...AND YON
Lunch
- May 24 -
Today, the boisterous students of my 3rd period class insisted that I stay after class for lunch. I tried to turn them down, because I need that hour to recoup my patience. But they insisted, saying that “Teacher James, Teacher Nick, Teacher Muhammad, Mister Joe, Mister Sameer,” would all be coming. I told them to shush and I began reviewing the grammatical rules for negations in the Simple and Continuous Tenses.
Two students walked out of class during the hour, saying, “Toilet.”
Those students returned with blankets and rugs piled in their arms. The students all began speaking out in Arabic and lost focus, so I made a peremptory show of finishing the lesson.
More students walked swiftly out and returned with more rugs. Soon the students had covered most of the floor of the classroom and a few were edging through the classroom doorway with three-foot diameter platters heaped with what I knew was probably “kapsa,” a salty, greasy chicken and rice dish that is the favorite of every Saudi man with whom I’ve ever discussed gustatory matters. The platters were, fragrant, and firmly covered with foil.
I returned to the room after retiring for a few minutes to my office to catch my breath and settle my thoughts. Students, teachers, and administrators were gathered around seven or eight mounds of rice and meat. The students cheered at my entrance and all of them entreated me to join them at their platter.
I found a place and saw that the meat was not chicken, but a darker meat. I asked “Hadtha lahem?” (Is this red meat?) Abdulkareem, a short guy with a stalwart manner, answered with raised eyebrows, “Yes, Teacher, kharoof—sheep.” He pointed to another platter where there was something round nestled atop the rice. He called to Salman in Arabic and Salman raised the brown and white shape, turning it toward me. I saw that is was a head, with charred ear stems and open mouth with small teeth.
I’ve always respected people who have no problem considering the reality of where their meat comes from.
I turned back to Abdulkareem and he was pinching pieces of meat out from among the bones and tendons and tossing them to my vicinity of the platter. I laughed, as the gesture seemed strikingly like pack behavior and intensely fatherly. But he was showing me respect by retrieving the best morsels from the animal, without a thought that it might be odd to me that he was feeding me with the hand that moments ago was pushing rice into his own mouth. I put my left hand under my thigh to remind myself not to eat with it, reached out with my polite hand and a smile, and grabbed a piece of some of the most tender lamb I’ve ever eaten.
From across the circle Fahad said, “Teacher,” and when I looked up at him he gave me a demonstration of how to take a piece of meat and a some rice in the palm, roll it around like you’re about to throw dice, and then clap your hand against your mouth to the consume the slippery bolus. Despite this, much of my rice was still ending up in my lap.
We ate, smiled, pointed at novel portions of the sheep that were excavated by our appetites from under the yellow rice and raisins, laughed, ate those novel portions, and dropped grisle and fat onto the thin plastic sheeting that Saudis put down when they eat a meal in this fashion.
The meal was drawing to an end and the students were beginning to collect the remaining rice to take home—few of them are wealthy enough to go in on paying for such a meal and leave so much rice for the trash. I offered to help, but Abdulkareem insisted that I go on about my business. I said, “Alf shuker” (literally, “A thousand thanks”) and Abdulkareem and Fahad laughed and repeated what I had said to nearby students. They said “Afwan, Teacher. Good, Teacher, yes?” I said, “Oh yes, ladthidth, ladthidth” (Delicious, delicious).
link- October 5 -
This mosque is across the street from the American consulate. The consulate is just out of the frame to the right. I took this as the noon call to prayer was being sounded. So think “Allaaaaaaaaahu akbar” as you look at it.
We are beset by vicious feral beasts with eyes like embers and teeth of scimitar proportion. Like Winston, for example.
The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia geographically comprises most of the Arabian Peninsula (al-jazeera al-arabiya). I live in Jiddah on the western coast, less than fifty miles from Mecca. When I look to the west, I see the Red Sea; across it is Sudan and Egypt. To the north, the Levant (Iraq, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon). Notably to the east is the United Arab Emirates, one emirate of which is Dubai (the “Las Vegas of the Peninsula”, where the world’s tallest tower was finished in 2009). The Islamic Republic of Iran is across the Arabian Gulf (so called by Arabs, also called the Persian Gulf by Iranians). To the south is Eritrea, Ethiopia, and Somalia (infamously the home port of many contemporary pirates); southeast is Yemen, Oman, the Arabian Sea, and, farther, the Indian Ocean.
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