29-Nov-04 (Created: 29-Nov-04) | More in 'Humanities 2007'

The pilgrim girl

Apparently "Zest, curiosity, imagination, and immersion" is present in abundance when one is 6 years old.

I was watching Hidalgo with my daughter. The movie is set in the late 1800s. I don't fully recall what she said, but it went something like this: "Does he like the pilgrim girl?"

I was going to answer sincerely but the apt description of the character in question took me by surprise and also the playfulness of the description.

I was thinking, what does a 6 year old know about pilgrims and what they dress like. As it happened, they had a play in school for Thanksgiving depicting the pilgrims and the Native Americans.

Later in the film the daughter of a Sheikh was chided by her father for exposing her face to a stranger. I have explained away the customs and she was quite for a while. Then the daughter of the Sheikh was rescued by a guy and was being escorted in the middle of a desert with no one else in sight but him and her. Sheikh's daughter dispatches with her custom and talks to him in the tent with out her veil. I hear my companions concerned words "Oh, Dad, she has taken the veil. Hope her Dad won't see her.."