On Religion

Those of you who know me well are probably surprised this post hasn't happened yet.  Well, wait no more.  Here comes Elise's religion-nerd posting.  Before I get into that, however, a brief update on life here.  Things in Aleppo are pretty calm and I've been being careful and safe, so don't worry about me.  We're spending the rest of spring break in Aleppo, which means I made a very fun but probably not financially smart gift-shopping trip yesterday.  I've gotten pretty good at haggling, although that makes it sound like I'm being annoying (possibly because it sounds like "nagging").  In reality, though, the way it works here is that I walk up, admire merchandise, surprise the shopkeeper by being able to speak Arabic, and then make friends with said shopkeeper.  I get a little off for speaking Arabic, a little off for being a student at the local university, a little off for being nice, a little off if the gift is for a "good cause" (a family member or a house of God), a little off if they have a friend in the US...etc.  It's fun being a novelty and incredibly and always welcomed.

While I can't speak to the ideas of all Syrians and while, as in any country, there is a diversity of viewpoints, I've heard the following from enough people that I think it's pretty standard here: "The important thing about religion is how you treat each other."  Variants include: "...and God takes care of the rest", "...and that's why the Christians are our brothers", and "..and that's why Syrians look forward while Saudis and Iranians are backward-looking."  This evening, after I was introduced by a Syrian hallmate to his family friend as a student of religion, the family friend asked me what the difference was between Christianity and Islam.  In my barely-adequate Arabic, I started going into the role of the Prophet Muhammad and differing views of Jesus.  Turns out the family friend has a master's degree in Islamic shari'a, and he proceeded to give me the same talk as so many others: Christianity, Islam, and Judaism as all "heavenly" religions-- the People of the Book-- and the important thing for all three is how you treat other humans.  It's a refreshing perspective.

On this issue, I often feel closer to the Syrians than to the other Americans in the program.  For anyone who doesn't know, I am a Christian who identifies both as religious and as spiritual; few of the other Americans would do so.  This is an issue which arose in literature class once when we discussed the Arabic word "maktoob" (lit.: "written"), meaning something that is preordained or meant to be.  Many of the students seemed to have a hard time believing that modern, generally rational people could also believe in God.  Likewise, the phrase "insha'allah" means for many students just "hopefully."  For most Syrians, though, its literal meaning, "if God wishes/wills", is the important one.  For the highly secular-minded American liberal-arts college student, God has nothing to do with whether our plane will take on in May.  On Ash Wednesday, I couldn't find a church at which to attend services; I burned paper on the stove to make my own ashes and smeared a cross on my forehead.  I told the Syrians that it was for a religious holiday, and that was pretty much that.  Doing weird things for religious reasons is pretty a3dii here.

I don't mean to rag on the Americans too much; perhaps I've been spoiled by the active Methodist group at my university and the wonderful teachers in the department of religion and philosophy.  My religious-person hat would like it if people were a bit more understanding, but it is my academia-of-religion hat that is most concerned.  While it's great to know things like the five pillars of Islam or the names of the books of the Gospel, what is more useful to understand religions is empathy and acceptance of religion as important.  Especially in studying Syrian society, an appreciation of the role of religion is vital.  Additionally, regardless of one's own personal beliefs, one cannot get a realistic and fair idea of Syrian society if one is convinced that religion is an archaic hold-over from medieval times.  Neither of the two major religions in the country-- Islam and Christianity-- is necessarily a burden on individuals nor a mark of backwardness.  Both are important and dynamic forces in everyday life and underlie every decision made by people throughout the country. 

I guess this is just frustrating for me because I am interested already in religion, and so know its importance in society.  To add onto that, I have put a good deal of effort into identifying and dividing my two afore-mentioned hats (religious convictions and academic learning).  I'd kind of like the same from other people; if you are not religious, wonderful.  Fine.  Don't be religious.  But identify and then suspend your own convictions or lack thereof when learning about other people's.

A Couple of Days in the Life Squashed Into One

So I've had a couple of people ask me about my life here, what a normal day is like.  I've also been promising people pictures.  Hopefully, I can fulfill both of these requests now, Internet gods willing.

I live in student housing at the University of Aleppo.  Specifically, my dorm is called "Dar al-Diyafeh", or Hospitality House, and houses most of the international students.  I've met a couple of Americans not in my program, as well as some Turkish, Japanese and Iranian students.  (We're having a pizza party with the Iranians on Thursday, which is exciting.)  I live on the third floor, which is entirely populated by kids on my program and our Syrian hallmates, who live here to make us use our Arabic and help us get further into Syrian culture.  As you get to the third floor, you see the common room, complete with couches, TV, used tea and coffee cups, and forbidden-but-lit cigarettes.  To the left is the girls' wing, beyond a set of swinging double doors, and to the right, the boys' wing.  Officially, we're not supposed to mix, but for cooking and movie-watching purposes, the American girls invaded the boys' domain long ago.  Today, the gas on the guys' side is out, so they came over to our kitchen to cook.  That made for a fun dash to my room after showering.

Dar al-Diyafeh (Hospitality House)

I have a better view from my window than you do from yours.

So I wake up on school days (Sunday-Thursday) around 8 am, grump angrily to the bathroom to brush my teeth (yes, for those of you who know her, Morning Elise came to Syria, too), and then turn out to go to class with everyone else around 8:45.  The past few days, the gate of the university closest to our academic building has been locked, so I and whoever else doesn't want to scale the gate grump around to another gate and are late to class.  I'm in classical Arabic class from 9 to 12ish, with two breaks during that time.  My teacher is this wonderful lady who dresses in black and-- weirdly-- thinks we're funny.  Today, we acted out movies in class, and I ended up explaining "Pride and Prejudice" in Arabic.  Cross-cultural communication, anyone?

As of next week, we'll have a shorter classical Arabic class and an additional colloquial Arabic class in addition.  This is an important distinction...the Arabic language is characterized by what linguists call "diglossia", where one language type is used for certain contexts and another for others.  In the case of Arabic, classical Arabic is the language of the Qur'an and the basis for what I actually learn, Modern Standard Arabic (MSA), the language of politics, speeches, business, religion, and other formal settings.  Colloquial Arabic varies from place to place.  You can draw a parallel to accents or regional dialects, but the case of diglossia is more extreme.  Grammar is different, some words are completely different, but it's necessary to keep straight which is which.  In university Arabic classes, you usually only learn MSA, although some schools offer upper-level courses in various colloquials for students who already know MSA.  I'm learning Levantine (specifically Syrian) Colloquial Arabic now, just from interacting with people around me.

This picture has nothing to do with diglossia, but I'm proud of it.  So it goes here.

After MSA class, we have about an hour for lunch and then I go to an English content course, either Literature as a Cultural Lens or Middle Eastern Issues.  These are both a bit fluffy.  Afterward, I go home and...do something.  Homework, studying, napping, adventuring in the city...this last is especially easy because a taxi trip within the city costs approximately 40-50 Syrian lira (about $1).  Recently, I've been to the Aleppo Citadel, one of Aleppo's ancient souqs, Al-Jdeideh (the Christian Quarter), and a Greek Orthodox church.  If you want more information about any of these, just let me know.  And then what...and then I come back to Dar al-Diyafeh if I ever left it, and provide moral support and/or ingredients for a bit of communal dinner-cooking.  Somewhere in the neighborhood of 11 or 12 pm, I go blissfully to sleep.

The less-claustrophobic view of the souq that tall people might have.

The Greek Orthodox church I visited for approximately twenty minutes, thanks to

some easily-bored fellow visitors.  The building's about 25 years old.

Living in Exciting Times, They Say

Public Service Announcement to concerned friends and relatives:  things are fine here at the university.  My biggest adventure of the day has been going to Carrefour, a sort of French Wal-Mart located near Aleppo.  (I figured staying out of downtown wasn't a bad idea, just in case.)  Here's a short glom of thoughts on life and living it in Halab (Aleppo):

My Contemporary Middle East professor is very cute in an old man kind of way and studied at American University, my school, for several years.  He therefore knows one of my professors, who's been there a while, and I officially have an "in" with him...anything for said professor at AU, he says.  He was talking to us about cultural differences between here and the US, and the best line of the speech was this: "Am I sexist?  Yes, I think I am.  I am sexist."  This was less of a reproachable statement than you might think, though, as it was in conjunction with talking about how he worries more about his daughter than his sons.  I know plenty of American dads who do the same.

Speaking of the sexes...I've been thinking a lot about Syrian men.  And not in an admiring way.  They drive me pretty crazy, since they seem to think American women are all...well...not all that modest, and open to all kinds of things.  As the girls walk to class, we often hear out the window, "Hello!  How are you?  I love you!" in English.  The thing is, American guys can be obnoxious too.  I keep reminding myself of that.  The difference is, I know how to handle American guys.  I know when they're acting interested, I know when they're pushing the boundaries of politesse, I know how to warn them off.  So, upon reflection, the Syrian guys are probably not as horrible as I tend to think...I just don't know how to play "battle of the sexes" here.  And so life is hard and involves lots of trial and error...hopefully not so much error.

But now about girls!  I had a Syrian make-over the other day!  Some of the girls on the hall decided they were in the mood for fingernail-painting.  After they ran out of their own fingers, they offered to do mine.  It's a pretty color-- sort of dark red-- and apparently special because it's from Turkey.  (I'll admit I think it's also the first time since prom that I've had nail polish on.)  Then we went to one the girls' room and sat around eating lunch and talking...admittedly, they talked more than I did, and I asked them to repeat everything at least once, but it was fun.  It was the first time I'd had extended interaction with Syrian girls, as they tend to be less outgoing with strangers than the guys.

(But, as in the US, there are marked differences...some of the girls on the floor are very extroverted indeed, and one in particular loves to dance in the lounge.  And she is GOOD at it.  While we're on the topic: clothing varies among women, too.  Many women wear the hijab, but not everyone.  Christians don't, and some Muslims.  On the street, some women are completely covered, eyes, hands, and all.  At the other end of the hijab spectrum, there are women like some of the girls on our hall, who wear pretty, flashy scarves over their hair only, and manage to rock a long shirt, leggings, and high heels.  These latter girls are happy to sing, dance, or hang out around men, while some of the more conservative girls will dance only around other women.)

The other night in the floor lounge, some of said singing-and-dancing was going on, and I asked my nail-polish buddy if sometime she would teach me an Arabic song.  She was more than happy, as was everyone else in the room-- immediately!!  They wrote out the lyrics to the first half of a Fairouz song (Fairouz being an intensely beloved Lebanese singer) and played it for me four or five times.  Now, almost every time I see one of the people who was there, they quiz me.

Important things: the Internet here is not always strong.  The dorm I live in was formatted for us especially, I think, and has lots of new things, among them hot water, wireless Internet, and co-ed floors (girls on one wing, boys on the other).  That means some of these things act up a lot.  So if I agreed to Skype with you or something and I don't show up, or if you don't hear from me for a couple days, that's probably why.

Still Among the Living

As the title suggests, I am alive!  And, knock on wood, the Internet is good at the moment, so I thought I'd drop by for a moment.  The flight here was long long long, but with each airport I came through, the group of students I was in grew larger, so I got to meet a lot of the kids before arriving in Aleppo.  A group of nine of us arrived together, which made the last leg a lot better than it would have been otherwise.  The students are a mixed bunch, but invariably interesting-- five others from AU, a girl who flies planes, many who have studied in Cairo or Damascus already, a full range of heights...and some sharp Arabic language skills.  I'm a bit embarrassed, especially as none of my Arabic professors ever emphasized speaking.  I can write a mean sentence or put the formal diacritical vowels on a text along with...well, not the best of the them, but the upper-middle section of them.  However, speaking still scares me.  I take pride, then, in my short conversations with a) a juice-seller and b) one of our lovely Syrian hallmates.  I take less pride in...my oral proficiency exam this morning.  Not so good, but there will be time for adjustment of class levels the first week of school if necessary.

Speaking of classes, I wanted to address some of the main differences I've noticed thus far:

1) The work week begins on Sunday (in Arabic, appropriately enough, "Yom Al Ahad" = [roughly] "The First Day").  Friday, the Islamic holy day, and Saturday are the weekend.  So I'm spending my weekend in orientation.  This means that when we went adventuring in the old city of Aleppo today, it being Friday, nearly everything was closed.
2) The azaan is the call to prayer, issued from minarets around the city at set times of day.  People say it is either the most beautiful thing they've ever heard OR a terrible way to wake up.  Well, now I can tell you.  It is beautiful.  That is true.  It is also not nice to wake up at five am to the sounds of roughly 8 million muezzins (the men who do the azaan) calling about a music-measure apart and continuing for a good fifteen minutes.  Especially when your language placement exam is at 9:30 that morning.
3) People STARE at us.  We're a group of mostly white American kids, with one Japanese kid and one Pakistani kid.  We stick out, and are the center of attention at any given time.  I spent most of high school learning how to get through crowds without sticking out too badly.  Men stare at the women in our group even more.  Sexy forearms.  It makes me glad for my beloved baggy-sweater wardrobe.
4) I don't want to give an overwhelmingly bad impression of Halab-ian life, though.  Nearly everyone who has found out that we are American-- usually by asking one of us-- has said, "Welcome to Syria!  Welcome to Aleppo!  We are glad you're here!" or some variant on that.  And our Syrian hallmates are really sweet.  There were also the Turkish tourists who we asked if they spoke Arabic.  They said, "No.  Turkish.  Turkish perfect!"

So...not really any more wit or witticism for tonight.  Tomorrow, I sign my language pledge: to speak only Arabic (except for communication with home) until I leave the program.  After that, you'll be probably be getting the full brunt of all my humor, as my Arabic is quite definitely NOT up to puns and sarcasm yet.  My big linguistic accomplishment of the day?  Learning the word for tomato.  "Banadoura."