Who Really Decides What's Right?

Earlier this week I went to a contemporary dance show at the Alexandria Library. It was a group from Cairo and very different from any performances I had seen yet in Egypt. I enjoyed the entire show, but there was one dance in particular that resonated powerfully with my experiences abroad. The number featured a large tank of water and completely submerged in the tank sat a cross-legged dancer. He breathed through a tube, motionlessly staring straight ahead. The water was still and beautiful, bending the murky stage light and throwing it back out into the audience. A second dancer was moving outside of the tank, and one of his first gestureswas to pull the breathing tube away from the man in the water. As the water dancer writhed about in confusion, searching for air, the second man glided around the tank, peering into its depths.The water itself erupted with waves and bubbles, instantly unrecognizable from the stillness moments prior.

The water dancer became more and more desperate, slamming his body into the side of the tank in an attempt to reach the air that the second dancer was breathing. He at last found the surface, but was confused by the sensation of the exposure and continued to thrash about in the water alternately surfacing for the necessary air. The air dancer meanwhile had been venturing closer and closer to the water’s surface and finally attempted to submerge his head, only to come up seconds later coughing and sputtering. As the dance progressed the air dancer climbed onto the edge of the tank and lowered himself cautiously into the water, shivering with the change temperature. The two moved around in the water, in a confused battle-like dance, until the air dancer pulled himself from the tank and returned to the ground. Back on firm land, however, he slid and slipped on the wet floor, unable to balance on the water that had infiltrated his environment. Eventually he returned to the water, whereupon the two dancers emerged together. The water dancer clung to the back of the air dancer, terrified at first to touch the stage, but eventually lowered himself, and the two glided around the wet stage, balancing themselves with the side of the tank.

I found the dance reminiscent not only of my semester in Egypt, but also of my time spent in Kenya before college. I’m sure the dance could be applied to many of the thousands of traditional cultures that have faced Western infiltration. Of course, this is a very romanticized analogy. I don’t by any means think that all traditional cultures of the past were beautiful, isolated pockets of harmony. The splendor of still water in the dance represented the power and order of tradition. The water dancer sat motionlessly staring straight ahead, content in his world, because he had no other options. His needs were met so variation was not necessary. Before globalization and awareness of faraway cultures, tradition ran day to day life in many parts of the world. Cultures mixed and influenced one another, but not on the level that the West is currently permeating traditional lifestyles around the globe. When colonists ripped the breathing tube out of much of Africa and South America, the people in those areas were forever robbed of the ability to breath under water. As that first TV in every village conveys the amenities and glamour of the West, the viewers will likely want to breathe that same air.

The Westerner, attempting to curiously venture into the unknown, receives quite a shock to the system as well. Study all the theory you want, but you can’t learn how to swim from a book. You’ll study the physics of each movement and then you’ll jump into the water and try to breath. You’ll be so overwhelmed by the foreign, fluidity of the water that you’ll forget all you read and you’ll drown. You can’t possibly understand a foreign culture until you experience it firsthand and chances are you won’t fully understand it even then.To come at all close to comprehending another culture, requires stepping out of your comfort zone and fully submerging yourself. If you try to stick your head in the water while keeping your feet firmly planted on the ground you will come out with a chaotic and muddled experience. It is only when you let go of all of your precious assumptions and suppositions that you might begin to see.Truly seeing involves respecting that which you observe, which in turn requires the humility to look outside of yourself. It is too easy to see things for what we want them to be or what we think they should be—or to see things for what they are not. Seeing takes a radical acceptance that other people might not share your deepest values.

As I have expressed in earlier blog posts, variance in value-sets has been one of the most emotionally wearing challenges I have faced during my time in Egypt. For much of the time I have struggled with gender politics and religion and last night I had my first serious discussion with Egyptians on the topic of Israel. While I had skirted the topic with some of the Americans on my program, I had previously been doing my utmost to avoid it. It is one of the most complicated debates in existence and I honestly don’t know what I feel about it. Last night however, one of the Egyptians in my dorm commented that Gaza is not so different from the Holocaust and my dam broke. This was the second time I had heard this claim made in two days and I couldn’t help but respond.

Of course responding only led to a fruitless argument that left a heavy damper in the air. Many of the Egyptians (including the woman with whom I was discussing) have lost family members in Gaza. I know Israelis who have lost family members as well, but when you compare it just comes down to a tat for tat of emotional losses from two groups of extremely similar people. I think the most important distinctions are that are too often ignored are those between Hamas and the Palestinian people and between the Israel government and the Israeli people.  

I’m getting sidetracked though. I really had no intention of bringing up Israeli-Palestinian politics at all. The point I originally hoped to make was that sometimes people’s beliefs are so deeply engrained that they cannot be shaken. And sometimes those beliefs are the exact opposite from those of someone with equally steadfastprinciples. That does not mean, however, that those people shouldn’t talk or that they can’t form relationships. One my best friends in high school and someone I still highly respect today could not have ranged farther from me on the political spectrum, but she is incredibly smart and fun to be around. So many different factors weave together to make up person’s beliefs, but those views don’t define the person. Aside from political and religious outlooks and separate from national and sexual orientation, a person has her preferences in sports and art. People have hobbies and senses of humor. There are food preferences and clothingpreferences. You can completely disagree with someone’s viewpoint on one topic and still find a great deal in common with her.

Rather than focusing on changing the differences, why not focus on the similarities that do exist? Judaism and Islam have more in common than in variance. I find it highly ironic that the two groups are fighting over a piece of land for religious reasons in the first place. And for the differences that do exist, why can we not celebrate them? A person learns most from things that are new and diverse. Differentiation is what opens a person’s perspective. I can’t imagine how blinded my views would be if I hadn’t had conservative friends in high school pushing me to explain why exactly I encompassed those views. There is a definite melancholy in the idea of cultures around the world losing their individuality. But there is also a beauty in the mixing of peoples and the sharing of ideas and traditions. The key component in that beauty, however, is that there is equal sharing and not an imposition of beliefs from one side. As Western culture spreads across the world it is the responsibility of Westerners to become educated and cultured. This does mean touristy safaris and cruises or reading National Geographic. This means talking to people and openly listening to outside perspectives

Listening without imposing can be far more challenging than one would think. It is one thing for me to accept that people have differing views on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. But it is more difficult to accept that people might have differing views on women’s and gay rights or domestic violence. I see these differences I am not sure that it is morally acceptable for me to sit back and observe a culture or to take part in a culture that promotes these practices. I have realized though, that all of these issues are far more intricate and multi-faceted than I can comprehend. Women wear the Hijaab and the Nicab, for example, for all sorts of reasons. Some might feel outside pressure to wear it, but for me to assert that all women are forced and that the Hijaab is sexist would be vast simplification on the complexity of the tradition. I have my values and I don’t need to bend them, but I also must remember that none of us have the answer in life. Maybe there is a greater power out there who knows what truly is right and wrong, but as far as I’m concerned no one here on earth has access to that scripture.

Had I come into Egypt raging for women’s rights and the abolishment of religious law, I would have first been vastly disliked, second sorely disappointed, and third incredibly naïve. I would have missed out on the opportunity to understand why people here do what they do. I would not have had my eyes opened to the number of challenges and hypocrisies that America still comprises. It would have been like trying to breath in a tank of water and I would have choked. Then I would have left in frustration, returning to the country I thought had all the answers only to find that it had been dampened by what I had seen outside. All I can do as a foreigner—and all I ever really should do anywhere I go is present myself for who I am. Then others around me can choose whether or not my traditions and values are worthy of replicating.

I feel like this blog post came off a bit idealistic with my vague and flowery approaches, but before you disregard it just take a moment and think it through. Then take a look at how things are playing out in the world today and let me know if you have any better solutions. Really, tell me—I want to hear. Because the way I see it, Westernization is currently being met with anti-American sentiments and resistance efforts that are almost leading to more othering and stereotyping than existed prior to globalization. The only solution I see is for people to mix at the civilian level and listen to one another. Groups like Encounter (an organization that brings together Palestinian and Israeli teens for intercultural dialogue) are a wonderful start and should be replicated. It is only once we can learn to celebrate differences and learn how to truly listen that we will ever come close to peace in the Middle East and in our own lives, but that really is not so hard when you get down to it.