The other
day, I left Burkina Faso en route to Istanbul. I had a daylong layover in
Tunis, Tunisia. I had already spent a day in Tunis when I was on my way to
Burkina, so really all I wanted was to get out of the airport, go into the main
part of the city, smoke some hookah, drink some coffee, and head back to catch
my flight. I learned a couple things that day. It is very difficult to find
shisha (hookah) or anything to drink during Ramadan in a Muslim country, some
is never enough, and nobody is exempt from terrorism. I’ll get to that last
part in a minute.
First, I have been in quite a few
Muslim countries in my travels, including Bosnia and Herzegovina, Albania,
Turkey, Burkina Faso, Morocco, and Tunisia. I knew many people fast during
Ramadan, as is the custom. I knew there were countries in the world where it
would be impossible to get food during the day. What I did not expect was for
Tunisia to be one of these. Burkina Faso is a Muslim country. Many people pray
five times per day, many people abstain from alcohol, and many people fast
during Ramadan. However, many people, whom are Muslim, drink regularly inside
and outside of Ramadan, eat pork, and don’t much care for a month of starving
themselves. I honestly cannot imagine going an entire day in Burkina (40+
Celsius) without drinking water, but that’s a different story.
When I first got to the city center
of Tunis, it was much like the last time, though the café’s had their seats all
put together and no tables were out. This was my first indication that things
may be a bit different. When I got into the market, I noticed all of the closed
doors. This was my, “oh dammit” moment because I realized the odds of finding
anything to eat or drink were slim. I meandered the streets, going to the
places I knew and a few I didn’t. I was fasting, but not by choice. Eventually
I gave up. I turned around, and headed to where taxis would be waiting. On the
way, I had one of those weird I’ll go left but you go right, ok, let’s switch,
oh crap we did it again moments with a Tunisian guy. We both laughed, and he
started talking to me in French. When he learned I was American, he switched to
English. It was good, though difficult to understand at times. I said I was
heading to the airport soon, but wanted to find some shisha (hookah) to smoke,
and maybe drink a coffee. He took this to heart and led me, for about 45
minutes, around a slew of closed cafés.
After about six failures, we found
a place that was open. The windows were covered with newspapers, and when we
walked in, it was like walking into a cloud. There was so much smoke it was
difficult to breathe. When everywhere is closed, those who do not fast and want
to smoke hoard to the places that will stay open, and they stay there for hours
smoking. We were in there for about fifty seconds when we discovered there was
nowhere to sit. On the way out, my guide jokingly said to me, “If you stay in
there for an hour, you’ll get cancer, guaranteed.” I’m not so sure he’s wrong.
We moved on to the next café, only
a few doors down. It was another place with the windows covered, and a cloud of
smoke greeting you upon entry. We sat down this time. I ordered a coffee and a
hookah, and we chatted. I offered him a drink before remembering he was
fasting. I felt bad, but he laughed it off so no biggie. This is when we saw
the TV and my friend turned to me and said, “Goodbye Tunisia. This country is
dead now.” He explained to me what the TV said and my jaw dropped.
Do you remember where you were on
9/11? Of course you do. Everybody of sound body and mind remembers where they
were that day just like our parents remember where they were when JFK was
assassinated and our grandparents remember where they were when Pearl Harbor
was bombed. It was the defining moment of our childhoods and it effectively
changed the world. It started two wars, and inevitably set up the crazy
situation occurring worldwide today.
The day I happened to be in
Tunisia, they were hit by their second terrorist attack in four months. The
first one was an attack on the famous Bardo National Museum, in Tunis on March
18, 2015. Twenty-two people died and fifty others were injured. This attack was
located in Sousse, about two hours from Tunis. 39 people were killed and
another 36 were injured. Both of these attacks were aimed at tourists, much
like myself. That same day, a Friday mind you, a mosque was attacked in Kuwait
City, Kuwait, killing 27 people and injuring over 220 people, and a man was
beheaded at a factory near Lyon, France.
The effect this attack is having on
Tunisia is drastic to say the least. The country relies on tourism. Since the
“Arab Spring,” Tunisia’s unemployment soared to almost 20%. It has since
dropped and is now around 15%. The youth is the country is frustrated to say
the least. Now add in the loss of millions of dollars in tourism, and you can
see the grave state that Tunisia finds itself in, and you can understand why
Mehmet, my guide and new friend, said that his country had died. For his sake
and the sake of the world, I hope Tunisia takes measures to increase security
and protect its tourists. Without that revenue, the country could be headed for
revolution again, or worse.
In terms of those within Tunis, it
was interesting to see the reactions of the people. It was the same as it was
that fateful in September. People were glued to the TV, shaking their heads,
murmuring under their breaths. People cursed (I assume since my Arabic is shaky
to say the least). They blessed each other and wished safety to families and
loved ones. I sat there watching with them, and my mind flashed back to Mr.
Brown’s world studies class when I jokingly asked him if a plane hit the World
Trade Center. The smile vanished when he told me it did. I cannot imagine what
that would have been like if I was older, more intelligent, more understanding
of the world. And in this instance, it was clearer to me than ever before that
really, we’re all the same and want the same thing: safety for our loved ones
and ourselves, and to live without being in fear, a goal that seems more
difficult now than at any point in my lives and many of my peers lives.
Hopefully one day this can happen in Tunisia. Hopefully one day this can happen
everywhere.
