Nice Guy

Generally I think of myself as a nice person, opting out of controversy and those topics that make my ears turn red. Of course when certain issues come up, it's easy to be opinionated. Baby seals in the arctic, for example, just should not be clubbed to death to make fur hats for vodka swilling Russian aristocrats. They are hunted like one would hunt a garden snail, a hammer and a good eye are all you need. Plus they are an important part of a fragile ecosystem, one doesn't club baby seals. Beavers are the better choice (according to my former fur-selling sister) because they have caused (and will cause again!) the mass desertification of the great north, literally damned the place. Then there's the thrill of the hunt, beavers are clever buggers, or at least they have legs and they can run away from your swinging death-club, y'know, or rifle. Here the argument is as easy as a seal hunt. The boundaries are clear, the moral standpoints are easy to identify and there is little grey area. Perhaps the bit about beavers is less obvious, but still, better wear a beaver than a baby seal in by book.

I come from a family where it is important to get along. Conflict is internalized and any outward manifestation is understood to be an act of aggression. I don't know where this comes from, but I remember long ago there was a family polemic about the new video for Michael and Janet Jackson's duet Scream. Mom wanted it recorded, sister couldn't get the recorder to work and tensions rose. It all ended in a climactic shout from my sister, "It's a music video, they'll play it again!" of which the logic could not be denied and the argument was over. For days afterward I felt like I could take a stand like my admirable sister. "Popcorn is fine for lunch! Gaaawwwd!" I would plead with my mom in the car on the way home from a playdate at the movies. I tried feeble logic, "I can't practice piano today, the humidity makes the piano sound weird and it throws. Me. Off." She just didn't seem to buy my excuses. Maybe that was the problem, these were excuses, not arguments.

Whatever the reason, favored dinner table conversation was light, funny, and always searching for agreement. Even the Dalai Lama would sound contentious for defending the right to life of the bucktoothed manace of the North, but around the table with the Wilsons, it is much more common to hear with a slight tone of acquience, "Ok, then, I can see why we should be killing and skinning beavers, suuuure." To this day my mother ports proudly a beaver's pelt that's been cut to ribbons and knit into a fuzzy vest. Seal free and without a qualm from a family member. After 23 years of agreement and peace-making, I feel bit like China emerging from the middle ages up against a scrappy and belligerent Europe. Though the orient had all the expertise and know-how, it was the constant fighting of those smelly and imbred Europeans that primed them for a European age of empire. We may be cultivated and mutlticultured, we may be from a beautiful place, we may be well travelled and educated, we may be open minded, but we are not primed for battle.

Chez les Shabtai, the family that has been hosting me in St-Remy, things are entirely different. Every time I utter the phrases je suis d'accord or j'aime ça or c'est bon, I have the distinct impression that I'm letting them down. Expression of agreement or admiration is not always welcome as they are at home. Here, harmony is for the piano, not conversation. It was Christmas day and we had been sitting around the table for three hours, counting the aperitif we had been eating and drinking for four. At exactly the moment when the alcohol mixed with the fatigue of trying to keep the pace in French when David's mother turned to me with purpose.

"Alors, on sait que tu aimes la france, mais qu'est-ce qu'il y a que tu n'en aimes pas?" So, we know you like France, but what is there that you don't like about it?

I could have said one of many things, like I hate the way that the bank, the police station, and the post office are only open when you are guaranteed not to have the time to pay a visit. Perhaps I could have railed on about the bizarre things that the french like to eat like spreadable meats, or the liver of force-fed ducks and geese, or the tiny whole raw shrimp we were presently pretending to enjoy with homemade mayo. Or I could have picked on the the way that every frog is a licensed expert on everything from sheep shearing the subduction zone of the Pacific and North American tectonic plates. Or what really irks me is the way that only girls get to wear high boots, and fashion victims like me are left out of the trend.

Not really wanting to play into her game of argument baiting, I chose a banal topic: work. I told her that most of the teachers whose classes I give English lessons are stress cases. I chalk this up to the fact that unlike a great mass of the French functionary workforce, teachers are held responsible, not by their employers so much, but by twenty to thirty little bosses every day, their students. Teachers are influentual people and by osmosis, students pick up on their high concentrations of stress. When I give a simple direction in class like, "Color the Christmas tree green," I am confronted with twenty-five pairs of worried eyes. "Vert clair ou vert foncé !?" Light green or dark green!? Lequel! They look at me with their big eyes, worried to death that a Christmas Tree colored the wrong shade of green will mean the difference between a "well-done" and a tirade and lecture on the proper greeness of a particular domestic-festive conifer. I tell them dark-green to assuage their fears, but I can't help cringing as their maitresse berates them for hesitating to sound out the words to their explanation of the festival of Epiphany. Many six year olds are getting a better education in coping with stress and fear than they are in experiencing the reality that. I wonder if the little ones see the significance in the stuffed toy witch sitting behind their teacher's desk, I wonder if their teacher sees it.

After I gave my feeble attempt of criticism, I got a simple, "Je suis d'accord, parfois les enseignantsmettent trop de pression sur les eleves." Agreement. What a bummer. I tried to make up for my obvious French-less response by proclaiming my appreciation for the paring of the wine with the possibly rancid cheese we were devouring. It seemed to allay some of the disappointment. Tant mieux.

This has been a common experience of mine in France. This is a culture where strangers will jump down each other's throats in order to let them know they pronounced to-mah-to and not to-may-to. In the place where streets are paved with gold, do we fear to dig down to find some real dirt? At the expense of sounding like a meanie, I have decided to be more honest and let you in on some of my harsher views on life's controversies.

For one thing, I don't like Hemmingway. Also, a part of me feels that gay marriage shouldn't be a big issue since marriage shouldn't be a part of the government's business anway. The treatment of Palestine by Israel is an insult to the memory of the victims and survivors of the Holocaust. Don't go out of your way to make a baby if you have to, adopt one. I think the world is on a pathway to become a lot more like Delhi's Chandni Chowk neighborhood so we should all learn to deal with less stuff and more hardship. Finally, make love, art, and seek to grow the consciousness of the human race instead of all the other stuff, but while your at it, don't quit your day job, the place still needs someone to sweep the floors.