Poster boys

By now you've probably seen this poster in some newspaper or on a TV news broadcast somewhere (this picture is from nytimes.com). It depicts Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Syrian president Bashar al-Assad and Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah - three men who President Bush has not invited to Thanksgiving dinner.

When I was in Damascus in July, this poster was for sale in roughly a million store windows, and during the war in Lebanon it came to symbolize the unity of the Arab world against the U.S.-Israeli alliance.

I took home one of these posters as a gift from a colleague I worked with in Lebanon. It had been sitting under a pile of junk in my office for months, and this week I finally had it properly mounted - politics aside, I think it's a great souvenir. I picked it up today from an art shop, and there was an American (or maybe Canadian) couple there looking at paintings of Maasai warriors.

I had my back to them as I collected the poster, but suddenly I could tell they weren't looking at Maasai anymore. I heard one whispering to the other.

"Where did you get that?" the woman asked me.

"Uh, from a friend," I said. "In Lebanon."

"Oh." Pause. "Where are you from?"

"Uh, California."

"Oh." Longer pause. The man looked concerned. The woman looked slightly disgusted.

I didn't feel like getting into a discussion with these vacationing strangers about irony. I kind of smiled at them, got my change and left the shop. After some thought I elected not to bring it to my office in town, and instead I've put it next to my desk at home, where very few people will probably see it. Probably better that way. I still think it's a great souvenir.