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From Middletown to the Middle East

~ Reflections on travel and teaching

From Middletown to the Middle East

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Greetings in Oman: more than just “hi”

16 Wednesday Mar 2016

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We were picnicking in a wadi when a farmer came around the corner, carrying on his head grass for his goats. Our guide rose and exchanged the following greeting and farewell (my apologies for poor transliterating/translating – it’s what I could get from my guide after):

Salaam aleikum (Peace be with you)
Aleikum Salam (And with you peace)
Kief Halek (How are you?)
Hamdulilah ([I am well,] Thanks be to God).
Mash Akbar? (No news?)
Mash ulum? (No information?)
Diar salime (The country is safe)
Bifuthel Allah wa Qaboos (by the grace of God and His Majesty Sultan Qaboos)
Ma Salama ([Go] with peace)

…and the man went on his way.

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Wealth, poverty and wealth again

13 Sunday Mar 2016

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Oman has swung from substantial to impoverished and back again. The trading history is fascinating and romantic. In the 18th century Oman controlled a series of ports along the Somali and Kenyan coast, as well as the island of Zanzibar. Trade was conducted by dhows, the last of which was built for (for actual commercial use!) in 1951.

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Built as an actual trading vessel in 1951! Cool, but also showing the technological limitations of Oman at that time.

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The beautiful harbor and lighthouse of Sur

Nowadays in the Omani coastal town of Sur they are still building dhows. Now, however, wealthy princes from other Gulf states order them as symbols of their commercial history! Made of teak and taking a year to construct, they don’t come cheap.

Fancy new dhow!
Fancy new dhow!
Caution: symbolic use only!
Caution: symbolic use only!

During the 20th century came a time of steep decline; Oman became incredibly poor. Since 1970, however, when the current Sultan deposed his father, the increases in all markers on the human development index have been dramatic. Oman once again does a serious sea trade; this time in oil and natural gas.

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LNG tanker off the coast of Sur, Oman

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Figuring out who is an Omani, and what jobs they do

11 Friday Mar 2016

Posted by tgilheany in Oman, Uncategorized

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This is my first time to a Gulf country, and I am particularly interested in questions of wealth, poverty, oil, and guest workers. On my Etihad flight from New York to Abu Dhabi, no-one was wearing traditional Gulf Arab clothes. There were no men in dishdashas, and I did not even notice a woman who covered her hair. In terms of appearance, if you hadn’t told me where the plane was going I would have said India. Most of the folks who didn’t look European on this flight looked South Asian to me. Were these mostly guest workers? Or were they just Indians and Pakistanis changing planes in Abu Dhabi? And is there another airline or flight time that is more popular for Gulf Arabs?

On our flight from Abu Dhabi to Muscat, however, there were significantly more folks in traditional dress, most clearly a group of young men. When we got off the plane, there were four paths through immigration. The first was marked “electronic gates” – the young men in dishdashas went that way. The second said “GCC nationals” – I’m not sure I saw anyone head that way. The third was not labeled as far as I could tell, and we were waved that way (just on the basis of our appearance, I think). The fourth said “retinal scan”, and that is where the folks who looked South Asian went.

Since we have arrived, I’ve been getting a better sense of identifying who is an Omani and who is a guest worker. There are many, many of the latter. As a tourist, I’m pretty sure none of the restaurants I’ve eaten at have had Omani staff. At the same time, it appears that this doesn’t mean that every Omani is wealthy. We visited a fishing village today, for example, that was not fancy by any means. And one of the first things one reads about Oman is that it has far less oil than other gulf states (though oil production still accounts for over 50% of GDP).

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Fisherman, Qantab Beach

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Changes and combinations in Tashkent

27 Monday Jul 2015

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A few observations about Tashkent from our day wandering the city:

There are a smattering of women dressed in brightly colored hijab, and a few older men wearing traditional caps. I was curious that the huge Jummah mosque was built in 2007-08 – I wonder what the story behind that is. There is a lively tradition of drinking – we went to a beer hall reminiscent of Eastern Europe, and apparently beer mixed with vodka is a popular drink. So the Islam at least of Tashkent seems to be a watered down (or ginned up?) version. Tashkent holds one of the oldest Qur’ans in the world, but alas for no clear reason the library holding it was closed today. I’ll have to satisfy myself with the images online.

The history of the statue in the main square is the history of the area in the 19th and 20th century. The first monument was to the Czarist governor general Von Kauffman. Then after the revolution came an image of a Red Pioneer, to be replaced by a hammer, sickle and cannon. A statue of Stalin rose in the 30s and fell in the 50s, to be replaced by a triptych of Marx, Engels and Lenin. Most recently after the fall of the Soviet Union Timur on his horse took the place of honor. For a dictatorship, there is absolutely no cult of personality – I have seen no picture of the president for life yet (though on our train ride to Bukhara, a poster had some saying attributed to him). Police presence appeared minimal, though once we saw several men in gray camouflage who our guide identified to us as from the ministry of the interior. Oddly, though, our bags were searched when we entered the subway. Apparently this is not always the case, but independence day is coming up…in a month!

The script is slowly changing. When the Russians took over from the Ottomans, they replaced the Arabic script with Cyrillic. Now the Cyrillic is slowly being replaced by the Latin script – we were told that school kids now cannot read the Cyrillic script well. The Uzbek currency is totally unwieldy – their largest bill is 1000 soum, which is worth at the moment about U.S. 25 cents. Thus, to pay for a delicious dinner for four people plus wine, $51, took more than 200 bills. We had stacks of bills in groups of 10 on the table counting out our payment! Several markets were very lively, though alas set in or around socialist 20th century buildings. Most of the areas we visited were fairly empty – probably most people were working, and it is quite warm during the summer.

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Linguistic and monetary echoes of the Soviet Union

26 Sunday Jul 2015

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We exchanged money through an acquaintance. As he explained, 2550 soum to the dollar is the official rate. The safe rate (he goes to an apartment of a friend he trusts) is 3800 – $1. On the street you could get 4000 – $1, but it is not safe.

My mom after the exchange

My mom after the exchange

We had to give him new $100 and $20s. The $20s had to be crisp and not after 2003.

Also interesting – he speaks only Russian and English. He’s born and raised in Tashkent, and when he was in school (though he seems like he would have been in school after 1991) they were teaching in Russian. He knows enough Uzbek for the market. Now, he says, more Uzbekis know Uzbek, though everyone in the cities still knows Russian.

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Tashkent – More Soviet than Silk Road (so far)

26 Sunday Jul 2015

Posted by tgilheany in Uncategorized

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Last night, after arrival into a mid-size airport that functioned fairly well and that kind of a drive through empty streets where you try to get a sense of the city in a jet lagged blur as it zooms by, we got to bed around 4am.

Tired at the Tashkent Airport

Tired at the Tashkent Airport

I hit the ground running at 7am with a visit to the City Palace Hotel’s exercise area. I came down from my 11th floor wood paneled room. They had a serviceable room with two treadmills, some weights and a stationary bicycle. The steam room was small and beautifully tiled, and I would have tried to capture some of the sense of a hamam except that it was the hottest steam bath I had ever been in! A quick stop in the sauna and some laps in the pool completed my gym journey. Breakfast in the surprisingly cheerful and reasonably sized coffee shop. Overall, I get the sense that someone with moderate aesthetics, taking a signal more from a nice Hilton than from the empty and grand monstrosities of the old Soviet empire, built this hotel.

Most of the streets are very modern.

Broad avenues

Broad avenues

People that I see so far look generally white, along the same spectrum that white folks in the U.S. would look. They don’t appear central Asian – well some do a little bit – is this a city vs country thing? The good morning greeting is “Salaam aleikum.” Neither last night at the airport nor today at the hotel do I see anyone in any form of traditional dress. A quick walk next door to the Timur Museum did reveal two women in brightly colored hijab. The young men hanging around the lobby of our hotel are wearing football (soccer) polo shirts and either shorts or slacks.

A few traditionally dessed women walk in front of the Timur museum

A few traditionally dressed women walk in front of the Timur museum

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Ibn Sina’s thoughts on the good ruler

09 Tuesday Sep 2014

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Erwin Rosenthal, Ibn Sina, just ruler, reason vs revelation

I am getting to know Ibn Sina’s (Avicenna in the West) political ideas through Erwin Rosenthal’s Political Thought in Medieval Islam. I need to read Ibn Sina himself, but in the meantime here is my first approximation of his concept of the preferred caliph.

To understanding medieval political philosophy, we must begin with the premises that God exists and is omniscient, omnipotent, and omnibenevolent. Then we pursue the following line of reasoning: the Divine wants people to be happy, both in this life and the next. Humans can only pursue the good life in the context of a well-ordered state. Thus, we must identify what such a state looks like.

Humans have two routes to knowledge in this worldview: revelation and reason. Revelation, being a direct communication from divinity, must be all encompassing and thus superior. Medieval philosophers thus faced a problem: why reason at all, if one could simply rely on revelation alone? Some Muslim philosophers, as well as some Jewish and Christian ones, responded that there are different paths to God, and for most people obedience to revelation is sufficient. To some, however, God gave a nature to follow a more complex path. As Rosenthal notes, “The distinction between the elect metaphysicians and the masses maintains religious equality and a concern for the happiness of all in accordance with the intellectual capacity of each individual, despite its claim that only the philosopher can penetrate to the inner, hidden meaning of these concepts, whereas the masses must be content with a metaphorical explanation.” The philosophers used this characterization of revelation as using metaphors to create the room for their work. Logical reasoning is more challenging than following metaphor, and thus reserved for elite thinkers.

Ibn Sina (d. 1037 CE) works in this tradition. Along with al-Kindi (d. c.873 CE), al-Farabi (d. 950 CE), ibn Rushd (d. 1198 CE), and others, he builds on Plato and Aristotle. Ibn Sina argues along with them that the leader, the caliph, must possess noble virtues. The core value is justice, which one realizes by pursuing the Golden Mean. The three other Platonic political virtues, wisdom, temperance and courage, devolve from justice according to Ibn Sina. In our discussion, Professor Khan noted that ibn Sina’s emphasis on justice made sense, since justice is even more strongly emphasized among Shi’ites than Sunnis, having suffered historical injustices.

One part of Rosenthal’s description of Ibn Sina’s argument I found challenging – when he describes how to handle undeserving rulers. It runs: The people must obey the caliph. If the ruler lacks the political virtues, however, the people must switch their loyalties to a challenger, if a worthy one is available. They must rebel against a tyrant. At the same time, the people should support a strong, impious caliph over a weak, pious caliph. Rosenthal sees these last two rules as inconsistent with each other. One could argue, however, that Ibn Sina is ranking caliphs from 1. pious and strong, to 2. impious and strong, to 3. pious and weak to 4. impious and weak. Within the second category, whether the caliph counts as a tyrant who needs to be deposed depends on how cruel he becomes. This advice would fit with the overall medieval philosophical understanding of the goal of a ruler: to provide a well-ordered state in which the populace can pursue happiness in this life and the next through submission to God. This goal is perhaps why Ibn Sina sees the less moral but capable ruler as preferable to the more moral but less capable ruler. At least under the former you have some chance of living an orderly life and focusing on the good life. Under a weak ruler, not matter how well intentioned, security will collapse and the probability of focusing on higher values will collapse with it.

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…and learning

27 Wednesday Aug 2014

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There is much travel and teaching reflection I need to do from this summer – I took 17 students and two fellow teachers to Israel and Palestine, and I also vacationed in Germany with my family. For the moment, though, I will use this blog (also?) to reflect on a course I am currently taking: Islam in Global Affairs with Muqtedar Khan. Thus the next entry…

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Crossing borders in the northern Balkans

01 Thursday Aug 2013

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borders, Croatia, European Union, Italy, nationalism, Slovenia

20130801-181301.jpgNo longer needed: checkpoint building between Italy and Slovenia

As we drove from one part of Slovenia to another, we crossed briefly through a slice of Italy. The border is marked by a sign and several abandoned checkpoint buildings. For those not used to thinking historically, this may seem like old news – after all, the EU has been a fact for a while, and recently has been more criticized than praised. Just 70 years ago, however, Italy was running brutal concentration camps in Slovenia. This open border without occupation is both unprecedented and a great boon for the well-being of all in the region.

Meanwhile, Croatia has recently been admitted to the European Union, though it has not yet become a member of the “Schengen” customs union, as Slovenia has. Thus the crossing between the two requires a (fairly gestural) stop, which will disappear in 2015 or so, when Croatia is admitted to Schengen. While a young Croatian I spoke with is worried that EU membership will turn them into Greece, again my bias is that less nationalism is better.

20130801-225019.jpgThe EU circle of stars is the latest flag to fly over Zadar

Reinforcing my belief in the need to transcend nationalism are the various stories of the siege of Zadar by Serb forces in the 1991-95 war. It is strange to live in and walk these streets and imagine this beautiful seaside town without electricity or sufficient food and medical supplies, intermittently shelled.

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Egypt today

01 Monday Jul 2013

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Egypt, military, Muslim Brotherhood, revolution, SCAF

Egypt’s military just gave Morsi 48 hours to “comply with the peoples’ wishes.” Some tweets I found insightful: “Raise your hand if you think a highly disciplined religious movement that survived arrests and killings for 85 years is going to go quietly.” – Evan Hill, Cairo-based journalist. “Choice facing Egyptian people: Generals who’ve proved they can’t govern. MB ditto & an opposition that can’t get organized enough to govern.” – Paul Danahar, BBC Middle East Bureau Chief. “The one thing I can say with certainty is this: I have no idea of how any of this will play out. I am as in the dark as you are.” – Mahmoud Salem, Egyptian secular activist.

In May 2012 I was in Egypt as the people expressed great enthusiasm for their first free elections. I then watched as the democratically elected president worked the military out of power and expressed his willingness to work with all parties. I was hopeful, and nowhere near as critical of his ties with the Muslim Brotherhood as many others.

Then came the steady decline – forcing representatives of the other religious groups and the seculars out of the constitutional process. Anti-semitic rantings from several years prior emerging. Losing control of the Sinai. More and more people becoming nervous – with a corresponding drop in the economy.

Yesterday’s protests were amazing to watch, though obviously concerning as well. After all, setting a precedent for toppling an elected leader isn’t ideal. And now the army is here to “help.” I’m reminded of the title character’s deadpan reaction in the 1985 film “Fletch” when confronted by an armed crooked cop: “Thank God. The…police.”

I don’t know the route forward, but I hope this is the bumpy road to progress and not the backsliding to some form of authoritarian or oligarchic rule.

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