Courtney Lynch, Gary Koenig Marry Courtney Elizabeth Lynch, the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Terence Lynch of Pacific Palisades, was married to Gary Austin Koenig on October 8. The bridegroom is the son of Pamela George Koenig of Brookline, Massachusetts, and the late Gary Evan Koenig. The Rev. Peter G. Kreitler officiated at All Saints’ Episcopal Church in Beverly Hills. A reception and dinner followed at the Los Angeles Country Club. The bride was previously associated with Benchmark Capital in Menlo Park. She graduated from the University of Arizona. The bridegroom is a vice president in the Institutional Equity Sales Group of J.P. Morgan Chase in Boston. He graduated from Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut. Following a honeymoon in Tahiti, the couple will live in Boston. Harter and Orgain Exchange Vows Ashley Ann Harter and David Richmond Orgain were married on September 17. The bride is the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Robert J. Harter, Jr. of Pacific Palisades. The bridegroom is the son of Mr. and Mrs. Peter A. Orgain of South Strafford, Vermont. The wedding and reception were held at The Inn at the Round Barn in Waitsfield, Vermont. Richard Commons officiated. The bride attended St. Matthew’s Parish School, Marymount High School and Robert Louis Stevenson High School. She graduated from the University of Vermont with a bachelor’s degree in environmental studies. She currently is the produce manager with Healthy Living Natural Foods Market. The bridegroom attended Hanover High School and Proctor Academy. He graduated from the University of Vermont with a bachelor’s degree in plant and soil science. He is a carpenter with Birdseye Building Company. The bride was attended by matron of honor Lindsay Commons; maid of honor Jessica Jennings, and bridesmaid Mimi Arnstein. The best man was the bridegroom’s brother, Nathan Orgain. The groomsmen were Tate Earle, Andrew Farrell, and the bride’s brother, Ryan Harter. After a honeymoon in New Zealand, the newlyweds are at home in Charlott, Vermont.

Golden Couples of Pacific Palisades

Grace and Angel Gonzalez will celebrate their 62nd wedding anniversary on March 13, marking one of the longest marriages in Pacific Palisades. Their grandson John Marrin, an LAPD officer, was at their home when I interviewed the couple and I asked him why he thought his grandparents’ marriage had lasted so long. “Family, constantly working and having their own interests,” he said. After spending time with the couple, I believe he is exactly right. Angel Gonzalez grew up in Mexico. His mother died when he was 8, and an aunt and grandmother helped his father raise him and his two brothers. He joined the Mexican Merchant Marine and when he was 18, the ship he was on was sideswiped by waves and sank off Ensenada. He was in shark-infested water for two hours before he was rescued by an American boat. Angel rose in the ranks until he was a commander. When his ship, the Poza Rica, was docked in Los Angeles for repairs, he was introduced to Grace Villarreal at a party through a mutual friend from the Mexican Consulate. Angel had tickets for the Ice Capades and asked Grace if she would go. Originally she turned him down but later reconsidered. “I was kind of impressed with his uniform and I didn’t have a boyfriend at the time,” she says. They dated and then decided they wanted to be married before Angel went back to sea, but it was Lent and the Catholic Church didn’t allow marriages during that time. They had to get special permission for the wedding in 1944. Grace, who was studying costume design, designed her own dress. “One of the reasons I got married was so I could make a wedding dress,” she jokes. She grew up in Los Angeles, graduated from St. Anne’s High School and attended Wolfe College where she took drawing and design. When she met Angel she was in the dubbing department at Warner Brothers, translating English into Spanish. “I was working my way into Edith Head’s department,” Grace says, referring to the famous costume designer. After taking a train through Mexico for their honeymoon, the couple settled in Salina Cruz, Mexico. Angel’s job took him out at sea a month or two at a time. He would come home for a few days and then go back out. In 1944, his ship went through the Panama Canal and up the East Coast to New York City. When they finally reached their destination, the Coast Guard couldn’t believe they escaped German submarines. “We sailed dark with no lights and far away from the coast,” Angel recalls. “When we slept we kept our lifesavers and flashlights close.” After the war, Angel remained with the Merchant Marine and the family moved to Mexico City, where their first daughter, Norma, was born. From there they moved to Mazatlan. Two years later they had fraternal twins, Mario and Maria. Grace traveled with Angel for a while on his ship. Since he was the commander he had a bedroom, bathroom and office, which accommodated the family. “It was dangerous on an oil tanker,” Grace says. “The fumes can get to you.” They moved from Mazatlan back to Los Angeles, and two years later Grace gave birth to identical twins, Rose Linda and Rose Helen. Grace remembers when they were born in 1949 because it was when it snowed and much of Southern California was covered in white. After that set of twins, Angel remembers they prayed that the rest of their children would come one at a time. They had two more children, Sylvia and Mark. Within 10 years, Grace was caring for seven small children. Her husband worked at sea until 1956, when he decided he wanted to be with his family. His first land job was as a building engineer for Orthopedic Hospital on Flower Street, and later, he switched to Mt. Sinai Hospital which is now Cedars-Sinai Medical Center. After that, he worked for the City of Los Angeles for 20 years as a building engineer. The family moved to the Alphabet streets in the Palisades in the late 1960s and joined Corpus Christi church. Both agreed on what they wanted to give their children: good morals, knowing right from wrong, loving God and respecting human life, and being charitable by giving back what you receive in proper proportions. “Family keeps you together,” Angel says. “With so many kids you have responsibility.” “We’re very different people, but we both speak Spanish, we have a Catholic upbringing and come from a similar culture,” Grace says. “It blends into a peaceful life.” “We don’t fight,” Angel says. “We have disagreements,” Grace says with a smile, “but since I always get my way, we don’t have to fight.” Although Angel just turned 92, it doesn’t stop the couple from traveling. They recently visited Italy and plan to visit Spain next year. In 1956, Grace, now 81, became the first woman building appraiser in the United States. She is also an accomplished painter, whose china painting and water colors are exquisite. The couple also stay busy with 16 grandchildren and nine great-grandchildren. Even though she and her husband each have their own interests and are very different individuals, Grace put a finger on what has kept them together for so long: “We have a mutual understanding of life.”

By KAREN LEIGH Palisadian-Post Contributor “All I want to do is get up there and jam with them.” So says Amelia June, speaking of her concert-going experiences. But June isn’t merely another excited music fan’she’s a burgeoning songstress who just wants to play wherever and whenever she can. “My main goal as a singer is to affect people,” she adds. “There’s something about music that is universally appealing.” June’s life of notes and chords began at age five, when she learned how to play the harp, a large string instrument commonly reserved for older musicians. By 14, she taught herself how to strum a guitar, and recently followed suit with the piano, on which she is still learning new skills. This dedication to music was in full evidence during her years at Marymount High School, where June organized benefit concerts, trilled in the school choir, starred in the drama department production of “You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown,” and won a Battle of the Bands contest (a local competition for amateur musicians). After high school, June attended USC’s Stein School of Music, but left after one month, feeling that her creative flow was being restricted by USC’s emphasis on music theory and technicality. “It wasn’t a good fit for me,” she says. While awaiting her next move, June rented an apartment in Silverlake and worked odd jobs’Starbucks barista, baby-sitter’for 18 months, before learning of Columbia University’s program for non-traditional students. “It’s a really flexible program, made for people who are coming back to school after time off, or working jobs’anyone who doesn’t fit into the traditional undergraduate mold,” June explains. “I had originally wanted to apply to Columbia, but decided to stay in Los Angeles. “After I left USC, I was at a crossroads in my life, and heard about Columbia at the perfect time. I was like, ‘This is it. This is my program.'” She will start as a freshman next month, majoring in art history. “I’m also going to take history classes, classes in mythology,” she says. “And I might take a few music courses. But I’m mainly going to be focusing on music outside of the classroom. I’m not too worried about my career right now.” Nor should she be. In October, June slipped into Venice Beach’s Beacon Street Studios, owned by her uncle, John Nau, and recorded a seven-song demo CD, titled EP (which she included in her Columbia application). In addition to writing the music and lyrics and playing her own instruments, June also produced EP, aided by Nau. “My album is really raw and unfiltered. No overdubs, no pitch correction; enjoy,” June says. “When you produce an album, you’re responsible for the feel of that album. I did all my songs in one take. Most big artists will record a stanza, take a lunch break, come back, record the chorus’mine’s simpler.” As producer, she also made the decision to include unintentional errors in the recording. “I kept them because this is who I am,” says the singer, “and if fans came to see me perform live, this is what they’d hear. I’d rather be honest on my album and have people be pleasantly surprised in person.” June perfects her live vocal skills at clubs around Los Angeles, performing at Open Mic Nights, during which venue owners open their stages to amateur musicians. To date, she has strutted her stuff at Hollywood’s Highland Grounds Caf’, club Room Five, and the Universal Bar and Lounge. Still, she says ours is “a bad city for open mic, because getting shows is mostly about who you know.” In that vein, she’s worked hard to make connections, notably the L.A. rock band Books Died On, for which she is a frequent opening act, and record producer/disc jockey BT’ she sings lead vocals on his upcoming album, for which she also wrote a song. This exposure led Room Five to elevate her from open-mic performer to hired musician. “I’ve played several shows,” June says. “I made 200 copies of my demo CD, and they’re all gone’some I gave away to friends, and the rest were sold at my gigs.” The album itself features tunes June wrote over the course of the past two years, and its themes include those typical of teenage girls’romance, longing, boys. “The songs are melancholy,” June says. “They’re all based on real things I’ve been through, events from my life.” As opposed to shopping her demo to record labels, June’who possesses an encyclopedic knowledge of the music biz’is taking the road less traveled, hoping that her burgeoning notoriety on the L.A. club scene will translate into wider success. “My voice will be heard,” she says. “But even if a huge producer approached me tomorrow, I’d wait. I want to be musically and emotionally ready for success.” Fostering this mature plan for the future are father Joe, a medical consultant and former neurologist who lives above the Alphabet streets, mother Sharon, a pediatric optometrist who makes her home in Malibu Canyon, and sister Johanna, a junior at Marymount. All three will see June off to the East Coast, where she plans to move into a cozy Brooklyn apartment and look for after-school gigs at acoustic clubs around New York City. At the end of the day, “I don’t care if 50 fans know my name, or even five,” she says, “just as long as I affect people, as long as my songs inspire them and run parallel to their emotions. For me, that’s music.” Visit June’s Web site at www.myspace.com/ameliajunemusic.

Hales and Owens Marry in Alpine Meadow Ceremony Katherine Washington Hales, daughter of Alfred and Virginia Hales, formerly of Pacific Palisades, was married to J. Spencer Owens, son of John and Virginia Owens of Lincoln, Nebraska on August 17. The wedding ceremony took place in an alpine meadow in Tahoe Pines, California, with John Owens officiating. Lisa Hales (Lewis), the bride’s sister, and Casey Owens, the bridegroom’s brother, each read poems. Nieces of the bride and bridegroom, Charlotte Lewis, 6, Cordelia Hales, 4, Evelyn Lewis, 3, and Ophelia Owens, 2, were flower girls. The bridegroom’s nephew, Tennessee Owens, 6, was the ring bearer. The bride’s nephew, Jefferson Hales, 10, took part in the unity blessing. Also present were several close friends and family members, including the bride’s brother, Andrew, and his wife, Catherine, of Poitiers, France, and the bridegroom’s grandmother, Esther Owens, of Plainview, Texas. The reception was held at Caf’ de la Paz restaurant in Berkeley, California, on August 20. Several close friends from Pacific Palisades attended the reception: Carrie Kandasamy, Cecilia Pan, Ann Kerr, Pam and Bill Bruns, and Kirby and Glenda Baker. Out-of-town guests included Susie Kerr van de Ven and her son, Willem van de Ven of Meldreth, England. The bride grew up in the Palisades and attended Palisades Elementary School and the Village School. She graduated from Marlborough School in 1992, and earned a B.A. in anthropology at UC Santa Cruz. After receiving a master’s degree in museum studies from John F. Kennedy University in 2001, she went on to become a creative manager at Antenna Audio in Sausalito, where she continues to design audio tours for museums and historic sites. Spencer was born in Lubbock, Texas and raised in Las Cruces, New Mexico. He graduated from UC Berkeley with a degree in history in 1996 and is now a merchandising manager at Travelocity in San Francisco. The couple honeymooned in New Mexico and now live in Oakland. Ann Chernow, J.D. Moitra Exchange Wedding Vows Ann Chernow, daughter of Mel and Elaine Chernow, longtime Palisadians, was married to J.D. Moitra, son of Mr. and Mrs. J.N. Moitra of Lynchburg,Virginia, on July 23 at the Hotel Bel-Air. The matron of honor was Nicole Chernow Jay, sister of the bride. Amy Patterson Parnell, Michelle Stutsman, Amy Porter, Sarah Venge and Alicia Schroeder were bridesmaids. Anastasia Beers, cousin of the bride, was the flower girl. The best man was Ian Cohen. Groomsmen were Dirk Frank, cousin of the bridegroom, Justin Morris, Brandon de la Houssaye and Keith Blechman. Brad Jay, brother-in-law of the bride, was an usher, and Kevin Jay, nephew of the bride, was the ring bearer. The bride graduated from UC Davis and the bridegroom from Brown University. The couple met in Manhattan while working in finance. The bride, a bond trader, and the bridegroom, an MBA candidate at Kellogg School of Management, are currently residing in Evanston, Illinois, after their honeymoon in Hawaii. Elizabeth Lynch and Gary Koenig Marry Courtney Elizabeth Lynch, the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Terence Lynch of Pacific Palisades, was married to Gary Austin Koenig on October 8. The bridegroom is the son of Pamela George Koenig of Brookline, Massachusetts, and the late Gary Evan Koenig. The Rev. Peter G. Kreitler officiated at All Saints’ Episcopal Church in Beverly Hills. A reception and dinner followed at the Los Angeles Country Club. The bride was previously associated with Benchmark Capital in Menlo Park. She graduated from the University of Arizona. The bridegroom is a vice president in the Institutional Equity Sales Group of J.P. Morgan Chase in Boston. He graduated from Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut. Following a honeymoon in Tahiti, the couple will live in Boston.

Movie Review

Peter Jackson’s latest project is proof of the adage: We never forget our first love. Ever since he saw the original “King Kong” at the age of nine, the Oscar-winning director knew he wanted to be a filmmaker and vowed to one day bring his own version of his favorite movie to the screen. Audiences this winter will be glad Jackson did not abandon that childhood dream. For while his “King Kong” is not without its flaws, it does succeed in dusting off one of Hollywood’s oldest themes’that of beauty and the beast’to create the most realistic and lovable silver screen silverback yet. Jackson did not rely solely on modern-day special effects and computer animation to make Kong look and sound believable. He spent weeks in the rain forests of Rwanda tracking real gorillas, paying particular attention to their behavior in the presence of humans. That knowledge, along with the acting talent of Andy Serkis (who played Smeagol and Gollum in the “Lord of the Rings” trilogy and now, with digital assistance, tackles the title role), make this Kong far more convincing than the tiny model brought to life by stop-motion photography 72 years ago. One place Jackson’s “Kong” surpasses the original is in the bond formed between Kong and the object of his affection, Ann Darrow (Naomi Watts), this time an unemployed vaudeville actress. Unlike Kong’s first leading lady, Fay Wray, who spent most of the time screaming, Watts’ heroine overcomes her initial fear to develop a trusting relationship with her captor, realizing he will fight to the death to protect her. The roles are reversed once the setting shifts to the concrete jungle of New York City, where Ann vainly attempts to save the 25-foot tall ape from his pursuers. While fans of the original will recognize many lines repeated verbatim from the first film (e.g. “We’re millionaires boys, I’ll share it with all of you!”) and Jackson’s lighthearted jabs at RKO Pictures (the studio that made the first Kong), Merian C. Cooper (who directed the original), as well as portions of Max Steiner’s powerful score, they might object to the liberties Jackson takes in regard to the plot. Still, like in the timeless epic that remains one of the most popular movies of all time, Jackson’s “Kong” is set in New York City in the early 1930s, during the Great Depression. Jack Black is curiously miscast in the role of ambitious moviemaker Carl Denham, who will stop at nothing to make his next picture. Though likely to cause a chuckle at times, Black’s attempt at humor seems out of place. Jack Driscoll, the first mate in the original script, is instead a brilliant playwright (Adrien Brody) who finds himself trapped onboard the tramp steamer S.S. Venture, which is headed for what Denham describes as a mysterious place no one has ever seen. At three hours and seven minutes, Jackson’s “Kong” is nearly twice as long as its black-and-white predecessor, allowing ample time for deeper plot and character development. Inexplicably, however, while characters like Jimmy, a wide-eyed stowaway, and Lumpy the cook (portrayed convincingly by Serkis) are thought to be important in the first hour, they ultimately add nothing to the story. What’s more, despite its running time, the picture fails to correct the most glaring omission from the original: How do Denham and his crew go about transporting Kong from his island back to New York? Though Kong is clearly “King” of Skull Island, Jackson gives us plenty of other dinosaurs, giant insects and creepy-crawlies to challenge the giant ape’s supremacy in a primeval world which rivals that of “Jurassic Park.” Many of the action sequences drag on much too long, particularly one in which Denham and his crew are nearly trampled to death by a herd of brontosaurs. Kong’s battle with three V-Rexes is memorable but other scenes are downright ridiculous, like when Jimmy uses a machine gun to shoot giant centipedes off Driscoll’s back. Once Kong, whom the ruthless Denham calls the “Eighth Wonder of the World,” hits Broadway, Jackson’s movie switches into yet another gear. Kong breaks his chains, smashes a few buses and chases Driscoll halfway across Manhattan to reunite with Ann, setting the stage for a spectacular climax atop the Empire State Building. The look in Kong’s eyes moments before he meets his fate is heart-wrenching’a scene that is hard to watch but one you don’t want to miss. Black does not deliver Denham’s last line with quite the same conviction as Robert Armstrong did long ago, but it remains one of the most famous in movie history: “It wasn’t the airplanes. It was beauty killed the beast.” Without stealing any of the 1933 film’s charm, this new version has a personality all its own. It is a director’s labor of love a few years in the making that beats its chest at the critics who claim you can never top an original. Jackson’s “Kong” will hold you in the palm of his hand. And rather than make the big fella’ angry, you best sit back and enjoy the ride.

George Balanchine liked tall dancers with big feet, and he could make them move as if they were 5 feet tall. Not only is he regarded as the foremost contemporary choreographer in ballet, but the Balanchine style, with its internal speed, sense of movement and attack, and sensitivity, has made dance the star of the show. While Palisadian Annakate Chappell is tall at 5-ft. 9 in., she doesn’t have big feet, but a certain intelligence, sensitivity and extraordinary stage presence, according to Westside School of Ballet teacher Colleen Neary. A former Balanchine ballerina, Neary is now guardian of his style and choreography, and Ballet Mistress at Westside Ballet, the pre-professional training company associated with the ballet school. At 16, Chappell is one of the top dancers at Westside Ballet, which speaks to her talent, hard work, passion, and imminent decision. Does she want to dance professionally or, now a junior at Crossroads, leave dance and pursue a college degree? “Between 18 and 30 is the dancer’s prime,” Chappell reasons. “If you don’t join a company at 18, the likelihood is very slim that you’ll reach any significant place in the company. And there is no way you can physically endure dance after a certain age.” But Chappell, an excellent student, also thinks about college, and goes back and forth weighing the decision. “You know, next year, I don’t think that I’ll have any clearer answer, and whatever decision I make, I’ll probably still wonder how it would have been the other way. “It’s 50-50 those who make it a career,” she says. “Society suggests the ‘right’ path to success, and if you go on your own tangent, it’s scary. So, you go with your instincts, you can’t think in terms of regrets.” Chappell began ballet at 7, but unlike many little girls enchanted with ballerinas, she says her mom “forced me into going into the Westside Ballet summer program.” Her mother also was a dancer, who stopped in 11th grade, Annakate says, because “she didn’t love performing.” No sooner had Annakate joined Westside than she met Kate Collins, now her best friend, and very shortly felt more and more comfortable in the ballet world. As she grew older, Chappell says that she recognized her talent and decided to concentrate on that, and began to see that her ballet world was quite separate from everything else in her life. “Here [at Westside] we all have a passion for ballet,” she says. “People at my school didn’t know or care about ballet.” Chappell’s days are stretched from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m., divided between school and practice. Right after school, she reports to Westside, which is conveniently located just a few blocks down Olympic Boulevard from Crossroads. While she waits for class to begin, she changes into her pink tights, leotard and toe shoes which, in their short life of about a week, have to be broken in and then, when they become too flexible, must be replaced. She stretches, follows up with 45 minutes of barre work, adagios, turns and combinations, and her big jumps, which Neary says are particularly astonishing. After a 10-minute break, Chappell is back for pointe work, with emphasis on footwork and articulation. She then practices various repertories from different ballets. Life at Westside Ballet is rarefied and ingeniously contained in another era. The company was founded in 1967 by Yvonne Mounsey, who joined New York City Ballet as a principal dancer for George Balanchine after performing with Massine’s Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo and de Basil’s original Ballet Russe. “We are expected to be very polite, show respect for our elders,” says Chappell, emphasizing that they do not tolerate differences of opinion, and in fact “are quite rigid and stiff.” There is an expected decorum, coupled with the exigencies of practice and lifestyle’particularly on maintaining an almost mythical weight. “This is a feeding ground for anorexia and eating disorders,” Chappell says, noting that she was once ordered to eat nothing but “steak and grapefruit.” “You have to be extremely strong, which is especially hard at our age,” she says. “But it reassures me that this is the place I should be. In surviving all of that, I am sure of my love for ballet. After all the blood, sweat and tears, it’s worth it to be on stage.” Chappell loves performing, and feels at home on stage, which Neary confirms. “She comes alive when she hits the stage. Her beauty and vibrancy are exciting to watch.” Recently Chappell completed dancing various roles, including the technically challenging Dew Drop, in Westside Ballet’s 30th annual “Nutcracker,” performed both at Pepperdine’s Smothers Theatre and the Wadsworth Theatre. As young women and men progress in the ballet world, they may audition for summer programs with companies around the world. The routine will begin again in January for Annakate, who studied for two summers with the Miami City Ballet School, established in the manner and style of Edward Villella, who trained at the School of American Ballet in New York. A full day consisted of breakfast (inedible) and classes in technique, pointe, repertoire, jazz and gyrotonics, a sort of circular Pilates. It is important for dancers to do some sort of cross-training to keep muscle groups balanced. While the food was questionable and the days rigorous, Chappell loved the people she met from all over the world. “There were dancers with backgrounds and family experiences that were so interesting to me. I could relate to people on a different level because we were so close, so immersed in what we were doing for five weeks.” At home, Chappell lives with her parents Catherine Kanner, a graphic designer and illustrator, and Winston Chappell, an architect, and her 13-year-old sister Rebecca, a student at the Frostig School in Pasadena. Next month, Chappell will audition with other Balanchine companies, including San Francisco, Pacific Northwest and Miami. In the meantime, she will continue to juggle her two worlds, balancing physics and pre-calculus with grand jet’ and petite `echappe. Next fall, she hopes to decide: either college or a professional career.

Palisadian Sajia Kamrany describes her weekly satellite TV program, “Afghanistan TV,” as a Larry King-type show. But the chatter is far from light and airy’it recently turned to the plight of a 9-year-old Afghan girl who was being forced by her mother to get married. As writer, producer and director, Kamrany sits in front of a camera every Saturday morning at a studio in the San Fernando Valley and talks live to people in Afghanistan, her native country, as well as to fellow Afghans living in India, Pakistan, Iran and everywhere else in the world. She funds the hour-long program herself, paying $2,000 for airtime each month, an expense she says she can bear for only a few more months. Her goal is nothing short of heroic: to empower women and promote women’s rights in a place notoriously repressive in the treatment of its female population. From forced child marriages entailing physical and sexual abuse to the public execution by stoning last April of a woman accused of adultery, violence against women in Afghanistan persists, despite the ousting of the Taliban regime by U.S.-led forces four years ago. “When you marry in Afghanistan, you’re a maid, a homemaker, a nobody,” says Kamrany, who came to the U.S. from Afghanistan as a college student in 1977 and never returned. “You have to just cook, bear children and be a sex machine. Women in Afghanistan are miserable, absolutely miserable.” While women ostensibly have more opportunities since the fall of the Taliban’they can go to school, receive health care and gain employment’the reality is that few can take advantage of these new freedoms. Most women, through fear of attack and social pressure, still wear the all-enveloping burqa, a third of the women in Kabul do not leave the house, forbidden to do so by the male members of the family, and it is still almost impossible for women to get a divorce. One of the most egregious acts is the widespread practice of forcing girls, sometimes as young as 8, to marry. “It’s all over Afghanistan,” Kamrany says. “They even sell their daughters.” In October, Kamrany opened her e-mail and found this message: “Salaam, I am Jan Mohammad from Mazar-Sharif [a city northwest of Kabul]. My mother is going to have my sister get married. But my sister is 9 years old. Please tell my mother not to do this deed. Otherwise, my sister will commit suicide. My mother watches your TV program. Thank you.” A distraught Kamrany announced the news on her show, admonishing the mother while also trying to persuade her to cancel the wedding and let the “little girl go to school and learn about life.” “My God, my daughter is 16, and I don’t even want her to date,” says Kamrany, who is a divorced mother of two. Her daughter, Michelle, attends Palisades High and her son, Tony, is a graduate of USC. “I was so mad,” says Kamrany, who devoted two one-hour shows to the topic. Two weeks after receiving the brother’s e-mail, another e-mail arrived from Farida, the elder sister of Shyma, the 9-year-old: “Everyone in our city is watching your TV show every Saturday and just yesterday my mom told everyone that she will not give her dokhtar (daughter) for marry, as Sajia insisted.” She went on to say that her mother told the prospective groom “now the whole world knows about this arranged marriage and how it is not good.” An elated Kamrany hopes this saga will be the beginning of a social change in Afghanistan through modern technology (her show also can be seen via the Internet at www.afghanistantv.org). She is especially intent on getting Afghans to disband the custom of forced and arranged marriage. But people reach out to her with many desperate needs. A 20-year-old from Parwan, a remote northern village, sent an e-mail to Kamrany just two weeks ago. He is the oldest of five children, his parents were killed by the Taliban, and he and his siblings are literally freezing to death, with no warm clothes or electricity. “I get all these e-mails and it breaks my heart,” Kamrany says. “There’s only so much I can do.” Kamrany’s first Afghanistan TV program ran from 1993 to 1996 on KSCI, Channel 18. It was a variety show featuring popular entertainers, interviews and a news segment. When Kamrany was persuaded to relaunch her program last May, she envisioned a similar format. “I thought I was simply going to entertain these poor people in Afghanistan,” says Kamrany, whose own background as a singer includes producing two CDs. A call from Moscow six months ago changed her focus. The Afghan man told Kamrany how he had been imprisoned during the Russian invasion and when he was released, his wife and kids had vanished. He has spent years trying to find them. Kamrany promptly announced the name of the family and conducted a search on her show, urging anyone with information to call a number posted on the screen. “He called me yelling and screaming and crying,” recalls Kamrany. “He found his kids, who were living in Virginia with a relative. Unfortunately, his wife had died.” She says that changed everything for her, describing her current broadcast as the “ultimate reality show.” Future shows will focus on female hygiene, birth control, education and artistic expression. Kamrany’s grant proposal to create a 24-hour satellite show devoted to education was turned down by the U.S. Agency for International Development. “I had a huge list of young Afghan-American girls and women willing to contribute,” she says. Nonetheless, she hopes to create a nonprofit organization to aid Afghanistan and eventually wants to travel back to her native land for the first time to make a documentary. In the meantime, she continues to use the power of technology to improve the lives of Afghans. “If I help one person, it makes a big difference.” Sajia Kamrany can be reached at sajiakam5@hotmail.com or visit afghanistantv.org for more information.