Posts Tagged ‘Culture’
• France
Packing for Paris, I was unabashedly giddy. I couldn’t wait to bring my cheetah print high top boots and my hip, off-the-shoulder sweatshirt. I brought the trendiest clothes I own (mostly acquired from Brooklyn flea markets during my stint as a Williamsburg hipster). Since the buzzword while packing was “edgy,” I debated whether to even drag along my un-cool Uggs. (Until I googled the question in my title and got resounding “yes! Uggs are everywhere!”).
But when I arrived at my new home I was met with a much different type of Paris than the liberal, trendy one in my mind.
The other day at dinner I told my host-mom about the babysitting job I just acquired, watching a set of Franco American twins nearby in our swanky neighborhood, the 16th arrondissement– comparable to the Upper East Side in New York. She smiled and told me what a great idea it was and how good it would be to earn some cash while I’m here.
Then, she got very serious. The smile almost always illuminates the strong, Peruvian features of her bronzed face was completely dispelled. “Ma-eve,” she said solemnly (the French have a lot of trouble with my name and always pronounce it in two, broken syllables, like a GPS would). “Ma-eve, you need to take our your nose ring. Here, Ça ce n’est pas marche,” she told me. She went on for several minutes about the stereotypes of people like me, with piercings and tattoos, and how in this neighborhood they will often be publicly scoffed at. Her husband seconded the notion later that day and when I told him I would buy a small stud to replace my silver ring, he exclaimed “Do it, do it” almost urgently.
Since the conversation I have become more wary of stares on the subway (and there have been several) and of the conservative nature of much French clothing. Earrings, in my neighborhood, are looked down upon and pretty much everywhere, necklines don’t brave past the collarbone.
So, at least in the 16th, it seems as if I’m better off wearing J-Crew than my original thrift store ensembles (I’m still wondering about my neon green running shorts). But more than that, the conversation has made me wonder what other social cues I’m blissfully ignorant of while I hum on the metro in my cheetah print boots. Stay tuned while I find out this quarter, one way or another.
Every Monday night in Buenos Aires, a drumming group called La Bomba del Tiempo performs for hundreds of people in Centro Cultural Konex. It’s an extremely popular event, and my friend Emily and I went a few weeks ago.
In the spirit of porteño Monday nights, I hope you enjoy this video of the show!
We first saw this group perform at the 190th anniversary celebration of La Universidad de Buenos Aires and knew we wanted to go back. When we got to the theater (really more of an outdoor courtyard with a stage), we heard so much English-speaking! A disproportionate amount, because on a daily basis we hardly ever hear someone speaking English, and when we do, it definitely catches our attention and we comment on it. This day when we heard all the English, we laughed at our own sudden superiority complexes (“Sheesh…what a bunch of tourists…”) and decided to only speak Spanish to one another for the rest of the night.
It paid off because we ended up talking to some nice Argentine people and even ran into a group of Argentine friends we already knew.
I hope you like this video and have your own Monday night La Bomba del Tiempo viewing.
The clock on my phone is 4 minutes slow, but I don’t care. “Greek time” has transformed my gotta-be-15-minutes-early-because-I’m-a-journalist attitude completely.
What is “Greek time?” It’s the long conversations held every morning by the people who sit in cafes having a frappe and smoking. It’s the dinner that takes 3 hours, and you can’t even get your check because your server wants you to stay and enjoy the meal. It’s taking the time to walk slowly and admire the beauty around you. It’s being 5 minutes late to class, but not really because the teacher and half the students aren’t there yet either. It’s being on the island Poros with no agenda and no watch and just sitting by the sea reading a book. It’s the city-mandated quiet hours, aka naptime, in the middle of the day. It’s being in Delphi in the foothills of Mt. Parnassus playing backgammon for hours without even glancing at the clock. It’s never being stressed, never being late, and never apologizing for taking your time.
The very first week here I had an assignment to sit at a café, pick any Greek person there, and outlast them. The first 30 minutes went by fast and I enjoyed observing them and the city around me. Then the time began overpowering my thoughts as the next hour, or more, passed. I had finished my iced tea ages ago, but they were still slowly sipping on the same frappe.
My stress during this experience seems silly now. My favorite part of Greece has been the long meals where you take time to really be present with the people who are important to you. My favorite thing has been ridding myself of my American “jet lag” and adjusting to “Greek time.”
The point of post this is not to explain how great and therapeutic it’s been for the busy Northwestern student to study abroad. It’s because I’ve finally had the chance to reflect on what I’ve learned about Greek culture, and the mantra is something more priceless than any souvenir: take it easy.
I have already brought up a couple of different times the fact that my experience in Buenos Aires has been completely different from my expectations. If someone said Argentina to me five months ago, it was another word for exotic. Especially after my previous trips in places like Mexico and Jamaica, I was expecting to find the polar opposite of my own world.
But the more I see and learn and encounter, the more it becomes clear to me that finding exoticism is not the point. I am in a region of the world that is so diverse and filled with extremes of every kind. Yes, I happen to be in an crowded urban city right now instead of in a hut in the Amazon, but there are so many levels of culture all around me. And I have a feeling that my time in Buenos Aires is part of a bigger destiny to meet the cultures in every part of the region as I continue down this path.
The people of Latin America may be spread out across wide expanses of land, and they may foster distinct and specific cultures from nation to nation, but they are also united by an indescribable passion and spirit that runs throughout. They have a common history, a common language, a connection with the land, a vibrancy, a spice, roots that run deep and a fire that burns stronger than any other culture I know.
There has always been a richness and seductiveness, a mysticism, an ancientness, an anguish and profound love that is irresistible. For years I have admired the writing of Gabriel García Márquez because his tales of Latin America blend reality with the magical. It is fantasy in so many ways, but at the same time I get it: Experiencing Latin America requires feeling a spark of that magic, an allure to a way of life that is rich even in poverty, happy in despair, and continues to believe in spells cast by ancient peoples lifetimes ago.
In “One Hundred Years of Solitude”, García Márquez describes incredible things happening, like the spread of a plague of insomnia throughout a pueblo, or the arrival of gypsies and alchemists to a secluded village. In his world, there is something in the air and the water that affects every person and persists from generation to generation. I believe I have felt it. My father began an adventure to Central America decades ago that made him fall in love with the culture. That passion has been infectious and I, in turn, have inherited the desire to come to this corner of the world in search of something I can’t quite put my finger on.
A couple of days ago I was reading one of the city’s newspapers and came across an article about a recent music video by Calle 13 called Latinoamérica. Although the group is originally from Puerto Rico, the members have shed that label in an attempt to represent the region as a whole. This particular song is a call to all people from the North of Mexico, to the jungles of Central America, to the islands of the Caribbean, to the arid Andes, to the Brazilian slums, down to frozen Southern Cone to embrace the identity of being Latin American.
It is a musical mural demonstrating that each nation’s pain and passion is one and the same. The main singer reiterates, “soy latinoamérica” – “I am Latin America” – in an anthem uniting all. I have only recently been turned on to Calle 13, but the hypnotic melodies and images that they put out there continue to feed my ever-growing spark of obsession with this land and this heritage. Take a look and see what you think:
I know there is no way to ever fully learn the secrets of a foreign culture, but if I could somehow adopt a new one as my own, it would be this one. It feels strange trying to write about all of this here in a neatly typed format, and with an unknown audience reading my personal thoughts. Part of me feels like I should be drawing it in sand or spray painting it across the streets or making a scene out of it in a painted tin shadow box. Nevertheless, here it is.
I have been meaning to write this story for a while, but I guess the days kind of get away from me and, well, here I am finally sitting down and taking the time.
Not too long ago I was having an exhausting day full of class and commuting. I didn’t have any breaks during the day and was burned out on being pushed around by crowds of strangers in the hot subway. My homestay has become a true haven, and going home is one of the things I look forward to most every day. It was such a relief to finally get back to the apartment and know that I could have a break from the chaos.
When I turned the keys in the door I heard several voices in the apartment, and as soon as I walked in, two small, beautiful children were running towards me giggling, followed quickly by my host mom. They stopped short of running right into me, and the oldest of the two, a four-year-old boy named “Segundo” (short for Juan Segundo), looked at me with his big brown eyes and asked my host mom, Teté, “is this the señorita that lives with you?”.
Teté laughed and said yes, but that he didn’t need to be so formal and could call me “Aja”. She then told me that she unexpectedly needed to help babysit her nephew and niece for the afternoon. Being one of eight siblings, Teté has tons of nieces and nephews, but I haven’t had the chance to meet very many of them because she always goes to babysit at their houses instead.
The two children were precious. Segundo reminded me of a little french boy with shiny brown hair, a button-down polo, khaki shorts and little loafers. His two-year-old sister, Julieta, looked like a little cherub. She has blue eyes and soft, curly, blonde hair, not to mention unbelievably big rosy cheeks. I could hardly handle the cuteness toddling before me. Before I could even set my bag down, Teté reminded them that it is polite to give a kiss, so one by one they came over and gave me little kisses on the cheek accompanied by, “Hola, mucho gusto” (“Hello, nice to meet you”). It was about as great as hugging a dozen golden retriever puppies.
The next hour was filled with stuffed animals, snacks, dancing to kids’ music, and little kid babble in Spanish. I have truly missed being around kids, especially my own nieces and nephews, and it made me so happy to have a break from other adults to just play and answer hundreds of little questions that Segundo and Julieta were firing at me.
They asked about the names of my pets at home, my favorite types of food, whether I know how to ride a bike, if I have to take the bus everyday, what my parents look like, if I like candy, and on and on. Then they told me all about their own likes and dislikes and they each took turns singing songs to me that they had learned in daycare. Meanwhile, they were fluttering all over the place and Teté and I were chasing them upstairs and downstairs, out on the balcony, and in laps around the kitchen.
After a while, Teté got them ready to head out and visit her grandmother that lives nearby. Before they left, Segundo noticed a wind-chime that was hanging by a window in the living room area. He asked what it was for, so Teté opened the window to show him how the wind causes it to make music. She told him it is called a “llamador de ángeles”, or “angel caller.” As soon as a little breeze came, it made a delicate clinking noise and Teté explained that now the angels will hear the chime and know to come visit us here.
I was in awe at being a part of this. After a while, the number of new cultural things I see here has started to get less and less each day. Yet this is something so small but beautiful to think about that I felt the urge to pass it along. Upon hearing this, Segundo nodded and smiled, understanding perfectly well now what the wind chime is for.
The three of them then left, but not before another round of kisses on the cheek, actually two this time because Teté told them, “don’t you think the señorita deserves twice as many kisses?” Gosh, talk about a great way to turn the day around.
Now that the weather is warm and refreshing, Teté has been keeping that window open more often, and I am constantly reminded that angels are coming by to visit each day.
Remember that post where I was talking about how I’m a really good eater? I prefaced that by saying that there are a lot of things in life that I’m not good at. And one of those things is dancing. So when it came time to choose a performing arts workshop that my program here was running, I was a little worried. The options were: kora (a beautiful West African harp), djembe (the main West African drum), tama (the Senegalese talking drum) and dance. I haven’t ever loved playing musical instruments, and I do love to dance so I tried not to worry about my incompetence and made myself go for it.
I’m really glad I did.
Despite a few serious dancers being in my class, we all struggled. Clearly, they moved in a way that looked a lot better than I did. But our instructor Tuti, who I thought would be a teddy bear of a lady based on her smiley appearance and body shape, ended up being a little scary. Her smile came off with her shoes at the door. Once class started, she was all business. Tuti’s two brothers played djembe for us, and the whole family was involved in keeping us on track. The strange thing was that they used almost no oral instruction (despite the fact that they all speak French). There was a lot of “NON! Dancez après baa baa baap, pas baa baa baaaaap.” The “baap” and “baa” of course refers to various drumbeats that we couldn’t discern, so none of us had any clue what instructions like this meant in practice. Besides trying to make sense of the little bit of guidance we received, we were also dodging missing floorboards in the studio and trying to maintain a normal body temperature despite the complete lack of airflow and the ninety-degree temperatures.
Ultimately, the class was so exhausting, and so incredibly fun. I am not delusional enough to think that my dancing looked even halfway decent or was anywhere close to correct, but I think one reason I loved this style of dance so much was that it’s really about energy and personality. The movements are challenging and super fast. But precision in terms of posture and placement is less important. Mostly, it’s about moving in time with the music. In saying that, it seems like a representation of Senegalese culture as a whole. No one is too worried about making everything perfect or streamlined (sometimes establishments decide to randomly close when they’re supposed to be open, people are often late or may not show up to appointments, etc.) but the incredible vivacity is impossible to miss (bright colors everywhere, incredible hospitality and warmth, etc.). In one dance class that was just a few hours for a few days, I found a boiled down version of Senegalese culture. Sometimes frustrating and always exciting, it was emblematic of the parts of Senegal that are hardest for me and also the things that make me love it.
Taking a taxi in this country is quite terrifying. I’ve written about the roads here before, but now I need to explain them, and all they reveal, in detail.
After only a few weeks here, the first piece of advice I’d give any newcomer is to stay off the roads at all costs. Traffic accidents are the second highest cause of death in Jordan, and it seems that everyone knows someone who was killed in an accident.
Unfortunately, the only forms of transportation here—busses, private cars or taxis—involve roads. There are no trains, and walking might be the only thing more dangerous than getting on a road.
Of those forms of transportation available, cars are taxed with a 200% import fee. Busses have no schedule—much like Jordanians themselves, they arrive whenever they choose.
Now that all other forms of transportation have been ruled out, a guide to navigating the streets of Amman:
When you get in a taxi, you don’t know what you’re getting yourself into. You may have a chatty driver who wants to hear all about America, or you may have a creepy driver who really wants to hear about America. You may have a driver who will not talk to women at all. Your driver may know where he is going, or he may only pretend to know where he is going. Halfway to your destination, he may ask you for directions. Your driver may reflect any of Amman’s distinct cultural groups.
Once you finally figure out what type of taxi you’ve gotten yourself into, you begin to assess the other cars on the road. Sure, there are lanes, but those are totally overrated when you can cram five rows of cars onto a street meant for only three. True to traditional Jordanian culture, the more the merrier. Turn lanes? Who needs those, when you can make the turn faster from the center lane? Who you know or to whom you are related is much more powerful than simple laws in Jordan. And the traffic circles. Those horrifying carousels of doom are the only type of traffic control present in the city, but they are everywhere. Like Jordanian politics, cars travel round and round, turning off wherever and from whichever “lane” they please, coming dangerously close to violent collision. Sometimes, they aren’t so lucky.
Pedestrians are mere annoyances, and should be run over if they get in your way. The same applies to other cars. You are the only person on the road, and if anyone dares to challenge that, honk your horn at them as rapidly as possible. Jordanians are known for yelling about everything when they are among family, and the family of cars is no exception. If someone cuts you off, or drives too slowly, or you don’t like the color of their car, let them know as loudly as possible.
But, somehow, some taxi drivers are lucky enough to carry passengers to and from work, school or the store each day safely. It’s as if they have a secret Jordan Taxi Code—no outsiders allowed. They are all on the same page, able to communicate silently through the very thin and flimsy steel car doors.
If you’re lucky, your taxi driver will steer with no hands. But then again, when you have to smoke your cigarette and count your cash (obviously much more important than driving), while attempting to shift gears and praying your car doesn’t fall apart, who has time for the steering wheel?
I’ve been in Greece for three days and I am happy as a harpy (ok, they’re not that happy, but it sounds more “Greek” than a lark). There are so many details I want to share with you about my time in Athens so far, so I think it’s best to organize my thoughts into how I’m experiencing everything: my senses.
The sounds of Athens
Greek is a soft language in volume, but that doesn’t mean it’s not passionate. In the late mornings and late evenings, the city buzzes with this modern language filled with so much ancient history.
Every day from around 2 p.m. (14:00) to 6 p.m. (18:00), a blanket of silence falls over the city. The shops close, people sleep; it’s eerie but also peaceful. Even during the city mandated “quiet hours” mopeds whirl by my window.
The sights of Athens
My neighborhood, Pagrati, is covered in graffiti, which is something I was not expecting. The graffiti here seems to be different than in the U.S in its method and message. Expect an entire post on graffiti once I’ve done more research.
Some graffiti in my neighborhood
In downtown Athens, every building looks ancient and majestic. This building is the National Library of Greece, and is surrounded by other grand buildings with columns. The views of Athens really do show the marriage of ancient and modern cultures.
The National Library of Greece
The tastes of Athens
I eat Greek food a lot at home, but nothing can compare to how they do it here- except for my YiaYia’s baklava, which is and always will be the best. We took a trip to a famous bakery to get loukoumades (λουκουμάδες), which are sort of like Greek honey doughnuts. Delicious.
As much fun as it is to eat out here (amazing fish, fresh Greek salads, etc.), it might be even more fun to cook because the food is so fresh. There is a local market on my street where we bought fresh fruit and veggies from vendors. Then for dinner my friends and I cooked rosemary eggplant with pesto, olive, tomato pasta and prosciutto.
Fresh Greek pasta with a homemade sauce
The coffee here is interesting enough to get it’s own post. I’m learning how to make it in about an hour, so look forward to pretty detailed instructions soon. I’ll help you bring a little bit of Athens to where you are!
The smells of Athens
The smells of ouzo and sweat come drifting out every evening. The mornings smell like sewage, as it’s not possible to flush toilet paper here. Therefore, the trash is filled with pretty foul smelling items. Other than those, the smells are intoxicatingly delicious. My school is next to a bakery, many cafes, a gelato spot, and a gyro joint. All those smells converge on a square where children are always playing. It is a picturesque, quaint Greek scene.
The touch of Athens
Every sidewalk is made out of slippery stone. I have already two skinned knees and bruises on my legs from falling down.
It also feels hot and sweaty basically all the time. Air conditioning is non-existent except for the grocery store. It’s a good experience for me, as someone who grew up in a place where there was no space too small to air condition, because I am very far out of my comfort zone.
The 6th “sense” – my feelings of Athens
My feelings are often contradictory. I feel comfortable for an hour, and then suddenly I’m far out of my comfort zone. On the plane here I was happy to be seated next to a few Greek women, whose talks about values and religion made me feel like I was going home, rather than to a new country.
When I got here though, I did not feel as connected to the culture as I thought I would. There have been moments of great pride in my roots- like when I could correctly identify the picture of the epiphany celebration. But there have also been moments where I almost felt like I didn’t belong at all- like when I couldn’t communicate to the nurse that I was no longer sick, but she put me in a wheel chair anyway. That’s a story for another time though.
Traveling is not just something I do; it’s a part of who I am. With travel comes the exploration of culture. In culture I find people with rich, deeply rooted traditions and beautiful diversity. It is perhaps in part my curiosity of the unexplored that I am so interested in different cultures. I so strongly believe that though each human on the planet grows up knowing different cultures and experiences, we are all inextricably bound by one commonality: we are human. It is my desire to understand others’ backgrounds that drives me to want to explore the world and all it has to offer.
For this desire and curiosity, I blame in part my background. Hailing from a small suburb of Boston, Massachusetts, I consider myself somewhat of an anomaly from this little town of Holliston. Since the end of middle school, I have felt like the little rebel who “wants out.” It’s not that my town is such a horrible place––it has good public schools and the people here are nice––but rather it’s that I perceive it as having a lack of culture. As a town of nearly 97% Caucasians, I have grown up as part of the (vast) majority group. Though Northwestern has provided me with more cultural diversity than my hometown, I am eager to experience the feeling of truly being a minority.
I’ve been reading “Miss Smilla’s Feeling for Snow” by Peter Høeg for my class, The Scandinavian Detective Novel. After a summer of consuming Agatha Christie novels, it’s lovely to dig into a book that comes from the same genre of crime fiction, but that also has its own unique, Scandinavian flavor (which usually means gloomy, pensive, and pessimistic – yet still very enjoyable).
This novel is quite popular in Denmark, and because it’s set in Copenhagen, I’m already starting to recognize some of the places mentioned. When the main character heads toward Kongens Nytorv or hears the bells from Our Savior’s Church, I feel a sudden connection with the author, almost as if we’re in some kind of exclusive club of Copenhageners.
We’ll be taking a walking tour of some of the significant locations from the book in a few weeks, and I can’t even begin to describe how happy I am to be taking this course. The intrigue, the mystery… the humbling realization that you probably aren’t as brilliant as the protagonist is. And while these novels might be dismissed as fiction, they also shed light on serious issues, such as human trafficking, immigration and racial tensions, and gender issues.
The reason I’m mentioning all this, however, is because I wanted to share an excerpt from the book. There are many passages that I’d like to copy down somewhere just so I can read over them and soak in the ideas behind the words. Here’s one on traveling:
“There is one way to understand another culture. Living it. Move into it, ask to be tolerated as a guest, learn the language. At some point understanding might come. It will always be wordless. The moment you grasp what is foreign, you will lose the urge to explain it. To explain a phenomenon is to distance yourself from it. When I start talking about Qaanaaq, to myself or to others, I again start to lose what has never been truly mine.”
In some ways, I understand exactly. I feel myself absorbing the details of this new environment, and I don’t feel a need to explain it, only to live it. At the same time, something also pushes me to view things as an outsider, because I want others to see what I see. I can only do so if I’m capable of thinking not only as a writer but also as a reader. Not everything can be put into words, but that doesn’t mean I won’t try.
So somewhere in between going to class, spending time with my host family, hunting down more cozy cafes with friends, and reading detective novels, I’m trying to find the right balance.
Great article!
