A Lewis in Tunis

At the end of April, I had the amazing opportunity to travel to Tunis for a Fulbright Regional Conference. This was my first time to Western Northern Africa, or what we call in Arabic the "Maghreb", which means the western place. Like most countries in this region, and really in the world, Tunisia has a number of competing identities as a result of being the home of various civilizations.The Phoenicians, the Romans, the Arabs, and the French all left their mark on this small but beautiful land, and these various civilizations still live amongst the Tunisians today. Ruins from the ancient empires still stand tall, and Tunis/Carthage apparently holds the most intact Roman Mosaics of any former part of the Empire. Arabic and French are both national languages, and the secular nature of this Muslim country also reveals this dual-history. Tunisians assumed that we spoke French, and when we busted out the Egyptian Arabic, it brought lots of smiles and laughs. The popularity of Egyptian cinema and music in the region allows for Egyptian Arabic to travel pretty much anywhere, so at least they could understand us. My batting average was about .500 with the Tunisian dialect, the part I couldn't understand sounding like French with an Arabic accent and proved to be ultimately unintelligible.

In addition to my excitement to be in Hannibal's hometown, I was wrapped up the beauty of the architecture and exterior design of the buildings. Clearly a long way from Cairo, most of the buildings were white with blue accents, and the intricately designed doors were amazing. These are a few of the 300 photos I took of the beautiful scenery, and I believe that the Tunisian government should pay me for all of the times I mention how lovely the country is. please see tunisiatourism.gov for more information about your next trip to Tunisia.


This was all the backdrop for the conference, where about forty Fulbright students from the region came together to present their projects and meet their peers. Coming from Egypt, Syria, Israel, the U.A.E, Kuwait, Morocco, Tunisia, and Jordan, everyone had an interesting story to tell and a lot of shared experiences from living abroad for almost a year. People seemed to get more comfortable with one another by the end of the time there, ending the early posturing and academic banter that had tainted the first part of the conference. Once we all relaxed and realized we had nothing to prove, with the help of Tunisian beer and the spicy red sauce called "hirassa" we actually were able to learn something from one another.

Overall, it was a great trip and as usual, I couldn't help but learn a few things. Number One: Tunisians are very friendly. Number Two: Their food is amazing, I think I had more tuna than I have had since third grade. Number Three: Those Romans made a damn good mosaic. Number Four: You won't ever hear Tunisians criticizing their government. This was interesting to note, coming from Egypt, where the government is tyrannical, and there is a lot of censorship, but even on pain of imprisonment, Egyptians still speak out. Despite the beautiful facade, Tunisia is definitely no democracy, and there are a lot of problems that I would have enjoyed hearing our Tunisian colleagues discuss. Maybe the next trip. Either way, the doors were beautiful, the food delicious, and I hope that this Lewis will be in Tunis another time soon.