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SPRING ’12 REGIONAL TRAVEL
Dear Colleagues & Friends of MESP,
MARCH, 2012
Before leaving Israel for our regional travel, MESP students spent a week in the homes of Palestinian families. Home-stays have always been an important component of the MESP curriculum, and we try to strike a balance between the reality that these stays can be Aileen Choi from Calvin College uneven, and the student need for cross-cultural l embraces the children of her host family. experience with those who are more like the local poor. “Certainly, graciousness and generosity knows no political or cultural boundaries” noted Phil Heimstra from Dordt College, who thoroughly enjoyed his home-stay in Aida Camp. As expected, Phil and others have a new found appreciation for Palestinians, in spite of language and other barriers that they encountered. Home-stay week was interspersed with day trips to Hebron, Ramallah, and a Kibbutz, allowing students to spend the evenings with their host families. The learning continued for MESPers, as seen here (right), during a visit to the tomb of Abraham in Hebron, where an Israeli resident explains the importance of the Jewish reverence for the Patriarch-Abraham.
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In mid-March, we embarked on our regional travel for the semester...First stop: ISTANBUL, Turkey; always a favorite with MESPers! Straddling two continents on the Bosphorus, this former Byzantine capital is modern and progressive, yet also historic and mysterious (see video clip below). Turkey is one of the most dynamic countries of the wider Middle East region. This dynamism, especially its political and religious dimensions, always translates into powerful learning for the MESP cohort. Prominent guest speakers covered a wide range of issues, ranging from secularism to new religious currents, MESPers L-O-V-E Istanbul from domestic human rights to foreign policy challenges and from CLI CK HERE minority rights to the persistent strength of nationalism. Currently visiting the Great Mosque, in Kairouan Tunisia, MESP is soon heading to Jordan.
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► About MESP ► Great Speakers ► Coursework ► Service Learning ► Home-Stays ► Feb. ‘12 Newsletter In SUMMER ISSUE... MESP
study abroad Re-entry
R-E-T-R-E-A-T
Blessings,
& A NEW MESP CENTER
David P. Holt
ALUM BOB KUBINEC attended MESP in Fall ‘07 and currently serves as a Foreign Service Officer at the US Embassy in Saudi Arabia. He came to MESP as an undergraduate student from Wheaton College. “MESP showed me vividly, both the beauty and the heartbreak of the Middle East, and it left me wanting very much to return.” Bob also recalls making the decision to pursue an MA in International Affairs, and the hours spent “bouncing around the MESP bus in Syria and Turkey, trying in vain to study for the GRE.” Less than five years after attending MESP, he completed his BA and MA degrees, along with a competitive battery of exams and interviews for the Foreign Service, and received his first posting in Riyadh. Today, he continues to enjoy the chance to work in a multi-cultural environment—including staff from Egypt, Syria, Lebanon and Sudan— and uses his language skills on a daily basis. “Saudi Arabia has a fascinating culture, and I’ve learned much from being here and interacting with Saudis from all walks of life…. It’s so important to spend the time to get to know people’s stories, both the good and the difficult, if you really want to understand a country.” Bob considers MESP to be “an important formative experience” and is thankful for the opportunity he had to participate in it.
COUNTRY Our plane landed on Tunisian soil, to the sounds of hand clapping by the locals onboard. Enthusiasm for their country was evident, and throughout our week’s stay in Tunisia, we felt similar sentiments as we listened to an array of Tunisian speakers and US embassy officials. While this country has undergone numerous transitions in the last century and a half, from a monarchy, to a colonial power, to a republic, to a dictatorship, to its present condition, guest speakers emphasized that the recent revolution was ignited by: the global financial crisis of 2008, a youth weighted population subject to poverty and unemployment, crony capitalism, an aging dictator, oppression of civil liberties, and an absence of civil society. Nonetheless, despite these factors, no one anticipated such a swift demise of authoritarian rule in Tunisia. With a twenty-three percent unemployment rate—most of whom are under twenty-five years of age, Tunisians recognize the challenges of transition. As one local professor admitted: “We do not have a magic wand to change things overnight.” Yet, one cannot underestimate the role of social media in galvanizing the revolution. In a country of 10 million people, 2 million are on Facebook. As one journalist told us, “it was our weapon of mass destruction.” All week long we were humbled to hear from participants involved with the Jasmine Revolution. Though we Americans are justifiably proud of our own history of liberty, most of us have inherited rather than struggled for these blessings. Tunisians are currently engaged in the struggle to articulate and define a new experience of liberty that may help to transform the ‘birthplace of the Arab Spring’ into a mature example of democratic values in the Arab world. We certainly wish them the best!
BLOGGER One of our first speakers in Tunis was blogger—Zied El Heni. A nuclear physicist by training, along with three additional masters degrees, El Heni’s passionate resistance to the injustices and oppression of the old regime compelled him toward a new vocation in journalism. “This was a revolution for freedom and dignity,” he said passionately. And he has experienced this first-hand! Jailed like his father before him for speaking out against the Ben Ali dictatorship, El-Heni joined other brave Tunisians in voicing the principles of resistance through his blog. He is credited as being the first to use the term “Jasmine revolution.” We were honored to meet him and hear his side of this courageous story!
For further information about MESP please click here David P. Holt (PhD) Mesp.director@gmail.com Director, Middle East Studies Program Council for Christian Colleges & Universities http://www.cccu.org http://www.bestsemester.com/mesp Jerusalem, Israel and Washington, DC 0549051844 (Israel) (00972)549051844 (From the USA)
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