Let's admit it - it is not so often that presidents are aimed at with a shoe. Perhaps a grenade, gun, and even an RBJ. But being banged with a pair of shoes - it is a rarity. Of all misdeeds of the past eight years, I bet George W. Bush will be most remembered by his impressive ducking in the face of a flying shoe. His entitlement as a lame duck is dropped automatically.
This incident warranted Bush the 'mother of all jokes' across Arab blogs, chat rooms, and every public expression sphere. Though I do believe that the word (at times) is mightier than the sword - or the shoe in this case - it is worth asking why a pair of shoes and no other item gets a close encounter chance with Bush.
Using shoes as a weapon of massive attack is significant as it carries a lot of connotation in the Arab culture. Footwear in almost all stories and sayings are always negative as they are the items that separate the human feet from dirt, litter and filth.
And that is why some take off their footwear when sitting together on the floor or at a gathering, as it is a line that basically separates cleanliness from dirtiness. It is disrespectful for example when an individual's shoe sole faces those sitting across. Hence, when a shoe comes flying at high altitude, it means disrespect, disgust and downright insult.
Arab fable
A famous Arab fable dating back hundreds of years, also spoke of the curse of the shoe (footwear in those days) that followed a man with endless trouble.
Al Tanbouri, a wealthy trader from Baghdad (what a coincidence!), refused to replace his old pair of shoes because of his stinginess. To fix holes and amend discrepancies, he consistently added layers of cloth or leather. This made him famous as all of Baghdad recognised the pair wherever he went. So to put an end to the insults, his friends advised him to get rid of them. Al Tanbouri then throws the dilapidated pair in the garbage.
Knowing that Al Tanbouri would never discard anything, a passerby who spotted the shoes takes them back to him thinking they must have been stolen. When the knocks on his house go unanswered, the passerby decides to throw the pair through an open window.
Al Tanbouri comes home and to his shock finds the shoes knocked off bottles of perfume with their content splattered all over the floor. "Damn you of a shoe," he says.
He then throws the pair in the river, which ends up in a fisherman's net who decides to return them to its owner. Unhappy with the surprise, Al Tanbouri places the pair on the rooftop to dry. A cat snatches them believing that they were a juicy chunk of meat.
Seeing the thief in action, Al Tanbouri races after the culprit and in the chase the shoes accidentally fall on a pregnant woman. Al Tanbouri is dragged to a judge as the husband complains that a foetus was killed. He pays blood money and angrily says: "Damn you of a shoe."
But getting rid of the shoes was a mission indeed possible and so Al Tanbouri throws them in the sewage. A couple of days later, the sewage got blocked and residents complained of the foul smell. No sooner that the pair was located, Al Tanbouri says following a harsh sentence: "Damn you of a shoe."
Never-ending crusade
Yet this shoes crusade never ends. So in the late hours of the night, he identifies a faraway burial place near a wall. Suspecting the commotion to be that of a thief, the neighbours call in the security personnel (police in modern terms). Al Tanbouri is jailed after failing to convince anyone. "Damn you of a shoe," he says.
Brilliant ideas never end. So he decides to put them up for the public to grab at a general bathing area. On that same day, a prince happened to be in the area and of all shoes a thief decides to steal his.
The prince asks his entourage to wait until everyone had left, as the last remaining shoe would identify the thief. And of course, it is no other than Al Tanbouri's shoes that are left unclaimed. He was brought in and sentenced for stealing a prince's shoes. "Damn you of a shoe," he says.
The desert was his last resort. No witnesses, sewage, garbage, neighbours, princes - nothing. So no sooner that he begins digging, security personnel who were on the stakeout surround him out of nowhere. A body with a bag filled with gold underneath was found in exactly the same place where he was digging. After paying a fine, Al Tanbouri pleads with the judge that he signs a paper relieving him from any wrongdoing carried out by his shoes.
For some reason Al Tanbouri and Bush are connected.
The common factor that brought them together is the shoes. So what's the connection - cousins?
