another American jerk acting up

I guess it was bound to happen sooner or later -- losing my cool. It’s just something I do now ant then. Mom, I can see you shaking your head and saying, “Why do you do that?” I am a person who stays very calm and takes in quite a bit without making too much of a fuss, but when I reach the boiling point I generally cause a little commotion, yes indeed, yes it’s true, oh yes.

I must back up a bit to tell about the doors to the lobby. I was given a key to those doors but it never worked. The doors were generally unlocked, but when they WERE locked on those rare occasions, I noticed other tenants would sometimes just give them a very hard yank, and just kind of rip the door open. I did it once and it worked. I figured that in a fix it would work again. But today, when I went down to go buy some toothpaste and chocolate at the store up the block I found that I was locked in my building. The hard yank didn’t work because the doors open out. It was only 5:30 pm and the doors are not supposed to be locked until midnight, but they were locked. I went back upstairs and called the harris (building supervisor) and I got a recording that said he could not be reached. I went down again, determined to yank that sucker open, or push it open, whichever the case may be. First I tried my key again on both doors, just to make sure. Then I took a hold of the door handle, propped my shoulder against the frame, and heaved with all my might. Well, the door didn’t open, but the large glass window broke into shards all held tight in its steel netting. None of the glass came out, and I wasn’t cut or anything, but I was a bit in shock. I had destroyed the door and still couldn’t get out of the building. There was nothing to do, so I came back upstairs and chatted with a neighbor for a while about her career options.

An hour later, I went down to see if anything had transpired. The harris was there, along with the business director of the company that owns our school, and someone else. They were all shouting and arguing about what had happened. I might have just slipped by without saying a word, but I thought I really should let them know what had actually happened. First they told me, “Apartment key no working heer - must your other key.” Then I showed them that I had the other key and demonstrated that it did not work. The harris said, “If you have a problem, you should call me.” That’s when I something popped in my head.

“I tried calling you. I tried calling you before, too, when my refrigerator didn’t work and how long did it take? Two weeks. And you said you would get my TV hooked up, and get me a lamp, too. Finally you came last night and brought someone to hook up my TV, but he charged me a fee, and guess what? Now the TV isn’t working again!”

“Not working? Okay I will call.”

And here’s where I got ugly. “DON’T BOTHER. I DON’T WANT TO WATCH TV. DON’T HOOK IT UP BECAUSE I DON’T EVEN WANT TO WATCH TV. ALL THE CHANNELS ARE MECCA!”

I must pause to say that while my behavior was not very sage-like, I will contend that it is rather off-putting to flip through the channels on Arabic cable network and find just one after another after another after another--broadcasts of the kneeling rows of bodies at that big mosque in Mecca, aerial shots with continuous chanting of the Quran blaring over loudspeakers. I hear it out my window coming from three directions. If you take a taxi ride you will hear it the whole way on the radio. And for the short time that I had a working television, I found that when I turn it on, there it is, again and again. You can find CNN and a couple movie channels from Dubai… it’s not really that I feel deprived of my American TV. But if anyone living here is really sick of hearing that eerie, depressing Islamic chanting night and day, he better not flip through the channels, because he will see the same thing in exponential proportions.

What was probably inappropriate was the disgust in my voice when I said the word “Mecca.” I said it like I was referring to something worse than a mixture of shit and vomit. I could see by the look on the business director’s face that he was surprised and disturbed. But I just turned and marched off to buy my toothpaste and chocolate.

I ended up buying only toothpaste and no chocolate, but when I got home and went to talk to my downstairs neighbors to vent my anger and admit my shame, they had some fresh baked chocolate chip cookies. They were very consoling and recommended playing the whole thing down with a shrug and bit of humor. Young as they are, they probably have more sense than me. Also they showed me that if I press a certain button on one of the two remote controls, the channel menu will appear. I am back in my own apartment now, and I just did tried the button, and the channels came on. Of course it came on a channel of the some guy chanting the Quran. You just can't win.

Those poor Muslims, force-fed their religion 24 hours a day. I can complain about it and say "mecca" with a bad attitude, and then come back and find that movie channel from Dubai. Those poor blokes have to feel guilty unless they bow down and beg for more. I wonder if the business director's look of surprise and disturbance came from the fact that he's really sick of hearing all that chanting too. Or maybe he really was offended. Probably a little of both.