Janina Speaks Out

This is Janina V., an architect from Bratislava, as I met her at the archaeological site of Palmyra,  in Syria, about nine years ago. Janina was super-excited - this was the high-point of her Middle-East trip. There is a reason she did not want to show her face ... read on and all will be revealed. In the morning she took a quick breakfast early, packed lunch and plenty of water, grabbed her notebook and camera and made for the main entrance. Janina's plan was to see everything, take lots of pictures and chat with people to exchange impressions, ideas and compare knowledge. She was climbing a small hill with interesting looking columns when she saw a large black car stopping and three local people climbing out: the one in the middle seemed important. When he approached, they started talking while the other two burly and serious looking men stood respectfully back. His name was Sheikh Rashid al Hussaini, he spoke good but heavily accented English, a businessman from Damascus, who stopped to see what the big deal was with these ruins (he had no idea of history). When he heard that she's from Bratislava, he told her that he'd been in her town, one of his companies imports furniture made there. He said: "Nice city, lots of pretty women." Janina, proud of her hometown, protested saying that there is much more to the city than "women" to which the Shiekh dismissively replied: "Not for me, and women are women, right?" Janina became upset and said that women deserved respect, after all, "You were born from a woman". The Sheikh, looking angry, raised his voice and said: "You are not to mention my mother!" The two bodyguards moved in closer and before Janina could continue, I grabbed her hand saying that we must catch our bus and pulled her down the hill and into my van. We drove downtown, Janina seething and red in the face shouting "male chauvinism" and "sexism" and I saying "different culture" and "take it easy" none of which seemed to have an effect on her. We found an Internet Caffee where we had sweet mint tea and Janina sent her mom a very long email.