Trying to catch up on my email to make Thanksgiving plans, I found a link to the schedule for Chicago’s Arab Heritage Month. Once again I have managed to miss a great deal of it.

I was most disappointed to find that the Jasmin Jahal School of Dance’s “Belly Dance Workshop: Intro to Sword Dancing” was over.  Not that I could have gone; it conflicts with my work schedule. Several years ago I went to Jasmin’s Arab Heritage Month event (an introductory lesson was only $10 back then, not $35) and greatly enjoyed the workout. Jasmin is a great teacher with apparently limitless energy. Even those with two left feet will believe that they too can learn to belly dance. The type of dance here is the traditional kind that is done at Arab wedding parties, the kind with only women present, not the kind done in certain (unnamed) north side Greek restaurants .

Unlike the Arabeque Arab festival, there is no master list of participants for Arab Heritage Month. Here is my own partial list, collected from hovering a mouse over the calendar of events:

Film

The two-part PBS film “Islam: Empire of Faith”

The Desert Triology [sic] of Nacer Khemir

Continuous exhibit

“Arab World Cultural Display” at Green Hills Public Library, 8611 W. 103rd Street, Palos Hills
from 9:00 AM – 9:00 PM from November 1-30. Admission: Free

Radio

Mondays: “Mornings with Ray Hanania” on WJJG 1530 AM Radio www.RadioChicagoland.com for guest information

Saturdays: Islamic and Arab Voices of Chicago presents “Arab Culture and Countries” & “Arab-Americans Past, Present & Future” on WCEV 1450 AM and streaming live online at www.wcev1450.com

Art

Galerie du Maroc (Moroccan Arts)
exhibit of Images du Maroc by Michael Monar
a traditional music performance by Bulbul Ensemble (see “music” below)

Language

Arabic for children on Saturdays from 1:00 PM – 2:00 PM at Bridgeview Public Library (year-round) “Arabic Story and Basic Arabic Language Class for Children”

Book

“Homeland Insecurity, the Arab-American and Muslim Experience after 9/11” by Dr. Louise Cainkar. Over a hundred in-depth interviews conducted  in the Metropolitan Chicago Area, about the experiences of Arab-Americans and Muslims after 9/11.

Music

Bulbul Ensemble is a takht based in Chicago. The ensemble plays the music of Oum Kalthoum, Fairouz, Asmahan, Sabah Fakhri and others, including composers Muhammad Abdal-Wahhab, Assi and Mansour Rahbani, Sayid Darwish, and other great artists from 20th century Near East music. Musicians: Nai: Kim Sopata, Oud: Rami Gabriel, Percussion: Doug Brush,Violin: Steve Gibons. www.bulbulensemble.com

[Bulbul's next public appearance:  Saturday, Dec 5, 2009, from 3 pm to 5 pm Il-Bulbul Arabic Music Ensemble Performs at Oak Park Winterfest
Downtown Oak Park, IL. -- check their webpage  www.bulbulensemble.com for some amazing  concert excerpts with unfortunately low sound quality]

Assi El Hellani & Shada Hassoun in Concert at Rosemont

Newspaper

Chicago’s Premier Arabic/English monthly, Al-Offok Al-Arabi Newspaper (The Arab Horizon), presents an introspective look into Chicago’s Arab-American Community. The paper has been covering the local scene and its organizations & individuals for over ten years…Links: profile for editor Amani Ghouleh.

Museum

Oriental Institute’s highly acclaimed special exhibit “The Life of Meresamun: A Temple Singer of Ancient Egypt.”

Upcoming events

Just for my own reference I’ve pasted here the info for a couple of upcoming events, tomorrow’s Oriental Institute (the inspiration for Raiders of the Lost Ark) tour is not to be missed.

tonight (free music downtown):

Description: The Amman Committee of Chicago Sister Cities International Program cordially invites you to a performance by Doris, the fabulous Arab musical star.

Admission: Free, but reservations are required

For more information email sistercities@cityofchicago.org or call Adrienne Tongate: 312-742-5320

also tonight (radio):

What:

Connecting Women Radio presents “Celebrating Arab Heritage Month”

Where: http://www.blogtalkradio.com/connectingwomenWhen: Nov 18, 9:00 PM – 10:00 PMDescription:

CCHR Advisory Council on Arab Affairs member Hanadi Abukhdeir will be speaking about the Advisory Council and Arab Heritage Month, and author Alia Malek, will be discussing her new book “A Country Called Amreeka: Arab Roots, American Stories.”

For more information, call Faten Abdallah: 646-595-3653

tomorrow (U of C campus museum tour):

Oriental Institute presents “Gallery Tour: The Life of Meresamun: A Temple Singer of Ancient Egypt”

Where: University of Chicago – 1155 E. 58^th Street, ChicagoWhen: Nov 19, 12:00 PM – 1:00 PMDescription:

Don’t miss this last chance to tour this exhibit with Curator Emily Teeter before it closes on December 6th!

Learn the behind-the-scenes story of how the Oriental Institute produced this three-dimensional biography of an ancient Egyptian priestess, and see how forensic scientists have used the latest CT data to reconstruct Meresamun’s physical appearance as she actually looked nearly 3,000 years ago.

For more information call: 773-702-9507 or visit: http://oi.uchicago.edu

A week from Monday:

Eid Al-Adha (!!?!)

What: Moraine Valley Community College presents “Eid Celebration”Where:

Moraine Valley Community College – 9000 W. College Parkway, Palos Hills, Room U111

When: Nov 30, 12:00 PM – 2:00 PMDescription: Do you have friends, colleagues or classmates that celebrate “Eid” and have always wondered what it is? A short presentation about the significance of the holiday will be presented. Enjoy free Middle Eastern sweets in celebration of the Muslim holiday, Eid Al-Adha. Also have your name printed in Arabic calligraphy to take home!

Admission: Free

For more information, contact Multicultural Student Affairs: (708) 974-5475

Does anyone know what this poem is?

Here is a partial quotation from a Jordanian named Zaydoun. His namesake was the poet Ibn Zaydun from Spain who was famous for loving a princess. The Ibn Zaydun poem fragment is something like “We used to meet…our meeting” the last word being the Arabic word “deena” (?) (meeting).  Apparently the first two lines of the poem are somewhat famous in Arabic and are studied extensively in Syria.

A cursory review 9f a few google books shows Ibn Zaydun was the great poet that set the standard for judging later poets.  So far I have tracked down the quite short Wikipedia article about Ibn Zaydun, a tantalizing tourism biography, and a few lines of a poem from Syrian (?) blogger MoCo:

God has sent showers upon the abandoned dwelling places of those we loved. He has woven upon them a striped, many colored garment of flowers, and raised among them a flower like a star. How many girls like images trailed their garments among such flowers, when life was fresh and time was at our service… How happy they were, those days that have passed, days of pleasure, when we lived with those who had black, flowing hair and white shoulders… Now say to Destiny whose favors have vanished – favors i have lamented as the nights have passed – how faintly its breeze has touched me in my evening. but for him who walks in the night the stars still shine: greetings to you, Cordoba, with love and longing.

Tired of politically slanted “news” items about the Middle East? Seems like everyone has an ax to grind, an ethnic or religious group to demonize (preliminary to….?), a book to publicize, or vitriol to barter for that coveted Western visa.

Time to escape the self-serving agendas and look at the ordinary people. Oh, sure, you can find the same old, same old politics in Jordan if you look hard enough, but most Jordanians just don’t go around with a chip on their shoulder hating one group or another.

For a more refreshing, and probably more realistic snapshot of the Middle East, try Wasapnin Jordan, written by a British ex-pat (click the page tabs for photos of Jordan and Amman), or try picking something at random off of the successors to Planet Jordan:  Jordan Blogs, Quaider Planet, or  Girly Gator (sometimes the Arab women like to blog away from the guys)–these are all blog aggregators with several hundred blogs on their blogrolls.

There’s nothing like a Jordanian blog to give you a slice of real Arab life. Here is just one sample from Jordan Blogs. Moey, who says he  has two friends suffering from AIDS right now, has designed a public service announcement for HIV.  The slogan in Arabic says “When cheating, make sure you’re protected.”  (Click image for larger view). According to his profile:

The free time I have becomes more and more precious to me as the years go by. I’m a working student, I work for one of the most notable advertising agencies in the world. I also like my quiet time to balance out the social leanings of my study and leisure.

If you want some edgy cartoons with a definite pro-Palestinian slant, try Abu Mahjoob. It can sometimes be difficult, but is easily as creative as Doonesbury. Cartoons are in the archives, and the forum is always good for a couple hours.  For those who are more comfortable with same-sex forums, there are also forums for only women or only men.

[Note: This post for some reason has become a magnet for Russian spam comments. Do they not notice the irony of spamming a website in a language other than the one it's written in? I have translated them with a machine translation tool and kept the ones I like--but with the links neutered!]

This week the Middle East blog chatter has been heating up.  Blogs that cater to American politics have seen a sudden influx of right wing pro-Israeli propaganda of the most extreme kind.  These cut and paste spam artists start work long after even the west coast Americans have gone to bed.  Like maybe at about 8AM Tel Aviv/Ramalla/Amman/Jerusalem time.  And they never discuss American politics; they just drag out every anti-Palestinian, pro-settler propaganda piece that ’s ever been done in the last 10 years. For a while, I tried to counter the hate, but it was like trying to empty the ocean with a thimble.  Then two days ago the Israeli-bots  went mostly silent, or cut back on the comments, until yesterday when Israel announced the unilateral cease-fire against Hamas in Gaza–along with a resumption of the occupation of Gaza that they had unilaterally ended in 2005.  (It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out they would announce a cease-fire before the American inauguration Tuesday–the Middle East is completely attuned to the American election cycle.)  My curiosity was piqued and I had to make a foray over to the Arab neighborhood to see how the Arab street was taking this.

It turns out they are taking it very well.  In fact they are jolly.

Mansef, I decided.  I’ve got plenty of hummus at home–tonight I would have to eat something special.  Arriving at my favorite mansef place,  I saw in the window a sign that said, “Work like you don’t need the money. Love like you have never been hurt. Dance like no one is watching.”  Not very Arab, that.  And inside the furniture was covered with drop cloths while a half a dozen Arab men sat around a big table with huge argila pipe discretely on the floor between them. They cheerfully waved me in.  “Remodeling,” said one, proud of the word.  “We can accommodate you”, said another.  I was in the right place, for sure.  But the mansaf special was yesterday.  “We have mansaf”, they declared confidently.  Just for kicks I ordered the kubba too.  Of course they didn’t have it.  On the South Side it’s always on the menu but they never have it.  You have to go to the North Side.  Mint tea, but with dry mint.  Can’ t have everything. In the winter you should really drink sage tea, but it’s the thought that counts.

From my hiding place in a booth, I couldn’t help but overhear what they were saying–and although I couldn’t follow the conversation  it was pretty clear what they were talking about.  Filasteen, Iss-rah-el, Muser (Egypt), Mubarak, Hamas, and of course yahood. One topic after another was discussed and dropped.  No saber-rattling, for sure. I would recognize that sound.   Then agreement around the table.  “Mish harb.”  (Not war) “Mish harb.” “Mish harb”, everyone agreed–cheerfully. “Did you solve all the problems of the world yet”, I asked on my way back from paying the tab.  “Not yet”, one said, as cheerful as anyone can be without alcohol consumption, “but we’re this close.”  He held his thumb and finger an inch apart.

Al-Ahram, a weekly from Egypt, showed up on my google reader’s list of top recommendations this week.  It is described as the “Arab world’s leading English-language publication.” Thanks, but no thanks.

Curious, I looked up last weeks’ confrontation in Hebron that was going on at the same time as the terrorist attack in India. A quick skim was disappointing. There was a picture of some people with guns and Jewish attire labeled “Israeli settlers teach their children to kill Palestinians”, but no Palestinians being aimed at.  A promised photo of a grave marker with a star of David was not posted. The world “Nazi” was sprinkled liberally throughout, and paragraph after paragraph claimed to know the thoughts, motivations, hearts and minds of a group of people who are not generally known for sharing their innermost thoughts and feelings with Palestinians.   The central incident the piece revolved around was vandalism in the middle of the night, resulting in breaking of car windows.

“The last time I went to submit a police complaint in Kiryat Araba one policeman took me to the next room and told me ‘I want to advise you, there is no point in submitting all these complaints. We simply can’t do anything to help you. The settlers control the state and the army can do little to protect you from them.’” Asked what he would do next to protect his family, Daana said, “I have no choice but to remain steadfast. A harmful neighbour will either die or move away,” said Daana quoting an old Arabic proverb.

Nice proverb.

Going to a Jewish source brings out a few more facts about the incident without the adjectives and heavy-handed world-view speculations of the Egyptian source.

Statements from the American Jewish Committee, the Anti-Defamation League, the American Jewish Congress, and the dovish groups Ameinu and J Street criticized the settler reaction, which included setting fire to olive trees, stoning vehicles and pedestrians, and defacing Muslim graves with the Star of David. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert termed the violence a “pogrom.”

A strong condemnation of the settlers.

But leave it to the Christian Science Monitor to put the incident in context of the upcoming Israeli February elections, the government /settler split, and the cultural background of the city.

The violence here last week that started with the Israeli army evacuating ultranationalist settlers from a disputed house was captured on film and broadcast around the world. One thing it made clear for many was the extent to which extreme right-wing Jewish settlers have gone beyond the control of the Israeli government and army….

~~~~~~~

Hebron is a city that is complicated at its core. Jews and Muslims regularly pray here at the tomb of their common forefather Abraham. Jews call it the Cave of the Patriarchs and Muslims call it the Ibrahimi Mosque. To suppress the chances for violence, there are separate entrances to the holy site. The city itself was divided into Israeli and Palestinian-controlled sectors in 1996, leaving just about everyone miserable with the results….

~~~~~~~

Some say the move to evacuate the settlers was a preelection ploy. Israel faces parliamentary elections in February, out of which will come a new prime minister and a new government.

The big question now is whether growing settler violence will lead to a more radical or moderate direction for the Israeli right.

On Monday, members of the right-wing Likud Party were going to the polls in primaries to choose a new leader. The toss-up is between Benjamin Netanyahu, the hawkish politician who served as prime minister from 1996 to 1999, and Moshe Feiglin, a harder-line, religious figure who is closer to the settlement movement….

~~~~~~~

“We appreciate that the army threw them out. I don’t see that any Arab army has been able to do that,” says Mussab Jabari, who lives across the street from the evacuated building. He has covered his windows with cardboard slats to protect against the rocks thrown at the house. “Last week, we saw the good side of the Israeli soldiers,” he says. “There’s a change in their attitude toward the settlers.”

Maybe that will give the Arabs a new proverb, something like “A harmful neighbor will either die, move away, or be removed by the government.

Once again it’s Arab Heritage Month and I’ve missed half of it.  I only found out because I’m signed up for Arabic language meetups and they sent a notice.  I don’t go to the meetups any more because they’re always in a smoky environment–ah, how I miss that tufaHtain (double apple) argila since I quit smoking–but my interest in Arabic is eternal. There are still some good events left and other events at museums and such that continue for the whole month.

This Sunday, for women only: if you’re interested in belly dancing–the proper Arab kind they do at all-female engagement parties and not the Greek restaurant kind–do check out the ten dollar introductory lesson that Jasmin gives at her North Side studio.  She’s very good and it’s quite a workout. Believe me, you will discover muscles you didn’t know you had.

The link to the schedule is here.

When I first discovered Hussam Al-Rassam  حسام الرسام a few years ago I posted a link to his website and a couple of his most popular songs. Those links are long gone, but today I was looking for his music again and found some new links. It looks like he’s been in Detroit, Chicago, and in Australia recording some new stuff.

Results of 3arabtv.com search (more in this list) (sound quality is like TV):

Iraqi Song-Sad but True

Bilani Zimani [New song 2008]

Ya Noora NEW

Results of translated google search, with thumbnails and YouTube links–the sound quality is better on some of these and there are some links to stuff from his defunct website.

A little better sound quality from YouTube:

Ya Ali ياعلي

Ibnak Ya Iraq ابنك ياعراق …another version of Ibnak Ya Iraq (Your son, O Iraq)

Mu Galo – مو كالوا with some crosstalk at beginning of recording–I think the photos are Baghdad.’

The Iraqi Football (soccer) Song “bring the cup home” Jeeb El Kahsجيب الكاس

And then of course there’s the ever popular al-3agruba العگربة “Oh, my mother I have been bitten by a scorpion”, take-off on American Idol, with Hussam’s sphinx-like smile and hot dance moves.

Wait! Wait! Here it is, the official new Hussam Al-Rassam website (?)–still under construction, but very slick, and there’s a nice instrumental on the home page.  It looks like there will be eventual links to his albums–and I can only hope they plan to add a little ingeleezi button for English.

If anyone knows where to find the lyrics in English and/or in Arabic, please do post a link for me.

The Chicago Music Festival runs from September 19-25 this year with free or very reasonably price concerts at various locations around the city.

Arabic artists this year are Dhafer Youssef of Tunisia, Ensemble Al-Kindi of Syria, and Gaida Hinawwi–listen to her |here|, a female vocalist from Iraq in the traditional maqam style.  The Iraqi already performed Sunday, and the Syrian group preformed Friday–drat, they bill themselves as “Whirling Dervishes of Damascus”.

Yet to come–

Wednesday:

The Dhafer Youssef concert (Sufi Mystic Fusion) is Wednesday 9/24 7:30 P.M at the Museum of Contemporary Art–Admission $15. Listen to a sample of the music–”Farha” from Electric Sufi–at the festival website |here|. (Click on Wednesday) Also  Wednesday night is Mor Karbasi with the flamenco-esque Shephardic Ladino music from Jerusalem–see Thursday for the link.

Thursday:

You can also hear Dhafer Youssef  Thursday from 11:00-2:00 PM at the Chicago Cultural Center’s Claudia Theater free.  (And bask in the glow of the Tiffany stained glass dome at the same time.) To be broadcast line on WNUR 89.3 FM on the “Continental Drift” international program.  Also appearing in this venue is Mor Karbasi–listen here, oh, yes! from Israel with Sephardic Ladino Music–the music and language of the exiled Jews of Spain–sounds interesting, but they are separted by two acts–could that be a coididink?

The festival ends Thurday with an open house/Mexican market at the Cultural Center. For addresses see the City of Chicago’s official festival website.

The links for audio tracks again are:

Chicago Music Festival

Gaida Hinawwi–listen to her |here|

Mor Karbasi–listen here, oh, yes!

or look for links yourself on this list of featured artists

Lo Cor de la Plana from Spain, a capella male voices

The Arab world is in mourning for the death of the Palestinian poet Mahmoud Darwish. As Jordan’s King slipped quietly into Iraq, made nice with Iraq’s prime minister Maliki, and reemerged with an agreement for oil at $18 a barrel less than the international price (Jordan also had a sweetheart deal under Saddam Hussein), the Palestinians were preparing for the first state funeral since Yasser Arafat was laid to rest. (photo: abro)

Everyone is remembering him a little differently. In Jordan they remembered him for, among other things, the poem Rita, perhaps a reminder that he once had a Jewish love. As he said in Haifa in 2007, “I will continue to humanise even the enemy… The first teacher who taught me Hebrew was a Jew. The first love affair in my life was with a Jewish girl. The first judge who sent me to prison was a Jewish woman. So from the beginning, I didn’t see Jews as devils or angels but as human beings.”

Said The Jordan Times:

Darwish was born in the Palestinian village of Al Birweh near Haifa, which was destroyed by the Israelis in the 1948 Mideast war that led to the establishment of Israel. He joined the Israeli Communist Party after high school and began writing poems for leftist newspapers.

The poet left Israel in the early 1970s to study in the former Soviet Union, and from there he travelled to Egypt and Lebanon. He joined the Palestine Liberation Organisation, but resigned in 1993 in protest over the interim peace accords that the late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat signed with Israel. Darwish moved to Ramallah in 1996.

His works are taught in Palestinian schools and are also popular among the thousands of Palestinians imprisoned by Israel. Darwish’s occasional readings in Ramallah drew overflow crowds….

Darwish’s poetry has been translated into more than 20 languages and he won numerous international awards. He first gained prominence in the 1960s with the publication of his first poetry collection, “Bird without Wings”. It included the poem “Identity Card” that defiantly spoke in the first person of an Arab man giving his identity number – a common practice among Palestinians when dealing with Israeli authorities and Arab governments – and vowing to return to his land.

Many of his poems have been put into music – most notably “Rita”, “Birds of Galilee” and “I yearn for my mother’s bread” – and have become anthems for at least two generations of Arabs.

He wrote another 21 collections, the last, “The Impression of Butterflies”, in 2008….

Darwish has been harshly critical of Israel over the years and was detained several times in the 1960s before going into self-imposed exile in 1970. Over the next 25 years he lived briefly in Paris, Moscow, and several Arab capitals.

A sequence of poetic prose written about his experience of life in Beirut during the Israeli invasion and bombardment of Lebanon in 1982 was translated into English in 1995 under the title “Memory for Forgetfulness”.

The Daily Star (Lebanon) preferred to remember a poem about the current political situation and take a political lesson from it:

It was not just the Israelis who drew Darwish’s critical attention. Indeed, he was among the most vocal critics of the fratricidal divisions that have emerged between the leading Palestinian factions, Hamas and Fatah. Recall Darwish’s words during a 2007 poetry recital in Haifa: “We woke up from a coma to see a monocolored flag [of Hamas] do away with the four-color flag [of Palestine,” he said. “We have triumphed. Gaza won its independence from the West Bank. One people now have two states, prisons who don’t greet each other. … We have triumphed knowing that it is the occupier who really won.” The words serve to further demonstrate how well Darwish and his generation of Palestinian intellectuals and leaders understood that a movement divided against itself could never succeed. If only the heirs to the Palestinian struggle would figure that out.

But what do the readers remember him for? The second most read poem on an Arabic poetry site is Psalm Three:

Psalm Three

On the day when my words

were earth…

I was a friend to stalks of wheat.

***

On the day when my words

were wrath

I was a friend to chains.

***

On the day when my words

were stones

I was a friend to streams.

***

On the day when my words

were a rebellion

I was a friend to earthquakes.

***

On the day when my words

were bitter apples

I was a friend to the optimist.

***

But when my words became

honey…

flies covered

my lips!…

“But when my words became/honey…/flies covered/my lips!…” Is this the type of dichotomous thinking that keeps the Palestinians from “never losing an opportunity to lose an opportunity”? Yes, there is another way, not the honey lips or the poisoned lips either, but speech that starts with the truth. Ah, the Palestinians. I have spent so many warm, fascinating hours with so many of them, but I give up trying to figure them out.

That’s why this blog’s mission statement ended up as “let’s just eat”. That is the better wisdom, the Arab wisdom.

Oh, goody, Arabs again. Last year’s Arabesque festival in Chicago’s Daly Plaza was perfect. The weather was gorgeous, there was plenty of Arab music, calligraphy, henna hand painting, flavored tobacco for your hooka pipe and a line of graceful guys with those gorgeous Arab eyes getting up on the empty stage to dance a little impromptu Dubka arm in arm.

This year one of the vendors is Amal which is promoted as a supplier of unique jewelry which gives ten percent of its proceeds to Women for Women, a highly rated not-for-profit organization for women survivors of war. Highly appropriate, as this week the U.N. finally declared rape as a weapon of warfare. Says the Amal “about” page:

Ah, the evil eye protection. There’s something to that, you know. A friend of mine in the middle east had an evil eye on her kitchen wall that faced anyone entering her apartment. A week before she was assaulted, the eye, and nothing else, disappeared from her apartment.

If you go into the right shops, away from the tourist section, you can even find blue plastic eyes about the right size for sheep and cows.

I just happen to have two eyes that guard me as I sleep. Are they just nice to look at, or are they something else?