Bombings in Mumbai: reactions on Al Jazeera

There is a certain level of irony in watching news on the Mumbai bombings from a hotel room in Morocco, which has been subject of the same type of attacks over the years, thankfully not recently. Suddenly, I had the surreal feeling of being lucky despite the otherwise unexciting trip - the first time I have been to Morocco without the wonderfully warm, yet not burning winter sun. Lucky that this multi-pronged monster did not surge in Morocco, lucky that colleagues that have just come back from Mumbai and stayed in the same hotels travelled a week before, lucky that my witnessing these horrible events is from a five start hotel room, through the lens of CNN or BBC rather that as an eyewitness.

As Mumbai's surreal three-day siege started to come to their gruesome conclusion, it emerged that outside the Oberoi and the Taj hotels and other tourist targets, another geographically and physically smaller target was hit - the Nariman house (a jewish community center). While the Nariman house may have contained less people, the symbolism behind this target is not insignificant, depsite the ongoing debate on whether it was an accidental victim or a targeted cite or the violence. As far as it known now (two days after the fighting has ended), five people lost their lives at the Nariman house, among whom the rabbi and his wife, who apparently came to India a few yeras ago to teach courses on judaism in the relatively tiny jewish population of india.

Al Jazeera, with its increasingly professional and (ahem - British) staff has decided to join the chorus of voices speaking of the Mumbai tragedy, bringing on the show a surprising guest - the ambassador of Israel (though interestingly, to the US and not India!) Usually, AJ selects the least presentable Israeli counterparts pitting them against a loudly protesting professor from Al Ahram or another such institution, ensuring that the Israeli interlockutor looks incompetent. This time, this was not the case and the ambassador was allowed to answer questions posed to him. It all started rather amicably. And then came the usual: "do you think this is a reaction to israeli behaviour in the palestinian occupied territories?". This was followed up by insistent repeating of this question by the interviewer when Shallai Meridor (the Israeli ambassador) said he saw no connection between the Israeli-PLO relations and the attacks in Mumbai.

Granted, every channel, obviously including Al Jazeera, has its bias, but where is the logic in linking every issue concerning jewish interests around the world to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict? For the moment, not much is known about the attackers of the Nairman house. One of the attackers detained by the Indian police is a 23 year old Pakistani citizen, with fourth grade education. I don't know about you, but I didn't realise that the curriculum of Pakistani madrassas included much content on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. His fourth grade educations allows one to be reasonably sceptical of his understanding of the roots of the conflict. It's also rather improbable that he has been to Israel or Palestine, if only for the tough Israeli security.

This leaves one option on the table - propaganda. Propaganda that attackers have been exposed to in their four years of 'education'. Of course, propaganda is everywhere, in every educational institution or media outlet, and certainly not only in Pakistan. It becomes more alarming however when a rabbi and his wife get killed for their supposed zionism (note to the attackers: many haredi do not believe in the state of israel despite having an israeli passport), or perhaps for their carrying an israeli passport, or for their teaching of judaism, or for their being jewish?

Though in many circles and debates divisions are being created to justify opposing Israeli interests, with various distictions between Israelis/zionists/jews being played to justify some oppostion which is allegedly not anti-semitic. Some, like Kamal Al-Hilbawi, director of the London Center for the Study of Terrorism, interviewed on BBC arabic just a few days ago, argued that attacking Israeli children is legitimate since they will eventlually become soldiers (note to Mr. Al-Hilbawi: an increasing proportion of Israelis is opting out of the army). That being said, most of those who oppose Israel or its citizens, including the Iranian president, are more selective in their critique, at least in public. What is puzzling though, is that Jewish targets continue to be attacked throughout the world not even based a single, but on multiple pre-texts: for the Jewish nature, for their Israeli nature, for their Zionist nature, etc. This 'terminological confusion' sheds some legitimate doubts on the attack on the Nairman house being accidental in nature...

Impressions of a local foreigner

When I undertake my annual transatlantic haul, I am all too content to finally get on the board of the plane, with or without dinner service, with or without 150 kg neighbours (as long as I am not in between!), with or without the window seat – simply because the procedures in France (and particularly flying out of Charles de Gaulle) is one’s worst nightmare, with no exaggeration. First, the airport which is located in the middle of timbucktwo and is naturally rather unconnected from the rest of the city. Add to this the check-in procedures and the security procedures the apparent objective of which is to prevent you from getting on that plane, without making you lose faith – at least until the last minute – that you will succeed in your mission to finally get to row x, seat y. Whoever directed 'Mission impossible' should have made it take place at Charle de Gaulle. Perfect setting. Consider the following scene:

Me (to the check in counter lady): Sorry I cannot lift up my suitcase to put in on the scale.
Her: yes, well…too bad
Me: (hinting that she might help me – an idea totally lost on her): is there not anyone that can help?
Her: you are funny, madame.

Now, I accept that sometimes I might be funny and normally would take it as a compliment, but somehow not under the circumstances.

Having succeeded to register, then there is the take-everything-off and throw-everything-out-ritual, and the start-your laptop-ritual (which naturally forces me to re-pack my suitcase while I am standing shoe-less and my purse has gone into the open on their lovely conveyor line). In essence, the familiar airport deal, just with no service but lots of attitude. I am trying to stay amused, but while I may well be amusing THEM, I am not finding this amusing at all.

On the return trip, leaving the immense Toronto Pearson which I am guessing was built on projections of it becoming the next JFK, I am thinking “this place is paradise on earth”. For me, the Toronto Pearson is like any decent Canadian house compared to the size of my French apartment – unusably large. This, coupled with its virtual emptiness, ease of passage and generally friendly employees – makes coming back to Charle de Gaulle a repeat of a nightmare for which I need serious psychological help. And yet, aside from all the logistics of it, I am normally happy to return to my status of a permanent foreigner in France, in return for my status as a temporary foreigner in Canada.

The first few trips I have made from France, I was still in my euphoria stage where just the idea of speaking English was a treat that I enjoyed, even at the expense of jetlag, relatively bad food, and the shock of seeing crocks for the first time. This time, the shock came from the question from a salesperson in response to my relatively straightforward request try on some shirts: “where are you from?” And here I was, officially a foreigner - again. I quickly considered the option of trying to explain to her the whole deal on my origins (too complicated and anyways she would have thought Ukraine is a city in the States or something along those lines). So I randomly babble out one word – France - which solicits the usual reaction along the lines of “oh, this is wonderful, you are so lucky!”.

I take my shirts and wonder along to my cabin wondering how can she know whether France is wonderful or not - after all, I could be living in some destitute village picking tomatos? Ps. Tomato pickers please don’t be offended, it just does not seem like a dream job for me. Tomatoes aside, this bring me to the moral of my story: despite the obvious difficulties of life in France (sufficiently highlighted by my airport comparison), and contrary to the common impressions of shirt salespersons, I was only too happy to be back to this side of the Atlantic where I am definitely a more obvious foreigner and where not many even bother to inquire as to where I am from because the very realization that I am from somewhere (ie. not French) is rather obvious (beyond three word sentences) and therefore does not interest anyone.

That being said, a realization that dawned on me is what matters more in this whole affair is not whether others see you as a foreigner, but whether you yourself see you as one and this latter requires point a consideration of what is important to you as a social context. Though I should by all objective criteria feel more ‘foreign’ in France, I could not help but think that this is somehow not the case. After all, home is where you decide to make it, perhaps minimizing or ignoring the differences between you and all the rest. And while to colleagues, friends and just nobodies here I am a confused Canadian, to me, I am a little French, at least for the moment. Which leads me to conclude that one can be ‘at home’ as a local foreigner and ‘abroad’ as a local traveler, all at the same time.