“We Don’t Judge You By Our Standards”
It’s never a good thing when a sentence starts with “we don’t judge you by our standards.” You know that whatever comes next isn’t going to be good.
It was our favorite time during Arabic studies. We were sitting around in the majlis room, sprawled against the cushions. We had finished all the lessons of the day, practiced new verbs, done all the dialogues to death, and we had a few minutes left before classes ended. Our teachers were really special women, and during these last minutes it was always question time, when we could ask them anything, anything, and they would answer, even if sometimes to laugh and tell us it was none of our business. We had so many questions!
“When we go downtown, ” I had started, “we have a good time. We laugh and we talk and chat among ourselves as we shop. But when we see local women shopping, we see you in groups, but you aren’t laughing or chatting. Is there some prohibition against it?”
There was a long silence. I really liked this teacher, and she really liked me. I knew, as the silence dragged on, she was seeking for a way to be kind. Finally, she spoke.
“You know, we understand you have other ways, not our ways. We don’t judge you by our standards. . .” and she gave a little sigh.
“In our culture, for a woman to laugh out loud in public . . .it would be taken as lack of self control. People could criticize. It could keep a young woman from making a good marriage.”
You could hear the collective gasp. Although it was said with great kindness, it was a serious blow.
When you are first learning a new language, and a new culture, it can be intimidating, but mostly, if it is well taught, it is fun, exciting, and stimulating to be mastering a new skill. The women at this language center went to a lot of trouble to insure that we were entertained while we were learning. They taught us Ramadan customs, they prepared an Iftar supper for us, they brought in all their jewelry and produced a bride. They henna’d our hands, and poured us tiny cups of qa’wa and chai with milk and spices. They took us on field trips. They treated us like sisters, or daughters. They were so kind, and babied us along as we struggled with the new language.
I give this teacher a lot of credit. She could have finessed the question, but she didn’t. She considered her answer, she knew it could offend us. And she chose to answer us honestly, trusting we would deal with it.
I had a physical reaction. I wanted so badly to “get” Arabic, to understand all the customs . . . but to give up laughter? I went through all the stages of grief, staying longest with denial and anger. I thought of all the times I headed for the souks in a gaggle of laughing women, and I felt ignorant, and ashamed, and also angry. It was a real struggle for me, a blow to my pride, an embarrassment. I felt sick to my stomach, and stayed depressed for a couple weeks. I didn’t want to change. I didn’t want to have to give up laughter.
And then one day, somehow, it stopped mattering so much. Time did its work. Life went on. The teacher kept teaching, we kept learning. I no longer go downtown in groups of more than three, and we keep our voices down. We’re still our loud, noisy selves most of the time, among ourselves, but in public – we don’t want to be thought of as women who lack self-control.
Fantasy Dubai Skyscrapers
My very cool nephew who works at Google sent me an e-mail this morning telling me to look at these photos. One of these days I will figure out how to link, but meanwhile, cut and paste to see these fantastic images of Dubai skyscrapers soaring above the fog – looks like a science fiction set or fairy tale city.
“Somebody posted these on Digg.com, thought you might enjoy looking at them. Very cool photos of Dubai skyscrapers piercing a layer of fog.”
http://www.flickr.com/photos/our_dubai_property_investment/sets/1531412/
“I Didn’t Teach You That!”
“I didn’t teach you that!” I exclaimed, mentally reviewing everything we had learned together in the last two years. This girl was SMART. If she learned this from me, I had to think carefully when I taught it – she was smart, and she remembers things.
We had just finished critiqueing a presentation she was about to make, in English, on quitting smoking. She had prepared puppets, and a dialogue, and oh! She did a great job! We were sitting in a restaurant, in a private room, where we could eat and still have fun without worrying about embarrassing ourselves.
“No, khalti, no, you didn’t teach us that in words. But that is what you DID,” she responded.
Hunh? Hmmmm. I had to think about that. While I was thinking, she continued.
“When we would say we wanted to do something, you would say ‘OK, what does your week look like? How would Monday after schoool work?’ and we would DO it. You didn’t just talk about things, you did them. When you start a project, you finish it. This is the most important thing I learned from you.”
There are some things you can’t teach; it’s just words. There are things you teach and you have no idea you are teaching. I have to admit, I got choked up.
And I have no idea where this smart young woman is going to go with her life, but I can’t wait to see.
Learning Opportunities
“Oh! I am so sorry!” I exclaimed. I caught them grinning as we worked on a project, and remembered the article I had read that morning in the Gulf Times.
“Sorry?” they looked puzzled. “Why khalti?”
“I’m humming! I’m so sorry! You are fobidden to hear music during Ramadan!” I apologized.
“No, khalti! Where did you get that idea?”
“In today’s Gulf Times” I replied, and went to get the morning paper. The three of us read through the article, on the religion page, together. It was in English, and I secretly rejoiced – a perfect opportunity!
I hate classroom teaching. I trained as a teacher, and actually, I loved my students, but oh, the classroom just overwhelms me. For one thing, I must be a little ADD (attention deficit disorder) because when the bell rings, and I know I have fifty five minutes in the classroom, I feel TRAPPED. I bet you didn’t know that some teachers feel that way, too!
What I like is living learning, and that is why I think those who are home schooling are enjoying so much success – really small classes, individual attention, and hands-on examples to illustrate what is being taught.
“We have to check with our Mom and Dad, they can tell us why, but we don’t believe this” they said, as we finished reading the article. (Teacher secretly dances for joy! They are reading in English with full comprehension!)
Later they came back to me and explained – in English – that while some believers felt that all music was forbidden at ALL times, not only during Ramadan, other believers felt that it was not forbidden, as long as it did not deal with forbidden things, like sex. This time, I really did dance. They could explain a complex subject to me in English, and I learned something too. This is the best kind of teaching, when the teacher also gets to learn from her students.
Change Two
It’s a continuing theme – the Locard Exchange Principal in every day life. We live in foreign cultures, we pick up foreign ideas. Change 1 was one of the earliest entries in the blog – investment. Investment is not alien to my culture; investing to protect yourself against an uncertain future, as insurance and as protection for your children – that got through to us and accelerated the investment process. Starting early in our married life paid off big dividends.
Change Two came in Jordan. We had finished an amazing dinner at a private home, mezze’s, a mensef (huge platter of rice flavored with leban, spices and sultanas, with meat – in this case, lamb, but we have also had goat or chicken served as mensef). The host was peeling an orange and had that look in his eye that tells you he is thinking about something and isn’t sure whether he should voice it or not. He struggles, and then he goes ahead . ..
“I don’t understand one thing about your culture” he says. I am surprised; this is a very sophisticated man, well educated, holding a high position. He has travelled. . . it will be interesting to see what comes next.
“Why is it you kick your children out of the house at such an early age? You love your children – I just don’t understand.”
We had observed the opposite – that in Jordan, young people lived with their parents, even after graduation from university, sometimes even after being married. . . and it seemed very alien to us, very uncomfortable.
We are raised knowing that the goal is to be independent, to live on our own. It is very very scary, but a rite of passage. You leave school, you find a place to live, you pay rent, you pay your own bills, you look for a mate – all on your own. You are supposed to be educated and wise, but you still feel very young and not at all sure of your own judgement. You can ask your parents for advice, but you are expected to make your own decisions. Eventually, you get the hang of it.
But . . . through the years, that question nagged at us. It opened us up to a new way of thinking. It would come up from time to time. Just that one little question, popping into our minds. Having friends from other cultures who helped their kids out well beyond college gave us some different ideas, a different model.
It’s a fine line. We don’t want to intrude on our son’s privacy; we want to be close without being interfering. And at the same time, he will inheirit everything from us – why should we not be helpful now, during the years of struggle, when he and his wife could use the help?
At the same time, we don’t want to be so generous as to preclude them from developing their own financial strategies, from learning thrift, and the thrill of finding a good buy. We want them to know the thrill of discovering for themselves how to balance spending and savings, investment in major purchases and investment in family.
We are so thankful for that thoughtful friend, a friend with the courage to risk asking a question that might be perceived as impolite.His question caused us to do things a little differently. It wasn’t immediate, but a long term effect; it caused us to question our own way of doing things and moderate it into a more supportive approach.
Opposite World
I need to write this post while I am freshly back home, because it wears off, you forget the sharpness of the differences . . .
You have to think about how you will manage your bags when you get here, because there will be no willing men with carts to do it for you.
Getting on the highway . . . people are so polite. People drive exactly at the speed limit, or maybe up to 4 miles over. If you put on your turn signal, they slow down and allow you to enter their lane. No one weaves back and forth, no one gets on your tail and insists you get out of their way. Traffic flows smoothly, predictably. People are wearing seat belts; their babies are in baby seats and their children are buckled in the back seat. It’s five lanes, and it’s all very tame. Our testosterone drivers in Kuwait would find it very very dull. I didn’t see a single accident, or single wrecked car all the way home, about twenty miles.
At the grocery stores, there are places for inviduals to put their grocery carts back – and they really do. There are also enough parking places. The cashiers also put the groceries in a bag for you, but there is no one who carries them out to your car.
The streets are immaculate – not because we have hoards of people to pick them up, but because people here have a horror of littering – and huge fines that discourage the rare few who would toss a kleenex out a window.
Service providers are more helpful, and less servile. There is a sense of interchangeable rolls – the guy behind the counter at Starbucks might also be a full time IT student at the local university, just piling up a few barista bucks to pay his way through school. (There is always a tip jar in every Starbucks – Have you ever noticed there are no tip jars at the Starbucks in Kuwait?) The gal behind the counter at the grocery store might live just up the street from you. The guy at the Half Price book store has kids at the same school where your child goes to school. It’s different when all the workers are part of the same community.
The health care worker living with my parents to take care of my father is treated like family. He’s from Ghana. I watch him watch us as we gather. I imagine some of it is very familiar to him – the way women communicate when family gathers, laughter, tears, family business, making plans and arrangements. And I imagine some of it is very . . . foreign. I would love to read HIS blog!
There are seasons here. You need to have socks with you to keep your feet warm, and closed-toed shoes. There are trees that were green two months ago, and are now a flaming red, or orange, or yellow. I need a sweater outside, over a shirt. It’s cool, but not yet really cold.
Part of the transportation system here is ferry boats. People take them to get to work. My home town is, like Kuwait City, on the beach, but the water is not jade green, but a deeper, colder blue.
Karma Payback
When I started this blog, one of the first posts I wrote was about getting an upgrade. This trip, it was karma payback. I booked a ticket and paid online, and later when I tried to reserve my seat online, I kept getting an error message. When I got to the airport, (confirmation in my hand, thank God) the clerk said my reservation had been cancelled. I had paid extra to have an upgradeable ticket, and to be able to change dates if I need to – it took the fixer-guy over an hour and a half to figure out how to re-instate my reservation.
And I asked for an upgrade – I have thousands and thousands of frequent flyer miles; I don’t need a free ticket but it helps on the night flights to be in business class because you can lie down and sleep! Makes a difference when you have a long way to go. But they didn’t give any upgrades – and when I got on the place, the entire business section in front of where we were sitting was . . . EMPTY. Go figure!
In Europe, I asked for an upgrade for the next leg – not free, I am willing to cash in miles, but the snotty desk clerk told me my ticket was the non-upgradable kind. It doesn’t do any good to lose it in those circumstances, but I was steamed. What did I pay extra for??? When the guy who fixed my reservation fixed it, I guess he didn’t put in the right code. I’m screwed.
After the next flight, which was very long (had a good seatmate, though, quiet, like me, but when we talked it was about books and families and comfortable stuff) I went through immigration and because this was my fifth trip back home this year, when I filled out the immigration form, I listed that I wasn’t bringing back anything. And I wasn’t. I barely have the right clothes. But that got the attention of customs, and I got the full inspection, which after you’ve been travelling for more than 28 hours is annoying. They were cordial enough, but they went through everything, suitcases, carry-ons and purse, very thoroughly. And found nothing.
Last, but not least, I went to pick up my rental car, only to discover I don’t have my stateside driver’s license with me. After half an hour of desperate searching (I am an organized person; things are where they are supposed to be! but it wasn’t!) I offered her my Kuwait license, which she couldn’t read and said she couldn’t accept, and then, miracle of miracles, I came across my old Germany driver’s license. A German license is good for life. And, thanks be to God, she accepted it. And on top of that, for some amazing reason, using a German license made the rate even better than renting in my own state with a state license. Again – go figure.
And I just figure all of that is karma payback for all the good luck I have had in previous trips. We have a saying: Every monkey gets his turn in the barrel. I guess it was just my turn.
We Make a Difference: Incremental Change
Here is what the experts have told us:
Germany and France can never live in peace with one another.
Northern and Southern Ireland can never live in peace.
Germany reunite? Unthinkable. They are too far apart.
Black and white will never be able to live together in South Africa.
The Serbians and the Moslem Croatians will never find a way to live in peace.
The European Union will never work.
The Soviet Union is impregnable.
Kuwaiti women will never get the vote.
There will never be peace in Lebanon.
These were not lies. The experts who told us these things were wise people, making their best guesses. When experts say things, we tend to believe them.
And here is what I saw – before the fall of the Soviet Union, things didn’t work. Toilet paper was rationed. There were no lightbulbs in the lamps. There were no hangers on hotel closets. In the market was only cabbage, sausage and tuna fish. The people were told that the West was failing, and that the supermarkets and stores were fakes, “Potemkin” villages, special effects to fool good Communists in a desperate attempt to make them think Democracy was working. But in every hotel room, when you checked in, the TV was already on – the chambermaids watched CNN, and then went home and told their families what was REALLY going on in the world.
And word of mouth, the truth spread.
There are some wonderful things happening in the world, technologies that could be used for good or for evil.
Cameras. Video cameras. Cell phones. Cell phones with cameras and videos. Google Earth. The Internet. It’s hard to cover up the truth when people can freely share information.
With these tools, we can hold ourselves, our leaders and our society accountable. Keep your cameras handy. Blog. Share your thoughts, your suspicions. Hold your leaders accountable for their actions. Read the news, and read the blogs from other countries. Refuse to believe there is no hope in appearantly hopeless situations, no matter what the “experts” tell us.
Here is what some experts are telling us today:
There is an imminent clash of cultures between East and West.
The Palestinians will never live in peace with the Israelis.
We can’t do anything about global warming / There is no global warming
Be afraid. Be very afraid.
+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
There are small things we can do, right now, to make incremental changes. Pick up a piece of litter. Buckle your seat belt, and buckle up your children. Give an enemy the benefit of the doubt. Smile at your neighbor, and greet them. Stop and help that poor man broken down by the side of the road. Feed a stray cat. Donate clothing to the poor. Do one small thing, every day. Hold ourselves accountable in small ways, and the overall effect tilts the balance in larger ways.
Dude, You are SOOOOO Busted
What was he thinking? ? ?
“I can’t go another minute without a cigarette. I’ll hide a chair behind the wall and go grab a quick cigarette where no one can see me. . . .ahhhhhhh! All alone. . . Great place to sneak a cigarette. . . no one can see me . . .”
Except for everyone living in the 20-something highrises across the street, you idiot!
DWP – Driving While Poor – to Be Outlawed in Kuwait
I’ve been watching the blogs, and I haven’t seen a mention of this, not a whisper. In yesterday’s Kuwait Times, front page, is an article about the proposal that all cars over ten years of age be taken off the road. The intention is to reduce congestion on the road.
I am guessing this will not apply to collectors of classic cars. I imagine this is aimed at the poorest of the poor, driving what they can afford, and holding their car together with prayer, shoestrings and chewing gum.
If Kuwait had a good public transportation system, this might be part of a solution. As it is – do you ever see a woman on a public bus? Taxis are available, but expensive. Domestic workers tell us that when they have any control over their transportation, they only go with a driver they know and trust.
I would guess that most of the cars 10 years and older on the road are owned by people who really need them, to get their children to school, to get to work, and to get groceries, etc. Legend has it that all these old cars on the road were brought in after the 1st Gulf War and sold – at great profit – to people who previously had been unable to own cars. For the working poor, cars give a smattering of dignity and luxury to a life full of scraping by and saving as much as you can. Yeh, the POS car puttering along in front of you is inconvenient, but have a heart – people need their cars, unless there is a good, reliable, decent and reasonably priced public transit system available to men and to women, which there is not.
I am also hearing friends telling me about the rules about driver’s licenses being enforced – you must be working, or you must have a college degree . . . but it is only applied to some, not to all. . .
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