Observations

There is nothing like good ‘ol fashioned sexism in the classroom, and it’s even more irritating when your student has no idea that what he is saying is inappropriate.  Case in point. Yesterday, one of my students looked at me and said, 

“Can I ask: What’s your real job?”

Naturally I was surprised as I have never been asked this question before, and I responded, “This.  This is my real job.” 

He was baffled (real shock resonated through his features), “Really?” 

“Really,” I smiled to mask my uncertainty, unsure of where this conversation was going, “I have my degree in Linguistics and a Teaching Certificate that says this can be my real job.  I have been teaching for three years.  Why?”  I decided to tease him, “Am I bad teacher?”

No,” he replied, “You’re very beautiful, you’re not a bad teacher.”

His English wasn’t good enough for me to attempt a retort on the fact that beauty has nothing to do with teaching ability and explain just how inappropriate his comment was- it irks me to no end when students comment on my ‘beauty’, as I am not here to be the showpiece for ‘different’ aka ‘non-Turkish’ aka “beauty,” and although it is sweet, it is completely unprofessional- I would never have told my teachers that they were beautiful, but as Joe gets told he is handsome all the time by students (both male and female same as me, I don't know if you could classify it as 'sexism' and it is a fine line to cross when it simply comes to cultural differences or sexism) Having lived in a few places now, I am continually troubled by the idea that foreigners are exotic and something to be ogled like a shiny new watch.  While this is definitely preferable to being persecuted, shunned or hated, and I am in no way bemoaning- merely observing, it is exhausting to have the knowledge that you aren’t different where you come from, but merely perceived as different where you are.  Another one of my students told me that he wanted to marry a Russian woman or a Canadian woman (an odd comparison) because they are beautiful and Turkish women talk too much.  Didn’t really know how to respond to that one, except to tell him that actually he talked a lot and maybe Turkish women didn’t want to marry him.  When in doubt, joke.

           The next day I ran into Mustafa as I was waiting for the bus home.  A woman slowly got on the bus ahead of us with her small child, and to be fair, she was moving quite slowly.  Mustafa remarked, "Women are such a pain."  I was surprised but didn't say anything, and he continued, "They have such huge asses."

         I didn't really know how to respond, but he continued when we got on the bus, "The reason Turkish women have such huge asses," he continued, "Is because they do nothing all day but sit at home and watch TV."  This is big commentary from a man, who, when both times I have been to his house, sits on his ass and allows his wife to cook and clean and make tea and coffee and roll the cigarettes for him to smoke.  I was especially surprised as Mustafa is usually quite a philospher, and for him to stereotype all Turkish women in this manner was not something I expected.  I quipped back about the fact that it is actually more common that I see Turkish men sitting around smoking in the cafes all day, rather than the women and then quickly changed the subject to safer waters.  

It has been an interesting weekend in terms of trying to compare my views of sexism and culture between various places, and while it is true that the staring is not nearly as normal in Malatya as it was in Jakarta (and again to counter, white men were ogled perhaps not as much, but still fairly often in Jakarta) and even worse when I lived in Albania, Malatya doesn’t have as obvious problems with sexism as Indonesia did.  It is more subtle, more in the way you might expect of Vancouver, although nowhere near as high in the index of women’s rights.  It is interesting to hear these comments from time to time because although they tend to make me laugh, I also realize the danger that approaches my way of thinking.  Only Eser showed up to my Friday class, so rather than sit in the classroom we went for a beer, but I said I would only go if I was paying (he paid last time), he hesitated- clearly unhappy with this, but eventually relented to letting me buy one round.  He wants to get Joe and Ilker and a few others together next week for beers, and my first thought was Oh good.  It will be much easier to get him to let Joe pay then to let me pay.