من شارع حرية
thanks for all the feedback re etiquette (slight sarcasm). French is all around me and it just didnt come to mind for some reason.
im back into the swing of things to do with study. i am really savouring the experience although it may not sound that way from some of my previous outbursts. i am privileged to be in Tunisia learning arabic and although i have never felt this stupid, well maybe once or twice before but not for this extended period of time, i feel like another world is opening up for me, albeit grain by grain.
im in an internet cafe listening to my broken mp3 player. Brent, after having a couple of red wines, tried to wrestle with me in the darkness of a desert night down south. although he was largely unsuccesful i did end up rolling down the side of a previously untampered dune with my mp3 in my pocket. the next morning i found it with a cracked screen, unable to change it from random play. now i either sit and bet on the one in 430 probabality that my song will come up or else accept the fact and lsiten to the sound track of my life, as God wills.
with this in mind i sometimes walk to school. i leave as the sun comes up and arrive at school around 1 hour and 5 minutes later. the cars build up and blow their horns around me. at intersections the traffic police blow their whistles every other second as i often overtake the same car 5 times before it finds a clearing and weaves away ahead of me. this hour and 5 minutes together with my abstract arrangement of music provides me with deep insights at times, about life and the way of all things. but i am pressed to get to school on or around time so i dont write them down, instead frantically repeating them in my mind in order to keep them in memory. not always successful but perhaps they will be come to mind easier sooner or later. i promise myself to do this more often, even more, to take the time and walk to no certain place by no certain time. but these are the sort of promises and grand ideals we make in the comfort of a peaceful mind but do not neccesarily manifest and materialise when confronted with 'life' - or at least i am speaking for myself. nevertheless, we do try.
...............
tunisia is really a confused country. the people here dont know if they,re arab or european. being a liberal Muslim country - mostly secular - they are shunned by other states in the middle east but can never quite make it with the frenchies and italians. nevertheless they tag along like some unwanted acquaitance that europe doesnt really care for. and although deep down they're definately arab, Tunisia's bold move in 1957 towards secularism and europe has helped them construct a platform on which to look down over the rest of the arab/muslim world shuold they need to.
and sometimes they do. they are insecure and looking for an identity. "what do you think of tunisia?"... in broken english. even more pertinently; "what do you think of tunisians?" ...pause... and i reply: 'i love it, the people are very beautiful.' and this is true but the pause is an honest reflection about a people who are really asking for reassurance and reaffirmation.
i looked in on an english class with a group of adult tunisians the other day. the topic was sterotypes, and although it was initially a light hearted discussion, the discussion soon began to reveal the communities outward discourses about others, and naturally then, about themselves. superficial schisms between people and societies were progressively emboldened as the guise of a 'light hearted discussion' allowed the protagonists views to be liberated. but, as it was evident to me anyhow, 'liberated' only by their insecurities and lack of awareness. even the words 'generally speaking ofcourse' were lost and long forgotten.
and how easy it is to note this here in Tunis. me, coming from a privileged country and a privileged society with liberal ideas and the freedom to choose and speak as i like. i can look upon this country and pick at it with my sophisticated academic insights and knowledge acquired through 'unbiased' informational sources... can't i? i mean my preconcieved ideas of political and socio-economic backwardness could well be justified. the president here recieves 95 per cent of the vote and has remained in power for almost two decades. his dignified picture is framed and hung in public view in every shop, politics here is a sensitive topic to speak about in the street, and the disparity between rich and poor is absurd. i can pick this place to pieces and im sure most people do, if they are that way inclined. but in truth, if i was another way inclined, i see the same insecurities in my own nation. and they may be just as real as the view that a westerner sees in tunisia. issues of identity? insecurity? ignorance? i can see it every day back home on tv, in the newspapers, in the streets and pubs, and in myself. and these things don't disappear easily regardless of how hard we may pretend they aren't there.
every society has weaknesses and every society can be differentiated by way of characterisations. today, with all that we are shown from our globalised media environment, it is all the more easy to do so. but on a personal level these differences are fundamentally subverted by one similarity. you can figure it out. not even ideas can break down that similarity. only insecurity, ignorance and our fallibility, in essence; our vulnerabilities. i dont want to give it away too early but thats not bad news. without vulnerabilities we are not human. it is how we accept these vulnerabilities, and, in the words of the late Curtis Mayfield, 'move on up', that we become really alive.
xo
im back into the swing of things to do with study. i am really savouring the experience although it may not sound that way from some of my previous outbursts. i am privileged to be in Tunisia learning arabic and although i have never felt this stupid, well maybe once or twice before but not for this extended period of time, i feel like another world is opening up for me, albeit grain by grain.
im in an internet cafe listening to my broken mp3 player. Brent, after having a couple of red wines, tried to wrestle with me in the darkness of a desert night down south. although he was largely unsuccesful i did end up rolling down the side of a previously untampered dune with my mp3 in my pocket. the next morning i found it with a cracked screen, unable to change it from random play. now i either sit and bet on the one in 430 probabality that my song will come up or else accept the fact and lsiten to the sound track of my life, as God wills.
with this in mind i sometimes walk to school. i leave as the sun comes up and arrive at school around 1 hour and 5 minutes later. the cars build up and blow their horns around me. at intersections the traffic police blow their whistles every other second as i often overtake the same car 5 times before it finds a clearing and weaves away ahead of me. this hour and 5 minutes together with my abstract arrangement of music provides me with deep insights at times, about life and the way of all things. but i am pressed to get to school on or around time so i dont write them down, instead frantically repeating them in my mind in order to keep them in memory. not always successful but perhaps they will be come to mind easier sooner or later. i promise myself to do this more often, even more, to take the time and walk to no certain place by no certain time. but these are the sort of promises and grand ideals we make in the comfort of a peaceful mind but do not neccesarily manifest and materialise when confronted with 'life' - or at least i am speaking for myself. nevertheless, we do try.
...............
tunisia is really a confused country. the people here dont know if they,re arab or european. being a liberal Muslim country - mostly secular - they are shunned by other states in the middle east but can never quite make it with the frenchies and italians. nevertheless they tag along like some unwanted acquaitance that europe doesnt really care for. and although deep down they're definately arab, Tunisia's bold move in 1957 towards secularism and europe has helped them construct a platform on which to look down over the rest of the arab/muslim world shuold they need to.
and sometimes they do. they are insecure and looking for an identity. "what do you think of tunisia?"... in broken english. even more pertinently; "what do you think of tunisians?" ...pause... and i reply: 'i love it, the people are very beautiful.' and this is true but the pause is an honest reflection about a people who are really asking for reassurance and reaffirmation.
i looked in on an english class with a group of adult tunisians the other day. the topic was sterotypes, and although it was initially a light hearted discussion, the discussion soon began to reveal the communities outward discourses about others, and naturally then, about themselves. superficial schisms between people and societies were progressively emboldened as the guise of a 'light hearted discussion' allowed the protagonists views to be liberated. but, as it was evident to me anyhow, 'liberated' only by their insecurities and lack of awareness. even the words 'generally speaking ofcourse' were lost and long forgotten.
and how easy it is to note this here in Tunis. me, coming from a privileged country and a privileged society with liberal ideas and the freedom to choose and speak as i like. i can look upon this country and pick at it with my sophisticated academic insights and knowledge acquired through 'unbiased' informational sources... can't i? i mean my preconcieved ideas of political and socio-economic backwardness could well be justified. the president here recieves 95 per cent of the vote and has remained in power for almost two decades. his dignified picture is framed and hung in public view in every shop, politics here is a sensitive topic to speak about in the street, and the disparity between rich and poor is absurd. i can pick this place to pieces and im sure most people do, if they are that way inclined. but in truth, if i was another way inclined, i see the same insecurities in my own nation. and they may be just as real as the view that a westerner sees in tunisia. issues of identity? insecurity? ignorance? i can see it every day back home on tv, in the newspapers, in the streets and pubs, and in myself. and these things don't disappear easily regardless of how hard we may pretend they aren't there.
every society has weaknesses and every society can be differentiated by way of characterisations. today, with all that we are shown from our globalised media environment, it is all the more easy to do so. but on a personal level these differences are fundamentally subverted by one similarity. you can figure it out. not even ideas can break down that similarity. only insecurity, ignorance and our fallibility, in essence; our vulnerabilities. i dont want to give it away too early but thats not bad news. without vulnerabilities we are not human. it is how we accept these vulnerabilities, and, in the words of the late Curtis Mayfield, 'move on up', that we become really alive.
xo
posted by Handsome Hish at 2:05 AM
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