Gypsyqueen Three weeks of exams, and the students only have 6 classes! I had hoped it was going to be an easy week, but not so! We all got written up, as we attempted to leave early on Wednesday (our Friday,)last week. No students for the whole day, other teachers were leaving, then somebody called us when we were in the van, and said we couldn't leave. We came back in the gates and sat in the courtyard. Two days later we all received a letter of warning, saying we had left. Needless to say we were upset over that. I got in trouble, as I had my laptop open at the beginning of one of the exams. This is like living in 1431, which is the Arabic year. When things are tense, and I'm upset, I tend not to write, as there is no use re-living it again. It's ok to write about it when I'm over it. There is lots of "whisper, whisper, whisper" all over the place. The "powers that be" wouldn't let us correct the English writing exam, and make the Paki teachers do it. We have not been told why, but you know that can't help. Apparently they think native speaking English teachers can't correct English exams. The whole problem is that they got 12 English speaking teachers put into a program created for 5 Pakistani teachers, and we were told to just fit in, don't do anything creative, only do the book. Once again, trying to take the "Western" out of teaching English, not going to happen. I expect to see big changes next semester. More teachers are coming, classes will be re-distributed and created, and changes in teaching assignments. It was the toughest week yet. I slept every afternoon for about 3 hours, even longer than my usual 1-1 and half hours. It's the only time I feel relaxed and safe from criticism. Every male or female in this country feels free to criticize any woman at any time. For the first time last week, I felt that we were not wanted or liked on our campus. I had a heart to heart with our company representative, and told him our point of view. He agreed that we were not wanted, and that next year, it is possible that they won't place women faculty in this university, as it is too hard to recruit or keep women teachers here. The whole community is against us, or that's how it feels. The girls love us, but they are the only ones. A few days ago, I was sitting in the food court of the mall, eating, and the muttawah (religious police) came by and told me by motioning, to cover my face. I said "No, I'm eating." The funny thing was that he wouldn't look at me to say this, only motioned and kept looking away from me. It's like a nightmare. Yesterday we were in the open market downtown, and they drove by and motioned for me to lower my face mask, as my eyebrows were showing. I ignored him. When we go shopping either downtown or in the mall, our security guys are always tailing us. Our driver, Abdul, says they are protecting us from terrorists, but I think it's just another control tactic. They aren't rude to us, but I think they are really trying to protect Saudis from us, not protecting us from them. Another funny thing that happened last night downtown, one of us needed visa photos, so we stopped at the place we had had them done a few weeks earlier. The guy asked us where was the gent that was with us, as we couldn't have our photo taken without a man present. We turned around and walked out. We can do photos here in the room and print them out. This is extreme religiousity, more like a cult. Women get the criticisms, corrections, any hostility felt by the males gets taken out on women. I say, deny them nookie for a few days, and then see what happens. It bothers me that the women just go along with it. They are at the bottom of the heap, they have no power at all, they have no economic power, they are kept in rags so no one can see them, they can have no needs or desires. It's like robots and automatons. It's no wonder that we sleep in the afternoons, and don't go out much. When we go out at all, we can expect to be spoken to about anything at anytime, something to correct us. I know that when it's over, I'll see the reason for my being here, besides the economic reason, but right now, I can't see it. Tomorrow, another day of "invigilating," (do you know that word? I didn't.) and then trying to hide in the corner of the library with my computer, to get out of sight and out of the line of fire. Thank God, I'm going to India for 2 weeks. I need a break. |