There is always a Them
The conversation about Them happens after a poor mans champagne at Cirio, after a local fruity sour beer concoction at Guests, after a walk around the Flemish ghetto and Grand Place, after seeing both the pissing boy and squatting girl and rubbing the reclining man with a dog for good luck (on the arm!) It happens after dinner in a Spanish bar where battered calamari and smoked ribs and deep fried anchovies and lush red wine graces our mouths. It happens on my first day in Belgium after walking the streets and smelling the smells of last year's trip to northern Africa, seeing women in burqas and men sipping strong coffee at cafe tables. It happens late in the night in Brussels.
The Moroccan question came up earlier in the night but was brushed aside. We talked of health care and maternity leave and unemployment. Of Obama and Elio di Rupo (Gay! Italian heritage! Socialist!). Of denying climate change and killing lobsters and how far a business can go making itself as environmentally sustainable as possible without putting itself out of business.
There is vehement talk of social service abuse and having six babies each, of failure to assimilate and of poor work ethic, of public schools going to hell having to deal with more languages and different cultural norms regarding parent participation in education.
We talked as we sipped tea in a kitchen of an apartment subsidized by the government in an attempt to keep the middle class in Brussels. She bought it six months ago and is now on unemployment as she thinks about her next career move. Her unemployment compensation is over 1000 Euros a month. That is more than some of my friends make with jobs. Health care is included of course, even if it is basic. The immigrants don't get this kind of money on Belgium's version of welfare, but like the rest of the inhabitants they know their health care is covered, that they will be able to get enough money to put food on the table. The social safety net will most likely catch them. This is why they come to Belgium.
As I told my host (who is a highly compassionate, intelligent, well educated person and more stating her perception of the national sentiment than her own position), I am trying to be sympathetic to an ethnic Belgian's position but to me it just sounds like any country's born-and-raised citizen complaining about the most recent immigrant. Just fill in the ethnic group with the complaints I just mentioned. In the USA it's Mexicans (It seems like Latin Americans all seem to get called Mexican if they work in a kitchen or as a gardener or farm worker). Italians before that? Irish way back when? Moroccans seem to be the thorn in the side in Belgium. There are a lot of them. Speaking their own language and making their own neighborhoods. They often end up with the jobs no one else wants to do and are sometimes/often discriminated against for "skilled" jobs. Before that it was the Spanish and Italians and Turks who came (invited by the government) to work in the coal mines.
The Spanish restaurant we patronized began because of these immigrants. The owner was kissed on the cheek and told all the best when we departed. The Spanish are accepted (It seems). Would this have happened in a Moroccan restaurant? Would we even have gone to a Moroccan restaurant or is that supporting the enemy? But isn't that what everyone should be doing? Supporting those that need support, reaching out to a community that is reminded every day that they are the outsiders and not necessarily welcome in their new country? Or is it not as bad as I perceive?
We emptied our cups and headed to bed, digesting foods, wines, tea, (ideas about culture, the notion of changing populations) from around the world.
The Moroccan question came up earlier in the night but was brushed aside. We talked of health care and maternity leave and unemployment. Of Obama and Elio di Rupo (Gay! Italian heritage! Socialist!). Of denying climate change and killing lobsters and how far a business can go making itself as environmentally sustainable as possible without putting itself out of business.
There is vehement talk of social service abuse and having six babies each, of failure to assimilate and of poor work ethic, of public schools going to hell having to deal with more languages and different cultural norms regarding parent participation in education.
We talked as we sipped tea in a kitchen of an apartment subsidized by the government in an attempt to keep the middle class in Brussels. She bought it six months ago and is now on unemployment as she thinks about her next career move. Her unemployment compensation is over 1000 Euros a month. That is more than some of my friends make with jobs. Health care is included of course, even if it is basic. The immigrants don't get this kind of money on Belgium's version of welfare, but like the rest of the inhabitants they know their health care is covered, that they will be able to get enough money to put food on the table. The social safety net will most likely catch them. This is why they come to Belgium.
As I told my host (who is a highly compassionate, intelligent, well educated person and more stating her perception of the national sentiment than her own position), I am trying to be sympathetic to an ethnic Belgian's position but to me it just sounds like any country's born-and-raised citizen complaining about the most recent immigrant. Just fill in the ethnic group with the complaints I just mentioned. In the USA it's Mexicans (It seems like Latin Americans all seem to get called Mexican if they work in a kitchen or as a gardener or farm worker). Italians before that? Irish way back when? Moroccans seem to be the thorn in the side in Belgium. There are a lot of them. Speaking their own language and making their own neighborhoods. They often end up with the jobs no one else wants to do and are sometimes/often discriminated against for "skilled" jobs. Before that it was the Spanish and Italians and Turks who came (invited by the government) to work in the coal mines.
The Spanish restaurant we patronized began because of these immigrants. The owner was kissed on the cheek and told all the best when we departed. The Spanish are accepted (It seems). Would this have happened in a Moroccan restaurant? Would we even have gone to a Moroccan restaurant or is that supporting the enemy? But isn't that what everyone should be doing? Supporting those that need support, reaching out to a community that is reminded every day that they are the outsiders and not necessarily welcome in their new country? Or is it not as bad as I perceive?
We emptied our cups and headed to bed, digesting foods, wines, tea, (ideas about culture, the notion of changing populations) from around the world.
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