Memories (1) - Egypt

     Asleep in the tourist bus, brand new and air-conditionned against the heavy temperatures of the country. Heavy for us tourists not used to egyptian weather, even though it was a nice spring. We were being taken from a tourist site to another, we had just passed by Hatshepsut's funeral site. We were now passing by a very poor neighbourhood. I was asleep because we woke up early and stayed up late, in order to be able to take all of what we could of the country in this very small week of holidays. And so, wanting to take all in, I slept through most of our coming and goings, thus missing whole sceneries adn views ...

     During this particular trip, I don't know why I woke up very briefly, thinking that maybe I was yet again missing out on something great. The bus was fast, and just as I opened my eyes, for 2 seconds, I found myself staring at a boy, less than a meter or two from me, behind the window, out in the street or what was passing for a street (a length of dirt flater than elsewhere), the upper half of his body down a roadside bin, with a goat beside him also head in the bin, both awfully skinny, skeletons of a human and a goat respectively, both looking through the garbage, obviously looking for anything that could be eaten. The boy got out of the bin just as the bus rode by with me in it, looking straight at us though not really seeing us, but it felt as if he was staring back at me, precisely me and no one else. 

     It was living scene of extreme misery, but what shocked me even more was this stare, his eyes. Where any one of us could have expected to find some pleading or sadness or anger or some strong emotion «fitting» with what we were seeing, I found nothing but calm. A calm look, serene, with maybe a hint of interrogation, and not even curiousity. Rich tourists passing by were a daily occurrence to this boy, just as not finding food and no clean clothes to put on. So we didn't deserve curiosity or anything else. He just happened to hear the noise of the bus, wondering if he was too close to the road, so he just glanced at the bus' curving trajectory. In that glance, for a quarter of a second that seems an hour in my memory, I saw this incredible stare of a starving boy in the middle of nothing but old houses and dirt. It disturbed me much more than any TV news I had seen on poverty or any other sort of subject usually linked to the «third world», the majority world I had never seen up until that moment, this unexpected holidays in Egypt I spent when I was 16, with my godfather and his family.

     I discovered at that moment that the rest of the world didn't need us, and especially didn't need pity or tears or the like, and possibly could be better off without us. That the rest of the world was staring back at us as an equal, and possibly a «stronger» equal in that it had not much too lose, unlike us, the rich tourists who couldn't survive a mild springtime without air conditioning.

     The boy didn't need pity. He needed food, but didn't ask for it, he was looking for it by himself. And wondering how to come by it, and how things came that rich tourists were passing by his village everyday. And maybe how all this could be changed. Unless that is what I wanted him to think, when it's more plausible he was being fatalistic, thinking that the only thing that was within his grasp was to look for food in trash bins. But then that too, could be only what an intellectual would like to think, that all arabs are fatalistic ...

    What was behind these eyes, I'll never know for sure, but I discovered a whole new world, less than a meter or two from me. I remember this boy more clearly now than the pyramids or anything else in Egypt.

  بالعربية هنا

Like-mindedness

      "I began to wonder about the calmness exuded by so many of the "sisters" and "brothers". Not all; these are human beings we're talking about. But many. And on my visit to Iran this September, the washing, kneeling, chanting recitations of the prayers at the mosques I visited reminded me of the west's view of an entirely different religion; one that is known for eschewing violence and embracing peace and love through quiet meditation. A religion trendy with movie stars such as Richard Gere, and one that would have been much easier to admit to following in public – Buddhism. Indeed, the bending, kneeling and submission of Muslim prayers resound with words of peace and contentment. Each one begins, "Bismillahir rahmaneer Raheem" – "In the name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate" – and ends with the phrase "Assalamu Alaykhum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh" – Peace be upon you all and God's mercy and blessing."

                                  Lauren Booth in The Guardian, full article here.

        I have finally stumbled upon an article of a convert's experience that is very close to mine, particurlarly for this "discovery" of muslim prayer feeling like a buddhist experience ( or what we imagine in the west being a buddhist experience ) : the utter feel of peace and calmness with repetitive words and gestures on (pretty much often) a pretty little rug. This experience I had in Hebron in the West Bank, when out of curiosity I asked the mother of the family I was staying with to show me how it was done. I was then very much in a great indecision, I was pulled towards Judaïsm as much as Islam or anything else. I knew I wanted to convert to something else than my christian/catholic/deism I was born into, I always knew that and always kept ( and still do ) a great interest in other religions and beliefs, but the more I went, the more the idea of monotheism fitted me, on a personal level. And I was there, on this now-tortured land I always dreamed of visiting, "the Holy Land", and especially its spiritual capital Jerusalem/Al Quds which remains to this days my favorite city ever. And I expected anything, any sort of glorious "revelation" or deafening experience, anything, but something big, huge, loud. And instead the only religious feeling I found was this, during this prayer in a house somewhere in the destroyed and invaded land, an utter peace of soul and mind for 5 minutes, induced by simple coordination of words and gestures. So contradictory to what I was seeing all around me in terms of injustice and violence. People, a lot of them, actually managed to stay calm, when there was every reason to be revolted and violent (as my french spirit was telling me).

        So I expected everything, anything, but this small yet powerful little moment of utter calm. Of evidence. And so I'm happy to see I wasn't the only one experiencing this.

Mother tongue burn-out. (Has it ever happened to you ?)

     A weird thing happened to me some time ago. I got bored, with this angry sort of boredom, of my mother tongue. I had to think in english, and read stuff in english, even though I could find it more easily in french. Which is not the best way to go when you live in the middle of France and you have to deal with people only in french. But I couldn't tolerate french anymore. It is very weird because it never happened with the other languages I ever studied, so why should it happen with the first one I ever learned ? 

      I have always been interested in other languages as far as I can recall, and technically the first language I spoke when I was a kid was not french, but that's another story, and I was never a fan of my own language, it was just a mean to read stories, but not a enjoyable thing in itself. I was more interested in what I didn't understand. And I always viewed french as particularly unattractive language, with flat sounds and no rythm, compared to my father's italian or the english and spanish we learned at school. So I have always been enjoying foreign languages, but it never led me to despise the french language or get bored of it. I even discovered the ultimate antidote to the flatness of french : reading books by Victor Hugo. This is the only author I ever read who manages to make french beautiful to my ears, to the point I'd read aloud whole paragraphs, for the sheer beauty of the sentences.

      So I never had any reason to get bored of my mother tongue, only not to use it more than I had to. 

But some time ago I also realized how much I forgot as to my french culture and knowledge, and how many years I spent reading tons of books ... In english or arabic, but no more than a dozen in french.

      So I saw in the library a book, written by a famous living french author, member of the French Academy, I read 2 paragraphs, found her style rather nice, so I borrowed it, thinking «that's good to get back into the french, a book by a talented writer that I certainly should know more about» ... And I have started to read it, and the more I read, the more I disliked it : the style appeared to me pompous, overdone, poetic but to the point where some sentences didn't have any meaning (grammaticaly correct but didn't correspond to anything in the story), and the story, well, very disappointing. Very orientalist in the sense that it is exaclty what the french intelligenstia wants to read on the subject, though I sometimes enjoy orientalist stuff (being an Edward Said's fan doesn't prevent from enjoying orientalist stuff when it's well done), so cliché in everything ... And still I forced myself to go on, because I had set it a goal «I have to read this author, it's part of the french culture, etc», homework-style.

      And days after it struck me that I got this bad habit back, doing «homework». One of the greatest language-learning tips website out there (AJATT)* explains it perfectly : you don't get better at something by doing stuff you don't like. I had applied his counsel on my foreign languages learning, doing stuff I liked and nothing else, not doing it because «I should» but because I liked it, like a kid learning ... Well, learning his mother tongue. So what I was doing well with my foreign languages I forgot to apply to my mother tongue, as if it was an entirely different matter. But, it's just a language, the fact that it's the first I learned doesn't matter. So I stopped reading the book, and took up reading something else. And since then, my angry boredom is already deflating, if not entirely gone.

      But th delfating tendency reassures me since I'm planning to take up 3 years of study to train as a FLE teacher ( French as a Foreign Language teacher)**, the best way I found up to now to go and live overseas. I have other plans, with the same goal, but this one looks great, with great opportunities in countries I'd love to live in (i.e. Northen Iraq, or iraqi kurdistan). (I know, I tend to like places that make my parents suddenly scream in alarm). So it's not totally lost, I might yet enjoy my mother tongue again ! Especially given the fact that I know I always enjoyed it more when I was in a foreign country. "Having the monopole of exosticism" says my sister. The notion deserves a whole post I think !

* A website dedicated to japanese, but all the author's tips and counsels are in english, and it's all true for any language you might want to learn. This website actually helped me a lot to keep my motivation intact with my learning process, and to find new ways of enjoying this process. And still does, obviously, even for my mother tongue.
** which is not my core studies and interests ( middle-eastern languages and history, anthropology ), but a PhD in history or social anthropology - which I plan to do someday - doesn't give you a job in France. The closest thing to my goals, as a mean to economically survive in this world, is then translator or FLE teacher. And for that, well, other diplomas are needed ... ( But I don't complain, I love studies ! )

Affaires de gros sous

"Pour la société Twitter également, les investissements du prince saoudien n’ont pas vraiment une importance capitale (!). Plutôt moins en tout cas que ceux consentis cet été par Yuri Milner. Mais alors que celui-ci a une trajectoire financière nettement plus sinueuse que celle de son concurrent saoudien, l’entrée de ce tycoon russe des médias dans le capital du second site au monde (après Facebook) pour l’échange d’information n’a guère soulevé de critiques, si ce n’est dans quelques publications spécialisées (voir cet article dans Wired en octobre dernier).

A l’évidence, les acteurs arabes du monde du numérique continuent à susciter plus de suspicions que les autres. S’ils investissent dans les nouvelles technologies de la communication, ce n’est jamais pure spéculation financière ; il y a forcément une mauvaise intention politique derrière" ... lire l'article d'Yves Gonzalez Quijano en entier ici.

Ce qui me fait rappeler ce bon vieux Voltaire : "Quand il s'agit d'argent, tout le monde est de la même religion". Mais bon, visiblement selon le teint de peau ou la nationalité du propriétaire, on a droit à plus ou moins de réactions ...

TerraFerma

... de Emanuele Crialese.

Another beautiful movie. Story : an italian island, rather poor, trying to convert from a fishing-based economy to a tourist activities-based one, and illegal african immigrants end up on the shore and the island last fisher’s boat, who saves 3 of them, obeying «the law of the sea» ( never live someone at sea ), in full contradiction to the official law «leave the clandestines to authorities, don’t pick them up ( even if they’re drowning ... ), and in any case, denounce them» . You see all the inhabitants’ reactions to the events, and you always wonder, as a european, safe at home, what horrors and misery could convince people to leave their country definitely, at so much risks ( death, mistreatment ... ).

Beau film, à voir ... Histoire d’une île italienne, pauvre, qui essaie de s’en sortir avec le tourisme quand la pêche ne suffit plus, qui se retrouve confrontée à l’arrivée de clandestins, dont 3 sont sauvés par le dernier pêcheur de l’île, selon la loi de la mer «on ne laisse personne à la mer», contraire aux nouvelles lois concernant les immigrés clandestins ( on les dénonce d’abord au autorités qui viennent les «repêcher», on n’est pas sensé les prendre à bord même s’ils se noient ). Et donc on y voit les différentes réactions des habitants de l’île, et des touristes. Et comme toujours devant ce genre de scène, on se demande quelles horreurs, quelle misère, peuvent pousser autant de gens à quitter leur pays à autant de risques et périls.

فيلم «تيرا فيرما» (معنى بالاطالي «البر» عكس البحر)

قصة تقع في جزيرة صغيرة اطاليانة ويعيشون الناس فيها فقيرين ويتحالون ان يكسب معيشتهم من السياحة بدلا من الصيد ... والصياد الاخير ينقذ من الماء مهاجرين غير رسميين من  افريقا الذين ضاعوا وسط البحر. 

ينقذهم مطيعا لقانون البحر «لا تترك احدا وراء في البحر» عكس لقانون الشرطة ... ومن هذه الاحداث قصة تجري حول ردود فعل من المقيمين والسياحيين . وامام قصة المهاجرين ,تتسائل دائما وانت الاروبي في بلد امين وغني ما هي البئس والحياة المخيفة التي تجعل كل هؤلاء الناس تغدرون بلادهم يتعرضون انفسهم لاخطار عدة مثل ما تحكي عنها امرأة من المهاجرين ...

Yes ... I've been telling the same thing for months.

But coming from such an important guy, it feels really good : 


"But the west should be patient with us, democracy will not come in six months or six years, and in the west it took centuries, so let us also have a little bit of time to get used to it. Some of the opposition leaders in Egypt were released from jail after the fall of Mubarak so don't expect them to behave like polished diplomats."


Wadah Khanfar, ex-director general of Al Jazeera, in this really enjoyable interview

Yvonne Ridley writing ...

... "In The Hands Of The Talibans"

"Hamid says everyone is very bothered that I'm not eating and asks if there's something wrong with the food, if I have a special diet or would prefer hotel food. They constantly refer to me as their guest and say they are sad if I am sad. I can't believe it. the Taliban are trying to kill me with their kindness" (p.127)

(upon her liberation) :

"They followed us for the next few miles and shouted to passers-by pointing my vehicle. These people are amazing. No grudges, no signs of hostility, yet, only hours earlier, Britain and America had bombed the hell out of them." (p.171)

(to fellow journalist critizing her captivity account) :

" I know Afghan women are treated horrendously by the Taliban and I hardly think the Northen Alliance, whose human rights record is just as appalling, will treat women any better. But I cannot be held responsible for the way the entire female population of Afghanistan is being treated" (p.210)

     This is one of the best I read if its kind (account of a journalist in a war zone). It raises several questions and remarks that would take pages, so I'll try to be quick : autobiography by a journalist held hostage by the Talibans just before and during the first day of the american invasion of Afghanistan.  The writing is good in a journalistic way, she manages to render what's going on inside her head as well as around her, what she tells of her previous life before the events taking place in the book is amazing, I wonder how you can manage to have so many lives wrapped into one. 

     The book radiates the author's strong personnality, you wonder at times if she's not out of her mind instead of plain courageous or stupidly brave, but she has the merit to try to be objective about what she witnesses, even if it's not what she expected. She really represents for me what is a true journalist, this willingness to discover things and report them in any condition, and almost at whatever cost for herself. For those who wants to know what happens "behind the curtains" this book is great. the world of journalism and politics and wars, and how anyone can be manipulated is frightening (the last chapter is maybe the most frightening of the book, even more than her actual detention in Afghanistan). 

     I'm really surprised this book is of print - I bought the last copy I found on Amazon (which had been around for 2 years but I waited to get a decent price), and not re-printed. Maybe as she says "It's very difficult because we know they're [the Talibans] brutal and yet they treated me with kindness and respect. People won't like it but I have to tell the truth". When events don't go with what we expect, it's silently buried by other opinions more "acceptable" ... In this book (contrary to what you might think if you read only her wikipedia profile) she's not more pro-"taliban" than pro-"western", she does her job of critizing any side of the game she gets to meet, and I guess that's why no-one bothers re-printing her book, when a "east-west conflict" story sells much better. Another journalist too independent. 

Maybe she ended up disgusted of what she was confronted to during the years after her return to the UK, because it seems know she works for a iranian TV channel, and according to her wikipedia article became a fierce critic of the "west". When you read the book you understand her subsequent turns of life (conversion to islam, etc), especially in the final chapters, when she's released.