01 August 2010

Hotel Room Philosophy

The more I know, the less I know. I can also see this is just a reconnaissance trip.  I would love to be able to tell peoples' stories from this side of the world.  I have collected a few, but they only scratch the surface.  I can see that I need to spend some concentrated time in one of these locations.

I am also guilty of being an Orientalist, although hopefully in the pre-Edward Said sense of the word.  The artists of the 19th and early 20th century -- Delacroix and Matisse for example, were seduced by the exotic beauty and tantalizing sensations of Morocco, Algiers and other places.  They understood themselves through contact with these cultures.  Of course they were outsiders, imposing the Western gaze on the East -- but I think they were genuinely transmitting their curiosity and delight in the treasures of texture, color, costume, smells of the marketplace, and mellifluous languages that flowed around their ears, through the art they produced. In that sense, I’m willing to accept that label.  Edward Said might call me naïve, and maybe I am…but I truly mean no harm, my desire is to celebrate what I see to my American audience.

One of the things I love about Sulymaniye in Iraqi Kurdistan is the collapse of cultures.  It was less evident in Istanbul or Israel or Palestine -- they were, in spite of themselves, much more Westernized, hijab notwithstanding.  Here, the traditional dress of the men, desert neutral in color,  very baggy trousers, fitted jacket over shirt, with a patterned cummerbund, and fitted hat or wrapped scarf is worn by every 4th man.   Sulymaniye is surrounded by mountains, with lovely green parks in the center of the city.  This time of year, like in California, the hills are brown.  They tell me that in March and April, the green hills are exquisite.  So the centuries conflate here -- there is a lot of 21st century building -- of first world quality, satellite dishes abound, and of course everyone is carrying a at least one cell phone.  Then,  some of the traditionally clad men are carrying prayer beads.  You want espresso coffee?  Check.  Skin tight jeans and tank tops?  Check.  Hijabs? Check. Niqabs?  Check.  Pushcarts? Check.  Mercedes?  Check.

I am visiting with my Baghdadi friend Sarwa and her friends here.  Here in the north we have water and power.  In Baghdad, municipal power is available one hour out of every 5, and the temperature ranges between 50-55 C this time of year -- you can do the math.  So, each neighborhood has its own generator, but citizens are hijacked into paying inflated rates or sitting in the stifling dark.

Many of Sarwa’s professional class friends have fled.  Here in Suly sits a mechanical engineer and his well-known Baghdadi attorney wife.  It is safer here, but they have to remake their lives in their mid-40s, and while this area is booming -- it has decades to go before it approaches the 21st century sophistication they left in Baghdad.  They see the US as the land of opportunity -- Turks do too.  They don’t want to come to the US, they love their countries, but they wish they had the level of personal opportunity they see Americans as having.  This is also true for the Palestinians.

I joke with them that my work is to show Americans that these people - Arabs, Turks, etc, do not have the same nature as the violent extremists (I neglect to use the “t“ word -- it blocks the blog from people‘s access) -- that they don’t mean Americans harm.  Quite the contrary, they say, (Iraqis and Palestinians alike) they hate the t-rists more than we do.  It’s too bad CNN and Fox, even MSNBC and NPR don’t make that fact clear.  Everyone I’ve ever met or spoken to, and indeed the vast majority of everyone in all of these cultures just wants to live in peace, raise their families, enjoy their lives.  Their blood is red, their tears wet, their stomachs hurt, their teeth are unfriendly, there hearts are broken--- just like mine.

Being a minority English speaker with only one language, I frequently sit in a swirl of words I don’t understand - Arabic, Turkish…  I enjoy it -- I relax into the cadences, watch the speakers’ faces, gesticulating hands, moving mouths…and I wish I could understand them.  In Istanbul the Turkish speakers asked me what their language sounded like to me.  Did it sound like Arabic?  No, I told them -- angry Arabic sounds like a long series of hash-marks (this is mainly the Arabic shown on Western television)…regularly spoken, conversational Arabic sounds like a flowing, bubbling river, and Turkish sounds like a mix between Japanese and Eastern European -- it is syncopated, lyrical, and complexly layered.

I also frequently sit in a swirl of cigarette smoke.  Back to the memory soup -- it reminds me of when I used to travel on business in the 70s.  My boss (and my first husband) were smokers so I had to sit in ""smoking" on the plane.  I carried stale smoke into my home from any evening out, and there was no such thing as a non-smoking hotel room-- so every room, like most of them here, was encrusted with layers of nicotine.  Last night, deja vu,  I had to drape my clothes over the chairs to air them out.  And, in my 20s I didn’t have the allergies I do now.  The smoke isn’t so fun for me -- but the lives of the people here are so stressful, I actually empathize with their habit.

So, yes, my heart is cracked, because I see the problems here (and at home)  in terms of the brokenness of the human being.  We can’t seem to prevent ourselves from allowing corrupt, greedy, arrogant power from taking us into war.  Even on an individual level, it is hard to prevent ourselves from dehumanizing some group of “others”, from acting out our prejudices in order to make ourselves feel safer or less afraid.  Some of the Turks I met speak disparagingly of Arabs, some of the Christian Palestinians I met, criticize the Palestinian Muslims....and so it goes.

As I repeated at each meeting in the Istanbul/Ankara Exchange...my interest and work is in cultural dialogue between the East and the West.  I guess I'd better get used to the heartbreak.

1 comment:

  1. Ginney the U.S. should make you the ambassador of the arts to the middle east ... i love reading about your experiences and reading your insights. You are growing in wisdom every day. But don't get used to the heartbreak. Our hearts must be broken open if anything is to change. Then we can begin to heal. Our thoughts & prayers are with you as you continue the dialogue with our brothers and sisters in the middle east.
    Lois

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