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La Muhammed, La Coca Cola?

During our last week in Jerusalem, Hunter and I visited the Museum on the Seam, located, not surprisingly, directly on the Green Line; it’s that building we all probably pass on the bus whose exterior flashes “The Olive Trees Will Be Our Borders” in Arabic, Hebrew, and English. The museum is dedicated to showing international works with socio-political themes and, during our visit, a work was displayed that addressed an urban legend apparently found in the Arab and Muslim world: if you flip the Coca Cola sign backwards, it reads, in Arabic, la Muhammed la Mecca (no Muhammed no Mecca). With a bit of creativity, you actually can decipher that message. The piece itself was basically a giant neon Coca Cola sign displayed in a mirror image, making it easy for Arabic speakers to see the message. Whether or not the conspiracy was intentional (and I’m going with no), Coca Cola is obviously still widely popular in the Middle East, and conspiracy theories, just as they do elsewhere, run rampant and generally unaddressed. I’ve heard some pretty wild things during my time abroad, but I’ve also had the chance to dissect misconstrued ideas, in their multitude of formations, with Palestinian, Israeli, and international friends this summer.
-Molly

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