[NYC-L] look what this guy has to say about us

[Isa Blumi]

I wish to provide my fellow readers a commentary (one
the last) I wrote for Kosova Times, an English
language daily I tried with help of some colleagues in
the now terminated PGK to get running.  I think it is
of some value to our present concern about how the
"world" sees us.  The only way we are going to avoid a
repeat performance in Kosova (because as far as I am
concerned, we have convinced no one that we should be
independent, we are too busy setting up cafes and
radio stations that will cater to superflorous tastes)
is to develop a more realistic, self-critical
understanding of what we are as individuals and a
community.  With that deeper honesty about ourselves,
we can then point the mirror (and commentary) out at
the "world" who is fully armed with what I called way
back in Sept. the Western Mystic.

Op-ed page, Kosova Times Sept. 7, 1999 
Prishtina

The Western Mystic: Enough Already


ISTANBUL, Sept. 6, - Winding one’s way through
Kosova’s last three kilometers towards Macedonia and
the infamous Blace, the release is overwhelming. 
Kosova’s entire bulk, like a stone in the center of
the chest begins to dissolve.  I do not know the name
of the angst that permeates my soul when I am in
Kosova, but it is clear upon leaving the place.  I do
not like it.  I am afraid to pick at this painful
sore; I do not know even why it is painful…. 
	Skopje looks so much better now than it did this time
last summer.  It has profited handsomely from Kosova’s
trials.  I begin to relax in the center of town, enjoy
a beverage in the sun, watch the unrepentant take a
leisurely walk through the city’s streets.  Macedonia
is filled with contradictions and dangerous
confusions.  The treatment the helpless received there
was unacceptable to my humanistic heart, vulgarly
chilled in its calculation.  I could go on for days
about how manipulative, abusive and ugly the scene was
in Blace, in the camps, even though I was not a
personal witness to the arrogance of charity at the
time.  I passed through Macedonia during the NATO
bombing many times, feeling vile as I awaited my turn
to be processed in the Macedonian system at the
border.  It was something from which no one should
ever forgive.  And yet, the act of humanity corrupts
so many of us.
	I bring this up because on my way to Istanbul, I
crossed paths yet once again with that Western Mystic.
 It is not only an externalized mystic, something we
people of the non-Western world imagine.  It, in fact,
may be more a case of self-importance, a spirit of
unwarranted superiority than anything else.  I like to
see all the UN 4x4s that clog up Prishtina’s streets
as a representation of an assumption.  What that
assumption is varies of course.  There are some truly
generous, brilliant people who take this job of
creating a new world order seriously.  Then there are
the careerists who will hardly disguise their material
rationale for being in Prishtina.  It is the third
catergory of international citizen that inspires me
tonight. There are those who carry most clumsily the
Western mystic.  They, in fact, are the most taken in
by the idea that there is something called the West. 
The West as a substance which one can touch, feel,
articulate and possess.  These types, who warrant
absolutely no respect from Albanians or anyone else in
the world, be it Dili, Maputo, Freetown or Port au
Prince, nevertheless arrive in Kosova with a massive
complex.  They believe by sheer fact that they are
remotely attached to the “West,” (in most cases it
simply rests in the fact that they carry a passport)
that they are superior to Albanians.  They can be as
lowly as truck drivers transporting portable latrines
to construction sites, and yet they carry with them
this Western mystic.  They for some reason feel more
confident in the Balkans, Africa.  They walk into
people’s lives and actually attempt to instruct them
on the finer points of democracy and human dignity. 
Some half-wit Canadian truck driver who can proclaim
no greater knowledge of things beyond the Detroit Red
Wings, had the audacity to attempt to lecture
colleagues and friends one day on what is wrong and
right about their existence.  By carrying this Western
Mystic, this intellectual equivalent of a gnat
stuttered his way through one undeserved arrogant
simplification of the Albanian experience after
another.  This Mounty flunky is not an exception in
the international community in Kosova; he is the rule.
 His inarticulation was simply too glaring to ignore
and deserves reprimand.  There are others who actually
have enough intellect to “wing it.”  But by winging
their assumed superiority by sheer force of their
better handle of a spoken language can get extremely
tiring after a while.  Albanians may be polite, may be
grateful and ultimately may be so under confident that
they can look at this plumage of Western self-flattery
and play along.  But when this arrogance reaches the
levels of dangerous disregard for the feelings of
others, as is often the case on the roads of Kosova,
there lays a festering problem, and probably the
source of my pain.
	By asking the international community to take the
time to sit down with those in the countryside, (Issue
1) out of respect for the pain they have gone through,
it is simply a request that people exercise a bit of
humility.  It is plainly too easy for Canadian truck
drivers to zip past waving children in his clearly
marked trucks and feel the breeze of that Western
Mystic blow through his hair.  But the breeze of
confidence corrupts the air in which Albanians breath,
it pollutes it.  Those 4x4s that clog up the streets
of Prishtina cut corners, break laws and show complete
disrespect for people trying to reestablish order to
their lives.  The Western Mystic may assume a position
of moral superiority, but once again, the UN is the
best place to look around for evidence of the
immorality of “Western” civilization.  This essay from
Istanbul is not another exercise of bashing the
“Western”World, for I do not personally believe it
exists.  This is an angry growl at the arrogant people
with coveted passports who cut long lines at the
Skopje airport.  It is an angry growl at Albanians who
stand and gawk in the hundreds while they are brushed
aside by some men and women who, taking the same plane
as they are, decide they do not need to wait in line. 
An Albanian’s time is just as precious as of those who
service them back in Kosova.  Those who flaunt that
Western Mystic have no right to step in front of men,
women and children on account of their loose
association with Bill Clinton, Jacques Chirac or Toni
Blair.  Get back in line, remember that those faces
looking back at you are human beings, many of whom are
more educated, more accomplished and more human than
you.  And for the truck driver, I would suggest that
chip you carry on your shoulder may only be a crumb
from the Dorritos you eat while watching your hockey
matches.  That Western Mystic that fills your sails
here in Kosova is only a self-inflicted illussion, you
impressed no one.


Isa Blumi
__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Talk to your friends online with Yahoo! Messenger.
http://im.yahoo.com