Day 30: Feedback!

Social commentary:

Our Arabic class is actually quite inspiring, but three hours can be long. I like to watch my teacher because she and my other female teacher are always donned in a similar outfit. There is a style here which is to wear a long dress covered by a sort of ankle length trench coat. They are a little bit fitted at the waist and come in a variety of exciting colors with ornate buttons and pockets to give it an edge. It may potentially be called a Jilbab, but when I googled this, it did not give the image I see here. She looks very put together every day, always has her headscarf and follows the image (to me) of modesty. If there would be an image in the dictionary of the modern Muslim woman keeping true to the whole conservative deal (without going crazy, and while still looking progressive) it would be Dr. Muna.

When we were starting to doze off, Dr. Muna deemed a ten minute break necessary. A couple of us decided to go on an adventure to find out where the bathrooms were because why would there be one in the same (entire...) building as our classroom?…not one. We walked to the neighboring building and climbed a flight of stairs to find one hole in the ground and a real toilet with no flusher or toilet paper. All our adventures appear to revolve around the bathroom, but I swear it isn’t really like that. Since there were three of us, we took turns with the toilet-de-luxe. While one of us went in, Elspeth and I stood outside the stall trying to form the first two positions in line to give the idea that we were waiting as there were other girls present (lines do not exist in Jordan, you may have thought they were “bad” in Europe, but there is no such thing here…at all… just a semi-circled clump). During our logistical nightmare of competing for this stall, we watched. For some reason we were absolutely perplexed by the site in front of us. In any American bathroom setting, you will find women, or adolescent girls in particular applying makeup and fixing their hair. But in this bathroom, the women were not fixing their hair, but instead combing through their headscarf and rearranging it the way we would with our locks. It was such a sight to see the same motions, the flipping, the curling, the pinning, the tying, going into a piece of fabric.

Good fashion is of upmost priority here (even if that means Diesel jeans with an “Orgasm Donor” t-shirt). We often see girls wandering the campus or the streets in a headscarf with skinny jeans, skin tight shirts, and always with fancy shoes. Rumor has is that Saudi women are so into their sexy lingerie that they have underwear parties of sorts in their homes with their girlfriends. The words that I’m embarrassed to say came out of my mouth when we were out of earshot were “If you’re going to do it, do it right!” The image in my head was of Dr. Muna. If you are trying to be modest, why don’t you look like her? Why are you wearing the tightest shirt Allah ever made with a headscarf? I have made a sort of inductive decision about a possibility regarding this phenomenon. I hypothesized that perhaps the way Americans see the curves of the body, that is how some Jordanians or some Muslims see hair. It appears that hair is a sex symbol, or at least a symbol of sexuality and flaunting it is flaunting your goods. Since Islam is not static is any way shape or form, and since no two people really appear to follow it the same way, I supposed that maybe “modesty” means two different things to two different people if that is even what you are going for, but maybe hair is a potential constant.

It is amazing what faith does for the masses. I mean MASSES. I feel sometimes like shouting “What if it’s all a hoax and you’re all falling for it!?” But what do I know. I guess if it keeps the blood pressure down to have a constant invisible support system, what right do I have to say anything. What are your thoughts? Should modesty be an integral part of the value system? Are there universal wells and evils in western society? Does this way of life make sense to you?