Good morning and welcome to Encompass Live. I'm Emily Nimsacant filling in for Krista Burns here at the Nebraska Library Commission. Encompass Live is the Library Commission's weekly online event. It covers a variety of Library Commission activities and other library-related topics. The free one-hour sessions are offered every Wednesday at 10 a.m. central time and they include things like presentations, interviews, web tours, mini-training sessions, and question-and-answer sessions. And they are always available as recordings afterwards. If you can't join us for the live session you can listen to the recordings online. Today we have Deborah, Julie, and Susan presenting a session called What to Read. Good morning everyone and let us know if you can't hear us since there'll be three of us talking. We've tried to arrange the mic but if we need to adjust it at all let us know. Our topic today does relate to what to read next. And you might have had a patron walk into the library and say, that is if I can get it to move forward, there we go, do you know of a good book? What should I read next? Do you have another book just like this one?  But do these questions just scare you to death because you're not quite sure how to answer them? Well today we're going to be talking about resources that you can use for readers advisory. Some professional sources, some social networking sources, and also talking about what you already know and what you can share in you doing readers advisory. But first I'm going to start by talking a bit about what a readers advisory is. Okay readers advisory can be one-on-one doing book talking in the stacks or you could actually market books to readers and try to target one group of readers that like a particular kind of book. But what readers advisory also really depends on is knowing what you have in your own library's collection, what you can get a hold of, and knowing books. There is quite a bit of literature out there now about readers advisory, but Joyce Sarex was one of the very first to start writing books about readers advisory and really talking it up. Her first book readers advisory service in the public library is now in its third edition. She's also written the readers advisory guide to genre fiction. She writes a regular book list column about readers advisory and she does presentations all over the country and a few years ago she did actually come to Nebraska and do one here too. The first book is the readers advisory service in the public library. It's a good introductory resource for how to do readers advisory. It talks about reading and thinking about books, how to talk to patrons, how to interview them to find out what kind of books they're really interested in, how to do book talking and things of like that. Now a lot of the things that are covered are pretty much common sense, but sometimes they're things that we need to be reminded of. So now we're going to look just briefly at what suggesting books to patrons entails. You should really make suggestions to patrons, allow them to decide whether what book you're suggesting is something that they're really interested in. Don't want to push books on anybody. But to find out what to suggest you do basically need to do an interview. You need to find out what do they like to read? What did you like best about the book that you want to find another one like? What don't you like about books, about particular kinds of books? Most people when they're talking about readers advisory have a list of characteristics or items of appeal that they tell you to listen for when you're talking to these patrons. Sometimes some people list four characteristics, some people listed dozen. I've just picked out a few of them right here. Not everybody who likes the same book likes it for the same reason. So you need to ask the questions, figure out what it is that they're looking for. Just as an example, a book that both I and Julie actually have read recently is the Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society. I'm trying saying that 10 times fast. I have a hard time saying it once. Somebody who has read this book and enjoyed it might come back with responses like, well, it was a historical fiction book or it was a gentle read. It didn't have foul language or sex scenes, but there was a bit of mystery, a bit of romance, a bit of humor. It was just a nice sweet read. For the plot, they might say, oh well, it was about an author looking for a storyline for a new book who gets a letter from a man who found her name in a book that she had once owned. In the correspondence between the two of them, she discovers that he was a part of a group of people who started a literary group to escape punishment for breaking curfew in Nazi-occupied Guernsey. And she learns how they survived the war and how they continue to help each other in the aftermath of the war. For setting, they might say, oh well, oops, I did two of them. That's okay. It's post-war England, and actually Guernsey is an island off of the coast of England in the English Channel. Format, it was mostly letters. There were some journal entries with some telegrams thrown in, but it was mostly correspondence between a number of different people. But that correspondence did tell a complete story. Characters, most of them were pretty eccentric. But there was a plucky, quirky heroine, and because the letters were from various people, you got a real feel for one character that was described from a number of different viewpoints. The pace, it was a quick read. It wasn't really a fast-paced thriller or anything of that nature, but I read almost the whole thing in one sitting, because I wanted to find out what happened. The tone, it was pretty upbeat overall. Yes, bad things happened, but the characters were survivors. And you knew that things were going to pretty much come out right in the end. And for some people, happy endings is everything. Don't give them a book that has unhappy ending. And part of that relates to why are they reading? Are they reading to learn something? Or are they reading to escape? Oops, let me back up half. If you were actually going to make suggestions to someone who wanted a book like this, and you picked out certain things that they were really focused on, for example, if they were really interested in the letters, the English connection, the author, you might try suggesting 84th Charing Cross Road, which is a collection of letters between an author that was actually located in New York to a book store in London. If they were interested in letters, don't care really where it happened, slower paced book, you might suggest Fair and Tender Ladies by Lee Smith. If they were really interested in the World War II aspect, things that happened during the war and how people survived them and how they went on after the war, you might suggest a town like Alice by Neville Shoot. So depending on what they emphasized in describing the book to you, you might suggest different kinds of books. What if you have a lot of demand for reader's advisory? One of my professors always said, work smarter, not harder. So if you have a lot of people coming in asking for recommendations on, say, romance books, put together a list and have it on hand so that any of the library staff can use it. On the right hand side, I put up an example. It's a page from Joyce Eric's book of different kinds of little lists that you can create for your patrons and your library. In this particular one, it's popular topics in fiction. And they not only created a topic, but they actually defined it so that everybody is considering the same thing when they're adding to these lists. And in this case, they're just listing authors who write in that style. You can also create annotated book lists with just a little bit of a blurb about a book so that people can look at that and say, oh, yes, that's of interest to me or no, that's not quite what I was looking for. Some libraries still create bookmarks on particular topics or authors. You can also create book displays for your marketing to a large group of people. And these can be for, if you have a popular book, a book that's in or an author that's really in high demand, you might create a display that says, if you like this author or this book, try one of these or if you have a long waiting list for a really popular book, you might call it while you're waiting for X, try one of these. So you can market to people and do readers advisory work ahead of time. How do you create these lists? How do you come up with ideas for suggestions? Well, personal knowledge is a big one. Thinking about books that you've read, but also tapping into other staff members, what they've read, and don't forget the patrons. If you suggest a book to them and they really liked it, when they come back, say, what did you like about that? Would you suggest it to someone else? What else do you like that's written in this style? Beyond personal knowledge, there are also print sources. So if you're not familiar with a particular genre or you don't have time to read a lot of books, we have a number of different titles here at the commission. In addition to Joyce Sarak's books, we have an ALA Readers Advisory series, which includes the horror readers advisory and the mystery readers advisory. If you have teenagers who are in that are asking for books, we have serving teams through readers advisory. There are also other print sources out there like Gen Reflecting, that one's hard to say too. And what do I read next? Book reviews in journals such as Publishers Weekly, Library Journal, and Booklist usually have summaries of books and they'll usually mention the appealing characteristics of books. That's another way to find books to suggest. But in addition to print resources, there are a lot of non-print resources and they, the number grows yearly, daily, exponentially. But there are certain databases that are out there that are more professional that you usually have to pay for. However, with these two examples, the books in print and fiction connection, which is related to that, and WorldCat, the Library Commission pays the subscription for all Nebraska residents so anyone can get in and use those. Some libraries also subscribe to a service called Novelist, which is another professionally done database. There are all kinds of other websites that are put out there by book groups, by individuals, and there are a lot of lists and blogs that also talk about books and reading. So now I'm going to turn this over to Susan, who's going to start off with, which one, Susan, with one of the databases. And she's going to highlight some of the features that will help you in doing readers advisory. And I'll see you referenced. I'm going to go ahead and go to Nebraska Access and take a look at one of the databases that I think is pretty helpful as far as readers advisory goes. And that is fiction connection. The one limitation to fiction connection, of course, is that it is limited to fiction. There's probably a little bit of that gets bent a little bit because they do have sort of personal narrative. They do have some sort of memoirs included. And so those would also be, I would think, I think of those as nonfiction, but they read like fiction. So they do include them in fiction connection. And fiction connection does go back probably to it's not just adult titles, but it goes back to maybe midway through elementary school, some picture books, chapter books that kids like. So it's not just limited to adults. There are a couple ways to use fiction connection. And so I'm going to go ahead and start out just by doing a search for a book. This is really helpful because you could have the patron tell you the book that they like and the book that they want to find similar to. So if they come in and they tell you they liked, let's just, I haven't, I didn't practice this one, but let's just go ahead and try since Debra mentioned the, what's the title? Just the Guarantee Literary and Potato Peel Society. So here's the book. And so if a patron, if you've never read this book and the patron wants similar books, you're kind of in a jam. So if you go ahead and take a look at the record for this title and you scroll through the book, you'll see that there's a lot of books that you can read. So if you go ahead and take a look at the record for this title and you scroll through, you do get the summary reviews and then they assign different characteristics to each title in the database. And you can scroll through and you can see what the details are, what genres have they assigned to it, what topic areas, timeframes, locations, setting, character traits, et cetera. So many of those characteristics that Debra mentioned. What's nice is you can go up to the top and there's a button that says Find Similar. And when you click on that, basically what the database does or what the search engine does is it goes out and it retrieves all the other titles in the database that share at least one of those characteristics with this particular title. And they will sort the results by relevance. And by that, it means books that share the most characteristics with the target title are going to appear at the top of your list. The easiest way to see what characteristics are shown is to look right here. And if you click on Show All, it'll show you what all characteristics it has in common with the Guardsy Literary and Potato Kale Society book. So self-discovery, friendship, journeys, adventure, adult, Europe, et cetera. So one thing you can do is you can just scroll through this list and see if you find titles that might be of interest to your patron. You'll notice up here it does say there are 65,000 results. The other thing you can do is you can look over here on the left. And one of the things that Debra mentioned is that the characteristics that made a book appeal into one person might not make it appeal into another.  So you can go through and you can look at the topic areas and see what did you really like. There's location, setting, time frame, character traits. Up here you have the topic area and genre. And you'll notice that there's a number behind each characteristic. And that shows you how many of the 65,000 titles also have that particular characteristic.  So we could go in and we could say, OK, only show me books that are about writers. And so that's going to reduce our list to, well, I said about 2,000. So now we've got books about writers. And then we can go back and look at those characteristics again and say, OK, now I also only want those books about writers that are set in World War II and click on that. And now we're down to 31 titles. Which is a manageable list to go through and look at. The nice thing about this database is if you don't like how you reduced your result list, you can always uncheck a particular characteristic and you'll increase your list size again. So fiction connection is really going to be helpful if your patron is asking about a book that you maybe haven't read. You don't have a good sense yourself. This actually walks you through the process of asking them what characteristics did you like about the book. One other way to use fiction connection, if your patron isn't coming to you with a specific title they want to find and read, you'll notice this display here. You've got topics, genre, setting, character, location, time frame. And this display is a little bit deceiving. It sort of rotates through the different categories or the different tabs here. So what's easiest if you want to actually use this is go down here and click on View All Topics. And it's going to start off with a topic tab. It's going to list more topics than you could ever think of. But if you have your patron browse this list, they might be able to pick out a topic area they'd be interested in. You do see that the words are different sizes and the idea is that the larger the font, the more titles are going to have been assigned that particular category. So you could scroll through and maybe somebody likes to read about academic life. They could click on that. And now you're going to get a whole list of books that have that as the main topic area. Again, something like this is just a good prompt for patrons and they can't tell you what they're interested off the top of their head. But if they see it, they can point out what they're interested in. So it just helps jog people's memories. OK, we're frozen up here. When you do click to view all topic areas, you will after you click, you will have to cycle through the tabs manually if you want to, for instance, take a look at genres instead of topics or characters or settings. So you can just click on the tab and you can tell when the display has changed because the fonts are going to be color coordinated with the tab color. So here are a whole bunch of genres listed that you might be interested in. This is, again, a very useful database for readers advisory. I want to show you one other resource that I recently discovered that is useful for readers advisory. And this actually helps me do readers advisory for my eight-year-old, trying to find books that are an appropriate reading level for him and might be something that he would like. This is a site called Find a Book with Lexile. And we do have this URL in our delicious account under today's Encompass session. So you should be able to find this site there. What I really like about this site is, first, that it does let you search by Lexile as a measure of reading levels. So if your school actually does use Lexiles, then a child will have been tested and they will have a Lexile range that they should be comfortable reading in. So you can enter a Lexile number. Or over here, you can select a grade. So we often have people ask us, can I search this database by reading level or by grade? And most of our databases, for instance, WorldCat, is not really a good, easy way to do that. So this lets you search by grade level. So I can say third grade. And then it asks you, does this person that you're searching for find books that they read for school difficult? Do they find them challenging but not difficult?  And so you can target where they are as far as third grade reading level goes. So I'll just choose the middle option and continue. And once we get to the next screen, there are actually two ways to search. You can, again, do a keyword search. You're also going to be given a display of topic areas that you can drill down through in order to pinpoint what the reading interest is. What I really, really like about this site is that once you've identified titles, it does link you to worldcat.org. And so you can find out then easily whether a book is available in the library. So it provides you with a way to search. You can't search in WorldCat. And yet then it links you to WorldCat. So it really enhances that, both services, I think. So a couple of years ago, my son was really interested in the Titanic. And so if I was still looking for books in the Titanic form, I could type in a Titanic and click on Search. And it gives me 11 books. They are in a particular lexile range that was identified as sort of the average third grade reading level. And you'll see over to the right, you can add to a reading list. You can find it in a library through WorldCat.org, or you could purchase it through Barnes & Noble. The other thing that's nice over here, right, there's some limit, abilities to limit. You can limit by fiction or nonfiction. Or then down here, I like this. You can limit by page count. So you can say, OK, I want my child to be reading. I don't want them reading books that are only 20, 25 pages long. So let's make them read books that are at least 48 pages or longer. And so you can limit your searches that way, too. I want to jump back and show you the drill down option here. So again, I'm going to go third grade and sort of the middle reading level here. And my son also likes to read books that are funny. So there's an option, humor and gains. You can click on that plus sign, and then you have some subgenres or subcategories. So he just likes funny stories. So I can select that and do the search, and then it'll just look for books that have that characteristic that are probably at an appropriate reading level. Once I find something that I think might interest him, I can just click on the WorldCat link, and it jumps me out to worldcat.org. And I should be able to find out whether it's in a local library. So as far as trying to identify books for a younger reader where a reading level is going to be a component of the process, this find a book I think is really useful. So here are Nebraska libraries that are not too far away that have this book. Just a couple other ways that I've been sort of doing reader's advisory for myself. Any more, there are lots of social networking possibilities as far as reader's advisory goes. There is a site called Visual Bookshelf that I've been exploring. Let me go ahead and go there. And I actually found this site through Facebook. It's an application that sort of interacts with Facebook. And so you can use it through that social networking service, or you can go to it directly and create an account. Let me go ahead and sign in, and then I can show you what it does for you. You can see a parenting book since I've entered some parenting books in here, some health books. You can kind of get a good idea of why it's making the recommendations it makes. If I go to my profile, you should be able to see where friends are reading. And I think that that's just a valuable way to figure out or get ideas for reading.  Lots of those people are probably reading books, but they don't necessarily talk to you about it. Not because they're trying to keep it a secret, but just because you're busy in talking about other things. But if people are willing to sort of keep an online list of what they're reading and share that with you, it's a great way to get ideas. And then often it's a good conversation starter too. So getting your patrons introduced to some of these services, if they are real voracious readers and really like talking about books with other people, that might be a nice sort of program to have some time. You can get some of your real voracious readers hooked up with some of these services that may help them as well. And finally, I just want to point out Facebook itself. I was talking to one of my coworkers the other day, and we both experimented with some of these sites like Visual Bookshelf. And they're a nice way, a nice place to go to just see longer lists of what your friends are reading. But just posting, just a brief post on a social networking site that you participate in about what you're reading actually seems to sometimes get the most comment. It's not really intrusive, I don't think, but people are interested in knowing what you thought of a book or interested in saying that they've read it too. I've had people ask if they can borrow a book after I've said I'm reading it. I've had librarians say, oh, I'm going to order this book after seeing that I was reading it. So it's just one more place to share reading interests. Here's a book that I'm just reading now. And I happen to post that I was reading it. And I've had several people comment. It's about parenting. This is someone that I'm friends with. Based on going to library school with them. But we haven't really ever commented back and forth. But she happens to have an eight-year-old boy too.  I need all the help I can get. So this isn't somebody I correspond with regularly, but she saw that book and she immediately piped in. It does seem to draw people out of the woodwork as far as commenting on what you're reading. I had another friend go through in all of the different posts about books I've read or reading that she went through and said, oh, I'm reading this one, or I bought this one. I have to read it. So it is a good conversation starter. I also want to show you something that O'Neill Public Library is doing. They have a page for their library. And what Becky, the director, is doing is it looks like, I don't know for sure, but I think there are new books that she's getting, but she's just posting on her wall new books that the library is getting. And you'll see that people are starting to comment and respond and say, oh, this looks good, or I read this one. I think one time she said, if you respond to this message, then I'll post more books that are new this month. And five people responded and said post them. People are enjoying this as a way to just see what's new in the library without being overwhelmed by a huge list. And it's just another way to market what you have right now. That's about all I have. So I'm going to turn it over to Julie. Well, that's a good segue because I have a little bit. You didn't log me out of Facebook, did you? Well, it's OK. OK. I want to show something that is very like that, and that would be. Would you mind pulling up the, or are there going to be any questions coming in? Just put that. Those are on the very top. The very top. Just want to make sure we're not missing any questions or anything. No, folks, I feel OK. OK. Arrow back. Close up. Left, left, left, left, left, left, left. I'm sorry. I'm unfamiliar. I'm not used to these people. OK. Goodreads is another very similar to what Susan just showed. And just to show that there are multiple recommendations and or websites now that this is actually a social network of within itself. But it also interfaces with Facebook. And I was invited by my nine-year-old neighbor who wanted more friends. I think. OK. How can I say yes? And so that's, and I actually haven't played with it that much, but that's how I got started with it. And so I should probably sign in. Like I said, I don't think. That was the social network that your nine-year-old wanted to participate in. And actually, my nine-year-old also is using it. And they're the only friends I have on here at this point. And you'll see they're very goofy little updates and that sort of thing. But it has an interface with Facebook the same way. And it has all kinds of other things that are really fun about it. Here are my friends. I'll show you my friends. My daughter and Catherine. But you can use it to find books. You can record. My book says you can read what you want to read, what you have read, and that sort of thing. But finding books, I really think this is kind of fun. They have all sorts of popular lists. You can do a search, find something that you have read that you really liked. Got one too many. Oh, there you go. And you can, obviously I haven't added this to my list of things that I've read, but it does. So you can rate it. You can discuss it. And none of my friends have read it. Surprise, my two friends are nine-year-olds. But it does give other reviews. If you're looking, you can gush, gush, gush, gush, gush. And different ratings. Some people really didn't like it. Other people did. So, and you can do. People who viewed this book also viewed others. So it's a way of leading you. And groups, you can find reading books. Groups this way. All of these people have read it. So it's really fun. I mean, there's all different ways. You can expect. There was something that said traveling vicariously. Was that on the previous page? Yeah, on the previous page. Up, higher. I wonder who that was. Oops, now I'm gonna go too far. Okay, oops, fine. Sorry, I'm probably asking you about something you haven't. Scroll up. There. That's traveling vicariously. Down a little bit. Here, he did it. No, not here. Oh, right here, the list. Yes. What is that? It's a list. Lists with this book. Oh, so since it's in Guernsey, it's in England. Here are other books that are in other places that you might like. And you can vote. And they do create lists that are very, that's one of the things that, there's lists. Sorry, this is what I wanted to show you. You can see the popular lists. Best books, best, you can click on more book lists. And there are lots of them, the best and the worst. And this is so much fun because these are the same. And of course, Twilight shows up on every list. And then there's lists with weeks in activity.  And there's also popular tags. So if you want to find romance, if you want to find nonfiction, mystery, historical, all of these things. So there are so many ways to find books using this. And I'm really having a lot of fun just exploring with it. But I like the visual aspect of it too. I think it is pretty attractive with the book covers. And you can, like I said earlier, you can find book groups. You can join book groups and discuss books online. And it is, there are so many recent popular groups, groups in Lincoln, recognize anybody, more members. And there's their bookshelf is the e-pray. So this is something like I said, I'm just starting to explore, but it is similar to yours. And I don't know how you think it compares, but. I think what is sort of frustrating is all of your friends will never be using the same service. So. Right. And like I said, I have not, I haven't, you know, tried to hook up with Facebook with this yet or so. Okay. And I want to go back to the list. Yeah, just type in the E-L. My typing is bad today. There you go. And you can just click on. All about romance. My sister is always asking me to serve as her reader's advisor for romance, which is really ironic since I don't read romance at all, but because I'm a librarian, she's always asking me to advise her. So I actually sent her this. Deborah is the one who pointed this out to me. I had looked at it before, but not made the connection. So thank you, Deborah. And so I'm waiting for her review about this, but I've looked at this and I think it's really wonderful. One of the things that is great is you can actually do, there's a sensuality rating system. And I work right across from the talking book and braille service desk. And so I hear them whenever they set someone up for service, one of the questions they ask is, do you want any sex with strong language? And I think they should have a rating more like this, actually, because it's a yes or a no at that point. And no grades within that. So everywhere from burning to kisses.  So if you've read someone and you can figure out what level you're comfortable with. So there is a review hub, there's Power Search, which allows you to limit then using your sensuality rating over here. So if you like just warm, you can do just warm and search for books that have that. And then they give grades, the reviewers give grades. So the very, it looks like an A is Alenor. And you get a nice review. Wow. So I think this is quite wonderful. But there are things from the authors here. And readers speak out, raves, rants. Oh, I want to read rants. Rants about sexuality. That's a lot of words. Yes. Quite of you. But there is just so many wonderful, I think, aspects about this. And probably the Power Search. I mean, if you're really looking for something, if you have a particular author, and of course this was one of the things that my sister is, she loves the, oops. Okay, yep, and then you- There, click. Sorry. Okay, well, we'll go with the title. I'm sorry, I'm doing such a best. It's hard to type at the same time you're trying to talk. This is her favorite, this is her favorite author. And so it is really fun to go in and do a lot of exploration on this. In fact, I found something I think I might actually try to say this. And I'm going to show you another one that I think is very good for readers. And it's fantastic fiction. One of my favorite authors is Louise Erdrich. Except I misspelled it again. And so it tells you if she has anything new. And in 2010, she has Shadow Tag coming out. It gives you her series. And actually, I think that there is another series that they're missing. These three were series that I didn't- Yeah, I found that their bibliographies aren't always perfect, but at least it gives you a story.  Her collections, fiction awards that she's won. And her recommendations, which I think is kind of fascinating. I mean, this is one that I've now marked that I would really like to read. So, and you can, it offers new authors. Lists, new books, awesome though. And forthcoming, most popular. I think there's a lot of ways that if you have a customer that you're not sure, you can sit them down and they can easily use these. And actually, if you go into a title, it'll do similar books too. Oh, okay. If you do some of these titles, actually. If you have a summary, and then if you slow down to the bottom, it says similar book. It's the only one. But it says the last symbol is similar to this particular Patterson title. Which is interesting, since this just came out and the one I chose is a forthcoming book. So, you're already... Yeah, somebody's already categorized. So, and you can, one way that I try to just make myself more aware is to look at awards. And even though I may not read all of them, but if I look to see what has won an award, at least I'm aware. And sometimes I can, I'll read a little bit about it if it's an author that I'm unfamiliar with. So that if someone does ask me for a suggestion, then at least I have an awareness. So, I do think this is good for that reason too. One thing that I do wanna show you that I use, I'm sorry guys. Yeah, there you go. Is to look at people's blogs. This is Pat Leach's blog. And she is actually blogging about the ALA award winners, this for the, or see, the ALA notable books. And she's reading all of them. She does a presentation at NLA each year about the NLA Notables. And so she's going through and making her notes basically of all the books that she's reading. And I've actually checked out a couple of the books that she had also talked up on books here. And I listened to NPR and their book recommendations. That's how I found the Guernsey Literary and Potato People Pie Society book. I heard the niece was interviewed, the one that finished the book after the author died. And so that just for awareness, this is one of the places that I come because I can't hear everything that's on NPR. I miss a lot of the news. I have plans for just so that I can also make connections. That was what I was going to cover. And I was running out of time. Well, do you want to check and see if anybody has questions? Sure. Now that I know how to do it. Are they? They're not coming through there. Is this the area? If you click on the plus next to attendee list, up kind of in the top, you can see if everybody's raising their hand or anything. Attendee list. Yeah, right there. Okay. No more questions? Yes? Okay. We have a couple more minutes. Let's see, what was I going to say? If you want to go back to delicious, see if I can ever get this right. There are a few other blogs that can help with readers advisory. We scroll down to how readers advisor online. Gonna take a minute here. This is just another resource where they talk about different books that are coming out and they talk about readers advisory in general. So it's just someplace that you might want to keep an eye on to find out what people are saying about books and different to get ideas on how you can talk to patrons about books. Another reader who's, reader reviewer who's very popular for her lists and has a blog now is Nancy Pearl. And if you remember, she actually came for an NLA conference here a couple, a couple three years ago now too. Maybe three years ago it was in Omaha. She was in Omaha, so. Anyway, she does a good job of giving a summary and talking about why she enjoyed particular books. So that's just another blog. And what else do I have? Oh, for teens, there is a blog that has been put up where teens can talk about books. And you'll notice what I like to look at too is how often entries are made and there's been an entry in this blog as recently as the, what was it, Saturday? It's been fairly recent. But here teens actually make comments or write blog posts and make comments about what each, what everybody's reading. So that's just another option for reader's advisory. And a lot of these places as Julie and Susan have indicated patrons can use on their own. So if you find a good site that does reader's advisory for a particular topic and you know that that patron is interested in that, refer them there so that they can participate too. You don't want to totally discourage them from asking you for book suggestions. But you can always just recommend other places that they can search for ideas. I mean, I would think that that could be a really popular program for patrons and we really like to read, you know, compile some of these sites and then have a one hour session, you know, come to the library and see a demonstration of sites on the internet that can help you figure out what to read next. I bet that could be a big draw. Right. And if you go to our Nebraska Access page and go to the Books, Humanities and Reading link and then scroll down a little bit, you'll see that there are several different pages that have information about books. But I'm going to go into Books and Reading just to show you that you can also go here to get to several of the websites that we talked about today. For example, All About Romance is here and Fantastic Fiction is here. And there are others that we didn't get around to talking about like our own Books and Series, which is something that is compiled by our reference librarians from their knowledge along with suggestions from other people. And you'll see, let's see, who's an author here that I can, a series author I can tell you. Gabel Don. Yeah, if I can spell it. Gabel Don. Okay. You'll see that there's a series title with each of the books in order underneath them and there's also a number at the end. You'll notice this service was basically started for our Talking Book and Braille patrons and that department, excuse me, so that they could better help patrons to locate series and then they have the number for that particular item available right there. So there are a number of different sites out there that will help you with Reader's Advisory. Search for more on your own. Take a look at what we've talked about and don't be afraid to talk about books. It takes practice to be a really good book talker, but people like to share what they're reading and because you're a librarian, they like to ask you for suggestions. We thank you for participating in the program today. It looks like we're right at the top of the hour, so we will say goodbye and hope to see you at our next Encompass Live. Thank you.


Welcome back guys, so I just want to give you guys a quick quick quick video on this mirror that I purchased from Ikea called the sand Sand toward I think it's sand toward I'll link it but it was out of stock for months and It's kind of like the next best thing to the what's the other big one? Oh The Huvvet So I'm just gonna turn my camera around Don't mind a little mess in the corner, but I'm gonna turn my camera around so you guys can see it I believe it's like 29 and a half inches wide and then 70 inches in height so the Huvvet is I believe 77 inches high and 33 and a 33 and a half inches wide But I chose this one because it kind of goes with my YouTube room Which I'll actually do a video on really soon so you guys can see that whole thing So let me just turn my camera around so you guys can see it So here's the mirror. It's just it's very very To me it's very what's the word Modern Okay, so to me it's very very modern if you guys can see I'm gonna actually go closer to it so you guys can see me but Um It's pretty big. I'm six feet tall and I Can actually fit in the mirror if I stand back I love this mirror. So if you guys decided let me move back some If you guys decided to get a mirror That wasn't the Huvvet because the Huvvet is the Huvvet is nice But I didn't I'm not too fond of the really thin frame for this particular room, but um I love it. So this is the sand torque mirror. It was $99. I can't think they slick because as soon as it came I can stock it went up to 129 Which I think it's because they know it was a hot item But um, like I said, it's a really good mirror to have in your house. I hadn't seen any mirrors Well, I hadn't seen this mirror on YouTube one lady mentioned it But I don't think she actually purchased it. Um, she just kind of mentioned it in her video This was months ago. Like I said, so again, this is the sand torque mirror 60 70 inches high 29 inches ahead 29 and a half inches wide and It's gorgeous. I'm gonna go a little closer so you guys can see some of the um, so it has a huge Frame it's not wide as in it's going into the mirror, but um, I Like it. I think it's a really nice mirror and I think It's a statement piece in a small room and you wanted to open up the space So sorry if this is a little shaky. I just wanted you guys to just see I See the mirror. Um, I doubt it like a couple of weeks ago Um, I just said let me just do a video because I still hadn't seen anything on it It is sold out in Georgia But it is available in other states. So check online. You may be able to order it I don't think they are delivering mirrors right now If you order after a certain time, so I Like it. I actually love it. I might even gonna lie to you. I love this mirror I'm gonna go as perfect in this room. So out at the studio studio tour is coming soon So be on a lookout for that But again, it's just a quick video of the IKEA Seeing talk mirror and I will see you guys in the next one. Bye for now


Okay, Coach Papalizio, Coach's Convention, C3, you get to come in and show a little technique, talk philosophy. What's it like to impart philosophy on people and talk about how you run your system at NC State? Yeah, it's great to get out, share what we're doing here at NC State. It's sometimes the tricky topic because it's a thing where not everybody might believe in what you're doing or what you're about, and I think that's what makes, obviously wrestling and recruiting special is the kids have the opportunity to go to what they're attracted to. What's in our control is what we do, and I just want to share the word with these guys is what we do at NC State and how we go about things. Might be a little unique, might not be to certain people, but I think it's who we are and what we do and we just want to educate people on that.  Thanks, I appreciate it. No, no, it's incredible to see the wheels turn with you and to see how you operate and so you talk to people. That's incredible to me, right? When I look at the proofs in the pudding, you guys took a trophy back to Raleigh, man. It's pretty incredible to me what you're able to do and how hard is buy-in for you? You got the guys, time against the first buy-in, right? Of old guys who were on the team, right? He's the last guy that stuck around with you. What's it like recruiting buy-in? What's that like to you? That was a huge part of the puzzle is to go out, create this culture. I was talking to Dresser about it. Obviously he is doing it again, he did it. And we were just talking about that whole thing is creating the culture and then reinforcing the culture. And it's a difficult thing to do. It's not easy and how you go about it, I think defines a lot of times is how quick your success can happen at the college level. Been fortunate enough to surround myself with great assistants and then obviously now these guys have gone out and are sticking around in our RTC and they're great role models that already understand our culture. So it gets contagious. Once you're around an army of people that think and act a certain way, that's what you become. So we want to continue to educate people and bring people in that we'll be willing to buy in. And it's a little easier to do now because I think people understand what we're trying to accomplish and what we're about. And there's always challenges to every level but at least kids knowing that NC State has a certain philosophy and mentality. That's starting to be great. Ask Tom Ryan this question, I see this question. He said Kyle Snyder is non-negotiable. He cannot let that guy leave. Barring the guy just wanting to be home, he can't change that but if it's a resource item, he's not letting that guy leave. It's Nick the same way for you in your RTC. Yeah, I think you look at these guys that are program builders. They're world title contenders which Kyle's obviously won, world in Olympics. Nick's working to do that. Those guys are extremely important to the recipe for success. And I think those guys are smart enough to know what got them to where they're at and why would you change a system that's already in play? It's a delicate thing to balance and if you're in this environment and you've had success, why would you risk leaving it? But at the same time, it's our job as coaches to make sure we take care of these guys and keep elevating their resources and make sure they're happy. And that's a fine balance because it's a working relationship and there's a lot of loyalty with certain kids and programs and that's something we have at NC State. I know at the end of the year, every time people are trying to jockey for position and get certain guys, but I know one thing in our program, guys are gonna find loyalty on both sides of the fence. Mike and Kevin, national champ, multi-time All-American and Kevin, those guys, those are guys we're talking about, that's RTC guys. What do you do with those guys and is that an all cost? Get those guys, keep those guys. Yeah, if someone does right for our program, we're gonna do what we need to do to keep them around and those guys have that mentality and philosophy and we wanna make sure we take care of those guys. But yeah, it was a lot of work this off season to put up a fence and say these guys aren't leaving. I mean, at the end of the day, I wanna make a statement and let people know that if you're gonna come and try to get somebody from NC State, it's gonna take them a lot. And that's good for wrestling. It's gonna elevate everything and these guys, it's the driving force for these guys to continue to keep training and puts a lot on us as coaches to make sure we keep bringing in the resources. But I want kids to know if they come to NC State long-term, we're gonna make sure we take care of them both, as far as accomplishments on their goals and then the financial situation when they're all done is to have them in play to where they can wrestle full-time. Two guys coming back for you. A guy took third as a freshman, a guy who was a runner-up as a freshman. Incredible, you know. Don't forget, Jordan Oliver plays easier too. You guys are just, it's incredible what you have coming back.  How do you keep going? New territory. So for me, it's something new. I'm gonna embrace it. It's a challenge. The year that we finished 11th, you know, we wanted to do better and we learned as coaches when we grew and we implemented some things and I think that's part of becoming a great coach is how you evolve from the mistakes that you made and become better and your athletes understand why you're doing certain things. So it's a lot of communication. Staying the course of what got you there. I think if you look at great programs, they all have something that they keep doing over and over and they add to it and that's something we're trying to do as well. But at the end of the day, the people that need to believe are the people in our room and they do and that's what all I'm worried about is the guys know that they can put themselves in position when individual and team titles. We're here in Florida, a lot of these people take some time in recreation with their family. Do you ever take any time off? I've never seen it, man. Yeah, go work out. That's what I thought. Up and out, we're gonna go right after this and we're gonna go get a workout and see who can out train who. Oh my God, do you relax at all, man? Just relax. You should get on the beach at all. I have not yet, but that's all right. We're here. Are you gonna do that? We'll work. There's another time to hit the beach. I don't know. You might get off to a pool for a little bit. We'll see. All right, what's next for you guys and going to Budapest? I just booked my ticket. I'll be out there for I think five days. So we have two guys, obviously they're going UW23 as well. So it's balancing that with some visits that we got set up. It's going out to the World Championships supporting Nick. So we're kind of all over the place. We just finished up. We do need to add a recruiting calendar into NCAA wrestling so we can actually, like you talked about, take some time to regroup. But in the meantime, we got bouncing. I don't think you have that in you at all. I don't think there's any regrouping in you, man. Yeah, a little training. That's how you get your mind right again. I don't know. There's a way to relax in that. And what do you guys start off with? What's the first thing friends in state like as far as schedule? Are you doing Italy again, by the way? Not Italy. I'm working with my brother right now for not this coming year, but the following year we're going to try to do another unique event to keep things. So internationally to go out and compete. I think it's every five years you're allowed to leave the country and say a rule. It's really a rule? It's a rule. I've like never heard of that. Well, you'll notice other teams, you know, the other sports, I think it's five years. It might be four, somewhere. But I know compliance-wise, you're only allowed to leave the country and do that so many years. So we have to get creative and we're going to find another place to do something. Hawaii. There you go. I did that event. I actually did that event. It was great. We need that. Our sport needs to keep evolving and be mainstream and be some kind of, you know, some kind of story to it. And our Italy trip did that and it also gave our guys an unbelievable experience that they can look back 20 years from now and have something to talk about. All right. You got to go work out or go spread the word. I don't know, go keep not resting. You got anything else for me? No, appreciate everything. Thanks. Hey, thanks for the time. Good luck to you guys. Thank you.


Yeah, I'm just gonna assume that this raise has a lot going on behind the scenes and Is living a really really like just rough Life outside of Valorant I'm gonna give him the benefit of the doubt and just assume he's like just Okay


Ladies and gentlemen, the Kiwi leg workout of the universe is the key Jeff Nipper. Why? I don't really know. He loves Kiwis. Is that all? He loves Kiwis. I'm sorry, Jeff. Buddy. Kyle, Kiwis aren't that good. What's your favorite fruit? Pineapple and mango. You? Wow. That was a really fast answer. I don't know. Apple. I just played this game with Tyka. That's why I know. We played what our favorite fruit game is. Mango is pretty good. Watermelon though. Good watermelon. Watermelon is good. Good watermelon. Let's assume a mango. Let's just assume they're all good, right? Unripe mango, not good. Worse. Mango and watermelon. Pineapple did. I'll be throwing in my yogurt. Slaps. I just had Kiwi in my yogurt. Doesn't slap. Warm up time. Coming, Kiwi.  They call me Mango Mike and Apple Abbey. Apple's boring. No. I like apples, but... I love a caramel apple. I don't want to be...  No. It's very aggressive shaking. Turn them up, baby. Hot summer. Hot boy summer. Can you do it? It is painful. What? You ever done scorpions? This but on your stomach? Scorpion? What are you doing? A snow angel? Loser? I'm like stretching my lower back. Yeah. Yeah. That's good. I don't know why your feet look... What? I feel it's small. What do? Your feet.  I think it's the shoes. Your size is 11. The shoes look small. These might be 10 and a half, but... Dang. Look at that mobility in your hands. What do you want, dude? No. They're happy? Oh. I didn't know if you could. I could barely. Some people can't. That's warming up the fingies. This actually feels really good. I feel kind of warm. I feel kind of loosey. What a warm-up, Kiwi.  Oh, God. Yeah. More plates. No dates. I got no plates and no dates. What if I got a couple plates? But Zettle dates. Zettle. How short is this? 15. Damn. You said 15. That's below my saggy nipples. You said 15. Whoa. Here you go, Avi. Oh, yay. Oh, yay. Hot steppa. Hot steppa. So when we plan to do a Kiwi leg workout, Jeff Nippard, I expect it to be a little bit higher volume. But looking at what we've got to go on ahead is actually kind of like how I train. I think we're going to be able to do it. I think we're going to be able to do it. I think we're going to be able to do it. It's actually kind of like how I train. What do you call it? Self-justifying or whatever? Like a lot of times it's cool because not that I don't coach, but I definitely don't coach as much as I used to. And obviously I observe a lot of lifting going on here every day and me and Avi talk shop and stuff. But I'm not like in, I'm not 100% a coach now where I used to be for like 10 years. Now I got the design.  I got other responsibilities. So you just always wonder if you get left in the dust, but it like justifies that how I train or how I coach or how I think is still relevant. Good. Yeah. Still good. Because Kiwi is known, Jeff Nipper is known for like being the latest on research. Kind of like our boy J.P. They're kind of, they're really analytical in how they train. And I used to be always in between. I was never a bro. I was like evidence based stuff, but I was never like reading the super science. I wasn't reading it. The first day it came out. I would talk to people and listen to some podcasts and keep up, but I was never, yeah, but I'm not. I'm somewhere at 50-50 and so my 50-50 is still good. What? Where does this energy come from? I just don't. What dude?  Maybe that's the issue. What's the internal energy forever energy? Have you grounded today? What does that mean? Doc, the electrodes that Mother Earth gives us naturally?  Did I wet? Sun your balls. No. You guys are obviously missing out on the benefits of Mother Nature. Bitched. I used to be at three and now I'm at four. I think I was skinny this last year. I think I was just two. That's pretty good. My face is itchy. Is your face hurting? No. But it's hurting me. It's killing me. Killing me or whatever. You're so annoying. I'm never working out with you again. They go from bad to bad. The difference in energy is you're crazy. Yeah, I don't know what's going on. I think he's draining my energy. I soak it up. You're stealing it. I soak it up. You're absorbing all. You're taking it away from me. Kiwi says four reps. We give him four reps. Okay. No debate. He said two to four. And we go. We're over. We're over. We're over. We're over. We're over. We're over. We're over. We're over. We're over. And we go. We're over shooters. Okay. They're looking at me. Not me. They're there on the dance floor.  Feeling like a manhore. I'm sorry. People probably think I'm a party pooper, but you're on this all the time.  You try it. You try it. Okay. Everyone here is in 6 a.m. Ew. You can't make this stuff up. Heartbreaks and promises. Oh, my God. Oh, my God. Oh, my God. Oh, my God. Oh, my God. I'm trying to give my love. Can get to nowhere. That pin's about to fall out. Dude, Robin's singing. Oh, he's listening. I do. It's just what he does is, let's see how long it takes for him to sing. God, like gangsters. No Velcro straps on. No straps. Drop heart. Drop heart. Yup. Do those quads. Let's go. Yup. All day. Good stuff. Good stuff. If you want to go and take a ride. On to the next, dude. That's just a warm up baby. Leg day. Leg day. What do you mean? You said that's it. That's it for here. Kill. It's got hard work. Hard work. Hard work. That's how bodybuilders talk. Powerlifting's too. You hear that, JP? Dude be hitting 80% for a three by three slapping ammonia all day. Hit me Tommy. This one's heavy. Check yourself for you wreck yourself because I'm bad for your health. Dang, don't bend your knee on the floor. 35. Certify. Look at the beef sticks. Yum. They say shows are one from the back. And I'm coming for Mr. Olympia 2025.  I'm just a bum. Just a bum. Unlock. Dispatch. I think the key we did decline crunches. But we don't have a decline and I don't want to get all fancy. We can make one off of regular bench but instead we'll just do some weighted crunches and I'll probably do some leg lifts in between just superset them. So I'll do kind of like a strict hanging leg raise and some of these weighted crunches. I have two of my own horn but I do agree with Jeff. Everyone hears like abs or crunches and they start to think one, people think you don't need to do them and you don't need to.  Front stuff? Sorry. Some of the abdominals. But the other thing too is you don't have to do sets of 50. Like we can load these things up. They're muscles. So load them up a little bit. You can get some 10s, 12s, 15s, heavy 20s in. Shout out to the Kiwi and Jeff Nipper. Hopefully you guys are well aware of them. If not, check them out. Tons of good info. Tons of good programs, stuff like that. And one day maybe I'll travel to Toronto, hang out with Tim and Omar up north. North of the wall. Until then, man, we over me. Be a part of something bigger yourself. Three new videos a week. Four new shorts a week. Be sure to subscribe. Share this with your friends. Join the Discord if you want. 3sb.co for all your apparel. Appreciate you sounding like them out.


Welcome everyone. Welcome friends of Anthony Hyman, friends of SOAS, distinguished guests and visitors, students and colleagues to the 20th annual Hyman lecture first delivered in 2003. I'm Scott Newton. I'm reader in the laws of Central Asia. I'm chair of the Center for Contemporary Central Asia and the caucuses and the head of the SOAS School of Law, Gender and Media. And I'm very pleased to be able to welcome you here in the flesh. And what we hope is the other end of this long pandemic tunnel that we entered just two years ago, actually right after the 2020 Hyman lecture, if you recall. I'm here today to introduce to you Matthew Acons, our speaker this evening author and prize winning journalists, who is going to talk to us about the refugee crisis and Afghanistan. The Anthony Hyman Memorial Lecture has become an established annual event at SOAS now completing its second decade, bringing together those with an interest in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Central Asia, and providing an opportunity for leading scholars opinion and journalists to reflect on issues of topical interest. The continuing success of the Anthony Hyman Memorial Lecture is a testament to the impact with which Anthony had on thinking about about Afghanistan and the affection in which he was held by his many friends and associates. Anthony, a SOAS graduate was expert on Afghanistan, Iran, Pakistan and Central Asia and a commentator for the BBC World Service for more than 20 years. Anthony was a linguist, historian, bibliophile, art lover and traveler. Just to remind you the lecture series is sustained on the sustained on the strength of donations, as well as a contribution from our side from SOAS. So please do consider making a donation to the Anthony Hyman Memorial Fund to help cover the costs of the lecture in future. The lecture series is equally a labor of love and of fundraising, or perhaps of love manifest by fundraising, as well as attendance and support. I'm delighted to welcome Matthew tonight under even more fateful circumstances than when we first approached him with the invitation some months back on the heels of the extraordinary events. Late last summer which saw an accelerated mass exodus from Afghanistan of Afghans and foreigners both following the collapse of the Afghan government and the re-ascendancy of the Taliban. Now of course at this juncture we are all plundered into an entirely novel and until recently unimaginable refugee crisis with its center of dispersal in the middle of the European continent. The Afghan and Ukraine refugee crisis resound with assonances and dissonances and present parallels and stark contrasts in many dimensions. We in the Academy, particularly those of us who work in the field and in newsworthy contexts, especially in conflict, constantly rub elbows and share hotel space with journalists, but don't often have occasion to take their measure and significance for our own scholarly profession or the world at large, with the exception perhaps of my colleagues at the Center for Global Media and Communications, in which is part of the School of Law, Gender and Media. Matthew is a timely and instructive reminder to us of just how much journalism counts of what it alone can compass and how exceptional journalism shares so many characteristics with impactful scholarship. The marshalling and analysis of data, the assessment of sources and evidence, novelty and insight, framing and narrative drive, capacity to challenge and overturn received opinion. Indeed, the chief difference is perhaps not so much in the relative quantity of footnotes and extent of bibliography, or even the volume of material produced so much as an extraordinarily compressed timeframes and pressurized circumstances in which journalism must be produced. The academics and journalists both live and perish by deadlines, but whereas for us academics, those are set months and years in advance, for journalists they recur with daily or weekly relentlessness. Matthew has for some years been an extraordinarily perspicacious and productive reporter from the overlapping theaters of Afghan public affairs politics conflict and quotidian life. His byline has graced the pages of Rolling Stone the New York Times Magazine and the New Yorker, three of my personal paragons for good biographical reasons. There was an impressive list of diverse and insightful articles from exhaustive feature length investigative long reads to shorter pieces. He bears the marks of a journalist with significant public stature awards like the George Polk and Livingston awards and fellowships at think tanks and academic organizations, including the type media center New America the Council on Foreign Relations, and the American Academy in Berlin. His recent debut book, the naked don't fear the water, however, is an altogether singular and bureau and bravura piece of journalism, revealing a level of soul and body commitment not seen since Hunter as Thompson, but in this case with issues and circumstances of existential and global gravity. The, those of you who haven't come across it is unique in the analysis of refugee reporting and invites comparison in its immersiveness and novelistic Brio with Dave Eggers what is the what. The difference of course is that whereas Eggers imagined the journey of his subject and reconstructed it after multiple interviews. Matthew accomplished it with his subject and accompanied him every painful eventful and fearful step of the way. I will now turn the podium over to Matthew, who perhaps alone among his peers has not just the ideal journalistic CV for his chosen topic, but the street cred and the road cred as well. We're lucky to have this opportunity. So please join with me in welcoming Matthew who will will speak for about 45 minutes, after which he will entertain questions from the audience. Thank you for having me. It's an honor to be here. When I was invited to to give the lecture this year by Jonathan good hand. I took a look at the previous speakers and was a little bit intimidated because a lot of them are the scholars that I have admired and learn from over the years as a journalist including one of my mentors Barney Rubin. He was extremely influential on the topic of Afghan migration. So I certainly did not have the same scholarly credentials, but I have been there at some of these key moments and so I think my experiences are probably what is most of interest to you tonight so On that note, I went to Afghanistan in 2008, the age of 24 and as a freelancer without much experience and I quickly discovered that even though my mother is a Japanese ancestry and my father is of European ancestry and I grew up in Canada. I look very Afghan and by you know by sort of accident of genetics, and I felt very, I was very interested in the country and very fascinated by what was happening and also, you know, it was it was disturbing as well, but I ended up staying I spent. I started living in Kabul. I, and you know spent years there in essence working as a journalist and so one of the first people that I met in Afghanistan is someone who in my book I call Omar. So Omar was one of my first friends he was about the same age as me. He had grown up in exile, like millions of Afghans his mother had actually fled the Soviets when she was pregnant with him. He lived in Iran and Pakistan, and he, you know, like many Afghans dreamed of a better life elsewhere in the West. And that was a dream that became more urgent, you know as a situation in a country worsened. So Omar had actually returned after 2001 and he worked as a translator with the foreign military. Omar started to work with journalists so he'd worked with Canadians the Americans, and he had long hope to emigrate with one of these visas the American government gave to Afghan and Iraqi employees and he should have qualified, based on his service with the American military, but he didn't have all the paperwork and he was actually denied his visa was rejected his application was rejected in 2015. And this, as I'm sure you'll all recall was the year of the year migration crisis in the Mediterranean, when over the course of about a year, around a million people crossed through the Mediterranean into Europe. It was the greatest movement of refugees by sea and history. And after Syrians Afghans were the second largest number among them. So, Omar, his visa to America, you know what you should have rightfully had being denied, decided to risk his life on the smugglers wrote to Europe. I wanted to cover the crisis. I wanted to report the migration trail from the inside. So I decided to go with him. And the only way that I could do that, given the risk of being arrested and separated or kidnapped was to go undercover as an Afghan refugee myself took company Omar. And I was able to do that, as I already mentioned, because of my face and also because that I'd learned Daria, you know, fairly fluently after spending years in the country. So that, so that's, that's basically the background for the book. I mean, we didn't have leaving until 2016 that following summer after the borders already closed because Omar had been had fallen in love and he was worried that he left his father would had his beloved to another suitor in his absence but because he was rejected for being so poor and also being from a different sect he realized ultimately the only way he was going to have a chance of when your hand was to leave and go to Europe and be able to come back and bring her there. So to go to win her he had to risk losing her. So I'm just going to read an excerpt from the day of our departure for the border with Iran, where migrants crossed through the desert of Nimroz to in order to get around the border walls there. On the day of our departure, Omar took the Corolla to the used car market in Cody sanghi, where, despite his battered condition, he got 3000 bucks. It was a manly car, he told me afterward, looking for Lauren. That was it for farewells. His family was already gone. And his beloved was locked behind her father's walls.  Plus Nimroz left in the early hours of the morning. When evening came I laid out the robe and pantaloons which I'd wear in the borderlands and stuff the jeans and shirt from bush bizarre into my backpack. I added some dried fruits and nuts in case we got stranded in the desert, along with a tourniquet and God's compresses, since the border guards were so trigger happy. The risks of going undercover were much higher now. The struggling gangs were notorious kidnappers and had links to the Taliban. If they found out I was a westerner, I could be worth millions of dollars to them. I was even more worried about the Iranian government. The police could be brutal during arrests, Afghan migrants were usually deported without further punishment. But the Iranians realized who I was, I would probably be accused of spying. The Americans were arrested hiking on the border with Iraq in 2009 spent a couple years in prison. Before the Iranians, before the Sultan of Oman was able to negotiate their release. I'd explained to Omar that the Iranians discovered me. He had to claim we'd met on the road and deny knowing my real identity. Otherwise he'd share my fate. But how would they know. The Iranians often travel without papers. They might be taken by robbers or the police. And Omar and I were both leaving our passports behind in Kabul. I took out the cheap smartphone that I bought for the trip and went through it carefully, deleting my call records. I checked the time. Omar wasn't picking me up until midnight. After months of waiting, it hardly seemed real that we were leaving tonight. I showered and stood in front of the mirror. The Iranians didn't have my fingerprints. I wasn't tattooed. I was circumcised. Skin is an opaque surface. Language is what betrays us. My Samsung rang. It was Omar. What's up. Oh, not much. Is it a problem if some other people come with us? What? Is it okay if Malik and Elham come with us? Malik was a shy neighbor whose father had lost his mind. Elham was Omar's maternal cousin. He explained that he'd offered to loan them the money he'd made from selling the Corolla so they could come to Turkey. They were both close to Omar and trustworthy, but it seemed last minute to say the least. Suppressing my irritation, I reminded myself that it was Omar's decision. Not mine. Do whatever you want, I said. In the end, when Omar showed up at a taxi at midnight, it was just Malik in the back seat. I got in beside him and we took off. When I greeted him, he tried to smile, but only managed a terrified grimace. I wondered if my presence as a foreigner was comforting. Probably not. Or do you think I had some special way of getting us out of trouble? Of course, Malik had already gone through the desert and knew the trials lay ahead. Omar and Malik were silent as we raced through empty streets, leaving their city behind. I breathed evenly trying to slow my pulse. The months of preparation and patience would be put to the test now. We were headed to a neighborhood on the western edge of the city called Kampani. It was a starting point for travel south along the National Ring Road, Highway 1, which curved down to Kandahar, and then back up to Herat. Company's main drag, it's asphalt shredded by truck traffic, was lined with cheap hotels called Musafir Hauna. Behind them were feedlots and slaughterhouses of livestock, a maze of mud walls by a ravine running with awful. We paid the driver and got out, making our way past families guarding piles of luggage and villagers counting sacks of grain and cans of cooking oil. You could spot the other Iran-bound migrants by their backpacks. The Musafir Hauna were lit with strings of colored lights beneath which vendors sat at their stalls, heat with nuts and cigarettes, or sauntered among the passengers with trays of wallets and prayer beads. Ticket touts cried the names along Highway 1. Wardak, Fazni, Zabel, Kandahar, Hellman, Nimroz, Herat. Beggars worked the crowd, some proud in Italy, others haggard junkies.  There were many bus companies applied Highway 1, but we bought tickets from Ahmad Shah Abdali, encouraged by the relatively modern looking coach parked out front, a Mercedes 0404, a model introduced in 1991. When the gates opened at 1 a.m., we joined the crowd jostling into the bus yard. There were more than a dozen glossy 404s the cabin lights on, bound for different destinations. But where was the bus to Nimroz? Back of the lot, an employee told us. There we found a row of decrepit Mercedes 0303s, a model from 1974. Our bus had a Masha-La sticker obscuring much the cracked windshield and a biohazard decal by the door. It's side read in German, children's paradise, dobbler travel, and gave an address in lower Saxony. The bus conductor stubby with a balding fringe searched our packs and then wrote our seat numbers on them with a marker. What's he looking for? joked Omar, who I noticed had brought an extra duffle. Who takes drugs and guns to Kandahar? It was like carrying cold in Newcastle. For safety reasons, the government didn't allow the buses to leave before three in the morning. We tried snoozing upright in our seats as hawkers and beggars shuffled up and down the aisle invoking the power of God and energy drinks. While more passengers straggled in, mostly young men with backpacks. At last, the overhead lights went off. There was a coral revving and then a concatenation of horns. Starting with the newer 404s, the buses departed on mass. As we rumbled down the strip, more coaches poured from the other company's lots, forming into a single, thunderous convoy. The drivers jostled for position. They called this part Buscashie after the national sport where teams of horsemen fight for a headless goat carcass. Picking up speed on the bridge over the ravine, the bus pack cleared the edge of the power grid and plunged into darkness. So that is the start of our journey, which had many starts, many fall starts, and many twists and turns, which I won't get into here. But we did eventually end up in Europe, and along with many other refugees, and I want to return to the question situation of Afghan refugees, but first I'm going to fast forward five years to the events this summer. So I finished me more or less finished writing the book at the beginning of the summer, last summer and I went back to Afghanistan in June, planning to resume, you know, doing journalism, which had been on hold for about five years while I was writing this. And, you know, like, I think almost everybody was not expecting the end to be just so near. And events began to happen incredibly quickly. I think that we're going to be reflecting on the question of how, and why this happened, and why it happened such a shockingly quick way before the government for many years but I think it's interesting because on one hand, we, the root causes of the decline of the Afghan Republic of the failure of the international intervention, you know, were obvious. They've certainly the skeptics of, you know, the Western military intervention and I consider myself one of them. I mean, in 2010, you know, Astri Sur gave a lecture, this very lecture, you know, warning about the contradictions of the surge, arguing that less would actually be more or our book is titled when more is less. So, you know, 40 year civil war fueled by foreign superpowers, malignant corruption in the government, Pakistani militaries covert support for the Taliban. And above all the fact that the US led occupation and created a state that was completely dependent on foreign troops and money. This was obvious to us. And yet, and yet, we were all caught by surprise in a way that I think contributed to the horrifying tragedy that took place this summer. And I do think that it was related to a kind of state of denial that was actively fed by lies that were told by by many parties, I think the US military, the foreign militaries were feeding a stream of false reports about the capability of the Afghan security forces that contributed to a, you know, false impression that they would be able to stand for at least longer than than in fact they didn't even stand they didn't even last past the last four years leaving so. There was also lies that were told by the Afghan government about the depth of its support about its commitment to democracy to human rights. You know, this was a republic that was founded in the name of those things of democracy and yet it was based on impart for all the good that it did accomplish it you know this is a place where the UN had every two years put out a report on systemic torture in its prisons. You know, this is a republic that was also founded on on repression. That was was big, you know, surviving off a tremendous amount of violence inflicted by airstrikes in rural areas. Much of it, you know, almost impossible to report on the kind of airstrikes that, you know, we witnessed this summer I reported on on one this summer that was that did make headlines the drone strike that killed 10 innocent people seven of them children in Kabul, who were falsely thought to be members of the Islamic State. So, I think these lies, possibly contributed to just how how blind we were to what was coming but eventually they couldn't be sustained the truth came to Kabul in the form of the Taliban at the gates. And we saw what was a remarkably accelerating collapse as local commanders switch sides and this is of course something that we saw before in the 1990s that's how the Taliban came to power. And the in 2001 that's, that's how the Taliban collapses swiftly after the US invasion. So, there was something I think that we'd witnessed before that there's something they've been precedent for. But on the other hand, I think that the speed of, of, of flight from the Taliban the way that so many Afghan elites already had one foot out the door that they had, you know, second passports and investments overseas is very particular to our own international system you know that so called free movement of capital, you know, welcomes saw transfer of wealth out of the country, billions of dollars often in cash leaving each year. So, the Taliban understood this, and we could we saw what was a policy of Afwa, a general pardon that they began to become more and more insistent public about they were exploiting the perception of the government was going to collapse that wouldn't have the departure of the foreigners, and they began to very publicly post about how they would accept the surrender of government soldiers, give them bus fare to go home, the message was anyone who laid down their arms and accepted, you know the Islamic Emirate would be forgiven. And it was, it was, it was by and large a successful policy one that was in their interest. Now that they were about to become government, the government they had a different different set of incentives. And that was the reason why I decided to stay. I mean I could decide to stay along with my housemate who's a Belgian photographer because most of the international media organizations there were evacuating including the New York Times they pulled out their, their whole local international staff but we we could stay and we decided to because we didn't think the Taliban were going to to kill us we thought they would be true to their word that they would want to protect foreign journalists and aid workers NGOs, in order to to begin their you know kind of campaign for international legitimacy. So, I wrote a story that talks about the events that I witnessed and and also what else was happening in the background the deal between the attempted to deal between the Afghan government and the Taliban and that was by the US negotiating team in Doha. Salman Khalilzad was was the key figure in that and that was an attempt to basically halt the Taliban outside the gates of Kabul for two weeks to allow for an ordinary transfer of power that that failed. The presidents, you know President Ghani is of course panic flight from the palace that day. Ultimately of the Taliban, somewhat reluctantly the Taliban themselves had not been expecting to capture the Kabul that that quickly and they weren't ready. They, they didn't want to, they weren't ready so they didn't they actually didn't want to come into Kabul I firmly believe that they did enter the city I think with probably less than 1000 men, which is less than the number of Marines that were at the airport, and certainly less than the tens of thousands of Afghan army and police who who abandoned their posts and weapons that day. So, I'm just going to read a moment from from the story from that day on August 15. And so we, you know, we've been trying to Jim and I, my husband, my friend is a photographer. We've been trying to just understand what was happening that day as as we watch the government sort of collapse. And there were all these rumors that Taliban would enter Kabul we've been first walking around the center of town, and then bicycling. You know, seeing all these helicopters taking off in the embassy panic convoys of government officials drive to the airport soldiers, you know, putting on plain clothes and leaving their posts, long lines of prisoners walking through the streets, having an escape from police hierarchy after, you know, after the Taliban arrived. So, which is the main prison outside of Kabul. So, so we're wondering where are the Taliban. It was nearly 5pm. When Jim and I returned home on our bicycles. Our driver Akbar was waiting for us. The streets were clear. So we decided to drive to the western outskirts of the city, with a main Taliban advance would be arriving from Wardak province. Traffic was light until we hit the main arterial road that runs west, where a stream of cars was leaving the city. As Akbar crept up the on ramp, we got down and walked to the start of the driveway of the intercontinental hotel. We went into robes as well, but still had their weapons. We introduced ourselves as journalists. The war is over. One said, he laughed. We've surrendered. You surrendered I asked to who they smiled and pointed to a bearded man sitting in their midst.  He carried a Kalashnikov and a radio. The first we'd seen that day. He returned our greetings gruffly. Jim asked to take a photo and he assented. He was from Wardak and spoke a little diary. How long have you been a Mujahid I asked. 18 years he said. I asked if he had anything to tell the public. Don't worry, we have no problem with ordinary people. All that's propaganda. What about the foreigners at the airport. The foreigners should go. We don't have any need of them, he said. He'd assumed I was Afghan. If you and I can make peace, then what do we need them for? The police had the giddiness of condemned men granted a reprieve. They crowded shyly around the Talib who seemed annoyed by his duty but not in the least concerned about being surrounded by our men who would have shot him a day ago. The cops wanted to pose for a photo with him. After Jim snapped it, the Talib waived us away. The leader said we're not supposed to give interviews. By now the card made it up the off ramp up the on ramp. And we got back in and headed to the western edge of the city and predominantly passed to a neighborhood called company. The area drew rural migrants, many of whom were sympathetic to the insurgents. As we approached we could see crowds gathered by the side of the road cheering.  There is no God but God and Muhammad is his prophet. A tan Ford Ranger drove by with armed Taliban fighters sitting inside. Several more police and army vehicles followed, including Humvees and four and a half ton trucks. The Taliban on board were holding American rifles, M16s and M4s. Booty out of the city, back to their lines on the outskirts. The crowd of men, mostly young, was whistling and cheering. Packs of little children ran after the trucks trying to jump aboard the rear bumper. Jim had his camera out. The Taliban were happy to be photographed. The warfighters roared by on motorcycles, armed and blaring, auto-tuned, taranas, Islamic chants from the cell phones. At the main company roundabout, there was an immense crowd cheering. Long lived the Taliban. That was August 15 from an article I wrote for the New York Times magazine called, Inside the Fall of Kabul. So the fall of the Republic has been a catastrophe for many people. Over the course of 20 years, we created one of the most aid dependent states in history.  I think it's not fully acknowledged just how widespread malnutrition and poverty were prior to the collapse. To a large extent, you know, in the latter half of the Republic, absolute poverty increased, you know, for a combination of just violence and insecurity in rural areas that meant aid couldn't get there, corruption, you know, inefficiency and competence. But the collapse has pushed an already bad situation into, you know, the point of the point where the United Nations, this winner, estimated that half of Afghans are at risk of starvation. And that combined with the Taliban's very real, you know, repressiveness, and the fact that countries isolated has led a whole new wave of Afghans to flee their country. One of the results of the Taliban's swift rise to power has been that the fighting has stopped in much the country. The roads are secure in a way they've never been for decade for more than a decade. So I was able to drive down to Nimroz in the southwest of the country from Kabul this fall, and return to Zaranj, the provincial capital on the border with Iran. And there we interviewed smugglers and migrants and it was clear that there was numbers that they hadn't seen since the 2015 migration crisis, according to smugglers. You know, despite all the investments in border walls and defenses, there are still, there was an unprecedented number of Afghans crossing. There was an estimate of that was around a million just through that route alone over the winter. And many of those Afghans, most of them probably are going to Iran, search of work, but some will certainly go further afield to Turkey, and eventually to Europe. So, but they will face, I think a much worse, the much more difficult journey that Omar and I did and though it's the same route but since then you know there's been considerable strengthening hardening of borders. In response to the migration crisis in 2015. You know the Europe's response that has been to invest in border walls to make to make the system harsher to pay countries like Turkey to try to keep migrants from coming. Just 10 days before the fall of Kabul, six EU countries had, including Germany had urged you know the European Union not to halt deportations. On August 5 saying stopping return since the wrong signal, it is likely to motivate even more Afghan citizens to leave their home for the EU. So that it is, you know, no longer possible to deport Afghans back to Afghanistan from the EU though I'm sure that's at the top of the priority for for some European countries and an incentive to at some point resume diplomatic relations with Taliban. But for now it is true that Afghans, you know very rightfully have a much higher chance of being given asylum should they reach Europe, or the UK. And I see that's, but that's only if they can get here and fact is that the, the road has has gotten harder. And that is, you know, a deliberate system to keep refugees outside of the side of Europe. So, I'm going to conclude just by reading a passage from the book. And it's about Omar's childhood in Iran. As he grew up. Omar's looks came to resemble Jamal's more than any of the boys. He shared his father's musical tastes too, and love to listen to his cassettes. All these like Ahmed Zair but also a new generation of diaspora singers voices from the West to long for home, such as Farhad Daria, the song Kabul John was a hit for 90s. Let me sing from Iran to Pakistan. You have news from dear Kabul, beloved. Afghans were increasingly unwelcome in Iran. They became more predatory. But Omar with his light eyes had it easier than the hazards who are marked by their more Asian faces, who got followed home by bullies calling Kessafat Afghani Afghan garbage. No, his hair was brown and his accent sounded like any Shirazis, but his swagger was modeled on the angry young men in the Bollywood films he adored. He was big for his age and hot blooded. He learned how to handle a knife from the local Tufts, the bad mosh, but stay clear of the heroin that was raging through the city. He kept working right through school enough to buy himself a bicycle and a radio shine shoes and harvested pistachios. The age of 10 you could lift 50 pound tubs of ice cream at the shop. At 13 he started working in construction. But he wanted to become a doctor and help people or pilot and see the whole world. He knew there was a better life somewhere in a place where he would belong. A friend of his lived near the airport, and they go out and spend hours by the fence, watching for planes. The end of the Cold War changed how the West saw refugees. The conflicts in poor countries were no longer deemed proxy battles between superpowers and their ideologies. Terrible wars without faith or law, no less foreign to the logic of Klausowitz than to that Hegel wrote the war correspondent come philosopher Bernard Henri Levy. After the Soviets left Afghanistan in 1989. Millions of Afghans home. They all wanted to return. But Mary I'm refused. She didn't trust the fundamentals rebels to let her girls continue their education. When the communist government collapsed three years later, the Mujahideen and militias turned on each other, and the West turned away. The world has no business in that country's tribal disputes and blood feuds proclaimed the times of London. Now came the time of the warlords. Devotion died. Affection perished. The poet Hallyla Hallyla had written. We are drowning in a sea of blood. The devastation of the 90s would stand as a warning to Afghans two decades later when the Americans started to go and the government teetered. flee while you can. Kabul became a maze of ruins carved up by arm checkpoints, crossing the meant risking debt. It might be the only way to avoid starvation. From a letter, Mariam learned that some militiamen had robbed your brother and beat him until he went blind in one eye. Then the Taliban, with harsh justice as their almost singular attraction swept across the country. In 1996, they captured Kabul. Five years later, Omar's family received long awaited good news. Their brother, who'd emigrated to the United States a decade earlier, was going to sponsor their refugee application. But they had to leave Iran and go to Pakistan where there was an American consulate. They sold what they couldn't carry and went to stay with one of Jamal's sisters in Peshawar. When Mariam and Jamal went to apply at the US Embassy, they were scheduled for a follow-up interview a few months later. It was late summer, 2001. On September 11th, they watched on TV as the Twin Towers burned. The US Special Forces and their warlord allies were in Kabul by the time they returned to the embassy. The official there told them that refugee applications for Afghans are being suspended. Mariam recalled these words, your country is free now. Go home. They returned in battered Toyota pickups and Mercedes buses long retired from Germany. They came on foot and on donkey, family by family over mountain passes. And in the throngs of thousands, the great border crossings of Weish and Torch. They landed in Boeing 747s wearing suits and freshly shined shoes. They came bearing master's degrees and prosthetic limbs and red cheeked infants. Five million returned. It was the largest repatriation program in UN history. The commitment to a stable and free and peaceful Afghanistan is a long-term commitment said President George Bush standing beside the new Afghan leader, Hamid Karzai. The Taliban had prohibited music. The first song played by Radio Afghanistan was Daria's Kabul John. Do you have news from dear Kabul beloved. And have you heard from me. In the spring of 2002, Omar and his family took a bus at the hybrid pass and arrived at the border of their own country. At the crossing, the stark white banner of the Taliban have been replaced by the black, red and green of the King's time. The site of the flag filled Omar with hope. When I, when I saw, you know, the Taliban banner flying above the palace this summer. I felt, I think we all thought about how these cycles of history that come around again seem, you know, how helpless we are to prevent them. But I think it's important to remember that for Afghans, you know, we're now in their fourth decade. It's been for more than four that four decades of conflict violence our country with with no end in sight. I'm sorry to say. And, you know, one of the most important survival strategies. And, and Afghans have, as a result of these journeys these migrations which are as, as, as Alessandro Montsouris has pointed out, you know, never unidirectional they involve returns and, and, and multiple displacements they form a national community. And that diaspora is really I think something that we should bear in mind is one of the one of the last options that are available to many Afghans and the restrictive borders restricted immigration laws that choke off the life of that diaspora that make it impossible for families to reunite impossible people to study, get jobs. The crisis in Ukraine there's many things that we could we could say about that, about the difference between the treatment of Ukrainian refugees and Afghan or Syrian refugees, and perhaps we will get that in the question and answer. But I think what it's interesting is that just how it shows us how much these crises, refugee crises migration crises are caused not only by wars and other catastrophes, but by laws by systems of laws and borders. You know, Ukrainians one of the reasons why you have so many Ukrainian refugees, more than four million I believe is because they can't leave their country, they're allowed. They can travel without visas the European Union, could drive their own cars to Poland. It didn't have to hire smugglers to take them across the deserts and mountains. They didn't have to risk their lives in little boats. And that is of course the situations, situation of Afghans today. So, thank you very much.