It's funny how quickly you can get used to things.
Like the fact that I used to hate mangoes and now I can peel, cut, and eat them like it's my job. Like the fact that I'm online roughly 16-18 hours out of every day. Like the fact that I now respond to the names "Abyad" ("Whitey"), "Khawaga" ("Stranger") and "Madame" (I think you'll be familiar with that one) even though they're oddly impersonal and/or ill-fitting.
Like the fact that I have hired two women to work in my home and help with the house work while I sit here in my home office to telecommute. Like the fact that five times a day I get to listen to men singing through amplified microphones from the tops of tall towers from several directions near my home, all roughly at the same time, all using the same words, all just slightly different, forming this rippling, echoing, harmonium.
Like the fact that life in this distant place now seems normal. There's less to comment on, less that just makes me go hmmmmmmmm.
Of course there are the reminders that things really are different here. Like the story I just heard about a man whose wife was raped by his cousin and now the wife faces charges of stoning. Or the fact that I have to have a permit to take a photograph or travel to another town. Or the fact that if I go on writing in this vein, I put myself and family at risk . . .
How does that happen? That things once so unfamiliar and shocking have now become unremarkable? Is it a phase of acculturation/culture shock? Is it early-onset senility? Or is it just the human ability to adapt, forget, move on, and survive?
2 comments:
It's called: you're starting to be the traveller, not the tourist. This is what will make your blog *more* interesting, not less. And it's called being human, adjusting to what is.
I do miss the sound of call to prayer.
S.
This is exactly why there is so much value in communicating with those of other cultures. they are our mirror. through their questions they reflect back those parts of our cultures that we no longer see and that may not serve what we value. we are grateful that they asked us so that we could see what we have become accustomed to.
Post a Comment