Did ya know a bit of Star Wars was filmed in Tunisia?
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I originally started life as a nurse and was a nursing instructor for a while. (Warning: You must endure a philosophical introduction before I get to the point.) I taught physical assessment which suited me well since I'm very visual....and I'm also very hands on....I liked the touching and feeling part of assessment... the "laying on of hands" and I liked the puzzle aspect of it...Why is her skin this color? Why does his chest rise asymmetrically?
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I wasn't an expert in physical assessment when I took on the job....but as you know teaching teaches the teacher....and I soon found myself staring at people while waiting in line at grocery stores or really any type of queue. Hmmmm, that ticket guy had pterygium....hmmm...that woman's legs show signs of chronic venous insufficiency. All of a sudden... everyone had funny eyelids, interesting moles, and lots of things to stare at. I'm sure people didn't sprout these interesting physical variations just when I became an instructor....but suddenly a whole part of the world opened up to me that I had never noticed........I developed (or did I steal this from somewhere?) a motto for my class.....You see only what you know.....so the more you know the more you "see."
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Which brings me(finally) to Star Wars......part of my research for my book involved studying Matmata......a small speck of a place in southern Tunisia. I was supposed to go there on my Sahara trip....but when Libya nixed visas to Americans ....that part of my trip got scrubbed.
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The reason Matmata is a cool place is because folks live underground there.....in troglodyte homes. It's a pretty smart way to live in that environment. It's blistering hot and the Berbers (indigenous folks of North Africa) were always having uninvited "guests" come to their land....Phoenicians, Romans, Greeks.....all looking to take or do something the local folks felt wasn't exactly friendly.... So ...they dug pits.....(not like a BBQ pit) but really big pits....perhaps 50 feet across in the soft clay soil.....and then carved out rooms for an eating area, bedrooms, grain storage....even a room for the sheep, goats, donkeys. When hostile folks came a-visiting....why they'd look out over the low desert hills.....and never suspect someone was living there....since they weren't any physical structures...and because the earth is a wonderful insulator..... your cave rooms were cool in the summer....and warm when those cold stinging desert winds hit in winter....smart living.
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Film scouts for Star Wars..."A New Hope" (first movie, Part IV)....... thought the desert in Tunisia would be a great place for the opening desert/dunes scenes. But they also stumbled upon the troglodyte homes.....and to make a long story short.....the underground homes of the Berbers became Luke Skywalker's Aunt and Uncle home. They actually used one of the underground homes(see above) and it's now left in its post-production state....(part of a thriving tourist economy that brings money into an area no one would have wandered into except a wayward archaeologist)
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So coupled with my recent Tunisian experience and my new knowledge of Matmata, I just had to rewatch the first Star Wars episode..... which I did last night.....and it was like a whole different film! Look look at the troglodyte home!...Those are Saharan dunes!.....hey....Obi-wan and the Sand people ......those hooded wool tunics are what the local people wear...and wait wait.....Tatooine.....that's Luke's planet???? Well that's the town next to Matmata....and the houses in the rough and tumble town with the famous interplanetary bar.... those are North African homes with their mosque-like domes and mud/clay white-washed structure....it was amazing how much of North Africa in in the film....and how much Lucas took from that environment.
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So now Star Wars is...in a weird way...part of my African experience...knowing and being there ...helped me see things I wouldn't have paid much attention to....hmmmmm....one of those Star Wars films takes place on some snowy planet......did I tell you I've always been interested in going to Baffin Island...in the Artic Circle??...lol...(mush mush...yeah they do dog sledding there.)
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