Book Fair, Church Fair

Saturday, 13 October 2012

This afternoon, I attended the Twin Cities Book Festival. Unlike previous years, this time the festival was held in a building at the State Fair grounds, so that was pretty awesome. They used to hold the fair at the Minneapolis Community and Technical College, in downtown Minneapolis. This assured that there was no place to park. But this year, it was closer to my house, and parking was free of both frustration and fees.

A couple of months back, I had this idea that I would show up with, like, $200 and just spend it on all the awesome books for sale. Alas, due to a string of badly-timed events, I had to attend the fair with no money. So…I just tried to find a bunch of free stuff.

I grabbed about ten pieces of candy, an apple, two bookmarks, and even a book. The book was available for free at a table called “Muslim Media.” It’s called A Brief Illustrated Guide to Islam, and it’s not quite a hundred pages. They were also giving away free copies of the Qu’ran, but I already have a copy, so I didn’t take off with another one.

I had a chance to ask the (presumably) Muslim man who was hosting the table a couple of questions I had. First, is it necessary to learn Arabic if I wish to read the Qu’ran? He said no, but, like Shakespeare in English, it sure is advantageous to read it in the original language.

My second question was: Do people mix you up with Hindus and Sihks and Buddhists? Yeah, he said this happens quite often, though the Twin Cities are better than other areas of the countries he’s been to (yay!). He mentioned the event, back on September 12, 2001, when some redneck opened fire on a Hindu man thinking “his people” were responsible for the terrorist attack. He and I both agreed that killing someone in cold blood because they happen to belong to the same religion as a megalomaniac is bad enough, but not even knowing the difference between majore world religions is, well, really sad.

Funny thing: The Muslim Media table was right next to the Freethought House table, and one passerby asked the Muslim guy (not the same guy I was speaking with) if he felt safe being next to a group of atheists, and the Muslim said, “I feel safer being next to them than being next to other religious people, or even other Muslims.”

Sunday, 14 October 2012

As advertised earlier, today I read a portion of my essay in Atheist Voices of Minnesota during a UU church service.

I liked this church. The building itself was quite inviting and comfortable. This is the fourth UU church I’ve attended, and I think this is my favorite building. The one in White Bear Lake was also homey and environmentally-friendly, so that one’s a close second. And the one in Minneapolis is all grand and church-y (and has a great view of the ciy), but it’s also cold and sterile feeling. So, the Bloomington UU church gets my vote for best church in the Twin Cities.

I think my reading went very well. The microphone was working (that’s actually a rarity, believe it or not), the room was comfortable, and I was well-prepared with a large-font print-out of my excerpt.

Last month, as you may recall, I read a portion of my essay at the Minnesota Atheists monthly meeting. That time, I made the mistake of reading directly from the book. This was tough, because I had to force the book open and try to read the smaller print while standing and projecting my voice. So, I learned my lesson.

Afterwards, there was lunch. Tacos. So, totally awesome. Any church that offers tacos after its services is already halfway on its way to snagging my membership.