Burning Seoul Photo: Justin De La Ornellas

It’d been a good night in Itaewon, one of Seoul, South Korea’s busiest nightspots. I’d potentially made a new friend to guide me through the city. Even better, I was dancing with an attractive girl. We moved closer together and she put her arms around my waist. She stopped dancing and smiled.

“What’s this?” she teased, grabbing at my several pounds of excess fat.

“Uh … well, me,” I replied, surprised and embarrassed.

What did one say? She’d picked out one of my flaws and told me all about it. Thanks for the observation? Unsurprisingly enough, things with that girl never went beyond the platonic. I had just learned my first lesson on the importance of looks in Korea.

In any subway car you will see young Korean women checking their hair and makeup in mirrors that come attached to their cell phones. For those with less image-savvy devices, the windows provide ample reflection for women to fretfully fix stray stands of hair or rouge streaks of foundation.

Wondergirls Press Conference Photo: DekOow

This preoccupation with beauty is no less reflected in how many Korean women dress. High heels, mini skirts and frilled blouses are not reserved for nights out on the town – they are the norm for many women going about their daily business.

But Korean’s quest for beauty often leads them to take drastic, more permanent measures. The number of women who get some form of cosmetic surgery is nothing short of astounding. Conservative estimates put the figure at 50 percent of women in their twenties. Equally striking, one newspaper poll carried out last year suggested that almost 90 percent of Korean women have thought about getting work done.

By far the most common procedure is double eyelid surgery, which involves putting an extra fold in the eyelid, making the patient’s eyes seem bigger. Nose jobs and liposuction are also popular.

While looking good is a matter of boosting self-esteem for many women, there are often more practical reasons for going under the knife. A lot of women believe that their chances of employment are largely dependent on their looks and will improve significantly after a cosmetic touch-up. In this highly competitive society, where it is routine to send your photo attached to your resume, a pretty face can give you the edge in a job or college interview.

Such is the pressure to succeed that some parents even pay for their daughter’s procedures. It is not uncommon for high school girls to have their surgery paid for as a graduation present. And with many Korean celebrities getting surgery, the pressure to look a certain way comes from outside the home as well as within.

Asian Art Festival Photo: Stinkie Pinkie

Even politics is far from immune from the beauty obsession. Recently, one South Korean politician who had judged at a college debating competition raised eyebrows when he gave a group of students his view on how to win a debate.

“When we have a debate competition, judges don’t really pay attention to the debate. They are actually interested in how participants’ faces look,” the politician was quoted as saying.

At the same gathering he was reported as telling an aspiring news anchorwoman, “You will have to give ‘everything.’ Can you still do it?” “Everything,” one can assume, was not an innocent reference to plain determination and hard work.

Shortly after my lesson in appearances at the nightclub, I saw an online advert for free weekend Korean lessons. I went without hesitation, eager to pick up a few phrases in a country where English-speakers are firmly in the minority. The lessons were being provided by a group of young Koreans, who were keen to improve their English.

They invited me to lunch after the first class. The conversation turned to pop music. Before long, one of the girls produced her phone to show me a photo of the “Wondergirls,” one of Korea’s biggest girl groups. She wanted to know which one of the girls I thought was the most beautiful. I pointed out my favorite. I had good taste, my new friend told me.

Of course I did. I’d already learned what it meant to be beautiful here.

Feature And Above Photo: tanki

So how did I end up hosting a baby shower in Japan?

I met Yumie a few weeks after my arrival in Okinawa, and she became my first real friend here. She helped me in all aspects of daily life from programming the complicated air-conditioner to introducing the best soba shop. I really valued our friendship. So when she asked me this favor when she was six months pregnant, I wanted to please.

But I quickly realized that Yumie had expectations for this party, and they were mostly derived from Hollywood movies.

To be clear, in Japanese society, there’s no such custom as a baby shower. It’s an imported event.

And while I veered towards a low-key affair, Yumie envisioned a shower of grand proportions.

“I want baby baby baby everywhere!” She said, waving her hands for emphasis.

“Huge cake with whipped cream frosting!”

“I wanna open presents in front of everybody!”

In addition, Yumie expected games and prizes, insisting on Starbucks gift cards and Victoria’s Secret smelly lotions.

As she rattled off her ideas, I considered the situation.

Living abroad for the past year, I had been trying hard to integrate into Japanese lifestyle and local customs. Then suddenly, I was asked to “stage” an experience with all the trappings from my own American culture. What’s more, that experience was largely defined by exaggerations in media.

Despite Yumie’s enthusiasm, I felt pressure thinking about how to pull it off. I knew from teaching English abroad that delivering a slice of one’s culture often challenges local etiquette and beliefs.

In fact, something as benign as an American baby shower was a strange event on many levels.

First, for many Japanese, it’s not customary to celebrate a new baby until after the birth. There is an underlying cultural belief in not testing fate, and making a production ahead of time might prove unlucky. People are more comfortable waiting a few months after a safe delivery to visit the mother and pay respects.

Next, going to someone’s home for a party according to American tradition is uncommon. Given the small size of houses and subtle rules for social interaction, it’s standard to host events at restaurants. When a guest is invited into a home, it is considered a great honor. But because I was a foreigner and a stranger, Yumie’s friends were reluctant to enter such an intimate environment with me. A few of them expressed discomfort, and we changed the location to her home instead.

Also, American baby showers are characterized by that mandatory “opening presents” time with lots of squealing over booties and tiny outfits. But in Japan, friends usually bestow gifts of money for new babies. When they do give gifts for birthdays or other occasions, they seldom open them in each other’s presence. Many believe that doing so puts the emphasis on the material object, upstaging the person bestowing it.

In all honesty, I was never sure how Yumie sold the baby shower concept to her friends. I wondered if they approached it as a novel, if not slightly wacky event, in the same way that many Japanese are attracted to prison and church themed restaurants in Tokyo.

On baby shower day, Yumie’s friends arrived bearing smiles and gorgeously wrapped boxes. The agenda followed a typical schedule of introductions, games, food, more games, gifts, and then cake. Some aspects of the event were hits and others definite misses.

Surprisingly, one successful feature of the baby shower transcending culture was playing games. In planning, I mostly tried to find tasks that wouldn’t be potentially offensive. (Blindfolding guests and forcing them to eat pureed goo? Thankfully I crossed this one off the list ahead of time)

Of course, initially there was feigned reluctance to join the contest to drink juice the fastest out of a baby bottle. And her friends were shy to guess the circumference of Yumie’s waist. But in the end, they showed true competitive spirit.

Opening presents time was a different story. All that pretty gilded wrapping paper and ribbon was not enough to temper the awkwardness of that interaction. When it came time to gush, guests sat eerily quiet and stiff looking on.

Finally, remember that huge cake with whipped cream frosting specially requested? Well, I certainly was not surprised by the outcome of that.

In all my experiences living abroad, one of the most common differences observed between Americans and other cultures is in the consumption of sweets. Yumie’s guests left the thick slices of sugary cake mostly uneaten on the plates.

Community Connection

Have you ever been asked to replicate an event from your culture while living abroad? How did it go over?

Photo and Feature Photo:quinn.anya

Before travel, I never realized how little I like to be touched.

Sure, hugs are fine. I don’t even mind a cramped car ride or overstuffed elevator. I thought that in terms of physical contact, my comfort zone was average.

Last year, I learned my limit.

In Turkey, even in the thick heat of an Istanbul summer, my ESL students would greet each other with earnest hugs and kisses. I do the same, if I haven’t seen a person for a while, but this was an everyday event, the Turkish equivalent of my North American eye-contact-and-nod greeting. Here, bodies were always getting close. I didn’t like it one bit, especially in the summertime of bare skin and perpetual sweat.

It wasn’t just the sweat factor, of course. It was the kissing too. All that kissing! One cheek and then the other, the two faces weaving dangerously close, the noses almost touching. You could study your friends’ pores if you wanted to. You could sniff in an instant your friends’ last cigarette or kebab lunch. Definitely not the stuff of a good student-teacher relationship, in my books.

Some students would embrace me as they would any teacher. I know they could sense my body stiffening as my head whipped around, trying to get it over with. I wanted to return this amiable gesture somehow. I would try to offer closeness the ol’ Canadian way; cracking jokes, asking questions, giving compliments. The more I opened up verbally, the more daily embraces came my way.

How do you greet people in Canada? They asked. I demonstrated a wave, a nod, a handshake, knowing full well that it seemed comparatively frosty. The conversation that ensued sounded like a teenage boy trying to goad his girlfriend to first base. So, what about kissing? Not even a little? But it’s nice to kiss someone, it shows love. Have you tried it? You should try it. You might like it.

I knew my resistance was more personal than cultural. Though we aren’t a huggy bunch in Canada, I knew many North Americans who could adapt to this Turkish custom. I would see expat friends on the street and in cafes, greeting their friends with smacking kisses. It was a small adaptation for me to make, but it just wouldn’t sit right.

I would talk about it with other teachers after class, rattling off excuses.

“It’s summer! Everyone sweats! I’m smelly, they’re smelly.”

“It blurs the teacher/student divide, I can’t grade the exam of someone I hug daily!”

“How about a compromise? I’ll only do it with females, and they have to be over a certain age or it feels weird. Eighteen? Nineteen?”

I sounded obsessive, fixating on this tiny cultural difference, this hiccup in what was otherwise a fine, friendly relationship with a lovely group of people.

Photo: Jesslee Cuizon

I tried to make a lesson out of it, a teaching point coming out of cultural difference. We read articles on personal space, we talked about physical contact in different cultures: the handshake, the bow, the hug, different forms of the same sentiment. The class took to the information with interest, but in my case, it all felt like excuses.

“But in Japan, they just bow!” I’d say, textbook in hand like a flimsy white flag. I was desperately justifying my stiff hug while a kind Turkish student stood before me, looking confused. Their past English teachers had done it. Their foreign friends did it.

But why? Why don’t Canadians like to touch? I could see them turning the logic over and over in their minds, trying to decipher this stubborn fact. It’s cold there, you should be touching more than us, keeping warm!

“We don’t dislike it, we just don’t do it so often.” To my students, this was the epitome of frigidity. To them, constant physical contact was as natural as breathing. One day, a quiet businessman in the class piped up. “No wonder Canada has a small population,” he said, “you can’t make babies if you don’t touch your wife!”

And that, thankfully, was when tension gave way. My anti-embracing became another class joke, the way Emre was always late, or Bashak’s nose was always buried in her Turkish-English dictionary. Each day, someone would jokingly lean, and I would play up my part with rigid shoulders and bulgling eyes. It paved the way to more discussions about Canada, Turkey, and their differences.

Months after the class ended, I ran into some of my former students at a cafe. There, hugs were exchanged, and each one was sincere.

Community Connection

Have you ever realized the differences in personal space or greetings while traveling or living abroad? Share your experiences in the comment section.

Photos: author

My only experience of life in a Xhosa village is of a walk with a friendly woman in the Transkei, who took us back down to the beach, along a thorny, dense thicketed path. We had gotten lost on our attempted hike, and were trying to make it back to our seaside hostel, The Kraal, without walking shoes.

She walked the entire path without any shoes either, but I didn’t see her flinch. This experience gave me a profound respect for the rural Xhosa lifestyle and attitude. After all it’s a similar upbringing the revered Nelson Mandela would have had in the village of Qunu, which is also part of the former Transkei.

Xhosa, or IsiXhosa, is one of South Africa’s eleven official languages, and is predominantly spoken in the Eastern Cape region, including the former Transkei and Ciskei areas, where Mandela and former president Thabo Mbeki were born. According to South Africa Info 17.6% of the country speaks Xhosa.

Xhosa culture is typically represented in the rural areas of the Ciskei and Transkei, where herds of cattle sleep unperturbed on the quiet beaches and ladies grind maize on concrete next to turquoise painted rondavels, or thatched huts.

In the rural areas traditional ceremonies are still practiced, including the rite of passage into manhood by young men, who leave their villages for a certain time and undergo circumcision. After this ceremony they wear ochre-coloured clay on their faces to signify that they have undergone initiation. Mandela describes his own initiation ceremony in his autobiography, The Long Walk to Freedom.

However, migrant labor has also lead to an urban representation of Xhosa culture, which is largely characterized by the idiosyncrasies of township life, including a community spirit and social gatherings such as chisa nyama (literally “hot meat”, or barbeque, also known as braai), which is eaten together with pap (porridge).

Unfortunately, the nature of South Africa’s past, and the diversity of its population has prevented linguistic assimilation to a large degree. Even people like myself, who have spent their entire lives in the country, still don’t understand all the languages spoken around them.

Xhosa, like the other eleven official South African languages, has been influenced and shaped by hundreds of years of migration, colonialism, apartheid and the discrepancy between rural and urban life. As a result of previous apartheid legislation, areas like the former Ciskei and Transkei were declared “independent” states in an effort to isolate ethnic groups.

However, this “independence” also created a lack of infrastructure and high levels of unemployment, which means that many people from these areas have left for cities like Cape Town to look for work. More and more people in South African cities like Cape Town speak Xhosa, and so the need for people to learn the language in these areas has increased.

There are several language schools that specialize in Xhosa instruction, such as Xhosa Fundis in Woodstock, Cape Town, which offers an intensive six-week course- with ample time to practice Xhosa’s characteristic “clicks.”

Apart from classroom instruction, and online learning, other language schools, such as Ubuntu Bridge offer what they call Xhosa Culture Tours, and Language Immersion Opportunities. These can be a one-night stay in a Xhosa home in the informal settlement of Khayelitsha, or an extended stay in traditional Xhosa village in the rural Transkei or Ciskei for up to 10 days.

Both Xhosa Fundis and Ubuntu Bridge also offer corporate or team building packages, which cater to adult learners in an organizational context. Language schools like these also make an effort to introduce aspects of Xhosa culture, such as the difference between life in the rural areas, or ezilaleni, and in the “townships”, or elokshini.

You can try to study via CD’s, books and classes that will teach you the grammatical nuances, because like any other language Xhosa is complex. According to the UCLA Language Materials Project there are also several dialects of Xhosa, which include Ngqika, Gcaleka, Mfengu, Thembu, Bomvana and Mpomdomise.

Or, as I experienced while trying to learn Spanish with only a phrasebook in South America, another way to study Xhosa is to take a hands-on approach. One way of doing this would be to get involved in the local community outreach, by volunteering to teach at understaffed schools in the Cape Town area or in the rural areas of the Eastern Cape.

There are numerous volunteer organizations that operate within these areas; however, SHAWCO which is based at the University of Cape Town (UCT), is one of the better-known ones. The organization is run by students who volunteer to assist learners in the surrounding township areas, so it offers an ideal opportunity to improve your Xhosa language skills.

Whether you take an academic or immersion approach, I think learning Xhosa, and any one of the other eleven official languages, is a valuable skill and one that I, as an English-speaking South African, hope to acquire myself. I feel that growing up in a segregated country has limited my experience of life in my own country: something I hope to change.

Photos: author

I came to Rishikesh to relax, to write, to bathe in the Ganga, to be left alone. It’s exactly as easy as I remember it being when I first came five years ago–the heart of the “banana pancake trail.”

Rishikesh is listed on the back cover of Lonely Planet as the yoga capital of the world. Unsurprisingly, there are foreigners everywhere, and Ayurvedic apothecaries, massage centers, Nutella, Sai Baba-branded incense, chillums.

Didi’s East-West Café and Little Buddha Restaurant offer avocado lassis, cinnamon rolls, homemade kombucha. Eggs, toast, and weak Turkish coffee are available together in a set as ‘Israeli breakfast number two.’ These things are, I think, meant to seem familiar and comforting to foreigners; but it’s hard to pinpoint exactly where they’re native to. Tourists who met and talked philosophy over lukewarm beer in other cities run into each other here again.

Every day I indulge myself in an Americano in air-conditioned Café Coffee Day. There are big windows in the front that look out across the street at the local jeep stand. People stare in at the mostly foreign customers, sipping our expensive coffees and magenta-colored frozen mocktails.

I imagine we look comfortable, entitled, ignoring the world outside of our glassed-in interior. I have an odd sense of guilt at being here. It’s almost too easy. I get caught in this trap of equating struggle with valor, with worth. As though by choosing to stay here I’ve temporarily checked out of India.

I keep thinking about a question someone asked me when I was here three months ago for the Kumbh. Ben, a Canadian tourist who’d also gone to Haridwar for the big bathing day, had heard that my friend Neel was fluent in Hindi and quite knowledgeable about Hinduism and North Indian culture. Ben wanted to know what was “more authentic” about my experience of the Kumbh because I was with Neel. The question startled me; I had no idea what to say. But how fitting, to ask such a thing here.

Photos: author

A silk merchant in Banaras once told me about attending a family wedding in Mumbai. It was a lavish, modern affair; the tikkas, normally made from sandalwood powder, were made instead of the dust of pearls. Out of all the male guests, the silk merchant was the only one in kurta pajama; the rest wore three-piece suits. Everyone wanted to talk to him, listen to his stories told through paan¬-stained teeth.

They were delighted: here, in Mumbai, a pakka Banarasi! Indians, too, cling to a vision of the real.

What and where is this pure, pious embodiment of Indianness that we are searching for? If it exists, so must its opposite. Before I came, an acquaintance sent me an email suggesting some possible destinations. He mentioned Pune, but warned in capital letters: “It’s NOT INDIA.”

Yes, India is changing. But if Rishikesh, Pune, and the pinstriped Mumbai businessmen aren’t Indian, what are they? Are we willing to relegate them to being as countryless as the banana pancake? The truth is, one of the things that defines India for me is how fluidly, how comfortably seeming contradictions coexist here–in her landscapes, her experiences, her people–until they no longer appear antithetical.

Here in Rishikesh, I read the Hindustan Times over my Americano. Today’s cover shows a girl in profile sitting on a raised platform. Her eye makeup is heavy and she’s wearing mounds of red silk and a garland of marigolds around her neck. The caption explains: She is a fifteen year old living goddess, revered as an incarnation of Kali. Before her kneels another girl wearing jeans and a t-shirt. The goddess is blessing her. Both girls have just passed the high school leaving certificate exam; the goddess is the first sitting deity to ever do so. Her success in the exam “[has set] her on course for a career in banking” after she retires when she reaches puberty.

Every day I go to the beginner’s yoga class at the ashram where I’m staying. One night I get drunk with my teacher, Praveen, and he tells me it’s only an ashram in name. He refers to the owner as “fatty man.” Sometimes no one else shows up for class. When it’s just the two of us, he doesn’t touch the threshold of the room and then put his hand to his chest when he enters. He doesn’t ask me to finish the session with Om chanting like usual. I could feel disillusioned when another batch of students appears the next day and again he has us sing shanti shanti shanti, but I don’t.

Seven years ago Praveen left the business world, or, if you prefer, renounced it. He lived in the forest with his guru, practicing eight hours a day, eating enough to satisfy only three quarters of his hunger. He missed his motorcycle, his cell phone. His friends and his parents distanced themselves.

When he was young, they took him to hear famous babas lecture on the right path, the holy way. Now they want to know how he’s going to make money, if he’s serious when he says he won’t get married. These days he eats finger chips and oils his hair, and he has another scooter–its model name is ‘Pleasure.’ He likes telling stories about the discotheques he went to back when he was “commercial.” I’m still getting more flexible every day.

I spend another comfortable night at my fake ashram, the banker becomes a yogi, the goddess becomes a banker. Today she doles out blessings; tomorrow, pin codes and deposit receipts.

Should I be disappointed? She shares the HT cover with a story on a new three billion dollar international airport terminal and another about the recent slew of so-called “honor killings” in metropolitan Delhi. Authenticity doesn’t sound so pretty now. But it sure is shocking, it sure is different.

In the morning, I start thinking about going back to Banaras. But I won’t make any decisions before I’ve had my Americano.

Feature photo: boyke bader Photo: Brian Giesen

“Learn Indonesian? What for? The only words you need to know are terus, berhenti and putar balik. Continue, stop, and turn around,” said my expat colleagues between snickers and high fives. “You know, for the taxi drivers.”

I could have lived in the expat bubble by eating in restaurants, hiring an English-speaking maid and hanging out with ‘my’ kind, but I wanted to be able to eat at roadside stalls and order without pointing. I wanted to have conversations with taxi drivers beyond “continue, stop, turn around.” I wanted to understand the jokes my Indonesian colleagues forwarded to each other, and I wanted to be able to speak to a certain cute girl in customer service.

When I first went to Indonesia in mid 2005, I had not expected to need (far less to want) to learn the local language. Like many Indians, I had been brought up to believe that all “educated” people speak English. The only other country I had visited previously was Malaysia, where English enjoys a similar status.

It was hard for me to imagine someone with a university education unable to speak English and to not be ashamed of the fact. I was surprised to walk into fancy restaurants and top hotels and to not be addressed in English. This reduced status of English was new and fascinating; my understanding of the world had taken a severe wallop.

I bought a couple of Bahasa books and found some online vocabulary and grammar exercises. My first goal was to learn the numbers, ask the cost of things, understand the response and pay the right amount.

Photo: boyke bader

I met this goal quickly, and I thought, “This language is easy! There are no verb tenses, no strict rules on word order and not even plurals.” In most cases you just repeat the word and it becomes a plural. Slowly I learned enough to try and talk about inane stuff with my co-workers, and avoid ordering genteng (roof tiles) instead of kentang (potatoes) at a restaurant.

I was arrogant and (probably) insufferable, and thought myself better than my expat colleagues for making an effort. I boasted about having “learned” the language in two months. I would pre-plan conversations and prepare sentences beforehand to show off my Bahasa skills. Things went fine for a while, but pre-planned conversations can only go so far. Indonesians have no qualms bursting out in laughter when a foreigner makes a mistake in Bahasa. I reached a point where I could communicate in many everyday situations, but I couldn’t make out a single word when people spoke to each other in Indonesian.

The truth became clear to me when one day, after I had had enough of the laughter and bit back, one of my local friends quipped, “I’m sorry, but you sound too much like an airport announcement.”

“Or a newsreader,” another chimed in.

I had always assumed that I couldn’t understand Indonesians because they spoke faster when speaking to each other, but that was not the case. A German intern who had moved to Indonesia after four semesters of studying the language back home explained to me that difference between textbook Indonesian and colloquial Indonesian is massive.

Speakers add suffixes, drop suffixes, and use words not found in a dictionary. Words are often shortened, sudah becomes udah or even just dah, and the word lagi is used in a hundred different contexts. Anda, kamu, lu, bapak, ibu, mas, mbak, saudara and kau are all different forms of the pronoun “you,” yet while anda is supposed to be acceptable in all situations you will rarely hear it spoken between two Indonesians in an everyday conversation.

Indonesian turned out to be a lot more complicated than I originally thought.

I gave up on my language study books and started reading Indonesian blogs, tuned in to the trendy FM stations and filled my MP3 player with Indonesian songs. While I couldn’t tear myself away from my favorite English TV shows, I started watching Indonesian shows every now and then. I wasn’t making any tangible progress, but I felt I was doing my best to “immerse” myself.

Photo: jensen_chua

Things started changing when one of my colleagues invited me to be the fourth player in a doubles tennis match. He was the quiet guy at work and I never expected to have much contact with him out of the office, but he turned out to be a very knowledgeable and encouraging guy with the patience of a mountain and opinions on everything. He was also like a human auto-complete. While I struggled for the right word, he’d come up with suggestions that sometimes fit, and sometimes led me to form ridiculous sentences that sounded correct but ended up meaning something I hadn’t even remotely intended. Either way, I was learning.

Earlier the same month I was introduced to a law student who had no patience for English. We got along immediately, but communication between us was painfully slow and full of misunderstandings. Nevertheless, I was determined to communicate in Bahasa. Sometimes I’d have to break off mid-sentence to look up a word in a dictionary. Progress was rapid, though and within a few weeks I needed the dictionary less frequently during our conversations.

By using the language with friends and colleagues, I was making rapid progress, and after a while I didn’t even realize how far I had come. One day I went over to a friend’s place and a show called “Empat Mata” (Four Eyes) was on. I was able to understand a lot, and I even got some of the jokes.

By 2007, life had settled into a routine and I was itching for more. I wanted to expand my social circle and learn something new. I searched for a class that was close to home and had convenient timings. I found a French class. I was quite confident in Indonesian, but learning a new language through one that I had just learned seemed a bit intimidating. Feeling both nervousness and excitement, I signed up. It would be the ultimate test!

When I walked into the institute the evening of the first class, my would-be classmates were all gathered in the café outside the classroom, getting to know each other. There was one other foreigner, an Italian who worked for the UN and wanted to prepare for his next assignment in Geneva. We were all talking in Indonesian, and he was mentioning how impressed he was with Jakarta’s skyline. The word for skyline, however, escaped him, and he looked around for help. None was forthcoming.

“Garis langit?” I offered hesitantly, making a literal translation.

“Ohhh garis langit,” the group nodded.

I beamed. I knew then that I would get by.

Community Connection

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Feature photo: themanwithsalthair Photo: Camden Luxford

It’s blisteringly hot and I huddle under Gabriel’s hoodie, longing for home, for a bottle of luxuriously thick 60+ factor sunblock, for ice-cream. Below us, richly costumed dancers the size of chess pieces move in precise geometric patterns about the central faux-stone platform. The ruins of Sacsayhuamán provide a stately backdrop. Further below is the city of Cusco, and to our right are golden-green rolling Andean hills.

The Inca, the emperor from which an entire culture drew its name, and his high priest speak at length in Quechua, striding about their stone platform with arms spread. The script in front of me tells me it’s the “coca ritual,” but I’m tired of the incomprehensible speeches and let my attention wander to the people around me.

The woman in front is full of vivid energy, threateningly waving a bag of rubbish at the child in front of her every time he stands up, turning to offer us some of her fruit, laughing long and loud. To our right is a more serious, middle-aged señora, in the colourful, voluminous skirt favoured by Andean women, her long dark hair in two joined braids. Her energy has obviously been sapped by the long wait. I overhear her grumpily informing someone who is infringing on her space that she has been here since 5 am.

This is Inti Raymi: a grand festival stitched together in 1944 from colorful scraps left by Incan historians, archeological finds and the contemporary rituals of indigenous communities. It was one of the four most important of the Incan celebrations carried out in Cusco – the center of the Empire and the navel of the world. Taking place on the winter solstice, when the Sun God is furthest from his children, it celebrated the origin myth of the Incas, gave thanks for a good harvest, and pleaded with the Sun to return and ensure the continued fertility of the Earth.

Then the Spanish arrived. In 1572 Viceroy Francisco de Toledo declared the festival pagan and contrary to the Catholic faith and absolutely prohibited its practice.

Photo: endlesstrail

Today it has surged once again to become the second biggest festival in South America, second only to Brazil’s Carnival. More than 150,000 foreign and local tourists descend on Cusco each year, most paying US$80 for a reserved seat in the grandstands closest to the action.

We sit on the rocky outcrop above the performance space, having arrived at 8:30 am to find around 100 people already there. We dozed, chatted and made sandwiches as we watched the crowd grow over the course of hours. Now, with the performance in full swing there are thousands of people pressing in on all sides; they are mostly local indigenous families but with a handful of foreigners mixed in. Vendors are hawking everything from hats to potato crisps to pollo al horno, and the warm smell of sweat and greasy chicken hangs over the crowd. An enthusiastic young man to our left gets us all involved in an erratic Mexican wave as the hour draws nearer and the excitement peaks. It feels like a football match.

Those with reserved seats trickle into place with minutes to spare. At 1:30 pm a steady drumbeat fills, and a procession of stately Incan nobles begin to descend from the ruins to the wide open space at our feet.

Earlier I’d asked Gabriel why the tradition had been revived. “Turismo, supongo,” he’d scoffed. And it is, no doubt, a grand source of income for a city that has come to thrive on the tourist dollar. But as I sit among throngs of locals who had waited hours in the hot sun and now proceed to yell and hurl rubbish at those who dared to stand and block the view, I wonder if it’s so simple.

Nobody pretends Inti Raymi possesses even a scrap of authenticity. It is an evocation of a long-dead past, but a past that defines the Peruvian national identity to an almost unimaginable extent. Cynical travellers seeking the elusive “authentic” may deride the celebration as a targeted tourist trap, calculated to extract as many dollars from foreign pockets as possible; but the truth is more complex.

The reinvocation of the Festival of the Sun rode in on the wave of indigenismo of early 20th century Peru, a time when the intellectual elite of Cusco seized the indigenous cause seeking to lift them out of lives of miserable servitude, to “reawaken their consciousness,” remind them of their rich cultural heritage and the peaks they had reached in the Empire of the Incas – the Children of the Sun.

Over time, this identity was claimed for all Peruvians, the great Incan heritage was embraced by European descendents and mestizos (those of mixed heritage) alike, and the social struggle for the rights of indigenous communities subordinated to the project of nation building, of establishing a national identity and culture.

Admittedly, tourism was not far from the minds of Dr. Humberto Vidal Unda and the other organizers of the revived Inti Raymi. Cusco was visualised as the center of “Peruvianness,” as a living museum which would draw tourists from all over the world. This vision was closely backed up by government funds for the necessary infrastructure.

Photo: Jessie Reader

The indigenistas of 1940s Cusco were on to something, it would seem. Despite a drop in tourism this year, the streets of Cusco have been full. As we sip a cold beer in a friend’s store just below Sacsayhuamán after the simulated llama sacrifice and close of festivities, we watch tens of thousands of people from all over the world descending into the city ahead of us. Tourism is the lifeblood of the city, as many discovered this year during the tense months following the Machu Picchu disaster when tourism dried up almost completely and everybody feared for their job.

Inti Raymi contrasts dramatically with the earthy, difficult and brutally chaotic celebration that is Qoyllur Rit’i. I’m tempted to place Inti Raymi to one side, consider it an aberration in the “real” cultural experiences I’m having; but that would be too easy. Overt manipulation of national identity discomforts me, and the depressing reality is that many of the indigenous people in nearby communities can’t afford to attend a celebration flocked to by people who live halfway around the world. But the Incan heritage of Peru is rich, unique, and worth preservation. Who am I, as an outsider, to dismiss this preservation as crass, inappropriate or “inauthentic”? Some would argue that whatever the motivation behind its original impetus, the force and meaning of this celebration to local communities provides an important counterbalance to the homogenising forces of globalization. The people around me on the hill buy ice-cream and question one another about the meaning behind the on-stage endeavours, watching a manufactured version of a distant past; but it’s their past and should not be dismissed.

What disheartens me most, whatever side of the debate I choose, is not for whom Inti Raymi was recreated, or the value of its continued celebration, but the powerlessness of the indigenous people it is supposed to represent. Trod into the earth by the Spanish Conquest, it was regenerated for them, not by them, by an intellectual middle-class of European or mixed-blood descent, who saw in its practice a chance to romanticize and mythologize their own history and identity. They may or may not, as individuals, value the preservation of this aspect of their culture; what bothers me is that they are not in control of this preservation, that in the face of inflated prices for grandstand seats and allegedly politicized selection of actors to portray the most important roles, power is still firmly out of their hands.

These days, the living remnants of Incan culture watch the celebrations from the hillside, an $80 grandstand ticket an unimaginable luxury.

Community Connection

What do you think, does tourism aid in the preservation of culture or distort it?

For more on this topic, check out Sarah Menkedick’s Tourism and the “Preservation” of Culture: A Rebuttal.

All photos by author

Late one night, in a rare moment when it was just the two of us, Sayma told me her story. I had only heard pieces of it before. She was the most modern in her family: she wore jeans, went out in public with her hair down, and talked on the phone with boys who were her friends. She’d even worked for a year in Delhi at a call center.

At the time, she lived with her brother, who was then stationed in Delhi. When his transfer to Srinagar came in, she was called back home to Mussoorie. She pleaded to stay, but she was told Delhi was no place for a woman, a girl, on her own. Four years later, she still begged her parents to allow her to get another job, any work that would give her something to do, but she was losing hope.

For the last three summers, she arrived in Srinagar to the news that her brother had secured a job for her there. But Sayma was convinced that her family’s agenda was not for her to work again as she so desperately wanted, but to shift her to a city that wouldn’t allow the liberties she had in Mussoorie. They wanted, she said, to tame her. The process of marrying off the siblings one by one in order of age had begun, and there was only one sister left ahead of her now.

She mostly hoped that her future husband would be modern, too, or at the very least, not Kashmiri. She cried while she told me all of this, whispering in the dark on the floor of one of the front rooms. She’d seen a glimpse of another world in Delhi, and now she looked ahead and saw a different life waiting for her, one where she might not even warrant a place on the card that would announce its arrival.

I didn’t want to forget what she had told me, but I didn’t know how to sit with my anger at her plight. I knew I had to keep my judgment at bay, rising furious though it was, if I wanted to make it through the week. I took extra time in the bathroom, savoring the few minutes of being alone. And I turned my gaze with renewed focus onto the activities of the four rooms, trying to drown myself in the curiosities of the days.

Even if Sayma was the intermediary between me and this world, I still wanted to try to absorb it on its own terms. Sayma’s story was real and undeniable. But so was what was going on around me: this community in the midst of a colorful and elaborate celebration. They seemed happy.

Srinagar was quite distinct from everywhere else I’d been in India. Every time we went visiting, the host entered the room with a lacquered box filled with almonds and walnuts still in their shells and toffees and tossed handfuls of them over our heads. Then a woman carried in a round clay pot the size of a soccer ball with a handle on the back, cut diagonally across one side revealing a hollow filled with hot coals. In her other hand would be an embroidered and mirrored pouch holding a spice like brown asafetida. She threw a handful on the coals, filling the room with thick, bitter smoke. Someone coughed; someone reached to open a window. The smoke thinned and finally stopped, and the pot was taken away.

Applying henna to the bride

Later, the nuts and toffees (known categorically by the English words ‘dried fruits’) were gathered, bagged and sent home with us. All of this, I was told, was considered auspicious. Even the chai was different. There was the sweet, milky tea I was used to, and a salted version made with thick, dark tea leaves like cinnamon bark in the bottom of our cups. Nani always drank hers from a small bowl. She tore up round croissant-like pastries into pieces and floated them in the top like crackers in soup.

And then there was a wedding, not a singular event but a series of gatherings spread over two days. On the first night, a dozen young women from the groom’s side, myself included, went in a caravan of hired Marutis to the bride’s house. We were served canned peach juice, then birthday cake, and then a main course of piles of meat (paneer for me) with untoasted, unbuttered white bread as a side.

Sayma turned to ask me what she was supposed to do with the bread at the same time I turned to ask her. The bride’s mother and aunt took turns walking around the room three minutes into every course, chastising us one by one to eat more. After the meal, the groom’s oldest sister cut into a second cake, the one we had brought. The oldest sister, Sayma, and Sonia, the middle sister, all took pieces and fed them to the bride and the bride’s sister. Then she took their hands one by one and applied a tiny design of mehndi (henna), welcoming them into their new family.

The bride’s sister was also getting married to a man from a different family, but her visiting party couldn’t come because of the curfew in their neighborhood from the ongoing strife; at the last minute, she was integrated into our ceremony. I asked Sayma if it was a bad omen that she hadn’t been able to have her own mehendiraat. “Nothing like that,” she said. “Strikes are common here. It has nothing to do with the wedding. Everyone knows it’s just politics.”

Back home, we walked around the corner where a large tent had been erected in a neighbor’s yard. Inside, the canvas was an assault of color and design — the roof was covered in orange paisley, and the walls were split into contrasting panels of red, green, and yellow with a border of multi-colored diamonds. Across the ground were spread huge pieces of floral-printed cloth that I recognized from the front rooms of the Mir house.

A band of two singers, a harmonium player, and two drummers began to play. The groom entered and another cake was produced; his sisters, parents, and Nani fed him sticky pieces. After he left, the band members were the only men in the room. They were joined by a dancer, a man dressed in a sparkly pink and blue lehenga chunni, a woman’s dress. He wore kohl around his eyes and bells around his ankles like a bharatanatyam dancer. He started out slow, joining the band to sing a few songs and twirling in a circle around the tent, his skirts billowing out dangerously close to the crowd of women sitting at the edges. They reeled back, curious but shy and giggling in embarrassment.

Male dancer

Soon he picked up a yellow chiffon chunni (scarf), the sartorial marker of a woman’s modesty, and began to throw it around members of the audience, choosing as his victim whoever looked more uncomfortable than the next. He would keep coming back, dancing closer, throwing the chunni every time it was removed by the woman or her friends, who couldn’t decide whether to help or to laugh. He demanded money to leave her alone, but no small change would do. Sayma’s mother was the first to be harassed. He took the 200 rupees she gave him and tore the bills in half. He left her alone after 500 more.

Later, another woman tried to give him the same amount; he wiped the sweat from his forehead with the bills like a handkerchief and threw them in her face. It was all part of the act. I heard later he made 4000 rupees that night. For the first time in days, I wasn’t the only human attraction in the room; I had the company of another strange specimen worth gawking at. It was the most comfortable – the least out of place – I’d felt the whole trip.

We went to bed late. In the morning, I woke to see two girls, maybe ten years old, giggling over me, already dressed in finery. They ran off when they saw that my eyes had opened. The only person who slept later than me was an 8-year old boy, who’d stayed at the performance (which had continued straight through the night till 7 that morning) even later than me.

A few hours later, a lawyer came to the house to take word from the groom that he agreed to the marriage. The groom wore jeans rolled up at the bottom and the same cotton button-down he’d worn the day before. He gave his assent and took a call on his Smartphone as soon as the lawyer stood up. The lawyer went off with a party of the groom’s relatives to the courthouse, where a delegation from the bride’s family would also be waiting to legalize the union. I had yet to see the bride and groom in the same room. They were, in fact, in entirely separate neighborhoods, the wedding carrying on almost without them.

The women were fed in the tent around 5pm, after the men. Before the meal arrived, the groom was ushered in. Everyone fished around in her purse for an envelope containing a gift for the new couple. The groom was covered in garlands made from rupee notes and crepe paper. The women approached him one by one, offering their envelopes and kissing him on the cheek or the forehead to offer their blessings. He handed the envelopes one by one to a man sitting to his right.

A group of women hovered behind the groom‘s friend, looking on as he took careful accounts of what was given and by whom. I’d spent six days amongst the gossip of women and knew what fodder sat in front of them now for the days to come. At least, I thought, they’ll have more than hearsay to go on.

After dark we gathered outside the house carrying plates of rose petals and dried fruits to shower on the groom. The house was covered in strands of blue and red Christmas lights, strung from the roof and flashing frenetically. The baraat, the procession of men to the bride’s house, was underway.

The older women followed the cars for a block or two, arms linked, singing more sad songs. We went back to the house and drank chai. I asked Sayma what everyone was talking about; it had nothing to do with the wedding, which at that very moment was at its climax only a few miles away. Late that night, the bride was delivered back to the Mir house. She’d been officially married since the afternoon.

The next morning, as I was saying my goodbyes, Sayma told me I could go to meet the bride. I’d only seen her from across the room during the mehendiraat two nights before. She was wearing a heavy, sequined sari and putting the backings on her earrings. She invited me to sit and offered me some cashews. On her wrist were two gold bangles, a gift from the Mirs that I’d seen examined and vetted behind closed doors a few days earlier. I offered my congratulations; she smiled without showing any teeth and looked down bashfully.

Nani came in and hit me on the back. I turned around. She frowned. She wasn’t happy I was leaving so soon. Everyone else insisted I stay – I still hadn’t seen Dal Lake! – even as they followed me out the door while I was rushed off to go to the airport early.

As of that morning, the whole city was under curfew. Stores would be closed and roads kept free of vehicles and pedestrians alike. We didn’t know what security or other forces we’d encounter. The driver told me to keep my boarding pass ready in my hand. Sayma, who’d gotten quieter and quieter as the hour of my departure neared, was silent through the uneventful ride. She gave me a hug and left me at the entrance of the airport without looking back.

I wound my way through security slowly. My bag was scanned three times and my body four, but I finally made it into the waiting area. I bought a coffee, sat down, put in my iPod and turned it up as loud as it would go, finally able to tune out the clamor of voices.

I thought about the bride, waking up like I did to a house full of strangers ready to appraise her and welcome her. I thought about Sayma, my translator, my confidante, my go-between, my personal, skeptical Kashmiri cultural ambassador. Almost every time I’d asked her “why” about what I’d seen over the week – the open rooms, the dried fruits, the man dancing in women’s clothing – she gave me the only answer she knew, “That’s just what people do in Kashmir.”

I realized that the wedding, my reason for coming, had become a mere backdrop for a different story. I had been granted a window into Sayma‘s world, and she, too, into a bit of mine. Perhaps we were, in a way, asking the same questions. Before us was a daily life that was not our own, and we wanted to know what forces created it, how it became so that this was the way that people did things here. Sayma’s Kashmir didn’t come with a guidebook either.

All photos by author

Srinagar is the Muslim-dominated capital of Kashmir, India’s northernmost state. Resting in a valley between snow-capped Himalayas whose peaks are visible even on cloudy days, local tourist paraphernalia boasts that the city is “Paradise on Earth.”

Kashmir has been the center of periodic fighting between Pakistan and India since the 1947 partition, as both countries claim ownership over the state. Beautiful as it is, it is also highly volatile and prone to civil tensions that range from localized to crippling.

It is not a place I would have ventured as a young woman traveling alone, but Sayma had invited me to attend her brother’s wedding, where I would be the guest (and the responsibility) of her entire extended family. I couldn’t imagine a better or more interesting way to visit.

The night before I was due to leave, I heard from a friend that there had been fifteen injured in some small-scale riot in the capital city. I called my hosts and a friend who was politically well connected to try to gauge the situation. Everyone told me there wasn’t really anything to worry about and encouraged me to make the trip, and so I did.

The recently built Mir household was in a quiet neighborhood south of the city center. Though a future second floor was planned, for the moment it was a one-story home, comprised of four rooms: a kitchen and a bedroom on the south wall with a bathroom between, and two sitting rooms in the front.

Aside from massive dresser-cum-closets that were built into the walls of the bedroom and one of the sitting rooms, and glass-fronted curio cabinets that were a staple of every middle-class Indian home I’d visited, there wasn’t a stitch of furniture anywhere in the house.

In my first hours in Srinagar, as I was welcomed and fed and questioned and encouraged to rest, all on the floor of one of the front rooms, I wondered whether this was because my hosts simply hadn’t had time to purchase furniture for their new home yet.

But as I went with the family that night to visit various relatives and friends, I discovered that this was simply how Kashmiri houses were set up. It had the effect of creating an automatic intimacy. There were no cushions to be adjusted or tables holding the day’s paper. In short, there were no distractions from the present company, which was, in a word, ample.

Whether it was the wedding, or because the early evening was the time for visitors, or because these houses were inhabited by far more people than I would have guessed (it was hard to tell without any distinguishing marks in any rooms other than the kitchen to indicate how they were used), it seemed every house we went to had at least a dozen people in it, in addition to our visiting party of six.

Perhaps the lack of furniture was a way to accommodate these vast numbers, simply the local iteration of India’s general economy of space. In any case, the absence of furniture freed the rooms to serve an amazing number of needs, as I witnessed while floating between them over the days to come.

At night, we laid down thin mattresses and blankets on the floor to sleep. In the morning they were folded and piled up in the stairwell leading to the roof. In addition to being our bedrooms, the rooms served as ironing boards for the huge amount of laundry generated every day by the house’s numerous temporary residents and as dining rooms when the kitchen was already full.

They were the stage for the group of older women who gathered to sing melancholy songs every day to bestow good luck on the new couple. When some slight or annoyance occurred between two family members, they were the airing grounds for gripes, complaints and a few tears. The only silence they saw was when they were temporarily vacated to provide space for the more publicly pious of the group to lay down their mats and answer the call to prayer five times a day.

Everyone did their part to contribute to readying the house and preparing for the wedding. A tailor, who had come from Mussoorie, was commissioned to help measure the rooms for rugs, and to fit the last-minute fineries purchased by Sayma and her sisters for the wedding.

Various cousins and aunts helped cook meals and simmer chai. Neighbor women peeled pounds of garlic on the roof. A few men appeared busy, but mostly they just sat in lawn chairs smoking and gossiping. The children’s role was to stay out of the way, and they spent most of their time in the lane outside the house, catching tiny frogs in the pools of water that lay stagnant after the recent rains.

One of Sayma’s sisters confided to me that she was convinced that the more people who tried to help, the slower the work went. I was tempted to agree. The general commotion around the house was such that the coordination of even minor tasks was carried out with a level of drama and franticness that suggested that the wedding was really only fifteen minutes away and a crisis needed desperately and immediately to be averted.

The language barrier was high: Kashmiri and Urdu, the most common languages of the guests, were beyond me. Out of the 30 or 40 people who were in or around the house at all hours of the day, at best there were five or six with whom I had any success in communicating, and half of those were children.

Sayma played translator as best she could, though most often this resulted in her repeating the basics of my life story all over again for whichever guest had arrived that hour. She was clearly frustrated, and, I think, somewhat embarrassed, that everyone had to know about me, and that they had no qualms about talking about me in my presence, which I could sense even if I couldn’t understand what was said.

I was used to being stared at in most new places I went in India, where it isn’t frowned upon as it is in the US. Most often it comes from nothing more than a relatively harmless curiosity, as was surely the case here. But to have this happening in the very home where I was staying, with nowhere to escape for a respite, was a new and tiring experience for both me and Sayma.

Truth be told, I was somewhat frustrated and embarrassed by the whole ordeal. Without my Hindi to fall back on and without a role to play in the preparations, I wasn’t entirely sure what to do with myself. My repeated offers to help usually resulted in me being told to sit down, and a fifth or fifteenth cup of chai was produced for me to linger over.

Though by day two I was already feeling restless, the situation did have its charms: Sayma’s grandmother, or Nani, interacted with me by slapping me on the leg or shoulder or whatever other appendage was most accessible to her to get my attention. Then she would mime through a series of gestures and eyebrow raises that she thought I should take another cup of chai, or that I should rub my hands together to remove the henna drying on them, or that she approved of my choice of a red chiffon sari for the first important event of the wedding.

Aside from Nani, others included me as best they could, by ushering me into different rooms to watch the various goings-on and smiling at me when they caught my eye. For whatever they thought of me, it was clear that most people were excited by my presence and very keen that I should witness every detail of the events leading up to the wedding.

There were also many attractions in the city that everyone was proud of and hoped I would see: manicured Mughal gardens, the cobweb of narrow alleys of the main bazaar, Lal Chowk, and the famous Dal Lake with its houseboats and pleasure dinghies. But what with all the activity in the house, I was told that there wouldn’t be time to show me around until after the wedding was over. And it was quite clear that the idea that I would venture out by myself or with Sayma wasn’t even considered as a possibility.

At first I thought, or preferred to think, that this was because of the civil tensions that had continued since my arrival. But as I thought about the parts of the city I was privy to – the domestic hubbub of the Mir household, and the public streets filled with veiled women I could see through the cracks of the curtained rickshaws we took when rarely we did venture out into the market (two times out of three to go to the beauty parlor) – I realized with discomfort and sadness that my sudden lack of independence was part of a larger system that appeared to intentionally, if quietly, render me and other women of equal young and unmarried status vulnerable and dependent. Among other things, Sayma and her unmarried sister didn’t even know their own address; a chaperone was necessary to ferry them anywhere they needed to go.

I began to wonder what I‘d gotten myself into. I had accepted the possibility that my safety would be more tenuous here than other places I’d traveled. But I hadn’t considered that this family, who had raised Sayma in all her curiosity and playfulness, was, at least while they were in Kashmir, quite conservative.

The total lack of privacy was starting to get to me, and, to be sure, the news of continued public disturbances didn’t help matters any. I pulled the wedding invitation out of my bag to look at the dates and determine when I could book my ticket out (if I could ever manage to make it to an internet café), and realized with a start what I had somehow missed before. The bride’s name wasn’t mentioned anywhere on the card.

Community Connection

To see images of Kashmir’s “Paradise on Earth” from outside the home, check out Matador’s Kashmir Photo Essay by Sami Calado.

Feature Photo: zozo2k3Photo: unforth

I should have known better than enter an Ikebana show in Japan. After all, I’d only been taking the flower arranging classes for a few months, and there’d been all kinds of nervous chatter in the weeks leading up to the event.

All my conversations with classmates Junko, Ai, and Shoko had followed a typical pattern.

Them: “Mary-san, have you chosen your flowers yet?

Me: “I’ll buy whatever is on sale.”

Them: “What arrangement are you going to do?”

Me: “I want to be inspired in the moment.”

Them: “Which vase are you using?”

Me: “The same old training one…”

Ikebana is a traditional Japanese art form which has endured for hundreds of years. You’re probably familiar with the distinctive arrangements: rustic branches twisted around a single yellow rose, bamboo stalks situated at precise angles. There’s a whole spiritual philosophy behind it. And just like Klingon language experts and dog show trainers, Ikebana enthusiasts take their craft seriously.

Somewhere in the back of my mind, I knew that. Yet, I just couldn’t bring myself to feel stressed about the show.

I had been living in Okinawa with my husband for the past year. Before the move, I had read that integrating into Japanese culture was deceptively hard. Expat accounts revealed that although locals are pleasant and accommodating, Japanese communication style and social customs are complex and subtle, often proving troublesome to foreigners. For Americans in particular, accustomed to directness, there was danger of failing to “read between the lines.”

Moreover, the Japanese cultural tendency to say “maybe” rather than “no” often led to misunderstandings between the two cultures.

But so far, I hadn’t suffered any of those tensions. In fact, my language lessons, karate classes, and weekly Ikebana helped me make friends quickly and feel right at home on the tiny island.

Yet, oh, how I wish I had paid more attention.

Photo: conveyor belt sushi

The day of the Ikebana show, I was in high spirits. I was so confident that I spontaneously met a friend for lunch when I should have been focused on flowers. I figured I’d have a quick meal and conversation at a sushi-go-round. Then I’d buy my flowers, drive to the exhibition hall, set up my arrangement, and be done.

Only that’s not how the day unfolded. Lunch ran late, a tropical storm hit, and by the time I arrived like a drowned rat at the florist, there were slim pickings. I quickly grabbed three green swirly branches, five spotty roses, and some spiky pink blossoms. I had never used any of those materials before in any of the lessons, but they would have to do.

When I arrived at the hall, I expected other participants to be as frazzled as I was, what with that mini-typhoon barreling through.

But they were all calmly sweeping the floor underneath their majestic arrangements.

I dispersed my flowers on the floor and unpacked my sheers and training vase, glaringly drab and inferior next to the sleek pottery around me. Scanning the room nervously, I saw that everyone had brought miniature brooms to clean their work space, linens to decorate their spot, flower food, and bottles of water. Water. How could I forget to bring something as important as that?

Noticing my disorganized state, Junko lent me a few of her supplies. Ai spread newspaper underneath my area to collect stray clippings. Shoko sprayed my flowers with fine mist from a water bottle. I hastily set to work on creating my masterpiece.

I didn’t feel good about the final product. Next to all the elegant displays, my flowers looked like they had been attacked by a weed-wacker. That I had produced a shoddy arrangement was confirmed by all the polite encouragement I received.

“Nice colors,” they offered, which in essence is like writing “nice font” on a dismal research paper.

I braced myself for the worst when our 80-year old Ikebana Sensei approached. But after gazing over my arrangement, she surprised me with her response.

“Mary-san, this is very very good.”

“Really? ” I asked disbelieving.

“Yes, very very good,” she repeated as Junko, Ai, and Shoko looked on with wan smiles.

I felt instantly relieved. Our sensei was a premier Ikebana expert in Japan, displaying her famous arrangements in national museums and winning prestigious awards. Despite my lack of preparation and experience, I had somehow made her proud.

Sensei moved on to assess other flowers and I beamed. In fact, my confidence soared as I admired my creation. I had a natural knack for this art form after all.

Remembering I needed water, I borrowed a bucket from Junko and went to the bathroom. I walked back into the exhibition hall a few minutes later, and it was then that my heart lurched.

Sensei was standing in front of my spot again.

From a distance behind, I watched her yank out branches and move blossoms around brusquely, completely changing my arrangement. Her head gave a final decisive bob as she clipped a spiky flower and walked away.

In that moment, color spread over my entire face. My mind drifted back to all the hints over the weeks – the innocent questions, the strained smiles and courtly interest. Not only had I failed to read between the lines, I made a fundamental cultural mistake. I had assumed that my participation in the Ikebana show reflected only on me.

Photos: author

This is an era in which tourism is the most postmodern of activities, and no experience is safe from the vacuum of commodification. There are Mexican tourists simulating the experience of crossing the border illegally in Hidalgo, where indigenous Otomi people run a theme park in which participants pretend to be migrants headed to El Norte. The tourists pay $125 to race along steep ravines and riverbanks, crashing through mud, brush, and dangerous terrain with the “border patrol” (the Otomis screaming in broken English) going after them, tapes of gunshot fire playing in the background, and the occasional terrifying scream coming from the bushes, signifying rape.

Alexander Zaitchik, a reporter for Reason magazine, ran the course in 2009 with a bunch of young, wealthy Mexicans who, as he pointed out, go to the U.S on tourist visas and sport Diesel jeans and hipster haircuts. Afterwards, they sat around the campfire drinking beer and swapping stories.

There are slum tours in Mumbai and township tours in South Africa, ghetto tours in Chicago, and revolutionary tours in Venezuela and Chiapas.

Some of them indulge in blatant and perverse exploitation and romanticizing of poverty; others attempt to make tourism, an inherently inauthentic and artificial endeavor, into an educational, empathy-building experience. But they all lay uncomfortably bare economic, social and cultural divides and pit the (relatively) moneyed traveler against the rooted, frequently impoverished, often discriminated-against locals.

They all contain some degree of voyeurism, guilt, twisted and complex longing (to join the revolution, to express solidarity with the slum-dwellers of Soweto, to “help” in some way) married to commodification (buy a t-shirt and a Pepsi in the Zapatista tienda, buy the experience of crossing the border).

Photos: author

They all, to put it simply, ask travelers to navigate a swampy and ethically iffy zone between naivete and cynicism. I tend to veer towards the latter. After seeing the revolutionary tourism linked to Oaxaca’s 2006 social movement which, like all social movements, was far more complex and intricate a phenomenon than the graffiti depicted it to be, I grew even more cynical.

In the midst of the Oaxaca conflict, the editor of Narco News – which covered the unfolding movement from a leftist perspective – came to the conclusion that “revolutionary tourism” was doing more harm than good, and regretted that the organizations and people pushing Oaxaca’s movement forward hadn’t strictly regulated the activities of foreigners as the Zapatistas had.

That example of the Zapatistas seems interesting after a visit to Chiapas, where tourism appears to be thriving in the Zapotec communities in the canyons and valleys outside of San Cristóbal.

So here’s the riff – in spite of everything I’ve set up above, all the problematic, superficial interactions and replications of wildly uneven power structures inherent in revolutionary tourism, I came out of a visit with the Zapatistas changed in a way that I’d like to believe isn’t superficial, that I’d like to believe hints at meaningful engagement, at some awareness of the other that goes beyond guilt alleviation or shining idealism or perverse voyeurism to compassion and belief in change.

It is so easy to be cynical about taking some sort of perspective-altering, revelatory tour through Zapatista communities, and to interpret the whole thing as the ultimate incorporation of real efforts to subvert the neoliberal system into the same commercial tokens, ideologies and values the system survives on.

It is so easy to sit in the comedor in Oventic and listen to the tour group shuffling around you compare donut stories and talk about Israel and wine and sandwiches in Nicaragua and think that this is just another authentic experience consumed and jotted down in the moleskin to be later strutted out at a hostel in Vietnam or Sydney.

Photos: author

But you’re there, too, for a reason that you hope goes beyond a check in the moleskin of experience, so unless your cynicism is unbelievably cocky and ignorant, you have to rein it in a bit in order to let yourself off the hook. You have to suspend your disbelief; there must be something else to it. This is what I thought going in.

Initially, as we waited by the roadside in the stillness under a white-gray sky, and the women with bandannas observed us from a makeshift observation post while dozens of other unmasked women and children loitered and knitted before a community store, I was uncomfortable. I wanted to see, yes, and to understand more about the Zapatistas, but in that act of seeing my outsiderness and the problem of my purpose were so obvious it was painful.

I am an estadouniense writer who’s come to poke around your community, take photos of your walls, swoon over your movement. I will probably think higher of myself after having done so, and higher of you. Then I’ll leave and I’ll go back to my life, and you’ll keep on there, hoping the army doesn’t come in and raze it all. I’ll have touristed your revolution.

But we were let in, and we ate simple quesadillas with slices of avocado and tomato before we were shown around Oventic. Another tour group browsed around the comedor and store, bought some things, and left. I went to the bathroom, with a kind, nervous, rail-thin man in his late thirties as my escort.

“Our facilities are rustic,” he warned gently.

“It’s no problem,” I said.

“There’s no toilet paper,” he cautioned.

“It’s fine,” I said.

They were rustic, but nothing you wouldn’t find elsewhere in rural Mexico. As I picked my way back to the man, black ducks waddled around fat green plants and a small stream. Not knowing what to say I asked,

“What do you do with the ducks?” I wanted to hit myself over the head as soon as I said it, but there it was – we were standing in the backyard of a Zapatista building, with trails curving off here and there and a rustic bathroom and big black bulbous ducks scattered about, and I couldn’t think of anything to say.

“We eat the eggs,” he said.

I was going to say, “ah, like in China!” but suddenly thought that’d be weird and instead nodded wisely as if eating duck eggs was a very sage idea. I’d never met anyone in Mexico who ate duck eggs, and the thought that this was my first factoid from the Zapatistas seemed comical and pathetic. We wobbled along the small stone path back towards the comedor.

“Stop!” the main said, “wait – you can wash your hands here. There’s soap, too.” I washed my hands and he leaned in with oval, inquiring eyes and asked,

“What do you do?” There was an insistence that went beyond curiosity to worry.

“I’m a writer,” I said, afraid that wouldn’t sound right but wanting to be honest. He asked the inevitable,

“De que escribes?” What do you write about? I rambled off a list of subjects: travel, critical travel essays, politics (leftist), Mexico, Latin America. He nodded.

“And your friends?” he asked. I identified Susy and Mauricio as students and Jorge as a photographer, and rushed to specify what Jorge photographed, citing a recent project on basketball in the Sierra Norte. The man seemed satisfied, nodding a few times, and we continued back towards the restaurant, parting ways as he veered off into the kitchen.

Photos: author

The visit continued on that tone of awkward mutual recognition, interest, and caution, but as we began walking down the steep hill and into the community a feeling of intense emotion came over me. The need to weep. It is rare in such a travel situation to get a sense of honesty, of – and I can’t imagine invoking this word without a mocking overtone, but I’m about to do it here – authenticity.

Here, my presence was tolerated, accepted, perhaps even condoned, but it didn’t detract from a wider truth that was being achieved in the buildings and meetings and community there. It didn’t seem to cheapen the project at hand, or to shape it. It made me very humble; the best indicator of the authentic.

I could understand for the first time in that visit what made the Zapatistas so compelling, so emotionally and intellectually powerful for their supporters across national, economic, cultural and social borders. It was a feeling more than anything else, the feeling of an alternative project – not frenzied, not reactionary, not hateful, not tentative and skeptical, but directed and organic and meaningful – in action. Women planted flowers beneath murals that said “otro mundo es posible.”

Another me would’ve cringed. I cringe writing this. But there, it wasn’t maudlin, and I didn’t see it as a sign of peace and love and la revolucíon as much as as an example of everyday life in a community that had regained its dignity from a corrupt government. It humbled me tremendously. At its best, that’s what travel should do.

A kid played basketball on a court with EZLN hoops, and fat, shiny black cows roamed a sloping lawn. Dogs followed teenagers collecting wood. Our guide, a man in his sixties in a black ski mask, asked lots of questions about Jorge and I’s upcoming wedding. Would we spend lots of money? Would we dance with a turkey? What would we eat? Would we drink? Lots?

He was congratulatory and told us he’d married when he was fifteen, and was still married to the same woman. He’d joined the Zapatistas five years ago, and lived between Oventic and San Cristóbal. He was like an old man you’d meet at the market, who’d clasp your hand and give you his blessings for your wedding, ask you how many babies you were going to have, and laugh gently at your answers.

He knew he was the one guiding us, hosting us, giving us permission to be here, and we knew it, always asking before roaming off into an unknown corner, but beneath the firmness of his small hardened body and his ski mask were warmth and curiosity. I don’t know why that was surprising to me – I had thought the people would be harder, more closed off and resentful, and the women were certainly quiet and withdrawn but not in a shut-down way.

The place, to put it very simply, didn’t feel bought, didn’t feel incorporated into the swirling worries about authentic and inauthentic, commodofication and resistance.

Photos: author

Mostly, what I felt was emotion, which didn’t belong to one category of sadness or excitement or belief or trust but was more the simple power of witnessing. I experienced a similar thing at a goat slaughter in the Mixteca, the only other time and place in years of traveling in which I’d use the word authentic.

We took lots of pictures, and bought t-shirts and cigars, and then we were back out by the road again in the pale fogginess of the late afternoon. Mauricio and Susy took two available seats in a passing taxi and Jorge and I settled in to wait for the next one.

A few minutes later, as we were taking pictures of the sign declaring this the heart of Zapatista territory, a man came out of the community gates and offered the indigenous women waiting on the side of the road next to us a ride.

“Are you going to San Cristóbal?” we asked meekly.

“Yes, subense,” he said warmly.

We got in the back of the van after the indigenous women, who were en route to San Andrés, and greeted them and the other passengers – presumably the man’s wife and his two children – and a young male driver.

The first half of the drive was silent, taking hairpin curves and slow descents and steep rises through valleys that feel like topo maps come alive, series of squiggling lines and treacherous precipices and ridges in greens and browns. Chiapas is overwhelmingly rural – we passed tiny scatterings of wooden shacks and the occasional ramshackle store, but there were no organized villages with their churches and restaurants as in Oaxaca. We passed palm green and pale green and pine green, patches of corn, cows and sheep, and the shadows of women in black skirts and men working the fields.

At some point, I asked the man who’d allowed us on board a question.

“How long has this community been in existence?”

I wanted to get a sense of whether it had been formed after 1994 or right then and there in the thick of things. He said,

“Pues, mil-novecientos-novente-cuatro,” as if it were the most obvious thing in the world, and once again I proved my scrabbling ignorance before the Zapatistas. But it got better from there. We started talking about governance, about education, about politics. The educational system is particularly fascinating. The kids study three subjects: social sciences (predominantly history), math, and biology/zoology. Once they graduate from secondary school, they become the teachers.

The schools don’t have government certification – “what would be the point?” asked the man laughingly, “if you’re trying to break away from the government, from their miseducation, why would you want them to certify and regulate what you do?” This does pose a problem, though, for Zapatista children who want to go on and study at university. The Universidad de la Tierra is the only university that currently accepts their qualifications.

The conversation wound like the road, around to Oaxaca’s 2006 political movement and to the PRI, the PAN, and the PRD, the increasingly interchangeable parties managing the corruption of Mexico. The drive back to San Cristóbal seemed to take minutes, and in the midst of conversation we barely noticed the van was driving right past the house we were staying at,

“Aqui!” blurted Jorge, just at the opportune moment, and we opened the door, shook hands, gave effusive thanks, and said our goodbyes.

The experience lingered the rest of the day, the way a powerful airport goodbye sticks with you like an aching pain for the duration of the journey. We walked the streets of San Cristóbal dazed and temporarily possessed by our experience in Oventic.

And then the speed and motion of our lives caught up with us again and we were eating pizza for dinner and planning the next day’s journey and catching up on emails, and the Zapatistas faded into the background of travel experiences and stories that lay in waiting only to surface from time to time like small boats on a choppy sea.

A few nights after that, on one of our last nights in the city, we finally caved and went to the Revolution bar. It was like the art scene of Oaxaca, but the pretentiousness had a strong hippie vibe and all the righteousness of deciding to switch historical sides and align oneself with the oppressed (while, of course, constructing one’s casa just outside the city and sipping beers and listening to folk rock by pretty young hippies).

There was a similar privileged-and-comfortably-leftie-Bohemian vibe, similar protagonists, more young mothers with curly-haired babies in indigenous baby slings.

Indigenous kids came and tried to sell their clay animals to the patrons, who smiled much more indulgently than most and teased them but ultimately declined their offers. The kids, impervious, continued on to the next round of tourists. Meanwhile on the pedestrian street clusters of tourists and families and couples streamed by – the nightlife in San Cristóbal is consistently vivid, even on Sundays. They sometimes cast curious glances at la Revolucíon, and then kept walking.

Photos: author

It was the quintessential Chiapaneco day – an excursion to Oventic, a night at la Revolucíon. I could see how this would get addictive – bagels in the morning, wine at night, picturesque forested hills and churches, like-minded Europeans and Americans baking bread and sharing the same ideals, coming from similar backgrounds (and benefiting tremendously from them to hang around Chiapas for a time), learning about the indigenous, doing some volunteer work, getting all the perks of a high quality of life in Mexico plus free guilt alleviation plus the righteous belief in your place on the right side of the battle.

And at the same time, I could see how it could be kind of awful. In a great piece written for Casa Chapulin, Leila (no last name is cited) takes San Cristóbal’s revolutionary tourists and foreign activists to task for outsourcing guilt and blame to “neoliberalism” or “corporations” while at the same time ignoring their own complicated roles as relatively affluent outsiders in Chiapas. She writes,

“Whether I’m spending the afternoon with Americans or Europeans talking about pleasantries and minutia, or having an equally evasive conversation with urban Mexicans, something essential is being avoided. None of us are talking about what’s all around us. None of us are acknowledging our own ease of life and its morally problematic positioning. We’re not talking in personal terms about the reality of poverty that flanks us on all sides; sometimes I’m not even sure we’re letting it trouble us. We recognize it systemically, intellectually, and beyond this we excuse ourselves.”

Even more powerfully, she asserts that the revolutionary tourist, who is politically-minded and who sticks around San Cristóbal for three months to several years, is no less a “tokenizer of the indigenous” than the more iconic tourist gleefully purchasing ethnic stereotypes as trophies.

Finally, she points out that the mere ability of revolutionary tourists to be present and to live in San Cristóbal is indicative of the inequalities of power and wealth that have characterized and continue to characterize Chiapas specifically and Mexico overall. Simply ignoring the fact that one’s own presence in a Zapatista community, buying t-shirts, is the result of a specific historical process and is also symbolic of that process, and instead commending oneself for “solidarity” and exorcising all blame and guilt to “the corporate-capitalist” system, is leaving a huge, self-serving, and ignorant gap in the process of attempting to contribute to indigenous movements.

What I love most about Leila’s piece, though, is that she doesn’t call for some stripped down lifestyle of solidarity via suffering, nor does she argue that revolutionary tourists are vapid and useless and should simply leave. Rather, she insists that self-awareness and criticism are essential to doing more than simply lauding ourselves and condemning the big bad guys – the government, the system, the corporation.

I would add that humility, too, goes a long way. What I saw in Chiapas was a brash lack of humility and in fact, it’s opposite – an ironic and vulgar egoism about helping the poor indigenous get their act together, a reincarnation of noble-savage-ish fawning plus European boutique tourism. There don’t seem to be many people saying wait, how is it that I, coming from France or Mexico City or New York, can expect to be down with the indigenous and part of the great revolution, on the honorable side of history and a soldier in some glorious battle for dignity and truth, when actually, history and politics and my background and situation have set me up to be in a position in which I can live an exceedingly comfortable lifestyle amidst poverty, I can study what I want and live where I please (and, I might add, do so guilt-free because I’m sympathetic with the poor?) There seems to be little discussion at all, in fact, of the great irony that San Cristóbal has become a snazzy little boutique destination for Tuxtla’s wealthy and curious ethno-tourists, the tense center of a (now repressed) revolution, and a playground for politically-minded foreigners to set up shop and watch Ingrid Bergman movies and drink Argentine wine and express their sympathy for one another’s sympathies, while all the while the military extends its tentacles further into the forests and jungles, the poor people continue to sleep and beg in the streets, and the Zapatistas, after fifteen years, struggle to hold onto what they’ve got left.

And yet, I went to a Zapatista community and would dare to call it a transformative experience. Educational, illuminating, and transformative. But I have, frankly, no idea as to what my role would be if I were to ever get involved with the Zapatistas, and I think it would have to be one that takes into account where I come from and what my privileges have been.

I’m sure many of the revolutionary tourists living and working in San Cristóbal have had far more enduring and equally profound encounters with the Zapatistas and local communities in Chiapas, and I think those encounters mean something. I think they’re important, critical even, and they are the best of what tourism can (not necessarily does, but can) offer.

But what we make of them depends on how humble we stay before them, and how critical we are both of our own perspectives and positioning and of the movements we want so badly to believe in. The easy embrace of revolution via some vibey conversations at Café La Revolucion over a few chelas and some peanuts, cemented by a few friendships with indigenous kids, seems to me to be fairly pointless. Maybe not necessarily harmful, but certainly not charged with the real potential to change anything.

Ultimately, perhaps, if this revolutionary tourism – be it the kind that lasts an afternoon, like that which I took part in, or the kind that lingers and draws itself out over years in San Cristóbal – is going to actually affect positive change, and is going to create some sort of understanding and interaction that goes beyond the purchase of symbolic trinkets, then it’s up to each individual tourist to take his/her background, experience, and place into account, and to examine what he/she can do starting from that.

Me, I can read and read and read about the Zapatistas, something I’ve never felt the urge to do before because, dumbly, I coasted along on snippets I’d read and heard here and there and thought I’d gotten it. I can write. I can research more about this whole concept of revolutionary tourism and its implications. And I can believe, honestly and with feeling, in the authenticity of what I saw in Oventic, Chiapas.

If it’s authenticity we’re after, travelers, and solidarity, then that authenticity will have to express the authentic truth that our privilege is all tied up in the poverty we want to end and sympathize with, and our solidarity is plagued by the great fortune we’ve had in being able to choose, in comfort and relative luxury, to feel it.

We first need critical awareness of that, and humility. And from there we can take steps – respectfully, honestly, purposefully – towards solidarity.

Photo and Feature Photo: author

“The ground’s not as cold this year, and there’s twice as many people.”

We stood and looked down at the sprawling city of tents that was Qoyllur Rit’i. The ground may have been warmer, but the cold still seeped up through heavy boots and three pairs of woollen socks, wrapping icy fingers around toes that had grown up wearing flip flops on Aussie beaches. I stamped my feet and listened as Chango marvelled at the growth of the festival since his last attendance five years ago. It is, he told us, the only indigenous celebration in the Americas that is consistently growing in size.

We had left Cusco at five in the morning, crammed our party of five into a taxi, and watched the sun rise over the Sacred Valley, the mist lifting, color seeping into the landscape as we drove. Nobody talked much.

Two and a half hours later we arrived at Ocongate, the jumping-off point for the five-mile (8 km) trek to the sanctuary of Sinak’ara, where Qoyllur Rit’i takes place. We joined a procession of hundreds – Andean women of all ages with large colorful bundles on their backs, children, men on crutches, young couples, a faint smattering of tourists.

One family led a donkey loaded down with a mattress – I was to envy them later. The trek followed a river through a high valley, and as we climbed still higher the vegetation became sparser and finally disappeared, and the chill in the air became more profound.

At regular intervals we passed richly dressed crucifixes, where many stopped to pray. Almost all at least made the sign of the cross themselves while trudging past. Every kilometer or so was a collection of blue plastic tents, rest stops complete with bubbling soups, trout and chicarrones. We took full advantage; the climb, after the initial upwards slog, was gentle, but the altitude was a killer. Qoyllur Rit’i takes place at 15,420 feet (4,700 m).

Andean women, Photo: anoldent

We arrived to mayhem. Thousands of people thronged the immediate surrounds of the church, haggling over dream-replicas in the symbolic market, competing drum beats and twirling dancers, vendors hawking rolls of blue plastic as a gentle snow-rain began to soak through woollen caps.

We somehow found Chango and Coneto, who had practically sprinted the trail, amidst the hordes. John had fallen in with his fellow ukukus and would catch up with us later.

The night was full of movement. We huddled in restaurants sipping coffee, wrapping hands around cheap and delicious bowls of steaming soup. Later we walked past the hundreds in line to enter the church, clutching offerings and shivering in the less-than-zero air, and declined to join them. The dances were more exciting – frenetic drum beats, ukukus lashing at each other with whips, girls in brightly colored skirts twirling.

We passed one group in which a conspicuous gringo camera crew was circling, lights blazing, cameras pushing into singing faces, and I felt resentful of the intrusion. The walk back to camp took us past a roped-off enclave, with a grandly outfitted dining tent, a foreign tour group inside taking dinner on their camp stools. Next door a group of locals lay in sleeping bags on the ground under a stretched out piece of blue plastic.

I got thinking about this, unable to sleep on the icy ground in the wee hours as the drums beat on and my feet became increasingly numb. I was angry at the presence of the other gringos – not that they were there, but that they came as a species apart, roped off in their shiny dining tents, expensive video cameras between them and the dancers.

But where do you draw the line? This is predominately a festival for the local communities – even the Peruvians I came with were from Lima, believers in their own way, yes, friends with ukukus, but not completely and wholly of Qoyllur Rit’i.

And I had come to look, to take photos, to be a tourist – perhaps I did it a little rougher, maybe I dined knee to knee with the real celebrants, but what makes me so special? Why should others miss out who don’t have the opportunity to be shown the way by local friends, who go with tour groups and inevitably become that species apart, whether they like it or not? And why shouldn’t film crews be able to share this with those who don’t have the opportunity to travel at all?

I was still thinking about it the next morning as the ukukus came down from their night on the glacier, as mass was held, as we walked homeward in silence.

Community Connection

What do you think? Just where do we draw the line between travel and tourism? Who decides the standards of sensitive travel? Share your thoughts in the comment section!

To learn more about travel in Peru, check out Matador’s Peru Focus Page.

All photos: The.Rohit

Called phuchka in Calcutta, golgappa in Delhi , paani puri in Bombay and gup chup in Orissa, these flour balloons are tangy vegetarian delights enjoyed by the young and old, rich and poor. Phuchka stalls are a place for neighbours, friends and family to meet and greet and engage in conversation. Rumored to have come into existence as a treat for children (Golgappa was the name of a children’s magazine in the 1970s), there are different variations of phuchkas which are readily available. The most common form of phuchkas is the flour balloon with a filling made out of spicy potatoes and dipped in tamarind water. Then there is the dahi phuchka, which uses curd instead of tamarind water, the churmur which is made by crushing the phuchkas and then adding potatoes, green chillies, cumin, lemon juice, cilantro and tamarind pulp.

Where do you find phuchkas?

While you will find phuchka stalls in almost every part of an Indian city, there are certain restaurants that also sell phuchkas. If you want the authentic experience, you should try the stalls but if you are concerned about hygiene issues, then perhaps the restaurants are a safer option.

Open any of the local English Dailies – The Telegraph, The Statesman, The Times of India or the Hindustan Times – and you will find restaurants listed. The Food Court at Forum, Elgin road is known for serving phuchkas as is the food court at South City Mall on Prince Anwar Shah Road.

The street vendors famous for their phuchkas are Bacchu Prasad, who sits outside Jadavpur University with his phuchkas and is known for tasting the tamarind water himself before serving his customers, Jitendra Pandit of Vivekananda Park, who is popularly known for his use of gandharaj lebu (which literally translates as the lemon which is the king of all smells) and Kusheshwar Shah who serves his phuchkas at Mudiali and has hoisted a golf umbrella above his phuchka-stand to ensure that crows don’t come and peck at his savory treats.

Stand in a half circle and wait for the vendor to give you a bowl made out of sal leaf (sal is a leaf native to South Asia). The vendor will immediately prepare and distribute the phuchkas either in a clockwise or an anti-clockwise direction. Be sure to say amar hoye gecche (I am done) when you’re too full to eat anymore!

What makes you an expert phuchka eater?

Hold the phuchka with your hand and try to eat the entire phuchka at once. If the size of the phuchka is too large, break it up. Use the sal leaf to drain the tamarind water out of the phuchka, break it into two and continue eating. If you think the entire phuchka eating process is altogether too complex, opt for a churmur. The churmur is made up of pretty much the same ingredients but is served in the form of a chaat, a mix of ingredients in a small bowl. Usually, phuchka vendors also offers spoons so eating churmur is easier than eating a phuchka.

What if you’re a tourist and you’re feeling unsure?

Tourists are often scared to try the phuchka because they are apprehensive about how the tamarind water is prepared. Also, the vendor’s use of bare hands is known to drive some travelers away. In these situations, if you still want to try the phuchka, you should buy a bottle of mineral water and ask the vendor to try and prepare the tamarind water with that. Also request him to wash his hands thoroughly before preparing your phuchka.

If you’re still feeling iffy, you can opt for a restaurant that serves phuchkas but if you’re adventurous, I’d say that it is worth taking a chance on phuchkas.

How can you make phuchkas at home?

The preparation of the phuchka is divided into three parts- first the outer layer or the phuchka must be prepared. Secondly, you must prepare the stuffing and finally, the tamarind water. You can prepare this in any order of course, but this is exactly how I would do it.

For the phuchka:

One tablespoon of flour
One cup of sooji ( or semolina)
Half a teaspoon of baking soda (to make it fluffy)
And more than just a drizzle of oil- about five tablespoons (it has to be crispy and deep-fried)

First, mix the semolina, the flour, the salt, the baking soda and add some water so you can turn it into a dough. Divide the dough into as many phuchkas as you would like to make. All the phuchkas need to be shaped like circles.

Heat the oil and deep fry the circles until they are crisp and golden. Do not eat the phuchkas until they have cooled.

For the stuffing:

4 boiled potatoes (if you’re using large potatoes, 2 will suffice). Mash the potatoes with a fork or spoon and add one or two green chillies, depending on how spicy you like your food to be, or use dried chilli powder. You can also add cumin, although this is not absolutely necessary.

For the tamarind water:

1 tablespoon of finely chopped coriander
Half a tablespoon of rocksalt
2 spoons of sugar
1/2 a cup of tamarind extract

Mix all of the above and pour it into a large jug full of water. Your tamarind water is now ready.

You have now reached the final step of your phuchka-making endeavour. Stuff the potatoes into the phuchka and dip it into the tamarind water before eating. And remember, an expert phuchka eater puts the entire phuchka into her/ his mouth at once!

Feature Photo: flattop341

I dread Thursdays, the day when the Portuguese maid comes to clean my in-laws’ house. My husband and I live in the basement, but I can hear this woman talking to herself and singing out of key from two floors away. When she talks with my mother-in-law, the decibels increase tenfold. I feel so uncomfortable with the noise that I avoid going to the kitchen. I keep a ceramic bowl and a can of soup downstairs for times like these. Loud times.

The other day I almost choked on a wheat cracker when my husband said something to his mom in Portuguese. Since he started talking suddenly in a loud voice, I jumped as if there was some emergency. It took about ten minutes for my heart rate to slow down, and he was simply asking his mom if the mail had come.

Photo: futureshape

Americans have a reputation of being loud and obnoxious abroad, but I think it really depends on what culture is being visited. We tend to be comfortable with the speech volume level we’ve grown up with, and when we encounter something different from the norm, we aren’t sure how to interpret it.

I often think my husband and his parents are fighting when they’re speaking Portuguese, but usually they are just having a normal discussion. We’ve been living at his parents’ house for nine months now, and I’m still not used to the volume level used in typical conversation. I try to use logic and tell myself, “They are not fighting. This is normal. This is just how they talk,” but I still can’t manage to convince my body to go off high alert. I get goose bumps. I can’t focus on anything, and I often retreat to a quieter place in the house.

We also come up against these cultural differences when we’re talking to each other. Most of the time when my husband is having a conversation with me, he keeps his volume level low in a typical “American style,” but when he launches into his Portuguese mode I often interpret it as him being angry or rude. I feel like he’s “raising his voice,” but at those moments he probably isn’t even talking as loud as he does with his parents.

In some countries, talking in public above a certain decibel level is a crime. A British poultry auctioneer was charged with noise pollution for speaking at a volume over 80 decibels in a public market (Poultry World, August 2006). In the US there are also regulations for how loud people can be in public places, whether talking, playing music or operating tools. Any violation can be considered as “disturbing the peace,” and others will call the police if they feel their “right” to peace and quiet is being ignored.

Photo: Meanest Indian

While living in Pakistan, I often wished I could report people for violating the quiet of residential neighborhoods. Most Pakistanis could sleep through fighter jets flying overhead, but I wake up to a quiet sneeze or a deep breath. We lived in an area of Lahore where most people had live-in servants, and when a homeowner would arrive outside his gated garage, he would blare the horn repeatedly until someone came to open the door. It didn’t matter if he came home at noon or at 2 a.m., beeping was customary.

I learned from experience never to move next to any empty plot, because if the owner decides to build on it, construction crews work during the night hours to avoid the heat. Cement grinders and jackhammers run from sunset to sunrise. The construction workers also like to blast Punjabi pop on crackling radios during their “work hours.” I remember griping, “Shouldn’t this be illegal? Isn’t there anyone we can report this to?” Our landlord’s family downstairs slept through the ruckus just fine.

I wonder if we can ever completely adjust to different noise thresholds, or if what we’ve learned to interpret as normal and abnormal volume levels stays with us even as we experience different cultures. After three years in Pakistan and almost a year in a Portuguese house, I still can’t sleep through someone quietly walking down the stairs. A friend of mine, who has been married into a Portuguese family for over ten years, says she still isn’t used to the noise either.

Community Connection

Can we adjust to louder conversation levels or longer silences, or is what we’re exposed to as children the threshold that we’ll feel comfortable with for our whole lives?

Have you ever visited a culture that was notably louder or quieter than your own? How did it make you feel, and how did you deal with it? Share in the comments section below.

Feature Photo: The Real Darren Stone Photo: Wootang01

The British government has long recognized that young adulthood does not come with deep resources, and so many cultural institutions offer discounts for not only students but also the unemployed – and virtually anyone under age 26. Thanks to a recent project by the Arts Council England, this now also includes London’s famous dramatic scene. Below are twelve theatres where, if you are 25 and under, you can see fantastic stage productions for free.

London theatres that offer cheap tickets regardless of age are marked as (26+).

National Theatre, Waterloo

This is where you’ll see the best of the best – from Tom Stoppard to Alec Bennett. Seeing cheap shows at the National Theatre is complicated, but absolutely worth it. Fill out the NT’s Entry Pass form, attach proof of age, and either mail it in or drop it off in person (if you’re smart, you’ll get your friends to sign up at the same time). In 2-3 weeks, you will receive your snazzy membership card by post. Your first ticket is totally free (must be a Mon-Thurs show booked by phone). Every subsequent ticket for any show at the National can be booked online for only 5 pounds!

Donmar Warehouse, Covent Garden

Becoming a member of the Donmar Discovery program is similar to the Entry Pass; you need to drop off the application form at the box office with proof of age. But unlike at the NT, a DD card only entitles you to book a ticket for a special performance of the production – though you will also score a free poster and invitation to a post-show discussion with the cast.

Shakespeare’s Globe, London Bridge (26+)

Far and away the best deal in London: every single production at this faithfully reconstructed theatre has 700 standing tickets available for only 5 pounds. While this means standing for the length of the show, it also guarantees you the best view and the chance to experience Shakespeare as he intended it. Arrive early to grab a good spot at the front, and don’t forget comfortable shoes and a raincoat.

Royal Court Theatre, Sloane Square (26+)

This theatre established in 1870 is known for its modern, hard-hitting productions. Be quick to book, because seats sell out extremely quickly (often before the production even opens) – including their special 10 pound Mondays. To book up to six free tickets, call the box office or e-mail boxoffice@royalcourttheatre.com. Like at many of the other theatres, you may only book free tickets once – so next time, have a friend use their name!

Old Vic, Waterloo (26+)

The Old Vic – currently under the artistic direction of Kevin Spacey – promises one hundred 12 pound seats in every show for those age 25 and under. (They can do this because their theatre, while beautiful and dating back to 1812, seats over 1000 theatre-goers in four vertigo-inducing levels.) One can either call to book Under 26 tickets by phone, or submit a form to get a membership card – but be aware that sometimes you can snag normal balcony tickets online for as little as 10 pounds.

Barbican Centre, Liverpool Street

It’s quick to register online for the Barbican’s freeB scheme, and you can start booking tickets online before your membership card even arrives in the post. FreeB allows you to book up to two tickets at select concerts, theatre productions, film screenings, and art exhibitions.

Battersea Arts Centre, South London (26+)

While the BAC is currently not offering any free tickets, normal tickets for their contemporary productions are usually quite affordable. If you call the box office, you can secure student discounts – and Tuesdays are Pay-What-You-Can nights. On the downside, it’s a bit of a trek to Zone 2.

Lyric Hammersmith, West London

Also in Zone 2 but a little more Tube-accessible, the Lyric is a relatively new and modern theatre with a rooftop garden. To find out which shows they have free tickets for, ring up the box office.

Arcola Theatre, Hackney

Until the new Overground line debuts, this theatre is a 15-minute bus ride from Islington in northern London. Call the box office to book your free tickets and, like at many of the other theatres, don’t forget to arrive early to collect them.

The Royal Shakespeare Company, on tour and in Stratford-upon-Avon

If you decide to visit Shakespeare’s hometown, time it for a Tuesday to get free tickets at the Courtyard Theatre. Stratford-upon-Avon is a two-hour train ride from London, with advance rail tickets starting at 10 pounds. While on tour in London and all over the UK, the Royal Shakespeare Company also offers 5 pound tickets for those under 26.

Feature Photo: author, Winter Sonata Photo: KBS

Wherever you are in the world, TV soap operas and serials exert a strange power over their viewers.

These four that have provoked a stir among fans, many of them in nations other than where they were produced.

Winter Sonata

Almost Shakespearean in its complexity, Winter Sonata follows the blossoming, or rather re-blossoming, relationship of former childhood sweethearts Joon-Sang (Bae Yong-Joon) and Yu-Jin (Choi Ji-Woo).

Joon-Sang, who starts off as an introverted music student struggling to cope with the fact he was born out of wedlock, is involved in a car accident and suffers amnesia, erasing his memory of Yu-Jin. He then moves with his mother to America where he grows up under a different name, while everyone back in South Korea, Yu-Jin included, is told he is dead

Things pick up ten years later when, as a successful architect, he returns to Korea. As fate should have it, he turns out to be working for the same firm as Yu-Jin, who is by now engaged to someone else. However, the viewer knows they are meant to be together, and slowly they realise it too.

The series was a hit in its home country of South Korea, but it became a runaway success when it reached the shores of Japan. Aired in the early 2000s, Winter Sonata marked the beginning of the popularisation of Korean drama in Japan. It sparked a proliferation of posters, books, CDs, DVDs across Asia, and perhaps less understandably an explosion in the popularity of winter fashion items, including the long woollen scarf sported by Joon-Sang throughout most of the series.

Photo: Star India

More than anything else, the series markedly improved the historically difficult relations between Korea and Japan, prompting an unprecedented interest in Korean language and culture and a surge in the number of Japanese heading to South Korea for their holidays, where they toured various Winter Sonata filming locations and held out the hope of meeting the stars.

Because a Mother-in-Law Was Also Once a Daughter-in-Law

Indian soaps have dominated television channels across the Asian subcontinent. Following the fall of the Taliban, who mounted a campaign in the ’90s to smash up Kabul’s TV sets, these TV shows have also drawn large audiences in Afghanistan.

One in particular, Because a Mother-in-Law Was Also Once a Daughter-in-Law (Kyunki Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi), which ended its run as the longest running serial on Indian television in 2008, became hugely popular with Afghan audiences when it was picked up by Tolo TV, Afghanistan’s first commercial broadcaster.

The show focuses on Tulsi, played for most (though not all) of the series by Indian TV actress Smriti Zubin Irani, who falls in love with and marries rich kid Mihir Virani. The Virani family are mainly disapproving of the match and the soap follows the couple as Tulsi tries to win over her new family.

Islamic clerics in Afghanistan demanded the show be banned on moral grounds and because of the prominence of Hindu ritual and imagery, much of which is already censored on Afghan TV. This move prompted angry viewers to take to the streets in the show’s defence.

Snail House

Photo: Dwelling Narrowness

Chinese TV series Snail House, also translated as the somewhat less catchy “Dwelling Narrowness,” garnered a sympathetic audience among China’s urban middle class, but its popularity really came to light after a government official labelled it as “vulgar” and accused its writers of “hyping porn jokes, corrupt officials and sex to woo viewers”.

Broadcast in 2009, The show was a success mainly for its realistic depiction of two young sisters struggling with housing price inflation in what appears to be Shanghai. With house price inflation a major worry for Chinese urbanite – house prices rose 11.7% in the last year – it is unsurprising the show hit a nerve.

But viewers also lauded the show for its depiction of government corruption; one of the characters is forced to become the mistress of a corrupt official. It was this that drew condemnation from the higher powers, including the angry outburst by Li Jingsheng, who rejoices in the title of Director General of the Department of Teleplay Administration under the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television.

Subsequently only 33 of the show’s 35 episodes made it to the small screen and angry viewers mounted an online campaign against Li in an attempt to discredit him.

Noor

Turkish drama Noor, or Gümüs in Turkish, was popular at home in 2005, but once dubbed into Arabic it won fans across the Arab world and has allegedly been behind a string of divorces by angry husbands and unsatisfied wives.

Set against the backdrop of Istanbul, the show charts what is initially a loveless arranged marriage between curly-haired heartthrob Muhannad (Mehmet in Turkish), played by actor Kivanç Tatlitug, and poor-girl Noor, played by Songül Öden.

The marriage is rocky mainly because Muhannad struggles to deal with the fact that his true love was killed in the first episode in a tragic, albeit wholly avoidable, traffic accident. But with each episode, he and Noor grow to love each other, and eventually have a child together.

The show appeared to strike a chord with couples across the Middle East, including in the Gulf where Dubai-based reported that the very onscreen chemistry that eventually brings Noor and Muhannad together has been behind several real-life marital splits.

Feature Photo: eschipul

I was lost, driving around Santiago attempting to find the freeway. While stopped at a red light, I looked up from the map to see a twenty-something guy standing in the crosswalk chucking knives into the air and catching them.

Forgetting about the map, I grabbed my camera and took a photo. The imprint of the knife juggler stuck, in my mind as well as my camera.

I wondered: how does someone get started as a knife juggler? Can people actually make a living doing this type of thing?

After I was able to build up the Spanish language skills and the courage, I decided to get to know some of the street performers in Santiago and find out what motivates them.

For the Cash

With low wages and a high cost of living, everyone looks for ways to make some extra luca. While some Chileans opt for selling jewelry, food or clothes, others go for a chance in the spotlight. In the case of street performers, many times this ends up being at a traffic intersection.

Photo: Herkie

One street performer I had the chance to talk to is Leo Cartagenas. He had been juggling golo (Chinese sticks) for eight years. As I watched him perform, the sticks seemed like extensions of his own hands. He held two plain wooden dowels and juggled a third that was wrapped in tape like a candy cane. Tiny bud earphones piped in fast-paced music to his ears to help him keep moving in rhythm. Leo tossed the sticks with ease, confident that he would catch them. He ended his routine holding the golo like a trophy.

Leo said he started street performing as a way to avoid the corporate world. One day he wants to have enough money saved up so that he can open his own tattoo shop.

For the Challenge…and the Girls?

Willy Cabello Urrutia and Luis Humberto Mancilla have less than a minute to give the captive audience in their cars a compelling show. The life of the street performer is all about timing: these two have 38 seconds to perform and 8 seconds to collect the money and get to the sidewalk before the traffic light changes.

While Willy threw the juggling knives into the air, focused yet seemingly unconcerned about the blades, Luis juggled with fire. What stood out to me were their hands. Luis’s hands were black with soot, yet unharmed from the flames. Willy’s hands, too, didn’t have a scratch on them.

I found out why when I ran my finger along the edge of one of the juggling knives: it was as dull as a spoon.

Photo: franklin_hunting

They told me they performed to earn extra party money, but after watching them flirt with onlookers, I have no doubt that they enjoy being able to impress the ladies with their juggling skills.

For the Family

Sometimes people don’t have a choice about taking up street performing; it may be a family affair. Such is the case with Francisco Javier Palma, who at age 11, works after school as a chinchinero, a skill his cousin taught him.

Chinchineros carry a bass drum and cymbal like a backpack. A rope attached to their foot works the cymbal while they carry two drumsticks to play the bass drum. The players dance and spin as they hammer out their percussive rhythms.

The bass drum strapped to the back of Francisco was smaller than the adult size, weighing almost 7 lbs. Francisco told me he can make over 10,000 Chilean pesos – about $20 – per day for his family. Though he didn’t know what he wanted to do when he grew up, he was adamant about one thing: he doesn’t want to be a chinchinero.

The Islamic Kazakh community has a higher birthrate than its Mongolian neighbors, as well as one of the highest maternal mortality rates in the country. In 2008, Bayan Ulgii’s maternal mortality rate was 76.7 deaths per 100,000 live births, compared to the national average of 49 per 100,000 live births. And while infant mortality hovers near the national average, Mongolia as a whole has the 67th worst infant mortality rate in the world, according to the CIA’s 2009 estimate.

On a recent visit to Ulgii, I tried to learn more about the beginnings of life and premature death there.

In the central hospital’s maternity ward, I saw Soviet made equipment, decades old, waiting to be replaced. The hospital- the main source of intensive health care for the roughly 100,000 people in the province- generally sees a handful of births a day. The ward has only a few doctors and a handful of nurses on staff.

Although none of the women I talked to at the hospital complained about the care they received, I heard rumors from a number of people around town that the doctors of Bayan Ulgii do not always act professionally. Some blamed the low government salary doctors receive (currently the national doctors’ union, alongside the teachers’ and railroad workers’ unions, are in negotiations with the government and threatening to strike if their salaries aren’t doubled). Some said that the doctors may be drunk on the job; others told me that bribes, including gifts of vodka, were necessary to secure the best care.

The bribes aren’t necessarily solicited. “To be more safe, they will give money, then the doctor will check carefully,” one nurse’s husband (the couple themselves the parents of a healthy infant) told me.

Such rumors are unsubstantiated. The director of one INGO’s regional health project said, “It’s difficult, we can’t catch them. I haven’t seen them taking money, so I can’t say that they are. But I can say they are, because people are saying it.”

Bayan Ulgii’s head pediatrician, Khuatkhan, says that the hospital didn’t have all the essential resources it needed until October of 2009, when an $11,000 World Vision grant allowed them to purchase new equipment. The hospital’s facilities remain less than desirable.

“The children that died this year”- 19 in January and February alone- “had treatable conditions, if the hospital had sufficient funds, equipment, and medicine,” he says.

Medical facilities aside, the families of Bayan Ulgii face another obstacle to fighting infant and maternal mortality: poverty. Forty percent of the population is very poor, according to Khuatkhan. Severe malnutrition is common among the children treated in Bayan Ulgii’s hospital, as is anemia, which afflicts forty percent of mothers in the province.

Three months old, the boy has gained just 300 grams- less than a pound- since his birth. A health baby gains about 900 grams a month. He lives with his parents, both unemployed, in a one room mud plaster house. They own just five goats, and since the government suspended a program which provided families with a small monthly payment for each child a few months ago, survival has been a struggle. Local doctors who normally make house calls refuse to give the baby check-ups at home, saying it is too cold there; while it continues to snow sporadically, the family has run out of heating fuel.

Maternal and infant mortality rates have dropped significantly in Bayan Ulgii during the last decade, as they have globally, although progress is not a given: more of Bayan Ulgii’s mothers died during childbirth in 2009 than in 2008. Neither Bayan Ulgii’s hospital nor its economy seem likely to improve significantly in the near future. In the meantime, its people will carry on as they always have. Says the regional INGO health director, “I would say that Bayan Ulgii is very hardworking. That is the only reason they’re surviving.”

Photos: author

Edward S. Tingatinga, a Tanzanian casual laborer in the 1960s, was the first person to paint in the style that now bears his name. I, Cara J. Giaimo, an American student in the 2010s, am now among the most recent.

In order to really connect Mr. Tingatinga and I, that one similarity has to counterbalance a lot of differences. Edward S. made his art with bicycle paint and masonite ceiling tiles leftover from the odd jobs he originally made a living off of. I’m using new materials: brightly colored, brand-name Master Paints, brought in from Dar es Salaam and brushed onto cloth that has been rubbed with wheat flour, waterproofed with white oil paint, and nailed to a homemade wooden frame.

I go to a liberal arts college; Edward didn’t go to any sort of arts school at all. And Edward was good enough that people solicited his work, good enough that dozens, if not hundreds, of Tanzanians now make a living imitating it and selling the results to tourists. I’m just supposed to be striping a zebra and I’m royally screwing up.

“No no no. Hold the brush like this . . . and put your little finger against the cloth, here.” My teacher, Max, is patient. We are seated very close together on a small bench in the entranceway to Suleman’s Art Shop in Mto wa Mbu, Tanzania, bent over a painting the size of a potholder. Currently it’s three silhouettes on a bus-yellow background, but soon it will be a zebra, a giraffe, and a hippopotamus.

Photos: author

There are six more paintings almost exactly like it on the ground, displaying various states of completion, and from then I can infer what Max did before I got here – stretched and waterproofed the campus, coated the background and let it dry, sketched out the main actors, filled in landscape details (a foamy river and trees, all children’s-book soft) – and what he’ll do after I leave, assuming I don’t botch it beyond repair.

After the animals are patterned they will be afforded eyes, big Betty Boop ones encircled in red. Then they can look around at all the each others there are, herds and herds of Tingatinga animals, hung up and propped up and laid out, covering the ex- and interior of every shop, up and down and on both sides of the long section of street. Max reaches over and calmly scrapes my latest stripe off with a fingernail.

Tingatinga is a type of what’s known as airport art – art made exclusively to be sold to tourists. And tourism is the largest and fastest-growing industry in Tanzania. People come from all over to see the wildlife, and when they leave, they want to take home nice, authentic, packable souvenirs.

That’s why the switch from ceiling tile to waterproofed cloth – the latter doesn’t break or smudge, and can be rolled down to the size of a pair or two of socks (plus you can bring it into Australia, which doesn’t allow in any foreign wood products).

It’s also why so much of it looks the same – it’s much easier and faster to paint the same things over and over. Max can make four or five notebook-sized Tingatinga in a day. Subjects are determined in the first place by what tourists want and expect to see in Tanzanian art, which may explain the colors, the jumbled and overlapping patterns (which match the fabrics that are used for everything here) and the preponderance of large savannah mammals. You look at it long enough and you start to hear thumb pianos.

Photos: author

All of this is explained to my companions and I by Big Sam, who we meet in Suleman’s shop. In spectacles and a Cape Cod baseball cap, Big Sam looks (and probably is) nearly twice the age of any of the other painters we meet in Mto wa Mbu, but he came here for the same reasons as everyone else – to learn an interesting trade and make money doing it.

He was a schoolteacher in Dar es Salaam until the pay dried up. Now, along with Max and Young Sam (who originally led us to the shop, calling it a “Tingatinga factory”), he’s being taught by Suleman, the shop’s owner and namesake. When Edward S. Tingatinga realized that his solo production team couldn’t keep up with customer demands, he taught some of his young relatives his tricks. Those boys taught other boys, and on and on, until someone taught Suleman.

Someone else taught Charles, who rushes into the shop about midway through my painting lesson, sweating through a black muscle shirt and a knit cap. We’ve run out of yellow paint and he’s generously lending us some.

He’s come all the way from the first shop on our side of the road, which he owns with his brother Thomson – Charles learned to paint Tingatinga and Maasai knife paintings in Dar es Salaam and is teaching his brother. Right now, in an attempt to diversify their styles, they’re both working on paintings of only hippos. I’m interested in this technique, and this goal – if it’s all just for money, why bother developing a personal style? Why not just go with what’s been working, and selling?

Later that day, taking a break from my zebra, I voice my question out loud to O-Man, the owner of the shop next to Suleman’s and (of course) a Tingatinga painter. He is surprised. “Personal style is key,” he assures me. “Why else would anyone buy your Tingatinga and no one else’s?”

I had been assuming that it was a matter of practical skill rather than artistic ability; that, having learned the basic components, the Tingatinga painter was more of a rearranger, a human scrapbook-and-photocopy machine. My attention is directed to a table of about 12 different paintings, some by Suleman and others by Maiko, a nationally famous Tingatinga artist who sells to many of the smaller shops.

“You’ll see,” he says, “Maiko paints fewer animals, but he paints them bigger. Suleman does many small animals.” He’s right. And there are other, subtler differences, too – color choice, placement, thickness of brush strokes, even the expressions on the animals’ faces, how they appear to be relating to each other. I can suddenly see why Maiko is renowned, and what Suleman has passed down to his apprentice.

Photos: author

Even their versions of common paintings, arrangements I’ve seen dozens of times (the canvas-wide whirlpool of fish, the impossibly long and thin birds set out in vertical parallel) have their own spin. Soon I can pick the work of either artist out of a lineup.

I go back outside and look up and down the impossibly colorful street. I’d been very close to losing interest in Tingatinga – purposefully plagiarized paintings that are originally based on stereotypes? Artists that want to sell out? I’m an English major from the American East Coast, I hang around people who would rather get thrown out of school or off a cliff than be deliberately derivative.

But to be able to be original within limits, to simultaneously express yourself, feed your family, and represent and support your country seems admirable. So I go back in to Max and keep attempting to paint, and maybe earn, my stripes.

Feature Photo: Pink Sherbet Photography Photo: shoobydooby

“Meagan, your popo like watermelons! Mine like apple,” said Nida, a professional dancer in Fire of Anatolia. We were standing backstage in our underwear, preparing to change costumes.

I had been dancing in Turkey with Fire of Anatolia for two months. I actually thought my butt was in great shape from hours of squeezing it in ballet class. At the very least, I saw myself as more of a pear than a watermelon.

It was time to put Nida in her place. I made her follow me to a mirror in our skin-colored booty shorts.

“See!” I proclaimed. “ Not watermelons! Maybe not apples…but not watermelons!” I wouldn’t normally do this in a bathroom, but my rear end’s reputation was on the line.

Photo: Pink Sherbet Photography

Then Nida peeled away my confidence. She pointed and laughed at my butt, which appeared to be twice the size of hers. I had never so closely compared cheeks with anyone, and now I knew why. It made me feel inadequate, inferior, and fat.

Back home, friends call me “the skinny one.” I take good care of my body, and I’m healthy, strong, and confident. However, standing at the mirror with Nida, I couldn’t deny it anymore: dancing in Turkey was damaging my body image.

I was warned about the importance of sticking to a “dancer’s diet” if I wanted to fit into the company’s costumes. I was supposed to watch what I ate, but more often I found myself watching what the other dancers ate. They were filling their plates at the buffet with mounds of pasta and baklava. Yet, these women strutted around with slender stomachs and nearly non-existent inner thighs. I figured they burned through all the calories in class. I relished in the idea that I too could indulge in a few desserts and still have a six-pack.

At first, the calories didn’t catch up with me, and my stomach toned up from Pilates. After a few weeks of dining at the buffet, however, I stepped onto the scale and the numbers taunted me. I had gained weight, and I knew I couldn’t chalk it all up to extra muscle. Some of the dancers had already pointed in horror at my miniature potbelly. I would have probably never noticed it, but dancers can detect every ounce.

I was aware of certain physical standards I had to adhere to as a dancer, but I didn’t realize just how important those standards are at the professional level. I don’t dance for the muscles; I dance because it gives me joy. I wanted to be moving to music, not counting every calorie.

When Nida gave me the nickname “watermelon popo,” I reached the peak of my insecurities. I felt like a forbidden fruit, and I realized my body image could mirror how a culture perceives my shape, for better or for worse.

Photo: Scott W Charters

Similarly, within minutes of arriving in Hong Kong, I felt like I was starring in a film titled Attack of the 50 Foot Woman. I’m just below six feet tall, but I felt like a Hong Kong skyscraper. I towered over the crowds of petite women in this megacity. I walked onto the subway for the first time to see that most of the passengers barely reached my armpits, making me feel freakishly tall. I had to duck in doorways, crouch through alleys, and sleep with both feet dangling over the edge of my bed.

Just when I started getting used to standing tall in the crowd, a visit to the market brought my confidence back down. I was merely browsing through a rack of floral-printed skirts, when the shop owner promptly snatched the item I was holding. She slammed it back on the rack.

“No big sizes!! No big sizes!!” she declared, frantically waving her arms around. It was as if she was banishing me from the shop for being too large. I’m only 148 pounds, a perfectly acceptable weight for my height. I told myself the owner didn’t really mean big, she meant tall, so I moved on to another stall to try on some t-shirts. Even the alleged XL shirts barely covered my belly button.

I thought back to the last time I went shopping abroad, which had a markedly different effect on my body image. In Rwanda, I felt as confident as ever, surrounded by other pear shapes just like me.

A month into my stay, I had fallen into a fashion funk of cargo-pants, sandals and t-shirts. I decided it was time to don my floral yellow sundress. Little did I know, my dress would drive the Rwandans wild.

Photo: configmanager

The maid, the cook, and the guard stopped in their tracks. “You look so smart,” they told me. As I walked towards to the local newspaper where I worked, a car slammed on the brakes, kicking up a cloud of red dust.

“I love your dress. It is very beautiful and it makes you look beautiful.” I stood there in astonishment, showered in dirt and compliments. I had a bounce in my step for the rest of the day.

While in Turkey the other dancers saw any extra ounce of fat as negative, our Rwandan cook Mary kept telling me to eat more because I needed some meat on my bones. For dinner, she often filled the plate with a parade of carbohydrates: spaghetti, potatoes and rice. A few pounds soon crept up around my waist.

At first, I freaked out, and began to devise a way to lose the weight. Mary, however, made a point of affectionately grabbing my little muffin top. It made me take a good look in the mirror, and I recognized that I had blown things out of proportion. Mary was right. My body looked great.

Travel changes perceptions about everything: life, love, freedom, and culture. That’s the best part of travel in my opinion: as I open myself up to other points of view, my point of view transforms. The same can go for body image while traveling. Different cultures have different ideas of what constitutes feminine beauty. I’m trying to learn how to appreciate the cultural norm while still managing to appreciate myself.

I made the first step in Turkey. After Nida made her fruity comments about my backside, this is what I told her:
“You bet I have a watermelon butt: juicy and delicious.”

Photos: author

“Humans learn. That is what we do. It is part of who we are.”

Masaba’s father, a slow-speaking pillar of a man, stood before us next to a pole flashing with Christmas lights. With red, green, orange, and blue light splashing across his face, he said, “If you cease to learn, you perish.”

Silence had settled over the room like a morning fog, and this statement seemed to echo. Anywhere else, a sentence like this could be mistaken for hyperbole; here in Uganda, a place where education directly determines one’s access to employment and quality healthcare, it served as an ominous warning: Learn or lose.

Masaba, my co-worker, had just received his post-graduate diploma, marking the completion of the first year of a two-year masters program. Thirty of us had gathered at a local restaurant to celebrate the achievement. For a few hours we ate, danced, and listened as people gave heartfelt speeches. Most speeches focused not only on Masaba’s tenacity, but also on the importance of education.

Listening to people describe the way Masaba latched onto education, using it to pull himself up to where he is today, I couldn’t help but think about how I took school for granted while growing up. If learning is living, was I half-dead in college?

*****

Once exams were finished, as campus emptied and slipped into its quiet summer hibernation, I did what most American students do after leaving their universities for the last time: I had dozens of people over to my parent’s house for a graduation party. I think I gave a three-minute thank you speech to my folks, but for the most part, the night revolved around food and socializing, around reveling in the present. Graduation in northern Uganda is a different affair.

For starters, a proper graduation party is only thrown for college graduates; one of my co-workers said it best: “When you finish high school here, you have only made it half-way.”

Finishing college, for many, is something that requires such extreme levels of personal and familial sacrifice that a cathartic party is almost a necessity.

Most universities charge fees that are well beyond what any family of farmers or laborers (ie. most families in Uganda) can comfortably pay. As such, many college students in Uganda are so broke from paying school fees that they eat one meal or less a day to save money—the common expression ‘having a university figure’ comes from this scenario. Parents, too, will often starve themselves of meals to avoid spending their child’s potential tuition funds.

The Acholi, the most populous tribe in Gulu district where I live, see college graduation as an event that is as important for a student’s parents as it is for the student. Graduation is an affirmation of parental prowess, a public declaration that parents have accomplished their responsibilities and primed their kids for life.

Students, too, don’t take graduation lightly, for it changes the way their communities see them. A Ugandan friend of mine said, “After graduation, members of your clan will look at you as an achiever. They will want to be associated with you. In clans where not many people have gone to university, you will be seen as one of your clan’s problem-solvers.”

The party itself can take one of two forms: a Western-style party with a DJ, rented sound system, and catered food, or a traditional party with Acholi dancing and a home cooked feast. With each passing year, fewer and fewer graduates are opting to dance the bwola and the dingi-dingi at their parties, replacing the sounds of the adungu, lukema, and the nanga with the pounding bass of Ugandan club hits.

*****

“When Masaba used to bring home his grades at the end of term, I’d look at the high marks—he always scored well—and I would say, ‘Son, these are good, but good is not great.’ ” His father cracked a smile. With the sting of these moments long buried in memory, Masaba too let a small smile slip.

His father continued. “And so today, Masaba, as we gather to congratulate you on your most recent accomplishment, I want to remind of you one thing.” He paused and turned to grin at his son. We all started laughing, knowing what was coming.

“As nice as this degree is, as hard as you have worked, know that this is not the end–there are more degrees to get. Good, remember, is not great.”

Photos: author

As an avid traveler I often get asked how I deal with, you know, stares, when I travel in regions where not a lot of black people travel.

A prolonged stare is creepy enough to rattle even the most intrepid of travelers. As much as we don’t acknowledge it, we all experience travel differently. Sometimes on a much deeper level than we’re even aware of. And unfortunately, some experiences can be marred by how people react to us…physically.

Here’s an excerpt from a piece I wrote awhile back that talked about dealing with stereotypes:

Your friend just returned from the trip of a lifetime – traveling around remote regions, being invited into homes of locals, feasting on ethnic spreads, and immersing herself in centuries-old cultures.

You’re not readily welcomed with open arms and you’re constantly being gawked at. At that moment, no one can understand the level of dejection you’re feeling…..

Situations like these can leave travelers confused and unsure of themselves. Having experienced a range of reactions from locals over the years – from acceptance to blatant rejection – I’ve decoded various types of stares into seven distinct types:

The “What on Earth?” stare

This is your typical “I’ve just seen a ghost look.” Usually reserved for older men and women and accompanied with a slight jaw-drop.

The “Hellooooo…baby!” stare

They’ve watched the music videos. They’ve seen the stereotypes on TV. So when they see you, they put two-and-two together and react based on assumptions. “They” being middle-aged men.

The “Frozen in Time” stare

Similar to the way a cow stops and stares, half-chewing and frozen in time. This usually happens when I saunter into tiny villages. They stop and freeze. This look also pops up on occasion in city settings especially with much older folk (80s and older) who freeze their steps and stare. The difference between the ‘What on Earth?” and this look is that the “What on Earth?”s keep on walking while these just freeze.

The “Covert Operation” stare

The sneakiest of the bunch, they use every reflective surface to observe and study you. Unless you catch them via their reflection in the mirror. Usually reserved for older teenagers (both girls and boys) and young men who find you attractive.

The “Confused” stare

They know I exist yet are taken by surprise when I turn up in their ski lodge or on their yacht.

The “Abject Fascination” stare

Just the other day I watched as a little boy barely 8 months old, strapped into a grocery cart, trailed me up and down an aisle with just his eyes. His dad, walking back from another aisle, caught his baby rubbernecking and we shared a lighthearted laugh.

Kids point. They stare. They gawk. Sometimes they laugh. If their natural curiosity didn’t bubble to the surface, frankly, I’d be concerned.

The “Utterly Disgusted” stare

Definitely the most difficult to stomach. Sometimes, you look over your shoulder wondering who they’re staring at with such loathing only to realize it’s…you?! Usually born from previous negative experiences or just deep-seated prejudice you really can’t change in a day.

Note – All of these types of stares, excluding the “Covert Operation” stare, are usually followed by some serious rubbernecking to make sure what they’re seeing isn’t a figment of their imagination.

So, how do I handle stares, you ask?

I just keep on traveling.

That’s the only way.

You’ve heard about the endless glasses of tea, the kebabs and how to haggle in the bazaar. But if you really want to get under the country’s skin, here are ten less commonly known things about life and culture in Turkey.

1. Not all Turkish men have mustaches

This Turkish stereotype is remarkably persistent .

While you might see members of the older generation sporting a mustache, young Turks are more likely to be clean-shaven.

2. There aren’t any camels

In Turkish holiday resorts it’s not unusual to see a couple of camels lined up strategically outside the tourist attractions, waiting to be photographed. Like apple tea, someone discovered that tourists like them. Turkey doesn’t have a desert, and it doesn’t have any (native) camels either.

3. The official language is Turkish

The only official language of Turkey is Turkish, although other languages spoken by minority groups include Arabic and Kurdish.

Turkish is part of the Turkic language family; similar languages are spoken in Azerbaijan and Central Asian countries such as Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan.

Turkish is not related to Arabic, although the two languages have some words in common. Although most Turks are Muslim, they are not Arabs.

Photo: mawel

4. Every meal is a barbeque opportunity

Breakfast, lunch or dinner: the grill can be used at any time of day. Picnics are also popular in Turkey and the portable mangal , barbeque, usually comes along.

There’s also a whole restaurant format devoted to the barbeque: called kendin pişir kendi ye : cook it yourself; eat it yourself. At the table you’ll get a pre-heated barbeque and a plate of raw meat. The rest is up to you.

5. Turkish soap operas are huge

Local studios churn out dizi , soap operas, at an impressive rate. Almost every Turkish region has its own soap opera. Most socializing in Turkey is done at home, and watching soap operas is a favorite pastime.

Turkish soap operas are not only popular inside the country; they are also watched throughout the Arab world and Central Asia. These shows have even been credited for an increase in Arab tourism in the country.

6. Turkish people are extremely hospitable

If a Turkish person invites you to his house after you’ve known him for half an hour, don’t panic.

Turks are incredibly friendly and hospitable and as a misafir , guest, you are highly valued. Many will consider it an honor if you accept an invitation to visit them. Once inside, you will be plied with food and strong black çay or Turkish coffee.

7. Turkish people are also very inquisitive

A typical conversation with a Turkish person you’ve just met might go something like this: “What country are you from?… Are you married?… Is your husband / wife Turkish?… Do you have children?… How old are you?”

Photo: jikatu

If you come from a different culture these might seem like very personal questions. Compared to people in U.K., the Turkish people I know are much more comfortable talking freely about personal details, even with someone they don’t know well.

8. Wearing a headscarf is forbidden in public buildings

This means that a girl who wears a headscarf cannot attend university. Some find ways around this, such as by wearing wigs. In other places, wearing a headscarf is purely a matter of personal choice. The proportion of women wearing a headscarf varies depending on which city or even which part of town you’re in. Interestingly, a recent study by ESI showed that while most Turks think headscarf wearing is on the rise, the percentage of Turkish women who cover their heads actually decreased from 73% in 1999 to 64% in 2006.

9. Like Tarkan? There’s more where he came from

Like soap operas, Turkish pop music is popular throughout the region. Other homegrown musicians to look out for include Sezen Aksu and Öykü & Berk, who are pioneering their own brand of Turkish flamenco. For something a bit edgier, try Orient Expressions or Mercan Dede.

10. Don’t mention Midnight Express

I asked a couple of Turkish friends about the questions and stereotypes they encounter most when they travel outside Turkey, and this is possibly the one that makes them cringe the most. The screenwriter of Midnight Express has apologized for the film’s negative portrayal of the Turkish people, but Turks feel they have to explain to the world that you shouldn’t believe everything you see at the movies.

]]> http://matadorabroad.com/10-things-to-know-about-turkey/feed/ 10 http://matadorabroad.com/tales-from-the-frontier-of-expat-life-being-an-american-woman-in-thailand/ http://matadorabroad.com/tales-from-the-frontier-of-expat-life-being-an-american-woman-in-thailand/#comments Wed, 31 Mar 2010 20:53:40 +0000 Katherine Stone http://matadorabroad.com/?p=3778 Photo: ZouteDrop Feature Photo: Spiros2004

An American English teacher in Thailand navigates wildly different cultural standards for how women should behave.

I am a teacher for a small school outside of Bangkok. I live in the close-knit community that surrounds the school.

One of the most salient things I have noticed here is that within this society there is a reigning thought that women are vessels of sexuality. Any prompt to the male species, even one as diminutive as a “hello” or a wave of the hand, is seen as eliciting their latent sexual desires.

I have repeatedly been asked by my school’s director to not talk to the men in the neighborhood or even offer them a smile and a wave. She explained that this implies that I am interested in sex. She reproached me because she had “heard” I was waving to the security guards by school (there are a lot of gossipers in town).

My shock turned into anger. I was being scolded for acting out of common courtesy: saying hello and acknowledging someone. This way of thinking about how women should behave towards men can make me livid; I believe it forces women to heed to these supposed “weaknesses” of men.

After the anger came guilt. I am made to feel I’ve done something wrong, which can be extraordinarily upsetting. The topic itself creates most of the guilt: “overt sexuality.” My director is placing the blame on my supposed lack of restraint. This kind of admonishment is very personal. At times, it has felt like an attack on my self-respect as a woman: she might just as well have called me promiscuous.

Even though I came here knowing that I would have to tone down my own habits and customs, it’s gotten to the point where these limitations infringe on who I am. My personality overall is friendly and outgoing. To have my affability be seen as somehow inappropriate is exasperating. Was I supposed to walk home everyday with my head down?

More often than not, I feel like nothing I’m doing is right.

Furthermore, my director is largely non-communicative when it comes to seeking the truth about any situation. She will reprimand me without ever asking me if what she’s heard is true. I’ll defend myself, and because she doesn’t want any more conflict she’ll just “yes” me out the door. This avoidance thwarts any opportunity to really try and understand each other or come to an armistice.

I can understand that Thai women believe the Western norm of common courtesy is suggestive, and I know that trying to amend my behavior is a matter of respecting their culture and of not wanting to offend anyone for the time I am living in this community.

However, it has become glaringly obvious to me where the woman’s place is in Thailand, and it makes me uncomfortable. Women stay at home with the children and run their cottage vendors. They hang out together. It’s easy to see why there is so much gossip here: the women have all this time to converse and come to conclusions about those that are different from them.

I have come to think that much of the emphasis on my “inappropriate” behavior is because I am a foreigner who is incredibly obvious in this neighborhood.

Photo: Massimo Riserbo

For example, I feel singled out as offensive because of my Western dress. Showing shoulders or knees supposedly sends a message of sexual availability. But I have seen Thai girls wearing shorts and showing shoulders. When I’ve brought this up, it is explained that the rules are different for me because I am a teacher as well as a Westerner.

After becoming aware of this “rule” I never feel comfortable leaving my house without my knees or shoulders covered. My opinion is that it’s not worth the scrutiny. When I go into Bangkok, I’ve taken up changing in restaurant bathrooms as soon as I get out of my little town. I can’t express how good the feeling is.

So, how do I negotiate my identity and my personality as established by my own culture with these new cultural rules?

Part of what has made me feel better about being here in this situation is that I’ve realized I can’t hope to fully integrate and that I don’t necessarily want to. I have also learned how to draw my own ethical, personal and cultural boundaries.

I can observe a certain cultural difference, such as the significance of covering shoulders, and respect it. However, there are other cultural boundaries that to which I just won’t make concessions. So despite all of the taboos, I have not closed myself off. Some of my most valuable experiences in Thailand have been nights spent sharing beers with the male Thai teachers. I can’t begin to describe how taboo this is: a woman hanging out with men, not to mention drinking.

I have had older men and women in the neighborhood who speak passable English publicly chastise me because they have seen me with a glass of beer. This makes me infuriated. I want to ask them: “Why do you care?” or “Why does this bother you?” In these situations, I have to bite down so as to keep my cool.

Yet I keep doing it. The Thai men and I talk about life and language. Most of my Thai language competence and understanding of the culture has come through these sessions. Our hangouts happen spontaneously and also somewhat surreptitiously.

These interactions connect me to a culture and a community that the majority of time I feel outside of. More importantly, I have created friendships and human connections through socializing this way that I have no hope of having with most of the Thai women here.

In my isolation I’ve become even more hypersensitive to my daily activities and behaviors. More often than not, I am being watched, particularly by Thai women who gossip relentlessly. I am observed so closely because I am a farang (foreigner). Anything I do out of the ordinary may just as well be performed on a stage. However, I know that I shouldn’t let these aspects control my life.

My reasons for coming to Thailand were to escape the commitments and restrictions of the western world. But look what I have found: more restrictions.

I can remember myself before moving to Thailand. I consistently said that I thought the most crucial thing I would learn through this journey would be patience, and I do think I have gained an enormous amount of patience and tolerance.

And yet I still have so much further to go. I’m not sure if I will make it, if I will be able to fully embrace these differences that make me so indignant and challenge me so much, but I know I will go home seeing my own culture in a different light. And in the meantime I’ll continue challenging and obeying the cultural rules here, testing the limits of my own cultural beliefs, ethics, and identity.

]]> http://matadorabroad.com/tales-from-the-frontier-of-expat-life-being-an-american-woman-in-thailand/feed/ 19 http://matadorabroad.com/bring-your-own-food-eating-out-in-the-philippines/ http://matadorabroad.com/bring-your-own-food-eating-out-in-the-philippines/#comments Thu, 25 Mar 2010 18:35:08 +0000 Noah Pelletier http://matadorabroad.com/?p=3751

Photo: Robertoverzo Feature Photo: Salim Photography

The Philippines might be on to something with bring your own food (BYOF) restaurants.

The twin engine plane that hurtled us over the Philippine jungle had tendencies for splendid, gut-wrenching drops. My eyes were glazed, staring out the window to a thousand and one clouds. My wife, Takayo, was trying to sleep through it. Her eyes were closed, but gripping the armrest like she was, I don’t think she was having much luck. We had an eight-hour layover in Manila before our flight back to Shanghai.

Aside from being overcrowded, noisy, and hotter than Hell’s doorknob, there’s nothing wrong with the Ninoy Aquino Airport, if you have twenty minutes to kill between flights, you can pick up a liter of rum for about two dollars, or talk scuba diving with someone over a San Miguel. For longer layovers, however, you’re better off napping through it in the backseat of an air conditioned taxi. Naturally, the air conditioner in our taxi was busted, so I asked the driver if he knew of a good restaurant in the area.

“What kind of food you like?”

“Traditional Philippine food. Adobo?”

“I know a place,” he said, and then stepped on the gas.

Adobo is the Philippine national dish, made using vinegar, soy sauce, and other ingredients indigenous to the area. The vinegar has a tendency to boil away, leaving a thickened broth and meat that falls off the bone. Our hotel in Boracay had served a chicken adobo for breakfast one morning. My wife and I were now hooked.

Photo: jonicdao

It was a clear day on the outskirts of Manila. Some have called Manila an unkempt, rundown, impoverished, and threatening sprawl of a city. I wasn’t buying it. As with anywhere in the world, the experience depends on the pair of eyes you’re looking through. My eyes, as it turned out, were hungry; I saw a future of culinary opportunities.

Our driver turned off a highway and headed down an alley lined with fruit stands, fry joints, and beer halls. We arrived at a closed cul-de-sac and parked, the only car on the street. The driver told us he’d stay in the car, but we told him he could go and walked up to the restaurant. It looked utterly abandoned, but the front door swung right open.

A girl came out from the back and gave us a sleepy welcome. She told us to pick any seat we liked. We flipped through the menu, which, of course, was in Tagalog. Our waitress arrived and we began pointing to items on the menu. She wrote everything down.

“OK, Where’s your food?” She asked.

“Where’s our food?” I said.

“Yes.”

“We don’t have any food. We came here to buy food from you.”

“We don’t have food.”

Wasn’t this the beginning of an Abbot and Costello routine?

“OK,” I said. “What am I paying for?”

“You bring food in. We cook it.”

“Oh, OK. Well, where can I buy food?”

“Market’s through the alley.”

Photo: besighyawn

I asked the girl to accompany me to the market. Takayo stayed at the restaurant watching a Philippine soap opera on the wall-mounted television. I followed the waitress through a cinder block corridor to the side of the restaurant. We passed a mountain of trash. We passed a boy sleeping on a wooden pallet at the mouth of a dark hallway. The earthy smell of roots and raw meat become stronger, and then we entered the warehouse market.

What was once a fly-swarmed place full of bored fishmongers became a fly-swarmed place full of excited people bidding for my attention. Handfuls of crab and shrimp were thrust at me from every angle. Eyes bugged out from sea creatures. A little girl asked me for spare change and I placed some in her hand. Everyone went wild. By the time we finished shopping, I carried out a kilo of prawns, a half-kilo of pork, green beans, broccoli, onions, garlic, rice, and more. I waved good-by to the vendors, who returned a tremendous farewell. The waitress kept walking and I had to jog to catch up with her.

It was nearly an hour before the food landed on our table, but it was worth the wait. Philippine cuisine has elements of Southeast Asian, Chinese, and Spanish influence rolled into one. There were Adobo prawns, pork apretada, stir fried vegetables, coconut rice…it was the type of spread you’d be happy to call a last meal. And who knew, it very well could have been. We still had to walk out of that alley to catch a taxi, but that would be hours later. We gave it our best, trying to finish everything on the plates.

A restaurant with no food. It may not be practical for everyone, but it’s a change of pace for those of us who like to know what we’re eating. And there in that little alley somewhere outside of Manila, it was the best possible way to spend a long layover, eating fresh food we’d bought ourselves cooked with local expertise.

]]> http://matadorabroad.com/bring-your-own-food-eating-out-in-the-philippines/feed/ 9 http://matadorabroad.com/traveling-to-the-motherland-motherland-travel/ http://matadorabroad.com/traveling-to-the-motherland-motherland-travel/#comments Wed, 24 Mar 2010 18:02:06 +0000 Valerie Ng http://matadorabroad.com/?p=3744

Photos: Fotos China by Jorge Santiago

The unexpected complications of traveling back to the motherland.

“Do you consider yourself Chinese or American?” the Chinese man sitting across from me on the plane asked in Mandarin.

“American,” I answered after a short pause. Having been born and raised in the United States, I believed it to be the only appropriate response.

He groaned. “You should say you’re Chinese,” he replied. “And it seems like you don’t speak Chinese very well, either.” He sighed. “That’s what always happens to our people when they go abroad. They become foreigners.”

The man’s words stung me as I was heading to China for the very first time. Growing up, I had always been aware of my dual identity. I spoke English at school and Cantonese at home, and attended Chinese school to develop my reading and writing skills.

I loved shrimp dumplings and rice noodles as much as mac and cheese and pizza. And although my family did not speak Mandarin, the official language of the People’s Republic of China, my parents signed me up for classes, adding to the Spanish instruction I received in my regular school.

Yet it was clear from this encounter that because I grew up across the ocean from the motherland, in an environment that was predominantly non-Chinese, the cultural influences that had shaped me were largely American, a fact that this man did not appreciate. I soon realized that despite sharing the heritage of the inhabitants of this country, I was an outsider.

No Homecoming

I was extremely disconcerted to get such reception from a native Chinese. Having spent my entire life as a racial minority in the United States, I had looked forward to being in a country in which I could blend in. I’d figured that my ethnic ties, as well as a familiarity with the language, would give me an advantage over tourists without that connection to the country.

But throughout the trip, I still found myself struggling to communicate in Mandarin, which I’d studied as a foreign language just as I had with Spanish. My family and I were sometimes charged foreigner prices because we were overseas Chinese. And each of the locales we visited were thousands of miles from the home villages of our ancestors, making them seem as exotic as Malawi or India. What I had envisioned as a heritage trip felt like anything but a homecoming.

Motherland travel can sometimes be more challenging than visiting a country in which you are an obvious foreigner. You’re expected to speak the language with the same command as a native and possess the same cultural proclivities, as if you have spent your entire life in that country.

But when your foreignness is obvious, the locals are often sensitive to your foreign ways, respecting any cultural differences and linguistic shortcomings. This seemed to be the case when I studied abroad in Spain and France, where I did not have any clear ancestral ties. My Spanish senora and her husband were patient with my roommates and me as we developed our Spanish skills, and understood that we were not accustomed to eating dinner after 8 pm. There was a mutual awareness of the cultural gaps that existed between us, and on each side, we did our best to accommodate for them.

My situation in China was not unique. A friend of mine who has spent extensive time in Mexico recalled that Mexicans would sometimes look down upon her Mexican-American friends for their imperfect Spanish and for having forgotten their culture, but were appreciative of the fact that she, a pale-skinned American, spoke their language at all and showed interest in their country.

Matador Trips editor Hal Amen also recalled that when lived in South Korea, Koreans would often become upset that his Korean-American friends, who were often assumed to be natives, did not speak the language fluently and were not familiar with the culture.

In contrast, Hal found that the locals were “thrilled” when he could dig into his basic Korean vocabulary, and that they would make an effort to start conversations in English and make foreigners like himself feel welcome in the country. He attributed this reception to the fact that South Korea does not receive many foreign travelers and to the Koreans’ fascination with the West, with the English language in particular.

Thinking more about my experience, I realized a few things about China. When I first visited in 1998, its society was still fairly insular, having emerged only in the 1970s from a decades-long isolation from international engagement. It still would have been difficult for many people to understand why someone who was supposedly Chinese did not speak their language fluently and thought of herself to be of a nationality other than their own.

They probably found it an insult that I rejected their country and culture, in which they had such fierce pride, and adopted that of a foreign nation. A similar logic can be applied to countries like Mexico and South Korea. My situation was further complicated by the fact that my parents grew up in Hong Kong when it was still a colony of the United Kingdom, and where Mandarin, China’s national language, was not spoken.

Reclaiming My Identity

After a second family visit to China in 2000, I avoided traveling to China. I studied abroad in London, Madrid, and Paris, where I would be free from misgivings about being out of touch with my cultural identity. In Europe, I could be just another foreigner learning about new cultures and picking up new vocabulary, whose American ways would not be questioned. I admired famous works of art, discovered new foods, took siestas in the middle of the afternoon, and conversed in languages I did not grow up with.

In all my travels, I’ve always identified the United States as my home, but have been forced to acknowledge that my roots are somewhere in Asia. And while I am proud of the fact that I gained proficiency in Spanish and French during my stint in Europe, I do feel guilty for not having put the same effort into mastering Chinese.

I have yet to return to China, in part because I still lack the fluency in Mandarin that would be expected of me and because of fears that I would be derided as a sellout.

I do plan on returning one day, and when that happens, I’ll have to keep in mind that I might come under greater scrutiny than someone of Western stock, and that any cultural gaffes or deficiencies in language won’t be shrugged off the way they were in Poland or Spain.

But I realize now that I at least deserve to give myself a break, even if the locals will not. I did not make a conscious choice to reject the country, culture, and language of my ancestors. Because I grew up in the United States, it was practically inevitable that English would become my primary language, and that I would become integrated into American life.

Mandarin was essentially my third language, and my classes occurred only weekly, which was inadequate if I wanted to
achieve fluency in a difficult language that requires more years of study than Spanish.

I have never thought of myself as purely Chinese or American, but as Chinese-American. I shouldn’t feel ashamed of the fact that I am more savvy with American culture and speak English, and possibly Spanish and French, better than I speak Mandarin. What matters is that I am aware of my identity and am comfortable with it, and can only hope that native Chinese will respect that.

]]> http://matadorabroad.com/traveling-to-the-motherland-motherland-travel/feed/ 15 http://matadorabroad.com/coming-to-grips-or-not-with-violence-as-communication-in-bangladesh/ http://matadorabroad.com/coming-to-grips-or-not-with-violence-as-communication-in-bangladesh/#comments Mon, 22 Mar 2010 14:17:15 +0000 Amanda Ferrandino http://matadorabroad.com/?p=3728

Feature Photo: joiseyshowaa Photo: ahron

An American living in Bangladesh struggles to understand and adapt to local methods of communication.

After the hour-long scooter ride to a scheduled appointment at a research center and a forty minute wait in the lobby, the secretary finally felt it was time to share that the coordinator was not coming in at all—our meeting was canceled.

Almost nine months into being here, I’ve come to find that in Bangladeshi culture people constantly talk, but no one communicates. Words are thrown around in conversation, but they are seldom concise and often add irrelevant information. Meetings that could have been accomplished with a five-minute phone call turn into an hour commute and a two-hour discussion that digresses from women’s empowerment to the freedom of jungle chickens. It takes my roommate ten minutes to tell me a thirty-second story. I’m constantly snapping at her, “Yeah, I get it—then what?”

Photo: ahron

This lack of communication goes beyond the obvious language barrier. I have learned enough Bangla to communicate my needs and am skilled enough in the art of charades to express to a waiter an order of vegetable soup without prawn. Yet he still argues for seven minutes that the taste will change. “Yes sir, I want the taste to change, I’m a vegetarian.” With the inability to express oneself concisely comes the inability to understand anything that is not repeated twenty times.

I believe the real miscommunication stems from this need for incessant repetition. If you don’t reiterate your needs at least three times, you’ll be misunderstood. As an ex-pat from fast-talking New York, it’s infuriating to have to repeat myself. Telling a rickshaw-wallah that I’m going to Karwan Bazar but ending up on Shatash Road made me late for a meeting. When I told my colleagues why I was late, they dismissed me, saying “You have to tell the wallahs four times.”

Alarmingly, what I found myself doing was adapting to another way that Bangladeshis communicate: through force. After I noticed we were heading in the wrong direction for several blocks, I then repeated to the rickshaw-wallah that I wanted to go to Karwan Bazar. He began mumbling under his breath that I made him go in the wrong direction, while I fumed that he didn’t listen in the first place.

At a turn, the wallah accidentally ran the wheel up a pedestrian’s leg. A typical Bangladeshi male stare-down occurred: the death stare with widened eyes, a raised hand, and a spew of curses so fast it sounds like an enraged auctioneer with a jawbreaker in his mouth.

After several seconds of this “masculine” throw-down as I screamed, “Go, uncle, move on,” I raised my own hand and smacked the wallah in the back to snap him out of his red-blooded trance.

I hit another human being. I resorted to violence, the sort of violence I am trying to combat in my work. In all reality, he didn’t even respond to my hand smacking his back. He just pedaled forward, yelling at the man behind him. But was it appropriate? Though it is culturally acceptable, should I have hit him?

Dozens of times in a day I see the standard “hand-raise-in-preparation-to-hit” directed towards children, women, beggars or lower class men. More often than not, the hand comes down on their cheeks, heads and backs. Physical violence becomes a straightforward method of communication—a straightforward method that their verbal expression lacks.

Photo: TMAB2003

It was pointed out by another expat that this is a preliterate society. According to UNICEF, Bangladesh’s literacy rate is 54%. For UNICEF, adult literacy is determined by the percentage of persons over 15 years of age who can read and write. This statistic can be skewed when people who can sign their name are counted as literate, even when they can’t read or write much else.

No matter how illiterate Bangladesh is on paper or in reality, many adults today never learned to practice comprehensive conversation. In societies with higher literacy, schools teach their students to be direct in essay writing and to clearly articulate their questions. A lot of adults didn’t have that opportunity in Bangladesh, and if they did, they were still raised by parents who didn’t. They were raised by parents who smacked them to make a statement.

This violence is still occurring—on the streets, in my friends’ families, even in safe homes for women and children. When a baby is crying, relatives raise their hand to teach them to listen. And I picked up on it. Humans adapt to their surroundings, but I am not proud of this moment of adaptation. This cultural habit and form of communication is something I can’t accept and I don’t want to mimic. I refuse to believe that hitting a baby will help it listen better. Violence perpetuates violence, and it’s a cycle that should end.

It’s a given that communication goes beyond verbal expression. It involves facial expresions, eye contact, charades, sign language and physical contact. Gently patting a child’s head says “Hello, sweetie.” Smacking would fall under physical contact communication—but it is invasive and violent. Violence will ultimately be redirected elsewhere—perhaps back to you.

As my rickshaw drove away, I saw this negative side of Bangladesh culture I was adapting to. I want to assimilate into this culture but I refuse to absorb a negative trait. Cultures are ever changing and pluralistic, and I’ll assert that ending smacking as a communicative expression would be a positive change for this culture.

There are better cultural characteristics that I could pick up on: patience, for example. Luckily I still have three months left for that.

]]> http://matadorabroad.com/coming-to-grips-or-not-with-violence-as-communication-in-bangladesh/feed/ 6 http://matadorabroad.com/one-frenzied-weekend-in-fes/ http://matadorabroad.com/one-frenzied-weekend-in-fes/#comments Tue, 09 Mar 2010 22:20:08 +0000 Andrew Farrand http://matadorabroad.com/?p=3647

Photos: author

A sudden water scare in Fes reminds an expat of his inherent vulnerability.

Saturday was the first day all week I didn’t need to wear my rain jacket to walk out the door. It was also the day the whispers began all throughout the medina, and grew to a frenzy.

After almost a whole week of driving rains, culminating in an all-day deluge on Friday, a friend and I spent the morning exploring the Old City and returned to the local salon de thé for lunch in the garden. I was up to my elbows in chicken tajine, baba ghanoush, and cinnamon-spiced potatoes when Denny showed up.

A middle-aged American photographer living in the Fes medina, Denny is a big talker – the kind of ultra-friendly guy who might finish his drink, say goodbye and then tell you three long, intricate stories before he actually leaves. Something about the quantity of Denny’s stories has always made me suspect their quality, and the information he delivered on this afternoon only confirmed my doubts.

He strode into the garden, glowing, like an Oscar winner on his way to the podium. Unable to contain himself, he immediately announced, to no one in particular, “Have you all heard the news? They found three dead cows in the water supply today, so now they’re going to cut off the whole city’s water for three days.”

Photos: author

Stunned silence, and some obvious disbelief, hung in the air. As if it proved anything, Denny reassured us, “It’s true. Just heard it.”

An hour later I was in a taxi and I explained to the driver what I had heard, as taxi drivers are known in Fes as reliable sources of popular gossip and rumor. “Waash kul haad saheeh?” Was all this true? Yes, sadly. Starting tomorrow, they will cut off the medina’s water supply, and maybe all of Fes’s.

When I returned to the salon de thé, the French owner, Cecile, told me I had just missed the city government representative who had passed by to officially inform all restaurants and cafés: at midnight that night, three days sans eau would begin. Cecile, now quite flustered, ran through the implications: How will we flush the toilets? How will we wash the dishes? Will there be bread? How much water do we need to buy if we stay open?

By dinner time, the standard 5-liter jugs of water that usually sell for 10 dirhams were up to thirteen and climbing.

The kids on the stoop outside our apartment were enjoying this, in the way that kids back in the US enjoy approaching blizzards, hurricanes, and other catastrophes which worry their parents and hold the promise of school cancellations. They laughed when I told them I was going upstairs to take three showers. (Whether they laughed at the joke, my Arabic, or the concept of a daily shower I just don’t know).

Photos: author

A few members of the Fulbright group gathered at our apartment that evening. All had heard some story about the water being contaminated, either with dead animals or from muddy runoff from the rains.

We did the natural thing when faced with an impending crisis – drank beer and played cards. In between each hand, I scurried to the bathroom to switch out the bucket under the running faucet and replace it with the next empty one. Like everyone else in the Old City, we were stockpiling.

As the evening progressed, it occurred to us how bizarre was the government’s decision to continue dispensing water to the city when they knew it contained dead cow particles. Why didn’t they just shut the supply off immediately? And what was the point of everyone’s hoarding contaminated water? Perhaps the local water department had concocted the story itself, someone surmised.

* * *

Photos: author

The first sound I heard when I woke Sunday morning was Ryan running the faucet in our bathroom. The water was still flowing.

After all their frenzied panicking of the day before, the Fassis suddenly acted as if nothing had happened. Only when I brought it up would the water situation get a mention: “Oh, yes, that water situation. Well, they shut off the water in the Sidi Bou Jida neighborhood, but not all of Fes, so it’s fine.”

A few, still alarmed, said that the city was using the last of its clean water supplies now but would soon run out, and could cut the flow at any moment. Even they soon forgot it all, and the frenzied panic of the previous day dissipated as quickly as it had arisen. By the time we got to class Monday morning, neither of our professors could be convinced that they knew anything of any such water crisis.

The speed with which a whole city reached full panic mode and then returned to normal only made the incident seem more surreal. I’m still a bit dazed.

But then, I expected surprises here, as I wrote soon after arriving. The popular advice “so long as you are in Morocco, let nothing surprise you” captures the great irony of successfully living abroad, precisely because it is impossible to obey.

No visitor to Morocco can avoid being utterly baffled sometimes by daily occurrences here, and those who try to know what’s around every corner merely frustrate themselves.

Photos: author

Being completely bowled over by Morocco is like being the brunt of a friend’s practical joke. It makes you feel vulnerable, and the natural reaction is to lash out, to erase the vulnerability. But at that moment, embracing one’s vulnerability, accepting that you were fooled, and laughing along with your friend can bring you to a new level of familiarity and trust.

And so the saga of this weekend, which all began with three allegedly dead cows allegedly in a reservoir and ended the same as any other weekend, was simply another reminder that I live in a medieval city, and that sometimes it will act like a medieval city, and that maybe I just need to learn to sit back and enjoy it. It might just be the start of a solid friendship.

]]> http://matadorabroad.com/one-frenzied-weekend-in-fes/feed/ 5 http://matadorabroad.com/studying-in-south-korea-an-english-teacher-asks-how-much-is-too-much/ http://matadorabroad.com/studying-in-south-korea-an-english-teacher-asks-how-much-is-too-much/#comments Mon, 08 Mar 2010 18:51:58 +0000 Bessie Julia Crum http://matadorabroad.com/?p=3639

Feature Photo: Jrwooley6Photo: the_mishka

There was a moment when I thought I might get some honest answers.

“I spend too much time at school,” the discussion book read. “I want to spend more time playing with my friends, but my mom makes me spend all my free time studying.”

I’ve been teaching English to this class of Korean 5th graders for months, and we’ve all gotten comfortable. I was thinking, wow, maybe we can really talk about the intense studying kids do in Korea. Alas, as in many other situations I’ve encountered living here, I was way off.

“No,” they chorused. “We don’t think so.”

“You don’t think you spend too much time studying?” I asked.

“Not too much, Teacher, just normal.” Another added, “A lot of time studying is good.”

I probed further, “So you don’t want to spend more time playing with your friends, instead of studying?”

The oldest girl in my class thought for a few seconds, searching for the words. “No, Teacher. Not more time with my friends; playing with my computer is more fun. Studying a lot is good.”

Sigh. We just see things so differently.

The way I see it, studying in South Korea is out of control. Kindergartners are immersed in English five hours a day, moving through phonics, spelling, and grammar books higher than their level. At the private academy I work in, kids can start full-time, formal education as young as 3 years old. Forget naps, playing and snack time, we’re getting you ready for Harvard. All of you.

Photo: chasing butterflies

But it’s not enough that students just be good at English. Most kids attend Korean public school and then spend hours at private academies on nights and weekends. They study science, math, Chinese characters, Japanese, or literature. Most add piano, swimming, tae kwon do or art classes to fill any potential free time they might have.

I once mapped out the weekly schedules with a 1st grade class, and most of them easily had 7 different extra classes to attend each week. It’s hard for me to comprehend being in class so much at that age, but it’s extremely common. Kids attend schools so late that a law was recently passed prohibiting schools from having class past 10 pm, although it’s routinely broken.

When I was young, 5 or 6 pm would have been a late day at school. To comply with the new Korean law, a number of schools now start classes earlier in the morning. It of course sidesteps the issue that students are spending really long days in class. How do they keep up with it all?

Perhaps they are not handling it well, but there is a lot of pressure to be successful and kids are forced to respond to it. In the pas sixty years, South Korea has grown from a war-torn country to the world’s 15th largest economy. It’s no small feat, and Koreans are very proud of this progress.

I don’t think my students’ parents that went to school with limited heat and food would agree with me that their children should work less. After all, they’re the ones signing them up for all the classes. But at what point is the desire for the next generation’s success getting out of hand? Can I be the only one noticing the kids’ struggle?

I think many of the students are feeling stuck, but only some are comfortable admitting that they don’t like it. I see it in the diaries they write me each week. They write about staying up until the middle of the night to study and getting hit when they don’t do well enough on tests. A girl complained about her mom making extra homework and tests for her after she finished her schoolwork.

Quite boldly one day, a friendly 5th grade girl wrote in her diary: “Why Korean students study too hard? In Korean parents’ story, some of the parents just play after the school. Before they play all day but now, it’s not. It is opposite. Now, students go academy after school. In vacation, too. Please… can you just see what we do? We want to play! We don’t want to be studying machine!”

It think a lot of students feel like this, but it’s just not popular to say.

Her description of being a studying machine is an apt analogy. About four months into the school year, my kindergarten supervisor told us she needed “output”. The parents wanted to see what their students were accomplishing. My expat co-workers and I cocked our heads in confusion, wondering what 5-year-olds’ “output” would look like. I pictured my mom’s Christmas tree and my “output” hung on it: a red macaroni noodle picture frame with my smiling 5-year old face in the center.

That is not at all what my supervisor had in mind.

Photo: author

We were soon given three hundred page Curious George books to practice so the students could read to their moms from them each weekend. Then, we were given the sentences they’d memorize and recite. Three book reviews were due each Wednesday. Every Thursday there was a twenty word spelling test, and it didn’t stop there.

Most of the kindergardeners produced their “output”. The ones whose moms spoke English or hired private tutors, that is. Others were embarrassed they couldn’t do the work or just skipped school. My job was to push them harder. More output.

One student was falling asleep in class one morning, and I pushed her to keep reading until she admitted she stayed up until 1 am finishing her homework. I tried insisting she go lay down and take a nap, but her pride made her resist. It was just another hard day’s work for her.

I’m lost knowing how to deal with these situations because my own experiences contrast starkly with theirs. Growing up I loved going to school. I remember watching butterfly cocoons hatch, taking art projects home to hang on the fridge, and looking forward to summer vacations with friends. We had real vacations from school – there was no studying. Extra classes were for trouble makers or maybe the nerds. I couldn’t have dreamed of being at school until 10 pm.

So now as a teacher, I want to help my students learn the best way I know how. The idealist in me wants them to love learning too. For me it’s not about perfect scores but the progress you can’t measure, like kids’ increasing confidence and their making new friends.

I try hard to teach so my students to enjoy learning, but the system almost makes this impossible. The Korean system values long hours, a heavy workload, and cramming in as much information as possible. It’s awfully hard to get kids excited when so many of them already feel tired and burnt out.

This is the hardest part of my job: finding a balance when I’m caught between value systems. In many ways I’ve learned to adapt to the system. I can get my kids to fill out twenty pages in a workbook in 45 minutes and keep the 4th grade boys in their seats after a ten-hour school day.

I still can’t rationalize the excessive memorizing, studying, and writing my students have to do for my classes. I can’t ignore the pressure it puts them under. But if my students are right, and a lot of time studying is good, maybe it’s up to me to adapt. Like it or not, I’m part of the Korean school system – I do most of what’s expected of me. At least if I have kids someday, I’ll have plenty of reasons why they should never complain about school work.

]]> http://matadorabroad.com/studying-in-south-korea-an-english-teacher-asks-how-much-is-too-much/feed/ 27 http://matadorabroad.com/tourism-and-the-preservation-of-culture-a-rebuttal/ http://matadorabroad.com/tourism-and-the-preservation-of-culture-a-rebuttal/#comments Wed, 03 Mar 2010 20:22:37 +0000 Sarah Menkedick http://matadorabroad.com/?p=3582

Photo: author

In a recent World Hum piece, Eric Weiner made the claim that Turkish baths and whirling dervishes, two traditional cultural practices he enjoyed in Turkey, would not exist today if it weren’t for the support of tourist dollars.

Young Turks, he asserts, have a waning interest in these practices and therefore tourism is all that sustains them. In his view, this “inauthentic” preservation of culture and these “inauthentic” cultural experiences are better than none at all. He states that the “travel snobbery” which criticizes tourists for courting such experiences and commercializing them is “rampant, insidious, and frankly, annoying.”

To this I respond:

If we’re attacking snobbery, is it not also snobbish for a tourist to claim that he and other tourists are responsible for the preservation of culture, since the locals can’t seem to bring themselves to do it?

I don’t think there’s anything wrong with going to a Turkish bath or a Mexican dance festival or a Balinese tribal ceremony that might feel slightly – or totally – constructed for tourist consumption. But I think celebrating this as the preservation of culture is self-congratulatory and smugly condescending, and it can wind up being imperialist.

If Mexicans or Turks or the Balinese no longer value the tradition being “preserved” and have lost interest in it, or see it merely as a spectacle for foreign tourists then really, whose culture are tourists preserving, and why? And more importantly, who has the right to decide whose and what kind of culture needs to be preserved? It sounds to me like the tourist is preserving his/her desire to experience the “exotic” and the “romantic,” and not a living, vibrant and necessary part of local culture.

When a cultural phenomenon has ceased to contain significance for local people and has become an entirely commodified experience produced for tourists dollars, it has moved into that 21st century society of the spectacle.

I don’t mean to imply that we should all throw up our hands in fatalistic acceptance that culture is dead, or that it’s going to die and there’s nothing we can do about it. But I also don’t think that culture is necessarily being preserved, or being preserved in a beneficial and productive way, simply because tourists pay for it. That argument inches us closer and closer to a world in which every cultural experience is something that is inherently designated for consumption, and culture is something determined more by what foreign tourists want to see and experience than by what local people actually believe in and practice.

It seems that what is bound to happen here is that Turkey could spiral off into the 22nd century, clogged with cell phones and traffic and Starbucks just like anywhere else in the world, while tourists go on paying for massages and traditional dances. And what, really, does that preserve? A certain sector of the economy? Tourists’ precious, foreign impressions of Turkish “culture”?

Weiner’s argument brings up Edward Saïd’s now familiar point about Orientalism – the West exoticizes and simplifies the East, fixing it permanently in the past and flattening its people and culture into stereotypes.

To a certain degree, cultural tourism that no longer has roots in a particular culture and that survives off of income from tourists does exactly this. Tourists go and look at a 15th century Turkey, reinforcing established notions of what Turkey should be and negating the country’s more complex and challenging modernity.

Meanwhile, the tourist dollars seem to instruct Turkey on what kind of culture it needs to have – here, you can’t protect it yourselves? We’ll do it for you. Saïd labels this process the internalizing of cultural stereotypes: tourists come in, establish what Turkish culture is via their ideas about the preservation of culture, and then hope that the Turks will internalize it.

I find the loss of traditional cultures distressing, but I don’t think that allowing traditional cultural practices to be commercialized and purchased by tourism is necessarily a positive solution, particularly when these cultural practices may hold far more meaning in the minds of tourists than they do in the daily lives of locals.

I think this solution also ignores so many of the factors that contribute to the death of traditional culture – devastating free trade agreements and the influx of multi-national corporations, the huge push of American capitalist culture overseas (particularly evident in modern Mexico), unchecked development, environmental destruction.

Tourists may keep paying for their cultural experiences in Mexican amphitheaters and Turkish hamams, in “cultural villages” in Kenya or Borneo, but that doesn’t stop the processes that devalue traditional culture and corrode it into a mere product to be consumed. The purchase of cultural preservation with tourist money also hints at a world in which someday, the Turks or the Mexicans or the Chinese might no longer have any connections to traditional culture, but tourists will still go into little bubbles and watch dances or ceremonies, pay their money, and leave, and culture will live on in tourist enclaves as an authentic, commercial simulation of what once was. Something similar like this could be happening in China, with the rise of the country’s ethnic minority theme parks.

This is the society of the spectacle at its most grim – traditional culture no longer holds intrinsic value for the people of a particular country, but inside the bubbles “preserved” by tourism tourists can buy a different, antiquated vision, a traditional culture that is no longer of importance and value to local people but has become yet another product they can sell.

I have two points here: the first is that conflating a tourist’s consumption of a traditional cultural experience with cultural preservation is dangerous. The commodification of any traditional practice for tourist consumption is something that should be considered and handled very carefully or else it threatens to divorce that practice entirely from the realm of local cultural tradition and turn it into tourist fanfare. Secondly, tourists should be very careful about claiming they have the right –and indeed, the responsibility — to preserve a culture that is not theirs. It smacks of condescension and imperialism and ignores the phenomena that contribute to the degradation and destruction of culture in the first place.

]]> http://matadorabroad.com/tourism-and-the-preservation-of-culture-a-rebuttal/feed/ 15 http://matadorabroad.com/cooking-in-lahore-an-american-woman-in-a-pakistani-kitchen/ http://matadorabroad.com/cooking-in-lahore-an-american-woman-in-a-pakistani-kitchen/#comments Mon, 01 Mar 2010 17:24:57 +0000 Heather Carreiro http://matadorabroad.com/?p=3554

Photo: Duarte Carreiro

I watch Nasreen as she carefully measures out four entire cups of ghee. I feel like I’m breaking out just being in the kitchen with this concoction. Four cups of clarified butter, almost pure saturated fat, is being used for just one dish. The golden globs sizzle and crackle as she tosses in the cows’ feet.

“You know how I learned cooking?” asks Nasreen. “From my mother. Before marriage, I learned everything. How to make chapatis, biryani, kabobs, chicken, mutton…so many things! Before marriage I was so smart and slim, but now I am very healthy,” she boasts as she makes the wrestler pose that inevitably accompanies the word ‘healthy’ in Pakistani English.

Breaking the Hulk Hogan flex, she giggles heartily. “Now you…you are looking so weak. You must eat rice and meat today.”

I smile. We’ve had this conversation on a twice-weekly basis since I moved into the upstairs apartment six months ago. As today Nasreen is teaching me how to cook her style, I decide it’s best not to explain that my version of ‘healthy’ differs markedly from the prevailing concept in Lahore.

To many Pakistani women, the more you eat means the healthier you are, and my stomach simply fails to comply. To terminate an endless deluge of food I often joke, “Bas! Mera pet Pakistani nahin hai!” No more! My stomach is not Pakistani!

Pushing a wisp of black hair out of her eyes, Nasreen rummages through the cabinets and pulls out an array of spices. “First we need to make the salan, sauce, for the biryani,” she explains. Throughout South Asia there are dozens of different biryani recipes, but Pakistan’s staple variety consists of chicken, aromatic basmati rice, onions, tomatoes and a complex cocktail of spices. Nasreen’s biryani is better than any I’ve had at a restaurant in Pakistan or even across the border in India.

She hands me ten garlic cloves along with a stone mortar and pestle. I haven’t used a set since high school chemistry, and Nasreen finds my ineptness amusing. In my fridge upstairs I’ve got a jar of pre-crushed garlic paste.

For me, the need to cook disrupts my daily routine like the arrival of an unwanted and unexpected guest. Almost everything must be made from scratch in Lahore unless you’re willing to shell out for expensive imported items. The temperature outdoors can be over 120 degrees Fahrenheit, and there are often power cuts that incapacitate fans and air conditioners. In the middle of the night, I’ve woken up in a cold sweat, dreaming that I was hosting a dinner party.

I can’t remember ever hearing a Pakistani housewife grouching about how she has got to cook, but it’s something I grumble about at least once a day.

Photo: Duarte Carreiro

Whenever Nasreen comes upstairs to share the latest gup-shup (gossip) about the maid or drop off a utility bill, she asks, “What did you cook today?” If she discovers that I’ve made only soup and sandwiches, she’ll send me a tray of daal and rice or a curried meat dish. More than once I’ve gone downstairs to see her after 9 p.m. and found her thawing substantial amounts of meat.

“Wow, Nasreen Auntie are you having a party?”

“No no. No party. Just my sister, my brother-in-law, their five sons and my three cousins are coming for dinner.”

“Tonight?”

“Yes yes. They are coming are 11 o’clock…you must meet them! I am making mattar qeeema, chicken, shami kabobs and daal-chaval.”

Usually I manage to decline the invitation only after tasting the smorgasbord of dishes. Today we’re cooking for only seven people, but she’s just as exuberant while she explains every step. We finish the salan and move on to the rice. I wonder why we didn’t have both cooking at the same time, since the rice will take much longer to cook. Before putting the rice in the pot to boil it, she soaks it and lets all the tiny insects and broken casings rise to the surface.

“It is very important not to touch the rice. You should shake it; don’t mix it with your hands.”

We wait at least 15 minutes while the rice expels the unwanted elements and sends them swirling towards the top of the bowl. Nasreen picks out each little bit separately and throws it in the sink. I stir the cows’ feet and remove the dish from the flame.

Westerners may look on the lives of Pakistani women and imagine them to be hapless housewives, banished to days of slaving over a hot stove. Only one out of every three women in Pakistan can write well enough to sign her name on official documents, and only a very small percentage work outside the home. It’s tempting to see the kitchen as an oppressive prison, but most ‘inmates’ I’ve met are in no rush to stage a jailbreak.

I once asked a middle class Pakistani housewife if she’d rather be out working. “Work? Why would I want to work? Whole the day I spend cooking, eating snacks, drinking chai with my friends, having some gup-shup…”

Nasreen checks the pot of rice, determines that it’s done cooking, and strains out the extra water. We thoroughly mix the rice with the salan and carefully dot yellow food coloring on the top. As the biryani steams, we set the table and gather the family for lunch.

Pulling off the lid excitedly she exclaims, “See, now you know how to make the real Pakistani biryani!”

And now, it’s time for us to dig in.

Community Connection

Check out Heather’s blog for Nasreen’s biryani recipe. Heather is a student at Matador U.

Want to learn the craft of travel writing?

Sign up for Matador’s new Travel Writing School and get the skills you need.

]]> http://matadorabroad.com/cooking-in-lahore-an-american-woman-in-a-pakistani-kitchen/feed/ 21 http://matadorabroad.com/on-blogs-of-the-world-intercultural-marriage-and-travel-writing-an-interview-with-liz-chatburn-of-pocket-cultures/ http://matadorabroad.com/on-blogs-of-the-world-intercultural-marriage-and-travel-writing-an-interview-with-liz-chatburn-of-pocket-cultures/#comments Wed, 24 Feb 2010 17:56:17 +0000 Sarah Menkedick http://matadorabroad.com/?p=3498

Photos: Fotos Oaxaca

Liz Chatburn, managing editor of Pocket Cultures, shares her perspective on being part of a cross-cultural couple, how blogs could change travel in the future, and the qualities of a solid piece of travel writing.

PocketCultures aims to “put the world in your pocket.” The site features blogs and articles from writers around the world and attempts to provide readers with a palpable, unique sense of local places and cultures. Its writers are diverse, coming from Thailand, Costa Rica, Germany, and Britain, among other countries.

PocketCultures pushes beyond the “look at this bizarre local custom!” gawking of so much travel writing to help travelers get a feel for the social and political issues a particular culture is dealing with, and the way its people eat, dress, speak and think.

It’s a site for the travel anthropologist, who wants to not only visit a place but to see the world from the perspective of people living there.

I interviewed Liz Chatburn, managing editor of PocketCultures, about the site, blogging, and traveling.

Photos: Fotos Oaxaca

How did the idea for Pocket Cultures come about? Can you share its story?

We’re three co-founders and we have all traveled and/or lived in several different countries. One thing we noticed is that the ‘real version’ of a place, which you see through visiting or getting to know locals, is often quite different from the story you see from outside.

For example the Vice guide to Liberia has been getting a lot of attention recently. But what was featured in that series is not representative of the lives of most Liberians and if you talk to a Liberian or someone who has spent a lot of time in Liberia you’ll soon find that out. Actually, we’re working on a series of interviews with Liberian bloggers at the moment.

So, back to the story… we thought it would be great to create a place where people from many different places could share the ‘real stories’ of their countries with each other. We hope in this way we can make connections and help promote better understanding between people of different countries, cultures, religions and backgrounds.

So far we have contributors from nine different countries and they are all passionate about exploring different cultures and sharing their own. As well as wanting to share their cultures, some also joined because they feel their countries are not well understood or don’t get the attention they deserve from the rest of the world.

Pocket Cultures has a really interesting section called “My partner is a foreigner.” This is an area most travel blogs don’t cover. How did the idea for this section come about?

It seems that many people who spend an extended period in another country end up meeting someone!

As one contributor to “My partner is a foreigner” wrote about living in Turkey:

“One of the things that surprises me about the Turkish culture is the huge sense of hospitality, they meet you today and tomorrow you are at their home having dinner and finally it happens like me…. you get married!!!”

Being part of a cross-cultural couple has its own unique set of challenges but it also puts you in the special position of experiencing another culture though your partner. We thought this would be a fun way to explore cultural differences.

One of the things I love about Pocket Cultures is that it covers “blogs of the world” — blogs from all sorts of different places, both in English and in foreign languages. Do you think blogs are changing the way we travel and encounter foreign cultures? If so, how?

Definitely. Personally I think guidebooks are really useful and I don’t think they will be going away soon. But by reading blogs as well before you visit a new place you can see a local’s perspective and gain deeper insights into life and culture there.

The other great thing about blogs is the interaction – you can easily leave your own feedback, or start a discussion with someone on the other side of the world. So yes, for people really interested in better understanding of a different place and culture blogs are a great opportunity.

How did you begin traveling? How do you think it affected you as a person?

Photos: Fotos Oaxaca

I’ve always been curious about the world, but my first real travel experience was a rail trip around Europe during the summer holidays whilst I was at university. I grew up in the UK, where you have to cross water to go abroad, so it was a totally new thing to cross borders without getting off the train!

As well as the ‘hey, there’s a whole world out there!’ moment, my travelling friend and I also met some really interesting people who didn’t speak English. It was a great feeling to be able to communicate using our (very bad) high school French and German. That was a huge motivation to carry on learning languages.

You are in an intercultural marriage; can you tell us a little about what that process has been like for you? How did you meet your husband, and what sorts of rewards and frustrations have come from being part of an intercultural couple?

We met when we were both studying in Barcelona. Deciding where to live after getting married was fun: we took a map and each marked our favorite countries. It turned out that we both liked the idea of experiencing life in Turkey – that was quite a surprise! That’s how we ended up here.

One great reward of being in an intercultural marriage is learning to be more open to different cultures and flexible about different ways of doing things. I’m definitely more laid back than I used to be. Deciding where to live is one of the most difficult things, because we cannot both live near our families. At least these days it’s easier to keep in touch with Skype, email etc.

What are some of the biggest challenges you have faced while traveling and living abroad? How have you overcome them (or how are you still struggling with them)?

On one hand I have friends in a lot of countries, which is great, but on the other hand we can’t hang out without someone getting on a plane, which is not so great. Making new friends takes time, so that’s always a challenge when you travel or move to a new place. It can be even more challenging to develop deep relationships with people who have grown up with a culture that’s very different to yours.

I try to be open minded towards different points of view, and meet lots of different people rather than searching out people with a similar background. It’s more difficult at first but very rewarding. Turkish people are incredibly friendly and outgoing so living in Turkey has been a pleasure in this respect.

When you think of “travel,” what’s the first thing that pops to mind?

Photos: Fotos Oaxaca

Definitely food! I love trying food from different places.

Would you mind sharing your travel philosophy, or the way that you think about travel?

Interesting question! First I should say that I think everyone travels for different reasons and I don’t think there is a wrong way to travel, as long as you get what you want out of it (and don’t do any damage to the place you visit)

I believe that people all over the world have lots in common, but there are also some differences, and understanding and respecting those differences is key to getting along. So I travel to learn more about what makes a place and its people unique. I’m as happy sitting in an everyday café soaking up the atmosphere as I am seeing the sites.

What do you look for in a piece of travel writing?

The best kind of travel writing lets you picture the place whilst you’re reading. I love articles that show insights into daily life and culture: encounters between people, the atmosphere, what the food is like, what makes a place special.

Also, for me a respectful approach to potential readers from other cultures is really important. Often when reading an article I think ‘how would I feel if someone wrote this about my country?’ How we experience a place is partly filtered by our own cultural values and expectations and I think really good writing is aware of this subjectivity and acknowledges it somehow.

Community Connection

Attention Matador U students! Do you want to become a contributor to PocketCultures? The site is currently looking for regional contributors.

]]> http://matadorabroad.com/on-blogs-of-the-world-intercultural-marriage-and-travel-writing-an-interview-with-liz-chatburn-of-pocket-cultures/feed/ 5 http://matadorabroad.com/the-origin-of-the-ugly-american/ http://matadorabroad.com/the-origin-of-the-ugly-american/#comments Sun, 21 Feb 2010 15:30:59 +0000 Amanda Ferrandino http://matadorabroad.com/?p=3477

Photo: Desmond Kavanagh Feature Photo: space cowboy

The phrase “ugly American” actually has two historical meanings, although we’ve tended to ignore one in favor of the other.

When my flat manager in Dhaka finally arrived and asked if I was well, I responded, “No, I’m not at all happy,” furious that it took him a full day to check our water pumps.

We hadn’t been receiving consistent water pressure out of our faucets for over a day now, making it hard to bathe and cook. He said a worker would come “sometime tonight,” just after my roommates and I planned a celebratory dinner out. I worried we might have to cancel our dinner to wait for him, and judging by Bangladeshi lack of punctuality, he might not even come at all. Things just move impossibly slow here.

I suppose both my response and attitude towards the nuisance would clearly define me as the “ugly American.” Frustrated that it took me three hours to get enough water to bathe, I couldn’t muster up any cultural sensitivity and not act like a spoiled brat. An American friend once told me, “Sometimes, you have to be the ‘ugly American’ if you want to get anything done.”

Is this true?

Photo: Nir Nussbaum

At first, I was grateful to have this excuse, but then I thought further about the situation. In my work and personal life abroad, I’d like to think I represent my country outside the stereotypes: ugly, arrogant, ignorant, imperialist. Living in Bangladesh on a US government scholarship, I try to listen to people’s experiences, asking questions about individual and community identity and culture in order to form a reasonable impression of this foreign land.

However, while those conscious sympathies are active, I must be careful not to be misinformed or deceived. As a foreigner, I am likely to receive the “tourist tax” and have the price of my goods jacked up, or be given false information in an attempt to persuade me to do something I normally wouldn’t. By always being a passive listener, I have a very likely chance of getting walked over. This can happen in any country, to citizens or travelers, but looking blatantly different physically makes me a marked target. A balance must be struck between cultural exchange and self-protection.

I think this is what my friend meant when he said we have to act “ugly” in order to get things done. Ugliness is easily confused with aggression. Americans are culturally more aggressive, with values centering around self-reliance, directness, and task orientation. Think about our idioms: time is money, don’t beat around the bush, keep your eye on the ball, if you want something done right… It should be forgivable if we pass back and forth between being conscious sympathizers and demanding “aggressors” while living abroad, especially depending on circumstance. Maybe “aggressive” America is as misunderstood as much as “submissive” Asian cultures.

Photo: RL Hyde

The term “ugly American” derives from the 1958 political novel of the same title by Eugene Burdick and William Lederer. “The Ugly American”is fiction based on reality, alluding to Americans losing political presence in Southeast Asia because of their failure to understand local culture. The novel quotes a Burmese character as saying,

For some reason, the [American] people I meet in my country are not the same as the ones I knew in the United States. A mysterious change seems to come over Americans when they go to a foreign land. They isolate themselves socially. They live pretentiously. They’re loud and ostentatious.

I think most Americans today would agree that this sentiment of imperialism existed during the Vietnam War, and any critically thinking traveler could easily witnesses this in many ex-pats today, especially government funded ones.

But interestingly, the title is a double entendre. The “Ugly American” also refers to the novel’s unattractive hero, Homer Atkins. According to a New York Times article appraising the novel, Homer, an engineer with black, calloused hands, lived in a dirt hut and collaborated with villagers on community empowerment projects, like the construction of a bicycle-powered irrigation pump. The article asserts that “Homer is the very model of the enlightened ambassador the authors thought America should send into the world.”

“Ugly” is an ironic play on words, describing an admirable hero who was “unattractive” due to the nature of his work: helping others.

Photo: Islip Flyer

Why did the negative title stick? Both kinds of “ugly Americans” exist abroad: the ones who are ugly from arrogant attitudes, and the ones who are physically ugly from giving up on hygienic luxuries for humanitarian goals. We more often lean to the negative rather than the positive. But according to the original definition, being an “ugly American” is what you make of it.

I thought about my manager and my aggressive tone: should I have been the “ugly American” and pouted until my water was fixed—or should I have been culturally sensitive and given up on water for a few days, as well as my personal hygiene, becoming the other “ugly American?”

We can’t always control other people’s perceptions of us. But what I could do is, firmly put my foot down to get what I needed, then be culturally sensitive and invite him for a cup of chai.

]]> http://matadorabroad.com/the-origin-of-the-ugly-american/feed/ 18 http://matadorabroad.com/group-and-ceremony-one-expats-experience-with-japanese-culture/ http://matadorabroad.com/group-and-ceremony-one-expats-experience-with-japanese-culture/#comments Thu, 18 Feb 2010 19:26:16 +0000 Tom Shuttleworth http://matadorabroad.com/?p=3452

Photos: author

The food, the chopsticks, the no shoes rules : no big deal. But the group mentality?

The vice principle walks carefully up the steps to the stage. At the top he stops and bows to the Japanese flag that hangs above. I can’t tell if it’s a bow of reverence or resigned routine. He approaches the podium, stops and bows to us. The gesture is returned.

“The closing ceremony of the second semester, 2009, will now begin,” he announces. My heart sinks. Another ceremony.

Group and ceremony. Two words that resonate throughout Japan. Twin pillars of social order and well being. You don’t have to be in a formal institution like a school to see it. Take football. The Japanese national team is technically proficient, fit and well drilled, but they can’t score goals. At the business end of things nobody wants the ball. It gets passed around like a hot potato.

“Just hit the thing!” I scream at the TV.

But to do so would require a degree of selfishness that is hard to reach when the group is so important. It would be a disaster to miss.

Regard the fans at a Sumo match. See how the two giants hold them captive with a thrilling pre-fight ceremony where the stomping of feet and slapping of thighs draw rapturous applause. My first time watching I was tensed with anticipation that this was going to lead to a titanic battle. The fight was over in 30 seconds. What was all that about, I thought. Well, the ceremony, as it turns out.

Group and ceremony. They have been the hardest part of adjusting to life in Japan. The other stuff has all fallen into place comfortably: the food, the chopsticks, the careful choice of socks because I know my shoes will be taken off regularly in public. All of these differences I’ve met with wide eyed enthusiasm.

Photos: Sarah Menkedick

I adhere to the group and the ceremony, too, but it’s merely a physical display. Internally I’m still at odds with it. This is perhaps because it’s only recently that I’ve come to give it serious thought; my early days in Japan were spent enraptured with so many other aspects of place and culture.

At times it feels like my life is put on hold and my individual instincts and desires suppressed. My reactions to this are kept bottled up. Internally, they run the gauntlet from a head full of angry expletives to a simple resignation whereupon I want to fall to my knees and weep.

These values conflict with some key western values. The individual, restrained here, is encouraged in England where it’s good to be different. “Be all you can be.” “Do what you want when you want.” Just try not to tread on too many toes along the way. There is no standing on ceremony either; if something needs doing, get on and do it.

Here in Japan, though, even the simplest tasks can be wrapped in ceremony. Group observed ceremony: a cathartic experience in which we finish with one thing and move on to the other, collectively.

Of course I enjoy the benefits. I live in Tokyo, one of the world’s largest urban areas and also one of its safest. Group mentality helps to keep it that way. So it is that I walk the streets freely and confidently, anywhere, anytime.

The group may also serve to promote me as an individual. Here I can be, with relative ease, all of the things that I would have to fight for back home – a maverick, left field, original and funny.

But this freedom is a reflection of the truth that I am yet to be truly accepted here. Why should I be? I imagine most Japanese people I know expect me to return home sooner or later. But what if I don’t leave and more foreigners come to stay? How will the group react? How will new arrivals react? These are interesting questions as Japan increasingly looks to the international community for ideas and support.

A maverick! I like the sound of that. The other day I arrived at work to the big eighties sounds of a song from the movie Top Gun. It was playing out of the school’s loudspeakers in an attempt to liven us up. I chuckled and thought of Tom Cruise’s ‘Maverick’ character fighting against the strictures of the US air force. I wondered how he would fare in Japan.

]]> http://matadorabroad.com/group-and-ceremony-one-expats-experience-with-japanese-culture/feed/ 12 http://matadorabroad.com/burakku-black-culture-in-japan/ http://matadorabroad.com/burakku-black-culture-in-japan/#comments Tue, 16 Feb 2010 18:16:37 +0000 Ricardo Arthur http://matadorabroad.com/?p=3396

Photos: author

An expat moves to Japan and discovers a fascination with his own culture.

Whenever I meet someone who has been to Japan for any amount of time a superficial bond is instantly formed. The script begins: Where were you living? How long were you there? Were you teaching English? What company were you with? These conversations eventually turn into personal experiences about the struggles of daily life for a foreigner in Japan, and what it was like in the first few weeks after arriving (or surviving).

I moved from Montreal to Tokyo excited about discovering new food, learning a new language, and seeing old temples. All of which I did. But no one told me I would also find Caribbean themed restaurants, girls wearing bomber jackets with ‘respect the black woman’, or ‘black for life’ written on the back and guys hanging out in old Cadillacs they converted into low riders. In my naivete I wondered where the ancient land of the mysterious orient I had envisioned was. I was experiencing my very own version of culture shock.

To see aspects of my own culture in Japan was, to say the least, surprising. I didn’t quite know what to make of Jamaican food and music festivals, Japanese reggae artists or clubs named Harlem or Bootie which played the newest Hip hop and R and B music. Seeing this apparent fascination by some Japanese people with all things black, my mind went from wow to why?

“Kokujin kakkoii!” is what I was often told whenever I asked what was behind the admiration of black people. Basically, I was cool, simply for being black. I admit it was a bit of an ego boost hearing it whispered behind me as I walked down the narrow yet crowded Takeshita –Dori in trendy Harajuku or while getting down on the dance floor till 5am in Shibuya. Sometimes people would come right up to me and say it. To which I would smile and say a simple thank you.

But soon I started to feel like a celebrity without all the perks. People didn’t know me, yet they thought they knew what I was about. I got tired of conversations that started with ‘Where are you from? New York?’ ‘Are you a DJ? ‘ ‘What sports team do you play for?’ I’m from Canada, and I came here to teach English. Sorry to disappoint you.

I was mistaken for both a band member from The Roots and Tiger Woods (who I look nothing like) and asked to sign an autograph by a high school girl while at Tokyo Disney. I was asked to pose for pictures while holding a newborn, and complimented by a group of small town teens on certain parts of my, ehrm, anatomy at a Tanabata festival. One guy even went out of his way to buy his train ticket at the counter next to me only so he could say ‘what’s up my brotha?’ then left with a satisfied grin. I guess I made his day.

Then there were the countless number of 20 somethings I saw wandering around, who payed 50, 000 yen (roughly 500 US dollars) at some chic salon to make it look like they had natural dread locks for a month or two. Or the guys dressed like they come from ‘the hood’ trying to have the speech to match. In reality there is no hood in Japan and their language is built around self effacing pleasantries and kindness instead of tactless blunt directness.

People often say that imitation is the biggest form of flattery. But is it really? Just what they were getting out of perming their hair to get an afro then sticking an afro pick in it? So much of it seemed disingenuous. For one thing, I knew today’s b-boys, popping and locking in the hallways of train stations (with extra effort as I walked by it always seemed), dancehall divas, and rent-a-dreads were tomorrow’s salarimen and OLs (salary men and office ladies, colloquial Japanese for corporate business men and secretaries). They would eventually grow up, conform and consider their former passions and pastimes as just kid stuff.

A black male colleague of mine who also lived in Japan offered another perspective. He found it refreshing to see a new take on music, fashion and food we both grew up with. I wasn’t so easily convinced. Playing with culture the way you play with the latest gadget could hardly be a positive thing, especially if you don’t know the culture well enough. There seemed to be no concern at all about whether their actions, dress, comments or hairstyle might cause offence.

Over time, I realized for Japanese youth, being into black culture is a form of rebellion, and therein lay the attraction. Young people like to be different in one way or another and stand out as individuals. Hard to do in a country where conformity is encouraged. Live the same, think the same, look the same, BE the same. To purposefully stand out is asking for trouble. As a well known Japanese proverb says: The nail that sticks out must be hammered down.

Maybe it’s just a form of admiration and shouldn’t be considered anything more. So much of hip hop culture today has now become youth culture it’s sometimes hard to distinguish between the two. But my colleague had a point. Japanese people put their own twist on things. Whatever subculture they adopt, they become masters, collectors and Aficionados.

You need look no further than Mighty Crown Sound Crew, who are internationally known and won multiple awards for their reggae remix and DJ skills. Not to mention Junko, a dancer who won the dancehall queen competition in Jamaica in 2002 and now teaches kids in Japan how to dance like her. I’ve met Japanese dudes that speak better Jamaican patois than even I could imitate and owners of soul R&B and hip hop vinyl collections that must have cost a small fortune.

Back in Canada now for a few years, I often find myself day dreaming about my time spent in Japan. Having lived in several areas of Saitama and Tokyo over three and a half years, pulled me out of my Canadian comfort zone and tested the limits of my Westerner patience. It challenged my way of thinking making me aware of the difference between group mentality and individual. Japan and Japanese people always kept me guessing. Just when I thought I had them all figured out, they threw me another cultural curve ball.

The presence of black culture in Japan still leaves me with ambivalent feelings. What is clear however, is despite the fact their own language and culture keep them apart there is a young generation of nihonjin who seek more than ever to be closer to the rest of the world, to feel somehow connected, and are still in the processes of figuring out how.

Want more? Check out Matador’s resource page for travel in Japan.

]]> http://matadorabroad.com/burakku-black-culture-in-japan/feed/ 33 http://matadorabroad.com/tales-from-the-frontier-of-expat-life-a-memsahib-in-pakistan/ http://matadorabroad.com/tales-from-the-frontier-of-expat-life-a-memsahib-in-pakistan/#comments Mon, 15 Feb 2010 17:51:34 +0000 Heather Carreiro http://matadorabroad.com/?p=3385

Photo: author Feature Photo: Zainub

An American expat in Pakistan finds herself confronting the color of her skin everywhere she turns.

“Sardar ji, Memsahib has arrived.”

I suppress a cringe at being identified as the “white foreign woman.” Memsahib is my least favorite Urdu label. I’ve gotten somewhat used to the staring, the whispering of “Dekho! Ghori larki hai!” (Look! It’s a white girl!), and constantly being referred to as Angrez or British. I often surprise my admirers by cheekily responding to them in Urdu that I am not British, but am in fact American.

When someone refers to me as memsahib, I know they’re doing it to be polite, but it evokes an entire history of well to do British army officers’ wives palling around in exquisite drawing rooms in the mid 19th century. I don’t want to be called memsahib or ghori; I’d rather be referred to as a teacher or a writer or anything else that identifies me aside from the color of my skin.

I smile at the guard who called me memsahib while I count out change for the rickshaw driver. The guard raises his hand to his wrinkled forehead and offers me a salute. His hand is stiff to attention at his drab olive-colored felt beret, yet his eyes glisten with kindness. I offer a wave and a greeting in return as I make my way toward the college’s main building.

Photo: kash_if

It is in Pakistan that I have had to come to grips with the inherent advantages and disadvantages of historical and cultural white privilege. Fair and Lovely beauty cream can be purchased at almost any roadside beauty shop, and every ladies’ beauty parlor offers multiple ways to whiten and lighten your skin tone.

For weddings, women use white powder and foundation to make themselves look lighter; the ones who overdo it end up looking like ghostly waifs in full bridal array. More than once when I asked an older woman about her daughter-in-law, the first thing she responded was, “She is very fair, not wheatish or dark-skinned.”

Because I am light-skinned, less educated locals often assume a lot of things about me. At first glance many see me as rich, educated, American and simultaneously a Christian and a loose woman.

A gaggle of men will surround me within seconds of emerging from a train, bus, taxi or rickshaw. “Ji, you want to buy carpets?” “How about some gold jewelry for a pretty lady?” “Taxi service to my brother’s hotel?” In addition to the typical touts, men try to grab me or brush up against me.

Photo: *_*

White women tend to be equated with prostitutes since most local men’s experience with white women is limited to pornography and Hollywood movies. “Eve-teasing,” as the Indian press terms it, is certainly not limited to white women; white women are just more likely to be targets of this popular pastime than local women.

Although being melanin deprived certainly has its disadvantages on the Indian subcontinent, there are also many privileges, or at least what are perceived to be privileges, granted to those who are fair skinned. Many times when a white person visits a local church in the Punjab, the ghora or ghori is garlanded with flowers and asked to stand in front of the congregation and greet everyone. The pastor may ask the foreigners to sit in the best seats, or even on the stage. Sometimes the white guest will be asked to preach with no prior notice consideration of whether said guest is a Christian or not.

I was offered several jobs just because of my foreignness, even though I was completely unqualified for the positions. Once I was asked to interview for a school principal job, even though I only had one year experience teaching in a K-12 school. Another time I was brought along to an advertising meeting. I thought I was going to meet up with some friends, and then suddenly I was being presented as a “foreign consultant.” My Portuguese husband was offered a position to teach college-level Spanish. He doesn’t even speak Spanish.

Photo: author

More often than not, we had to explain to locals why we were NOT the best people for the job. I spent an entire week persistently telling a local publisher in Lahore that I was not the person to write a complete K-8 English curriculum for Pakistani schools. The publisher’s response: “It’s okay, we just want your name on the front of the book, and a nice picture on the book cover. Find two or three other foreigners in America, and we can put their names on the cover as well. That’s the new trend; they don’t need to contribute. It just looks… nice.”

When I first arrived in Pakistan I was impressed with the hospitality of the locals, and I still am, although I am now wary of unsolicited hospitality and invitations. Being a memsahib can be tiring, especially during wedding season.

“Hello, Heather, are you free tonight?”

“Um, I’m at home. What’s up?”

“It is the marriage ceremony of my second cousin from my uncle’s village. You must dress smart and come to the barat with me. Thik hai?”

When people I barely knew started inviting me to three-day wedding ceremonies of a distant cousin, I started to get the gist that certain individuals wanted the company of my skin color more than me.

I turn on the lights in the classroom and take out the teeming folder of papers to pass back during my creative writing seminar. Today is the last day of class, and I have not failed to dress smartly in a fashionable shalwar kameez. I know my students will have their cameras. Most have never taken a class with a foreigner before, and they’ll want photographic proof for their families and friends.

I know I’m white. I know people who see those pictures will refer to me as the ghori or the memsahib or the Angrez. I put on a fresh coat of lipstick and give in to being a novelty.

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]]> http://matadorabroad.com/tales-from-the-frontier-of-expat-life-a-memsahib-in-pakistan/feed/ 31 http://matadorabroad.com/traveling-as-a-mixed-race-couple-in-asia-no-sir-i-did-not-buy-my-wife/ http://matadorabroad.com/traveling-as-a-mixed-race-couple-in-asia-no-sir-i-did-not-buy-my-wife/#comments Tue, 26 Jan 2010 16:57:05 +0000 Pete Olson http://matadorabroad.com/?p=3107

Photo: Stéfan

“Where in the Orient did you meet your wife?” asked the man in his sixties sitting beside me on the boat. We were heading to a small island off the coast of Borneo and had reached a lull in our conversation in which he had given me, in one more or less grammatically coherent sentence, his entire personal history from boyhood in Missouri, to his Mormon missionary work in Malaysia, to his current semi-retirement in Idaho.

There is a lot of subtext crammed into the nine-word question “Where in the Orient did you meet your wife?” even when you exclude the geographical relic of the term “the Orient.” As I explained that even though Aileen’s parents are from Taiwan, she has lived in New York City all her life and that, subtextually, I didn’t rescue her from a pimp in Shanghai, the light in his eyes dimmed. After I finished he sat for a moment, staring at the waves, and then looked up and said, “Huh. Well isn’t that nice.”

Now maybe it’s unfair to expect a sixty-something former missionary in tube socks and sandals to be one-hundred percent politically correct when he phrases a sentence, but I was annoyed – not at the man but at the question. Very nearly every other tourist Aileen and I meet west of the International Date Line asks us us some variation of that question. No one has ever interrogated a family of fat, fanny-pack wearing Europeans about their origin story, but if you travel as part of a Asian/Caucasian pair, you can expect the third degree throughout your trip.

Photo: Desmond Kavanagh

Interracial couples are common enough in the United States (except apparently in Idaho) that even the term “interracial” has a kind of quaint, backwards tinge to it. You’re really only only likely to hear the word used nowadays by racists, pornographers or statisticians.

Head over to South East Asia, where the confluence of economic inequality, cheap airfares, and high divorce rates has made the region the go-to destination for the recently dumped gentleman to find a woman for companionship, and the sight of a mixed couple tends to have less than positive connotations. Tourists in the region seem to be hard-wired to react to any heterogeneous racial pairing with leers, snickers, and loaded questions about where you met your wife.

These reactions do vary somewhat by country but they never completely disappear. In Singapore and Kuala Lumpur other tourists hardly seem to notice us, while Thailand – where the vision of local women giddily weaving their fingers through the ample chest-hair of Western men several decades their senior has ingrained itself into the tourist landscape along with the Grand Palace and gut-shattering spicy food – is pretty much a poisoned well as far as being able to walk around without getting the stink-eye from other travelers goes.

(Not that Aileen and I are entirely above this kind of cattiness. We once walked down a busy street in Phuket yelling out “midlife” every time we passed a mixed couple in an attempt to get a statistically valid frequency measurement).

There are two groups of people who don’t seem to be put off by us. The first is locals. People generally know whether or not someone is from their homeland, and so it’s not surprising that most natives of our host countries don’t immediately leap to the conclusion that my life partner was purchased in the seedy bar around the corner.

This is not to say that they have never made any incorrect assumptions about Aileen and I. They just make the wrong ones. We have had many recursive, Abbot-and-Costello style conversations with people who have vapor-locked when confronted with a woman which they had presupposed to be a Chinese National speaking in perfect American English.

“Excuse me, Peter, where is Aileen from?”

“New York.”

“But she looks … Chinese?”

“Her parents are from Taiwan.”

“But she speaks English…”

“Well she’s from New York.”

“But she looks…Chinese?”

“Her parents are from…look, can I just have a coffee?”

Photo: hulivili

Or, as one Indonesian woman put it, “I was confused because…she looks like…us, only more,” before pulling her eyelids back.

The second group is the men in the mixed couples. They do seem to make the same assumptions that other tourists do, but instead of acting superior, they exhibit gestures of kinship. They nod at us, the way two guys in Yankees caps might nod at each other on the streets of New York. They mark us as the people in the crowd that they can come and talk to.

In the departure lounge in the domestic terminal Bangkok, a couple – a 50-ish German man and a 30-ish Thai woman – were arguing a few seats down from us, alternating snippy comments back and forth in a mixture of Thai and German until the man stood up with a gesture that translates – in any language – to “Oh yeah, well I’ll prove it then.”

He strode over to Aileen and asked her a barrage of questions, each increasing in intensity, about where the bars are in Phuket. After several minutes of what the UN would categorize as a “minor international incident” the man stopped and said, “Oh, you’re not from this country” before wandering back to his companion who was attempting to bore small holes in his head with her eyes.

Many people travel to challenge their assumptions. Aileen and I seem to have ended up challenging other people’s assumptions through the act of travel.

So one last time, yes, she speaks English. No she wasn’t purchased down the street.

And no one has called it the Orient for fifty years.

]]> http://matadorabroad.com/traveling-as-a-mixed-race-couple-in-asia-no-sir-i-did-not-buy-my-wife/feed/ 28 http://matadorabroad.com/gringos-in-mexico-and-that-elusive-quest-for-authenticity/ http://matadorabroad.com/gringos-in-mexico-and-that-elusive-quest-for-authenticity/#comments Fri, 08 Jan 2010 21:05:43 +0000 Sarah Menkedick http://matadorabroad.com/?p=2972

Feature and Above Photo: Fotos Oaxaca

A traveler goes for a ride on a gringo tour bus and comes away with some unexpected observations about authenticity.

We piled on the bus like a group of awkward middle-aged kindergarteners, fumbling around and smacking our heads against the plastic TV’s. My mom, sister and I, the slightly skeptical cool kids, formed a little grouplet in the back of the bus. There must’ve been around thirty of us altogether, masses of white flesh, sandals, and outdoor wear. The Spanish teacher proceeded to make very slow, meticulous announcements about where we were going and how long it would take to get there, and the middle-aged gringos shuffled around in their seats, chatting.

The bus pulled out of the city and glided onto the highway into the valley. Gringo murmurs filled the cool bus air and the valley opened up into greens, yellows, and rocky buttes, long squares of corn and grass stretching up to dry peaks. Half-built tin houses and orange-green mezcalerías with small maguey fields hinted vaguely, half-heartedly, at the presence of people.

The journey to Mitla was uneventful, all those gringo bodies carted around in a big clean gringo bus that bumbled through ramshackle Mexican pueblos, towering above the moto-taxis and pedestrians and squat Ford stick-shifts, us with our white faces stuck to the windows looking out onto hot, brown-green Mexico.

Photo: author

It felt bizarre. I don’t think I’ve ever been on a tour bus. I’m skeptical of the ol’ backpacker standard affirming the inauthenticity of the tour bus vs. the authentic quest of the “traveler” but damn, I must say that being on one of the things does throw one’s perspective for a loop. Even for someone who thinks she’s cynical enough to grasp and honor the postmodern lack of authenticity behind just about any travel experience, the organized tour can be a bit jarring.

In the beginning, I couldn’t get over the stark inside/outside divide. We sat on our big blue seats in our big white bus looking out on the jumbled cubist scenes below, disarray in various shapes, colors, and sizes, foreignness sprawled out there before us like a movie set we could venture into and shrink from when it got to be too much, and eventually wrap up neatly into a few trinkets and photos so we could say, proudly,

“One time, in Mexico…” or “In Mexico, they do this…” with that satisfied smack of the captured experience.

We got out of the bus in Mitla, blinking, stumbling, little swirls of dust rising around our feet, plunk, plunk, plunk, one gringo after another plunking out of the bus like penguins wandering dazed out of a cave under the watchful eyes of zoo-goers. The sun was high and hot at 10 a.m. and we were standing on the side of the road in a dusty pueblo.

Photo: author

The Spanish teacher guide shooed us this way and that, speaking very carefully as if one of us might dumbly wander over to the other side of the road and get lost, a scenario that I had to admit wasn’t terribly unlikely. Her Spanish came in the cadence of the kindergarten teacher who has spent years explaining how not to hit one’s neighbors and why one shouldn’t eat the glue.

We filed into a family home. One gringo after another, looking this way and that, smiling politely and trying, in all earnestness, to squeeze poignancy and insights and deeply meaningful authenticity out of everything from flowers to dog to grandma. We just kept coming in, one after another, until the simple living room, with its old faded couches in the corners and its pretty altar adorned with photos and flowers, was packed full of gringos.

The Spanish teacher admonished us to make room for the new arrivals and we kept packing in, squeezing into corners and crowding round the couches, the never-ending gringo parade. When we were all relatively settled and quiet, our gringo minder presented the house’s grandma, an older woman with gray-white hair and a gray dress, whom the gringos actually applauded, with no sense of irony or absurdity, in an outburst of gratefulness – A Mexican! A real one! And she’s old! And folkloric! And representative of everything we want to feel and experience and care about before we go back to work on Monday!

Eager and primed on all sorts of travel lit and the spiritual necessity to squeeze every ounce of Culture out of the experience, it’s hard to fight the urge to applaud Grandma Mexico.

The grandma talked about the altar and why she’d built it, and maybe half of the gringos understood, but everyone nodded because they knew she was talking about Culture and whatever it was was deeply moving and emotional and poignant and something they should talk about in hushed, contemplative tones with their friends and co-workers in a few weeks. So they nodded. The grandma finished explaining and took her leave under the mixed gazes of pity and admiration and perhaps, caught up somewhere in there, a tame form of envy.

Then they served the mezcal. We partook – five tiny plastic cups, five people sipping and laughing. We had one foot out of the experience and one foot in, but for all we tried to look at it on a meta-level our gringoness and the inherent absurdity of our presence in that house in Mitla was exposed and handed to us on a platter.

Tourism, that ugly condition “travelers” like myself try to hide, was branded on our foreheads. A gringo stepped in the flower pot containing zempasuchitl, the flower of the dead, and flowers and water went everywhere. The gringo tried to extract himself, ready the pot, tidy up the flowers, and a swarm of Mexicans surrounded him and removed him from the situation. Everyone was milling around drinking mezcal, turning red, swapping travel stories.

We went to the cemetery slightly buzzed and fully immersed in the absurdity, blinking into the sun, stepping gingerly over the speed bumps and rocks and discarded gravel of the pueblo road, the gringo parade now on full display for the town.

“I feel like we should be singing the national anthem or something,” I whispered to my friend. To complete the full-on gringo show, to make the consumption of pre-fabricated cultural assumptions a little more mutual. We were, I felt, tall and fat and white and nearly all in sneakers or sandals and professional outdoor wear bought from some glass-walled shop in the parking lot of a giant shopping complex somewhere in America.

The blue sky exposed us, the people of Mitla cast bemused passing glances at us and hurried on, and we sipped our little plastic cups of mezcal and soaked up the nearby mountains rising, the white, hot, yellow dryness of Mitla.

The cemetery was a jolt back into reality. Not the reality of the gringo imagination, but the reality of the Day of the Dead in Mitla, of Mexicans going through a ritual that was actual and felt and present and, dare I say it, genuine in that moment. A reality that would exist with or without the presence of the needy wandering gringo-child.

Photo: author

Flowers were everywhere and on everything, calla lilies, marigolds, vibrant purple masses of furry flowers on white-gray graves. The flowers, the sun, the blue sky, made a kaleidscope of color. People bustled in the unhurried way Mexicans bustle, stepping around graves, lighting incense, sorting flowers, carrying babies, sweeping.

There were babies and old people and couples and people laughing and señoras with twin braids with silken fabric woven into them. There was an old, rusted bike I focused on for a minute, narrowing my vision down to one thing. I could start to pick out the tourists after a few minutes, but they were irrelevant, all caught up just as I was.

We walked around for awhile, dazed, looking at graves and at people sweeping and dressing them in flowers, taken aback by the reality of it.

The Spanish teacher tried to keep the order of the cultural lesson in tact, instructing in the same careful tones how the family kept up the grave of the maternal grandparents and then the paternal grandparents, but the neatly packaged and constructed pseudo-authenticity of the experience had briefly disintegrated as people dispersed into different corners of the graveyard, some still chatting about travels through Sweden and only barely catching a glimpse of the spectacle of here and now in Mitla Mexico (would they even remember the town’s name? I doubted it. But it wasn’t really necessary for “one time in Mexico I went to…”) but others absorbing, sorting through that confusing mental stew of outsiderness and insiderness, of wanting to understand and almost understanding, of experiential learning where reflection and experience go side by side, jostling each other.

Then we left. It was back on the street, a little quieter, fireworks going off everywhere around the town now. The little, poppy, jolt-you-out-of-your-skin fireworks they set off every minute of every day around Mexico. Smoke trails lingered in the sky against the blue. People were “bringing back their dead” according to a friend of mine, who managed to walk through the whole experience – bus tour, family home, cemetery, mezcal – with calm grace and humility. A drunk, brown, round nut of a man in a white straw hat weaved towards and away from our gringo parade.

“I live in U.S.,” he slurred in broken English, weaving. “Atlanta.”

Only my teaching experience could help pick out the words. Other gringos shied away from him, wary. I, stupidly, caught his eye and gave a “buenos tardes,” which he latched on to instantly. I spoke in Spanish, he responded in English.

“Trabajas en los estados unidos?” I asked politely.

“I live there,” he slurred, “I’m a resident.” He was half-looking at me and half weaving.

“Ok,” I said, “y qué haces aquí?”

“Vacation,” he said, “I’m on vacation!” There was something much more doomed than enthusiastic about it.

My mom attempted to join the conversation but couldn’t understand a word the man said. We reached the house and started filing through the door again, and the man knew his vacation was ending there. There would be no authentic Mitla and mezcal sipping for him, not there, anyway. He took advantage of one last try and took my mom by the hand, pulled her aside, and attempted a gallant kiss on the cheek.

“Beautiful, very beautiful woman!” he said.

We went inside, laughing, but I felt a little sickened by the interaction with the man, jutting into the tidy cultural experience of our gringo parade. There wasn’t time for sociological analysis or guilt, though, as we were all soon crowded back around the altar and the family was crying and fireworks were going off outside and my family was crying over the death of my grandparents and then we were drinking beers and eating mole around a table on folding chairs, and a gringo was bragging about how he bought a belt off a peasant in Guatemala for “more money than that guy had ever seen in his life” and when my friend asked how the peasant held his pants up, the gringo shrugged and said, “pins or something.”

I couldn’t really deal with that without making everyone slightly uncomfortable, so I had to stand up and go hover around the baby, who was almost as exciting a gringo attraction as grandma. Being at a susceptible biological moment in my life, I couldn’t resist the baby pull.

She was a little girl called Carlita, oblivious to the oddness of the beaming white faces staring down at her, giving little coos and bubbly smiles to her adoring foreign audience. I let her clasp my finger for a bit and then wandered outside, to where my sister had escaped from the increasingly suffocating swapping of travel tales (“you’ve been to that place in the highlands of Guatemala, too? Almost no one goes there…”)

There was a yard out back, a scrappy little dog, and the quiet sense of life going on as it usually does off down the dusty roads.

The Spanish teacher instructed us that the señoras in this house hicieron trabajos artísticos muy bonitos and we should consider buying scarves porque esta familia nos dio todo gratís y son muy amables, muy amables. It was like having a National Geographic for Kids voiceover distilling the experience for us, dictating where our emotions and priorities and attention should be at any given time. Most people complied with the voiceover’s instructions and bought scarves, lots of them, and soon the gringos were bedecked in bright greens and pinks and blues, beaming over their purchases.

I stood back and observed, and I saw in their faces – trying in broken Spanish to talk with the Mexican grandma, trying on scarves, fondling the material – the desperate need for connection. Something, anything spiritual, anything “real” would do, they just wanted to be a part of it.

If they could buy it for twenty pesos it was an enormous relief, mission accomplished, and if they could give that money directly to this Mexican grandma it was like some big, sweet gulp of water in the parched spiritual desert of the American marketplace, of daily American life.

It was the brief relief from some sort of long detachment and disconnect, and maybe it was all they needed, maybe it was just a vain construct in a world gone so postmodern that even relief from commodification fed back into greater commodification, but it could also have been the spark, the indication, of something much greater. An indication of yearning for a certain connectedness between people, traditions, and beliefs outside of the realm of what could be commodified, bought and sold.

How many of those Columbia boots and jackets and t-shirts had been made in Cambodia somewhere, by a five-year old, and yet their wearers were so desperate to get a little bit of connection here, to feel like this act of buying was noble and was helping to preserve and respect something they honored and even, perhaps, envied.

Instead of seeing that paradox as ironic, I wanted to see it as hopeful – the desire to participate in and respect this culture and its people, to show gratitude for it, and to be respected by it, overlapping the blind, disconnected and detached decisions that go into buying a pair of pants at Target. Maybe the former would usurp the latter, or at least question it.

So perhaps it was the mezcal, but I felt hope there. Of course we then piled back onto the bus, with people already formulating their anecdotes to tell on next year’s trip to Belize, and promptly stopped at a sprawling tourist market full of Mexican souvenirs made in China.

Everyone plodded out and plodded on again, but hardly anyone bought anything. Perhaps that was simply an anomaly, an indication that they were all too tired and sunburned to care. But I like to think it was because they’d gotten a taste of a certain connectedness, and they were still wrapped up in it. And perhaps, the rest of it felt false. Who knew how long it’d last, who knew if it was all a figment of what I wanted to believe. Twenty minutes later we stepped back onto the colonial streets of Oaxaca and parted ways, so I suppose I’ll never know.

]]> http://matadorabroad.com/gringos-in-mexico-and-that-elusive-quest-for-authenticity/feed/ 13 http://matadorabroad.com/how-to-express-your-emotions-or-not-in-other-cultures/ http://matadorabroad.com/how-to-express-your-emotions-or-not-in-other-cultures/#comments Tue, 22 Dec 2009 16:10:05 +0000 Brittany Vargas http://matadorabroad.com/?p=2779

Feature Photo: Lin Pernielle Photography Photo: arwen-abendstern

“You can’t bring that to the table here,” he said. My boyfriend wasn’t talking about forbidden fruit. He was pointing out my tendency to visibly (and sometimes audibly) wallow in negative emotions publicly. My habits are taboo in a country where negativity is frowned upon and open emotional expression of the depressing variety is kept to a minimum. I am in Thailand, after all- the Land of Smiles.

Negativity- particularly anger- is not openly expressed or even discussed in many Asian cultures. In Thailand, complaints about cold weather, discomfort or weariness, can be considered rude. You are to keep such complaints to yourself- if you are tired, go to sleep. Otherwise, it is polite to mention it in a joking, laughing manner.

Most offensive to Thais is the expression of anger. Arguing with your lover loudly and publicly, waving your hands, and generally losing your cool (and losing face) is considered barbaric and rude. This may be the single most important fact to learn about Thai culture, and yet it has taken me almost a year to really get it.

Photo: dolspics

I tend to lose myself in emotion and forget to refrain from a whole gamut of negative expressions- complaints, criticism, sarcasm, argumentative words, and sullen disassociation. This openness is not the result of a desire for attention or melodrama. Rather, I find it very difficult to put on a happy face in the company of others when I am feeling down.

Despite my persistent efforts to remind myself of what is culturally appropriate, unreserved expression of negative emotions is not an easy habit to break. Like all humans, I have been conditioned by many things. I come from a background where volatility and conflict was the norm. I still find it difficult to control the volume of my voice, even in the midst of a crowded restaurant.

So these challenges are a result of my personal history- genetics, family, and personal experiences. Yet I am by no means unique in my tendency to display emotions in forthright and even dramatic ways. Having lived with Americans (and Europeans) of varying backgrounds, I have observed a wide range of explicit emotional expressions. Slamming doors, shouting matches, and flying objects are frequent expressions of anger within my culture. Furthermore, it is not at all unusual for these behaviors to be acted out publicly.

Photo: Fran Ulloa

Many Americans are desensitized to aggression in its many forms- passive and active; mental, emotional, and physical; subtle and stated. Likewise, feelings of depression and despair are hardly censored. Of course these feelings are present in the life of any human being. Yet for many Americans it is incredibly normal and natural to express them in hyperbolic, dramatized ways.

In contrast, the Thais avoid conflict at all costs. Whether annoyed, embarrassed, or angry, they smile and chuckle. I’ve heard travelers describe the Thais as “happy stoners” or insinuate that they have no cares or worries. Nothing could be further from the truth. The seemingly carefree, cheerful, and accepting Thai attitude that so many tourists comment on is highly enforced through social, familial, and cultural conditioning.

This popular conception of the famous Thai smile neglects to specify that the Thais have many smiles. Far from uniform, each smile belies a different emotion or attitude.

I had heard this before, but it became truly clear when my boss was upset with me due to what seemed to be a miscommunication. I had not followed one of her “suggestions” for teaching my Creative Writing class, and had not dressed according to her taste (first I was too formal, then too casual). I believe her dislike of me also stemmed from the way my emotions were sometimes written all over my face when I came to work.

As we sat and talked in her office, I noticed how hard she was straining to smile. Her skin seemed so taught, the corners of her mouth ready to wilt at any moment. Her voice took on a scarily unnatural tone of politeness. As it became clear to me just how pervasive the smile was within Thai culture, I began to think of the different smiles I could remember.

Photo: AlphaTangoBravo

There’s the “I am ripping you off” smile, the “thanks for stepping on my shoes” smile, the smile concealing smoldering and utterly repressed anger. There’s the smug smile, the smile of the superior, the sexy smile, the embarrassed smile (followed by a coy giggle) and of course, the smile of genuine kindness and goodwill.

In Thailand, will you be smiled at by a Nurse while standing in the hospital waiting room in agony. A smile is the standard expression for every emotion, yet it is not difficult to detect the real, underlying emotion driving it.

According to many scientists, all humans share the same basic emotions . The concept of the universality of human emotion was first explored by Darwin in his work “The Expression of Emotions in Humans and Animals”. He theorized that emotions were biologically based and had an adaptive value.

Currently, evolutionary biologists and psychologists tend to agree that human emotion and facial expression of emotions lean towards universality. It is what anthropologists term “cultural display rules” that determine what is expressed behind closed doors and what is a socially appropriate expression.

Photo: lisa_at_home2002

Cultural display rules are enforced by pressure from all levels of society. As part of a collective culture, Thais are generally under pressure to suppress feelings of negativity and anger. Unlike individualistic cultures like that of the U.S., in which emotions are perceived as highly individual, in Thai culture feelings are seen to be entirely linked and interconnected with those of others. This accounts for the disgust and feelings of offense aroused when Thais are subjected to someone else’s negativity.

Knowing this makes it just a little easier to smile when I feel like screaming. I have slowly begun to step outside my cultural bubble to begin to understand- and respect- these cultural differences in emotional expression.

]]> http://matadorabroad.com/how-to-express-your-emotions-or-not-in-other-cultures/feed/ 11 http://matadorabroad.com/does-travel-abroad-less-conspicuous-consumption-at-home/ http://matadorabroad.com/does-travel-abroad-less-conspicuous-consumption-at-home/#comments Fri, 13 Nov 2009 18:15:33 +0000 Sarah Menkedick http://matadorabroad.com/?p=2521

Feature photo: Phillie Casablanca Photo: permanently scatterbrained

What are the impacts of long term travel abroad?

I often hear talk about how travelers made a bold and courageous move to “leave behind the American dream” or “escape from the rat race” to travel abroad. Well, great, I think, but what happens when you go back?

Perhaps in contrast to many travelers and travel bloggers, I’m not sure I see the act of getting temporarily out of the 9-5 grind as inherently courageous or life-changing. Sure, in some contexts it is – but in others, it seems like a vain and pompous way of, well, to put it bluntly, slumming it, playing at poverty and adventure for a certain period of time before settling snugly back into a world of Western plumbing and three dollar lattes.

Photo: colros

Don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing wrong with taking a break from work to travel (nor, I should add, is there anything wrong with Western plumbing), and I think escaping daily life for awhile can lead to some perspective-altering experiences, but I just don’t buy that it’s always an act of nobility to leave a cushy job with a pile of savings and hit the road for a bit; I don’t buy the frequent argument that this automatically creates a life or society changing perspective.

But this piece about how adventure travel kills conspicuous consumption changed my mind for a bit. I cringed at the opening line about ditching the American dream, thinking isn’t it the “American dream” that’s allowed you to save up for this whole adventure and to appreciate it from the distinct perspective of someone from the land of plenty?

But the article humbled my cynicism. The author talked about coming home to an overflowing storage unit of stuff she realized she didn’t need. She discusses the changes in her lifestyle in San Fransisco after more than a year traveling around the world, and how she doesn’t feel the need to fix things that aren’t broken. More interestingly, she notes how before resistance to materialism felt contrived, whereas post-trip, it feels natural.

Photo: chopr

Thinking about this, I experienced a full-on surge of travel optimism.

I have my personal opinions about how traveler quests for “authenticity” or “simplicity” often enough end up reinforcing the same dichotomy between noble poor paradise and wicked material wealth, but this article offered an alternative: taking an awareness of the enormous gap between wealthy developed nations and poor developing ones -between the excessive haves of the former and the often desperate lack of the latter – back home and crafting a different lifestyle out of it. Yes. That’s good.

And you, reader? What do you think? Do you think travel abroad -adventure or otherwise- curbs consumption? Share your thoughts below.

]]> http://matadorabroad.com/does-travel-abroad-less-conspicuous-consumption-at-home/feed/ 21 http://matadorabroad.com/getting-hassled-in-top-travel-spots-preventable-or-inevitable/ http://matadorabroad.com/getting-hassled-in-top-travel-spots-preventable-or-inevitable/#comments Wed, 11 Nov 2009 15:44:47 +0000 Sarah Menkedick http://matadorabroad.com/?p=2509

Feature Photo: Andrew Currie Photo: akechi

Where do you get hassled most abroad?

I still remember the sinking feeling I had getting off the train in Guangzhou, China, at 1 a.m. You think that perhaps arriving in the middle of the night in the middle of winter might spare you from the onslaught of shouting pushy people waving laminated fliers, but no.

“Hotel hotel HOTEL HOTEL hotel hotel CHEAP CHEAP good price!!”

The refrain like a cacophony of badly tuned horns, reinforced by jostling elbows and hands grabbing at our coats. These situations require a big deep breath of centered calm. Otherwise, if you’re anything like me, you’re likely to freak out and start running as fast as you can in the opposite direction.

Guangzhou isn’t the only place this happens in the world, of course. At those charged Destinations with a capital D where travelers arrive in swarms with obvious needs to be met (spiritual, commercial, basic, or otherwise) there is inevitably a waiting mass of locals looking to fill those needs, or create them. The Age recently ran a piece about the top cities where you get hassled as a traveler and I can think of many that aren’t on that list.

For me, this is a nasty feeling. I dislike fighting through the crowds, dislike the pulling at my clothes and the shouting, dislike the feeling of being in a full-on, unmasked consumer interaction with a place and it’s people. It’s like pulling that pretty little shear veil of “authenticity” or awe off of a travel experience and a place to reveal the simple, ugly framework of money beneath.

But then again, is it really my place to whine about this? After all, in China or Peru I am taking advantage of the low cost of living and searching out my own version of the authentic (Chinese living in traditional hutongs? Peruvians walking llamas through the Andes?) and there’s no reason the local people need to comply with my vision of an idyllic authentic getaway, right? To many of them, I am a way to make money – perhaps a nice and friendly way to make money or a slightly hostile one, but in any case, a path to the cash. Does this make them bad, cynical, sinister people? Perhaps some, but not all.

From yet another angle, however, one wonders if this sort of unregulated full-on assault throwing all sorts of random goods and services at tourists really benefits the “sellers” or “touts” or “locals” or however you’d classify them in the end – it often creates a popping resentment and hostility between them and visitors, it can end up damaging tourism to the area, and it frequently leads to rampant development in the form of hostels and backpacker joints and, to use a controversial term here, “cultural pollution.”

Yet how do we and they prevent it from happening?

What do you think, readers? Where are the places you’ve been hassled most? How do you deal with it? What do you think could be done about it? Let’s get the discussion going.

]]> http://matadorabroad.com/getting-hassled-in-top-travel-spots-preventable-or-inevitable/feed/ 11 http://matadorabroad.com/what-makes-travel-abroad-unique-and-why-should-americans-do-it/ http://matadorabroad.com/what-makes-travel-abroad-unique-and-why-should-americans-do-it/#comments Fri, 06 Nov 2009 18:36:54 +0000 Sarah Menkedick http://matadorabroad.com/?p=2472

Feature Photo: Paul Stevenson Photo: gabyu

Why is it so important to travelers and travel bloggers that Americans do or don’t travel abroad?

There’s plenty of reasoning about why Americans don’t travel abroad. Travel bloggers speculate on whether it’s fear of a big, scary world, or ignorance of other cultures, or short vacation time, or the simple fact that there’s a helluva lot of stuff to do in the U.S alone. It may be all of those factors combined, but that’s not what interests me. What interests me is the assumption behind all this speculation – the assumption that Americans should travel abroad.

At first I wanted to question that assumption, since I’ve met plenty of Americans who could (and happily would) tick off all of the countries they’ve visited, list all of the trials and tribulations and predictable breakthroughs they’ve had, rave about all the artwork and trinkets and objects they’ve bought and swoon over the precious simple authenticity of “the locals,” and I find nothing particularly revolutionary or educational about this at all.

In fact, I think it’s pretty much the same old dynamic between the U.S and the world multiplied once more – simple consumable experiences, the commodification of culture, the seeing-what-we’ve-been-primed-by-the-media-to-see vs. researching-what-is.

But I hope I’m not so cynical or so pompous as to completely disregard the potential of travel abroad – while I don’t see it as the panacea for twisted U.S foreign policy or the distorted views many Americans have of the world, I also think it holds enormous potential to create positive, constructive change. By “change” I mean change in the way Americans think about, say, where their coffee comes from, or change in the way they think about an American food culture that relies on an unhealthy dependence on processed corn and the microwave.

Photo: tiltti

I’ve met plenty of people who have gone through transformations abroad and started, little by little, to see their world and the world overall from different angles. They’ve perhaps started to follow the news about China or Mexico much more carefully and to search out different perspectives. They’ve become aware of the affect of U.S corn subsidies on the people they met and talked to in Southern Mexican villages. They see that wow, I have a lot of stuff in my house and these people, they seem to be doing just fine without having to go to Target every other day for a new something.

This is not, of course, a given. I don’t think anyone has the right to declare what a traveler should or should not learn, should or should not see. But I have met plenty of Americans who have been prying into their own assumptions and accepted ways of understanding the world, taking apart their own cultural perspectives, and coming away with a much more complicated, empathetic understanding of the connections between themselves and the places they’ve visited.

And I think that process, of empathizing with people from vastly different cultural, social and economic perspectives, is at the heart of traveling abroad. That is what often distinguishes travel abroad from domestic travel – travel abroad requires so many more leaps into the unknown.

There are the major unknowns, the unknown languages and cultures and histories, but there are also the smaller unknowns; how rice or sugar cane is made, the herbs people use for medicines, the deserted villages where people have been forced to migrate to other countries. And traveling abroad is the process of excavating these unknowns, of bringing them up to the surface of one’s mind, in the hope of creating some new bridge of empathy and compassion.

So I’m not sure it’s the percentages and the statistics that matter, I’m not sure it’s the act of getting one’s passport stamped – I think it’s the way of seeing and questioning that makes travel abroad different, and that has so many people vehemently defending the act of crossing borders. It’s the push into the unknown, and the coming back humbled, contemplative, vulnerable, and yes, in ways both conscious and vaguely felt, changed.

Community Connection

What do you think, readers? Do you think travel abroad is inherently educational? What have been your experiences overseas? Do you think Americans are afraid of overseas travel?

]]> http://matadorabroad.com/what-makes-travel-abroad-unique-and-why-should-americans-do-it/feed/ 5 http://matadorabroad.com/indulgence-in-new-orleans-a-guide-to-7-classic-deserts/ http://matadorabroad.com/indulgence-in-new-orleans-a-guide-to-7-classic-deserts/#comments Mon, 02 Nov 2009 20:18:42 +0000 Megan Hill http://matadorabroad.com/?p=2448

Feature Photo: stuart_spivack Photo: ldhny

There is nothing comparable to deep fried beignets and café au lait.

New Orleans’ internationally famous cuisine is decadent and indulgent, mixing the best flavors from its many ethnic influences with the soul of the city.

But in New Orleans, you should leave room for dessert. These seven are among the city’s most famous and most widely available treats.

1. Bread pudding

While not unique to New Orleans, many of the city’s restaurants have perfected their own version of this delicious use for stale bread. At its most basic, the dish involves drizzling melted butter over leftover bread chunks and baking it with sugar, cinnamon, vanilla, beaten eggs and raisins. It’s usually served hot and soaked with rum or whiskey sauce.

2. Pralines

You can credit the French for introducing this candy, now ubiquitous in New Orleans. Pecans are suspended in a creamy mixture of sugar and butter that is so rich you probably can’t eat more than one. They’re available, usually wrapped individually, at many gift shops in the city and come in a few varieties like chocolate and rum. If you don’t want to sound like an outsider, say it “praw-leen.”

3. King Cake

Photo: mikebdoss

While king cake is eaten mostly during the Mardi Gras season, you can find it any time of year if you look hard enough. There are many variations with different fillings, but a king cake is essentially a huge cinnamon roll with sprinkles and generally iced in Mardi Gras colors—purple, green and gold.

Most king cakes have a small plastic baby inside, said to represent the baby Jesus, as Mardi Gras is actually rooted in Catholicism.

4. Beignets

It’s pronounced “ben-yay,” which is French for fried dough. This dessert’s charm is in its simplicity, as it’s nothing more than deep-fried dough covered in a mound of powdered sugar. Buy an “order” of three donuts with a cup of café au lait or chocolate milk.

Photo: clamhead

It’s famously available at the bustling French Quarter tent of Café du Monde near the Mississippi River, but there are a few other spots where you can indulge on what many locals call “coffee and donuts.” Just don’t inhale when you take a bite.

5. Doberge cake

No New Orleans birthday is complete without a doberge cake. A New Orleans baker adapted the Hungarian dobos torta and gave it a French-sounding name, and doberge was born. The cake consists of multiple layers of cake and pudding—usually chocolate or lemon—topped with rich icing. Oh, and it’s pronounced “dough-bash.”

6. Snowballs

Snowballs—or snoballs—are definitely not the same as snow cones. Snowballs are like fresh powder, and the juice doesn’t sink to the bottom of the cup like with crunchy snow cones. The New Orleans-invented SnoWizard machines shave down blocks of ice for the perfect consistency.

Around New Orleans in the summer, snowballs stands are packed. Each offers dozens of flavors, from wedding cake to superman to margarita and more. You can get them “stuffed” with soft-serve ice cream or drizzled with condensed milk. Yum.

7. Roman Candy

Roman Candy, a chewy taffy sold in vanilla, chocolate and strawberry, has been made and sold by the same family since 1915. You can find the original mule-drawn wagon in random places across the city, but your best bet is the Audubon Zoo. Long, thin sticks of the candy sell for 75c and come wrapped in wax paper.

]]> http://matadorabroad.com/indulgence-in-new-orleans-a-guide-to-7-classic-deserts/feed/ 7 http://matadorabroad.com/bravery-or-brashness-a-moral-holiday-in-indonesia/ http://matadorabroad.com/bravery-or-brashness-a-moral-holiday-in-indonesia/#comments Wed, 28 Oct 2009 13:46:31 +0000 Simone Gorrindo http://matadorabroad.com/?p=2429

Photos: author

An American gets in over her head searching for challenge and adventure, and comes to understand something quite different from what she set out to learn.

“Is it a man of a war?” I asked my boyfriend. In an instant, the scalding burn of the sting had progressed into an ache, shooting its way to my groin from the blisters it had left on my ankle.

He scanned the images of jellyfish in the health guide we had brought on our backpacking trip through Ujung Kulon, a remote and untouched swath of rain forest on the western-most tip of Java. A Portuguese Man of War is no Box Jellyfish, I knew, but I recalled that it could send victims into shock and cardiac arrest. The pain was unbearable.

“Is it?” I said again. It was becoming difficult to breathe.

“No,” he looked up, shifting his eyes towards our silent guide who was preparing dinner behind me. There was a kind of tough sorrow in his face. I knew, instinctively, that he was lying; but I also knew that, if only to calm myself, I should try to believe him.

I stared blankly out at the ocean, watching the waves crash against the rocks that surrounded the cove where we had set up camp. Ujung Kulon had a perilous beauty about it, the cliff faces steep, the open clearings between dense forest flat and eerily lifeless like the moon. Since I’d first entered the wilderness, I had been on edge.

But now, lying on the sand in the worst pain I had ever felt, I was terrified. Guides didn’t carry radios in Indonesia. And even if they did, where could one get us? The tiny, dusty village of Tamanjaya at the entry point of the forest didn’t even have a fruit stand, let alone a hospital.

This national park saw few visitors because of it’s location – starting from Jakarta, we had spent eight hours on two different sweltering buses rides, two hours on a motorbike down a deeply-rutted road, and three hours on a boat out to the island of Panaitan where we finally began our hike.

In coming to Indonesia, I had been looking for that thrill of raw experience that only traveling can give you. But here was a sensation I hadn’t quite bargained for: I felt like I was on the edge of the world.

A Moral Holiday

We “need sometimes,” the philosopher George Santayana wrote, “to escape into open solitudes, into aimlessness, into the moral holiday of running some pure hazard, in order to sharpen the edge of life, to taste hardship, and to be compelled to work desperately for a moment no matter what.” The notion of travel as work may be surprising, but that “moral holiday” is exactly what most intrepid travelers are searching for.

I began my trip through Indonesia with a backpacking trek curious to explore the rain forest, but even more eager to discover the resources dormant within me. I wanted to test myself—to reveal how I’d hold up under the humidity, how my Bahasa would fair with our guide, how well I could maintain 15 mile days on ramen and eggs alone. I wanted to sharpen the parts of myself that had grown dull in the tedium of daily life. I wanted to work.

I took on these endeavors aware of the possible dangers – the chance of rousing a sleeping panther, of crossing paths with a crocodile while wading through a stream. But it is only when we are faced with these actualities that we realize how dim that awareness really is. Only then do we know what it’s like to sense our own smallness in an unfathomable universe, to scan our failures and regrets, to suddenly glimpse both our life and our death.

The Luxury of Recklessness

I spent that evening in the rain forest in panic and pain, listening to the waves crash outside of our tent. But I knew by dawn, as the aching grew quieter, that I was going to be all right.

The order of society – no matter if it is the layout of New York City’s grid or the perfect rows of rice paddies where the wilds of rain forest once stood – provides us with predictable comfort, insulation from the ruthless and indiscriminate movements of nature. I returned to seething Jakarta with a sense of relief, consoled by the traffic, the bartering in the garbage-strewn streets, the call to prayer that sounded reliably throughout the day.

Yet it was really my travels through Indonesia’s cities and villages in the months after that marked me with an unshakable sense of life’s fragility. Weeks later, in a small, ocean side village of north Sulawesi, I paid a fisherman to take me out snorkeling. The water was incredibly clear, and he pointed out from his boat the fish and sea urchins that were poisonous. I passed him my mask at one point, and he laughed, shaking his head.

“Why not?” I asked.

“We are not brave like Americans,” he said, pausing for a moment. “Or crazy.”

It was a luxury, I realized. A luxury to be both admirable and insane.

The “Adventure” of Daily Existence

It is one thing to force hardship upon yourself; it is another to witness the daily, impossible struggle against it. For the next three months, I kept moving: by crowded train in Java, by speedboat through choppy water, in dodgy aircraft where women prayed not just at the beginning of the flight, or the end, but throughout.

On the switchbacks of bus rides, the faces of rickety homes flew by— they had been built precariously on mountainsides, where the shorn land lay vulnerable to mud slides. Leaving Jakarta, the train gave way to endless stretches of shantytowns, heaps of trash baring the evidence of past floods.

All over Java refugees from mudslides, floods, and earthquakes—the constant stuff of life in Indonesia— cling to temporary shelters, waiting for government aid. Hardship, both man-made and nature-driven, is impossible to ignore.

Locals I met throughout Indonesia echoed the fisherman’s confession of timidity: “We do not have adventure like you,” they’d say. And yet, in their daily lives, they were a people unfazed. Children begging in the streets of Jakarta weaved casually through chaotic traffic, vans and motorbikes ungoverned by any real rules of the road. Pedestrians walked indifferently across the paths of speeding cars, in tune with some kind of unspoken choreography.

Baffled, I hung back on street corners, waiting for a moment to jet across. Most Indonesians possessed a balance and grace I could only dream of. I imagined that, for all of their reservations, the locals would fare much better in the rain forest than I had. But why test yourself when the daily trial of existence is enough?

A Death

The Balinese and Torajans are famous for their elaborate funerals, drawing visitors from around the world each year. But around the archipelago, much quieter ceremonies of mourning in the Muslim and Christian tradition are an everyday routine. And as access to health care is scarce for many, the cause of death is often unknown.

In a rural village in Halmahera I visited, a child died of a fever he had been struggling against for several days. Such news travels at lightening speed among villagers, and it came to the yard of a home where I was sharing a meal with a local family that same evening. The teenage girl standing in the doorway of their little home looked out with pleading eyes and asked:

“But why? Why did he die?”

She was looking not at the messenger but at me. I couldn’t answer the question anymore than the other people there. It was a fever; who or what brought that fever I didn’t know. Silence filled the muddy compound where we sat scattered in plastic chairs. The world looked hazy in dusk’s failing light.

“God took him,” a man next to me said. The rest of the group nodded.

Medicine might have other explanations, scientific answers may provide us with the comfort of understanding, but in the end, the question is enduringly, painfully the same: Why did he die? Because she was asking not what had caused the fever, but what we all ask in the face of death: why does it happen with such blatant indifference, such injustice, such frequency? How can life be so tenuous?

I looked around at the family surrounding me. The matriarch wore the same expression that I had seen on many faces throughout my travels in Indonesia– on women heading to family funerals, on men leaving the mosque, in my boyfriend’s face that evening in the rain forest. It was an unlikely mix of defiance and sorrow, a look of prayer in their eyes.

]]> http://matadorabroad.com/bravery-or-brashness-a-moral-holiday-in-indonesia/feed/ 9 http://matadorabroad.com/a-video-in-honor-of-mexican-independence-day/ http://matadorabroad.com/a-video-in-honor-of-mexican-independence-day/#comments Tue, 15 Sep 2009 18:09:28 +0000 Sarah Menkedick http://matadorabroad.com/?p=2129

Feature Photo: siddharta Photo : ivanx

Mexicans are getting hyped for the biggest national holiday of the year.

It’s the eve of Mexican independence day.

Almost exactly 200 years ago on the 16th of September 1810, priest Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla gave the famous “grito de dolores” or, as it’s commonly referred to “el grito.” Priest Hidalgo gathered his congregation at his church in Dolores, a small pueblo in Guanajuato, and proceeded to give the sermon credited with kicking off Mexico’s 10-year war for independence.

The sermon culminated with cries of “Death to the illegitimate government! Long live the the glorious pueblo Méxicano!” followed by the emphatic ringing of the church bell.

This grito is replicated each year on the evening of September 15th, in the Zócalo of Mexico City and in plazas, cities, and pueblos around the country. The president and other public figures initiate it with three or more shouts of “Viva México!” followed by a “Viva!” for every Mexican state and for Mexican revolutionary figures. Massive fireworks are set off and the pueblo Méxicano goes nuts in shades of red, white, and green.

In honor of el grito, I give you “Mexico Lindo y Querido,” sung by Mexican singer and actor Javier Solis (1933-1966).

Any mariachi in Mexico will be able to sing this for you. I most recently heard it on a road trip in Ohio, when Jorge gained control of the Ipod and used it to shout, weepy and unabashed, “México lindo y querrrrrido!” out onto the open road.

If you want to follow along, find the lyrics below:

Voz de la guitarra mía,
al despertar la mañana
quiere cantar la alegría
de mi tierra mexicana

Yo le canto a sus volcanes
a sus praderas y flores
que son como talismanes
del amor de mis amores

México Lindo y Querido
si muero lejos de ti
que digan que estoy dormido
y que me traigan aquí

Que digan que estoy dormido
y que me traigan aquí
México Lindo y Querido
si muero lejos de ti

Que me entierren en la sierra
al pie de los magueyales
y que me cubra esta tierra
que es cuna de hombres cabales

Voz de la guitarra mía,
al despertar la mañana
quiere cantar la alegría
de mi tierra mexicana

México Lindo y Querido
si muero lejos de ti
que digan que estoy dormido
y que me traigan aquí

Que digan que estoy dormido
y que me traigan aquí
México Lindo y Querido
si muero lejos de ti

Viva México!

]]> http://matadorabroad.com/a-video-in-honor-of-mexican-independence-day/feed/ 1 http://matadorabroad.com/singing-karaoke-in-japan/ http://matadorabroad.com/singing-karaoke-in-japan/#comments Sat, 05 Sep 2009 12:25:42 +0000 Ryukyu Mike http://matadorabroad.com/?p=2034

Photo above by the author. Feature photo by invisible hour

With just the right amount of Jack Daniels, anything is possible…

Way back before Karaoke hit the Western world, where it somehow turned into Carry-O-Key, there weren’t 5 or 6 monitors mounted on the walls of the bars.

There were no videos accompanying the music and no words streaming across the bottom of the screen.

Photo by saotin

Bars were for drinking and singing. TV’s were for watching the news, cartoons, soap operas and cooking classes.

On a 17 year stint of bachelorhood, between wives number two and three I found myself doing a lot of bar-hopping.

At some point during the night, wherever I was, I’d be asked to sing karaoke by whichever charming hostess I was buying drinks for at the time.

“Nah, I don’t sing” was my standard answer and if they kept bugging me, I’d leave, find another bar and fall in love with a different hostess; one who could drink Jack on the Rocks, with me and not be a pain in the ass.

Karaoke, back in those days, consisted of a cassette player, microphone and a book about the size of a bible – you know that thick book hotels leave on coffee tables for you to set your drinks on.

I’d heard enough Japanese businessmen screw-up My Way. I figured I couldn’t do any worse.

Oh, yeah, the really big karaoke bars had a scoreboard, a big, black board with bright LED numbers.

An applause meter would give each singer a score based on how much noise the crowd made when the song was over.

Just about every karaoke-joint had the same three songs in English, My Way, Sixteen Tons and You Are My Sunshine. Even if I knew how to sing, none of them would have been top-ten list.

Hell, I got kicked out of Boy’s Choir for skipping practice; what was I supposed to know about singing?

Well, one night I hit this bar with dozens of pretty hostesses and just the right amount of Jack Daniels in me to give it a try.

Photo by digo moraes

I’d heard enough Japanese businessmen screw-up My Way. I figured I couldn’t do any worse.

Probably no one in the place knew enough English to understand me, anyway, so, what the hell, when a gal asked me if I could sing, I’d give it my best shot.

Sure enough, before I could finish my first drink, a hostess asked me to sing.

“OK, let me try My Way,” I told her.

I stumbled and fumbled through the song, squinting at the book and trying to make noises along with the music. Frank Sinatra probably rolled over in his grave (or hospital bed, not sure where he was at the time) a few times.

Even half-plastered, I was self conscious; sweat was dripping off my forehead. The song seemed like it was around two hours long.

I belted down the last “my way” nice and loud, set the mic down on the counter, slammed the rest of my drink and looked for the door, in case I had to make a quick exit.

The crowd went wild, the applause meter hit “98”and the owner of the bar brought over a bottle of whiskey half as tall as the girl sitting next to me; my prize for the highest score that night.

I shared the bottle with everyone and soon we were all singing Sixteen Tons and You Are My Sunshine.

Now, I’m a karaokeholic.

Want To Live In Japan?

Check out: How To Get A Job Teaching In Japan

]]> http://matadorabroad.com/singing-karaoke-in-japan/feed/ 26 http://matadorabroad.com/a-travelers-guide-to-culture-in-nepal/ http://matadorabroad.com/a-travelers-guide-to-culture-in-nepal/#comments Mon, 24 Aug 2009 23:31:21 +0000 Sarah Vazquez http://matadorabroad.com/?p=1920

A worshiper being blessed. Note the sheep. All photos by Sarah Vazquez.

From the moment you step off the plane in Kathmandu, you will notice several obvious cultural differences from your home in the Western world.

Perhaps these tips will leave you a little less jolted during your first few days in Nepal, and a little more prepared to dive into a new culture!

Eating with a Baba.

A Bit on ‘Om’

In Nepal, religious practice is not limited to one day a week, but is displayed, practiced and respected every day, all day long.

It is refreshing and intriguing to see a Shiva shrive rather than a Starbucks on every corner.

About 80% of Nepali people are Hindu and the rest are mostly Buddhist with a touch of Christian and Muslim followers.

You will see and hear puja (worship) mostly in the early mornings, when woman are walking to shrines and temples to give daily offerings.

Puja will often include loud noises from blowing into conch shells or from chanting; there will be brief gestures of faith when people touch their heads when passing an image of Shiva or longer gestures when monks sit and recite their dharma for hours on end.

The best time to witness the intricate practice of devotion is to walk around temples early on Saturday mornings, the main day for worship.

Unless you are Hindu, you will not be able to enter the Hindu temples, but you can still be blessed if you bring an offering (money, flowers, or rice are typical gifts).

Life size prayer wheels in Kopan Monastery.

There are several gestures and motions to follow when being blessed or when worshiping; just follow the local example and you should be okay.

You will see religious symbols and references all over Kathmandu and Nepal. There is a subtle difference between religion being over commercialized and simply being omnipresent in daily life.

In Nepal, religion is omnipresent, which is a refreshing difference compared to the West. Take note of the symbols you see, such as “om” and the “swastika.”*

If you can see the effect that worship has on the daily culture in Nepal, religion will become a beautiful part of your visit.

The Clump and Push (vs the Lift and Drop)

Traditionally, Nepalis use their hands to eat their meals. Although you will almost always be offered silverware, you will impress your hosts if you show them you can eat properly with your hands.

This technique will make your culinary experience more authentic and adds a personal connection to meals. However, do not embark on this adventure unprepared.

Most beginners will try the “Lift and Drop” method. They pick up their rice (and fail to pick up their lentils) with their fingers, tilt their head back and drop the food into their mouth, like eating trail mix.

This will undoubtedly result in spilling on your clothes, not capturing the full flavor of your dish and simple embarrassment.

Instead, try the “Clump and Push” method. Use your whole hand to clump all the food together.

Mix the lentils with your rice; throw the meat on top; mush those juicy flavors together! You’re going to have to wash your hand no matter what, so you might as well use the whole palm and all five fingers to really clump it properly.

The food will stick together quite well and you can make a little ball of deliciousness. Then hold this ball of food on top of your thumb (as if you were going to play a game of Marbles or flip a quarter), raise it to your face and gracefully push it into your mouth.

By successfully executing the Clump and Push, you will have no problem leaving your plate clean, your tummy full and your hosts impressed.

Hindu gods dressed for a festival.

Intra-sexual vs Inter-sexual

It is common to see two men walking down the street holding hands or linking arms. Likewise, it is common to see two women showing the same affection.

Intra-sexual relations can be public and quite affectionate and are a sign of friendship and kindness.

However, PDA of any sort between a man and woman is not common. In fact, husband and wife will rarely show affection in public.

These guidelines hold true for rural parts of Nepal and among the older generations throughout the country, although sometimes in cities you will see the youth adapting more modern social guidelines.

No matter where you are, however, sticking to conservative social guidelines is important to avoid offending the locals.

Rawness

If you visit Kathmandu, you will notice a certain quality of rawness.

Traffic is hectic, animals roam the roads with free will, butchers slaughter animals next to corner stores, dogs bark, beggars sit with compelling grief, horns honk, and pujas are preformed loudly and frequently.

Animals are everywhere in Kathmandu!

Shopkeepers pursue you aggressively, dead animals are left on sidewalks, and the dust in the street can add a haze to your day.

Despite these unfamiliar exposures, once you step past the raw edge of Kathmandu, you will notice that it is also an very human place.

Kathmandu is alive. Its pulse is vibrant and its activity is dynamic. With a steady look, you will notice Kathmandu’s rich history and its world-renowned architecture. If you invest some patience you will notice a sincerely approachable city.

Don’t hesitate to initiate a conversation with a neighbor on the microbus and you will soon find that for all its rough edges, Kathmandu is distinctly personable and friendly.

Bathrooms, Showers, and Water

The general state of water will be a new and foreign concept to most travelers sojourning to Asia for the first time.

Nepal suffers from a severe water shortage; there simply isn’t the infrastructure or management to supply enough water for washing, bathing and drinking year-round.

For this reason, water is very scarce and is used with precious mindfulness; the amount of water a family has will often reflect their economic ability to tap into limited sources or collect rainfall during the rainy season.

Bathing with scarce water.

You will immediately notice that the bathroom situation is quite different from the Western norm.

The toilets are Asian style (squat toilets), of course, but in addition, many households will equate “taking a shower” as “taking a bucket shower.”

You should feel free to ask for water to shower with, but know that it is a valued commodity and that you will receive about one cooking pot full of cold water.

If you ask politely, you can have a little extra boiled water to make your bath water warmer. Because of the scarcity of this resource, it is normal for people to shower only once a week.

At first, these bathroom differences can be uncomfortable for travelers, but you will adapt faster than you think.

Electricity

Like water, electricity has a lack of infrastructure and management and therefore is also a precious commodity.

Electricity will typically be available for between four to eight hours of the day. The entire city of Kathmandu is divided into a grid system where each zone receives electricity at different times.

Not a symbol of fascism!

The tricky part of this situation is realizing which shops, houses and offices fall under what zone.

No house or store is invincible to the frequent power shortages; businesses will often casually shoo you away with a flick of their wrist if there is no electricity available (it is wise to note what hours your closest internet café runs on).

Occasionally, houses and shops will have generators that grant them electricity throughout the day. However, sometimes these generators don’t work.

Basically, it is in your best interest to become accustomed to patiently letting go of a strict time schedule and calmly watching how the rest of the country reconciles these inconveniences.

Kathmandu is a dusty, culturally rich and energetic city. It may present inconveniences at first, but it will undoubtedly leave you will a greater sense of patience and a new found appreciation for the vivacity, diversity and culture of Nepal.

Ramro sanga janusna!

* The Swastika is a ancient religious symbol of good luck that predates the Nazi regime.

Going to Nepal?

Get inspired by a photo essay on trekking Langtang, read Andris Bjornson’s classic guide to the Mt. Kangchenjuna circuit and peruse the 5 best treks in Nepal.

Finally, study up on your Nepali language skills with Sarah Vazquez, and get ready for your Himalayan adventure.

]]> http://matadorabroad.com/a-travelers-guide-to-culture-in-nepal/feed/ 3 http://matadorabroad.com/11-weird-japanese-foods/ http://matadorabroad.com/11-weird-japanese-foods/#comments Thu, 20 Aug 2009 18:34:59 +0000 Pele Omori http://matadorabroad.com/?p=1872

Natto photo by jasja_dekker. Feature photo by tamakisono

If you’re visiting Japan, venture beyond sushi and and try the following weird foods.

These are the slimiest, hairiest, chewiest and smelliest foods commonly eaten in Japanese households.

1. Natto

Natto are fermented soybeans notorious for their pungent smell, which reminds some of dirty old socks. These slimy beans are commonly slurped for breakfast with hot rice, with the optional raw egg mixed in for added nutrition.

2. Umeboshi Plums

If you thought Lemon Heads were the sourest food of all, try placing an entire umeboshi plum in your mouth—it’s salty sour flavor will be sure to pucker your face.

Umeboshi photo by tamakisono

The potent red plums are rarely eaten on their own, used instead to season rice, vegetables and meats. I’ve even seen umeboshi flavored potato chips.

The Japanese believe that the umeboshi plums help ease nausea from motion sickness, and some carry around the freeze dried or individually wrapped version for air travel.

3. Mozuku

This stringy and soft seaweed may remind you of the handful of hair accumulated in your shower drain, but mozuku is far more nutritious.

The hairy seaweed has got fucoidan, a polysaccharide touted for its ability to enhance your killer T cell activity, giving your immune system an added boost.

Mozuku is usually served cold in a vinegar sauce to distract you from thinking that it’s the algae growing in the fish tank.

4. Shishamo

Shishamo photo by yomi955

Imagine a skinny little smelt with its entire body cavity crammed with millions of small crunchy eggs. These small fish are grilled and served on a platter with their heads and tails still on.

No chopsticks here – shishamo is finger food. Rip the fish head and tail off and nibble everything in between.

5. Inago

The small brown crickets resemble roaches when viewed from far away, but I assure you that roaches aren’t a part of the Japanese culinary repertoire.

Inago are caught in rice paddies and either fried crisp or cooked in a sugary soy sauce broth and served as a condiment with steamed rice. Everything on the critter is devoured—including its sex organs and puny brain.

6. Dried squid or octopus

Dried squid is the Japanese equivalent to beef jerky snacks, but with more omega 3s and a fishiness that can be smelled from across the room once a package has been opened.

Dried squid photo by sushiboy555

The squid or octopus is seasoned, then dried in shreds or rings. Try the jar of dried baby squid or dried octopus legs made extra chewy with its tentacles.

These dried cephalopods are usually served with some icy Sapporo beer.

7. Mochi

Mochi is a chewy rice cake made by pounding sweet glutinous rice and forming it into discs—commonly served on New Years Day, which is also the day when mochi choking incidents are the highest.

If you’re tired of your regular bubble gum, you can blow and pop bubbles with mochi instead. I find mochi delicious when served as a dessert, stuffed with sweetened azuki beans.

8. Konnyaku

Wobbly and low in calories, this rubbery rectangular lump is loved by dieters. Konnyaku is made from the wild Konnyaku potato. It’s very high in dietary fiber, which gets your system clean while expanding in your tummy and tricking you into feeling full.

You may identify konnyaku immediately in the nabemono (hot pot) because it’s slippery body is very difficult to grasp with chopsticks.

9. Koya dofu (freeze dried tofu)

Destinations

Community Connection to Japan

Koya dofu is tofu which has been freeze dried, and sold in many Japanese supermarkets.

Don’t attempt to eat it uncooked as you may chip your teeth. When cooked in broth, its texture becomes that of a sponge that soaks up flavors—much like your kitchen sponge soaking up sink water.

10. Niboshi (dried anchovies)

When you see a pile of niboshi, it may remind you of a morgue for desiccated small fish. These dried, salted anchovies are used to make dashi, or fish stock commonly used in Japanese cooking.

The crunch of niboshi are also enjoyed as snacks when sold pre-seasoned with a sweet and salty coating.

If you’re going to the movies, they’re available at concession stands, and their crunch is similar to that of popcorn – but fishier.

11. Anko (sweetened azuki bean paste)

Anko and Mochi photo by jim212jim

Most of us are used to eating our beans in savory dishes, and wouldn’t dream of eating them as a dessert.

Let this be an eye opener for you, as anko finds its way into many traditional Japanese sweets, ice-creams, popsicles and bread fillings.

You may forget that anko is made of beans, as the high sugar content often overpowers the bean flavor.

For beginners, visit a Japanese Dunkin Donut shop and have an anko filled doughnut with some coffee.

Want To Live In Japan?

Check out: How To Get A Job Teaching In Japan

]]> http://matadorabroad.com/11-weird-japanese-foods/feed/ 37 http://matadorabroad.com/weird-laws-from-around-the-world/ http://matadorabroad.com/weird-laws-from-around-the-world/#comments Thu, 30 Jul 2009 18:38:01 +0000 Cole Robertson http://matadorabroad.com/?p=1414

Photo: erikrasmussen

There are more laws in existence now than at any other point in history, and often the odd, archaic or stupid ones are easier to leave on the books than to bother voting away.

Did you know, for instance, that in British Columbia it is illegal to kill a Sasquatch?

Laws like this sprinkle the ledgers of the world, a testament to what lawyers will do if you give them too much leash.

The following are some of the more exceptional examples (thinking of making sweet love to a porcupine? Better read this first).

Immortality and Armor

In England it is illegal to enter the Houses of Parliament wearing a suit of armor. This was apparently a problem.

But be careful without your armor, British politicians, because it is also illegal to die in the Houses of Parliament, and if you look sick, you will be quickly ushered out the doors.

One wonders about the legal ramifications that will ensue after death in Parliament. Maybe worried British politicians should move to North Korea where, instead of being slammed with a posthumous lawsuit, they’ll be crowned eternal rulers.

Photo: yeowatzup

Their predecessors can then become military dictators. And pursue nuclear arms programs. And try to solve their country’s hunger crisis by buying giant rabbits from Germany!

One such dictator, President Kim Jong-Il, has enacted legislation making his father, Kim Il-Sung, dead since 1994, the “Eternal President.”

I know the great leader casts a long shadow, Kim, but you’re 68. Time to move out of the basement.

Sex, Mothers-in-Law and Porcupines

Speaking of repressed Oedipus complexes, in a town in Colombia, the first time a woman has sex with her husband, her mother must be present.

The men there must sure be jealous of their counterparts in Wichita, Kansas, where the way a man treats his mother-in-law may not be used as grounds for divorce.

But these weren’t the only legislators with love and marriage in mind. In Argentina, feather beds are illegal. The reason? “Such an indulgence induces and encourages lascivious feelings.”

Whatever. It didn’t stop Mark Sanford.

And apparently nothing stopped the people who set the precedent making it illegal in Massachusetts to have sex with a rodeo clown in the presence of horses. I wish I could have seen the expressions on the couple’s faces when the stampede started…

In Florida it is illegal to have sex with porcupines. (Really?) While In Minnesota fish are off limits, but only to men.

Photo: aliferste

And in Headland, Alabama, no woman dressed in a nightshirt is allowed to be taken for a flight in a private plane.

Finally some place recognizes the deadly powers of the female nightshirt.

Denial is Good: Hot Pink Pants Are Not

Then to Australia, where taxis are required to carry a bale of hay, bars must provide food and water to their customers’ horses, and on Brighton Beach it is illegal to wear hot pink pants on Sunday afternoons.

Also banned is walking the streets in black clothes, felt shoes and black shoe polish. Apparently, these are the tools of a “cat burglar.”

Photo: hawk914

And if you’re Australian, and you’re feeling a little picked on, don’t. In your country it is legal for certain government officers to: treat an event that happened like it didn’t happen; treat an event that didn’t happen like it did happen; treat an event that happened like it happened at a different time; treat an event that happened like it happened at a different place; and treat an event that happened like it happened to a different person.

So, it’s fine. None of this happened. I never wrote this article and you never read it. But if you want some ammunition to fire back with next time you don’t get made fun of in an article that doesn’t exist, check out: dumblaws.com, wierdsexlaws.com, or lawguru.com.

The rest of you: try to set some new precedents, and good luck.

Community Connection

It’s always a good idea to check out the local laws before traveling somewhere. In particular, you might want to know not to flip the bird in Dubai or kiss in Guanajuato. And before you end up making desperate calls to your consulate, check out 12 things you don’t want to be caught doing in foreign lands.

]]> http://matadorabroad.com/weird-laws-from-around-the-world/feed/ 9 http://matadorabroad.com/the-minority-perspective/ http://matadorabroad.com/the-minority-perspective/#comments Fri, 24 Jul 2009 16:18:24 +0000 Sarah Vazquez http://matadorabroad.com/?p=1489

The author and her Nepali host family at home in Kathmandu. All photos courtesy Sarah Vazquez.

Travel reveals many unknown qualities about ourselves, including the reserve of xenophobia that we carry around in our backpacks.

Being a minority is one of the most valuable experiences of travel. The sensitivity and awareness we learn from the minority perspective is important to bettering ourselves as global citizens. This is especially true for citizens of the United States.

Our country’s makeup includes many types of people and heritages. To say that there is one, streamlined “American Identity” is simply impossible.

From the earliest days of Manifest Destiny and mass immigration to our current times of hostile neighbor relationships (inside and outside our borders) and unprecedented presidential elections, the story of the American Minority has always been highly relevant.

My digging skills under review.

Foreign Americans

By definition, all Americans are travelers and foreigners.

Connecting with the experience of being a foreigner in a global context is really to relate back to the innate immigrant thread that all Americans share.

Amazingly, our common experience as immigrants does not fracture us into categories, regions and races, but rather weaves through our differences and ties us together as one nation.

Whether or not your (great-great-great-great) grandmother’s house was next to Plymouth Rock, or your family just moved to Queens five years ago, we can all learn what it feels like to be “the only one” in a room by adopting the minority perspective and remembering what the experience of immigration was like for our ancestors.

Maybe you are like many Americans and have ancestry rooted beyond the red, white and blue of our nation, but have simply not yet connected with your heritage. Sadly, many efforts towards assimilation and shared identity have meant losing our own distinctive histories and cultural traditions.

Laughing at me?

Personally, I have experienced much of this internal bi-racial contradiction.

My father is from Mexico, yet for many reasons, I have been raised more or less in a completely “American culture”.

Of course, there is no right or wrong type of heritage, and I’m thankful for the unconditional love and patience my family has given me.

However, in my mind, for better or for worse, “American culture” has sometimes meant a focus on the future at the expense of my heritage.

When I was in Nepal a wave of liberating realizations hit me, subtly and powerfully, over the course of my three months as an oddball foreigner.

I was sometimes, conspicuously, the only female in a room. I was the only one whose skin color didn’t match. I was the only one who couldn’t speak Nepali. I was the only one who couldn’t do the simple task at hand.

In addition, I was often culturally inept. I stepped in the wrong place, I ate the wrong way and I showered poorly.

I was a person I had never been at home in America.

I was a distinct minority.

Celebrating Holi, the Festival of Colors.

I tried to take my failures at cultural assimilation lightly.

I quickly got over being afraid of embarrassment, because embarrassment was simply inevitable.

I learned humility, and many of my pre-conceived notions of “what’s proper” soon disappeared as I watched the everyday tasks accomplished in a new way.

I began to lift my head and look around outside of myself. It occurred to me that the Nepali ways were not foreign. The only thing foreign was myself.

Relating to my Father

Perhaps I could now relate to how my own father, along with many other young immigrants, felt in his first years in America.

My father and I had never connected on this type of level before, because we had always focused on our commonalities, namely our recent past together and the future ahead of us.

Although we still don’t talk much about this now, I feel (and hope) that my new-found sensitivity to the minority perspective has spoken louder than my words ever could.

Just like family.

The Lessons of Being Different

Perhaps one of the most useful things I learned in Nepal was how to treat foreignness as a gift.

I began to take solace in the fact that I was learning what it meant to be “the only one” in the room.

Often times over the course of history, Americans have rejected foreignness in favor of conformity. In Nepal, thousands of miles away from home, I learned that everyone is a foreigner somewhere. We are all foreigners because we are all unique.

We all have differences, and so our position of being different turns into a shared experience.

Most Nepali’s seemed to dismiss the idea that I was “wrong” when I misspoke or made a cultural misstep. They just accepted, with enthusiasm, the fact that I was “different.”

I got laughed at. A lot. By many people.

It took me a while to get used to being in the social spotlight all the time, but the humor of my Nepali hosts was not malicious or antagonistic.

My host-family and their friends laughed simply because my differences amused them. It made me happy to see that I could make people smile simply by being myself and by doing some things my own way.

Working in the wheat field.

I treaded these cultural waters with trepidation at first, expecting to be chastised when I stepped incorrectly. Instead, I was respectfully guided in the more culturally acceptable direction.

Perhaps more amazingly, I was never corrected for the sake of retaliation or enforced conformity. Instead, I was always corrected so that I could become a better Nepali and improve my own experience.

Strength in Difference

I returned to America with a strong belief in the importance of respect and understanding within the global community. We must all be responsible, compassionate global neighbors.

But I also returned with a vision of what it means to be an American today. Our nation’s backbone lies in our shared experience of the minority perspective. Our differences help make us strong.

What do you think about the minority perspective?

Please join the conversation by leaving a comment below.

]]> http://matadorabroad.com/the-minority-perspective/feed/ 22 http://matadorabroad.com/expressions-that-define-cultures/ http://matadorabroad.com/expressions-that-define-cultures/#comments Wed, 22 Jul 2009 14:56:11 +0000 Turner Wright http://matadorabroad.com/?p=1159

Feature photos by kalandrakas

If you stick around long enough to listen, you might come across one simple saying that seems to epitomize the local culture.

Learning such expressions is key not only to picking up the local language, but also to grasping different belief systems and ways of seeing the world.

Think of these expressions as ways to get inside of a particular worldview, and to show the locals that you’ve got an awareness of their cultural values.

Japan photo by tiseb

1. Shoganai (しょうがない), Japan

“It can’t be helped.” Japan is for the most part a very non-confrontational culture. Shoganai epitomizes this tendency because by encouraging people not to complain or try to “fight the power”.

Circumstances can’t be changed, so why get angry or try to avoid the unavoidable?

It’s too hot and you have walk 10 km to the nearest train station? Your boss asks you to work an extra four hours that evening?

Just accept it and move on: shoganai.

2. Mai pen rai (ไม่เป็นไร), Thailand

Thailand photo by mckaysavage

“Thailand is where no matter what happens, you say ‘mai pen rai.’ Never mind. Que sera, sera. Water off my back. And get on with your life.”

- Jerry Hopkins, Thailand Confidential

Whereas in Japan this “never mind” idea encourages one to endure hardships, in Thailand, it implies that life should be lived at a relaxed pace.

This could not be more evident in the idea of “Thai time”: several days late for a gathering of friends? Mai pen rai; it’s no big deal, we can always put things off for another day, a week, a month.

3. Sempre tem jeito, Brazil

“…there’s always a way. Don’t drive yourself crazy over stuff now, there’s always a way to work it out in the end.”

- Thomas Kohstamm, Do Travel Writers Go to Hell?

4. Pura vida, Costa Rica

Costa Rica photo by lulumon athletica

If you’ve been reading up on the exploits of one frozen banana stand owner, you should understand the idea of enjoying life in leisurely manner in Costa Rica, pura vida!

Literally meaning “pure life”, the saying is often used as a handy catch phrase and a way of offering greetings and farewells.

5. C’est la vie, France

Apparently the French and Japanese think very much alike in this respect. C’est la vie is often used to describe situations beyond someone’s control in a way of saying “that’s life” or “what can you do?”

6. Insha’allah, Arab nations

“In Egypt, it is an expression that is relied on so utterly, repeated so continually and universally – invoked on the quiet, dusty paths of rural villages and on the crowded streets of Cairo alike – that it is a part of our national character.

For Egyptian Muslims (and many Christians, too), insha’allah is the constant reminder that human beings are not in control. It is funny, but also somewhat telling, that most foreigners and visitors to Egypt believe it means ‘never.’”

- Jehan Sadat, My Hope for Peace

7. No worries, Australia and New Zealand

Although the phrase “sweet as” might be just as strong a contender in Kiwi territory, no worries is probably the most culturally relevant phrase in Australia and New Zealand.

The saying expresses a laid-back approach to life. No worries, mate.

8. Huevos, Mexico

Our own Sarah Menkedick offers her experience in Mexico with the variations on huevos (eggs):

“Que hueva.”

Imagine you are Jorge, it is Sunday morning, and you are snug in bed with the sun pouring down on you. Then your peppy girlfriend and her German Shepherd come racing into the room, jump on the bed, and shout/bark “Come running with me!!”

Your response would be: “Que hueva.”

Huevo photo by bpheonix

In case the context didn’t help, “hueva” here means something like boring/tedious/dull/dreadful. You could also translate it more or less directly as “how laziness-inducing.”

“Que huevon/huevona.” This is that guy with his arm elbow-deep in the Ruffles and his gut pouring over the edge of his jeans who shouts “yeah, I’ll get around to it later honey, I’m watching the Simpsons!” The Lazy Egg.

Huevona is the feminine form.

This is what you try to pull on your friends when they refuse to walk the dog with you or trek it across town to catch a bus to see a movie.

“Que huevon!” you say with mock indignation. It rarely works, but it’s fun to call someone a lazy egg anyway.

- Huevos a la Mexicana

9. Maningue Nice, Mozambique

Mozambique photo by JenvanW

A cross between a purely national term and a flair of English, maningue nice means “very nice” and is the closest thing to a slogan in Mozambique. Scream it from the tallest buildings whenever fortune favors you.

10. Bahala Na, Philippines

Come What May.

“This is the term that is very often used when all else fails, when you have done all you could, it doesn’t matter
because fate will take over. Sort of a comfort in a sense, that wills the Filipino, that gives them a sort of perseverance.”

Source: tingog.com

A Cross Cultural Theme

When I started researching these expressions, I was expecting to find similarities based on geography: patterns in Asia, South America, Western Europe, etc.

I was surprised, however, to find a cross-cultural theme; many of these phrases are used in response to circumstances beyond people’s control.

How each culture is epitomized in these terms is indicative of how they react to unfortunate or unavoidable events.

The Japanese and French suck it up; the Thais, Kiwis, Aussies, and others shrug it off; Arabs put the responsibility to a higher power.

Join the Conversation!

Do you know a phrase that seems to epitomize a culture? Please share it by leaving a comment below!

]]> http://matadorabroad.com/expressions-that-define-cultures/feed/ 36 http://matadorabroad.com/civilization/ http://matadorabroad.com/civilization/#comments Tue, 21 Jul 2009 17:01:35 +0000 Tim Patterson http://matadorabroad.com/?p=1462

Photo by gruntzooki

]]> http://matadorabroad.com/civilization/feed/ 13 http://matadorabroad.com/worlds-wackiest-wifi-hotspots/ http://matadorabroad.com/worlds-wackiest-wifi-hotspots/#comments Tue, 14 Jul 2009 13:28:45 +0000 Michelle Schusterman http://matadorabroad.com/?p=1313

Feature photos by striatic

Wi-fi zones have long been branching out to more than just cafes, hotels, and airports. Check out a few of these surprising hotspots.

The Beach, Los Angeles, California

As long as a beach bum is within sight of one of the elevated antenna locations along Pier Avenue in LA, he can surf the net. The Hermosa Beach wireless system (WifiHermosaBeach) has been up and running since February of 2008.

Hermosa Beach / Photo by Chris Cohenour

Phone Booths, Moscow, Russia

Plans for integrating 200 coin-box telephones with wireless connection into Moscow’s Comstar network began back in 2007. Customers can use pre-paid cards, SMS-authorizations and MGTS phone cards to access the Internet.

Since then, other cities have jumped on board. Hong Kong offers wi-fi at a few hundred phone booths throughout the city, and internet street kiosks have also popped up in London, Amsterdam, Dublin, Berlin, and New York. The price is typically steep, but these are convenient if you’re desperate to get online.

Buenos Aires subway photo by Irargerich

Subways, Buenos Aires, Argentina

No, not your favorite sandwich shop, although a few of those have been known to offer wi-fi, too. But in some cities, it’s possible to check out the latest YouTube vids…well, while riding the tube.

Buenos Aires became the first city to offer free Internet access in subway stations a few years ago, and several cities have followed suit, including Hong Kong, Glasgow, and Boston.

Marinas, Auckland, New Zealand

Specifically, Westhaven Marina, which is now the largest marina wifi zone in the southern hemisphere.

Coverage at Westhaven is provided by Auckland City Wi-fi, a collaboration between the Auckland City Council, Kordia (leading provider of broadcast and telecommunications networks), and Tomizone (Australasia’s largest wi-fi provider) that covers seven zones across Auckland.

Marina hotspots are becoming more common, and there are several around the world, including Canada, the U.K., Europe, and several states in the U.S.

Photo by andreanna

Whole Foods, Most Cities, United States

As announced on their blog in April of 2009, now customers can stay connected to the world while shopping for local food, or enjoying an organic soy latte in the Whole Foods cafe.

Bonus: Now you can run a Google search for the weird stuff in the produce section. (You know what I’m talking about. That spiky orange football-shaped thing.)

Golf Courses, Tallahassee, Florida

At Florida State University’s Don Veller Seminole Golf Course, wi-fi isn’t just for the club. Thanks to the GPS Industries’ Inforemer HDX display units on their golf carts, combined with an integrated wi-fi communications network, the entire facility is a hotspot.

Internet access on the green helps the staff monitor play to keep things running smoothly. And Tim Melloh, General Manager, adds, “Even the ability to order food from the course’s Renegade Grill while you’re out on the course will save golfers time at the turn.”

Middle of Nowhere, Sarohan, India

Wi-fi in India may not seem so surprising, but for this small village of 2,000 people, it’s almost miraculous.

As of 2005, Sarohan didn’t even have electricity, so the 20-metre wif-fi tower that looms over the thatched roofs and mango orchards provided a much-needed way to communicate with relatives.

The tower was provided by IIT Kanpur’s Digital Gangetic Plain Project, which has taken phones and internet connectivity to 10 villages in and around the Unnao area.

What’s the weirdest place you’ve found Wi-fi?

Share your experiences by leaving a comment below!

]]> http://matadorabroad.com/worlds-wackiest-wifi-hotspots/feed/ 19 http://matadorabroad.com/8-fascinating-things-you-probably-didnt-know-about-thailand/ http://matadorabroad.com/8-fascinating-things-you-probably-didnt-know-about-thailand/#comments Mon, 29 Jun 2009 17:43:02 +0000 Ryan Libre http://matadorabroad.com/?p=1031

Thai monks by Ryan Libre

There’s a lot more to Thailand than elephant rides and pad thai.

The King Makes it Rain

The King of Thailand perfected and holds the patent on a form of cloud seeding. He has designed bridges and dams and holds an engineering degree from Switzerland.

The King also plays the sax and composed the Thai national anthem. He built his own sailboat and is a talented oil painter.

He is the longest reigning monarch in the world. The Thai people love him and with many good reasons.

It is Year 2552

Buddha statue by Ryan Libre

Thai people start counting from when the Buddha was born, who came along before Jesus. A few other Asian countries also count from Buddha’s birthday, but they are all a few years apart.

The Clock Starts Over Every 6 Hours

You know the 12 hour clock, you’ve heard of the 24 hour clock, but you didn’t know that most of Thailand runs on a 6 hour clock that resets 4 times a day.

Bangkok? Where’s Bangkok?

Bangkok was the temporary Thai capital after the Burmese sacked Ayutthaya. After 10 years or so the Thais moved across the river to start a new capital city called:

Krung Thep Mahanakhon Amon Rattanakosin Mahinthara Ayuthaya Mahadilok Phop Noppharat Ratchathani Burirom Udomratchaniwet Mahasathan Amon Piman Awatan Sathit Sakkathattiya Witsanukam Prasit.

This is the longest place name in the world. Thais usually shorten it to just Krung Thep.

Destinations

Community Connection to Thailand

The original temporary capital city “Bangkok” was soon swallowed up by the rapidly expanding Krung Tep, so Bangkok is now just one of the many outlying neighborhoods.

If you ask most Thai people where Bangkok is they only have a very vague idea and wouldn’t know exactly how to get there.

The “Thai” in Thailand Means “Free”

Thailand is the only Southeast Asian country that was never colonized. This is a fact that they are very proud of and want ingrained in their national identity.

Even Thai Kings Often Misspell Words

The Thai alphabet has 6 more vowels than the entire English alphabet! All together, Thais have 32 vowels and 44 consonants.

All the Thai kings in the past several generations have been educated overseas. If you read their personal memos and writings there are many spelling errors.

The Chinese run Thailand

Chinese influence by Ryan Libre

Many generations ago there were no paid jobs in Thailand. Every man had to work for 3 months for free for the monarchy.

Sometimes that labor wasn’t enough and sometimes the kings didn’t trust their own subjects for accounting jobs, so they hired Chinese workers.

Their salaries may have been small, but they gave the Chinese the upper-hand in business, which paved the way to political success.

Thaksin (the highly polarizing former Thai Prime Minister), and a large majority of Thailand’s businessmen and politicians are the ancestors of these early Chinese workers.

Despite living in Thailand for many generations, many of these powerful individuals hold on to their Chinese heritage and often read the newspaper in Chinese.

Vegetarianism is NOT a Western Import to Thailand

The Chinese also brought vegetarianism with them hundreds of years ago.

Vegetarian Thai food by Ryan Libre

The Thais still use the Chinese word for vegetarianism, simply pronounced “J”. Eating vegetarian has been a major part of the Thai worldview for generations.

Despite the recent article in the New York Times about the “booming” vegetarian movement in Thailand, little has changed in the last 100 years and almost nothing has changed in the the last decade.

Going to Thailand?

Check out 10 Thai Customs to Know Before Visiting Thailand.

For a good laugh, read Matador Nights editor Tom Gates’ diary of an eating binge in Bangkok food-courts. Tom also has reviews of authentic Italian food in Bangkok and the coolest hostel in Bangkok.

Nomadic Matt lives in Bangkok. Matt is an expert on Bangkok nightlife but also knows how to get off the tourist trail in Southeast Asia.

Your very own Matador Abroad editor Tim Patterson thinks You Sabai is the best organic cooking school in Thailand.

Matador Trips editor Hal Amen shares a jungle adventure in his guide to Khao Sok National Park.

For up to date and comprehensive information about travel in Thailand, you can’t do better than the online Thailand travel guide on Travelfish.

Not a Matador member yet? Join our travel community.

]]> http://matadorabroad.com/8-fascinating-things-you-probably-didnt-know-about-thailand/feed/ 21 http://matadorabroad.com/tips-foreign-child-adopt-adoption/ http://matadorabroad.com/tips-foreign-child-adopt-adoption/#comments Tue, 09 Jun 2009 12:19:53 +0000 Niamh Griffin http://matadorabroad.com/?p=704

Photo by jdl deleon

Adopting a child abroad is an enormous undertaking. These tips will help you make sense of the process.

Madonna doesn’t do things by halves and has rarely been known to take no for an answer.

When Madonna flew to Malawi recently to adopt a second child, who could have foreseen the problems she would face?

Madonna’s case has once again reminded childless people that there are millions of children in the world today who are looking for homes.

In spite of her wealth and the fact that she set up a children’s charity in Malawi, Madonna’s adoption application didn’t cut it with the judge.

Photo by fffriendly

So what did she do wrong, and what should you do if you’re considering welcoming a child from another culture into your life?

1. Stop and think.

The first step in the long journey towards adopting a child from another country or indeed adopting or fostering any child is to stop and think.

The Jolie-Pitts of this world may make adoption look easy, but integrating a new human being into your world is a challenge.

Think about your emotional commitment to a child for the next twenty years and how the rest of your family will feel; in other words, evaluate all of the factors that most prospective birth parents consider.

You should also think about your commitment to the child’s home country – you should be ready to keep the child aware of their heritage.

2. Check home-country regulations.

Photo by peasap

It’s a good idea to look into the regulations in your home country before you start the process.

Adopting a child is not as simple as signing their name into your passport.

For example Canadians need to sign up for a home study by a government representative, which can take up to a year to complete.

There’s no point getting indignant about this paperwork; the rules are in place to protect the kids from even more trauma than they might already have suffered.

3. Prepare to pay the fees.

When there’s paperwork, there are fees to be paid. Adoption of foreign children isn’t a cheap process; the US Office of Children’s Issues talk about costs of $30,000 just for the adoption agency fees.

Not that a child’s life can be measured in dollars, but you should be prepared for the financial commitment.

Groups like Help Us Adopt exist to help you find that initial funding, but you’ll also need money for education and all the other costs of raising a child.

Photo by lepiaf.geo

Remember that the adoption process is only the beginning of your commitment to the child.

4. Avail yourself of help from agencies.

But even though the agencies are expensive, you’ll find the process a lot easier with their help and going through an agency mandatory in some countries.

Each year in the USA, about 20,000 foreign children are taken into homes along with about 2,000 in Canada, so adopting a foreign child is not an impossible task.

It’s important for you and the child to check that the agency is fully accredited – American agencies should be accredited by the Council on Accreditation (COA).

5. Check foreign regulations.

With the help of the agency, you’ll need to carefully check out the regulations of the child’s country.

Madonna wasn’t aware that she had to live in Malawi for 18 months before adopting a child – probably because she had managed to get around that law once before.

This U.S. state department website gives you detailed information on which countries have signed up to The Hague Adoption Convention and also allows you to track changes in national adoption laws.

This kind of information will make your journey to finding a child smoother and more successful.

6. Familiarize yourself with the Hague Convention.

Photo by nyki m

Read up on The Hague Adoption Convention.

This agreement between 75 countries was set in place to stop trafficking or other abuse of children. It means more paperwork for you if you adopt from one of these countries, but you and the child will feel a lot more secure in your relationship.

After all a child takes a huge leap of faith getting on a plane with you, so the more safeguards there are for them the better.

7. Think beyond logistics.

Of course it’s not all about paperwork. Try to get as much information as you can about the emotional effects of adoption.

Books like Twenty Things Adopted Kids Wish Their Adoptive Parents Knew or The Complete Book of International Adoption will give you a good idea of what’s going to happen.

Use the internet – once you know which country your child is from, you can join online support groups to help you though the adoption process and to make friends who can support you in your new life.

8. Think about the child!

Photo by Tom@HK

Depending on how old your child is, the adoption process can be quite difficult for them.

Older children will have to learn a new language, new culture and come to terms with being far away from familiar life. We talk a lot about culture shock but imagine what it’s like being 7 or 8 years old and thousands of miles away from home with no return ticket?

You’ll need to be patient and remember that no matter how much you love this child, it will take time to create that perfect family you’ve been dreaming about.

But given time and oodles of love, adopting a foreign child will be the most rewarding journey you can imagine.

]]> http://matadorabroad.com/tips-foreign-child-adopt-adoption/feed/ 6 http://matadorabroad.com/travelfish-wants-you-to-get-offline/ http://matadorabroad.com/travelfish-wants-you-to-get-offline/#comments Fri, 05 Jun 2009 15:28:48 +0000 Tim Patterson http://matadorabroad.com/?p=887

Photos via Travelfish

Travelfish is a hugely popular online travel guide to Southeast Asia.

The success of Travelfish, Matador and other travel websites begs a questions – are travelers spending too much time online these days?

Here’s an open letter from Stuart MacDonald, the co-founder of Travelfish:

Despite the dour economic scene worldwide, it seems barely a week passes without a press release landing in my in-tray proclaiming yet another internet travel site destined to be the best thing since padded moneybelts.

The higher-tech sites promise things like localizing content depending on where you are (via your laptop or mobile phone) and telling you how far down the road the guesthouse is — but if you pass another guesthouse while walking down Khao San Road in Bangkok you might get a text from them telling you they are offering a 50% off deal if you check-in during the next hour.

Is that really as absurd as it sounds?

Obviously running a website like Travelfish, we hope to help travelers plan and enjoy their trip, but has travel become too wired?

It’s a sign of the times that it is considered normal to walk into a guesthouse and see it full of travelers gazing into their laptops, checking their Facebook page, updating their travel blog, uploading their photos, Twittering, ranting on Lonely Planet’s Thorntree or, yes, cruising Travelfish.

Just a few years ago, walking into a scene like that would have been decidedly odd.

How is this changing travel?

People’s sources of travel intelligence are morphing.

Largely gone are the days of guesthouse comment books, once immensely valuable tomes full of snippets and travel advice. Instead people search travel websites for up-to-date info.

Why ask a stranger in the common room where a good cafe is when you can simultaneously ask a million people through Twitter on your laptop?

Why use a guidebook when a savvy website will localize content to your iPhone and recommend the best guesthouse within 100 metres of where you are standing based on your past reservation preferences?

Why swap addresses when you can just swap phone numbers or email addresses on your Blackberry? When was the last time on the road you actually exchanged postal addresses with another traveler?

What happens when you leave your laptop, iPhone and Blackberry at home? Remember Poste Restante?

All these new ways of collecting travel intelligence can be great, but when it comes to up-to-date information they are rarely a substitute for sitting down with a complete stranger and swapping notes.

So try it: Switch off your laptop, walk across the room and introduce yourself to another traveler — you’ll be surprised just how much untapped information is sitting right there in the guesthouse common room with you.

And, of course, once you’re done chatting, be sure to get the laptop back on and post the information on Travelfish quicksmart — or at least throw in your two cents about wired travel on the Travelfish forum.

What Do You Think?

Hey there, wired traveler. What do you think about the profusion of online travel guides? Please leave a comment below.

]]> http://matadorabroad.com/travelfish-wants-you-to-get-offline/feed/ 28 http://matadorabroad.com/10-thai-customs-to-know-before-visiting-thailand/ http://matadorabroad.com/10-thai-customs-to-know-before-visiting-thailand/#comments Thu, 04 Jun 2009 13:35:18 +0000 Voralak Suwanvanichkij http://matadorabroad.com/?p=874

Photo by jurvetson….feature photo by permanently scatterbrained

For many travelers, Bangkok is the first stop on travels in Thailand and throughout Southeast Asia.

With its chaotic veneer, Thai customs are easily overlooked in Bangkok. Respect the local people by knowing these ten cultural points before you embark on travels in Thailand.

Photo by specialkrb

Versatile Greeting

The wai, or pressing your palms together at chest or nose level and bowing your head slightly, is a gesture that you will encounter almost immediately upon arrival in Thailand.

An integral part of Thai etiquette, it denotes respect (or reverence when performed in front of a Buddha image), and can be used to express a hello, thank you, or goodbye.

Absolute Reverence

Photo by permanently scatterbrained

Thailand is a constitutional monarchy, and the royal family is revered throughout the country. The King is especially beloved for his six decades of public service and humble demeanor.

His image is everywhere, from posters plastered on the exterior of buildings to photos displayed on taxi dashboards.

Always stand when the King’s anthem is played before movies, concerts and sporting events. Travelers should also refrain from making disparaging remarks about the royals.

Strict lèse majesté laws apply, and offenses are punishable by imprisonment.

National Pride

Over the past several decades, the government has introduced various practices to encourage nationalism.

Photo by Swami Stream

One example of this institutionalized patriotism is twice daily broadcasts of the national anthem.

Pedestrians, commuters, and students are required to stop or stand whenever this song is played.

In recent efforts to boost patriotism, a group of generals proposed that traffic also come to a standstill, arguing that motorists “already spend more time in traffic jams anyway.”

Colorful Days

Based on pre-Buddhist Hindu legends, a particular auspicious color is associated with each day of the week. This is most noticeable on Mondays, when many people wear yellow shirts, acknowledging and honouring the day on which the King was born. Other popular colors include pink (Tuesday) and light blue (Friday, the Queen’s day of birth).

Given recent political protests, the colors red and yellow are also of significance, representing opposing movements.

Never mind!

The phrase Mai pen rai (never mind) describes the country’s unofficial philosophy, capturing locals’ knack for keeping cool in taxing or annoying situations. In the grand scheme of things, why stress about trifling matters? Mai pen rai!

This laidback mindset goes hand-in-hand with an inherent sense of light-heartedness. Nothing is taken too seriously, and anything worth doing should contain some element of sanuk (fun)!

Sexual Tolerance

Photo by zaphodsotherhead

Thailand has long enjoyed a reputation for sexual tolerance, based more on non-confrontational (as opposed to progressive) attitudes. The country is very safe for GLBT travelers.

Transsexuals, also known as krathoeys or ladyboys, are highly visible in mainstream society, from scantily clad teens to high-profile celebrities.

Religious Objects

About 95% of Thailand’s population is comprised of Buddhists from the Theravada school.

Photo by jurvetson

Despite teachings against material attachment, many Thais worship Buddha images and don amulets for protection.

Various animist practices have also been integrated into Thai religious life.

Most buildings boast spirit houses or altars, where offerings of food and garlands are made to appease the spirits inhabiting the land.

Avoid touching such displays as some Thais can be highly superstitious, fearing disruption of harmonious balance.

Bodily Conduct

Based on Buddhist beliefs, the head is the most valued part of the body while the feet are the lowest, symbolizing attachment to the ground, a cause of human suffering.

Photo by irene2005

Touching someone’s head is highly offensive, as is raising your feet or pointing them at people or religious objects.

Shoes are to be removed before entering homes and religious structures.

Most types of attire are tolerated in areas frequented by tourists. It is a good idea, however, to cover up when visiting temples and shrines. Those wearing sleeveless tops, short skirts, shorts, and flip flops may be denied entrance.

It is not unusual to encounter signs prohibiting women from entering highly sacred places, such as temple libraries. Women who wish to worship do so outside the buildings.

Also, while it is taboo for a woman to touch a monk or pass things to him directly, polite conversation is fine.

Nicknames

Destinations

Community Connection to Thailand

Thais are generally addressed by their first names, preceded by the honorific title Khun, appropriate for both men and women. In more casual settings, mono-syllabic nicknames are used.

More traditional monikers cover categories such as colors, animals, and fruit, including Daeng (red), Lek (small), and Moo (pig); these days, you will encounter nicknames such as Good, Money, and Benz (as in the luxury auto).

Bathroom Basics

Outside of large cities, squat toilets rule. These are flushed by pouring water from an adjacent bucket into the hole. Also, used toilet paper is to be discarded in the bin provided; never try to flush it down as it most plumbing isn’t designed to handle paper.

Traditional washrooms include a trough filled with water where a ladle or bowl is used to sluice water over the body. In areas where outdoor bathing is the norm, women will don a cotton sarong or wraparound, and men will bathe in their underwear.

Photo by jurvetson

Matador loves Thailand.

For a good laugh, read Matador Nights editor Tom Gates’ diary of an eating binge in Bangkok food-courts. Tom also has reviews of authentic Italian food in Bangkok and the coolest hostel in Bangkok.

Nomadic Matt lives in Bangkok. Matt is an expert on Bangkok nightlife but also knows how to get off the tourist trail in Southeast Asia.

Your very own Matador Abroad editor Tim Patterson thinks You Sabai is the best organic cooking school in Thailand.

Matador Trips editor Hal Amen shares a jungle adventure in his guide to Khao Sok National Park.

For up to date and comprehensive information about travel in Thailand, you can’t do better than the online Thailand travel guide on Travelfish.

Not a Matador member yet? Join our travel community.

]]> http://matadorabroad.com/10-thai-customs-to-know-before-visiting-thailand/feed/ 9 http://matadorabroad.com/5-asian-food-blogs-to-read-before-traveling-to-asia/ http://matadorabroad.com/5-asian-food-blogs-to-read-before-traveling-to-asia/#comments Mon, 01 Jun 2009 03:20:18 +0000 Sarah Menkedick http://matadorabroad.com/?p=702

Burmese Curry / photo by jackol

You’ve gotta eat on the road, so why not eat informed? These blogs throw you into local food cultures and help you use food to discover the essence of place.

Photo: David Hagerman

Does eating a searing red curry with a piece of buttery naan make you feel like a different person from one who normally eats, say, a baguette of Serrano ham and heirloom tomatoes?

Does eating pickled vegetables on a daily basis start to get to you, make you feel a little differently about life after awhile?

Does standing in the narrow corridor of a Japanese yakitori bar, smelling grilled chicken and onion, watching smoke billow around a bandannaed man flipping the skewers, temporarily give you a new identity?

Like traveling, food can pull the rug – subtly or blatantly – out from under a given identity.

The transformative effects of food might not be as immediately obvious as those of a new cultural environment, but they’re just as significant.

Which is why I bring you my top five Asian food blogs.

Why Asia? Because the continent is fortunate to have some extremely talented and experienced cooks and writers dedicating their lives to exploring its cuisine.

These bloggers will help you navigate the overwhelming realm of Asian food. They’ll flesh out the context for you and guide you through the culinary metamorphasis that takes place in travel.

And they’ll make you so. freaking. hungry.

1. Yasuko San’s Home Cooking

Photo: I Love Egg

Poco is a Japanese woman blogging about her mother’s cooking. The aim of her site is to preserve knowledge of and respect for traditional Japanese cooking. She quotes her grandfather :

“You eat local cuisine and you’ll not get sick.”

The site is a food diary of what her mother cooks every day—literally, almost every day—as well as an extensive catalogue of Japanese ingredients and recipes. This is one of the best resources I’ve found on Japanese food and cooking.

I think Poco sums it up simply and sweetly in an essay entitled The Natural Style:

I never forget that our body is made up of foods.

2. Appetite For China

I cannot tell you how many times in Beijing I’d spend the morning devouring Appetite For China and the afternoon scouring the city for roujiamo (a kebab-like sandwich of pulled pork) or the perfect dan dan mian(spicy Sichuan noodles).

Diana Kuan grew up partly in Puerto Rico, where her family operated a Latin-Chinese “fusion” restaurant (before fusion became the most overhyped food concept of the century) and partly in suburban Boston, where the family ran a “Polynesian-style take-out and Cantonese bakery.”

Combine that family background with French culinary training, a stint as a pastry chef, years spent as a food writer covering everything from chocolate to Ethiopian food, and a move to Beijing, and you have one helluva perspective on food.

Appetite For China runs the spectrum from the traditional (mapo tofu) to the innovative (absinthe cranberry frappe).

And you can’t beat Diana’s 100 Chinese Foods To Try Before You Die if you’re moving or traveling to China.

3. Eating Asia

Photo: David Hagerman

Writer Robyn Eckhardt and photographer David Hagerman have been living in Asia for over thirteen years, and are currently based in Kuala Lumpur.

Their blog is equal parts travel, people, and food, and can’t be missed if you’re traveling to Malaysia.

The photos and the stories behind them invoke fields, valleys, smoky alleyways and street-side noodle stands where you’ve never been but can somehow feel and taste.

The writing is suburb and direct – as much about recipes as it is about local ingredients, people, and stories.

Even though I’ll be leaving Japan soon and don’t have another Asia trip planned, I visit this blog because I want to be there in the dumpling steam, sitting at a tiny plastic table beside a ramshackle stand, with the taste of scallions and meat and sharp vinegar in my mouth at 7 a.m.

4. Rambling Spoon

Karen Coates is the Asia correspondent for “Gourmet” and author of “Cambodia Now: Life in the Wake of War,” among other books. She and her husband have spent more than a decade living in, traveling through, and writing about Asia.

Rambling Spoon is as much about Asian politics, history, nature, and social life as it is about food. Coates writes:

Food is life (and death). It is history and politics and science and nature. It is everything, and it is not a subject to be taken lightly. After all, food is everything we are.

Photo: Jerry Redfern

I would argue, food is also essential to traveling, and it is part of the transformation that takes place in traveling.

What we put in our bodies links us to people and landscape.

And those links are evident in the stories, recipes and photos that come together on Rambling Spoon.

5. Sticky Rice

The bio on this site leaves an air of mystery about the authors:

“Eating, drinking, sitting, watching -these are the things we love about Hanoi. On this site we will attempt to eat our way through Vietnam’s northern capital and pass on the results.”

Despite the dearth of personal info, the writing has a distinct voice. It manages to be snarky, insightful, slightly pretentious and down home all at once.

It makes for great reading and stokes a desire to go to Vietnam that I didn’t know I had.

Photo: avlxyz

For anyone traveling to Hanoi, and Vietnam in general, this is the one blog that should not be missed, and for those of you for whom food blogs are porn, Sticky Rice is particularly drool-worthy.

Sticky Rice teleports you to the green banana stand, to the cluttered café, to the pho joint that haunts your dreams.

Again, these five blogs are the ones I find exceptional in the way they capture places through food. There are, of course, many more great Asian food blogs.

Consider food blogs as travel guides that give you another angle through which to experience culture. With these blogs as your guide, you can learn how to literally swallow up and digest a place.

Community Connection

For more about the connection between food and place, check out this author’s article about Tasting Place, or peruse Essential Cookbooks for the Culinary Traveler. You also might want to know how to eat a new language before you embark on your culinary adventure.

For up-to-date Southeast Asian restaurant reviews and trip planning information, check out TravelFish.

]]> http://matadorabroad.com/5-asian-food-blogs-to-read-before-traveling-to-asia/feed/ 22 http://matadorabroad.com/taj-mahal-video/ http://matadorabroad.com/taj-mahal-video/#comments Fri, 15 May 2009 13:33:38 +0000 Tim Patterson http://matadorabroad.com/?p=616 The Taj Mahal is a monument to love.

Destinations

Community Connection to India

Lonely Planet author Sarina Singh shares the secrets of the Taj Mahal in this beautiful video.

The dark love story of the magnificent monument is fascinating. If you’ve seen the Taj, is there any other man-made structure in the world that could possibly match its beauty?

Going to India?

Be sure to read 10 Indian Customs To Know Before You Visit India.

Feature photo by Matador member Vlogabond.

]]> http://matadorabroad.com/taj-mahal-video/feed/ 2 http://matadorabroad.com/10-indian-customs-to-know-before-visiting-india/ http://matadorabroad.com/10-indian-customs-to-know-before-visiting-india/#comments Thu, 14 May 2009 15:54:39 +0000 Shreya Sanghani http://matadorabroad.com/?p=557

Lajpat Nagar by Wili_hybrid

First, please dump the clichés.

For ages, India has been viewed as a symbol of the mystical and exotic East.

Dismissing India as a cliche runs the serious risk of placing India in a timeless zone outside of the real world, which is increasingly modern and complex.

India is a vast and rapidly developing country with twenty-eight different states and seven union territories. India hosts a great many languages, religions and cultures, which coexist and intermingle.

Delhi sunset by Wili_hybrid

The real India is hardly the random (yet homogenous) assortment of the Taj Mahal, call centers, poor people and veiled women you might expect.

The India you’ll actually encounter is a lot more diverse and complicated than that. Things are changing in India at a frenetic pace, especially in the big cities.

Hopefully, these tips will give you a better understanding of what to expect when you travel to India.

Sacred cow by Wili_hybrid

Temple Etiquette

Always take your shoes off before you enter a place of worship in India, and do not wear revealing clothes.

Travelers in India are often tempted to wear shorts, but it’s crucial to keep your shoulders and the lower part of your body covered when visiting a site of religious importance.

As the land where four major religions originated, and many others arrived and never left, many Indian people take their religion very, very seriously.

If you are interested in exploring their religious sites – many of which can be of immense historical and archeological importance – please respect religious sentiments even if you are not a believer.

Street scene by Wili_hybrid

Prepare to be OVERWHEMED!!!

India carries the burden of three centuries of British imperialism, along with the weight of its own often reworked and redefined history.

Destinations

Community Connection to India

The two make a very postmodern combination. The complications and contradictions of India’s political realities will stun the first time foreign visitor.

You’ll encounter huge, swanky shopping malls very close to massive slum settlements that reek of utmost poverty.

Many visitors who stay in India leave with a sense of accomplishment, after having survived the initial overpowering shock.

And rest assured: it is a shock to learn what it means to live in India (as over a billion of us do).

Public Displays Of Affection

The beautiful lagoons of Kerala or the beauty of the Taj Mahal might make you want to sidle up to your partner and give them a quick hug and kiss, but think twice before doing that in public.

Even though you might catch young couple canoodling in public parks, it’s best not to perform public displays of affection in India.

Sexuality and Women Travelers

White women traveling in India may feel very vulnerable and exposed to some of the Indian men that they might encounter.

Due to some cultural constructs, and also a great deal of curiosity, Indian men might have formed certain false notions of the sexual availability of the foreign woman.

I am not saying that every other Indian guy you meet will be a pervert, but street sexual harassment is a phenomenon that is unfortunately widespread in the country.

You might fall prey to this due to your increased conspicuousness. It’s best to dress conservatively and keep yourself safe at all times.

Don’t forget the basic safety rules you’ve learned in your own country, and also observe the way the local women dress and behave as an example.

Hands and Feet

Hand by Meanest Indian

There’s a whole hierarchy of the body parts in Hinduism. The head is superior to the rest of the body, and the feet are lowest on the rung.

Feet are considered dirty in India, so take off your shoes before you step into someone’s house. Don’t step on anything important and if you do, immediately express your apologies.

It’s a sign of deference to bend down and touch a respected elder’s feet in India.

The left hand is customarily used for cleaning oneself after defecation, so Indian people never eat with their left hands. Also remember never to pass on anything – money or a gift – to an Indian with your left hand. The most conservative Indians might take offense.

Questions and Eyes

Bow Down by Koshyk

What might be considered intrusive in many Western cultures is only a matter of course in India. Also, people will generally be very curious about foreign visitors, and this can take the form of unabashed staring.

There’s a lack of privacy among the teeming millions of India, and the concept of personal space as you know it might not exist.

Try not to take it too personally if people on the street seem to be staring at you all the time, and if Indian acquaintances and friends ask you questions that you think are none of their business.

Most of the time, it’s just friendly curiosity, and if you smile at a staring stranger, many times you will get an amicable smile back. However, never sacrifice safety for the sake of politeness. This is especially true for women travelers.

You’ll Be Hounded

You might be seen as a rich foreigner thanks to the exchange rate, and many times you’ll be followed around by beggars, beckoned into shops by over-eager store keepers, and hailed by expectant taxi drivers.

Make sure your local friends tell you what the standard rates are, because if you’re looking to do some great shopping or have a comfortable public transport experience, you need to be in the know.

Holi festival by faceme

Indian Festivals

With so many religions and cultures, you will come across fairs, celebrations and merrymaking of all kinds.

Whether it is the shimmering lights of Diwali, the colors of Holi, the extravaganza of Durga Puja, Navaratri, Onam, Dusshera, Id Ul Fitr and Christmas, you’ll encounter indigenous customs, amazing Indian cuisine and total festive abandonment.

We Are Like This Only

English is widely used throughout the Indian subcontinent, and is the “co-official” language of the country. Indian English has a distinct flavor and in