I'll be pleased as punch if I'm able to master the buffoonish Egyptian accent in the next few years. At least it's better than whatever faux-Arabic they speak in the Maghrebian backwaters, eh?

Concerning democracy, economics and Islamists, we've already talked about Tunisia to some extent when someone asked me a question about Ben Ali. I tried to give as informative an answer as I could but I'd like to know what you think of Ben Ali's policies, most of all those related to economics and Islamists. If you've been to Tunisia, is the average Muslim there more socially liberal than the average Muslim in surrounding countries? Are they more ecomically liberal*?

What do you think of Ben Ali's implementation of those policies?

*Here, "liberal" is in the European sense.

Well, first for Pratike, while perhaps there is some achievement in actually obtaining the buffoonish Ciarene accent, please do avoid picking up the unfortunate and unfactual Machreqi prejudices regarding the Maghrebine accent. At least they pronounce all the letters properly or bloody damn close to Fusha.

This aside, Syria would serve you better. Cleaner accent, less English speakers and just as portable if not more so in some ways.

Re BSR:

Well, I have often expressed my approval of the overall historical framework of the Tunisian economic reforms. They could and should do more liberalising, but what they have done so far has been effective, and as well, sustained over time.

Has that changed man on the street attitudes?

I dunno. I have not spent enough time in Tunisia to know, passing through on business just is not sufficient. You speak to the wrong crowd.

Same on social matters, although I would hazard the opinion that in grosso modo, the Maghrebine populations are more socially liberal relative to actual practice (and I am not speaking to elite practice), but that is relative to the Gulf.

The average Muslim? eh, that is a question I am not sure one can answer. I certainly would hesitate to even try for countries where I have lived quite a long while. Certainly their attitudes are differently structured, but liberal.... I don't know.

However, to sum up, relative to most of the rest of the Arab world, I would say that the average Tunisian is probably more liberal (in the old world, not American, sense) than most others. That , of course, is not a particularly strong statement.

The worst thing is that my new teachers this semester refuse to speak proper fusha ... it's gims and hamzas and all that good stuff. So I'm going to have a cosmopolitan Cairene accent at all times.

Welcome to Umm ad-Dunya and the land of Egiptiyah.

This reminds me of a hilarious conversation I once sat in on between an Egyptian and a Khaliji (I think Kuwaiti, but now I forget, been years now).

As often occurs between Arabs, they got into some absurd little argument about Arabic language - not serious of course, but became so as they were disagreeing about some grammatical point or something. The detials escape me. As I recall, I seem to recall thinking they were both wrong, but whatever.

At some point the Khaliji got sick of the argument and waved his hand at the Egyptian and said something along the lines of "What do you know, you're not even a real Arab." Some how the way he said really carried a punch, I still recall the poor Egyptian's face, who spluttered something along the lines of "Well what am I?" (Eh, Ana Eh?) to which our fine arrogant Khaleji responded most dismissively, "I don't know, Egyptian I suppose. But you're not Arabs."

It was, I have to say, a hilarious conversation to sit in on given how Egyptians like to recount how they educated the Gulfies (true to an extent).

I was seriously worried after my last class that I'd come out speaking fusha with an Italian accent, so it could be worse.

There's definitely a Coptic nationalist contigent of folks who say they aren't really Arabs, but they're fairly small.