a kaddish for qaddafi. of sorts.

This one is reposted from kaddish in two-part harmony, but maybe it belongs here as well, what with all the Ibn Khaldun and thoughts about current uprisings in the Middle East and North Africa. Comments are welcome at either site.

I feel like I'm supposed to write a kaddish for Qaddafi. And I'm having a lot of trouble doing so. What I want to do is defend him somehow. Say that he's been maligned for decades. Tell you about the jokes Tunisians (Libya's neighbors to the the west) used to tell about Qaddafi, all the way back in the 1970's...

In those days, Tunisians used to sneak over the border 'basbor de-la-lune' into Libya to work. They'd cross over at night, their passports being nothing but the light of the full moon. Qaddafi put people to work. Even Tunisians.

In Tebourba, people said that just working in a cafe in Libya brought home more money than anything they could do back home.  And so they'd go. And they'd stay until they'd made their fortune. Two years. Five years. And then they'd come home briefly, bearing massive gifts. Sewing machines and heaters. Fancy fuzzy carpet and grandfather clocks. Electric fans and electric ovens. Even if the electricity couldn't handle it. They brought the hope of employment and wealth. And then they'd be gone again. To bring back more.

Tunisians used to joke that Qaddafi gave everyone a car and everyone a house.  Every Libyan, that is. And that Libya was so rich, that when the car ran out of gas, they'd just abandon it right where it stood. Libya was that rich.  It was a very Tunisian joke. Tunisia was surrounded by rich neighbors, and their humor was the worst kind of self-deprecating.

Until last year. When Tunisia led the way.

And then the neighbors followed.

So.

Qaddafi was killed today.

And the media is still making jokes about him. How ludicrous he was. The crimes he perpetrated. Remember when Reagan called Qaddafi a 'Barbarian and a rat fink'?  It was headline in the SF Chronicle way back when. Today, even NPR still felt the need to joke about Qaddafi's hats, his ego, and his tent. The media has enjoyed decades of making him look clownish and stupid. A country bumpkin who ended up in power. Although, he never did hold any official title beyond 'colonel.'

My favorite Qaddafi story is when some Minister in Tunisian President Bourguiba's cabinet handed him an edict, and the first president of the republic signed it, sight unseen. Only to discover that he'd just given his country away. To Qaddafi.  Under the edict, Bourguiba would stay president of the newly combined nation, and Qaddafi would head the military.

Oops.

When Bourguiba realized his mistake, the story goes, he threw the Minister in prison for a while, and went on national TV.

"I'm an old man," President Bourguiba said, "and someone took advantage of me."

Tebourbis told me this story. They loved this story.

And then Bourguiba—right there on the tube in front of his entire nation—admitted that he'd made a mistake.

He picked up the edict in his two hands, held it up for all to see, and tore it to pieces. Khalass. No more treaty.

God, that was simple.

And that was the difference between the two North African leaders.

Qaddafi tried to merge Libya with Egypt, too. And Chad, as well. It just never seemed to take.

I was once in Chad when Qaddafi was visiting N'Djemena. As we traveled south from the capital, the tribesmen were riding north to pay him homage.  Thirty five years later, he still had sub-Saharan and even Tuareg allegiance, even in recent days. He desired a greater Maghrebi union. And believed that kings and royalty were anachronistic in the modern age. That the Middle East and North Africa should let go of monarchy already. For himself, no title, just rule. Seems he was more opposed to titles than despotism.

So.

Long live the revolution. That's what Qaddafi used to say.

But if the rest of the world is holding its collective breath for the blossoming democratic institutions any time soon, you can say kaddish for that one starting right now.

Yes, I know. You're sick of my invoking Ibn Khaldun. But there it is. A prediction of yet another oscillation of elites. The 'Arab Spring' may well be an upheaval against a generation of despotic rulers across the Middle East and North Africa. But expect preexisting opposition factions, parties, and leaders-in-exile (or prison) to step into power vacuum more than democratic proceedings.

But if democratic institutions somehow miraculously do flourish one day—thank this eager new generation (with their cell phones, smart phones, social networks) for finally doing what every generation before them could not manage. Keep in mind how the 'Arab Spring' started. In Tunisia. With one young man. Underemployed, and bureaucratically hampered. One young man with no future at all.

Unemployment of a plugged in hip new generation. Linked in to global scene. Aware of options and lack of options. No movement, uprising, or revolution has solved that one at all.  Not anywhere. Not even here.

The next leader and government of Libya is going to have to do at least one thing that Qaddafi did. He—or she—is going to have to somehow put this next generation to work.

mark

It doesn't seem like over thirty years but apparently it is.  I can't say that I've known him all that time.  I can merely say that we've had the same abbreviated  conversation for probably about that long. Ritualized. Mumbling. Not really checking in. Rote. Playing our roles. Routinized.

But sometime this past year something changed.  Is it that he looked up or that I did? Not sure.

"You're that doctor," he said, actually looking in my eyes.  "Wait, don't tell me ..."

I waited. But the line was going to get restless.

"Anthropologist," I said.

"Right."

And the conversation for a few months went like that—

"Wait, don't tell me—"

I'd wait.

"Archaeologist?" he'd say.

Close enough.

And after all these years of mumbled, "debit or credit?" the conversation took a turn at the check out line.

Slowly, I learned that he had been a history major at San Francisco State. That what he loved most was history. And that he had over three hundred history books in his apartment. And that he spent four to five hours a day reading.

"I have a book for you," I'd say. But invariably I'd left it in the car. And thought it obnoxious to go back out to get it. And then at a certain point, not standing it any longer, Rh cleaned out the back of my car — and I couldn't find the book.  Still can't.  But I've got another copy.

So. Today's conversation took another turn.

"Archaeologist?" he said — after we went through the preliminaries.

"Close enough. Anthropologist."

"Right," he said.

"I still have that book for you—"

"Today's my last day," he said.  "After thirty-three years, I'm retiring!"

"Mazel tov," I said, realizing that was culturally inappropriate. "Congrats," I said. And "yikes— I still have that book for you—"

I ran home with my four bags of groceries and left them in the car.  I scoured the garage. No Ibn Khaldun.  The one I wanted to give him was pristene. I'd given it to bio-father about thirty-five years ago. It had never been opened. And yet Al-Muqaddimah is one of the most profound takes on world history that ought to be read in the West.  It was written in 1377, and — and you're probably sick of hearing me talk about it.

Scoured upstairs as well. All I could find was my own home edition of Al-Muqaddimah. You know, the one with all the paper clips, stickies and underlining.  It was sitting on top of the three volume edition that I hold as close to sacred as I can manage.

I took a breath, and grabbed my own copy. And headed back to Andronico's.  He still had five more hours before leaving the grocery forever. Yet still, the line before his register seemed as endless as it did every single time I'd stood in it.  Wow. In a few more hours, no more Mark! But the uncaring line would pile up anyway.

I handed him the book.

"Do you want it back?" he asked, noting the clips and stickies.

"No, keep it," I said, hoping that my notes might help.  I realized suddenly that he too might not read it, just as biofather had not. But that the notes might help him engage and make it more user-friendly.

"It's written in 1377," I added, hoping that would help.

"A primary source!" he said.

And he beamed.

the little country that could

Once upon a time there was a little country. It hadn't always been a little country, but it had for the most part been an outlier in the larger scheme of things. It prided itself on being the 'breadbasket of Rome' but if the Punic wars had gone otherwise, Rome might have been the breadbasket of lovely Carthage instead. Oh well.

When I lived there, the humor in the little country was entirely self-deprecating and perpetuated the idea of smallness and the inability to aspire to anything much at all. My personal favorite being:

if the boat has two captains, all the crew will perish

Which was meant to be sure that the people understood the dangers of a two-party system. It could not be tolerated. Debate was inherently dangerous, and could break the back of a fragile little country like ours.

"Ahna kul kif kif," people would say. "We are all the same." Scratch the surface, and it wasn't true at all, of course. Nevertheless, there came to be not debate but only whispers.

There was a benevolent ruler of the little country, after its mild revolution against the dominant forces of the north. He was proud, but conciliatory. And he wasn't afraid to make mistakes.

One day, he didn't read the fine print, and signed an edict stuck under his nose. Inadvertently, he had just given his country away to the neighbors. Well, oops.

I mean, what do you do with a mistake like that? Run away to Saudi Arabia and hide your face and stash your floos? No, no, no. The wise benevolent ruler was filled with grace.

He got on national TV and announced to the people (and anyone else who might care enough to listen at the time — it was, remember a very little country):

"Somebody," he said quietly and with no hint of animosity,"somebody put this paper in front of me," he said as he waved the paper in the air.

"I'm an old man," he said. "I made a mistake." And he took the decree that gave the little country away to the neighbor, and he ripped it into pieces.

Khalas. That was the end of that. Crisis averted. And what could the hungry ruler next door do? The deal was dead inside of a five minute broadcast. A Minister of the government was thrown into prison for a while, until his inevitable pardon.

It's a sweet little country.

And that wasn't the only mistake the ruler had made. Think of this one:

Early in his rule, a great fasting holiday was approaching, right smack in the middle of harvest season. Our fair ruler feared that in its early days of independence, the fast might interfere with the economic development of his newly independent little state. He got on national television, and did something unheard of at the time (and perhaps more shocking today).

He ate something.

On TV.

In the middle of a sacred fast.

And he gave an awe-inspiring speech citing holy scripture to back up his claim that now was the time for nation-building, and that down the road fasting would be de rigeur again.

There was a collective intake of breath.

Some ate. Most didn't. Work slowed down, but it didn't stop or falter. The point had been made. Our president of the republic did not try it again.

The point is — he tried. There was a lot at stake. And he made mistakes. Big ones. And he survived them — and so did the little country. For the most part, the people went along their merry way, in relative peace and relative obscurity. They ran off to the rich neighbor to work, when they could. 'Bassebor de la lune' they called it, as they snuck across the border at night. Passport of the Moon. Or they managed to get papers and run off across the sea to work in the northlands. There was a large middle class, and an even larger rural sector.

There still were plenty of gourbis — mud huts with straw roofs, and strings of bright red chili peppers hanging from the modest roof, beside the doorless door. Courtyards were filled with women brewing tough as nails mint tea, so strong and sweet that you could stand a spoon in the tiny glass and have it stand erect from all the buzz. Miniscule blue enamel teapots sat in little earthen firebowls in each courtyard, filled with sweet smelling mesquite coals burning hotly. A kanoun, they called it, and the kanoun would be used in the winter to warm the beds, and dry the clothes; to 'bake' bread, and most of all to brew the national brew of mint and gunpowder tea.

As I said, it was a modest little country, with modest little aspirations.

After some decades of national decreasing expectations and increasing self-deprecation, the father of his country still held onto power, did not hold elections and did not step down — until, with ultimate humility and low key style, his prime minister took the reigns out of his hands and took over as ruler. But he forgot to steal the charisma that had so long held the little country together. More decades passed. The country slipped further into the backwaters of international reckoning, where it lay underestimated by all.

And then one day, a young man recognized his aspirations had been crushed. The population of the little country had exploded exponentially while no one was paying attention, and chomage had become not just the national past time, but the primary national vocation.

Hittistes — from the word hayit, or wall, that's what they were called. Though this was a word used more by the neighbors to the west, who had more hittistes standing around with nothing to do. Wall leaning was an escalation from what the previous generations had done — which was to sit in cafes nursing tiny glasses of killer tea, with at least the pretense of doing something moderately productive maybe.

And that one day, that young man — set himself afire, and took more than North Africa with him. And he was no hittiste — he was trying to eke out an occupation, albeit way below his level of aspiration. Time to face the music.

Mohamed Bouazizi from the town of Sidi Bouzid, had had enough, perceived no future, perceived that there was nowhere left to go.

And his moment of private frustration sparked the flame, quite literally, of the youth across North Africa. The youth and citizenry across the Middle East, and beyond, a bit, as well. Business as usual will not continue as business as usual.

Or maybe it will. Tunisia has had only two presidents. Bourguiba and Ben Ali. Do we say a kaddish for the benign neglect of presidents-for-life as we say a kaddish for Mohamed Bouazizi? Do we dare to think that the pattern of governance will change, and not just the face of the ruler on the side of buildings? Can Tunisia pave a path to a different kind of rule.

I've always said no, it couldn't happen. Relying on the eternal wisdom of Ibn Khaldun, I've maintained that the 'oscillation of elites' is the political system on the Middle East and North Africa — not an aberration of it. This is the way governments transition. They don't need elections or two party systems. They don't need democracy, or what we call democracy. That the circulation of elites is as valid as any other way of ruling territory and its people.

But when I look at Tunisia and Egypt today, and even Yemen, maybe more—I think the time has come at last, to say that I'm not sure.