Anthropology Lessons

One of the positive things of traveling abroad is that you detoxicate from the reality of your own country. My ears escaped the past days from listening to the same Greek new songs playing over and over again.

I confess that I am unaware of which news gave performance on the domestic news bulletins. I confess that I DON’T HAVE AN OPINION! And just when guilts are ready to find their way from the back of my head, I confess that I feel more FREE!

The same time that here I would be in front of the TV screen so as to be informed by disputing TV “windows” (someone tell me, please, whether this is a Greek innovation), there I was discussing with someone from Ethiopia, France, Brasil, Kameroon, Senegal, who knows how to listen what you say and then express his/her opinion without that ” know-all” attitude. I LEARNT a lot about other countries: their economical situation, their cultural reality, facts that I’ve never heard on the news. I LAUGHED a lot, I don’t know how we made it, but this Babel had such a good communication that if I had known it before, I would have worn a water-proof mascara! I CONTEMPLATED that the word “primitive” creates different connotations to other races, it’s a taboo, and that it was a mistake of me to characterize in this way the fact that we were eating without forks or knives Ethiopian food- a ritual that I enjoyed a lot. I ENVIED the manners of ethnicities that we know little about (both the manners and the ethnicities)- and I don’t want anyone to tell me that all these are just formalities: I’d like to be more polite (a formality that becomes a way of life), more positive, more well-disposed, calmer, to show more respect and love to the others without expecting it in returtn and maybe this is the way to take it back. In other words, to get rid of many imperfections of my race.

The Quai Branly museum at the same street of Paris is characterized as a museum of anthropology, arts and culture with samples from all the continents apart from Europe- probably an attempt for the Europeans to learn about other cultures. It opened its gates in June 2006, it hasn’t been completed yet, but stands as an example of how a museum should be. There are videos showing eg. the way a tribe in Oceania fish next to the exhibited fishing tools, how carpets are made somewhere in Iran, next to a persian carpet of the previous century, while the proper music sounds around the musical instruments of some African races. In a small room I see Christian wall-paintings from Ethiopia, influenced by the Orthodox and the local aesthetics. Traditional music sounds, I close my eyes remembering stories that my friends have told me about their country and I let myself participate in another holy ceremony. Going out to the rest of the world, I meet a company of Americans who say in great enthousiasm that they could spend weeks in that museum ( I guess trying to find in vain their ancestors).

So few differences among the people through the centuries and the continents! The only things that change are the tecnique and the materials. Everyone had to invent tools, weapons, jewelleries, objects of religious worship, musical instruments. Others from corals and shells, others from gold and precious stones.

In the years of economical and cultural globalization, although things tend to become all the more similar, diversity is not always tolerable. Maybe, that’s the reason why.

My handmade leather sandals from a village of a Greek island endured walking in touristic and non-touristic streets in Paris. Now a coloured girl will be tasting a traditional Greek,homemade sweet somewhere in Lyon, while another in Washington, honey from Crete. As for me, I’m trying on handmade silver earrings from Ethiopia, a similar design of which I saw in the museum. My own globalization.

A detoxication like this is liberating. It makes you feel that you’re not only a citizen of this country, but the world. And I still have no guilts for not having an opinion of what is going on inside my country. At least I believe that I create a broader perception. Maybe, this is the way we should start…  

My own private Darfur

DARFUR: Hot Spot for Hollywood Stars, as many lifestyle magazines claim. Not only do they creat organisations like ‘Save Darfur’, ‘Enough’ or www.notonourwatchproject.org but they actually go there. It seems like a trend or a ‘must’ to be photographed next to those sweet, black, starvation-dying children. I wouldn’t like to know how these children feel next to those whites trying to save their souls. And I care less if their motives are pure and sincere. It is the results that count. So, it must be quite a success for those stars to have accomplished the awakening of Americans for an issue that takes place overseas. It’s a show with millions of spectators, who want to contribute to the Happy End. Up to this point, it’s all Hollywood-like.

So, why Sudan? and not Sierra Leone, Congo, Ruanda…There are so many places that each Hollywood star could take up a place of his/her own. Even President Bush expressed his sympathy- yes, he managed to do that- talking of a ‘genocide’. Ofcourse, in this case we can not talk of ‘pure and sincere’ motives…I guess one of the many reasons is to save his ‘political soul’ after the iraqi fiasco. Or it is about another ‘war on terrorism’ since the ‘good, black victims’ are killed by the ‘bad Islamists’.

I’m no Angelina, but I have my own Darfur. Yesterday, I recieved a letter from the ‘Medecins Sans Frontieres’ desrcribing the situation in Bunia,Congo. The doctors there managed to overcome many difficulties and help a lot of people. The children in the photos smile happy and healthy. If I were Angelina, I might be in the photo. ‘Action Aid’ does also a great job. You can take up the raising of a specific child sending him/her money, which ofcourse is absorbed for other good causes of the community. If I were Angelina, I would adopt this child for real.

 Experiments by psychologists have shown that humans respond to the suffering of individuals rather than groups, when they are asked to help financially. It’s overwhelming that a suffering puppy with big eyes and floppy ears can arouse bigger sympathy than a whole group of people. Any similarities with those photos of black children with big eyes?…

Scary thought: Why save the child? S/He is going to die soon having lived a miserable life. What is the reason to keep living in hell? Death in such places is salvation.

What I’m saying is that charity is not the answer neither the solution. Change of politicis and mentality is. I quote this incident: Mia Farrow accused Steven Spilberg of being in a way responsible for the Darfur tragedy! Because he contributed to the Chinese Olympics and China buys oil from Sudan and sells guns to it. Makes sense, doesn’t it? But, mrs Farrow, how many Blood Diamonds do you wear-coming from Sierra Leone and elsewhere?

 One way or the other we’re not just observers of those countries’ atrocities. We’re contributors both to their tragedy and charity at the same time! Makes sense, Angelina?     

Babel

Babel- the movie: A Japanese gives a rifle to a Marocain. The last one sells it to another one whose son shoots by accident an American tourist woman. The news reach the TV screens of Japan where the owner of the rifle is trying to communicate with his lost in the high-tech wilderness deaf daughter. In the Marocain wilderness the father is trying to save his sons from the police chasing them. The guilty son is disgusted with killings and guns and gives himself in. Conscious of his mistakes he confesses his guilt and repents.

Babel- the real world: A S.Korean kills 32 students in the Virginia Tech. He probably bought the gun from a local store. Its origin might be from anywhere in the world. The breaking news broadcasts the incident all over the world. Some parents from India try to communicate with their son amd find out that he dropped dead. In Greece some other parents are relieved to hear that their son was not in the scene of the murders.  The high-tech murderer is shown on a video being conscious of his intentions before the massacre. He kills himself- or so they said- at the end without any feelings of remorse. I could have a friend there or you could have a relative. Your relative could have also drunk a beer with the murderer some time.

Tragic coincidences and the phenomenon of the butterfly (or the butterfly effect)…

Life just like a movie!  

‘Dream of Californication’…at Easter time…

Red Hot Chili Peppers as genuine rockers, rebels with a cause, criticized with those lyrics their surrounding world: Superficial and vain people who sell their flesh and soul in order to climb up the Holly(mountain)wood. The term ‘Californication’ (=California+fornication, μοιχεία) wasn’t invented by them ofcourse. In the State of Oregon people struggled for years in order not to be ‘californicated’. Both examples lead to the conclusion that the Western culture corrupts in a way the people. Agreeing or not with that, the fact is that this culture(not the Westerns) is spread all around the globe via globalization.

Californication, nowadays, has evolved to a social phenomenon, which sociologists use to describe the vast amount of various festivities for a few days and the impact that this energy has on our psycology. Many religious celebrations feed such festivities and through the years, the substance of these celebrations is commercialized and finally lost. Everyone knows what happens during the Christmas period.

Now it’s Easter time. This means that thousands of Jews from the Old and New Testament are marching in front of our TV screens this Holy Week. We’re gonna learn once more by heart the dialogues from Zeffirelli’s “Jesus of Nazareth”. Our pockets are going through a period of fasting, as we’re touring from one shop to the other. The Holy Week ends- along with our tortures- on Saturday night, when we’ll finally wear our brand new outfit. On the day of Easter (Pasha, passover), flocks of sheep- not us, the real ones- are going to pass over our stomachs, cooked in various ways, while in many places, the local custom will burn the wicked Judas. We always need someone to blame. But in this case, shouldn’t we praise him? Nothing of these would happen if it wasn’t for him!!!

So, you think you can blog?

WordPress says I can. My country’s constitution acknowledges the right of freedom of experssion, and a blog is part of this procedure. I’m not aware of some countries’ constitution (eg. Egypt, China) where bloggers or users of Yahoo mail are imprisoned because of their socio-political ideology, but that’s certainly a serious issue. So, let’s talk about the meaning of perception.

Politics and religion draw people’s interest and creat passionate reactions in many parts of the world. And reaction may also vary among people of the same country. Sometimes, it happens to us to criticize or even swear our national emblems, without any consequences in many parts of the world, but at the same time we hate the foreigners who do the same to us, with dramatic results sometimes. Or vice versa: We may be imprisoned for having harshly criticize eg. a political issue of ours, when it is delt the same way by foreigners, without consequences. Confusing world!

Moreover, can we all be so carefree and enthousiastic about the freedom that this modern invention of “cybergraphy” furnishes us? It’s common knowledge that the internet is under surveillance especially after the 11/9. What if a blogger satirizes or deliberately leaves threatening innuendos(even as a joke) for the U.S. external policy? Would that make him/her a suspect of a possible terroristic act? Is it possible that someone be forbidden to get a Visa for a country about which s/he expresses a negative opinion? I want to express such opinion about U.S., but I also want to get a Visa for it. I’m sure that someday we’ll be hired or fired because of our “blog views”. It has already happened, in a way, in the case of the Egyptian blogger, Kareem Amer, who has been imprisoned.

Have we become viewers of another sequel of the “trapped in the net” scenario? Nevertheless, even though thought can be trapped, it cannot be imprisoned.