Go "Green" By Growing "Green"

I was fixing to write another column where I ranted about something. But the reality of life in these times is no one really needs to read a column where I keep harping on just how bad it is. We all know about good and bad economic times based on our individual pocketbooks.

My pocketbook has been very lean lately. So, I have learned to stretch my budget even further. The other day as I took out an entire chicken from the freezer to fix for dinner, I decided to subdivide it into several meals rather than cook the entire thing at once.

I cut off the legs, thighs and wings and kept them to fry for the next day's dinner. I used the breast meat and as much of the meat that I could filet off the back and used it in my favorite recipe for chicken fajitas.

As I went to the freezer to pull out a bag of frozen green peppers, I had to smile. Those peppers were the ones I had grown in my garden last summer. Green peppers are one of the easiest vegetables to grow, and they store easily through the winter. All I do is rinse them, let them dry off and then freeze them in freezer bags.

Now that spring is here, I am going to encourage everyone with a backyard to plant a garden. Even the Obama White House now has a garden.

Gardening is going to be one of the hippest things to do this year. Now I know for some people who don't normally garden, the idea of eating something you planted can seem kind of strange. We have become a society of grocery store shoppers. The first year I grew tomatoes in my backyard, I'll admit I was afraid of them. They were so simple to grow that it was slightly scary. But I got over that fear once I tasted those tomatoes. The taste of a homegrown tomato can rarely be duplicated by anything commercially grown.

I know a lot of people who say that rats keep them from planting things in the backyard. But guess what? There are rats running around the farmer's fields as well, plus a whole bunch of other animals. And if you believe that the worker in the field goes back to the farmhouse to use the bathroom, well think again.

If you haven't already set aside a part of your backyard for a garden, consider doing so. I have several areas in my yard for growing my own vegetables. One is a raised bed on the side of my patio. I also have several large containers that I grow things in. One was an old basement sink. I filled the bottom with rocks and then added several bags of top soil mixed with peat moss and manure. I also have several large plastic pots that I use to grow vegetables in.

Consider growing a variety of peppers. The hot peppers; jalapenos, habaneras and cayenne are easy to grow. Try sweet bell peppers, especially ones that turn yellow, red, chocolate and orange.

I have successfully grown Brussels sprouts, corn and string beans. Every year I swear that I'm going to make pickles out of those cucumbers that I grow along the fence I share with my neighbor, but have yet to get around to doing so. I've also grown cantaloupes and muskmelons. I'm even going to start my seeds and see if I can get a watermelon to grow this year.

We may be in a rough economy. But if you have one of the basic staples of life growing in the backyard it can be one less worry you have to think about. Plus, if you grow enough, you can sell it to your neighbors and earn a couple of extra dollars.

Okay Folks, Let's Think About It

Would you make a public bid on buying a house if you couldn't get the financing? Would you accept a bid on your house and take it off the market by someone who couldn't possibly afford it?

What's up with this failed bid to lease Midway? If they couldn't afford to get the financing to lease, can they take the hit to lose the money?

Something fishy on the fifth floor at city hall.

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The much-anticipated $2.5 billion deal to privatize Midway Airport has become the latest victim of the global crisis choking off the financial markets, Chicago city officials said Monday.

Unable to borrow the mountain of cash needed to finance the deal, a consortium, including a unit of troubled Citigroup Inc., had to scotch its plans to lease and operate the city-owned airport facility.

For now, the city will have to make do without a windfall of $1 billion that Mayor Richard Daley hoped would help fund infrastructure projects, pension obligations and, to a lesser extent, other city spending.

Gene Saffold, the mayor's chief financial officer, said the city will be able to keep $126 million in earnest money put down by the winning bidder to secure the transaction, so "it wasn't a total loss."

But a deal that promised to serve as a model for other cash-strapped states and municipalities seeking to raise money by leasing off big public assets has instead turned into a cautionary tale.

"For other cities trying to cut their budget deficits by selling off assets — and there are many — things just got a lot harder politically," said consultant Steve Steckler, chairman of Maryland-based Infrastructure Management Group Inc.

Though Saffold said there may be an opportunity in the future to resurrect the deal, he conceded any fresh effort would have to wait until the capital markets fully recover.

Meanwhile, the city will set to work formulating a definitive plan to spend the $126 million down payment. Saffold said $40 million would go toward shoring up the budget this year and in 2010, and some will go to unspecified public works projects in the city's neighborhoods.

Daley recently pegged the 2009 budget shortfall at $220 million.

The Midway deal reflects the troubled business environment. In 2005, when times were easier for borrowers and lenders, Chicago was able to reap a one-time $1.83 billion windfall by setting up a long-term lease of the Chicago Skyway toll road. In 2006, Indiana raised $3.8 billion leasing out the Indiana Toll Road.

The mayor's plan to lease Midway for 99 years drew six serious bidders led by a consortium of Vancouver Airport Services Ltd., Citi Infrastructure Investors and Boston's John Hancock Life Insurance Co.

When the City Council voted 49-0 last October to approve the Citigroup's $2.5 billion offer, the idea was to use most of the money to pay off Midway's long-term debt, leaving $1 billion for the city. State law mandated that 90 percent of that had to be used to support infrastructure and pension obligations. But the other 10 percent could be used for general spending.

Steckler said many experts believed the $2.5 billion price tag was high. But once the cost of financing began to soar as the credit markets froze up last fall, it would have become even more difficult to cover future interest expense with airport cash flow, he said.

It doesn't help that due to the recession the volume of both flights and passengers at Midway during January was down 12 percent, year over year, according to the Bureau of Transportation Statistics.

Bob Montgomery, vice president for properties at Southwest Airlines, Midway's biggest tenant, said he would support an effort to cut a new lease deal. But he's "a little bit relieved" this one didn't work because privatization would have been uncharted territory.

"It takes the risk off the table for us," he said.

Isn't She Lovely?

Tiana - She's Disney's First Black Animated Cartoon Character.


A Fairy Tale Beginning
Snow White, She's Not. Among Disney's Royal Ladies, Tiana Is a Notable First.

By Neely Tucker
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, April 19, 2009



Long ago and far away, she was an unnamed little princess in a little story called the "The Frog Prince." She and her amphibious friend lived in a very small, mostly forgotten corner of the fairy tale universe.

Many years passed.

And then one day, through the magical powers of Disney animation and commercial marketing, the forgotten little princess was transformed into Tiana, a beautiful black princess from New Orleans. She became the star of "The Princess and the Frog," a movie set to premiere in November. Her doll and toy set were unveiled last month, and the Disney promotional machine is already humming, for Tiana is the first Disney princess in more than a decade, and the first ever to be black.

In the 72 years since Walt Disney's animated version of Snow White captivated audiences as "the fairest of them all," there have only been eight such Disney princesses. Through these movies and a line of toys, dresses and figurines, the Disney princesses have become global, doe-eyed icons of childhood. Sleeping Beauty awakened by a kiss, Cinderella's clock striking midnight, Belle waltzing in the Beast's castle, Ariel with Prince Eric in the moonlit lagoon -- these have become heroines whom parents the world over feel safe to let their young girls idolize and mimic. And while Disney has brought us nonwhite princesses before (see "Mulan," "Pocahontas"), Tiana is a first.

The implied message of Tiana, that black American girls can be as elegant as Snow White herself, is a milestone in the national imagery, according to a range of scholars and cultural historians.

Her appearance this holiday season, coming on the heels of Michelle Obama's emergence as the nation's first lady, the Obama girls in the White House and the first line of Barbie dolls modeled on black women ("So in Style" debuts this summer), will crown an extraordinary year of visibility for African American women.

But fairy tales and folklore are the stories that cultures tell their children about the world around them, and considering Disney's pervasive influence with (and marketing to) young girls, Princess Tiana might well become the symbol of a culture-changing standard of feminine beauty.

"If this figure takes off, you're looking at 30 or 40 years of repetition and resonance," says Tricia Rose, a Brown University professor who teaches both popular culture and African American studies, citing the enduring popularity of Disney princesses at the company's theme parks, on Web sites and in videos.

"It's a very big deal," says Leonard Maltin, the film historian, critic and author of "Of Mice and Magic: A History of American Animated Cartoons."

"She's the first modern American [Disney] princess, and that she's black sends a huge message," says Cori Murray, entertainment director for Essence magazine.

On its most basic level, "The Princess and the Frog" is a vintage Disney princess fairy tale, in hand-drawn (2-D) animation, a Broadway-style musical. It draws inspiration from an 18th-century fairy tale from the British Isles, and "The Frog Princess," a 2002 teen novel from Maryland writer E.D. Baker. Disney transferred the story to 1920s New Orleans and changed her name, race and almost everything else.

In the Disney version, Tiana is a young waitress and talented chef who dreams, like her father, of owning her own restaurant. She eventually kisses a frog and is transformed into one. She must journey into the dark bayou to get a magical cure from a good voodoo queen. She is aided by a goofy firefly and a trumpet-playing alligator. The frog turns out to be handsome Prince Naveen, from the far-off and fictional land of Maldonia.

The stills released by the studio show Tiana in full princess regalia: a powder-blue gown, tiara and hair in an elegant upsweep.

Tony Award winner Anika Noni Rose voices Tiana. Other parts are played by Oprah Winfrey, John Goodman, Terrence Howard and Keith David. The music is by Oscar winner (and New Orleans veteran) Randy Newman. It is directed by Ron Clements and John Musker, the same team behind "Aladdin" and "The Little Mermaid."

"Our first goal is to make a great motion picture," says John Lasseter, chief creative officer at Pixar and Walt Disney Animation Studios, who is overseeing the project. "But we have also worked very closely with a lot of leaders in the African American community, all across the nation, to make sure we're doing something African American families will be proud of. It's very important for us to do it right. We've been very careful and cognizant about what we're doing."

He says it was Clements and Musker's idea to make Tiana black, and he stresses that Tiana will be one of the "strongest" Disney heroines yet. The criticisms the film got over the character's name in early drafts ("Maddy," short for Madeline, was perceived by some to sound like a "slave name") were only hiccups on the way to a finished product, he says, noting that one of his most popular creations, Buzz Lightyear in "Toy Story," was named "Tempest" at one point.

The message that Tiana learns in the film -- Disney characters always learn something by movie's end -- is that balance is important in life. Jazz Age woman that she is, Tiana needs both love and a career to find happiness.

"Her dream is not just to marry a prince," he says.

It will be a closely watched debut, with almost every aspect of her character subject to interpretation.

Murray says she was pleased the studio is portraying Tiana with skin of a "darker hue" and slightly full lips. Tarshia Stanley, a professor of English at Spelman College in Atlanta who often writes and teaches about portrayals of black women in film, says that the character's hair -- straight and pulled back in early images released by the studio -- seems to be the appropriate, middle-of-the-road bet, too.

"They might as well make it straight so little girls can comb it when the doll comes out," she notes, wryly. "We as African American women haven't fully dealt with how sensitive the subject of our hair can be, so I certainly wouldn't expect Disney to know what to do with [that issue]."

(Prince Naveen, for the record, is neither white nor black, but portrayed with olive skin, dark hair and, need we state the obvious, a strong chin. The actor who plays him, Bruno Campos, hails from Brazil.)

Big box-office numbers will be expected for Tiana. The eight Disney princess films, as defined by the company -- "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs," "Cinderella," "Sleeping Beauty," "The Little Mermaid," "Aladdin," "Beauty and the Beast," "Pocahontas" and "Mulan" -- have all been smashes. When adjusted for inflation, three of them -- "Snow White," "Sleeping Beauty" and "Aladdin" -- rank among the top 100 domestic moneymakers of all time, according to the Box Office Mojo Web site.

The last two princess movies, "Mulan" (1998) and "Pocahontas" (1995), each have a worldwide gross of more than $300 million, according to the Web site, in numbers that are not adjusted for inflation. Disney has also reprised the princesses' roles into more than 50 sequels, specials, spinoffs or appearances by the characters on Disney television shows.

Further, Disney began grouping all eight princesses into a single line of toys, games and costumes in 2000. Sales were more than $4 billion last year, according to the company.

"It's hard to sort out which princess is the most or least popular because they're all included in so many sets of toys," says Jim Silver, a toy industry analyst and editor in chief of the Time to Play magazine Web site. "It's all about fashion for little girls, and they may love Belle the best, but most like Jasmine's [from "Aladdin"] costume."

The films featuring the darker-hued heroines -- "Pocahontas," "Aladdin" and "Mulan" -- were much different from the Cinderella-at-the-ball idea of a princess. Pocahontas drew on the real-life travails of her Native American namesake, and Mulan was a warrior who spent most of the film disguised as a man. The two films have had mixed receptions among their real-life ethnic groups.

Gabrielle Tayac, a Piscataway Indian and historian at the National Museum of the American Indian, has taken her daughter to Disney World and says the "princess breakfast" the resort offers children (with real-life actresses portraying the fictional characters) was "heaven" to her child. She doesn't want to come across as a scold. But, as an adult, she says, "Pocahontas" often makes her wince.

"Pocahontas was presented in an almost Frederick's of Hollywood costume," she says. "The movie turned out to be more damage control for Native American parents than a moment of pride. It was nothing you wanted your daughter to grow up to be. . . . I have never seen little Native American girls try to dress up as Pocahontas."

Jeff Yang, editor in chief of "Secret Identities: The Asian American Superhero Anthology," also writes about Asian pop culture for the San Francisco Chronicle. He says that the Disney adaptation of the Chinese story of the warrior Mulan brought a "sigh of relief" from Asian American parents.

"It was a real cultural opening; Disney's characters had been lily-white for so long," he said. "Asian American parents were much more open to the princess brand for their daughters once there was Asian representation."

Disney's Lasseter thinks all the films work well, but acknowledges some differences.

" 'The Little Mermaid,' 'Aladdin,' 'Beauty' -- they kind of have more staying power, generation to generation," he says. "Maybe the quality of filmmaking is stronger. Maybe those are considered a little bit more of a fairy tale than the others."

The story line of "The Princess and the Frog," he says, lends itself more to the traditional, romantic fairy tale.

Scholars say the fairy tales that last are the ones that continue to enchant, entertain and touch children over the ages -- but, most of all, the stories continue to live by finding ways to transform themselves into new worlds.

"Fairy tales absolutely should be brought up to date, to be more user-friendly for the children in our culture," says Maria Tatar, the editor of "The Classic Fairy Tales" who chairs the program in folklore and mythology at Harvard University. "You don't want to tell a story that was just right for German children in the early 19th century."

Jackie Chan's Comments About China - Will he get the Bill Cosby Treatment?

Here is an article from the AP. Jackie Chan is critiquing his own country no differently that what Bill Cosby did when he spoke before the NAACP on the 40th anniversary of Brown vs Board of Ed. I wonder if Chinese Americans will call him everything but a child of God?

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Jackie Chan: Chinese need to be controlled
Action star draws applause, saying too much freedom can lead to chaos
The Associated Press
updated 11:12 a.m. CT, Sat., April 18, 2009
BOAO, China - Action star Jackie Chan said Saturday he’s not sure if a free society is a good thing for China and that he’s starting to think “we Chinese need to be controlled.”

Chan’s comments drew applause from a predominantly Chinese audience of business leaders in China’s southern island province of Hainan.

The 55-year-old Hong Kong actor was participating in a panel at the annual Boao Forum when he was asked to discuss censorship and restrictions on filmmakers in China. He expanded his comments to include society.

“I’m not sure if it’s good to have freedom or not,” Chan said. “I’m really confused now. If you’re too free, you’re like the way Hong Kong is now. It’s very chaotic. Taiwan is also chaotic.”

Chan added: “I’m gradually beginning to feel that we Chinese need to be controlled. If we’re not being controlled, we’ll just do what we want.”

The kung fu star has not been a vocal supporter of the pro-democracy movement in his hometown of Hong Kong. Since the former British colony returned to Chinese rule in 1997, voters have not been allowed to directly elect their leader. Several massive street protests have been held to demand full democracy, but Beijing has repeatedly said Hong Kong isn’t ready for it.

The theme at Saturday’s panel discussion was “Tapping into Asia’s Creative Industry Potential,” and Chan had several opinions about innovation in China.

He said that early in his career, he lived in the shadow of the late martial arts star Bruce Lee. He said that during his first foray into Hollywood, he struggled to establish his own identity, so he returned to Hong Kong. After spending 15 years building his reputation in Asia, Chan finally got rediscovered by Hollywood, he said.

Chan said the problem with Chinese youth is that “they like other people’s things. They don’t like their own things.” Young people need to spend more time developing their own style, he added.

The action hero complained that Chinese goods still have too many quality problems. He became emotional when discussing contaminated milk powder that sickened tens of thousands of Chinese babies in the past year.

Speaking fast with his voice rising, Chan said, “If I need to buy a TV, I’ll definitely buy a Japanese TV. A Chinese TV might explode.”

Hmmm, Will All Those South Side Beaches Be Closed This Summer With The Olympic Bid Still On The Table?

Every now and then I feel the need to rant. Just to scream and holler and just get some things that have been bothering me off my chest. And this year as part of my rants, it's the "pay attention" part that I scream the loudest.

One of the things that's been irking me is our mayor's current obsession to get the 2016 Olympics here in Chicago. I was watching the television news the other day and the reports were all about the visit by the International Olympic Committee. The IOC had toured the city via a well-orchestrated plan and the press conference they held at the end seems to give very positive feedback about Chicago. Of course, we were the first city that they visited, so they didn't have anything to compare our plans with.

As I watched the news report that showed a video presentation of what the Olympic Village would look like and also where all the Olympic sites would be positioned, I noticed quite a few of them were on the South Side in predominately African-American communities. Now being a conspiracy theorist, and also being one who tends to be more right than wrong in my conspiracy views, I must ask this question.

Every year for the past few years, the park district would always announce beach closings. Those closings were always because of fecal materials that had the water levels so unsafe, that for the safety of the residents, those beaches were off limits. It was also always interesting that those beaches were usually on the South Side in areas where African-Americans would be the predominate users of the beach.

I mean think about it. They have a dog beach on the North Side just off of Montrose. Now unless those are some very well-trained dogs, you would think that water at the North Side beaches would occasionally suffer a need to be closed as well. I am sure that all those half-naked bodies at North Avenue Beach and Oak Street Beach would have left enough fluids in the water in that area to make them unswimmable as well. But it is rare to hear of them closing those beaches like you hear about the ones on the South Side being closed.

But now that the mayor wants the Olympics and is toting Chicago's lakefront, isn't it interesting that he found all those sites on the South Side and even has a private beach for the Olympic athletes as well? I just wonder if their beach will be subject to the same closings that Chicagoans have experienced. Or were all those beach closings on the South Side really necessary? Because if people are creatures of habit and you constantly do things to break the habit, then closing those beaches means that you can get the population to stop using it because as old folks like to say, "Use it or lose it."


Here's another thing that has irked me. In this week's news, Alderman Tom Allen of the 38th Ward and head of the Transportation Committee is proposing that drivers who drive on suspended or revoked driver's licenses lose their cars as part of a crackdown ordinance. On the surface, this sounds like a great idea. Take the cars of drivers who have lost their privilege to drive and charge them a $1,000 fee to get the car back. But at the same time, Chicago has been declared a sanctuary city for illegal aliens. Many of them are driving the junk trucks that all seem to have a temporary plate on them.

So if the alderman and the city want to take the cars of American citizens whose licenses have been suspended, then how come the city and state sells anybody who pays for it plates, stickers and city stickers with no regard for their licensed ability to drive the vehicle?

To me, that sounds like the simpler solution. Present a valid driver's license for all city stickers. Of course that might cut into the revenue the city is getting as it doesn't care when it's time to pay $75 for a city sticker whether or not you are a licensed driver or legal resident. All the city wants is the money. The same can be said for the state. Otherwise, why would we have so many temporary plates driving around? Those plates are no better than the old licensed-applied-for piece of paper that used to be in the back window of every car driven by those of questionable driving privilege.


Pay attention, Chicago. Let's see if we get beach closings this year as we wait to hear about the Olympic bid. Pay attention, Chicago, as the city comes up with another plan to dig into your pockets claiming its concern is over your suspended license. Because, for a lot of people, that suspension could be because of parking tickets, missed child support payments, failure to take an emission test or the myriad of reasons that they use to revoke your driver's license as punishment for something else.

Damn, Now This Child Is Sick

After three days of around-the-clock gambling, Alexis Robinson was ordered to leave the Majestic Star casino.

But when a security guard told her early Monday she couldn't return until that afternoon, "She just stared at him," her arrest report states.

Robinson, 23, of Chicago, was arrested after the guard and Gary police Cpl. Michael Barnes gave her one final chance to leave, but she didn't.

She continued to stand silently, until the officers arrested her, court records state.

"I didn't want to argue with them," Robinson told Gary City Court Judge Pro Tem Itsia Rivera on Monday morning.

Robinson was charged with criminal trespass. Rivera entered a not-guilty plea on her behalf, then questioned her about the incident.

Although the woman admitted she had been told not to return until 3 p.m., "I didn't have papers stating that," she said.

Robinson said she had been gambling almost continuously "like three days," and told the judge she'd been in the casino the entire time without taking a break at the nearby hotel.

"You have a gambling problem," Rivera said.

"If I do, then I have to change," Robinson said.

When Rivera told her she'd need $300 to bond out of jail, she asked if she could leave to go get it.

"I'm trying to get my son out of the hospital," Robinson said.

"You were not with any sick baby," the judge retorted.

Her trial is set for June 15.

Is this ethical?

From the Associated Press:

DALLAS (AP) - Nikolas Colton Evans had talked about how much he wanted to have a child, but the 21-year-old died after he was punched and hit his head on the ground in a fight. That would have been the end of it, if it weren't for his determined mother, a court order and a urologist.

Missy Evans has harvested her dead son's sperm and hopes to find a surrogate and one day raise her son's child. It's a decision that ethicists say raises troubling questions; one called the potential offspring a "replacement child."

Evans isn't concerned about what others might think. She says she is only doing what her son would have wanted.

"He would love me so much for doing this," she said.

Austin police say Nikolas Evans was punched during a fight on an Austin street early March 27 and then fell to the ground, striking his head. He died April 5. Police are still trying to identify the person who hit him.

After a doctor told her that nothing more could be done for her son, Missy Evans came up with the idea of harvesting his sperm. She discussed the idea with her ex-husband, her older son and other family members, and said all supported her wish to help a part of Nikolas live on through his future offspring.

She said her son once told her he wanted three sons and had already picked out names. She described Nikolas as an "old soul" interested in filmmaking, politics, music and old movies.

"My son wanted to graduate from college. He wanted to have children. And someone took that away from him," said Evans, 42, of Bedford, located between Dallas and Fort Worth.

Evans had to go to court to get permission to harvest his sperm. On Tuesday, a Travis County probate judge granted her wish - ordering the county Medical Examiner's Office to keep her son's body chilled to at least 39.2 degrees and allow access so an expert could take the specimen.

Evans' attorney Mark Mueller said no one opposed the plan.

An Austin urologist volunteered her services and collected testicular tissue from the body Wednesday night. Missy Evans said she's been told much of the sperm is viable and is making plans for it to be stored.

Decisions such as Evans' must be made quickly, and allow little time for a grieving person to reflect on the choice, one ethicist said.

Using the sperm brings up more issues.

"That child's biological father will be dead. The mother may be an egg donor, anonymous or gestational surrogate," said Tom Mayo, director of Southern Methodist University's Maguire Center for Ethics and Public Responsibility.

"This is a tough way for a kid to come into the world. As the details emerge and the child learns more about their origins, I just wonder what the impact will be on a replacement child," Mayo said.

He said the desire to replace a deceased child is a classic scenario that, in this case, took a nontraditional turn.

"The underlying desire would be very strong, even if she wouldn't describe it that way," he said.

Art Caplan, chair of the department of medical ethics at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, said that in the past decade there have probably been about 1,000 such requests by spouses, mothers, girlfriends and others in the U.S. - but most "don't wind up using it."

Caplan said hospitals may have protocols for dealing with such requests, but there are few laws or regulations regarding the practice. It's usually up to a urologist to decide whether to perform the procedure, he said.

It would be rare for a child to be born from sperm retrieved from a dead person, said Melissa Brisman, an attorney on the American Fertility Association's legal advisory council.

"This is an unexpected death in which there are tons of emotions and you don't even know if you want to do it," she said.

Mark Vopat, a professor of philosophy and religious studies at Youngstown State University in Ohio, questions whether the court should have granted the mother's request. He said that while Nikolas Evans may have told his mother he wanted children someday, it's wrong to assume he also would have wanted to father a child posthumously if he died prematurely.

"This is a disturbing sort of case," he said.

Missy Evans said she is unsure when she'll be ready to seek a surrogate to carry her son's child. But she added that she has no second thoughts about the plan.

"This is probably going to bankrupt me and I will do whatever I can to make it happen," she said.