Marketable Identities

I hope the title isn't a misnomer.

I just went to a round table on reporting from/about Iran. It was interesting -- one of the women who spoke was based in Iran until a year or two ago while the other reports almost entirely in absentia. It was curious because both felt like the work they were doing was more accurate or representative of the view of The People than much of what we get in the West -- it's interesting that in this day and age accurate reporting in absentia is possible. Communications are open, the internet is here, people can take videos from their phones -- all this allows you to be connected to sources without physical proximity.</p>
<p>Really what was interesting to me, though, was this: the event was sponsored by Fletcher's own all-stat professor, who is of Persian ancestry; the panel was chaired by student of Persian ancestry; and both journalists were women of Persian origin.</p>
<p>It makes sense, of course it makes sense! Both journalists made the excellent point that long gone are the days when you can ship off a journalist with zero language skills to a region and count on them to shape public opinion back home.  Language skills pour over into a multitude of fields-- for example, Istvan Deal wrote so perceptively about Hapsburg Hungary because he spoke Hungarian when few other historians could be bothered.

Thinking about it made me jealous, I guess, of these people who had grown up bilingual and bicultural, ready-equipped to plug the gaps in our understanding of Iran. Is it unfair to suggest that this is a ready-made path? Certainly I don't want to denigrate anyone's achievements or any hurdles they might have leapt (I have no insight into the difficulty of growing up in an immigrant community, for example, nor have I tried to become a journalist or get a PhD), but at the same time it seems to me that beginning a specialist on your could try of origin for the benefit of a foreign audience is a door that's always open.

Perhaps I come at this as someone who would like to be a subject matter expert, but must start from scratch. Sometimes I feel inauthentic -- what right do I have to claim to know a people or a region? But you have to start somewhere.

Passports

I was delayed in Rite-Aid yesterday because a gentleman ahead of me in line was asked to provide ID. He was Irish, so he handed over an Irish passport. I've been around passports enough that they don't scare me, but it was a big problem for the nervous-looking man at the register. Probably within two years of my age, this guy looked like he had been promoted once and subsequently grew a beard, as though the scant covering of hair on his face might somehow confer upon him the authority and competence that he was previously lacking. He was doing his best to look put-together -- his shirt was tucked in, his pants were pleated and belted, and as I walked by he welcomed me to Rite-Aid and wished me a good day with more gusto than I would have expected from such a small man-- but it didn't quite come together. His pants were too big, his eyes were tired and shifty, and his beard looked more like something somebody left in the bathtub than a noble facial pelt. Nor had the beard endowed him with the knowledge of how to enter a passport in the system. He held it like a venomous snake.

His eyes flitted between the passport and the computer screen. "I don't... I don't know how to enter a passport." His face was a lightshow of the panopoly of human emotions: fear of the unknown document, anger at the injustice of the world, growing hysteria.

Over the intercom: "May! May. I don't know how to enter passports in the system." She came to the desk and with the other pharmacist, the three of them began searching the computer. They found the right button, I guess, because the man started filling out the data. Hi s voice finally cracked, "What number do I put? I don't know how to read passports!!!"

Jesus, it's not Linear B.

[What struck me about the situation was how easily the man's veneer of almost-put-togetherness was shattered and how foreign and viscerally terrifying something like a passport can be here.]

Doctors and Pharmacies

Yesterday I was at Rite-aid getting a prescription filled. I like being back in the US because the over-the counter stuff isn't even over-the-counter, but nicely organized on dozens of shelves. I don't need to talk to a ny other person in order to dose myself with supplements, painkillers, decongestants, laxities, yeast infection mess or anything else my breezy heart might desire.

This is compared to Hungary, where a pharmacy actually has pharmacists who act as gatekeepers between you and body-altering substances. This means that if you want anything, you have to be able to explain it. By the time I left, I knew a decent litany of symptoms that I could rattle off; however, in my first year in Budapest, when my language skills consisted of ordering beer and forming the imperative, talking to the pharmacist was mote than a little challenging.

My first spring in Hungary I started breaking in some new Birkenstock, which meant I got blisters. Shortly thereafter the blisters got very mildly infected - or, they were red and tender. I thought I should put some anti-bacterial cream on them,  so off to the pharmacy I went. "My shoes arr new and my feet... hurt. I want... some cream. Hydrocortisone?" That didn't work. The lady wanted me to see a doctor and when I demurred, (Primal rage! I DON'T NEED A DOCTOR TO TELL ME I SHOULD PUT A LITTLE BIT OF ANTISEPTIC OINTMENT ON MY WOUND! THIS WOULDN'T HAPPEN IN AMERICA!) she offered me bandaids.

I went to a friend's house; he suggested another brand I could mention. So we both went back and I had the same conversation. At that point necessity won out over propriety. I said to the pharmacist, "Excuse me," took off my shoe, hoisted my foot to the window and used the imperative. "Look! See? It hurts! Little infectio." I got some cream.

On Coming Home

Although I'm an American citizen, I've spent approximately 3/5 of my life so far outside of the States. I have yet to come up with a catchy or succinct way of saying this, or of answering the question of where I'm from. Sometimes I abbreviate, saying, "I moved around a lot." Other times the questions elicits a (painful, at least to me) litany of dates, ages and countries. In lazier moments I claim Connecticut as home; while thief is an accurate answer for tax purposes, the inevitable associations with yacht clubs and polo shirts it conjures is a far cry from my actual upbringing.

Two weeks ago I was welcomed home by college friends. What is the home to which I'm being welcomed? My country of citizenship? My tax home? (No tax haven, unfortunately) The country I went to college in?

(When I look at my nearest and dearest from high school, I see that we did retreat to college in the countries that we were "from." The .act made so -- had we gone elsewhere, all bonds would finally have been severed and we would truly be adrift.)

I am conscious of home being constructed, home being a choice. Home is where the heart is. Home is where your friends will travel hours to throw you an awesome surprise party. Home is community. Home is the harbor in which we finally choose to anchor our ships.

This could well be home, then. Why not?

I continue to have the nagging sensation that this is only temporary.

I know I'm back in the US when...

... I can charge $2.26 for coffee to my credit card.