I couldn't help but cringe while watching Barack Obama's speech to AIPAC in the Middle East.
While I thoroughly support almost all of his other policies, and firmly believe in his personal & political instincts, his unfortunate lack of international experience was desperately on display the same day he received the nomination. With all his domestic policies, Obama has put thorough effort into understanding all perspectives, appreciate where the opposing sides are coming from and trying to present a nuanced, insightful solution by integrating these perspectives and addressing them all.
It was not displayed in that his solution or his stance was the right or wrong one, it was displayed because his speech was so utterly detached from the perspectives of the entire Arab world, which is just unlike him. It was a speech which was tremendously in tune, however, with the spirit, concerns, perspectives, and self-conscious identity of Jews. So, much so that I think it allowed me to understand them better. But in the rare occasions he mentioned the legitimacy of Palestinian concerns, it was insulting by its sheer lack of effort to understand what they really want.
It is one of the inevitable issues in any presidential contest that you have to be an expert on everything, and the easiest way to fake that is to agree with the dominant political consensus. Unfortunately, with regard to Middle East policy that consensus rarely takes into account the culture and perspective of the average Arab. Every reference to the average Arab seems to be simplistic portrayals more reflective of how the Arab world is misunderstood than its reality.
That rare mention of Palestinian concerns was his encouragement of Israel to grant ease of movement, alleviate economic conditions, and halt new settlements in the West Bank (after the security of Israel was secured, and an undivided Jerusalem declared the capital of the Jewish state). Yes, Palestinians do care about these things, but having been in the Middle East, I suspect that those practical accomplishments are subservient to a much greater goal.
Justice.
It is a concept that holds far more weight in the Middle East than freedom, democracy, economic development, or peace. The rare references to freedom come in elite circles' self-conscious references to the west or with freedom from international mingling. The rare references to democracy come with allusions to the hypocrisy of Western governments not to acknowledge the legitimacy of Hamas' victory in Gaza.
While every Palestinian would like to go back in time and retroactively instill justice, at this point I think most would settle for a more recent and enduring justice. They have felt lied to, exploited, and ultimately helpless because of their situation in the West Bank, and the root is often seen as a puzzlingly staunch commitment of the United States to the Israelis. It is a commitment where every decision that gets taken by the US or the international community seems to account for only one side of the story. In many ways it isn't a hard problem to fix. So, here is what I would have said to AIPAC, and I think it is something in the ballpark of what Obama would have said if he had put the same thought into understanding the perspectives in the Middle East with the same care with which he approached, let's say, health care.
"Most of you here want me to proclaim how diligently I will protect Israel's existence & security. How staunchly I will oppose extremism in the Middle East, & how firmly I will stand when dealing with Arab leaders hostile to Israel. Those are important points, and I will address them in due time.
But I wish to start from a different perspective—the perspective that despite 60 years of steadfast American support, Israel is no closer to the long term stability that it seeks. And so we must begin to attempt to undermine not only the extant threat of extremism, but the roots of it endurance.
The problem before Israel is not the extremists, but the ease with which they recruit people to their cause. The problem isn't the hostile Arab leaders, but the fact that they gain rather than lose political points by railing against Israel.
The very root of the problem goes deeper than day-to-day security issues. If it is dealt with as such it is a fight which will go on forever.
The problem is that Arab people feel that they have not been dealt with fairly. And while I fully sympathize with the need for an identity, and a homeland and a peace with which to enjoy it, this simply will not come without a true relationship with the average Arab.
I am suggesting a different approach. We talk a lot about winning the hearts and minds of the Arab people in Iraq, but we rarely get into specifics. There are quite a few tried and true ways to begin to do it.
The first is simply listening. Designing policies based on the actual needs of the people instead of solely the security needs of Israel. This might sound like a bleeding-heart approach, and I'll admit to some degree it is. However, more than that it is an eminently practical approach. Hamas wins elections not primarily because people chafe at what they perceive as Israeli injustice, but because it serves their practical needs far better and is far less corrupt than Fatah. They lay their claim to legitimacy on the fact that the party addresses their needs.
By preempting that need, by actually addressing the needs of the dispossessed and by giving them hope for their future, we can build not only a rapport but a constituency that supports and is invested in the peace process.
Right now the Palestinian people have no reason to be invested.
Hezbollah has gained tremendous popularity not because it uses violence, but because it was seen that the outcome was the first glimpse of fairness that the Arab world has seen in the last century. Not that Israel should capitulate or not capitulate in the face of the situation they were confronted with by Hezbollah. Far more important than that, is that we have an opportunity to win over the hearts and minds of the Arab people by providing that sense of justice, that sense of fairness to the surrounding Arab countries.
In the mind of many Arabs, peace hasn't seemed to bring a sense of justice or fairness, and until recently war hadn't either. Hezbollah offered for them the sort of targeted instead of senseless violence that seems far less morally reprehensible than the targeting of innocents of Al Qaeda or the anarchic violence led by extremists in Iraq.
Let there be no mistake. I will oppose extremism wherever it lies, and wherever innocent people are put in danger for the sake of ideological intolerance, I will stand ready and willing to act to protect them. (…here is where we insert all of the Obama's resolute text on opposing intolerance and appreciated the Israeli self-image and concerns…)
I think I might have lost every friend I had in this audience, but I shouldn't have—because I have only one goal. It is the peace and security for every child is born not knowing the ideology or violence of their fathers. I think of that humanity, so rich with possibility. Whether it is the unyielding service of humanity, the tireless service of God, the attempt to improve themselves, the search for truth, or simply the modest plight of a better life for their children, it is too often that this selflessness and goodness in humanity is usurped by horrors of senseless violence, the wars of the past, the hopelessness of the future, and the bigotry of ideological fanaticism.
I am working for peace, and the only difference between me and many of the politicians who are equally earnestly working for peace, is that I know this is the only way to reach that enduring peace.
I mentioned that 60 years of efforts toward peace despite steadfast support of the US have failed to bring Israel closer to feeling their country is at peace. The reason for this is that they have sought to impose peace through military superiority.
The difference in how I seek to deal with the Middle East is not a policy change. It is one of approach. It is treating the people on the other side of the table with the respect that in our hearts each one of us craves more than anything else."
Saturday, June 7, 2008
Friday, May 2, 2008
communicating compassion and selflessness in the Arab world
Subconsciously, I have always presented myself in a way that I think is best suited to the person I'm speaking to. Without noticing it, I'll often try to intuit the frame of reference people are using and try to present myself in terms of that frame of reference.
In the Middle East, there are things about myself that I just don't talk about. it isn't because I am in any way ashamed or want to hide them about myself, but primarily because people don't really have any frame of reference for it. I can count on two fingers the number of times that I've any sort of substantial conversation on Buddhism with Arabs, and on one the number of times where it has made any sense to them. I've also given up on trying to explain to people that my only goal in life is for people to have the optimal ability to come out of their inner turmoil. Even when this is simplified down to working for the good of society and people is usually seen with some skepticism.
I
There are a number of different hindrances to this understanding. The first is that Islam, especially as it is practiced today, is about as far as a religion can get from Buddhism.
After telling an Arab friend that Buddhists were agnostic on the question of God, he asked me "Who do Buddhists pray to when they need help?" to which I answered "Buddhists don't pray. They meditate. They try to recognize that whatever is going on is impermanent and improve the way they interact with it." He looked at me quite confused.
While Buddhism is completely focused on the individual purifying himself, Islam is solely focused on God almost to the exclusion of attention to internal issues. Buddhism relies on faith for the purpose of focusing on the work of meditation by which you overcome your personal hindrances, while for Islam faith is the end without which everything else you do is purposeless. In Islam, any attempt to improve oneself is almost solely behaviorist. In Buddhism modifying behavior is only a modest prerequisite to arriving at true peace within oneself. The idea of retraining the subconscious mind has no reference as most of the unexplained parts of a person are referred to as the soul.
While many of these parallel to Christianity in the West, the Muslim world has virtually no importation of these ideas and the tradition of doubt and consideration of all perspectives is non exisitant.
II
The second is that the Arab culture is one far more based on pride than on service.
As a Syrian friend was defending the protests about the drawings of the prophet in Denmark, he analogized the situation to someone insulting your father. He asked me "What would you do if someone insulted your father?" I told him "It depends on whether it is true or not. If what he said is true then I would try to help my father overcome whatever failings the person was pointing out. If it isn't true and the person is an idiot. How is that my problem? I'm not going to go out and yell and scream at every idiot in the world. You could spend your whole life doing that and never get anywhere." He was floored. He clearly had no way to relate to this approach. He went on and discussed how there had been criticism before and after assorted but similar methods the criticism had stopped. At that point I realized we were coming from different worlds. In numerous situations I have noticed this approach repeated. Criticism is seen as the problem not an opportunity to solve a problem.
However, I have grown to understand where he is coming from. In the Arab world, in a society where relationships matter far more than quality of work or integrity, one's reputation is everything. Slander is more than a personal insult. It can be a direct economic and social threat.
But what he was touching upon was a more obvious and broadly accepted culture of pride. As I was studying Arabic I came across the word for "humble." I thought, that is a word that I want to know. Then I noticed it had the same meaning as "small" and "insignificant," and came from the root which meant "to humiliate, disparage, derogate, detract" and "to be lowly, humble." As I looked it up in the English to Arabic side, I found another word which I hoped to be more aligned with the meaning I was looking for. This one came from the root "to despise, scorn, disdain, to look down on, to have a low opinion of." Ouch. (Neither of my dictionaries had a word for "selfless")
While charity and forgiveness are themes often returned to in the Quran, these are not the same as compassion and selflessness. Charity and forgiveness can often serve directly in the culture of pride. There no doubt are people working selflessly in the Middle East, but they are the ones who have bucked the overwhelming focus on social status and reputation. It is few people who have accepted my explanation that I would like to understand different cultures and bridge a dialogue between the Middle East without asking how it connects to a career.
Of course these are some of the same difficulties people in the US have in understanding what I'm doing what I'm doing. But the difference is that the US is a number of different cultures coexisting, and while there may not always be mutual understanding, there is an acknowledgment of the coexisting cultures and their validity. The homogeneity of the Middle Eastern culture makes it a bit more difficult to understand the purposes of people outside that perspective.
III
Finally just being a Westerner makes me suspect.
In Cairo, a friend recently told me that NGO's doing work serving marginalized populations are often targeted and deprecated if they receive any attention at all, and they are usually accused of being pawns of the West and serving their interests. These interests I gather are left vague and impending. In the end it doesn't matter what these interests are. At this point we have a half a century long history of intentions, words, and actions that whatever their justifications have perpetuated if not caused conflict and suffering in the middle east. So, no matter how benign an organization's purpose may seem, just receiving US funding is often enough to discredit them as truly serving the interests of the people.
IV
Until now, I've accepted this as part of being in a culture that is not mine. I came not to tell people about myself, but to understand them, and serve them, and help them however I can. But after having been here for some time I have gathered that some of these qualities that I have so much trouble communicating are some of what the society needs most desperately to invest in its long-term future and to grow as a community. As I've looked at many of the problems endemic in the middle east, it has seemed more and more that the problems are a symptom, not the problem. It is a trendy argument to be made that the middle east is or isn't ready for democracy. I have developed some thoughts on it, but ultimately it isn't the question that I'm seeking an answer to. Because ultimately that question leads to many more questions. (and more relevant questions such as "what are the goals of democracy and how can we best meet those goals given the current situation?") The question I'm seeking the answer to is how can I help the people of the middle east be happy and at peace--not only internationally but with themselves at an individual level.
I was talking with a friend who had just had a couple of Arab friends come back from a NGO training conference in the US. The thing that had struck them most on a trip that included a session with Condoleezza Rice, and many activists, organizers, and community investment NGO's was how people treat their kids in America. The idea that parents would ask their kids where they wanted to go on a trip and what they wanted to learn was one they had never, ever run across in the middle east.
This same situation and the ultimate power of the culture had struck me when I was traveling through the US. I stayed at different times with two single moms in rural America, just barely getting by. One was a vegan, caring mom, full of love, who at 27 had just finished her art degree, but her life was completely designed around the parenting needs of her son, who was about 8. She was an amazing parent. Always juggling two jobs, but finding time to help her son with homework, and emphasize the joy of learning. She wasn't coddling, he didn't always get what he wanted and when he pouted she would talk him through how to best get through the situation. He was probably the most mature eight year old I've ever met. When I clumsily knocked over his lego set, he was heartbroken for about 10 seconds, after which he said "It's okay we can rebuild it."
I stayed with another single mom, about 24, with two kids, 3 and 6. The 6 year old daughter was precocious, but already showing the outer independence which belied the desperate neediness for attention and care. She told me on more than one occasion in my 16 hours at their home how she wished that people would send her flowers. It nearly broke my heart. A bit more revealing was the night before when the mom told me about her family story. As she spoke of her mother, their times of the various times of poverty and riches, I noticed that it was the same pattern and lack of needs of the children. Growing up without attention, she moved in with a boyfriend after high school and was still intuitively saw the solution as a man who would provide them with thing as opposed to investment in themselves.
It left me feeling a bit helpless. It just made it exceedingly clear to me in a short time that economic problems aren't the root. How to you teach culture? Self-reflection? Critical thinking? Asking oneself how to make a situation better as opposed to finding whom to judge?
Though, I'm kind of jumping the gun here. I'll write more later on the thought process that led me to believe that the problems of the middle east weren't just in communication, economics or power struggles.
In the Middle East, there are things about myself that I just don't talk about. it isn't because I am in any way ashamed or want to hide them about myself, but primarily because people don't really have any frame of reference for it. I can count on two fingers the number of times that I've any sort of substantial conversation on Buddhism with Arabs, and on one the number of times where it has made any sense to them. I've also given up on trying to explain to people that my only goal in life is for people to have the optimal ability to come out of their inner turmoil. Even when this is simplified down to working for the good of society and people is usually seen with some skepticism.
I
There are a number of different hindrances to this understanding. The first is that Islam, especially as it is practiced today, is about as far as a religion can get from Buddhism.
After telling an Arab friend that Buddhists were agnostic on the question of God, he asked me "Who do Buddhists pray to when they need help?" to which I answered "Buddhists don't pray. They meditate. They try to recognize that whatever is going on is impermanent and improve the way they interact with it." He looked at me quite confused.
While Buddhism is completely focused on the individual purifying himself, Islam is solely focused on God almost to the exclusion of attention to internal issues. Buddhism relies on faith for the purpose of focusing on the work of meditation by which you overcome your personal hindrances, while for Islam faith is the end without which everything else you do is purposeless. In Islam, any attempt to improve oneself is almost solely behaviorist. In Buddhism modifying behavior is only a modest prerequisite to arriving at true peace within oneself. The idea of retraining the subconscious mind has no reference as most of the unexplained parts of a person are referred to as the soul.
While many of these parallel to Christianity in the West, the Muslim world has virtually no importation of these ideas and the tradition of doubt and consideration of all perspectives is non exisitant.
II
The second is that the Arab culture is one far more based on pride than on service.
As a Syrian friend was defending the protests about the drawings of the prophet in Denmark, he analogized the situation to someone insulting your father. He asked me "What would you do if someone insulted your father?" I told him "It depends on whether it is true or not. If what he said is true then I would try to help my father overcome whatever failings the person was pointing out. If it isn't true and the person is an idiot. How is that my problem? I'm not going to go out and yell and scream at every idiot in the world. You could spend your whole life doing that and never get anywhere." He was floored. He clearly had no way to relate to this approach. He went on and discussed how there had been criticism before and after assorted but similar methods the criticism had stopped. At that point I realized we were coming from different worlds. In numerous situations I have noticed this approach repeated. Criticism is seen as the problem not an opportunity to solve a problem.
However, I have grown to understand where he is coming from. In the Arab world, in a society where relationships matter far more than quality of work or integrity, one's reputation is everything. Slander is more than a personal insult. It can be a direct economic and social threat.
But what he was touching upon was a more obvious and broadly accepted culture of pride. As I was studying Arabic I came across the word for "humble." I thought, that is a word that I want to know. Then I noticed it had the same meaning as "small" and "insignificant," and came from the root which meant "to humiliate, disparage, derogate, detract" and "to be lowly, humble." As I looked it up in the English to Arabic side, I found another word which I hoped to be more aligned with the meaning I was looking for. This one came from the root "to despise, scorn, disdain, to look down on, to have a low opinion of." Ouch. (Neither of my dictionaries had a word for "selfless")
While charity and forgiveness are themes often returned to in the Quran, these are not the same as compassion and selflessness. Charity and forgiveness can often serve directly in the culture of pride. There no doubt are people working selflessly in the Middle East, but they are the ones who have bucked the overwhelming focus on social status and reputation. It is few people who have accepted my explanation that I would like to understand different cultures and bridge a dialogue between the Middle East without asking how it connects to a career.
Of course these are some of the same difficulties people in the US have in understanding what I'm doing what I'm doing. But the difference is that the US is a number of different cultures coexisting, and while there may not always be mutual understanding, there is an acknowledgment of the coexisting cultures and their validity. The homogeneity of the Middle Eastern culture makes it a bit more difficult to understand the purposes of people outside that perspective.
III
Finally just being a Westerner makes me suspect.
In Cairo, a friend recently told me that NGO's doing work serving marginalized populations are often targeted and deprecated if they receive any attention at all, and they are usually accused of being pawns of the West and serving their interests. These interests I gather are left vague and impending. In the end it doesn't matter what these interests are. At this point we have a half a century long history of intentions, words, and actions that whatever their justifications have perpetuated if not caused conflict and suffering in the middle east. So, no matter how benign an organization's purpose may seem, just receiving US funding is often enough to discredit them as truly serving the interests of the people.
IV
Until now, I've accepted this as part of being in a culture that is not mine. I came not to tell people about myself, but to understand them, and serve them, and help them however I can. But after having been here for some time I have gathered that some of these qualities that I have so much trouble communicating are some of what the society needs most desperately to invest in its long-term future and to grow as a community. As I've looked at many of the problems endemic in the middle east, it has seemed more and more that the problems are a symptom, not the problem. It is a trendy argument to be made that the middle east is or isn't ready for democracy. I have developed some thoughts on it, but ultimately it isn't the question that I'm seeking an answer to. Because ultimately that question leads to many more questions. (and more relevant questions such as "what are the goals of democracy and how can we best meet those goals given the current situation?") The question I'm seeking the answer to is how can I help the people of the middle east be happy and at peace--not only internationally but with themselves at an individual level.
I was talking with a friend who had just had a couple of Arab friends come back from a NGO training conference in the US. The thing that had struck them most on a trip that included a session with Condoleezza Rice, and many activists, organizers, and community investment NGO's was how people treat their kids in America. The idea that parents would ask their kids where they wanted to go on a trip and what they wanted to learn was one they had never, ever run across in the middle east.
This same situation and the ultimate power of the culture had struck me when I was traveling through the US. I stayed at different times with two single moms in rural America, just barely getting by. One was a vegan, caring mom, full of love, who at 27 had just finished her art degree, but her life was completely designed around the parenting needs of her son, who was about 8. She was an amazing parent. Always juggling two jobs, but finding time to help her son with homework, and emphasize the joy of learning. She wasn't coddling, he didn't always get what he wanted and when he pouted she would talk him through how to best get through the situation. He was probably the most mature eight year old I've ever met. When I clumsily knocked over his lego set, he was heartbroken for about 10 seconds, after which he said "It's okay we can rebuild it."
I stayed with another single mom, about 24, with two kids, 3 and 6. The 6 year old daughter was precocious, but already showing the outer independence which belied the desperate neediness for attention and care. She told me on more than one occasion in my 16 hours at their home how she wished that people would send her flowers. It nearly broke my heart. A bit more revealing was the night before when the mom told me about her family story. As she spoke of her mother, their times of the various times of poverty and riches, I noticed that it was the same pattern and lack of needs of the children. Growing up without attention, she moved in with a boyfriend after high school and was still intuitively saw the solution as a man who would provide them with thing as opposed to investment in themselves.
It left me feeling a bit helpless. It just made it exceedingly clear to me in a short time that economic problems aren't the root. How to you teach culture? Self-reflection? Critical thinking? Asking oneself how to make a situation better as opposed to finding whom to judge?
Though, I'm kind of jumping the gun here. I'll write more later on the thought process that led me to believe that the problems of the middle east weren't just in communication, economics or power struggles.
Tuesday, April 1, 2008
Getting over a stolen laptop
so, the below entry I wrote about a month ago about a week after I lost my laptop. i didn't want to publish it because I wanted to give it some time to make sure I still thought it was honest after the anger passed (which it has)...
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Hello all,
I'm sorry for not writing sooner. There are many practical reasons why I haven't written for a few weeks now, but they are all only proximate causes. The real reason why I haven't written is because I have been angry. I don't like when I'm angry and I'm constantly worried that I'll give a biased point of view of a culture that 1) has no shortage of biased points of view, and 2) feels victimized and paranoid about these biased points of view, thus perpetuating the circle of misunderstanding.
I don't by any means consider myself an angry person, and I've been more angry the last week than I can remember being in a long time. I'll get to the specific reasons in a moment, but the reason is basically unrealistic expectations and the wrong approach to the Middle East.
I came to the Middle East thinking of it as an situation where I would learn the language, learn the culture, interact with the people, grow as a person, and come out of it with a greater ability to communicate with a different culture--essentially as an academic exercise. Recently, at a moment of particular frustration, I was talking to a British friend who has lived in the Arab world for about a year and a half. He told me "The Middle East is hard. Not long after I was first arrived in Morocco, I just broke down and cried." If you prepare emotionally, for that sort of experience you can expect it, deal with it and move on. When you come a idealistic greenhorn, it feels like the whole culture is undermining your attempts to learn from it and help it grow.
You can't approach the Middle East like that. If you want, you can do the tourist thing, and go about in the world insulated by money, but that is not what I wanted and still not what I want. Nothing in the West really prepared me for it, and because people here are 1)used to dealing with it and 2) very proud of their culture and don't want to say anything that reflects poorly on it they haven't really prepared me for it. The tendency to repress seems a strong one, and quite honestly the thing I am most grateful for since I've been here has been a piece of advice to never leave my passport and money anywhere--not a locked apartment, not a hotel room, not anywhere. If it hadn't been for that I probably would be without a passport and down a few hundred dollars more than I am. If someone had said to me before the trip, "If you think someone is cheating you, don't trust them for a minute" and "Don't ever leave anything unlocked anywhere, no matter how trusted you think it is" I'd probably still have a laptop, an ipod and a whole lot more compassion. But there has been only one person that has cautioned me about it, and even him only after a hundred conversations emphasizing the generosity of people.
As a liberal, there is the strong tendency to fight categories and to try to expect the best of everyone. Those aren't good assumptions in the Middle East. Not that you should expect that everyone is bad or anything of the sort, but know that you will get ripped off because you are vulnerable. After it happened to me a few times, I tried to do everything I could to prevent it. After failing time and time again due to the magnitude of things I didn't know, I try my best and accept that it is going to happen. The male social situations which are the majority of my interactions form a sort of model around which to build a more realistic approach to the Middle East. In them, you get the very male energy and attitude that is built around cleverly insulting each other and the assertion of dominance over each other. It is a culture that I definitely recognize from the US, but one that is marginalized to frat houses and high schools. It is a culture where pride and dominance are the natural approach. It is a culture that I've occasionally had to deal with, but never one I've been comfortable with or liked. When you stack all the cultural and linguistic barriers against one, it has been that much harder.
The anger comes as a reaction to feeling taken advantage of. It was there when my ipod was stolen. It was quite a bit worse, when I loaned money to a person who disappeared before he could return it to me. It was subtly reignited each time a person would give me grossly incorrect change. It started to burn when I was charged about $35 for a load of laundry, and when my laptop was stolen, along with my wallet, all the books I had bought to learn about the region, and about 15 pages I had been working on writing to trying to express my sense for the culture, different experiences I had that illuminated the differences, and how to grow closer. Finally, reporting the incident to the police who are now using as an opportunity to extort greater bribes from the hotel is not exactly doing anything to restore my confidence.
I think my approach is often similar to the western tendency of grafting our thought patterns onto the rest of the world with atrocious results, and I see that in myself more than anything. I'm not quite over the anger, but I'm starting to get to the other side of it.
I'll try to recreate my conceptions of how my experiences reflect different parts of the middle east, I hope they will be helpful to both cultures. That's really my only purpose here.
However, for those that would like to categorize and write off the middle east, I still do run into ubiquitous acts of kindness and generosity.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Hello all,
I'm sorry for not writing sooner. There are many practical reasons why I haven't written for a few weeks now, but they are all only proximate causes. The real reason why I haven't written is because I have been angry. I don't like when I'm angry and I'm constantly worried that I'll give a biased point of view of a culture that 1) has no shortage of biased points of view, and 2) feels victimized and paranoid about these biased points of view, thus perpetuating the circle of misunderstanding.
I don't by any means consider myself an angry person, and I've been more angry the last week than I can remember being in a long time. I'll get to the specific reasons in a moment, but the reason is basically unrealistic expectations and the wrong approach to the Middle East.
I came to the Middle East thinking of it as an situation where I would learn the language, learn the culture, interact with the people, grow as a person, and come out of it with a greater ability to communicate with a different culture--essentially as an academic exercise. Recently, at a moment of particular frustration, I was talking to a British friend who has lived in the Arab world for about a year and a half. He told me "The Middle East is hard. Not long after I was first arrived in Morocco, I just broke down and cried." If you prepare emotionally, for that sort of experience you can expect it, deal with it and move on. When you come a idealistic greenhorn, it feels like the whole culture is undermining your attempts to learn from it and help it grow.
You can't approach the Middle East like that. If you want, you can do the tourist thing, and go about in the world insulated by money, but that is not what I wanted and still not what I want. Nothing in the West really prepared me for it, and because people here are 1)used to dealing with it and 2) very proud of their culture and don't want to say anything that reflects poorly on it they haven't really prepared me for it. The tendency to repress seems a strong one, and quite honestly the thing I am most grateful for since I've been here has been a piece of advice to never leave my passport and money anywhere--not a locked apartment, not a hotel room, not anywhere. If it hadn't been for that I probably would be without a passport and down a few hundred dollars more than I am. If someone had said to me before the trip, "If you think someone is cheating you, don't trust them for a minute" and "Don't ever leave anything unlocked anywhere, no matter how trusted you think it is" I'd probably still have a laptop, an ipod and a whole lot more compassion. But there has been only one person that has cautioned me about it, and even him only after a hundred conversations emphasizing the generosity of people.
As a liberal, there is the strong tendency to fight categories and to try to expect the best of everyone. Those aren't good assumptions in the Middle East. Not that you should expect that everyone is bad or anything of the sort, but know that you will get ripped off because you are vulnerable. After it happened to me a few times, I tried to do everything I could to prevent it. After failing time and time again due to the magnitude of things I didn't know, I try my best and accept that it is going to happen. The male social situations which are the majority of my interactions form a sort of model around which to build a more realistic approach to the Middle East. In them, you get the very male energy and attitude that is built around cleverly insulting each other and the assertion of dominance over each other. It is a culture that I definitely recognize from the US, but one that is marginalized to frat houses and high schools. It is a culture where pride and dominance are the natural approach. It is a culture that I've occasionally had to deal with, but never one I've been comfortable with or liked. When you stack all the cultural and linguistic barriers against one, it has been that much harder.
The anger comes as a reaction to feeling taken advantage of. It was there when my ipod was stolen. It was quite a bit worse, when I loaned money to a person who disappeared before he could return it to me. It was subtly reignited each time a person would give me grossly incorrect change. It started to burn when I was charged about $35 for a load of laundry, and when my laptop was stolen, along with my wallet, all the books I had bought to learn about the region, and about 15 pages I had been working on writing to trying to express my sense for the culture, different experiences I had that illuminated the differences, and how to grow closer. Finally, reporting the incident to the police who are now using as an opportunity to extort greater bribes from the hotel is not exactly doing anything to restore my confidence.
I think my approach is often similar to the western tendency of grafting our thought patterns onto the rest of the world with atrocious results, and I see that in myself more than anything. I'm not quite over the anger, but I'm starting to get to the other side of it.
I'll try to recreate my conceptions of how my experiences reflect different parts of the middle east, I hope they will be helpful to both cultures. That's really my only purpose here.
However, for those that would like to categorize and write off the middle east, I still do run into ubiquitous acts of kindness and generosity.
Wednesday, February 6, 2008
On Impressions
I was at the home of Mohammed this weekend (the weekend in the Islamic world is Friday and Saturday because Friday is their day of prayer) where an episode of “Cops” was on. He mentioned that if anyone was planning to go to the United States, their mothers would beg them not to go. Without fail the mother would believe that her son would get shot in the street by an African American.
In Washington DC, before I left, when I first mentioned to the teenagers and African-Americans who regularly hung out on my block that I was going to the Middle East, the first reaction for a few of them was “Shit, you think it’s dangerous in DC, over there everyone’s packing.” They were definitely joking, and another soon spoke up and said he thought I would be fine because as long as a person greets people with respect and interest you make friends easily and are welcomed.
For all the reasons you might imagine, my mom didn’t want me to go to the Middle East. The specters that some Americans (especially worried mothers) might imagine in the US are easily laughed off here. The likelihood that someone would get kidnapped or seriously hurt are extremely slim unless you consciously put yourself into a dangerous situation (by that I mean Gaza or non-Kurdish parts of Iraq. There really isn’t any place in Jordan that I wouldn’t feel safe). I sometimes joke with her that I do whatever I can imagine that would worry her the most.
In Washington DC, before I left, when I first mentioned to the teenagers and African-Americans who regularly hung out on my block that I was going to the Middle East, the first reaction for a few of them was “Shit, you think it’s dangerous in DC, over there everyone’s packing.” They were definitely joking, and another soon spoke up and said he thought I would be fine because as long as a person greets people with respect and interest you make friends easily and are welcomed.
For all the reasons you might imagine, my mom didn’t want me to go to the Middle East. The specters that some Americans (especially worried mothers) might imagine in the US are easily laughed off here. The likelihood that someone would get kidnapped or seriously hurt are extremely slim unless you consciously put yourself into a dangerous situation (by that I mean Gaza or non-Kurdish parts of Iraq. There really isn’t any place in Jordan that I wouldn’t feel safe). I sometimes joke with her that I do whatever I can imagine that would worry her the most.
Saturday, February 2, 2008
My fitful Arabic
I'm only starting to become comfortable enough with Arabic that I'm not intimidated by casual experiences. The process, which has been extremely fun and has made me lots of new friends, has been one of humility and been I think most valuable in understanding how hard it is to learn a language and how hard it is to be an immigrant. A day or two after I arrived, I looked out the window, and my first thought was "Holy shit. What have I gotten myself into?" Progressing fitfully, the last three weeks have also made me eternally grateful for the overwhelming effort that strangers have put into making sure I was comfortable. Everyone immediately tries to speak in whatever English they can manage, wants to relate to me any connection they might have to the US, and wants to be friends.
Yes, of course, there are other, mostly benign, motivations besides a warm hospitality, but for the most part it comes with a pure heart. There is sometimes the unrealistic or subconscious hope that the friendship might somehow help get them a visa to the US. There is the subtle prestige that comes with having a Western friend. There is the rare opportunity to practice English with a native speaker. However, it is very rare that a Jordanian will exploit the relationship for any sort of monetary gain.
More than anything it makes me want to go out of my way to help the innumerable immigrants in the US when I get back. To see American in the idyllic light of opportunity where democracy is real and the only thing holding you back is your will, while only relatively accurate, still makes me want to work harder to help us to live up to that dream for Americans and immigrants. Of course I recognize that it is not to the benefit of the country to open wide the gates of immigration. So, the goal is not only to live up to that dream domestically, btu to support the developing world in meeting this dream themselves.
Yes, of course, there are other, mostly benign, motivations besides a warm hospitality, but for the most part it comes with a pure heart. There is sometimes the unrealistic or subconscious hope that the friendship might somehow help get them a visa to the US. There is the subtle prestige that comes with having a Western friend. There is the rare opportunity to practice English with a native speaker. However, it is very rare that a Jordanian will exploit the relationship for any sort of monetary gain.
More than anything it makes me want to go out of my way to help the innumerable immigrants in the US when I get back. To see American in the idyllic light of opportunity where democracy is real and the only thing holding you back is your will, while only relatively accurate, still makes me want to work harder to help us to live up to that dream for Americans and immigrants. Of course I recognize that it is not to the benefit of the country to open wide the gates of immigration. So, the goal is not only to live up to that dream domestically, btu to support the developing world in meeting this dream themselves.
growing acclimation
I’m sorry I haven’t written more recently. Since I left Amman, I have established a nice existence in Irbid, a sizable town of maybe 800,000 near the Syrian Border. I haven’t written more recently for a few reasons. First and primarily it has been because I’ve felt that I needed to focus on learning Arabic and about the history of the region, which has monopolized my time so far. The second was that after I wrote my last entry, I realized that I wanted to not only be honest, but also try to give as complete and accurate a picture of the culture as I could. Finally, it was because I want this not to be just a chronicle of my series of experiences, but also give some insight into the culture, and I felt that I didn’t have enough experiences to start to extrapolate that insight.
So, I’ll begin very generally before going into specifics.
The first thing you notice is the tremendous generosity and excitement with which Jordanians, Palestinians, and pretty much all of the various immigrant groups greet foreigners. In fact, their generosity is only surpassed by their pride in their generosity. I’ve borne frequent witness to both.
It has been one of my small obstacles to try to go somewhere and learn how to interact with waiters. Either I’m alone and do the best I can or I am with someone and he insists on doing all the talking and paying. I’ve gotten many promises to let me do the talking ‘next time’ but as of yet none of them have been fulfilled. An Muslim friend of mine (originally from England) once relayed to me the almost perpetual fighting within his family anytime they would go out to eat over the right to pick up the check. I can definitely see that happening here. One of the common responses to “Thank you” is “No need for thanks. It’s my duty,” which is the general approach to the situation.
One of my students whom I went to dinner with recently (who of course bought me dinner) said that he was nowhere near as generous a person as he should be if he followed Islam strictly.
I will talk more about Islam later, but I still very much feel that I have only scratched the surface of it and how it affects the values and cultural norms in society. For now, I’ll just say that it is easy to see how the complete immersion in Islam could translate into both a tremendous generosity with concomitant pride.
So, I’ll begin very generally before going into specifics.
The first thing you notice is the tremendous generosity and excitement with which Jordanians, Palestinians, and pretty much all of the various immigrant groups greet foreigners. In fact, their generosity is only surpassed by their pride in their generosity. I’ve borne frequent witness to both.
It has been one of my small obstacles to try to go somewhere and learn how to interact with waiters. Either I’m alone and do the best I can or I am with someone and he insists on doing all the talking and paying. I’ve gotten many promises to let me do the talking ‘next time’ but as of yet none of them have been fulfilled. An Muslim friend of mine (originally from England) once relayed to me the almost perpetual fighting within his family anytime they would go out to eat over the right to pick up the check. I can definitely see that happening here. One of the common responses to “Thank you” is “No need for thanks. It’s my duty,” which is the general approach to the situation.
One of my students whom I went to dinner with recently (who of course bought me dinner) said that he was nowhere near as generous a person as he should be if he followed Islam strictly.
I will talk more about Islam later, but I still very much feel that I have only scratched the surface of it and how it affects the values and cultural norms in society. For now, I’ll just say that it is easy to see how the complete immersion in Islam could translate into both a tremendous generosity with concomitant pride.
Saturday, January 12, 2008
Didn't take long
I woke up this morning in Marka, Jordan at the house of my friend thinking I might listen to Regina Spektor or something. Marka is somewhere between a suburb and a slum on the outskirts of Amman, a place with ubiquitous 7 to 11 year olds constantly embarking on imaginative adventures. It is definitey not on any tourist map, and has all the charm of cities in the third world where community still plays a greater role than productivity. My host has a small place there, at which he shares with Suleiman and his wife, the friend that I mentioned in my last post.
So, I woke up and went to my bag, and well my ipod's not there. After shuffling around for a minute, I notice that all my books are out of order and one of them actually has a huge tear in the cover.
Flashback to last night. We get home about in the late evening, and there are four guys in the living room hanging out. It doesn't take long for Suleiman (with Raed translating) to ask me again about meditation and Buddhism. It is basically in the form of a challenge. They are questions like "What do you get out of meditation?" "If you found out that your path was wrong, and another was right would you be willing to convert?" And leading questions to suggest that there could not be any other explanation for existence than God as interpreted by the Prophet Muhammad. So, I answer as asked and explain that I have gained a tremendous amount from my path of meditation, and it has lead me to be a stronger, better, more peaceful person. But, I am seeking truth in any form, and I am happy to accept anything that builds on my experience. At this point my part in the discussion was done. For the next 20-30 minutes one of the guests took up the ecumenical argument, while Suleiman took the "one true path" argument. I listened intently trying to pick up any words I knew and absorb as much Arabic as I could.
It eventually ended with the guest saying, calling Suleiman a word that I inquired the meaning of. He said, it means "a person with no sense."
So, eventually everyone went home and we went to sleep.
Back to this morning: Now there is a little part of me that would like to have my ipod back, but anyone that has had anything stolen knows that it is the sense of betrayal that is the much more bothersome. It makes you feel stupid for trusting a person, and besides making you less likely to trust, makes you less likely to care.
Once when I was in Nicaragua speaking to an uncle of mine who was a businessman related what he thoguht was the biggest thing keeping the country from growing. He believed that it was centrally a culture of corruption. From the rich to the poor, if there was an opportunity to steal it is universally taken. From a meal to trinkets to investment. Any effort at social improvement was inevitable undermined by everyone taking a piece.
Depending on the person, I can see how it wouldn't take long before a person integrated this into their worldview, and simply gave up on acting for social betterment.
However, that is the only way we have ever moved forward. Fighting crime, but at the same time fighting the tendency to view society through the lens of our own disappointment. To see the world for its reality and its possibiilty at the same time.
So, I woke up and went to my bag, and well my ipod's not there. After shuffling around for a minute, I notice that all my books are out of order and one of them actually has a huge tear in the cover.
Flashback to last night. We get home about in the late evening, and there are four guys in the living room hanging out. It doesn't take long for Suleiman (with Raed translating) to ask me again about meditation and Buddhism. It is basically in the form of a challenge. They are questions like "What do you get out of meditation?" "If you found out that your path was wrong, and another was right would you be willing to convert?" And leading questions to suggest that there could not be any other explanation for existence than God as interpreted by the Prophet Muhammad. So, I answer as asked and explain that I have gained a tremendous amount from my path of meditation, and it has lead me to be a stronger, better, more peaceful person. But, I am seeking truth in any form, and I am happy to accept anything that builds on my experience. At this point my part in the discussion was done. For the next 20-30 minutes one of the guests took up the ecumenical argument, while Suleiman took the "one true path" argument. I listened intently trying to pick up any words I knew and absorb as much Arabic as I could.
It eventually ended with the guest saying, calling Suleiman a word that I inquired the meaning of. He said, it means "a person with no sense."
So, eventually everyone went home and we went to sleep.
Back to this morning: Now there is a little part of me that would like to have my ipod back, but anyone that has had anything stolen knows that it is the sense of betrayal that is the much more bothersome. It makes you feel stupid for trusting a person, and besides making you less likely to trust, makes you less likely to care.
Once when I was in Nicaragua speaking to an uncle of mine who was a businessman related what he thoguht was the biggest thing keeping the country from growing. He believed that it was centrally a culture of corruption. From the rich to the poor, if there was an opportunity to steal it is universally taken. From a meal to trinkets to investment. Any effort at social improvement was inevitable undermined by everyone taking a piece.
Depending on the person, I can see how it wouldn't take long before a person integrated this into their worldview, and simply gave up on acting for social betterment.
However, that is the only way we have ever moved forward. Fighting crime, but at the same time fighting the tendency to view society through the lens of our own disappointment. To see the world for its reality and its possibiilty at the same time.
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