He had to follow his wife to that foreign country. And he had no idea about its religion or tradition.
It was a life time job they had offered her at her special field of science as a university professor. So he had to look after the child, which he wasn’t used to. However, times were bad, and he could not support his family, not having been offered an equivalent job. And, despite his own lack of opportunities, he was honestly happy for her having a decent career.
Soon though, to his astonishment, the daily routines with the child filled his life quite satisfyingly. Therefore he actually feared the day when the child would be going to school. He still did not know about tradition or religion here, because he had never mingled with people. Also as a family they had hardly ever met anyone. They did not even know their neighbours, apart from wishing them a good day. So what was he going to do with his time off, since education started at such a young age in this country?
He then was relieved by a thought his wife brought up, that he could make contact as soon as the child would be entering school. Surely there were other parents who would welcome to have someone to talk to.
And as a matter of fact, when the first day of school was over, they had actually met half a dozen very nice couples. They had been ever so friendly, and one couple, a friendly consultant and his wife had even invited them to their lovely home for this or another of the upcoming weekends.
So the next day, when he was to pick up the child, he friendly greeted each of the mothers waiting in front of the gate. And when the woman who had been inviting his family arrived at the gate, he had a nice and casual chat with her, just like the evening before, making a joke and telling her about his first lonely morning.
But then he realised that the woman was hardly taking any notice of what he said, using the first opportunity to talk to someone else.
He frowned. What had happened? Had he said something wrong? Had he offended her in any way? He just didn’t know.
At this moment, the child, running at him, very excited to get home after this first day all alone at school, took his mind of things. So in the evening he had not even recalled the incident nor told his wife, when the telephone rang and she answered it by saying her name.
“Yes”, she said, and then “oh”, and “oh” again.
“Anything wrong?” he asked worriedly as soon as, with a peculiar look on her face, she had put down the receiver.
“I don’t know”, she said. “But apparently you talked to this man’s wife this morning, and he now told me this in order to express his deep concerns.”
“What?” He could not believe it. “I don’t understand?”
“In this country you cannot just talk to another man’s wife without crossing boundaries. It’s religion or tradition.”
“Well”, he said feeling slightly offended. “Don’t you think it’s a bit off?”
She nodded and shrugged, and then comforted him, knowing that his disappointment was so complete because of what was going to be in front of them rather than behind.
The next day he stood on the opposite side of the gate than those women, and he argued with himself, contemplating about the reasons why he had come here in the first place, and whether they would have come at all, had they known what life here was like.
People often looked down on Muslim countries, having no idea about their religion or tradition, but he was sure it could not have been worse. At least, the Muslims would not drink as much alcohol as they did here.
© 2009