Spring has sprung in the Middle East (1)

Tags

Change, Colours, expat, life, Life in the Middle East, Seasons, Spring

You know it’s spring time in the Middle East when:

The sky is so blue it hurts your eyes and the beige buildings suddenly and inexplicably look a bit orange

The versatile tribe of ants who live in my cupboard is back in business

The trees are in bloom

Young girls have traded their high heel boots for open toe pink pumps 

Headscarves are getting higher and higher and pinker and pinker  

Taxi drivers leave all windows open and a flag flying over the driver’s window (a smart and patriotic way to get the breeze in while keeping the sun out)

More young men lean against walls engaged in chatting, smoking, staring, laughing or any other vertical leisurely employment they can think of

Little sun birds are courting energetically and tiny feathers drift over yesterday’s cup of coffee left on the balcony

The man who sells peanuts is not wearing his woolen hat

The white-clad men smoking argyllas and speaking to similar looking men on their i-phones instruct the waiters to remove the cellophane lid that has enveloped the terrace since November

The street cats look fluffy and purposeful as they patrol the bins (on top of which they occasionally fall asleep in the sun)

The sugar cane juice hut has more customers than the falafel place next door

Small apostrophe rant

Tags

apostrophe, nerdy stuff, punctuation, what gets on my nerves

‘ 

Dear viewers, I apologize for interrupting our programme but I have a breaking punctuation rant.

The little guy up there is one of the most misused and abused creatures that have ever lived on any keyboard on earth. 

“Photo’s from Cairo!”, an expat blog proudly announces.

“To all my children’s teacher’s” an angry parent prepares to vituperate.

“Cabbage- it’s proven benefits” (sadly, none of which seem to include a better grasp on punctuation) 

Have mercy.    

The apostrophe is not just a bizarre little comma that goes before an S like soup before the main or clouds before the rain. Nope. It lives its life to show a possessive or a missing letter.  

Sorry to be such a pedantic pain in the ‘S but this really get’s on my nerve’s:)!

So you wanna speak my language? Top 4 reactions to the struggles of a language learner

Tags

Adult learning, Arabic, attitudes, communication, expat, Learning a new language

You try hard. You want to learn the Local language of this wonderful new place you find yourself in. You love the place, you love the people, you love the sound of the language.

You passionately want to give it a go. 

At night you sweat over the past simple and the irregular plurals and even swallow a vowel sound that your mouth and all your ancestors’ mouths have never produced in the history of vowels.

And then, one beautiful morning, you go out into the world and proudly say “I like peas” in Local. 

And that is when, regardless of where the wonderful new place is and what Local sounds like, these 4 friends will always come out of the woodwork.

1. The Cold Ignorer

This guy will listen to your little peas confession, ignore it completely and loftily answer in his splendid American accented English. He doesn’t have the time or the inclination to listen to anybody butcher his language. He will not play your game. It is foolish and flawed and best ignored in the interest of real communication.     

2. The Benevolent Pedagogue

Now this guy means business. He will listen to you with an expression of amused encouragement and then never let you go. He will drill you in how to say “peas” in Local until you are blue in the face and hate the little green buggers. The Pedagogue will demonstrate with gusto and then make you repeat and repeat until he can triumphantly exclaim: “Now do you hear the difference?” Of course I don’t, you secretly sob, while acknowledging out loud that you do indeed, and what sort of deaf fool could claim otherwise?

3. The Entertainment Seeker 

The E Seeker finds you and your linguistic attempts hilarious. He will order you to speak Local at any opportunity and then fall off his chair laughing pea size tears. He will call his mother, he will call his mates, if he can he will arrange a TV crew to come and hear you speak Local. Fun fun fun. 

4.The Gentle Liar

This guy knows you can’t speak his language. He sees right through your pathetic little efforts. But for some reason he wants you to believe you can. So he will mime ecstasy when you bring your peas into the conversation. He will swear he has never heard anybody sound so convincing since his grandfather last ordered peas in the local pub.  

 

Let’s move on to Lesson 2. How do you like your peas, ladies and gentlemen?

 

Q is for Quiet in Qatar

Tags

Doha, Female traveller, Gulf, Qatar, quiet, travel

I landed in Doha on a warm evening in April. 

The immigration guy leafed through my passport with a vaguely disgusted air.
Beautiful dark eyes, lean facial features, impeccably white dishdasha.
An eye pleasing ensemble which I was to revisit with equal (purely aesthetic) joy over the next few days.
Pam pam, stamp stamp, out I go to meet my Sri Lankan driver. Nice guy.
Do you like living here? I asked.
Well, he answered. It is quiet.
And off we drove through the quiet of the city. Wide lanes, palm trees, dark buildings. And then more of the same. It was like a film set with no actors.
You know that Bjork song, it’s all so quiet……… bruuuum? Well it was like that but without the bruuuum.
In the evening I went for a walk. Not a soul in sight.
I walked and walked and then walked some more. Past quiet office buildings, past palm trees, past traffic lights (past the Green Sea, past the Live Forest and the Magic Cave – sorry, wrong story) and then I got to a restaurant.
Hurray hurray, weary traveller, I said to myself, now is your time of joy and plenty.
I walked in with a huge expectant smile which froze as 48 male eyes measured me from head to toe in disbelief. A lonely female walker goes into the local bar? Good one, next joke please.
So I went out and walked some more.
And no doubt I’d still be walking today if I hadn’t had to go back and see that immigration official again.
LE: The word “bar” as used above is part of the joke.

Of food, identity and the generosity of the desert

Tags

Bedouin traditions, Desert, Identity, Jordanian cuisine, Mansaf, Middle Eastern food, Pride

Tell me what you eat and I’ll tell you who you are. Maybe.

But could you tell me what you eat so I tell you where you’re from? Not really, not in today’s world. Not when you may be having hash browns for breakfast, tandoori chicken for lunch and tortillas for dinner.    

But Mansaf is a clear statement. The king of Jordanian cuisine, Mansaf is more than food – it is an assertion of identity.

In a country where waves of newcomers have settled at a rate which left the local population culturally rich, dazzled and unsure, Mansaf is certainty and pride. 

It started out in the bedouin community of the Arabian desert. Slowly cooked lamb with rice, almonds and a yoghurt sauce.

Mansaf tastes best when cooked in big quantities. An expression of hospitality in harsh conditions and kindness to strangers. Immensely filling. So filling you’ll hardly be able to walk home (which in the desert wouldn’t have been advisable anyway).  

I suspect that even people who are quite indifferent to its taste feel duty bound to proclaim its superiority to all else. I may secretly like burgers and pasta but I will tell you I like Mansaf so you know who I am.  

As I write this, thousands of families are sitting down to have the most important meal of the week. Friday lunch, ample portions of Mansaf for all, big and small.

Thousands of hands reaching out for the fragrant, heavy mix, from the fancy villas of Western Amman to the desert tents around Wadi Rum. 

I don’t expect I will be seeing a lot of walkers this evening.