts lyrics to them. And she writes her own songs in the gypsy jazz idiom. She does a lot of collaborating as a member of an Internet group FAWM February Album Writing month., http://fawm.org Members compose 14 songs in 28 days and listen and comment on each other’s work. Participants include all kinds of composers from housewives to professionals. Canary also participates in “skirmishes” - writers have only one hour to write the music, the lyrics, produce it and get it online. Watch video interview and singing here. In another video, Canary sings her composition satirizing the world's dictators, "Coffee with Gadaffi." The Hot Club Canaries perform at the Mermaid Inn on Thursday May 10, 2012

By a Maine river, life as it should be for 87 year old

Natalie Kempner says it is a gift to be living in Maine by a river (the Kennebec) at the age of 87. She cherishes the beauty, the constantly changing river,the ice that breaks and goes up and down with the winter tides, the constantly changing seasons.  She swam as a kid all the time and if she had had a wish, she says,  it would have been to be able to live and swim out her front yard. And now she’s had it for twenty years after she and husband Fritz moved from Conshohocken just outside Philadelphia. She enjoys the company of her children and grandchildren and friends and the bustle of visitors in the summer and the quiet time to catch up on things in the winter. A sparkle comes into her eyes as she describes  the wildlife all about - seals in the river, foxes and skunks on land, the coyotes walking atop the frozen winter river,and ospreys and eagles up above. Quoting the common Maine slogan, Natalie says it’s “life as it should be.” Watch video interview here.

Valentines Day roses - does love hurt?

[Alexandra Serfass, Robertson's Flowers greenhouse employee]

In the 2004 movie, “Maria Full of Grace,” a pregnant young woman trades the harsh conditions of a flower packing operation in Colombia to come to the United States with a friend as a “drug mule.” It doesn't turn out well.

The flower export business is big business. Large, drab greenhouses, like those in Ecuador where “Maria” was filmed, can stretch for miles. From my bus window, I knew the eerily transformed landscape would not be on any picture postcard I would be sending home to the U.S.

Beauty has its cost to both the environment and people, however, according to “The Secrets Behind Your Flowers,” a February 2011 Smithsonian Magazine report. Because it may take three gallons of water to grow just one rose bloom, groundwater supplies become depleted.  The low-paying work is tedious and straining. In traditional growing operations, workers are exposed to the dangerous pesticides and fungicides that keep insects from taking the slightest nibble from an otherwise picture-perfect flower.

Public outcry in recent years has led to the introduction of fair trade practices.  Nicole Serfass, flower buyer at Robertson’s Flowers greenhouses in Wyndmoor, showed off the Veriflora label on the roses they import from South America.  Veriflora is one of a handful of certifying organizations that try to ensure that their growers are using sustainable agricultural methods and providing equitable, healthy conditions for their workers.

At Robertson’s showcase Chestnut Hill store, Sandy Robertson says they source their flowers locally  from New Jersey,  domestically from Florida when they can and even sees growing customer interest in organically or sustainably grown flowers. Serfass has been asking their growers about organic but believes it’s not yet economically worth it for them to invest the years required for organic certification.

“Aren’t they gorgeous?” Donna Beardell of  Chestnut Hill asks,  exiting Robertson’s with a brilliant bunch of pink tinged roses, destined for her nieces competing in a gymnastics meet. On Valentines Day, she’s hoping she’ll be the recipient.

watch video here

[Sandy Robertson]

 

[Donna Beardell of Chestnut Hill]

[Nicole Serfass Robertson's Flowers greenhouse, Buyer]

Vintage motorcycles ship to England

WHAT’S THE STORY WITH ALL THE MOTORCYCLES?
They’re all heading to England.There’s a big craze there right now with these older Japanese motorcycles forrestoring. So we traveled around North Jerseyand bought ten and were heading back. AND HOW DO THEY COME TO BE HERE INCHESTNUT HILL? I live in Wyndmoor. A friend of mine is a motor cycle dealer in England so hesent me on a mission to get 10 of these old bikes. It’s taken me about twomonths but I found them. HOW OLD ARE THEY AND WHAT’S SO SPECIAL ABOUT THEM? Theoldest is 1970 and the newest is 1976. They’re all two-stroke engines which youcan’t buy anymore because of the emissions. And they’re becoming rarer andrarer. Some just rot away in garages. Others get in accidents and stuff andjust by attrition they get rarer and rarer. So they got some real value to themnow. HOW DO YOU GO ABOUT FINDING THEM? Mostly through caigslist. I got a coupleon eBay but almost purely on craigslist. But then you have to do a phoneinterview and really get down to nitty-gritty and asking prudent questions andfinding out what they have and then maybe it’s worth traveling 100 miles topick them up. AND WHICH IS YOUR PRIZE HERE? I would say these two.  It’s purely a money thing although I’d like to keep them. WHAT ARE THEY WORTH? Here they’re probably not worth more than$2000; in England,$5000, maybe 6 if you get the right buyer. Each of them cost about $400 to getto England and obviously there’s a profit to be made. Marc Bagwell, left,a contractor who lives in Wyndmoor with his brother-in-law Jack Leamy, of Chestnut Hill.
Watch video here.

Richard Morais' Hundred Foot Journey

WHAT DO YOU LIKE ABOUT READING YOUR BOOK ALOUD? “As you can see I’m a bit of a ham and authors love talking about themselves. Nothing gives them more pleasure. I actually always wanted to be an actor so I realized early enough on that I wasn’t a stable enough person to be an actor because it’s a very unstable life and the ragged edges of my personality would be magnified in that situation so I decided to be a writer… The next time I went down to Bombay, there was an actor who introduced me and I was sort of inspired by his presence to put on an Indian accent and so I went home and I called my wife up and I said, “Yeah I think it went pretty well. I read in an Indian accent” And she said, “Tell me you didn’t.” [Audience laughter] And the reason I say this is that the way I’m reading it now is the way I hear it. One of the great things about fiction writing is for a little while you can pretend you’re not who you are. You can pretend you’re someone else in the world. And that is the great joy and liberation of fiction writing.” Richard Morais, author, The Hundred Foot Journey. Watch video and Morais reading aloud from book in Indian accent here.

Geocaches to fight muscle disease

HOW’D YOU GET STARTED GEOCACHING? “A friend introduced me when we went to hawk mountain, you know the bird observatory. He had his IPhone or his Droid and he had a geocaching app on it. So we decided to do some caching and I got hooked because the first one I found was in the middle of a beautiful valley surrounded by pine trees with a mountain range in front of us. It was a gorgeous view. I think the name of the cache was ‘The View’. Went to Cabela’s, bought myself a GPS for a couple hundred bucks and I’ve been doing it ever since. And it gets me out. I’m on oxygen because I have a muscle disease. It gets me out and moving instead of being sedentary- you know, getting atrophied and dying.” Dan McGrogan, Core Creek Park, Middletown, Bucks County.

Watch video here.