Adrift in Translation

Almost two months ago, I was fortunate enough visit the Middle East, where I climbed around the rose-hued ruins of Petra, dove in the Red Sea off the Sinai Peninsula and got lost in the labyrinth that is the Old Town of Jerusalem.
    Before leaving I had seen a documentary and read some articles on how our society villifies the Arab people. It's something that's deep-rooted and hard to notice until you're there in their country, speaking to them face-to-face.
    Admittedly, I was only there for two weeks, but it was still long enough for my eyes to be opened. People were extraordinarily kind to me, and on more than one occasion complete strangers would see me dining alone at a local cafe and buy my dinner, refusing to take any money.
    Local cab drivers ribbed me playfully about the West's preoccupation with romantic love and how the tradition of arranged marriages works so much better.
    "You meet a girl, you go to bed with her, and then what? Then she leaves!? What good is that?" said Mousa, an inveterately wise cabby from Aqaba.
    Yet I won't lie. There were aspects of the culture I found strange and others that even turned my stomach. It was impossible to avoid feeling a creepy sensation when I saw women in full-body burqas, and I fell ill at ease whenever I'd hear the eerie call to prayer blaring from the local mosque's PA system.
    (Hence, I find it pretty outrageous that some mosques England want the right to broadcast the call to prayer in communities where Islam is a minority religion. Sorry, dudes, freedom of religion doesn't necessarily mean freedom from noise ordinances.)
    My point is that even though I was meeting people who were breaking down stereotypes, it wasn't difficult for me to remember what makes Middle Eastern cultures so distant and bizarre to many Americans, including myself. And what makes them so unfamiliar is what makes them so easy to dehumanize.
     Yet, however different our views are on religion, morality and sexuality may be, Arabs are just people like us who want the same things we do: safe streets for their children to play, good-paying jobs to provide for their families, a home to call their own and a government where their voice can be heard.
    Persepolis is a French film based on the eponymous and autobiographical graphic novel about a young Iranian, Marjane Satrapi. It focuses on the cultural dislocation she feels during her adolescence as she flees her homeland for Europe and then returns only to feel like an outsider.
    Marjane grows up in Tehran beating up boys, wearing sneakers and listening to MIchael Jackson. This is an important film because, though Persian, she is immediately recognizable to American audiences.
     She wields a bold and ironic sense of humor and is quick to ridicule what she knows is myopic. She is bellicose and rebellious, especially when confronted by fools, but this belies an incredible vulnerability.   
    Stranded in Europe on her own, caught between her need to adapt to her new home and her desire to retain what had made her Iranian, she founders. Her landlord, for instance, eyes her dark hair and olive complexion suspiciously, surmising she is likely to pilfer various household amenities. At a party, Marjane betrays her culture, claiming she is French so as not to scare away an attractive male flirt.
    The film is darkly funny, beautifully animated and absolutely redolent of what binds humanity together.
    In a way, I felt a kinship with Marjane because I too have a blurry vision of where I came from, having bounced itinerantly from place to place these past six years. At times I wonder if I'm just a conquistador circumnavigating the globe: the farther I wander away, the closer I come to returning. Others I think I'm a permanent drifter, and home is a concept that no longer applies.
    Of course, for Marjane, the difference is she had no choice.  Her nomadic path was set in motion by political forces and the fear of persecution. In the end, she might have survived at a time when others like he perished. But as Persepolis gracefully reminds us, her survival was not without a sacrifice.
   

Comments

[Big Mike]

You're a conquistador circumnavigating your roommate's corn hole.