The Fasting Doctor

Last week, my Egyptian Colloquial Arabic teacher posed a question to our class and asked us to debate it amongst ourselves. The question was as follows, and came directly from her own experience earlier in the week:

"On Monday, my mother was scheduled to have hip replacement surgery. It's a difficult surgery and my mother has a weak heart and weak health in general, so we were worried about how she would manage with the anesthesia and her recovery, especially if there were any problems during the operation. I was particularly worried because the doctor was Muslim, so he would be fasting during the procedure, which was scheduled to last 5 hours. I wanted to ask him not to fast, but my mother and sister told me it wasn't my right to do so. Was it my right to ask him?"

During our debate, I was on the side arguing that it was not her right to ask him. I probably would have found difficult even in English, let alone in Arabic. It was hard for me to think of reasons why you shouldn't be able to ask a doctor who is being paid a great deal and holding your mother's life in your hands to take one day's break from his religious ritual. Surely God would want the operation to be a success and would not be offended by a one-day hiatus.

I guess it is hard for me to understand as a non-Muslim how important each DAY of fasting is. To me it seems that 30 is already so many days that how could missing one single day matter so much that it is worth risking an important procedure. As our debate went on, I started to change my mind and see both sides more clearly. One girl argued that no amount of money should be able to interfere with someone's religion. Fasting is one of the five pillars of Islam - only certain extreme conditions exempt a Muslim from doing it, and even then they have to make up the days later after Ramadan. The same girl pointed out that fasting is meant to bring you closer to God, so wouldn't it be even better if the doctor were fasting? The operation is in God's hands, not the doctor's. The doctor knows his work and has a team of people working with him who will not let anything go wrong.

The other side of the debate made plausible claims too. There is no harm in asking the doctor not to fast or requesting a Christian doctor to do the procedure. Your mother's life is important and you should do anything you can to ensure that the operation will be a success. You have certain rights as a patient as well, especially since you are paying a lot.

At the end of our debate, we asked our teacher what she had ended up deciding. She said, "After discussing it a long time with my mother and sister, they convinced me I was wrong. I don't have any right to ask the doctor such a thing, so I didn't ask him. The operation went fine, al-hamdulilah (thank God)."

I'm still not sure where I stand. I would appreciate any of your thoughts on the matter!

A-Siyaam

It's a lazy day. I'm sitting in my room trying not to use up too much energy or get too hot, since it is the first day of Ramadan and I'm fasting in solidarity with my friends here. I have not been forced or encouraged to fast. It's a personal thing and no one expects foreigners to do it, but I have fasted Ramadan before and I know it tends to bring people together, so I'm giving it a shot again at least for the first day. I like the way fasting forces your mind to transcend your body. I don't like the way your mouth feels like it's full of sand after 17 hours without water.

For those of you who don't know, Ramadan is a month of daily fasting to commemorate the month that the Quran was revealed by God to the prophet Muhammad (PBUH). The word for fasting in Arabic (Siyaam) comes from the root that means to "refrain," and it is a fast that involves your entire body, mind and spirit. Not only do you refrain from eating and drinking between sunrise and sunset, but you must also refrain from all impurities and temptations. You are supposed to refrain from even hearing negative talk, insults and gossip, let alone producing them. It is a time of daily purification and intensive prayer which will last until weeks after I have left Egypt. 

Last night, a group from our program did as many locals do and stayed in a restaurant  until about 2 AM to eat a last meal before the Fagr, or dawn prayer. The fast lasts every day from the Fagr until the Maghreb, the evening prayer at sunset. August is a rough month for Ramadan because the days are at their longest, so there is a long, roasting wait before the Iftar meal that breaks the fast. Fast is always broken by eating a date and then some simple food or tea before a larger meal later in the evening. Ok, I need to stop talking about Iftar now because my transcended mind is starting to sink back down into my stomach, which is starting to notice my neglect.

It is interesting how Ramadan changes the rhythm of life here. Everyone who is Muslim is fasting, even kids who are old enough (around 10 and up). The only people who aren't are little kids, people who are sick or traveling, and women experiencing their monthly cycle (though they have to make up those days after Ramadan has finished). The fact that so many people are doing it means that things won't get effectively done between certain rough, hot hours of the day. People sleep late and conserve their energy, so the hours of most businesses change so that they can remain open late into the night when workers have more energy. There are decorations everywhere and lights hanging from houses. People in Egypt hang lanterns everywhere. Some of them sing little songs about Ramadan and Allah as they light up the nights in which families come together for Iftar. 

It is a beautiful holiday that I deeply respect, and I am lucky to have had the chance to be a part of it in Mali, Senegal, and now Egypt. I hope that some of you get the chance someday to see what I am talking about. 

I will write again very shortly, since I am trying to catch up and write entries about all of the things that have happened since I arrived. 

"The Public Language"

I thought I would post this picture of the board after my last class because it pretty much illustrates how my life feels right now. If "HUH" were a feeling, that would be how I feel.

There are two things I have decided I will never achieve in Egypt - not that I am not smart enough or persistent enough, but that achieving them is not possible and I must let the idea of achieving them go in order to be happy. The first is looking good. A few moments after I walk out of the dorms in the morning, I look like I have been dunked in a pool. So I have to just give up on looking good and focus on other things, which is good in many ways.

The other thing I have given up on, at least until I have the opportunity to spend a solid year or two in Egypt, is trying to make people think I'm smart or good at Arabic. It's frustrating to be fluent (or think you are), having studied Arabic for years intensively, and then come to a new place and have to start again!

Let me explain the most challenging thing about Arabic and why I have been brought back to baby talk novice status once again now that I am in Egypt. Some of you may know that Arabic has developed very differently in different countries. All countries do share the same language: the language in the Quran, classical Arabic, and the language of the news and formal settings, called "Modern Standard Arabic." When you innocently begin studying Arabic in the US, these are mostly what you learn. Then you go to an Arabic-speaking country and suddenly realize that you are speaking Arabic like someone speaking English who learned solely from the King James Bible.

So let's say you're studying in Jordan when the reality of the challenge you have undertaken hits you, and you begin studying the "Ammiyya," which literally means "general language" in Jordan.

"What?" you might say... "Not only is the vocabulary different but the grammar too? The way they conjugate verbs is different? But how can this be?" But you happily learn it all because it is fun and it allows you to actually speak to people and understand what is happening around you, rather than only understanding the news.

Now we get to the point in the story where I find myself. I was in Jordan two years ago and then in the US for a while, so I have forgotten a great deal. Now we get to the really tricky part about Arabic.

Not only does Arabic have an entirely different form of the language that's spoken on the ground, but that language is different in Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, etc... Most Arabs can't even understand Moroccans when they hear them speak. They understand Egyptians, but only because Egypt has been the center of the cinema industry for years, and all Arabs have grown up watching movies and listening to songs in Egyptian colloquial.

The difference between Jordanian/Palestinean and Egyptian is not something to be learned in a day, as I realized when I arrived in Alexandria. Imagine if you were a foreigner studying English and you had been to England and become fluent. Now you decide to study in another country. Upon arriving, you are told that here, most daily vocabulary words are different. Most adjectives and verbs are different...actually the only things that are the same are more abstract ideas that are used less frequently. Anything used every day is definitely going to have a different word.

Oh also...here in this country they say b in front of every verb in the present tense. Just remember to slap that on there EVERY time you say a verb...and the way you do the future tense is different too. Well now that you mention it, the past is different too. Oops. Are you remembering all this?

Oh yeah, and in this country, articles go after the noun. And they're different. Sorry that you got used to saying nouns with articles in front of them...now instead of saying "the dog", now you're going to say "dog di." Oh but for feminine things, remember to say "da."

Question words are also different in this country. Instead of saying "where is the bathroom," you have to say "the bathroom is where?" Otherwise people will give you strange looks at first and it will take them longer to understand you.

This language also changed the inflection of words and phrases completely...so try to get used to that too. Use your old inflection learned elsewhere, and people will look at you funny, not understand you. If they know you, they might say, "hey...you're not in England anymore."

Add to that the fact that the people in this new country speak at least twice as fast as they did in England.

So in our illustration here, if Jordan is England and Egypt is the new country, you now have a better understanding of what I mean when I say that Egypt has a different dialect.

And yet I am not floundering as much as I expected. Maybe my experiences in Jordan did give me something: the ability to learn quickly and know what to look for when I'm learning. I know it probably seems like I am discouraging all of you by making Arabic seem like the hardest language there is to learn. You have to think about the reward these challenges give. I was so deeply proud of myself when I could speak with Jordanians because I worked really hard for it. I get to be even more proud of myself the day I can speak like an Egyptian.

Here is my evidence - the tiny piece of proof of the work I have put in and the goodness it has given me. In Egypt, foreigners pay 2-3 times as much for a ticket to any sight. It makes sense - the system encourages and allows Egyptians to experience their own cultural attractions without paying much for it. Yesterday, when I went to an aquarium, the man handed me my regular non-Egyptian ticket and took my money while he gave an Egyptian ticket to my Egyptian friend. Then he heard me speaking to her and said, "You SPEAK ARABIC?" He snatched my foreigner's ticket from my hand and gave me back my money and this little blue Egyptian ticket that I am thinking about framing and said, "You speak Arabic, you pay the Egyptian price."

And THAT is why I am here, and why I have given my life to this language. For moments like that. So learn Arabic.

Arrival in Al-Iskandariyya

Well... I am in Egypt. It is a little hard to believe that I am finally here - our trip was beyond eventful and I'm pretty sure this stack of cancelled and unused tickets shows you why I will NEVER be flying United Airlines if I have anything to do with it again (the best part of the trip was the train United put us on when they had no other options).

Oh well... "ce qui est dur ne peux pas durer" as they told me in Senegal... "that which is difficult will not last long." Although apparently it can last at least 54 hours, because that's how long it took us to get to Cairo. After a four hour bus ride to Alexandria, we were scraggly, exhausted, and ready to sleep. However, I would do it all again just to spend a week here. Alexandria has so far proven to be an amazing place. Every single person I have met has been ridiculously friendly. I keep expecting people to be wary of me or accuse me of doing something wrong since I was warned that there has lately been suspicion of Americans, but instead I have received nothing but warm welcomes and a great deal of patience. And a lot of food.

My favorite thing to do here so far (besides drinking fresh mango juice, enjoying the garbled English phrases on the shirts of passers-by, and walking along the edge of Poseidon's playground) is tell people that I actually teach Arabic to high school students. I think most people are delighted and surprised that American high schoolers care about their language. Maybe it makes them reexamine their previous mental picture of Americans, and it makes them reexamine me. Every time you travel, you should be an appropriate ambassador for your country to every single person you meet, no exceptions. Talking with pride about my students back home makes it easy for me to do that, and it makes me very happy.

Keep in touch for the next five weeks as I post updates about my trip if you are interested in Egypt or Arabic!