Cordoba, Argentina
Alison Gillmor’s well-researched article on Esperanto is unusual in that I can find absolutely no factual errors in it. I even learned something I didn’t know (about Johannes Goropius Becanus). Many thanks for an outstanding job! Amike salutas via.
Brian Kaneen
Former president
Vancouver, BC
I learned Esperanto as a teenager and have used it all over the world. I’ve always been disappointed by the distorted image the media usually presents of it. Roget’s Thesaurus does not contain the words I need to express my feelings about Gillmor’s article, so let me tell you in Esperanto: Mia entuziasmo himalajas. There’s no direct translation, but it means something like, “My enthusiasm reaches Himalayan heights.”
Claude Piron
Gland, Switzerland
Gay in the Middle East
In separate Field Notes, both R.M. Vaughan (“Welcome to Cairo, Where Is Your Wife?,” October) and Chris Koentges ( “The Human Library,” October) unintentionally misrepresent gay culture in Islamic societies by approaching the subject from a singularly Western perspective.
In many large Western cities, gay culture is clearly apparent — the “fags are out,” as Vaughan might say. Both Vaughan and Koentges portray Islamic societies where, in clear contrast to this openness, demonstrations of gayness aren’t encouraged: a group of Egyptian men laugh when Vaughan orders a particularly frilly dessert, and Sahin Balci, who’s a Turkish immigrant in Holland, tells Koentges how his parents accepted him when he came out but “cautioned him not to talk about it.”
While I believe neither author meant to do so, these pieces suggest the following dichotomy: societies where people categorize themselves as “out” are good (or more evolved), while those where people do not make such announcements are bad (or less developed). Islam, though, may be much more evolved than the still Christian-dominated West in its rejection of such ready categorizations of identity. As my neighbour here in Istanbul once put it, “You fall in love with a person — man or woman, doesn’t matter — and that’s your private life and you don’t talk about it with everyone.” Koentges may have found the response of Balci’s parents unusual in Almelo, but scores of comments like my neighbour’s have convinced me this is the norm in Turkey’s large cities.
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