White Baboon

(I know the title sounds like a Country Music Telelvision Countdown Contender, but bear with me.)Black-hooded women, not a speck of face-skin to be seen, scurried toward home, in groups of three along the littered streets. On the main avenue, smoke rose from a schwarma stand, hovering above the gingham, picnic-table-patterned heads of moustached, Muslim men. While CNN had always painted those Arab-symbolizing scarves flowing freely in the sun, tonight they were wound tightly, more like turbans, to battle the winter wind. The whining violins of an Arabic tune were never quite out of earshot. The few palm trees now made claw-like shadows on the street and the racks of pashminas were put away for the night.It was 10:57 PM on Christmas Eve and we were on our way to “midnight mass” at the Latin Church of Aleppo, Syria. We were well-acclimated by now, and although we didn’t dare hold hands in public, there was no real threat in the air. Earlier that day we’d found the Christian Quarter, a maze of alleys with the black Braille-looking doors of a dungeon and multiple churches–one for Orthodox Greeks, one for Latin Catholics, one for Armenian Orthodox, one for Maronites, even others. A whole quarter for us?

I was prepared for a calm, reflective visit–with Christians only 11% of the population, how many could be at midnight mass? But peaceful was not what the universe had in mind. The cathedral was so packed we could barely make it in the door and having been misinformed, we arrived just in time for communion. But we took our place in the mobbed line, gazing at the creamy walls, ballroom chandeliers, understated crucifix, soft paintings and positively beautiful people. All obviously arriving straight from the salon, Christian Syrian women, no matter their age, were highlighted, styled, eyelinered, manicured and pocketbooked to near perfection, wearing an odd, but beautiful mix of class and bling–obviously without a headscarf in sight. The men, as we’d come to expect, were quaffed.

Not until this moment on our trip had we been so conspicuously so out of place and so clearly underdressed. But we couldn’t dwell. I simply vowed never to look down on a casually dressed church-goer ever again and swallowed the body of Christ, facing the stares with a soft smile on my way to the back of the church.The service was in Arabic, but we could sense the rhythms and syllables of a familiar verse here and there. We sang Go Tell It On the Mountain in our own words and Oh Come All Ye Faithful, too, before sinking into a pew for some prayer.Here we were. In Syria. With a whole cathedral full of familiarity to bring us back home.I’ve always believed that no matter which higher power I end up worshipping, Catholicism has provided a wonderful platform from which to leap. Or stand on. Or take a rest upon. When I speak with someone who grew up without religion–with nothing to. . .come back to, to, I am instantly grateful.It’s been foreshadowed, in one way or another, that I might someday return to Catholicism. While I’m not yet certain of that, tonight, I had a greater appreciation than ever before of what I’d been given as a child. Something very concrete, or perhaps sometimes more like marble or stone, to hold on to.

Do you feel the oppression here in Turkey?I choose not to feel it. We have a word, created in the last few years “Mahalle Baskisi”. It means the pressure a place exerts on its inhabitants.

Where do you feel it? In my wallet. Turkish identification cards require a religion. In my opinion, you might as well put your star sign or your favorite color. Why should your religion define you?There was a survey and most people in this country defined themselves first as Muslim, then as Turkish, then as male.

How would you define yourself? Well, my father was from Albania. He died when I was seven. My mother is from the Caucuses. But I was born here in Turkey. I guess that makes me Turkish, but I prefer to define myself as a member of the universe. A creature of the natural world. A human. I don’t like to define myself with a group, because this creates exclusion. It builds walls and boundaries. It means I’m NOT something else.

Do you feel Turkey’s oppression in other ways? Well, if a woman who is wearing a full birka sees my bare arm, she instantly views me differently. As if I am a stranger. As if I am an alien. Not one of her kind. That sucks.

How old are you, Rana? 22. Just.

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This made me think: I do like defining myself in different ways. But if I had to choose, which comes first? My ethnicity? My religion? My gender? My family name?How do you define yourself? And in what order?

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I’d heard the stew-brewing controversy about the headscarf ban a few years ago, but I never really got it. I remember thinking: A majority of Turkey’s population are Muslim, so what’s the deal? The protests surrounding restrictions in French schools seemed to further submerge the issue in a murky bath of obvious modesty, yet nonconforming rebellion. Confused and not terribly concerned, I forgot all about it.But a few trips to Istanbul during our Peace Corp service planted a couple quickly flowering plants in my ever-expanding, but weedy, garden of ideas. So what was the headscarf ban all about? Should women be allowed to wear these seemingly harmless hijabs in government-funded environments?Our new Turkish friend, Sez, who hosted us through a smashing little thing called couchsurfing, thinks yes. But while he believes women should be able to express their own interpretations of the Koran in any way they choose, he also urged his own sisters, upon approaching adolescence, to abstain from the headscarf. Why? Because in Turkey, you must choose. Hijab-free, you can attend high school and university. With it, you’re forced by law to self-study. According to him, the Qur’an says merely to “cover yourself” but does not specify how. He feels they should not forsake their education for this amorphous rule–and that going without a headscarf does not make one less Muslim.Now in Turkey for more than two weeks, I am no longer just reading a story about a clandestine book club amidst a Muslim community. Nor are my impressions captured within the confines of a two hour film about an American trying to escape her Iranian husband.I understand now that this country is a lot more like Europe than the Middle East. A lot more like Greece than Iran. As I shop for groceries. . .as I walked home in the dark last night to the sound of the eternally haunting call to prayer. . .as I ride the subway with Ipod-clutching, paisley-pattern-covered, and generously eye-lined 17-year olds, I am here.From this vantage point, complications fall away with ease. Clarity emerges. Just like in the US, some people go to church and some people don’t. Some find strength in the holy spirit, others in running triathlons and still others in restoring vintage pinball machines. It’s your choice. And similar trends shine through as well. When heading from Chicago to, say, Kenosha, Wisconsin, bible ownership and potluck suppers probably increase. Similarly, Islam is more apparent in the village than in Istanbul. Women here just happen to wear their Allah-worshiping heart on their sleeve. I can see how it’s really none of anyone else’s business.So, again, why the headscarf ban?In short, so Turkey can maintain the glowing impression I’ve just received. Straddling the East West fault-line in many ways, they want to appear European, dedicated to secularism enough, to wash from their billowing, balcony-hung flags, any wrinkle of a potential return to an Islamic state–a place where religion and government are one, public hangings and stonings actually happen and women aren’t allowed an education. On the lengthy Turkish timeline, it was “just” a century ago that the Ottoman Empire fell and a guy named Ataturk led the Turkish National Movement, helping to establish a modern, secular Turkish democracy. And thank God (or maybe not, depending on your denomination) that he did.In America, for the most part, we’re comfortable with yamikas, headscarves, beards, aprons, crosses or robes–whatever you deem spiritually fashionable. Maybe because religious freedom was one of our nation’s founding principles. Or maybe because there is no fear, in America, of returning to some Quaker or Christian state. However, relative to developing countries, America IS fond of  “bright lines”; enforced laws drawn in the sand (or in our case, grass) which are relatively unsusceptable to corruption. And as much as I eventually warmed up to the benefits of a bendable rules in Bulgaria, defined lines, such as a ban on headscarves, are a characteristic of a developed country, where social order is held a little more sacred. Moreover, who knows how the United States would react (perhaps a la the French) if we had an overwhelmingly large Muslim population throwing a little too much religion into the classroom. It’s tough to say.Strange, isn’t it that the very law which drives Turkish women away from formal education is the same one meant to make Turkey a more modern, more Western place. But so it is. And with neighbor Iran demonstrating the very Islamic state at the end of a slippery slope Turkey is struggling so desperately to avoid, I’m starting to get it. Why the headscarf is a halo of heated controversy. Why the ban is actually protecting women from a potentially worse fate. Why different laws work for different countries. Why Turkey is holding its ground.