Me: Look at that beautiful butterfly!
Naseef: *stomp*
Naseef: *stomp*
“
You won’t allow me to go to school.
I won’t become a doctor.
Remember this:
One day you will be sick.
I won’t become a doctor.
Remember this:
One day you will be sick.
“
| — |
Poem written by an 11 year old Afghan girl This poem was recorded in a NYT magazine article about female underground poetry groups in Afghanistan. An amazing article about the ways in which women are using a traditional two line poetry form to express their resistance to male oppression, their feelings about love (considered blasphemous), and their doubts about religion. (via blua) |
I love your blog. I am now following you. Would you take a look at my blog about global education and consider following me?
Done! Always happy to read more about education :)
news!
I’ve just accepted another position here in Erbil for the next school year. I’ll be a KG teacher at the new Dream City school (provided it opens in time!) and will be living in Ankawa. I’m super excited :) I’ve also recruited a very dear friend to come over from Australia, and he’ll be teaching in Suli which will be AWESOME! This means that I don’t have to move my nail polish collection too far :)
My message tone on my iphone is Rue’s whistle. My whole first grade class now sound like Mockingjays :)
ugh.
One thing that I still can’t get used to in this country is how incredibly difficult it can be to be a woman. I had a conversation with an acquaintence at the weekend, and she said
I’m a good Kurdish girl. I don’t leave the house.
Wow.
Most of the women I have met here (and this is a limited sample, and so I’m being careful not to generalise) have been in their early twenties and are either ex-pat Kurds or students. They are conservative but love to laugh and meet people, and they’re incredibly hospitable. They are family-centric and their reputations are of utmost importance. I love the contrast to western women- my peers (for the most part, and again this is limited) are liberal, but they are share the love of meeting new people and socialising. I find it fascinating that growing up in different cultures can cause suck marked differences in adults- amongst my students, the differences are much less pronounced, if not invisible.
I’ve also had a lot of interesting (read: horrible) experiences recently which all relate to how small the expat community is here. It turns out that everyone knows everything about everyone. I met someone at a bar and spoke to him for about ten minutes, and three weeks later I’m asked whether I’m still sleeping with him. Um, what? I’m maybe used to the liberal social life that I enjoyed in Australia and New Zealand, but my god, you can go to the other extreme too. I’m not used to everyone knowing my business, especially when it’s none of theirs.. and when it’s untrue to boot. To be honest, this isn’t something that I think I could ever get used to- it makes me feel guilty for going out and having fun, even when I’m not doing anything immoral, even by western standards. Frustrating.
