Meet Charles Carver!
In a previous post I mentioned that I was going to start a series of articles on young expatriates in the Middle Esat. In that post, I wrote about an experience a young gentleman from England called Edward had,experiencing street vending in downtown Amman, and also linked to his own description of the experience as he shared it on 7iber.com
This time and in continuation with what I have started in that post, I decided to meet with a young gentleman from the United States by the name of Charles Carver.
Charles Carver, a student of International Relations, came all the way from Austin-Texas along with 30 other students from different parts of the U.S to Jordan to enroll for a semster at the University of Jordan, learning Arabic, and other area studies such as; Economics, International Relations from Middle Eastern Perspective, and Islam in Modern Contexts, part of a programme organised by the Council on International Educational Exchange, shortly known as CIEE.
His passion lies in photography and journalism, as well as traveling and experiencing different cultures.
Charlie currently writes for 
magazine in Jordan, which is a pop culture magazine published in English, his articles focus on social issues concerning the youth of Jordan, from student council elections to drug abuse and underground life.
Last month, he wrote a very interesting article about the underground culture of heavy metal music in Jordan, in which he dispelled the myths spreaded about the assoaciation of heavy metal music with satanism or devil worshipping.
I thought it would be interesting to link to it, as also Esra’a brought up the issue in her last podcast interview with the DJ from Saudi Arabia, so I contacted Pulp magazine and they were courteous to send me a soft copy of the article to link to Underground and Loud P1 , Underground and Loud P2 , I hope you find it interesting to read!
I leave you now with the interview I made with Charlie, along with pictures of sights he visited in the Middle East, enjoy!.
• You have been in Jordan for about 8 months now,being an American, what were the ups and downs of your stay here?
Well at first it was the weather that got me down, I had no idea that the winter rain was almost continuous for 3 months, that was quite shocking because I only packed a light jacket. Thankfully the weather since then has been beautiful, I’ve heard complaints about the heat, but where I’m from I can safely say that it is much hotter during the summer. Nothing other than that was entirely unexpected, I expected to be ripped off by cabbies for the first month, to be looked at with those eyes that seemed to say “aysh?” But I would have to say that my experiences have been overall quite glowing, touring the countryside and meeting all sorts of interesting people, not to forget the ability to smoke a cigarette almost anywhere I feel like.
•How did you find the youth population in Jordan, have you made friends here?
Youth are similar all over the world, some have more money than they know what to do with, others have more simple pleasures. Something relieving about the youth here in Jordan that separates them from other places, is they seem to be, in general, more receptive to foreigners than for example, my experiences in Europe. I’ve made quite a few friends here, it was hard at first to branch out away from the other expats because it was easy to find similarities with them. But Jordanians reputation for hospitality definitely applies to the youth here, they’ve always been willing to help and are very nice.
• You’ve written for Pulp magazine for about 2 months, how do you evaluate your experience writing for a Jordanian magazine?
Well, I think it almost goes without saying that freedom of the press isn’t the priority it is back in the states. There have been times when my frustration with what can be printed makes me want to scream bloody murder and generally through a fit, but then i just have to accept that this is the way things are and i’m not in any position to change the system. Pulp has been great, they have been more open to tackling subjects that are often considered too taboo to print here. I have found it a good outlet for me, as I like to write about the often unseen image of the Arab street seen by the west, that of the young people doing what young people do best, being normal and having fun. I think the image that the west has is that a young man in this part of the world is just another potential terrorist, which is sad. Working with Pulp has shown in very clear terms that the majority of the younger generation just want to have fun, and we work hard to show this, and that even this society’s misconceptions about the youth are unfounded.
• Your article in Pulp’s July edition-which we are linking to here on our blog- tackled heavy metal underground culture in Jordan, what made you decide on the topic,and what feedback have you got from the critics and readers?
Continuing with the theme of dispelling the rumors and other here say that put young people here in a bad light, heavy metal has been targeted as being a source of the the downfall of youth here. There are countless rumors about them, ranging from drug use, to satan worship, to even crazy wild orgies. I just wanted to show anyone who read the magazine that these were all unfounded and were the product of fear or misunderstandings. I have only had a little feedback from the article, mostly positive, the bands themselves and a website dedicated to the local metal scene encouraged their members to pick up the magazine.
• Having lived in Israel for 2 months also, how do you compare your stay in both countries as even though they both lie in the Middle East,they are very different from each other!, and how do you see the future and prospects of peace in the region?
I think that Israel and Jordan are quite similar on some levels, for example, no one waits in line in either country, people are generally after the same goals in life, living well and being safe. Unfortunately, they both seem to be similar in who they blame for their problems, Israelis like to blame Arabs and Arabs like to blame Israelis. Israel, like Lebanon and many other Arab nations, is a society that has very distinct divisions within itself. There are movements in both countries that are large proponents of peace, but equally there are groups that see total war and conquest as the only way to achieve this goal, there are groups that could care less about the fate of the nation and only care about religious zealotry. I don’t think we’ll see anytime in the near future a true peace, what we will see is moments of hot a cold political situations occur periodically.
• You have dated a girl from Jordan, how did you find the experience, given you both belonged to very different cultures.
I wish I could say that it has been easy, but this society’s view on dating, especially between a foreigner and a local girl is not well looked on. My girlfriend and I have become quite frustrated by constraints placed on us here, even though she grew up with this culture, she has not wholly accepted it. We have had to try our best to keep our relationship secret, we even tried to keep it from our close friends for a short period of time. You never know when word of us might get to the wrong person, who decides to ‘correct’ the situation. I like sometimes to think romantically about the situation, that love transcends all boundaries and cultural barriers, and in our case it has in many ways. Realistically, because we are both young professionals with a less oriental view on how our relationship is viewed here, we’ve come to realize that keeping everything as low key as possible is for the best, maybe not what we would prefer, but a necessity none the less.
• You have enrolled for a semester learning Arabic at the University of Jordan’s Language Centre, how do you see higher education institutions in Jordan compared to those in the U.S?
Universities here require some major overhauls, there seems to be a push to just pass students through without making sure that the graduates retain a level of education that is on par with European or North American schools. Jordanians graduate, then look for jobs, but often lack the skills that gainful employers are looking for. With so many young people in Jordan and so many universities to accommodate their education, it’s sad that they are being turned over so quickly. I’ve heard officials talk of Jordan’s greatest investment being the education of the children. And it is a great investment, there are a plethora of universities here. Unfortunately the focus seems to be on the investment aspects of running a school, not on the quality of education, this isn’t a unique problem to Jordan, but a large one. There is of course the politics of university professors and administrators that is always in tension, but i think this is fairly normal for a place of higher education.
• Being at UJ’s Language Centre sure has given you not just a Jordanian experience, but also an international one, as many students from all over the world come to Jordan and enroll at the language centre to learn Arabic, how do you see young expatriates like yourself coming here to learn what seems to be a difficult language?
I’ve been really impressed with my fellow students, some people speak such amazing Arabic that it has been hard to think that I would ever evolve to their level (I’m still waiting). Some people came because they just thought Jordan was a weird place to visit or had an academic interest in the region, others because they had family connections with the region, and others who came because they either hope for a career in politics or the military.
• Last but not least, where do you see the situation in Iraq going, will there be tangible progress in the mere future?
When the war started I don’t think most people in America knew the difference between a shia and shizou, a sunni and a sandwich, or a kurd and a (well you get the point) I would say that the only good thing to come out of this whole war has been that the common American now takes an interest in the goings on of the Middle East. This is probably a step in the right direction as the region has often been neglected by foreign powers and has had to solve it’s own issues alone. Probably the Middle East was one of the few areas of the world that hardly noticed that the Cold War had ended, there was no real affect here. I would like to see Iraq fall under a nationalist umbrella, but their history seems to lead them away from such feelings, and I think that the violence caused by the divisions in their society will continue and possibly worsen. I recently read that the US generals and ambassador to Iraq are drawing up plans to remain until 2009, so I don’t think any progress will be made in the near future, I can hope that one day they’ll all wake up and say, “what were we thinking killing each other, lets build a viable country” but i don’t think that will happen for many years.
