Cultural Pride: Not for Everyone

I have never lived in a country where I felt I fully belonged and was embraced as an indiginous or national with full rights. As a child, I always wished I could be one of those proud children neatly wearing dresses and hair ribbons of the flag colors of their country. I remember the mixed feelings I had of joy and envy as I just sat on the gym floor watching the Kuwaiti girls rehearse their cultural dances for the big performances on national holidays and end of the year graduation day. The joy of always being one of the honors students receiving cool gifts at the graduation ceremony was not enough to quench my thirst for wearing fancy, glittery clothes and colors that show my cultural and national pride. I still remember the graduation day of 2nd grade when Mom thought I'd look neater in the school uniform, but I insisted on wearing a fancy white dress. I probably didn't even know what a Palestinian cultural dress looked like back then.

Playing in the school band in Jordan while the Jordanian girls rehearsed their national songs and dabkeh was not any easier for me. Even though there were some Palestinian/Jordanian girls in the team, only pure Jordanian girls were allowed to sing and be lead dancers. The video of that award-winning performance of my middle-school's team, taped in 1992, is still being played on Jordanian national TV over and over to reinforce concepts of national pride. Cultural pride is beautiful when it's not intended to reinforce divides or hierarchies. But when Palestinian expats and refugees are the only ones not appreciated, not allowed, or even endangered for displaying their cultural and national pride, it's plain unfair.

* image of Kuwaiti children from http://www.amanjordan.org/articles/index.php?news=3400