Whale Rider (2002)

This is a movie about a girl from a broken family, in a broken culture, who defies her personal and collective past to create a new and possibly better future.

Paikea is a girl who, in the eyes of her grandfather, shouldn't have been born. Paikea was born into a patriarchal Maori tribe, of which her grandfather, and his grandfather before him, and his before him, etc. is chief. The story behind her culture is that they all came to where they're living now because one of their ancestors, a man named Paikea, rode on the back of a whale, and they really cherish whales because of this. The problem is that the blood of the community is growing weak, and not many people are choosing to follow the old ways. Paikea's father chose to leave the country instead of take his place as next in line, and her grandfather was hoping that his firstborn grandson would take his place and lead the people. Paikea was born along with a twin brother, but the boy didn't survive. Paikea's father left soon after her birth, and she was raised by her grandmother and grandfather.

One day, her grandfather decides to open a school for all of the young boys in the village, to teach them the old ways, and to choose one of them to be the new chief. Paikea tries to join in, but her grandfather gets angry and kicks her out of the school. She is of course upset by this and gets her uncle (her grandfather's second born, also not good enough for her grandfather) to teach her the traditional fighting style. To pick one of the boys to follow in his footsteps, her grandfather throws a whale tooth to the bottom of the reef and says that the one who can retrieve it will be chosen. Of course none of them can do it. And of course Paikea asks her uncle to take her there and successfully retrieves it. That night at her school she says a speech in her grandfather's honour, but he doesn't make it to the event because for some reason all of the whales have beached themselves. The whole community comes down to the beach to try to save the whales, but nothing seems to be able to fix this situation. Will Pai be able to do anything!?

This is kind of a slow-moving film, but I really love it. It's a story about inner strength, about fighting adversity, and most importantly, about valuing tradition and your heritage and fighting to keep it alive, even when doing so seems impossible or useless. Everything in Pai's life seems to be working against her, or falling apart. She comes from a tradition that seems to be losing it's place, where her place as a woman makes her voice a little bit harder to hear, and yet she's the only one with the power to speak. She's also from a broken family. She rarely ever sees her father who lives in another country, her mother died during childbirth, and her grandfather resents her existence because of her gender. But despite the fact that so many things in her life are 'broken', Pai keeps trying to fix them. A great scene symbolizing this is when her grandfather is trying to start a motor with a piece of rope and he explains that their ancestral line is like the rope, many small strands woven together to become something stronger. He then snaps the rope trying to start the motor and angrily goes off to find a better one. Pai picks up the rope and fixes it, ad then uses it to start the motor and her grandfather comes back and scolds her. She's able to gather people, and lead them, but because she's a girl, her value is overlooked and belittled. And what's so inspiring about the movie is that she barrels forward despite all of that.

I'm kind of a sucker for tradition and culture, and keeping your own alive in a modern world that does not immediately make room for older modes of thought and being, so this film always strikes a chord with me. I often feel the richness and beauty of my own family's culture and traditions fading slowly away with every generation, and movies like this one give me a confidence boost when I'm feeling like I'm the only one who wants to treasure that heritage. And it gives me confidence that I can adapt that older way to fit the new world I'm living in now.

Even if you're not female, and you're not very traditional, this is still a good movie about finding yourself and standing up for your beliefs or standing up to outdated thoughts or closed-minded adversaries. A definite watch.

 

The Daring Book For Girls: Things To Do by Andrea J Buchanan

This book is trying to milk the success of the dangerous book for boys with content not quite on par with what was in that book. The book for boys had interesting and slightly obscure facts and activities one would enjoy reading about, and not just for little boys but in general for adults as well as kids, its an interesting book to flip through. The book for girls on the other hand had some activities in there that were... more widely known about, or in other words, common sense. Examples like bandana tying? Tree swings? What do you need to know about those things other than the fact they exist? To need an instruction manual on how to tie a bandana or paddle a canoe is kind of sad. To compare the girls book to the boys book one would think we patronize our girls (which we do unfortunately but lets hope we grow out of that). I found most of the activities to be hands on and not so much intellectual, which is not completely bad, but the funny thing about 'active' activities is you learn them best by doing them, not so much reading about them. Don't get me wrong, the fact that there are more so called 'hands on' activities in the girls book is not what makes it bad, its the fact that those activities are so juvenile and uninteresting compared to the information in the boys book. There were a few interesting things in the book, but overall not worth the time. The only way in which it is as good or maybe better than the book for boys was the recommended reading list at the back. There were a few good books and it was a more extensive list than the boys list (hint hint, go read those books instead of this one). 

Of course the problem with both of the books is that they attempt to make the information gender specific which just perpetuates stereotypes and closes minds, but short of writing your own book or writing letters there's not much you can do about that other than tell your child its OK to like reading the book with the name of the opposite gender on the cover.

My advice to you, buy the dangerous book for boys and give it to your daughters. Or if you are really keen on getting a reference book with the word girls in the title, go with one called: Science Book for Girls and Other Intelligent Beings by Valerie Wyatt. That is a good one that will get them doing something and teaching them at the same time.