This American Life producer Chana Joffe-Walt calls reporter Maram Hamaid in Gaza frequently. Often the calls are interrupted by her friend's daughter, Banias, an almost-adult in an eight-year-old form. Few American children can match her for vocabulary and self-assurance. Banias often interrupted her mother to hijack the phone call with this strange person beyond the sea and outside the war. The mother welcomed this opportunity for her daughter to widen her horizon; the journalist gratefully recorded the ensuing conversations. Banias didn't want to talk about the war, but one day she excitedly reported Big News. The journalist drew a breath and waited expectedly. "When my friends and I went out into the backyard to play, there were some strange insects we had never seen! We played with them!"
Occasionally, Banias would break her rule and remark about an Israeli fighter overhead. She cheerfully reported one crashing in her vicinity. She made no secret of her dislike for the Israelis.
Her mother related that one day, after an attack, a train of ambulances filed by the apartment, slowly, as the war-torn pavement dictated. Banias sat in the open window, tranquilly blowing bubbles. Her mother asked "How can you do that? In a time like this?"
"I am trying to improve the mood."
You can eavesdrop on Banias' conversations here and hear a brief follow-up here