America, Germany and the Middle East
Last night I had dinner with my host family and several members of their extended family. An excellent (and huge!) dinner with lively banter and really a fun experience to sit in on a real German (non-student) gathering.Sometime during the conversation the topic of Vacations came up. My host mum was just in the forests of Bavaria with some of her girl friends. My host dad was just in Turkey with his brothers. My host aunt was just in Iran. Yes, Iran. For a fun 3 week vacation with a couple friends. They just went with no particular plan in mind, without a company holding their hands. I was in disbelief for some time.
When was the last time you heard an American causally remark that they bummed around Iran (or any other hardcore Muslim country) for 3 weeks? The best part was that everyone else at the table hearing it for the first time didn't give it a second thought. It was like she said she was in Italy.
Why does our reputation and position in the world have to be such that this Christian, White, Female, Middle Class German can take a trip like that not fearing for her life, and even a Muslim American would be at risk of abduction or assault?
I ran across another really interesting article in the NYT on how setting up more free trade with Muslim countries could decrease terrorism and foster better relationships with those who's hearts and minds we so want to win. Apparently Pakistan was just in DC a few weeks ago asking for free trade, esp. In regard to textiles, and we gave them a flat "No", oh, "But do you want some more F16s?"
Read it Here:
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/25/opinion/25mon1.html?th
posted by Jason @ 1:17 pm
1 Comments:
That's friggin crazy. We need to get this all cleaned up. Free trade would help so much, but these stupid special interests and labor unions won't allow it. And then they yell at Bush to protect us because the world hates us due to our closed borders. Insanity. Thinking 'bout ya, J-Lat, miss ya!
~Wyoming
Post a Comment
<< Home