Job Discussion Forums

[KiteBiker]

Survival Tip #1 - Beards are OK in the Middle East.

Having worked there for several years, I lived in Oman where by all accounts the people are super nice and laid back - especially in Salalah. However, the youth seems to get into bad habits everywhere, including Salalah. I was sporting a short trimmed beard and moustache and was frequently verbally assualted by the youth with exclamations of "We F*** you, we kill you!". Then a local friend of mine told me the story of Prophet Mohammed who, penniless at the time, was asked for collateral on a loan. He is reputed to have plucked a single strand of hair from his beard and gave it to the [usurer] loaner, saying something to the efect of "This should be adequate. My word is as good as my [beard]".

So I let it grow. To bushy unkempt proportions. Soon, the Arabic Dean was poking fun at me indicating I had secretly joined Al-Quaeda. But you know what? Those kids never bothered me again. And as I told this story to my Arabic friend, he said "AHHH. They respected the beard. There is hope yet for our youth".

[khmerhit]

So the beard is a symbol of male collateral...hmm... a sort of anti-capital or anti-collateral before the fact of its acquisition, for want of a better beard--uh, word. And by trimming it, you were insulting the original owner and by extension everyone, at least all the little males of the species in that corner of the world. Isn't that a bit beard-olatrous of them? Or does the religion allow for it? They certainly do get hung up on their images, witness recent unrest. I've been reading a biography of Paul Bowles in which the ultimate Moroccan insult is to subject another to sodomy, apparently, so that makes sense. They can inflict injury and insult, and get off at the same time. Ideal, really, and cheap at half the price! (Mods, you might want to mod this...up to you.)

www.paulbowles.org