“Great” Moments in Teaching, Part 10

Americans really don’t realize how lucky we are to have certain freedoms, especially the right to criticize our government.

In fact, there is a HUGE market in America for political comedy mocking those who govern our country.

In many other countries, to do so would be to risk prison, or sometimes worse.

But what happens when an American cracks a joke about a foreign government, while LIVING in that foreign country?

Syria is not known for its political freedoms, something easy to forget… but there were the occasional reminders. For one, when I was on the phone, sometimes I could hear a *click* and knew someone was listening in on my conversations. The government wasn’t afraid to remind people of this either – the “secret” police (called mukhabarat) could be found standing on most street corners, semi-automatics slung loosely over their shoulders.

While I never found them intimidating (their “uniforms” looked like a bad ripoff from Miami Vice ten years earlier), they scared the shit out of locals.

اعذرني سيدي. لدينا بعض الأسئلة ، أنا كروكيت وهذا تابس.

Almost everyone had a story of someone they knew being interrogated or locked up.

Stories were also whispered about torture, but no one could confirm.

There were also pictures of Hafez Al-Assad, the “elected” president of Syria for 25+ years everywhere…watching Syrians in their daily life.

It was an effective, intimidating way to control the population. And, to add insult to injury, the Syrian Air Force Department’s headquarters were across the street from the American international school’s athletic fields behind the building.

For those who are unaware, al-Assad was an Air Force pilot during the Six Day War with Israel, and it was that arm of the Syrian Armed Forces that controlled the country. There were rumors abounding that there were listening devices aimed at our school…

Which didn’t help when I decided to make fun of Hafez Al-Assad.

My favorite class that year was my sophomore history class, and we regularly engaged in discussing controversial topics, but never about the Syrian government. I went ahead and (jokingly) told the class that the Syrian government was having difficulty connecting with the younger generation, and would be replacing some of the Hafez Al-Assad portraits around town with more up-to-date ones, representing the interests of the youth.

Surfer Hafez …

(which I then acted out)

Rapper Hafez (hat on sideways)…

and finally…

DJ Hafez.

The class laughed hysterically, while some wondered if it were true – after all, I didn’t roll my eyes when I shared the news story.

The story was so popular with the class, I decided to tell it again, to my junior class.

I have to say, I loved this class as well, but I didn’t know many of their backgrounds – I knew nationalities, but not what their parents did. I told the story again, and reenacted my poses of these new statues/portraits.

There was a nervous laugh or two, and maybe a couple foreign (non-Syrians) who laughed.

The Syrian kids, however, kept nervously glancing over at one female student in class to see her reaction. She had a little smirk on her face, but never gave away what she really thought of my joke.

I taught the lesson, the bell rang, and I went to have lunch with a few other teachers. I mentioned the difference between the classes, and one teacher asked who was in the class, and I mentioned the girl’s name.

Well, that’s why.