People, Jul. 1, 1974

  • Share
  • Read Later

(2 of 4)

"I think it's good to have quiet and prayer and love in your heart. I think this hate is just uncalled for." Pat Nixon sounded a little like a Sunday-school teacher faced with an unruly pupil. In fact, she was ducking a question about Moslem customs posed by a reporter: "Would you like to pray five times a day?" For seven days, while President Nixon hammered out agreements with Middle East leaders, Pat went out to meet the people, gracefully adapting to the varied cultures of the region. In Saudi Arabia, where women are seldom seen in public, Pat greeted a shopkeeper in Jidda (top), and quipped, "I wish I could come here without an escort and have some fun." In Damascus' Azem Palace she met a stone camel (left).

In an Israeli kibbutz (bottom, right), she told the schoolchildren it was time she learned their language. A Palestinian-style embroidered dress was presented to Pat in Jordan (bottom). "I would put it on," she said, "but wearing an additional dress would be too warm." However, for a tour of the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus, Pat had to don the long black robe that women wear to enter the Moslem holy places (top, right). Once she made a gaffe. With King Hussein of Jordan's wife Alia she visited the Greco-Roman city of Jerash (left), where she shopped at an open market. On the steps at the ruined Temple of Artemis, goddess of hunting, Pat said, "There must be buried treasures here. They should excavate." Reproved the guide politely: "Just the history is treasure enough for us." Pat made a quick recovery: "That's what I meant."

Math Teacher Angela ("Bay") Buchanan, 25, feels just the way about effete snobs that her big brother Pat does. But the younger sister of President Nixon's sharp-tongued conservative adviser feels the same about Pat's pals too. "I just don't like politicians and all their phoniness," she said, after a Melbourne newspaper had revealed her plans to emigrate to Australia. "I'm very disgusted with the Watergate mess," she declared, adding, "Australia's far enough away that people there won't be talking about American politics." Bristling when she is introduced around Washington as "Pat Buchanan's sister," Bay longs for anonymity. "I plan to go to Sydney and be a little nobody, maybe get a little waitress job or something."

  1. 1
  2. 2
  3. 3
  4. 4