Ramadan 2019: Day 10-11

Day 10 Wednesday

Walid and I reflected before on the first instances when people called us "uncle" and "aunty." I was called aunty when attending college. Walid's nephew, Asar, called him "ammu Walid," which made Walid conscious about his age.

I went to the hairdresser in the afternoon. She was quite dressed up, in all black clothing and sharp cream-colored gel-nails, which helped me feel that I was also going for a "makeover." She was also quite focused on making this trip an "experience," asking a lot of well-meaning questions, and showing the end product through a dramatic build-up. She offered a lot about herself as well: unmarried (despite wearing a ring), easygoing, likes to travel to Europe and the Caribbean, of Italian descent...

I felt uncomfortable when she kept praising my straight hair in front of two other ladies of African descent and mused about the origins of this interracial hair salon. She also noticed my frequent yawning and asked if I partied last night. I felt slightly obliged to educate her on the idea of Ramadan. Instead, I gave up and offered a sheepish smile.

I waited for a bus transfer for forty minutes without cellphone service while Walid waited for me at Malden Center. The rushing cars, suburban decay, and the manicured, external facade left me feeling apocalyptic. The habitus of the well-tended gardens and individual houses can render immigrant existence as largely ahistorical and destined for such depressing, parochial pastures.

I reunited with Walid and complained about the foreignness of the aging suburban community and my out-of-place-ness. Walid was quite understanding although he was tired of waiting at the station. We recharged at the Indian take-out restaurant while I ate spicy palak paneer with a mango lassi. The restaurant played a punjabi playlist, including Punjabi Mast, which swept some of the blues away. Other days the TV played teledramas or Hindu and Sikh bhajans. I wondered if internet connectivity was more essential to diasporic people than non-diasporic people in the U.S. I realized that the cook/cashier man lost a lot of his hair over the short time I had met him. Walid thought it could be from stress.

A picture of maqlooba from Fauzia's Kitchen fun

We bought groceries and Walid helped carry it all the way back. He was excited over the $2 / pound mackerel that would be perfect for his baking plans. He broke his fast with the remaining lassi, while uttering the words prior to iftar. He made a vegetarian version of maqlooba and we both enjoyed it.


I felt ill in the evening and Walid read surat al-jumaa for me. I found the message about Jewish people eye-opening and somewhat disturbing as well. One version of the explanation is that the passage meant that if certain people think they are favored by God, they can "prove it" by desiring death since that is a sign that they are sure that they will enter heaven (jannah). But this life is attractive in its own ways, and among all the people I have met, only a few who I have seen in Asia have truly achieved that level of consciousness.


Day 11 Thursday 

The sun finally appeared after days of rain and clouds. I chatted with Amina in the morning, which helped me wake up my brain. I learned more about updates in her life while offering some of my wisdom on how love affects one's spirit, without using those words as such. Later, she messaged me and said that she finally realized that over-rationalizing prevents other sweet aspects of life.

I read Dr. Kecia Ali's interview of scholar amina wadud, and was comforted by the fact that Buddhism helped dr. wadud realize that God's form is not limited to an old white man in the clouds. She also said the following quote about her lived engagement with theology: “I don’t believe in a dead God; I believe in Al-Hayy, the Living God, and I don’t practice a dead religion.” The following passage is also quite illuminating:

I think in becoming a Muslim I intuitively knew, as did Africans who were brought here and enslaved who had Islamic backgrounds, that you are connected to the entire planet. You are not separated from Divine truth just because you’re separated from your origins. The reality of the sacred is manifest everywhere, in every religion, and even in nonreligions. I see that manifestation, so I’m no longer so estranged by the mandate to define a territory as exclusively mine, as a Muslim, as a woman, as an African American.

I felt rather hyper and full of energy. My roommates discussed their graduation plans and incoming relatives. One roommate's deadbeat boyfriend possibly cannot attend her graduation. I felt sorry for her.

I listened to a podcast about a study on migrant laborers in Beirut. In between, I called Ahmad and wondered if any successful Syrian ever wrote about his or her account of life as a businessperson in Lebanon. I finished the podcast, wrote down some thoughts, and ventured to school. I drank a cup of coffee and saw a few fellow students, some of whom were still grading tests before their graduation.

I read the "Repression in the Fieldwork" chapter in anthropologist Pascal Menoret's Joyriding in Riyadh and learned a lot of useful information. I liked his description of his as well as his bedouin informants' tufshan (emptiness and repressed life).  The level of social suspicion described by Menoret reminded me of the telfaz11 short that depicted a thief who tried to enter a shilla and pretended to be related to one of the absent friends of an all-male gathering.

I found anthropology quite personal: if you don't like the researcher, it is hard to relate to the moods described in the ethnography. In contrast, the data in history is impersonal. During that time, my friend CP texted me about the death of I. M. Pei. I told him that I also visited places of his works, and felt the loss of this great Chinese American architect. CP found it impressive that I had traveled to such places.

The Arabic translation's book cover

I returned my professor's book and printed some reading. I printed and began reading Baudrillard's Forget Foucault on the way back to Malden. I would not have been susceptible to such a title prior to this summer break, possibly because I have realized the limitations of working with the archive, truth, and genealogy. The first section discusses how capitalism has destroyed our understanding of sexuality, with finer words. He discusses how liberation can also be part of repression, which is interesting to think in terms of the social conditions of Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and China.

I also found relief in the sensibilities both Walid and I share, to some extent, in regards to how to discuss taboos. While taboos are generalizable, different cultures have different reasons and manners to observe those taboos. Luckily for us, we can come to the same habitus and understanding in regards to sexual taboos. When I was young, I liked generalizable information on such subjects, since they can help navigate the terrain. Now, after marriage, the practice is about what Walid and I share as truth and does not matter what works for others. Science tries to be generalizable, but ethics are specific and interpersonal. I have yet to read works on a queer modernity's vision of ethics, that would be as informative to me as Bedouin ethics of manhood, described by Menoret.

I once lamented to Walid that there are fewer and fewer people who can think with me. Many people can think against me (as is often seen in trite academic debates). But that is perhaps I have matured and found comfort in my own thinking patterns.

I met up with Walid at Oak Grove. He just finished his first day at a pizza place. There were Iraqi kurdish coworkers, one of whom worked at the same place for seven years. The Egyptian owner found Walid's skills to be quite good. Walid did not find the food suitable for himself there and waited to eat his own maqlooba. We listened to the music of the carnatic violin. I was surprised that he could appreciate the music, which my mother cannot. He joked that he cannot change this type of suffering, so he might as well enjoy it. Then he played Black Thema's song fi bilad ay hagga, which was quite depressing.

I quoted to him a version of this quote: “A poet might die at twenty-one, a revolutionary or a rock star at twenty four. But after that you assume everything’s going to be all right. you’ve made it past Dead Man’s Curve and you’re out of the tunnel, cruising straight for your destination down a six lane highway whether you want it or not.” - Murakami

We walked around the neighborhood around 11pm pretending to smoke. We saw the moon and Walid remembered how a sahaba said that the Prophet Muhammad was more beautiful than the moon.

On the way back, we discovered a skunk. Walid remembered my grandpa's cautionary tale of the skunk. We translated its name in Google and found out that skunks are unique to North America. Animals truly humble our ways of knowing and bring attention to our limited existence.

Walid wrote a very beautiful poem for me in our collective journal. We drank a can of soda, ate a lot of pepper jack cheese and slept. 

"Trees are poems that the earth writes upon the sky"

(Title is quoted from Khalil Gibran's poem Sand and Foam.)

A reproduction of "The Divine World" alongside the roads of Bcharre, "one of the Gibranean visions (1908-1914)"

The second to last adventures Morgana and I made was to Bcharre in the Qadisha valleys. Although I have not read the Bible in a long time, the reputation of the cedar trees seems to precede even the country's capital. (In Boston, I see Lebanese products that use the cedar symbol as well.) So that was my main interest in visiting the place. Morgana was also read The Prophet, so the birthplace of Khalil Gibran also interested her.

“Let there be spaces in your togetherness, And let the winds of the heavens dance between you. Love one another but make not a bond of love: Let it rather be a moving sea between the shores of your souls. Fill each other's cup but drink not from one cup. Give one another of your bread but eat not from the same loaf. Sing and dance together and be joyous, but let each one of you be alone, Even as the strings of a lute are alone though they quiver with the same music. Give your hearts, but not into each other's keeping. For only the hand of Life can contain your hearts. And stand together, yet not too near together: For the pillars of the temple stand apart, And the oak tree and the cypress grow not in each other's shadow.” 

― Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet

July 22nd

We scheduled to meet each other in the Armenian neighborhood of Beirut to take the long distance bus. I didn't have a phone or internet access and the area had no clear meeting point. Neither of us had been here before. I was a bit agitated since we might not be in the same place and there would be no way of contacting the other. I asked a taxi driver and a policeman where the bus would be. They both pointed in the same direction. While I was walking in a different direction than what they said, just to make sure that it wasn't the right direction (gotta test things out!), Morgana called my name and I saw her. We greeted each other with much excitement. The policeman also corrected us in regards to the actual bus loading site and we went towards that way. While getting in the bus, I was a bit surprised we didn't have to buy tickets beforehand. The journey lasted for three hours. The driver played some music by Fairuz played in between. Many people came and left the bus. We ate Manaooshes I bought from the Hamra bakery (furon). The road was very dangerous and windy. The architecture was exclusively Christian. It is so hard to believe that this area is closer to Tripoli geographically than it is to Beirut. I became concerned as we pass through the fog and small towns since this was not my familiar terrain. Luckily Morgana knew; she was more worried about the driving since she survived an accident ion a similar windy mountain road. I was a bit dizzy when we left the bus but I didn't know it would get worse later on.

I bought some yogurt once we arrived in Bcharre. The store owner, a woman with glasses, who looked around 38 years old, was discussing about a piece of paper. It took her some time to come attend to us. Later she said apologetically she had just got married. I realized the paper was probably the marriage certificate and I congratulated her. "Mubarak." (Not sure if it was the right Arabic  word) There was another wedding ceremony going on in the village as well, with much loud and joyous music. We were even eager to join the party but the specific location was less public than the music. We walked uphill to find our hostel where we made a reservation for the night. Morgana wisely took more breaks than I did. In the mean time we also stopped at a beautiful cathedral to take photos. I finished some salad given to me by Bayt Haleb when I bought Knafeh.

The hostel check in experience was quite odd. The female head of the household was not sure which reservation we had and later asked for our passports and information in quite a brusque manner. We were more than happy to leave the place to explore.

After we dropped our stuff at the hostel, Morgana and I went to a cute cafe: Morgana wanted eat some proper food. (In this area and perhaps beyond people served almonds and a special kind of nuts as appetizers). I was not hungry and just had cappuccino.

There were also some tourists from Beijing at the cafe. It was the one and only time I heard Chinese people speak in Chinese during my one month in Lebanon. But since it was customary to ignore one another, we did not greet. The view was amazing and we took turns taking photos. I exclaimed that I never have been to a mountainous area that had such wealth. It doesn't seem that the young people leave for the cities either. There's a lot of social activity and they are caught up with the, latest trends. Morgana also said that the stones used here are quite expensive.

We rushed to the Gibran museum because we were worried it might close. We were so surprised that it was high up in the mountains. I double checked with a man who was sitting at the gas station whether it was uphill or not. He seemed quite entertained that these two foreigners were going to go all the way up.

We had one hour and successfully toured the museum in due time.  Most of the rooms displayed Gibran's paintings that engaged with deep and heavy themes. Both Morgana and I loved the paintings, which  we did not know about before hand. He also drew portraits of his friends and acquaintances, which included Tagore and Carl Jung. I could see a lot of connections with psychoanalysis in his paintings. I would never have thought he would be from such a quaint and simple town given his engagement with rather dark and moody themes. The guide of the museum said it much better than I did: some men were born in caves but have minds of castles. It is quite interesting to think about how he bolsters or prevents the construction of a uniform Lebanese identity.

Gibran never lived at the site of the museum but he was buried here. His family members fulfilled his wishes despite initial difficulties from the religious order that owned the property. We spent some contemplative time in the thoughtful grave room that almost resembles a religious site for communion. Gibran's quote was also written in prominence in Arabic, French and English. Other Lebanese visitors were less inclined to be close to the dead.

Just before we left the museum, it dawned on me that I was suffering from high altitude sickness. I was nauseous and couldn't walk fast. I regretted drinking coffee. I sat for some time and ate almonds offered to me by one lady who socialized in the museum. Morgana, who has lived in the highest city in the world (El Pasco) and thus had no problems at 1500 meters, took care of me for the rest of the day. We walked arm in arm to a nice restaurant by the waterfall and ate some mezzes (snack dishes) for dinner. We discussed some of the friend group competition we experience as ambitious young people.

While walking back to the hotel, we passed through a lot of people who were also having dinner. It was so odd to be so close to people's houses. One young man even said hello from the inside of his house.

Some kind of Christian votive shrine

When we got back to the town center, were lucky enough to see the wedding fireworks shoot up in the sky amidst the old towny buildings. I made a nice video unexpectedly. While we were in awe of the fireworks, someone drove past us and shouted: "Bcharre! You welcome!" It took me a minute to realize he was saying you are welcome to Bcharre. It was a nice sentiment with some surprise. Looking back, we probably would have missed it if I wasn't slowed down by the high altitude sickness.

here are two short videos I made of the fireworks

We memorized some Arabic verbs and went to sleep. Luckily we were the only two in the room. Unluckily, in between 3am and 8am, the insomniac who also stayed at the hostel went in and out of our rooms just to talk a walk. The female householder  also chain smoked throughout the night. But our spirits were still high when we set out for the cedars the next day.

To be continued...