PSU Magazine Spring 2001

I intere ted in studying archeology and cast around for a way to nurture his intere ts while still preparing for a career. "I learned that Portland State had the Middle East program," he says, "so I said to myself, 'Well, that's the world' primary archeological region so, maybe it made sense to enroll in college there.' I started taking courses in that field, and little by little I got interested in Middle Ea tern studies for its own sake after taking Arabic. That led me to specialize in Middle Eastern history." For all his hard work and thought– ful preparation, Leiser was never able to complete his original plan. From his desk at the Travis Air Museum, he says his career has taken a path he could never have predicted when he first started college. Leiser is curator of the technology museum at Travis Air Force Base in northern Californ ia. "I had intended to teach Middle Eastern history at the university level when I finished graduate school but, being a master of bad timing, I found out that the academic job market col– lapsed just before I got there," he says wryly. "I wasn't sure what to do, and we were living in my in-law' basement at the time. I applied to the Defense Department as an Arabic lingui t and wa hired as a Turkish lingu ist. Anyone who has knowledge of both Arabic and Turkish will under– stand that this speaks volumes about the depth of the government's need for linguists at the time. The languages are completely dissimilar. The simple fact that Leiser had proved himself willing to tackle Arabic was enough for the Defense Department to take him on, get him a private tutor in Turkish for ix months, and ship him over to Turkey for a four-year tour of duty-also no one else had even applied for the job. It was this kind of need that led the U.S. government to generously fund the P U Middle Ea t Studies Center. "For a while, at the end of the six– ties, there was so much money coming in, relative to other programs, that it looked like we were dominating the offerings at the University," Man– daville remember . Students at the center were offered the opportunity to attend summer schools based at other well-known universities, and every summer some of the students spent time in various places in the Middle East. "The year abroad altered my life fundamentally," says Robert Hunter '64, now chair of history at Indiana State University. "We lived with vil– lage families in Lebanon who treated us as if we were their own. This wa before the civil war there, when Lebanon was still called the 'Switzer– land of the Middle East' for its high mountains, picturesque valleys, and because it was the financial center for the region." Frank Nettleton '67, a Middle East Studies Center graduate, makes his American home in San Francisco, where the climate, land, and even the sophistication of the city remind his Lebanese-born wife, Nadia, of her homeland. Nettleton, who is currently working in Korea fo r the Bechtel Corporation as the services manager for the Korean high-speed rail construction project, spent a year in Lebanon as part of his studies at Portland State. "I went to the British foreign office language schoo l there," he says, "which wa probably the best practical Arabic school in the world. If you were reasonably talented and diligent, you were rea onably as ured of emerg– ing fluent, which I did. That in turn made me succes ful at Aramco, which at the time was the world's largest oil company. I eventually finished my graduate work at Berkeley." O nce in a while someone went about the proce s back to front. That's what happened to Lucille French '78. She studied at Portland State for a couple of years in the 1950s, but couldn't settle on what she wanted to do. When a recruiter for the State Department came to town, she signed on to become a cryptographer and was sent almost immediately to a posting in Izmir, Turkey. "One day, not long after I arrived, one of the consu l genera l took everal of us for a picnic at an archeological site. It was one that had never really been excavated" she recalls. "! was looking at the beautiful red poppie , which covered the place, and it awak– ened me piritually and intellectually. I suddenly asked myself how many millions of people had lived and died in this part of the world. And I knew then how very unimportant I was, and how vast and beautiful the world really is. I fe lt the history and the struggles of the people who lived there as if it were inside of me. You can never be the same after that. It was like my life was beginning." When French returned to Portland he hurried over to the Middle East Center to renew her acquaintance with an area she had come to love. "I have always appreciated the opportunity to have genuine informa– tion about this place," say French. "I watch Turkey in the news and hav– ing been there, I feel like I know a lit– tle bit more about the situation. I don't have to depend so much on the opinion of others. These experiences, this knowledge, it has made me a happy person." T t is a fundamental tenet of education 1 that it enlarges the per on who engages in it. And, although the tu– dent making their way out of the Middle Ea t Studies program have contributed tremendously to the coun– try at large, their studies also enriched their own lives in ways they had never anticipated. Lillian Carbone says that her studies at the center have given her a way to understand the world. "The world is so big," she says, "and we are bombarded with so much news from everywhere-it's hard to feel you can cope with it all. I say, pick a part of the world that interests you, study it, and really come to know it. It gives you an edge. Whether or not it's some– thing you develop into a career, it broadens your life to have this area of expertise and knowledge. Phil and I both have stud ied the geology, history, and events of the Middle East, and it has added immea urably to our lives." 0 (Merlin Douglass, a Portland freelance writer, wrote the article "In Search of Cathlapotle" in the winter 2001 PSU Magazine.) SPRING 2001 PSU MAGAZINE 15