Not a Pity Oscar

Amman, Jordan

When they said that Heath Ledger deserved an Oscar for his performance as the Joker in Batman: The Dark Knight, I scoffed. A pity Oscar, for sure: poor guy dies young, we give him an Oscar out of sympathy. I was wrong.

We went to see The Dark Knight last night, and I was amazed. There were many stunning performances in this film, not least of which were the supporting roles of Michael Cane as Alfred, and Morgan Freeman as Lucius Fox, the man who runs Wayne Enterprises while Batman is capering about saving Gotham. And under all the fantastic special effects, the screenplay, too, deserves credit for exposing very real, visceral truths about human nature and politics, as well as the very thin line between the archetypical hero and the archetypical villain. Batman, the Joker and Harvey Dent/Two-Face have a great deal in common in this film. They are all idealists in their own way, all three acting outside the law as judge, jury and executioner, and it can seem in The Dark Knight that the only thing that makes Batman the hero and not the others is the moral influence of Alfred and Fox.

But ultimately, it was truly Heath Ledger's performance that distinguished this film. I don't know enough about acting to really express why, but despite his overt insanity, Ledger's Joker was the most human villian I can remember in a Batman film, perhaps even in a superhero film. He made the whole film work, on both its literal and its symbolic levels.

Pictures

My pictures from our trip to Wadi Rum and other escapades in Jordan are now available on Facebook, and can be accessed at this link even if you don't belong to Facebook:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=31634&l=2f1bc&id=742577970

If you are a member of Facebook, there are also pictures of me taken by other people as we traipsed about the country. More of my pictures from Wadi Rum and the village will be forthcoming, so stay tuned to the above link.

P.S. Sorry for the quality of some of the pictures. My film's been in the heat and/or through airport security too many times!

I've Still Got It!

Amman, Jordan

I was beginning to wonder if I would ever learn Arabic well enough to be a simultaneous interpreter of Arabic, which is my current career goal, or even if I could still pull off a career in interpreting at all, but today I proved to myself that I've still got it!

We had a really special field trip today to Raghadan Palace, the seat of power (literally! We saw the throne) and oldest of Jordan's royal palaces, where we were treated to a tour (in Arabic, of course) of the palace. We were accompanied by an external auditor for the Critical Language Scholarship program, a delightful linguist who, however, speaks no Arabic, and so I asked her if she might be interested in a little translation. She was, of course, so I went right ahead. I was a little slow at first, very out of practice, but by the end of the tour, I knew that I had it back.

Not only can I still interpret, but when the subject matter is fairly familiar, I can even intepret Arabic. Another year or two here in the Arab world, a summer or two in Germany, and I'll be ready for the Monterey Institute!

Small Grants Are Still Effective...

...sometimes even more effective.

Madaba, Jordan

This hypothesis is, of course, what won economist Muhammad Yunus the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize. He revolutionized development with his policy of microcredit, giving loans as little as $100 or less, especially to women, to start businesses in the cottage industries, handicrafts, and other mundane matters. Banks have traditionally believed that such tiny loans were not worth the effort, or were to risky, as such borrowers are the poorest of the poor. Yunus, however, found that these borrowers are extremely reliable, and that their contributions to the welfare and development of their communities were incredibly important to improving life in the poorest of the world's communities.

That's why I was so disappointed, in a job interview I did today, to hear that USAID has twice turned down a small grant of a few thousand dollars requested by the Greek Orthodox School of Madaba. They have started a new after school English program, open to the public and not merely their own students, staffed by volunteers who are native speakers of English and teach the British Council's internationally recognized Cambridge curriculum in English as a Foreign Language. Such English programs are available in Amman for JD150 (about US$220) or more, and the Orthodox School is offering these classes for JD35, while simultaneously bypassing the inconvenience and expense of travelling to Amman.

The program has been popular, and the students have done very well on the Cambridge exam, as administered by the British Council. The program has been so successful, in fact, that they're opening two more programs elsewhere in Jordan, and considering adding TOEFL exam preparation to their offerings. However, for many families in and around Madaba, even JD35 is far more than they can afford. In the interest of providing the most benefit to the most people, the Orthodox School asked USAID for a grant of just a few thousand dollars to provide partial or full scholarships to the poorest applicants, and the school's request was twice turned down at the 11th hour.

In a country where almost all conversation now revolves around rising unemployment and the rapid rise of the cost of basic necessities like food and heating, a solid background in English reading, writing and conversational skills is almost invaluable. I remember, from my time as a Peace Corps Volunteer, how much emphasis parents and students put on the study of English, which is necessary for university education abroad or even here in Jordan, and required in the IT economy that Jordan, which has no natural resources, is hoping to develop.

It's a real shame to deny the neediest families access to a resource such as the Orthodox School would really like to offer them.

Two Years Older, But Mostly the Same

al-Mshairfeh, Jerash, Jordan

Though almost nothing has changed outwardly about al-Mshairfeh except a few new houses and some new furniture sets, time has passed, and two years is a long time in the life of a four or five year old. I hardly expected Zayuuda and Hadeel and especially Saddeen to remember me after I'd been gone two years. I was wrong.

Zayd (aka Zayuuda):
Born about a month before I arrived in al-Mshairfeh, I used to tell people that Zayuuda was my favorite Jordanian, because he didn't speak more Arabic than I did, though by the time he was two and I left, that was becoming a difficult claim to make. I expected his brother Khalid, who is two years older and used to call me "khaala" (auntie), to remember me, but not Zayuuda. But when I walked into the living room of my friend Wijdan, who lives five doors down from Zayuuda and is no relation whatsoever to him, one of the first faces I saw was Zayuuda's, and he jumped right up and said, "It's Maryah!" He attached himself to my side and would hardly be parted from me for the whole 24 hours I was in the village.

Hadeel:
When I left Jordan, Hadeel was Wijdan's youngest daughter at three years old, but about a week ago, on my birthday, Hadeel became a big sister. When I lived in al-Mshairfeh, I had a standard issue Peace Corps whistle, in case I ever got in trouble, and Hadeel adored my whistle. Every time I visited Wijdan, Hadeel would beg me for my whistle, and when I needed it back before I left her house, she would make me promise to give it to her when I left Jordan. And I did, though she was only three and I was pretty certain she would either break it or lose it within a matter of months. I hadn't been at Wijdan's house long when a whistle blasted in my ear, the same whistle, with the Peace Corps logo still barely visible on its side. Wijdan reported that Hadeel had a very secure hiding place for her whistle, and would take it out to blow it, and then put it right back where it would be safe, and she never let anyone else use it.

Saddeen:
She was born in the middle of Ramadan of my first year in al-Mshairfeh, which would have been October 2004, and was only a year and a half when I left Jordan. I'm not sure that Saddeen actually remembered me, but she certainly knew who I was. Like all the other families I photographed in the village, her family had very carefully guarded those pictures like precious gems, and clearly these pictures had been taken out at intervals and shown to Saddeen, because she knew exactly who I was and where I had lived, and she stuck to me almost as tightly as Zayuuda did.

The only little kid who didn't remember me was Ali and Rania's son Saif, who was, after all, only 9 months old when I left!

Other Updates:
The headmistress's oldest Safaa' graduated from al-Balqaa' University with a Bachelors in Computer Information Systems yesterday.
The headmistress's oldest son Alaa passed his Tawjihi exams with high marks, and has just returned from his second year studying medicine in Ukraine.
The headmistress's second daughter Ala' passed her Tawjihi with even higher marks the next year, and is studying math at Yarmouk University.
Fatima and Muhammad's eldest Alia, "the sheikh" Radwan's third son Mahmoud, and Wijdan's eldest Ghadeer are all on pins and needles awaiting the results of their recent Tawjihi exams.
Anis got so tall and looks so adult that I was sure he was Osama, who also grew several inches taller. Sadly, Anis had a bicycle accident a month ago that broke his jaw in three places, and is in the middle of a long recovery.
Umm SaleH, the grandmother, passed away in February 2006, and Abu SaleH, the grandfather, recently remarried a well-liked middle-aged woman named Latifa.
The headmistress's husband recently got a Masters in something military in Pakistan.
Uncles Khalid and Ahmed, brothers of the headmistress and Fatima, got married in a double ceremony, which I think was last summer.

And the most visible change: The school across the street has a beautiful new, two-story building which is now a girls' school through the 10th grade, and the old building remains as a boys' school through the 8th grade.

I'm looking forward to going back for mensef when they're ready to celebrate Ala''s return from the Ukraine.

HJ for Lunch!

Madaba and the Dead Sea, Jordan

Today was our third group field trip, altogether with the Beginners and Intermediate students. You know what's great about these field trips? When you're travelling in a group of 50, you're going to look like a tourist no matter what you wear, so I feel free to wear my sleeveless shirts and tight pants despite the presence of Arab Muslims. I don't mind dressing conservatively most of the time; I think it's important to respect the cultural norms of your surroundings. At the same time, it's so bloomin' hot here, it's nice to get out of the long sleeves once in a while!

When we got to St. George's Church in Madaba, there were flyers up that the Orthodox School next door was looking for native speakers to teach English in the fall, and as I was scribbling down the contact information, the souvenier shopkeeper suggested that I just go over the school and talk to them. The director wasn't there, but I did talk to a woman from the school's administration, gave her my name and number, and she said the director would be in touch. Just in case, I've just now emailed him my resume.

We also went out to the Madaba Mosaic School, which is a really cool place; I wish I'd gone before. They have all kinds of handcrafts, from painted ostrich eggs and jewelry to clothing and, of course, mosaics, and almost a quarter of their artisans are disabled, many of them homebound.

And then it was time for the one thing you must do when in Madaba: lunch at Haret Jdoudna! Everyone I know who's been there agrees, it's the best restaurant in Jordan, in terms of the food, which is nouveau Lebanese, and the atmosphere. And, of course, HJ has real sentimental value for me. We went there fairly frequently in training, and then again when Scott and Anyess were living in Madaba. I've taken Auntie Viv and my parents there. Most of all, I suppose, there are lots of things about Madaba that remind me of Oren.

We also went to the Dead Sea and swam at the Dead Sea Spa Hotel. This time I remembered not to shave my legs the day or two before the trip, so I was able to stand going into the Dead Sea itself, and playing in the mud. And, of course, playing in the regular pool, too, because there are some places that the public shower just can't reach to get off the salt!

Even if it was 44 Celsius, it was a great day!

Change the Subject!!

Amman, Jordan

If we never have another class discussion about marriage again, it will be too soon!

For the past two days, our literature teacher, Manal, has been asking our opinions on the roles of the partners in a marriage. She agrees to a large to degree with the text on marriage we've read by 19th century Egyptian Sheikh Tahtawi, which says that the husband is the Prime Minister of the family, and the wife is the Interior Minister. This was controversial enough, inasmuch as it seemed to suggest that the wife's influence was restricted by the walls of the home, though Manal tried her best to point out that the Interior Minister is engaged with plenty of international issues.

My classmate Ann got really inflamed when Manal said she believed that, while the wife's opinion was important and should be discussed, the husband should have the first and last word in the family. It has been the subject of intense debate for two days, abetted by opinions by other students, ranging from liberal Muslim to conservative Christian to Muslim convert and in between, with everyone determined to convince the rest.

Though I have been doing my best to stay out of the conversation, Manal keeps saying, "Maryah will agree with me! She knows how the Eastern woman thinks!" but not (thankfully!) giving me any opportunity to affirm or deny. Then, today, Galaal kept saying, "Let Maryah speak! I want to hear Maryah's opinion!" even though I was very carefully keeping my hands in my lap and my head down.

I hate this conversation, and I avoid this topic whenever I can. There's a good bit of the Western feminist in me, though not as much as Ann, and sometimes it bothers me how deferential wives I've known here can be to their husbands. When my Arabic teacher Wijdan used to say, "We'll walk over to the neighbor's house, if Nusri gives us permission," it would just grate on my nerves. On the other hand, Nusri almost always said yes, and always had a good reason to say no, and eventually I learned to hear Wijdan's qualification as my mother's "I'll just let your father know where we'll be."

In any case, it's clear to me that opinions on the roles of husbands and wives is not anything that I can change with logic. At best, I can give examples of how, in my family, it tends to be my mother who's the President, and my father who's the Secretary of Labor and/or Secretary of State. Or of my Girl Scout leader's husband, a career Marine who, when invited somewhere or asked to help with a project, always replied, "I'll have to check with the Boss," meaning his wife.

I learned a long time ago, probably sometime in middle or high school when my evangelical classmates were preaching at me at every opportunity, that there are some topics better left alone. In Jordan, and probably in most of the Middle East, this is probably one of them. Certainly, Queen Noor and Queen Rania have managed to ruffle plenty of feathers in Jordan by calling for reforms to women's status in law and practice.

Eventually, I couldn't help but step in, though, with my favorite quote from My Big Fat Greek Wedding, in which the mother says to her daughter, "Don't worry. Your father is the head of the family, but I'm the neck, and I tell him where to go!"

Unfortunately, it did not quite end the conversation as I had hoped.

Free Birthday Drinks!

Amman, Jordan

A whole bunch of us went out last night to celebrate my birthday with dinner at the Blue Fig, which I can't believe I never visited when I was here with Peace Corps. The food is delicious, the atmosphere really fantastic.... (It's an expat restaurant/bar in Abdoun, the richest part of Amman ... which is probably why I didn't go as a Volunteer, but I'm a bona fide tourist in Jordan this time!)

Then I remembered that the last time I had a birthday in Jordan, and Anyess was not only having her birthday but also celebrating her engagement, we got free drinks at the irish pub in the Dove Hotel. I remember the Dove Bar as a dark, crowded, dingy little hole-in-the-wall bar/dance club dive, but I remember it fondly, especially when I was getting free birthday drinks! (Also, it doesn't have a cover charge!) So we decided to round out the evening with some dancing at the Dove Bar.

Wow. Has it ever changed! The dance floor is gone, with its colored lights, the whole place has been repainted, the bathrooms were cleaner.... It's a pretty respectable bar now, which explains this rumor I've heard that Peace Corps Volunteers are no longer welcome there... (though I've not heard why!). But there are still free birthday drinks, and at the end of a large, electric blue birthday drink, we decided we were going to dance anyway, and by the time we left, it was just like old times!

The Village Called!

Amman, Jordan

It really must be my birthday, because I got a fabulous gift today. The village called!

First I got a call from Wijdan, my Arabic teacher and one of my closest friends in the village, who had all her local in-laws and Radhwan's family over because she'd just gotten home an hour earlier from having a beautiful baby girl! Wijdan was very excited about the letter I sent them. (I'm just glad it got there, with my luck with the Jordanian post!)

Then Abu Anis and Umm Anis called, my immediate neighbors who frequently sent me meals, equally excited to have gotten a letter, and wanting to know why I hadn't emailed them from America. NOW he tells me he has email! When I asked after the family, and particularly after Saddeen, who was born while I was living there, Umm Anis said, "She's really grown up!"
"Well, of course!" I replied. "It has been two years!"

I think I'll be going up to visit them next Sunday and Monday. I'm really excited to see how the kids have grown up, what has changed and what has stayed the same. And in particular, I'm really looking forward to the food!

Out of Sight, Not Out of Mind

Wadi Rum, Jordan

We're spending the night at Wadi Rum tonight, almost the whole CLS group, plus our program coordinator Ishraq, her friend Aboud and some of their friends. On our way into the campsite, I was telling about my brother Wesley's adventures in Wadi Rum, getting stuck half way up the rockface at sundown with a Frenchmen who was not nearly as good of a climber as he claimed, but having no choice but to go the rest of the way up and then down in the dark. So, of course, while most of us watched a gorgeous sunset from sand-level, Chris, Doris, Sam and Galaal decided they were going to scale a rockface (without lines!) and watch the sunset from the top. And as they were coming down and it was getting darker and darker, they said to each other, "Perhaps we should have listened to Maryah!" But then, I'm too timid to hitchhike and drive across Central Asia like Chris, either, so what do I know? ;)

Then they showed us how they were cooking our dinner the real Bedouin way: First, dig a hole in the sand, put in a big metal tube, mound the sand up around it, and build a fire in it. When the sand is good and hot, remove the fire and put in a metal rack of chicken and potatoes, put on a lid and cover with sand, wait an hour and remove. Delicious! And they had my favorite kind of Jordanian salad, just like Umm Alaa makes it, with chopped cucumbers and tomatoes drenched in tahini!

After dinner, Ishraq and I taught the rest of the group the Jordanian dubkeh, and then out came the CDs of Nancy, Ruby, Deena and the rest of the Arab popstars for more dancing!

I had a very interesting conversation with the owner of the camp, Ribha, that started out very inauspiciously with "Oh daughter of the Bedouin [Aboud was telling everyone that I was a "real" Beni Hassan Bedouin, and it had become a joke across camp], why didn't you marry a Bedouin?" But after the initial awkwardness, he told me about his own American wife, who went back to the States when her mother got cancer, and we talked a lot about why it's important to visit other cultures, live in other cultures, marry into other cultures, etc., in order for people to better understand each other.

In the process of this conversation, he mentioned the town of Rajef, near Petra, and I mentioned that I had a Peace Corps friend in Rajef. "Ah, Josh!" says Ribha. "Josh is a good guy! So is Zane!" In case Josh is reading along, I wanted to put this out there, because it's often considered bad luck in Jordanian culture to compliment someone in their presence.

Hip Hop for Peace

Amman, Jordan

Unfortunately, I only saw the last half of this film I've been waiting with such anticipation to see, "Slingshot Hip Hop," but the half I saw was both very hopeful and absolutely heart-wrenching.

Heartwrenching because of what they show of the destruction of the Palestinian environment. They showed pictures of an apartment building in Gaza they had filmed at the beginning of the process, and it was beautiful, like the newly redone 30s Bauhaus communities in Berlin where my cousin Gwen lived, with verandas and crisp whitewash and bright blue trim. Then they showed the same buildings recently, after the Israelis had come through, and they were untenable, despite the fact that there were kids playing in some of the upper floors. I was struck, too, but the pictures of the refugee camp in Khan Younis in Gaza, with six and seven story cinderblock buildings, unfinished as they are in many Palestinian refugee camps here in Jordan, just overflowing with people. (Khan Younis is one of the most densely populated places on earth.)

Most heartwrenching of all, tho, was when they showed film footage from the last year in Gaza of Israelis bulldozing whole orchards of olive trees that had to have been at least fifty years old. An olive tree is like one's child, they say in the Arab world. It requires attention for 7 to 10 years before it bears its first fruit, and longer until it's really productive, but then an olive tree will provide olives and olive oil for the family, the pruned branches help feed the goats in the fall and heat in the winter, and the leavings from the olive pressing can be made into balls called "jiffet" that can also be burned for heat in the winter. And that olive tree can continue to provide for the family for literally a millenium. Every time I see Israelis bulldozing olive trees, it makes me cry.

But it was hopeful to hear the artists talk about why hip hop is so important to them. I think it was Ibrahim from Gaza who talked about how impossible it is to feel anything when you've lived your whole life in Gaza, and hip hop helps him to feel again. Others talked about how constricted their lives were, and how hip hop helped them to expand their horizons, to reach out to other artists, Palestinian and otherwise, and feel like they're connected to a larger world. Others talked about how hip hop was bridging a gap between '48 and '67 Palestinians; for some, the first time they'd ever heard anyone admit that both groups suffer equally was through hip hop. And in the Q&A afterwards (though I think this comes up in the part of the film I didn't see), the artists from DAM talked about being interviewed on Israeli television and asked if they thought the political agenda in their music was divisive and problematic. We don't have a political agenda, said DAM. We don't care about independence or any of that. We just want peace, and then we can work out the rest.

If you get a chance to see this film, in my opinion, it's a must-see!

Like a Real Arab

Amman, Jordan

Today we went to visit the Council of Deputies (the parliament) and met an MP of one of the tribal southern districts, himself a Huweidat Bedouin. As soon as I opened my mouth, he declared that I sounded like a real Jordanian. My first question concerned the changes that had been proposed for the school-leaving exam when I was here before, so I mentioned that I had been an English teacher in a government school in the village of former MP Harahshah, and immediately MP Huweidat said, "Al-Mshairfeh!" which is indeed the name of the village where I did Peace Corps.

It's not the only time I've been told I sound like a real Jordanian. We ordered in from Pizza Hut the other day while I was helping Galaal with some grammar questions, and he had gone down the hill to get us sodas when his phone rang. Thinking it must be the pizza guy, and unable to see the number that was calling, I answered his phone. I started talking to the woman on the other end as if she were the pizza delivery person ... in Arabic, of course!
"Are you with Galaal?" she asked me (also in Arabic, as Galaal's parents are both native Egyptians).
"Yeah, yeah," I said, "he's just gone down the hill to the store. Have you found the American Center?"
Eventually I figured out that she was not the pizza person, about the time she said she would call him back. So I asked if I could tell him who had called. When she said she was his mother, I switched over to English and apologized profusely and told her I'd let him know she'd called.

So, yesterday I was hanging out doing homework after another grammar tutoring session I took with Galaal, when he said he'd talked to his brother, who had asked who the girl had been on the phone. When Galaal said that I was part of the Arabic program, he says they were surprised, because they'd been sure that I was a real Arab!

And yet, I still turn on al-Jazeera and understand only one word in six or seven, although in "Noor," the soap opera all of us girls have been watching and calling "studying," I understand about two thirds of the dialogue, because it's in Syrian dialect.

Hip Hop for Hope

Amman, Jordan

I've been waiting for this film to come out. It's being shown now at film festivals all over the US, Europe and the Middle East, including Sundance, and I'm hoping to go see it next week here in Amman, to be followed by Q&A by the group DAM, who feature prominently in the film and Palestinian hip hop generally.

http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoid=35309296

More info and links to the Websites and MySpace pages of various Palestinian hip hop groups and organizations, as well as other spoken word artists, can be found through "Slingshot Hip Hop"s website: http://slingshothiphop.com/index.php

Struggle for the Middle East

Amman, Jordan

We read a fascinating article this week for our first hour of class, which has been devoted to topics from the news media and politics, and has focused thus far mostly on the Iranian nuclear issue, including the recent military exercises Israel executed over the eastern Mediterranean in early June. The article in question, from moheet.com, was a summary of a new book published by Syrian journalist and writer Rana Abu Dhaher ar-Rifaa'y titled The Iranian Nuclear Issue and the Struggle for the Middle East. It's not available in English at this time, and I think that's a shame; although I don't think that her conclusion is a new one, it's one that bears repeating for American audiences.

She begins with a common theory floated in the Lebanese media, particularly in the newspaper "an-Nahar," which says that the real reason behind the current crisis between Iran and the United States is the increasingly critical situation in Iraq, where the U.S. would like Iran to play a positive role in the future of Iraq. On the other hand, the Bush administration is eager to be seen as playing an important role in securing Israel against threats to its borders, especially in the Palestinian Territories to the east and west, from Hezbollah from the north, and from the spectre of Iranian nuclear missiles.

As far as Iran's nuclear program is concerned, ar-Rifaa'y goes into great detail over the state-of-the-art missile defense systems that Israel has developed over the years, including early warning systems and other technologies that make it virtually impossible for any missile attack on Israel, conventional or nuclear, from Iran or elsewhere, to even penetrate Israeli airspace. Furthermore, it's no secret that any attack on Israel would be met by an immediate, devastating counter-attack by Israel. Or, as Syrian President Bashar Assad said Sunday in response to accusations that his country is developing nuclear weapons for use against Israel, any attempt to crush Israel would only crush Israel's attacker. In ar-Rifaa'y's opinion, the chances of Iran actually launching an as-yet theoretical nuclear attack on Israel, or even a conventional attack, are minute and would be prohibitively costly to Iran.

Nevertheless, the crisis between Iran and Israel continues. Why? I don't find at all credible those who say that Iranian President Ahmedinijad is crazy, and there's no predicting what he'll do. For one thing, he doesn't hold the real power in Iran. Mostly, however, I don't believe that he's suicidal, and for Ahmedinijad to attack Israel would be tantamount to committing actual, not just political, suicide. Nor do I believe, and neither does ar-Rifaa'y, that it's in Israel's interest to attack Iran, because the outrage over such an attack would go far beyond the borders of Iran. It would enrage the whole Muslim street, ar-Rifaa'y says, from Baghdad to the Palestinian Territories to Lebanon, and if Israel attacked Iran, it would also have to be prepared to simultaneously do battle in the Palestinian Territories and Lebanon.

Ar-Rifaa'y concludes that the current accusations by Israel and the U.S. of an Iranian nuclear threat is not about Iran and Israel; it's about a much larger struggle by the U.S. for influence and power in the Middle East. I find her conclusion compelling. I remember, during the 2006 war between Israel and Lebanon, a great deal of talk of the conflict actually being a "proxy war" between the U.S. and Iran. The same accusations have been made about the struggles between Hamas and Israel, or Sunni and Shi'a in Iraq. In fact, I might even go so far as to say that we are witnessing a new "cold war" between the U.S. and the nations of the Middle East, but it's not about democracy and communism this time. The stakes here are simply the right of Middle Eastern nations to self-determination. Will the people and countries of the Middle East be afforded the right to build their own futures, or will they continue to be pawns in a chess game in which the very real victims are the uncounted Iraqi families and Palestinian youth and Lebanese children who are dying and suffering, physically and mentally.

The Circle's the Thing II

Amman, Jordan

Apparently, according to a conversation some of my colleagues were having on the bus this morning, traffic circles are preferable to traffic lights in Jordan because almost all the automobiles here are standards, and traffic circles require less shifting and produce fewer bad emissions than traffic lights.

This is one of the fascinating things about Jordan as a developing country, and perhaps it has to do, as Queen Noor says in her memoir Leap of Faith, with the nature of kings, who can better afford to aim for results fifty years down the road than can presidents or prime ministers, who have to produce results by the next election cycle. I had a student in the writing center at IU whose paper argued that GNP was an insufficient measure of a country's potential, in part because GNP doesn't factor sustainability or the global interconnectedness of ecosystems into its calculations. At the end of the paper, almost as an aside, he said that only rich nations and not developing nations could afford to consider sustainability, and I took real issue with this statement, on the basis of a single example: King Abdullah II of Jordan, in his National Plan and subsequent development initiatives, has proposed that all development in Jordan be based on environmentally safe and sustainable means, because if Jordan builds its economy at the expense of the environment, such results will be short-lived, and Jordan will be worse off in the long run. The March 2008 issue of National Geographic includes a story about the Kingdom of Bhutan, the king of which is pursuing development along a path of GNH (Gross National Happiness), and one pillar of GNH is sustainable development. I think this is part of what Fareed Zakaria means when he talks about "the rise of the rest," the concept that the United States is no longer the driving force behind global markets and concerns; in the age of globalization and the Internet, the smaller, poorer, developed countries are just as capable of making significant contributions to global trends, and it is to the disadvantage of the United States to discount what was once dismissed as "the Third World."

So here's to the developing world, sustainable development, and the traffic circle! SiHa wa 'aafiya!

Hooray for the Passive!

Amman, Jordan

Finally, I found a tutor who didn't change the subject when I said I wanted to learn how to conjugate Arabic verbs in the passive voice! And he is a very good teacher, too. While I can appreciate that most of the people in the group need more work on listening and speaking in Arabic, I've got that down pretty good, especially compared to my reading and writing skills, and I was really hoping that this program would focus a little more on pen-and-paper skills!

After my semester in Tuebingen (Germany), for some time I said that I aspired to someday be a nerd like my friend "Molly the Rhodes Scholar," to have her work ethic and patience for study and detail, to be writing or co-writing papers that earned me scholarships to present at conferences in exotic locales like, say, Rome. I was going to be a professor in my ivory tower with my little circle of admiring students, etc., etc.

Then I joined the Peace Corps, which, as I was saying to someone in the group yesterday, I don't consider a "real" job because it's so much more intense than any real job, with the long hours, the language and cultural barriers, the lack of amenities like cheddar cheese (damn the Danish media!) and tank tops (depending on where you're posted). In the Peace Corps, despite all its frustrations and disappointments, from time to time I produced real, immediate results (and hopefully long-term ones, too) that made other people's lives better.

When I got to grad school, academia had lost almost all its appeal to me. I didn't want to be a nerd in my ivory tower. That's great for the Mollys of the world, and lots of other people I know who find real satisfaction in academic pursuits. But I myself couldn't help but feel that all I did was sit and read and write and talk, but I didn't DO anything, and what results I had were for my own benefit. It seemed selfish. Sure, I needed those two years of grad school to be qualified for really effective work in that future "real" job, in order to make significant positive impacts on other people's lives, but I felt trapped in that ivory tower.

Now, though, I wonder if it was the academics that frustrated me, or the departmental politics. I wonder because here in Amman, where I have no responsibilities but to go to class and sit for hours at my homework, I've become a virtual shut-in. It seems like all I do is study and sleep, and I'm really happy doing it!

As Dad would surely point out, it's all relative!