Tomorrow I’m applying for a passport. It’s the third week in August and if all goes to plan, I’ll be leaving late September. Where am I going? I’m going to Egypt. Crazy I know. But how many times do you get to go to Egypt? I’ll tell you, the majority of people will never go, so when you have an excuse to go, you damn well better go.
Last year I met someone who was here on a study abroad program at a college nearby. We hit it off. We became good friends. But reality reared its ugly head and she had to leave in late December right before Christmas. So we celebrated the time we had. I was mostly broke at the time so I couldn’t do all the things with her I wanted. See, she’s lived in Egypt all her life, there are things that we take for granted every day that she’s never done or heard of. So I made a list and I tried crossing off as many things as I could in the few weeks we had left.
Of course, the same goes for me. There’s plenty I haven’t done or experienced that are everyday occurrences in Egypt. Technically speaking it’s in Africa, and the Middle East. For a lot of people, those last two put quite a lot of perspective on Egypt now reading this. We think of it as a whole other country where people are safe; as if terrorism only happens in Iraq and Afghanistan because that’s what they tell us on the morning news. But hearing from a few people who live there, it’s not exactly what we’re fed from news anchors. Today I heard on the radio a car bomb went off in Cairo. Things like that make me scared. But for my friend, it didn’t faze her. I’m travelling to this place. But if you know someone there, you get the whole story. We’re scared into staying home. It may be a more dangerous part of the world, but look out your window.
I thought to myself, what do others think of the U.S.? Look at the news, violence every day and night, supposed mass-shootings all over, domestic terrorism at its finest. Who says America is any better? Well, we do of course. Do you think an African or Russian or Korean think any differently? Maybe so, maybe not. But I won’t be scared into staying in my room all my life. The minute you hear the real story from a citizen of the country where it happened, you know it’s all hype. Sure, it might’ve happened. But it’s the equivalent of that bad neighborhood 10 minutes away. You hear someone else has been shot. Does it upset you? Most of the time we don’t think twice. It happens every day. So why does it scare us when we hear a bomb went off or a building fell in another country? It’s the unknown. We’re scared of not knowing what would happen if we were in that situation. But more importantly, it’s the refusal of adaptability. We think of the desert, we think turbans and head scarves. Everyone speaking another language and assuming everyone is armed. Why is this any different than the shooting down the road? You don’t go there either, do you? Because you think it’s dangerous. But people live there day in day out. You think there’s a difference, but there is not.
Sure, different cultures and countries. But the same goes for down the street. Really think about it. There is a gang shooting. If you were there as a witness, or got shot, what is the difference? You still get hit. Nobody said, “Oh wait, he’s not involved, let him through.” No you only get an unbiased piece of lead in you. Still an accident, it wasn’t meant for you, but it still happened. Now you’re on the news. You weren’t in another country, you were down the street. Same goes for religious killings abroad. You’re now saying “WAY different.” Not so, Different? Yes, far off? Not at all. Perhaps the reasoning behind it is all. You think you’re safe where you are, you’re comfortable. But that doesn’t save you from being shot minutes from home. You aren’t surrounded by a foreign culture to you at home.
Or are you?
Yes, you are. You only know what you chose to. You speak your language, and talk to your friends who you love, have a significant other whom you cherish and go to work or not. You play the guitar or fight for what’s right or mow lawns or teach kids or build picnic tables, you do whatever it is you love to do. But you choose that. You surround yourself with those people and things and experiences. There’s a whole other world out there right outside your door. It’s not on television, and it’s not overseas. There’s a Spanish family across the street who value their traditions as much as you do yours. The Chinese family celebrates the New Year, but not yours, and you think they’re crazy. What makes you so special? They speak Spanish or Russian or Chinese or Arabic, you speak English. You buy beer and chips and wear jerseys on game day. They dress up and dance on their days. You’re blaring your rock, they blare their salsa. You think they’re foreign. You were here first yea? Well share the fucking air.
There are thousands of cultures all around you. You don’t have to fly across the ocean to see it. You can experience some serious carnage down the block, across the state, and on the other side of the country. But some people chose for it not to be there. They think all that exists is their world. The gang shooting where an innocent woman got shot and killed, you feel nothing but a shrug and “those damn people.” Well people from Egypt, and China, and the U.K. think the same thing when a mass shooting happens, or someone decides to blow something up. The Same. Exact. Thing. We only receive it as “terrorism” as if it doesn’t happen here. It does. Domestic Terrorism. They only choose not to call it that. But I’ve severely digressed here.
My point is, I’m travelling to Egypt in September. I’m scared out of my mind, not because of danger, but because I live in Massachusetts and I’ve never been past Tennessee, and now I’m travelling over 5,000 miles across the ocean to another continent. But I assure you, I’m not scared because of danger, or terrorism, or bad people and especially the news. It’s only because I’m never out of my pasty white comfort zone. That’s IT.