NATIVES AND EXPATS

Patriotism is the last refuge of scoundrels..

Samuel Johnson, English writer and thinker, 18th century

With the passing of time, I have noticed that after two or three years living in a country - and I have lived in quite a few by now - I feel an increasing desire to criticize it pitilessly. I cannot hold back my comments, I mutter insults under my breath and in general pester all those around me. This reaction of mine, of which I became aware quite a few years ago, began to worry me, since I felt that there might be something negative in my personality that enjoyed finding faults in everything around me, wherever I might be.

I have found among my papers little essays I wrote many years ago, criticizing an endless number of things about the USA, where I lived at the time. Afterwards, articles about Sweden that would have enraged any Swede reading them. Later on, I remember my untiring comments about Spain (because the fact that I was born there does not soften in any way my reactions), comments that I did not refrain from making just because I happened to live in Spain at the time and that, probably, made many a Spaniard take a dislike to me. And now that I live in England I make pejorative remarks whenever I see things and attitudes that I do not like, something that happens with a surprising frequency.

As a matter of fact I do not even have to live in a specific country in order to criticize it: It is enough to be well acquainted with that country or, even better, to find myself living in that country’s cultural environment. Having been married to a Frenchwoman, which means that I lived for years in a French atmosphere, with most of my social life taking place at that time among and with people from that country, France has also became one of the targets for my comments.

One day, turning all of this in my head, I began to think about my early travels: when I was seven years old I moved - or rather, my parents moved with me - to Argentina. I began to go to school there, acquired a remarkable Buenos Aires accent, learned the lyrics of a lot of tangos and, with the flexibility of my tender age, I accepted unquestioningly that country as the place where fate had decreed I should live. However, when I was eleven or so, we moved to Brazil and I became conscious of something quite strange. Let me explain: Argentina and Brazil had a war in the 19th century, to decide who was going to be in control of a third country, Uruguay. I had studied all about that war at my Argentinian school but when I started studying in Brazil I discovered that what I was told at my new school was quite different. The bad guys has become the good guys and vice versa. At the age of eleven it was quite a shock to realize that such a serious thing as history could be totally different depending upon who was telling it. My faith in grown-ups took a serious beating. Logically enough, I came to the conclusion that it would be very silly to rely on anything explained by the natives of any country, because all of them rearranged things to make their country look good. That was the seed which started the development of the attitude I adopted later on.

With the passing of time and after living in many countries, that attitude took shape, little by little, and became well defined, something that happened on its own, without my being really aware of it.  And very slowly I began to acquire my current perspective: the most important thing for a person is not to be European or American, or Christian or Muslim. What really defines you is whether you have spent all your life in just one country - or one culture - absorbing its ideas and attitudes without ever looking at them with a critical eye, as opposed to having lived and worked in many countries, developing a sort of cultural relativism and - at least I think so - a clearer, sharper view of things. If you’ve always lived in one country, you’re a “native”, while if you’ve moved around you’re an “expat” or (somewhat fancier) a “citizen of the world”.

Very slowly I have come to understand that an expat born in Poland, for example, is closer to me and easier to understand than a native Spaniard, in spite of the fact that I don’t speak a word of Polish, was born in Spain and have relatives there. There is a sort of complicity between expats, born from the fact that they have had very similar experiences, that makes it easy for them to understand each other. To live in a different country, to learn another language, to feel oneself outside the system, to look at things with a different perspective, to enjoy the good things that every country offers while rejecting the bad ones, to put on a poker face when natives talk about songs, TV programs or events that are part of their shared past but not of yours, are commonplace events for expats.

As an expat you don’t take long to learn how to ignore many of the things that natives say. The natives of practically every country are convinced that they have the most beautiful women, the most admirable culture, the most remarkable history and the bravest men. Not to mention the sweetest melons, the best cuisine and the cows - or goats, or sheep or kangaroos - with the best meat. It is like a repetitive mantra that becomes an acoustic backdrop, one that with time you learn not to hear, just as after a time you don’t hear the cars, motorcycles and buses that pass by if you live on a busy street.

And what has all of this got to do with my criticism of the countries in which I live? Well, it means that in fact I have nothing against those countries: it’s just that the attitudes of natives, which are the same in every country, bother me. Because, paradoxically enough, natives are terribly international: they’re all the same, regardless of their countries of birth. It’s not that I think that Americans are this or that way, or that the Spanish or the British have this or that defect. I just react against the “native” environment, against the endless pats on the back that they give each other while tirelessly chatting about how very lucky they are to have been born in Chicago, Montpellier or Geneva, instead of having been born in some horrid foreign place. I become fed up with the smug, self-satisfied atmosphere cultivated by natives, with their short-sightedness and their narrow horizons, their chauvinism and their mindless appreciation of the bit of land where they happen to have been born, their offended rejection of any criticism and their shock if anybody suggests in front of them that some foreign ways might possibly be better than their own.

That’s perhaps the reason why my writings and my comments about the countries where I have lived tend to be negative. It’s just a reaction against the tidal wave of silly satisfaction created by natives, an attempt to deflate a little bit their balloon of chauvinism. It’s obvious that there are many wonderful, admirable and brilliant things in the countries in which I have lived. But in general I don’t mention those: the natives of those countries take care of that job, endlessly and to the point of utter boredom. And I suppose that my reaction is an unconscious desire to act as a counterweight, telling them that their idols have a little bit of clay in their feet. I fear, however, that this is a hopeless task and my only reward is to observe the rage that this provokes in natives. Still, being a bit of an optimist, I allow myself to think that perhaps that rage may lead them, once they calm down, to broaden their perspectives. Hasn’t happened, so far, but you never know.

Just another Sunday dinner chez Jim

I met Jim when I was living in Stockholm. Or, rather, that was when I first got in touch with him, since I didn’t meet him in person at the time. A friend of mine had lent me a rather big book, full of pictures and descriptions of some rather wild carrying-ons at an Amsterdam festival and, having read and enjoyed it from cover to cover, I decided to write to the person who seemed to have organized it, a certain Jim Haynes. Being the nice person that he is, he answered my letter and we proceeded to develop a curious, long distance, postal friendship.

One or two years later I moved to Marbella, in Spain, and decided that it was time to meet Jim in person. I phoned him and he invited me to stay at his atelier for as long as I wanted to.

I arrived there on a Saturday and found Jim to be as friendly and warm in person as he was when writing letters. The atelier was a great place, full of books, videos and, of course, people. I was told that I could sleep in an upstairs room, which had a balcony from where I had an excellent view of all the activity downstairs. And there was a lot of activity, because a whole army of voluntary helpers was busily preparing the food for next day’s dinner (Jim’s Sunday dinners have between 60 and 80 guests, which means a lot of food). I pretended to help, took walks, got to meet some of the people who lived in the house or were passing through it – you’re never sure at Jim’s, as people arrive just to say “hello” and may still be there two weeks later – and enjoyed Jim’s company.

Sunday evening arrived and the house looked perfect: lots of pots with yummy smelling food, lines of trays with assorted salads, desserts carefully tucked away, glasses, water, wine and beer outside, in a little corner under the stairs, freshly cut French bread, paper dishes and napkins. And then people started arriving: an American college professor fresh from a tour of lectures in Africa, a Finnish girl who sold cell phones, several French couples, assorted young backpackers of both sexes who had, somehow, heard about Jim’s dinner, an eccentric (and lovely) Russian lady of indeterminate age, who had lived in Paris forever and was holding court outside, on the steps, while smoking a cigarette in a long holder (you can’t smoke at Jim’s dinners, except outside. He’s not part of the manic antismoking brigade, but 80 people smoking in a single room would make London’s old peasouper fogs pale in comparison) and a zillion other people of every color, shape, age and nationality. Jim welcomed them, handed them forms to fill in, if this was their first visit, and introduced them to everybody. Once in a while, he would pounce on people who seemed to be a bit lost, in a corner, and would introduce to others that he considered a suitable match.

Food got served and eaten, names and addresses exchanged, conversations held and romances begun. Being a people person and terribly curious, I felt I had been let loose in paradise: I kept meeting people, chatting about all kinds of subjects, hugging good looking girls and having a hell of a good time. The sound track was amazing, as I could hear six or seven languages being spoken at the same time, laughter, shouts of “who wants seconds?” and the general hum of a succesful party.

Slowly, the whole thing began to wind down, people began to leave,  paper dishes were put in garbage bags and pots and cutlery were washed and put away. Leftovers were stored in several fridges, guaranteeing a very nice lunch the following day. Jim and I sat down and exchanged impressions about the guests and the food. I had three or four names of interesting people – all women, for some strange reason – who had offered to meet me for drinks or go to a concert or do any of the million things one does when visiting Paris.

Finally, I said good-night to Jim and went up to my room: a large mattress on the floor looked terribly inviting and it didn’t take me long to undress, lie down and start falling asleep. Other people in the house were getting ready for bed, as well: some in the basement, others in sleeping bags on the living room floor. Suddenly, Jim’s voice: “Benny? Sorry to bother you, but two unexpected visitors have arrived and they don’t have any other place to sleep. Downstairs is full and you’re alone in this room...” I suppose I moaned in silence, since I had enjoyed having a room all to myself, but there was nothing I could do but accept the newcomers. Jim stood to one side and two young girls came into the room: “Benny, these are Birgitta and Pia, from Stockholm. Birgitta and Pia, this is Benny, who is kind enough to let you share his room. And he speaks Swedish”. Suddenly, sharing my room didn’t feel like such a bad idea. Birgitta and Pia were staggeringly good looking, in a typically unselfconscious Swedish way. I began to get up and muttered something about making room for their sleeping bags. The girls looked at each other and one of them, quite shyly, said “We don’t want to bother you. That is a big mattress and if you don’t mind, we can just share it with you”.

I almost heard celestial voices singing “Hallelujah!” right then, as I realized that the universe can be an OK place, after all. And modesty forbids me from continuing this tale (in addition to which, the Travellers Companion Series, which would have been the natural place for such a story, no longer exists) but in a single instant I came to understand why Hemingway said that Paris is a moveable feast. In spades. At least in Jim’s house.

I ended up spending a week there.

Jim’s dinners? Go, and may the force be with you.

P.S.: if you REALLY want to try Jim's dinners, visit this: http://www.jim-haynes.com/