[joe-frank-list] 'Another country, part 1'

[russellbell at gmail.com]

	Joe tells the story of an unnamed fellow, whom I'll call
Protagon to make writing this synopsis simpler.  (Everybody else has a
name.)

	Protagon grew up with a mother who was frequently and
seriously depressed.  He and his father found her moods crushing.  She
thought her husband weak.  She'd play the piano for hours in the
afternoon, classical music.  He would close and lock all the
intervening doors, but still hear the music.  (Joe's mother was often
depressed, played the piano; she characterized her husband as weak.)
	1:40: Although he enjoyed Temple services on the high holy
days, he imagined the stigma Christians attached to Jews for killing
Christ (The Romans killed Jesus; some 'Christian' antisemites blame
Jews.)  When he forgot to take his skullcap off after services, he'd
feel badly: he didn't want people to know he was Jewish.  He thinks
about the suffering of Jews in the Holocaust.  (Joe tells the same
story in 'Karma memories'.)
	5:00: At age 25 he moves to Washington DC, lives in a boarding
house (so Joe says; it was just a building with separate bedrooms -
there was no board.)  Many of the other residents are Arabs, including
Naim, 'one of the most beautiful women he'd ever seen: she looked like
an Arabian princess.'  An Algerian, Ali, also a resident of the
building, a law student at Georgetown, is her lover.  'He [Protagon]
felt ugly and poisoned because he was a totally anti-social recluse
not really a pleasant person.'  He keeps to himself, doesn't
socialize.
	6:00: Naim faints, Ali asks Protagon to call for an ambulance,
because his English is poor.  He doesn't.  Later, Naim gets mad at
him.  'He and Naim didn't speak to each other for weeks after the
incident'
	7:00: Protagon works for Film Presentations, which he figures
out is sketchy.
	8:00: Naim and Protagon get to know each other.  She's 30,
from North Yemen, went to University of Missouri, degree in
communications.  She took a job in Kuwait to work on Arab 'Sesame
Street' (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iftah_Ya_Simsim) (The Arab
version of 'Sesame Street' was made in Kuwait, beginning in 1979.) ,
for which she had made a marriage of convenience with a Palestinian,
Kamal, because single women are considered immoral there.  The job
fell through but she keeps the marriage to get a Green card
(https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_card).  Kamal runs a company in
Florida.  She's studying linguistics so she can teach English to
foreigners.  They become lovers on her instigation.
	12:30: They go to the Edinburgh festival
(https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edinburgh_International_Festival) to
see her sister, Fadal (sp?), a famous dancer, perform.  He meets Ali
there, who figures out what's going on.  Protagon and Naim discover
their incompatibilities.
	18:40: They see 'Raiders of the lost ark'
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raiders_of_the_Lost_Ark), which makes
her mad.  She sees it as Zionist propaganda.
	20:20: She gives him 'Men in the sun'
(https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Men_in_the_Sun), her favorite book,
because it recounts the plight of Palestinians.
	21:20: She takes him to parties, where he meet many Arabs,
begins to see they aren't all violent fanatics.
	22:20: They attend a fund-raising bake sale for Palestinian
terrorists in Mount Pleasant (a neighborhood of Washington -
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mount_Pleasant,_Washington,_D.C.)
They talk about how Mossad offers them money to stay in the US, funds
their educations.  (Apparently true.)
	24:00: 'Thilemzith thevgha atsazhu'
https://youtu.be/xIX3CPflo9g (This is a Kabyle song, from Algeria.
Ali is from Algeria but I think it's coincidental.)
	25:50: He moves to a nearby apartment.  She helps him paint
and furnish it, is there much of the time, keeps her room in the
boarding house to keep up appearances.
	27:00: He gets a new job with a film and video production
company, why he can afford the apartment.  He figures out they
misrepresent themselves.
	28:20: Because her education is about to end, thus her student
visa also, she recruits a friend to fund a language school at which
she can teach English to Arabs.
	29:30: His new employer lets him go.  He takes a job with
B'nai B'rith.  He doesn't want them see him with an Arab; she doesn't
want to go near them.
	32:20: Naim's language school fails after 7 months.  She takes
2 night jobs teaching English as a second language, lies about having
a Green card.
	33:10: They take a trip to Ocean City, Maryland
(https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ocean_City,_Maryland) which they
hate.
	39:10: Naim had wanted to be a dancer like her sister, but a
'degenerative cartilage disease in her knees' made it impossible.  She
likes to give elaborate parties, with lots of food and dancing.
	40:30: Naim tells Protagon she wants to have a child with him.
	41:00: They see 'The Land'
(https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Land_(1969_film)) at the
Smithsonian. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smithsonian_Institution
She's unhappy with the way American movies depict Arabs and the way
Arab movies depict women.
	46:20: After a call to her home Naim tells Protagon about her
family: her mother married at 15, raised 8 children, a father who
spends all their money on khat ($50/day!) (a narcotic leaf
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khat).  Her father had wanted even his
daughters to get educated, come back to reform North Yemen.
	49:40: Israel invades Lebanon (1982 June 6.  Israel calls it
'Peace in Galilee' https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1982_Lebanon_War).
B'nai B'rith paints it in a positive light.  Protagon and Naim fight
about it.  Protagon begins to see the Arab point of view.

	https://jfwiki.org/index.php?title=Another_Country_(Part_1)

	The first datable event is a viewing of 'Raiders of the lost
ark', which premiered 1981 June 12; they went to see it after the
Edinburgh festival (in August), before he moved into the apartment.
The last is the invasion of Lebanon, 1982 June 6.  The language school
Naim and her friend opened lasted 7 months.  I don't see how to date
events before; they seem like weeks or a few months, at most.
	Ocean City is as they describe it: the worst place on
Maryland's Atlantic coast.

russell bell