I won't get into the politics, the author is way off base... > Tunisian cities are mostly ugly as hell. Bare a few touristic spots, yes. It is unfortunate as

I won't get into the politics, the author is way off base... > Tunisian cities are mostly ugly as hell. Bare a few touristic spots, yes. It is unfortunate as Tunisia could have looked more like Santorini and less like the nuclear apocalypse that it is today. I guess on the upside you have little to no homelessness? > The only problem with Tunisian niceness is that it blends into Tunisian mercantile craftiness. This is mostly a problem in touristic craft stores which I never visit. I guess tourists are attracted to the Medina; but most Tunisians "Medinas" have completely collapsed economically. > Informality Has Its Advantages Given how broken the system is, that's how anything can run in Tunisia. > Tunisian butcher shops tend to hang not just hunks of meat but animal heads in front of their stores This is kind of an ad that we just had the animal slaughtered now. Fresh meat. > Sorry Tunisia, but your mosque game is weak. He should have focused on Churches, Cathedrals and Synagogues. > There aren’t many bars in Tunisia, even in the major cities. There are lot of bars in Tunisia but the second major city is a conservative one. It is the last place where you want to have a beer. > Alcohol is still fairly taboo in most Arab countries, even in relatively liberal Tunisia, so they probably adopted cafe cultural norms. No, the cafe cultural norms came from the French. You can see a similarity with Vietnam in this regard. > but he was most excited to tell me that the U.S. Ambassador had just visited the House of the Governor two weeks ago along with his “black wife” who “wasn’t white like you and me.” Ok, then. You are reading too much into this. Tunisians are pretty chatty and gossip to unhealthy levels. > ... where there’s a lot of lingering resentment against their former overlord France was a popular (and the) destination until 10 years ago or so. France now sucks economically. It has nothing to do with it being a former overlord.