Brain Gaps

I am TO Sudanese

The other day I was wearing a thobe and enjoying the smell of my bakhour (Sudanese incense that melts over coals and fills the room with fragrant smoke—don’t try this in places with fire alarms), and I was congratulating myself for my Sudanese-ness. My friends had been joking with me about how I’m not a khawaja anymore, I’m now Sudanese, and it went to my head. I know because I was hanging out with our West Darfur team, telling them that if wouldn’t matter if I broke curfew if I were wearing my thobe, because if I were, no one would know that I wasn’t Sudanese. I was helpfully informed by one of our staff, “Amanda, even if you are wearing a thobe, you are still white. And people will see your white hands.” This was really surprising and disappointing to me.  I mean, just the other day I took one of those online quizzes called “How White are You?” and I got 8 out of 100, which classified me as ‘not white at all.’ This is the same website whose informative quizzes helped to determine that I am Harry Potter (something I’ve suspected for some time now) and that I should be a red-head (which is going to be less possible since I’ve run out of henna I brought from India). Now it seems like these quizzes may not be entirely reflective of reality, and it has shaken the very foundations of my world. But the good news is, my wrists are no longer white because I got sunburnt in the car-ride on the way to Sirba, and even though we did break curfew (it’s the curfew for people who are obviously foreigners--7:00pm, i.e. the time that fun is just starting for all non-foreigner Sudanese), I was not abducted by any angry tribesmen, nor did I crash the car into a donkey or get stuck in the sand.

I had to leave when these
guys were just coming 

So I’m not white, if the characteristics of being white are directly related to being a 6^th grade girl in the 90’s (dancing to the Macarena and debating which boy-band is better, according to the quiz), but I am white if we are trying to hide from local police who enforce curfew and/or hostage-takers.  Wearing a thobe and knowing how to light coals for bakhour doesn’t make me Sudanese anymore than eating rice for breakfast makes me Indonesian or always bringing presents to people who invite me over for dinner makes me Syrian.

What I am is an American who has spent a cumulative two-thirds of her life in Asia and now lives in Africa, and with that comes many strange idiosyncrasies.

Eighth Grade at Deaf School graduation. Hey--Where's Waldo? 

I get annoyed when people tell me the weight of something in kilos and then remember that I’m American and try to translate that into pounds—like I didn’t have Canadian teachers all throughout my elementary school career, EY. But I do measure my morning running distances in miles, though I can tell people the distance I covered in kilometers, just in case they don’t understand. And I’m not the only one who mixes the English and the metric systems—in India everything is in kilos in the stores, but you measure well depth in feet.  So there, World.

Our rainy season family vacations were great!

But the truth is that there is a lot of American common knowledge out there that I’m not aware of (much of it having to do with ways of measuring), just as there is other international common knowledge that I missed out on, probably while I was flying over the international date line losing brain cells or something like that. I’ve been sorting through my brain, trying to find things that I don’t think are normal (which is hard since they ARE normal for me), and I’m pretty sure other third culture kids will relate to this, but even in our little group of identity-confused kids of multi-cultural upbringings, we have different brain gaps, which my bro-in-law likes to call affectionately the “third culture delay.”

Here are some of my brain gaps:

If we’re talking about the weather, I’ll give you the temperature in Fahrenheit if it’s hot and Celsius if it’s cold. (But I did just have to spell check ‘Fahrenheit’ because not only it is less practical when trying to remember the boiling or freezing points, it’s also harder to spell.)

I’ll tell you the length of something in centimeters and use the word ‘gallons’ with misguided confidence. I will admit to having no idea what a ‘quart’ is, but it is a fun word to say. Quart. Quart. Quart.

Wearing the right clothes is the best way to fit in--you can't tell I'm not Yemeni!

I can never remember if I’m supposed to put the day or the month first when writing dates numerically, so I usually just write the whole thing out: 19 February 1984 or February 19^th, 1984 (it’s my birthday—you should also remember this important date. And Hackers: take note that I never use it as my password anywhere because of my confusion with numerical dates. Also, I don’t have that much money, so it wouldn’t be worth your while anyway.).

When riding in cars, I prefer just to go sit in the back so I don’t have to worry about which side of the car the steering wheel is on.  I CAN drive—automatic and manual, but I sometimes forget which side of the road to be on and whether or not traffic rules are enforced. So it’s better just not to let me…

First camel ride a long time ago-my skills were acquired young

I could tell you almost as much about the Danish royal family as I could about the Obamas.

I find cricket and baseball equally boring.

Age 29, wearing a sari I bought at age 15 in Little India in Singapore.
My life came full circle once I finally fulfilled my destiny of living in India.

I can tell you as much about Premier League Football as I can about American Pro Football, which is to say, I know enough not to sound like an idiot in a brief conversation about favorite teams, but that’s about it.  Definitely do not ask me about names of any players who are not married to famous beautiful women.

The longer I stay out of the US, the less I know about famous musicians or the names of anyone who won a Grammy, and if you scroll through my iTunes account you will find that a significant portion of my music has been designated as “Unknown Artist” or “002 ÇáÍÇáÉ Çíå” because my taste in music is broader than my computer's ability to guess what the name of the singer is.

Crashing an Ethiopian wedding in Somaliland
with Kenyan and Sudanese friends.
This is my normal.

I can tell you the capital city of Burkina Faso, but I really don’t know what part of the US Iowa is in, much less if it even has any cities, one of which may have been designated as a capital. I'm only about 80% sure that it is a state. Iowa is a thing, right? It's not just a mispronunciation of Ohio, is it? (I know that the way to pronounce 'Ohio' varies from country to country. In India I heard it called "OH-HEE-Oh.")

A Somali friend in Yemen with more patriotism for my country
than I'll ever be able to muster. She deserves my passport more than I do.

I could fill in these gaps in my knowledge, and sometimes I’ve even tried to do that, but usually I just embrace the imbalance in my life or I try to balance out the imbalance by taking on as many characteristics as possible from countries where I’ve had the privilege to live. It’s OK. Make fun of me at will—people all over the world have been doing it for years. But don’t expect me to listen to boy-bands or dance to the Macarena or join your fantasy football league—whether it’s American-style football or The Rest of the World-style football.

High-school me demonstrating how to balance on the imbalance in one's life
OR
just climbing on a weird totem pole at Pangadaran because climbing things is fun.
(I always climb in flip-flops.)

More Somaliland Musings

Dundumo

If I were a photographer, I would travel the world make coffee table books. I feel that it is an important market niche. There are many excellent subjects for coffee table books in Greater Somalia. (I refer to Greater Somalia in an attempt to be politically correct for Somalilanders who are hoping for international recognition as a separate country from Somalia and the state of Puntland which is also Somalia and plans to go back to Somalia if Somalia ever gets its act together. I think Somaliland deserves recognition but I will not write about that because it would take too long and require sources and MLA format and lots of stuff I left behind me when I completed my formal education.) Driving around the countryside visiting ADRA worksites gave me a great view of this strangely beautiful country. While I am always fascinated by camels and flocks of goats, I am also interested in muddy unpaved roads and dry riverbeds, but I recognize that buyers of coffee tables books might not share that interest. But who could possibly not share my interest in the subject of what would be my first coffee table book--dundumo (Somali for ant hill)?

Ironically, in spite of my self-stated desire to coffee-table-book dundumo, I didn't get many photos. While it shouldn't nomally be too difficult to take photos of stationary objects, in my case, I was taking all these photos from the back of a speeding car. Occasionally we'd hit a bump, catch some air, and go flying over several deep holes only to slam on the breaks in order to avoid hitting a wandering camel. I imagine it would be bad to hit a Somali symbol of wealth and future someone's future dowry. In Garowe, someone offered 100 camels for me, but I told him that as an imported women, I was naturally going to be more expensive and I wouldn't go for less than 500 (shipping costs are higher with the pirates). He tried to bargain but then realized that in the end, products imported aren't worth as much as you pay for them-they don't last much longer than those that are domestically-produced and it is often difficult to get used to their systems. Also the owner's manuals are written in so many different languages, it's hard to find the one that you want. Anyway, I don't have many pictures yet. I'll have to make a special trip on somebody's dowry camel so I can go slower and take more photos.

These dundumo are massive. They can be more that 2 meters high. Some are tall and slim and look like how I imagine Lot's wife turned out after she became a pillar of salt. Others look more like funky dirt snowmen. Some, fittingly, are reminiscent of sand castles. I like the ones built around trees that remind me of Angkor Watt temples that have been covered by jungle trees and vines although in this case, I'm pretty sure the trees were there before the buildings, unlike the Cambodian ruins. I also appreciate the dundumo that are right beside a tree. They look like they're in a competition to see who can grow taller. Sometimes the trees win, sometimes the ants pull it off.

I also noticed that dundumo are often found in the middle of a farm with the land cultivated around them. They also aren't removed from their places even if they are right beside a house or tent. I was surprised by this at first, wondering why they weren't cleared away. First I thought that maybe the people were afraid of being attacked by large red ants, angry at the destruction of their homes. Then I was more charitable and chalked it up to Somali respect for hard-working creatures who take weeks (months? years? I have no idea...I'll have to find out before I make my book) to build their elaborate hives (hives? nests? Again, stuff I'll need to know before I publish). But later, when I requested a photo beside a particularly massive one, I was told that Somalis are afraid of them because they are "the house of the devil" which I think means that they think that evil spirits live there. It also meant that the security guard who was already mad at me for a short trip to the beach while everyone else was in the bathroom (The foreign girl will be attacked by gangs with knives! Why did you let her go down to the beach? It's not deserted as it looks! In fact there are many evil people lying in wait for her! Now I have to convince the other fatter guard to go down there and watch out for her because at least he kind of likes her.) and mad at me for stopping for another photo-op picking up a tortoise (I need to get home to chew qat because stupid ADRA refused to pay me extra money for my drug of choice!) was even more furious with me for this last stop I politely requested. He was also mad because we stopped before we noticed a large monkey clan hanging around the tree nearby (They will eat up the foreign girl and then who will get in trouble? That's right, me. The guy who didn't get to chew qat). He didn't have to worry about me going over to the monkeys to get them to pose with me. I know monkeys from childhood days in Indo. They are not nice creatures. Sure the babies are cute and fuzzy and it's so clever how they hang on to their mommies, but they bite, steal food, give you rabies, throw stuff at you, and break your things. I don't mess with monkeys. Unless I am throwing stuff at them. Fair's fair.





So I got my photo, escaped a loud lecture from the guard by feigning ignorance of the Somali language, which is mostly true but I did recognize several new words I'd recently learned (badeed-sea, deen-tortoise, daanyeer-monkey, cun- eat, dundumo-you know this word already if you've been paying attention), and sat demurely in the car for the rest of the journey planning out various titles for my coffee table book, hoping that my qat-deprived guard wouldn't start shooting at our car, trying to get us to go faster. Here are some of the titles I came up with.

My first creative choice: Ant-hills of the Somali Desert. It seems pretty straightforward, but I did struggle with the Somali part (see side note above about Somaliland, Puntland, etc). Genius will come through at the end though, of course.

Then I thought, if I were catering to a more academic group (of course academics make up a huge percentage of coffee table book consumers), I would go for something like: The Architectural Masterpieces of Somali Desert Denizens, subtitled: How Evolution Helped Ants Adapt to Harsh Surroundings that Would Ultimately be Caused by Manmade Climate Change so That When Humans Destroy Themselves and Ants Take Over the World They Will All Have Nice Places to Live.

Naturally, my very popular book would spawn a series for children which I would entitle: Ants are People Too and They Feel Sad When People or Camels Kick Over Their Houses and Usually They Eat People Who Upset Them. I think this could make a very pleasing pop-up book as well.

Sadly, photography is not one of my skills. While I do believe that those super-fancy cameras are a huge part of why many aspiring photographers actually take good pictures, A) I am too poor and too cheap even if I weren't poor to buy one and B) I congratulate myself on taking pictures when my thumb isn't making an appearance in the left corner of the screen, the object I'm trying to shoot is near the middle of the photo, and a casual observer won't find him or herself feeling symptoms of vertigo when looking the picture. Alas, I shall leave my idea to others who agree that coffee and ant houses go together and he or she can reap the rewards, financial and otherwise, thereof. All I ask is that a small donation be made to the charity I happen to be working with at the time made out to "Amanda Stillman's salary" as a way of thanking me for my awesome idea.

Somaliland Musings (one of a few more to come)

Various stories out of chronological order will be added pending my access to computers. Here's the first one:

Las Geel

Not satisfied with their own Lascaux cave paintings, some French archaeologists came to Somaliland a few years ago to check out some ancient cows on rocks they heard rumors about exisiting in Las Geel (pompously translated "The dromedaries' watering hole" by whoever wrote the poster in the guard house/museum). They immediately recognized the awesomeness of these pictures (cows and men, men and cows, cows and calves, and some cow pornography) and stayed to study them. Now the area has become Somaliland's primary tourist destination, which is to say that when we drove off the paved-ish road through the desert for about twenty minutes, we finally found a tiny house with a couple of guides hanging out who were almost as surprised to see us as we were to see them. We then embarked on a lovely hike made awkward by stupid long dresses up the rocky hill/mountain to get to the first paintings marked off by barbed wire which was already broken down. We climbed around to get a better look.

The paintings were colorful and primitive looking, and I tried to get more information from the guide-a charming older gentleman with a wooden cane that he used for hiking and pointing out important details on the paintings. He didn't speak English so we communicated through broken Somali, a bit of Arabic, and some hand gestures. Interestingly, for your future reference, the Somali hand sign for knife is similar to the gesture other people use for "I'm going to kill you." I can see how this could potentially cause problems for future tourists who might misunderstand him.

Since I was small, I always loved ruins, the older the better, even going through a brief "I'm going to be an archeaologist when I grow up" phase. I like to walk on ancient under-water roads and climb up old crumbly staircases, and I generally ignore signs telling me not to go beyond a certain point or not to touch certain objects. Naturally, I touched one of the paintings to see how the paint felt and was immediately gasped at and ordered never to do that again. Not because I might mess up the paintings (I didn't touch it enough to do take of any of the paint and I didn't scratch at it and I didn't write "Amanda was here 2011" either) but because they were unsure what the people used for paint and how that might affect my health and/or state of pureness. I thought that was a good call by the French, letting that rumor spread because I think that many people share my same desire to ignore "don't touch" signs, but if you make people afraid to touch something, they are more likely to leave it alone. Personally, I think all museums should be like the Egyptian museum where you can shake hands with a statue of Ra or tweak the nose of a sphinx. You can pretty much do anything except try on Queen Nefertiti's jewelry, which I think would be an awesome exhibit even though it would probably only last a few hours until all of the Queen's old treasures had found new owners. Anyway, I of course touched another painting, and I am happy to report that as yet none of my fingers have turned black and fallen off.