Then, one somehow needs to cope with one’s disturbing emotions. When events do not develop according to one’s expectations, this can be upsetting. Since I was participating in “Bashar’s culture”, he expected me to do most of the accommodation, which at times felt unfair. Nevertheless, he also adjusted, for example, to the notion that I want and need personal attention. The dissimilarities on this value orientation created mutual frustration in many situations over a long period. My cognitive understanding would help me to cope emotionally and eventually, I started to enjoy community life. At times, I even felt jealous of his always being surrounded by friends, while he envied my privacy.
Furthermore, one needs to adjust one’s behavior. Mainly in the beginning of our friendship, I felt uncertain about how to behave, something to which I will return extensively in the next chapter. In many situations, I arrived unprepared. I then would observe the other people around, look for cues and try to imitate. This worked out mostly in a good enough way. Sometimes I asked what to do. The required behavioral changes in the field of individualism/collectivism were of less difficulty than the cognitive and emotional challenges.
It seems possible to integrate the individualistic and the collectivistic point of view. It is an issue of looking at the social situation from two different perspectives. Although cultures as a whole may tend to either perspective, individualism and collectivism are complementary, and as an individual, one may be able to provide attention to both the individual and the community aspects. Initially, without being much aware of this process, I began to change my own attitudes and behavior in contexts that were unrelated to my Bedouin friends. In dealings with Westerners, I found myself doing – or proposing to do – things in a more collectivistic manner, though not necessarily in a Bedouin way. Thus, in a team within the human rights organization in which I volunteered, with members from all continents, I tried to listen more carefully to and involve several of its relatively silent members. I introduced the notion of cultural aspects of communication. Email communication had created an – in my view – Western dominance within the team. Therefore, I proposed to share more of our thoughts in conversation, which is a more collectivistic way of communication.
