Swine Flu and Censorship!

Ah yes, the ever popular pandemic these days is the good ol' Swine Flu! Kuwait has decided that the Swine Flu is a serious concern over here and has had strict health guidelines in place since the beginning of school. For example, the lower kindergarten classes and all pre-schools and daycares are not allowed to start/reopen until December due to the concerns of having so many little kids in such close contact with each other. The Kuwait Ministry has ruled this and our school must follow the same strict rules. We're also not allowed to have assemblies with more than 100 students due to the risk of spreading the flu bug.....even though we're all in the same building together anyways!!

We've definitely had a fair amount of H1N1 cases in our school, but it's really not that big of a deal. Once their tests come back positive for the virus, the doctor says they have to stay home for 7 days and rest. All the kids who have come down with it have fully recovered within a few days. People here are over-reacting to this bug and panic has ensued! There are parents who refuse to send their kids to school for fear of contracting the virus and demand to know how often the doorknobs are wiped and how many times a day the garbages are emptied and desks are wiped. Ridiculous, as we've actually had more kids out with the regular flu and bad head colds than H1N1!

Some "interesting" facts for ya.......ok, so pigs are "haraam" or taboo to eat or really discuss over here due to the Islamic cultural belief that they are unclean and impure. I have found some, well let's just call them interesting, things based off this belief. When I first arrived, I remember seeing a large poster claiming that this 'swine flu problem' is spread by pigs and some other untrue facts regarding the spread of H1N1. That poster has since disappeared and new ones with more correct facts on them have sprung up. Although they do still refer to it as the "swine flu", it's starting to be referred to as H1N1 more and more.

Back to the pigs.....well, obviously pork is illegal here, so no bacon or pork roast or ham for Hawaiian pizza! Turkey ham is ok, but it's just not the same on a pizza or in the form of bacon! I never was a big consumer of pork when I lived in Canada, but when you can't have something, you start to actually really miss it! What I wouldn't give for some good ol' maple smoked bacon! Also, do you know that "Charlotte's Web" is even banned at our school!? Yup! All because the main character happens to be a pig. Sometimes this culture can be a very different culture to get used to.

Speaking of banning things......I was so excited to discover that our school does the Scholastic Book Club orders. I was given my package of flyers and a list of all the banned books that had to be censored out of the flyer using a big, black marker. So yup, you guessed it, "The Diary of Anne Frank" had to be blacked out as did "The Big Book of WWII" simply because it demonstrated sympathy for the Jews.....again, considered "haraam". I've looked at the high school history textbooks and they also have been censored to the point where pages have been ripped out and any mention of "Israel" has been blacked out, as are any pictures or maps of it. The Ministry makes the decision on what gets censored and if we are caught giving out uncensored flyers or textbooks, our school will be heavily fined. I'm thankful I do not teach any History courses over here because I would have a difficult time dealing with the blacking out of historical events!

Now with all that said, there are some censored items that I do appreciate! :) Picking up a copy of the latest People or OK magazine is always funny to look at. There's a nice stamp on the inside cover stating that it has been officially censored and then as you flip through, any inappropriate outfits or baring of skin has been covered with you guessed it, a big black marker! It's great! I mean, I do not want to look at Britney Spears or any other celebrity in their inappropriate outfits and I don't have to because they're all wearing matching ones that bear the coincidental black streaks! LOL

Alright, last comment on Kuwait's censorship.........something to think about anyways. You have to understand that Kuwait is an up and coming country in the Middle East due to the ridiculous amounts of wealth held by the people here. However, their systems over here are very archaic as is their infrastructure. They don't do upkeep on anything, so they wait until something blows up or breaks before they look at it to fix it. Hence the current problem with sewage water leaking into the drinking water in one district! With that said, they're not very organized yet, so I can't see them having anything fancy or high-tech to monitor things like phone lines or internet.

However, here's what is 'weird' and something I'm looking into to find out what I can. The last three phone conversations I've had with my parents back home in Canada have had moments of disconnection. Now with the phone lines over here, that's not really all that surprising! What's surprising and strangely coincidental, is that every time we've been disconnected, I've been in the middle of talking about "church" over here. No other time have we been disconnected!!! I've asked around and apparently our apartment building is one of the only ones that consists almost completely of Westerners in this district - we have 77 Western people living in this building! If they were going to be watching/listening in on anyone, it would be our building they would have flagged, so perhaps the feelings of being "listened in on" are true! To solve the problem, we now just call church something else and again, coincidentally, we don't get disconnected! Odd, eh? Yeah, it could be just a strange coincidence or there could be something behind it. Honestly, one never knows over here!

Alright, that's all for now. If anyone has anything they want to know about, please fire me off a question and I can write about it. Take care and thank you for all the comments you've been leaving me - they are all super encouraging! :)