Catching Concerts by Chance

I've been getting out more, whether dragged by friendship obligations last Thursday to Cave de Baal to support my friend Noor's DJing (party every Thursday), or more willingly to a few concerts. In either case it means I'm behind on watching Noor, the dubbed Turkish muselel, and I hear very exciting things are afoot!

Noor's a good DJ, in that he plays more than techno, but his party's at the matinee hour and coming on the heels of highschool exams, the place was packed with teenagers. I love teenagers as much as anyone, but I felt like I should have brought my walker. Whatever, it's always fun to watch muhajibbat grinding on the dance floor.

The concerts I stumbled upon going the International Flower Exhibition in Tishreen Park. There's been signs all over, so I went Sunday. It cost 50 lira to get in, and the exhibition itself was quite underwhelming. "International" apparently meant Jordan, Egypt, Iraq, and Homs. The best design by far was Hama's.

A little disappointed, we started to leave, only to find a stage all set up for a concert near the Sahat Umuwe'en entrance. We asked the techs what was up, and they casually informed us there would be an Itar Shama' concert later. Itar Sham'! They are an awesome husband-and-wife band that plays Arabic rock. I saw them earlier in the year at an Arab Cultural Center outside of Damascus and the place was packed. The kids love 'em. I been keeping up on concerts, even the ones I know there's no way I'm attending (Julio Iglesias in the Bosra Ampitheatre). How had I not heard? No body has heard. The publicity for the exhibition has unfortunately not included the fact that they have all of Syria's most popular bands booked.

The tech gave us a schedule: Itar Shama', LEENA CHAMAMYAN (probably Syria's most popular singer), Anas and Friends, Daraja Aliya - all of Syria's most popular bands. Each night a different band.

I didn't see the concert Sunday night because of a prior commitment to watch Germany get their asses handed to them (ok, so the game wasn't actually that one-sided, but still yay Spain) the same evening, but returned to see Daraja Aliya two nights ago and Anas and Friends last night. Not so impressed with the last one, except the last song, a cover of a 10-year-old Mohammed Monir song (who I saw in concert in Cairo with Nancy Ajram in 2006).

And tonight- Leena Chamamyan (maybe that's how you spell her name, but probably not). It'll be the third time I've seen her and I own her two CDs. She rocks the Arabic jazz-ish music. And my socks.

Hopefully I won't end up on TV. Everytime I go to a cultural event, my friends try to push me to talk to the Syrian TV camera roving around. Yesterday Tariq even went up to the reporter and told her there was a foreigner over there, while I was yelling, "She doesn't care." Some of my friends, who I met back when I was struggling to say things like, "The sheep also meat no meat tummy pain no thank you pain," and are very proud of teaching me to now say things like, "Thank you, I'm sure the meat is delicious but it will cause me stomach pain," and swearing, of course.

They also try to push me to introduce myself to the artist.
"What would I say?"
"Just that you like their music. They'll be flattered that a foreigner likes it."

I believe this is just a plot to have an excuse to shake hands with the musician themselves, as I observed when pushed to congratulate an opera singer at Dar al-Assad. I imagine while I'm saying "I like your voice," in my retarded accent, my friends are behind me, looking at the artist as if to say, "Sorry what can you do? She's foreign and weird. But nice to meet you too."

Men Don't Wanna Take Care of No Babies

As I envoke the "liberation of men" to do childcare or other activities not considered traditionally masculine, in the back of my head I hear a conversation from several months ago, back when I was living with a Syrian family on Sharia Baghdad.

Back during the now-unimaginable February cold, I got into a 2-day, well, discussion with them.

It began innocently enough when I came home Friday at around 5pm, planning to eat and then retreat to my room with the Ghassan Kanafani play I had to write an analysis on and the Andalusian poetry I had to lead the class in the following Sunday. As per usual in the biting cold I took my meal in the sobia room, joining Iyad, the unemployed law school graduate midget (literally) and two of his friends. I ate my meal in silence, listening to their conversation. I was soon incorporated into that conversation, which began with the usual "So, how do you like Syria?" (one of the boys I had not met before) and somehow ended up on The Gays and my strange lack of revulsion to their Ways and complete willingness to let them live and marry. "But what is the point of marriage? Children!" Iyad claimed. I told him I know some gay couples with children. But how? That is impossible!

"They adopt. I know people who have done this, and they have beautiful families." That someone could love a child that did not squirm out of her vagina or result from his penile squirt some months previous was denied:"Blood is blood."

That my aunt, with two adopted children, loved them as much as "real" children was as well.

Then we landed on the women. The conversation kept me up until late into the night, preventing me from getting any work done, and spilled over well into Saturday night. One of the highlights was when Iyad denied that men have estrogen and women have testosterone. "Why would women have testosterone? It's obvious they don't. Their voices aren't low, they don't have hair." But his insistance that men do not have estrogen was even stronger. "Of course they don't! What, is it for their period?" The next day, when I returned from Sitt Zeinab and teaching English to Iraqi kids, Iyad was in the sitting room, triumphantly looking over his highschool biology textbook. He pointed me to the short passage, where it said that testosterone was the male hormone, and listed its effects on the male during puberty. Estrogen is the female hormone, with its effects. And progesterone is also a female hormone, with its effects. The complete passage was three small paragraphs - hardly what I would call comprehensive review of the complicated subject of hormones. I considered letting him believe what he wants, but instead printed out some more complete information from the internet, which identified the existance of all three hormones in both sexes and even included the gem about how while most men have more testosterone than most women, the ranges for both sexes are very wide and overlap, thus some women have more testosterone than some men.

The hormones came up because wehad been talking about the babies.

Iyad insisted that full equality was impossible, and sarcastically asked me if we should make men pregnant, because it isn't equal that women have to go though that. "That must be hard." I told him not to act like I am an idiot - naturally women have a womb, but the moment after birth why can't the man take care of the baby?
"Because they don't have attifiya (kindness and feelings) like a woman!"

Abu Mazen joined in to ask me why I was mad about this if it is what God wants. Being a mother and taking care of children is an honored and respected role. I was accused of thinking of childbearing and taking care of the home as an "insult". No, I insisted, it's not an insult, which I why I want men to be free to do childcare as well. Why should that be denied to them?
"What, you want all men to stay home and take care of children?" Iyad asked.
"No, but both parties should be free to choose what they want to do. In some families, the woman may want to take care of the children, and the man may want to work. In some families, the man may want to stay at home, and the woman may want to work. In other families, both want to or have to work so they share raising the children 50-50. What's wrong with that?"
"If the man stays home he is lazy."

This allowed me to appeal to Um Mazen, asking her if raising 6 children had been easy. She looked at me like I was crazy, saying of course not. Um Mazen was not exactly on my side during the debate, telling me several times that while girls are loved, boys are preferred. And that God loves men more than women. But at least she told her son that raising kids is not the lazy choice.

During the converstation, no one present had a problem with women working, but the problem was with men take on such a feminized role. Childcare is an honored and respected role, unless a man takes it on and then he is a lazy pussy. Of course, this is far from a Syria-specific double standard, and reflects the situation in most of the world.

But it was a fun conversation in that I was also asked several times if I hated men.

To Save Humanity: Men Take Care of Babies

There has been conservative hand-wringing for quite some time now about the "demographic crisis" of falling European birthrates, some arguing that concurrent Muslim immigration is going to cause the downfall of Western Civilization. Often these critiques blame (white) European women for their selfishness, exhorting them to pop the babies out.

But in a NYTimes article, awesomely titled "No Babies," Russell Shorto (also an awesome name) finds that gender relations, more so than selfish, decadent European women, are a reason for low fertility.

“In all of these countries [mostly southern European with emphasis on traditional gender roles]," Billari said, “it’s very difficult to combine work and family. And that is partly because, within couples, we have evidence that in these countries the gender relationships are very asymmetric.”

Counter to intuition, that working ladies have less babies, the article points to a study since the mid-1990s, lowest fertility levels in Europe are in countries with lowest female labor-force participation.

To explain, the author compares the Netherlands and Italy, the former with less traditional views about gender roles than the latter. Geert is much more likely to change some diapers than Guiseppe, so Geert's wife is more likely to want to have more babies: "It's about how much the man participates in child care."

The article finds this true across regions, not just in Europe:

By this logic, the worst sort of system is one that partly buys into the modern world— expanding educational and employment opportunities for women — but keeps its traditional mind-set. This would seem to define the demographic crisis that Italy, Spain and Greece find themselves in — and, perhaps, Japan, South Korea, Hong Kong, Taiwan and other parts of the world. Indeed, demographers have been surprised to find rapid fertility changes in the third world, as more and more women work and modern birth-control methods become standard options. “The earlier distinct fertility regimes, ‘developed’ and ‘developing,’ are increasingly disappearing in global comparisons of fertility levels,” according to Edward Jow-Ching Tu, a sociologist at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. According to the United Nations, the birthrate in 25 developing countries — including Cuba, Costa Rica, Iran, Sri Lanka and China — now stands at or below the replacement level. In some cases — notably China — the drop is explained by a concentrated effort at containing the population. In the rest, something else is happening. The lesson of southern Europe is perhaps operative: embrace the modern only partway and you put your society — women in particular — in a vise. Something has to give, and that turns out to be the future.

Interesting to hear Iran put on this list, as Iran is held up as a "best practices" example within the UNFPA of how to be culturally sensitive and achieve major results in reducing population growth.

In Syria and many other "developing" countries, fertility rate is very highly inversely correlated to a women's education status and workforce participation (fertility goes down when education or working goes up). This "embracing the modern" (not a fan of that expression, but letting slide) is one of the best ways to reduce fertility in high-fertility countries, but this article suggests a tipping point of beneficiality. If these workforce changes are not supplemented by cultural changes with regards to gender roles, fertility rates will slip below replacement, and humanity will be doomed.

Thus addressing inequitable gender roles is a solution for both underpopulation and overpopulation. While women moving in traditional "male roles" of working outside the home is more and more acceptable in more places, often out of necessity, there is still widespread resistance to men moving into traditional "female roles" of child care or housework. Gender issues are often thought of as "women's issues" but this emphasizes, how realizing equality is not just about women's issues, but men's, and fighting the societal restraints upon men as well. This is a the companion to the liberation of women; the liberation of men.

Of course, whether negative population growth is inherently harmful is also up for debate. In an era where overpopulation is certainly a greater concern in most places than underpopulation, and in which we are just beginning to see the manifestations of our effect on the global climate, is less humans a bad thing? The article delves into this as well:

For there are those who argue that low birthrate in itself is not a problem at all. Paul Ehrlich, the Stanford scientist who warned us about the “population bomb” in the 1960s, is more certain than ever that the human race is catastrophically straining the planet. “It’s insane to consider low birthrate as a crisis,” he told me. “Basically every person I know in my section of the National Academy of Sciences thinks it’s wonderful that rich countries are starting to shrink their populations to sustainable levels. We have to do that because we’re wrecking our life-support systems.”

Muslims are Similar to American Anti-Contraception Pharmacists

In the current Pharmacists-for-Life controversy in the States, on a group of pharmacists who refuse to sell birth control, some writers like to make analogies to show just how crazy these pharmacists are and how wrong it is for them to shove their beliefs down others' throats. And guess who is a great analogy for that? Muslims! And racists, naturally.

I usually like this blog, because they write some posts on international reproductive health, but I was not a big fan of this recent post from Reproductive Health Reality Check:

If a pharmacist refused to fill out a Viagra prescription for a black man he saw walking around with his white wife, we would have no problem seeing this behavior as bigotry, even if said pharmacist claimed that Jesus told him to do it. But if a pharmacist refuses to sell birth control pills to a woman who isn't wearing a wedding band, somehow that's legitimate religious expression, even though his rights are extending well past her nose. If Muslim pharmacists started refusing to fill out prescriptions for Christians because those Christians don't share their beliefs, we would have no problem seeing that the religious freedom pinched was that of the customer's, not the pharmacists.

Because you know that's a part of Islam: refusing to give medicine to Christians. What? Sorry, where did you pull that out of?

Earlier post from the same blog:

If, however, we're going to let everyone's political beliefs or religious enthusiasms govern our important life decisions, then we must allow that any political or religious convictions can hold sway. In this case, why not permit a Muslim fundamentalist pharmacist to simply put up a sign politely explaining that his religious beliefs require him to deny a woman's prescription for any medication? No doubt Aryan pharmacists have a belief system too. Why should they be forced to violate their dearly held beliefs and serve blacks?

Because Muslims hate women? I think I remember hearing that sura, in which antibiotics and allergy medication are denied to women. It's a core religious conviction in Islam.

From Feministe:

What happens if next, pharmacists or doctors refuse to serve non-Christians? Or if it comes back to bite them in the ass when, say, a conservative male Muslim paramedic refuses to touch women? Or if religious doctors and pharmacists decide that STDs are appropriate punishments for the sexually active and refuse to fill prescriptions for treatment medicine? Or if a paramedic or doctor refuses to deliver the baby of an unmarried woman?

Cause Muslim men never touch women, and Muslim doctors don't perform thousands of procedures everyday on women. If any man did have qualms about touching women, I doubt he would become a paramedic, which I think is the point of this post: don't become a pharmacist if you can't do the freaking job.

I understand why Muslims are getting thrown into the mix, alongside Aryans (do they mean Iranians and northern Indians?) and racists. It's an attempt to expose the hypocrisy of these right-wing movements, that are all for respecting religion as long as that religion is Christianity. But claiming Muslims would deny medicine to Chrisitans or to women, is smearing Muslims based on common stereotypes:
1) that Muslims hate Christians
2) that Muslims hate women, I mean, they must since they veil them and don't let them drive and don't let them get an education and... 60 other misconceptions people have about Muslim women.

There are other analogies that could be made, such as an orthodox Jew refusing to give out condoms (according to some Talmudic interpretations, birth control is allowed for women but not for men, so pill in, condom out), but of course Jews just aren't as scary as Muslims.

Later in the Feministe post, I think they did a better job with analogy:

Wingers were all up in arms about the Somali women who wanted to wear more traditional clothing to work (even though they were still doing their jobs) and the Muslim cab drivers who wouldn’t pick up passengers who had alcohol on them, but if it’s fundamentalist Christianity that’s an excuse for not doing what you were hired to do, and if it’s women you’re refusing to help, then it’s a-ok.

This exposes the hypocrisy of the right, eager to defend the right of Christians lock-step with their views to exercise their religious views, but quick to lambast Muslims for the same. And this features actual events where Muslims felt that some aspect of their job and their beliefs were at odds, not random hypothetical that accuse Muslims of hating Christians and women. When, from personal experience, I know many who are very fond of both, especially the combination. Oohh!

Worst Syrian Host Ever

My continued failings as a host were put into stark relief Sunday night, when Manar invited my roommate and me over for tabouleh. We arrived at 9:30, bearing Bear Beer (the highest alcohol content of any beer in Syria) and a bottle of wine. Manar welcomed us, set us up in the newly redone living room, in which they have traded out the couches for the old-style floor pads and painted the walls green. The importance of hosting cannot be emphasized more than in Manar's house, where despite only being a two-room apartment (not two bedrooms - two rooms total), the family reserves one to entertain guests.

Manar shooed her mother away, and ceremoniously brought out three bottles of wine - 2 red, 1 rose - before going to the kitchen and retrieving salad, jarjir (a green plant thing), chips and french fries. Soon the doorbell rang and it was delivery argileh! We sat down to feast and chat.

Manar said she had to invite us over because we're always inviting her over. She works right near our apartment and gets off at eight, so I often call her to come over. Sometimes I order an argileh, usually there's a beer in the fridge if she'd like, and there's hardly ever food unless I whip up some Indomi (like ramen).

This has been perhaps the hardest adjustment for me. When I go to peoples' houses I feel weird being waited upon. Now that I have a place, I know I should wait on guests, but its hard to snap out of my hard-wired American hosting: "There's a beer in the fridge," and you can go get it. Hungry? "I think there's some cheese, olive oil and zaatar." Thirsty? "There's drinkable water in the kitchen pidot." Then I sit, and as my guest gets up to walk to the kitchen I remember my role, and jump out, chasing them down the hall.

"Nooo! You! Sit down."
"It's really no problem," they protest. "I can grab the beer/bread/cup of water."
I physically block their path, yelling, "No! You are my guest! Sit down in the saloon! I will bring you water!"
"Ok," they say, now thirsty and terrified.

As a good Syrian host, I shouldn't wait for my guests to voice thirst or hunger. I should offer from the moment they walk in the door, until, in need of refreshment or not, they acquiesce. But from America I'm used to going to a friend's house, voicing my hunger, and asking if I can eat their food. "Sure, everything in the right cabinet, but not the milk or jam in the fridge cause that's my roommmate's." Then I make a solo search of the options and eat their crackers.

Phone Calls

About a month ago a strange number called me on my cell, saying he was from the simsar's office and asking me how I was doing. He knew my name, but was a young guy, not the old man that handed me the keys to my apartment three months ago. He asked how I was doing and if he could come over, while I was cagey and refused. His name was Ra'id, and I know of no other Ra'id than my friend over on Rowda. "Why do you want to visit?"
"To see how you are doing."
"I'm fine, thanks."
"Can I come over."
"No. Who are you?"
"I'm Ra'id, from the office."
"I don't need anything from the office."
"Do you like the apartment?"
"Yes."
"Can I visit?"
"No."
"Why?"
"Why do you want to visit?"
"To see how you are. Just to visit."
"I don't know you. No."
"You're on the second floor right?"

After wasting his minutes more, he finally didn't call back when I hung up again.

Strange phone calls from strangers are not uncommon. Often someone will call a wrong number, and if a girl answers, they keep calling back trying to get a date. My friends have confirmed this happens to them all the time, so it doesn't have to do with my foreignness, just my ladyness, but in an attempt to not get me to hang up they always bring it up:
"Allo?" I say
"Marhaba."
"marhabtayn. Who is this?"
Sometimes they say their name, often they just ask for some one who I am not.
"Sorry, wrong number."
"Where are you from?"

After the call has ended, the guy calls back, to let me know that I have a pretty voice and where am I from? Am I a student? I hang up. They call back.

They call back the next day. They call back at 1am. And again the next day. I finally hand the phone to a male friend standing nearby, who bitches them out for me, identifying himself as my khateeb.

Sometimes the guy tries to speak to me in English, producing sentences like: "You voice nice."

Sometimes the English is a bit better, and they try to pass themselves off to me as another foreigner. "I am American too. Why don't we talk?" as if I'm not going to detect the Syrian-accented English or be unable to identify another American. I told him, in Arabic, that I didn't want to talk with him and he was an asshole. "What? I don't understand. Speak English." This was only the second time that particular guy had called back, but I was standing next to a friend, so I handed him the phone. He invoked the man's sister's genitals in a disrespectful manner, but the man just kept repeating, "I don't understand. Speak English. What?"

But at least he didn't call back.

According to some guy friends, some of these calls are not the result of wrong numbers, but bored guys sitting around dialing random numbers until a girl picks up. I don't really know what they are expecting to get out of this: BINGO! Got a girl! I'm sure she'll want to go on a date with a complete stranger who keeps calling her! I mean, maybe there's a glimmer of hope the first time, but after that, really, what are you thinking? That if you call me at 1am I'll be happy, put on some pants, and come over to your parents' house for some lovin?

Noor and Awkward Moments

There's an almost daily battle now between watching Noor and watching the Eurocup. Noor is a Turkish muselel (Gumus) that's been dubbed into Syrian Arabic, and while I could claim I watch it for the Arabic, the truer reason is probably:


Kivanç Tatlitug is the most attractive man on the entire planet. I should've studied Turkish, at least so I could just pronounce his name.

The problem is its on daily at 10, right during matches. I can watch a match and then rush home after work to catch the 5pm replaying the next day. Truth be told, while I am a fan of football my viewing is along the same lines: though I'm for the Nederlands (having been a fan since living there for a bit as a kid en ik kan nog steeds een beetje nederlands spreken) it becomes "The Italians are playing? Fuck the Dutch!"

Noor's been winning most nights as I can just turn on my TV, while watching a match means going over to a friends house who's bought the al-jazeera special sports channels.

And compared to a draw at zero, Noor is very exciting: Noor is married to Mohanet (pictured), who just discovered that his previous lover didn't die in a car accident years ago but instead is paralyzed AND has a toddler who is his son. Noor just found out and left, with her grandmother who is living in the same house with Noor, Mohanet, and Mohanet's sister, mother, and grandfather, but walking out the door Noor's grandmother had a stroke so Noor couldn't leave and instead she and Mohanet are pretending everything's ok for the grandmother's sake but really Noor wants a divorce. Meanwhile, Mohanet's Aunt remarried secretly after divorcing her douche husband Tariq but her new husband's daughter won't accept her. And there's something about drugs and newspapers.

Watching the episode where Noor has her suspicions after finding out Mohanet wasn't at work when he said he was (instead he was playing with his newly discovered son and sharing shy glances with his wheelchair bound former sweetheart) with roommate Michelle, some friends and their mother, the mother jokingly said, "He should just marry the other one too! Problem solved!"
Her daughter was shocked, "They're Muslim?" The characters don't come across as terribly pious with their penchant for unwinding with some booze in the grandfather's study, but I'm not one to judge.
"Of course they are; they're Turkish."
"But who could share him (Mohanet)?"
"God I know," I added "impossible!"
We all pretty much put in our thoughts that another wife would be unbearable, the son said he thought no one would be able to share a spouse, to which the mom reminded us she is the second wife of a Lebanese man. "I know he's with the other woman, so what?"

Then it was awkwardly silent and we concentrated on Noor's distraught wanderings through the streets of Istanbul.