228. When in Rome

Part of the Moslem tradition is hospitality to strangers. They tell stories of the days of old—when the men vied with each other to see who could be the most hospitable, and when a stranger came, they would all want to have the stranger stay with them. Part of their tradition is to have the stranger sleep in their bed and wear their night clothing. They fed the stranger the best food available and generally made a great deal of him—and it has been my good fortune to meet men who still believe in these old traditions. Because of this I have been treated extremely well here—been babied and petted and pampered and just generally treated awfully well.

I’ve tried to keep the scale sort of even by drawing pictures for people as gifts and taking photographs and giving them copies and generally being agreeable; teaching a little English and playing with the children when I’ve seen them and things like this. But the scale is heavily off-balance on their side—they’ve been so extremely generous and kind to me.

They are a bit possessive though.

I guess they sort of feel like I belong to them. I’m their American and they want me to follow what they want me to do. I’m generally willing to do this because I learn so very much and its better to go along. You know, when you’re in Rome, you do like the Romans and I’m in Tripoli so I do like the Tripolitarians, or whatever they call themselves, do. It’s been a very interesting time, and I wrote a short essay about the situation. I wrote it in December on a cold day when I was indoors—there was nothing much else to do. I think this is a good time to read it. I’ll pick up my logbook—(this is in my new logbook. I’ve gone thru the old one—filled it completely and I bought a new one, which is very large. It will last a long time!) I wrote this in early January 1975.

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