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The Square: The Learning Curve of a Revolution

by Dane Benko

Poster for The Square

Poster for The Square

In December of 2010 I went on leave from my job in the United Arab Emirates to visit Egypt with a coworker.  On the first night after we landed in Alexandria, he crashed out in the hostel and I wandered around to get a feel for the streets.  I ended up walking through a street demonstration with several people giving speeches in Arabic over megaphones, but I was not aware of what the speeches were about.  The fact that I wandered into the demonstration at all indicates my poor situational awareness.

Later, in Cairo, my coworker asked a taxi driver, “So what do you think of Mubarak?”  The taxi driver said, “I cannot speak about Mubarak, but I feel eventually we will have to speak about Mubarak.  Because, see, we cannot talk about Mubarak, so we have to talk about Mubarak. You see?”  Unfortunately, that would be the full extent of my personal experience with what later became internationally known as the Arab Spring, which swept the news a full week after my return from Egypt.  I didn’t even know what I was looking at until various media told me.

 

Tahrir Square during the demonstrations
“Tahrir is a symbol of power. If you hold Tahrir, you hold control of the country.” –Aida Elkashef

Three years later, Netflix has distributed a documentary called The Square, after Tahrir Square in Cairo, which came to be the focal point of mass protest against Mubarak’s and subsequent regimes.  The Square has been nominated for Best Documentary in the 2014 Academy Awards. It comes at a point where the topic is so familiar that many people have already solidified their opinions about it, but it’s a new look into the revolution from filmmakers that have been recording the mass protests in secret for several years.

Coming into the documentary with my personal experience as a prelude, I wanted to see how the documentary presented the events in a different manner than the walled-in thirty second clips embedded in shimmering red and blue motion graphics presented in major mass media outlets.  As it turns out, the concept of media becomes an underlining metanarrative to The Square’s attempt to reclaim the Arab Spring for the populist revolutionaries.

A range of characters includes Ramy, a musician; Khalid Abdallah, an actor known for his role in The Kite Runner; and various activists, painters, and civil rights watchmen.  The main plot, however, surrounds two protestors known as Ahmed and Magdy.  Ahmed is a young populist seeking a brand new Egypt after living his entire life under Mubarak’s rule.  He’s introduced speaking about his childhood, history, and hopes in the revolution while walking down the street in a heavily vignetted tracking shot that seems to be aiming more for focus tilt and ends up being a serendipitous dreamovision in high contrast DSLR.  Magdy is introduced less stylistically as an interviewee attempting to represent the Muslim Brotherhood.

The cameras let themselves be rolled along waves of protestor movements, successfully pulling off a giddy and delirious effect to match the revolutionary fervor as more and more voices join in to describe their hopes of the future.  Surprisingly early on in narrative time, Mubarak steps aside and everything seems renewed.  And of course, shortly after everything gets much, much worse.

It’s there that the movie gains its focus (though starts racking focus in tighter and tighter focal lengths) to tell a three part narrative of the revolution from the ground level.  Mubarak turns out to be only the first part, as the military then moves in and outstays its welcome long enough to set up a Parliamentary election (swept by the Muslim Brotherhood) and a Presidential Election (that goes to Morsi).  Mubarak, the military, Morsi: the three acts, each who have access to their own mass media to write a narrative.  A military general known as Bekheit insists in an interview that the military was the start of the revolution. A television recording of Muhamed Morsi insists that it was the Muslim Brotherhood.

Without access to mass media, Ahmed, Magdy, and other protestors start gathering together whatever cameras they can to record everything, communicate to each other through social networks and street-level word-of-mouth, speeches, and demonstration, and share videos on YouTube.  Khalid Abdallah becomes a sort of Metatron, using his media and entertainment experience and the advice of his father (often a floating head in a Skype window) to put these videos into context and keep eyes on the streets and away from figureheads.  Their instinct in this matter is well founded as the demonstrations become targets of brutality and the cheerful characters we met earlier on are beaten, imprisoned, and shot at with live rounds.  Warning: the documentarians don’t look away.

Meanwhile, Ahmed and Magdy’s relationship starts to drift as Ahmed becomes more and more aware of the significance of finding a universal, non-military and non-religious constitution, and Magdy’s relationship with the Muslim Brotherhood starts to get ambiguous.  On the one hand they are both principled men who feel dedicated to those they supported before, but on the other hand, the realities of conflict and differing opinions rears its ugly head just in time for the new regime to start dividing the ranks of protestors against themselves.  Neither man is able to keep everybody on their side of the fence, and the two of them even struggle not to argue amongst themselves.

In the end The Square is merely the first act of a larger narrative history has yet to tell, but it firmly takes the perspective of the populist protestors to fight against the representations of the military and Muslim Brotherhood.  It’s also worth studying as a look into the learning curve of a revolution, as individuals are increasingly left with the burden of representing themselves and their fellow activists coherently and in a manner that doesn’t get subverted from above or contradicted from below.

Filed Under: ENTERTAINMENT, MOVIES, REVIEWS Tagged With: Ahmed Hassan, Aida Elkashef, Egypt, Hosni Mubarak, Jehane Noujaim, Khalid Abdalla, Magdy Ashour, mass protests, media, Mohamed Morsi, Ramy Essam, revolution, skype, social media, Tahrir Square, The Arab Spring, The Muslim Brotherhood, The Square documentary, youtube

Considering relocating for a job? I say, YES!

by Chris

http://erikhatch.org/free-relocation-package/

A few months ago I completed a 9.5 hour relocating adventure to my new city all for a fantastic new position. While I am uprooting myself now for the third time in three years, I think I have finally made the right choice:  one based upon a job of a lifetime. 

Yes, I left behind a life I created for the past two years including amazing friendships; relationships; sports teams and most of all my heart. But sometimes life happens for a reason. Not everyone will receive such opportunities in their life however by keeping an open perspective when it comes to geography it could lead you to somewhere new and exciting.

Before just jumping into a relocating situation consider a few things along the way:

1) Analyze the surroundings. Utilize my favorite new city comparison website (http://versus.com). A place you can compare cities across the globe. Check it out, it will surprise you. I may have an extremely optimistic perspective on life but making sure we are aware of what is happening around is pivotal when jumping ship for new opportunity and life adventure.

  • Geographic location Determine where you would like to live the most, yes, this includes the climate.
  • Social Life Consider the social life. No, not necessarily knowing a person in the city you are going to but knowing how the city operates when it comes to social circles. Even if we are in our late 20’s or 30’s or 40’s a social life will assist us in making a smooth transition.
  • Affordability Can you make it by on a day-to-day basis without an exorbitant amount of money coming through? Compare electricity/rental costs or even groceries, you’d be surprised.

2) Go full force with the job search/interview process. Land a job before you leave. It will save you the hassle when you arrive. Typically a person will advise not to move without a job and as a person who has moved quite a bit I would agree here but only to an extent. If you have an opportunity to move and can get by with a day job for a while (i.e. tutoring, serving tables, bagging groceries) by all means, go for it.

  • Save some money
  • Network without turning into that guy who constantly bugs people about not having a job
  • Stay positive!
  • Take classes to further your education. Coding is our generation’s new literacy. Knowing how to code is key to helping you land a successful job.

3) Don’t stop. Once you let up, you will start becoming lazier and lazier. Do not let that overcome you. I am not saying do not take any breaks but be cognizant that your work ethic will pay off in the long run.

And I leave you with Journey.

 

Best of luck and please share your relocating and career success stories!

 

 

Chicago, IL “The Bean” Millennium Park

Filed Under: BREAKING NEWS, BUSINESS, TECHNOLOGY Tagged With: affordability, Business, career, chicago, coding, economy, job, job of a lifetime, journey, manhattan digest, millennial, relocation, social life, social media, technology, versus.com

How I got a job and how you can too

by Chris

As a person who graduated from university in the heat of the recession (2008), I can safely say I am very familiar with an unsteady job market and making the most out of any opportunity I have come across.

After years of working in a few different positions within in recruitment and staffing, I finally landed my golden opportunity. One might ask, how did you get there and why did it take you so long?

 

 

With patience, the right questions and determination, I landed the biggest job of my career.
With patience, the right questions and determination, I landed the biggest job of my career.

 

Friends,  I have applied thousands of times, went on a plethora of interviews, completed tons of job shadows, and attended numerous volunteer workshops and all I can really say is that the process is equivalent to that of dating. It takes patience. You have to find the right match for yourself and similarly you have to be a solid match for the company as well. This process where we figure it out involves asking the right questions during the interview and really getting to know the company and the folks who would be your team members.

And that goes without saying, there were some companies who knew right away if they wanted me or if they did not want me; and then there were companies who never responded. I used these obstacles and hurdles as motivation. In my previous job, it took instances of feeling hopeless, where I realized if I could gather the experience I need or want to gain for my next job in my current position, then I would be golden. Simple, right?

Hardly. This did not happen overnight.

1) Find your passion and inject it into your current position. If you can build a solid repertoire WHILE you have employment, you are creating the path that will lead you to your next opportunity.

  • Attend volunteer workshops
  • Volunteer on projects that push your boundaries and force you to try new things
  • Apply to promotional positions
  • Ask to shadow your boss or a top-notch employee who has the job that you want
  • Don’t give up

2) Build an online presence and use it to assist you. If you are unfamiliar with Linkedin or Twitter or blogging, get your name out there in the social media circles within the fields you hold a particular interest.

  • Linkedin is a professional networking super highway – use it to your advantage
  • Show of your skills (presentations, photography, writing skills, video editing)
  • Be bold and creative, it will show you like to push the limits
  • Use social media correctly especially when it comes to talking about yourself. Braggarts are never fun to be around.

3) Talk the talk and walk the walk. Learn the lingo and understand why decisions are made a certain way.

4) Let people come to you. More often than not, new positions are offered to those who are not looking for a position/did not know the position existed or would never have considered themselves qualified. So, you’re probably wondering, how did they apply?

Internal employees or Recruiters will come to you if they see you have what it takes. The best ways to show off yourself is via social media in the form of presentations/blogging/tweeting/photography, etc.

5) Find your niche and stick with it! Good things come to those who are clear and patient.

 

On a more personal note, I was about to give up on my job search a month ago until I received an anonymous but personalized e-mail and a phone call about a position. It just so happened to be the jobs I just recently landed. I posted a presentation that I had created and inserted it into my profile. All it took was that presentation to lead me to 7 successful interviews and a new opportunity.

I cannot begin to thank those who have supported me, encouraged me and showed me that anything can happen especially when you push yourself out there and reach for what you want. Sure, you don’t always get it but it’s worth a shot.

Anyone can do that or get there. All it takes is some structure, time and patience. It will happen when you least expect but if you can stay focused and remember your deep passions, you will never go wrong.

 

 

Your dream job is possible, just obtain the proper tools and get it done!
Your dream job is possible, just obtain the proper tools and get it done!

Filed Under: BREAKING NEWS, BUSINESS, TECHNOLOGY Tagged With: 2013jobs, career development, careers, dream job, employment, instructional design, job, job 101, job search skills, Linkedin, recession, recruiting, social media, Twitter

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