Strange Writers

It has been difficult for me to think of a topic for my second entry. Five months into a new life in a foreign land, one would think the list of potential topics would be inexhaustible. But something about each new idea made me uncomfortable. So in the end I resorted to the tried and true method for getting past writers block, that is, I decided to write about it.

Most of my ideas for the blog were about things I thought people in the States would find unusual and romantic, that is, exotic. I didn’t notice this at first; there was only a vague feeling that these ideas would give the wrong impression. And at first glance, it made sense to focus on what was unusual, given that the point of this blog is to help others grasp the parts of our life that would be closed to a person who hadn’t spent time here. However, on reflection I realized that the way I thought to describe Nicaragua wouldn’t actually be very helpful to anyone who wanted to come and get to know it for themselves.

Having some experience arriving to parts foreign with other’s descriptions in my head, I’ve found that images of the exotic – the strange, romantic and adventurous – have in many cases been harmful to my efforts to really understand the place. Descriptions of the strange are entertaining. They make for good stories, and may help me to appreciate the world in a different way. But they haven’t often helped me connect to my neighbor.

In my college courses on anthropology we were taught that thinking of people as exotic leads us to focus on the ways that they are different than we are. It separates rather than unifies. When trying to engage with a new culture, I’ve most often found myself searching for those things that I can relate to, for ways to use what I already know to make sense of this new situation. It is more difficult to do that when my head is filled with the many ways that my new neighbors are different from me. And my hope is that the little that I write about Nicaragua would encourage solidarity with it’s people, rather than add yet another obstacle to understanding besides those of distance, nationality, language, culture and class.

It would be nice to say that my hesitation to write about the exotic is exclusively out of concern for the few who read this blog. However, it is just as much because I know my own weaknesses. Even recognizing all that I’ve just written, it is still my tendency to focus on differences. On the one hand, it is tempting to exaggerate the differences I enjoy about living in a foreign country, partly because I want to reassure worried friends and family, but just as often because I’m prone to the vice of daydreaming that others may envy my ‘exotic’ life. On the other hand, being a foreigner is at times a lonely and frustrating experience, and it is tempting to unload those frustrations on people you know will sympathize. However, focusing on negative differences carries and even greater personal danger.

I’ve heard expats living all over the world sum up a frustrating experience by saying something like, “Well you know how all people here are”. It’s easy to nod one’s head and go along with this sort of talk, because implicit in these statements is a praise for our status as ‘veterans’, as opposed to all the tourists, as well as our superior understanding for how things really ought to be done, as opposed to the majority of the population amongst which we live. That is not to say that frustrations leading to such talk are always unwarranted. Within every nation there are misguided values and commonly accepted, unethical practices. As foreigners we might be in a position to recognize them more clearly. However, such judgments shouldn’t be pronounced out of frustration. I believe one should make and share such judgments with care, and only in the hopes that some good may come of it. If such judgments not made with humility and much prayer, they become mere stereotypes, and we, merely prejudiced. Personal prejudices inconspicuously become facts, and before you know it, you’ll be reading a blog about all these fiery Latinos, who wouldn’t be so poor if they could keep time and weren’t so incurably lazy.

There are clearly differences between cultures, and learning to understand these differences is a significant part of expat life. However, before I write about them, I’ll ask the four of you who managed to read this entire entry to hold me accountable. I don’t want to paint the challenges of a country with large, careless strokes. I want to avoid the easy temptation to offhandedly slander an entire people in between parenthesis. Neither do I want to write to make people daydream about a tropical paradise; I want to write to encourage them to meet a friend which I’ve recently met, and am getting to know. It’s my goal to never write about the strange for its own sake, but only if I hope to make it more understandable. As for the many strange things we can’t understand, those I’ll save for our visitors.

- Luke